#but a healthy string is a glowing string and that can be any color

[fluffypotatey]

With how much of mess wukong has made several of his personal relationships (not just mac), really glad he can't naturally see the strings.

Kind of off topic but also related, do you keep strings with the dead? Macaque is a special case cause he was revived, but would wukong have strings to the graves of his jttw companions? If yes, would they last until souls are reincarnated. If no, did the shadowpeach string just reformed out of nothing?

ooooooh good question!

i think it is assumed that the strings break off after death because human lives are so finite and with immortals there’s not much worry because most of their strings are tied to immortals. there’s not much research for it bc it falls under myth and legend category, and not a lot of people can even see the strings

however, if an immortal shared a string with mortals, then when the mortal die the ribbon fades. it’s still there but more translucent.

shadowpeach is a special case because their relationship was originally strong and (though none of them could see it) was bright, shining gold on the edges. then Wukong is sent under the 5 Phase Mt., and the two fight to the point that they don’t see each other until Wukong is on the pilgrimage with Tripitaka.

by jttw, the light of their string faded and became dull (symbolizing the distance that’s grown between then) and when they fight, the ribbon tears and frays because they are approaching a point of no return

Macky’s death should have snapped the string completely. it should have gone translucent and separated with neither attached ever again. but Macky gets revived and Wukong is immortal

thus: the ribbon stays with the biggest tear at the center, being held by a couple threads

[querical-equinox]

I've had this DCA Magic/Dragon AU in my head for a good minute now. And I don't know that I'll ever get this fully written out in a way that I'm satisfied with, but I've been wanting share the idea so bad!!

So in an act of whimsy and self love imma just jot down my thoughts here and throw em out to the world!

So as things start out, you live in an old barn you'd long since fixed up and turned into a home. It's nestled away in a mountain forest, out of sight of the village that rests in the valley below, but not out of reach.

Magic has a natural flow in this world. Some people or creatures may be more intuned, but anyone can learn and wield it if they try. While some places are gearing towards an academic understanding of it, most people still learn by pure trial and error. All feeling and emotion and ritual.

You do the latter.

You're a Mender, by Trade and Title. Always had an uncanny knack for fixing things up, and as you've fiddled and fumbled your way through figuring out magic all these years, you've only gotten better at it.

Anything you need is either made or grown at home, forged from the wilderness, or received from villagers who make their way out to your little loft. You pay and are payed in trades and favors, and are on good terms with most of the folk who live down below you.

They often come out seeking your help with repairs, most often knick knacks, or important tools. Sometimes treasured and sentimental pieces. And more and more as of late, mending of a medical variety.

This is something you still struggling with, but you're learning.

You also tend to keep close to your home. Mostly because it's where you're the most comfortable, you're really not seeking any grand adventure or fortune. You have most everything you need right here! But it's also in no small part due to your Delicate Constitution.

It's not so bad some days. Buzzing around your home and gardens, steady energy and a bright heart. Taking breaks when you need, but otherwise left unhindered.

Most commonly you get around with the aid of one of your canes or walking sticks (a good few are gifts/trades with folks from the valley.) Sometimes needing to wear compression braces. Definitely resting more in between activities, and usually relying on your magic a lil more than might be healthy.

At your worst though you're lucky to get around your house. Using magic is intensely detrimental in this state, and something you opt only to do under dire circumstances.

You're grateful to the folk who pop in and help when you're like this, even if the embarrassment/shame never fully fades, despite their gentle insistence. Even more grateful still that they'll leave if really ask them to.

-

On the flip side of things, are Sun and Moon! Living, Dragonoid Marionettes. Though one wouldn't guess them to be puppets at all, as they keep their true forms hidden under physical illusions.

Sun is all glittering gold and scarlet scales. A large, fluffy spiked mane the color of sunlight, and an adornment of flashy red frills around his neck and wrists.

Moon is all midnight hues, with a speckling of shining scales (are they silver or a muted gold, who's to say as they twinkle like stars.) A silvery mane trails more down his back than his counterparts. And he has two long, dark blue whiskers, that wink and glow a soft yellow at the ends.

Both can choose to keep closer to their original size, or take on a much larger form at will. They're wingless dragons, long and serpentine. All muscle with wicked sharp claws at the ends of their hands and feet.

Their true form are more akin to a child's wooden slither snake toy, just done up all fancy. They sill have their marks and fur and frills, but look decidedly more handmade. And those magically inclinde may just be able to spot pale, shimmering strings, fading off into an ethereal distance.

Who made them, and what for, is unclear. IF they were made for a purpose at all of course they were, but it's been so long, do they remember?

Their main concern at the present date however, is helping their dear friend Music Man. Also known as The Music of the Mountain, or on the occasion someone happens to spot him, oh goOD LORD THAT"S A REALLY BIG SPIDER.

He likes Music Man just fine.

He'd been acting strange as of late, and the final straw for them to intervene was one of his darling Minis seeking them for help so far from home.

This ends with them caught in an ambush at the mouth of his cave home (not the fault of the Mini seeking help mind you!) And the two are separated. With Sun flying down the Mountain, struggling to fend off the Minis swarming him as gently as he can. And Moon facing the Music Man himself, getting backed further and further into the cave.

-

This leads to your first meeting with Sun! He crash lands in a meadow you frequent for herbs and the like. Having shaken all the Minis off along the flight down the Mountain, but left horribly tangled in their incredibly strong spider silk.

It takes a lot of coaxing and gentle words to even get near him. But he seems desperate enough to accept your cautious help.

So you sit and carefully unwind him from this painful mess. You talk to him the whole way through, explaining the work you do (especially when he cant see you), but also just making idle chatter in the interim.

You can feel a powerful magic rolling over and through him, and would nearly be mesmerized by such a beast if it weren't for the serious task at hand.

Despite his rush to get back up and go help Moon, he's incredibly patient with you. Even as you insist on rubbing some ointment on his wounds once you've finished, not knowing the hurry he's in.

When he leaves, it's with a burst of warmth and intense gratitude, as he's seemingly carried off on a breeze.

You head home feeling lighter than you have in years. Cane loose in hand, with coils of spider silk wrapped around it, that you'd keep for a project of some sort.

The field sees a sudden, unexpected bloom over the next week or so after.

-

You meet Moon a little later after that. Again in the field, though it's raining this time. You were out hunting some storm only blooms for an upcoming potion, things like Gator's Tears, and Froggs Foot.

You catch a glimmer of gold, heart picking up in elation at the return of your sunny dragon friend. Though it quickly drops at your sight clears through the rain.

He's carrying a badly injured Moon. You become acutely aware of the anxious, roiling energy trickling down from them.

He brought Moon to you, entirely uncertain, but desperately hoping you could help. He didn't know quite what else to do.

And so you do what you always do. Help as best you can.

This is leads you to guiding Sun back down to your barn, where you thankfully have enough room to squeeze them both in on the ground floor. You set to work on fixing up a barely conscious lunar dragon, who gets hissy in his brief moments of lucidity.

You don't talk during most of this endeavor. More focused on the task, and channeling your magic as best you can the mend the poor dear. Sun is pure anxious energy coiled protectively nearby.

When you're done and Moon is stable, your watch with a startled awe as he seems to shift and dustily dissolve into his small dragon form. Sun follows suit, in what feels to you as sigh of relief.

Only then do you gently bubble with idle chatter, as you get them blankets and pillows to help them be more comfortable. You tell Sun that Moon will need to rest for a while. And that you'd like them to stay a bit to watch over how he heals.

You've expended entirely too much magic during his care , and end up out of commission for a while after yourself.

As so it goes, you have two Ethereal Dragons as house guest for a short while.

-

I have more loose thread for things I'd like to see later on. Like them seeking your help with Music Man, and possibly some other fnaf crew.

Funny moments of them being appalled by how you channel your magic. (Some spells and the like have very physical channelings, and you can get the same results from different methods if you're creative enough.) As beings soaked and strung with magic, they take to it a lot more naturally than you, like second nature it seems. They try teaching you easier/safer ways of harnessing it.

As well as some other fun things, soft visits and hijinks, their Marionette reveal to the reader, interacting with some of the villagers, and so on so forth.

This is all I have to share for now though, and if you made it this far thank you for taking the time to read!!!

[dynamicelectricworld]

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[luuurien]

Marxist Love Disco Ensemble - MLDE

(Disco, Synthpop, Boogie)

Luxuriant disco with a leftist edge, the Italian collective's debut album explores not only the relations of its chief genre to class struggle and social identity but how disco has been morphed by Western capital desire over the years. MLDE is the band's mission statement, and it's a near-perfect one at that.

☆☆☆☆½

Created with liberation and freedom in mind, disco's history has nearly been entirely wiped from its modern image. In its earliest incarnations, disco and the places you could dance to it were safe havens for queer communities, music made by oppressed communities as an expression of joy and empowerment they weren't allowed anywhere else in the world. After the genre's mainstream explosion during the 1970s, all those precedents were lost, disco homogenizing to fall in line with the needs of record executives and radio stations, and by the early 80s disco was largely already on its way out - not to mention a healthy dose of racism and homophobia thrown towards it and the club culture it was born from as well. Marxist Love Disco Ensemble isn't having any of it. A somewhat mysterious collective from Bologna, Italy, their debut album MLDE refutes the idea of disco as a purely bourgeois entity, pulling off the veil over disco's sociopolitical origins and embracing the joyous, communal resistance its early years held so dear. Dusted with retro stylings but settling principally in modern Marxist theory and praxis, MLDE is one hell of an impressive debut. Inspired by Soviet era disco-pop à la Hamlet Minassian and Chaz Jankel, MLDE is an amalgamation of post-disco gentility, 80s boogie, and pure pop perfection, vocals often performed by a quartet in homage to traditional Soviet vocal records while the rich orchestration of disco colors in everything else. But there's more to Marxist Love Disco Ensemble's formula than meets the eye: it's hard to deny the many similarities between them and Stereolab - there's even hints of loungey, space-age pop in the flashy synth arpeggios dotted all over 1905 and Dust's jazzy piano line - and the notes of retro synthpop in the glowing keyboards all over Manifesto or Engineers' shiny digital strings help give bold outlines to the lo-fi edges of the album's 1/2 inch cassette tape recording set up. All these little details are what keeps MLDE from growing stagnant, a disco album through and through but never succumbing to the genre's trappings and testing how far they can take things while staying comfortably within dance tradition, Brumaire toying with a fuzzy analog synth solo and Hues of Red featuring a percussive breakdown and a whistle that calls back to the same way Donna Summer used one back on 1979's Bad Girls. In sound alone, MLDE is one of the most delightful listens this year, balancing creamy disco richness with just enough new additions to make their take on it compelling and singular. But the most important thing that distinguishes MLDE from its disco contemporaries is its political focus, Paolo Volkov's songwriting pulling from different strands of Marxist theory - dialectical materialism, class struggle, capitalist social stratification - and implementing them forthright into his music without subtlety. He references Marx's book on The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte on the fittingly-titled Brumaire, situating bloody images of revolution ("The workers aren't blindfolded / ...Bleed the skull from culture") with his hope for a communist future ("Brumaire's up eighteenth / Take the bow now"); album centerpiece 1905 takes advantage of its radiant space-disco sound to look back on the 1905 Russian Revolution and the following revolution which ended the Russian monarchy and reformed the Bolshevik party in 1917. His reserved vocal presence serves not to undermine his message but ensure it doesn't take over the music, Engineers shifting between proletariat sympathies ("The calloused hands who work for pay / Can change their emotions to betray") and outward calls for protest and change ("Here's the voice that calls your name to go defy / Marx, Engels, Lenin, Luxembourg") and perfectly balancing the disco's hopeful glow with the message Marxist Love Disco Ensemble seeks to convey. It's both poetic and sardonic at once: Volkov can sell his message so well because he knows that keeping his ideals crystal-clear while presenting them underneath velvety dance music is the most potent way for him to express it. Outwardly political music rarely manages to be so well-constructed and lyrically impactful at once, yet MLDE seems to manage it with more effortlessness than anyone else out there. Maybe it's their low-key Italian cool or the hazy warmth of these cassette-recorded dance tunes, but Marxist Love Disco Ensemble makes for one of the most enchanting new groups of the year with a might few others could manage, MLDE's leftist-aligned disco jams as fun to listen to as they are spiritually vital. The dancefloor's demands for energy and passion are met by the group every time, and the strength of their Marxist-aligned message is only amplified tenfold through it.

[cosmica-galaxy]

The baby posts were adorable af! The thought makes my heart all warm and mushy like oatmeal. Now I gotta wonder what a Jeb or Phobos dad would be like. Hell, what would a Player/Tricky hybrid look like?? That one’s a little scary.

ANSWERING BOTH OF THESE! I MADE MORE MADCOM PAPA FLUFF FOR ALL YOU! HEHEHEHAHAHAHAH!

HAHAHAA! I cannot be stopped! MORE MADCOM ASKS!!

Tw: Pregnancy and non-descriptive birth mention, but more cavity-inducing papa grunts!

+Reader has fem bits but are gender neutral +Set in Salty’s Self Aware AU PART 2 HAS SHERIFF AND TRICKY! Thank Jebus I got two asks asking for the same stuff!!

– JEB –

The moment that his player comes forward to tell him that they were carrying his child, Jeb pretty much experiences a temporary blue screen in his mind. After a few moments of him blankly staring ahead, he comes alive and finds himself so elated that he picks up his player and spins them around in a fit of elated joy. He was going to have a demi-god for a child, how could he NOT be happy? Not only that, but it was a product of their shared love for one another, so Jeb couldn’t be any more excited.

In the first trimester, Jeb works overtime to make a safe haven for you to carry his child safely to term. He gathers up any materials he can, such as blankets, medical supplies, and various utilities that he can use to help you throughout your pregnancy. He also reassumes his ‘bodyguard’ instincts from the early days of him protecting the Sheriff from Hank, making sure to watch over you whenever he could and dealing with anyone that dared come too close for his personal comfort.

He also begins to reread up on his studies from long ago and to apply much more modern knowledge to childcare. His player had to help him understand human anatomy at times, but he was more than willing to learn if it meant that his child would be brought into the world of Nevada healthy and safe.

In the midterm, Jeb grows more anxious and excited as you have to help him relax and calm down on more than one occasion. Mostly because his repressed emotions have begun to emerge and they slightly get away from him from time to time. Your cuddles and loving kisses always calm him down and he lays next to you for hours on end like a loyal guardian, even after you’ve fallen asleep and the nighttime part of Nevada comes around.

Jeb even takes up ‘childproofing’ most of the new living space and gathering furnishing materials in his spare time. He’s not an overly handiworker-type of grunt, but he is determined to give his offspring the best crib in all of Nevada. Days of work went into carving up a wooden crib for his child. Designed with angel wings on the corners and halo-esque designs carved into the wood that gave the side of the crib a similarity to stained glass windows one would find in a place of worship.

Needless to say, you were pretty impressed with his work, even more so when you discover that he wasn’t really a handy grunt or an artist. You give Jeb a kiss of approval to make sure he understood your appreciation for his effort.

By the late trimester, Jeb becomes borderline obsessed with protection and nesting. The crib’s room is decorated with little carved figurines and lots of white sheets and items, to which Jeb claims was just to make the room ‘feel holier’. As his player could only snicker in response and encourage his creativity by making glowing sheets and a ‘onsie robe’ from their own iridescent strings.

Eventually, the room is covered with white and color with a few shiny objects and precious polished metals that Jeb had found while he was scouting around for items. It reminded you of a holy-themed magpie's nest for obvious reasons, but you could only give Jeb a loving kiss on his lips while you stand and look on in satisfaction of what will become your child’s bedroom.

Pretty soon, the due date begins to arrive.

Jeb is no longer leaving his players side as they need more and more help as their birthday draws closer and closer. Jeb is stressed out and nervous, and he makes sure that you’re cared for and doted on the most in this stage. He even gives you periodic massages along your back and hips to help you with your growing discomfort and pain.

You both prepare for the arrival by gathering up materials and items that would be used to help you deliver his child as Jeb also works on a medical station that would deliver his child safely.

Then suddenly, it happens.

Right before dawn, his player lets out a loud cry of pain that shocks Jeb out of his deep sleep. Jeb springs to life as he picks up his player effortlessly and goes to the makeshift medbay to lay you on a stretcher he stole from an abandoned hospital. His emotions run high as he prepares and follows your strained instructions on what he should do.

The process was long and difficult with you two being the only ones around, but eventually Jeb finishes the delivery process and cleans the young one off. His player becomes exhausted as they slump against the cot to catch their breath while he swaddles up the little arrival and then…there’s stillness.

There was only the sound of your labored breathing while he sits in the quiet room looking at the bundle in his arms from behind his shades. The little one makes a couple of quiet squeaks as they wiggle in his arms and let out a kitten-like sneeze as they open their eyes.

Surprisingly, their eyes looked just like his…and an even more shocking turn of events, an iridescent halo suddenly developed around their head after a few minutes of being awake. It startled Jeb, but enthralled him at the same time. He holds his child close as the infant lets out a few squeaks and painful yanks on his beard, making Jeb wince and pull back a bit giving his young one a soft glare before chuckling in response. The child even let out a giggle of their own.

Then, the emotions hit Jeb all at once and the ex-AAHW member blinks in a repeated fashion until something wet drips past his eyes. He doesn’t even mind the small hands that come up to investigate his dripping tears as the new father merely holds them close to his body. Relief and happiness fills his S3LF as he nuzzles the glittering infant as close to himself as possible.

Jebus wept. But not from sorrow.

As a father, Jebus desires to raise his child to become the ‘true savior’ of Nevada. Since his departure from the AAHW, Jeb has tried to live a more peaceful life, but Hank and their group tends to make that…difficult. But his child is far stronger and has higher-god blood in them, so he tries his best to be a great role model for his child and guide them through Nevada the best he can.

Jebus is an honored parent of a demi-god that wants his kid to succeed and be just as righteous, if not more so, than he could ever be. While hopefully saving Nevada from The Madness in the process.

– PHOBOS –

When you told Phobos that you were pregnant, you should have really expected that he would be the type to go full ham about you carrying his holy offspring. Phobos was beyond elated, he was pretty much ascending inside of his own body when he processed the news that he was going to have a child. He had pulled you close and nuzzled you in the way you liked while he rambled about making a new wing on the science tower that would house all of his youngling’s rooms.

During the first trimester, Phobos begins construction on the new wing of the science tower. This didn’t surprise you in the slightest, as Phobos was always the type to go above and beyond to ‘please his godly lover’ and as your loyalist acolyte (and chosen child-bearer; his words not yours), you being pleased with your environment came before all else. Even the project.

So he started from the ground up with units to build more onto the building that houses you both, he started the project with the bedroom. Phobos is relentless in his desire for absolute perfection when it comes to you and your developing young. The poor workers are strained to their limits while he makes the room as perfect as he can. Not only that, but he was also making it as ‘holy’ and needlessly extravagant at the same time.

The floors of the room were made from a polished rare white stone, the pillars of the room had to have unique carvings on them, and the doors were made from the darkest refined wood that they could find. All the patterns worked in harmony and even had a style that was similar to Chinese Imperial architecture from your world. Which made sense, since Phobos was a self-deemed ‘emperor’ of Nexus City.

The crib itself was made with precious metals and has a long canopy that was strung above it by one of your iridescent strings, which was requested by the worker that hung the canopy up.

The room was also given a bookshelf, chairs, a changing station, a vanity, and a large walk-in closet. Each piece of furnishing was also overly decorated and painstakingly carved with unique designs that each depicted the player in their holy visage and a god-like Phobos as well. You really felt bad for the workers that put all that effort in, so you would bring them refreshments and sweets as a gratuitous gift to them when Phobos wasn’t around. Since you worried that he would execute the poor workers if he saw them ‘tainting’ you with their presence. This made you rather popular with the workers and some would even visit the altar that was dedicated to you Phobos had set up to leave you gifts.

During the midterm of your pregnancy, Phobos is pretty much obsessed with making sure that you’re protected at all cost and that the wing of the science tower continues its construction. After the bedroom was done, the construction moved to making the child demi-god a playroom, an entertainment center, a living area, their own personal kitchen (cause like hell Phobos would prepare their food in the cafeteria of the science tower), a schooling room, and a luxurious bathroom. He still wasn’t done with the plans for the tower, but you constantly had to remind him that your child was merely an infant and what he was doing was enough.

Phobos is stubborn though, but a good few kisses and affectionate strokes is enough to make your ‘loyalist acolyte’ melt under your touch in response. You manage to get him to relax for a while as you both lay together, his hands on your belly and him whispering sweet sayings into your ear as you stay wrapped up in his crimson cape. Then, he gasps when he feels the child press back into his hands. His cycloptic eye seemingly sparkling as you let out a couple of giggles and a long sigh when he cuddles up closer to your belly to talk to the little one within. Listening to him say how he was so excited to meet his little godling and how much he loved them was enough to make you blush brightly in response.

In the late trimester of you carrying his child, Phobos is strict with his staff and he begins to prepare for the arrival of your little one. Making a closet worth of clothes, high quality blankets for the crib, having a cleaning staff go through the new wing of the science tower daily, and preparing a special medical wing for you to give birth in. Phobos also has to work on his ‘lesser important’ project in the meantime, so you are left in your shared room alone most of the time with assistants helping you throughout the day.

Then, the due date arrives.

Phobos is in the lower levels of the science towers scolding a lot of incompetent grunts from messing up some ‘simple’ engineering work when he suddenly gets a call on his comm from the medical wing.

The moment he is given the news that his player has gone into labor, he leaves the other grunts behind and races to the medical wing. When he arrives, the grunts that were walking through the medical district of the tower part like the red sea to allow Phobos through without a hassle. He gets to the private section of the wing to find his player in the middle of labor.

He rushes to his players side while the trained medical team works on preparing to deliver his godling. He allows you to grip his hand throughout the process, which nearly brings a tear to his eye from how hard you were crushing it. Then, the process passes and the medical team clean up his little one while you release his hand from your deathgrip.

With his player resting on the medical cot, Phobos is handed a little swaddled bundle of grunt in a satin cloth while the medical staff clear out of there to give the pair a moment of peace. Phobos is in awe as he looks at the little glittering grunt in his arms in silence as they slowly awaken to see the world for the first time.

Their eyes are colorful like the players and they were sporting a rather unique mark around their head. There was a bright small crimson circle that was placed in the middle of their forehead, along with crimson markings that gave the illusion that the little one was wearing a royal circlet. Phobos holds up his hand as he gently rubs the child’s face in a gentle and loving manner, almost as if he couldn’t believe his little god was finally here after months of waiting.

He cuddles them and holds them close to his body as the youngling hiccups and stretches out their little limbs, making cute little straining noises before letting out a small yawn. Phobos could feel his ego pretty much becoming even BIGGER as his heart melts and palpitates in his chest. What a perfect little royal.

“My little god…it’s nice to finally meet you.” Phobos mutters just above a whisper as he nuzzles his child in a loving manner.

As a father, Phobos couldn’t be more protective and proud. He bred with the most powerful being in Nevada and was ‘chosen to rear their young’ (again, his words, not yours.) as a god among the masses, Phobos is the most egotistical he has ever been.

But now, he has a child to absolutely spoil rotten and dote on while he works on his other project. Though, you’re the parent that keeps a tighter leash on your child and you also perform disciplinary actions against them. Less they become a spoiled brat because of Phobos’s constant doting.

You also might have to keep a watch on Phobos too, because he’s already talking about having another little god.

[monsterfloofs]

How about some asexual reader! x incubbus and succubus? I would love to see that chaotic trio <3

Incubus and Succubus (Leo and Vivan) x Anonymous Ace Reader

(You have absolutely won over me with this idea about the goofy beans! I am all for the chaos trio, sign me up please. I have to also admit though, as much as I love Leo and Vivi I absolutely fell tail over tea kettle in love with Cirrus. Elegant, prim, and pouty-- ahhhhhhhhhhh!! I have a feeling their little attitude guards a sweet inside and a hurt heart. Here I go again, falling in love with the side characters. Ehehe whoops!)

Your eyes felt heavy as you sat at the bar, waiting for your significant others to get off work. The building was run by concubi, and while the aroma of honeyed aphrodisiac didn’t bother you the same way that some other humans felt it. You still had a number of side effects, especially when there were so many of them around in one place. You stifle a yawn, eyes drooping from the sleepy lightheaded fog that clouded your eyes. Shifting on your seat uncomfortably, you take another healthy swig of your water before resting your head on top of your hands.

“They’ll get off work soon, I don’t think. . . a little nap will hurt--” You wobble in place, eyes drifting closed.

You didn’t know what time it was the next time you had started awake, the dim blue and purple lights glimmered in your glazed vision. There was someone who was trying to talk to you, gently shaking your shoulder.

“Hey, I wouldn’t be dozing off here if I was you-- If you stay here any longer you could get in trouble.”

You rub your eyes and give slow and deliberate blinks, trying to focus on the person in front of you. “Sorry?” You mumble, wiping the tears that had formed in your eyes and looking up.

There was a waitron with their hands on their hips, frowning at you, their blue skin almost looking bioluminescent in the lights that were cast inside the bar. They had soft fluffy hair, you were unsure of the exact color it was, due to the bleeding glow cast from the bar lights.

“I’ve never seen a human fall asleep in here before seeing anyone,” they state their observation quietly before raising their voice, “What business do you have in here?”

“Oh!” You squeak nervously, “I’m waiting for--” You stop mid-sentence with gaze transfixed on something past the waitron’s silhouette. Watching a pair of playful pink hands tiptoe up the waitron's shoulder, before a pair of arms wrap around their neck and the tall demon hiccups in surprise as they are suddenly pulled backwards. Vivan’s plump form hugging them from behind as she puts the other concubi in a playful choke hold. Vivi’s soft rolling curls of hair draped down over them. “Aw come on Cirrus! Don’t be such a stick in the mud! Can’t a little cutie like that take a nap in peace?”

The waitron’s features smoothing into an embarrassed and agitated sneer. “Vivian. . . let go.”

Leo steps around the two ignoring Vivians tomfoolery as he puts a big hand on your head and ruffles your hair. “Sorry about that rockstar, we got held up.” 

“It’s okay,” You begin, your voice trailing off as you watch the two concubi scramble around in the background. Cirrus, the waitron, obviously trying to weasel their way out of Vivan’s grasp. Leo folds his muscular arms over his chest and raises a bushy eyebrow, “Comeon Viv, quit tormenting the poor string bean.”

Vivian giggles, as Cirrus manages to claw their way out of her grasp. Despite being a short and shapely demon, Vivi was stronger than she looked. Her tail wagged playful and happy while Cirrus displayed all the affection of a cat who had just been given a bath. Dragging their hair from back from out of their eyes, Cirrus haughtily dusted themselves off. Their eyes cautiously watched Vivian for a hard moment before their gaze shifted to glare at Leo. “Who is this?” They demanded angrily, “You know the rules, humans can only visit this bar at certain arranged times.”

Leo gives a sigh, rubbing the back of neck, fingers massaging his mess of dark hair. “Ah. . . yeah, about that, they aren’t a patron or anything Cir. They were just waiting for us to get off work.”

Cirrus ears perk up, an unreadable expression crossing their face before they stare at you. “This is the reason the both of you changed positions here isn’t it?” They said flatly. 

“Yeah!” Vivan says, throwing her arms around you and hugging you tightly, “This is our little beau! We love 'em so damn much!” She grins proudly, nuzzling her nose affectionately against your cheek.

“. . . And how long do you think this little fling will last?” Cirrus mumbles dryly causing the other two concubi to fall silent. You swallow thickly, mouth going dry from the razor edged comment.

“Fling?” Leo echos, his expression darkening, “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

Cirrus scoffs, straightening up, “Well obviously this isn’t going to last long. Knowing both of your track records.” Their cold gaze drifting down to stare at you again. “Do you think something like this will last? With how much other things beings like us demand from a relationship? You’re going to wear the poor thing out. Ultimately it will be too much for them.”

Leo and Vivi exchanged glances with each other. Vivi hugging you tighter against her as Leo puts an arm around both of you protectively.

“Screw you!” Vivian chirps, “We gotta more wholesome relationship than you could ever dream of!” She glares daggers at Cirrus.

“Well. . . thanks for that gloomy opinion Cir. But honestly, that’s really none of your damn business.” Leo says cooly. Cirrus scoffs in disgust and tosses their head, turning frostily on their heels and marching away. “Just warning you. . .” They call over their shoulder.

Leo slowly raises his right hand to his forehead, holding up his thumb and forefinger into a L while sticking out his pierced tongue.

“What an ass. . .” Vivi grumbles, “They’ll always been prickly, but this is a whole new level of friendly.” Her expression changes as she looks down at you. “I’m so sorry pumpkin, I can’t believe they said that-- OOh!” She growls as her temper flares, “What a total jerk!!”

“It’s okay. . .” Came your soft muffled response, Vivians grip had been getting a little too strong, and you were well. . . fiercely being smothered into her ample chest. 

Leo makes a noise in the back of his throat. “Vi. . . you’re gonna kill em’ if you keep holding em’ like that.” Vivian blinks innocently before looking down. “AH--!” She recoils hastily, “I’m so sorry sweetheart!! I didn’t mean to!”

[archetypal-archivist]

Tommyinnit and Hermitcraft- Heartstone

So this builds off of the whole "Tommy has somehow found himself on Hermitcraft after the exile arc" thing that got really popular with @redorich and @petrichormeraki on tumblr. Basically it's an excuse to give Tommy therapy and 20+ parent figures. One thing that's a common thread in those stories is that Tommy is shocked that Hermitcraft has infinite respawns and all of the hermits are quick to reassure him that he really won't perma-die in their world. And I had the thought- well, what if he wasn't in their world anymore? And thus came forth 1500+ words of angst~

It begins like this. Evil X is stuck in the void, alone and with no one to talk to. He misses daylight, he misses touch, he misses hearing voices other than his own. One day, he sees something get shot through the void as if by slingshot, leaving a trail of code in its wake, tethering the whatever it is back the way it came. This is Tommy, and while he begins to get adjusted to Hermitcraft and company, Evil X watches as the string of code begins to imprint itself into the void, and eventually learns that he can interact with it, albeit only on the most superficial of levels. On Tommy's end, he slowly begins to heal from his time spent in the war zone that is the Dream SMP, making fast friends with Grian and several of the other hermits in the process. He goes pranking with his newest, winged older brother figure, laughs at the antics of Impulse, Tango, and Zedaph, builds a cobblestone tower with BDubs, etc. But for all that he's healing, such a process isn't linear. No one on the server can truly understand just what sort of stuff he has been through, and so he often finds himself alone, trying to deal with his wildest emotions by talking to himself.

One day, however, a little voice in his head starts talking back. It's rough and gravelly and not very nice at first, but it's faint enough that he chalks it up to his imagination and moves on with his life. He follows Stress around like a duckling for a day, plays squire for Welsknight, and has a roaring panic attack after an unfortunate spar with False leads to him getting flashbacks to the Pit with Technoblade. He retreats back to his tower for a good cry, and in the midst of his tears, he hears the voice again. This time it's a bit nicer, sounding unsure and a bit panicky as it tries to encourage him to stop crying, god this is awkward, kid, it'll be fine. Wait, are you a kid? You seem tall for a munchkin.

This time, Tommy knows that it isn't his imagination, but half of his old server seemed to have voices in their heads so he really isn't all that alarmed that he seemed to have developed one of his own too. And he does something that no one else does when Evil X reaches out- he starts talking back. It's rough going, at first, especially since both of them have abrasive personalities, but eventually they settle into a rough estimation of friendship that means more to them then they are willing to say. From Evil X's perspective, this is the first time someone has actually listened to him and hasn't been turned away by his violent streak, his bad manners, and lack of proper social skills. For Tommy, this is a chance to vent to someone who seems to understand his pain. It helps that neither of them are inclined to ask too many questions. Tommy, on his part, has no clue that Evil X is an actual person and not a voice in his head, while Evil X can't bring himself to ask why Tommy has left a trail of code in the void and why it's all so glitched. He especially fears asking about the perma-death clause that seems to naturally have occurred in his code.

He will come to regret this choice.

The day is like any other, at first. He begins his day with a slice of sweet melon and then flies off to whatever hermits are awake at the time to "share a meal with them." Really, it started as an excuse to make sure that Tommy was eating at least one meal day, even in his most dissociative of states, but has since turned into an opportunity to eat weird things in front of people to see their reactions. (Etho is his favorite. He's always up early and half the time, asks to try a bite of whatever Tommy is having. They both agree that spider eyes taste a lot like sour boba.) From there it's off to the shopping district to restock his dirt shop and claim his share of the profits from the hole-digging service he runs with Grian. After that, there's just enough time to complete an order or two and collect more cobble and dirt before he has to meet up with Grian to go on their biweekly End Busting session. The two usually have a lot of fun as they go about it, Tommy jokingly shoving Grian off the platform only for his adopted brother to catch himself and fly up to join him on the narrow platform spanning the emptiness once again. Every once in a while, Grian mock-threatens to do the same in return, but he knows better than to actually attempt it after he did it once and had had to catch Tommy when he started screaming and even after they had gotten back to solid ground, he wouldn't stop for the better part of half an hour.

On habits die hard, after all. Tommy may have been told time and time again by everyone on the server that infinite respawns are a thing, yes really, but he still has a hard time believing it. He actually has a rather insane number of levels racked up- even more than Xisuma, which is impressive- because in all the months that he has been on Hermitcraft, he hasn't died once. It's a combination of survival skills taught to him by Philza and his own paranoia which has kept him alive for so long, and most of the hermits agree that it is rather impressive, if not entirely healthy for him to be so scared of dying. (Doc once offered to kill him as evidence that yes, it really is safe here and you will respawn, but for all that death by crazy redstone machine might of been cool, Tommy took a hard pass on that. Grian low key took exception to Doc offering to kill his adopted little brother, really man? Not cool.)

Anyway, Grian and Tommy meet up in the End and start off bridging with the insane amount of cobble that Tommy has stored up. Usually Tommy is in front, placing the stones, and Grian is in back, watching out for any sign of a slip up, but this time they decide to switch it up a bit, head in a new direction, play around with who's doing what this time. It ends... poorly. They bridge out into the black, on and on and on, farther into the void than they ever have before. Slowly, the islands of floating white stone stop appearing with such frequency, but they become larger in size and stranger in shape. Every once in a while Grian will see what he swears to be a glowing white mountain of Endstone in the distance, although Tommy calls bullshit each and every time. They chalk it all up to bad luck and going nuts from boredom, but really, neither one of them knows how to quit while they're ahead. As the islands disappear altogether and all that remains to orient themselves is the tenuous lifeline of cobblestone beneath their feet, the unthinkable happens.

Grian slips. And Tommy, taught compassion by the very world that will now kill him, reaches out to save him.

For one, brief moment, the two brothers clasp hands- and then Grian's weight pulls Tommy right over the edge and down, down, down into the void below.

Grian fell out of the world.

Tommy fell out of the world... and into a new one.

----

Xisuma wakes up late that day. He's been doing that a lot, if he's honest, given how late he's staying up most nights finishing up builds and the like. Those hours of sleep have to come from somewhere, after all, and he's far from an early bird. He gives into the impulse to relax a bit, drinking some tea sweetened with just enough honey to rot his teeth, and then heads off to his computer room to start up his duties as admin for the day. It's the red lights that alert him to something being wrong, and at first, he thinks it's just one of hermits' cam accounts being buggy again. Perhaps it got shut off while the hermit was bridging through the void and the hermit in question simply hadn't retrieved it yet? But who would name their cam account Tommyinnit? The looming dread sits cold in his gut as he flicks his fingers to open up his admin panel... Best to check, just in case.

The death messages are clear enough- Keralis had just perished to a ravager yesterday, likely Tango's from Decked Out if he had to guess. Zedaph had been slain by a piglin twenty minutes ago. And Grian and Tommy had fallen into the void. But if that were the case... why had only one of them respawned?

On Grian's part, he comes to with a lingering chill deep in his bones and an awful headache. The bed underneath him is warm and the sheets are a soft rosy color, likely one of the ones in Scar's magical village if the persistent smell of spruce is anything to go by. He winces against the light filtering through the window and turns to the side, squinting at where Tommy had placed his blue bed right next to his, apology on his lips for his stupid mistake. The sheets are undisturbed. Huh. That's weird, he could have sworn that he and Tommy had set their respawn points at the same time. Maybe Tommy had just forgotten and he was back in his base or at spawn? Grian rises to his feet slowly, giving his body time to adjust to the colors and sounds of the Overworld, then flaps his wings and takes off to go looking for his Tommy.

He doesn't find him.

---

The reactions to Tommy's "death" are many and varied, although for the most part, the hermits are split into two camps- those that think Tommy is gone for good, and those that think he may still be out there somewhere. For the first few days of Tommy's disappearance, most everyone is in the latter camp. Xisuma spends hours upon hours scanning the code, becoming increasingly more frazzled and terrified as his lack of sleep gets to him. Tango and Doc join him in the endeavor, although none of them have any luck or are able to spot the piece of code that caused the problem. No additions, no changes to the text, nothing. Grian leads the other team, those who set out on foot and one wing and with pick in hand to scour the world for their youngest charge, taken from them too soon. They begin in a grid pattern, setting out in ones and twos to search the whole world, but as the distance increases, the neat, orderly flyovers turn into frenzied boosting as panic starts to get the better of them. Some of them hold onto their composure better than others, but Grian ends up flying over the same patch of forest three times because he can't see for his tears. False, Impulse, Welsknight, and Beef cross the Nether, fighting their way into Bastion after Bastion and leaving Nether portals in their wake. In their tracks comes the fliers- Grian, Ren, Iskall, and BDubs. Each one takes a portal and does a sweep through the corresponding patch of Overworld before picking a direction to continue the search. Cubfan, iJevin, and Scar take to the seas, Mumbo, Stress, xB, and Zedaph to the End, Etho down into the depths of the caves below. Strangely enough, there are a few hermits who don't join the search- Keralis, who got the unlucky task of taking care of Xisuma and the others searching through the code, Tinfoilchef, who doesn't provide a reason but everyone gives him a pass because of his age, and Joe Hills and Zombie Cleo, who refuse to explain themselves.

Eventually, the searches dry up. Eventually, some of the hermits admit defeat. Hundreds of thousands of blocks out from spawn, down to the bedrock below, beneath sea and sky and every place that lacks the sun. How far is too far? For Xisuma, enough is enough. Tommy is dead. The search is over.

He stops looking. And soon, others do the same.

And the tone of the server... shifts.

For the first time that any of them can remember, a person has perma-died. Sure, they've all heard the rumors, of servers where infinite respawns is not the norm, of servers where the world glitched and a creeper is supercharged enough to damage a player down to their code. But they'd never thought that one of their own would be on the receiving end of such a curse. And to the hermits, the possibility of dying themselves suddenly becomes all too real. The constant flying is the first to go, and for those that insist on it anyway (outside of Grian, who has wings), checking the elytras' durability becomes more than just a habit. Eating spider eyes and other junk is out of the question, now it's golden apples or nothing. The Nether is all but abandoned, as is the End, and everyone on the server either groups up so that they are never alone, or retreats into their bases, becoming true hermits befitting of their server's name.

The joy that had once been so characteristic of the server is gone, and in the hearts of all, there lingers the dread that any one of them might be next- although, there are still those that hold on to hope that Tommy may not be as gone as he seems.

---

The hermits who think Tommy is dead for good and have stopped searching: Doc, Etho, Xisuma, Welsknight, Grian, BDubs, Cubfan, TinfoilChef, Stress, False, Iskall.

The hermits who think Tommy is still out there, alive if still missing, and that the search should continue: Keralis, Mumbo, Tango, Vintage Beef, Impulse, Zedaph, Joe Hills, Zombie Cleo, Scar, Rendog, xB.

Doc and Etho are old. They don't like to admit it, but they've been around since the beginning, back when players were first learning how to jump servers and communicator technology was undergoing its first upgrade. They've seen a lot and know well by now that dead is dead. Tommy is dead. All that is left to do is mourn and move on, and they have shed their tears already. Call them cold for it, but in the face of a kind of drive that can keep a man going after his entire server has burnt down around his ears (Mindcrack will be missed), they know they need to keep moving forward. There are enough broken messes on the server these days, and it is through their efforts that shops remain stocked and the torches don't burn out. They hold onto normalcy with an iron grip and hope that some day, the rest of the hermits will join them in rationality.

Stress too has a comparatively healthy approach to all of this. She doesn't want it to be true, god no, but so far everything is pointing in the direction of Tommy being dead for good. She eats a couple dozen bowls of ice cream, has a some good cries, doesn't leave her base for a week, and even afterwards she can't bring herself to wear pink for a while. But she's mourning. She's accepted things. She lets her heart break, and as time passes, she lets herself heal. And that's enough for her.

Scar is of the opinion that Tommy is still out there, and while he clings to that hope with all his might, it's fragile and Cub just knows that his best friend is going to be cut to pieces when that hope inevitably breaks. So he takes Scar aside for a quiet conversation, to break his heart before the world can break it for him. Afterwards, Scar stops talking about Tommy as if he's coming back, but his smile is never as bright as it was before. And Cub's heart breaks too.

Team ZIT swings the exact opposite way as the rest and are firmly of the belief that permadeath is impossible and thus Tommy must be alive. The three of them aren’t known for their impulse control at the best of times, and with so many hermits having given up, the trio is rightfully vicious about the fact that the others, in their eyes, have abandoned their friend. Zedaph, Impulse, and Tango all kind of feed into one another and start doing lots of dangerous stunts, as if daring the universe to permakill them and prove them wrong. If one of them does something, the other two join in and escalate things, which gets impossibly dangerous very, very fast. Tango is furious, Impulse is bitter, and Zedaph is straight up heartbroken that his other friends would give up on another of their number. They do things like fly incredibly high, go cliff jumping in the Nether only to catch themselves at the last minute, and sprint across the End bridges. If they have doubts, they never voice them. Even when Tango feels like he’s burning up from the inside and wonders at his newfound hate. Even when Impulse is utterly terrified but goes along with things anyway because Tango is doing it and he can’t bear to leave a friend alone. Even when Zedaph looks at his friends and can’t help but feel scared of and for these strangers wearing the faces he knows so well. Even then.

Team ZIT often gets dragged into and starts lots of screaming fights with the other hermits who believe Tommy is dead, especially Doc, BDubs, xB, and False. False especially gets vicious, as while pvp is no longer permitted on the server, her tongue is as sharp as any blade. She believes firmly that the others are trampling on Tommy’s memory by insisting that he isn’t dead and she is determined to make them stop. And if they refuse to give up their foolishness? Well, all she might have left is her words but with them she will make them bleed.

xB and Vintage Beef are as close to neutral as you are going to get from those that get into regular arguments. xB thinks Tommy is dead until proven otherwise, while Beef thinks the exact reverse. As some of the more chill hermits, they often get dragged in to play negotiator so that the fights don’t turn physical. And some days, when someone says something particularly hurtful, they’ll close themselves up in one of xB’s bunkers and drink until they can no longer remember why they ought to be enemies. It’s hardly healthy, but they both agree that it’s better this way. Better to forget than to hurt, after all.

Grian is… somewhat the same. Sort of. He was traumatized by Tommy, the boy he adopted as his little brother, dying before his eyes, and he can’t help but blame himself. That is, when he can remember that Tommy is dead at all. After the fall, Grian’s mind was badly broken and he couldn’t accept that his little brother was dead for the longest time. He fell into two weeks of deep depression, barely eating or drinking, and eventually Iskall came and took care of him when he realized that he hadn’t seen his buddy in ages. Iskall nursed Grian back to health, only to feel his heart shatter in his breast when Grian turned to him, eyes feverishly bright and tone childlike, asking where Tommy was. The winged man’s mind couldn’t cope with the loss so it had shut down entirely, making him forget the tragedy that had occured. Iskall had deflected then, frantically trying to figure out what to say, but after a few days of Grian wandering about in a dreamlike state, his memory came back to him and he collapsed in on himself once more. The winged hermit is now locked in a loop of this, while poor Iskall is stuck trying to keep his friend alive and relatively sane.

Iskall, for his part, thinks Tommy is well and truly dead. In part because of his own certainty, in part because anything else would be even crueler for Grian. He doesn’t resent his friend for his break downs, just quietly bundles him up and clutches him close, coaxing him to eat and bathe, to put down the guilt and realize that it’ll be okay, the world won’t end with Tommy gone. He gently tries to nudge Grian down that path of acceptance of Tommy’s fate, and though he faces many setbacks, he tackles each one with a special kind of patience born of platonic love. They’re bros, despite everything. It’s only right.

Mumbo is, weirdly enough, on the side of Tommy being alive. Iskall doesn’t exactly approve and while he and Mumbo sometimes get into whispered arguments over it, they try to keep their little disagreements from Grian. Both of them only want to see their friend happy again, and will do just about anything to make it happen. For Mumbo, this means putting together crazy redstone contraptions to try and find Tommy again, as he’s certain that Grian’s little brother is still out there somewhere- and he has a piece that might prove it. Iskall comes over one day, face drawn and haggard from a night of soothing Grian through another set of screaming nightmares, only to find Mumbo waist high in redstone wiring, all hooked up to a strange portal design that looks too much like Doc’s infinity portal from season 6 for comfort. At the top of the arch is Tommy’s compass, needle whirling about like a hurricane, and while the portal isn’t lit, it does give off a faint blue-black glow. Iskall is frightened that Mumbo is tampering with something that could get him killed and Mumbo rushes to reassure him that no, the compass was specifically linked to Tommy so if Tommy was really dead, it would have been reset, right? He’s merely borrowing that tie to try and figure out where the two ends lead. Iskall is less than sure about this, especially since Mumbo is just as drawn and pale as he is, if a bit more covered in redstone, but they agree that fighting is pointless. They care about each other and about Grian too much to put any of them through that sort of pain- and besides, there’s more than enough fighting on the server already.

Ren too thinks that Tommy is alive and he is one of the ones who gets into regular fights. He’s a lover, not a fighter, but something about this whole situation just burns him up. When the pressure gets too much, he goes flying, tracing over those old familiar trails they searched so long ago, trying to see if there is anything they missed. There never is.

Welsknight has made his peace with Tomy’s death, though the server tends to forget that he and Tommy were closer than most. He alone knew that Tommy was once upon a time a boy called Theseus (a name given to him shyly when Tommy had asked him if there were any great heroes with that name that didn’t die). He alone knew Tommy’s love for horses, or that he would spend hours whispering horror stories to them when he thought no one would hear. Tommy was his squire, and although he had accepted the tragedy, he still wept for the hurt it brought him. He alone knew of the little grave he had dug under the willow tree in his castle courtyard and the headstone he had placed there, engraved with Tommy’s true name, death date, and supposed date of birth. He couldn’t have been more than 17, and perhaps that was what hurt the most. Every morning at dawn, Welsknight brings a bouquet of flowers to that little grave and says a prayer before disappearing into the morning fog. The flowers are always the same- forget me nots, for remembrance, violets, for devotion, and clover. (Think of me).

Tinfoilchef stays out of it- always has and always will. He’s too old to rush about searching or to feel as wildly as the others do. He feels, of course, but more so as the mountain does, steady and strong despite the winds that tear at its surface. Tommy is dead, but then, so are many of the people he has known in his life. It’s best to just keep plodding along.

BDubs is a mess. He had never spoken of it, but long before he had come to hermitcraft, he had had a daughter- a beautiful baby girl whose heart was too big for her chest, and she had died for that difference. He had grieved for years, but eventually the peace of the hermitcraft server had left him soothed, if a bit different than before. Tommy had been another chance at fatherhood, not that he could ever bear to call the teen that, even in the privacy of his own mind. Instead, he had taught the kid to build cobblestone towers that weren’t entirely offensive (if shaped a bit oddly) and had been the first to volunteer any time Grian was out and Tommy needed a place to spend the night when the nightmares were particularly fierce. They had so many fun sleepovers like that, and staring at those awful cobble towers in the distance, BDubs can’t help but bawl his eyes out at the memories. He waffles between taking the towers down or leaving them up- they really are ugly, and the feelings in his chest that they inspire are even more so, but somehow, he can’t bear to see them gone. Instead, he dries his eyes, flies off to grab a shulker of cobble, and sets about adding a few more to their number. A final remembrance for the boy he would have gladly claimed as his own, if only he hadn’t been too late. (He ends up building a lot more than a few).

Joe and Cleo are somehow the only ones who are actually neutral in the whole mess. Whenever they are asked their opinion on if Tommy is truly dead or not, the pair simply smile mysteriously and refuse to comment. Joe always seems to know more than he lets on and Cleo is his closest confidant, after all. Despite the anger and tears directed their way for refusing to commit to either side, the two keep their silence. (They know the truth of the matter, after all. Everything will be okay in time).

Xisuma has given up. Tommy is dead, and there is nothing he can do but spend days and days going over the code with a fine tooth comb, trying to find the glitch that cut the life of their youngest member short. Keralis takes it upon himself to take care of his long time friend, but it’s not an easy task, not when the other is so determined to make sure that such an incident never happens again. And Keralis can’t find it in himself to complain, especially since he is laboring under the impression that Xisuma agrees that Tommy is still out there and is trying to find him. It is only when Keralis mentions it in an aside, thanking the admin for his dedication, that Xisuma breaks the illusion and explains. Tommy isn’t just dead, he says tiredly, his very presence is well and truly wiped from the world’s code. All that is left of him is the faint impression his code had left behind, and trying to read it and understand what went wrong is a bit like trying to read small letters that have been drawn out in dry sand. Even for a voidwalker like himself such a task is near impossible, and Xisuma can only do so much. The needs of the many above the needs of the few- best to secure those he can now than worry over those that are gone beyond his reach. And Keralis can’t help but look at his friend with new eyes, a fleeting sense of betrayal in his heart. He had thought better of his Shishwammy, and he says as much. 

He cries while Xisuma watches on in solemn, mournful silence.

---

TBC  :)

[unholyplumpprincess]

Eternal Honeymoon Phase

For @itsthesinbin bc we were yelling about Morticia and Gomez and it’s spooky season so the Addams Family works perfectly. I HOPE U LIKE IT!!!!

Summary: You’re the newest addition to the Addams Family couple and you’re a little shier when it comes to their sexual appetites. You’re, well, a virgin, and when you finally ask to do more, Morticia has a better idea on how and when to take your virginity. Under the moon of Halloween, you shall be their sacrifice.

PLEASE REBLOG IF YOU LIKE! Minors and ageless blogs DNI or you will be blocked.

Fandom: Addams Family

Relationship: Morticia/Gomez/Reader

Warnings: NSFT/R18+, Reader is gn and has a vulva, also reader wears a dress but it’s a costume for an angel costume!, implications of virginity kinks for Gomez and Morticia, uhhhh ya get eaten out and ur face fucked, overstimulation.

Words: 3.3k

_______________

Morticia and Gomez had never been against adding a third to their little ‘eternal honey moon’ romance.

It’s just that no one had ever quite...fit into their world of them as a couple. They could come off a little strong, a little, ah, overbearing and well. Downright indulging in intimacy like rabbits tended to not be something people enjoyed, much to Gomez’s and Morticia’s surprise. Whatever did people mean that they lost a ‘spark’? They just didn’t see it.

They had met you at a family gathering. You’re a friend to one of the many, many, many family members there, exuding such a sweet and kind energy amongst all the dread and vulgarity. You’d seemed a little overwhelmed among everyone else yet still was just as polite with everyone. Your state of dress had been borrowed, Morticia had noticed, from cousin Lilith. The dress you had on spilled off your shoulders and you kept adjusting it with a little shy bow of your head and flashing a small smile.

Poor thing.

~Rest under the cut~

You’d caught Morticia’s eye first, who had hummed her interest as Gomez dipped her upon the dancefloor. Her head had been tipped back, showing the long, pale expanse of her neck that he ached to kiss as her hair spilled behind her. But, he’d seen her eyes lingering on you, trailing up and over to you from where she was looking and a grin spreading across his face. “Cara mia?” He questions in a teasing tone, kissing over her shoulder and up to her neck before pulling her to a standing position. “The one Lilith brought has your attention?”

“Yes...Don’t you think they look rather sweet standing there?” Morticia hums in reply once she returns to his embrace, swaying their bodies together and making sure to twist so they both could glance over at you. You’re talking to another cousin, tucking hair behind your ear and smiling kindly at something someone else says. A laugh graces your features, and even Gomez is humming now.

“Out of place,” He agrees, taking her hand and letting her spin from his grasp only to bring her back in time with the waltz, resting his head upon her breast with a sigh from his lips. “You have always been fond of the smaller ones, haven’t you, Tish?” A playful tease that earns him that charming little laugh from his wife’s lips.

That night they had both approached you, each offering a dance. Morticia quite liked the way your cheeks warmed a healthy shade of pink and you’d been honest about how your dress kept falling. To which Gomez, ever the gentleman had offered his assistance there. Brandishing a pin from seemingly nowhere and getting behind you to help pin the dress closed better. You’d smiled so bright then, thanking him with a hearty laugh. “I thought I was going to pop out of it any second now! Thank you- Would you both like to dance? I’m sure we can come up with something together!”  

And how odd you had been. Breaking traditions of just two in an intimate dance. Showing them how Gomez could hold your waist from behind and you could hold Morticia’s from the front and all sway together. Over your shoulders you hadn’t seen the way the two looked at you. A bright spray of sunshine in their gloomy, dark worlds.

They quite liked their rainy days full of thunder and harsh winds, and at first, they thought that wouldn’t be your speed.

You’re invited privately to come into their home for dinner. You’re such a vibrant ray of sunshine in the otherwise dark room, lighting it up with the glow of your presence. There are quiet tests here and there as they get to know you. Such as inviting you on terribly stormy days only for you to excuse yourself with the children to go out and play. Only to come back in soaking wet and smiling just as bright as Gomez wraps you in a towel with a laugh as you exclaim how beautiful their home always is.

And how much you loved that it was always storming or cloudy.

Another time, Mama offers you something and exclaims it to be a sort of poison. Morticia had watched as you smiled, only questioning if it at least tasted good before you’d put it into your mouth. It had been laced, of course, Mama was always good at such things. Thankfully it only made you terribly drowsy. Such a sweet thing you had been with your head in Morticia’s lap that day. Gomez having helped you out of your shoes and let you lay your legs across his lap, stroking over your calf. You’d smiled so lazily up at them, your voice happy as could be. “It did taste good. She wasn’t lying on both accounts, huh?”

Nothing frightened you. Nothing turned you away. Somehow you took doom and gloom and made it into something bright and beautiful without modifying what it looked like. Even the children took kindly to your presence. The house just came to life with you inside it, everyone seemed more active. Even Gomez had taken to leaning over the railing with wistful sighs as he watched you, and Morticia knew it was up to her to do something about it.

You’d been asked to accompany them both to dinner privately. Neither Gomez or Morticia had been into the dating scene- as is they married practically a month after they had met and proposed the day of meeting. Yet, you seemed a little old fashioned to just be proposed to in such short notice. Much to Gomez’s dismay who already had a ring picked out for you and had pouted when Morticia gently closed the box to tell him as such.  

You’d agreed joyously to dinner, and not long after had your relationship begun. Gomez had been the one to ask if you would be moving in with them, both of them delighting in the flush on your face and stuttering out about how you weren’t particularly attached to your apartment. He’d insisted with a big smile, and you’d agreed. The children were just as excited, even if Wednesday had showed her own happiness in her own little way of offering to hide weapons in your room ‘just in case’.

Prompting you to ask, of course, “Just in case? What, an attacker?”

“No,” Wednesday had spoken as if it was the most obvious answer on Earth. “Just in case I want to test your reflexes.”

Morticia and Gomez had the delight of watching you spare a grin to her, pretending to pout and telling her. “Aw, man, that’s too bad because maybe I waaaant tooo test,” Only to quickly scoop her up, resulting in their daughter letting out a shriek of terror and joy. “YOUR reflexes!”

The look they had shared was full of love, Gomez’s smile lighting up the room and Morticia having to resist the urge to steal your moment and whisk you away to the bedroom.

To present day, you three have been a couple for nearly half a year. Your first kisses with both of them had been shared, as well as some more intense heavy petting. Normally resulting in you in between them with scarlet red lipstick marks curling up your neck and bite marks on the other side. No one went further than just making you a blushing mess, always one of them murmuring to you that you just need say the word and they would ravish you.

A week before Halloween you shyly tell them that you’re ready to go further.

Morticia has to rest a hand on Gomez’s leg to keep him still when he sits up eagerly in their bed like a dog hearing the word ’treat’, but Morticia only cups your cheek fondly. Smoothing her thumb over the apple of your cheek and drawing you into an oh-so-soft kiss. “In a week, my dear, we shall have a ritual on Halloween night. You are a virgin, correct?”  

Her bluntness had made your face burn, a huff going from your nose but you’d nodded. Gomez had hummed next to her, reaching over to replace her hand with his own rougher one and letting you lean into his palm with a pout. “Now, now, none of that, sweetheart! We’ll have plenty of time to plan for you and get questions out of the way. Like condoms! Shall we need condoms? Tish- we don’t have condoms, do we?”  

“No, my love, we have never desired them before.” Morticia had responded with a sly smile on her lips, sharing a look with you. It seemed you would burn up before they even got to play, but you’d shaken your head, your voice seemingly caught in your throat.

“Good,” Morticia near about purred. “We shall inquire further- would you like to join us in bed tonight to make preparations?”

You had joined them that night. Talking of consent and what you thought you might want to try or be comfortable with. Ending up curled up in Gomez’s arms with your face buried in his warm, hairy chest and Morticia’s freezing cold arms around you from behind. Embraced and safe within their bodies.

--

When Halloween approaches, the children are so excited to drag you and Fester outside to come up with games. Pugsley had dressed as a pirate fit with an eyepatch and a sword in hand, whilst Wednesday had merely taken dressing brightly for once. When questioned, she’d merely said in a stoic tone of voice, “A majority of the animal kingdom has brightly colored flesh in order to identify who is poisonous.” You’d thought it was rather clever.

Yourself, you had dressed as a cliché angel. With a white dress that reached the floor with a slit up each leg for more freedom. The top was a plunge neck with criss crossing strings over your chest, and flaring sleeves down to your fingertips. You’d even gotten a little halo headband and little wings to match. Though your halo was quickly given to Fester who had quite the fascination with it, smiling as you told him you two matched.

Perhaps you had dressed as an angel as a tease. Morticia had admitted that she was quite attracted to the fact that you hadn’t had penetrative sex yet, spoken exactly like that. And Gomez had agreed, not as bluntly but definitely implying that it was very much a ‘thing’ for them both. And maybe you were trying to get a little payback for in the middle of the week. When you had been so comfortable resting with them only to find yourself teased with hot and heavy kisses from Gomez and little nips on your neck from Morticia as they both told you how good of a sacrifice you were going to make on Halloween night.

When you’d arrived, you’d certainly felt their hungry stares. You’d call this righteous payback, thank you very much.

The entire day goes rather well, you’d thought. The children had a day full of fun and were being put to bed by Lurch, slung over both his shoulders as they both wave to you before vanishing around the corner of upstairs. Immediately you feel arms wrap around your waist from behind, a warm kiss pressed to your shoulder and Gomez’s voice sighing out. “As much as I appreciate the time you spend with the children, I am glad it is our turn now.”  

“And what if I’m too tired, hm?” You tease out, only to fall into giggles from your lips when his arms squeeze tighter around your waist and a low growl comes from his throat. You hear the click of heels approaching before Morticia is in front of you, her long fingers tipping your chin up with two fingers. You can practically hear both yours and Gomez’s breaths leave your body at her beauty. She always looked so regal, especially tonight in a more spider web designed dress that had a slit up the leg.

“If you are too tired, we shall simply put off until next Halloween. I am patient.” She speaks coolly, a quirk to a corner of her mouth when you whine aloud and lean back into Gomez’s arms who makes the same sound as you. Clearly the most patient one in the room was Morticia, but even then, her eyes are flicking down the front of your low plunge dress and you have a feeling that wouldn’t last long.

After a few teasing ‘double checks’ from the both of them, you are brought to a room that you don’t recognize. It’s wide open with windows covering one side, and in the center of the room is soft looking cushions and blankets. In a star formation on either side of the center where the comfortable spot looked were lit up candles, all black with roaring red flames. You should have realized Morticia wasn’t joking when she said sacrifice, but in your heart, you knew nothing bad was going to happen. Nothing you didn’t want would happen.

Gomez is the one who strips you from behind, warm kisses placed on everywhere he exposes behind you. Trailing kisses down your back until he can’t reach whilst standing anymore and letting your dress pool to the floor. Morticia watches, patient as ever with her hands folded at her waist, though her head does tilt, this hungry gaze in her eyes as they fall to your hips. You weren’t wearing underwear, you thought it would give your dress undesirable lines. You flush when you hear the appreciative sound behind you, a firm hand tracing down your side and squeezing your ass.

“You were just as eager to get here as we were all day.” Gomez growls in your ear, both his hands grabbing your hips now and yanking you back against him. You whimper faintly, tipping your head to the side when guided to feel the searing hot kisses up your neck. You’re already dizzy with arousal, faintly hearing Morticia say something only to be released and guided to the cushions instead by her hands.

You’re lain on your back, watching Gomez strip from his suit jacket and loosening his tie to work on the buttons. Morticia slips out of her dress, revealing a black lacy get up with matching bra and panties, a garter belt holding spider web thigh highs on her long legs. You swallow thickly when she crawls up to you, nudging your legs apart that tremble as they fall open. Cold kisses leave scarlet prints up your inner thigh beginning at your knee, her lips coming up and over your hip to your lower abdomen and kissing her way back down, down, down.

Her fingers part your lower lips and you throw your head back in embarrassment when she smiles up at you under her lashes. “Already so wet, little one? How sweet.” You can’t even help the way your hips jump when her cold mouth presses an open-mouthed kiss over the hood of your clit, her tongue pressing downwards against you before sealing her lips lightly over you.

A low whine leaves your throat, your fingers quickly twisting into the sheets beneath you as your hips start to hump against her mouth without thinking. You feel a pressure by your head before your eyes flutter open halfway, looking up at Gomez who pushes your hair out of your face adoringly. “Open your mouth, sweetheart, stick out your tongue for me.” Murmured gently from his lips, and you do as told, a shudder racing through your body when Morticia’s tongue dips lower.

His cock is in his hand, thick enough to the point not even his fingers touch when holding it. It looked shorter, maybe at about five inches with the foreskin pulled back with a tug of his hand across his cock. Your mouth waters at the sight of the flushed head, fluttering your eyes closed when he glides the head of it across your tongue. “Ah, there you go, darling, just get used to the taste for now.” Spoken lowly in his throat, as if he’s holding back from just grabbing you and slipping into your throat.

You get to experiment with little laps of your tongue after a moment, keeping your lips parted to allow him to slide the shaft over your lips so you could get used to the weight. A moan spills from you when you feel Morticia’s tongue back on your clit, applying pleasant pressure and moaning against you in turn. You whimper sharply, your hand reaching down to try and find her. She takes the hint, her fingers lacing with yours at your hip to hold your hand there.

It isn’t long before Gomez is pressing the head at your lips, talking you through it ever so softly. “Breathe through your nose, relax your jaw- there you go, that’s my sweet pet.” Crooning as he presses carefully into your mouth. It stretches your jaw, your head tipped backwards and your breath stuttered. He only dips halfway, his hand coming down to rest on your jaw, helping you keep tilted and supported.  

By the time he finally slips all the way into your mouth, his balls against your nose and your eyes nearly rolling into the back of your head, you’re cumming. You squeeze tight to Morticia’s hand, automatically swallowing around the weight in your mouth with moans blossoming from your chest. Your body trembles, hips stuttering up against her mouth where she licks you through each wave and even afterwards. Until your tremors are too much and you’re making soft whimpers around Gomez’s cock and trying to shake your head, but his hand holds you still.

“Mmh. That was one. Just four more.” Morticia practically croons, pressing a kiss to your engorged clit that’s surely circled by a ring of lipstick right now. Your hips jerk upwards, moving your free hand up to Gomez’s thigh and clinging to him when his hips start to move lightly.

Four?! Four more?! You try to sob out, but only the tail end of it gets out when Gomez pulls his hips back until the head rests heavy on your lips. You try to speak, but Morticia’s nails tracing up your thighs as she sits up catches your attention more. “My love, the toys?”

“Behind you in the bag, dearest.” He hums out fondly, the hand gripping your jaw smoothing his thumb over your wet lips until your lips part again, taking his cock once more with a low growl in his voice. “I think you were made to be a toy for us, little one. How well you take me.”  

You can’t help your own whimper when he slides all the way back into your mouth. Your eyes fluttering just as you feel Morticia return with the light pressure between your legs. She lifts one of your thighs, angling you better for the rounded head of a smaller toy that you assume is a dildo, already wet with lubrication. “I would ask Gomez to prepare you as my nails are too long,” Morticia explains, her hand lying flat on the mound of your sex, her thumb circling your clit to not overstimulate you just yet. “But, it seems he is preoccupied at the moment. I cannot say I am not jealous.”

“In d-due time, my dear,” He huffs out, his hips speeding up slightly when you prove you can take the smaller thrusts. Your toes curl, feeling the toy slowly slide into you with a delicious, slight stretch to it. It isn’t long before Morticia’s moving it in sync with Gomez’s hips, your eyes rolling into the back of your head and feeling just like the toy Gomez claimed you were.

You know by the end of the night you’ll end up well taken care of and tired out. But for now, you’re happy to be caught in between them, drooling around Gomez’s cock and feeling Morticia’s cold tongue lapping at your slick.

You think Heaven is a lot darker and gloomier than thought to be.

[castlevania-afterdark-imagines]

Christmas Headcanons

This year has been a ride for everyone, so as a gift: some cute holiday HCs! We'll try to get to rolling out match ups after the festivities die down.

Trevor

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: Every ornament every Belmont child has made since his great great great great granddaddy. No tinsel though, the hunting dogs always try to eat it.

Favorite Holiday Treat: Gingerbread cookies! But he has Opinions™ about gingerbread houses. Why the hell put so much good candy on a decor piece people don’t let you eat?!

Holiday Lingerie Styles: Santa hat, clean pair of briefs, if not commando. Simple, but just as effective when he announces he’s planning on cumming down your chimney tonight.

Christmas Morning Jammies: A red onesie with white and red striped socks (If he really had his way it’d be what he slept in, but once the family started gathering for Christmas morning...well, best not to be dick out in front of the kids)

Alucard

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: Very simple, white lights and gold ornaments. It gives a nice warm glow, easy to assemble, and not super obvious when a bauble goes missing because they all look alike.

Favorite Holiday Treat: Eggnog. Yes, he’s aware it’s devisive as fuck, but anyone who takes issues with drinking what’s basically melted ice cream clearly missed the memo about the holidays being the time to indulge.

Holiday Lingerie Styles: He’s not really a lingerie guy to start, but if it’s a romantic Christmas lovemaking you want, he’ll nail the decorating just like he nails you. The lack of lingerie is made up for by the home makeover your room goes through to become a winter wonderland He splurges on  white satin sheets that feel hideously luxerious to fucking ruin before Christmas morning.

Christmas Morning Jammies: Cream nightshirt, with red ribbon accents and matching pajama slacks

Sypha

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: She’s precise, taking her time to put up every ornament with care and making sure the tree has a healthy balance of decoration on every side. It’s cute when she gets frustrated upon finding a bare spot.

Favorite Holiday Treat: Rumballs. Just enough to make her nose a little warm, and they’re too heavy to have any other time of year.

Holiday Lingerie Styles: Lingerie implies a lack of coverage, and this lady runs cold. She might pick some lacey and soft white strap getup, but that is going to be hidden under a very thick house robe until you can get her warmed up enough to remove it.

Christmas Morning Jammies: Same thick houserobe, whether or not there’s anything underneath it entirely depends on whether or not her family had left the house already.

Dracula

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: Honestly, if left to his own devices he won’t have one. But if he has a partner or Adrian is staying over he’ll get a live tree and do some white lights with red garlands.

Favorite Holiday Treat: He’d say the wine, but honestly he drinks that year round. Upon observation you do notice a distinct increase in candy cane consumption.

Holiday Lingerie Styles: The one thing this man will get into the festive mood for. Low key likes couple sets, they’re ridiculous of course but if you both have some flimsy and strappy excuses for coverage it makes running around the house trying to tear them off each other so much more fun. Also he’d sell his soul for getting to rip up some thigh highs.

Christmas Morning Jammies: What jammies?  Simple red satin button downs, they’re very soft but not the best for keeping him warm. That’s your job after all.

Lisa

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: Lights, lights, and more lights. She hates the short days so you have many different sizes of trees throughout the house with mixes of colored and white lights. The main tree in the living room gets all of the ornaments though, the others are there to give off the enchanted forest vibe.

Favorite Holiday Treat: Danish cookies. She hides her medical glove supply in the tin when she’s done. It’s just as upsetting to whoever finds them as finding sewing supplies.

Holiday Lingerie Styles: Angelic lace robe that hits about mid thigh and white fingerless gautlet gloves.. She already has cute lacey undies and bralets for other times of year so for her the up-styling for Christmastime is in the accessories.

Christmas Morning Jammies: All of the soft things. Fuzzy socks, sweatpants, fleece pullover, it takes her a bit to warm up in the morning, so cozy her up with a blanket and some hot tea.

Godbrand

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: Chaotic. Like some shit out of a Saturday morning cartoon, this man grabs the string of lights and spins the tree and lets them wrap around it wherever the hell they want. Cards taped to the walls, figurines placed in raunchy positions on the mantle, this ain’t your grandma’s Xmas.

Favorite Holiday Treat: Everything baked, but any kind of bread-based thing is the best. Though he also goes a bit feral for all of the roasted meats.

Holiday Lingerie Styles: Ugly sweater sans pants. Okay, maybe some glitter in his happy highway which he deems “Santa’s Landing Strip”.

Christmas Morning Jammies: It’s the most tame part of his holler-day cheer, it’s whatever clean boxers and plain Tshirt he could find through his eggnogg induced coma from the night before. At least he does remember to get dressed, gotta make sure all the kids get their presents on time!

Hector

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: Reeeeeeally simple, white and blue lights with maybe a few sparkly ornaments but those are just things begging to be broken by the house pets. If he can get a real tree that’s prefered but he’s also very aware that Caesar won’t know the difference between a Christmas tree and his favorite outside tree.

Favorite Holiday Treat: Mulled Cider. He likes to be warm after all, and it has fewer embarrassing effects than mulled wine.

Holiday Lingerie Styles: He’s not a big fan of Christmas so don’t go expecting a “Santa” cock sock. He’s not keen on wearing christmas lingerie himself, but if you happened to wear the very short red slip that just so happened to appear on your nightstand you can expect to get your stocking thoroughly stuffed.

Christmas Morning Jammies: Just some soft pj pants, maybe with a festive print if he happens upon them in his drawers.

Isaac

Christmas Tree Decorating Style: Bold of you to assume this man has a Christmas tree. That said, if you put one up he’ll participate in decorating at your request; an ornament here, a bauble there. The tree doesn’t bring him happiness as much as seeing you enjoying it does.

Favorite Holiday Treat: His preference is less about the sugary things (though he’ll gladly take anything you make) but he has a softer spot for the warm meals. A freshly baked bread pudding with cinnamon and clove would be perfect for him.

Holiday Lingerie Styles: He’s not going to participate, period. But he does love to see his partner in red regardless of the time of year...

Christmas Morning Jammies: If you plop a Santa hat on his head, he’ll tolerate it for you. Otherwise, it’s the same pajamas he always wears, a black cotton set with grey dotted vertical stripes. It’s a button up and you are tempted to unwrap that present after you’re done with the ones under the tree...

~Mod Soviet & Mod Rose

[kindahoping4forever]

Under The Christmas Lights // Ashton Irwin

Cass and I are having a blast so we hope everyone has been enjoying Hoe For The Hoe-lidays as much as we are. Her Cal blurb for the day, Baby Please Come Home, is up at @cal-puddies​ and it is one of my favorites from her, so you should definitely check it out if you haven’t already. (And as always, links to all of this week’s blurbs are in the event masterlist below!) Stay tuned tomorrow for our last set of blurbs and our grand finale on Monday: a galaxybrain co-write I guarantee you do not want to miss.

Extra thanks to Cass for helping me figure out what this story wanted to be. The overall concept remained but the structure, character details and tone of it took on a life of its own and morphed drastically as I was writing it. 

Warnings: Established slow burn with Neighbor!Ash, mentions of quarantine, a healthy helping of thirst and sexual tension, implied consensual voyeurism and exhibitionism, mutual masturbation

Word Count: 4048

Hoe For The Hoe-lidays Masterlist

Masterlist // Taglist and Ko-Fi linked above

Let  me  know  what  you  think!

"Quite the festive display you have there."

He stops at the end of his driveway, popping an earbud out as he turns towards your voice. Your next door neighbor, Ashton, stands in his yard, looking at you expectantly as you sit on your front porch, gesturing towards the freshly hung Christmas decorations all along his house.

"Oh thanks! I'm actually not even done. Waiting on a few more pieces to be delivered, really trying to merry things up, you know?" He answers, turning to collect today’s mail.

"Oh really? Everything's already so bright and eye-catching… up so early too," you punctuate your evaluation with a sip of coffee.

He smiles at you and you’re almost embarrassed to say you feel your heart skip a beat. You admit you had a bit of a crush on him when you moved in last year and for a while it seemed plausible you could’ve ended up more than just friendly neighbors. But that hope was yet another thing 2020 took from you.

Even though you were home more because of quarantine, you understandably had to interact with him less and less; gone were the days of “accidentally” baking too many cookies and walking over to offer him a plate or hoping your mail gets misdelivered so he’ll have an excuse to come visit you. These days, your visits were relegated to socially distanced greetings over the backyard fence and happenstance meetings like this.

“Yeah… I know it’s early in the season but I thought after the year we’ve all had, a little extra Christmas cheer couldn’t hurt,” he shrugs. He looks like he’s about to elaborate but then he feels his phone vibrate in his pocket; he apologetically but sincerely says, “Have a good night” and then scurries back to his house before you can get another word in.

It’s another couple of weeks before your next encounter, one night when you’re bringing the garbage can back up the drive and you hear Ash’s voice greeting you from his side of the fence.

“Those decorations certainly escalated, didn’t they?” You ask, amusedly peering up at his colorful house; the flickering icicle lights on the trim were a new addition, along with a big glowing snowflake and star sitting on his balcony.

“Does that mean you like it?” He laughs delightedly, walking up his own driveway. Your brain involuntarily appreciates how he looks with the lights reflecting off the dark wool trench coat he’s wearing; his hair is a lot longer than the last time you saw him, beard much darker and fuller. He looks good. You try not to think about it.

“Very pretty… not anything I would put up, but it suits you,” you comment, hoping your tone landed on the right side of the line between flirty and rude; you’re so out of practice at this, you’re not quite sure.

He takes it in stride. “That’s fair,” he chuckles. “No decorations for you this year?”

“Oh, I’ve got a wreath on my door,” you gesture. “May or may not get a tree. Little touches like that, things just for me; that feels appropriate but full on decorating this year… it just doesn’t feel right, doesn’t feel true to what we’re all experiencing.”

He furrows his brow. “Do you think my decorations are dishonest?” He asks, looking interested in your perspective.

“Not yours specifically, lots of people in the neighborhood are doing the same thing, some started even earlier than you did,” you carefully try to explain. “It just feels like surrounding ourselves with these crazy festive decorations�� it’s like we’re working very hard to convince each other, maybe even ourselves, that this year isn’t any different when that couldn’t be farther from the truth… it is different and it feels weird not to acknowledge that.”

You look up, hoping you haven’t offended him, that you don’t see like too much of a grinch; you find yourself surprised at how relieved you feel when he nods thoughtfully as he considers your point of view.

“I actually agree, people are definitely using the decorations as a bit of a coping mechanism,” Ashton states, leaning on the fence as he ponders. “But I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. I know for me, after spending so much time being upset that I was trapped in my house this year, I figured I should do what I can to make my house feel happy for once. Especially if I’m gonna spend Christmas alone in it.”

You marvel at how despite the heavy turn the conversation has taken, his face never darkens, his warm and cheerful aura never falters. “Oh. I actually hadn’t thought of it like that,” you admit, playing with the drawstring of your hoodie, wondering why you care that you’re feeling vulnerable around him. “I’ll be alone this year too. I guess it just doesn’t feel like Christmas to me so I don’t like reminding myself that it is that time of year. If that makes sense.’

He gives you a sad but empathetic look. “I totally get it. I felt like that for most of the year… birthdays, seasons changing… I didn’t want to admit any of it was happening,” he shares. “But I don’t know… not to seem like I have it all figured out, but if we can’t change how we react to the environment we’re in, I think there’s something to be said for changing the environment itself. It’s important to acknowledge what you feel but also letting in even a little positivity can do wonders.”

You offer him a soft smile, letting him know you appreciate his encouragement. “Even just seeing the wreath on my door every morning is a nice moment,” you confess.

Ash smiles back and you feel warmer than if you’d gone inside and cozied up in front of your fireplace. “See? A couple strings of lights, a little tree. Maybe break out with that big yellow Minion you put out on your lawn when you moved in last Christmas,” he teases, lightening the mood.

“OK, first of all, it’s not a Minion, it’s Woodstock from the Peanuts, thank you,” you laugh, shaking your head. “I’m surprised you remember that.”

“Well, it was quite the first impression,” he shrugs and you can’t help but notice how broad his shoulders look in that coat.

You lay in bed that night, the night’s events on a loop in your mind; you ended up standing outside and chatting over the fence for more than an hour. It was nice and stirred a sense of normalcy in you that you hadn’t felt in a long time. It stirred other feelings in you as well but you knew there wasn’t any sense in dwelling on that since it’d be a long time before either of you would be able to do anything about that.

A few days later, you hear a muffled murmur that sounds a lot like your name while you’re washing dishes; you look out the kitchen window to see Ashton waving at you from his patio. He’s shirtless and sweaty, having clearly just finished his afternoon yoga session. Not that you had taken to timing your kitchen chores to coincide with his workouts.

You signal to him to give you a minute and then you head out the backdoor to chat. “What’s up?” You say as casually as possible, willing yourself to keep your eyes trained on his face and not the sweat dripping over his defined muscles or how low his athletic shorts are hanging.

“Your house is looking nice,” he gestures at the colored lights you recently hung around your window frames. “Little touches, just for you, like you said. I like it.”

You beam at him, impressed that he remembered your words from the other night. “You were right, I do feel a bit brighter having put those up,” you share, stuffing your hands in your hoodie pocket to keep from fidgeting, thinking about how much you’d like to brush the curls out of his eyes.

“I’m glad to hear it,” he replies jovially. “I actually have something for you.” He gestures for you to back up as he ducks inside his backdoor, retrieving the package off his kitchen table; he walks back out and smiles when he sees you’ve also turned around so he can surprise you. He sets the box over the fence and returns to his patio; he waits a beat longer than necessary to give you the all clear, he had to give himself a second to appreciate your ass in those leggings.

You spin around and see a box containing an inflatable light up Minion wearing a Santa hat. “Are you kidding me?!” You burst out laughing, picking up the gift to inspect.

“Figured Woodstock could use a buddy,” he laughs, shrugging. “Ordered it when I came inside after our talk the other night, just in case you changed your mind about decorating.”

You feel yourself blush. “Wish I could offer you more than a smile and a thank you,” you blurt, before realizing how forward that sounded. “I mean, like a hug or dinner or something…” You laugh nervously and look to see him trying and failing to hold back a devilish smirk.

“Well. When the time is right, I’d love to take you up on that offer… for the hug or the something,” he flirts.

The next day, you make Christmas cookies and leave some in his mailbox when he goes for his morning run. When he comes to tape a thank you note to your front door, he catches a glimpse of you through the window, decorating the tabletop Christmas tree you bought for yourself and you share a nice moment.

You gave him your phone number that time pre-lockdown when he went out of town and you watered his lemon tree; he finally starts using it, texting you on and off throughout the day and it’s nice to feel like you finally have someone to share with.

It’s when you’re in bed at night, texting away, that you always wish you could share even more with him. Your phone says he’s typing a response and you turn over to stare across the room at your bedroom window, the one facing his bedroom window. His curtains are drawn but you can see the soft glow of a bedside table lamp illuminating the room; you wonder what color the lamp is. Wonder if he sleeps on the left or right side of his bed. Wonder what he’s wearing while he’s typing his messages to you. If he’s wearing anything at all. Wonder if he wants to ask you the same thing. You lay there, wondering, until your phone buzzes again and the cycle continues.

You carry on like this for the next couple of weeks, collecting feelings and building tension. A few days before Christmas, you hurry outside to collect the packages that were just delivered by the mailbox, rushing to bring them in before the holiday Zoom party you have planned with friends.

You stop to text your pals you’ll be a few minutes late when you hear a sharp gasp behind you. You turn and see Ashton at the end of his driveway, eyes poring over you in the fitted green velvet wrap dress you’re wearing.

“You sure cleaned up for the mail delivery?” He jokes, trying to recover how clearly affected he is by the sight in front of him. You realize it’s the first time in months he’s seen you in anything besides hoodies and lounge pants.

You laugh, walking to the fence. “I have a Zoom party to attend but I didn’t want these boxes sitting out here all night,” you explain, instinctively starting to touch your face out of nervousness before stopping yourself for the sake of the dark red lipstick you have on; you’re not used to wearing makeup these days.

“Well… you look fuckin’ incredible,” he breathes, making no attempt to disguise the way his gaze is travelling up and down your body. He runs his hand through his hair and clears his throat, willing himself to move on. “I won’t keep you, then. I just wanted to ask you something.”

You lock eyes with him and feel your heart speed up; usually you’d have a quippy reply to shoot back to him but today, all you can think of is the heat you feel between the two of you. Instead, you nod attentively, trying your best to act like your mind isn’t distracting you with daydreams of walking around to his side of the fence and leaping into his arms.

“I know we’re both alone for the holidays… wish I’d thought of this sooner, so we could’ve done something about Christmas, actually… but say if we were to properly quarantine - you know, like, no outside contact at all quarantine - would you want to spend New Year’s together?” He’s speaking quickly, rushing it out as if he’s afraid he’ll lose his nerve and yet he presents his proposal with an assurance that almost hypnotizes you.

You can’t keep from grinning ear to ear but you still try to play it cool. “That could be fun,” you answer, grateful. You joke, “God, I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t at a party for New Year’s, what do people even do to celebrate at home?”

Without missing a beat, he suggestively replies, “I’m sure we can think of something.”

You have fun with your friends on Zoom but in the back of your mind you can’t stop thinking about the way that Ash looked at you, the honest hunger in his eyes. You keep your curtains open much later than usual, hoping to catch a glimpse of him, wondering if the lights around the window will catch his eye and he’ll stop to try and catch a glimpse of you.

New Year’s can’t get here fast enough as far as you’re concerned but time feels like it’s moving slower than ever. Christmas finally arrives and you wake up bright and early to Zoom your family to open the presents they sent you. Afterwards, you decide to give yourself the gift of going back to sleep; when you wake up a few hours later, you tidy up the living room, gathering the trash bags of torn wrapping paper and ribbons to take out to the garbage.

You step outside and note Ashton isn’t on his patio like he is most mornings; you’re just about to head back inside when you hear a warm “Merry Christmas” from over the fence.

You turn to see him wearing a smile brighter than his extravagant Christmas lights display and yours combined. “How’s your morning?” He asks earnestly.

You smile back. “It’s good! Slept in a little, Zoomed with the fam. Lowkey but nice.”

“Ohhh. That’s why you weren’t at the window this morning,” he muses. You look at him quizzically and a sheepish look washes over his face. “I’ve maybe noticed that you seem to like tidying up the kitchen around the same time every morning… maybe sometimes when I’m ready to start my stretches, I’ll check to see if you’re at the window yet. Maybe sometimes if you aren’t there yet, I’ll wait.”

You feel yourself flush, flattered. “Here I thought I was being voyeuristic when all along you’re just an exhibitionist,” you smirk.

He chuckles knowingly. "And you're leaving your curtains open all hours of the night for aesthetic reasons?"

You're surprised you don't feel embarrassment, just a sense of pride and overwhelming desire. "You're welcome," you say coyly.

Completely devoid of self-consciousness or hesitation, Ash says seriously, "I'd give anything to come over there and kiss you right now. Touch you. Just feel you."

Your breath catches but you manage to get out, "Six days. Just gotta get through this week. Somehow."

The interaction plays over and over in your mind throughout the course of the day: the confident way he told you he wanted you, the way his gaze seemed to devour you entirely, the simultaneous relief and ache you felt knowing that the yearning that’s been threatening to overtake you has him floundering too.

Six days is a long time, especially when you’ve not so much as grazed another person since the beginning of the year, not to mention you’ve been waiting to get to this place with Ash for over a year.

The idea enters your mind while you’re cleaning up your dinner dishes, peering out the kitchen window he’d freely admitted to using to perform for you. You slip out to the garage, finding the box with your usual Christmas decorations much more easily than you expected. You glance at his living room window, ensuring he’s occupied before heading up to your bedroom to set your plan in motion.

You add as many strings of lights to your bedroom window as you can fit: colored ones, white ones, blinking ones, the ones that get slowly brighter and then dim back down. You stand back and nod to yourself, pleased with your work. You’d certainly call this eye-catching.

You feel more excited than nervous when you see it’s already around the time that Ashton usually heads upstairs for the night. You see the light in his room go on and you wait impatiently, just long enough for you to wonder if you didn’t go far enough with your display. You jump as your phone buzzes on your nightstand with a text message.

“Feeling extra festive tonight?”

You chew your lip, weighing how to play this. “Wanted to be sure I had your attention.”

He types for what feels like a lifetime but all he ends up responding with is: “Oh?”

You push yourself off your bed and go stand in front of your window, responding, “I think I’ve figured out how we get through the next week.”

You see him through his window, shirtless and in his boxers, laying on the bed with his phone. He reads your message and runs his hand over his beard, lost in thought; his head turns towards the direction of your house, pondering, when he notices your illuminated figure. You see him sit straight up and stare in disbelief as it dawns on him that you’re standing at the window, dressed in a lace lingerie set that has him almost feeling dizzy from how fast the blood is rushing to his cock.

He walks over to his own window, needing a closer look; he groans as he takes in every detail: how the red color of the bra and panties contrasts against your skin, how the black lace trim accentuates your curves, how the strappy detailing of the underwear present you as a Christmas gift meant just for him to unwrap. The lights around your window cast a glow around you, making you look like even more of a holiday fever dream come to life.

His eyes meet yours and you hold his gaze as you run your hands slowly down your body; you start by trailing down your neck to the straps of your bra, tracing along the lace outline with your fingers. You give your breasts a firm squeeze as you run your palms over the cups, stopping to use your thumbnail to tease your nipples until they poke through the thin material. Your fingers dance down your torso, swirling around the lines of your belly, pulling at the waistband of your bottoms. You tauntingly skip over your hips entirely, moving to caress your thighs.

Your phone buzzes again and you pause your show to reach for it. “Wish it were me,” Ash’s confession reads.

“In my mind, it is,” you reply, sitting your phone aside to dip into your panties. You lick your lips, in awe of how aroused you are, how aroused you’ve been since you decided to create this situation.

Ashton gulps and if he wasn’t so blinded by lust, he would’ve laughed at how audible the sound was in his ears. He wants to text you back, wants you to know how he’s dying for this week to pass so he can ravish you with the attention you deserve, the attention he should’ve given you a long time ago. But he also doesn’t want your hand to stop moving inside your underwear, so he waits.

You spread your wetness around, teasing yourself slowly. You considered bringing your bullet vibe to the window with you but you figured you were going to be overwhelmed enough and you weren’t going to need any help getting off. You close your eyes as you trace around your clit, not allowing yourself to put much pressure on it just yet, not willing to risk having this be over too soon.

He sees you throw your head back in pleasure, eyes fluttering shut, lips swollen from sucking them between your teeth and he can’t take it anymore. He pulls his cock out through the hole in his boxers and starts stroking, exhaling in relief at how instantly good it feels; he spits in his hand to ease the friction at first but it only takes a few tugs for precum to start trickling from his tip. He groans and pumps faster, knowing this won’t take long.

You press a fingertip inside yourself and moan a lot louder than you expected; you open your eyes and notice his stare remains unwaveringly focused on you, only now his hand is working his cock. He moves rapidly up and down his shaft, seemingly unconcerned with taking it slow. Part of you wishes his movements would slow down so you could get a better look at his dick but you also love that he’s seemingly so turned on by the thought of having you that he needs immediate gratification.

He tries to keep up with you, matching you stroke for stroke as you continue working yourself up, hand speeding up inside your panties, hand pawing at your clothed breast. His rough grip catches on one of the veins running down his cock and he chokes out a strained curse; he notices your mouth keeps forming a perfect O shape as you react to your self pleasure and he lets out his own whimper as he imagines how heavenly your sounds must be.

“I can’t wait to hear you when I make you cum for me.” You softly whine as you read his latest text. You’re nearly there and your head is spinning at the deliberate nature of his words: “When” he makes you cum “for him.” You rub hard at your clit and feel that familiar burning ache building in your core. You swear your wetness increases tenfold as you feel the pulsing begin.

Ashton’s cock leaps in his hand as he witnesses your body tense and shake as your orgasm washes over you; he notices your lips murmuring something and the thought enters his mind that you could be saying his name. He hopes you are.

You’re still waiting for your heart rate to settle, realizing there’s no way it will as long as you’re watching Ash pull at his cock like that. One hand flies over his length, the other firmly clutching his balls; his hips start to move, fucking into his hand as he nears the edge. You’re captivated watching his abs tense, fluttering with intensity until suddenly they’re being coated with cum. The ropes streak his skin and you decide it’s too soon to text him to share how badly you want a taste.

He hangs his head in exhaustion, briefly ducking away from the window to grab a tissue off the dresser; he cleans himself off, tucks his cock back in his boxers and finally looks back up at you. You smile softly at each other, though you’re not sure of the tone; it’s not exactly shy and it’s not entirely wistful. Whatever it is, it’s nice. Hopeful? Satisfied. For now.

You text him, “It’s after midnight now. 5 days.” 

You see him shaking his head, smiling as he types. “Still too far away. Same time tomorrow?”

You grin, shooting off your response before blowing him a kiss goodnight. “Still too far away. Meet you here after yoga tomorrow.”

————-

Taglist issues again so my apologies if you get notif’d more than once (or not at all)

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[baoshan-sanren]

Chapter 51

Emperor Wei WuXian And His Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Birthday

Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 Part 1 | Chapter 8 Part 2 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 Part 1 | Chapter 15 Part 2 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 | Chapter 20 | Chapter 21 | Chapter 22 Part 1 | Chapter 22 Part 2 | Chapter 23 | Chapter 24 | Chapter 25 | Chapter 26 | Chapter 27 | Chapter 28 | Chapter 29 | Chapter 30 | Chapter 31 | Chapter 32 | Chapter 33 | Chapter 34 | Chapter 35 | Chapter 36 | Chapter 37 | Chapter 38 | Chapter 39 | Chapter 40 | Chapter 41 | Chapter 42 | Chapter 43 | Chapter 44 | Chapter 45 | Chapter 46 | Chapter 47 | Chapter 48 & Chapter 49 | Chapter 50

Jiang YanLi is asleep.

Her eyes had not strayed from Wei Ying’s face for the majority of the evening and the night, but now, her head is pillowed on her arms, her breaths soft and nearly soundless. The dawn is only a few hours away, the darkness assuming a gentle, mellow glow, as it usually does before giving way to the morning light. Resting in the far corner of the Imperial chambers, uncle’s form is only a shadow draped in blue robes. XiChen is playing, his fingers moving over the strings, the stiff posture of his shoulders giving away the misery in his wrists.

WangJi’s own wrists and fingers ache, a dull, burning sensation that refuses to fade. He is grateful to the pain, for it keeps him alert. Even under the shifting light of the candle flames, Wei Ying’s face is no longer ghastly pale. There is a delicate flush across his cheeks now, a healthy color of dreamless sleep. His mouth is slightly parted, his breaths deep and even. Jiang YanLi had been the one to remove the cumbersome hair ornaments, to brush the thick curtain of Wei Ying’s hair until it shone. It is braided loosely now, a heavy, glistening coil of impossible length. WangJi has moved to touch it more than once, but drawn his hand back each time.

The memory of sliding his fingers through the strands, marveling at their texture, at the rich and lush weight in his hands, is a painful, physical presence. Wei Ying will recover, uncle had said. He will wake. WangJi keeps these words in his heart, a small, burning flame of hope. But there is very little uncle can say about the adverse effects of Wei Ying’s ordeal. Since the time of YanLing DaoRen, the study of resentful energy and demonic cultivation has been prohibited, its practitioners facing a swift and brutal death in every corner of the Empire.  

Uncle may be knowledgable on the subject, but he has said precious little, leaving most of WangJi’s questions unanswered.

Wei Ying will wake. Wei Ying will recover. But will he still be Wei Ying?

The Rogue Prince shifts slightly in his place against the far wall. He has long ago settled down to meditate, the sword placed across his knees, the white bandage around his eyes glowing in the gloom.

At first, WangJi had believed his presence to be a family matter. After all, what is more natural than a concerned uncle at the bedside of his ill nephew? But now, WangJi thinks that perhaps Xiao XingChen is here for an entirely different set of reasons. There is no other living person so intimately familiar with YanLing DaoRen, with the corruption caused by the resentful energy, with the symptoms of YanLing DaoRen’s particular type of madness.

If Wei Ying wakes, and he is no longer Wei Ying, will Xiao XingChen take the matters into his own hands? Will WangJi be expected to abide by the man’s judgment?  

Silent and still, wrapped in white, the Rogue Prince is not a comforting presence, but a ghastly specter of an executioner. WangJi moves a little closer to the bed, his knees aching sharply, another pain that will keep him awake and alert.

Time passes, slow and thick with waiting.

In the soft light of the early dawn, uncle wordlessly takes XiChen’s place at the guqin. Although XiChen’s skill is significant, WangJi can immediately feel the difference in the richness and the depth of the sound, in the strength and determination behind every note. Each time it wraps around him, uncle’s spiritual power is familiar and comforting, a calming memory, a steadying touch, pressing gently on his weary shoulders. It is a battle now, to keep his gaze clear and focused. He had wanted to wait until Jiang YanLi woke on her own, so that he may close his eyes instead, but sleep is dragging him under despite his aches and pains. Reaching across Wei Ying to wake her, he feels a tremor underneath his arm, a stutter of a breath, a slight impression of movement.

He freezes in place, his own breath locking in his chest. Wei Ying’s eyelashes flutter. His mouth moves, the motion soundless. A tiny line forms in-between his eyebrows.

“Wei Ying,” WangJi says, his voice rough with disuse.

The Rogue Prince shifts again, a soft rustle of robes. WangJi can now feel uncle’s sharp gaze on the side of his face. Jiang YanLi sighs deeply in her sleep.

“Wei Ying.”

The eyelashes lift. Underneath them, Wei Ying’s gaze is blank and unfocused. They descend again.

WangJi carefully fumbles for the hand resting on top of the covers, mindful of the neatly splinted wrist. He struggles upright, the pain in his knees forgotten.

“Wei Ying.”

The throat moves. A heavy swallow, then another. Fingers tremble, brushing against WangJi’s own.

This time, when the eyelashes lift, Wei Ying’s gaze is focused. His lips move around a name, but no sound comes. Still, WangJi has seen Wei Ying’s mouth form that shape many times before; he does not need to hear, to know what it means to say.

Lan Zhan

The sound of the guqin ceases. Chaos erupts.

Uncle is first to reach the bedside, reaching down to check Wei Ying’s pulse. Jiang YanLi is awake; she relinquishes her hold on Wei Ying so that uncle may take her place. WangJi is grateful to be allowed to stay where he is, to keep his hand lightly pressed to Wei Ying’s palm. XiChen takes uncle’s place at the guqin, the Cleansing now forced to battle with the clamor of activity. Although her eyes are red and shining, Jiang YanLi’s voice is steady as she sends the guards scurrying out of the Imperial chambers. The Royal Companion and the Council must be informed that the Emperor is awake. More candles are brought in, despite the rapidly brightening skies. Servants are sent for tea, despite the fact that no one will drink it. More servants are sent for food that no one will eat. This all occurs around WangJi, meaningless and unimportant events that cannot compare to the gentle brush of Wei Ying’s fingers, the grounding pressure of his thumb on WangJi’s knuckles.

Nie HuaiSang appears just as uncle moves away from the bed, half-dressed and noticeably disheveled, the state of his hair perfectly reflecting the disorder around him. Jiang WanYin arrives on his heels, tidy where Nie HuaiSang is rumpled, contained where Nie HuaiSang is vibrating in place. Still, the dark shadows under Jiang WanYin’s eyes reveal that he had been the one who had not slept, his neat uniform the same one he had worn the day before.

“I can detect no traces of resentful energy,” uncle says, “However, the Emperor is very weak, and should not be moved. I would prefer to consult with the Head Healer on any further treatment.”

The Rogue Prince had not yet approached the bed, but now he does, a soundless movement bringing him into Wei Ying’s field of vision. Although the man’s smile appears to be relieved, WangJi finds himself turning slightly, just so he can monitor Xiao XingChen while still keeping his hold on Wei Ying’s hand.

“The Head Healer is in the dungeons,” Jiang WanYin says, “and so is her apprentice.”

Jiang YanLi hisses under her breath, turning a disapproving gaze onto her brother.

Wei Ying’s fingers tighten, his expression growing alarmed. He attempts to sit up.

This results in utter commotion, nearly loud enough to drown out the Cleansing altogether. Jiang YanLi tries to convince Wei Ying to stay put, her tone pleading but firm. Uncle grumbles in disapproval, giving voice to a string of words that should never be used in reference to an Emperor. Jiang WanYin curses loudly, a collection of profanities that make WangJi’s ears burn. Wei Ying ignores them all, his grip on WangJi’s hand now painfully tight, his breaths labored from the struggle.

Finally, WangJi can see no other course of action but to slide his arms under Wei Ying’s shoulder blades, and lift him up. Wei Ying is strong enough to latch on to WangJi’s robe with his uninjured hand, but not yet strong enough to remain upright on his own. With some shifting, his upper body settles against WangJi chest, forcing him to sit on the edge of the bed in order to bear its weight.

It is an intimate, utterly inappropriate position, and WangJi finds that he cannot look up at his uncle again. At this very moment, with Wei Ying pressed against him, he cannot muster the necessary fortitude to confront uncle’s disapproval. Somehow, in all the shifting and movement, the long braid had slithered down into WangJi’s lap. Wei Ying’s body is a scorching line of heat from his hip to his shoulder, and yet, it is the weight of that braid that that keeps driving WangJi to distraction, the inky black coil a sharp, eye-catching contrast to the white of his robes.

“A-Yuan,” Wei Ying croaks, the feeble sound lost in the ongoing procession of Jiang WanYin’s curses.

Still, Jiang YanLi hears it, immediately rushing to reassure, “He is safe, and well-hidden. The rest are unharmed.”

“A-Sang,” Wei Ying says.

“I am here,” Nie HuaiSang says, only now moving closer to the bed, his posture cautious.

“Tell me,” Wei Ying says.

“Are you stupid?” Jiang WanYin bursts out, “You cannot even sit up on your own. Do you want to die again? Wei Ying, you best lie down right now, or I will put you down myself.”

“You will not,” WangJi says.

He had not intended to speak out loud, but the words come out sharp and cold, leaving silence in their wake.

Nie HuaiSang’s eyebrows climb so high, they attempt to disappear in the messy tangle of his hair. Jiang WanYin has finally been made speechless, although his mouth is still moving; at this moment, he very much resembles Wei Ying, who does not know how to be silent even when his lips are sealed. Jiang YanLi is studying the carpet under her feet. There is an odd expression on her features that WangJi does not recognize.

Is she... going to laugh?

Wei Ying’s body shudders against his own. A soft gasping sound follows the shudder, and WangJi looks at him in alarm.

Wei Ying is... also laughing.

WangJi feels his face heat.

Jiang YanLi delicately clears her throat, “Sect Leader, if you wish to speak to the Head Healer, I am sure my brother would be pleased to provide an escort. It may be prudent to do so now, before the Council realizes that they had failed to impose any restrictions on visits to the Wen Sect.”

His face still burning, WangJi does not look up to see his uncle agree, or to watch him take his leave with Jiang WanYin.

No longer laughing, Wei Ying slumps with a sigh, forcing WangJi to wrap an arm around his waist in order to keep him upright. His temple presses to the side of WangJi’s neck.

“My protector,” he whispers, the teasing note obvious despite the weakness of his voice.

“Shameless,” WangJi hisses back, but there is no real heat behind his words.

It is hard to muster any heat, when most of it has collected in his face and throat. Wei Ying’s hair is soft against WangJi’s skin. His temple is warm and full of life. The smell of pears is heavy now, carrying with it memories of a mouth pressed against his own, a gentle huff of a laugh against his lips.

The sounds of the guqin have gone on uninterrupted, but he can practically sense his brother laughing at him. He has a feeling that the Rogue Prince is laughing silently as well.

It is not all due to WangJi, their amusement. The Emperor is alive, awake, and well enough to tease. The relief in the air is palpable and infectious. Under the circumstances, it does not take much, to be cheerful. WangJi feels it himself, a light bubble of air in his chest, bright with contentment. The mortification of being so intimate in front of so many witnesses cannot be simply willed away, but he finds that it can easily be overshadowed by joy.

“A-Sang,” Wei Ying says, “Tell me everything.”

[little-mad]

Little Jackpot Pt. 8

~ Previous Part ~ Next Part ~

It had taken around thirty minutes of wandering around the city before the pixie dust showed any type of reaction. Once it did though, zeroing in on Ambry’s location had been fairly swift. That is, assuming the dust was reacting to Ambry and not some other pixie. As far as Sebastian was aware at least, there was only one pixie in town and that was his companion.

Once the increasingly vibrant glow of the pixie dust had led him to a house that positively reeked of magic, Sebastian was sure he was in the right place. The residence looked innocuous enough to the untrained eye, and Sebastian was sure the normal human neighbors didn’t find anything unusual about it. However, any witch with a decent grasp of magic sensing would be able to tell that the building was coated in various charms and enchantments.

Sebastian approached the front door of the house. He didn’t think politely ringing the doorbell was the appropriate response, which meant he’d need to break through the sealing charm that held the door firmly shut.

Exchanging the vial of pixie dust for the wand in his pocket, Sebastian pondered the best approach to break the seal. Thankfully, he knew himself to be quite skilled at breaking the spells of others, but it was crucial that the correct process be followed so as to not cause the seal to tighten itself even further.

Taking in a deep breath, Sebastian aimed his wand at the door and began to mutter a string of incantations under his breath as he moved the wand in a precise series of movements. After about a minute, a small burst of shattering light indicated that the attempt had been successful. Sebastian didn’t allow himself any feeling of pride, not when his companion still wasn’t out of the woods yet.

It was unsurprising to him when he found that the front door, despite having been magically sealed, wasn’t even manually locked. Unlocking charms were rudimentary for most any witch, so if anyone managed to get past the seal, the lock would likely be child’s play.

Carefully pushing open the door, Sebastian stepped into the house. Immediately he noticed that there was no one currently present, however; that didn’t mean they weren’t somewhere else in the building.

Quietly, Sebastian snapped the front door shut. He would keep his presence hidden as long as possible, the element of surprise would serve him well. He had no real idea of how skilled this witch would be, although, from what he had seen so far, it seemed likely that they were considerably talented. Sebastian was beginning to wonder if not waiting for backup had been the best idea. He’d messaged Adrien the address as soon as he was sure he had found the right place, but when his friend hadn’t replied immediately, Sebastian had decided to press on by himself.

“No, Ambry needs you now.” Sebastian argued with himself mentally. It was true that getting to the pixie sooner rather than later could mean the difference between her losing her wings or not. There was no time to wait around.

Moving with silent fluidity, Sebastian made his way through the expensive looking home. He checked the kitchen, a bathroom, and a dining room with no luck. He then moved towards a shut door at the end of the house. A bright glow suddenly began to shine through the fabric of his jacket. The pixie dust was reacting stronger than ever, which meant Ambry must be just through that door.

Sebastian tightened his grip on his wand, took in a steadying breath, and then shoved open the door. His eyes immediately found her. She was sitting in the middle of a golden bird cage, her piercing yellow eyes staring back at him in shock. A wave of emotions flooded through him all at once. There was a warm glow of relief at seeing the pixie looking mostly healthy, wings still attached and all. Then there was a fresh stab of guilt and regret. But perhaps most powerful was the burning rage that came with seeing his small companion locked up in some cage meant for an animal.

It was then that Sebastian’s gaze shot over to the room’s other occupant. The dark haired witch had gotten to his feet and was looking at Sebastian with poorly concealed surprise. It only took a moment for Sebastian to connect the face of this man with one he had seen in the Council’s “Most Wanted Criminals” bulletin. Ambry hadn’t been abducted by just any run of the mill rogue witch, she’d been taken by Kole Miyazaki.

“Well, well, well, color me impressed.” The leather clad witch remarked after having schooled his expression into one of sly amusement. “I really wasn’t expecting you to track me down.” Kole began to walk towards the center of the room, placing himself in between Sebastian and Ambry.

Kole Miyazaki was wanted for a battery of crimes, most involving thievery, but what had landed him on the Most Wanted list was his associations with the magic blackmarket. The witch was known as one of the blackmarket’s top sellers due to his ability to get his hands on some of the rarest magical items in the world. Obtaining pixie wings could have been Kole’s most impressive feat yet.

“Release her, now.” Sebastian ordered. He was not interested in any chit-chat. And as much as he wanted to curse this asshole into next week, he knew his first priority needed to be getting Ambry out of there with as little chaos as possible.

The opposing witch gave a light chuckle. “I’m sorry, Sebastian, but no can do.”

“So you know who I am.” Sebastian said dully, unsurprised and unamused.

Kole grinned. “Of course. You’re Sebastian Altalune, a young witch with promising talent who fairly recently was assigned a cute little pixie for a companion.” Sebastian’s free hand formed into a fist. He didn’t even want this creep mentioning Ambry. “You’re good with potions and general magical knowledge, but your combat abilities...leave something to be desired.” Kole went on. “So I hope you don’t plan to challenge me. Not only do I have a couple years of experience on you, but combat magic happens to be my specialty.”

Sebastian took a step forward. He wasn’t about to allow himself to be intimidated by this thug. “That’s fine, I don’t need to beat you.” He calmly stated. “I just need to keep you busy until my coven comes along with the Council Police.”

This caught Kole’s attention. The man’s eyes narrowed, some of the previous casualness leaving his stance. “Getting the police involved was a bad move on your part.” He said, a darkness tinting the nonchalant tone. “Now I’ll just have to break you quickly before making off with your former companion.”

There was no time to react before a blast of energy suddenly exploded out from Kole, throwing Sebastian back several feet. He landed painfully on his back, a dull throbbing instantly starting up in his tailbone, which had taken the brunt of the impact.

Clearly Kole hadn’t been lying about his proficiency with combat magic. The guy had just effortlessly pulled off an advanced spell, and wandless nonetheless. “Fine, so defense is the name of the game.”

By the time Sebastian had gotten his senses together again, Kole had made his way over to Ambry’s cage, which he was now holding tucked under one arm. Inside the golden prison, Ambry was clinging to the front bars, eyes glued to Sebastian’s downed form. Seeing the fearful look on her tiny face was like a gut punch. She was usually so confident and strong willed, fear was something she rarely revealed to others. It was all the push Sebastian needed to jump to his feet and face his opponent.

An instant before Kole could send out another blast that would send Sebastian back to the ground, he threw up a ward spell. A translucent field of energy formed in front of him, effectively blocking the spell Kole had cast. The ward wasn’t unbreakable, but it would hold so long as Sebastian was able to keep his focus.

Instead of the frustrated or defeated look on Kole’s face that Sebastian had been hoping for, there was a conniving little smile. He aimed his hand at the ground for a moment before abruptly pulling all his fingers into a fist. The result was a rolling tremor that headed straight for Sebastian. He was forced to jump out of the way of the cracking floor, causing the ward he had been holding to drop.

“Gotcha.” Kole purred. Sebastian let out a grunt of pain as magical chains suddenly materialized, tightly pinning his arms to his sides. He clung tightly to his wand, but his movements were so restricted he would be unable to cast any spells with it.

Kole had begun to make his way around the room, collecting various items and placing them inside a large black backpack. All the while, the witch refused to put Ambry’s cage down. Sebastian could only watch as the pixie was carelessly shaken and jostled inside her prison, powerless to escape what was no doubt a stomach churning experience. He grit his teeth. He wanted nothing more than to get her out of the hands of that piece of shit.

“I’m going to be taking a financial hit losing out on this place.” Kole commented as he continued packing up. “Thankfully, the wings on this little one will more than make up for it.” He crooned, shooting Ambry a little smile before returning to digging through a dresser drawer.

“You’re not going to touch her!” Sebastian spat, a fury rising up in him that he hadn’t known himself capable of. Before he himself even knew what he was doing, the silent, wandless spell had been cast. It wasn’t until the magical chains had disappeared in a cloud of smoke that Sebastian realized he had just successfully wandlessly performed an advanced spell. He didn’t pause to celebrate though.

With a swift wave of Sebastian’s wand, a ring of blue fire formed around Kole’s feet. The spell was one of Sebastian’s own invention, meaning it would require some trial and error for anyone to figure out how to cancel it.

Kole lifted a foot, as if intending to step over the fire. However, the moment he did, the blue flames climbed higher, not returning to normal until Kole had given up his attempt at escape.

The frustration and annoyance had finally presented itself on Kole’s face. Sebastian had clearly gotten to him. Unfortunately, Sebastian had failed to recall what happened when an enemy became desperate. He could only watch on in confusion as Kole unlocked Ambry’s cage. The confusion quickly turned into rage as Kole grabbed hold of the captured pixie, dragging her out of the birdcage before tossing the golden container to the side.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Sebastian hissed, moving towards where the dark haired witch stood.

“Ah, ah, ah.” Sebastian froze in his tracks as he realized what Kole was doing. The man’s left hand was wrapped around Ambry’s bottom half, meanwhile, his right index finger and thumb were poised in front of and behind her neck.

Seeing the effect his actions had had on Sebastian, a pleased grin spread across Kole’s face. “Great, now we can make a deal.”

[themockingcrows]

Doki Doki Grist Panic Ch. 4

Another chapter of my Magical Boy fic, sorry for such a long wait while I got my brain in order!

Ao3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27802735/chapters/79562023

This chapter is sfw!

Soft, repetitive beeps were the first things Dave heard when he woke. The whirring of machinery, of a barely there fan spinning in a metal case. He’d know the sounds of technology anywhere, used to the hum and breath of his own computer tower in his room. Nothing was overheating, the room was a comfortable temperature, just warm enough to feel cozy where his skin touched itself at the crooks of his elbows and the backs of his legs. He was aware he was lying on his side, but it was so hard to wake up. Opening his eyes felt far too difficult, let alone moving his limbs. Dave settled for a fingertip stroking at what felt like a blanket or sheet beneath his body and sighed a breath exhaustedly.

It wasn’t fully dark in the room. He must have left his lamp on at the desk and taken a nap, or the door was open somewhat to let in light from the hallway and living room. He didn’t hear anything from the front room, Bro must be napping as well or doing something with his headphones on at his computer. Maybe dinner was cooking, or he was waiting for something to be delivered, indulging in his free time doing this or that. It was a comfortable silence. Dave blinked a few slow times before taking in the strange blue tone to the room’s light, cooler than his usual warm home light. Bulb change? Slowly he rubbed at his face and slid to his back, wanting to stare at the ceiling so he could come back to himself more and wake up properly.

This wasn’t his ceiling.

Instead of the textured white ceiling he was used to seeing for so many years, the ceiling was metallic and matte in color. The walls were matte as well, though at least they were white as his own were. Fat load of good it did him, considering the walls didn’t look familiar in the slightest either. Where WAS this place? This wasn’t his room, it wasn’t the living room for sure. Was it a friend’s house? A hospital?

Dave sat upright and lifted his hands to his throat, his face, a sudden feeling of breathlessness hitting him as he panicked. Breathless… It all came flooding back to him in a rush, mind swimming. The attack, the lack of air, choking, suffocating. But it still didn’t answer the question of where he was, nor what was happening. When he went to rock to his knees, Dave paused, feeling a tug of fabric at his waist and chest. That… didn’t make sense, his uniform wouldn’t do that, nor would his casual clothes. Instead of wearing either outfits, he was draped in a soft white material that was tied at the waist with a woven red cord, though he couldn’t guess what type of fabric it was. It was too soft to be linen, too sturdy to be cotton, and didn’t match anything he’d ever felt. Were it not such a mystery he’d probably even go to say it was quite comfortable.

… Where were his boxers?

Who had undressed him? Even the lack of transformation would be something of importance, he’d go back to his civilian clothes, not… whatever this was. When he finally managed to stand, the room span and he sank back down to sit for a moment on the edge of the bed with a grimace, taking it all in as his mind raced in circles like a penned dog. Dave realized that it wasn’t just the garment that was covering him either, but what looked and felt like strings of pearls and golden beads. They were settled around his neck as if wrapped specifically to make a draping effect over his chest and shoulders here and there, and clasped together at the ends behind his neck with what felt like a filigree hook. Someone had taken great care to dress him like this, but why? Who?

Panic rising in his throat like bitter bile, Dave stood slower this time and headed for the cracked doorway, surprised to find the room unguarded. Cameras? Or was there some other way he was being watched? Paranoia ate at him, but when he poked his head out into the blue toned hallway, he heard nothing but the same soft hum of machinery, felt the cool air blowing from unseen vents. Barefooted, he padded along down this hallway to the left of his room, prepared for any threat. ...Or. Well, as prepared as one could be while unarmed. Dave knew how to defend himself while unarmed well enough, but the desire to have a sword was strong. Maybe he should change before exploring further, get his powerup back and-

“You’re awake. I was wondering how long you were going to be unconscious for. So long as your brain waves were healthy and strong I wasn’t worried, at least. It’s fascinating how fragile humans are once you remove their air.”

Dave froze in place. He knew that voice, but the things it was saying weren’t making sense to his brain. John wouldn’t talk like that, but that was the first person that came to mind upon hearing that specific tone and cadence, the way it handled words as if they were fluid on one's tongue instead of just a thought. Swallowing and taking a deeper breath, he rolled his shoulders back and strode to the full end of the hallway and the room it opened into.

The space was massive. The hums were definitely computers, projecting screens and physical and digital keyboards everywhere, holograms and different moving charts and images dancing in the air. Each wall seemed to have some kind of a space background, stars and a moon, a view of the Earth like a peaceful screensaver. In the center of it all stood a figure with glowing eyes and gray skin, unfamiliar clothing and decoration adorning him, a serene look on his face. He looked calm, in control, but there was no hostility to be seen.

“You can come closer. I’m not interested in fighting you,” he said.

Dave frowned and strode closer, observing the different screens as he went, unable to read any of the angular text he saw. When he was a more reasonable distance from him, he finally talked.

“So you’re the one that brought me here.” It was John. Closer, he could see the shape of his eyes, his mouth, the way his hair sat on his head, his broad shoulders. The appearance had changed, but the core was definitely the same. His stomach churned sickly. He’d kissed this person. He’d been held by this person. He’d contemplated doing more with this person, and it was all a lie.

“You seem surprised and yet not surprised enough,” he said with a hint of a smile. It looked a little forced, stiff at the edges of his mouth as if the gesture were foreign to him. “Might I ask who you were expecting?”

“...Nobody specific,” Dave admitted, trying to keep his cool. “Where is here though? I assume you can at least tell me that.”

John lifted his foot and stomped downwards, forcing the ground to shimmer for a moment before it turned pitched black and then seemed to dissolve. The space pattern from the walls blended to the rest of the floor, leaving them seemingly free floating in space despite walking on solid ground.

“I’d thought it would be fairly obvious, but I suppose even someone like you might have been confused at first. Does this clarify things, then?”

Space. Dave knew Bro had gone before, he’d talked about it in the past, but never did he think he’d get to see it himself. Much less in a situation like this one. His fingers curled into the sides of the new draping clothing he wore, steeling himself as he stared directly down towards nothingness. If Earth was on the wall’s side, then they must be at an angle without even being able to feel it. Whatever technology was doing this was astounding.

A gray hand was suddenly touching his cheek, cold and lifeless feeling, and Dave jerked his head up and took a step backwards to put some distance between them again. The look in his eyes could peel paint, aggressively defiant as he’d been during battle, though this time with the added benefit of betrayal as well. This person had lied to him, led him on, played with his emotions. Made a fool of him. He was a moron. Of course he couldn’t have nice things like romance, they weren’t possible for someone with his kind of career. This just hammered that idea home even harder than before in a way that made tears sting in his eyes and threaten to show themselves.

He kept them down out of sheer spite.

“You hate me so much already,” John mused. “Not even a moment's hesitation before pulling back.”

“You’re not John.”

“Yes, I am.”

“You’re not my John.”

“We are one in the same, Dave. Open your eyes to reality,” John said with a flourish of his arms, displaying himself in his entirety as if he hadn’t been seen properly before. “It doesn’t have to be so bad. Think of the possibilities you’re being afforded.”

“Possibilities? Don’t make me laugh,” he nearly spat. “My John might as well be dead now. I don’t care if you’re the same person, the John I gave a shit about wouldn’t be my enemy. I fell in love with a lie, but it was a wonderful lie, don’t even pretend to act like you’re remotely the same thing.”

John sighed a little and rolled his head on his neck to stretch it before rubbing a few strands of hair behind his ear. “You’re really in denial, aren’t you. I’m the same John. I have the same feelings for you, those weren’t a lie. The only lie is that I’m not human. I’ve no intention of hurting you.”

“You fucking suffocated me!” Dave reminded him with a hiss.

“It was the quickest way to end the battle and sequester you away,” John shrugged. “Would you rather I have beaten you senseless with my hammer? It could be arranged now, if you’d prefer. But I’d dislike crushing your pretty face.”

Dave scowled and clenched his fists tight enough that he felt his nails cutting into his palms. “What do you want with me. Hurry this up, I’ve got places to be.”

“You talk as if you’re getting out of here easily,” John mused. “But since you’re here, I’ll go ahead and extend my offer formally.”

“Offer?”

“Yes,” John said, taking a step closer in an attempt to close the gap, though it renewed itself almost immediately when Dave backstepped again to keep distance between them. Frustrating, but fine, he’d deal with it. “I’d like for you to come back with me to my planet.”

“...Why.”

“Why? Because I like you, Dave. I enjoy your company. You are… special to me. I would enjoy keeping you by my side.”

“Cute words, but you still kidnapped my ass and dressed me up like some toy. You’re not exactly still on the boyfriend pedestal,” Dave pointed out. “Why not just find someone on your planet?”

“There’s nobody left for me there,” he said simply, flatly. “It’s why when I’m done here, I’d prefer to keep you with me. I’ve got the technology to make sure you adjust to our atmosphere once it’s restored, an-”

“Restored?”

John reached a practiced hand out to tap at a keyboard, bringing up a specific hologram of a ruined looking planet. Smaller screens lit up around it showing devastation, pollution, destruction both natural and man made. There was a distinct lack of life. “Restored. All it’ll take is enough grist, and my world can be restored to its former beauty. It’s not the same as Earth, there’s a lot different about it. But it’s beautiful in its own way, when it’s healthy and alive.”

“Why is it your job to fix your planet? If you’re the only one left, why not just live here? We have problems, yeah, but there’s plenty of roo-” Dave started, only to be interrupted.

“Because I’m it’s guardian,” John said simply. “I have a chance to save and restore it, to restore everything to how it was but better. I can fix things. I have that power, and I intend to use it. I just need grist from Earth, and my home will come back.”

“How much grist do you need…?” he asked, already having a sense before getting confirmation.

“All of it, preferably. I could work with less, but if I’m here already why not just drain the damned place and be done with it.”

Dave finally took a step forward aggressively.

“So that’s the entire plan? Destroy Earth, gain grist, revive a dead planet?”

“And have you at my side for the duration. You’d love my world, Dave. You’d be loved there. You wouldn’t have to risk your neck all the time as a guardian nobody is grateful to, either,” John explained, grin widening in an almost manic way. “Once I’m the one to restore things, everyone will realize they have a guardian with that power. That I’ll exist to them as more than a vague concept of right and wrong, that I’m a real person, and that I gave them their life back. It will be beautiful.”

The aggressive stance slackened somewhat as Dave shifted his weight back towards his heel.

“You’re crazy.”

“Am I? Or are you just not looking at the big picture clearly,” John said, pulling out his hammer from thin air with a shimmer. He was a guardian. They were the same, and yet, so obviously different in every way. John tossed the weapon easily in one hand, unbothered by its weight in the slightest, then pointed it at Dave before gesturing to the rest of the room. “I’m offering you a place by my side, an entire world. This is an easy choice, Dave. We were getting so close…”

“If I knew this side of you, I’d never have even called you a friend,” Dave said, trying not to flinch when the hammer swung down sharp enough it made stinging air snap against his face. “I’m a guardian of Earth, John. You know I’d never accept this kind of offer. I can’t let you do as you please. I’m offering you a hand again to join Earth, but that’s as far as this goes.”

“Fuck the Earth!” John shouted, eyes blazing. “It's time as the crown jewel of the milky way is over, Dave, open your eyes! Look at the writing on the wall! War, famine, pollution, greed. Your planet is going down the same path my planet did at first. It’s on its way out now. It’s dimming. Yet, it still has a chance to be useful. It can restart my planet, it can become a utopia, like it always had the potential to! A second chance!”

“And why the fuck should I let you kill my planet to restart yours? What makes all our lives inferior?” demanded Dave, jaw tense. This guy was crazy. Absolutely fucking crazy.

“It’s nothing personal, Dave. It’s just business. We can always work together to find another planet to restart yours the same way, another world chock full of grist for the taking. We could work together, even. Keep both our planets safe. It’d be great, it-”

“Isn’t going to ever happen.”

“Dave.”

“I’m not going to let you lay your fucking hands on anything of mine ever again. The Earth is off limits to your grist mining.”

“Dave, listen to me.”

“The offer to remain as a friend of the planet is on the table still, but from the sound of things you’re expecting more. It’s not going to happen. I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“Dave,” John said again, sounding pained. The grip on his hammer tightened with every word, face desperate and tense.

“Not now, not ever. This planet is my responsibility.”

“Dave, listen!” John shouted.

“I DON’T HAVE TO LISTEN TO A FUCKING THING YOU SAY WHEN YOU’RE TALKING SO NONCHALANTLY ABOUT KILLING ALL MY FRIENDS AND FAMILY!” Dave shouted right back, raising his fists into a fighting stance defensively, prepared for what might be coming from their outbursts.

John lifted his hammer high, eyes flaring like electricity. A dark breeze rushed through the room, jerking Dave’s clothes left and right, whipping his hair wildly. He prepared for breathlessness, he prepared for the hammer. For what may come.

“WHY CAN’T YOU JUST DO AS I SAY?” John yelled, slamming the hammer Dave’s direction. It was a mistake. An accident, he’d try to tell himself. He would never hurt Dave, he’d promised himself he wouldn’t, yet him talking back like this, him refusing him, him refusing him the chance of fixing his world… it was just too much to handle, and he’d done the first thing that came to mind with the darkness.

The hammer struck true, but not on Dave, much to John’s anger and relief. Instead, it was struck and currently straining against a sword that he hadn’t seen before. It was white as marble, with a strange, almost conical looking crossguard. Solid as anything, with a hum of vibrant energy as Dave held John’s strike at bay. Gone were the white clothes, the beads, the pearls, in its place the familiar uniform and white hair John had seen so many times. The flashy red, the gears ticking in the air as he stared with piercing red eyes directly into John’s. No sign of yielding.

He hated that look.

He loved that look.

They strained against each other for a moment before Dave made a move, gears spinning wildly behind him as he slowed things down and surged forwards, sliding the hammer along the edge of the sword till he could flip the balance and send it away from him. Quickly, he angled his body and struck a blow across John’s middle, though it was far from a kill strike. Even now, Dave hesitated to kill some of his enemies, something that he knew would come back to bite him in the future in one way or another. He hoped that, possibly, there would be some way to save John from himself. To clear his heart, his mind. Somehow.

Maybe he could ask Bro, call a favor in from Dirk. Anything. There had to be a way.

As time sped back up, however, Dave knew he was out of time, metaphorically. Instead of attacking again, or preparing to intercept a second hammer strike, he instead clenched his hand over his heart and focused as hard as he could on home. He could picture it in his mind, the futon with Bro’s legs dangling over the end, the television, the wires crisscrossing the floor, food on the counter, smuppets and swords everywhere. The moon from the rooftop, the faint hint of stars in the light polluted sky, the heat of midday sun on the treated surface, waves in the air bouncing off the metallic surfaces of the industrial air conditioners. He could feel it so intensely he could have drawn it with his eyes closed.

Chest warm, Dave heard his heart ticking in his chest, the steady beat of the clock that he worked with. It ticked louder, louder, harder till it was all he could feel, all he could hear… and he was gone. John struck the empty space Dave had been standing in mere seconds after he flashed and disappeared from view. Growling in rage, dark wind wildly thrashing, he threw his head back and yelled wordlessly to the digital sea of stars above him.

This wasn’t over.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Dave’s roof was exactly how he’d been imagining it. Comforting, welcoming, and entirely his own. Though relieved at his sudden arrival back on Earth, he couldn’t help but stare up at the sky to try and figure out which bright spot was a star and which might be John’s ship just beyond the atmosphere. He gripped his hand tight against his chest again, before finally glancing down towards his sword. This definitely was new, but what happened? Did he get gifted an upgrade, or had he unlocked it somehow on his own in a fit of panic? He gave it a twist swing, slicing the air cleanly with a vwip noise a few times before the door to the roof clanged open.

“Jesus fuck, kid, you’re gonna give me a heart attack. Where’ve you been? It’s like you disappeared!” Bro said, hurrying forward as Dave slowed his strikes to a halt. “I came soon as I felt it, but seriously, what gives?”

“Felt it? Felt what?” he asked, confused.

“The ping,” Bro said. At Dave’s continued look of confusion, he set a hand over his heart with a smirk. “I might not be a guardian anymore, but I’m sure as shit still tapped into the system somewhat, and just from bein’ who I am to you I’d feel it I’m sure. Felt when you disappeared… felt when you came back. Dirk no doubt felt it too, even if only a bit. Everyone must’ve felt somethin’, no matter how small, that changed.”

“Somethin’ sure as shit did change, did you see this thing?” Dave asked, hefting the sword up one handed to display to Bro lengthwise, offering it to him to hold and examine in the moonlight, white and all but glowing in its deadly way. “I don’t know what happened, one minute I was goin’ for my sword, the next this cropped out instead.”

“Nice. Solid as shit, too,” Bro judged by the weight. “This is a hell of an upgrade kid. ...I hope it didn’t cost you too much. You know how they are about their workers supplies.”

There was always a price. Be it in time, or be it in blood.

“I hope so too. I’ve got no idea, though. I didn’t hear Hephaestus at all, or see him or anything, just. New sword,” he explained as he took the weapon back, changing out of his uniform and into-

“What’s with the getup?” Bro asked, cocking his head to the side.

“Fucking-! Ugh. God damn creep changed my clothes while I was out cold. H- … Wait. Motherfucker, my phone!” he shouted, looking up towards the sky angrily. His phone was gone, his clothes, his everything was gone and it wasn’t like he could just ask for it back.

“There’s worse ways to lose a phone, kid. We’ll get you a new one,” Bro said with a shrug. “Come inside, already, before you get sucked back to space or wherever the fuck you were at. I’ll make Hot Pockets or somethin’ to celebrate.”

Dave smirked. “I survive a near death experience and you offer me Hot Pockets. My first time off-planet, and it’s Hot Pockets.”

“These are the garlic bread kind, and I’m willin’ to share.”

“...You drive a hard bargain.”

Bro clapped a hand on Dave’s shoulder. “We’ll try puzzlin’ out your powerup and talk while you eat. You can even change out of your weird drapey dress if you want.”

Dave shot another look at the sky as if daring John to react while he stood there more vulnerable, while he was with his guardian, but nothing came. He’d need to finish this. Maybe the Hot Pocket talk could include more strategy than anything else, a second head with more experience fighting off-planet threats to help him think of different options.

“Yeah. I’d like that.”

As they started walking, Bro chuckled. “If you wanna call your boyfriend I’ll lend you my phone for a bit if you ask real nice.”

Dave’s stomach churned as they headed through the door, mouth suddenly full of bitter spit. “No thanks. That’s. ...I’ll tell you while I eat.”

[witharsenicsauce]

Chosen Stories From The War #44: The Glass Elevator

(Content Warning: This chapter contains brief mentions of abuse)

Camazotz’s cold heart didn’t hold much room in it for anyone. He had already relegated far too much space for Abyzou, and Bhandasura had stolen a chunk of it too, and the remains of it were far too dry and cold to make anything else out of it.

That was why he always laughed--internally--when Abyzou called their little worker drones their “children.” It wasn’t such that he hated their creations (he hated everyone, but that was beside the point), but he just could not look down at any of them, not even his own Gur-Rai, and see anything but a machine. Maybe an employee at best, and employees could be terminated.

This one, though, he had to admit, had stolen a tiny piece of his cold, dead heart. Maybe it was the eyes: the color of snake venom, similar to his. Or maybe it was that charismatic smile: they had made him for one reason, and that was to win over the crowd. But really, it was probably the way the Speaker, even as he bowed low, practically prostrating himself before the Elder, still managed to hold onto a portion of that power in their face. Abyzou would hate it, if she ever noticed. Camazotz saw it as something to respect.

“Glorious Elder Camazotz.” The Speaker looked up at him from his position on the floor, and Camazotz saw a glint of yellow behind those glasses. “You know I would never interrupt unless for the most urgent news.”

“Of course.” Camazotz chuckled. “I assume it’s something I’ll be happy about.”

“An associate has informed me that they have three of the Commander’s Inner Circle right on their doorstep.” The Speaker rose to his feet. “Jane Kelly is among them, as is Shaojie Zhang, and a name I’m sure you have not heard in years, the legendary Taymallat.”

“Annette Durand? That is a rare sighting.” Camazotz chuckled. He almost regretted that Annette had managed to escape so early on. She had been stronger than most humans he’d encountered. Maybe she could have managed where the others failed. “But she is not as important as the others. Jane Kelly is out in the open? She is practically giving herself up.”

“I believe from here, her capture will be swift and simple.” The Speaker continued.

“She is a wily thing, Navisor.” Camazotz knelt down so he was closer to the Speaker’s height, although the cold floor hurt his knees. He reveled in the pain. It meant he was still alive.

“This time is different.” The Speaker insisted. “She is looking for Vahlen.”

Camazotz clenched his fists in laughter. “Humans are so sentimental.”

“Aren’t they? But she’s still convinced, deep down, that to reconcile is possible. And I think with a bit of twisting, that could work in our favor~”

“You sound like you already have a plan.” Camazotz said.

“I do, but I would never do anything without consulting you.” The Speaker bowed low again.

“Navisor, whatever you are planning, you have my permission to execute it.” Camazotz assured him. “Especially if it will cause my beloved wife a headache she’ll suffer for days.”

The Speaker faltered at that, but only briefly. “I shall prepare to fly out at once. And on the topic of consulting you, Vox Camazotz, I do again require your wisdom.”

“Speak freely.” He waved a hand toward the Speaker. “You know there are no secrets here.”

“The humans are beginning to question the absence of the Chosen.” The Speaker raised his head, green eyes peering over black sunglasses. Both mirrored Camazotz’s own reflection back at him. He saw his own, sickly eyes looking back, and he may as well have been staring at someone else entirely.

He sighed. “And I suppose they will start causing problems if we don’t offer them an explanation soon. Or at the very least, distract them.” Camazotz raised his four arms and clasped his fingers together.  “There is another gala coming, is there not?”

“Indeed, in no less than a month.” The Speaker said, and he could feel Camazotz’s satisfaction.

“I believe I may have a solution. If Xezbeth and Tiyanak have decided they want to play mad scientist, perhaps I’ll make them earn the title.”

.

.

“I apologize, I am not very skilled…” Kon-Mai admitted as her fingers ran through the long, black tresses that fell to Aisha’s waist. Her hair was coarse and thick, but looked healthy beyond measure. Reaching back toward her own curly locks, Kon-Mai acknowledged how she had been leaving them down recently, and unfortunately they’d developed some rather embarrassing tangles as a result.

“An extra pair of hands is appreciated.” Aisha assured her. “It doesn’t have to be a perfect braid, I’ll be putting it under a cap anyway.” Speaking of, she reached over and grabbed a satin underscarf and handed it back to Kon-Mai. “Can you hold that? I’ll put the hair in a bun.”

“Of course.” Kon-Mai took her hands away as she watched Aisha work. The yurt they sat in was hers, and of course since Aisha was the Jinong, it was slightly bigger and more elaborate than the other single houses in Karakorum. The walls were made of stone instead of leather, although the roof was still thatched like the others. On said walls, a few keepsakes hung, some carvings in rock done presumably by a child, a few arrows with feathers on the end, some strings of beads, a bow…and other than that, it was clean, almost pristine.

In the center, the two sat beside a small fire pit that was unlit at the moment, relying on the light flooding in from the open door. The ground was swept as clean as it could be in the steppe, and out of the corner of her eye, Kon-Mai saw a beetle saunter by lazily. She put one hand down on the cool ground and took a deep breath, rooting herself in this place.

She looked up as Aisha reached back for the cap, but instead of handing it to her, Kon-Mai (her hands seemingly moving on their own) raised the cap to Aisha’s head and slid it on for her in one fell swoop, covering her hair almost perfectly. Aisha seemed to startle, and Kon-Mai reeled back at her own forwardness.

“I’m so sorry…” She stammered. “I…I don’t know why I did such a thing.”

“No, it’s okay.” Aisha smoothed out some of the baby hairs around her face and chuckled, tucking them under the cap. “I haven’t had anyone do that for a long time.”

“I’m sorry.” Kon-Mai said again. “…Was that another practice Monkh performed for you?”

“When I was little.” Aisha said quietly. “ …She was so good with hair. Her hair was so different from mine, it was really curly and kind of coily, but she could pull it back in braids, or smooth it down, or…” She paused, laying her hands in her lap. “ …Thank you for helping me with this. It’s nice to not be doing my hair alone…”

“No one else comes over?” Kon-Mai asked, getting to her feet and walking over to the wooden table that held a series of metal pins and brooches, all adorned with Elerium glowing in various colors.

“No…” Aisha shrugged. “I do not mind. The others…they feel more comfortable around each other.”

Kon-Mai herself had been slightly apprehensive to come over when Aisha invited her, even more so when the Jinong had asked for help doing her hair. She had cited Kon-Mai’s own silver locks as inspiration for asking, but Kon-Mai still felt a bit guilty that she had hesitated at all. Aisha was already so isolated, and to be honest...so was Kon-Mai.

“They should not exclude you simply because you are different.” Kon-Mai scoffed, turning over a few of the brooches in her hands, and finally selecting one shaped like a seashell with a faint purple glow.

“I don’t think that’s the entire reason.” Aisha assured her. “It’s a mixture of things…jealousy is probably a root.”

Kon-Mai chuckled. “There might be much to be jealous of, but it is their own shortcomings that hamper them.” She sat behind Aisha, who was wrapping the dark purple hijab round her head. “They should use their envy to become stronger.”

“I think they think I’m the weak one…” Aisha sighed. “And that I didn’t earn my place as Jinong.”

Kon-Mai scoffed. “Monkh would disagree. She loved you too much for you to think that.”

Aisha froze, and Kon-Mai froze with her, and the two sat in silence for a moment.

“It still hurts.” Aisha admitted. “And it’s never felt right without her here, the Khatun hasn’t been the same…”

Kon-Mai quietly pinned the hijab in place with the purple brooch. It sparkled in the sunlight, turning pink then red, then purple once again.

“I need to do some hunting before the sun sets.” Aisha got to her feet and took her bow off of the wall. “Will you join me?”

Kon-Mai raised a brow. “Proper hunting? I’m afraid I am terrible with a bow.”

“I can show you how.” Aisha assured her. “And I’d like the company.”

Kon-Mai mused on this for a moment, watching the look in Aisha’s eyes go from painful reminiscence to anxious desperation. She stood slowly, brushing off her knees, and nodded.

“Thank you.” Aisha sighed in relief. “...You can take Nergui. He’s big enough for you to ride.”

“Nergui?” Kon-Mai faltered. “...But that was Monkh’s horse. You said he does not let anyone get close…”

“He was Monkh’s horse, yes.” Was all Aisha said, her eyes unreadable. “But…”

“But?”

“He’s one of the biggest ones.” Aisha stepped away, avoiding Kon-Mai’s gaze. “If you want, you can take one of the smaller ones, but I don’t think they’ll handle as well.”

Kon-Mai wanted to insist on doing so, but when she went to protest...found she was unable to speak. 

.

.

Malinalli was waving in the distance as the cart came into view, and Dhar-Mon made himself smile for her. But as the cart drew closer, laden with metals and processed Elerium, she saw his face, and saw the worry lining it.Her own smile dropped.

She embraced him as he came close, squeezing around his waist and burying her face in his chest, and he put his hands on her shoulders and brought her in close, seeking comfort in her embrace.

“What happened?” She asked softly, looking up at him with worried eyes. “Did something go wrong at the mines?”

He sighed, shook his head...and then sighed again. “I do not know. And I feel we cannot discuss it here.”

Malinalli looked around, then grabbed his hand. “Let’s go somewhere private then.” She began to pull him away, stopping only when one of the warriors Dhar-Mon had been traveling with, Uyanga, called to them.

“Hey, Purple Man! You’re strong!” She jabbed her thumb at the cart. “Help us unload.”

“I was going…” Dhar-Mon began to protest, his voice shaking as he tried to find the words. “...'Purple man’?”  

Malinalli stepped up and put a hand on his arm. “I’ll help too. Those look heavy and you could use all the help.”

Uyanga raised a skeptical eye, running her gaze up and down Malinalli’s body. “No muscle on you. Only fat.”

“That’s correct.” Malinalli gave her a smirk as she pushed past and grabbed a chunk of Elerium with both hands. “So you don’t want the extra help?”

Uyanga eyed her for a moment more before nodding slowly. “Just keep up.”

Dhar-Mon approached his lover, who was faring okay carrying the smaller chunks, but when she reached for a piece almost as big as her head, he stopped her. “Are you sure-?”

“Please, don’t you underestimate me too.” She said softly. “I can carry these fine, holding down patients is a lot harder.”

“I…y-you’re right, I am so sorry…” He stammered, looking down and blushing purple, his skin growing hotter until Malinalli climbed up on the cart beside him and kissed him on his scaly cheek.

“Now, tell me about the mine.” She whispered in his ear.

“We are exposed here.” He looked back at Uyanga, who was unloading her own batch of Elerium near the town’s center plaza. “If only we could talk like before…”

“The mental link.” Malinalli chuckled. “I miss you on the inside sometimes.”

“I believe I have a substitute for that.” Dhar-Mon couldn’t stop himself blushing as he said that.

Malinalli snorted, almost dropping the Elerium she had picked up. “In my head, you dummy. But maybe later, we’ll see~” She winked.

He chuckled, then his smile fell and his heart sank again. “It was everything the Khatun says it is, a great hole in the earth that slips into darkness, but the walls are lined with glowing Elerium. They process it, and in turn stabilize its radioactive properties. For the most part.”

“So you won’t become fully irradiated from wearing a necklace.” Malinalli nodded. “Smart…”

“Indeed.” He didn’t quite know what else to say on it. “The workers…seem indifferent. I met one that was friendly, but the others did not pay me much mind. Several were…they were scared of me.”

“I’m sure they were just startled, they might not get many visitors…” Malinalli looked over her shoulder, then leaned in again to kiss him, whispering as she did “But that’s not all, is it?”

“There is something amiss within the mine.” He said. “And I do not believe it is benevolent. Screams echo from within.”

Malinalli pulled away from him, worry more apparent in her eyes. “I’d love to see it.” She tried to keep her voice chipper. “You’ll have to insist the others take me with, next time they go.”

“Next time?” Dhar-Mon blinked. “...Oh. Yes. When next we go, I will take you, my darling.”

Malinalli winked. “We should go early. So we aren’t missed too much here.”

“I’m sure it will not take long. We only want to see the outer mine, after all…” Dhar-Mon looked over at Uyanga, who only generally glanced in their direction. It seemed like she hadn’t heard them.

“Maybe with some luck, we can sneak away together~”

.

.

It seemed like Hong Kong was always kind of dark. Then again, everything was dark around Jane Kelly.

She crossed her legs, leaning back against the metal bench plunked smack in the middle of a park that was way too pristine. The sky was a soft grey, and the sun hid behind a thin layer of cloud that dimmed its light just enough that the shadows covered her face.

She knew she was taking a risk out here, but she had to get away. Do something. It felt like they were getting nowhere with Dax́iiu: Zhang kept giving him good reasons to defect, and Dax́iiu just kept kicking the can farther down the road. Her comrades had assured her that it would just take time, but Jane wasn’t going to sit around holding her breath.

Time was passing, far too quickly. She’d already lost so many years, she wanted as much time as she could pry from the cosmos’ cold, dead hands. And if Vahlen was here? If Vahlen was somewhere in Hong Kong?

Jane stood up and walked briskly across the street shoving her hands into her pockets. She had to keep moving, always keep moving. Bradford used to call her a hamster, running on its wheel. Maybe that was true. Maybe she should go back to-

Footsteps behind her made her slow, and she took a quick turn down a dirt maintenance path, ducking behind a beat up truck. A couple of Trooper helmets lay on the ground beside their wheels, and the footsteps drew closer to her hiding place and then stopped.

“I know you are there.” A familiar voice called out, stilted and awkward, in broken English. “Come out.”

Jane took a moment to remember where she’d heard that--him--before. When she did, a shiver went up her spine, and she was definitely no closer to revealing herself. She envied Kon-Mai in that moment, being able to go invisible would have been really handy right now.”

“I am not going to hurt you.” He said again. “I know what you seek. I want to help you.”

Jane still hesitated. “ …I’m armed.” She said. “If you try and drag me off to ADVENT, I have absolutely no problem shooting myself.”

“Please don’t.” He said. “Please, I want to help.”

“How do I know I can trust you?” Jane reached for her pocket weapon, ready to make a run for it. “You’re in Dax́iiu’s pocket. And he might be talking, but he sure hasn’t made things easy for us.”

“Please.” He said again. “I don’t know how to say. Please…”

Jane kept silent for a moment longer, then stood up and looked into the black eyes of T8Y47.

“I know what you seek.” He said. “I know...who you seek.”

“How?” Jane drew her gun and pointed it at his shoulder. His eyes were gleaming with what looked like tears, but she could never be sure. “ …How much do you know? How do you know? Who told you?”

“ADVENT knows all.” He said, his hands in the air. “I know that your name is not really Jane. I know that your mother abandoned you. I know where she is.”

Jane felt her hands starting to shake--probably from holding the gun up for so long. “You…you know? You know where she is?”

“Dax́iiu knows too.” He said. “He wants to help you.”

Jane snarled. “That weasel needs to pick a side and stop sitting on fences.” She hissed. “Mother can wait that long, if he keeps wanting to drag his heels.”

“But she can’t.” The hybrid lowered his hands. “That’s why I came to find you.”

.

.

The nearly black horse looked up at Kon-Mai with sad, dark eyes as she approached. In her arms, she held a knitted saddle blanket and a pair of reigns, and as she drew close to him, his ears folded against his head.

“Aisha, are you certain?” Kon-Mai turned to the woman who was already seated on her own horse. “He looks forlorn.”

“Do not force him.” Aisha assured her. “But…you’re doing well. He doesn’t seem agitated.”

Kon-Mai looked back to Nergui, whose ears perked up slightly as she did. They locked eyes again, and she set down her tackle and approached him slowly, hands out, just as she was.

“You were her horse.” She said softly, reaching out ever so tentatively. “You were Monkh’s horse”

Nergui let out a soft nicker and shook out his tangled mane, turning away from her.

“I know you must miss her.” She continued. “I am no substitute. I am not Monkh.” With barely a touch, she put her hand on his nose, and gasped as she felt its velvety softness. “But I…I want to…” What did she want?

Nergui knew far better than her, obviously. He responded to her touch by pressing his nose forward into her palm, then stepping forward and bobbing his head slightly, as if telling her to pet him. She stroked his nose while he brayed happily, closing his eyes and turning his face up towards the sun.

“I had a feeling!” Aisha called to her. “Do you need help with the tackle gear?”

“No.” Kon-Mai said, far too quietly. “No, I’ll be fine!” She reached down for the saddle blanket (forgoing the actual saddle, as she was far too tall for any of them) and then picking up the bridle and placing the metal bit in her palm, gently holding it against his lips, waiting for him to bite. And bite he did, taking the bit from her with the kind of ease that could only come from years of trust.

“Do you need a leg up?” Aisha called after her again, crawling closer on her horse.

Kon-Mai gave her a look. “At your height? Do not try it.” She walked around Nergui’s side, heaping her hand on his neck the whole time. “I’ll be alright.” She bent one knee slightly, throwing her arm over the top of his neck, and ran forward, kicking up and over his back and landing, seated, on the saddle blanket, pulling herself upright into a sitting position.

She straightened up, shaking out her hair, and noticed Aisha staring at her. Her expression was…unreadable, but her mouth was set in a thin line.

“What is wrong?” Kon-Mai took hold of the reigns.

“Nothing, just distracted…” Aisha turned her own horse towards the gate. “Have you hunted before?”

“Not like this.” Kon-Mai chuckled, feeling Nergui paw at the ground excitedly. “But I am always ready to learn.”

.

.

For once, Betos found herself really wishing Geist was here, if only so she didn’t have to feel like the odd one out.

Drakaina and Volk each sat on an arm of Drakaina’s throne, passing a glass of vodka back and forth between them as they chatted in their native tongue, completely acting as though Betos did not exist. She understood the hesitancy to discuss anything more serious before Senuna arrived, but occasionally they would glance pointedly in her direction and Betos, despite being invited here, felt as though she was intruding.

Part of her wanted to leave, just walk right out and communicate the level of disrespect that she felt. But as soon as she gathered up the strength to turn on her heel, the doors opened and Senuna walked in, flanked by Bradford.

“Sorry about that!” She giggled, flipping her silver hair. “I was sure I had enough time for a quick nap and well, time got away from me.”

“It’s fine, you are here now.” Betos grumbled and turned to Drakaina, who stood so Volk could keep his seat on the arm rest.

“I brought you all here to discuss preparations on an outpost attack.” Drakaina said. “We have discovered ADVENT has a city center near Erdenesant, that is small enough that my army could take it, if we had help.”

“Hold on.” Bradford held up a hand. “You said no city centers.”

“I said settlements.” Drakaina clarified. “This is technically one of those. The center was constructed only a month ago and its defenses are still incomplete until more troops can be allocated.”

“Commander.” He looked to Senuna. “Back me up here.”

“How big is the settlement?” Senuna asked. “City centers aren’t usually small. I’ve been to plenty, trust me.”

"It has a population of about 3,000 people, and as of right now about half as many hybrid soldiers guarding them.” She looked to Betos. “Guards that, perhaps with your help, could be made to quietly walk away.”

“We said we weren’t taking on a city center.” Bradford insisted. “Infiltration is one thing. This is an all out attack.”

“This is our chance to save these people.” Drakaina insisted. “Or would you rather they starve under the tyranny of our invaders?”

“I’d rather we not lose this war by getting our skulls dashed against the sidewalk while the general population cheers.” Bradford crossed his arms. “And answer me this: how do we convince them we’re the good guys? I’m not just talking about the soldiers; the civvies are going to be terrified if we run in there guns blazing to drag them from their homes.”

Drakaina seemed to hesitate a bit, and then Senuna interjected, looking toward Bradford. “I might be able to convince them to come quietly. And I could evacuate the city before the attack happens.”

“I’m not sending you back in there, Sunny.” He hissed. “Not a chance.”

“A leader should fight on the field with the rest of her warriors.” Drakaina insisted. “I have heard tales of your great power, Commander.”

“I won’t have to get close.” Senuna assured him. “Just enough to project my voice.”

Betos chuckled nervously. “You plan to perform a concert?”

“Who knows? Maybe I have some fans in the city~” Senuna winked. “But Drakaina does have a point. If the city center is that small…it’s conceivable that we could crack it. And--I’ll be honest--taking on a city center is risky business, but if we have a chance to help people get out of there...”

Bradford looked away, glowering at Senuna’s answer, while Drakaina smiled. Her nearly white eyes seemed to glitter. “I see why you are the Commander, you know exactly what must be done.” Drakaina looked back at Volk. “Your Reapers are very good at remaining unseen.”

“I’ll have Elena take a couple and scout out any weak points.” Volk stood up and downed the rest of his vodka. “I know it’s a scary concept, John, but it’s about time we start taking the fight to the Elders. Can’t play defense forever.”

.

.

“Does Zhang know you’re talking to me?” Jane asked, glancing sideways at T8Y47. The hybrid held the door open for her, gesturing for her to continue. When she hesitated, he entered first.

“Nobody knows.” He answered. “Chilong and Taymallat are...focused. On other things. Not you.”

“I’m focused on the mission, too.” Jane said. “This is a side quest at best.”

“You have been searching for so long.” T8Y47 led her down a hallway similar to the one in the penthouse, but instead of gold, this one was lined with silver and marble and dark green gems. “And you came all this way. I understand why. I understand you want to know.”

Jane scoffed. “Yeah, sure you do.”

“I do.” He insisted. “I had a mother too.”

Jane stopped. “So you’re one of the ones they ‘rewarded’, huh?”

He slowed his pace, probably realizing she was no longer following him.

“Do you remember your family at all?” She asked. “Do you remember your mom?”

He shook his head. “I do not know if she lived or died. I do not know if she would want to see me again. I only have the memory of her smile, a faint outline of light in a dark void..”

Jane swallowed the lump in her throat. “I’m not a therapist but…” She said softly. “...You should find her.”

T8Y47 stopped briefly in his tracks at that, looking back at Jane with black eyes.

“I’m serious.” Jane insisted. “Hey, if you’re helping me find my mom, maybe I’ll help you find yours.”

He kept watching her out of the corner of his eye. “...You would do that for a stranger?”

She shrugged. “I repay kindness. I know I don’t seem like I do but…I will.”

T8Y47 stood still for a moment longer…and then put his hand on the glass doorknob. “You will find what you seek in here.”

“Thank you.” Jane stepped in front of him, her heart pounding, her hands shaking. “...What’s your name?”

“I have no name.”

“When I’m done in here, I want you to have thought up a name.” She looked back at T8Y47 and winked. “See you in a bit.”

Jane hadn’t had time to prepare for this at all, this moment was supposed to be magical, she closed her eyes and tried to imagine herself a child once again, running across marble floors to finally land in her mother’s arms…

The door swung open and she stepped inside, her heart instantly dropping as she saw the spacious, dark, nearly empty interrogation room. Across the wall, rows upon rows of televisions blinked, cameras scanning what looked like a prison. In front of her was a desk, and at the desk sat a slimy looking man, smiling behind his sunglasses.

“Hello Jane.” The Speaker said as the door closed behind her. “...Or should I call you Sinéad? It’s such a pretty name.”

.

.

The wind in her hair, whipping past her face, tickling her cheeks, the sound of Nergui’s hooves thundering against the ground hard enough to shake the mountains around her…

Kon-Mai hadn’t felt such joy in years. She threw her head back, looking up to the golden sun glowing through the clouds, just as a purple arrow whizzed past her head. She looked behind her as Aisha cried out “Sorry!”

Tugging the reigns to one side, Kon-Mai moved out of the way just enough for Aisha to ride past and hold out her hand, calling the arrow back to her and scooping up the animal she had killed with it. She checked it briefly, then gave Kon-Mai a thumbs up. “Instant!”

“You are quite talented!” Kon-Mai cried, guiding Nergui over to her companion.

“Speak for yourself.” Aisha chuckled. “I didn’t know you could ride so well.”

“I’ll be honest, neither did I.” Kon-Mai leaned down and patted Nergui’s neck, and he whinnied happily at her touch.

“He’s…not usually this happy.” Aisha added. “After Monkh died…I used to try and take him out, he refused to go each time.”

“You were the one who offered for me to take him.” Kon-Mai raised a brow. “Giving me a troublesome horse on my first ride? Quite irresponsible, Aisha.”

“Well, he’s also one of the biggest ones, I knew he’d be able to hold your weight…” Aisha coughed. “No offense, I mean-”

“I know, don’t worry.” Kon-Mai giggled. “He handles like a dream.” 

“I think he just likes you.” Aisha threw her leg over her horse and slid off, taking the reigns in one hand.

“Have you caught all you need for today?” Kon-Mai asked.

“Not yet, but I thought this would be a good place to stretch our legs.” Aisha said as she drew her sword. “You could show me a few tricks.”

Kon-Mai raised a brow. “That is incredibly foolish of you.” She said as she slid off Negui’s back. “My sword never misses a target.”

“Then I’ll have a real challenge.” Aisha shrugged. “That’s perfectly fine.”

“You can’t get such a challenge elsewhere?” Kon-Mai asked as she let Nergui to a green looking patch of land.

“Perhaps I could.” Aisha shrugged. “But why not you? And besides, we���re all the way out here.”

“I don’t want to accidentally hurt you.” Kon-Mai smirked as she unsheathed her sword.

“And I don’t want to be hurt.” Aisha giggled. “So I guess I just have to be good.”

.

.

“No!” Jane turned on her heel and slammed her shoulder into the now locked door. “FUCKING BASTARD! YOU TRICKED ME!”

“Sinéad, let’s now make a scene now.” The Speaker stood slowly. “I’m here to help you.”

Jane began searching for screws along the hinges, maybe she could dig them out with her fingernails, but froze as she felt his hand on her shoulder.

“You want to see your mother.” He chuckled. “I’m sorry she couldn’t be here today, she’s a very busy woman after all, running all those experiments, corrupting the Elders’ hard work, I’m sure it’s a taxing job. But she’s so happy you came all this way just to find her.”

“I don’t believe you.” Jane hissed. “You’re a fucking conman! You tricked me! She’s not actually here, is she? She never was!”

“I think you’ll find my offer is sincere.” His grip on her shoulder tightened. “You’re smart, that much I know, and you’re smart enough to know what I will do if you resist me.”

Jane froze, her body going limp as she let the Speaker guide her back to the table. He sat down across from her, gesturing for her to do the same in the chair provided.

“...How did you find out?” Jane murmured. “I’ve never gone by my birth name.”

“It wasn’t hard to piece together.” The Speaker reached across the table to where the pile of files sat, dragging one over. “Your records may not be public per se, but they were not exactly hidden either. You have a paper trail miles long whether you like it or-”

“Did she tell you?” Jane was afraid to know the answer to that. People cracked under pressure all the time, good people, but after all that if her mother had given her away…

“No, which is no surprise.” The Speaker looked over the top of his glasses, his green eyes boring into her. “Moira Vahlen is not a weak-minded human. She never even mentioned she had a daughter before. But the papers speak for themselves, don’t they?”

Jane felt her shoulders relax and droop, just as the Speaker slid her old, yellowed birth certificate across the table.

“Sinéad Vahlen.” He said, his tongue hissing against his lips ever so slightly. “You’re a very long way from home.” 

.

.

Two swords clanged against each other, and the frosty air was filled with fire.

Kon-Mai’s eyes were alight, and her hair flew out behind her in a wave of snowy locks. Aisha darted to the side but still had to raise her own blade to parry Kon-Mai’s swipe downward. She blocked it, then her leg bent and she rolled away from under the Shrinemaiden’s pin.

“You fight well.” Kon-Mai said with a smile.

“I take a lot of pride in that.” Aisha got to her feet with a smile and twirled her blade in two circles, almost mimicking Kon-Mai’s own movement with her blade. “All those years of training, I would hope I’m good.”

“You…” Kon-Mai shifted backward again, getting back into her stance. “You have a good disposition for combat. Loose, almost casual, but not so easily distracted!” She dipped and darted forward, and Aisha barely had time to bring up her blade in a parry once again. She slid backward briefly, putting one hand down to steady herself, and then ducked away, letting Kon-Mai’s sword embed itself in the ground.

Aisha rolled into a standing position and plunged her blade into the ground, a purple glow emanating from her eyes. “You’re as nimble as they say, Shrinemaiden.” She drew her blade back, carving a curve into the ground, with a cloud of pink dust rising up around it. “Let’s see how you dodge this!”

Kon-Mai could only brace herself against the...wave of psionic energy that crashed over her, sending her to her knees. She squeezed her eyes shut, mind and heart both racing.

How did Aisha know that? That was her move. That was her Harbor Wave.

When she heard footsteps approaching, she looked up and saw Aisha was holding out a hand to her, but Kon-Mai only stared up at her in shock.

“How do you know that move?” She stumbled to her feet.

Aisha pulled back. “Mai…”

“Don’t call me that.” Kon-Mai hissed. “Just answer me. Where did you learn that?”

“I’m sorry.” Aisha reached out, and Kon-Mai took another step away. “Kon-Mai please-”

“Where did you learn that?!” Kon-Mai shrieked. “Nothing makes sense here. The horses, the language, Nergui acts like he knows me, and now this?! What are you hiding from me?! Who are you?!” Not waiting for an answer, Kon-Mai turned on her heel and began to walk away-

“Wait!” Aisha reached out and grabbed hold of Kon-Mai’s hand, finger’s lacing around hers.

A flash of orange light surrounded them as the sun set, and she grabbed hold of the little girl and lifted her in the air. Her braids flew around her like branches of a tree, and as she spun and the two of them laughed, Monkh felt free.

Kon-Mai pulled her hand away, shaking as she stared at it. Aisha, too, stumbled back, looking down at her hand, then up at Kon-Mai.

“...It…” Aisha shook her head, her lip quivering. “It’s you…it’s really you…it’s impossible but it’s you!” 

Kon-Mai took a single step backward, her entire body shaking like a leaf. “...How do you know all this?”

“Monkh.” Aisha put her hand to her face, her lips trembling. “I...I learned that move years ago. From Monkh.”

Kon-Mai turned on her heel and ran. She heard Aisha screaming her name, running after her through the treacherous step, but she simply closed her eyes and ran forward into darkness.

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Summary: The chapter begins with Camazotz meeting with the Speaker, reflecting on how the Speaker is the only one of his creations he is actually proud of. The Speaker reports that Zhang, Jane and Annette are in Hong Kong, and that he has a plan to capture them, which Camazotz approves. Afterward the Speaker confesses that people are becoming restless not knowing where the Chosen are, and Camazotz decides to enlist the help of Xezbeth and Tiyanak.

In Karakorum, Kon-Mai is helping Aisha style her hair and put it up under her hijab, and the two talk briefly about how Aisha is seen as different from the others, and some believe she did not truly earn her place as Jinong. Aisha offers for Kon-Mai to come hunting with her, and suggests she takes Nergui, the old Jinong’s horse.

Dhar-Mon returns from his trip to the mines, and Malinalli welcomes him home. The two quietly discuss what Dhar-Mon saw there, while helping to unload the Elerium harvested from the mine. Dhar-Mon and Malinalli make plans, in secret, to return to the mine again.

Betos meets with Drakaina and Volk, and feels left out while they wait for Senuna, the two actively talk with each other and ignore her. When Senuna finally joins them, Drakaina confesses she wants to attack a (small) city center. While Bradford is hesitant, Senuna agrees to help

In Hong Kong, Jane takes a break from her current dwellings to walk around the city, and is stopped by the hybrid assistant of Dax́iiu, T8Y47. He tells her he knows what she is seeking, and that he can help her find her mother. T8Y47 leads Jane back to the hotel, where he double crosses her and locks her in a room with the Speaker, who reveals that they discovered her true identity: Sinéad Vahlen, daughter of Moira Vahlen.

Back in Mongolia, Kon-Mai and Aisha have success in hunting, and Aisha comments on how good a rider Kon-Mai is. The two stop briefly to practice swordwork together, and after a brief battle, Aisha uses Kon-Mai’s own Harbor Wave attack, which scares the latter. Demanding to know where she learned that, Aisha reveals she learned it from Monkh, the previous Jinong, and then grabs Kon-Mai’s hand, triggering what seemed to be a flashback. Kon-Mai pulls her hand free and runs away, overwhelmed.

(I know it’s been a while, thank you all so much for sticking with me again. This time, it really is more health problems getting in the way of me writing, but I assure you I’m still very passionate about this story. I thank the SFTD Discord for keeping me grounded in that aspect, and I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. It was kind of short, but we got a lot of big reveals in this one.~)

[uwua3]

Bunniiiieeeee, have you considered being a goose or a duck? Ohohoho jkjk~ could I request Azuma blushing hc? Ily so much 💜

it’s my Sworn Enemy and Mortal Rival ruri *goose honk intensifies* but because i love you, i will Answer: i have T_____T now back to fighting you ♡ i hope you love it~

summary: who knew you would meet an angel at a 7/11 when it was 3am?

warnings: impossible beauty standards, insecurity, late nights, overthinking, unrealistic expectations

author’s note: this is for my favorite azuma stan of all time! my great friend who is definitely just as head over heels for him like the mc in this headcanon ♡

i wanted to touch upon azuma’s ego. although he’s definitely not arrogant about his looks, i feel as if pretty people can develop some sort of imposter complex of whether they really are who people see them as. i wanted to recognize maybe an inner people pleaser within him and someone who actively sought validation because he lacked it before he was considered “pretty”. this is mainly a romanticized take on imposter syndrome and what it means to have fake love for temporary satisfaction

word count: 1,335

music: water fountain – alec benjamin

convenience store angel.

❄️🍶 yukishiro azuma

why did everyone want azuma to sit still and look pretty?

it was like he was some victorian doll people played around with before becoming bored, abandoning him for someone so much better. someone, prettier

so azuma grew up following the latest classy fashion trends, locking himself in his bathroom to spend hours taking care of his hair, cashing out thousands to preserve his youthful appearance to defy his age

no matter what time of day it was, he always came off as the best version of himself. pale like the snow, because no one liked it when his face was red. azuma learned how to maintain his porcelain complexion to be even prettier

azuma knew he was pretty; after all, if he wasn’t, all his hard work would be for nothing in the end. he had to be pretty, easy on the eyes, it’s what he was meant to do

compliments had no effect on him anymore, he’s heard it all before: how delicate his dainty fingers were, how smooth his luxurious voice was against their ear, how he was the best they’ve ever had. he knows they lie, and lie, and lie, just to steal a moment with veludo way’s resident ethereal god. they all wanted something underneath their corrupt surface

azuma never believed any of them, no point getting his hopes up about a one night stand. he was just arm candy, something to show off like he was an a prop mannequin

they were all the same: azuma would leave early in the morning and never reached out to contact them again. they did the same, no wonder, he wasn’t pretty enough to be worth their phone bill

azuma would be by himself in the dangerous streets after sneaking out, walking hurriedly from the dark alleyways. he knew no matter what time it was, wolves in sheep’s clothing wanted a bite of him

even though it was safer to stay within his one night stand’s four walls, he couldn’t risk feeling something in any affair. staying in the morning meant wanting more, more visits, more time together

he didn’t have time for anyone else but himself

it was the same process: leaving at midnight, meeting up for drinks, and disappearing into the night at 3. for years, that’s all azuma knew how to do

but then you came along like out of a dream, appearing into his life out of thin air one night

azuma had his face down as he quickly walked towards the dorms silently, his blazer too tight and v–neck too revealing for the hungry eyes staring at him

passing by the convenience store, the LED lights glowed as azuma stepped inside to avoid the heavy set man that was just trailing behind him again. thank god for rest stops, azuma refused to have someone taint his appearance

maybe he was doing something right with his looks if men couldn’t stop following him home, azuma thought, unaware of how he was basing his self worth on creepy attention

the store was lined with racks of cheap food that was sure to give him acne and oily skin. azuma grimanced at the idea of breaking out, or god forbid, having a wrinkle! he’d get the worst possible attention, the one that came with gossips and insults. no, he needed every stranger’s validation on his beauty. he was pretty, right?

turning into one of the aisles to make a call for a ride home, azuma stopped dead as he saw you bent over your cart that was surely not cleaned, debating over two food options that were not healthy in the slightest

shit. he didn’t look, presentable, right now. azuma’s hair was tied down to the best of its abilities, but he could feel the flyaways from his scalp. his casual suit had lint and creases. even his shoes were smudged despite polishing them last night

a first impression, and you were going to forever remember him as an unkempt, messy fool who wasn’t socially acceptable. azuma felt his heart skip a beat as he maintained a charming, easygoing aura, attempting to scoot past you without drawing attention for once

“hey, you! come here a second!” you ordered, not even looking up as you were staring at the colorful advertisements labelled on each plastic bag

azuma held in a sigh as he turned around slowly, forcing a pleasant smile as he hummed a questioning tone against his will. his clients never liked it when he disagreed or talked too much, so wide eyes and thin smiles were the way to go

“what’s the best snack—” you began, pushing your hood out of the way as you finally looked at azuma. azuma who believed he was too ugly and your silence was a confirmation of that

“whoa.” you dropped randomly, squeezing one of the bags so hard that it popped open loudly much to both your dismay

flinching, azuma reprimanded himself mentally for showing any sign of weakness before hearing your laugh amidst the quiet neon store. you sounded out of place over the consistent fan rotating in the background and rare car or two speeding outside

“my bad! sorry, you’re just...” you trailed off, putting both bags anyway into your cart to buy anyways as you stood up to his level

azuma was ready to hear it. how he wasn’t even good enough to be outside right now. how he should try harder to please society’s beauty standards. how there were so many better and—

“beautiful. yeah, that’s it.” you finished, nervously smiling as you suddenly found the stock of usa–imported snacks the most interesting in the store

you’d never tell him until much later on, but azuma appeared like an angel in the dinky, rundown gas station. looking up, you saw his silver periwinkle hair illuminated in the bright white lights like a halo. his white undershirt was bright against his smooth skin and his striking sharp yellow eyes felt like a godsend. azuma was so beautiful in that moment, he took your breath away. he was so gorgeous and heavenly, it was a surprise you didn’t drop to worship him

azuma paused, his mind blanking for the first time in his entire life. he always had something to say, something to add that made the other person want him even more. but you, you didn’t look like you wanted to devour him whole and take advantage of him. you just looked... in awe? like, he was really pretty.

azuma turned red

azuma was blushing uncontrollably, because it’s almost as if you meant it. did you really think he was beautiful? more than pretty, more than an artificial sense of self? even like this? he wasn’t even at his best, he was average. there was no reason he could have warranted such a dramatic reaction

typically, azuma would easily take the compliment and have a graceful act of appreciation as his consistent insecurity over his appearance thudded in his ears

but this time, he didn’t know what to say. there was nothing to say. did you actually think he was beautiful?

azuma subconsciously lifted his hand to his ear, which was burning hot to the touch. but he didn’t feel embarrassed, he wanted to feel like the summer more

less cold, less frigid like he was frozen in time like a snowman. maybe for once, azuma wanted to be as fluid and everchanging as the water. azuma wanted to be melted, and your sunny smile burned him

two people stood inside a 24/7 convenience store, staring at each other with hundreds of questions but comfort they hadn’t found in anyone else. the cars outside whizzed past in the distance, the street lights changed colors, the sun was about to rise on their relationship. things were changing. they were changing

azuma blushed as red as the string of fate looped around their pinkies. he would do so many, many more times and you were always there to make it happen

[apinklion01]

I thought of several headcanons for each element's egg for Flight Rising, feel free to add to them or use them with credit to me :D Earth eggs: Start out without any cracks, but slowly erode making it appear to be a rock from the area its in. most of them appear to be a sedimentary rock. A few can show igneous rocks, which often leads to confusion with fire eggs. When an egg is close to hatching, patches of the stony outside begin to fall off, showing a smooth eggshell that sparkles like minerals. Most dragons prefer to keep them to remember their hatchling's birth, and string them into necklaces. Wind eggs: When laid, the egg starts out with a singular swirl at the top. Over the following days, more swirls appear, giving it the illusion of them moving. the eggs are the thinnest out of the elements, and will move when there's an outside sound. When the egg is close to hatching, the swirls will start to thicken and then thin out, depending on when the hatchling is resting from its attempts to break free. Fire eggs: The eggs are laid near a hot lava surface, but are gradually pushed inside. Depending on what kind of lava it is, the resulting hatchling will have a certain heat tolerance. Putting it in magma is considered rather dangerous for both the parents and the hatchling, as they may not be able to survive without air. A lack of warmth or too much may cause the egg to rot. When they hatch, the rocky surface, covered in igneous rock, starts to crack, showing a fiery embryotic liquid inside the egg. Steam may hiss out, so new parents are advised to keep a small distance in case of flying hot eggshell pieces. Water eggs: Though commonly laid in salt water, it is possible to lay them in fresh water, as well as estuaries, or where both salt and fresh water meet, though this is quite rare. The resulting hatchling will have a tolerance for the water its laid in. salt water eggs only grow coral if they're laid in coral reefs. Most of the time the eggs are surrounded in barnacles. fresh water eggs are covered in algae or other sorts of material. When the egg hatches, it leaks bubbles, and a a result, parents are advised to keep a constant eye on their hatchling and take it to the surface for it to breath air in case they don't develop their water magic fast enough. Eggs are to be kept underwater for the majority of the incubation. If a storm causes the egg to drift ashore, the egg may not survive, and will rot. Ice eggs: Laid most commonly on tundra fields or nearby forests. parents are advised to avoid permafrost areas as the egg may develop a hard icy outside layer. The highest egg rot rates often occur from this mistake. An egg that does survive in a permafrost nest will be very tolerable to the cold, but will never be able to survive in warm or hot climates. Ice eggs may have different colors depending on the surrounding ice, but all must be kept cold. If they're placed in a warm environment, the eggshell will melt, and the hatchling inside may not survive or if not developed, will rot. Shadow eggs: Mostly laid in marshy areas or swamps, though a few have been known to be laid in a meadow or a field. Parents often cover them up in grass or moss to prevent other dragons from stealing them, though the nest may still be discovered since bioluminescent plants or fungi tend to grow near the eggs. The eggs start to glow brightly near hatching. There's a superstition that eggs born on moonless nights will have strong shadow powers, and those born in the day have the weakest powers, though this hasn't been proven nor disproven. Light eggs: The brightest and shiniest of all the eggs. Most parents lay them in nice fields or areas where the sun shines. They must be kept at an even temperature, though rarely will they be moved to the shade. Some clans sell the egg fragments as makeshift jewelry, though the majority will be eaten by the hatchling. A light egg hatchling in a total eclipse is seen as bad luck, but one born at the end of an eclipse is seen as good luck. Light eggs born at night are gifted with being able to see in the darkness, though there's also caution against one being born in a blood moon... Lightning eggs: Though also bright, rarely will they outshine light eggs. Most are kept in high places where lightning has struck, and parents consider it a blessing if an egg hatches in a storm. Their nests are mostly guarded by cacti or prickly bushes, though the parents will abandon the nest and create a more friendlier one upon the hatchling's birth. Some dragons place wires to attract lightning to the nest, however this practice is dangerous as it can cause fires, and harm the small hatchling. Nature eggs: start out as a seed from a tree in the area, though most commonly a coconut of all things. A sprout slowly grows, and when the egg hatches, a tree or similar plant will continue to grow from where it was laid. While an egg, its treated like a plant, given plenty of sunshine, a bit of water, and always kept in healthy dirt areas. Parents are hopeful if an egg hatches during a light rainstorm or a sun shower, as they might have stronger nature magic. However other creatures may mistaken the egg for a plant, so they'll resort to hiding them under a spiky bramble cover. The bramble cover is removed once the eggs begin to hatch, signified by the eggshell splitting open with roots. Plague eggs: Though translucent, the egg has a shell that appears to be like a snake egg. The eggs are meant to be kept in humid locations, though more often than not they'll be introduced to a puddle that'll contain diseases in the hopes they'll gain immunities. The eggs are kept in rotten carcasses to scare off any intruders or egg stealers, though the inside is often covered in any vegetation available. When born, the egg will release an unusual smell that isn't unpleasant. Parents are advised to prevent their hatchling from eating their eggshells, which are promptly thrown away into a fire. Arcane eggs: Unlike the other eggs, these ones float upon being laid due to the arcane area having an unusual gravity. The eggs sometimes make an unusual echo that most believe to be the hatchling's voice. Parents often make sure the eggs are placed into a small hollow cavern to prevent the wind from blowing them away. Some may even place spells to ground the eggs if they feel unsteady or are first time parents. Eggs will start to rotate near hatching, and when the hatchling escapes the egg, it'll create a small firecracker sound, and the hatchling will fall gently into the nest, covered in soft moss and vegetation, or sometimes into a parent's claws.