#he used to say 'an hour' but by the time i was 14 he'd reduced it to 'less than 20 minutes'

[shanastoryteller]

Happy birthday Shana!!! I wish for a continuation of the Lady Mo story if you have any inspiration. Otherwise I would love any untamed promt!

a continuation of 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36

"Are you hurt?" Sizhui asks anxiously, jumping off his sword to tun towards Lady Xuanyu.

"Nah," she says, wincing as she stresses. "Well, nothing important."

"You're bleeding!" Jingyi shouts at a really unnecessary pitch. He unsheathes his sword and points it at Song Lan. "What did you do?"

"Stop that," she scolds, knocking his sword down. "Go get Xiao Xingchen and the girl. He's probably really confused right now."

Song Lan's expression clears and he bows to her before flying off.

His father jerks as if to go after him and Lady Xuanyu calls out, "Leave him be! He's doing what I said."

Lan Wangji hesitates, but nods and finally descends to join them. He towers over Lady Xuanyu, looking down at her with a fierce glare that makes Sizhui cringe even though it's not directed towards him. "What happened?"

"Found Xiao Xingchen, found Xue Yang, Song Lan killed him," she says, not even so much as lowering her eyes. "Xue Yang, not Xiao Xingchen, obviously. Wasn't this guy supposed to be killed during the war or something? It was a little before my time, so to speak."

"Song Lan is unharmed and you are not," his father says, lifting a hand to press it against the sluggishly bleeding wound in her shoulder.

Lady Xuanyu hisses at the contact but doesn't pull away. "He's a more experienced cultivator. Give me a couple hours and they'll be all closed up."

It used to take days for Lady Xuanyu's golden core to heal anything more complicated than a paper cut. She's strengthened it to the point that what would have been weeks of healing is reduced to just a day.

"He should have protected you," Sizhui says stubbornly. He'd rather she didn't have to heal at all. "Why did you run off with him anyway?"

"Had a hunch and figured I'd be back before you noticed," she says. Jingyi sputters. "Also, I don't need him to protect me, geez. He's a more experienced cultivator, but I still am one. I've gotten more hurt in training."

It's true, but Sizhui doesn't like that either. To harm ones body without cause is against the rules. Perhaps it's not entirely without cause, considering her rapid growth, but none of their teachers had ever beat them as badly as she demands the disciples beat her, and their cores had all turned out fine.

"What hunch did you have?" his father asks.

She winces and says, "Oh, you know, womanly intuition."

It's a lie and not even a very good one.

Lan Wangji's eyes narrow but they're interrupted by Song Lan returning with two people balanced precariously on his sword. Sizhui assumes the other man clad all in white must be Xiao Xingchen but doesn't know who the blind girl that looks to be about his age is.

"Xuanyu!" the girl calls out joyously, causing him to reevaluate his assessment of blind. She's being awfully familiar with his step mother. The girl leaps from the sword before it's fully on the ground and goes running towards them, shoulder pass Lan Wangji to body slam into Lady Xuanyu. "You're still alive, right? You said you would be!"

Lady Xuanyu laughs, closing her arms around the girl's shoulders. Her shoulder is bleeding again now that his father isn't keeping pressure on it. Cant the girl see that she's injured? "Yes, yes, I'm still alive. Excellent work keeping Xiao Xingchen out of the fray, A-Qing. I knew I could depend on you."

The girl - A-Qing, apparently - glows under the praise, beaming up at Lady Xuanyu, still with her arms around her waist.

What's her problem anyway?

[the-firebird69]

This is the size I like I called optimum performance cuz I can drive trucks and I can drive equipment and take equipment that works for people that are not too big and I can move things that are real heavy and I can rip open doors most doors even thick ones 2 ft thick steel, my grandson's a mutant but is a human mutant it's a different brand and she mutated into a completely different human but they have very very powerful superpowers no surprise that you're getting away with tons of stuff no it's just a strength thing but you see that you can just sit there for hours and do stuff and you have trouble with it it's a lot of radiation around here too. And I have trouble with it I have to fight it he has to fight it too by the way he takes a lot salt and it's kind of catching up with him a little so you need salt without iodine and I heard it but really I get pretty big like 14 ft tall and he'd be about that height and about the size and nobody's curious. But I'm like the serious and mostly leave me alone but they send teams in to see what we're doing which is really nasty and upsetting so you have to go in fast and out and then that's it but I used to do it now I don't do it at all and get caught and it was horrible and he ruined me probably wants our son to do it to capture him

Bill will

Mac but we say to them is don't do it but he's poisoned any sick and it's too small and he's complaining all the time he's dizzy at night all the time and somebody fight it anymore cuz they've already started reducing the growth reduction medicine that's why I'm writing it down is testing it and following him around and testing it eventually be gone he says he's going to go straight up and it's not true it's going to get big and lead himself at a house and home and I'll have to get money somehow we'll have to get it to him

[gingeraleforthetrauma]

I suppose while writing these memories down, I'll be jumping around a bunch, no linear timeline here.

TW here ig, includes child being locked in a hot car, gaslighting and a panic attack.

Today's memory is of the 4th of July I'd mentioned before, it's longer than the first memory.

Going back a bit, my parents got divorced between 2010-2011, and from then on there was a series of rather nasty court hearings all the way up until I turned 18.

Like most kids with divorced parents, my sibling and I were had the 50/50 custody agreement pushed onto us, the especially wonderful 5/2/2/5 schedule.

This of course, also included holidays switching between parents each year.

Thinking on it now, it had to have been when I was 9 (that would've been 2011, the first 4th of July since my parents had officially been divorced).

Back then, my dad had this beat to hell white and grey Subaru Outback, I still feel panicky when I see one of them on the road or in a parking lot. We'd gotten picked up from where we lived with our mom and had gone to some event or another before getting slushies at our local SA gas station, the promise of going swimming after just one more stop, I was not terribly pleased.

Especially when I found out just where we would be going. A former friend of the family, who had stabbed everyone but my wonderful father in the back, was apparently going to be hosting us for an hour or two before we'd finally get our dad's apartment and go swimming.

I told him as much seeing as at 9yo I hadn't quite retreated into my shell enough to not be vocal about what I didn't agree with.

I was given two options as a result, either stop arguing and go inside with him and my sibling, or stay in the car until he was done chatting with his friend (both options had the addition of being grounded from the pool, going outside and playing video games). Logically, I asked how long he would take. He said he would be less than 30 minutes and that my sibling didn't get a choice, they'd be going inside with our father.

I ended up choosing to stay in the car. Which was, admittedly, incredibly stupid. It was in the upper 80s outside, he refused to rolled the windows down, told me not to open the door unless I was joining them inside, and to stay out of sight in case anyone saw me and tried to break in.

(I had less than half of my slushue left and it'd long since melted and gone warm)

Thinking back on it now, I realize I'd had a panic attack. I couldn't breath and within five minutes of being locked in it became unbearably stuffy and the cool from the AC had been swept out the doors when I'd been left in the car. Anytime I saw anyone outside I panicked more, the idea that someone would try and kidnap me had been planted and my little 9yo brain couldn't rationalize anything by then.

I spent over 45 minutes alone, in a sweltering car in almost 90 degree weather with only a tiny bit of syrupy water to drink (it didn't make past the first 10 minutes).

It's one of the most terrifying things - and I've been in a handful of nasty situations both before and since then - I've ever experienced.

By the time they came back, my sibling was stressed and teary by then, I was extreamly flushed and sobbing in the backseat, I've never done well with heat, and shaking from the panic attack I'd unknowingly had.

My father proceeded to chew me out for "not just doing what he told me to begin with," called "foolish and stubborn" for not just opening the door (despite the fact that it'd been made very clear, with anger and a raised hand, that unless I wanted to go inside his friends house I wasn't allowed to open it) and dragged around for another hour or two after in the heat without enough to eat or drink.

From there on out I got grounded almost every weekend he had us, trying to refuse going to the various houses his friends occupied, with the bonus of him provideding less and less food and drink outside of meals for years.

Nowadays I tend to get heat exhaustion rather easily and had a burning hatred for just about every holiday my family celebrates. It took years to be able to wait in the car with or for anyone and have the engine off without feeling panicky; I also feel intense anger towards anyone who can leave their kid/s or pet/s in a hot car, regardless of whether or not they crack the window and leave water with them.

[pawacelsus]

>Be me, Occultist >Been dating Vestal for 8 weeks now >BigTiddyHolyGF.gif >Her writing has been getting better since we've been together >Somehow manage to keep our relationship a secret from the Heir, 14 other heroes, and the hamlet residents >Madam assumes drop-off in revenue is due to being unable to replace Hellion after she ran off and eloped with a Musketeer >Abbot has been too busy with three new Flagellants and a new Crusader in town to notice Vestal's absence >Spend time canoodling on the edge of the Weald while the Heir is at the estate >Have to beat up spiders and the occasional mushroom men but it's no big deal >Set up a makeshift camp with a small tent for privacy >HomeAwayFromHome.jpg >Practice Daemon-Pulling her to me from across the camp without hurting her >She fucking loves it >Catch her and fall backwards >Roll over each other in the spore-choked grass >Assault her face and neck with kisses as she laughs >She tells me how much she loves me >Things start heating up >We've never gone all the way >She tells me she's willing to forfeit her celibacy for me >Ask her if she's sure >"In the sight of the Holy Light, I denounce my faith, and my oath, in the name of the divine love that Light represents." >Spend the best hours of my life in that tent >Next day >Heir says a few dropped boxes of medicine need to be recovered from the Weald >Recruits Vestal, Crusader, and a Flagellant >Step forward as casually as I can to volunteer >Tell Heir I want to try out my new Sacrificial Cauldron and get enough experience to become a Champion level Occultist as soon as I can >Heir is suspicious at first but likes my drive and can always use another healer >Get positioned in the far back, behind Vestal >Marching through the woods >Crusader and Flagellant murdering everything in sight >Vestal and I don't do much because everything is dead by the time we're ready to act >Scoop up two of the three missing boxes of medicine >Landscape starts to look familiar >HolUp.wav >Find Vestal and mine's campsite >Try not play it cool >Heir assumes it's just an abandoned camp and orders it searches and demolished >Join teammates in tearing up the campsite searching for valuables that aren't even there >Crumpled and perfumed sheets in the tent show what it's use is >Crusader starts rambling about godless degenerates fornicating in the woods like animals >Vestal looks momentarily insulted but remembers to keep a straight face and agrees with everything he says >Flagellant finds something >Eldritch Killing Incense >OhShit.txt >Heir tries to shuffle items around in the pack to make room for it >Asks me if I really need it, because he'd rather take some cemeralds we found >Tell him it's okay, keep the emeralds >Crusader burns the tent and camp to the ground "to show that heathens are not welcome in these lands" >Exchange glances with Vestal >HowDoYouDoFellowHeathens.avi >Leave the smouldering remains of our love nest behind >Set up camp for the night >Vestal leads group in a prayer to the light to reduce stress >Nothing happens >Everyone thinks that Vestal maybe misspoke and disregards it >Go to sleep >Wake up next morning >Crusader wants to talk to me in private while everyone's getting set up >Tells me that he's been watching me this whole campaign >That I've been looking at Vestal with a fleshly gaze >Threatens to impale me on the church steeple if I so much as think about corrupting a sister of the Light >Assure him that, while my eye may wander, her chastity is in no danger >Bluffing harder than I ever have in my entire life >Crusader stares at me for a moment, then turns away, apparently satisfied with my false sincerity >Continue the mission >Discover the last missing crate of medicine >Guarded by a blighted giant and his crone keeper >Giant swings a fucking tree into Crusader's chest >Death'sDoor.wav >Vestal intones a prayer of Divine Grace >Nothing happens >Crusader demands healing immediately >No idea what's wrong >Flagellant steps up and Redeems Crusader >Giant continues beating the shit out of us with a literal tree >Vestal can't

call down the Light's Judgement or get her healing intonations to work >Help out as best I can with my own spells >Vestal stops and gasps >Realizes that, in renouncing her faith and her chastity, she has severed her connection from the Light >She immediately becomes Hopeless >Try to reassure her while Crusader has his helmet caved in, and his body dragged off by the crone >Vestal and I move up >Between bouts of sobbing, she flails her mace at the giant, to little effect >Flagellant lost in the midst of his masochistic revelry >Crone takes advantage of the situation and repeatedly commands Vestal to Embrace The Dark >Stress Level 185% >Stab at the giant with my dagger, but we're not doing enough damage fast enough >Giant collapses Vestal's breastplate >Death'sDoor.wav >Attempt to heal her >No effect >Eldritch benefactor laughs at me from within my mind >Vestal tries one last desperate effort at Divine Grace for herself >No effect >She becomes silent, tears streaming down her cheeks >Opens her eyes >Tells me that she loves me, one last time >Giant winds up an overhead swing >Crushes Vestal into the ground >Scream in agonized terror >Fall on my knees >Can't stop screaming >Stress level 190% >Irrational >Heir calls for a retreat >Can't move from my spot >Giant swings again and throws me back through the trees >Heir and Flagellant take the opportunity to retreat >Leave our loot, the medicine, and return to the Hamlet in shock and shame >Heir doesn't understand what really happened back at the Weald and just wants me to snap out of it and be ready to fight some brigands in a week's time >Unable to move of my own volition >Get helped along by a Man-at-Arms >He carries me into the Brothel, trying to reassure me >Can't really hear him, or anything else >Catatonic >Be carried into a private room and laid in the bed >Madam sends all available women to see me and try to cheer me up >Even sends one in the Ringmaster outfit >They paw at me and coo sweet things in my ears >I can't hear them or feel them >Their words and caresses are cold and devoid of real meaning >I just want to curl up and die >Cover my eyes with my palms >Scream as loud and as long as I can how I loved her so much >Sobbing, shaking, screaming uncontrollably >Be inconsolable for days, and unresponsive for weeks >Everybody in the Hamlet knows the secret now, and I don't care if I'm crucified for it >Finally pull myself together enough to step outside >Wander around town, ruminating on my loss >Decide to visit the cemetary >Her body was never recovered, but she still received a full ceremony >I missed the funeral, but at least I can visit her grave >Other heroes are gathered there >Crusaders, Flagellants, a Leper, and other Vestals >Even the Heir is there >They part to make way for me >The headstone is adorned with trinkets and wreathes of flowers, even weeks after the ceremony >Approach the ornate headstone, and see the epitaph >"In honor or Sister Beatrice, who gave her faith for the love of a man. May she find blessings in the hereafter, as she found them on Earth." >Can't stop the tears >Fall to my knees at her grave, weeping again >Feel a hand on my shoulder >See the Abbot standing over me >Tells me that, at the funeral service, and as a representative of the Light, Vestal was forgiven of all transgressions against the Light, and that her place is in Paradise >"The Light is love, and in knowing love, Beatrice knew the Light better than any of us." >He tells me that he has also commissioned a depiction of her on one of the Abbey's new stained glass windows >Thank him for his understanding and forgiveness, and for the memorials >He offers me a place in the Abbey cloister, to collect myself >Tell him that, for now, I'd like to be left alone, to honor her memory in my own way >Everybody leaves >Light a stick of incense and offer a solemn incantation of peace >Leave the cemetary >Try to go on, nursing the pain and living as good a life as I can >The sort of life she would have wanted me to lead

AUGH???

images to properly summarize how I felt reading that

[aria-laughs]

Real talk..(needed to vent, feel free to not read this if you don't like long rants)

When i was 11 years old i had already been through my fair share of crap. Coming from a "broken" home with little money, a depressed mother and an absent father. At that time i remember being bullied as a biproduct of my sister stoping one of her classmates (a 13 year old girl) from traveling half accross the contry to meet her 19 year old boyfriend who she'd met online for the first time.. under the pretence that she was traveling to visit my dad with my big sister. This all ended with the police stoping the train and picking the girl up before she reached her destination and everyone didn't have to suffer through the ordeal with a minor being raped or worse by a yound adult in a strange city..anyway. when the summer ended and we (me and my two siblings) gor back home, all these rumors spread about us and school became tricky. I got used to it tho, i had my friends and i quickly learned to keep close to teachers whenever i was alone. At the home front my mom became sick and the kids got a lot of grown up responsibilities. It was okay too.. kids get used to a lot, and today im a wizz in the kitchen and i clean with the best of them.

My mother had a temper, and would hit us when we did something wrong. I remember trying to cover for my siblings as much as possible, trying to shield them from the worst of it. Don't get me wrong, i LOVE my mother. She's been through hell and her sroty is worse than anything i've ever heard of. I understand what happened when i grew up and i love her because she allways did her best.. but i haven't forgiven her for making my home unsafe. At 11 years old one of my teachets notised that i had a hard time with my schoolwork. They couldn't get me to focus on my work and i was distracted by anything. I remember the letters mixing up as i read, and it became impossible to do my homework because no one could see the letters moving like i could. The teached contacted my mom and my stepfather and told them he'd talk to a specialist about me maybe having ADHD. The next week my mom dropped me off at the specialist and i got tested in every subject known to man. As usuall i exelled at language, history and music. But everything else was a bit off, i remember hearing him telling my mom that it couldn't be HDHD because my memory was too good. But refered her to a doctor for more tests. The ordeal took another week before my mother came to pick me up at lunch one day and told me we had to go to the hospital.

I had a thyroid condition that firsly was almost non-exsistent, and secoundly was unheard of in someone my age. They took blood, and sent me to get an MR and CT. When all the tests came back, we got the good news that i wouldn't die if they treated it quickly. But since i was still waiting for normal bodyparts to arrive, and hadn't gone through puberty yet.. he had no idea where to start. I don't remember the name of the medication, but i remember taking 15 a day. 5 in the morning, 5 when i got home from school and 5 before bed. I took them and 39 minutes later i was sprinting to the bathroom puking my guts out. This obviously didn't work in the long run and by the end of it i was so skinny you could see my teeth through my cheeks. They changed my meds and i stopped with the hurling. Instead i gained about 30 kg in the first 6 months and looked like a beach ball on legs. And as a kid being bullied, this wasn't that fun. Let me remind you that this had been going on for a while and tho my mom did what she could.. the was depressed and didn't see how bad it got for me and all the responsibilities i had at home made me dissapear in the day-to-day of it all. Alone and scared as the bullying became physical I panicked and stoped taking my meds, and all my symptoms came back. I would sleep for 14 hours and wake up exhausted. I'd go full days without getting hungry and i'd get moodswings and get real clumsy. My family got used to this and the symptoms stoped being symptoms and started being "just me".

So now i'd wake up and have to care for my siblings, go to school without lunch for myself because i had to make it for my siblings, or forgetting to shower because i had to remind my brother to do it. I get off the buss and get my ass kicked on my way to the classroom. Some days i'd get through it and come home to start dinner for my family, and other times the bullying sent me to the ER to get stitched up (i didn't have to make dinner on those days). This happened often enough that the doctor knew me by my first name, and instead of "how did you hurt yourself?) I'd get "Again!? When the nurses came to get me. One day i slept for 16 hours and my mother confronted me about my weightloss and asked if i'd been taking my meds. I came clean and a few hours at the doctors office and one frustrating car ride later. I'd promissed to take my pills again, but by that point i had ruined my body enough to never get better. So at 15 years old the doctors decided that they'd treat my thyroid with radioactive iodine. This worked great and killed the thyroid gland, making me dependend on meds for the rest of my life.

For anyone who don't know, the thyroid gland is responsible for your bodys metabolism. This means everything... your metabolism is a part of every funktion of every organ in your entire body, tho we usually think about how fast you burn fat because this is what we see on the outside.

We did our best, and we got through it. I had a safe place with my best friend and his family. And i'd escape there as often as i could. His mother would remind me to take my meds, she'd let me shower at their place and when she realised that i never ate at school she started packing lunch for me to send with her son every day.

I don't think i'd survive and be the person i am today without them. I remember the day i finally told them what was going on at home when i grew up, at this point i had grown up and moved away from home. I had started opening up to people i trusted and understood the power of talking about my problems. i never ment it as a "why didn't you see".. im thankful for my life, even the bad pars, but i needed them to know how much they saved me. To understand how much i love them all. I'll keep their reactions to myself, but i'll tell you that i have never felt more treasured in my life.

I was 22 years old the first time someone told me that I never deserved the abuse at home. I was 25 years old when i told my mother i forgave her for the physical stuff, but that i couldn't forgive her for stealing my feeling of home and safety. And i was today years old when i wrote it down for anyone to see.

I've been taking my meds for about 17 years now, but I have yet to actually get a normal metabolism. My last stunt was that i suddenly didn't need that much medicine so my metabolism speed up to lifethreatening speed and i had to endure panic attacks, dizziness, lack of consentration and shaking so bad that i almost quit school and almost sent me into a brainfailure (yes thats a thing) over the summer. My doctors paniced and reduced my meds so much that i didn't get nearly enough. This ended with me loosing weight, not eating, shaking, being sick and passing out all over the place, and almost sent me into a life threatening coma as my body overcompensated for the loss of thyroid hormones. My dad said something i've never heard my family say before. We were eating dinner last weekend and i was having a bad day when he told me "its painful to watch you struggle like this". And i almost cried, this was the first time in forever that a parent told me that they see me. And now i'm finally starting to get back to where im used to.

I have skipped a lot of stuff that happened. Some things i don't think i'll ever talk about, and some things that are too personal or too painful or too stupid to write down. But i needed to work through the new stuff, to reflecr back and to realise how close i came to loosing my life again this year. How lucky i am that i not only held on for dear life, but that with all the crap i felt. All the sickness and panic and everything. I managed to finish this semester at school. I managed to survive again, and im 6 months away from reaching my goal of allways being able to help when im needed. I am so proud of myself for getting to where i am today. And im so thankful!!