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choking-on-tae · 3 years

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ATEEZ Reaction To: Kissing you out of nowhere

A/N: I've been in a really fluffy mood lately and I've been wanting to write this for a while now. This was supposed to be pretty short but I got a bit carried away. Hope you guys enjoy and as usual gifs aren't mine and credits to the rightful owners! x

Seonghwa

Seonghwa feels someone staring at him, and when he looks up he sees you looking at him. He chuckles softly as he moves closer to you, which makes your eyes grow wider. Even though you've been dating for a while now, you're still not used to being so close to the beautiful man. Which Seonghwa finds adorable.

"It's just me, Y/N."

"I know, but you still make me nervous."

Seonghwa smirks upon hearing your words when an idea pops into his head. He leans in even closer until his face in mere inches away from yours and looks into your eyes. His hand coming up to gently hold your jaw.

"Can I kiss you?" He asks, his voice soft as he stares at you lovingly.

You feel your cheeks heat up as you softly nod your head.

"Yeah you can."

Seonghwa leans in until his lips are pressed against yours, kissing you softly until he pulls back. Both of your faces red as you giggle at each other. He leans in for another quick kiss, and another one until both of you are giggling messes.

Hongjoong

Hongjoong is confident but also a soft guy, so I think he'd be quite nervous for your first kiss, since he wants everything to be perfect. You two are at your favorite café when he finally decides the timing is right. Unlike most couples that go out on dates, you two sit next to each other instead of on opposite sides. It's something Hongjoong suggested on your first date and you've been doing it ever since. You've finished sipping your drink when Hongjoong notices that some of the whipped cream is stuck to your lip. He giggles softly as he leans in closer.

"Why are you laughing at me?" You pout, folding your arms as you glare at your boyfriend, who only laughs harder when he sees your adorable expression.

"You've a little.. here let me help." He says, as he leans in until his lips brush against yours, successfully getting rid of the whipped cream.

You just stare at him with wide eyes as he pulls back and licks his lips. "Hm, that's pretty good!"

You chuckle at your boyfriend as you lean in to press a kiss to the corner of his lips, this time catching him off guard. Now Hongjoong is the one to be flustered, which makes you laugh.

"That's what you get for taking my whipped cream."

Yunho

Since the weather is so nice you decided to get ice cream together. Of course being the gentle man he is offered you to pay for your ice cream, and you refused but Yunho swiped his card before you could and therefor he paid. You're still a bit bitter that he wouldn't let you pay but the ice cream is still delicious. Yunho chuckles as he wraps his arm around you as you two make your way to a bench.

You start to eat your ice cream as you take in your surroundings. The weather is really beautiful and with the flowers blooming it looks even more magical. Yunho notices that you're lost in your thoughts as he chuckles softly to himself. You really look adorable when you do that. Yunho wants to get your attention and so he leans down to press his lips against yours, snapping you out of your thoughts.

When he pulls back he can't help but laugh when he sees that you now have chocolate ice cream on your lips.

"What's funny?"

"You'- You've ice cream on your lips." He laughs, hiding his face behind his hand. His happiness is affectious as you too can't stop yourself from laughing, poking out your tongue to remove the ice cream that was staining your lips.

Yunho leans back in to press another kiss to your lips, again smearing chocolate ice cream all over it. "Yunho!"

This time he fully cracks up as he throws his head back in laughter, clutching his stomach as he looks at you.

"I can't help it! I just really like kissing you and smearing ice cream all over your lips."

Yeosang

You're walking hand in hand through the new zoo that opened up not too far away from where you live, so of course you wanted to check it out. Yeosang drags you from one animal to the next as you chuckle at his excitement. You stop in front of the seals as you hear your boyfriend let out a soft squeal. "Look at that baby! It's so cute!"

You chuckle softly as you watch him make his way to the glass and press his hands up against it. Right that moment you spot a little boy around the age of 4 doing the exact same thing. Yeosang seems to spot the little boy too as he slowly makes his way towards him.

"They're cute, right?" The little boy looks up at him as he nods, quickly going back to watching the seal that passes right in front of them.

Yeosang motions for you to go to him and do the same, which you do. You too press your hands against the glass as you stare at the seals. Yeosang moves a little so he's behind you, his arms caging you in as you feel his chest against your back. He rests his chin on top of your shoulder as you watch the cute seals together.

Yeosang nuzzles his nose against your cheek before quickly pressing a kiss against it, catching you off guard. You turn your head to face him and are surprised when he leans further until his lips are pressed against yours.

The kiss is soft and short but it's enough to make your heart flutter. Yeosang smiles against your lips before pulling back and going back to resting his chin on your shoulder and looking at the seals.

San

Ever since San found out you're ticklish it's become a habit for him to tickle you every so often. So you're not surprised when he comes up behind you and starts tickling your sides. You let out a squeal as you try to get away from him, to no avail. San's giggles fill your ears as you let him attack. Giving up trying to fight him since you know he's stronger anyways. Once San notices he stops immediately, a soft pout appearing on his face.

"It's not fun when you're not trying to get away." He pouts, tightening his grip on you as he holds you close.

You chuckle at his words as you lean in to kiss his lips, which look extremely kissable right now. San smiles softly as he pulls you tighter against him, deepening the kiss slightly.

You pull back and press a kiss against the corner of his mouth, making him giggle.

"You're so cute, San."

He blushes at your words as he goes to hide his face in your neck, but you push him away.

"No! Don't hide from me!" The two of you laugh as you hold each other tightly, constantly switching between cuddling and kisses. And of course tickling each other again.

Mingi

You and Mingi are watching a random movie on Netflix, cuddles up on the couch as you share a bowl of popcorn. Mingi's head is resting on your shoulder as he lets out a soft sigh. It's not that he isn't enjoying the movie. He just finds it very hard to focus when you're next to him. To Mingi you're far more interesting than this movie that he's seen 5 times already.

So he tilts his head slightly to press a kiss to your cheek, only for his lips to touch yours instead. It just so happened that you decided to turn your head the moment you felt his lift off your shoulder. You stare at each other in shock before giggling softly. This wasn't how you imagined your first kiss with Mingi to be.

"I... I can't believe we just accidentally..." You laugh, stopping mid sentence when you see him looking at you with so much love in his eyes.

"Wh- Why are you looking at me like that?" You stammer, trying to turn your face but Mingi is faster, taking your chin in between his fingers as he turns your face to look at him.

"Because you're beautiful and I really want to kiss you again. Properly this time. Is that okay with you?"

You nod softly as you see him leaning in, his soft lips pressing against yours again as his hand moves from your chin to your jaw, pulling you closer as he deepens the kiss. The two of you pull back when you hear a loud scream, only to see it was one of the characters in the movie that startled you. Both of you giggle as you let out a sigh of relief, worried that it was one of the boys that caught you.

Mingi presses one last kiss to your forehead before he goes back to resting his head on your shoulder, wrapping his arms around your middle as he holds you close while you continue watching the movie.

Wooyoung

You let out a groan as you let the whisk fall into the bowl. Wooyoung chuckles from where he's standing next to you as he stops what he's doing. "Need some help baby?" You nod softly as a small pout forms on your face.

"It's just though to get all the lumps out of the mixture." You pout, moving aside so Wooyoung can take over.

"Good thing you've a strong boyfriend then." He smirks, sending you a wink as he starts mixing the batter.

You wrap your arms around his waist as you press yourself up against his back, leaning your chin on his shoulder as you watch him mix everything until the batter is smooth, which doesn't take him long.

"Tada! I think it's perfect now!" He smiles brightly as he shows you the batter.

You lean in to press a kiss against his cheek when Wooyoung surprises you by smearing something onto your cheek, laughing hysterically. You frown when you wipe it away, only to see it's some of the batter you've just been mixing.

"Jung Wooyoung!" You shout, taking some of the batter yourself and running after your boyfriend, who ran away screaming. Both of you laughing loudly as you're chasing after each other. Wooyoung finally caught you in his arms and started smearing the batter all over your face. You do the same to him. Once you've both ran out of batter you stare at each other until you burst out in laughter.

Wooyoung laughs as he realizes pretty much the only spot on your faces that doesn't have batter smeared across it are your lips, so he leans in to press a kiss against your lips.

You giggle as you pull him closer, not caring that there's cake batter everywhere as you kiss softly.

"Hm, we should bake together more often." Wooyoung mumbles against your lips, instantly pulling you back again so he can kiss you some more.

Jongho

If there's one thing you and Jongho enjoy doing it's working out together. You're nowhere near as extreme as he is but you do join him once a week, which is more than enough for you. Jongho enjoys these days a lot because he's able to work out with your help, and able to spend more time with you.

"I want to do some sit ups, can you hold my legs for me?" He asks as he moves to lay down on the floor.

"Of course." You say as you sit down on your knees, holding onto Jongho's knees as he flashes you a soft smile.

"Hold them tight, I might move a lot."

You nod as you brace yourself, but to no avail. Your boyfriend is much stronger than you and you're almost being pulled forward. Jongho falls back as he laughs loudly, trying to compose himself.

"I told you to hold them!" "I know! But I didn't know you had this much strength!"

"Just hold them tight, okay?"

"Okay."

This time you're prepared as Jongho moves up, successfully holding onto his legs so he's able to do his sit ups properly. After about a minute or so your focus starts to go elsewhere until you notice your boyfriend's face mere inches away from yours every time he comes up.

Jongho chuckles when he sees your cheeks turning pink when an idea pops into his head. This time when he comes up again he leans in just far enough to kiss your lips. You stare at him with wide eyes as you watch him go down again, only for him to come back up and do the same thing.

This time you chuckle softly as you playfully shake your head. "You're unbelievable. Is this why you wanted me to work out with you?"

Jongho nods as he stops his exercise. Coming up to you again and this time kissing you properly, his hand coming to rest on your cheek as he pulls you closer.

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mrpenguinpants · 4 years

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Razor: Jealous HCs

Hey anon!! As much frustration I hold for crippling oblivious couples, I also love the trope so much. Plus I adore Razor. Even though I try to not call Razor a dog, I still google “jealous dog traits”. Also, I found out both Hanniejji and I secretly HCs Bennet is friends with Razor and Fischl. If genshin won’t give me character interactions then I’ll write it myself.

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Semi Part 1: General HCs

Semi Part 2: Pre-Relationship HCs

Semi Part 3: Cuddle HCs

[Masterlist]

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[taglist] <- if you want to be added, please read this first.

@mikeysbike @unionwitch @musekala @sunnshiii @stanzastic @akaasea @xoneaboveallx @adoring-ghost @asheseiler @childelover @dilucsz @dai-tsukki-desu @thicmitten @nonniechan @htnicayh @genshins1mpact @morthecreator @ aanne2601 @hanniejji

Razor: Jealous HCs

Bennet and Fischl are both foaming at the mouth at how deeply in love you BOTH are and yet you’re both equally blind. Fischl wants to grab you by the shoulders and yell at you that Razor returns your feelings and you need to stop doing whatever it is you’re doing. A sad Razor looks like a kicked puppy and even she can’t handle it. But Razor absolutely refuses for anyone to confess for him because he believes that you might just genuinely be uninterested in him. Plus, it wouldn’t feel right if he couldn’t confess himself. It’s his first love, this is important to him.

Bennet thinks it’s really sweet that his friend is in love. Even if he does get a bit pouty that whenever he get’s hurt, Razor will ask if he’s alright and leave it at that. But if you accidently trip Razor is already at your side and fussing over you. Bennet uses this as physical proof that yes, your feelings are returned and this man is in love with you, but you always brush it off as Razor’s nature to be caring. He’s smiling patiently on the outside but on the inside he has his hands in his hair and he’s screaming.

God forbid anything upsets you. Razor hasn’t been around other humans long enough to pick up on most social cues but he does have a good sense of smell. If you’re happy then the wind smells like sweet flowers. If you’re upset then it smells like mint. While Razor usually keeps himself in check and is somewhat indifferent, the second he catches any signs of distress from you he’s on high alert. Until you tell him what’s been bothering you - a group of hilichurls stole your bag of snapdragon flowers - he’s going to be on guard and stressed out. He’s already throwing his claymore over his shoulder to go and fight the monsters that tried to upset you. Wow, what a good friend you say to Fischl. Fischl is ready to punt you off a cliff.

Razor tries his best to show that he likes you by bringing the things you need and looking like such a proud pup. He looks at you with such hopeful eyes that it takes you a second to register what he’s asking before you feel your own heart rate speed up and pound into your ears. You flush pink before you move to embrace him and ruffle his hair as praise as he nuzzles into your shoulder affectionally. You assume his affectious actions are apart of his wolf nature and how they act so you try not to read too deep into things. Even if Razor seems a bit too happy to be hugging you and receiving pets. Or the fact he doesn’t let anyone else pet him...

Bennet tries his best to help his friend out by giving Razor some advice but considering Bennet himself hasn’t been in a relationship yet, it’s all practical. Telling Razor that he’s seen couples bring each other flowers as a sign of affection, maybe Razor could find some plants to bring you? It ends horribly when he offers you a wolfhook and you just stare at him. He says that these are his feelings towards you but you’re just...so confused?? Wolfhooks have thorns so does that mean he thinks you’re clingy? Isn’t that a bad thing? Are you annoying to him?? But wolfhooks also symbolize wolves so is he saying you’re like family to him??? You’re internally screaming while debating if you just got family-zoned or if Razor is trying to subtly tell you that he doesn’t like you.

Just because Razor is, somehow, unsure if you actually like him or not. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t get incredibly jealous and possessive at any unknown presence. He’s still a bit wary of the City due to all the conflicting smells and noises but he can’t help but look so sad when you have to run errands and you can’t visit him. But when you mention that a really nice knight gifted you a flower does Razor see red. He gave you a flower?? Shouldn’t you be happy with his? Why do you need another one when you have his? Is his gift not good enough? Is this your way of saying you’re interested in someone else? This poor boy is on the verge of either running off to go sulk or find the man that gave you this flower, which up until his knowledge - courtesy of Bennet - is a sign of courting, and absolutely destroy him to prove he’s the better partner.

He tries to keep it under wraps since he's been told that while in the City, he needs to exercise restrain and understand that if he enters. He's expected to at least respect the laws and people. But this poor wolf is so feral over this new development and this new smell that's been clinging onto you that whatever worries and isolation issues Razor felt about the city flies out the window as his protective instincts kick into overdrive. He sees other people and even pets as a rival for your attention and love. He just wants to scoop you up and growl at everything as a message to say “this is mine, go get your own”.

Even when the both of you are far away from the city, Razor’s continued mood seems to hang heavy over both your heads. You’re not sure what exactly caused Razor to be on high alert. He’s snapping and growling at everything little thing that comes close, even a butterfly!

You abruptly stop walking to Razor’s surprise as you whip around and frown at him. He can feel a chill run up his spine as he stands perfectly straight as you study him before you hold your palm out and looked at him expectantly. He looks at your hand with a small spark of perked attention before his nose twitches and he goes back to sulking. You’re still waiting for him as he shuffles a bit, his hair that resembled a wolf ear is twitching, before he whines and trots over and places his chin on your palm. He’s looking up at you with the most kicked puppy expression and you don’t even know what you did but you feel like the worse person in all of Teyvat.

“Razor...what’s gotten into you?” you ask gently as you rub circles into his cheek as he nuzzles into your palm. He seems really conflicted as his eyes dart away from your face and he almost looks guilty. He just whines and turns and buries his face into your warm palm. You’ve never really seen him like that before as you awkwardly try and comfort him. Until the same flower slips out of your pocket and you hear something primal growl out of Razor. His teeth are pulled back and he snarls at the flower as his pupils dilate. You quickly get between him and the poor flower before Razor tries to do anything.

“Seriously Razor, what’s gotten into you?” you asked concerned. He quickly shifts his attention to you as he pounces and knocks you over. You left off a soft noise as the wind get’s knocked out of you but you peep when his hands cage you from above. Razor’s red eyes bore into yours and you’re suddenly thinking the air is getting too hot.

“Do you like Razor?” he asks, tilting his head in a cute pout. It makes you internally coo before you quickly snap out of it. Stay focused!

“Of course I do! Remember we talked about this?” you say as you remember back to your previous interactions but this only seems to frustrate Razor more.

“No. Not that like. More...” Razor struggles with his words as he tries to piece together the right string of sounds to try and convey what he’s feeling. He seems so conflicted that it breaks your heart a bit. So you reach up and gently rub behind his ear as he closes his eyes and relaxes. He breathes in deeply as his eyes open and his pupils return to normal, but vastly determined.

“Together. Always. Just...us,” Razor says softly as he looks at you hopefully. There’s a small pink dust to his cheeks as his fang digs into his lip in nervousness. You’re not sure why but your heart absolutely sky rockets at it and you can feel your face flush pink.

“Um, yes?” you nod along, you think you’re understanding what he’s trying to say. Maybe he was just upset you were spending so much time in the City and away from him that he felt your friendship was neglected? That would make you really upset. But the way he phrases his words makes you believe that perhaps...

Before you can think more on it. Razor’s face breaks into a grin that nearly blinds you from the pure affection that sprouts from it. He’s already hugging you harder as he starts rubbing his nose and cheek against your neck. Making soft and happy sounds as he nuzzles you. He’s never done that before but you assume he’s just so happy. You breath a sigh of relief that it appears that your message to him was clear enough.

Yeah of course, friends always, you think

Lupical. Partner. Mate, Razor thinks.

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whistling as I pretend I don’t see your stares. Yeah ik but it’s ok. This is a sorta semi series. We’ll build upon it. But Xiao content is next lol. I’m taking inspiration from this. I mean, when I don’t feel like shit 😷

I’ve been listening to [ Softy - Dear Moon ]. This isn’t the usual kind of music I listen to but it came on shuffle and this is now my mental breakdown song.

Quick edit: Turns out this is an ost from “My Mister”. I’ve never been into kdramas (I think I’ve only seen goblin, she was pretty, and Hwarang) but the cover picture looks so upsetting? My friend is really into tgcf and I believe that had a live action as well.

#genshin #genshin impact #genshin x reader #genshin impact x reader #genshin imagines #genshin impact imagines #genshin headcanons #genshin impact headcanons #genshin fanfic #genshin impact fanfiction #genshin razor #genshin impact razor #genshin razor x reader #genshin impact razor x reader #razor x reader #razor #razor x aether #razor x lumine #razor headcanons

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cesabutterflywrites · 4 years

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When One Meets An Angel

Part [1] in An Angel’s Smile Series

“At first I didn’t want to fall in love. But at one point you just smiled at me and here I am.”

Summary: Janus Ethan Dannecker starts college with only a box, backpack, $300, and a ton of emotional baggage that is overwhelming. The broken home he came from cast a shadow on him that he refused to let anyone see. The scars on his body were no match for the scars on his soul. He made it his mission to never let anyone see where he came from. See what he was really made of. See how messed up he would always be.

That is, until Patton Mavers smiled at him. Ao3 [Next Part] [Spotify Playlist]

Word Count: 2184

Story Warnings: past abusive childhood, angst, untreated/undiagnosed mental illness symptoms, detailed descriptions of abuse, cursing, implied/referenced substance abuse. Rated M for Mature audiences. Let me know if I need to add more, and read with caution!

When One Meets An Angel

Janus Ethan Dannecker was not good with honesty. He’d been through a lot of shit since the very beginning of his life. He found it easier to lie about everything because honesty caused harm. Honesty hurts. Exposure had the potential to be abused. It was not something he could risk. Not anymore.

He still felt, though. God, did he feel. So much so that he wished his lies were true. Every “I’m fine,” that fell from his lips so easily were secretly wishes that it would be a reality. Each time he was forced to give a smile he hoped the next one would be genuine.

For the first day of his new life, he wasn’t dressed for the part.

Janus was wearing a plain black t-shirt underneath a thick, large yellow-and-black flannel that he got for a bargain at Goodwill. His jeans weren’t purposefully ripped, but they were five dollars. He wore his only beanie-a black piece with red text reading ‘Skyline Titans’. His shoes were new. He splurged to get sturdy combat boots that he hoped would work for his first winter with snow.

The beanie was comfortable on his brunet hair. It had gotten too long, seeing as he couldn’t afford a haircut. He had struggled to tuck his bangs to fit underneath the hat without it falling off. It was a fight he eventually lost.

His pace was slow as he walked up to his dorm room for the first time. He watched the students milling about with their families carrying boxes full of remnants from their childhoods. He felt a pang of loneliness as he carried his one box of the bare necessities of life.

He had his backpack, one box of the absolute necessities, and 300$ to his name to start the beginnings of college. He didn’t have much to bring from his childhood home. Well, if you could call it a home.

He finally reached his dorm room door. It was open, so he could see into the space he’d call home for at least a year. From where he stood outside the doorway he saw a Green Day poster, a purple blanket with an orange spider pattern, and the shoulder of the person who was most likely his roommate.

The band poster was a bit too angsty for his tastes, but he’d learn to live with it if his roommate used headphones for his music. The blanket was obviously a comfort item from how worn down it looked. The person who owned the shoulder was laughing, causing the arm to shake.

Getting a read on someone was not only easy, it was necessary. He’d be stuck with this person for a year. It was his first time living with someone outside of his...family. He would have to create a whole new persona to keep up for a year. Of course, he knew this ahead of time. He didn’t want to be vulnerable because of his past.

Janus didn’t want his negative outlook to overwhelm the person he’d be living with. He needed to gather himself first. He took in a deep breath. He made sure to rearrange his mask enough to be a perfectly polite person on the outside. It should have concerned him how quickly he was able to put it on in a new environment. How easy it was to scream in the mind without making a sound in the world.

He walked in with a forcefully reserved smile that quickly dropped when he saw there were two other people in the small room. One of them was sitting on what would be his bed.

The boy on his bed was beautiful. He looked like the human embodiment of a cinnamon roll. His wavy blond hair fell in his face perfectly with a blue streak in the bangs. He wore large, circular glasses that seemed too heavy for his face. He had freckles splattered underneath the frames which spread down his cheeks and up to his temples. The eyes behind the glasses looked like pieces of green jade. They were bright companions to the pink lips that were pulled at the corners in laughter.

Janus seriously wondered if love at first sight was true; when the love came from the first glimpse of an angel’s smile.

He averted his gaze from the angel to look at the people in the room. There was a tall lad leaning against the desk underneath the window. He had strawberry blond hair, which was a reasonable length on top while being recently shaved along the sides of his head. His grin was also beautiful, but not nearly as beautiful as the one that belonged to the perfect stranger on his bed. He had blue eyes that seemed to be teasing at potential mischief. He looked like the type to have owned a Letterman jacket in high school. Tall, muscular, probably a jock of some sorts.

The third person in his room was definitely his roommate, which was a given with the emo interior Janus had seen so far. His smirk was playful as he looked at the redhead. He had shaggy, shoulder length, purple hair that fell over his eyes enough to cover one of them. His black nose ring flashed in the sunlight coming from the window. He was wearing a black hoodie with sewn purple patches. His eyes were such a dark brown they looked black. He looked like an adult living a seventh grade emo student’s dream.

Janus would have found him intimidating if it weren’t for the fact that he had dealt with scarier people in his life.

The laughter had died down when they saw him standing in the middle of the room holding the one large box. They all seemed to notice him at the same time.

“Oh, I’m on your bed. Here, let me get up so you can set your things down.” The angel offered politely. His voice was heavenly. Janus wanted to throw the nerves of the day away to just listen to that voice wash the dirt off of his tarnished soul. Which felt silly, confusing, and terrifying.

Janus muttered a soft “Thanks” as he tried to control his blush.

He was rarely caught off guard, and it was a miracle that this surprise was such a pleasant one. He had been expecting his roommate to have parents accompanying him, not two cute boys. This was a deviation from his expectations.

“I’m Patton!” the angel, named Patton, introduced himself enthusiastically. He offered his hand out swiftly, with that bright smile still on his beautiful face. His blue streaked bangs fell into his eyes.

“I’m Janus,” he took the hand and barely hid the reaction of sparks shooting up his arm. He was used to burying feelings. Yet these were a struggle to choke down. They were good feelings. Positive reactions to a familiar action. He hoped that he was covering the sound of his rapid heartbeat well enough.

“Janis, what are you, a middle school librarian?” the redhead giggled out. He covered his mouth quickly when Patton gave him a stern look.

Janus just smirked. “No, more like a Roman god,” he let his voice drip with sarcasm as he rolled his eyes. It wasn’t his first time being mistaken for ‘Janis’ when introducing himself.

“Oh, what a coincidence! Janus, this is Roman.” Patton nudged his blushing companion. Janus wondered to himself if he was laying on the cheer thick to embarrass Roman about the insensitive remark. Roman glanced down in embarrassment.

“Nice to meet you, Roman.” Janus replied amicably. He reached his hand out to shake, hoping to communicate that all was well. He didn’t have any intent to hold resentment between himself and someone else on his first day.

Roman shook his hand and nodded to the black clad lad who was rolling his eyes at the interaction that had just happened in front of him. Roman let go and gestured dramatically at the boy. “And that little Emo Nightmare is Virgil!”

“‘Sup,” Virgil saluted lazily with two of his fingers. Janus saluted back with a tight grin.

Janus turned to his backpack to start unpacking. He had expected the three to continue the conversation they were having before he interrupted with his arrival. However, a warm hand reached out in front of him. He jumped at the sudden movement.

“Sorry,” Patton took his hand away. He made his tone extra warm, “I was just going to offer to help you unpack, since we’re already helping out Virgil.” The freckles on his face nearly disappeared as his face flushed red with embarrassment.

“No, thank you,” Janus replied politely, though his voice was gruff from his tightened throat. He forced himself to plaster on a smile. “I’m fine.”

It felt wrong to lie to an angel. However the words had already left his mouth out of habit.

Patton shrugged, then glanced at the other two boys in the room. “Hey Roman, you wanna work with Virgil while I work with Janus?”

Janus held back a pleased gasp when his name was uttered by those pink lips, in that soft voice, in the small room that was his new home. He let some of his surprise leak through as Patton insisted on helping him out. He couldn’t form a reply so he watched as the angel got started.

He was grateful for the help; especially if it meant more attention from the angel. The two of them worked together as they put away the small amount of things Janus brought with him. They finished before Virgil and Roman had, though that had less to do with Janus not having much to unpack, and more to do with Virgil interrupting Roman with nuzzles along his neck.

Janus grimaced. It was slightly uncomfortable to be witness to such pure, light energy. He hadn’t seen this much positivity since...ever, really. Public displays of affection always sat wrong within him. Perhaps it was because he knew he would never feel that feeling. Nevertheless, it was pretty hard for him to keep his composure with the happy giggles coming from the couple.

Patton seemed to have read his face well, because he clapped his hands to grab everyone’s attention. “Alrighty then, boys, I think we worked out plenty of what we needed to get done today. Whaddya all say to going out to dinner? My treat.”

Roman didn’t hesitate. “I’ll go to our room and grab our jackets!” He ran out the room with a haste that reminded Janus of an excited puppy.

Virgil smiled at his boyfriend’s retreating form. “You know, he may be annoying, but he’s also pretty cute when he’s excited.”

Janus fiddled with the covers of his bed while he sat. He didn’t want to intrude on their time together. Having someone pay for his dinner felt wrong. He didn’t really deserve it. Plus, he hadn’t planned on eating dinner at all that night. Food was a privilege that he didn’t deserve more of after his breakfast that morning. Well, that was what he would have been told if he had still been living at home.

Patton grinned at him when he didn’t speak up. “You gonna join us, Jan? I’ll cover you too if need be.” He sounded so genuine in his offer.

How could he say no to that face? “I’d love to,” he replied honestly. He couldn’t hide his blush at the response he uttered quickly. What was he doing?

“Awesome! I’m going to go to my room to make sure Roman doesn’t get too ahead of us,” Patton shook his head playfully. “Virgil, make sure to bring Jan. We’re gonna head to Leo’s.”

“Damn, Pat, you win the lottery or something?” Virgil asked with wide eyes. Janus grasped from the context that this place was expensive. His stomach fell at that notion.

He really didn’t want to go if he would cost too much money. He started to make plans in his head about looking for the least expensive item to order, or maybe just getting water and making an excuse for not being hungry. Were they offering to be polite, hoping he’d say no? He did well to hide his rapidly increasing guilt while he watched the two friends talk.

Patton giggled. “I wish,” he winked, “No, I just saved a bit of extra money for our first night at college.” Patton waved at both of the boys as he left.

Virgil stood up with a groan. “Knowing Roman, he’s probably bouncing excitedly and I’ll get bombarded with a million texts at once asking why we're taking so long” He chuckled, then noticed that his roommate was still sitting. “You gonna get ready, roomie?”

Janus bit his lip. “I dunno, if it’s too expensive I don’t want to intrude.”

Virgil barked out a laugh. “Don’t worry about that, I was teasing Pat. He’s good to cover you.”

“Okay, well, I guess I’ll grab my coat.” Janus forced a relaxed grin on his face while inside his mind the anxious screaming grew louder.

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violetsmoak · 5 years

Text

Philtatos [3/?]

https://archiveofourown.org/works/20101543/chapters/47654632

Blanket Disclaimer

Summary: During a patrol where Red Hood and Red Robin cross paths, Jason is infected with the blood of the Eros, the ancient God of Love, who informs them that they must track down his missing bow and arrows, or Jason will go slowly mad with an obsessive desire–for Tim. Though overwhelmed by the sudden attention being paid to him, Tim sets to work trying to solve the case, before Jason succumbs to madness. In the meantime, Jason discovers that there’s more than godlike powers at work here, as well as a legacy that reaches back through the sands of time.

Rating: PG-13 (rating may change later)

Beta Reader: None at the moment.

JayTimBingo Prompts This Chapter: # fate #gods in disguise #reincarnation #secrets #titans #wings

First Chapter

________________________________________________________________

As a general rule, Tim avoids going to Batburger when in uniform; it feels as if he’s endorsing a company that capitalizes on cape and rogue identities, and which he knows for a fact treats their employees like chattel.

But apparently mythological gods of love have insane metabolic needs.

He makes a mental note to ask Bart to send some of those special high-calorie protein bars he eats. There’s no way Tim intends to spend valuable time playing delivery boy if Jason’s in trouble.

He frowns at the thought, causing the girl at the takeout counter to step back nervously.

Jason was his usual charming self tonight. But it was a bit off.

The older vigilante, never the paragon of patience and gratitude, was on a hair-trigger tonight. Under normal circumstances, there’s more verbal sparring between them before Jason things get physical. Even then, their altercations are usually because some villain is trying to pit them against each other.

Or he really was just pissed off I was following him.

But Tim can’t help thinking that’s not it. The whole thing has been nagging him since the night before, drowning out what would normally be frustration and hurt after his encounter with the Red Hood. There’s no time to be hurt when there’s a problem to solve.

Tim accepts his order, and after ensuring it’s triple-bagged, tips the girl at the counter for her time before taking off. Swinging across the rooftops of Gotham carrying ten times more than he ever buys for himself is too awkward, so he ends up jumping on the roof of a passing bus and riding it toward the old theater district.

His eyes automatically flick to the passing buildings, wondering if his progression away from Jason’s part of town is being watched from up top.

Or if he should be ducking an impending sniper shot.

Jason’s words echo on repeat in his mind, needling deeper each time. It shouldn’t sting as much as it does, but they were just getting to a good place in terms of trust.

“If I need help, I’ll ask. And chances are, I won’t be asking you.”

“So much for that,” Tim mutters to himself as he prepares to disembark from his ride.

Upon arriving back at the Nest, he skips changing out of his gear and heads straight for the subbasement. The containment unit there was build with Poison Ivy and Scarecrow related emergencies in mind, but it’s come in handy since he acquired an Olympian roommate of sorts.

Normal protocol after a twenty-four-hour observation period would be to send Eros off to a prison for metahumans, but Tim is wary about giving up custody of him any time soon. The potential danger to Jason aside, he’ll need to get his hands on a good deal of null technology and fortified transportation just to move the guy without setting off his powers.

That memory induces a shudder; it’s been a day, and he’s still tasting pomegranate.

Tim doesn’t wish that on anyone. And if that lack of control seizes Jason, forcing him to throw himself at Tim like a ravenous dog?

A visceral swirl of nausea settles in Tim’s gut. Jason’s always had strong ideas on consent, even before his death. It’s one of the few things that didn’t change following his resurrection. If Jason becomes the very thing he’s been fighting his whole life, Tim worries he’ll break for real this time, and in a manner very different than when he first broke The Rule.

Tim isn’t going to let that happen, even if that means working with an entitled godling that’s already become more trouble than he’s worth.

It was hard enough just getting him here, the guy’s way heavier than he looks…

He wonders if it’s the wings, if their mass is still discernible even when they are out of the visual spectrum, and how strong they’d have to be to carry something person-sized. They probably aren’t like a birds’ appendages, and Eros is clearly not hollow-boned, so either they’re extremely well-muscled or of some metaphysical material construct that—

“Hey! Are you going to feed me at some point, darlin’? Or is part of your brand of hospitality enforced starvation?”

Tim jolts back to present from his drifting thoughts and glances across the open space of the Nest toward the containment unit. It’s a hundred square feet of bulletproof glass and filtered air designed by S.T.A.R Labs specifically to counteract the abilities of metas and other enhanced humans.

Eros lounges on his cot, wings out and examining the feathers with his lips pressed together. He’s been annoyed with Tim since waking up in the in custody, though Tim thinks he’s more upset about the whole being knocked-out thing. There’s some kind of telenovela playing in the background.

He wasn’t sure how long he was going to have his guest, so while Eros was still unconscious, Tim hooked up a television screen inside, and brought several books and a mp3 player. He also brought every piece of art from his apartment upstairs and crammed it inside the unit. Eros’ abilities may not have affected Tim when he put him in there (this time), covered as he was, but as those powers grow beyond his control, he’s going to want to siphon it off however he can.

Eros finally looks up at Tim, narrowing his eyes. “For your sake, I hope you got the fries Jokerized. And your channel selection sucks. What kid your age doesn’t have at least one Adult channel?”

“The kind that finds them gross and exploitative.” Tim makes a face as he pushes back his cowl, though he keeps his domino on.

And who has two full-time jobs that make sitting down to watch anything like that pretty much impossible.

He can’t remember the last time he went on a date or did anything nearing the realms of sexual. Normally he just sees to his needs in the shower and that’s that, since there’s no time for much else. He’s even gotten in the habit of not taking more than five minutes so he can do other things. What’s the point of taking longer if there’s no one there with him?

Eros is watching him with a cruel twist to his lips, and Tim’s ears warm. He has a flash of worry that the Olympian can read minds but then decides if Eros had that ability, he’d be using it mock Tim by now. The guy's sort of a dick.

Tim scowls at the notion and opens the hatch in the side of the unit and shoves the takeout bag inside, punching in the code to decontaminate the area.

Eros gets up from the cot, stretching in a languid movement that’s distracting for reasons other than his shirtless state, and stalks over to the hatch on the other side. As he moves, he brushes his fingers across a bronze Grecian krater from the Classical period. Something like golden wisps of smoke swirl around it and then settles into the piece, which gleams a bit brighter.

He wasn’t kidding about that, I guess.

Eros clutches at the takeout bag and begins unloading it on the table by the door hatch, stuffing fries in his mouth and making borderline pornographic noises that have Tim swallowing uncomfortably.

“So where’s Tall, Dark and Angry?” the Olympian asks. “I figured you’d be wrangling him back here—force him into a sweet set-up like this one.”

He kicks at the glass.

“There’s no wrangling when it comes to J—Red Hood.”

“And you’re not worried at all?”

Tim considers the last meeting and carefully says, “He seemed fine when I ran into him tonight.”

But he can’t quite hide his unease. Eros picks up on it.

“You get that that’s only temporary, right?” he asks, stuffing a handful of fries in his mouth.

“I also know that going at Hood head-on isn’t the way to convince him of anything. He’s got to reach out for help himself. The most I can do is monitor him from a distance until he’s ready.”

He wanders over to his main computer and brings up the tracking program for the bug he planted on Jason when he grabbed him tonight. The other man was more distracted than he let on if he didn’t notice Tim slip it on him.

And he hasn’t gotten rid of it, judging from this.

It’s not making a quick exit via sewer or a passing truck, which is par for the course when ditching a tracker. He’s chased enough of those to know what that pattern looks like. And when Tim pulls up camera footage from the surrounding area, he catches several shots of Jason making his way to the safehouse in Coventry no one’s supposed to know about.

“Really?” Eros drawls. “Are you sure it’s not because you’re perfectly happy with this state of affairs? Maybe you’re hoping you’ll finally get some recognition from the guy you’ve been pining for?”

Tim tenses and turns, forcing a blank look and neutral tone. “I’m not pining for him.”

“Don’t lie to me—God of Love, remember? I could smell it on you the minute you were both in the same room.”

Tim clenches his fists, a pit forming in his stomach at the idea that someone knows, followed by disgust as he registers what Eros just said.

“No, I’m not happy about it,” he growls. “Why would I be happy about him being forced to do something against his will? Especially if it’s giving a crap about me?”

“Hey, no offense meant,” Eros says, holding his hands up in surrender; the effect is ruined by the burgers clutched in each fist. “My mother and I have made a career off guys wanting the object of their affection to pay attention to them, at whatever the cost. And there was no such thing as dick pics back then. It’s kind of a question I’ve got to ask in my line of work.”

“Your line of work? You mean you still fly around the world making people fall in love?”

“Uh, no, human beings fall in love fine on their own. I just…make it happen faster and last longer. To my mother, love is a whimsy, gossamer thing, all moonlit strolls, and flowery words and basking in the newness of it all. For me, it’s fierce. Intense. Something that when denied guts you like a knife and hollows you out with desperation.”

A hungry expression passes over his face that has nothing to do with food, and Tim shivers, disliking how a lot of that sentence is hitting too close to home. Rather than betray his discomfort, he takes a chiding tone. “If that’s what you do, no wonder people kill themselves after bad break-ups. Some people aren’t able to deal with that sort of pain—do you even care?”

“Not particularly. Besides, it’s only the interesting ones we get involved with. They tend to be stronger at heart.”

“Because that makes it so much better!”

“Do I tell you how to do your job? No. So how about I get a little less judgment and a little more ‘start finding my diviners’ from you?”

“Oh, we’re going to find them,” Tim says, fighting to control his anger. Whether I’m letting you have them back is another story entirely. If I can figure out some way to keep you and your bow locked up, it’d save a lot of people grief. “But just so you understand, Red Hood is my priority here, not you or your toys.”

“Really?” Eros purrs, sneering skepticism on his face. “Even though I could ensure he starts to return those pesky feelings of yours? In a less life-threatening way, of course.”

“He might not even be affected.”

“Naivety’s not a good look on you, darlin’. But seriously—all I have to do is use an arrow, and you two could retire from the cape gig and go antiquing in New England once this is all over.”

Tim snorts at the ridiculous image and shakes his head. “No.”

“Really? You’re still willing to fight for him, even if he goes back to treating you like an afterthought if you help him?”

“When I help him. And it’s not like it would be something new.”

And, yeah, that still hurts.

Eros huffs, his expression suggesting he’s not sure what to think of that, and then shakes his head.

“Self-sacrificing as ever,” he pronounces and pops the top on a can of Zesti.

Tim puzzles at that remark for all of five seconds, when the screen of his computer lights up with an incoming transmission from Titans Tower. Tim accepts it and the screen fills with a familiar face.

For the first time that night, his mouth smooths into a genuine smile. “Hey, Cassie.”

“Red Robin,” she replies, eyes flicking over him as if to assess him for injury or danger.

She keeps to his rules about secret identities in his base. Sometimes he wishes his identity was public like hers—and then he remembers that he gets enough unwanted attention as Tim Drake-Wayne, it would be worse if people knew for sure he was Red Robin.

Vicki Vale would be the first in line to turn my life into some kind of reality TV show…

“You tried to get a hold of me earlier?” his friend asks, and Tim nods. He’s never been the type to leave anything to chance, and last night while Eros was still conked out, he shot an email to Cassie asking her to get back to him as soon as she could.

“How are things in California?”

“A hell of a lot warmer than where you are, but I don’t think you want to talk about the weather.”

“Nope. How much have you heard about Eros?”

“Eros?” she asks. “Like Cupid?”

“Really?” the winged Olympian groans. “You too? You’re supposed to know better.”

Cassie’s eyes narrow as she takes note of the figure in the containment unit behind him. “Who is that?”

“He says his name’s Eros, and from what I’ve seen, I’m inclined to believe him.”

Eros gives Cassie a smarmy smile. “Hello, Auntie. Nice to meet you finally.”

She wrinkles her nose, and Tim can’t help mirroring the expression. “And I thought my family was messed up.”

“Your family is messed up,” she retorts. “Mine’s just been doing it longer.”

“Touché.”

“So, why’s he in a cage?”

“The real question is why isn’t he gagged,” Tim replies, earning a smirk from Cassie and an offended ‘hey!’ from his detainee. “Basically, he’s losing control of his powers and when that happens apparently there will be a nuclear explosion of desire.”

And that’s possible the weirdest sentence he’s ever said.

“Super orgy,” Eros agrees. “Which though fun in theory, is a lot messier than any of us want.”

Cassie and Tim shudder.

“Not that Gotham couldn’t use a collective chill pill,” Cassie says, “but that sounds like an easy fix. You’ve got him locked up, send him on to Iron Heights or one of the other places that have meta containment.”

“Hey! What’d I ever do to you?!”

“I would, but there’s a complication,” Tim sighs. “He was wounded in an altercation involving a bunch of mobsters, and some of his blood infected a human—no, not me.” He is quick to add that at her widening eyes. “But the individual in question isn’t exactly known for being in control of their emotions. They have a history of trauma as well that could turn this into an issue, so I need to find a cure as soon as possible. Preferably before the symptoms Eros insists are coming manifest.”

He purposefully downplays Jason’s involvement, since the Titans aren’t his biggest fans. Even the ones who weren’t around at the time have heard the story of unconscious bodies, a message written in blood and Tim nearly dying. Heroes are supposed to be above grudges, but they are still teenagers.

“Not sure what I can do for you on that front…”

“Eros says his arrows will reverse it, but they’re missing, along with his bow. I’m looking for that. But I have to find out how bad this could potentially get, and how long it will take.”

“I could tell you that,” Eros grumbles.

“I need independent corroboration because I don’t believe he’s being completely honest with me,” Tim finishes, ignoring him.

“I know nothing beyond what I’ve heard in the stories, and those you have to take with a grain of salt,” Cassie muses.

“Told you,” Eros informs Tim.

“But I’ll contact a few people in my family. They might know something concrete.”

“Thanks,” Tim says, relieved. “Other than that, everything’s good with the Titans?”

“Just the usual stuff. Nothing end-of-the-world bad this week, but it’s only Tuesday.”

“Don’t jinx it!”

“We live in a jinx,” Cassie replies with a roll of her eyes. There’s a crash somewhere in the distance, and the trumpeting of an elephant and she winces.

“Beast Boy?”

“I’ll see you later, Red, I’ve got an idiot to kill,” Cassie sighs.

“Isn’t it fun being the leader?”

“Shut up.”

The screen goes blank, and Tim can’t help his grin.

“So, you know my aunt.”

The grin vanishes as he turns to face Eros. “First, stop calling her that, it’s weird. Second, she’s with the Titans. Of course I know her.”

“Titans,” the Olympian scoffs. “You call yourselves that, but you’ve never met an actual Titan. They were formidable warriors. So fearsome they had to be thrown into the deepest pit of Hades to ensure they never rose up again to threaten the gods.”

“Clearly they weren’t all that if they got locked up,” Tim retorts, offended on behalf of his team.

Miraculously, Eros has nothing to say to that.

⁂

Jason wakes to the sensation of lips between his shoulder blades and someone’s fingers sliding down the curl of his spine. He grumbles in dozy annoyance, shoving his face deeper into his pillow. It took him way too long to fall asleep last night, his overactive imagination plying him with thoughts he does not want to be having. Whoever’s bothering him is about to—

He jerks upward then, fingers clenching around the pistol beside his bed and whirls around to aim at whatever intruder has slipped into his room.

Because he went to sleep alone last night, and no one should know about this safehouse or how to bypass his security.

(Well, obviously there are the members of the Family, but Jason’s fairly confident none of them would be waking him like that.)

He faces the emptiness of the room, breathing hard as he tries to gather his wits. The space is too sparsely furnished for someone to find a place to hide, the shadows already eaten away by the sunlight. There’s no question he’s utterly alone, gun pointed at nothing and his body heaving like he just went three rounds with Bane.

What the hell…

He lowers the gun, scowling, and rubs the back of his head with his free hand. He’s used to having realistic dreams, but that’s new…

Jason scrubs a hand down his face, gives one last bleary glance at his surroundings, and heaves himself out of bed. There’s no way he’s falling back to sleep after this.

He’s distracted the rest of the morning, paranoia higher than usual as he takes second and third glances around the room before getting in the shower. He really shouldn’t have skipped it last night, because his skin is sticky with dried blood.

The wound in his shoulder is completely gone now.

If he’s learned anything in his life it’s not to ignore when things magically appear or disappear.

And yet…

If he acknowledges it, it means acknowledging the fact that he’s starting to fixate—hell, already is fixating—on Tim, and that’s something he can’t give in to.

Repressing shit is a time-honored Bat tradition, and he decides for once he’s going to partake for as long as possible. He’s still able to function, which means there might still time for him to figure all of this out on his own.

He returns to the location of Eros’ warehouse, hoping to find some trace evidence left from the night before. If he can get an analysis of the blood that infected him—

Except, the person he’d usually ask for that is the one he should be avoiding at all costs. The other options are ten times as unpalatable.

Damn it.

It turns out there’s nothing to be found anyhow, although Jason isn’t sure it’s because someone cleaned it up (the GCPD crime scene cleaners or the ever-diligent Red Robin) or because maybe Olympian blood doesn’t stick around. His wound is healed like it was never there, it’s possible it’s the same with the blood.

The day gets steadily more discouraging.

The first time Jason hears the voices, he’s in the middle of busting up a shipment of drugs he stumbled onto while leaving the warehouse district. The Triad flunkies seeing to said shipment aren’t exactly happy to see him, which is why things quickly devolve into fisticuffs.

As one of the knife-wielding henchmen take a run at him, Jason crouches, ready to engage, when without warning, someone whispers in his ear.

“Ready to lose?”

“Do your worst, infant.”

Somehow, he can feel warm breath along his jaw, even though he’s wearing his helmet.

Jason jerks to one side, prepared to pull whoever is behind him over his shoulder, only to find the air behind him empty. His pause allows his opponent to shove his knife at his ribs.

Body armor and his own deflection abilities keep the blow from being fatal, but the rest of the fight, Jason is thrown. There’s no one else but him and the Triads, but the sensation of someone hovering behind him doesn’t disappear.

Tim?

He’s looking for him before he even registers it, stepping over the groaning bodies of his opponents and examining the shadows for any sign of Red Robin. It would be just like him to sit and watch from the shadows, the little stalker. Dick told him stories about what little Timmy was like as a kid, and it wouldn’t surprise him if he still liked to sneak around with a camera.

That idea makes the blood rush to his cheeks for some reason.

Disappointment rises when he confirms he’s completely alone—followed by the queasy realization of what he was just doing.

He doesn’t even bother calling the GCPD to do a clean-up as he flees the scene.

As he stitches himself up later in his safe house, Jason eyes his reflection in the mirror, glaring at himself in reprimand. He should be stronger than this, damn it! If not because of his All-Caste training, then even thanks to Bruce’s insane regimens for dealing with poisons.

His gaze flicks over his scarred body, assessing the damage. He’s used to the litany of scars that cut across his skin, this latest is just part of a growing collection. The other one, though—

He studies the healed part of his shoulder and swallows.

If he hadn’t known there was something wrong with it before, healing as quickly as it did, he knows now. The raised skin of the new scar looks as if it’s been glossed over with gold; fine threads of it follow the surrounding capillaries like loose threads.

If this is some kind of King Midas deal, I’m going to kill that winged douche. Though, turning into a golden statue is potentially a better outcome than what could happen if what Eros said was true. At least this time Bruce will have something better to stick in the case than an empty suit.

The grim humor usually makes him feel marginally better; today it doesn’t.

After that, the voices are everywhere he goes, needling at him in a way that is somehow more present than the insanity of the Pit, more maddening. At least when he was driven by an insane rage, the voices egging him on made sense. There was a purpose, a logic behind their prompting.

“Always planning, aren’t you?”

“Well, someone has to.”

The whispers that dog him are more like snatches of a picture or a dream, without context, and yet each word murmured to him falls on him like a searing iron on his heart.

“Should e’er I go, will you go with me?”

In the next few days, things get steadily worse.

Jason’s all but given up on sleep, since every time he closes his eyes, Tim’s face seems engraved on the backs of his eyelids. Only not Tim—sometimes he looks different, but the image is so fleeting Jason couldn’t even explain how. And when it’s not Tim’s face or his voice, then his slumber gets interrupted by vibrant flashes of color and sound. There is warmth and laughter that abruptly turns to crushing, wrenching pain.

“You think of me as a shield?”

“I think of you as my shield.”

“You’ll have to catch me!”

It’s not an echo of the physical, the way nightmares about his death tend to be; the bone-shattering imprint of the metal bar against his bones. No, this pain is something else, a gaping hole, someone shouting into a dark void that no one will ever hear.

“I would that you would leave them all to perish.”

“Bury us together.”

During the day, he experiences a bitter longing, like he’s missing a limb or a lung. By night, his patrols are more vicious, bloodier as he tries to exercise his frustration the best way he knows how. As if hitting harder, and faster, will bleed out whatever is slowly poisoning him.

By the middle of the week, Jason is smoking a pack a day and filled with the manic energy of the perpetually exhausted. He’s started seeing things out of the corner of his eye—full lips tilted upward in amusement, flashes of blue eyes, dark hair disappearing into a crowd—that makes his stomach flip.

“Come back to me.”

He picks his phone up and puts it down several times one morning, each time getting closer to calling Tim until he throws it at the wall. He leaves his apartment before he can do the same to his tablet.

There’s no point carrying out his usual errands, and he ends up wandering aimlessly around the city for a few hours. Somehow he ends up on a building across the street from Wayne Enterprises, staring at the floor where he knows Tim’s office is. Where he knows Tim is.

Even on a case, pretty boy has to be the model employee or no allowance from B.

It would be simple for Jason to get into the building if he wanted to. There’s Bat access points all over the place, and secret corridors and doors. He wouldn’t even need a disguise to keep anyone from recognizing Bruce Wayne’s dead kid.

Yeah, and then what, moron? What exactly is the game plan once you get in?

He can’t even answer himself and lets out a wordless yell of rage that gets lost in the whipping wind.

“Screw this,” Jason growls and turns his back on the WE building. It galls him that it’s difficult to do even that.

Time to get some answers.

Since there haven’t been any reports of arrests of winged metas, he knows exactly where to look. Tim’s as paranoid and as much of a control freak as Bruce, and he’s not about to let a potential resource go before he’s used it to its full potential.

And there’s no way babybird doesn’t have a secret hideout under his place.

It’s a short journey back to the old theater district, or at least it feels that way; Jason’s more distracted than he’d like and barely registers the trip. Once there, he circles the block where Tim’s apartment is located a few times, making sure that there’s no sign of its owner (even though he knowsTim’s at work, there’s a part of him that keeps hoping) and then breaks in.

It’s a bit of effort to disable the security system (the little shit is too paranoid and smart for his own good) and then even longer to start looking for a way into Tim’s base of operations.

He may or may not get side-tracked snooping through the kitchen (no wonder he’s so scrawny, he’s got barely any food in here) and rummaging in the bathroom medical cabinet (at least he’s well-stocked, it’ll keep him from bleeding out the next time he gets injured) and picking through various DVDs (of course Tim has the extended versions of Lord of the Rings, why doesn’t that surprise him?). It’s only when he peeks into Tim’s bedroom, sees the king-sized bed and has a sudden image of the younger man sprawled out on it that Jason remembers the actual reason he’s here and almost runs back downstairs.

It takes longer than he’d like to find the trick to opening the secret door, though when he finds it, he snorts.

Because fish? Really?

When would Tim even have the time or patience to remember to feed them, unless he was coming over to the aquarium every day? It’s the only thing in the apartment that doesn’t feel like Tim.

Jason scowls, wondering when he started being so familiar with Tim’s esthetic. They’ve barely hung out together since his grand and bloody return to Gotham, and they’re both always traveling the world or wide void of space, there hasn’t been the opportunity to get to know the kid. Yes, he once studied his replacement obsessively, but that was to find his weaknesses, to learn how to take him apart, to destroy him and in turn destroy Bruce.

None of that should translate to knowing minutiae like how Tim takes his coffee.

When did I even pick that up? Could it have been that time with the waffles?

His ruminations trail off as he takes in the vast, three-level cavern he’s descended into.

And…okay, this place is way cooler than Jason’s pseudo-Batcave, but he guesses that’s par for the course when a tech nerd whose Daddy bankrolls everything.

Though he doubts Tim would have used Bruce’s money to finance this. He likes his independence; Jason learned that for himself about the time he found the kid holed up in Lex Towers. It’s one of the things he likes about him.

He finds Eros in a containment unit.

Bingo.

The guy has a decent set-up too, from the look of it; he might as well be in a swanky hotel room.

“Back so soon?” Eros calls, not looking up from his show right away. “I thought you had work or whatever it is you humans force yourselves to endu—” He glances up and sees that it’s not Tim, and his sentence trails off, expression becoming almost gleeful as if he’s been waiting for him a while.

“Kairόs dé, poimḗn laôn,” he purrs.

Jason blinks, not understanding the words even as they tug at something in him. It’s like being spoken to in a dream or from beneath running water.

He shakes his head. “Sorry, that’s not one of the languages I had drilled into me.”

Eros’s face morphs instantly.

“Well, you’re no fun,” he says, and though the words are accompanied by a childish pout, Jason thinks he senses actual disappointment there. Normally he might investigate that, but he’s here for a reason, and that involves figuring out what the hell is going on with him.

“You know why I’m here.”

“Indeed,” Eros says. “Starting to get that unscratchable itch, aren’t you?”

“What do you think?”

“I think I warned you and you didn’t believe me. Not sure what you expect me to do about it now.” The Olympian examines his nails.

“Oh, I don’t know--fix it, maybe?!”

“I already told you how to fix it. You could have been helping the pretty boy the past few days and possibly gotten closer to sorting things, but then you had to be all brooding and tortured and stomp off like a teenager.” Eros considers him. “Unrelated, but have you ever actually seen a bird brood? I’m curious, if you took that bucket off, would there be actual similarities?”

Jason tells himself the reason he clenches his fists is because of the Olympian’s flippant manner, and not because he called Tim ‘pretty’.

Which, no, not relevant.

“You said I’d be going out of my mind over T—Red Robin,” Jason growls. “That including hearing voices? Or seeing things that aren’t there?”

“It might? To be honest, I have no idea,” Eros says with a yawn. “I’ve never had anyone with your particular…history exposed to my blood. There’s any number of things it could be.”

“My history,” Jason repeats.

“Well, to start with the most glaringly obvious, you’ve returned from the dead. There’s an odor Revenants like you give off…hm, sort of like dirt and petrichor. If they’re brought back properly, I mean, otherwise it’s all rotting flesh and bodily fluids.” He shudders. “And there’s the unmistakable seal of the All-Caste on you. Ducra’s work, I’m guessing.”

Jason’s mouth twists. “And you can just…tell all that.”

“It’s written in the story of your soul,” Eros intones, and then looks smug, “among other things.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen too much in my time to go for that poetic New Age crap.”

“Oh, it’s far from New Age, boy, it’s from an olden time when men were men—”

“And sheep ran scared?” Jason interrupts. “Spare me the walk down memory lane and just answer my questions.

“You haven’t really asked me anything yet.”

“How long do I have before I completely lose it?”

“Again, no idea. Though no one’s ever made it more than two weeks, and by that point, there’s not really much left to save, if you know what I mean.”

Kind of figured that.

“And before it gets to that point? Is there a way of putting off the…urges?” he almost gags on the word.

“Depends.”

“On?”

Eros smirks. “On how far the object of your obsession is willing to go to save you.”

Rage frissons through Jason’s body. “Fuck you. That’s not happening.”

“Then you’d better get your affairs in order and say your goodbyes, et cetera…”

“I’m going to kill you.”

“Oh, do try,” Eros sniggers. “Birdboy took great pains to tell me there’s no way into this shiny prison cell unless you unlock the door from the outside. And if you walk in here now…well, you might end up seeing those troubling hallucinations and hearing those whispers a little more clearly following a second exposure.”

Jason snarls with rage and punches the glass in front of Eros’s face; it doesn’t even make a dent, and his knuckles immediately burn with pain.

“Feel better now?” Eros simpers, and then his face goes cold. “I don’t care if it’s with or without your little crush, it’s in everyone’s best interest to get my toys out of the world and back in my hands as soon as possible. You two have already withstood enough tragedy, don’t you think?”

“That written on my soul, too?” Jason spits but doesn’t wait for an answer. He whirls around and stalks away from the containment unit. This was a waste of time, and he needs to get out of here before Tim returns.

He’s not sure what he’d do if he actually ran into the other vigilante just now.

But one thing’s for sure: he’s going to have to start taking this seriously.

Knowing Tim’s already investigating the bow and arrow angle, Jason decides on a different take. There’s something not entirely above board about Eros, and Jason has no illusions the guy wouldn’t screw them over in a second. He’s calculating, like Tim, except in the Olympian’s case, the only one to benefit from that calculation is himself.

And there are some things he says that don’t jive. Jason’s not sure what exactly he’s been picking up on—going over all of their interactions, there’s nothing that stands out—but his gut is telling him there’s more going on here than the Olympian is telling.

The problem is, who the hell is going to help him out with this?

He can’t work with Tim, for obvious reasons, and contacting Bruce or Dick to use their Themysciran connections is right out. He doesn’t have any of his own, not really—Donna doesn’t really talk to him anymore. Even if he did have an in somewhere, he’d want to have at least enough background on the issue to understand whatever mindfuck logic usually comes along when dealing with Olympians or magic or anything like that.

He needs information, and he knows who he needs to reach out to to get it since Tim isn’t an option. He’s not looking forward to it.

It’s always a toss-up if she’ll help or not.

Or make him beg or demand a favor in exchange.

Though at this point, the sooner he unravels the shitstorm that his life is devolving into, the better. Then he can hightail it out of Gotham and not come back until he and Tim have forgotten all about this little bit of awkwardness. Perhaps get back to the Ally-Possibly-Friend-Kinda-Brother-Sort Of? thing.

And so, before he can talk himself out of it, he taps into the private comm line to Oracle, the one he purposefully keeps muted whenever he’s back in town.

“Red Hood,” the familiar digital voice acknowledges a few seconds later.

“I need a favor.”

“Will wonders never cease.”

“I’ve been asking myself that for years.”

“You’ve been pretty adamant about not wanting help from me,” she remarks, and even with the lack of intonation he can hear the rebuke and rolls his eyes.

“Look, can we skip the guilt-trip? I’ll owe you.”

“I know you will.”

“It’s more your research skills than hacking.”

“Oh?”

“I need to know as much as you can find about the Greek god Eros.”

Oracle is quiet for a long moment, and he wonders if she hasn’t logged off, but then she says, “Does this have anything to do with Red Robin asking me to watch for reports of individuals carrying a bow and arrows over the past few weeks?”

“It might,” Jason allows, a smile in his voice at the mention of Tim. He forces that back down, mentally castigating himself.

None of that!

“Are you two working a case?”

“Sort of. Not together—” Definitely not together! “—but same case. We’re approaching it from different angles.”

“But you’re reaching out to me, which you don’t do unless things have the potential to take a turn for the worse.”

“I’m reaching out to you so that they won’t have to later on, and that’s all I’m going to say. Can you help me or not?”

Another pause.

“It will take some time.”

“We’ve got less than two weeks. Think you can manage that?”

“What did you boys get yourselves into this time?” Oracle sighs. Her cooperation is implied, and Jason relaxes a hair.

Things are going to be fine.

“Thanks,” he says, and then pauses. “So, when you spoke to him—Red Robin, I mean. How did he sound?”

Or not.

⁂⁂⁂

Next Chapter

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goodgriefwhatanerd · 4 years

Note

For Kain the emojis 👏, 🎁 and 💜. And for certified soft boy Melchiah 💖, ♎️ and 😘!! :D

(one of these answers practically became a ficlet. apparently I’m in the mood to ramble. thank you sm for giving me the opportunity to ❤)

Kain:

👏 - What's your favorite habit of (Y/N)'s?"Rowan's most endearing habit is regrettably also their most annoying. Whenever they are thinking or reading, or in fact doing anything when their mind is not present, they chew the tips of their claws. They would not thank me for likening it to a child sucking their thumb, and that is the only reason I shall not do so. Nevertheless, we know one another by our silences. Thanks to that habit we can have entire conversations without saying a word."

🎁 - Do you like to pamper them?"What is the purpose of power if not pleasure? When Rowan joins me at the heart of the empire they want for nothing. A dozen attendants are on hand day and night to cater to their every whim. While they may dress them, style their hair, bring them blood, the honour of tending to them in the blood baths belongs to myself." In fact, he should start organising something for their return. Nothing dramatic, but some minor display of his affecti- high regard for them. "I rarely give them gifts of a non-edible nature. After the first millennium one finds one already has all that one desires."

💜 - Are they closed-off or do they wear their heart on their sleeve?"Rowan has a scholar's mind driven by a fool's heart. They feel too deeply and show it all too easily. It is a wonder they have never fallen prey to things worse than hunters," said the man who refused to smile in public out of concern for his reputation.

Between them, they made one well adjusted vampire.

Melchiah:

💖 - What's one really cute/cool thing that (Y/N) does?As penance for putting the list up in the first place, Raziel had been sent off the Rowan's blood family to ask after the matter of dates in preparation for the next answer. He was therefore not here to roll his eyes as Melchiah's lit up.

"Have you seen them doing lacework? They take a roll of cotton and some chart which may as well be a relic from the Hylden and make wonders. I may be as skilled in necromancy as any other, but that is dark magic I could never hope to fathom."

♎️ - Do they act very similar to their zodiac sign?

This one required some research. Melchiah looked over a stack of books laden with markers. "Raziel, the results if you please?"

Raziel tapped his claws together. "This proved rather difficult. Rowan is over four hundred years old, and no one much cares what date a fledgling was raised on. As their sire remembers, it was some time in early summer."

"Which would make them... probably Gemini." Melchiah consulted the topmost book. "They should therefore... 'enjoy socializing and love surrounding themselves with people.'"

He glanced at Raziel. The wraith looked back. A second passed and they both burst out laughing.

Melchiah wheezed. "I once thought they had gone into a state of change only to discover they had found a new series of books and locked themself away for a month. So, no. Not in the slightest."

Raziel scratched the back of his head. "I did discover something else on my travels. It appears that the village in which they were born had a memorial for those taken by the vampires, leaving behind no body to bury. It... may have had their dates on it."

"Surely it either did or it didn't. There can't be that many Rowans out there."

"And there you have it. The date of death lines up, as does their age. However, it was a different name, someone's beloved daughter."

"Oh." Melchiah's claws left grooves in the table and his knuckles went white.

"Yes."

"There is a reason they never speak of their mortal life."

"Yes. They were a Libra, by the way."

Glad of the distraction, Melchiah flicked through the book again. "Libra... need for balance, justice... yes, I can agree with that... surround themselves with beauty..."

Raziel held up a hand. "If you say anything soppy, I am leaving."

"Dearest brother, they deign to spend time with us."

"Yes, you're right. Utterly inaccurate."

Raziel fled the room just in time to avoid the book thrown at him.

😘 - How often do you like to smooch them?"As often as possible. It is a poor day that doesn't start and end with kisses, and if some time can be found for more between our various duties, then so much the better."

#f/o takeover #this one went in a lot of directions #bastard of balance #raz and mel #stitch husband #I also spent longer reading through astrology nonsense than any sane man should for that second to last answer #the weird thing was half the websites disagreed with each other on what the signs mean #considered thinking up nosgothic star signs but thought that was little too sad #anyway this was a lot of fun to write ty <3

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idkwhyiloveoldletterssomuch · 5 years

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Alexander Hamilton to Elizabeth Hamilton [June 1798, New York]

[3rd June]

I have been extremely uneasy, My beloved Eliza, at the state of health and state of mind in which you left me. I earnestly hope that there has been a change of both for the better. Let me entreat you as you value my happiness to tranquillize yourself and to take care of yourself. You are infinitely dear to me. You are of the utmost consequence to our precious Children. You have every motive to study your own health and repose.

I will not hurry you to return because you must do as duty and affection to your father demand and because I know you will be glad to come back to my arms as soon as possible. These when you arrive will welcome you with increased affection. I always feel how necessary you are to me. But when you are absent I become still more sensible of it, and look around in vain for that satisfaction which you alone can bestow.

I dined with Angelica today - Margaret was with her. My spirits were not very good - though every body tried to make my time pass pleasantly. Give my love to your father & mother. Kiss the dear Children with you for me and receive the assurance of my fond & unalterable tenderness.

A H

[5th June]

I wrote to you, My beloved Eliza, by the Monday’s Post. You will be glad to hear that your dear boys & myself continue in good health & that they thus far behave well. I hope they will continue to do so—for in our mutual love & in them consist all our happiness.

I trust you are by this time arrived & shall impatiently look out for a letter from you. Our public affairs continue to march in a good train; & when you shall return to me my private affairs cannot fail to be in as good a train as I desire them.

Yrs. most faithfully & affec

A H

[8th June]

This is the third time I have written to my love since her departure. I continue to enjoy good health and my spirits are as good as they can be in her absence. But I find as I grow older her presence becomes more necessary to me. In proportion as I discover the worthlessness of other pursuits, the value of my Eliza and of domestic happiness rises in my estimation.

Angelica & her family are all well except that Mr. Church’s gout is not intirely gone. Peggy has been as well as usual. Yesterday however she complained of a little gout in her hand. Cornelia is well.

Tell your father that our affairs continue to mend & that there is every prospect that we shall not put on the French Yoke. Adieu My very dear wife.

Yrs. most affecty

A H

#source: founders online #alexander hamilton #elizabeth hamilton #elizabeth schuyler #1798 #1790s #alexander hamilton to elizabeth hamilton #hamilton

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46ten · 6 years

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As a compare/contrast with the Knoxes’ letters, here are the originals and transcriptions of some of AH’s 1798 letters to his wife. Elizabeth Hamilton had finally gone to visit her father, having not gone with AH earlier that year. Angelica Church’s “Icarus letter” (see runawayforthesummer’s transcription) also probably dates to this time. Letter of June 3, 1798

I dined with Angelica today—Margaret was with her. My spirits were not very good—though every body tried to make my time pass pleasantly. Give my love to your father & mother. Kiss the dear Children with you for me and receive the assurance of my fond & unalterable tenderness.

A H

Letter of June 5, 1798

Yrs. most faithfully & affec

Letter of June 8, 1798

Tell your father that our affairs continue to mend & that there is every prospect that we shall not put on the French Yoke. Adieu My very dear wife.

Yrs. most affecty

Letter of June 22, 1798

I believe my beloved that I omitted to write by the last Post thinking it would not find you at Albany; but as it seems possible from what Mr. Schuyler tells me that your stay may be prolonged I write this to say to my darling that I begin to [be] very anxious for her return & hope it will be accelerated. I was very glad to receive a favourable account of her health & spirits.

Note indicating that she’s no longer in Albany below. It also looks like someone snipped out AH’s signature in the above letter.

*Looking up original letters can yield some fun information. Sometimes there are notes of ownership that help explain why certain letters ended up in certain collections (like this example of the 30Jun1780 letter to John Laurens). Sometimes the letters are actually in the handwriting of others (meaning they are copies, and we cannot be certain what the original contained). Occasionally the text was transcribed incorrectly or incompletely, or there are insertions and deletions the original author made (for example, it looks like AH added the “Cornelia is well” statement to his 8June letter after he had started writing the paragraph below). Sometimes an interpretation becomes unsupportable once you check the originals.

#Alexander Hamilton #Elizabeth Hamilton #letters #1798

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eldritchocs · 5 years

Note

🍒 for bronze boy

🍒- how do you act when you have a crush?

[ Well, uh, I-I like t• think I’m pretty sweet ar•und pe•ple I like! I like t• spend as much time with them as I can, make and d• things t• impress them, d•ing little fav•rs f•r them, t••. As shy as I am, I d• like my affecti•ns t• be clear. ]

#whovyx answers #anon

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devilsfortea · 2 years

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love

is it asking too much to want to be loved? i am not talking about friendly love or familial love, but true romantic love. am i selfish for not being satisfied with my best friend, who brings me so much more joy than i thought possible, or my mother, who constantly reminds me of her love no matter how unlovable i may be. why is that not enough?

i hate myself for saying it, but i honestly feel that i would trade all of that for the love of a boy that i was in love with. i hate that. it is disgusting and embarrassing and diminutive and archaic, but it's true. i have always known it. the thing i have always wanted most in this world is the thing i will never have. and for reasons unbeknownst to me, that fact is enough to make me want to stop living, despite all of the other wonders of life that surround me.

i want to be loved more than anything in this world. above all else. i would give up everything else for it. i would rather die than to never experience it. i just wish that i could know now if i will forever be waiting for something that will never happen for me. i cannot imagine that the universe would be so cruel as to force me to continue living without ever offering me the love that i so deeply desire and yearn for, especially considering the torturous self hatred that has consumed my thoughts for what feels like every minute of every day of my life.

i want to be loved so deeply and so passionately that the one who loves me cannot bear to be apart from me, cannot bear to stop touching me, cannot bear to stop kissing me, cannot bear to...

of course i want to love just as deeply, but i already know that i am much too capable of cultivating such emotions. it seems i fall in love with every mildly attractive man that so much as looks in my direction. i hate that i fall in love so easily and so deeply and so stupidly despite the inescapable reality that no one has, and no one ever will, reciprocate.

i want to be one those women who does not care about men and yet unintentionally makes every man fall in love with her. i want to be someone that men look at and stare at and lust over. and i hate myself for it. i hate myself for wanting it and i hate myself for not having it. no matter what i do i always come back to hating myself. at least i'm consistent.

i hate that my desire, no my need, for the approval of men makes me hate not only myself, but other women. i cannot see the beauty in others without first reminding myself of my unattractiveness. and yet i always see the beauty in others, which means that i am always thinking of my own ugliness. i am jealous and spiteful and full of resentment for everyone, because when i am in the presence of others i cannot escape the overpowering thoughts about myself and all of my fatal shortcomings.

it is narcissistic how much i hate myself. i am so consumed by my self hatred that i must look in every mirror i pass, i must constantly take photos of myself, i must control the way others see me in every way i can, so as to keep everyone else from seeing the real, disgusting, unlovable me.

why do men never look at me? why am i so unlovable? why has an attractive man never so much as held eye contact with me, let alone considered kissing me? why has no one found me worthy of a declaration of love, or at least attraction? what makes me so unattractive?

the girls in my life have always gone out of their ways to compliment me, i guess that should make me feel better, but no matter how much they may deny it i know that they do it out of pity. i know they do not see a beautiful face when they look at me, instead they see an opportunity for charity. strangers feel so bad for me when they see my asymmetrical pimply oily face, big nose, small beady eyes, flat short body, etc., that they try to do a good service by complimenting the monster. an act of charity. that is all that it is.

but men are not so charitable. they see me for who i am and they will not be guilt tripped into feigning affection. they see the same girl that i see. they see all of the flaws and all of the mistakes and all of the embarrassments. they know i am not worthy. they know that i can never be loved. they know they should not even try. i am unfixable. i am damaged from birth. they know what i know. they know i will never get what i want because asking to be loved is asking too much. they know what i know. they know i should stop trying to defy fate, they know.

what am i supposed to do with this knowledge? i have had it for all my life, from my first elementary school long distance rejection, to my last senior year virtual rejection. 19 years of wishing i was wrong. i have worked tirelessly to learn from the paragons of beauty that capture the attention of men in romantic movies and tv shows. i have thrown myself into these stories and have tried with everything in me to be like these women. i should have known better, what hope does an ugly brown girl have in this world that only values white beauty. i have pushed myself to constantly appear casually put together and potentially attractive. i have worn short skirts and low cut tops, uncomfortable push up bras and tight spanx. i have covered my face in makeup, watched hundreds of tutorials, burned my hair to a crisp, i have cut myself whilst shaving more times than i can count. i have so many scars from the burns and cuts that i have accumulated throughout the years. i have practiced what to say and what to do. i have gone over every interaction i have ever had to try and learn how to improve. i have watched others tirelessly to try to be like them, to be normal. i have rehearsed my lines, i have edited my scripts. i have tried to be impressive, tried learning dance, guitar, karate, piano. i have tried to be smart, i have tried to get into the best colleges, i have spent years planning, i have spent nights writing and rewriting and rewriting. i have begged for contentment, i have begged for relief, but now i know that this was all for nothing. i have cried so much that i cannot believe i still have tears left. i have contemplated death. i have wished for it. i have sucked in for all of my life, trying to be someone that someone could love, but all i want to do is breathe. i do not know how to, and even if i did, what does it matter. i have tried so so so very hard, but i have failed. my existence has been 19 years of the world proving that i was right all along, i will never be worthy of love.

why is this so important to me? there is supposed to be more to life. i should care about school, about my future, about my family, my friends, but i don't. i would rather be beautiful than anything else. i would rather be beautiful than be alive.

what am i supposed to do. i wish i was beautiful, i wish i didn't want to be beautiful, i wish i was not so vain. i wish i cared about helping others or saving the world or doing something meaningful with my life. but i don't. i would trade any of that in a heartbeat for beauty, for reciprocal love. i wish i could just kill myself and stop getting caught in the same traps that i have designed for myself. i wish i could get better and never go back. i have had highs, moments when i actually thought life was taking a turn and things would be different, but they were all lies. nothing ever changes for me. i am cursed.

it is torture to keep hoping, to keep trying, to keep failing, to keep being disappointed, to keep disappointing others. it is exhausting. each time it happens i feel that i cannot bear it, that i cannot continue, yet life cruelly keeps progressing and dragging me along with it. and no one can save me. everyone expects me to somehow get better, or change my life, but i can't. i am powerless. so now i am looking beyond myself and hoping, as i always have, that the greater forces of the universe will decide to stop this train wreck that is my life by either ending the story, or adding a plot twist.

please, i am begging with everything i have, please give me romantic love or give me death. please do not keep me waiting, i cannot bear it. please please give me the reason that i need to continue living. please give me love, please give me love, please give me love. i need it. i cannot wait for some far off future. i have never gotten even an ounce of validation, not one possible indication of the love that i desire above all else. nothing. in my whole life. that is just cruel. people who do not even care for it have gotten far more than what i am asking. every single person i know has gotten some sort of sign of their potential for love, i am the only one who is truly ugly and unlovable. i know this seems childish and ignorant and superficial, and i hate it so very much, but love is the only thing i want.

my hope for love is the only thing that has gotten me to this point, and this hope has run out. so this is it universe. this is your last chance. please. give me love or give me death. give me love or give me death. please.

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alexisification-art · 3 years

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My 4 Story Splines

Once upon a time… there was a group of friends Dolo, Miles and Vishantae .

And everyday… they travel to different worlds seeking a new adventure

Until one day… they come across a world that makes them lazy

And because of that… they are attacked by an enemy who traps its foes with a lazy spell

And because of that… Dolo and his friends have to figure out how to defend themselves.

And because of that… they use their laziness to their advantage to outmaneuver and trick the enemy.

Until finally…the enemy decides to not harm Dolo and his friends and hangs out with them. for the rest of the day.

And the moral of the story is… why attack someone when you can take a chill pill.

Once upon a time… there was a young girl named Vishantae

And every day… she travels alongside with her friends Dolo and Miles

Until one day… she decides to create some new spells.

And because of that… she spends time experimenting and testing out new spells.

And because of that… Dolo and Miles are subjected to her experiments.

And because of that… both Dolo and Miles bodies are physically altered multiple times in a comedic fashion.

Until finally…Vishantae is satisfied with her new spells and feel they are effective for battle

And the moral of the story is… when you want to try out an experiment, just know your indestructible friends make fun test subjects.

Once upon a time… there was a man named Miles

And every day… he travels alongside with his friends Dolo and Vishantae.

Until one day… Dolo and Vishantae get sick from a strange fruit they ate.

And because of that… Miles goes out to find a cure

And because of that… Miles encounters a giant purple Raven that holds the cure.

And because of that… Miles battles the giant Raven in an intense battle.

Until finally…the Raven is defeated, Miles acquires the cure and gains new powers from the slain Raven and Dolo and Vishantae are cured.

And the moral of the story is… don’t eat strange fruit or you’ll gain powers.

Once upon a time… there was a boy named Dolo

And every day… he travels alongside with his friends Miles and Vishantae.

Until one day… Miles asks why Dolo’s peacoat hoodie is sentient and so cool looking.

And because of that… Dolo explains the backstory of his peacoat.

And because of that… Miles is impressed with how unique Dolo is.

And because of that… Miles fights Dolo to see how indestructible his peacoat was since it always protects him in battle.

Until finally…Dolo is unharmed and Miles shows more respect for Dolo’s apparel.

And the moral of the story is… the apparel drip can be affectious.

#story spline

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loveinquotesposts · 4 years

Photo

https://loveinquotes.com/as-she-stooped-over-him-her-tears-fell-upon-his-forehead-the-boy-stirred-and-smiled-in-his-sleep-as-though-these-marks-of-pity-and-compassion-had-awakened-some-pleasant-dream-of-a-love-and-affecti/

As she stooped over him, her tears fell upon his forehead. The boy stirred, and smiled in his sleep, as though these marks of pity and compassion had awakened some pleasant dream of a love and affection he had never known. Thus, a strain of gentle music, or the rippling of water in a silent place, or the odour of a flower, or the mention of a familiar word, will sometimes call up sudden dim remembrances of scenes that never were, in this life; which vanish like a breath; which some brief memory of a happier existence, long gone by, would seem to have awakened; which no voluntary exertion of the mind can ever recall. ― Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist

#CharlesDickens, #CharlesDickensCharlesDickensLoveQuotes, #CharlesDickensLoveQuotes, #CharlesDickensQuotes, #OliverTwist, #OliverTwistQuotes

#Charles Dickens #Charles Dickens Charles-Dickens-love quotes #Charles Dickens love quotes #Charles Dickens quotes #Oliver Twist #Oliver Twist quotes #LoveQuotes

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lost-corner · 7 years

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He never wanted his son to see him like this, a sea-monster of a man, his face disfigured by barnacles, seaweed streaming down his shoulders. Yet even if Henry is startled by his appearance, he doesn’t betray it. Not a trace of fear or disgust is to be found in his eyes; only unyielding determination that brings back a faded memory of Elizabeth standing on the railing of the Black Pearl. Elizabeth. He imagines her pacing nervously up and down the hall, wringing her hands in exasperation, and the image fills him with hopeless fury. He is not mad at Henry – God knows he couldn’t bring himself to be – but just angry in general: at the curse that binds him to this damned ship; at himself for wishing his son would never leave even if it meant condemning him to this sorry semblance of a life for the rest of eternity. No. Whatever Henry is here for, Will will put an end to it; he must.

‘Don't you see I'm cursed to this ship?’.

‘That’s why I’m here,’ Henry replies adamantly, and hurriedly presses on before Will has a chance to raise more objections: ‘I think I know a way to break your curse. To free you from the Dutchman.’

‘Henry,’ he says, his voice barely above a whisper. He’s heard it before: a map no man can read, a Trident that holds all the curses of the sea. He has no idea how Henry found out and a part of him wants to ask, out of sheer curiosity, but that’s hardly relevant now; he only has a couple of minutes before the Dutchman submerges again – the passage of time is something he has become minutely attuned to, inescapably aware of – and as much as he is yearning for an ordinary conversation with his son, the circumstances aren’t exactly favourable: Henry is standing in front of him with a sack of stones tied around his ankle, for God’s sake, having taken it into his head to save him – as if he wasn’t beyond salvation – and over Will’s his dead body (the irony is not lost on him) will he allow his son to put his life in danger ever again because of some nonsensical myth. ‘No.’

His words, however, fall on deaf ears; as if he didn’t hear anything Will said and completely unfazed by the harshness in his father’s voice, Henry goes on: ‘I read about a treasure, a treasure that holds all the power of the sea. The Trident of Poseidon can break your curse!’.

It’s so beautifully simple that it almost seems too good to be true, Elizabeth explained eagerly as they lay in bed, the sky outside slowly turning from black to a hazy grey; but she had studied all the documents she could lay her hands on (‘Really, Will, you wouldn’t believe what you can find at Shipwreck Cove’) and they were all perfectly consistent: ‘I’m not quite sure how just yet, but the Trident has the power to lift this bloody curse,’ she said, her face alight. And although the hope shining in her eyes was intoxicating, he couldn’t bring himself to believe it; he couldn’t afford to. He told her it wasn’t worth wasting her life away chasing something that may or may not exist (her brows furrowed irritably at that); he tried to make her see the risk of allowing herself to expect something that was at best highly improbable; he pleaded with her to consider the perils she would be exposing herself to, quite likely in vain. She retorted that she didn’t consider her search to be a ‘waste’ of anything – in fact, she could think of a few things more worth her time than attempting to get her husband back (he was genuinely taken aback when she called him that and had to remind himself that they had, indeed, been married for a decade); she insisted that she would never be at peace unless she had the certainty she had tried everything she could have and failed; she reminded him she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself, thank you very much. They argued for hours until they realised the quarrel was perfectly futile: there was nothing he could say to change her mind, and no argument she could come up with that would persuade him. The only agreement they reached was that Henry was not to be told – it would be cruel to give him as much as a shred of hope if the threat of disappointment was, Elizabeth begrudgingly admitted, all too real.

As far as Will is concerned, it’s not just real; it’s inevitable. Back then he did everything in his power not to let himself succumb to the spell of her words and the heady promise they held because as much as he fought against it, deep down he was still foolish enough to trust that maybe – maybe – his service did not need to last forever; the idea that it would was simply too absurd, too stupendous, to wrap his mind around. Now, however, he is too tired to hope; sick of the dreary routine, the oppressive silence, the suffocating longing, the crushing guilt he can't get away from. The one day he got to spend with Elizabeth and Henry should have given him the strength to carry on for another decade, but it didn’t; instead, it was a painful realisation that it doesn't depend on the one day at all.

When he finally stepped on shore and saw them running towards him, the happiness that filled him was so overwhelming that he felt his knees grow weak. It was worth waiting ten years to be able to hold them, Elizabeth trembling in his arms, Henry clinging to him as though he would never let go, talking excitedly about something Will's dazed mind couldn't process. But if tearing himself away from her after that one day on the beach was the hardest thing he'd ever had to do, leaving them both behind proved to be beyond his endurance. Normalcy, he learned, was a frightfully powerful addiction; only once he was allowed to live for a day did he realise how desperately he craved something beyond an endless progression of days he counted down in anticipation for the twenty-four hours of bliss that were promised him as a reward.

But realising exactly what he was missing wasn't the worst; no, it was Henry's obstinate insistence that he wouldn't go to sleep even though he could barely keep his eyes open because he refused to waste as much as an hour of whatever time he was given to become acquainted with his legend of a father; and the disbelieving sigh Elizabeth breathed when she woke up in the morning to find him next to her – ‘Oh, Will’ – before kissing him tentatively, as if she was expecting him to be nothing but a dream, an immaterial fantasy.

It felt wrong; it was wrong because although both Elizabeth and Henry welcomed him with open arms, he did not belong. He couldn’t. Over the course of the past decade, the two of them had found a way of making it from one day to the next, a daily routine that his absence was inscribed into and his presence incommensurable with. When he walked into Henry’s room, he felt like an intruder seeking to usurp the place that the idea of him had in his son’s life. His own absence was overwhelming: it screamed at him from the wall, where a crumpled piece of paper with crossed-out names of months evidenced the boy’s anxious anticipation of his return; there was also a large glass jar full of little pebbles and fragments of shells which, as Henry proudly explained, he would pick up at the beach whenever he and Elizabeth went there to watch the sunset. Even though Will was finally back, it seemed as though he wasn’t, not fully; his presence was only a moment of suspension between one decade of longing and another; the ghost of the past ten years persistently haunted the nooks and crannies of the lighthouse, and his impending departure was implicated in the hastened words and greedy gestures the three of them exchanged as minutes until the sunset ticked away with tyrannical steadiness. And when the time came to kiss them goodbye – even though he was still bursting with things he had planned on telling them and never got the chance to, questions he had intended to ask which had somehow slipped his mind – he realised that the one day, as perfect as it was, could never satiate either of them; it could only make the loneliness of the following years more acutely felt, the longing more insufferable. The price he is making them pay for their love and devotion is too steep, and although he can’t force them to give him up altogether, he can, at the very least, persuade his son to give up this ridiculous Trident.

And yet playing the role of a stern father proves to be more challenging than he has imagined. He’s been a captain for such a long time that he is used to his commands being obeyed without question – although giving orders made him deeply uncomfortable at first, he had no choice but and embrace the authority he’d never had any desire to possess, and it’s become a habit; a second skin he has taught himself to wear with relative ease. He is absolutely clueless, however, as to how to exercise it on a little boy who refuses to be intimidated into submission, a little boy whose face is lit up with enthusiasm – rapture – at the idea of getting his father back. He has half a mind to try raising his voice to make himself sound as imposing as possible but instead finds that his legs carry him across the deck and before he knows it, he clasps Henry in his arms, holding him for all he’s worth. He feels his son’s ice-cold cheek press against his own and recognises it was a terrible mistake – how will he ever find the willpower to let go? – but he can’t bring himself to care; it’s too late now anyway.

‘Henry,’ he tries again. ‘The Trident can never be found.’

He doesn’t expect his son to yield too easily and his suspicions are immediately confirmed when Henry retorts:

‘I found you.’

Despite his unwavering resolve, the boy’s voice breaks slightly, and although he is certain he is doing the right thing, Will is sorely tempted to consent to whatever rash and perilous idea Henry puts forward because he knows what it’s like to be pushed away by a father you’d be willing to go to the ends of the earth to get back. He still vividly recalls the words Bootstrap said to him as he was fleeing the Dutchman, and not even the affection that has grown between them over the years can make the memory lose any of its bitterness: I could say I did what I had to when I left you to go pirating, but it would taste a lie to say it wasn’t what I wanted. You owe me nothing, Will. Now go.

And yet going was the very last thing he wanted to do. Even if Bootstrap was a far cry from the good, respectable man Will grew up striving to emulate, he was still his father, and after years and years of hunting rumours and assiduously, tenaciously piecing together loose scraps of information, he wasn’t about to let him go without putting up a fight – a fight that eventually led him to where he is now: heartless, half-dead, broken beyond repair. He understands Henry all too well; but he has also grown to understand Bootstrap and his reluctance to accept Will’s bloodthirsty promise to slay Jones. He considered his father cold and doggedly reserved, always enforcing distance which Will thirsted to close, and it wasn’t until the elder Turner renounced his newly-gained freedom to remain on the Dutchman that Will acknowledged the possibility that Bootstrap wasn’t utterly indifferent towards him; and now that he’s attempting to discourage Henry from going after the Trident, just as his father urged him to forget about the Chest, everything finally falls into place: it wasn’t because Bootstrap didn’t care – it was because he cared too much.

‘It’s just a tale,’ Will insists.

‘Like the tales of you and Captain Jack Sparrow?,’ Henry asks shrewdly, pulling away to give Will a defiant look. He has been fathered by the immortal captain of the Flying Dutchman, brought up on stories about skeletal pirates and sea monsters; of course believes the Trident to be real. ‘He will help me find the Trident.’

‘You stay away from Jack,’ Will cautions, his voice suddenly harsh. The idea of his twelve-year-old son embarking on an adventure with the old captain makes his blood boil; Jack Sparrow may be a good man, he is also a pirate, and Will is absolutely certain he wouldn’t hesitate to take advantage of Henry’s determination and ruthlessly exploit it for his own purposes, just as he did when he used Elizabeth to find the Chest or tricked Will into joining Davy Jones’s crew in his stead. ‘Leave the sea forever. You have to stop acting like –.’

‘A pirate?’

Never has Will hated the word more.

‘I won’t stop,’ Henry snaps back impatiently, visibly frustrated with Will’s stubborn refusal to see the brilliance of his plan. The anger on his face, however, melts away in a blink of an eye; his features soften and Will’s breath catches in his throat when he recognises the achingly familiar pout. ‘I want you to come home.’

Home. .

The closest thing he’s ever had to one were the droughty rooms in England where he lived with his mother, but even then the sense of security the word ought to connote was disturbed by the raspy breathing that echoed through the walls as he lay in bed staring into the dreary blackness of the night, his fists clenched in despairing helplessness. He realises he didn’t permit himself to think of the lighthouse as his home – how could he if it was as foreign to him as it was delightful? – and only now that he has heard the word from Henry’s lips – home – does it dawn on him that it never even occurred to his son to question his place there, and this sudden revelation breaks something in him. All the exasperation and resentment that have been building up within him over the past year give way; he feels light, as if a weight he wasn’t even aware of has been lifted off his shoulders, and the purpose he lost sight of is suddenly as plain as day: he has to fulfil his obligation for Henry and Elizabeth, to come home to them. It’s so wonderfully clear: somewhere in the other world, where the sun rises and sets and the sea breeze is like the gentlest caress on your face, they’re waiting for him, and every soul he shepherds to peace brings him a step closer to seeing them again.

A step closer to another one day he will be given in return for a decade of servitude. One day on shore, ten years at sea. The Dutchman must always have a captain.

His heart sinks; or it would if he had one, he thinks wryly. He isn’t able to give his son what he wants – what he deserves and needs – and no Trident will ever change that.

‘Henry,’ he begins again, his voice softer. The disappointment written all over Henry’s face and the reproach in his eyes force Will’s gaze downward; he can’t bear to look at the crumpled, dejected figure he has reduced his boisterous son to. ‘I’m sorry. My curse will never be broken.’

In one smooth movement, he pulls the pendant he wears off his neck and gently places it in Henry’s small palm, watching the boy’s fingers close around it. It’s pathetic, really. This little trinket is the best he can do for his son, the only thing he has to offer, the only way of expressing his appreciation for Henry’s unconditional love and the fierce, fearless spirit that led him to the Dutchman. But if it’s a token of gratitude, it’s also a silent entreaty that Will would never dare articulate: please, don’t forget me.

‘This is my fate.’ It’s almost impossible to force the words out. ‘You must let me go.’

As soon as he says it, he realises – for the first time truly realises – how desperately he doesn’t want Henry to; how miserably dependent he is on the belief that no matter how much time passes, he will always have someone to come back to. Yes, they both deserve so much better than the life he’s consigned them to, and if there was anything he could do to secure their happiness –in his head this scenario never includes him, but a faceless shadow of a man who makes Elizabeth’s eyes sparkle in the way he knows so intimately and teaches Henry swordplay in the sweltering afternoons – he wouldn’t hesitate. And yet when he imagines stepping on land to find that they have moved on just as he has exhorted them to – the beach is empty and eerily silent, and he spends the day drinking himself to oblivion before returning to the Dutchman with the sickening recognition that there is no need for him to disembark ever again – the very idea makes his blood curdle, and the notion of ripping one’s heart out of one’s chest, which struck him as farcical when he first heard the story of Davy Jones, doesn’t seem all that unreasonable. There is only one thing that the previous captain failed to predict, Will thinks bitterly: it doesn’t work. It just doesn’t bloody work.

He gingerly lifts Henry’s chin and has a proper look at his son’s face for the first time. He can’t hold back a small smile; he has almost forgotten how much of Elizabeth there is in the boy.

‘I love you, son,’ he says tenderly, and prays that Henry will believe him.

As the Dutchman goes down, Will watches his son’s body grow increasingly smaller until it’s only a shadow dancing on the surface of the ocean; and then it’s gone, and there is nothing for Will to do but take the helm and resume his duty, and this one time – just once – he allows himself to picture the future the Trident could give him: he sees himself chasing Henry around the beach, their bare feet sinking into the wet sand; Elizabeth is sitting nearby, watching them with a small smile on her face, one of her hands placed on her rounded midsection – it will be a girl, a lovely little thing with bouncing blond curls – and when they approach her with laughter on their lips, he bends down to kiss her, and takes the joy that bubbles up within him for granted; the idea that anything could ever separate them doesn’t so much as cross their minds.

If only it was possible, he thinks, gripping the wheel tightly. If only.

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