#but like. ive been scrutinizing them and there is NOTHING observably wrong

[aropride]

i have been checking every single aspect of the new 3m aura 1870s i got to make sure theyre not counterfeit and literally everything checks out there's nothing wrong with them at all . but theyre so easy to breathe through its unsettling. like are these just really breathable or is there something wrong that is completely flying under my radar.

[juchumice]

ive been thinking abt this avatar au for SO LONG!! i know some other exists but i still really wanted to put my spin on it and make them younger so it could be a bit more contextually different, so they’re roughly 14 during the au!

AIZAWA: aizawa’s a waterbender from the northern water tribe. initially, many believed he was a nonbender as it took quite awhile longer for his bending to reveal itself than the other children. he has zero talent concerning waterbending, none at all. in fact, he was absolutely terrible at it initially. but, if there was one thing he was certain about in youth, it was being an excellent waterbender. when first applying to waterbending classes, he was considered far too inexperienced to join. the instructor was a stern type. he told aizawa that he had, “no potential,” and should focus less on waterbending and more on hand to hand combat to waste less time. instead of listening, aizawa practiced terribly. everyday, every moment, he would be waterbending from dusk to dawn till he stumbled from lack of sleep. he even founded his own method, drenching his scarf of spongey material in water and bending it as a weapon. after further practice, he finally got accepted into the course with pure hard work. the issue was that everyone in his class was younger than him, talented and brilliant. none of them worked as hard as he did. they all were children just playing around. as the bending moves increased in difficulty, aizawa began to fall behind again, so his whole day would be absolutely swallowed in practice, practice, and practice. he would be beaten constantly by his peers: during spars, general displays of moves, and learning, so he couldn’t rely on his own power, instead focusing on strength in addition to strategy and observation. it was this adjustment of tactics that led him higher in his studies. he was able to graduate the minor classes, but his instructor thought it was best to get more experience in bending rather than continually relying on his other strengths, so he was sent away from home to study abroad among the other kingdoms and view their bending techniques.

YAMADA: yamada is an air nomad, but he is one of the very few who does not appear to be capable of bending. due to the spiritual nature of the air nomads, there are very few who are unable to airbend, and yamada is one of them. but, everyone else was very supportive even without his bending. he was able to have many friends, however couldn’t join in their air bending games. that’s where he learned his talent for announcing. as the other kids would play their games of air ball and pie toss, he’ll be there on the sidelines, narrating every single thing with his peculiar flare that led to his popularity among the northern air temple. though, even with everyone’s supportive nature, yamada was unhappy with his position. ever since he was but a toddler, he really wanted to be an airbender, streaking across the sky on a glider and riding on air scooters, only to be sorely disappointed. sure, he was able to ‘fly’ with his flying bison’s, baito’s, help but it just wasn’t the same. after a bit, he ran from the northern air temple, sick and tired of living in such a small space. with far too many fantasies on his mind, yamada wished to explore the other nations. it was then he stumbled across the fire nation. they were fascinating. their own fierce power, their sense of fashion, their culture, everything drew yamada closer. he would watch their shows with undisguised excitement, even announcing for a couple of them. while announcing for one of the firebender shows, yamada was required to choose a volunteer from the crowd, which just happened to be aizawa. this led to the beginning of their interactions.

so that’s it i guess! my main ideas for the avatar au! yamada has a glider, but he uh... stole it. just carries it around a lot to ‘feel like an airbender’-- and it’s a great umbrella when it rains!

the au itself takes place before the 100 year war so no worries abt any firebenders just yet!! i might develop it more but this is where its at so farrr

also i wrote a lil small thing while i was playin with the idea: 

...

“You know… I always wanted to bend,” Yamada said. He kicked up the dust with a shoe, frowning at the cloud that billowed around his feet as if it could disappear with a simple scrutinizing look. But, it didn’t. Merely floated to and fro without a care of his whims. 

Aizawa examined him carefully. There was no sound made, just an invitation to continue.

Yamada blew at several pieces of hair that loosened from his bush that he called a hairstyle. “Yeah. Sounds ‘crazy’! But, it made total sense! Look, look, look, I would be an EPIC airbender. You have to admit. I mean, look how cool my poses are!” He proceeded to strike several different ‘airbending poses’ that neither suggested coolness nor airbending. 

“You’ve watched too many firebending shows,” Aizawa replied. 

“But that’s what makes it so cool! The fire just exploding into the sky like Pompeii, but you can only see these red sparkles and nothing goes wrong… Imagine doing that… Imagine…” He chuckled mirthlessly. “Being a bender must be fun, huh…” His staff loosened from his fingers to slide and clatter to the floor. “Don’t even use this DUMB thing! I dunno why I keep it all the time… Maybe, oh! Maybe every time I hold it I get a 1% increase in being an airbender or something! Yeah… tough luck. You know? You know how stupid it is when EVERYONE in the temple’s an airbender and you’re stuck being the only kid around-- believe me they’re all super nice about it-- BUT ME?? THE ONLY ONE!! Don’t feel bad for me or I’ll strangle you or something, but it still freaking sucks. Man, air scooters? I totally would’ve invented those if I was an airbender…”

On and on he jabbered. He could have done this if he was an airbender, or maybe he could have done this!  Aizawa was unsure what to respond with. He never understood. Sure, he understood hardship and running raggedly through the critics and holding one’s goals to heart. A waterbender who couldn’t bend water for crap? That’s what they called him, might as well give up they had said, but he powered through and became skilled with pure hard work. No luck, no cheats, and no talent. Yamada was the opposite case, full of supporting faces and ancient smiles, but just no bending in general. How could someone so hopeful be met with such a grisly fate? Yet, all that Aizawa could offer was a tongue-in-cheek, “Sorry.” 

Yamada stopped talking abruptly. “Huh?”

“I said sorry.”

“Oh. Yeah. Don’t say sorry, man! What’s the fun in that, too gloomy Aizawa, waaaay too gloomy. Y’know, it is what it is! I got a sweet gig going on anyway, I don’t need anything as stupid as airbending. Only saps use airbending, they probably think it’s cool or something, but it isn’t haha. Waterbending, firebending, earthbending, that stuff’s cool! Airbending’s just some playing around with wind or something.”

[sysullivan]

Mothers & Sons [ SM; Soliloquy ]

The dreaded day approaches and there’s not much he can do to keep the inevitable reunion from the forefront of his thoughts. No amount of distraction, of organizing and reorganizing, no amount of wearing himself out far beyond his easily surpassable threshold of exhaustion helps to quell or stave off this unrest. Sleep does not come easily or at all and it’s plain to see; circles darkening under dull eyes and paper white skin. 

Sullivan keeps to himself and speaks no more than necessary. It is a ritual by this point, a strange sort of penance, a purgatory he subjects himself to every year. As often as he is reminded of the cowardice that defines him, no one is aware of and unable to look past that weakness more than Sullivan himself. As pitiable as he may at times seem, no one pities Sullivan more than he pities himself. He is still in love with the boy from his youth; a boy who had the whole ‘verse at his fingertips and lost it all. It’s selfish and immature in the faces of those who have lost so, so much more, but every year Sullivan folds up into himself and mourns the loss of his life.

It’s the Captain’s voice that cuts into his wallowing via the intercom, instantaneously shredding the black shroud he’s draped over each self-defamating thought. Suddenly he is alert; at attention. Immediately, he knows that something is wrong, dreadfully wrong. He’s seen and heard Jaewon in all levels of outrage and fury, but this...this is worse. Just the tone of his voice brings an immovable knot to Sullivan’s throat and the words themselves form a cavernous pit in his belly, one that, in comparison dwarfs the one previously festering there. His heart aches with renewed pain, a constricting empathy that Sullivan prefers not to feel but cannot escape, not when it comes to Jaewon and certainly not when it comes to the captain and her.

It only took hearing one story for Sullivan to decide three truths about Captain Vera Blackhound. First; Jaewon loved her. Maybe he wouldn’t choose that word himself; perhaps respect or reverence sounded more palatable, less intimate, but at the time, Sullivan had not yet seen nor heard his captain speak about someone with such affection; understated definitely, but unmistakable under the cool gaze of someone who’d been studying and scrutinizing his every word and gesture since coming into his employ.

Second, she was terrifying and thus, Sullivan was terrified of her. He’d naively believed Jaewon’s calamitous, cataclysmic existence to be unique. There couldn’t be multiple souls that possessed the same force as his. The thought in itself was frightening but at the same time, he was reminded of something he’d learned in his youth. The digital encyclopedia clip resurfaced vividly in his mind’s eye and haunted him again now as it had when he was younger. The clip showed a massive storm; black clouds ominously swirling and roiling, cloud convulsions illuminated by neon forked lightning until a writhing plume of tempest coiled to the ground and gained mass enough to threaten decimating everything unlucky enough to be in its path. As terrifying as the magnitude of that storm had been, Sullivan had watched on with renewed fear as other tornadoes twisted out of its breadth, breaking free of their mother to gain their own mass and speed and force, to leave their own unique wakes of destruction.

Third and most poignant of all, she would not want him on her ship. A bonafide son of the Alliance. A ‘purple belly’ in the flesh; a cowardly spineless weakling, if anyone had opposite beliefs, morals, and values, surely it would be him. This assumption was owed to her based on what the Alliance represented. It was not an association Sullivan could easily shake from himself and it was unlikely he could earn a reassessment from her based on his own dismissable merit. She had every right to distrust him and the reality of this opposition increased Sullivan’s estimation of that second truth.

It was quite early in his employment when he heard of her and quite soon after that they came face to face. He didn’t know what Vera thought of him or if she knew of his existence before waving in that evening for her weekly chat with Jaewon. She undoubtedly knew of Jaewon’s tendency to collect oddities that drifted into his path, objects that contained questionable value; value that perhaps only his hypnotizing golden eyes could estimate. It was the certainty that she would not see the worth that Jaewon seemed certain he possessed that caused him to fear her so greatly. It was the first time he remembered hiding behind Jaewon out of fear and the embarrassment of it still made his knees weak. He could recall her voice as she inquired as to just who that ‘ghost’ peeking out from behind him was and the resulting scuffle as Jaewon tried to pry previously strengthless hands off the back of his coat.

It seemed like ancient history now and he, of course, understood that his initial fear was misplaced. 

She reminded him of a nightmarish woman he’d known shortly before then. A similarly stern and powerful woman who was like Vera in the force she commanded, yet unlike her in the ways that truly mattered; in the ways that separated humans from monsters. He recognized the difference immediately, but he was still afraid. If anyone could convince Jaewon to be rid of him, it was her.

Thankfully, that hadn’t happened and he hoped there had come a turning point in the years since he’d joined the crew where she realized Sullivan posed no threat to Jaewon, his crew or the Serenity herself. What Vera felt for him, if anything, mattered not when compared to what Jaewon felt for her and what they’d meant to each other. If there was ever a time to assume that Sullivan would cry out of empathy or sympathy, it was now but somehow, there were no tears in his eyes when he flung open the door of his quarters and sprang to action.

He was on the cortex immediately, contacting clients and port authorities, seamlessly realigning their obligations to account for the Captain’s detour. He hunkered over his desk, tirelessly assessing the route they’d need to travel to make it there in time, accounting for the resources they’d be burning through and need to replenish and orchestrating precisely timed false leads to keep the more heavily alliance-patrolled thoroughfares clear of obstacles that could possibly detain them.

When they’d landed and the time came, he joined the others in the cargo bay as they waited with heavy hearts. Jaewon emerged from nowhere and Sullivan felt his breath hitch; heart splitting as he beheld him, a white squall. He followed, as he always follows, this time silent and solemn. He watched the ceremony through his lashes, eyes half-lowered, earnestly desiring to support Jaewon in his loss but guilty all the same since he wasn’t sure he was welcome.

If the sun beating down on them was any indication, Sullivan was sure he was unwanted. But stubbornly, he stayed put. And as one might imagine, the climate did not agree with his disposition. Sweat poured off of him, soaking him to the point he was worried the officiator might accuse him of crying for the deceased. The temperature made him nauseous and the sun’s rays ate through the pale linen garments he wore, bringing welts and blisters to the surface of previously pale skin.

By the time Jaewon and Vera started their journey into the sunset, Sullivan was near fainting. Somehow...he didn’t. For someone who was accustomed to operating on borrowed strength, he couldn’t honestly say whose he was syphering now. The idea that it might actually be his own bolstered his resolve. He followed the procession into town, feverish and dazed but unwilling to withdraw himself from the experience if there was a chance it meant dishonoring Vera or her sons.

He joined them in a tavern, many of them strangers yet somehow eerily familiar. He stayed on the outskirts of the room, sipping water, eavesdropping on stories that he honestly couldn’t believe weren’t embellished. He silently paid homage, raising his glass with the others, grateful for the chance to experience their memories; envious that he didn’t have the courage to live life with the same intensity.

The more he listened, the more he understood the legacy Vera had imparted to these men and women and though she was gone, there was no way she’d ever be forgotten. Jaewon had amassed his own ragtag, mismatched family but it was just one branch of a much larger, firmly rooted tree. The more he listened, the closer tears came to his eyes. An older pirate noticed the out of place youth and his glassy eyes. He joined Sullivan on the opposite side of the post he gingerly leaned against, a knowing gleam in his eyes when he warned him not to waste tears on the dead. “They’re...” Sullivan struggled, concentrating on not letting them spill and speaking loud enough to be heard. “They’re not for the dead.”

He’s not sure who carried him back to the Serenity, but he’s grateful he was not conscious during the journey. Apparently touched by his sentiment, the burly old pirate had raised a heavy limb to drape over Sullivan’s shoulder, a gesture of solidarity intended to bolster his spirits. However, feeling that log-like arm and hand clap onto his sun-blistered shoulders felt like nothing less than a lightning bolt, sending Sullivan promptly to the ground in a heap and instantly out of consciousness.

He woke in the medbay, slathered from waist to scalp in a jelly-like goo and wrapped in bandages like a mummy. Knowing his miniscule pain tolerance, Casta had medicated him accordingly but it didn’t do anything to mask the feeling of wanting to die from embarrassment. He spent an entire day in the infirmary with an IV rehydrating him, Cheesestick suspiciously observing the vaguely familiar creature, lingering nearby but out of reach.

They were already back in the Black when he came to and his recovery afforded him a lot of uninterrupted time to think and come to term with things in the well-intentioned but strange way he made deductions. He didn’t believe in Heaven or Hell, but he did believe in ghosts. Vera’s body had died, which meant she was now a spirit; free from pain and worry and the tethers that bound her to their plane of existence. If she could now exist wherever she wanted, surely she would stay close to her treasured children; watch over them, protect them.

Sullivan frequently feared. Big things, small things, unlikely things...he always feared for the Captain, who seemed genetically compelled to flirt with disaster and tempt fate. Yet, Sullivan felt so much less worried now? Perhaps it was completely illogical. It isn’t something he can prove and perhaps Jaewon would allow his loss to swallow him up before he again saw the light, but it didn’t change the newfound peace of mind that washed over his blistered skin and soothed him from the inside out.

If there was anyone who could keep Death from robbing Serenity’s crew of their captain, certainly it was her.

“LOOK AT ME, I’M MUTILATED!!” Sullivan croaked, leaning over the sink in the medbay to look at his newly spotted visage. He furiously rubbed his fist against the mirror, trying to convince himself that it was the reflective surface that was marred; not him. His efforts were to no avail. His eyes scanned his reflection to his outstretched arm and up to his shoulder. He checked the other side to be sure and then looked back to his freckled nose. 

He frowned, imagining he’d be teased for his insurmountable lack of constitution. The Vallurian sun and desert had given birth to Jaewon. He was made of them and sure enough, Sullivan hadn’t lasted a single day in their presence. He’d had a multitude of run-ins with the Captain that left him scorched and flushed and certain if the man had gotten any closer he would’ve combusted but the habitat itself had literally burnt him; leaving a permanent spattering of sun-kissed speckles on ivory cheeks and shoulders.

Secondary to the shock of his appearance was the realization that he had lived through his birthday without sparing a further thought to his own self-pity. It was something small when compared to everything else going on around him, yet, something he wouldn’t have believed he was capable of. He felt different somehow. Not in a way that was obvious. Maybe only because he looked a bit different now. 

Sullivan wants to believe there’s something more and it’s with the hope that there is, that he combs his hair into place and dresses himself up before sitting down in front of his communicator. He punches numbers and letters into the device that he was sure he’d forgotten after five years without use. The face that greets him is different than he remembers; faintly lined, brows heavier, eyes tired and worried until she recognizes the man staring back at her; until she realizes her eyes are not playing tricks on her. “Sully!! Sullivan!”

Floodgates open and a deluge of tears seem to gush from his eyes all at once. “Mom...” he chokes out. “I’m sorry I haven’t called you,” he sobs, shoulders shaking. He wanted to sit in front of her, poised and grown up and strong but of course, that was not the case. It was outrageously presumptuous even for Sullivan, to believe he could change to such an extent after what boiled down to a funeral and a sunburn. Still, somehow he’d managed to face this; a huge fear that could’ve turned into a huge regret. A fear he would not have dared face if it hadn’t been for what his friends had lost.

“It’s all right, darling...don’t cry,” she soothed, reaching up to wipe tears as they slipped down her cheeks. Despite crying herself, she smiled, she smiled so brightly that it just made Sullivan's heart want to burst. He’d spent such a long time letting fear control him, letting doubt and worry restrict his actions. He didn’t want to live like this anymore; didn’t want to waste any more time. “You look well, dearheart. Are you happy? You look stronger,” she gently praised, eyebrows rising when her sensitive boy perked up.

Did he really look stronger? Could she tell?! Sullivan sniffled and straightened up, wiping his tears away but the freckles still would not budge. “Yes, I’m much happier, Mother and...I’m stronger too...probably,” he added although he seemed less certain of the second part. 

“Tell me,” she encouraged. “Tell me where you’ve been...the adventures you’ve had.” 

Sullivan loved to tell stories, but whenever he told one it was about someone else. Someone famous who’d lived and died; someone who had accomplished something, someone who stood for something. He’d never been able to tell a story that he shared a part in and although they were small parts, it was still something he belonged to. Something precious and sacred that shaped him into the person he was now, a person, he was coming to realize, that might not be as worthless as he believed. 

Sullivan swallowed down the lump that had been stuck in his throat for the past few days and told her; told her everything he’d been holding onto since the last time he’d seen her.

[purkinje-effect]

The Anatomy of Melancholy, 6

Table of Contents Go to first. Go to previous. Go to next.

Updated 2019.01.29. (Minor name tweaks.) Insects tw.

That night after pairing a dinner of pan-seared Cram with a few shots of bourbon, Carey slept on the couch in the second floor lobby. He bundled up comfortably in a hospital blanket from the stock room. As much as his mind protested, he knew better than to sleep in his new braces and binding--especially not the corset. But, he reminded himself that he could simply don them fresh upon waking.

Day three at the pharmacy crowned first thing with Carey testing the elevator once more. As much as his constitution had prioritized his need to seek out the orthotics--god, sprinting down the Commons like that had felt disgusting--he knew exactly what he wanted lay on the third story. And while he had the braces on his side, he hoped that the elevator could shuttle him there reliably.

So, he located scales in the stock room. From there, he estimated he weighed just over a 110 pounds clothed, and he made Angel hover on one as well, to guarantee its thrusters’ applied pressure didn’t translate into weight. It stepped off, still confused.

“I’m not sure what this accomplishes, Sir.”

“Here, bring me a walker.”

“Surely.” It complied, and when indicated, balanced it folded up and upside-down on the scale. “Eleven pounds.”

Carey looked over to where the walkers were stored, folded up on the shelf.

“Put... ten of them in the elevator car for me, please. No, twelve.”

“I might have a misunderstanding of how these are used, if you need so many...”

“Look, they’re just the easiest unit of measurement I have handy. I don’t need a walker.” I don’t think, anyway... “I know it seems funny, but.”

Once Angel achieved the request, Carey pushed the third floor button and let the elevator travel upward. Once the light went off on the operating panel, he called the elevator back to the second floor.

“Twelve more.”

“...Yes, Sir.”

A second test proved the elevator could handle roughly a minimum 250 pounds.

“You can put them back in the stock room now.”

“As you wish.” Angel hovered back and forth with its three tentacle-limbs each loaded with four walkers at a time. “Seeing as you didn’t consider the elevator safe enough to test personally, does... whatever this was... assuage your fears of it?”

“I think I could handle riding it to the third floor, if that’s what you’re asking.” Carey stood and snatched up the last of his sweet roll, and shoved it in his mouth. He dusted off his hands in a steeling gesture, then stepped into the again-empty elevator. His grin with a cane across the car threshold kept the pocket doors from shutting. “Come with me?”

Angel rushed to cram in with its owner.

“Oh! So soon?”

“Third floor,” the elevator announced, holographic and androgynous.

With a pleased sigh, Carey exited the car with his Handy in tow. The doors shut behind them. This floor’s lobby had two armchairs and a coffee table, and some large fake potted plants. The door to the stairwell was in tact, as were the bathrooms. Like the two floors before it, this lobby still boasted both elevators. Unlike the other floors, besides access to the other floors this one only had a single heavy white wooden panel door. Before entering, he put his hood on again from his back pocket.

The chemist let himself in, and walked into what looked like a reception desk littered with paperwork, a terminal, and a keyboard. The light of his Pip-Boy scattered across the receptionist who now lay decomposed in the floor beside her office chair. Relieved to have found no ghouls, he took his hood back off, his hair mussed worse for nothing. Behind the desk stood a heavy digital security door. Squinting, Carey tried to peek in with a hand against the glass. He could see a faint green glow, but had no way of knowing if it came from a backup power source or the indicator light to something inside. He banged his fist on the glass angrily and slouched at the computer terminal with a growl.

“Fuck me. I knew the chems would be behind glass like this.” He scrutinized the terminal on the desk. “At least the terminal the door’s wired to is still working. It’s heavily encrypted, though. Could take me days, weeks, to figure it out.”

“Is it really so critical to gain access to the chem stores?” A hard pause and Carey turned his head slow to glare at his Handy. “Yes, yes, it’s certain to have some kind of medication that can help.” It knew this had nothing to do with its owner’s health.

“Could you be a dear and... make me a pot of coffee, Angel? I’m going to be at this for the rest of the afternoon.”

“It would be my pleasure.”

Angel dashed off, grateful for the chance to get away before popping off sarcasm. Besides, it knew his chem stash was inside it, and if it excused itself, he couldn’t get at them.

Carey found the password was ten characters long, based on the command line which blinked at him. This newer model of RobCo terminal interfaced with Pip-Boys, to his delight: it took both holotapes and the key-prong. Eager, he rooted around the receptionist’s desk drawers for a holotape he could cannibalize. The receptionist relied heavily upon a large library of them, and she had entire dedicated file cabinet specially suited for them among the furniture of the small office. After loading a few of them to browse, he found one with only two or three entries on it, and proceeded to format it.

“Thank you, Eleanor.”

While the tape formatted, he continued rummaging the desk. Nothing looked like it could have been the cheat for the password. Before he dove into repurposing the holotape, he made sure no holotapes in the library stuck out to him, which might have been the key all along.

Carey removed his Pip-Boy and set it up on the counter. He pulled up the command screen on it and loaded the blank holotape into its cassette tray, then plugged in the key-prong to make use of the terminal’s keyboard. He still hadn’t figured out how to input data into the Pip-Boy directly, and this was a facile cop-out. By the time Angel returned, he’d gotten embroiled in composing a simple decryption tape.

“Here you go.” It set a clean mug of hot black coffee beside its owner. “Is the going as tough as you expected?”

“Not so sure yet. I’m just grateful RobCo put out any cross-compatible models before the world ended. I don’t even know if it’s possible to write anything to this Mark IV model of Pip-Boy. You remember that I clocked into the Deenwood Compound with the key-prong of my Mark III model? The thing had a holotape in it we had to guard with our lives, and plugging it into the security door loaded the data from the holotape into its terminal, which only had the key-prong and not the holotape cassette tray. Two-part key. I guess that’s how they kept people from doing what I’m doing now.” He nodded thankfully as he picked up the mug with one hand and took a testing sip. When it didn’t taste horrid, he took a second. “Exquisite. It may be two hundred years old, but fresh ground coffee still tastes fresh. Angel, you still make the best coffee.”

“That means the world to hear, Sir.” Its ocular lens flitted anxiously. “What is it that you’re ‘doing now’?”

“I’m writing an algorithm that suppresses the encryption that’s censoring what each byte of data holds in it. It’s not going to crack the password for me, but it’s at least going to let me see letters instead of a billion bytes of punctuation. If I’m lucky, it’s a word and not a random set of characters.” Carey stopped a moment and counted on his fingers as he mouthed the letters. “Damn, ‘pharmacy’ is eight letters. ‘Pharmaceutical’?” He shook his head.

“I’m not sure that’s wise, though I’m most impressed, Sir.”

A few more skims of the script left Carey confident enough to pop in the tape into his Pip-Boy and run it. It seemed to work, Eleanor’s screen then displaying twelve ten-letter words, interspersed with miles of ASCII symbols. He didn’t see any good guesses among them, so he tried the first on the screen: CIRCUMFLEX. His script indicated the input had only two characters in common with the answer.

With so little overlap, he couldn’t readily discern a pattern; so, he tried the second word: JACKANAPES. It also had two characters in common--however, his script told him one of these characters was in a different position from those of the first guess. He wasn’t a master at hacking or decryption, just good at undermining basic protocols, so the formula to putting this information to good use didn’t present itself immediately. He started scrawling notes on a piece of scrap paper, and jotted down the twelve words so he could still study them should the terminal clam up like he thought it would likely soon.

The third blind attempt--ACQUIESCED--had yet another pair of characters in common. He wondered if any of these three pairs overlapped. Noticing the trend, he observed finally that all twelve possibilities had an ‘E’ in the ninth position, and he bit his upper lip. He scrawled a sort of Hangman at the top of his notes:

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ E _

The computer let him have a fourth try, so he tried the fourth option: SEXUALIZED. He laughed in frustration when this not only was wrong--the terminal locked him out for trying too many times. Yet, thanks to his decryption script, the screen displayed that the guess had four positions in common with the actual password--three which he hadn’t had prior.

As he downed his rapidly room-temperature coffee, he pored over the twelve words looking for further patterns. Six of them ended in a ‘D,’ and ACQUIESCED was the only one of those that didn’t end in ‘IZED.’ He’d already tried SEXUALIZED, so he had his next four attempts narrowed down fairly quickly once he formed a strategy. In hindsight, it would have benefited him to forge a strategy before the series of attempts.

The screen said Carey still had 34 minutes before it would let him test his theory. He sat back with a sigh, and glanced around the room with closer attention to detail. Angel had gone back downstairs. He took a smoke break and glanced down at Eleanor. Cautious, he knelt down to check her for valuables. In addition to praising she had on her person what looked like the passkey to the private elevator, he also took the silver locket around her neck. He couldn’t make out more than there being three faces between its two halves, the snippets of photography faded beyond recognition. He pocketed the passkey and jewelry, and proceeded to go through the desk for valuables now that he’d combed it initially for keys. Something felt so relatably muddy about the passing thought that the password had died with her.

“I’m about to get it, though,” he told her, “especially if it lets me try four more times.”

The time didn’t pass quickly enough, and his mind wandered again to the African beetles. He recalled folk medicine making use of all kinds of insects, for all kinds of remedies. Termites, centipedes, even grasshoppers, scorpions, and spiders. He also knew of the less reputable uses, as the vehicle of imbuing the individual with different boons... or as the source for powerful hallucinogens. A resin distilled from the finely ground powder of a particular arachnid he couldn’t recall the identity of--camel didn’t sound right--had been highly sought after in the black market, and he and Jacob had dealt with it several times. Simply named, the junkies called it Resin. From his understanding, its psychotropic potency exceeded that of even psilocybin, or even Jet, and one typically heated it just enough to liquefy in order to inject it. He never sampled the stuff himself, owing to its notoriously high addition rate.

He’d had enough expensive habits to nurture.

Half of them went into cooking Melancholia. Melancholy. You are what you put in your body, right? He’d have to take stock of how much of the chem-coction Angel had left.

The Handy had left the carafe of coffee with him, and he topped off his cup. His thoughts returned to the giant cockroaches and horseflies that had infested the New England Commonwealth. He wondered if any served the same significance as the Resin scorpion?

Eleanor’s terminal let him in again at last, and he hunkered down to scrutinize his choices against the list to ensure it hadn’t shuffled them. All four of his theory-words still appeared among them and he sighed, taking one last puff off his cigarette before putting it out in Eleanor’s ashtray. OXYGENIZED. Five in common, proving to Carey his theory held clout. Among the remaining three, he ruled out the unlikely TEXTURIZED, and tried SEQUELIZED. When that didn’t work, power of elimination left him with ALCHEMIZED.

Somehow, he’d all along had a feeling it was the right answer. He’d always thought he liked Eleanor.

After confirming the password, Carey left the door shut. He called out to Angel to see if it was within earshot, so he could report his success, but he didn’t get a response. He put his Pip-Boy back on and took his cane and his cup of coffee with him into the pharmacy lab and stock room alone.

His Pip-Boy cast a hard rim light on the equipment and shelving. To his left around the corner lay the chem lab, and to his right, the pharmaceutical stock with a dozen or so metal stock shelves. Even better than he expected, he sipped on his coffee, and took in his victory in awe. Given some acclimating, this could certainly be a veritable playground for Melancholy.

The chemist specialized in sedatives and painkilling agents. That’s what the military wanted him for: to study the applications of opiates. The more he thought about it, the more he felt the moniker fit him better than his own name, or nationalized name, ever had. He’d gone by his last name longer than he could even remember the exact point at which he’d committed to it. But to become a symbol, an avatar of the poppy? He had already, in his short time unfrozen, become something entirely otherworldly than he’d known in his past life.

Yes. Before the vault. That was a past life. Being frozen had been antiseptic in nature, and killed off the bacterial infections of compunction and reservation. This new world fostered a culture which could nourish and condition the latent aspects hidden away within himself which humanity had failed to recognize. Without time, he could tell neither if this quality was pieces of his identity to which society had been willfully oblivious, nor some vestigial proof of an embrace of atavistic progress.

But he would tap into it here. This building would be a crucible for change.

As he leaned proudly against the desk at the inventory side of the room, he felt a sharp pain in his foot, and jerked with a hiss. The mug shattered in the floor when he dropped it, and coffee splattered everywhere. He flashed his Pip-Boy this way and that because he heard the spill agitated something in here. Breathing heavy, he clutched at his cane. He wasn’t alone. Another ankle-bite jerked him to the floor, and he slid head-first backwards into the metal desk-front. With him now in the floor, the vermin revealed themselves, a dozen RadRoaches skittering eagerly toward their next meal.

Go to Next »»»

[valamerys]

{fic} Sing Down The Skies ch 2/?

Part 2 of the ‘Elain comes to the Spring Court post-acomaf’ + fake dating, sort of + extreme angst elucien fic! rated T for being really sad. like, I’M dying, and I’m the one willfully inflicting this on us all.

part 1 •  ao3

“I’m going to pretend to fall in love with you.”

All the air goes out of the room. Lucien is so uncomprehending he’s sure he must have misheard her. “What?”

III.

The designated meeting spot is a clearing near the border, a vague approximation of neutral territory. Tamlin stocks it so full of guards, some Hybern’s men, some their own (is there a difference anymore?) that the whole field glints with weapons, like they’re launching into battle. Rhys brings the shadowsinger and the blonde woman, three figures in black against an army of gold. Lucien gets the distinct impression it’s still not a fight the spring court would win.

The emissary assigned to the task approaches the High Lord of Night and exchanges a few words of formality, Tamlin standing stoic behind a line of soldiers—the word coward flashes hot through Lucien’s mind, and he tries half-heartedly to crush the thought. Next to him, Feyre’s eyes are locked on Rhysand, her expression unreadable. Tamlin shifts to put an arm around her and for a moment, it looks like she might break, tear the arm off and run to Rhys and end the whole charade right there, but she doesn’t. She recovers and gives him a weak smile.

Lucien can’t make out the words of the emissary, but Rhys nods, makes a gesture to the blonde, who winnows away. Lucien feels his heart jump into his throat against his will. There’s a moment where nothing happens—the trees rustle far above their heads, Rhysand looks cold and imperious, there is the faintest sound of shifting armor from the ranks around them as they wait.

And then the woman returns, holding his mate by the arm.

Lucien stops breathing, a rush of Elain consuming his senses even from this distance. It is only with three hundred odd years of practice that he’s able to school himself into stillness, into apparent indifference, as relief and panic and dissatisfaction and fear war in his throat.

She’s plainly dressed, a little dirty—like she actually was a prisoner; the thought makes a growl build in his throat—but looks unharmed. It’s not good enough; Lucien feels the overwhelming instinct to winnow to her, to shield her from Night and Spring both, to ask her very intently if she’s alright, to hold her until he’s convinced. To take her somewhere far away from all of this and not ever bring her back.

The woman releases her, and Elain takes an unsure step forward. Lucien’s fingernails dig into the flesh of his palms. The spring court Emissary says something to her, extends a hand, and she takes it quickly, follows him away from her “captors” without looking back.

Someone lets out a tiny, strangled sound, and for a moment Lucien thinks it’s him—but Feyre is pushing through the soldiers, ignoring Tamlin’s murmured command to stay here, and almost stumbles in her haste to embrace her sister. They cry and laugh all at once, Elain’s thin arms going around Feyre. Tamlin looks at Lucien, expecting some reaction, no doubt, but Lucien doesn’t move, keeps his face a mask of perfect blankness. He dimly notes that Rhys and his associates have vanished behind them, the transaction complete.

When the sisters break apart, teary, Feyre does what Lucien wants to do and wipes a smudge of dirt from Elain’s cheek, assessing her breathlessly. “Are you alright?”

He can sense Elain’s emotions like holding a bird in his palm—small, fluttering, alive: anxiety, bone-deep fear, determination.

“I’m fine,” Elain says, giving her a brave smile.

It’s the first time he’s heard his mate’s voice. His composure cracks, the breath he draws shuddering as Feyre takes Elain’s hand and draws her towards Tamlin. Towards him.

“Elain, this is Tamlin,” Feyre has remembered herself, her free hand caressing Tamlin’s arm. “My fiance.”

Elain bobs into a curtsy. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, High Lord. Thank you for everything you’ve done. For all of us,” she says sweetly, if a little shakily. She’s playing a role too, Lucien realizes, one of grateful prisoner freed, to corroborate Feyre’s thin story of her own “kidnapping,” to maintain the polish on the version of the Night Court they’re feeding Tamlin. The more he looks, the more holes he sees in her costume. She’s dirty, but there’s no grime under her nails; her hair is tangled but not greasy. It doesn’t make him feel better.

Tamlin nods, clasps her hand in some show of paternal comfort. “Welcome to the Spring Court, Elain.” He’s a little awkward, a little gruff about it, but it’s clear he’s pleased.

“And… Feyre nods at him, says gently, “You’ve met Lucien.”

Elain seems to hesitate before meeting his gaze, and Lucien wonders if she’s been avoiding looking at him—but then she does. She’s exactly as he remembers her, her features burned into his memory.

“Hello, Lord Lucien.”

His heart twists. “Hello, Elain.”

It feels strange and perfunctory and totally inadequate. He needs to tell her everything. There is nothing else to say. He’s suddenly once again claustrophobic with the need to spirit her away, to hide them both from the hundred unwelcome eyes that watch their meeting.

Thank the cauldron for Feyre, who takes Elain’s arms and breaks the moment, begins fussing over her and assuring her they’ll get her cleaned up. She steers Elain towards the manor, prompting their entourage to follow.

Lucien hangs back, trying to stop his mind from reeling. He shrugs off Tamlin’s supportive clap on the shoulder as he passes.

IV.

There’s been a lovely dinner prepared for the four of them, and Lucien does not think he could possibly bear it. He tells Tamlin he’s going to skip supper and retire early, feels Tamlin’s irritation gather like storm clouds.

“Elain will be there.” It’s not an order, but it sounds like one.

“I’m aware,” Lucien says. “But I’m not feeling well.” By which he means I would rather have the attor gnaw my arm off than my first real conversation with my mate be a performance for you to scrutinize. He supposes he could circumvent that—talk to Feyre, steal Elain for the half hour before the dinner, show her the gardens, perhaps. But something about that feels wrong. Doubtless she needs her sister’s company more than she needs his.

Tamlin and Lucien hold each other’s gaze for a moment, the push and pull of power tangible between them as Tamlin decides whether or not he’ll insist upon this.

“Very well,” he grunts, and Lucien tries not to exhale in relief too obviously. “I’m sure she’ll be disappointed.”

V.

Alis is helping Feyre, of course, and now, by extension, Elain too. Elain asked to see you, she whispers to him later that night.

After dinner, Tamlin, mood dramatically improved (by Feyre’s wheedling, no doubt), had told him where Elain’s room was. It might have been innocent, a simple encouragement to get out of the way an inevitable conversation—but Tamlin had said it with a tone that suggested things other than conversation. As if Lucien didn’t feel sick enough about this entire situation already.

The manor feels like enemy territory now, something to sneak around in. There are too many guards, too many unfamiliar faces he passes on his way upstairs, too many eyes following him—but mercifully, the hallway in question is empty.

He knocks on the door, feeling like his hand moves of its own accord. He can hear her on the other side, can feel her nervousness spike at his knock, can anticipate the exact moment she cracks the door open. Is it going to be like this every time they make eye contact for the rest of eternity? A lightning bolt to Lucien’s chest?

She’s bathed, and now wears a soft white dressing gown; her dark gold hair gleams in the dim light. He doesn’t say anything, and neither does she. Instead she just retreats to sit on the bed, leaving the door open for him. Lucien lingers there after he closes it, unsure where it’s appropriate for him to go.

Elain tugs a blanket half on to her lap, her hands twisting it. She won’t quite look at him again—if he’s not mistaken, her eyes are a touch red, face just a little swollen. Her gaze darts here and there, and finally to a chair near the fireplace that she gestures to. “You can sit, if you like.”

He does, with slow, measured movements. He still doesn’t speak—there’s a thousand things he needs to ask her, but he wants her to go first. There is so little he can do for her, nothing that can possibly balance out the horrors she’s been thrust into, but he can give her this, he can surrender the power, the control, when they’re together.

“You weren’t at dinner,” she says finally. It’s not an accusation, just an observation. An acknowledgement that he was clearly meant to be and chose otherwise.

“Should I apologize?”

She plays with the edge of the blanket. “I was relieved, actually.”

It’s not an insult—just a confirmation that she thinks as he does. That this, this meeting, should belong to them, and them only. The bond throbs between them like a fresh wound; Lucien feels it the way you can feel a heartbeat in your own damaged flesh.

“How are you?” He asks. A clumsy question if there ever was one, ridiculously mundane given their circumstances. But they have to start somewhere.

She hesitates. Her fingers pick and pluck at the blanket. Is that a nervous habit? Every tiny motion, every detail, is magnified between them, and he wants to know everything about all of it. He wants to understand her, devour her in ways he hardly even understands.

She lets out a long breath, eyes half-lidded. There is something in her that is still a thousand miles away, or perhaps locked within her, behind a thousand layers of loss. “I’m… sad. That sounds silly, I know, but—“

“It doesn’t,” he says, softly, fiercely.

It falls quiet between them. The sounds of the spring court soften it, the crickets and frogs in the distance a reminder of life outside of this building that may as well be their prison.

“And how are you?” Elain says finally. His instinct is something flippant, something deflective. But he owes her more than that.

“I’m scared,” he says. It’s true in a dozen different ways, let her take her pick. He presses on haltingly, a prompt. “Feyre told me that you asked to come here.”

Something draws in around her eyes. “They wanted to send Nesta. they thought…” There’s a stray thread in the blanket, and she pulls at it, unravels it. “They thought I wasn’t strong enough. But I knew it should be me. I’m worth more, since I’m your mate; Rhys could drive a harder bargain with Tamlin.” She says it emotionlessly, like it’s not completely horrifying that Lucien has inadvertently turned her into a bargaining chip.

“And Nesta should stay in the Night Court,” she goes on. “They’ll teach her to fight. Cassian is there. She’ll be happy there, eventually, I think.”

And what about you? Lucien wants to ask.

“Lucien, I—“ Elain pauses. “There’s something I need you to know, about my being here. About my helping Feyre.”

Whatever Lucien expects her to tell him, it’s not what she does. Her hand goes to the necklace she’s wearing, which is half-hidden below the neckline of her nightgown.

“I’m going to pretend to fall in love with you.”

All the air goes out of the room. Lucien is so uncomprehending he’s sure he must have misheard her. “What?”

“I’m going to pretend to fall in love with you.” She’s looking at the floor, not at him; clearly it’s hard for her to say. But her voice is steady, older than her years. “We needs Tamlin thinking he’s winning, that he’s taken care of everything and it’s all falling into place. We need him relaxed and smug and stupid.”

Her eyes fasten on his, finally, and they both know he knows he understands her. The manor has become a dollhouse, and Feyre is arranging them all just so, to entertain a dangerous blonde child.

Elain’s voice is very quiet as she says “He got me for you.”

As though Elain is some kind of thing, like it’s Lucien who is a petulant child and Elain is a shiny toy that was purchased to placate him. It’s a repulsive thought, and the most painful part is that Lucien can’t deny it: of course that’s how Tamlin sees this. The parts of him that do it on instinct now grapple for some excuse, some lifeline to cling to, but the excuses for his behavior—for his mentality—slip further from Lucien’s grasp day by day.

“Or he thinks he did, anyway,” Elain goes on. If she “But Feyre and I need to let him keep thinking it. So I’m going to pretend to be happy and I’m going to pretend to fall in love with you.”

Lucien doesn’t have the faintest idea how to respond to that. It… makes sense, on a certain level; maybe he should have anticipated it, after seeing her play into Feyre’s facade this afternoon.

“More than anything, I hate to… ask you to play along. I know, Feyre told me, how much Tamlin means to you, how loyal you are to him..." She trails off, at a loss. "It's abominable of me to ask you to deceive him, but I—"

"But there's no other way," Lucien fills in softly.

“I’m sorry,” she says, so quiet that they’re less actual words than the suggestion of them, and Lucien is shaking his head—

“Don’t you dare be sorry,” he says. It comes out broken, a mess of all the things he needs to say to her. “I’m the one who should be sorry. I am sorry. About everything. About the bond, about how I’ve put you in danger because of it, about whatever part of me could have stopped all of this from happening and didn’t. About everything that’s happened to you and everything you feel like you have to do now because of it.”

Elain looks caught off guard by the sudden confession, her hand frozen gripping the charm of her necklace. The expression on her face is pain, but it’s not her own, it’s pain for him and that’s so much worse.

“I don’t blame you for anything, Lucien,” it’s pure compassion, raw and strained. “You know that, don’t you?”

He does. And it’s all but killing him. Anything, anything would be better than this. If she loathed and despised him it would still be better than this… resignation to her own misery, this gentle despair. Elain is as kind in suffering as she must be in joy: she does not blame anyone, her pain has not grown sharp edges and lashed out the way his would, the way most people’s would. It is just the opposite. In the gaping absence of her own happiness, she is still concerned with others’. With his, even though she does not know him, has every reason to resent him.

The bond lets him see Elain’s anguish and her goodness with such searing clarity it’s unbearable.

“Of course I’ll help you, Elain. Of course,” is all he says by way of answer.

Elain blinks rapidly, and Lucien realizes with a sickening lurch she’s teary-eyed again, and trying to hide it from him. There’s a matching rush of stifled embarrassment from the bond—does she even know he can feel her? Her mental shields don’t seem to be up; surely Rhysand taught her how to use them.

“It’s late,” he says, standing. There are still so many things he would ask her; he’s more confused than when he came, rather than less, but he’ll spare her what embarrassment he can. “I should go.”

Elain just nods, not looking at him again.

The bond crawls up his spine in dissatisfaction as he makes to leave rather than comfort her, rather than obliterate whatever made his mate upset. He ignores the instincts as best he can, but he has to pause at the door, ask her the one thing he cannot go another night without knowing.

“Elain, what…” He looks back at her. “What is it that you feel, of the bond?”

She sniffs slightly, her brow creasing. “Nothing… strong. Just something like a thread, I suppose. I can feel that it’s tied to you.” He remembers the way she stared at him, wet hair stuck to her forehead. “But nothing else.”

Lucien grips the door handle almost hard enough to break it, flush with simultaneous relief and terror. She doesn’t feel him with the raw, painful intensity that he does her, thank the cauldron, the bond has not snapped into place for her yet, but oh gods, it will, it will if they keep being around each other, she should never have come here, he shouldn’t be here right now—

“Goodnight, Elain,” he manages, before leaving her to her tears.

[xhapjeongkrp-blog]

( We thought we were running away from the grown-ups, and now we are the grown-ups. )

Name: Kwon Haesol Age: 22 Occupation: Intern at sleep clinic/Karaoke bar staff

Content Warning: Abuse

I. You left me with such a silent world.

Anecdotes, passed on from generations of self-proclaimed wisdom flourished fossils tend to claim that if you build your walls high enough, it is presumed that only the deserving will brave the journey.

There are four gates that embrace the valley of Seoul, a protective barrier that once restricted the foreign from being allowed into the walls of a fortress that formerly held an entire kingdom behind its stone. Of the four, Haesol was born behind the East gate, Heunginjimun which left the lips with literal benevolence. But he knew this gate he called home, as Dongdaemun.

Home was the stray cracks in the cement he strategically hopped over – one hundred fifty-two of them to be exact, but who’s counting? – every day on his way to and from school.

Home was the pair of convenient store chocolate ice cream cones his father hid in a black plastic bag to share – since his mother complained about cavities – after a long week.

Home was the frozen persimmons and scented erasers that the older lady who ran the stationary store loved to bundle up in cheese cloth and send him home with, even when he didn’t buy anything.

Home was Happy, the neighborhood stray, that he snuck his unfinished dinner to while he talked about his day before he would kiss his mom goodbye and be forced to bed.

Home was the jazz records he listened to in the summer afternoons when the temperature was just a little too hot to go outside and play.

Home was the rare nights where his soft breaths were diminished by his mom’s hands stroking his hair back until he was lulled to sleep.

Home is a cozy two bedroom two bath, coddled between narrow roads and brick walls. Home is his father, a simple paper pusher at a small advertisement and marketing firm. Home is his mother, the owner of an expanded food stall that served an eclectic variety of cheap alcohol married with seasonal dishes. Home was behind the East gate of benevolence. But home also tended to only consist of Haesol himself.

And when his parents make the decision to move to Mapogu, he really isn’t sure where home is anymore. Or if he had ever had one to begin with.

II. Where evenings are calm, but I am restless.

Haesol is ten when he first decides that he is perfectly capable of living on his own. Equipped with a backpack filled with three days’ worth of canned stews and vegetables along with a roll of toilet paper and change of socks, he peered out the window with one eye closed from the back of the bus while his index and thumb squished his usual stop between his pale fingers.

There was only one place that he wanted to run away to, and that was home.

When he reached his familiar stop in Dongdaemun, he was more than eager to get off and indulge in chocolate ice cream cones, frozen persimmons, and scented erasers. Most of all, he wanted to see his friend, Happy. But it doesn’t take more than hour for him to realize that the neighborhood he had been pacing up and down – with no familiar faces in sight – was not his home.

It’s almost midnight when a police officer finds the sloppy mess of tears and boogers painted across the child’s face; feeble body hunched near a brick wall from exasperated exhaustion, the officer called the station to confirm that this was the child that skipped school and had a pair of frantic parents on the other line.

And Haesol spends the night at the officer’s home before he is returned to his parents who promise that they can all visit their old home again some time; which never comes into fruition, but as he got older, he forgave his parents because he knew they wanted to fulfill that promise, at least.

But he never does find Happy.

III. My breath has become as thin as the wind.

“What’s got you always smiling, kid?”

When you have less than a word to utter and a thousand, million different thoughts cluttering your skull, wouldn’t you rather shut the hell up for a second and just listen to what has your brain rattling?

Haesol was a daydreamer, nothing else to it really, just always occupied in his own head. A vivid imagination that contained a fervent collection of fiction and non-fiction that plagued his thoughts. Not that he had mind it as much as his peers and the adult figures in his life had, though.

At first, all his teachers had assumed he was simply shy. Quiet and seemingly meek, he always had the crumbs of a smile left on his lips that curved the end of his mouth. But it lacked presence. The smile itself, was genuine. Always. But no one ever knew why he would be smiling. And he always managed to cause an uproar when he did actually open his mouth, asking his obviously female teacher if she had a male’s sexual reproductive organ or revealing that he had seen the principal take off his toupee to the entire student body during the talent show.

But in exchange, he had always been a good listener. Always.

Never one to neglect the honest plea for a simple penny exchange, he had always found himself in the situation of a sacred practitioner preparing to bless and relieve sin from the damned that has professed a confession. But just as so, he was never graced with more than that.

IV. You enjoy coffee and Debussy.

The fundamental nature of humans included very few motives which comprised, but were not limited to: eating, sleeping, and reproducing. Amongst these categories stemmed a variety of arbitrary, however somewhat entertaining and pleasurable inclusions. One of the few optional choices was romance, up to the discretion of the participant, of course. But Haesol was a desolate onlooker when it came to romance, not one to humor the idea nor let it humor him. By all means, he never saw anything wrong with a pair, falling in love – and he still doesn’t. His parents had succumbed to the customary tradition themselves but in retrospect, he knew it was not for him.

But she talks like a breeze during an August afternoon and kisses him like the rain in June.

Bruised plums stain his skin when her lips leave the hollow of his neck, whispering strange strings of words that perplexingly tangle before they even reach him. With her, he wants to be absolutely everything she wants him to be.

Enkindled with a convex reflection of a slow burning flame behind a pair of glossy irises as dark as a bittersweet malt roasted warm and sticky, he found himself lodged somewhere between empathetic and in love. And he isn’t sure if it’s because when he holds up a mirror he can see those same eyes hiding behind his lashes or that she is everything he isn’t.

But there was one thing that he was absolutely certain of, she was his home.

V. And nothing takes your place, your emptiness too great to fill.

Staring down towards the pearl hued item between his fingers, he turned it over a few times in hesitation. Three hours into his sixteenth birthday and somehow, between the alcohol and cocktail of unknown drugs that were swimming through his blood – not to mention the “trip” to the grocery store that he could barely recall – he had become convinced that egging some stranger’s house may have been even a minuscule of fun.

But now, he wasn’t quite so sure.  

And when they wake up at the police department, covered in the dried starch of egg whites and yolk, he knew he was busted. The scrutinizing eyes of passing officers riddled every inch of the perimeter as the individuals would pass by the two, their parents being phoned on the other line with hushed tones. And all that seems to be processing is that as soon as he sees his parents, he knows he is getting a new asshole, courtesy of his dad’s hands ripping him a fresh one. But her hand is in his, and the way her fingers squeeze his flesh is as if to whisper in that very moment that nothing else mattered.

And he truly believed that.

With all the ephemeral, fleeting moments that he had not captured during their intrepid wanders through the city past midnight, he realized that he needed to preserve the instances. Leaning against a desk, he stole away a small pad of sticky notes before scribing onto the pale yellow, a stream of consciousness that he observed before him. And this grows into a habit, bound between series of black leather.

The complication that he had created between his parents seemed exponential compared to his companion’s. Not that his parents had ever been around enough to rear him into an upstanding adult within society – but who could blame them? They were simply working under the conditions that they had always been, and that was to provide for their only son.

But she received a slap on the wrist before being told that Korea University is her only option. Provided that she repents through getting accepted into the university. But with her grades – not to mention, government connections – this was redundant and perhaps rhetoric, in nature.

And when Haesol hears that from her mouth, although he isn’t great with school, he starts studying his ass off. Textbooks begin to fill his room, each page smeared with old copper from consecutive nosebleeds that seem to grow more concerning with each sheet.

When the acceptance letter reaches his parent’s hands they are unable to form a response, impressed – and shocked, to say the least – when he manages to not only get accepted to one of the top universities in the nation but also, into the scholarship pool. But it isn’t enough. It forces his parents to pick up extra hours to help him pay for the forty-five minute commute to a school he is less than eager to attend.

Through a few connections, he manages to land himself a job at a local karaoke bar. The place smells like a wild concoction of buffalo wings, vomit, and beer and while the pay isn’t great the tips fill his pockets so thick that he doesn’t have a moment to complain. Not when he needs to pay for tuition.

And Haesol isn’t really made for institutionalized study, he never has been, but she’s there. And that’s all that matters, that’s all that has mattered.

VI. But what does it take to believe in all the thing you believe?

And Haesol is nineteen when the keys to their apartment finally reach his palm. The moment is sweet and warm like honey on his tongue, and he never forgets it. However, it muddles amongst the screaming matches and broken plates that are aimed at him. But perhaps he had expected a honeymoon in Fiji and that was his fault.

Psychology is the only choice that makes sense to him. And he muses to himself that just maybe, he can fix her. The unstable fits of toxic arguments were like a cold lug of metal aimed at his throat, constantly ticking until the bullet was to soar through him the moment she set it off. It starts off as peeling him apart with little insults like cigarette burns under his wrists but they turn into the vases he brings home on Valentine’s Day, after they have kissed the wall and spilled on the ground like a kaleidoscope amongst withered petals of she-loves-me-nots.  

But he applies what he learns earnestly, just not one to translate his work ethic into exam material. But one professor in particular sees a bit of themselves in him, so they offer the daydreaming C student a chance to intern at their sleep clinic to study the dream patterns – from verbal recitation of patients to the machine’s interpretations –, the brain waves, and tossing and turning physical habits of those in the clinic. He learns to love it there because he was never really a classic student to begin with.

Some nights, he would spend his time simply watching those who slept, wondering if they shared the same dreams as himself.

VII. And we fall apart without intention.

The abrasion is shaped like a cloud along his forearm, but it feels more like a mile wide and ten miles deep and he imagines if he were ever to try and jump it, he wouldn’t make it. But who would?

The swelling beneath his eye has finally gone down, and the bruise has faded into mustard remnants mixed amongst black cherry juice. And he likes neither.

The splint that sits around his middle and fourth finger carry them tight between marshmallow gauze and a metal cast. But he still makes sure to wear their couple ring.

But he starts to wonder why he is still wearing it at all.

VIII. But I can’t deny that I didn’t think ahead.

And she finally catches a glimpse of what she looks like from the other side of the one-way mirror that was bound between the library of leather books. Though the words were strings of affection that lingered in his reminiscence, she is far from infatuated. The infuriation stems from the way she is captured, like a subject in a petri dish. And later he wonders if she was the delusional one, or perhaps, was he? Honestly, he isn’t so sure if he wrote about her because he was in love or curiosity watered an obscure obsession that grew into a habit.

Whether he was rational or not, she doesn’t tell him that she has found his secret.

IX. You’ve got control, but I don’t mind.

At first, it was a childish request to flip up the skirt of the short-haired classmate who rode the subway in the same car as them. And he did it, of course. Another time, he stole twenty cartons of Marlboro cigarettes from the corner store and smoked them all in one sitting.

But he barely had a chance to watch the escalation as he found himself getting undressed, staring into the eyes of a stranger that had no resemblance to his companion. And she was bare and pale like marble strewn across their maroon sheets. When he looks up, he sees the glossy irises as dark as a bittersweet malt, roasted warm and sticky like when he first met her.

And he fucks the stranger with a desolate gaze that isn’t quite towards her or the malt irises.

It isn’t anywhere.

And he knows she has become estranged, but perhaps he realizes their romance, or whatever the hell it was – the one he had never saw an ending to – was tumbling down a misshapen denouement. With every wish to reach into her flesh and light a lantern upon her spine to tell her all he saw in her was light, she gained another pair of lips to revel in.

And he probably knew that.

But he didn’t want to know.

When he sees her, body tangled with a stranger, he swears he must be a passerby. This couldn’t have been his home. These two? They must have both been unnameable faces. And he can’t remember what he said, or what he did.

But it smells like gasoline.

Trying to extinguish the pages of infatuation he had captured for several years – half because he wanted to salvage them and half because fires were obvious hazards – he found himself staring into the flame. As if the slow burning concave reflection behind her pair of glossy irises as dark as a bittersweet malt, roasted warm and sticky, were still staring back at him.

And he stops and he watches the flames lick at its luminescent body as if it were an unexplainable creature, tending to its wounds.

X. You never mean to, but you have got me tied so tightly to your wrist.

Haesol has only ever been in the hospital twice, neither visits for himself.

Which may be one reason why he cannot stop staring at the plastic nametag snapped onto his wrist or the pristine décor of the room that is painted a sickly white. According to the nurse that delivered his five star meal – which consisted of half toasted bread and unsalted butter with a side of soggy grapes – he had been smothered by smoke from a fire. Fortunately? Fortunately, a “friendly” – but Haesol knows he was probably just being nosy – neighbor wanted to check up on him. A bit of the reptilian brain’s intuition begged he break the door down and so he did.

After he is discharged, there is a black plastic bag with a pair of chocolate ice cream cones from the convenient store hanging from his wrist. Back against the brick wall of the home he once resided in, he eats them in silence, afraid any sign of an utterance would force a well of emotions to escape from him.

But he ends up breaking down anyways.

When he returns to the apartment, he notices there are gaps in the bookshelf.

Some towels are missing from the linen closet.

The shoes on the rack are a mess.

And the pages are still tarnished, burned to a crisp though salvageable. But he doesn’t salvage them.

XI. If you ever want some trouble but can’t afford the alcohol, I’ll be there.

He doesn’t sleep for a few days, not by choice.

And he stops eating for a week, because everything he consumes tastes like ash and coffee.

He drops out because he never wanted to be a student anyways.

But he lies to his internship, because it’s really all he has right now.

And he moves out, somewhere closer to Hajeong station.

But the one thing he must promise himself is to not allow home to be anything more than a place.