#anyway i have a vague sense of impending horror

[asquareinverona]

Sorry yall, @friendamedes has cursed me and now I'm watching all the cartoons I managed to avoid getting into in my teens through shear force of will.

[exoticalmonde]

There is something I have absolutely been adoring about Childe and it's the same everybody else likes. He's ginger- No, it's just because he's nice. The poor lad has a few screws loose but he knows how to have fun and his very, very normal lifestyle and family are charming as heck. He'd approach you out of nowhere all smiles and cheers without ever batting an eyelid or showing that 10 minutes before that he was fighting to the death with someone and probably has 15 stab wounds, rendering himself to swiss cheese with an attitude.

I've rarely seen him as an enemy. Even when I go kick his butt for Xiao crowning rituals, I feel like it's a friendly spar and not a full-blown fight.

It's not the same as with Segnora, maybe because he doesnt die at the end, but it's also not the same as the Ei boss. I go there when I need steam off, I go there to kill and cry when it doesnt work.

With Childe I can sit down and listen about his family, about Snezhnaya, about the impending doom and dread he is torn between with trying to get stronger so he could maybe possibly probably save his family AND face the Tsaritsa and the horror he saw while in the Abyss with his Master.

But anyways, he's just approachable and my time spent with him in my team was a blast. I still pull him out when I need to fight something thst reacts to Hydro. After all, all enemies since the Pyro cube literally do not care if you have Hydro on your team. So he's almost use less outside of Liyue, but hey... Fire nation is close to being released next year, right?

How time flies...

'Nobody' suggests he met others... I wonder if he made friends. Did they spar? Were they also some abyss creatures in humanoid forms, were they Khaenri'ahn? Does he miss them too? Is that stirring power within him trying to draw him closer to the place where Skirk can be?

I'm a fan of the idea she was actually a friend of some kind. He has quote about it, like, it's vaguely in my memory that she taught him and cared for him but also made sure he knows his place is on the ground.

I also inevitably saw leaks of the new Boss for 4.2 which is SUPER exciting. I wonder if he finds her, is SHE the whale he sees in his dreams? But it doesn't make sense because she is already telling him she awakened traces of.... It.

Are we... Talking about some sort of Leviathan that took a liking to you? Would Tartaglia embrace the power or would be try to fight it? Wonder if he has voicelines for the boss too.

Paimon... I sure hope he comes back looking for us to brag about his fight. You go puppy, you best the enemies, you pop off with your vision and keep off the delusio-

This is the face of someone who would let him return to us every single time, no questions asked.

[thepaintedlady00]

The Sandman and the Girl Without Dreams

Chapter 6: Friends As Endless and Constantine As Mine

REPOSTING! Sorry all, my app is glitched to shit so I'm reposting to fix the missing read more issue! If you can just like and repost or something to boost this one I'd appreciate it since the other will be deleted! <3

TW: angst, depression, slight horror, slight blood, slight gore (sorry for the late posting, technical difficulties are a bitch) BUT here are all 13,039 (aka 34 pages) of chapter 6!

1934

I was floating in an endless sea of stars, the ebb and flow of cosmic waves wrapping me in an ethereal warmth. For the first time in a long time I felt free. I should have known it wouldn't last. The stars around me took shape, a hand cradling me within it as it lifted me upwards. The sea of stars pulled together, swirling around two glowing eyes until they formed the vague shape of a woman.

You do not belong in the Sunless Lands, not now, not ever.

The voice was all around me, made of the stars themselves. I didn't understand.

Two tethered stars cannot survive this world alone. One must have the other or chaos and ruin shall reign.

It didn't make sense, but I could feel the weight of impending cold beginning to seep back into the air as the hand began to lower me down. It got colder and colder until it felt unbearable. No. Please.

So upon your head I give a gift. The blessing of the Night.

The cold bit at my skin and settled deep into my bones as I pulled myself from the river and collapsed along its edge. I was shivering, shaking, so violently I almost couldn't move as I forced my stiff body to roll. The stars were back in the sky clear and bright and warm and far away. A shuddering breath left me as I looked up at it in awe and wept. It was an odd sensation, feeling both disappointed and glad. I hadn't intended to survive and after everything I'd been through, death seemed like the last way out. Yet here I was, alive?

"Hello!" A voice startled me to my feet, but as I tried to move, to run, I started to fall. Two arms wrapped around me, helping me stand. "Oh, you poor thing, you look so lost."

"Y-You could say that," I replied in a shaky voice.

"I'll admit, I'm a little lost too. Well I wasn't, but now it seems something's changed."

When I had finally regained my balance I turned to the stranger and squinted. "Do I know you? You look very familiar."

Her smile was warm and full of comfort, something I hadn't felt in so long it felt foreign. "I get that sometimes. But I don't think you're supposed to know me, not yet… At least that's what it looks like."

She was beautiful, elegant and regal even in the simple clothes she wore. The gold of her pendant glistened in the moonlight as she shrugged off her shawl and wrapped it around my shoulders, rubbing slightly to try and warm me. I could feel the heat rolling off her and before I could stop myself I'd curled up under her arm, leaning into her, soaking up every second of that warmth that she'd let me.

She held me tighter and we walked along the edge of the river, back towards the dim city lights. "I should probably give you my name since I'm curled up on you like a cat."

"You don't have to," she said. "And I don't mind, I always liked cats."

"I'm Penelope." I gave her the name anyway, though I'd gotten the sense she didn't need it to know who I was. I looked up at her, her arm thrown over my shoulder as we walked. I knew her face, but I just couldn't place where I'd seen her.

She glanced down at me. "Don't strain yourself, Penelope."

At the sound of her saying my name, the familiarly sweet voice hit me. "Death." She smiled. "You were here for me, weren't you?"

Nodding she tightened her arm around me, shielding me from the chilled breeze. "I was."

"What stopped you?"

"You did." We were just minutes from the city now, just minutes from the world I'd longed to be part of for eight years of hell. The world I no longer knew anything about. I was scared, absolutely terrified, to leave the warmth of Death's side. To be forced to face the unfamiliar life that now waited for me.

The air around us grew colder, a sign that our walk was almost over. "Why?"

She pulled us both to a stop and with the most loving eyes she pressed my hand to my chest. The beating of my heart hummed under my palm. "You feel that? That's a beating heart. Your beating heart. You are here, heart beating, lungs full of air. You, Penelope Barlow are alive. You're alive."

Tears streamed down my cheeks. "What if I don't want to be?"

Death's smile was sad, but her eyes were soft. She tucked my hair behind my ear. "We don't choose when our time is up, not me and not you. I know you think I'm the only way forward, but I'm not. I'm the end, love. I know it hurts, I feel it hurting, but in time that will fade."

"What if I can't do it?" I asked, holding back a sob. "What if I can't move forward?"

"I can't tell you what's certain for you. Hell, nothing might be certain for you, you are special." She wiped a tear from my cheek. "What I can tell you is that even though you may not want life now, you will again. In a year, ten years or even twenty! Time changes things, heals things. It won't always be this painful, it can't be, not when there's so much love and beauty here, you just need to find it again."

"But why? Why me?"

"I don't know," she admitted sadly, sad that she couldn't help me further.

I wiped my eyes and looked out at the looming cityscape of London. It looked so foreign. "I don't know what to do now."

She grabbed my hand, giving it a squeeze. "You live. For all you've lost and all you have yet to find, you live."

"Will I see you again?" I asked, squeezing her hand back. 

With a shrug she smiled brightly. "When it comes to you, I don't really know."

"Then I guess we'll see."

"Guess so." She pulled me into a warm hug. "Goodbye Penelope. I might be seeing you."

As she walked off into the night I waved, whispering a faint goodbye. "I might be seeing you too, Death."

1946

I could feel the heat of the fire rolling across my skin. Shouts and sirens echoed in the streets, the neighbors rushed from their homes, running in a frenzy of panic. But I remained still, frozen in place as I watched it burn. This was my fault, I told myself. They wanted me… If I'd just-

Two firm hands gripped my shoulders, pulling me away from the building. Everything spun. The fleeting faces of the crowd swirling together like melting wax. The hand I'd been gripping onto slipped from my grasp. "Penelope! God damn it, Penelope, move your feet!"

Move your feet. Had I stopped? Move. I didn't remember doing that. Move. The ringing echoing in my ears had finally started to dull, slowly being replaced by my loud heaving breaths. MOVE! I stumbled forward just in time as the car flew past me. Hands grabbed my arms again, pulling me forward into the solid chest that smelt of ink and steel.

"I did this," I sobbed into him. "Olethros…"

His firm voice wrapped around me like a blanket. "No you didn't, this isn't your fault."

Wails and screaming echoed from down the street. The sounds still made my mind twist, threatening to pull me back to that room, to the haunted memories of the asylum. I cried harder as Olethros' hands covered my ears, blocking the sound from bringing me further pain. He pressed a kiss to my hair and said something I couldn't hear before he moved my hands to replace his and lifted me up into his arms.

He ran, we ran. The further we got from the blazing flame the more the pit in my stomach sank. I'd failed him… Again. The past eleven years were all wasted, because of me. Because I'd gotten too comfortable. The house… Everyone inside… Their blood was on my hands.

I was soaked in it, stained, in the blood of all the innocent people my rebellion had caused. All the people that chose to help me, chose to love me. All of them were gone. And it meant nothing. The Sandman was still trapped, our plan never being able to take shape. The cult once belonging to Roderick Burgess had gained more power than ever and the Institution… A weak sob left me. The institution knew I was alive.

Everything I touched I ruined. Everything I said turned to ash. And everyone I loved either burned in the flames or withered away by my side. Long life, perhaps even eternal life, had not been the gift I hoped.

I clung to Olethros' broad shoulders, held onto him, the last piece I had left to remind me I wasn't alone. "Rest, Inky, we're almost there."

The warmth of his nickname spread through me, lulling me to sleep with thoughts of what our life would be like in America. He could paint, I could collect antiques, and my friend and I would never have to be alone again. When I woke the ground was swaying side to side. Salt filled the air and the sound of waves hammered against the wood walls that surrounded me. I sat up in the swinging hammock, eyes darting around in search of the familiar tall burly redhead. Panic filled me when I found nothing.

"Oh good you're awake!" An old man wearing a sailors uniform said as he made his way across the room to me. "Thought you were dead for a bit!"

"My friend, where is he?" I asked, not bothering with any pleasantries.

"Friend?"

"Big guy, red hair, you can't miss him."

"Ahh yeah, he dropped you off."

Despair filled my lungs. "Dro...dropped me off?"

The sailor nodded. "Yeah, he brought you on board, told us you were goin to America and left."

My jaw clenched. "No... No. We were supposed to go together, he's supposed to be here."

"Sorry lass," was all he said as he turned and left.

Alone. I was alone again. My chest ached with the crushing weight I'd long avoided, the weight of the nothing that looked over me. White walls, endless halls... NO! I'm not there. I'm here. I'm here. I pressed my hand to my chest, holding it tightly over the heartbeat. I'm here. I'm alive.

God it hurt, it always hurt. Tears streamed down my cheeks but these were different. These tears weren't out of fear or loss or sorrow, but of anger. I was angry. Angry at everyone that had just kept taking and breaking down all I worked to build. Angry at Olethros, so angry, that he just left me here, after everything. Fire burned my throat as I screamed, throwing whatever I could get my hands on at the wall. But when the fire faded I was still alone. I sank to the floor, hugging my knees as I cried, the ship rocking me back and forth with the waves.

1968

America was just another shit hole to me. The anger I'd clung to had served me well, for a while, but as anger always did it burned out slowly. It faded with each year that passed, with each brick I'd built up once again from the bottom. My life here hadn't been difficult, the inheritance I'd kept from my family's estates and whatever I'd been able to save from what Olethros and I had accumulated, kept me comfortable, but the small surrounding comforts of a lonely life meant very little to me.

Truth be told I was scared. Scared to lose anyone else. Scared to be betrayed again. Scared to do anything but sit on the rickety bed and stare at the hideous wallpaper. A chill ran up my spine as a low, guttural moan filled the room. "This feels different. Your despair."

In the shadows the figure of a woman stood. "God not again," I said with a sigh. "Look, I'm kind of over the hallucinating so if you don't mind just fucking off right back to where you came from, please."

She shuttered. "You're so much meaner than I thought you'd be. But, he can be mean too sometimes… Oftentimes."

I closed my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose. "Look, lady, I really don't want to do this."

"You don't want anything." She said sadly. "That's why I'm here. It's why I can feel all the pain boiling up inside you."

"That sounds disgusting."

"No!" She cried, a glint of metal flashing in the pale light. "It's beautiful! I've never seen pain so beautiful before! You're special."

"Fuck me," I groaned standing and pointing a finger at her. "If I hear one more person tell me how goddamn special I am I'm going to throw someone off a building!"

The glittering fish hook dug into her face as she smiled. "Oh they're going to love you! But you'd best be nicer to them, they like to hold a grudge."

Anger swelled in me as I turned, grabbing a lamp off the desk and raising to throw it, but when I turned the figure was gone. I sat back on the bed and looked down at my shaking hands. I need help. The realization was colder than I expected, but it was more than I'd felt in a while so I welcomed it. He would hate you, I told myself looking at the wall. He would hate what you've let yourself become.

1989

Our lips were hot and wet as they moved in a poorly choreographed dance. My fingers had curled in his hair, his had done the same. I should have felt more... Pressed up against another warm body, the light buzz of alcohol, this should have been better. But it wasn't.

I pulled away, setting a hand on the stranger's chest. When I looked up, with my vision slightly blurred, his hair was dark and hungry starry eyes stared down at me. I blinked and it was gone, the dark hair turned light, his dark eyes looked down at me with confusion. "You okay?"

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine." I sighed. "I just need a minute, I think."

"Okay, well come find me later, yeah?"

"Sure," I lied.

Dragging my feet I returned to the bar of the old tavern, sitting in the stool the bartender had brought out for me. He gave me a look, the same look he'd given me two other times this week. Why was this so hard? I wanted to scream. Why did it always feel so hollow?

"My, my, aren't you just the belle of the bar," a light teasing voice cooed beside me. 

The bright red lips caught my eye first as I turned, the cheshire grin sending a chill down my spine. The golden eyes and skin tight black leather of their outfit were both close seconds though. I shook off my surprise and met their gaze, a hum of something rolling from the honeyed depths. "I'm sorry?"

"Oh no need to apologize, little petal." They said twirling a strand of my hair on their finger. "You, it would seem, are the most desired creature in this place."

I glanced around, confused as to who this was and why they'd spoken with such familiarity. "I don't understand."

A throaty laugh. "Yes, that much is obvious." Wow, rude. I thought, clenching my jaw. Their fingers brushed over it gently. "Oh come now, I'm only teasing. I was hoping you'd be more fun than him, my twin told me you had spark, but now I'm not so sure."

"Look, I don't know you or your twin nor do I particularly want to, so can you just tell me what you want so I can go back to my night?" 

The gold in their eyes swam with glee. "Oooh, there's that fire! I like it!" With a long, languid look around the bar they sighed. "All these people either want to fuck you or be you. Their desire is so... Simple." They looked back at me. "But you, you I can't seem to read. So, petal, what I want is to know... What do you desire?"

They'd moved closer, just an inch away from my face. "Some personal space."

Another long laugh. "I do love the attitude, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking it's aimed at me."

"What?"

"All that fire, all that venom and nowhere to put it. How tragic." They purred. Pressing a quick kiss to my cheek they turned to leave, but not without throwing one last insult over their shoulder, "If you ever decide he's too self important for your tastes, do remember my doors are always open for you, petal."

Through the crowd the shimmer of the black leather vanished. I did my best to brush them off. They obviously had me mixed up with someone else. The bartender set my drink down and arched a brow. "You doin' okay, sweetheart?"

"Yeah, I'm good. Just an off night."

"Looks like you ain't the only one," he said nodding toward a man alone at a table. I watched him for a moment, taking in his dark hair and sad eyes. Yeah, he's definitely not having the best time. As the crowd thinned he came to the bar, leaning against it trying to hide the sigh. "Whisky please."

"Oh, you'll have to be more specific," the old barkeeper said. "We have a menu now."

"Oh," he said, taking the plastic lined paper and giving it a half glance. "What's the oldest you've got?"

"I've got a Glen Grant old enough to be your father!" He answered.

A chuckle and a look, amused and cocky, filled the man's face. His eyes stayed sad. "I'm older than I look."

The barkeeper filled his glass, sliding it towards him. He lifted it to his nose, our eyes locking as he took a long sip. He wasn't ugly, quite handsome in fact, but I was far more curious about the sadness he seemed to carry so, before I could think better of it I asked, "You waiting for someone?"

He pulled the glass from his lips and smiled that same smile. "I think I’ve been stood up.”

“I’m sorry.”

With a shrug he looked into his glass, swirling the liquid around a bit. “We had a fight. Last time we were here. It was my fault. I wish I could say I was drunk at the time, but I was just an idiot.”

I smiled, taking a sip from my own glass. “Well, you do look the type. No offense!”

“None taken.” He said, clearing his throat slightly. “What about you?”

“What about me?”

He looked around as if the question had been outrageous. “You’re by far the most beautiful girl in this place and here you are sat alone with me and the barkeep.”

“If I’m with you and the barkeep am I really alone?” I countered, nervously stirring my drink with the straw.

“A fair point, but my question remains the same.” He slid closer. “What’s your sob story?”

I bit my lip, trying to fight the smile that started to spread. “That’s a very long story, stranger.”

He shrugged. “I’ve got plenty of time.”

“Is this your move?” I teased. “You make up a little story about being stood up by a friend and then come over to hit on lonely girls at the bar?”

With a boisterous laugh he shook his head. “That would be rather pathetic, wouldn’t it?”

I took another drink. “Eh, I’ve seen worse.”

“So, why are you lonely?”

“That is the question of the hour.” I had the answer, but I refused to acknowledge it. The pain of such an admittance would drive me back to where I’d been thirty years ago, and I wouldn't go back there. Not back to the hallucinating and the constant state of fear and pain that had all but consumed me. I owed him more than that.

"Well, lonely stranger," he said, holding out his hand. "I'm Hob."

It was an odd name, but I placed my hand in his with a smile. "Hello, Hob, I'm Penelope."

He pressed a kiss to my knuckles and winked. I rolled my eyes and sighed. "So, you think your friend is still mad at you?"

"More than likely, he's the type to hold a grudge."

The barkeep chuckled, butting into the conversation. “I’ve seen plenty of friends get in fights in pubs. Even more of them laugh about it together later!”

Hob looked over the counter and smiled again, more amused this time. “Maybe in another hundred years.”

“Ah, you’ll have to have found a new pub by then. This place has been sold to make room for new flats.” The horror that filled his face was something I wasn’t expecting. Had it meant so much to him? Perhaps to his friend? "The borough council are trying to stop them, but if you've got enough money in this country you can do whatever you bloody want."

I sat with him for another few minutes before the place needed to close. He was still upset, still for whatever reason worried as we stepped out into the night. "Would you like me to wait with you, while you call someone or?"

"It's alright, I walked." I assured him just as the rain began to pour down from the starry sky. With a sigh I looked up at them, wishing to see the blue pair of eyes looking at me once again.

"Need an umbrella?" Hob asked. "I'm sure I have a spare."

I smiled at him, a smile that reflected his. "And miss out on the rain?! Absolutely not!"

"You are the strangest girl I've ever met, Penelope." 

"Strange," I hummed, mulling it over in my head. "I quite like that."

"See you around?" He asked.

I shrugged. "Maybe in a hundred years."

The phrase seemed to light something in him as a smile, a real smile spread on his face as he tipped his imaginary to me. "A hundred years then."

2017

I pulled up to the club, tires screeching against the asphalt as I skidded next to her car. God damn you Johanna Constantine! I cursed, ripping my belt off and slamming my door. A hooded man leaned up against her car, flipped casually through the pages of his book. 

"You're too late," he said in a rich slightly scratchy voice as I drew closer.

"Excuse me?"

The chains that seemed to bind him to the book clacked against the hood of the car sending a shiver of unpleasant memories through me. "You're too late to save the girl. Or perhaps you're right on time… It likes to change for you."

I kept walking toward the door, dread filling me at the way the man's weighted words clouded around me. "JOHANNA!" I all but screamed. The smell of smoke and burning flesh was pungent in the air. No. Not again.

I ran, ran through the double doors and almost slammed into the back of Logue, a man I'd only met once before and absolutely hated. He stared down in front of him, wailing, feet planted in place. I shoved him to the side and felt my heart fall into my stomach at the sight of my friend, frozen on the ground, clutching the hand of the girl, Logues daughter, that had no doubt been lost to his stupidity.

"This is your fault," Logue spat down at her and I didn't hesitate to whirl around and punch him. 

The sound of his nose breaking beneath my fist was music to my ears. As he stumbled and stuttered out cries I stood over him. "If you want your nose to be the only thing I break you'd better leave now. And I don't want to hear a goddamn word from you ever again."

He ran out, but I didn't focus on him, couldn't, not when Johanna was sat there unmoving and practically wheezing. "Jo..." I tried in a soft voice. 

Nothing.

I knelt down beside her and carefully moved the hair from her face. Her lip quivered. "Johanna." Her eyes had begun to water, tears already spilling over as I rubbed a soothing hand over her back and gently held the wrist of the hand that still held onto the girl. "Johanna, you have to let go."

Her chest heaved. "I... I can't."

"Yes you can," I assured her. "Let go."

The arm thudded to the floor and I pulled her into my embrace immediately. As was the Constantine way she resisted, tried pushing her pain back down and me along with it, but I still held her. 

I knew this pain, knew it well, knew it wasn't one you could push down. So I held her as she pushed and shouted and raged in my arms. Eventually the fight left her and the heartbroken sobs filled the room as the remnants of fire and brimstone crackled beside us.

"I've got you," I whispered, blinking the tears from my own eyes. "I'm not going anywhere, Jo. I promise."

This promise was one I intended to keep. After all, Johanna Constantine had been my only constant in recent years. The only one I had to call upon if I needed help, so in turn I was there for her. Most would have called such a thing friendship, but she'd hated that word, so we'd called it a beneficial alliance, something she still hated but at least allowed. But, I had no trouble admitting that Johanna Constantine was my friend and that I wouldn't abandon her to bear the pain, no doubt ahead of her, alone.

Present Day

The rain had begun suddenly and had only worsened as the afternoon drifted to night. I saw the flash of white, her signature coat, in the crowd ahead. "Johanna!"

She, thankfully, heard me and stopped. I opened my umbrella, running out from my covered spot to catch up to her. She smiled as our umbrellas knocked together. "Didn't know you were out and about today."

"I was just looking at a few antiques from a collector." I replied, falling into step beside her.

"Were they shit?"

"Absolutely!"

She shook her head. "It appears you still hold the title of greatest antique in London!"

I scoffed and smacked her umbrella. "Bitch."

***

London. The city that he had been doomed to, bound to, for so long the mere air left him tasting ash. He hated it. The loud crowds of humans, the cars and trains and constant rain. This city is cursed, he deducted as he waited for the Constantine girl to arrive. She wasn't far, that much he knew, but it appeared as if she was running late.

As he stood out in the dreadful city he felt… Hot? An odd sensation filled him, one he shoved down as the black cab pulled into view and this Johanna Constantine stepped out. She paused across the road, speaking to the woman he knew as Mad Hettie, one of his sisters immortals. He waited for her atop the stairs, somewhere she'd be forced to speak to him in order to pass and when she finally turned and approached him he was surprised by how closely she resembled the Constantine he'd known. 

She stopped a mere four steps away and looked up at him with a tilted head. "Constantine."

"Do we know each other?" She asked, taking a step up.

"We have business, you and I." Was all he said, all he was going to say, if there was one thing he hated more than this city it was the forced pleasantries mortals seemed to be so fond of.

She sighed. "Get in line, bruv. I can't keep God waiting."

He was baffled at her words, more so at the way she just waltzed past him. It would seem that while in captivity the humans had grown far more impetulant than even he remembered. So the king of dreams watched Constantine bicker with the priest about the royals and her fee. It was only when the demon tore its way from its host that he intervened. 

"You talk too much," the demon growled.

Constantine tilted her head and smirked. "Tell me your name and I’ll stop.”

“And why would I do that? When there are far more enjoyable ways to make you stop.”

Now standing at the top of the steps, looking down at the demon and the one trying to send it back he called out, "His name is Agilieth.”

“I’m flattered you remember me, Lord Morpheus, after all your time away.”

Constantine looked up at him with furrowed brows and a pensive look. “Lord Morpheus?”

“He is.” Agilieth answered, not once breaking the stare of the king. “Though I confess, I almost didn’t recognize you without your helm.” Dream’s glare darkened. “I wonder where your helm could be.”

A test perhaps? To see how much he knew of what had happened to his tools while he was imprisoned. “I presume it is in hell, with the demon to whom it was traded.”

“Yes, but which demon?” He smiled. “Give me the princess and I’ll tell you.”

Dream considered it. After all, what was one mortal princess to an Endless? What was one mortal in exchange for finding his tools, restoring his power and his realm? Constantine began her chant once again. “Wait!”

She did not stop. The ring of fire circled around Agilieth. “Fine, Fine! I’ll tell you where your helm is, just don’t send me back.”

“Constantine stop!” He called out. Still she continued. “I command you!”

“Dream of the Endless commands you!” the demon shouted.

With a smile, smug and rebellious she replied, “Run along and fuck off back to hell.”

He watched as the fire encased the demon, sending it back to its home in ashes. He glared down at her. “You have no idea what you’ve done.”

“I’ve just tripled my fee,” she answered simply as she turned and began shouting at the priest about how to receive her payment.

He was annoyed, though he probably should have been expecting the outcome from the close proximity to a Constantine. They, no matter what era he’d come across them, were a difficult force of nature. As he stood outside the church, listening to the ramblings of Mad Hettie a pang of guilt filled him as he thought of the cold and callous thoughts he’d had. *She* had been just one mortal, hadn’t she? Had things turned out differently would he have so easily thrown her life away? 

The rough sound of her approaching footsteps pulled him from his thoughts and he turned slightly. She looked, if possible, even more apprehensive than she had before. Hettie huffed. “I said the Sandman and I meant the bleedin’ sandman. It's good to have you back, milord. Don’t let her mess you about.”

He gave the old woman a polite nod, taking her warning more seriously after Constantine's rebellion back in the church as he turned to her. She smirked at him. “My gran used to tell me stories about you lot.”

“I’ve known your family for centuries,” he admitted, voice low, a warning.

“Then you know there's not one of us that can be trusted.” For a brief moment, Morpheus thought he saw a hint of sorrow in her eyes, but it was gone in an instant. “What do you want with me?”

“Something of mine came into your possession.” He said simply. “A leather pouch filled with sand. I need it back.”

“Oh, that was yours?” She pondered. “I bought it at a state sale. Didn’t even manage to get the drawstrings open.”

“Where is it?”

“No idea, could be anywhere.”

“We must find it.”

“Must we? Why is that?”

Morpheus felt his annoyance at her vague answers growing by the minute. Why did it have to be a Constantine? He sighed, hands in his coat pockets fisting in a poor attempt to sooth the hot emotion. “Because without it my realm will cease to exist, and if dreams disappear, then so will humanity.”

Her eyebrows raised. “No offense, but… I could do without dreams for a while. Haven’t had a decent night's sleep in ages.”

“Nor will you,” he insisted, stepping into her path as she moved to leave. “Until we find the sand. We must go. Now.”

“Does this approach generally work for you?” She snapped. “You just turn up and order people about?”

“Yes.”

“Alright,” she replied, far too suddenly. Dream resisted the urge to make a face at the compliance. “I’ll help you find your sand.”

“Good.”

“First thing tomorrow, and I work alone.” 

There it was.

“No.”

She ignored him. “Don’t want you and your little friend following me all over London.”

“My friend?” He asked. What sort of trick was this?

Her head turned and she gestured off to the side. “Is that not your raven?”

Morpheus turned to look, far too quickly, too eagerly. For a moment he saw Jessamy perched on the back of the bench. For a moment he’d gone back to a point in time where such a sight was not uncommon, nor painful. The little black bird watched him, waiting with a stiff body and confused eyes. He smothered the warm feeling of fondness already forming with the creature.

“My gran said Dream always had a raven,” Constantine said, eyes drinking in his expression, or lack thereof.

“Not anymore.” Was all he could say, and even that had been too much. He approached the bird slowly, speaking softly. “Who are you? Tell me your name.”

“It’s, uh, Matthew, sir.”

“Matthew, I've made it clear to Lucienne that I do not require a raven at this time.”

“Yeah, she told me you’d say that,” he said with a loud caw. 

If I need assistance, I will ask for it.” A lie, one Lucienne would immediately see through.

“Uh, you do actually…” Another caw. “She’s getting away, sir!” He looked behind him where Constantine had been and now no longer was. With a sigh the bird looked down. “This is why you need a raven.”

“Go back to the Dreaming, Matthew,” he forced out, though it didn’t sound as harsh as he’d wanted it to. Dream didn’t even need to look at the raven to know he would not listen. Ensuring things went as she wanted was something Lucienne was quite good at when she found something she felt worth her efforts. He’d forgotten how much he missed it as well as hated it.

For a while he wandered the streets, thinking of how to find Constantine once again. It was a simple task, but with his mind so scrambled even the most simple thing felt miles out of his reach. Stopping beside a water feature he looked into the rippling depths, recalling how he’d seen her face in the waters of his realm. It was only one of the odd occurrences that plagued him. They shouldn’t have done that. Those waters had only ever shown him the darker version of himself before. Perhaps it was because he was now the darker version he always saw in the water. Perhaps the dreaming had sensed it and changed to accommodate… Had chosen her because she was all the good he’d had in him.

The raven, Matthew, landed beside him with an uncomfortable stretch of his wings. “I’m back.”

The glare the Endless sent to the bird would have been enough for any human to go running off as fast and far as they could, but the raven didn’t budge. “Yes, in spite of my telling you to leave.”

“I… I can’t. I… The boss lady told me-”

Boss? His mind hissed as the unsettling wave of anger and jealousy rose up in him. He was darker, he concluded then. Darker and desperate. “Lucienne is not your master.”

Matthew clacked his beak. “She told me you’d say that too.”

“Do you know who I am?” Dream asked, slightly less angry.

“Not entirely, but I… I don’t even know who I am anymore. A couple hours ago I apparently died in my sleep, and now I… I’m a bird!” He shifted from foot to foot, stretching his wings out. “I used to have thumbs. Now I have these things.”

“Yes. And now you must use them to fly back to the dreaming.” A hint of pain laced his voice when he spoke next. “This world is not safe.”

“You think I don’t know that? I lived my whole life here. That’s why Lucienne sent me to help you.”

Help me. The very idea was like a bitter wine on his tongue. He’d done nothing for the loyalty of the bird. He’d done nothing. “My last raven came here to help me.”

“Yeah? Where is he now?”

Blood, bones and feathers. The look of her eyes as she held the small creature in her hands. “Her name was Jessamy. She died, trying to help me.”

With a soft click of his beak Matthew sighed. “I’m sorry. Look, let me at least help you find this woman. If she’s asleep we’ve probably got five or six hours before she’s on the move again.”

Of course, he thought. “If she is asleep, then I know exactly where to find her.”

***

Johannas’ favorite restaurant had, of course, been busier than ever. Every time she asked me to go out to grab it the store was swamped., it was almost as if she planned it. Which, knowing her wasn’t that far fetched, especially if the job she was going off on was one she knew she needed help with. No matter how many times I’d told her about my durability she still refused to accept any help unless it included staying at her flat curled up on the couch with a book or laptop doing research. 

I had no interest in doing what she did, but after all she’d helped me with, I felt as though it was only fair I offered her the same amount. The Constantines were stubborn and more often than not paranoid when it came to friendships and love. It made sense, their line of work being as dangerous as it was, I just wished that she’d let me help her more. I also wished to not have to hear about it for the next month as she bitched about my softness. Another thing she wasn’t entirely wrong about. I was soft, well I’d grown softer. The old wounds had started to mend and, though I knew the memories and pain would always be there I couldn’t help but think that Death had been right all those years ago.

It took thirty minutes to get our order, and with another ten minute cab ride back to the flat I was certain the food would be cold by then. Johanna wouldn’t mind, especially if her night had been a long one, which was almost a certainty at this point. I just hoped it would be enough for her to finally get some sleep. After what happened with Astra… I'd never been more thankful not to dream before, but seeing Jo struggle with the nightmares always put a pit in my stomach. 

I'd seen violence and death before, and as fucked up as it was the bodies and blood weren't what I focused on, weren't what haunted me. No, instead I saw my friend in a spot I'd once been in, a spot where no matter how far ahead you looked the future remained dark and full of despair. Johanna was strong, resilient and seeing her actually break was what scared me the most.

A large shoulder slammed into me, nearly knocking me and the bag of food to the ground. "Watch it, asshole!" I hollered, but kept walking to catch the cab that had pulled up. The air around me swirled with a tang of something, but so close to the car I didn't pay it any mind as I hopped into the cab and gave the driver the address.

***

Dream stood in the darkened, cluttered apartment, looking down at the sleeping Constantine girl. He'd seen horrific memories plague humans dreams for centuries, hers had been cruel and painful, but he'd seen it all before. So, when she woke with a gasping breath and tears in her eyes he didn't react. When she finally noticed him standing in her living room she signed, "For fucks sake. How did you find me?"

"You were dreaming." He answered. "But it was not only a dream, was it? It is a memory. No wonder you do not sleep."

He'd meant for it to be a statement of understanding, but judging by the way she clenched her jaw and glared up at him he'd not done it properly. "Maybe I don't deserve to."

"Perhaps not. But, I could make it go away." A bargain, he thought, would be the best way to ensure her cooperation.

"Only if I help you find your sand." She finished, the look in her eyes shifting into a more contemplating one.

Glancing around at the shelves and piles of things he said, "Though finding anything in this place may require more magic than even you can muster." 

Finally she stood, having made up her mind. "I'll look in the office. Try not to clean up while I'm gone."

"I'm coming with you." Was his simple reply. "You have a gift for disappearing."

She smirked. "You'll love my flatmate then, woman can vanish in less than a second. She certainly wouldn't need to distract you with a raven." He felt something, a warm tug, trying to coax the question out. But instead he stayed silent and watched her as she moved around him. "If the mess out here offends you, just wait til you see my office."

Dream looked at the mess of the small living space and sighed. If this is what she considers tidy we'll be here all night. He followed her and the sight immediately confirmed his worry. Piles of junk, boxes both full and empty tossed about, clothes hanging from every surface, this was a true disaster. The Constantine jumped into looking in the furthest corner of the room, tossing useless trinkets or empty bags over her shoulders. It was a wonder she got anything accomplished when she lived like this.

They searched, well she did as he watched, for a while before she'd, apparently, grown bored of the silence and decided to fill it with questions. "So, you seem pretty attached to this sand."

"It is a part of me." He kept his hands in his pockets and watched as she flew through the space like a hurricane.

"If that's true, then how'd you happen to lose it?" Another toss, one that sounded fatal to whatever the object had been.

The small lingering spark of rage twisted in his lungs. "It was stolen by another magic user called Burgess."

Recognition sparked in her. "Wait, not Roderick Burgess? The old demon king himself, eh?" Recognition shifted to rage. "Woman beating piece of shit, everyone said he had the devil locked up in his basement, wait how did you…"

He'd felt the unpleasant curl of the memories beginning to swarm his mind, but the look she held in her eyes was deeper than mere pity, a realization. "It was you…"

"Yes," he'd said in answer, but the look did not fade.

"No… You're him, the man in the glass."

Impossible. Darkness laced his tongue when he spoke. "How do you know about that?"

"Holy shit." She breathed out, searching quicker for something in the pile. "My flatmate, the one I mentioned, stayed at the Burgess house for two years before the bastard sent her up the river to the looney bin."

He'd stopped breathing. No. This was surely some cruel joke. "That's not…"

She pulled the picture frame out front under a stack of papers and held it up to him. "Does she look familiar to you?"

His fingers curled around the frame, digging into it painfully tight as he stared down in awe. It was her. Curled around Johanna Constantines back, smile wide… Happy and eyes filled with the joy they'd been devoid of their last meeting. How? How was this possible?

The sound of the front door closing restarted his heart and for the first time in eighty years he felt the mark on his arm burn. The tugging sensation snapped into a forceful pull as he turned and looked at the office door.

***

I shut the door with my foot, and shimmied out of my jacket, scratching the puffed up skin of my mark, sending a dull burn through it, as I went. "Johanna!" I called. "You home?"

"In here!" Her voice was muffled by the door, but I could still hear something off.

"I got your usual," I said, opening the door and rummaging through the bag. "But they forgot the… Sauce."

All the air left me as I looked up, expecting to see the face of my flatmate, only to see him, the man I'd spent so many years thinking of, wishing to see just one lsst time. This wasn't real. It couldn't be. I wanted to pinch myself, or stab myself with one of the plastic forks but I couldn't seem to move, I couldn't do anything but stare at him. Had he always looked like this? So stoic, so powerful, so beautiful? 

Johanna stepped around a pile of junk and grabbed the bag from my hands. "I'm gonna, uh, give you two a minute."

Once the sound of the door had announced her departure the Sandman drew in a breath and spoke the first words I'd ever heard him say, "Hello, Penelope."

Tears spilled down my cheeks as I closed my eyes tightly. The sound of his voice was deep and rich, sending a wave of power and emotion through me like lightning. When I opened them again and he was still there I said nothing, closing the space between us and wrapping my arms around his shoulders. The scent of sea and what I could only describe as stardust flooded my senses, further cementing this as reality. My hands fisted in his coat and for a moment of his body remaining stiff I thought I might have overstepped, but then the touch came, soft feather light pressure of his hand on my back, holding me to him. I didn't know how, but somehow I managed to get the strangled greeting out, "Hi, Sandman."

We stood like that for a minute or two, frozen in the embrace of one another, an embrace I never thought I'd get, before I pulled away and wiped the tears from my eyes. His hand stayed on my back, putting slightly more pressure there as if trying to keep me from moving away any further. The star filled blue eyes I thought of so often finally stared down at me. The sound of his voice surprised me, after years of silence I definitely needed time to adjust to hearing it. Now I just hoped he wanted me to hear it more. "How?"

It was a difficult question to answer, even after all these years. "I don't really know."

"What happened?" He sounded angry, hurt even.

I sighed and pressed my forehead to his chin. Perhaps the gesture had been too intimate, but I didn't care, I just wanted to feel him for as long as I could, as long as he'd let me. "After the basement…" I swallowed hard, pushing the painful flashes down. "I wasn't going to go back… and the only way I could see to do that was to… Well…"

"Throw a car off a bridge?" He finished.

Looking back up into his gaze I shrugged. "I didn't think you knew about that."

"Paul told me," he answered as his eyes filled with pain. "He said you were dead… I thought you were dead."

I blinked away tears. "I think I was… For a little bit at least."

"Then how are you here? How do you look exactly as I remember?" His eyes trailed over my face, my body, honing in on the mark and then on the long jagged scar on the arm across from it, that I'd given myself so long ago. 

Shame burned in me as I curled the arm into my chest, pulling at the chain of my necklace to try and hide the fact I didn't want him to see it. "I only remember pulling myself out of the river. Everything before is hazy." His eyes were still glued to my arm so I nudged him gently. "How did you get out?"

His eyes returned to mine. "Paul. He broke the summoning circle, which in turn restored a small portion of my power. I used that to free myself." Another strong pulse of something swelled in me. "I kept my promise. Alex Burgess pays for every second of torment he allowed."

It felt good to hear, and though it was probably terrible, I smiled. "Thank you." Is he angry, hurt, I never came back for him? The sudden thought filled me with dread. "I… I did try to come back for you. I did… But…"

A cold hand stroked my cheek. "Do not apologize. Freeing me was never your burden." 

"Still, I wanted you to know I tried. I'd be the worst person ever if I just let you rot there without a second thought, Sandman."

"Morpheus," he whispered and a warm feeling nestled in my chest, like the answer to a question I needed to be whole. "My name is Morpheus, Dream of the Endless."

"Is it Morpheus or Dream?"

"Either, but…" He paused, "People call me Dream mostly, but in private I would like you to call me Morpheus." 

"Morpheus," I breathed, tested with a smile. "It's certainly not as catchy as Sandy, but it'll do."

"I hated that name, just so you know," his eyes glistened with the playful tone of his voice. It was so much better than I could have imagined, all of it.

"Oh I knew, but that only made it more fun." I laughed softly, before the silence turned more serious. "I'm glad you got free, Morpheus."

With the smallest hint of a smile he bowed his head, brushing it against the top of mine. "I am glad you did as well, Penelope."

We're getting out of here. You, me and Jessamy. I promise.

"I um... I have something for you," I said, squeezing the glass vial in my hand and stepping around him to get to my desk, buried among Johannas crap. I opened the drawer, fingers stroking the soft bag before I opened it and retrieved the small black pouch. I turned, placing it gently into his hand with care. Morpheus stood looking down at the pouch curiously. "It's... It's Jessamy, well her remains."

His lips parted, shock and pain settling into his features, the feeling pulsing between us. "How?"

"I'm sorry if I've offended you," I said quickly, a moment of fear hitting me. "I didn't really know how you wanted... I was going to bury her, but it just didn't feel right, trapping her in that place. So, I burned her, or well, Paul did… and kept the ashes hoping that, well… Hoping we'd get to have  this talk." I rambled nervously, twisting the vial on the chain.

For a long minute all he did was stand there, staring down at the remains of his companion. When he did speak it was quiet, pained but grateful. "You should keep it. To remember her by."

He pressed the pouch back into my palm. "Oh, I... I already have some pieces of her with me." 

"I see," he said, lifting the necklace up closer, admiring the feather in the glass vial. "She would have liked that."

"Probably would have tried stealing it from me," I said fondly, the hurt of her loss at last beginning to shift into good memories. Turning our hands I pressed her ashes back into his and smiled against the tears that began to swell. "Now you can take her home. You can find a place she loved and set her free."

 His hand slid out from beneath mine, fingers brushing along my palm. "Thank you, Penelope. I will not forget this."

"Don't thank me." I insisted. "I'm sorry I broke my promise."

"I'll not hold it against you," he said, smiling a little. His mouth… I strangled the thought quickly. "I do not possess your unwavering ability to hold a grudge."

I let out a breathy laugh, "You know I highly doubt that."

The air between us had shifted to what it used to be, comfortable, familiar. I was happy. Happy he was finally free, happy he was here. Yet, all the questions I’d long buried, convinced I’d never get to see them answered bubbled back up to the surface. A twinge of confusion, of a need to understand what this was connecting us, filled my chest, and I suppose in turn his. His eyes turned more serious and he nodded his head slightly. “You have questions.”

“Yeah, you could say that…” I muttered.

“I have some answers,” he admitted freely, “But…”

“Later,” I finished, feeling the words before he even spoke them.

“Yes.”

I kept his gaze a moment longer. “There will be a later though, right?”

“Yes.” His fingers grazed my hand. “I promise.”

A loud knock to the door was the only warning we got before Johanna barged in. I took a step away from him, not wanting him to feel uncomfortable under Johannas’ scrutinous stare. "I get that there's some history here, but I'd very much like to find this bag and be done with Mr. Sandman."

I rubbed my chilled hands together. “Okay, well what exactly are we looking for?”

“A bag of sand,” Johanna said bluntly as she began looking around the room haphazardly throwing and stepping on things, as I was certain she had been before I arrived.

While I looked around I could feel Morpheus’ eyes on me, watching every movement, every shift, everything. When I felt his gaze shift, I looked over my shoulder at him, eyes trailing down his fit form. He wore a long black coat that seemed to hold the stars inside it, black boots and well black everything. It looked good. He looks even better naked, I reminded myself. His head turned towards me, faster than I was prepared for. And his voice sounded deeper when he said, “It was one of the tools they’d stolen from me. I need it back.”

“So,” Johanna started, her signature nosey face looking up at him. “You were down in that basement all this time?”

I quickly threw an empty bag at her and gave her the glare I knew she hated. He didn’t bother answering her, but I could see the pain in his eyes as he looked down to a small roll of photos that stuck out of the box beside him. “Is this you?”

“Why?” she practically groaned. “Do I look that different? Or younger?”

She took the photo from his fingers and held it between her own with a gentleness that showed just how much she cared. “No,” Morpheus said. “Happy.”

Suddenly her hand dropped, still holding the picture. “Shit. I know where your sand is.”

“God no,” I groaned with a huff. “You left it with her?”

“I know,” she started rubbing her forehead. “I know.”

I leaned back against one of the desks. “How do you want to do this?”

She shrugged. “The only way we can.”

I smiled, trying to lighten the mood. “Oh, so we’re finally offering you up as a sacrifice? I always thought it’d be to some demon, but I suppose an ex girlfriend is close enough.”

“Not funny,” she said, slapping my shoulder on her way out the office door.

Looking over at Morpheus I smiled, “It is funny though, isn’t it?”

He looked at me in a way I hadn’t seen before, his eyes so full of fondness… no, that was too tame a word for it. Adoration, I thought, but quickly pushed aside. He didn’t adore me, he barely knew me. After a minute his lips tugged into a smile, small and fleeting, but still there. “You can be quite amusing.”

“Hear that Jo! Sandy agrees with me!” I hollered, basking in the look of utter disgust and annoyance that spread across his face that the familiar nickname.

“You are not calling me that any longer,” he commanded. 

“You gonna make me stop?” I teased, far more flirtatiously than I’d been intending, at least out loud.

He arched a brow, taking a step forward, looking down at me with a darker gaze than normal. “I could.”

Johanna cursed from the other room. “Pen, where's my coat?”

“Raincheck?” I asked softly.

“I suppose, so long as you bite your tongue the next time you feel the urge to call me Sandy.” A wave of heat rolled over me. God that voice, I thought and his eyes flared. I wonder what it would sound like when he- “You should be mindful of your thoughts.”

Heat rose to my cheeks and my eyes went wide, embarrassment filling every fiber of my being. “Can you?” He nodded. “Oh god.”

I caught a glimpse of his smirk before he erased it completely. “I can’t hear every thought, just the loud ones… the ones you can’t seem to keep to yourself.”

“How long have you been able to do that?” I demanded, unable to meet his gaze.

“The duration of this conversation.”

More heat as I covered my face with my hands as I recalled all the things I’d thought over the last few minutes. “Oh god.”

He said nothing, but I could feel the pride he felt, and could see the smirk once again before it vanished. Johanna popped back through the door. “Found it. You okay Pen?”

“Yep!” I cheered, quickly moving for the door. “Let’s go!”

“I’ll meet you there,” Morpheus said, voice full of amusement at my expense. I looked back at him, Asshole. The glint in his eyes told me he heard it.

Johanna and I stood on the corner, waiting for the cab, when she finally looked over and said, “So, you and the Sandman?” I opened my mouth ready to tell her it wasn’t like that when she shook her head. “Don’t even try to tell me it isn't like that. I saw you checking him out.”

“Jo,” I whispered. “It’s complicated.”

She pulled me to her side. “Look, I’m not gonna lecture you. You’re like ninety years older than me and we both know you wouldn’t listen. Besides, I’m not really one that should be giving out this kind of advice. I just… I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

I smiled at her. “I’ve been through worse, Jo. And for the record I’m only seventy six years older than you, I’m not ancient.”

“Not like your boyfriend.” She didn’t waste any time with the dig.

“Shut up.”

***

Dream felt like he was on fire. He had since the moment she embraced him. His eyes watched her as she walked ahead of him and Constantine, humming with her hands in her pockets and a slight skip in her step. The simple dress she’d worn bouncing up slightly with every movement, raising just enough that he could catch glimpses of her thighs. Dream found himself unable to stop thinking of the heated thoughts she’d unknowingly shared with him, of how tame they were in comparison to his.

“Who is she?” He decided to ask Constantine, an attempt to clear his thoughts and remind himself of what his focus had to be. “The woman in the picture.”

“Her names Rachel, Rachel Moodie.”

“Does she deal in magic as well?”

She scoffed, slowing beside him. “God no. No, She’s actually a decent person. Proper job, nice family. She fuckin’ hated all the magic stuff.”

“And yet you left the sand with her.”

“I did not leave it with her. Sort of left it, and her.” The two shared a look, hers one of pain and guilt and his one of understanding, perhaps even sympathy if he was feeling generous. Constantine looked away and released a huff of annoyance. “I was staying at her place for a few months. She interpreted that as us living together, which we weren’t, so, one night I just went on a job and… never went back.”

“Why?” He hadn’t meant to ask it, but as he watched Penelope look up to the sky and smile the word just slipped past his lips.

"Because it never ends well, does it?" She looked over at him, following the steady gaze that fell on her flatmate.

"What? Love?" Dream looked down at her for a moment before his eyes returned ahead of them to Penelope. If one fact had remained true over the long years that had separated them it was that he did not deserve her. "No, I suppose it doesn't."

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but people around me tend to get ripped in half or cast down to Hell.”

“Not all of them,” he replied.

Johanna smiled, looking over at the girl they both seemed to share a common fondness of. “She’s different. Pen doesn’t need me to look after her, not really. She’s been through far worse and somehow come out of it all still her… Still good. But Rachel, she wasn’t used to this kind of life. It was safer for her if I left.”

“Did you tell her that?”

“No.” She said as they finally neared the door. “I suppose I’ll have to now.”

Penelope hopped down from the step and gestured to the door. “It’s still her.”

“Bollocks.” She shoved her friend up to the box. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and she won’t be-” The sound of the door buzzing echoed in the small enclosed space and Constantines face fell. “Weird… She didn’t even ask who it is.”

“Johanna,” Penelope tried to interrupt.

“Maybe she’s expecting someone. This could get awkward. More. Awkward.”

“Do you want me to come up with you?” Penelope asked once the nervousness became too obvious to ignore.

“No, you lot wait here.”

“I’m coming with you,” he insisted, not wanting to risk her running again.

“No you’re not. Do you have any idea how much she probably hates me right now? Do you have ex girlfriends?” His jaw clenched. Yes, he had many… Many who would not be pleased to see him ever again. Many whom he would have to tell her about. No. He forced the cold thought. No, he would retrieve his tools, save the dreaming, give her whatever explanation he needed to in order to satisfy her curious mind and then he would let her go back to her life. The life she’d built without him, the one she knew and the one that would keep her safe.

“I will not wait long.”

“You won’t have to,” Constantine assured. “She’s gonna slam the door in my face.”

He and Penelope waited until the door slammed closed before looking at one another. She leaned over towards him, “How long do you think it’ll take them to get undressed?”

Tilting his head at her he smiled. “What makes you think this woman will be keen on reconnecting?”

She shrugged. “I just know Johanna.”

***

The rain had started not long after Johanna disappeared upstairs and as it began to come down harder a small black mass shot down from the sky and landed roughly onto the pavement. Morpheus looked down with a sigh. “Matthew.”

“This is a bad idea.” The raven shook off his wings and looked at Morpheus, then to me. “Uh, sorry, I thought it was just you out here.”

My eyes widened at the voice of the bird. “Oh… the raven talks.”

“The raven has a name,” he said grumpily. 

Morpheus sighed. “Penelope, this is Matthew.”

I knelt down and smiled at him. “It’s nice to meet you, Matthew. Sorry I’m just a bit new to talking animals, or spirits, or whatever it is you are.”

His feathers smoothed out. “I guess that’s fair. I’m kind of new to this too.”

“You’re a magnificent raven,” I said, holding a hand out. “Would you like me to hold you? So you don’t have to look up so high?”

“Well… Yeah, I guess that sounds nice.” He said slowly, hopping into my hand and gripping me tightly as I rose back up and held him out to Morpheus, who looked at us with a softness in his usual hard exterior expressions.

“Anyway, I say this as someone who was recently human.” I let the question go. Later. “Human beings cannot be trusted.”

“No.”

“If I were Johanna Constantine, I’d be up there cutting a deal with Rachel to keep the sand, then cut the dream sand with real sand and sell it to the highest bidder.”

"Johanna wouldn't do that," I assured him.

"Well you're not exactly impartial, are you?" 

"Maybe not, but one thing to know about me dear Matthew is I'm very good at spotting monsters." I stuck my free hand out into the stream of rain, letting it pool in my palm and run through my fingertips. "And Johanna isn't a monster. She's just seen too much and lost even more."

I could feel Morpheus' eyes watching me and not the raven, but when I looked back up his eyes had shifted. “Well, I wasn’t the best person when I was a person. We can’t all be Jessamy, who was apparently perfect in every way.”

I giggled, earning a look from both of them. “Sorry, it’s just, Jessamy was far from perfect.”

“You knew her too?”

“Kind of.” I said leaning back against the wall. “She never spoke to me, I didn’t even know she could, but we spent a lot of time together.”

“So, what was she like then?” Matthew asked carefully, almost as if he was afraid of the answer.

“She was brilliant,” I began, noticing the sad gleam in the sandman's eyes. “Sly as a fox and fast as the wind in a storm. She also liked to steal my things, ribbons, rocks, anything I’d collected that she took a liking to. Jessamy was also quite a bitch,” I admitted with a laugh. “She was always picking at my hair and clothes and swooping down to scare me.”

Matthew sighed. “She sounds nice.”

“She was.” I said. “But, she was just like you. Not better or worse.”

Morpheus looked at the bird with a sigh. “Matthew I-”

“I get that you don’t think you need a raven, but if you’re out here, waiting for human beings to help anyone but themselves you’re gonna be sitting out here in the rain forever. Whatever they’re doing up there, they’re not thinking about you.”

“Oh they sure aren't,” I chuckled.

“What’s funny?”

“Dear Matthew, I’m willing to bet they’re up there tearing each other's clothes off.”

“No way!” He cawed. “They’re definitely planning a doublecross.”

I looked down at him and smiled. “You want to bet on it?”

“I’m a raven, I don’t really have anything to bet.”

“True.”

“How about this, the loser buys the winner the meal of their choice.”

I cocked a brow at him. “Do you have a wallet hidden in those feathers?”

He shook his head slightly. “No, but I do have the tall guy.”

Looking up at Morpheus’ unimpressed stare I pressed my bottom lip out slightly, pouting. “Please, O great dream god!”

"I'm not a god." His voice was stiff. "I am one of the Endless."

"The Endless. Sounds very ominous.”

"The Endless are beings of great power that maintain the order of this world. Myself and my siblings," he explained.

I hummed thoughtfully. "You don't sound too fond of them."

He sent me a look. "There are a few that are... Troublesome."

"Just like in any family I suppose." I smiled. "How many are there?"

“More than enough.”

I shrugged. “Okay, well then, O great Dream of the Endless, will you please agree to the terms of our bet?”

He glanced down at the raven then back at me. “Very well.”

“Okay then, let's go. Prepare to lose, raven boy.” I said standing next to the door and hitting the buzzer. Nothing. I looked over at Morpheus whose face had turned sour. “That’s not good is it?”

“No, it is not.”

*** 

Upon finding Constantine in the hall Dream knew the only thing capable of this was none other than the sand they were here to retrieve. He stood back and watched Penelope as she attempted to soothe the dazed woman. With watering eyes Constantine glared at him. “What did you do to me?”

“It was the sand.” He was unsure of how to prepare her for what no doubt lay beyond the door of the bedroom.

“Where’s Rachel?” His jaw clenched, an act that only seemed to spur her into action. She pushed past Penelope and opened the bedroom door. “Rachel? Rach?”

“Jo? Jo, is that you?” The weak reply barely made it to the door as he followed in after the two women. “That’s such a wonderful dream.”

There, lying in the bed with hollow cheeks and skin clinging to bone, decaying in the bed of pillows was Constantine’s ex lover. She was barely clinging to life just as she clung to the pouch in her decrepit hand. He moved slowly, not wanting to disturb the unsettled quiet that had filled the room. Penelope stayed by the door, watching Johanna with a sorrowful gaze as her friend looked up to him. “What’s happened to her?”

“It was not meant for humans,” he said simply as he pulled the bag from her hand.

“No! Wait, please. It hurts,” She groaned.

He turned away, heading towards the door with a steeled expression. “We can go.”

“What?” Johanna demanded. “What we can’t go, we can’t leave her like this.”

It was Penelope’s eyes that he met as he spoke. “We can’t help her. The sand was the only thing keeping her alive.”

He could feel Constantine behind him, could feel her anger as she began speaking, but he didn’t care. All he saw was the sorrow in Penelope’s eyes, sorrow that he’d seen before so many times he’d lost count. But this time was different. This time he had no one to be angry with but himself. He had been responsible for this in some way, hadn’t he? He had been the reason the sand found its way into the mortals' hands, whether it was unintended or not it didn’t matter, not to him.

So he turned and gave Constantine a command, “Wait outside.”

He watched the woman apologize to her dying lover, watched her press a kiss to her forehead, an act that spurred his own memory of the goodbye he’d once thought was forever. And then, without a word to anyone Constantine left. He watched her go, eyes settling on Penelope for a moment before he spoke. “You should go with her.”

Facing the dying woman whom he had, unknowingly, put there he waited for the door to close behind her. It didn’t. Instead she moved closer, sitting down on the edge of the bed beside Rachel Moodie, taking her frail hand and holding it close. She looked up at him when he didn’t move and gave him a soft nod. She was staying. Staying beside a woman she didn’t know? Then it hit him.

It wasn’t Rachel Moodie she was staying for, not really. And so he opened the pouch, grabbing a small handful of sand and sprinkled it over Rachel Moodie. The sand fell across her face, but some of it swirled in the air drifting towards Penelope and circling over her. As the life faded from Rachel the sand retreated and settled once again. Penelope pressed a soft kiss to the woman's hand and gently set it beside her as she fell into her final slumber.

***

Johanna leaned against the wall, staring out at the rain as Morpheus and I came down. He stayed behind, giving the two of us space to talk while he spoke with Matthew. She didn't look at me when she spoke. "Was it quick?"

"Yes. She died dreaming of you," I replied, recalling the beautiful sun filled vision.

Her jaw clenched. "I didn't deserve her."

Standing beside her, shoulders touching, I shrugged. "Maybe not, maybe no one deserves anybody, but she loved you all the same and I know you loved her too."

As Morpheus drifted closer I moved out of the way so the two could speak alone. I'd hoped Johanna would be less hard on him than she had been upstairs, but the wound was fresh, and Johanna didn't deal with loss as tactfully as others. I knelt down to Matthew and sighed. "In light of recent events I think we should call off our bet."

"Yeah, seems kind of in bad taste, all things considered."

"Next time I'll beat you though," I assured him.

He laughed. "Not a chance Penny."

"Penny?" I asked with a smile.

"Yeah, cause you're all shiny!"

"I'm shiny?"

"Yeah, at least in these raven eyes of mine you are." He looked at me, as if double checking. "You got a very nice… Glow… Thing going."

"Well that's weird," I replied. "But that's kind of just been the new normal for me I guess. It's a nice nickname. I don't think anyone's called me that before."

He took a tiny bow. "I am a raven of many talents!"

When I stood back up and dusted off the dirt Johanna and Morpheus both looked away from me. Her attention turned to the little raven as she instructed him to take care of his master then she unfurled her umbrella and stepped into the rain. "You comin Pen?"

"I'll catch up with you later," I told her, settling into the spot she'd vacated. 

"Be safe," she called as she hurried off to the cab.

"How'd she take it?" I asked.

"Better than most."

I nodded. "Yeah, she's had her share of this shit. She'll deal with it, in her own way."

"How are you?" He asked softly.

"I'm alright." I shrugged. "I've gotten used to being surrounded by death."

"I suppose you have."

With a short glance at one another I asked, "I'm still perfectly fine with the whole later talk we need to have after you've got your tools back, but I have to know… did this," I gestured to my arm. "Did it keep me from dying that day?"

"No." He looked out at the rain and shook his head. "I am not even certain I have the answer as to how you survived. I'm just… I am glad you did."

I stepped towards him. "Oh? Would you have missed me?"

A pulse, strong and steady hummed between us. "More than you know."

I blushed. "You probably say that to all your friends." Friends. The word felt entirely too plain.

"I am Dream of the Endless, I do not have friends," he said lowly.

"Everyone needs a friend, Dream." I replied. "Is that not what we are?"

The blue of his eyes darkened. "I do not think that friends is a strong enough word to describe what we are."

"Best friends?" I whispered in a light teasing tone.

"Something like that," he said with mischief in his eyes.

"Well, best friend," I said. "Good luck getting your stuff back."

He looked out at the rain. "Are you intending to wait until the downpour ends?"

"And miss the rain?" I stepped out under the cold shower and smiled at him. "Never!"

"Goodbye, Penelope."

"Goodbye, Morpheus. I look forward to later!"

I danced through the rain all the way to the road, feeling his eyes on me every step until I faded from his view, where I called a cab to get me back to the apartment. Soaking wet footsteps trailed behind me as I walked through the door and got onto the elevator. A minute passed brfore the lights flickered and flashed for a seconds before the elevator stopped entirely. Soon the power cut out, flooding the pitch blackness of the elevator with red. "Great," I grumbled.

The pungent tang of sulfur burnt my nose and a wave of freezing dread filled me. In the distorted reflection of the elevator doors a shadow rose, twisted and deformed. A long gnarled hand reached towards me and then it fell like a pool of water, gone, at least from my sight.

Heart pounding I turned, checking every reflective surface, looking up the ground beneath my feet was nothing but bubbling darkness and my stomach dropped. "Fuc-"

Claws dug into my leg, pulling me down into the darkness before the scream could even form in my throat. I thrashed and clawed trying to find some kind of grip as whatever had grabbed me dragged me through whatever portal it had been capable of opening up. Sharp rocks sliced my arms and hands and dust... No, ash filled my nose. 

The claws released me, dropping me into a straight plummet down. I fell for less than a minute before my body slammed into a cold smooth floor of black. On the ground, over my gasping and disoriented form, the shadow of two large wings unfurled. Every inch of me wanted to curl into itself, every instinct I had told me to run, to get as far away from here as I could.

"Well well, what have we here? A guest in hell?"

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[devildom-tyrant]

Could make the nightmare scenario with Diavolo too?

You wake up with a start, gasping, your hands automatically coming up to touch your throat.  It was always the same nightmare, even though you’d long since forgiven the perpetrator.  

Dying wasn’t something so easily forgotten, you supposed.

Your throat burned with the phantom pain from the memory, and you groped for the water bottle you usually kept on your bedside table -- only to come up with nothing.  Perturbed, you sleepily propped yourself up, giving your eyes time to adjust to the darkness.

You weren’t in your room.  Right.  You’d stayed the night at the Demon King’s castle at the behest of the demon prince himself.  After dinner conversation had gone on for so long that he suggested you take one of the many guest rooms, and you had been tired enough that you agreed.  

Unfortunately, there was no way that you were going back to sleep now.  The room was comfortable, but it wasn’t your room; you felt oddly out of place here alone.  It had been easier to sleep in these rooms when one of the brothers was sharing it with you, to give you some sense of normalcy -- which was odd to admit, considering your status as an exchange student.  Perhaps if you got some fresh air, you could calm down and get out of your own head.  

Despite it being 4AM, you open the guest room and step into the corridor.  The castle is massive, with plenty of twists and turns that could easily cause you to get lost.  Even with all the exploring you did with the brothers, you know you’ve only seen a fraction of the rooms, and with your anxiety screaming at you, you dare not let your curiosity get the better of you.  Instead, you follow a path you know by heart, out into the night air by the sparkling lake and gazebo.  

The ripples of the water bring a sense of calm over you, and you feel the tension draining from your shoulders.  The tightness around your neck is still there, still making your breaths more shallow than you’d like, but you attempt to force your memories to happier times.  It was out here, after all, that Belphie made his amends by making a pact with you.  It was here that you took his hand 

             -- the hand that had been around your throat, pinning you to a wall, his face twisted with cruel laughter

--and forgave his misplaced cruelty.  He’s a demon.  If you remember that, and that they used to want to eat you and take your soul -- and that some would still kill you given the chance, despite your good standing with the Student Council -- then his behavior wasn’t strange.  Most of the brothers tried to kill you at one point or another, too.  There just didn’t happen to be anyone around to save you that time.

... This isn’t helping.  

Think of something happier.  Think of that silly Mammon 

              -- screaming your name, gingerly cradling you against his chest, tears splattered against his trademark sunglasses.

Clasping your hands against your ears, you suddenly bend over, your eyes screwed shut as you struggle to get a breath in.  

Why is breathing so hard right now?  You’re okay.  You’re okay, you’re okay, you’re...

Something’s suddenly draped over your shoulders, big enough that it engulfs your frame.  You sharply glance up, eyes wide and glassy, as Diavolo kneels next to you, his hand on your shoulder.  You can feel his lingering body heat in the red coat, warding off the chill from the night air.  His brow is pinched with concern, golden eyes piercing right through you.  

His voice is a baritone rumble as he says your name, gentle, yet commanding your attention.  “What’s wrong?  Are you ill?”

“N-nothing’s wrong!” you immediately blurt, cursing the fact that your voice betrayed you by breaking.  Your smile is watery, almost manic.  You can’t very well tell the demon prince that you’ve been having nightmares.  “I just came out here to -- to get some fresh air.”

Your breathing is still uneven, which only causes Diavolo to appear even more concerned.  He grasps your wrist in one hand, his long fingers curling around.  “Your pulse is awfully quick, even for a human.”  It only gets faster as he points that out -- and also, have you ever been this close to him before?  Not since the dance at his ball, you think, and even then, you were awfully flustered to be in his arms.  His brow becomes less furrowed, his expression shifting to something more gentle.  

“I want you to know that you can talk to me.  If there’s something wrong, or something bothering you, and in it’s in my power to correct it, I will.  I want you to be comfortable in the Devildom.”

Demonic charm might not work on you, but you’re definitely not immune to regular charm.  The impending anxiety attack has receded, but you still hesitate, trying to choose your words.  He knows what happened, doesn’t he?  He had been standing there in the foyer, aided by Barbatos’ insight.  He chose not to punish Belphie in this timeline, but if you bring it up again... would he change his mind?

Ultimately, you decide to be vague, despite how childish the admission sounds.  “I... I had a nightmare, and I was just trying to shake it.”

“A nightmare?”  He’s surprised, but you know he’s not going to tease you, even though your cheeks are burning.  His fingers are still on your wrist, but his hold has shifted to something gentle, his other hand still resting on your shoulder.  “I see.  There isn’t much I can do about that -- unless it’s over something you’ve experienced here?”

Your muscles tense, and you notice his gaze sharpen, even as you shake your head.  “No, it’s... uh, I can’t remember it,” you lie, “but the feeling just kinda... was still there, if that makes sense.”

He nods, humming in the back of his throat.  “In that case, I could have Barbatos make you some tea to help you sleep.”

“No, please -- I don’t want to trouble him.”  If he woke up at 4AM because you had a nightmare, you would feel awful.

“I had a feeling you would say that,” Diavolo replies, smiling.  “Okay, another idea... let’s talk until you forget the feeling and grow tired again.”

“Aren’t you tired?” you shoot back.  “Why are you out here at this time, anyway?”

“I heard you walking down the halls.  I’m a light sleeper.”  He shrugs, before beginning to stand and tugging you up by the wrist.  “Come, join me in the gazebo.  I want to hear more stories from the human world.  And I bet I have a few more of Lucifer that you haven’t heard yet.”  He winks, and you feel your pulse quicken all over again.  

At the gazebo, you sit beside Diavolo, the demon prince’s arm behind your shoulders, and his coat wrapped around you.  Despite how powerful he is, you feel at peace like this, especially when he belly-laughs over your stories regarding the time that Lucifer was in Levi’s dating-sim-turned survival-horror.  You’re smiling just as broadly as he is, and throughout the conversation, you find your eyes becoming heavier and heavier... until you accidentally fall asleep with your head lolled against his shoulder.  The last thing you remember is that baritone rumble, murmuring something along with your name, and the feeling of fingers lightly touching your hair...

When you wake up the next time, you’re in your own room in the House of Lamentation, with Mammon pounding down your door, shouting that it’s time to eat. 

[unproduciblesmackdown]

watched the end of some guy’s amnesia: rebirth playthrough and i have some boring thoughts @halloweenhavoc have u finished the game i feel like you have more of a grasp on all this stuff than i do lmfao what with having actually played it and also probably remembering machine for pigs better

i really did not like fully piece together either the lore of the Main Story of the game nor the broader Amnesia Universe Lore lmfao but i was interested in the latter especially, but re: the former, i did like having all these other Known People associated with the protag whose fates we could all find out and shit

i’m like, sort of underwhelmed, but that’s b/c even though i was like “okay so just b/c this is a frictional-produced amnesia sequel a decade later doesn’t mean you need to hype it up like it’s gonna blow your mind just coz atdd was That big a deal” doesn’t mean i still wasn’t partially like oh but what if it is like mindblowing horror game tho......it felt a lot more like soma than atdd which isn’t in itself bad b/c soma rules but when i’m expecting it to be more like atdd it just makes things kinda bemusing and hard to recalibrate.....it was a good game though lol just like the whole time trying to figure out what the experience is gonna be i guess

anyways so like in the direction frictional’s games have gone it def feels like they’re more into Game Environments (those ruled in this game....) and being very like Thematic Story-Centric.....atdd was very stripped down and they sure got creative with that and it was as effective as it was but yeah it feels like now that they have the clout from that and the game production experience and presumably more resources and stuff that they’re progressing in This Direction which is not as atdd-esque lmao like good for them if this is the creative vision, follow those dreams and stuff

did not feel at all invested in any of this baby lore lmfaooo like it was very abstract and also i don’t care. but 10/10 for breastfeeding gameplay

i did like the Other World lore like. this is where alexander is from, Maybe?? i remember he’s mentioned as an apostate from [somewhere else] but like, is that somewhere else in another dimension or just another Region in this world lmao i don’t know. out here Inventing the amnesia potion vitae harvesting strategy, and then it’s Something Else he does that is considered heinous and they just banish him to earth lmfaooo like our problem now......and who is alexander’s wife lmfao. in atdd bad ending, when alexander portals back, does he get to come back to the shitty place where nothing’s going on but eternal vitae harvest i guess? sucks. in atdd sorta-neutral-ending, when you toss agrippa’s head through the portal and then agrippa asks [someone, i forget who....the student? weyer? or whoever??] to Help Daniel, does everyone get to go to this crappy world or are there other better dimensions lmao....also i forget how this The Other World got so shitty in the first place. something something they flew too close to the sun with their technology and it got fucked up, i forget what The Gate even is........i do like this origin story for what the fuck is up with the shadow lmfao. that like, it’s just some other alchemical Invention expressly to fuck up the vitae system?? which is sort of counter to the idea that it’s simply a Guardian of any orbs.....but then also, there was some sort of note or memory that seemed to imply that having fucked up whatever Gate they fucked up created something that sounded like maybe it was the shadow?? or was it just something Else fucked up and b/c it was like “uh oh something shitty is happening here now” i just Assumed it was the shadow.....idfk. but idk maybe since Orbs are Other World Tech For Portals the shadow is just like, Other World Tech Ruiner and if you handle one improperly the shadow will like, sense orb-jostling Lol and be On It....i don’t knowwww

i gotta admit i did love the lore tying to atdd lmfao like maybe this game would’ve been better off not really being tied to atdd but i’m still like oh yep i’m a sucker for cameos / lore about these atdd people places and things.....herbert, alexander, daniel, brennenburg, and someone else i forget who was like “i’m the first human to get to this place but i don’t have A Traveller’s Whatever so i have to die here,” rip to him.....kinda funny that vitae-harvesting is like, so Industrialized in the other world with this factory and mass-produced as it were, which is Fucked Up, and alexander got shot to earth for some mysterious terrible thing and had to invite some rando with an orb to his castle and then get his help torturing other randos with medieval instruments like. banging rocks together over there. also i don’t get what the harvesters job was? they were sure Harvesting but if the vitae is just getting Sucked thru tubes why are these guys going around breathing it in also. just like, stray air-vitae filtering system?? idk

also what was going on time-wise with this weird accelerated pregnancy. i don’t think i get Why tasi got amnesia in the first place. coincidence i guess??? and why...did she end up back in the plane wreckage. was that just where she got dropped off after they were all like. taken from Our World into the Other World and then....back into our world?? i guess??? i’m just not clear on the Timeline Of Events and how everyone got split up with some people dying and shit....was everyone getting attacked by ghuls i guess. there was a crapload of them in that one place, wasn’t there.....i also forget Where things happened lmfaooo like shit was this in Earth or The Other World.....i guess the latter it was always like, “high tech” with that art deco design shit and green light and stuff.....god i don’t know. like i already forget why richard was like, held captive and tortured. just on evil principle??? augh lmfao

also it was certainly Interesting that people turn into monsters around here with some like, magic + corruption deal going on......felt like the Lore in atdd was sort of vague but that it could Maybe tie into that sort of idea....frictional games sure will like, Metaphorically have the Self and the Non-Self But Which Is Tied To Your Self in all its stories, atdd, soma, rebirth......daniel having this past self he’s now detached from but re-learning of his past exploits.......soma copy/pasting consciousnesses.......uhhh also when it was talking about the ideal Vitae Collecting Cycle being fear, amnesia, and then Hope, and about who was the best candidates for that, i was really thinking that like, we’d learn tasi was being put through a [Hope] sequence, basically

also (rachel if ur reading this lmfao) i remember this pre-release Audio Tape that wasn’t in the gameplay that i think was like, the doctor doing an experiment on a Monster to confirm it had regenerative properties?? i thought we were gonna get a whole fucked up subplot dealing with that guy lmfao but nah just at the end......i guess soma’s promotional stuff was similar, they had all these Files and Videos and stuff which was relevant to the Lore / story but which wasn’t like, flatout in the game......i guess at some point the doctor must’ve been like, experimenting on a crew member who was sort of in the process of Turning or w/e. hank or someone i guess.....UHHH i did like “talking” to so many monsters lmfaooo like leon and crap. wild, tragic, etc.......

RIGHT and i think frictional is really creative in its like, Game Mechanics, like how relatively recently we learned that that whole thing about being told that Low Sanity makes you easier to detect in atdd, but that wasn’t true and was just put in the game to put the player more on edge? i mean, daniel keeling over for a moment if sanity gets too low is probably unhelpful in a chase but. and like, here the “sanity” thing was neat, i liked the Sound lol, i liked the flashing images and how that was like, Relevant, but also it seems like you can’t ever die in this game?? basically, ish?? which i think is neat. like, you don’t really Need to.....said it last time how it feels like the player just is still going to react as Urgently if they’re being chased by the monster lmfaooo

idk there was something other neat / creative element i think i wanted to point out as Cool but i forget (HAHA...manesima.....) i dunno the 0.0001% chance any of you are Coincidentally into amnesia at all and know what all is being talked about here and have thoughts....feel free to send me an ask or whatever.......would be inchrested in hearing other takes on it etc

OH and it didn’t feel like machine for pigs was involved at all lmfao which makes sense since it wasn’t actually produced by frictional but now i’m really struggling to remember the Lore there and if it could Conceivably tie in with descent/rebirth-verse.......oswald’s soul got actually split with Evil Orb-Corrupted Self (which!!!! i forgot there’s even the implication that maybe orb-proximity fucks you up. didn’t seem that relevant here. here magic empress fountain water fucks you up) and Amnesia’d Good (Normal-er) Self and there’s the giant machine which is gonna.....consume the world to protect it from self-destructing in another way......or, that was the reason given to oswald anyways, i remember he like sacrifices his kids to it to save them from [his visions of ww1 being an impending thing] and he doesn’t find that out till the end......his evil self tricked his good self into firing up the machine......i forget where the pig men come from or what their point is, and the machine is like, another Factory Line Vitae Harvesting thing, right?? what’s the vitae For in this case....i sure don’t fuckin know. i forget what oswald does at the end as well to like, fix things, i remember feeling sad about it even though he was a horny weirdo.....i really forget what the full picture was there or what the Orb Involvement was. anyways. idk

would be fun to see more frictional games but it seems like they’re not too interested in doing something as atdd-esque again lol, soma seems more like What Frictional Really Wants To Do, which isn’t a bad thing cuz soma rules and like. objectively i guess soma is the better game, i’m not at all mad at anyone arguing soma is better lmfao, i just sure cherish atdd and it sure is the one that made the whole [subsequent horror game defining] splash lmfao. OH YEAH and i liked they threw in another moment where someone’s been alive for ages and you unplug them and it’s like what the fuck. and i guess you do that but even Harder in the one Rebirth ending where you shadow-infect everything and all the people in the vitae-pods die......which like, it Was def creepy having all those vitae pods lmfao. conceptually fucked up.....uh yeah that’s it i guess. was a sucker for the atdd-lore-fanservice stuff lol. thought it was good but wasn’t like atdd 2.0 which is both Totally Fine and also A Bit Disappointing Of Course lol. now i’m thinking about soma some more though which is Worthy cuz that game rules and i love its story / concepts so much. and i love that you keep fisting sphincters to Save until you have to fist your forearm off. we’ve all been there. and i love the “we have the better view. :)” audio log from someone on the surface. and how the gradual reveal of the [lady you talk to throughout the game who guides you along]’s story. and the Ending. and the gradual reveal of Just What Is Going On Around Here

anyways yeah atdd rules soma rules i thought this game was good too but def is like okay you’d rather make soma than atdd and that is valid

thots????????????????

[stanskzseungmin]

Operation Miroh | Stray Kids Mafia! AU ~ Chapter 14

Masterlist

Secret Mission Briefing

Location: Unknown Settlement

Weather: Rainy

Date: 20XX 

Time of Day : 0000

Mission Objective: Undercover info about the "Desert Fox"

Mission Partners: Seo Changbin

You slowly closed the door behind you. The door closed with a soft click. Your stance and demeanor fell; your shoulders slumped as your forehead connected with the door dejectedly. The heavy lingering atmosphere was looming over you, pushing you down making it harder to breathe. You turned and pressed your back against the door as you eyed each of the closed door in the long dark hallway. You gazed at the closed door next to you, a door that would never be opened again and the room will forever be empty now.

This base. This hideout of yours. This hideout of Stray Kids used to feel so safe and comfortable. It sheltered you from the dangers of the world and you felt your previous life living under extreme hidden dangers were so far away, but now, this place you once called home is now breached and you felt as vulnerable as ever. A friend is suddenly gone. But now, who do you even call a friend?

You trudged down the hallway, lifting up one leg after another returning back to Hyunjin’s room. You pushed open the slightly ajar door and peered in. Chan and Felix were still sound asleep, Jeongin was still curled up in the chair at the corner and Changbin was still sat up fiddling and cleaning his guns. You knocked on the open door softly to catch the weapon dealer’s attention. The second he turned to look at you, you gestered your head signifying him to come out and you left, leaving the oxygen tank behind by the door.

You stepped foot out of the base, the suffocating feeling alleviated momentarily. The cool air kissing your exposed skin helped calm your nerves a bit. Despite this, your fear and anxiety still crawled and bubbled within you. Your mind was restless as you can’t stop the lingering thoughts. Before you could fully be consumed by your thoughts, you were snapped out of your daze by two fingers tapping on your cheeks delicately.

“Room for another?” Changbin whispered out with a small smile and you nodded softly.

“Are you okay?” you asked,

Changbin sniffled, face scrunching up a bit. He nodded softly and whispered out a small “yeah.” His voice was breathy, scratchy and weak.

You nodded looking away. The full moon illuminated the surrounding locale making everything shine an iridescent blue. A chilly and soft breeze came by.

“It’s late, what is on your mind?” Changbin asked out, sensing your internal discourse.

“I’m scared,” you gulped, sniffling softly. You looked up to the full moon, blinking profusely trying to stop the dam that’s so close to breaking.

“Why are you scared? There’s nothing to fear here. You’re here. You’re with us. You’re home,” Changbin tried to console you.

“That’s the problem,” your voice cracked. 

You quickly turned to him, taking his large hands between yours in a pleading manner.

“You absolutely cannot tell anyone, please Binnie,” you begged. Your eyes were wide and pleading. Changbin could see all your fears and worries in your eyes and he felt his heart constrict in pain. 

Changbin nods hesitantly, sensing the distress within you.

“I don’t know who to trust,” you whispered. “I don’t know who to trust anymore. I just feel so lost and alone. Binne, it’s you. It’s only you right now. You’re the only one I can trust.”

Changbin nodded slowly. “What is it?”

“I think the Desert Fox is one of us.”

The silence that followed was a loud silence. You could hear a pin drop from how silent it was, but you knew from the silence that what you said was a huge bomb you just dropped.

“We’re going to go back. It’s our only lead on the Desert Fox,” you carefully pulled out a hanging gas mask from your waist. Prior leaving the base, you made sure to sneak into Minho’s room to grabbing a couple of gas masks.

You offered the gas mask in between shaking hands. Your mind was racing with thoughts and your heart was thundering in your chest. You didn’t want to accept reality. You begged the universe that what you were feeling was mere paranoia, but you can’t help but feel if Changbin accepts the gas mask, your worries would be set in stone. No longer were your fears a fragment of your imagination, it would be your reality. Your eyes fell to the metal accessories decorating your fingers. Your heart constricted at the sight Han Jisung’s smiling face appeared before you in a vision as your face fell. You bit the inside of your cheek to stop the impending fears.

You had to be strong. You had to be strong for him. The Desert Fox took him away from you, he took Jisung away from Stray Kids and you had to do everything in your power to bring him to light. 

You stood straight swallowing your tears away, now fueled with new found determination.

“Seo Changbin,” the man jolted in surprise hearing his full name escaping your lips with a sternness that he hardly recognized. “Are you in?”

He watched you transform before his eyes. From once you were so very vulnerable, now your eyes raged on with a newfound determination. He knew you would stand by your decision, not letting anything change your mind. Despite your absurd accusation, something lingered in the back of his mind. Something was telling him that a newfound danger was coming, a danger that was blossoming from deep within. The only thought that crossed his mind was that he had to protect you at all costs, because his gut feeling told him, that whatever decision you would follow through with will ultimately cost you your life and you would die with little to no regrets.

“Okay.” Changbin responded firmly, accepting the gas mask you were offering.

~

“Are you ready to face whatever it is that is in there?” Changbin asked wanting to know if you were 100% mentally prepared about what’s going to happen next. A previous chapter has closed, now a dark chapter has opened up and he’s sure that there will not be a happy ending.

“We have to,” you spoke out darkly and walked forward to the cave entrance without a second thought.

Changbin frowned at your tone. You were changing, but you couldn’t help yourself. It’s funny how pain and betrayal changes a person.

Your gaze darkened at the sight and Changbin let out a small growl. From once was a place of beauty, now it was a ghost town. There was now a heavy lingering smog hat was tainted with a dark mustard yellow color.

“This place used to be so filled with life,” you whispered out.

“Now it’s just a ghost town,” Changbin growled out, his eyebrows furrowed at the sight.

You both adjust your gas mask, tightening the straps. You both nodded at each other nodding in confirmation. You both jumped off the cliff, landing on the ground with a soft thud. The impact unsettled the lingering gas and dust, creating a small cloud surrounding both of you individually.

“With this amount of gas, I don’t think your lady is here,” Changbin started, stepping over a dead body.

“Yeah...” you breathed out looking at your surrounding area. Several corpses littered the ground. Corpses of the people you saw alive and well a mere day before.

“The Desert Fox will pay,” Changbin seethed clenching his fists. “I will kill him with my own two hands.”

“Even if the lady isn’t here, she’s got to have left some clues behind.”

Changbin nodded. “Let’s keep going.”

You headed towards the back of the underground settlement.

“Oh my god...” you breathed out in shock and horror.

Your lady WAS here. However, she was bound and tied to a wooden post. The flesh on her face was red, raw and practically melting off, revealing the muscles underneath. Her eyelids were completely gone exposing her white eyeballs.

You turned away in horror and disgust, not being able to bring yourself to look at the sight. Changbin threaded a hand through your hair and pulled you flush into his chest.

“This is a goddamn war crime,” Changbin barked out. You felt his body tense up.

“Who could do something like this?” you whimpered in his chest.

“Who fucking else? I’m definitely going to fucking kill him.”

“But who is he anyway?” you pulled away to look at him. You made eye contact with the weapons dealer. You couldn’t see his expression due to the gas mask, but his eyes said it all. You can see the rage burning within him.

“You think it’s one of us, right?” he asked.

You nodded slowly. Changbin trusted your judgement, you were very well adept at piecing things together. If you thought Desert Fox was one of us, then he definitely is. There was no way in hell you would accuse anyone in Stray Kids if it weren’t the case.

“Well, what do you have so far?”

“I, um, do you remember when we left for this mission yesterday?” Changbin nodded in response. “I noticed Chan’s laptop lying on the ground in the warehouse in the corner.”

“Wait, what? Why? I thought Chan hyung repairs his laptop, why would he have another one lying around?”

“I don’t know. You’ve known Chan way longer-”

“I only knew him because I watched his knee get blasted,” Changbin deadpanned.

“Ok, OTHER than that. Weren’t you, Chan and Jisung in 3RACHA or some shit?”

“Ok, that was just a phase, mom,” Changbin snorted. “But yea, it was when Chan was still hammering out the details of Stray Kids.”

“Did he ever change his laptop?”

“Actually...now that I think about it, I think he has. I vaguely remember him stating that he wanted to start with a clean slate, but I thought he destroyed that laptop...”

“Could it be Chan?” you whispered out.

“It could be someone else using Chan’s spare-” Changbin gasped.

“What is it?”

“Chan told Jisung to destroy that laptop.”

“Are you saying Jisung is Desert Fox?” you whispered. “B-But, he’s....”

“It’s a possibility. It also could be Woojin hyung?”

“No. Not bear-”

“It’s a possibility. Chan’s laptop was out there in the open, someone could’ve been using it. Woojin hyung’s been gone since he announced he was going away for a bit. He could’ve been in the warehouse all along using Chan’s laptop.”

“I can’t believe this.”

“You can not disregard anything. It may seem slim, but it’s still a chance.”

You dropped your head in defeat, your forehead coming into contact with his chest. Changbin brought up his hands to your shoulders, his thumbs rubbing small circles in the flesh to console you. 

“I know it’s hard, but you need to keep an open mind. The Desert Fox is one of us, they may be playing us all along, ok?”

You nodded in defeat.

“Listen, whoever had Chan’s laptop knew of all your missions. I’ve read all your briefings. Didn’t every mission go south in some way or form?”

Your eyes widen as his words settled in.

~

Woojin was about to contribute his thoughts but a loud thud broke through the silence and followed by running. Woojin reacted by immediately dashing towards the open back door. You followed and both bolt after the intruder. The intruder tried to break line of sight by swerving into the alleyways, but he wasn’t getting away that easily. The both of you quickly cornered him in a tight alleyway with a huge brick wall at the end. The man didn’t stop running. Woojin let out an exasperated sigh as the man scaled the wall next to him, using his upward momentum to jump to the wall behind him repeating the process until he can grab ahold of the tall brick wall. Your eyes widen at the face of the man who intruded on you both.

“You,” you gasp out menacingly.

He smirked. The man that caused the incident. The incident that left you severely burned, forced to be bedridden in a hospital in the middle of nowhere for months until Stray Kids located and came for you. [Chapter 3]

A secret mission after you’ve been reinstated. It should’ve been easy and quiet. Yet your enemy at the time knew where you were. He had no reason to return to that bakery especially after he already had the baker within his grasp.

~

“Look at what we found,” two men appeared behind you.

With the two men was Bang Chan himself held in a chokehold with a knife pressed to the soft flesh of his neck. The other man was casually looking through Chan’s laptop. Instantly, you felt your stomach drop seeing your leader at knifepoint and incapacitated. [Chapter 5]

Chan was capable. He is one of the more capable members of Stray Kids. You all collectively agreed that Chan was 3rd best at close quarter combat after Felix and Woojin respectively. So how did he get captured and placed at knifepoint by two ill trained goons?

~

When Lee Know and you were sent to investigate “Paradise,” you both were left incapacitated and injured. You both would have bled out and died there if it weren’t for Seungmin coming along and extracting you both… but how did Seungmin know where you both were?

Lee Know and you only found “Paradise” because you allowed yourselves to be captures and Chan himself mentioned he had never heard of the place before despite his vast knowledge of the world.

~

“Going to send Bang Chan and Stray Kids a message,” the man gazed at you at the trapdoor unbeknownst to you due to your limited line of sight.

Your earpiece buzzed back to life. “GET OUT OF THERE!” Seungmin’s voice boomed with urgency. Over his exclamation you can make out his rapid footsteps and labored breathing as well as the loud crunching of dirt and gravel beneath his feet.

“We’re going to show Bang Chan what it means to play with fire. You play with fire, you’re going to get burned.”

The man grabbed his goon and tossed him over the trap door. The weight of his body slammed into the wood door against your head causing you to slip off the ladder falling to the floor below with a loud thud and groan.

“GET OUT!” Seungmin panicked. “I’VE LOST ALL CONTROL OVER THE C4. SOMEONE’S OVERRID-”

“Say goodbye to your precious member, Christopher,” the man seethed as he jumped off the tower landing on one of the rooftops below. He pulled the trigger on the ignition device he had in his hand. [Chapter 9]

The man knew. He knew. How did he know that you were there for him?

Not only that, someone overridden the C4 that Seungmin himself planted.

~

You tsked figuring [the crate] was unlabeled and unmarked just like all the others. Unsheathing your knife once more, you force the black blade underneath the lid to pry it open. The worn wood moaned under the pressure as the rusted nails pop out one by one; eventually, the lid would be able to slide right off.

“What the fuck?” you whispered to yourself. Within the box were several sacks with an ominous black skull with crossbones on every one of them.

“Hyunjin?” you buzzed into voice comms. 

“How may I be of assistance?” his words were too polite, almost as if he was being sarcastic.

“I don’t know what I’m looking at,” you whispered as you cut open the sack with your knife, its contents spilling right out.

“Very enlightening,” now his voice was sarcastic, the radio static buzzed softly.

“It looks like green rocks that have some sort of luminous glow to them.”

“Shit,” Hyunjin cursed.

“Jinnie?”

“Destroy them.” 

“Wha-”

“Destroy them, don’t get it on your hands, don’t expose it to the air too much,” Hyunjin commanded.

“What are they?” you asked as you felt your heart drop down to your stomach fearing his answer. “How do I destroy it?”

“Don’t ask questions you’re not ready to hear the answers for,” Hyunjin stated. [Chapter 10]

Hyunjin has seen the darn green rocks. He knows of the gas, yet his final words echoed within your mind.

“Don’t ask questions you’re not ready to hear the answers for.”

What did he mean about that? He knew of the gas, he knew what it was. He knew how dangerous it was, but he never told you or Chan what it was.

~

And finally, your recent mission with Changbin and Felix. 

The woman you met that fled from you accused you of being affiliated with Desert Fox by the way you dressed. Stray Kids has their own unique motif: neon or bright colors. It’s what makes SKZ stand out and unique, differing from all the other gangs and mafias.

Felix got outed by his fighting style. Everyone has a unique fighting style. It’s like fingerprints. Sure two people can do Tae Kwon Do, but how they perform each move and attack is so unique with its own little quirks that can only belong to one person. The guards recognized Felix by his fighting style. Is he Desert Fox or is the Desert Fox someone close enough to Felix to mimic his style?

Finally Changbin. He got outed by the guns he brought to the weapons deal. The people recognized the guns to belong to the Desert Fox, but the guns Changbin bought were fully customized and unique and no replica of it exists anywhere else in the world.

Guns customized with the joint efforts of Seungmin and Jeongin, but Changbin also had quite a hand in many of the customized weapons Stray Kids owned.

“Do you finally understand?” Changbin broke you out of your thoughts.

You nodded, letting out a shaking breath. 

“Y-yeah,” you panted. Your heart was hammering in your chest as it felt harder and harder to breathe. Your breaths got more labored and shorter. Tears were brimming your eyes as you failed to keep yourself together.

“Hey hey, easy. Breathe,” Changbin tried to ground you by grasping your shoulders firmly. “Inhale 4 seconds through your nose, hold for 7 seconds then exhale through your mouth 8 seconds.”

You did as he told.

“Now do it several times,” his voice was gentle. You nodded following his orders.

“Better?”

“Y-yea-” you gasped, noticing a dark figure looming on a rooftop. “Chang-Changbin!”

Your hands flew up and quickly turned his body pointing to the figure.

Now his cover was blown, the dark figure attempted to flee.

“It’s him!” Changbin growled out. “It’s the Desert Fox!” 

Changbin charged forward sprinting down the street. “Don’t let him get away!”

You quickly pursued. Using your (Jisung’s) claws, you quickly scaled up the building to pursue the fleeing figure on the roof.

“Hey! Why are you running, you traitor!”

The man turned to face you momentarily. He wore an all black gas mask, but the glass that exposed the eyes was covered with a dark tint and he wore a hood that hid the fringes of his hair. He clearly wasn’t leaving any hints for you on who this guy really is.

“I know you’re one of us Desert Fox!” you accused.

The figure outstretched his left arm parallel to the ground with an item within his hand.

Your eyes widened recognizing the item: a small glass container with several individual compartments wired and connected to a small battery taped on.

Minho’s bottles. His glass bottles were so very crafted and forged in cooperation with Hyunjin and Seungmin. The glasses were so fragile and thin that it can shatter under electrical currents, but sturdy enough where the glass wouldn’t disintegrate under layers of clothing. 

Within the Desert Fox’s other hand, he pulled out a detonator and very quickly pulled the switch. The small glass container he tossed at your shattered under the small electrical current. The contents collapsed on each other created a small, mild explosion that managed to stun you and blast you off the rooftop.

“Y/N!” Changbin screamed out your name in horror seeing you get blasted off the roof. He pushed himself harder, sprinting towards you. His lungs were burning and his legs were sore and shaky as his muscles cried for him to stop. He slid on his knees feeling the dirt and gravel shredding and tearing through the fabric of his jeans and scraping his knees as he caught you in his arms.

Your ears were ringing as black dots littered your visions. Everything seemed to be spinning and your body was in pain.

“It’s ok. It’s ok, I’ve got you.” Changbin’s voice sounded so far away and you could barely make it out with the ringing in your ear. “Stay with me!”

You could faintly feel Changbin tapping your cheek repeatedly. “Stay awake.”

Within your blurry vision, you could see the Desert Fox return to the edge of the building. You could see him face you. Before the darkness of unconsciousness took you over, you could see the Desert Fox turn away. The last thing you saw was him grapple hooking away and disappearing behind the buildings.

And then, your world went dark.

~

Lol Sike, this chapter every member restriction is dropped again.

So yea, this chapter dropped a lot of clues on the potential identity of the Desert Fox, but nothing is definitive. So this voting, put down who do YOU think is the Desert Fox. You don’t need to say why, but I’m interested to hear your thoughts.

So...

Be careful who you vote for, it may have deadly consequences.

Happy Voting!

You can vote in my asks if you’d like. 

Which Stray Kids Member do you think is the Desert Fox you on this secret mission?

Kim Woojin [Status: AWOL*]

Bang Chan | Bang Christopher Chan 

Lee Know | Lee Minho (Heavy injury)

Seo Changbin 

Hwang Hyunjin (Heavy Injury)

Han | Han Jisung [Status: Deceased]

Lee Felix 

Kim Seungmin 

I.N | Yang Jeongin

* : AWOL = Away on leave, but Woojin will return when called upon. (A/N: Clarification on WJ's current status. A majority of you voted to keep Woojin in Operation Miroh. This means Woojin is still an active member of SKZ in Operation Miroh. His AWOL status means that he's NOT currently in the SKZ warehouse/base with the other members until he's get voted in as a mission partner. Once Woojin is voted as a mission partner, after the mission, he WILL BE RETURNING back to the base and is AWOL status will be removed).

[aj-artjunkyard]

‘Til Death Do He Part AU CHAPTER ONE: Wailing Sirens

The ‘official’ ‘Til Death Do He Part AU story begins...

Wailing sirens cut through the silent street, getting more and more deafening as they approached the bloodied form of a young adult who lay motionless on the sidewalk. The flashing blue and red police lights blinded and irritated the man. Nonetheless, he tried his hardest to keep his eyes open for as long as possible. He couldn’t loose sight of the billions of gleaming constellations above him. But despite best efforts, they were becoming dimmer by the minute. Lester dragged in rugged, uneven breaths that became slower and more sluggish as the seconds passed.

His favourite wooden peacoat was loosing its grey colour to the deep red seeping from his side. His work shirt was in tatters, torn to shreds by the hellhound that had attacked the three young demigods he had been driving to camp half-blood. Lester thought of the little girls he had been guiding, his sympathetic heart aching at the thought of preteens making the long journey to camp all by themselves. He had defeated the hellhound and given them time, but with the price of his life. A price he was willing to pay. The thin, navy scarf he constantly wore in a European loop had come undone, the light fabric fluttering in the bitter winter wind. His pale skin had been utterly drained of pink undertones. He was too tired to quake under the sting of the December cold.

Footsteps. Getting closer. Yelling. Faint yelling. Faraway…

“…ter? Lester! C’mon buddy, wake up. Lester!”

Lester felt a few light slaps to his cheek, the cold of this person’s hand shocking his eyes into opening a crack. (Wait…they had been closed?) He managed a tiny smile when he saw that he was looking up into the face of a very familiar man. The same man who had kindly brought him, a grubby teenager dressed in torn rags, into his own house when Zeus had refused to accept the tried boy back into his Olympian ranks. The same man who worked late shifts and extra days at his job as a police captain to pay for the additional food. The same man who had treated him like his own son for almost nine years.

“It’s me, it’s Derek!” His voice was fast and breathless. A reassuring smile tugged on his lips, though his eyes showed nothing but pure, undiluted fear. He sounded desperate for anything, any noise from his adopted son. “Derek Goodman, you hear me Les’? It’s-”

“Dad,” the young man croaked, before breaking down in a fit of coughs. Derek tried his best to calm his son, though he had to admit, the gash in his right abdomen was alarmingly deep. He was loosing blood fast. Derek kept one large, dark-skinned hand on the wound to slow the blood flow, and used the other to point and bark orders at his men who stood aways back from the scene, all very interested in their own boots. They had never seen their centred captain this distraught - and none wanted to endure it for much longer - and so they scattered to follow the captain’s commands.

Meanwhile, Lester Papadopoulos was focusing all his remaining energy into tracing his index finger around a crack in the pavement beneath his hand, trying to think about anything other than impending death. He had known that the clammy hands of Thanatos would tear away his life-force one day, but he had hoped it would happen like a regular mortal’s (as sad as he knew that was). In fact, he had envisioned it many times: he was in a hospital bed during a bright summer afternoon. He was surrounded by his children, his friends (most of which might as well be his children), and perhaps even his mother and twin, who still shone with eternal youth. He was grey and withered. This millennia-old life had nothing more to offer him. He was complete and at peace. The reality was startlingly crueler.

The pain that tore at his stomach, hands and face was fading to a dull throb as a deathly cold overtook his senses. His mind was alight with panic - where would he go when he died? Would he scrape Elysium or would the gates of the fields of punishment swallow his soul? Would he be cast into Asphodel, forced to wander for eternity as a blank apparition of his former self? Would he ever see his children again? Would he ever see Meg again? Meg. Where was Meg? Would she be okay without him? Would his mother weep for his passing? Would his father care? His last breath escaped his lips before he could think of an answer.

Even until the very end, the man’s slashed and bleeding hand clutched onto a phone, the screen still alight with the emboldened words: ‘Dad’ and ‘Call ended’.

……………

………

…

.

I couldn’t hear anything. 

I couldn’t feel anything. 

I couldn’t see anything.

No. Wait.

I could see something. It wasn’t anything, but it wasn’t darkness either. It was different. It was light. A blinding, golden light that pierced my vision like searing hot needles. My body burned, but I could feel no definite limbs or appendages - just blazing, scorching heat. I didn’t feel solid. But I was there, and for now, that was enough. Voices faded in and out of earshot, like someone was repeatedly dunking me underwater and yanking me back upwards before I drowned in my own subconscious.

Blurred shadows danced across my vision, blocking out the intense light with their large forms. Slowly, those forms sharpened and became detailed. I searched the many faces looming above me, surrounding me as if I was a fading patient on a hospital bed. 

The faces were human... but not quite. They gave out a certain aura of boundless, buzzing power. I was quite sure it was supposed to make you drop whatever you were holding and run screaming to your momma, which is something I would’ve appreciated at that moment. As well as their general aesthetic, they also had strange features that no human should possess. The few who seemed happy to see me had literal halos of light around their heads that reflected their cheerful smiles. Some were less ‘excited’ and more interested in my presence - one of which was a woman with piercing grey eyes who wore a full set of gleaming bronze armour, complete with a helm. One of them leaned against the wall to my left, smoking a cigarette and absentmindedly cleaning his wraparound shades on his red muscle shirt. His eye sockets were hollow, and where his eyeballs should have been, there were two spherical flames, both sparking and flickering furiously.

Panic started to swell in my throat as I realised the sheer number of beings present. Their energy unsettled me, their searching eyes and obvious raw power left me feeling extremely small and exposed. I tried to lift my arm, but I was too weak to move a muscle. All I could do was observe as eleven pairs of eyes (or flames) stared me down. 

“Try not to move, sweetie,” whispered a caramel-haired woman to my right. “Your essence is still settling. Give it time”. She talked in a calming, soothing manner, like a mother to her child. Her tanned skin seemed to glow in the bright light, and her features were soft and caring. She wore a stark white sundress that revealed her shoulders. She looked as if she had been crying for hours. I felt my pounding panic slow to a rate that would only worry a doctor (instead of sending them into immediate shock). She did not seem like the type to try to hurt me. And I could’ve sworn I had seen her somewhere before. 

In fact, I could have said the same thing to everyone in this room. They were all so frustratingly familiar, yet so vague that I couldn’t place it. Where had I seen them? In a dream? In a past life? Was I dead? I didn’t feel dead. Then again, I had never died before. Not completely, anyway. I tried to voice my concerns for which direction my soul had gone and if I could possibly go home, preferably with a hot latte and a sincere apology in the form of this month’s rent money, but all that came out of my mouth was a puff of air and a small squeak.

“She told you not to move, idiot,” an annoyed, young girl to my left spoke, rolling her piercing silver eyes - though they were also red and puffy from tears. She was about thirteen in age, with auburn hair pulled back into a high ponytail. She wore a grey parka, arctic camouflage trousers and weathered white hiking boots. On her head, she wore a silver crescent circlet that glinted in the light. I looked down and noticed she had one hand squeezing my arm so hard her knuckles were white.

My arm.

I choked in horror as I took in my state. My skin was shifting and moving like the surface of a pool. My arms melted from being tanned and muscular, to being wiry and pale, and sometimes completely formless - like churning liquid gold encased in a vague human-esque shape. I saw my clothing was the same, though it flickered more frequently. The bronzed skin wore short greek togas, white blazers with gem-studded lapels, skinny jeans or red leather jackets. The pale form’s wardrobe was much more limited - a thick, grey, knee-length peacoat made an appearance in many of the outfit combinations, along with a navy scarf and with dark, uniform trousers with work loafers. Sometimes though, the body sported a plain t-shirt with flannel pyjama bottoms or an oversized navy hoodie with some loose jeans. I noticed that unless the black loafers had been adorned, that form hardly ever wore shoes, like he could only afford one pair - though being broke would also explain why he wore the peacoat with everything. 

Confusion beat down on my mind, threatening to crack my skull with the pressure. Who was I? Which one of these bodies was mine? Surely it couldn’t be both. I closed my eyes and racked my aching brain. What was the last thing I remembered? Faces began to swim in my memories. 

I remembered a girl in her late teens, about five years younger than myself. I had known her for years and knew her inside out - the pudgy ex-street-urchin who had been my best friend for nine long years. She had a bob of shaggy black hair and a constantly changing sense of fashion that got more mismatched with every outfit. Her tracksuit bottoms were a favourite, and maybe a tattered jacket every now and then, but sometimes she even dared to leave the house wearing double denim, which was the biggest no-no known to the human race. She had long since ditched the cat eye glasses in exchange for some more regular-looking red glasses, even though they magnified her eyes so much that she could have been mistaken for a Disney character. I grabbed at the name in my conscious, refusing to forget - Meg Mccaffrey.

The shifting between looks slowed as I thought about the name. The fit, tanned body became less frequent as I remembered what I looked like. Images - memories - flicked through my head. Feeling spread throughout my nerves and tingled warmly at my fingertips. I felt the soft bedding below me, and the tickle of my tight curls on my face. With my shoulders relaxing, I tilted my chin up slightly and sank further into the comfy pillow beneath my head, taking long, deep breaths. My life flowed through my brain in double time, allowing me to relive the last nine years in seconds. 

My name was Lester Papadopoulos. I was a clear-sighted mortal and a lanky, caucasian man with tight brown curls, blue eyes and a relentless case of sniffly nose that never seemed to dissipate. My father was Derek Goodman, who had fostered me shortly after finding me unconscious in an alleyway in Brooklyn Heights, and officially adopted me when I turned eighteen. From there I had worked towards a goal of helping people, like my new dad did in his job as a police captain. I had become a paramedic, the first one one the scene when someone was hurt. I had saved some half-bloods from minotaur wounds, minor deity singeing and cyclops bruisings and broken bones. I calmed them and drove them to camp, where word spread of the human hero who openly helped half-bloods, free of charge and free of tricks. My crummy apartment had become a safe place for the lost and hurt descendants of both Greek and Roman deities - and even sometimes their faun or satyr protectors, if they were lucky enough. Even when I had no money in my pockets, I still tried my hardest to keep the shelves stocked for the next poor kids who didn’t ask for their fate. When those kids reached their camps, armed with the information that I was practically broke, demigods started appearing with snack food or teabags as meek offerings (curtesy of the satyrs/fauns, who seemingly didn’t know what humans needed to make a sustainable meal). I learned their names and remembered their stories. When they couldn’t sleep, they snuggled themselves into my own bed, like my own little personal hot water bottles - if hot water bottles could burrow their heads into my sides and put their freezing cold feet on my legs. They were all a constant hassle, and I loved each and every one of them with all my heart. I would do anything to keep them safe, which is why I always had to say goodbye.

It dawned on me that this was what I had been doing when I died.

A chilling scene played in my mind’s eye. It was dark, the street only lit by the golden light of the sparse, flickering street-lamps. I was running, my breath short, my exhales causing bursts of mist to hang in the frigid air behind me. A little girl in a worn, woollen jumper sprinted by my side, taking three steps for every one of mine, and still struggling to keep up. Her dark skin glistened with sweat. A rucksack - which was filled to the point of bursting with her inventions and things she insisted that she could make ‘useful’ - bounced on her back, the contents clanging together with every stride. A few dreadlocks hung out of her now messy buns, one gathered on either side of her head. It was too dark to see her expression, but I could tell she was terrified from the whimpers she kept letting out. Hetta Abdi was always the worrier of the group, perhaps because she had inherited her godly father’s genius, and was more aware than the others. It seemed like her and I were the only ones sensing the sheer weight of the situation, as neither of the other two seemed too concerned.

The youngest one slept soundly in my arms, her snores echoing through the night as the rest of us ran for our lives. Every few yards the girl’s peaceful face was illuminated by another streetlamp, reminding me of the god who I was certain was her father, as he too loved nothing more than to nap in the most dire of circumstances. How he managed to stayed awake for long enough to conceive with a rich Singaporean businesswoman, I would never know (or want to find out). The girl’s expensive silk pyjamas were stained by mud and monster goop, and ripped at the hems and knees, which she assured me would make her mummy very upset. Even though my arms ached, I clutched her tighter. I couldn’t fail this innocent little girl, who’d known nothing but hardships in the guise of a golden life. She had told me (between naps) that she didn’t mind that I wouldn’t get it, as no one did, but sadly I knew exactly how Aria Chua felt.

The last girl was the feistiest, the alpha leader of her mismatched pack. She was the same age as her friends, about ten or eleven, but had the guts of a rigorously trained soldier on the battlefield. Except, her tactics boiled down to ‘smash everything, then run for your life’ which was not going to help us right now. Still, she insisted on running a few paces behind me so she could protect us if the ‘big doggy’ got any ideas - but how an eleven-year-old planned to beat a hellhound with a scraped and taped baseball bat, I had no clue, but I had learned not to question her. She reminded me of how Meg used to be at that age. All I could do was run as fast as I could and pray the hellhound didn’t gain any ground. Her choppy blonde hair flew wildly around her like a lions mane, her expression just as fierce. Her ratty street-urchin jacket billowed out behind her, and her torn jeans flapped in the wind. Yes, Eden Ross made me think of Meg in more ways than one.

The hound was gaining on us, its glowing eyes washing the pavement with light the colour of blood. Its paws churned up the tarmac. Once I felt its warm breath rustle my hair, I knew it was too late. 

For a split second, the moon was blocked out as the massive figure leaped over our heads. We skidded to a stop (Eden thumping into my legs and giving my thigh a painful whack with her baseball bat on instinct) as the creature landed in front of us with a mighty thud.

It snarled, foamy saliva dripping from its many-toothed maw. Its eyes flashed dangerously, its oily black ears pressed flat against its neck in aggression. It dug it’s claws into the pavement, ready to pounce at any second. Beside me, Hetta whimpered and clung to my peacoat. Eden growled and tensed, ready to swing her bat at the hellhound’s legs. Aria shifted in my arms, the commotion finally waking her up. I seized the opportunity and flung her down to sit at my feet next to Hetta, who grabbed her friend with her free arm, the other fist still tight around my coat. I pulled out a flashlight from my pocket. It  had been made specially for me as a parting gift from Harley, as I had broken his first present to me while fighting Commodus in my trials (a celestial bronze ukulele which I had loved very much). If he could make such amazing contraptions when he was eight, he could certainly make astounding things as a thirteen year old. I clicked the ‘on’ button three times in quick succession, and the flashlight began to extend and morph until I held a sleek, matt black bow in my hand, which I drew. An arrow matching the dark sheen of the bow pooled into existence from the arrow rest to the bowstring. 

The wretched creature did not seem to care. A small pointy stick? It probably thought. Ha! I eat those for supper! It stalked closer to us, unafraid and clearly drawing out the confrontation. It could kill us in seconds. We were no more than its source of entertainment. It was only a matter of time before it tired of this game of cat and mouse, and then we were toast. 

I loosed my arrow. The hellhound snapped it up in its mighty jaw and chomped down on it like the deadly projectile was a cheap chew toy. I felt my heart sank as I realised that I had no hope of defeating this thing. Even if I managed to land a hit on it, I knew my arrows would do little to no harm to it. The best I could do was be a distraction, and by the Styx, I was going to do my best. These little girls deserved a chance to grow up - as someone very close to me once told me, everything living deserves a chance to grow. 

I tightened my grip on my bow and stepped out in front of the kids.

“Mr Lester?” Hetta called uncertainly. “What are you-”

I glared over my shoulder and said in the most commanding tone I could muster: “Run.”

“What?!” Eden barked, her bat still raised. “We are not going to-”

The monster was on the move again. It bounded towards us, opening its jaws to reveal rows of glistening, jagged teeth washed red with blood. I turned back to ready myself for my final battle. 

“RUN!”

I charged the monster, hoping beyond all hope that the girls had heeded my warning and fled. I had no time to check. I loosed a volley of arrows, aiming for the monster’s eyes and joints. A dozen of them found their marks in the hellhound’s matted fur, but it did nothing. I ducked as it made a swipe at my head with its claws. I released more arrows into its side when the monster whipped around, whacking me with its tail in the process and violently knocking the wind from my lungs. My leg made a sick cracking noise on impact with the cold ground. I lay on my back, gasping for breath before rolling onto my front and forcing myself to rise to my knees. Those kids needed me to give them time to get away, or they’d be dog food. I’d grown to care for them over the week they’d spent at my apartment, like all the demigods who passed through. I let steely determination flood my veins as I stood, gripping my bow until my knuckles were white. My left leg was screaming from my rough landing, causing me to lean to the right to keep my balance. ‘Wobbly Young Adult’ isn't exactly a feared status, but nonetheless I tried my best to look territorial. Thanks my many hours spent with Artemis and her hunting dogs, I had a general gist of what actions portrayed which messages, though it had been a while since the last time I spoke wolf - since my last visit to Camp Jupiter, in fact. 

Bearing my teeth, I drew myself up to my full height and glared daggers right into the deathly red eyes of the hellhound in silent challenge. Like; “Hey, you just slapped me across the sidewalk, and I’m still standing. Leave my land, for there is no way you’re gonna top that.” 

Thankfully, the hound seemed unsure of me. It sniffed at the air around me, circling me, as if deciding whether he should heed my warning or pounce and be done with it. I stayed opposite him, carefully sidestepping with my bow drawn and my expression stony. The bitter night air hung still in suspense, like the whole city was waiting with baited breath. Suddenly, without warning, a high, shrill scream of pure fury rang out from behind the Hellhound, startling both of us out of our brief stalemate. We broke eye contact as a little girl of eleven bolted towards the dog, baseball bat in hand and wrath on her face. Her irises seemed to glow yellow in the light of the streetlamps, making her eyes look as if they were alight with rage at this creature’s intent to her friends. She swung her bat with all her might, yelling a war cry that resounded off the hard surfaces of the street. The bat connected with the hound’s leg with an almighty CRACK - and shattered to splinters.

The Hellhound did not like being whacked by eleven-year-olds.

Eden’s face dropped as the monster turned. It snarled and stalked threateningly towards her tiny frame. She backed away, terror evident in her movements as she dropped the remains of her bat with a clatter. The noise was enough to spur the hound into action. It pounced for Eden. The sheer thought of any of my girls being hurt was enough to make something snap - a click of power I hadn’t felt since my last days as a mortal quester. I remembered how I felt when I saw Frank (precious, adorable Frank who would now be around my age now - twenty-five - but I still had trouble imagining him as anything other than the huggable seventeen-year-old praetor I had left the last time I was at Camp Jupiter) burst into flame in the Caldecott Tunnel. I remembered the power I had instinctively called upon when I wrapped my hands around the throat of Emperor Commodus. I called on the same protective might that had made a half-divine crumble.

I let out a singular note: all my love, rage and fear compacted into a roar that cracked the pavement and shattered the bulbs of every streetlight in sight, making glass rain down around me. The hound shuddered and whimpered, it’s head was bowed and it clawed it it’s ears, trying to block out the sound. Eden covered her ears and curled into a ball, the noise thumping down on her even though it wasn’t aimed in her direction. The sight made me falter and stop, clamping my mouth shut should it let out another sound without permission. Everything was still once more - if only for that one second where I stood, glued to the cracked concrete, fearing the worst as I searched for signs that the demigod was okay. In that second, the Hellhound, though visibly weakened, turned from Eden to swipe at the source of the sound. 

Claws raked from my right abdomen to my left shoulder. Warm, red blood, a stark contrast to the cold, frigid night, seeped through my shirt. A pain as white hot as Hephaestus’s most scorching forge erupted from my entire torso. I toppled, my vision only staying clear enough for me to witness the Hellhound’s dusty demise before blurring completely. My heart thumped in my ears. I don’t know how long I lay there. Nothing disturbed me until those wailing sirens…

[elliemarchetti]

Slytherin!Hermione AU (part 11)

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10

Other Harry Potter fics:

Somewhere to Start (part 2) (part 3) (part 4) (part 5) (part 6) (part 7) (part 8) (part 9) (part 10) (part 11)

The Deal (part 2) (part 3) (part 4)

Our First (Almost) Kiss | Our First Kiss

The Polaroids | The Sixth and Seventh Polaroids

Memories of a Survivor 

Words: 2442

In the following years, Hermione never remembered exactly how she managed to pass the exams by living in the almost certainty that Voldemort was going to return but the hottest days of her life passed, albeit slowly,marked by an alternation of written and practical exams and there wasn’t the slightest doubt that the three-headed dog was still alive and well, behind the bolted door. The last exam was History of Magic; after spending an hour answering questions about the inventor of the self-mixing cauldron, they would be free for a full week, before the results came out, which cheered Hermione up a little, even if she was slightly disappointed  by the fact she had unnecessarily studied the Werewolf Code of Conduct of 1637 and the uprising of Elfric the Eager.

"No more reviews!" Ron exclaimed when he joined them in the shade of the tree that she and Pansy had claimed as theirs, one of the closest to the lake shore, but far enough away from the Weasley twins and Lee Jordan who were tickling the tentacles of a giant squid basking in the warm, shallow water. Harry, who continued to rub his forehead, also joined them, which further cheered Pansy, although the boy wasn’t exactly in a good mood. Hermione had already advised him to go to the infirmary but he claimed that he wasn’t sick and that it was only a warning of impending danger, although they didn’t know where it would come from: the Stone was safe and Snape didn’t seem to have discovered how to evade Fluffy’s surveillance. Despite this, Hermione couldn’t free herself from the annoying feeling that there was something important that she had forgotten to do, something that wasn’t about the exams.

"Doesn't it seem a little strange to you," asked Pansy, "that the thing Hagrid most wants in the world is a dragon and a stranger appears who happens to have a dragon egg in his pocket, which is prohibited by the wizards laws? "

"I don't understand. Couldn't he have been a dragon trafficker?" Ron asked, but Hermione, who had been following Pansy's mental process, had already stood up and was running with her friend to Hagrid's hut. Harry, who during the ascent must have understood what the girls had realized, didn’t even give the keeper time to greet them and asked him what the stranger looked like.

"I don’t know," Hagrid replied vaguely "he never took his hood off, so I never saw his face, but it's not strange, there’s a lot of bizarre people at Hog's Head."

Hermione dropped to the ground, exhausted, near a bowl of peas.

"And what did you talk about?" asked Pansy "Have you ever mentioned Hogwarts?"

"Maybe," replied Hagrid, frowning, trying to remember. "He asked me what job I do and I told him, so he asked me what kind of creatures I cared for and I told him, adding that I always wanted a dragon. Then I don't remember so well, because he kept offering me drinks, but I think that’s where he offered me the egg, but only if I had kept it well: he didn’t want it to end up indoors in some house. So I told him that after Fluffy taking care of a dragon would be the easiest thing in the world.”

"And did he show any interest in Fluffy?" Hermione asked, trying to stay calm.

"Well yes, even here you don't often meet three-headed dogs, right? So I told him that Fluffy is good, if you know how to calm him down. Just a little music and he falls asleep like an angel.”

Suddenly an expression of horror was painted on Hagrid's face, once he realized that he shouldn’t have given them that information, but before he could stop them the four kids had already disappeared, headed for the castle, which after the sunny meadow seemed cold and gloomy.

"We have to go to Dumbledore," said Hermione, but nobody knew where the principal lived.

"What are you doing here?" asked Professor McGonagall, who was carrying a large pile of books.

"We would like to see Professor Dumbledore," said Hermione with a courage that all her friends seemed to judge remarkable, unlike the teacher, to whom the request seemed to be suspicious.

"Professor Dumbledore came out ten minutes ago," she explained coldly. "He received an urgent owl from the Ministry of Magic and immediately flew to London. So, provided what you have to say is more important than that, I advise you all to go back out and enjoy this beautiful sun.”

But they didn't follow her advice and began to plot a plan, only to be interrupted again, but this time by Snape himself, who in turn suggested to them, in a much more threatening tone, not to stay indoors on a day like this. Unfortunately, their first plan failed miserably, and they had to ask Blaise’s help to design a better one, which quickly became even more dangerous than the previous. After dinner, Hermione was very nervous and sat down with Pansy, browsing through their notes, hoping to find some spells that could help them that night. Blaise, who was on the same couch, hardly opened his mouth, too focused on thinking about what he was going to do. Slowly, as their housemates went to bed, the room emptied, and after Adrian had given her one last sad look before closing the door of his room behind his back, they were finally alone.

Pansy, who had noticed the whole thing, gave her a long look, which Hermione knew meant that in her opinion she should’ve talked to him, but she didn't go into further discussion, partly because she didn't want to risk arguing with her again, partly because she was too busy thinking about a way to sneak out of the dormitory without being noticed by Filch, his cat or Peeves. It was an injustice that Harry and Ron had the cloak while they could only count on their cunning, but Hermione certainly couldn’t complain that she had no dead parents from she could inherit such a magical object, so they would’ve arranged, as always.

"What are you doing?" asked a voice from a dark corner of the room, from which Sally-Anne emerged like the villain of a sci-fi movie.

"Nothing," said Pansy dryly, who had been deeply disappointed by the girl's attitude, perhaps more than Hermione.

"You're going out again." she noted, and no one denied that, since she was right. Despite she was bad, and had kept a decidedly low and childish attitude, she wasn’t stupid, which certainly wouldn’t have allowed her to understand the gravity of what they were going to do but could’ve stopped them, or at least slow them down, which they certainly couldn’t afford, given timing was fundamental in that plan.

"Even if it were, it's none of your business. And anyway, why are you still awake? And what were you doing hidden in the dark?" Hermione asked, hoping to have caught her in the middle of a crime.

"I wanted to know what you got Blaise into. I may have been wrong, but it's not fair that he doesn't talk to me anymore because of you." she replied, and for a split second Hermione felt guilty, remembering how she had felt when she thought he had chosen Sally-Anne, but then the boy replied, speaking for the first time after a long silence, in a cold voice that would’ve hurt anyone deeply. From that kind of attitude it was evident that he came from a noble family, where screaming was useless but acting in that way dug holes of coldness between themselves and others. Hermione hoped that he wouldn’t become like Malfoy's father, whom he and Pansy had described to her as an ice-hearted person, despicable to anyone, even his own son.

"When you reach a certain level, they’re all like that." Blaise had told her one day, and Hermione had never forgotten it, showing her Malfoy from another point of view, although she was sure she would never be his friend.

"I don't care what you say," Sally-Anne insisted, but before she could go on, Pansy petrified her, without the slightest sense of guilt in her eyes, and they went on. Nervous as they were, they saw Filch every statue’s shadow and believed they heard Pix falling on them in every distant breath of wind. At the foot of the first staircase, they spotted the janitor's cat, which forced them to deviate, but fortunately they didn’t meet anyone else until the third floor, where they reunited with their friends.

"If you want to go back, I won't blame you," said Harry, incredibly serious for being just eleven-year-old, but everyone followed him, although the door was already open and the risk of running into something they didn't want to see was very high. As she imagined, Fluffy was asleep, lulled by the sound of a haunted hard that didn’t sound a real tune but was enough to keep it calm. They crawled toward the trap door, which was incredibly close to the three gigantic heads, and Ron pulled hard on its ring, opening it instantly.

“What do you see?” asked Hermione, anxious.

“Nothing, just darkness.” he replied. There was no way to know if there was a safer means to go down unless they used the Lumos spell but Hermione suggested not to because, although music kept Fluffy asleep, a sudden source of light could disturb its sleep, making it perceive them as a danger. So they decided to jump, Harry first, followed by everyone else when he warned them it was all right. They must have been several yards below the ground, even below Slytherin's dormitory, judging by the wet walls and the fact that a huge amount of Devil's Snare covered the floor. Before it could cling to her friends, Pansy pulled out her wand, waved it in the air, muttered something, and shot a jet of flames at it, the same ones that Hermione had used on Snape. Within moments, the plant withdrew from the source of light and heat, its tentacles crumpling.

"Fortunately, you always pay attention to Herbology’s lessons." Blaise commented, leaning against the wall next to Hermione and wiping the sweat from his forehead. Then they entered a narrow passage that proceeded downhill between two stone walls, the only sound to accompany them the slight dripping of the water, until she seemed to hear, in the distance, a flutter of wings, nearly at the same time Harry saw a light at the end of the tunnel, which turned out to be a room with a vaulted ceiling full of birds with splendid colors that fluttered and circled. On the opposite side there was a heavy wooden door, which led Hermione to imagine that they would’ve been attacked by beaks and claws if they had tried to cross the room, which instead didn’t happen, even if they still faced an obstacle, and a great one: the door was closed and not even Alohomora could open it. Pansy suggested blowing it up, but again Hermione voted against, certain that it was protected by a spell far more powerful than the ones they could cast.

“And now?” asked Ron, but Hermione and Harry had already found the solution and were throwing broomsticks at their companions.

"They are keys." Blaise explained, pointingat what they supposed were birds.

"And they are hundreds." Ron hissed, hateful as always towards the newcomer. He probably would’ve preferred to carry Neville with them than to accept a new Slytherin in their party.

"What we are looking for must be a big old-fashioned key." Pansy noted, carefully examining the lock.

"Probably silver." Hermione added.

"Like the handle." concluded Harry.

"It shouldn't be difficult for you, Potter." Blaise commented, alluding to his role as Seeker in the Gryffindor Quidditch Team. Harry was the first to fly, probably hoping to prove his worth, but it was Ron who saw the right key, who had a wing bent, as if someone had already caught it and abruptly slipped it into the lock. Hermione rushed at full speed in the direction Ron indicated, but risked bumping into the ceiling by how abruptly the key run away.

"We have to surround her!" Pansy exclaimed, never taking her eyes off the right key.

"Ron, you watch from below and Hermione, stay where you are and stop it if it tries to go up while we catch it.” Blaise ordered, and so it was done, but the key dodged all five, forcing Harry to chase it, the pursuit ending with a sinister sound of the key looking for an escape between the wall and his hand. The jubilant cries of the other kids echoed under the vault of the vast room when the lock clicked open.

“Ready?” asked Harry at his companions while he still had his hand on the handle. They all nodded and he pulled, revealing a dark room that suddenly lit up as they entered, parrying an amazing scene before them: they were on the edge of a huge chessboard, behind the black pieces, all much taller than them and carved in what looked like stone. In front of them, at the end of the vast room, there were the white pieces, which made them shiver, as they had no face.

"And now? What do we do?" Pansy whispered.

"But it's clear, isn't it?" said Ron. "We have to start playing and gradually cross the room until we get to the other side."

Indeed, well defended by the white pieces, there was another door.

"And how do we do that?" Hermione asked nervously.

"I think," Blaise replied, heading for a black horse "that we should pretend to be chess pieces too."

As soon as he touched it, the stone came to life and the horse began to scrape, while the knight lowed his head covered by the helmet to look at Blaise.

"Do we have to come with you to cross?" the boy asked without hesitation and the knight nodded. Blaise turned to his companions: "We have to think about it well. Weasley, Potter, can you play chess?”

"Ron is very good at it," said Harry, "but I started only a few months ago.”

"Hermione, you're not a great player, too, so you and Harry will be king and queen. Pansy, you take the place of that tower," he said, pointing at one on the far left “while Ron will take the place of the bishop next to Harry.”

“And what about you?” asked Hermione, worried.

“I’ll be the knight.”

[dukeofriven]

I feel you on criticisms on John. Dude certainly has his flaws and his relationship with other people, particularly Roxy, have clearly been unhealthy. But the guy have apparently been depressed for years, and he haven't actually ever had much experience with real life on person relationships. He got issues he needs to work on, but he is not a bad person.

It’s the rampant hypocrisy that’s eating at me. “Let they who are without sin cast the first stone” y’know? Roxy and John are the only survivors of Game Over - even given the trauma that everyone went through those two went through more. Even Rose, with her vague sense of her alt-self in a doomed timeline, experienced what it was like to fail on such a profound scale: and to know that your failure is the one which the alpha timeline was aiming for all along. Your utter failure was not only pre-ordained, it was requirement for existence to go as planned.Both Roxy and John experienced this, but Roxy got to move to a universe where her friends were still alive, and their formative experiences were identical: Roxy lived through, what, 24 hours that Dirk and Jake and John’s Hot Mom didn’t? Less? Dirk is still hurtling through space when John and Roxy arrive in Post-Retcon world, just as he was before Game Over broke bad. Roxy has to live with the horror of seeing her friends die - but her ‘replacement’ friends are functionally indistinguishable from the old ones. Which I’m not saying to be callous, but to contrast her with John. John moves to a universe where his sister shares almost none of his memories of years spent together on a golden ship, growing up together, bonding as closer friends, as siblings.We don’t talk about that enough, I think. Jade gets shafted in several ways in the final hours of Homestuck: she gets no chance to speak to John and say “you were dead” - to come to some kind of understanding, some beginning of healing. What must that be like, to meet someone - your own brother - who mostly knows a you you never were? John has all these memories of Jade and Jade has only a fraction of the memories of John.And for John there are those issues that he would have encountered anyway in the OG timeline had things gone well. His other close friends (heck, I’d argue he was closer to Dave and Rose pre-Sburb than he was to Jade; he calls Dave, at least, his best friend) had all spent years forming closer bonds with one-another and new people. In the OG timeline, had Game Over not happened and they’d won, John would still have had to bridge that gap of space and time: but he would have had his sister there for support, and companionship, and close bonds. The Jade he instead ends-up with is practically a stranger who spent three years mourning him (AND HER BOYFRIEND BIRDFRIEND WHO IS PART BOY (thanks @technicallynotanon for the reminder that retcon Jade didn’t date)) alone save for a bunch of none-too-bright animals and her ghost clown grandmother.It’s tragic - and to make it so much worse things seem to have been easy for everyone other than John. They all fell in to new things. Relationships, mostly: Dave and Karkat made room for Jade, Rose got married. Relationships tend to tax friendships: the singular I struggles to compete with the plural we. Only Terezi - with her endless capacity to understand the paths of mind - might have understood him: but she left, taking the blackrom crush with her as she did so.John was isolated. John was more isolated, more alone than any other person: even Callie, who had an intermission of eternity being dead, returned to a world full of friends who remembered her well, and she snagged a don’t-yet-have-the-label-for-it-partner in the process. She too had someone to turn to, and that someone was the only other person John shared his trauma with.Sometimes its hard to talk to people. Sometimes it is harder still when the shadow of a life-partner looms over everything.So John didn’t talk to Roxy. Why does that shock us? Why are we the least surprised? Why are we acting like his actions are so unconscionable? For all that they were so darn cute together that cuteness comprised a relation of several hours over which one of the top two greatest traumas of John Egbert’s life occurred.The other was the death of his father, who was murdered, and whose brutalized corpse John had to witness. A murder - as far as we know - that never had any closure. A murder - as he may have come to realize with some reflection - that occurred largely through the manipulations of the same troll girl his only other crush fucked-off to go find and be with.We keep minimizing John’s trauma. We keep not putting it into perspective. We do him such a disservice.We say, instead, that his not talking to Roxy - that brief surge of anger and shame that threatened to break through his crushing anhedonia, his envy of one person who found another when he did not - we say it is some appalling moral failure. I’m a depression sufferer with a life of regrets and an embarrassing number of long years full of singledom and opportunities that were missed accidentally, but just as often avoided on purpose because self-sabotage is a way of life for people like me.Self harm can be as simple a matter as seeing something you want and letting it slip away, watch it slip away, watch yourself watch it slip away knowing you could do something and then… just… not. And afterwards struggling to explain your actions to other people, and even to yourself: if only I’d… if I had just…why didn’t…?You let it happen because, deep-down, you know you don’t deserve it. The paths not taken, the paths heavy with bitterness, shame, self castigation - paths such as these I have in spades, and hearts, and clubs, and even diamonds.But I, of course, could NEVER see myself acting like John does, and I am sure that no one on Tumblr calling John a creeper has ever done something like it either. I am sure their reaction is born of pure and moral rectitude, and not fear and revulsion at seeing themselves reflected so completely in so unflattering a manner.Surely not they. Surely not I.John Egbert doesn’t need a reason to be depressed. Nobody does. But his depression is not solely an accident of brain chemistry: it is rooted in his sense of self, and his sense of self is a failure. He couldn’t save his dad. he couldn’t save his friends. He couldn’t win Sburb and he couldn’t build the universe he was allegedly destined to build. All of that happened only because Terezi knew how to use him: left to his own devices, nothing would ever have gone right. John couldn’t save anyone.Or so it must seem in the haunting privacy of his thoughts.John has lived with that failure circling around and around in his head since… oh, I’d say about thirty minutes after everything settled down on Earth-C, about an hour after the party ended and his friends went to their new homes and their new lives and he was alone for the first time with the things he had done and the things he failed to do. It probably started the moment he first noticed the silence of his house, the house that was essentially an exact replica of the house he had lived in on the very day his father was murdered and his litany of failures began. It probably began when he sat on the couch in that big empty house and stared at the door that his father was never, ever going to walk through and listened to deafening roar of being the only person there.That was when it started: with a hollow emptiness in the stomach. With a skull that every-so-slightly seemed to be pressing in on his brain, a feeling he’d never felt before. The sudden, sharp, jarring flashes of memory: his father’s body ripped eight ways to Sunday, Rose breathing her last in the dust of LOPAN, that awesome expanse of Skaia local alight with burning worlds and desecration. It began when the Heir of Breath found himself short of his own element for no reason at all, save that he simply found it hard to breathe, hard to make his body continue to breathe.He didn’t say anything at first.He made excuses.He didn’t want to bother people - told himself he was actually enjoying the alone time, enjoying having nothing to do after what felt like a lifetime of doing: although, really, the events of his life comprised little more than two sets of 24 hours spaced three years apart. And that bothered him too - “all things considered it’s not like you went off to war, John, and spent years away” he told himself. Retirement after two days of solid work? Most would kill for that. These and other good reasons not to say anything came and went: there was always a good reason not to say anything, and even those times when some semblance of human feeling  burned hot enough to produce genuine emotion he quickly suppressed it. It’s amazing how quickly depression is something you normalize, how quickly you find reason not to disturb it, to upset the status quo.By the time he realized even dimly that he should have said something to someone, anyone - about Roxy, or about that hollow feeling that now comprised his insides, about how nothing caused him joy or distress, that he could feel his youth rushing away from him in a torrent of time that he could do nothing to stop - it was too late. Perhaps it was always too late. This too, perhaps, was something that always had to happen.Perhaps.There is a moment at the end of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead where Guildenstern, standing on the gallows, faced with his impending doom and the absurdity of his existence muses “There must have been a moment, at the beginning, where we could have said ‘no.’ But somehow we missed it.”Then he dies.That line echos with me. I suspect it echos with many people like me. That’s the worst part of depression: the sense that no matter how much your condition explains your past you are never free of the feeling that there was a moment you could have done something about it all - but you missed it. The moment was lost, and everything since has been one long, unending chain of payment for that mistake.John Egbert doesn’t need our pity, and nor do I mean to say that he is free of criticism. Our depression contextualizes our actions, but it does not excuse our frailties. John Egbert, however, deserves better than the disapprobation of sinners throwing stones.

[psychosistr]

The Haunting in St.Canard- Chapter 1

Summary: Drake Mallard, mild-mannered suburbanite by day, masked vigilante by night, moves into a cozy new home with his daughter Gosalyn and his partner Launchpad. However, things take a turn for the mysterious when he discovers why no one has ever stayed in the house for long...

Notes: So, for anyone who’s been following me, you’ve probably seen the art work leading up to this. This story is based off of an RP I’ve been doing with @abbythegamergirl and it’s going to be a haunting/murder-mystery with different endings. Enjoy!

Next Chapter->

The sun shines high above the calm suburban neighborhood within the city of St. Canard, Calisota. A moving truck is already parked in the driveway of one house when the car containing its new residents pulls up to the building.

Or, rather, careens over the curb and screeches into the driveway after clipping the moving truck’s fender. The workers near the truck shout angrily at the driver of the car as the family inside steps out.

The first to exit the car is the driver, a tall red-haired duck dressed in a pilot’s outfit. “Oops, heheh, sorry about that, fellas!” He offers his apology with a lopsided smile, rubbing at the back of his neck as he tries to laugh off the fender-bender.

The next to step out of the vehicle is the passenger in the backseat, a young girl duck with red hair pulled up into pig-tails and dressed in a purple jersey. “Woah, keen gear!” She say while looking at the big house. “I get the big bedroom, right?!”

“So you can turn into your own personal dump? I don’t think so.” The final occupant says when he exits the car. He’s the oldest duck of the trio, that much is made clear by the lines along his forehead, and though he’s significantly shorter than the other adult in their group he’s clearly the one in charge (despite the pink sweater and green sweater vest that make him seem far less intimidating). “WE will pick the rooms, while YOU get started unpacking the boxes in the living room.”

“Awww, no fair!” The girl pouts while folding her arms over her chest. “Why do I have to do all the hard work?”

“Hmm, maybe because SOMEBODY decided it would be fun to mix up all of the packing labels?” He asks while narrowing his eyes at her, leaning down to her level with a mildly-irritated scowl.

She gives a slightly-nervous attempt at an innocent laugh. “O-Oh, yeah, right..gee, wonder who could’ve done a thing like that..?” She runs off into the house. “Anyway, yeah, I should PROBABLY get started on those boxes, huh? Don’t wanna have dinner without the silverware, right?”

The older duck sighs and stands up straight, shaking his head. “She’ll probably get to her videogames and say she’s earned a union break or something…” He mutters before going over to his companion to help him smooth things over with the movers.

While the adults discuss money due for damages, the red-headed girl goes inside…and proceeds to walk past every single one of the boxes that the movers have already brought in.

“Lets see..” She says to herself while looking around. “Knowing dad, he probably had those guys hide all the good stuff..” She goes up and down the stairs a few times as she explores the new house, opening up various closets and bedroom doors to see if she could find a few boxes in particular. She even checks the attic and throw a covering sheet off of some boxes to check the hidden ones as well, only finding a bunch of model airplanes and books.

After a few minutes, she starts to get annoyed at her lack of results..

“Aw, come on!” She complains while kicking the corner of a rug in the downstairs hallway. Doing so, however, reveals an odd line in the otherwise solid floor. “Huh?” she shoves the rug aside more until she reveals- “Keen gear! A trap-door!” She tries pulling on a small dip in the floor that looks like a handle, but it doesn’t budge. “Rats! Must be locked..” She looks the small wooden hatch over carefully for any signs of a keyhole or some other type of lock. “Maybe there’s a hidden switch around here somewhere!”

Temporarily distracted from her quest to find her video games and/or sports equipment, the girl starts pushing at every old painting she can find on the walls to see if it will trip the door. After setting every picture off-kilter, she moves her focus to a large bookshelf at the end of the hall and begins pulling each of the books off of the shelf in a similar attempt to trigger the lock.

“One of these has to be a fake, right?” She asks herself while moving the books on the lower shelf. “Seriously, ‘The Unofficial Biography of Scrooge McDuck’? Who’d wanna read that?” She picks the book off of the shelf with a hopeful smile, but it quickly turns into a pout when the book slides out without any sort of click or whirring sound. “Dang it..” She’s about to move on to another row of books, when something in the space she just revealed catches her eye. “Huh? What’s that?”

She kneels down and starts shoving armfuls of books out of the way, moving everything aside until she’s able to clearly see that there’s a decent-sized hole behind the shelf. What’s even more interesting, though, is what she finds INSIDE of the hole.

“A jack-in-the-box?” She ponders while pulling the item in question out of its hiding spot.

Sure enough, it looks to be a rust-red jack-in-the-box. It’s outlined with faded white trim and has an image of a star on the front. The old turn-crank handle looks well-worn, likely from many years-worth of use.

“Wonder if it works?” Curious, the girl grabs the handle and begins to turn it slowly. The notes come out tinny and warped, like something out of a horror movie about a haunted fairground or a serial killer clown. “Way creepy..” She mutters as she continues to turn the handle. However, when she reaches the end of the song that would normally lead to the “pop”, the lid doesn’t move. “Looks like it’s busted after all. At least the song sounds cool.”

Before she gets a chance to try winding the box again, a frustrated shout from another room startles her. “GOSALYN MALLARD!!!”

“Oh boy..” She sets the box down and stands up. “Guess they finished swapping insurance cards..” She then turns around and starts walking back towards the source of the voice. “Coming, dad!”

When she leaves the hallway, everything is still for a minute.

Then, in an oddly delayed reaction, the lid of the jack-in-the-box suddenly pops open. There is no visible spring inside or any sort of doll or puppet as one would usually find in such a classic childhood toy.

What happens, though, is much more startling: A shadow begins to spread upward along the wall, the light making it look as if it were climbing out of the jack-in-the-box. It grows and grows in height until it stands tall enough to reach the ceiling- actually, it ended up hunching over slightly due to its massive height.

The shadow looks rather frightening, resembling something vaguely duck-like but with much longer and much thinner limbs, as well as a beak of sharp, pointy teeth.

It looks around the hallway for a moment, turning its head in different directions, before it “walks” along the wall in the same direction the girl from earlier went.

It reaches the living room, where the girl is being lectured by the older duck, and hides behind a sofa so that it can watch and listen without being noticed.

“Honestly, Gosalyn, I gave you ONE job!” He fusses at her, finger pointing in a classic scolding gesture. “Did you unpack anything at all, or did you just decide it would be more fun to redecorate the walls and give me an ulcer?!”

“But dad!” She tries to defend her actions, holding her hands out in front of her in a plea for him to listen. “I’m telling you, it’s not like that! See, I found this trap door- come on, I’ll show you!” Before he has a chance to protest, she grabs him by the hand and drags him into the hall where she found the odd door. “See?” She points down at the lines and the handle. “There’s gotta be some sort of hidden switch around here to open it up, right? It’s probably a secret crypt, or a treasure-room for pirates, or the hidden cryogenic storage facility of an alien race that crash landed here, or-!”

Her father kneels down and inspects the sealed door. “It’s the old boiler room.” He explains calmly.

“Boiler room?” Gosalyn’s excited smile instantly drops into a confused frown.

“Yep. The realtor told me this place used to have a boiler, but it exploded years ago so they had to seal up the room.” He stands and pulls the rug back over it. “Probably for the best- who knows what sort of disgusting mess is festering down there?” He looks around at the mess of pictures on the wall. “Now, I want you to start straightening these ouuuu-WHAT?!” He spots the mess of books on the floor from the bookshelf at the end of the hall and turns a mild glare on his daughter. “Gosaalyyynnnnn..” His voice holds a very clearly frustrated tone, warning the girl of an impending lecture.

She gives him a nervous and somewhat embarrassed smile. “I, uh..maaayyybee thought there was a secret book-lever or something..?” She offers by way of explanation with a small, nervous laugh. Sensing a lecture still ready to be launched at her, she quickly moves over to where she left the jack-in-the-box and picks it up. “But, look, I found this behind the shelf! There’s a secret hidey-hole back there!” She looks at the open lid curiously, peering into the dark, empty box. “Weird, it wouldn’t open before..”

That, at least, seemed to shift her father’s attention briefly. “A hole?” At a nod from the red-head, he walks over to the shelf, nudging books out of his way on the floor, until he’s kneeling in front of the shelf that she points out to him. Leaning his head down so he can see between the shelves properly, he finally sees the hole. “Huh, would you look at that..” He reaches back to feel the rough edges of the crudely carved crevice. “That certainly wasn’t in the home-owner’s report..”

“Probably violates some sort of health-code rule or something, huh? You should call him up and see about getting some money back!” Gosalyn suggests with an air of being extremely helpful.

“You’re right, this should get me at least-” He finally figures out what she’s doing and turns to her with narrowed eyes. “Nice try, Gos, but you’re still-”

Thankfully, she was saved by the bell- literally.

The doorbell rang and she set the jack-in-the-box down to go investigate. “I’ll get it!”

“Gosalyn!” He shouts after her, but she’s already down the hall and heading for the front door by the time he’s on his feet again.

She reaches the front door and opens it, the other male duck already heading for the door too by the time she grabs the doorknob. Once the door is open, they see a family waiting on the other side consisting of an obese duck in a Hawaiian shirt, a slender yellow goose in a blue dress and white apron who was carrying a lemon Bundt cake in a clear container, a red-haired and slightly chubby white-feathered goose boy in a red shirt, and a much smaller goose boy with more yellow feathers in a green shirt and big red glasses.

“Howdy, neighbors!” The overweight duck says cheerfully with a smile and a wave. “We’re the Muddlefoots!” He introduces himself and his family, pointing to each of them as he speaks. “I’m Herb, that’s Binkie, and our little guys here are Tank and Honker!”

The older duck enters the room around the time the larger duck begins his introduction. “Nice to meet you.” He says politely, but without sounding anywhere near as excited as the other duck. He extends a hand towards him in another show of politeness. “The name’s Drake Mallard. This is my daughter, Gosalyn, and our..uhh..roommate, Launchpad McQuack.”

Herb takes Drake’s hand and shakes it up and down rapidly, jostling Drake’s entire body in the process. “Nice t’ meetcha, Drake-a-roonie!”

Binkie smiles and hands the cake she’s carrying to Launchpad with a bright smile. “It’s always so nice to meet our new neighbors!”

“Hey, it’s always nice getting’ free cake, too!” Launchpad replies with a grin, licking his beak at the delicious looking cake.

“Oh, thank you, dear.” Binkie smiles more. “The last neighbors liked it, too!”

“There are other new neighbors around?” Launchpad asks while opening the lid and dipping a finger along the frosting to try some.

“Oh, well, no.” Binkie’s smile doesn’t falter as she shrugs. “I just meant the last neighbors that moved into this house. That was what, two months ago, dear?” She asks while looking up at her husband.

“You got it, Binkums.” Herb agrees with a nod. “They just moved out a couple weeks ago. Such a shame, too- they were the longest lasting neighbors we’ve had in years!”

Drake, who had been preoccupied with trying to keep his “roommate” from eating anymore of the cake, stops and looks at them skeptically. “They moved out after only two months? Why? Gas leak? Bug problem?”

“Ghost problem’s more like it..” The youngest goose in the family mumbles, earning a rough elbow to the ribs from his older brother. “Ow..! It-it’s true, though..”

“No one wants to hear your dumb nerd theories, Honker!” The heftier child rolls his eyes at his nerdier brother.

“This place is haunted?!” Gosalyn’s gasps, but it sounds more excited than scared- the smile on her face plainly showing her thoughts on the matter.

“Oh now, don’t you mind our little Honker.” Binkie giggles and pats her son on the head. “He’s one smart cookie, but he gets a little carried away with his ‘paranormal investigation’ shows!”

“Gosalyn’s the same way..” Drake mutters. “Well, thanks for stopping by, but we REALLY need to get started unpacking.”

“Feel free to come over if you want some free burgers and hot dogs sometime!” Herb offers as a final farewell before he and his family leave.

On the way out, though, Honker takes one last look over his shoulder. When he does, his eyes widen and his face goes pale as he spots a tall, ominous shadow standing behind the family. “Waaah!!!!” He quickly runs past his family and heads for the safety of their own house.

Drake and his small family look behind themselves, but see nothing. “??”

“Huh, must’ve seen a spider..” Drake closes the door before looking at Launchpad and Gosalyn. “Now, are you two thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Um..how many slices of cake we should have before dinner?” Launchpad offers after thinking the question over for a minute.

“That’s what I was thinking, too!” Gosalyn grins, her and Launchpad sharing a high-five.

“The answer to that question is NONE- you’ll spoil your appetite.” Drake says while setting the cake down on the living room coffee table. He ignores the resounding disappointed pair of “aww”s and begins pacing the living room with a hand placed under his chin in thought. “To have such a high resident turn-over rate in a common suburban neighborhood so far from the downtown area is extremely unusual. There must be something devious driving denizens out of this deceptively domestic domicile!”

Launchpad, who had been trying to creep closer and snag a piece of cake, suddenly freezes up when he hears Drake’s alliteration. “Y-You don’t think this place is *gulp* HAUNTED, do ya, DW?”

“Of course not, LP.” Drake brushes off his friend’s concerns casually, side-eyeing him in a silent warning to stay away from the cake. “But, cracking this residential riddle is certainly a job for-” He tosses a smoke bomb that he appears to have pulled out of nowhere onto the ground and, when the cloud of purple smoke dissipates, he is instead wearing a purple costume with a large hat, cape, and dark mask. “DAAARKWIIIING DUCK- the masked hero of Saint Canard!”

The smoke disperses into the air of the confined living room, making all three residents cough violently.

“Daaaaad, can’t you go one day without gassing us?!” Gosalyn manages between coughs.

“Sorry, yeah, that’s my bad!” Darkwing coughs as well from the smoke and stumbles over to open a window. “I forgot the AC wasn’t on yet!”

While the house’s new residents busy themselves with clearing the air, the shadowy figure that had been eavesdropping on their conversations creeps back towards the jack-in-the-box still sitting in the hallway.

“A hero…a pilot…and a curious girl…” A deep voice that seemed to come from the shadow itself said quietly as it reached the still open box-shaped toy. “Perhaps they are the ones that I have been waiting for…”

The shadow climbs back into the box and closes the lid behind itself. However, before the lid closes completely, a small object slips out: A photograph that lands face down on the floor before blowing about and winding up between the pages of one of the books still lying open on the ground.

The book seems to close by itself to keep the photo from blowing away, but leaves at least half of it sticking out, revealing the faces of a rat with a pair of goggles and an electrical plug-shaped hat and a duck with a large smiling beak and a jester-themed cowl.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meanwhile, upstairs in a dusty attic littered with cobwebs and freshly-moved boxes, something begins to stir…

A rustling is heard through the otherwise quiet room, a shifting in the corner visible among the unmoving boxes…

The shifting turns out to be a white figure, round and blob-like in appearance as it rises up into the air, appearing almost like a sheet-

Actually, it turns out that it IS a sheet.

A sheet that had been draped over someone as he slept..

A hand pushes forward to knock the sheet off of its drowsy wearer. “Okay, dress-up time’s over.” A voice says with a chuckle as the sheet falls away.

In its place is a much creepier sight of what the sheet cartoonishly resembled earlier:

A ghost.

The ghost is a translucent blue color and has the body of a duck with an exceptionally long beak. The ghost is also clad in a jester-themed costume with lines that clearly indicate that it once had a color scheme that is no longer visible in its spectral state.

All-in-all, the ghost does not seem very threatening in appearance at all- one could even be forgiven for thinking it was merely a regular person if not for the translucent state of its blue body and the fact that it had a classic ghostly-tail instead of legs.

The spirit stretches his limbs and gives a loud yawn, its head rising off of its neck slightly in the process before he taps it back down casually with one hand. “Whooo, that was some nap, eh, Sparky?” When he doesn’t receive a response, he looks around curiously. “Sparky? Megavolt?” He floats over to an outlet in the wall nearby and claps his hands. “Up an’ at ‘em, Sparky!”

The outlet sparks a few times before a large bolt of electricity shoots out of the outlet. The bolt bounces around the room a few times until, with a loud yawn, another ghostly body forms in the air.

This ghost is a rat in an electrically-themed suit, complete with a plug-shaped hat, goggles, and an outlet on his chest. He seems to be in a far rougher physical state, though, as he is missing an arm and, when he opens his eyes after he finishes yawning, he is clearly missing an eye.

“Quackerjaaaaack…don’t call me Sparky..” The rat ghost mutters in annoyance as he stretches and shakes off the last remnants of his own drowsiness. “Is it morning already..?”

“More like afternoon by now, Megsy.” The clown ghost says while looking over the new boxes in their attic. “And look! We’ve got some new toys!”

The electrically themed ghost seems more awake now, a smile slowly spreading across his face. “You mean..?” As his excited grin grows, sparks of electricity travel along his shoulder to form a silhouette of his missing limb, both his real and fake fist flexing in anticipation.

“I sure do, buddy.” A grin that’s equal parts excitedly mischievous and darkly sinister spreads over his beak. “It’s PLAYTIME.”

Next Chapter->

End Notes: Keeping the first chapter short and simple to introduce the main characters. Hope you like it so far :)

[stcllac]

i. ready

snippets lost to the past, all in chronological order.

          be strong, he tells himself as small fists collide with a punching bag too big for them.

         be strong, he tells himself as he hears the children in the apartment below his sob for their mother.

         be strong, he tells himself as police sirens echo down the street for the third time that week.

          ❝ she’s a mistake. ❞

          ❝ there you go stating the obvious again. ❞

          ❝ then i’ll ask the main question: what the fuck do we do with her ?? ❞

          ❝ the population already knows she exists, so we can’t get rid of her. leave her for now. we’ll deal with her when she becomes a problem. ❞

          ❝ fine. in the meantime, she should be educated and taught to act worthy of our name. she might be a mistake, but no one else needs to know that. ❞

          tiny hands reach up to pull at glasses, a childish giggle leaving an equally tiny mouth.

          ❝ he wasn’t left with a name, right ?? what should we call him ?? ❞

          brown eyes stare into blue. a name comes to the tip of her tongue, a sudden idea, but it feels so right.

           ❝ levi. ❞

          his eyes open blearily, only to close again as the fluorescent lights overhead cause a dull ache between his eyes. he focuses on breathing, almost as if he’s forgotten how to do it, and his senses slowly return. he hears voices nearby and listens in an attempt to forget his own problems.

          ❝ another success ?? ❞

          ❝ of course, we never fail. not for the past few years, anyway. ❞

          ❝ where did you find him, anyway ?? ❞

          ❝ wandering the streets, rummaging through trash cans. we thought about making him a raccoon for the irony, but decided against it. ❞

          vague memories are beginning to resurface in his mind, but just as they’re in reach, he drifts into another round of slumber.

          she’s five years old.

          she’s being kicked around like a soccer ball, dragged along the dirt like a potato sack, thrown into the lake like a squirming fish. she cries and yells and gasps as the other children laugh and throw sticks at her face. the sun is excruciating against her pale skin, and she finds shade only to be pulled away and tormented some more.

          she’s five years old, and she thinks she’s dying.

          your entire existence hinges on the stability of this shrine.

          she doesn’t know how she knows this. she doesn’t even remember how she arrived here, what her name is, where she comes from. all she knows is that this is the home she must look after.

          her lungs are on fire but she can’t stop, her gaze fixated on a single spot in the water, her screams directed at the unassuming ripples her voice makes. the other children stare in horror while the adults are calmer. they understand what’s happening, she can tell, so why aren’t they helping ??

          hands gently guide her beneath the surface and against the current, and it’s only when they’ve passed the root maze that she’s able to close her mouth and her fuzzy senses return.

          it isn’t until later that she's told what she experienced: on occasion, a nix will sense when a drowning will occur, upon which they will stare at the scene of the impending tragedy and scream for an extended period of time unless removed from the vicinity.

          ❝ you have a remarkable gift, milady. ❞

          she doesn’t understand. no one has ever referred to her as ❛ milady ❜, and she thinks they’re wrong anyway, as she hasn’t been given any presents recently. surely she would know if she had a gift.

          her father looks at her and she, a daddy’s girl until this very moment, recoils. there is no love or pride in his eyes, nothing that makes her feel safe in his presence. she feels more like an object than a living being and she curls into herself as a protective instinct.

          he surges forward and grips her shoulders, shaking her lightly, and the grin on his face makes her want to cry.

          ❝ you’re going to have it all, ❞ he hisses.

          this, she’ll realise later, is where it truly begins.

          ❝ hey, knock it off !! ❞

          ❝ oh, yeah ?? what are you gonna do about it ?? ❞

          the bully is three times her size, and far too big to be picking on her, let alone a young child, but she’s ready to take him on. she never lets herself waver, staring him down as she raises her fists -- a decoy.

          as expected, she’s laughed at right off the bat.

          ❝ you think you can land a hit on me ?? you’re a fucking pipsqueak, you can’t even reach my -- ❞

          all at once, his feet are swept out from under him, and she pulls her leg back so she and the initial victim can make a quick escape from the scene.

          she leaps. she runs. she cartwheels. anything to get away from the droid after her. she’s at an advantage, her small stature making it easier for her to dodge, and her speed is nothing to laugh at, either. it’s only pressure that she doesn’t work well under, but the adrenaline is helping her through.

          she beats her record by ten seconds, earning her a grin and a ruffle of her hair.

          ❝ that’s my girl. ❞

          he wakes in the snow, mind foggy, eyes searching. the winter woods are dead silent save for the pained sound that leaves his throat as he slowly lifts himself up, more akin to an old man than an eight year old.

          he remembers his name, a term for twilight, a shade before night, but he doesn’t remember who he is. where does he come from ?? who does he come from ?? his instincts tell him that the answers lie through the frosted gates he spots in the distance, but with that realisation comes a sense of foreboding, a strong push that tells him not to follow up.

          he steps back, then again, and again, until he’s completely turned and sprinting to a place more warm.

          the sound of arguing is something he’s used to by now, though he never admits as much. he pretends he never hears their rows at all when they all sit at the table and discuss their day as though nothing’s wrong, and he knows that today will be the same as muffled voices slip through the crack beneath his door.

          ❝ i just want to leave !! let me leave !! ❞

          he’ll say that you can’t leave.

          ❝ you can’t leave !! ❞

          there it is.

          ❝ why not ?? what could i possibly have to gain from staying here ?? ❞

          he’ll mention the kingdom, the people, and their responsibilities. and me as an afterthought.

          ❝ have you forgotten about the kingdom ?? our people, our responsibility to them ?? ❞ a pause. ❝ our son ?? ❞

          he sighs. if this is what being crowned entails, he’ll pass.

          she drags her feet, ready to collapse as she searches for her keys, only to find she doesn’t need them when the door opens without her prodding. her father stands there with a bright smile on his face, and for a few moments she dares to hope.

          ❝ mini-hyewonnie !! great, you’re here. ❞

          her hopes disappear into the void that all her dreams reside in. is it too much to ask to be referred to by her actual name and not a mini version of her ( currently awol ) mother ?? is it too much to ask that she be her own person with dreams and desires ??

          unaware of her inner turmoil, her father continues. ❝ i think i have a lead to where your mother is, i’m gonna go check it out. could you make dinner ?? ❞

          he says this as though he regularly makes dinner, as though she isn’t the one who slaves over the stove every night after both school and her part time job just to ensure she and her younger siblings are fed. he just smiles down at her with eyes that tell her that he’s already made up his mind. she’s cooking dinner whether she likes it or not.

          ❝ sure. ❞

          ❝ thanks, sweetheart, see you later !! ❞

          he’s off before she can say goodbye, and for a moment she just stares as the car starts and he disappears down the road, likely to be gone for a week at least. she resigns herself to that fact as she puts on a smile for her siblings and steps inside.

          ❝ stop it !! ❞

          her words fall on deaf ears, but she stands her ground, arms pointing at the two most important people in her life. she’s trying desperately not to cry because this isn’t how things are supposed to be. she wants to act like a normal ( as if she’s ever been normal ) sister and spend time with her family like a girl her age is supposed to.

          as if that’s ever going to happen, but a girl can dream.

          ❝ you’re leaving again ?? ❞

          ❝ we didn’t tell you ?? we’ll be gone for the next couple of weeks, we’ll be back on the 28th. you’ll be alright to get to school and everything, and you can ask the neighbours if you need anything !! ❞

          he leans against the doorframe with a sigh, watching the car ( once again ) being loaded with bags and suitcases. ❛ that’s not the point ❜ is what he wants to say, but he doesn’t bother. he’s clearly the adult here.

          ❝ we’ll see you when we get back !! love you !! ❞

          it isn’t perfect. the curve isn’t as smooth as it could be and the arrows are different lengths, but he’s never done this before, so he counts it as a win.

          he leaps through the air, following the wind as he targets the trees, hitting them one by one. his laughter is lost in the breeze when he departs from the glade he’s been spending his time, itching to explore elsewhere. he ensures he collects his arrows on the way.

          he avoids the woodland creatures, the only things safe from his sharpshooter eye. there haven’t been many threats as of late, and he craves a decent fight, so it’s no surprise that he whirls around the moment he hears the crunch of the grass behind him.

          his arrow is pointed at a girl not much younger than him, and for a moment, all they do is stare at each other. she doesn’t appear fazed at all. is he not threatening enough ?? is his stance too lacking ??

          in the end, she says, ❝ can you get out of my way ?? i have to get back to work. ❞

          she gestures to a woven basket with various items he can’t make sense of, but it makes him grin all the same, and he bows with confidence.

          ❝ i’ll escort you, m’lady !! ❞          

          ❝ you’re kinda boring, you know ?? nothing, like, stands out. ❞

          he doesn’t think the words are said maliciously. they’re so nonchalant, as if just stating a fact, and he realises with a pang in his heart that that’s exactly what it is. he stares down at his plain clothing and catches sight of his boring black-ish brown-ish hair in the window and wonders how he can seem more interesting.

          his gaze wanders the graphic novel lying on his desk and he flips through the pages, wishing he could be a character from some fantasy land instead.

          the boys in the photographs are familiar, but she has no interest in any of them, eyes briefly glossing over them. how annoying.

          ❝ so ?? do any of them catch your eye ?? ❞

          her glare is as intimidating as any ten year old’s would be, but she knows her message is received when her father sighs in resignation and leans back against the sofa.

          ❝ we only want what’s best for you -- ❞

          ❝ -- i didn’t realise that shoving me into an unhappy arranged marriage and planning my entire life out for me before i’m even a teenager is what’s best for me. ❞

          a pause. she doesn’t break eye contact, though he desperately tries to.

          ❝ your mother and i are happy. ❞

          ❝ liar. ❞

          the word echoes long after she speaks, leaving the weight of her bitterness and indignation for him to see. her eyes don’t leave his until she stands and storms out of the room.

          he doesn’t follow.

          the rain splashes across the tree leaves and drowns the weeds in puddles, but she continues to dance with her eyes closed, magic flowing from her fingertips. she loves the rain, though that isn’t saying much, as she loves the sun and the snow and the clouds and everything the weather brings.

          her companion doesn’t think the same, taking shelter beneath the awnings of her small cottage. all it does is make her laugh, and she wastes no time in scooping the little fox up in her arms and twirling her around as raindrops run through her hair.

          this isn’t the first time he’s snuck out of the house, but it’s the most important time, and his hands shake as he clings onto the windowsill. he can jump from the second storey when in a pinch, but that makes more noise. he can’t risk it. he grabs onto the nearby tree and manoeuvres his way to the side opposite the house, staying aware, hoping and praying no lights turn on.

          the guilt he’s been harbouring since receiving the offer is still with him as he jumps the fence and heads down the road he knows leads to downtown. isn’t he just abandoning his siblings this way ?? perhaps he’s doing this to earn a living that, hopefully one day, will help them, but in the meantime ??

          he’s nothing more than a shitty brother. 

          she runs through the halls, slamming doors and skidding across the floor until she arrives in the dining room. she leaps onto her sister’s back and giggles despite the lack of reaction.

          ❝ janiiiieeeeee, where’s baby ?? i wanna show him the new tricks i learned on the bike and the skateboard !! ❞

          janie stiffens and she’s forced to slide off. she peers around to see her sister’s face and her own drops at the pure worry she sees.

          ❝ janie... what’s going on ?? ❞

          ❝ go-go... i’m so sorry. ❞

          her fingers are covered in blisters and she’s sweating under the summer heat, but she has another accomplishment under her belt and that’s something to be proud of. her fellow members think so, too, judging by the way they high-five each other take a selfie to send to their parents, showing off their newly earned patches.

          she’s about to join them when she hears a voice behind her and, despite it not being directed at her, she turns. it’s pathetic how she listens for his voice with hearts in her eyes. she’s only young, but she’s always been a romantic, and she wishes and dreams that her life will be like the movies and books she reads.

          it’s funny how she can climb a mountain in a skirt, ride a jet ski blindfolded, and save an endangered species, but she can’t tell her crush she likes him.

          she quickly shakes the thought from her head and faces her friends, beaming. ❝ guys, wait for me !! ❞

          ❝ finally graduating, huh ?? ❞

          ❝ right ?? holy shit. ❞

          ❝ got any plans ?? ❞

          ❝ i’ll probably go to the city. ❞

          ❝ seriously ?? lucky. ❞

          ❝ you only have one more year, don’t you ?? you can make it. ❞

          ❝ i think you’re overestimating my academic abilities, my man, but thanks. ❞

          ❝ i don’t just mean academics. academics who ?? don’t know her. ❞

          ❝ bitch, i wish that was me. ❞

          the tallest tower isn’t high enough, but it’ll do for now. he spreads his arms and closes his eyes, letting the wind gently caress his face, the cold nipping at his nose. he doesn’t mind.

          is this what it feels like to fly ?? is this how his father feels ( felt ) every day ??

          ❝ i’ll find you, dad, ❞ he whispers to the clouds. ❝ i promise. ❞

          huddling in the corner between the wall and her bed isn’t the best course of action, but it’s all she can do. she’s paralysed, frozen as she listens to the whispers and feels the chills that travel up her spine.

          none of the other kids get this way, so why ??

          ❝ go away, ❞ she whimpers as she senses a presence beside her, but when she looks there’s nothing there.

          she cries harder.

          the moment she opens the door, she’s bombarded.

          ❝ where were you ?? ❞

          she dumps her bag in the hallway. ❝ library. ❞

          ❝ by yourself ?? ❞

          heads through the kitchen, doesn’t look at her mother. ❝ yep. ❞

          ❝ what were you doing there ?? ❞

          takes the steps two at a time. ❝ studying. ❞

          ❝ are you going to answer with more than one word ?? ❞

          ❛ are you going to stop cheating on dad with some sneaky ass rich guy and buying me presents with his money because you feel guilty ?? ❜ is what she wants to say, but she bites it back and simply says, ❝ nope. ❞

          row after row of statues, the smell of dust and grime taking over her senses, her footsteps the only sound in the chamber aside from her laboured breathing. she knew something was wrong, that there was something she was missing, but she never thought it would be something as disturbing as this.

          familiar faces are etched in stone, and the further she walks the sicker she feels. it has nothing to do with the state of the room.

          she doesn’t react save for unsteady footsteps until she finds the statue at the back of the chamber. it’s like looking into a dirty mirror, and her gaze roams around the oh-so-familiar pose until she feels bile rise to her throat and she’s forced to cover her mouth to keep it in.

          ❝ why do you keep these ?? ❞ his mother asks, turning up her nose as she picks up one of his old casts. she must have found one of his secret treasure boxes.

          he grins. ❝ ‘cause !! it proves how many awesome things i’ve done !! ❞

          his mother shakes her head, but he spies the small smile on her face as she does.

          she waits until she’s perched on the windowsill to light the match, throwing it onto the documents she's spread across the study. she’s taken everything she needs and refuses to leave anything else for her father and sister, though she’ll miss the days she spent rummaging through the shelves when her father thought she wasn’t around. not that he looked hard enough anyway.

          the papers ignite and she drops onto the grass outside, making a mad dash for the forest. her father’s screams moments later propel her forward and she smirks as she disappears into the night.

          she’s useless.

          she never says as much out loud, knowing she’ll be met with resistance, that she’ll be told that she’s perfect, which is just ridiculous because that isn’t true for anyone.

          ( well, it is for perhaps one person, but she’s biased. )

          if she wasn’t useless, she would be able to stop the crying she hears when she explores the castle. her father would consider her a strong and educated girl instead of something he remembers to see every few months. she would be able to prevent the wounds inflicted on her cousin before a hand is even laid on him.

          no hands would be laid on him at all.

          but she has always been useless, and useless she will continue to be.

          lean fingers spin the ring around, light reflecting off the gold band. she hasn’t seen this particular item amongst her mother’s collection before, and she’s sure she would remember it, even if the last time she played dress-up was years ago.

          figuring she can indulge herself just this once, she slips the ring on, staggering back when she’s enveloped in a blinding light.

          the moon dips below the horizon. tech finishes fiddling with the audio and he watches the ❛ on air ❜ light flicker on.

          he grins.

          ❝ good evening, listeners... ❞

          ❝ alright, guys, gals, non-binary pals !! it’s time for a q&a, the final and arguably best part off the night !! ❞

          before he can say anything more, his phone pings, and he checks his notifications as questions spam the chat. a message from his sister isn’t unusual, but the message itself has his eyes widening before he can stop himself.

          ❛ he’s back. ❜

          he sucks in a breath. he’s only vaguely aware that he’s still streaming and, barely looking up from his phone, let’s out a rushed, ❝ hey, i’m so sorry, guys !! a family emergency just came up -- don’t worry, everything and everyone’s fine, but i have to be at home !! i’ll make it up to you guys soon, bye !! ❞

          ❝ the new girl thinks she’s better than us. she doesn’t say hello, barely even smiles, what the fuck ?? ❞

          ❝ i’ve heard she does sketchy shit late at night, if you know what i mean. ❞

          ❝ are you kidding ?? i bet she’s never worked a day in her life. ❞

          none of these things are said to her face, and she’s sure that she isn’t meant to overhear, but not being a human comes with consequences. sometimes better hearing is one of them.

          the only person who says anything directly is a nervous looking boy, and judging from the way her classmates are watching and giggling behind their hands, he drew the short straw.

          ❝ hey, uh... your parents are seriously fucking rich, right ?? ‘cause people are saying they’re, like, swindlers or whatever -- ❞

          she cuts him off with the way she looks at him. it’s a variant of her usual disinterested expression, this time with a fire behind her eyes.

          ❝ my parents are dead, ❞ she says, loud enough for the entire class to hear.

          she rubs her forehead, willing the ache to disappear. she can’t afford to take a break now, not when her deadline is quickly approaching and she hasn’t even begun her search for her parents. there are so many things she has to do and so little time to do it in.

          coffee. coffee will make things better.

          only when she checks the cupboard, the instant coffee is gone, used up by her sleep deprived self that morning. her fingers clench around the handle as she curses herself for not remembering to pick any up after work. it isn’t a big deal, it’s just coffee, and yet it’s the cherry on top of everything that’s gone wrong lately, and she has to swallow thickly to get rid of the lump in her throat.

          she slaps her cheeks and shakes her head. no, be strong.

          fire consumes her, but she doesn’t burn. she’s revitalised. any ache or pain she may have felt before is gone, making way for the power she never realised she had. she doesn’t know what it is or where it comes from, but she thinks she can take on the world.

          a petty criminal will have to do.

          the robber is taken away within minutes and she’s surrounded by strangers, and perhaps it’s the high from the fight, but she feels so in control, so valid.

          she answers the call next time it comes around.

          ❝ why bother learning about your history when you can make your own ?? ❞

          ❝ what do you mean ?? ❞

          ❝ i mean that i could tell people where i come from and why i’m here now and all that boring stuff, but why bother when i could give them a story ?? ❞

          ❝ but... wouldn’t that be lying ?? ❞

          ❝ not if you make it grand or fantastical enough. ❞

          ❝ i’m not good with words like you are. ❞

          ❝ maybe not, but you’re surrounded by history. i’m sure you’d be able to think of something. ❞

          ❝ hey, i’m not about to dishonour the dead that way. ❞

          [ LOADING... ]

          [ LOADING... ]

          [ LOADED ]

          [ ACCESSING... ]

          [ CONNECTED ]

          ❝ hello !! how may i help you today ?? ❞

          his face is warm where the sun showers him with light. his eyes remain closed, both because he doesn’t want to damage them, but also because he truly can’t be bothered. he’s content where he is. why should he move ??

          something -- someone -- shifts beside him and he whines, just a little, wrapping his arms around the moving figure and curling into them.

          he could die happy here. he has the sun, some sleep, and his best friends beside him.

          ❝ everybody hold on tight !! ❞

          she doesn’t need to be told twice. her hands find another’s -- she’s not sure whose -- and she clings tightly as the countdown begins, faster than it’s ever been before. these are dire straits. there isn’t time for the usual fanfare that comes with the spell that she’s usually so enamoured by.

          this is a fight for survival.

          the countdown ends and she shuts her eyes tight as the familiar swooping feeling returns to her stomach. she hears a scream from the opposite side of the room, but doesn’t open her eyes to investigate. she doesn’t want to see them.

[presumenothing]

once more with feeling

(or, spooky action at no distance)

belated halloween-ish fic, aka questionably-serious crackfic with a heavy side of casual morbidity and inappropriate science. also entirely unedited phonefic which i refuse to even reread before posting. beware of character death (sorry shiho) and property destruction (not sorry). working title: the ectoplasmic method. this is what happens when grad school deadlines meet the looming shadow of finals?? idk just have it anyway

Somewhere, in the cell of a singularly dismal back room –

A figure falls to slump against the wall, the handcuff on one wrist letting out the sad jingle of a clink as it takes on most of her weight.

The same somewhere, scant minutes later –

"Oh, bollocks," says a disembodied voice, two feet up and several inches to the left, with more heartfelt feeling than its owner ever really displayed in life. "This isn't even scientific at all!"

…ahem. Anyway.

The first thing that Shiho does with her newfound freedom from both matter and gravity (along with most of physics and the sciences, really, natural or otherwise) is to float back out to the main lab, and sigh a non-essential breath of relief at the absence of a tiny horde of spectral lab rats scurrying about.

Admittedly the process of doing so is rather less smooth than imagination might suggest, with more error than trial in the grander scale of things, but such is the steady march of science.

Either way, some brief confusion of force and acceleration aside, the lab proves empty of any (other) less-than-corporeal entities.

Hypothesis: either said rats were once here and had since dissipated with the pass of time (because she refuses to use such a vague phrase as move on, even setting aside the question of whether it would even – theoretically – apply to animals of questionable self-awareness), or this… ectoplasmic… existence is yet another astronomically-rare effect of the apoptoxin.

Shiho's still mulling over the question when she reaches for the coffeepot from long habit…

…only for her hand to pass right through it. Predictably enough, in hindsight.

Her eyebrow twitches.

…

……

………………

Revised hypothesis: the afterlife sucks.

The moment of decaffeinated betrayal is interrupted by the insistently loud tick of the wall clock.

Her baleful glare at it yields nothing much of use, since she hasn't had any way of reliably telling the time over the past couple days, given her spectacularly cozy accomodations.

If nothing else, it's probably going to be a couple hours until someone discovers her very dead body and alerts Gin, she thinks in no little vindication – followed by an itemised list of unprintably detailed expletives.

Because, in that moment of thought, she'd suddenly found herself elsewhere in a quantum blink, with no experience or memory of having crossed the intervening space.

And staring Gin almost in the face, no less.

Shiho definitely does not shriek as she throws herself aside, all the while cursing stupidly broken FTL teleports that didn't even have the decency to deposit her somewhere more pleasant. Like Majorca, maybe. Or even back to America.

…actually, on that thought – Shiho narrows her eyes in concentration.

Several (failed) attempts at geographically displacing herself later, she gives it up as a bad job, earmarked for further study. At the very least Gin didn't act like he'd heard any ghostly screeching that may or may not have happened, even if he also failed to display signs of the sudden chill – more's the pity – that featured so consistently in those terrible movies she'd had the misfortune of being coerced into watching by certain people one time too many.

Though she supposes that could also be due to the fact that she'd dodged with the express purpose of not having him walk through her. Not that intersecting spaces with a corridor wall had turned out to be a much more comfortable option, on the whole, but it's mostly a matter of metaphysical principle.

Either way. Shiho inches forward until she's no longer coexisting with shoddily-constructed cinderblock, all the while cheerfully ignoring whatever nefariously above-her-paygrade evil Gin is monologuing about to Vodka, over the increasingly loud click of heels.

…wait. Heels? she repeats mentally, before promptly noping back through the wall before she has to experimentally verify whether Vermouth, of all people, can see her or not.

Which is how she finds herself somewhere that looks suspiciously like Gin's dressing room, complete with shelves of overpriced hair product, full-length mirrors, and a wardrobe she assumes must be full of identical white turtlenecks and black trenchcoats.

"Hm," she says, aloud, as she sets to work. All in the name of science, of course.

(Careful recollection of events, multiple attempts, and a fair assortment of choice swears later, she figures out what her previous attempts at properly haunting ghosthood had been lacking: emotion.

Fortunately, she doesn't lack for any degree of anger in this circumstance. It still takes some trying to have the conditioner bottles explode messily rather than just fall off the shelves with a series of dull thunks, but eventually she manages it.

Though she limits herself to breaking only one mirror. Just in case the bad luck accrues to her instead of Gin.

Then again, she is dead. How much worse can it get, really?)

Armed with her newfound discovery, she attempts to teleport again. A few minutes' intense concentration on the comfortable familiarity of her lab brings her back to where she started, but thinking fondly of her doctoral research lab garners her nothing but a faint headache and an impending sense of hypocrisy.

At least she confirms that her body is still where she left it.

Honestly, she's almost unsure whether to be offended or not, Shiho thinks, as she watches the slow creep of rigor mortis across her muscles.

Unbidden, the lone photo from that newspaper clipping flashes to mind –

"…oh, come on!"

Look, it's not like Shiho can deny the miniature cataclysm of feelings surrounding even the echo of that image, but really? Really? After everything else she's tried?

And why to an elementary school, of all places? Jeez.

Shiho rolls her eyes at the corridor – which stands empty, this time – and swears off shattering any more mirrors before floating off again. There's an awkward moment when she vaguely recalls something about children supposedly being more sensitive to unscientific phenomena, though that's quickly falsified by the inhabitants of the first half-dozen classrooms she passes through, teacher or student alike.

Ironically enough it's the de-aged Kudo Shinichi who does react somewhat to her presence, when she finally manages to locate his classroom – and honestly, couldn't he have at least faked his way into a higher grade? Pretend to be very unusually short for his age or something? That can't be enjoyable at all.

Shiho tries to imagine herself stuck with this bunch of seven-year-olds and can't help a shudder, which is why she almost misses one of said children leaning slightly backwards in her seat to whisper far too loudly. "Are you alright, Conan-kun? Do you need a sweater?"

"No, I'm fine," Kudo-kun demurs, rejecting the profferred garment – quite rightly too, Shiho thinks, since that's just plain asking to be a vector for germs. "Just a cold draft, that's all."

He doesn't look even once in her direction, but relaxes visibly when she finally floats back out of the classroom to observe via a window.

Huh. Interesting. Maybe it's something about having seen too many corpses?

Shiho almost discards that out of hand on grounds of Gin, who had seen easily ten times as many dead bodies, most by virtue of having put them there by his own hands.

Admittedly, now that she thinks on it, it does seem entirely possible that Gin would not notice a localised drop in temperature due to being cold-blooded to start with, anyway.

She has insufficient data, she decides, and three working guesses: either Kudo-kun has seen too many deaths, too many corpses, or he's just looped into the same cosmic joke for having taken the apoptoxin as well.

History and statistics suggest that she'll eventually run into both mass murderers and homicide officers if she hangs around him long enough. Which leaves the third category quite unverifiable, but at least it'd make more sense than some high school detective managing to be the single outlier that should not be counted in any statistic, ever.

Though even waiting out the school day in the hope of some murders happening feels like an increasingly unattractive prospect, she thinks, pulling a face at the chalkboard's worth of mind-numbingly basic math when the bell stubbornly refuses to ring the end of first period.

She didn't skip through the first half of her education just to subject herself to it in death, of all things, and besides it's about time someone found her body anyway.

Shiho contemplates the hallway ceiling for a minute before managing to rebel further against gravity until she reaches the rooftop, already preparing to move herself back to the lab once she gets her bearings straight.

Then someone behind her gasps Shiho? in a voice all too familiar, and she –

Shiho isn't actually too sure what happens, in the following minutes.

Somewhere in the glassy shards of thought left fractured by her sister's voice is a swift-rising horror that it'd all been a lie – that the bullet which killed Akemi-oneechan was one she'd made with her own hands –

And maybe she says some of this out loud, maybe she doesn't, maybe it's simply that her sister has ever been the sole person in this world who understood her (even if she'd only realised that too late), but when the unrelenting static finally clears Shiho find herself not-quite hyperventilating on the rooftop of one Teitan Elementary, head spinning from the lack of air that she doesn't even need, and the one voice she'd never thought she'd hear again.

Even through the haze she can hear onee-chan saying things like it's not your fault, never was and Shiho almost shakes her head in reflexive denial, even as her mind whirrs back to that thrice-damned photograph and whispers agreement in logic, that death by apoptoxin is instantaneous and a gunshot wound would've left a significantly different blood spatter post-mortem, which meant –

"How are you here?" she chokes out, unable and unwilling to look up and meet those eyes. "If it wasn't the APTX – "

"APT– oh, is that the drug you were working on? No," Akemi says, with a sudden vindictiveness that startles Shiho into looking up anyway. "No, it was that utter scumbag Gin who shot me, you can take my word for that."

Shiho supposes that she must look unconvinced somehow, because Akemi adds, "I'd say that you could confirm with that little detective about that, but… well…"

Her gaze follows the wave of onee-chan's hand down to a cluster of small figures in the field, one of which is barely identifiable as Edogawa Conan, from this distance. It raises another dozen questions in turn, but still Shiho persists. "But how are you still here? Why haven't you… moved on?"

"Unfinished business, I suppose you could say."

"Huh?"

Akemi-oneechan blinks at that, in some apparent surprise. "Isn't it obvious?"

Shiho shakes her head in full earnesty.

"Oh, Shiho," Akemi almost-sighs, as she floats over and – catches hold of her hands, with a bout of warmth against all logic, the first solid thing Shiho's felt since this all started. "It's you, of course, it was always you."

…her words won't work and either way she knows not what to say to that, so Shiho just stands (floats) there, gaping silently like an idiot.

Somehow Akemi-oneechan is still smiling. "Well, I mean – I did manage to track down Dai-kun by accident, and I've been keeping an eye out for anything around Conan-kun, you wouldn't believe the amount of trouble he gets into. But the only one I worried over was you, and yet I couldn't find you, no matter what I tried…"

Shiho tries – and mostly fails – to process all this, and pieces together the next logical question. "Then what about me?"

She'd thought that it'd been because of the apoptoxin, but that's obviously invalid now, even if it galls her to replace that with such a ridiculously nebulous notion as unfinished business –

"There must be something you haven't done, a wish you haven't fulfilled, or… well," Akemi pauses, and Shiho can tell just from the lilt of her tone that she's not going to like whatever follows next, "like I've always been telling you, maybe it's just that you need to live a little. Have some fun, you know!"

And Shiho surprises them both by snorting a laugh at that. "In that case, I've gotten a start on that already."

To describe Akemi-oneechan's expression as starry-eyed would not be amiss, nor her voice as a squeal. "What did you do?"

"…destroy all of Gin's hair products?"

"Really?! Oh my god, Shiho-chan, I'm so proud, I always knew you had it in you – "

.

.

.

(AO3)

listen i literally?? don’t even?? know???? i did not see this coming, no plans here only bad jokes. the semi-crack antidote to this previous fic or something i guess, except not. don’t @ me 

[antikristvs]

Inktober Writing Challenge

(I have been really struggling with the challenge lately. This piece was especially hard given I accidently lost the whole work, thus had to re-write the entire story. I have little time to catch up, but I'm trying. Hope it fucking scares you)

Day 22: A Creepypasta

The Story

I debated bringing this story to light for weeks. It haunts me as clear and vividly gruesome as if the nightmare had unfolded a mere hour ago. I spent day after day wallowing in vodka, however no amount of alcohol rescued me from the bottomless gulf of heartbreak and guilt, or dimmed the abysmal horror lingering like poisonous thorns goring my ailed heart. It seems I have no choice… I shall succumb to insanity looming over me and pull the trigger if it  remains silently locked under my ribs, and my dear friend will have perished in vain. And her kid… He sincerely wanted to help. All this madness, death and agony he roused for me. I must unveil what happened, perhaps then I can breathe once again. I am to keep personal details as vague as possible, for if authorities find out my relation to the tragedy, I may land in more trouble than I can handle.

It began a few months ago. I was a horror author in the spring of career. My first novel, Miasma, had been published the previous year, I found myself in a storm of praises from readers and critics alike. Everyone was starving for my second book rumored to come out the following Halloween. Nobody could possibly know the truth… How hollow I had become, a mummified shell of the creator I once was. I drowned myself in spirits and melted my brain with cocaine to make existence bearable, distancing from friends and loyal admirers. Except one. For the story’s sake, I am going to name her Nellie. We… were morning against midnight, summer against dead of winter. Nellie was a single and eight months pregnant bachelor in family studies with a dream to one day run her own daycare. She had not as much as glanced at my book, far too squeamish for things I depicted, but cherished every part of me. I scorned Nellie for it. Who could adore the cynical addict I was behind a charming mask of blossoming talent… In my mind, no one. Nobody sane at least. I will divulge my soul and sincerely admit Nellie would have been the first person I shunned if not the stubbornness so aberrant to her naive and gentle self. She would not let me decay in peace, ringing the doorbell every fucking day with a flowery paper bag of home-cooked food and a rented DVD. Sometimes, she would even have me tag along to a tiny local coffee shop around the corner, where somehow, I smiled to the green-haired barista and signed a couple of autographs people asked me for. Nellie was the sole reason why I chose not to end it all. And I’m certain she knew. She was mellow, yet not a fool neither blind.  I loathed her, but found it impossible not to love her. She knew I could not bring myself to let her find my lifeless cadaver with skull blown off and brains all over the wall.

Upon stirring awake and noticing it was six in the evening, I caught myself both dismissively relieved and slightly concerned. Nellie always showed up around three in the afternoon to drag me out of bed and scold me for downing five cans of Red Bull to stay restless till ungodly hours of dawn again. Swallowing the worry and assuming she got caught up in university work, I stalked to the kitchen, only to freeze in sheer astonishment oozing with faint and abstract sense of primeval terror. Among the clutter on the table, sat an object which definitely had not been here before - a neatly folded piece of paper. Frowning, I snatched the mysterious item and frantically stared at the elegant note within. Gravely wind gushed through the balcony door I had not realized was open, and my skin grew pale as bone.

“End of the road behind the city park. I shall be waiting upon your wake”

Before spiralling into perpetual gloom, I used to be an avid urbex explorer. I’d gladly risk getting injured or arrested to sate my fascination for the cryptic and the macabre. Even Miasma, my novel, was inspired by an abandoned hospital a few streets away. Thus I certainly was aware about a deserted road behind the city park despite never having stepped a foot on it due to work and later misery devouring all my time. It was enlaced with legends and eerie stories told in slumber parties, university students organized ghost tours there for Halloween, high schoolers filmed themselves sniffing around to impress their crushes. Older folks feared the road like ants fear fire, claiming a curse plagued it, and monstrous specters roamed it on moonless nights. Nobody had dared to complete the route in last two decades, or lived to tell the tale, but an abandoned church was said to still stand at the end quite firm, held together by forces of ancient evil which infested it.

Though I doubt there is any need to mention urbex was no passion of Nellie’s.

I tossed the crumpled note away, grabbing my coat and bursting through the door, not bothering to brush my hair or change the jeans and shirt I had been wearing for last five days. All I hoped was that the hood will obscure my face enough for me not to be recognized.

The city park laid an hour away from my home on foot, and took an hour more to cross it. Without a physical possibility for the police to monitor the entirety of such a large area, the place could get extremely dangerous at night, lunatics, rogue criminals and homeless heroin junkies lurking in the bushes. Yet I could not care less about peril. Dread of something unnamed and far, far more cruel than a knife or a gun awaiting at the end of my destination pulsing like sick, festering aura around me likely  pushed any attacker to turn around anyway. My muscles were burning, sharp twigs whipping my face as I took every possible shortcut. The air was thick and heavy like butter, it felt as if my lungs had been flooded with slowly stagnating slime, robbing me of oxygen and making my head foggy, sight growing dark. I bit my lip harshly, rough, warm taste of iron dripping on my tongue, and pushed forward, struggling not to collapse.

I wish a gasp of ardor had erupted from my throat when indeed, outline of a small, crumbling church of gray stone emerged from the dark. I wish I had gingerly leaped forward, clutching my camera and already spinning a chilling tale in my head. Not limped towards impending doom growing clearer and clearer in front of me, ankle sprained in the rush refusing to obey my sizzling nerves.

What I found inside the forsaken sanctum surged me with such sepulchral, abysmal sensation I fail to flesh out earthly words to recount it. The horror… Oh, the spine-crushing horror. Nellie was here. She gazed straight at me, starry blue of her gaze now glassy, final visage of sheer fright and despair chained in the milky prison until maggots gnaw it away, mouth agape in a wordless greeting muffled by raw red muscle stuffed withing. She laid so heinously beautiful on the split, mouldy altar, broken arms motionless by her side, bare intestines slumped over the edge, blood and yellowish, reeking stomach fluids still trickling and spreading around as if a morbid halo. Her chest… Torn open, flesh and fragments of fractured bone scattered around, a dusty golden Chalice set in the middle. I stumbled backwards, screeching soundlessly. On top of it… placed a severed head of an in infant, so tiny, but almost fully developed, ruthlessly gouged out of a lifeless womb.

What… What in the name of all Saints and Sinners… Was this all a nightmare?.. A hallucination?.. Let it be, please, let it be!..

“Do you like it?” a voice rumbled from my left, guttural, yet serpentine,  shaking every fiber in my body with shock so intense I broke out of paralysis, jumping and turning around to face four blazing amber orbs in the shadows.

The figure rose seven feet above ground, without counting the enormous crooked horns sat upon his head that is. Black as obsidian, his skin merged flawlessly with the murk, or was he cloaked I could not tell.

“I beg you, fear not… I did this all for you” he continued without waiting for a response of mine “For your story. A child once lost a scripture of yours on the road that I wandered. I gave into curiosity, and the way you weave words of terror has bewitched me. I have watched over you ever since… I saw how uneasy your slumber was, I witnessed the pain drained ambrosia has brought you. Please…” he gestured towards the desecration “drink inspiration for your new story”.

[maximuswolf]

Metaphors and Medication Come-Down Tomfoolery via /r/schizophrenia

Metaphors and Medication Come-Down Tomfoolery

Currently waiting for the sun to rise so that I can sleep and have found myself in the zone. Things are comfortable and easy, so here’s a few thoughts. Might be a long read, no need to invest the time if you’re not intrigued. Although, it would be nice to see how others describe their experience without trying to make sense, just unadulterated thought processes.

The personal human experience exists on such a strange spectrum that manages to be both sparse and overwhelming at the same time. Trying to get a concept, born out of a lifetime of stimulus and learning, from point A to B in any social situation never does justice to the realities of my sentience. I’ve learned to use metaphors to bridge that gap, sending them out like a Hail Mary without regard of how well they work as explanations. It’s my world, my words, and if it doesn’t ring a bell with you, we’re probably in the same boat.

Anyways, here’s some of them:

My departures from reality feel a lot like being the main character of a Twilight Zone episode. There are so many episodes I’ve seen that trigger the same feelings of foggy, disoriented memories of my own life. The minute becomes dangerous, the horrifying seems normal, and the impending feeling of doom is all over. It helps me to quantify and subdue my episodes by looking at them as if Rod Serling is narrating them. Sometimes it’s uncanny and vague, like knowing for a fact that my room isn’t my room, just an exact replica that switches back and forth between being real or fake like Schrödinger’s Cat. Other times, it’s the stretch of gravel road between the farm and the highway that doesn’t end, filled with almost-humans being pulled toward my truck by an unknown gravity. At its worst, it’s the entity in the corner of the room that wont let me focus on anything but it, yet my mind creates a void every time I try to remember what it looked like. I could go on, but the show really does capture the imagery and situations that my mind doesn’t want to grasp.

I’ve been watching my grandfather slowly deteriorate due to Alzheimer’s, and one of the most profound parts about it is “things”. Once he got to the point where oral communication meant nothing, “The Things” became his catchphrase. It’s so hard trying to understand what he means, The Things could mean anything. That’s the bothersome part. Take any life experience, important object, or concept and strip it of all its meaning, all its significance, all its symbolism. You’re left with a Thing. Seeing him describe all facets of the world around him as Things made sense. At my worst, I can’t describe anything or be coherent. It’s just The Things, the overwhelming conglomeration of the world I have to process. It’s horrible and Lovecraftian in nature. The overwhelming cosmic horror that is The Things. At some point I am robbed of any ability to ground myself with insight, having my brain being thrown into a feedback loop of everything all at once. On a brighter note, my very sweet dog is never one of The Things.

To wrap up, I’d like to shoutout Dudeism. Sometimes having the ability to shrug the world off with no regard for any repercussions is important. Worst case scenario, I die. My smoke detector can’t try to dive bomb me when I’m dead.

I may regret writing this once I have taken my medication, but I feel it is important to be able look at yourself with humility and kindness to acknowledge that you are who you are regardless of how liquified your brain might be at certain times. As long as it’s done respectfully and responsibly, it’s A-OK to let yourself ride the lightning every once in a while.

Submitted January 29, 2021 at 04:09AM by FrogVEVO via reddit https://ift.tt/3cmZTLC

[drink-n-watch]

You know how it’s smart post writing to sort of keep the punchline of your post until the latter half? Or you know, until at least the second paragraph so people can’t just know your entire thoughts from the little snippets in search engines or in reader and have to click on your actual post to find out? It’s sort of elementary good post writing basics. Anyways, I loved this episode. I can’t even quite explain why (spoilers for the rest of this posts there) but I enjoyed it tremendously. Let’s see if Crow is better at this building suspense thing than I am!

I’ve seen bloggers able to do that! Let’s see if I can pretend… I loved it, too, but I won’t say why until later. How’s that? I’m building mystery!

Of course, spoilers for episode 84 (Deky vs. Gentle Criminal) of My Hero Academia. That’s the one in which Deku and Gentle Criminal meet for the first time, in case you’re reading this way into the future or something.

Let me just start by laying out the summary of the episode. It’s just about time to put on the show for the school festival and last minute preparations, and nerves abound in class-1. Everyone has gotten into the spirit of things and is desperate to put on a great show. Deku and Aoyama realize that the rope which Deku was going to use to hoist Aoyama above the audience and make him float around is a bit worn, and they worry it could be dangerous. So Deku resolves to go buy one in the morning right before show time.

So far it’s pretty standard festival episode stuff, but it’s charming. They manage to really bring the anxiety and excitement of impending performance across and I was getting psyched for the show right along with those kids.

First mystery reveal: That’s part of what I loved about this episode!

In the morning, Deku darts out to the closest hardware store for the rope, but runs into Gentle just as he is leaving the small café next door. Surprisingly, both of them recognize each other and a confrontation ensued in which we finally get a glimpse at both Gentle’s quirk and his plan! Did I leave anything important out?

Nope! Those are the important details! I also thought it was funny that Deku’s knowledge of Gold Tips Imperial got Gentle Criminal so excited he started to talk to Deku! It was a little detail, but I liked it.

Like I said, the first part of the episode was really sweet. The show did some heavy duty heartstring tugging by throwing in some Eri flashbacks. It was also just fun seeing how everyone dealt with the upcoming show and the pressure of performing in their own way. However, one of my favourite parts was actually Deku getting his gloves.

Some of you may remember that Deku had commissioned some extra accessories from Mei and it seems those were gloves. First of all, Mei is one of my favourite characters so of course I’m going to enjoy any scene she’s in, but the gloves themselves were just really cool. I mean they looked great, I understood exactly what they did, had a vague idea how it could work and it just made a whole lot of sense with Deku’s powers. Practical fantasy is awesome!

More Mei is always better. If I were Deku, I’d be working with her and some of the business course students to build relationships. I don’t care if Mei’s babies blow up as often as they work (or more?). She’s talented and creative. If I were a her, those are exactly the skills I want in a support staff!

The meatier part of the episode is certainly the Deku and Gentle meeting. Their initial interaction was actually very funny and edited in a way that makes us think Gentle and Deku are really very similar. Like Deku could have become a criminal just like Gentle is he had taken a different path.

It’s hard to say without seeing how this all plays out. It’ll come down to Gentle Criminal’s motivations, I think, and exactly what he plans to do once he gets to the school. But that initial interaction was wonderfully awkward on both sides — it’s like they both knew the conversation was wrong, but they couldn’t escape!

I personally don’t think this (that Deku and Gentle are counterparts). Yes, Gentle and Deku do have some similarities in the way they analyze things and in certain aspects of their demeanor, but I think they are fundamentally different. I also think that considering his personality, a disgruntled and disillusioned Deku who turns his back on heroes is more likely to become Stain than Gentle…. Stain was a good character.

Stain was an amazing character! And that’s why I need to see Gentle Criminal’s motivation. If it’s as ideological as Deku, he might go as dark. But then, with Deku’s power, he’s more likely to be the blunt object that was Stain than something more refined. I just argued myself in such a tight circle that I got dizzy.

Let me just say it right now, Elasticity has got to be one of the best quirks ever. Like not the most powerful or anything, although it seems like it could be very powerful, and it’s also really adaptable and can be used in so many different ways. The idea that you can rubberize air itself holds so much potential. Also more than a bit of fringe horror as Gentle could easily encase someone in a cube of rubber air and asphyxiate them if he was a more violent type.

But beyond the practical considerations of this power there’s the anime design considerations. It’s fun to animate and watch things bounce around. It creates a lot of dynamic fast movement scenes and the wobbly scenery it leaves behind is also visually interesting and brings a bit of levity to fight scenes. It’s a good power that’s easy to explain. It’s a wonder it took them this long to use it.

It’s like they kept his power a mystery to build suspense! And in fact, I liked that power so much it’s my next to last reason I liked this episode so much — for exactly the reasons you just explained. Interesting concept with a visually exciting execution. Perfect for anime!

It’s possible that I missed something. Not to mention that I’m not sure to what extent Gentle is a reliable narrator, if at all, but from what I gathered Gentle’s plan is to simply sneak into the festival, for the views. Like those jerks that disturb people at work because they think it will make for good clickbait on YouTube. Putting aside the means for a second, the base motivation here seems to be just personal fame. And that’s not bad at all, in fact it’s kind of cool. After all those anti heroes or broken villains with elaborate plans and deep Freudian excuses, it’s sort of refreshing to have an antagonist that just sort of a shallow jerk. And the entire conflict comes simply from the fact that he’s selfish and not very empathic. That’s not a bad character type and it’s one that My Hero Academia hasn’t used so far, so I like it. The slight issue I’m having is that it sort of clashes with how Gentle has been presented up until now. He always seemed more clueless than self-centered and for some reason, I convinced myself that he had a reason for his actions beyond fame. This is why I’m not entirely sure if I missed something. What do you think, Crow?

I don’t think you missed anything; or if you did, we missed the same thing. I have a sense that the narrative is keeping the full explanation ambiguous to keep us interested, and to be honest, it’s working with me. I mean, can the explanation really be as simple as he’s just a jerk? Or is there something more? I think there’s more to La Brava than we’ve seen so far, but that’s no great insight — the cliff hanger in this episode was her about to use her Quirk, and there’s some hesitation on her part and on Gentle Criminal’s to use it.

And let’s go back to the means. Sneaking into the school festival sounds harmless enough, but if Gentle is caught, the event will probably be canceled, which would be heartbreaking for all the kids that poured their heart into it and were looking forward to it. But it goes way beyond that, it takes away the symbol, the “everything is going to be ok” message that festival stood for. It’s another bit of darkness encroaching on the light.

Much worse would be if he actually got away with it and the festival went off without a hitch with Gentle in attendance. Not only would posting the video afterwards destroy the message as well, but it would send a signal that UA security can be breached. It would announce loud and clear that no one is safe anywhere. That would truly be a disaster.

It’s like a malicious attacker getting into a company’s computer network. It’s bad enough for the incursion to work, only to be detected and repulsed by the company’s security team. It’s quite another to find out days, weeks, or months later that the breach happened — and the security team wasn’t good enough to even realize it.

Like I said, I really liked this episode. I’m still not sure why. And I can’t wait to catch up with Deku and Gentle next week. I wonder if we’ll get to see La Brava’s quirk. Do you want to guess what it is, Crow?

For an instant, I wondered if it was some kind of limited time jump, but with severe consequences for the quirk user. That’s probably because of some of the audio books I’ve listened to recently! Other than that, my second guess would be that she has the ability to capture and arrest movement with her camera; but then, why wouldn’t she use that more often? Do you have a guess?

I also think it’s camera related but I really don’t know what it is. I briefly thought she may have the power to trap people within the video, maybe for a limited amount of time. This would have the potential for a very interesting fantasy episode if the characters ever put on a play or something…

I think one of the things that I liked most about the episode was that the fight reminded me so much of the first three seasons. Deku isn’t zipping around with an Eri power pack (or limiter). He isn’t taking on a villain who can crush city blocks. He’s taking on a criminal who has some skills, but who’s unlikely to crush a city. Ever escalating stakes are fun for a while, but they have diminishing returns. A return of an earlier form is a pleasant break, I think.

My Hero Academia s4 ep84- The Show Must Go On You know how it’s smart post writing to sort of keep the punchline of your post until the latter half?