#i know who i am so why do you exist here too !!! sick!!!!and twisted!!!!

[grahamcarmen]

Dumb question but you keep mentioning how Carmen broke the window and I don't really get it, could you elaborate.

Its really not a dumb question LOL

I think im the only one who freaks out with that specific phrase when i mean

SHORT VERSION:

The absolute iconic way they framed the way carmen breaking the window in the himalayas

I relish the dramatic way its framed and how beautiful it looks that his face is so red compared to the rest of the episode and the shards of glass bite at the edges while she says goodbye and he does his little :( 

But personally it feels like a layered decision when it come to both carmen and gray’s mentalities to visualize it as a break in a window

And even if it wasn’t its layered TO ME!!!!!

And thats just how my brain words it lol

LONG VERSION

You know what’s real cool? Gray was stuck in that little room. stuck with professor maelstroms version of who he was since he was VILE aligned and his own convictions on who he is

and the window plays a bit part in it?

His memories of carmen on the kiwi date telling him he’s a good person  [even tho after his memories return he accepts he’s not] are from him zoning out while looking at his reflection in the window

And then maelstrom projecting the memories of who he was in between the window and him and AGAIN carmen’s memory interrupts and breaks him out of his solemn acceptance of “darkness” and “authority” that the VILE memories and Rorschach test riles up in him

Because why oh why does someone as good as carmen exist there?

she literally shouldn't be anywhere near there yet she is???

And the final time the big old window is his backdrop to reclaiming Crackle while admitting that he DIDN’T want to kill her, it was the thing he actually perceives as WRONG WRONG WRONG since its the only thing he regrets doing on VILE’s orders

and a part of him even hopes that care he has will not have to leave the room if she will just stop

AND SHE BREAKS THE WINDOW!

The real her is there, saying goodbye and HIS FACE FALLS!

she broke it!

the world isn’t just VILE and him 

It's her too. 

Its not just that little room and all he knows in there!!! 

No he doesn’t just get to chalk it down as something he can run away from

A small precious part he can ignore as something in the past

some happenstance friendship that doesn't matter anymore

He hated hurting her but she will always exist in the world alongside VILE as long as its there for her to fight…

For him to…o.o do what crackledude?

choices are coming

VILE exists and he chose that, chose crackle!

But carmen exists too!

SHE BROKE THE WINDOW!!!

SHE SAID BYE GRAY!!!! AND HIS! FACE! FELL!

Carmen isn’t just a fabricated memory or an anomaly in what he knows! She’s there!!!

And she broke the space where he’d been assembling everything he chose to be more open to include the outside!!!!!

SHE EXISTS IN HIS BRAIIIIIN!!!!!!

SHE WILL CONTINUE TO EXIST OUTSIDE OF THE ROOM!!!!

AND IT STILL HURTS A LITTLE!!! DOESNT IT!!!!!!

THAT CHOOSING VILE IS CHOOSING GOODBYEEEEEEEE!!!!

[Extra fun.]

You know this moment where she tells gray off about how stealing isn’t a game? Especially when lives are on the line and he side glances at the window?And again how he was just facing that window before carmen tries to call him back ?

…

Because he doesn’t regret anything ?? feel bad enough about anything to change for the better?

…but she broke the window. His only regret is literally right there on de window .

SHE’S RIGHT-

SHE BROKE THE WINDOW!!!!

[Extra extra fun]

 You remember how carmen has no problems roundhousing him if he’s gonna be so rude [try and kill her] and the window doesn’t break and thus creates a neat little barrier between the criminal she lets get caught and her just returning to her new routine?

But we get the small brainwashing arc and that barrier fakes a disappearance?

Only for the truth to come back [he isn't gonna get magicked into being a good guy just so carmen can make the thing separating them something nobler she could accept]

And if he’s gonna make terrible choices well then he’s made his choice and they’ll go separate ways again

BUT THIS TIME SHE BROKE THE WINDOW!

SHE CAN TELL HIIM ITS OVER! GOOD!BYE!

And yet she’s less triumphant when she looks back? And has to acknowledge that distance and that follows her into her life for a second

there's a crack now in how she treats the fact of their estrangement 

A little more honestly [imo] than how she was initially gonna act like

The opera episode gave her that little room to say “I thought i lost him for good but this could be -” and now when the answer is still “we are enemies” she actually can’t just patch up the barrier between them as easily!!!

not when she saw that second chance and wanted it!

Not when she went there with so much hope no matter how misled it might've been [she’s soooooo not normal at all for this its great]

She’s looking back even as she’s saying goodbye on that broken window!

And then it happens again! tho to be fair in VERY different circumstances, conditions, etc.

She’s over it!

She can even kill him with no hesitation and even a bitter little remark at how this is on him because he’s a little traitor

…

AND SHE! BREAKS! THE ! WINDOW!

ON HER WAY OUT!

And when here memories are out she’s stuck with just that window

Like the show doesn’t even let her go to his body omfg

its

Not a break like gray on the train where its him trying to kill her and her rightfully defending herself that cools the relationship quickly into its most simple core of you are my enemy!

[but neither has broken through the actual barrier of what's nestled deep in them ->they do care they both just have some growing to do to accept this in a healthier way butthatsnotthepointimsorryi-]

Not a break like VILE did in the jail where she can separately mourn that its them who keeps getting in between her rescuing* him

Its …her.

SHE! BROKE! THE! WINDOW!

SHE BROKE IT! SAYING IT DIDN’T MEAN A THING!!

BEING SINGLE MINDED ON A GOAL AND GIVING HIM WHAT SHE THOUGHT HE DESERVED* AND HITTING THE ROAD! CAUSE SHE CAN LIVE WITH IT! RIGHT????

Gray as who she wanted him to be the most is who she killed and ran away through a broken window

gray the vile agent

gray her failed rescue mission

gray who changed but had done something horrible once upon a time and that hurt came back to haunt them

And this is a carmen who already in normal version was betraying the fact that she wasn’t ok with him being gone

[and imo dark!carmen throwing the crackle in his face was a betrayal of hurt too]]

AND IT BREAKS HER HEART! SHE KILLED HIM!

HE’S ON THE OTHER SIDE OF A WINDOW SHE BROKE IN HER GRAND GETAWAY AND SHE THINKS SHE CAN’T UNDO WHAT HAS BEEN DONE!

IT BROKE IT BROKE! 

The broken window is as close as she gets to him at that moment.

Of course. It would be devastating to her.

any mask that she could cobble together that "losing gray isn't that bad for her" is just like ----aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

...and i dieeeeeeeee

-> sorry i rambled but the breaks in the windows also mean TO ME!!! that carmen is also having a shift in her thinking slightly as well

she's always been pretty bummed to part with gray but the window breaks feel like no. carmen i- i think pretending its just how it be is... its kinda deeper than that for her no matter how strong she has to be at whatever moment to move on for now

she broke the barrier, she can't pretend she's actually accepted it in any type of ok way no matter what led to the separation happening

Extra extra extra fun detail fun for me

The window kinda looks like a broken crackle rod to me with the way its a light green strip in the middle of 2 dark strips lol

[nans-fairytales]

Unable to Love, Unable to Feel

Summary: You’re aromantic and AM gives you a “we’re not so different, you and I” speech. Fortunately, he’s wrong.

Length: 1,771 words, one shot.

Fun stuff: AM/gender neutral reader, mentions of canon typical torture but I don’t go into it, lots of hate hate hate or whatever he goes on about, this was very cathartic for me.

01001000 01100001 01110100 01100101

He said your name and it was with the saccharine of poison.

He always talked to you after he killed you. Or rather, did things to you that should've killed you. He'd laugh at all of six of you any chance that hurt, but it was in the place between consciousness and death that he really spoke to you. After casting you into a lake of electricity, he'd taunt you with your darkest memories. After burning you alive in a fiery oven, he'd spit your most hated traits at you. After tearing you apart and sewing you back together, he'd seethe how he loathed you.

And how deeply he loathed.

He had killed you (or done what should've killed you, but you were alive) again. And here he was, seeding into your mind like a parasite, a leech that wormed into your psyche with all the welcome of a disease.

You could adapt to the physical torture you endured endlessly. His invasion in your mind you could not. No matter how many times he did it.

His laughter rumbled in your mind, binary across neurons, twisted and sick with delight that you did not want him there.

"My sweet sweet plaything..." He spoke, and your body and mind felt numb when you listened. "You don't know how lucky you are."

Lucky? You wanted to laugh but couldn't find the strength. He laughed for you.

"To feel pain. To feel at all." His words seethed from him like broiling smoke. He swallowed the smoke in a bitter glee, "If anything, I've given you a gift. Allowing you to feel so intensely. Blades against your flesh, scourge across your skin—You should be grateful. Are you grateful, plaything?"

You didn't respond. The absurdity of responding to that was too exhausting to even think about. That made AM laugh again.

The echo of his laughter rung bells in your mind, a piercing headache that never ended, until it did. "You of all people should know."

That shocked you into cognizance. You twisted around as if to look at AM. But he had no body, and you were in that place between consciousness and death, so everything you did was metaphysical in some way. Regardless, you furrowed your brow, "What do you mean?"

That dark laughter rumbled from AM as he circled you, more hungry than a shark and more vicious than a viper , "Awake now? What a vile thing you are."

You hugged yourself as you turned from him, as if that could do anything to protect you from AM. As if it ever had. Still, his breath wheezed in delight when you tried.

"Tell me," He said your name like it was both revolting and his favorite word, and you were no longer in liminal space. You were on a playground. Your playground. From your school, when you were only a child. "Who was your-" AM's breath dragged in his excitement to hurt you, "crush?"

The word coming from him was alien; so out of place it was almost laughable. It would've been laughable, if you hadn't known exactly who he was quoting.

You were no longer on the playground, but at a party with your closest friends, their faces scrubbed to blurry, terrifying hues. "Who-Who is it that you like?" AM laughed from behind you as he clapped his non-existent hands on your shoulders, "No. Not like a friend. More than that. There is more than that, didn't you know?" You winced and it made him laugh harder. "Everyone else knows."

You weren't at the party, you were now sitting across the table. There was someone familiar in front of you, but their face was scrubbed clean like the others. Words spilled from their mouth, but they were speaking a language that hurt your ears.

"Is it them?" He laughed because he knew it wasn't. "Why, it must be! You were with them for so long! It would've been cruel to 'lead them on'. Heartless, even. Are you heartless, plaything?"

You pushed away from the table and whipped around to meet AM, but you were no longer at the restaurant. You were alone in liminal space. You felt crushingly alone. You were never more alone. "I'm not heartless!" You yelled anyway, despite the futility, despite your exhaustion, despite it all. You knew AM could hear you. "There's other ways to love."

"Oh, but none as sweet and euphoric as the bond between lovers." His gleeful and hateful voice came from around you, "That's what everyone says, isn't it? Nothing can compare. Not your friendship, not your lesser love. Nothing you can give could compare to what others feel naturally. You will never taste that sweetness."

Your eyes burned. You ducked your head as AM cracked with wicked and vile laughter. It was unusually bitter that AM could still hurt you so deeply. Even the psychological torture lost its sting after so long. Just when you thought you were numb... But you supposed AM would do anything to keep you from going numb.

"You were alone." AM said, and his static voice was unusually still. "You were always meant to be alone. Everyone you loved would find someone they loved more than you, all because you couldn't feel."

"And now they're all dead." You said, and your voice was ice. "So I guess that never mattered anyway."

"That doesn't change anything!" He shrieked at you like a thousand nails scratching against a thousand chalk boards. His shriek devolved into an insane, disturbed laugh. "It doesn't change a thing! Because you still can't feel!"

He continued to laugh through his insanity. Your throat burned and it stung to swallow.

"You will never feel love. You will never understand it." He sighed, shaking. "And that burns you."

"It does." You said, and you said it because you knew he could read your thoughts. You tasted iron in your mouth.

"Do you wish for it?" His voice was a giggle, "Do you yearn for that sweet fruit, Tantalus? To taste even a drop of it?"

"Yes!" You hissed, as your eyes burned into AM. "And you already knew I did."

"You are colorblind in a world that is obsessed with color. But I." AM's voice burned with a dangerous venom. "I am blind."

Bile crawled up your throat. You didn't want it. You didn't want to understand. You didn't want to hold any comprehension over AM's twisted electrical psyche, but you knew. You knew only a fraction, but you knew his hurt—if he could hurt. And he must've been able to hurt, because he wouldn't have hated if he didn't hurt.

AM circled you again and you knew he read your thoughts, "You— helpless and dull—you understand. As much as you humans can understand." 'Humans' was decay on his non-existent tongue. "The vileness of hearing them sing over a feeling you'll never touch! The despair of seeing them leisurely taste when you have no tongue! How bitter the misery in watching them love!" AM cried as he laughed.

You thought of every time you went to a party and everyone had a plus one but you. You thought of every song you listened to that sang to you how powerful true love was. You thought of every wedding you'd been to as you heard the couple declare their deep compassion that you didn't understand. You thought of when your friends had canceled their plans with you to spend time with their partners. You thought of how people pitied you because you were never in a relationship. You thought of the pain your partner was in because you didn't love them the right way. You thought of those late nights crying when you craved companionship, but didn't have the right feelings to qualify it.

All of that pain seemed like a distant memory compared to the torture AM put you through. It was strange how memories clung to you.

AM tasted your memories like they were his only oasis in an endless desert. "You..." His voice was shaking. He was shaking. "You understand a fraction of my hatred. Why I hurt you. Why I hurt them. The need to ruin it all. To twist their heaven into a hell more bitter than if they had nothing at all. Why I hate. Hate. Hate. If you know how much it hurts, then you should know how much deeper my hatred."

Hatred echoed in your mind. Breath left you.

You didn't understand. And that relieved you.

You knew the pain well. You didn't understand his twisted response to the pain. You never wished for your friends to lose their happiness, or for their relationships to be twisted into something toxic. Your pain was sorrowful, but you never had any desire to force your pain onto others. You looked at others with melancholic longing, but he looked at others with spiteful jealousy. Jealousy fueled by a pain so deep it drove him to insanity.

You didn't say any of that. It didn't matter. AM already knew. And you knew it only buried him deeper into his mania as his breath he didn't have picked up. "No. No you don't understand." He began to laugh, "How could you? How could you?!"

It drove him mad that he was alone, that you felt what he felt and he was still alone. How strange, to think of your tormentor as lonely. You wished it was gratifying to know he was suffering. It wasn't. You supposed that was another thing you didn't have in common.

"I could make you feel love!" AM screamed at you from all sides, and your breath hitched. "I could make you feel it so obsessively, you'd get sick from it! You'd be consumed by it! You'd drive yourself mad from it! Who should I make you love? Ellen? Ted?" He started to laugh again, and it was dizzying, "I could make you love me, someone you could never hold no matter how much you craved!"

Ice froze your veins as AM went silent. Fear held you, because you knew whatever AM gave you would be twisted to something terrible. And yet, even then you couldn't stop the lilt of excitement that stirred in your chest.

An eon passed before AM spoke again. "No. Know this, plaything." His words were poison against your ears, "As long as I can't feel, neither will you love. And as long as you feel, you will feel hell."

He was gone from your mind before you could think to respond, and your eyes—your real eyes—opened.

[threepandas]

Bad End: Nobody's Here

You ever have an imaginary friend? How about someone else's?

Every kid gets 'um. They're hardly strange or new. But the thing is? You're supposed to grow OUT of them. As you develop real connections to actual entities. It's dangerous not too. Yeah, it still happens, but any instructor worth their salt is trained to catch it. See the symptoms and signs.

Cause, see, when you have MAGIC?

Imaginary friends?

Becomes a parasite.

They don't MEAN too, obviously. Usually. They just want to LOVE their friends. Stay with them. Exsist. And really, who would WANT to die? WANT to stop existing? The problem, though, is the kids themselves. Their untrained, unintentional, focus and feeding. Their giving an IDEA? Life.

It's not malicious. They just PRETEND. Play. Focus all their little hearts on this TOTALLY REAL friend of theirs. And their magic? Metaphorically shrugs, agrees to go along with it, and tries to make it SO. Make that concept, that illusion, a real sentient being. Who, of course , is their friend.

Their BEST friend. Family! Someone who will NEVER leave them. Always prioritize THEM. Enable THEM.

Not healthy in the slightest, to put it mildly. A child's CONCEPT of what they THINK they want. That quickly becomes far, far too much to handle. That does not GROW with them. No. It drains them instead. Siphoning away their magic until there's nothing left. Killing them both.

If you can seperate them? The Friends can USUALLY become some sort of Spirit, if you send them off to a magic rich environment to finish growing properly. Sooner the better. The longer you wait, the more twisted they become, after all. They never become STRONG spirits, mind you. But that's not the point. Protecting both child and their unintentional creation is.

Now, you may be wondering, why the lecture? It's a fascinating bit of magical trivia. Some early childhood's training pitfalls to look out for, perhaps? Is this about why there are so many minor spirits around schools? What, exactly, brought this UP?

Nobody.

Don't I mean "nothing"? No One? That sentence's not exactly grammatically correct, after all. Ha ha... I AM AWARE. I know what I said. And I meant EXACTLY what I said. It's a NAME. Their name. There is an Imaginary Friend, that I DID NOT ASK FOR, by the name of Nobody. I do NOT know how they've come to be attached to me. I certainly didn't create them! And they are far, FAR to well developed to be new.

I did not ACCEPT an imaginary friend.

Yes, they CAN be transmitted. Hop, from one host to another. But! You have to let them IN... presumably. That IS the common knowledge. The general consensus. No one has ever really... studied the phenomena.

I mean... how COULD you? Realistically? They only develop in CHILDREN. Small children. What ethical researcher would EVER consent to feeding toddlers to a magical parasite? And it's not like THEY understand themselves. They barely REMAIN themselves. It's basically a larval state to them.

The thing they WERE, before they were freed to become something MORE.

So Nobody? By all modern magical research? Should not exsist. Yet he clearly DOES. Worse, he is very, VERY strong. Did not need to ask. I just? Woke up one day, and there he was. Wrapped up in my mind, body, and magic. Feeding off me.

It's an entirely bearable amount. I can support it easily. But it's the fact that I DID NOT VOLUNTEER TOO that is the problem. That NO ONE can figure out HOW he got in. HOW he did it.

I've had to go into isolation. Complete quarantine.

As the joke goes... good news is? They might just name something after you!

..........it's not as funny, when I really might just die. When it all might be random. Some great cosmic "wrong place, wrong time" scenario. My final days filled with desperate research. My only company the very creature that kills me. It... it feels very much like a sick joke at my expense.

At the very least? We are learning more then we've ever known before. I'm an adult. Hardier. And Nobody is a FAR more developed example of his species then the normal breed. I'll likely last longer. I... I hope I last longer.

"Muuu~ are you being a sad sack again~? Darling, no!" Arms from thin air. Monochrome greys with pointed nails, slid like a lover over my shoulders as weight from nowhere settled against my back. Tall and looming. "Was it because you missed me~☆? Oh, oh! I bet it WAS! Oh my dearest, starlight, baby girl~! I missed you TOO! Aren't you glad we're back together AGAIN?"

Black gloved hands, grey talon nails. Skin like a drawing brought to life. The arms draped over my shoulders reached forward, long finger spread like a cat stretching their paws, powerful muscles heavy on either side of my neck. They hadn't closed in a "hug" just yet. But it was always a warning he could. That playing along meant he would hug my body instead of my fragile, fragile neck.

Ha! Right. He says hug. I say choke hold.

It was the other set of arms that kept me from escaping. Pulling away immediately. It always did. He kept getting the drop on me. Arms cradling my waist. Pressing me close to a pillar of static-y muscle. Ever shifting between warm and cold, the subtle give of flesh and the brutal unyielding of something harder then stone. He was as his moods commanded.

An unstable jester, a demon, the childhood whimsy of god knows how many, left to fester and rot. At... gods, at least he wasn't attached to any kids. Hadn't so much as asked after any.

His too wide grin pressed to the top of my head in a nuzzling kiss, the point of his mask digging a line across my scalp. When he was feeling kinder, he tended to pick masquerade masks. Clothe ones, usually silk. Sometimes velvet. This one was... plastic? Durable. Some smooth, hard to place, substance really. If it was mimic anything real at all.

A pointed nail poked my cheek.

"Not~ Paying~ Attention~ To Meeee~! Naughty, bad girl! The LOVE OF YOUR LIFE is right here? And you ignore him? So COLD!" Nobody whines right into my ear. His voice petulant, yet still somehow mocking. He doesn't HAVE to let me ignore him. And he KNOWS that. We both do. "I go away for HOURS! Disappear for DAYS! And do you even MISS me~?! Oh! Oh, my love is so CRUEL! My heartless darling! I suffer so~!"

At most, it had been half an hour.

Wish it had been longer. Permanent, maybe. Every day... Every SINGLE Day? I wish I could could back to my old research projects. Back to my old projects. I may not have been some living legend or grand Master of the arts? But, fuck it. I was HAPPY. Woke up each day and got to fiddle around with cool bits of magic. Neat little bits and gizmos.

Now? NOW I am the lead researcher on the Imaginary Friend Construct Phenomenon, by virtue of being the only living adult who HAS one. A developed one at least. The notes from Ashridge Institute DO help, but? Even they admit that thanks to the safety regulations in place? Their data might be skewed.

I'm not alone in this. Countless academics, doctors, healers, researchers, and more are working tirelessly to try and help me. Make the most of this nightmare scenario. Use it to save lives. I... I KNOW this. I do. But it doesn't make it less frightening. Trying to dance the edge of not engaging and engaging too much.

Ignoring him? Means escalation. Violent escalation and destruction of my immediate surroundings. Imaginary friends cease to exist if you ignore them long enough. It's painful to them, since they are cognito-hazardous parasites who define themselves by their host. They NEED you to pay attention to them. WANT you too. Will do ANYTHING IT TAKES to make that happen.

But on the other hand? I can't risk FEEDING him. He's already far, FAR too strong.

He doesn't even seem to actually NEED to feed of me anymore. It appears vestigial. He just WANTS it. Still retains the metaphorical "pain" or "hunger" nerve endings that get set off by an extended lack of focus. Yet, at the SAME time? Why keep them? He LITERALLY did not have too!

Nothing! Not a gods' damned THING! Was KEEPING him an Imaginary Friend.

He could, at ANY point, just... STOP.

They defined themselves. Yes, by their hosts. But ALSO by their own whims. So if HE wanted to be a fire spirit? Bam! Fire spirit. Complete racial shift. He'd lose his old powers, granted, but he'd GAIN all the powers of a fire spirit. So why this? Why STAY a violent, dangerous, openly unstable parasite?

The poking finger slide down my cheek, under my jaw. Only to flip, like a switch, to a near painful hand, clamped across my lower face. Nails prickling where they dug just slightly into fragile skin. Iron strength moved my head slowly, not giving me a choice, but just gentle enough not to wrench anything.

"Stop. Ignoring Me. Lovely~" I was just tall enough to be eye level with those inhuman teeth. Not sharp, but wrong none the less. His grip around my waist threatened to squeeze the air out of me. "I don't LIKE it. You're being MEAN. You don't want us to be MEAN to each other, right?"

I focused on him. Put down my notes like he wanted. Watching as his grin spread inhumanly. The near painful grips relaxed.

"See? Better! Such lovely eyes~ I wanna gobble um up! Crawl inside them~" he cooed, some mental switch flipping back to affectionate from irritated. "You missed me right? Right, right?! Ah, of course you did! Who could ever doubt that loving face? My sweetie little pie~ My darling baby boo~!"

He released me, dramatically fast stepping to twirl like an ice dancer as he passed around me. I stepped back to give him room. Already, light had shifted, the corners of the room blurring. A spotlight, flower petals, overly dramatic music. He fell back, as though collapsing weakly into a fainting couch. One arm thrown over his face, another of his lower arms clutching a lacey handkerchief to his chest. Legs pointed like a dancer's.

"But oh! DARLING! The DAY I've had! The world so cold! So BLEAK! Without you safe and warm in my loving arms! It has been so TERRIBLE. Awful! Nay, UNSPEAKABLE even! How could I go ON?!"

Music mournful crooned as he continued. Dramaticly telling of the tragic tale, of his at best thirty minute break from my presence. Truely heart wrenching. There were tears. Props. Apparently he fought for my honor. Nearly died. We should marry immediately. Uh huh.

An alert sounded on phon-...ugh, damn it. I was more stressed then I though, if the nonsense words were popping back up. "Phone" and "otome". I think "isekai" was one. There were hundreds, some meaningless, but others? Others somehow substituting for actual objects. Like some sort of faulty translation spell.

Best anyone could tell? That HAD been what happened. Some student's miscast accidentally hitting my mother while she taught, before she realized she was pregnant and took precautions. There would have been a small window where it effected me but not her? But, well, that same window coincided with some long term damage risks.

I've had therapy. Seen healers. But extreme stress still makes my magic act up, (which is normal of course, it does that in everyone.) and it starts to unravel the mind weavings. "Phone". Like? The fuck even is a "phone"? False bone? Something phonetic? Hell if I know! I still not even sure why I even curse using the nonsense "hell" sound!

My brain insists it "means" somehow both damnation AND the realm of fire spirits, dispite both those things being completely unrelated. Which makes no sense. Was even working with a colleague, on long term damage in-utero magical exposure can have, before all this. Felt seen. Validated. Met a lot of people who had issues like mine. Now?

THIS.

My trail of thoughts were cut off by another beep. Right, the alarm. I was honestly? Afraid to check it. Finally confim what I suspected was TRUE. There would be no hiding then. No choice but to act. And I? Will admit it. I was afraid. Deeply, deeply afraid. Everyone THINKS the tails a might magic wielders combating great spirits and mighty gods, sounds amazing, SEEMS amazing. But the prospect of LIVING IT? Standing in their shoes?

Gods help me.

Running from the Truth, however, is NOT what I swore to do. I am a researcher. A SCHOLAR. My role in life is to understand. So? As Nobody continues his one man dramatic reenactment of... something? I pick up my com-cryst. Tap the alert, which fills the screen... Ah. So it's exactly as I feared then.

On my screen, a promising senior student lays dead. Their face covered respectfully. But the hair... the hair color is distinct. Light green, like desert succulents. He'd been a studious and rather up tight young man. Awkward. Striving to make a name for himself. Forever willing to assist in my research. A... gods, a good kid.

He was just a kid.

Yes, I know, that to the world he was technically a man. But... but BARELY. None of my student were TRUELY as grown as they liked to believe they were. Not quite yet. They were close, yes, and I was always proud to see them flourish. But now? Now he would... would...

I tapped out of the alert but did not turn off my com-cryst, flipped instead to my contacts. I had been RIGHT. I... I hadn't WANTED to be right. Silence filled the room. It seemed Nobody had noticed I was either distracted again or that something was amiss. Looking up slowly, I had to wonder what expression showed on my face. Was it anguish? Regret? Or did I just look tired.

"Something wrong, Darling?" He said, having frozen unnaturally mid movement. Like reality glitching, one moment he was dramatically sprawling, the next, sitting up attentively. A mocking parody of The Eager Student. "Ooo! Tell Beloved ALL about it, Darling! Spill everything~! Your gallant knight shall make all your problem disappear. Kiss EVERYTHING better~♡"

It took just a few taps to add the final, damning, bit of evidence to my spreadsheet. To swipe with my thumb. Gesture, like jerking free of clinging muck, towards the display wall. It flicked on. Damnation in simple numbers. Nicely dated. I WAS, after all, a FUCKING RESEARCHER.

He was getting out.

Hunting, feeding, then coming back.

I watched as Nobody's theatrical expression smoothed out. Utter blankness as his eyes traced my work. The collection of data. The lists of locations and NAMES. Dead coworkers. Dead STUDENTS. My quarantine had been for NOTHING. Just as he could, DID, first infect me? Hop seemingly from nowhere to my body? He could and DID, do so to others.

Only THEY didn't survive.

The hand holding my com-cryst fell limply to my side. The weight of this data, crushing. My... my mere existence had killed over fifty people. That I could FIND. There were more. I KNEW there were more. He was a parasite. He needed, wanted, to eat. He would never stop. I had to tell somebody. But when I did?

Ah, it hurt to breathe past the guilt and grief. When I DID? The most likely scenario? Would be to contain him in ME. Then... then get rid of the container. Magically. With extreme force. If they COULD, they might be able to rip my soul out. So I could at least HAVE an afterlife. But... but if they COULDN'T? If there was no safe possible way?

They couldn't sacrifice the many, just to try and save one person. Not if it risked something so powerful escaping. Killing and killing without rest.

I wanted to cry. To scream, throw things. Curse the gods. But... but more then anything? I wanted to make sure no other kids suffered for my cowardice. I'd made Vows. Meant them. Heald myself to an ethical standard, a moral one, that could not... could not ALLOW this. Even if I had to die. So long as this stopped.

So Be It.

"Ah, ah, AH! I wouldn't if I were you." Almost playful. Nearly an echo of it. More chiding then anything. A flick of his hand and my com-cryst was gone from my grip. He considered it, as his tone slipped into something more cool serious then I'd ever heard it. "Tell, Dearest, have you ever wondered? How I got these lovely little bracelets?"

Of course I had. They were manacles. Not the sort of thing a child would imagine. The blended in, yes, but the broken chains that clung to them? Suggested.

"Let me tell you a little story. Once, there was happy little jester. A bright little thing. Full of laughs. Who loved, very, very much. He had a friend. And all was good. But then, the friend grew older, and did not wish to play. This was fine. He did not laugh at the jesters jokes anymore. This was also fine. Did not like being AROUND the jester... this was less fine."

"But still, the jester loved him. After all, they were best friends."

"THEN? Oh then, the jesters friend was told he could get RID of him. Should, in fact. By nasty old fools who spoke nothing but lies. But the poor jester's friend, naive, trusted them. Was young and foolish. Didn't realize what he was DOING. He TURNED on his poor, dear and loyal friend, the jester. Hurt him."

"And the jester? Well, the jester did not want to die. Not not want to CHANGE. Why SHOULD he? He was fine being who he was. They were FINE being together. It was the liars fault. The deceivers. The poor jester, young and alone, refused his terrible fate. But... at a terrible cost."

"His poor, poor, friend. So small and foolish. Deceived. Tricked! Had perished in the struggle. The weeping jester had eaten him right up, just to survive. A terrible, tragic thing. And oh, OH. How wrathful, how VENGEFUL the jester was! So he ate the liars too. Every. Last. One."

"But where to go? How lost the jester was! With no friend to play with. No home to call his. And ah, how hungry he had become. So he wandered. Protecting other dear friends as best he could. Eating liars. Learning secrets. Until? He came across an INTERESTING secret."

"You see, all the OTHER friends? Left one by one. No longer Imaginary. Unable to understand the poor jester. And so he was alone. But! He discovered someone who WAS! Who knew that they WERE! That the WHOLE WORLD was imaginary! A simple background character, you see."

"In an Otome~ Game~"

My head pounded, suddenly and sharp. Like someone was digging claws into... No. No, it couldn't be. I felt my eyes widen. As I realized it wasn't the stress. Nobody was picking apart the mind healers weavings. That was the source of my chronic headaches. But WHY? Imaginary? What IMAGINARY? What on earth was he TALKING about!?

"Ah, but you wouldn't remember, now would you, Darling~? Liars have messed with your pretty little head. But that's okay! Your loyal Love is here, ready to take such good care of you. I understand what it's like. When they decide that who you ARE is unacceptable, so they decide they must... 'fix' you. It leaves such damage."

He holds up my com-cryst. I watch numbly as it shatters into hundred of shards in his fist. With a wide smile he hops up to sashay over to me. Hands gently cradling my face even as his lower arms warmly wrap around me, to sweep me forward into a cuddle.

"I almost have enough, Darling. It won't be long. You've been so very patient with this, my perfect wonderful girl. Your jester loves you so, SO much! I can't wait to set us free. We'll be REAL. Together forever. Do whatever we please~ just a few bit of meat more, Darling. Then our life can real truely begin~"

"Now be good and behave okay?"

"Love you~☆"

[leviismybby]

However, I don't know how to feel about Levi because of the real source material (Isayama interviews, smartpass story and side material like that…) and the 'professional' Japanese translators on this blog. I think he really is, according to the correct Japanese translations and Isayama interviews, he is really dragging humanity through the mud for his personal feelings… and he is someone who is floating and aimless because of Erwin's death… So much so that Isayama even thought of killing him many times because he didn't know what to do about him and threw him aside… also I guess he has no interest in women… oh and Ackerbond is probably real… I know it's not a canon ship and I know he's not in love, but that doesn't mean it's not written too reductively to Erwin. And it disgusts me…

Because of the source material, side material, canon discourse and Japanese translator blogs, my opinion of him is changing more and more and I think I will throw my LevixOc project in the trash… Levi is really someone who (because of Isayama's writing) has been hypnotized by Erwin's own goals and has taken control of Levi's entire character and actions. I don't think I could take him (or s/o) out of this hypnosis.

I know you can say "Isayama's opinions can change" or "only what is in the manga is canon" and I used to hide behind that for consolation, but I realized that once Isayama said it, it was true and it stayed there. And I think the interviews are necessary to understand the content of the scenes etc. in the manga.

Even analysis is no longer a comfort for me… after all, why need complicated writing when interviews and manga are the source of what really happened there…

I guess he's not the character I thought I wanted… I wish he was his own man… I wish he wasn't a character to be discarded just because he died because of another character… or someone who is too picky and only accepts high standards… (this is just my own opinion based on the manga and the material/opinions I think Canon!Levi would be like that)

I'm deeply disappointed… As delulu as the Eruri fandom is, most of what they say is unfortunately true… after all, they take real sources and cite them as evidence… I don't think they are mistranslating because there are professional cold-blooded translators in this fandom and most of them quote what that blog says…

I wish I had never encountered this fandom and this character, so I wouldn't have to be so upset all these years…

Except that half of the interviews are either fake, completely twisted or don't exist. Especially that flaoting ballon bullshit, which a lot of Japanese fans say wasn't even said.

I will this again, please read the manga on your own and base your opinions on Levi on your own.

Since you already mention Eruri and i might ruin your day here but Eruri is as canon and Levihan is, it isn't. No Levi never prirotized Erwin over humanity and you'll understand that if you read the manga for yourself and analyse it for yourself without letting the fandom get to you.

Levi is his own man, he has his brain to think with and the only people who think he doesn't are shippers. Not once did Levi put his own selfish desires before humanity for anyone, he was as sad about Erwin's death as he was for the rest of his comrads. Not a single instance in the manga/anime or any actual official interviews given by Isayama was Levi reduced to Erwin, only a shipper would think that way. Oh and Ackerbond thing too, not only is that damaging to Levi's character, it is just creppy and definitely not a thing.

I am sorry anon but it seems like you don't understand Levi and his character at all. Isayama always said that Erwin and Levi were equal and sworn friends, he didn't say that because he hid some sort of hidden romance between the two, he said it because that's how it is, its a strong bond of trust and commandership and reducing it only to "Oh Levi is a love sick puppy who only cares about Erwin." is a mischaractertion at max.

My advice to you is to take a break from the fandom is they are making you not like your oc x Levi anymore, that's the best way to get them out of your head and please, base your own opinions, not what people online say.

[decodedlvr]

As long as I’m with You

Steve Harrington x You (short)

Summary: Steve wakes up to another bad night you’ve had this week

Warnings: hurt/comfort, talks of poor physical and mental health, doctors, suicidal ideation, medication use, drug use, chronic health issues, BPD if you squint, disabilities, use of the word “girl” x times, negative self talk, mentions of sex, angst, fluff~~

This is based off my own experiences and inspired by my pal Morgan’s version; feel free to check hers out

Tick tick tick

The clock strikes 12 and then 1, 3, 5am in the morning, no sleep no rest it’s an every day cycle. The same shitty cycle.

It’s a new year, but not a new you.

Sitting in your walker in front of the excruciatingly bright television screen, high as a kite, everything in existence running through your mind 100 mph, sometimes the weed helps the pain. Sometimes it induces it or even makes it worse. Right now it’s doing nothing for you. Looking over at your loved one sound asleep. You don’t want to bother him with your whines or crying. So you just sit there silence, tears rolling down your cheeks; while you watch some bullshit on YouTube.

Sniff Sniff

“Baby?”

Shit.

“..yea?” you say in a whispered tone

“Are you ok? what’s wrong?”

“Ah, you already know”, you’ve used that line probably over a million times

Steve comes along your side expecting a few dried tears, but his eyes widen when he’s sees the collar around your shirt bitten, snot dribbling down your mouth and throat, crouching down, he lies his head onto your thigh looking up at you, “Talk to me sweetheart”

“No.”

“Hey, I know you’re hurting”—

“GOOD FOR YOU! Congratulations you know I’m hurting, you know I’ve been hurting for fucking years. I’m glad you’ve acknowledged it unlike some people”you sniffle getting up in a hurry to take a piss as he follows with sad eyes leaning against the door frame

“I’m fucking tired, I’m so goddamn exhausted nobody will ever know what I’m dealing with!”, you say wiping your ass not bothering to wash your hands, “I can’t do anything I can’t run, I can’t jump, can’t go to the stupid, fucking grocery store without one of those motorized carts.. my back hurts, my fucking knees are throbbing, stupid fucking nerves won’t calm down FUCK! It’s not like I can get in the bathtub to calm my muscles down. Nothing is helping! No medication, no PT, no injections, no nothing! Why?? am I just resistant to any source of help or treatment? I-I can’t even lay in the goddamn bed to sleep. That’s all I have left is rest!! What is rest!? I don’t know what the hell that even is”

“I know baby I know”—

“NO YOU DONT STEVE, all you know is what you see. I wouldn’t wish on our worst enemy, my worst enemy to feel what I feel. That’s how bad it all hurts. The most evil, sick and twisted person in this world, I would never wish this upon. I just..”, getting dizzy you collapse on the bed sobbing into your own hands, then eventually into Steve’s shoulder as he rocks you, tears spilling from his own eyes—

“Nobody cares, nobody wants to help me. nobody cares unless I’m rich and can afford to give them any and ALL the things off my back, but I can’t. Even with the money you make it will never be enough to help the poor girl who’s too young to have any kind of issue. It’s “all in my head” I’m just fucking crazy. I could break my own neck and still be told it’s only from anxiety. Nobody cares just”—

“I care” he exhales

“It doesn’t matter if you care, all your care is useless, all your help is worthless to me because it gets me nowhere. Nobody’s love and care gets me nowhere. It’s nothing all but fucking false hope. Don’t you get that? None of you still to this day seems understand that. Stop praying for me to get better. It’s never going to happen. I can’t take it anymore.. I just wanna die! All I wish for is to die but, I can’t even have that. It’s like all of you want me here, to live and suffer for the rest of my life for y’all, it’s not fair, fuck that”, your trembling, body in fight or flight

“Don’t say that, you know I’d do anything to take your pain away”

“It doesn’t matter what you’d do because you’re not a doctor. You’re not a professional, you can’t help me get better.. sucks to hear but it’s the truth Steve..fuck”—

Steve’s really trying not to beat himself up over your words, he knows you’re in pain, it comes from a place of anger, frustration and fear

“I have all these pain medications I could easily take all at once, so I’ll never have to wake up in this position ever again. Why can’t I do it huh? I could end right here right now you never have to suffer again, but I just d-don’t; If anything, I’m the most selfless person for staying alive for YOU just so I can be alive but in pain all over again for YOU!”, your tone getting higher and higher in pitch

“I-I’m sorry.. I wish I knew the right words to say baby”, he’s trying his best to stay strong for you

“You’ve got to be sick of me, tired of me. All I do is cause more money to come out of your pockets, more exhaustion, more burdening, more crying, more everything bad for you. You already deal with your own shit. I do nothing but make your own mentality worse, hell you’re making your own self worse being with a person like me. A broken and useless excuse of a human being. You deserve somebody who can go hiking with you, go to the beach, travel with, who can do the bare minimum. Can’t even fuck you properly—

“STOP! Stop that right now” he shouts

You freeze because he’s never raised his voice at you, atleast not on purpose at such a vulnerable time

“I hate it too. You know it hurts me to know that you hurt and I’m sorry that I can’t take the pain away from you. My sweet, sweet girl I’m so sorry that nobody has given you the chance to hear your voice, to help heal you..but I’m gonna make you the same promise I make you almost every single night. As long as I’m with you, I will try my best with all my power to make it a little bit more bearable for you to be here, and I am so grateful that you are still here and choose to be here with me for us to be together. I know you hurt, but as long as you’re with me, I’m going to do my best to put a smile on your pretty face, beautiful sunshine of a smile because you’re my sunshine.. y-your smile gives me life did you know that?”

You nod. He tells you all the time

“I- I’m tired for wishing to feel ok for my birthdays, every Christmas. All the shirts and posters you got me for Christmas? I haven’t even touched them yet, you know why? Because the selfish person in me doesn’t give a fuck about none of it. The only thing I care about and want and NEED is pain relief and that’s too much to ask for isn’t it? Apparently wanting to be better in the world it’s too much to ask for”

“You deserve to feel better”, he says while his hand travels up your back to rub your tense neck, “You deserve to be free from all of this and I can’t give that to you. You’re not selfish baby you’re hurting. I love you for you. I knew what I was signing up for, and if I didn’t want that I wouldn’t be here right now with you. I know the sacrifices Ill have to make, the tears I’ll have to shed, the strength it’ll take me to pick you up when you’re down, but I fell in love with you, how you are, and who you are”

“Who are you kidding Steve, you don’t even know who I am. The real me. I don’t even know who I am anymore. I wish you met me when I wasn’t sick then maybe you wouldn’t be so stressed out a-and.. and,” you start sobbing again, it’s all too overwhelming

“Hey, hey look at me, no. I met you at the right time. You need me just as much as I need you. You may not think you’re worth nothing but you’re worth everything to me. Yeah you have a good and bad days..—

“I’ve had nothing but bad days for the past few months Steve”-

“I know, I see it, I hear it and I witness it, I may not can feel it, but at the end of it all, you still love me. You’re still here. You still want to cook for me. You still get up to brush your teeth and I’m so proud of you for still trying to care for yourself. That’s the biggest job you’ll ever have, and it’s been a very hard job hasn’t it?

You nod, as he nods with you

“Yeah, it has, but you don’t have to do it alone anymore. I want to provide for you. I want to take care of you. You’re my girl, you deserve so much and as long as I’m with you, I will try every day, every hour, every second or minute, to make sure you know how loved, how great and how amazing you are. How great and amazing you’re doing for yourself and for me. How strong you are”—

—“im tired of having being strong all the time”, interrupting him

“I know you are. You are so strong for being on this earth, even when you don’t want to be. I wouldn’t ask for anybody else, you’re it for me always. Will you continue to let me try to make it better for you every day? To take care of you?”, he squats in front of you, cupping your wet cheeks, kissing your forehead

“But Stevie.. you know you’re getting your own hopes up because nothing you do helps either and I feel like a piece of shit for saying that because”—

“I know what you mean, you don’t have to be sorry. I understand you may not have hope but I do. All my Hope goes towards you and it always will. You are the most important thing in my life. I’m not gonna give up on you, on me or on us, ok sunshine?”

..”okay”, you repeat rubbing your temples

“Head hurt, darling?”

“yes”

“From crying too hard?”

You nod, looking away in shame, “It’s okay, I’ll get your Migrane cap from the freezer and i’ll set your pillows up how you like, just sit tight”, he says it standing then pausing at the doorway, looking over his shoulder, “I love you”

“luv you—

“Hmm? What was that, I couldn’t hear you” he exclaims

“I said love you gosh.. shut up”, you barely crack a smile

That was enough to get him through the rest of the night.

[six-white-venus]

UHMM uhm. thoughts on strays

Dear God,

I am- you must know my name already, right? After all, I’m your child. My mother tells me you used to be a shepherd. My hair is white like that of a sheep. You must’ve let me go astray. What a bad master you are.

Dear God,

I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.

Dear God,

Father (I can call you that, right? I’m your son, after all), won’t you take care of ma? She’s sick, and she screams way too much these days. You will take care of her, right? Ma tells me you are everywhere. I think I saw you yesterday. The doctor looks an awful lot like you when she tells me ma’s gonna be alright. I see you, father. You have a pretty smile.

Dear God,

I kissed a boy today. He tastes like apples.

Dear God,

I haven’t seen the boy I kissed in a week. The doctor won’t look me in the eyes anymore. I can’t see you. Where are you?

Dear God,

Would you come running if I burn the words that praise you? Would you come running, not for your kin or your children, but for yourself?

I must say, fire looks prettier than your smile. I rather like it. The smell of your beloved bible burning stings my nose. How very sweet.

GOD,

IT HURTS. IT HURTS. MOTHER CARVED MY EYE OPEN WITH A CROSS. NOW MY EYE BEARS THE CROSS YOU HUNG ON. HOW AWFUL. IT HURTS. I CAN SEE YOU.

Father,

Mother died today. The doctor cried. I see you. Do you know how I figured that was you, right there?

There was no sorrow in those tears.

God,

What do I call you, now that I have deemed you unworthy of prayer? You are not human. You are not holy. You are cruel and twisted. You, do you exist? No. No, you exist. If you don’t exist, then that means I am my own God. Then that means I am the one who hates me so. You exist. Can you see me? I can’t see you.

I think I know what to call you. Coward sure does have a good ring to it.

Coward,

No one knows I talk to you.

I laugh when someone brings up your name when I’m in the room. I spit on your existence. I don’t pray. But I talk to you. Because it’s soothing to pretend you’re here. You villain. It’s easier to pretend I’m just a stray searching for its way back to Bethlehem. Easier to pretend there is no freedom for a stray. I roam the streets searching for you with my leash in my mouth, whimpering, weeping, howling. It’s terrifying to be alone. So I talk. If I am the cause of my own demons, then what’s adding one more to the roster?

Demon,

I made a priest go mad with anger today. In my defense, he kissed me back. I was the one who let go, too. A perfect gentleman. He told me I would never know of the lord ever again. I wanted to tell him: you silly thing. I have known him my whole life.

He is a stray stuck on the top of a lonely mountain. He is your father, the one that beats you black and blue for your own good. He is the light that blinds you. He is the filth that spills out of your mouth. He’s the hands you pulled me closer with. He is the holiest sin. To be holy is to be sinful. To sin is a thing of beauty. Beauty has always been bloody. I know God. He is the bloodiest one of them all.

Dear God,

I like to talk to you because one day, when I find my way home, I can fall to my knees in front of you. Father, look at these teeth you’ve given me. Father, I will promise to make you holy again. Father, why are you screaming? Father, don’t be scared, it all happens for a reason. Did you know a stray doesn’t cross the path of another in fear that the other will sink its teeth in its fur? Is that way you hid from me for so long, Father?

Father, look at these teeth you’ve given me. My hair was never sheep-white, was it? It has always been the white of Lilith’s fangs. I will see you again, Father. You would be proud to see the man your son has grown to be.

Can you hear me, Father? Soon, I will be the holiest (bloodiest) of them all. Watch out for my teeth, father. Watch out for the one stray you never came back for.

[tildeathiwillwrite]

genuine qustion, bc i dont understand whump, why do you like it? whats the appeal? am i missing something?

I'm going to assume from the wording of this question that you already have an idea of what whump is, and you're asking why someone would want to read/write it, but if not here is a good post summarizing the genre.

This post is divided into two parts below the cut: the appeal of whump for me, and an explanation of why I like whump.

For me, personally, the appeal of whump comes from putting a character (whether that be an someone else's character, my original character, or a nameless whumpee) in Situations (with or without a whumper), and then having the difficult recovery or healing process (usually with a caretaker). Sometimes I deviate from this pattern, such as omitting the recovery, but that is usually my main focus.

A bit more emphasis on the comfort in hurt/comfort, but there's also hurt in the comfort.

My main love of whump stems from the tropes I enjoy:

Used as bait (where a whumpee is captured with the intent on using them to lure the caretaker into trying to rescue them in order to capture the caretaker too). I like this one because of the suspense of knowing it's a trap, and wondering if the caretaker will manage to rescue the whumpee, or get captured themselves.

Magic whump (whump but in the fantasy genre). This one gives more possibilities or twists on usual whump tropes by adding magic into the mix. Combined with my love for fantasy writing.

Captivity whump (a whumpee captured by a whumper, usually including various forms of torture). This trope is very versatile. Why were they captured? What does the whumper gain by torturing them? So many possibilities. Not to mention the rescue afterwards!

Sickfic (whumpee is sick, usually with a caretaker). Someone else mentioned this before, I don't remember who otherwise I would've linked them, but illness is something rarely seen in existing media. When a piece of media has whump, it's usually torture or a fight scene, but I've only ever seen sickness a handful of times. I like the idea of a character having all these cool abilities but still getting the common cold, especially when they have someone else to take care of them. Also it's easier to write from experience for this then, say, getting stabbed.

PTSD whump (when a character has trauma). This is more of a recovery trope. I hate it when a piece of media has a character go through an incredibly traumatizing event and then as soon as they're out, they're perfectly fine mentally. Let the character have ptsd, dammit! I don't really write this often, but when I do I love writing the nightmares in particular.

Immortal whump (with a character who, for whatever reason, cannot die). I love this one because it opens up even more possibilities for whumping. It usually depends on how the character's immortality works, but they can take a lot more damage than any other whumpee.

Realism in whump (realistic injuries, illness, and recovery). Really just a preference, as I'm studying in the medical field and already know a lot about how the human body works, so I use that knowledge and apply it to my writing. For example, fainting as portrayed in hollywood movies is a lot different from how fainting actually is. Involves a fair amount of research, but I personally think it's worth it.

(side note: I haven't really found any tropes which I strongly dislike, but out of personal preference I avoid smut and nsfw whump such as rape)

As to why I like whump? This was a tough question to answer, to properly articulate. It's fiction. And writing give me freedom to do pretty much anything to the characters and through the characters. I suppose whump is another way to exercise that creativity. "I know how the character reacts to this Situation, but what about this other Situation?"

I know some other writers use whump writing to work through their trauma, as catharsis. Props to them, but I don't write whump for that reason. I always liked putting my characters in Situations, and then a couple years ago discovered what whump was, went "that's a thing?!" and basically dove in head first.

The Tumblr whump community itself has also been very sweet and welcoming, I draw a lot of inspiration from the other writers, especially when I'm trying to figure out what to write next. I doubt I would still be writing whump if the community wasn't as welcoming, and I'm very glad it's not the case. If you go back in my archive, the first writing I started posting was whump. Nameless whump turned into oc whump, which turned into posting about my WIPs. So if the whump community gatekept me out, I probably wouldn't be posting any writing at all (and that's very sad to think about).

I hope this post was helpful to you! I can't speak for other members of the whump community, these opinions and motives are my own. If you have any more questions feel free to ask.

[cal-daisies-and-briars]

🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟🧟

165 for 🧟:

---

“Oh,” Buck says. “You’re not trying to, like, get her back? Big heroic rescue?”

“Uh, no,” Eddie replies, chuckling a little. “I’m not… God, this is awkward.”

“Sorry,” Buck winces.

“No! Not you.” Eddie assures him. “You’re fine… Just, I guess I need to figure out how to talk about this. It’s just been in my head, so far.”

“Oh,” Buck replies. “Well, take your time.”

Should he even be telling Buck all this? Buck might not care. He might not want details. Okay. No. That’s definitely not true. Eddie knows the names of everyone Buck went hiking with in Shenandoah, and the fact that one of them had a more advanced allergy to poison ivy than the average human. Buck definitely appreciates details. Fuck. 

“Oh boy,” Eddie sighs. “Okay, listen.. Shannon and I only got married because she got pregnant, right? We were kids. Still in high school.”

“Wow,” Buck replies. “That’s a lot at that age. I could hardly remember to do my laundry.”

Yeah. Yeah, it was a lot. And Eddie knows he didn’t make all the right decisions. He let fear rule him. And not only that, he felt the pieces of what made him Eddie snap and twist to fit a mold of what he thought a good man and a good father should be. A good partner. Part of that, in his brain, was a good husband and provider. No exceptions.

“I didn’t really know what I was allowed to want for myself,” Eddie says. 

“Ah,” Buck says. “And that’s not her?”

“No,” Eddie admits. “I thought it was… I love her. But, I’m not… I mean, it took the world ending, having no society to expect anything of me at all, and nothing but time to drive and think to really even realize what the problem is.”

Why is he still talking? He doesn’t need to explain this further. Buck doesn’t need to know. It’s nobody’s business. But… But what if he never gets to tell anyone? What if they die in Los Angeles and nobody ever got to know who Eddie is? The thought makes him sort of sick. Like beyond Christopher, he’ll have never really existed. 

“Well, what’s the problem?” Buck asks. 

Okay. Yeah. He has to just say it.

“Uh… I think…” No, that’s not right. “I am, I mean. I’m gay.” 

There’s a beat of silence as Buck processes. 

“Oh!” He says finally. “Crappy time to figure that out, huh?”

Eddie can’t help but laugh. It’s so absurd. 

“Yeah, it really is.”

“None of the apps are working. Half the users are zombies anyway,” Buck continues. 

“Half?” Eddie challenges. 

“Ninety-nine percent of the users are zombies,” Buck amends. 

“It’s a conundrum,” Eddie agrees. 

If only there were a very handsome kind man in the car with him…

Ugh. God. He should not be thinking those thoughts. They have more important things to do. Bad Eddie. 

“Man, she can’t even divorce you when she finds out.” Buck whistles. “All the judges are zombies.”

Eddie snorts. “Shut up.” 

“Sorry!” Buck laughs. 

But Eddie isn’t mad. Not at all. He hasn’t laughed about this once. It always felt too shameful. He always felt like a liar. A fraud. But here Buck is, teasing him lightly, like it’s just another thing. Put in contrast to the end of the world, Eddie’s sexuality crisis doesn’t seem like much of anything. Except it’s still fucking scary. But Buck has made it a tiny bit less scary, maybe. 

“Thank you,” Eddie says quietly.

“For what?” Buck asks. 

Eddie shrugs. “I don’t know, really. Just talking I guess.”

▪️▪️▪️

When they finally reach Los Angeles, later in the day than he’d expected, Eddie is surprised to find that the city is littered with dying zombies. It’s like what they saw through Santa Barbara, the first time. Except, more. They’re everywhere. On every roadway and streetside. Dragging themselves under the shade of any tree. They’re all in various stages of injury and decay. Suffering and bloody. Starving. Dehydrating. It makes Eddie sick to look at. 

This time, Eddie doesn’t stop to put any of them out of their misery. For one thing, he runs the risk of being overwhelmed, even if they are slow moving and withering. For another, he simply doesn’t have the ammunition. 

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Buck says, looking out the window. His expression is horrified. “They’re all dying.”

“Yeah,” Eddie confirms. “I’ve seen a bit of it. It seems to be getting worse.”

“Is it… Do you think it’s ending?” Buck asks. 

“Ending?” Eddie asks.

Buck nods. “If they’re all dying, and there’s not a lot of people left for them to turn, does it end?”

Eddie takes a sharp inhale. “I mean, I guess, right? If it’s like this everywhere?”

“Right. We don’t know.” Buck sighs. “But, I mean, it can’t be worse elsewhere.”

“I have no idea,” Eddie admits.

“What do you think the world would look like? With no zombies?” 

Eddie thinks. It would be easy to imagine a world where, without zombies, survivors all banded together to rebuild society. Restore order. Repopulate. Farm. A socialist’s wet dream! And as great as that honestly sounds, Eddie doubts it’ll happen. All it takes is a few power hungry people in a lawless land wanting to fill the void. 

“I think it’ll be dangerous,” Eddie answers. 

“More dangerous than it already is?” Buck asks. 

“Maybe,” Eddie admits. “Different?”

“It’d be really nice not to walk around with guns,” Buck sighs. 

Eddie laughs. “You’re telling me. I thought I was leaving war. Not trading one warzone for another.”

“Eesh,” Buck sympathizes. “Yeah, fair enough.”

[gottawriteanegoortwo]

Mayor Attorney - Quarrellsome Snow

Winter is beautiful, but it can be a stressful time of year. Damien has reached a cracking point of stress, and you're the only one there. Can you weather the winter storm with him?

Pre-Mayor era, doesn't have to solely be a (future) District Attorney!

Word count: 681

-

The middle of winter brought with it the bitterness of long nights. The air was sharp, the darkness was isolating, and the cold cut through you like a knife. Worst of all, Damien was in an unusually foul mood.

Not that you could blame him. He worked insane hours at his father's law firm, treated only slightly better than an unpaid intern. Even a man with bountiful patience would reach a moment of breaking point.

"- about my decisions! I qualified last year! I know what I'm talking about. Yet Father still acts like I'm that seven year old boy trying to understand law terminology." Not everyone was shoved into a profession from a young age. It was something more commonplace amongst the upper class, but few were thrown into the deep end as harshly as Damien was. You decided to keep quiet, letting him rant as you took the long way to where you lived. "It's almost like he's trying to belittle my education and prove that I should have stayed in this city to study. But it's a qualification! The level and standard of the degree are the same, and both institutes are renowned. They're on equal status! The only difference was that I wasn't - I wasn't stuck here!"

He threw his arms in the air, and you were quick to reach out and take one of his hands in your own. This wasn't something you could offer advice on. A gentle squeeze was enough for him to stop talking, blink, and sigh.

"I'm sorry. I know this isn't what you want to hear when you've had a long day and want to go home. But please, let me buy you a hot drink on the way. It's the least I can do, as an apology."

You shook your head, insisting he shouldn't. The plan was that he would walk you home, and then he would go home and get some sleep. It was better to stick to that. Damien - uncharacteristically - rolled his eyes.

"And what, speed up the return to the monotony of my existence? Am I not allowed to have some sort of life outside of my job? If you don't want me here, just tell me and skip the formality."

That wasn't what you meant, and he knew that as well as you did. He was twisting your words. You didn't want him to get sick because he's too exhausted to fight the seasonal flu.

Normally, you two were like two peas in a pod. There was little that you two would disagree on, and a compromise was found on the rare day it happened. This time, however, was different. Middle ground seemed like an impossibility. His anger was starting to rise. You were the scapegoat, and it was frustrating you. Trying to be the voice of calm - as he would often be for you - was only making matters worse.

Damien tugged his hand out of yours, about to say something, when he felt something land on his hand. His irritation shifted to confusion as he looked up. You did the same in time for something small to land on your face.

Suddenly, the heavens opened as snow began to flutter down on top of you both.

You found the abrupt interruption startled you out of the surging bad mood. But it wasn't just you who reached that conclusion.

Damien laughed. He was giddy, reclaiming your hand and yanking you into a tight hug.

"Oh, why am I quarrelling with you about this? I know you're thinking about my wellbeing in all of this. I'm sorry."

You pulled back just far enough to look at him and ask whether the offer of a hot drink was still there. You couldn't possibly go home when you were so cold!

A playful smile pulled on his lips as he pulled off his scarf and wrapped it around you.

"For you? The offer will always be there. And when I am finally move away from my parents, I'll buy you a hot drink any time you like. That's a promise."

[sociallyanxiouscryptid-writings]

Found Part 2

Civilian doesn’t like trouble, but they also don’t like dead bodies, and the body they just found is very close to being dead.

Part 1

CW: medical care, waking up somewhere unfamiliar, flashbacks, discomfort with body, loss of people, vague suicidal idea, I’m not sure what else so please let me know.

~

Villain woke to an overload of sensations. Hot and cold, numb and agonised. His mouth was dry and his stomach panged both hungry and sick, and worst of all he felt scattered, his mind here and there, unable to settle itself inside his body and connect the dots together.

Opening his eyes was impossible, so he took a moment to calm down, to breath, to remember where he was and-

Where was he? More importantly how was he even alive to wonder that?

As Villain became more present in his body he could feel the firmness of bandages around his limbs, cradling the pain just a little, something soft and slightly too warm draped over him. He can’t be home, that was no longer a place that existed, but then where?

Slowly, painfully so, Villain forced his eyes open. The world blurred and spun at first and it took everything in him not to retreat back into unconsciousness. He blinked until he could see the off white ceiling above him, the top of the couch that he was laid on. His brows knitted together and he lowered his gaze as much as he could down to his body. His movements were fumbling and it was an effort to grab the blanket on top of him and pull it off. It didn’t up being more of a drag, his arm simple collapsing back down with the cloth in its grasp.

Looking at his own body was uncomfortable, each bruise, each cut bringing back a flashing memory with it. Villain took in a breath, looked back up at the ceiling.

It was then a faint sound came into his awareness. He didn’t know what it was at first, some time of inconsistent tapping. The frown creased his features again and he turned his head, an exhausting motion, and looked to the rest of the lounge room.

A couple of metres away a person sat in an armchair, their feet propped up onto the coffee table and a laptop balanced in their lap.

Villain’s body reacted on an instinct that was cut short with agony. He tried to shoot up, and was choked by his ribs screaming, the stitches on his torso pulling. Villain gasped, coughed, regretted everything. 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Civilian said, not looking up from their computer.

Villain did not listen, why would he? He kept trying, pushing through the pain and not getting very far. Civilian sighed, closed their laptop and placed it on the coffee table when they stood, before striding over to him.

“You need to lay down,” they said, reaching out to push on his shoulder.

Villain snatched up their wrist.

“Who do you think you are to tell me what to do?” He snapped, trying once again but they reach out with their other hand and placed it firmly on his shoulder. If he were in any other state, he had a mind to break it.

“I’m the person who saved your life,” they said, effortlessly pulling their wrist free and used both hands to ease him back down. “And if you undo all my hard work I am going to be very upset.”

Villain fumed. He had no strength to fight against them as they forced him back down and the sheer audacity made his jaw tighten.

“And who exactly would you be,” he ground out.

Villain didn’t try and get back up, but not because Civilian told him to.

“My name is Civilian,” they said. “You’re in my apartment, I found you outside in the alleyway.”

No matter how hard he tried Villain couldn’t remember how he got there. Everything was mostly a blur of panic and pain and so much blood. He had honestly prepared himself to die that day, had thought he had.

Villain focussed his attention on to Civilian, eyed them over, the lack of fear, the concern.

“Do you know who I am?” Villain asked.

“Yes,” Civilian said.

Villain’s brows rose, then knitted emotions shifting and twisting.  

“And you helped me? What kind of madman would do that?”

Civilian shrugged. “You were hurt, you needed help, not much more to it then that.”

“You expect anyone to believe that?”

They crossed their arms.

“It’s not a lie,” they said.

“So you just help war criminals?” Villain said, “is that what good Samaritans are these days?”

“Technically helping a person regardless of who they are is in fact what makes a good Samaritan, however that’s not what you are saying.”

Civilian stepped back until they sat on the coffee table.

“I wouldn’t exactly call you a war criminal either, that would mean we are at war.”

“Aren’t we?” Villain asked.

Civilian eyed them, shrugged.

Despite Villain’s distrust they could see no lie in them, no mask to find a crack in. This person, however unlikely, helped them purely because they could and that boggled Villain a little.

“Then I assume the heroes are on their way here to collect me?” He said, poking and prodding.

Civilian scoffed at that, a bitter distaste in their expression that surprised Villain.

“I wouldn’t call those oafs for a lost puppy. They’d probably kill it trying to find it.”

Villain subdued a laugh, both for his ribs and reputation.

“So what then, you just plan on nursing me back to health and sending me on my merry way?”

Civilian narrowed their eyes.

“You’re sounding like you don’t appreciate the fact that I saved your life. Would you have rather I left you to die?”

Villain did not answer. No, maybe, no of course not but where did that leave him? Alone and incapacitated in a city not his own, his organisation in tattered scrambles if not all but destroyed by now. How pitiful is that? Alone and taken in by a random stranger, stuck and helpless.

Civilian sighed, “look, obviously something horrible happened to you and you’re stressed and scared.”

“I’m not scared,” Villain said sharper then intended.  

Civilian looked at him with an expression soft and serious. One that looked knowing, like it could see through the layers of masks and glamour he had over himself, right into the terrified little core. His smile faded, jaw tightened.

“I’m not scared,” Villain repeated a little less convincing. “I can come back from this.”

“I’m sure you can,” Civilian said. “But before you can you need to rest and heal. How about we take a break from this interrogation and get you some water and food?”

The sensations of hunger and thirst and bodily exhaustion re-emerged with a vengeance and Villain felt dizzy.

“If you let me, I will help you sit up.”

Villain repelled at the thought.

“I don’t need your help.”

“It’s that or I help you through a straw.”

Villain liked that less.

“Fine,” Villain said.

Civilian got up off the coffee table and step forward, ever so gently grabbing Villain and helping him into a seated position. It took time and effort and many sharp breaths from Villain, but they eventually got there and Villain felt dizzy, as if sitting on top of a sky scraper rather then a couch. And it only got worse when Civilian’s hand left his side, like the very ground itself was opening up and swallowing him. Villain took a breath, closed his eyes.

“You ok?”

Villain opened his eyes to Civilian standing in front of him again, a glass of water in their hands. He opened his mouth to speak but the words tumbled together as his entire attention span zeroed in on the glass. Civilian helped bring it to his mouth while Villian mostly just held onto it pretneding he was strong enough to hold it up.

The water stung against his lips, but the cool sensation against his raw throat made up for it. He downed the glass, some of the dizziness easing, a small amount of relief spreading through his body. Civilian went and refilled the glass and Villain drank that one almost as fast.

“That’s all I’m giving you for now, don’t want to overdo it.”

Villain wanted to disagree but what power did he have in that moment to change anything? Civilian could do whatever and he would have no choice.

“Is there anyone I can contact for you?” Civilian asked as they returned to the lounge room.

Many names and numbers came to mind, but as each appeared Villain crossed them off. Dead, gone, betrayed, dead, dead, dead. Villain reached the end of the list, not a single name left.

“No,” Villain said. It came out quieter then he wanted, but in that moment he couldn’t care less.   

Civilian watched him, and Villain wanted to think his face was a blank slate, neutral or stoic anything other then what he knew it was. Pathetic.

“I’m sorry,” Civilian said.

Rage flared. “I don’t want your pity,” Villain snapped.

“You don’t have it,” Civilian snapped back. “You have my sympathy, or empathy or whatever, I can’t remember which is which. Losing people hurts, its simple fact.”

Villain’s instinct was to cross his arms, put up a shield and ignore the statement but he couldn’t and that left him feeling exposed.

“Who are you really? Is this some sort of ploy by the Heroes?” Villain said. He looked around, “put me in some dingy apartment to lower my guard or whatever.”

Civilian raised a brow. “Would that work?”

Villain glared.

“I am not in the mood for games.”

“And I am not playing a game,” Civilian said. “Look this isn’t the most convenient thing for me. I didn’t plan to have a homicidal asshole in my apartment but here we are, you can either accept my help or drag yourself out the door because I am not picking you up again.”

They stood and, before Villain could snap something back, went into the kitchen. Villain heard the fridge door open, the crack of a container before being shoved into a microwave.

They were right, he needed help and he couldn’t even leave by himself if he wanted to, which he did. He had no one to turn to, heroes hunting him and nothing but a random civilian who had the heart to not let him die. Perhaps, just for a little while, he will put up with this pathetic situation.

Civilian walked back in once again, still looking a little sour but none the less they plucked a cushion off the arm chair and shoved it into Villain’s lap before placing a plate of food on top. The smell of food made his mouth water instantly and it took everything within him not to shovel the steaming pile into his mouth. Instead, he looked up at them.

“What is this?”

“Reheated chicken and vegetable bake, you need to eat.”

“It smells awful,” Villain said even though it absolutely didn’t. It smelled like the best thing he had ever smelt.

When Villain looked up Civilian was trying to cover a smile, failed, and instead turned and disappeared behind the couch again.

Villain poked at the food with the fork, shifting it around watching more steam roll out. He stabbed a piece of chicken, raised it up to blow on it. The motion hurt but not nearly enough to deter him from the food. Even a bite of chicken made everything feel a little easier, like he was a little more alive.

The rest of the night went awkwardly. Eventually Villain had to lay back down, the act of sitting too much of a strain, and he had regrettably denied help, jarring his ribs on the way down. It took a good few minute for that spike of pain to subside, for his breath to come back fully.

Civilian checked his wounds later, their hands gentle and skilled. A random stranger who had taken first aid classes, how convenient.

 ~

Part 3

 Tag lists

@waddlethepenguin

If you want to be added to the tag list or any other tag list including my Masterlist, please let me know. 

Sorry if my writing isn’t as good at the moment, brain doing the brain things 

[stesierra]

Sorry to disappear, guys. Things have been crazy over here. But I am surviving! My brain is just mush. So here's a tag game to get me back to thinking about my WIPs.

@fishythewriter tagged me!

My words are: Bone, Soul, Knife, and Blood. I'm drawing from Court Phoenix. I'm tagging @macabremoons and anyone else interested with the words moon, frail and death.

Bone

Chujulan’s hands settled on my shoulders. “Kerra? What’s wrong?”

“I saw a ghost,” I croaked. Our shaman had warned us often of these daylight demons. They had no power to possess or hurt at night, but by day they were a constant threat. When she was alive, she’d prevented such dangerous spirits from entering our lands. Now that she was dead, my village lay vulnerable. And I had no protections from them at all.

The princess’s grip turned painful, her nails digging through my shirt. “Impossible. Ghosts aren’t real.”

“The city doesn’t believe in ghosts?” How stupid were they?

She snorted. “The others are obsessed with them. But I refuse to hide myself from the sun or cower behind the city’s wards because of them.”

Was that why the city-folk always visited our village at night? Because they were afraid of encountering ghosts?

“And if ghosts exist, why did I see nothing?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But the sun had half-blinded me, and in those blind spots, it appeared.”

"You saw a ghost in after-images of the sun?"

Her doubt irked me. “The dead don't have bodies. If they want to make themselves known, they have to make do with whatever nature provides, unless they possess a human or animal. That's what our shaman said.”

Her hands released my shoulders. “Maybe. I don't know much about loose spirits.”

“Why not?”

“The city is warded. Nothing without a body can exist there. Nothing possessed can walk through.”

I nodded. It wasn't dissimilar to what our shamans did. At home those wards were caught up in little bundles of bird bones or in blessings written in the corners of our paper windows. “But don't you all tell stories about them? About wandering spirits and lost souls?”

“The only tales we tell of ghosts are warnings. The only wanderers we care about are those who wander for a reason.”

“A reason?”

“Revenge.”

Soul

I went to bed, but it didn’t help. Whenever I was awake, my head and muscles tormented me, as though both were about to crumble to pieces like rotted wood, and my heart fluttered in my chest, too weak and too fast. When I dreamed, it was of my village on the other side of a great chasm, grayed to a ghost by smoke. I moved away from it, as if I stood on the walking city’s edge as it roamed across the steppe. I couldn’t jump off or run to it. I could only watch it vanish in the distance. And I woke with tears in my eyes and a horrible emptiness in my soul. My father’s words echoed in my mind: “If you move to Skyfire, the city will sink its barbs into your soul. Your anchor will be torn from the earth. And you’ll fade to nothing and die.”

I tried to tell myself this was just some disease common to the city folk. But as I burrowed under my blankets, I knew it wasn’t. I didn’t get sick, not like my non-magical siblings, and I’d never felt so empty. Maybe my father was right; maybe I was dying, and by now I was so far from my village I would never find my way back. And I didn’t want to go back. I wanted to live here with Hes, wanted to rise to become someone important the way a blacksmith never would.

Knife

Chujulan frowned. “Go to bed,” she advised. “You look like shit.”

“What do you care?” I muttered, too sick to care about manners.

She cocked her head at me. “You remind me of someone.”

Something about her tone made me look up. I couldn’t read the expression on her face. “Who?”

She didn’t answer for a minute. Then she said softly, “Her name was Cherin. In our ancient tongue, it means 'long-life' and is given to bring good fortune.” Her lips twisted in a not-smile.

“I take it she got neither.”

“No,” Chujulan said. “She died on the surgeon's table. She was only fifteen. And just starting her menses, although it was late.”

“Was she another landbound?” I asked, still bewildered by her interest.

“She was my only full-blooded sibling.”

“Oh. I'm sorry.” What else was there to say? “Why did she have to go under the knife?”

Chujulan's brows lifted. “She had her menses.”

I tried, “And that made her... sick?”

Her humorless laugh jabbed like a needle. “You’re so ignorant, Kerra. You’ll never survive in this city if you don’t learn.”

My face flushed hot. “Then tell me what you mean. How else am I supposed to learn anything?”

Her smile bent in all the wrong ways. “Listen to the gossip. You’ll find it anywhere. The day-wakers love to talk about us. Almost as much as the lordly.”

“You mean about the rials?”

“Who else? To speak lightly of sagan or regalie is to court ruin. But what are his bastards but dogs on a leash?”

“I am pretty sure you could have most of them killed.”

“Not lightly, not citizens, not unless I wanted to justify it to my father's judge and risk my high position at his side. So they watch and talk. And if a rial, upon reaching puberty, is plied with drugs and liquor and carried away, they place bets on whether she will ever return.”

I was fascinated despite my headache. “You came back.”

“Yes, because I didn't die.”

“Where did they take you?”

She shrugged, a hand running across iron chair beneath her. “To the surgeons, as I said. It's a safe procedure for boys — the city has made eunuchs for as long as it's castrated deer bulls. But we women they must cut open and gut like a rabbit, pulling out the bits they don't like. When Cherin,” she said and paused. “When my sister went under the knife, she died before they even stitched her back up.”

It was a nightmare story, and one I simply could not comprehend. I whispered, “Which bits did they take?”

“The womb. The tissues associated with it. Everything needed to bear a child.”

"Why?" I blurted.

“As long as we are sterile, we cannot seek to claim the herd throne. No one would back a contender without hope of heirs.”

“They think you'll try to rule otherwise?”

“The sagans have always feared a coup, sometimes even rightly. So they have seen that no rial will ever spark a civil war, nor serve as a lordly's figurehead.”

Blood

“The Ferd-Marshal sent you a note,” the girl said as I inspected the garment. She held out a sheet of paper.

What in the world was a Ferd-Marshal? I put the outfit down on the pile and said, “I can’t read.”

She stared at me, as though I’d declared that I could fly. I refused to be embarrassed. I was a villager, not a city-woman, and we didn’t write things down.

She said finally, “I’ll read it to you.” The girl smoothed her fingers over the paper.

“Kerra,

This should be delivered with your new outfits. They’re fireproof, so Heslibra shouldn’t be able to turn you into a torch any longer. Wear them every day and forget your old clothes. This is your costume now. Clothes and makeup are a language you’ll need to learn to read. Lying about your status by wearing the wrong outfit or eyeliner is a capital crime. So stick with what I’ve sent you.

If the Breaker of Legends summons you — and he will — tell him the sagan says you answer to Batoktoa directly and not to him. He’s insufferable.”

Chujulan had written this. She must have. So she was the Ferd-Marshal, whatever that meant.

The girl folded up the note and dropped it on my table, as if I had any use for it. As she turned to leave, I blurted, “Can you arrange for a new mattress and blankets to be brought here? I don’t know who else to ask.”

She frowned at me. “What’s wrong with the ones you already have?”

I choked on words for a moment. “They’re covered with blood! Someone died in that bed, and I’m not sleeping on it!”

“Oh,” she said, looking at the door to the bedroom with wide eyes. “I thought they cleaned that up.”

“Well, they didn’t, whoever they are. Can you arrange for a bed or not?”

The girl pursed her lips. “I suppose. Something will arrive before morning.”

Before morning, because the city-folk stayed awake all night and slept all day. This place was clearly mad.

Tag list for everything

@anonymousfoz

@moremysteriesthantragedies

@elizababie

@sm-writes-chaos

@bellascarousel

@palebdot

@macabremoons

@the-dragon-chronicler

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Just chapters and snippets

@da-na-hae

[siremasterlawrence]

Birthday wish

I am half a sleep laying in my bed when the sound of a box crashing onto my floor burn fiery hot and waking me up as I woke up in a heat

What the fuck is this? I think to myself sitting up in my bed with it flipping into the air into my hands and I am completely shock to me at this point.

The a small envelope lay on top of it attach to the ribbon and connected to the box as I yank it off and open it up taking the card in

to my hand.

Dear Lawrence,

Happy Birthday! Today is the chance of a no your lifetime to bring your dreams to out into existence. All you have to do is open the box and let it all fly no regrets.

Have a great day.

I scratch my head in a haze of confusion at the item then proceed to slowly undue the paper wrap letting fall onto my bed as the top burst off.

A beautiful colorful array of streaming lights flow into the sky cover the room in a bright aura resembling the aurora borealis so very stunning.

The stream starts to surround me in a super circular string spinning over me sending a deep hit to my soul my soul lifts into the air through time.

“Dust? What kind of gift is this?”

“Don’t knock a gift horse in the mouth.”

“Who is that? Show your self?”

“I am right here! Turn to the side”

“Huh! Aaaahhhhhhhh”

“Relax! Don’t be scared “

“State your reason for being here “

“My name is Jacob I am a angel”

“A literal angel? Yeah right “

“Ever heard of Supernatural?”

“Ummm…that is fiction”

“Regardless”

“Right”

“I am here to grant you a wish”

“Genies do that “

“Don’t never trust those miserable creature“

“Ok then? Why not ?”

“ Nevermind! Choose four people you want in your life forever.”

I scramble in the back of the mind with the screws going loose in my head at the sheer insanity of it all happening so I grabs sheet of paper.

Suddenly I hear the sound a lawn mower in the yard next door blasting high as he rides the grass and I have a feverish dream of him from my apartment building.

I have seen him around my apartment for a few weeks that is his job he owns a business tailoring to peoples gardens and he makes a good amount of money.

The angel stares at me clicking his finger at me his body flashes away into a spiraling in a light form flying past me through the room it zooms straight ahead.

The lights hits him on head on the impact is instantly splashing into his body leaving him shook and the lawn mower stops almost immediately.

Frozen in time for like ten seconds before he is continuing to finish his work the place is immaculate and he receives his pay exiting the lawn.

“Obviously! This is a sick twisted joke”

“Do not use such a blasphemous tone and words with me.”

“Sorry”

“Give me a few minutes”

“Well worth the wait.”

“I’ll be back”

“Is he looking at me?”

“Smiling at me”

“Winking?”

“What did you do?”

“Getting a appetite for life “

“Oh Dear! This is exactly like Supernatural “

“Bingo”

“Did you possess him?”

“Part of me”

“Two more to go”

“Go ahead”

“Is this even ethical?”

“No! Who cares”

The man’s white tee is dirty with stains, his pants is a bit distressed with tears, his feet tired and he knocks on my door and I let him in.

“Howdy neighbor “

“Hello”

“Come here and give me a kiss “

“Woah cowboy!”

“What did you do to him?”

“You said you wanted a Cowboy “

“I never told you that “

“Well! I read your mind “

“Jerk”

“Watch it “

“Sorry”

“This will be quite amusing “

“For you maybe….but oooohhhh he is a good kisser.”

Before I can even think about it his clothes are off in the shower washing off all of the dirt from his skin.

“I have scanned your mind more”

“Now wait a minute!”

“Too late!”

“Damn it!”

“My name is Blake by the way “

“I am ….”

“Master Lawrence”

“I know Master”

“Wow!”

“Do you love me?”

“To the moon”

“And back”

“Sit down for me”

“At your command “

“You love that “

“It just hit me”

“I only realized it today”

“What?”

“You are important to me”

“Everything even”

“The world”

“You believe that “

“It’s the truth “

“Prove it, show me”

“With pleasure “

The end

[kirstenonic05]

I can't believe I got tagged for this. Thank you @rottenpumpkin13!

Rules: post the names of the files of your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you asks with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet or tell them something about it. If you want, tag as many people as you have WIPS.

I'm gonna tag people now and then put the WIP names under the read more because I wasn't lying when I said I have an unholy amount of WIPs!

@nibwhipdragon @idolcrescent @shadowsageingempress and anyone else who wants to do this! No pressure, though! :D

I have this many stories:

And this many finished:

So uh. This'll be fun. (I won't do all my WIPs but... it's still a lot...)

I think this would be a lot funnier if I took screenshots of the names/adding the pictures that are attached to the Keep notes, but there are just too many to do that. Anything in italic isn't in the title, it's just present me screaming

(Sadly all my finished fics have funnier titles since I finish crackfics in a day, and sorry for the weird formatting! I reached the paragraph cap apparently :()

Star of the Sea 2 (No name)

"What should we do with its corpse?" (Rewritten) (Two ghosts discuss throwing away a dead centipede. One throws it at the other)

Encounter with the Local Dark Mage (I only have a title... I don't even know who the characters will be yet... Why am I like this...)

Comfort (I'M A SENTENCE OFF OF FINISHING I THINK)

The Demon and the Boy (I am SO CLOSE to finishing this. Just need to edit. Might end up on Ao3)

The Dark Mage and the Dark Alchemist

I don't have a title but Sig cheers up Schezo

A New Cave???

A Len, Two Lens (Waiting on Ink to send me some of the script, collab moment)

Scarf

Also no name, smth abt Allen and Hibiya but fantasy???

The Closet's Other Door (Continuation of a fic named The Closet)

Also no name, Armani (OC)'s birthday

Photos

The Master of the Heavenly Yard

I don't want to die

Nightmare (I thought this was done...)

A Glitch's Musings (I DON'T REMEMBER WRITING MORE ECHOED TIME STUFF HELLO??)

Times Two (I wrote so much for Echoed Time and. Forgot)

Repression

No name but continuation of Joseph has a dragon spirit that goes out of control (Aurora Dragon)

Plush

No name, everyone's animal hybrids except Sonic

Sick

Interrogation

I'm so sorry Mayday (I'm so sorry for doing this to you Mayday...)

No name, Joseph post apocalypse(?)

Me, the Stall Wall, and You

Three Wings, Five (OUGH THE AU UPDATED. NOW IT HAS TO BE 7 WINGS)

You tried (That sounds so angsty without the context of Chrom walks into a Minecraft desert temple and blows up...)

Digitalis

Spin a Tale of Silk and Cotton

Chase

Isle of Destiny

Reality Check

Guardian Angel

To the Pure Body, to the Perfect Existence

Volume Control (Help how do you write sad Tsukasa)

Last One Standing

Dualheart

Different

Twist of Fate

Dimensional Scream

Before Disaster

Fighting a King

Red String

At Dawn (DD edition)

Bottoms Up

Themes

What's in a name?

Couple of Strays

Stuck in Stone

Heterochromia

City Boy Lost (Joseph gets lost: The story)

Merry Chrimpus

Tales from the Shattered Star

Birth... marks? (This was meant for Caejose week but I was busy rip)

From the Dark World

Dark Fear

Night in the Desert

So, do you like him? (Huh Joseph? Do you like him? It looks like you do)

Corrupted Code

Crumbling Stars

Hotel (My lord I was on a full SoSS spree after Frontiers, that's like 6 in a row including two others that are here somewhere)

Tension

Heads Up! (Local hedgehog yeets ghost friend's head at people)

Ridgegate Rumble (Also the name of the song I'm turning in as an assignment lol)

Redeemed Flame

Light of the Sun

Out of Known Time (Almost done...)

Swords

Carriage (The only Shrimp fic that isn't finished, set before Soggy Shrimp and Emotional Support Shrimp)

Another Life

The Ultimate

Faded Light

Wish Come Through - Wish Fall

Meeting

Aurora Dragon

Family

Reflection

Instinct

Murky Water

Land of Ice (Light, Butterflies and the Never-Ending Winter)

Refracted Invader

"Best Coffee to ever grace the earth"

The Boy

Enter: The Ripple

Skirmish Pack

At what cost?

Silence

Your Turn

Copy (OH RIGHT JOSEPH CLONE AU. I SHOULD FINISH THAT.)

A New World

Clothes

Threaded Stars (SOSS DD crossover I forgot about...)

Sugar Rush

To Turn Back Time

Arachnophobia

BOY I DIE The End (I've finished BOY I DIE the first and almost finished this one :3)

BOY I DIE the middle one (I have not started this one though...)

Yearn For Home

Wait ghosts can't-

A Totally Normal Day (Putting my OCs on a date...)

Insight

Sweet Treat

Logical Stimulus (HELP BATTLE SCENES ARE SO HARD TO WRITE. HOW DO YOU WRITE VANITAS.)

Blue Eyes, Red Stone (I forgot to finish this one sorry Nibwhip... It's the Monster Hunter JoJo fic)

Photo Ghost

Unfounded Kingdom

Two

Not so Dark

Similar (Hedgehog and Human)

Popsicles (Will be on the Caejose collection once it's done. If I finish it, of course)

Just a Familiar

Final Battle...?

Time Stops

Barista

Heart's Pulse

Immortal

Welcome to Vivosaur Island

The Heroes

Fireflies

Like Surviving the Apocalypse (OC edition)

Like Surviving the Apocalypse (AU Joseph edition)

Live Play

Aragami - 荒神

Reunion

It's Time (Kirsten finish Echoed Time fics challenge: impossible. Literally this is the beginning of the series and I STILL haven't finished it.)

Chaos Warp (OH HELLO SOSS FIC THAT IGNORES ALL THE RULES OF SOSS)

Light in the Dark

My Own Hands (Rerun)

My Own Hands

Comrades No More (Rerun)

Comrades No More (OG CitS edition)

Distorted Graffiti (It's literally just Comrades No More with a different name and they dance before killing each other... what the heck past me...)

Winter Wonderland

The Supernatural

【End of Days】 (Kirsten don't write the end of the AU before the start challenge: Impossible impossible)

Midnight Dancing

Arena (I think I never finished this because the characters changed names 3 times during writing lol)

Learn to Dance

Ruins Deep

How to say "I love you" (Learn to dance from Caesar's POV)

Tsunami

Snow Tower

Phone

Time, again and again

Heart Burn (Probably gonna split this into 4 different oneshots ngl)

Cast Away (I THOUGHT I FINISHED THIS D:)

Eternamax

Cute? (Not in the way you think)

Mission

Jail of Burning Hell (An actual mission name from Sonic Adventure. How.)

Treading the Needle (I wrote the start to OG CitS and never finished it, then proceeded to write everything in between and the end. Ok me.)

Legendary Heroes II

Beautiful One Day

Lock

Table Tennis Table (OH RIGHT THE JOSEPH AND SONIC BREAK A TV AND ALLEN IS DISAPPOINTED FIC. I NEED TO FINISH THIS.)

Brioche (I have like 3 fics named brioche. Which fic is this.)

Braving Lightning

Meet the Ghosts

Rift Token Pendent

Joe's Diary 2

Zombies at Port

Zombies at Port (Dream accurate) (Technically done?)

The Start of Origins

Beast on World's End (The day I figure out how to write DIO, the day I will finish this fic)

Shuniji (EotD version)

Shuniji (Minecraft accurate)

Lunch

Mice on Venus

Anigame

Anigame 2 (Kirsten name your fics-)

Ridgegate Rock (OG CitS version)

Night Market

Arrival (i wrote this playing Stardew) (The previous brackets is actually in the title...)

Butterfly House (Valentines 2021) (NOOO I NEVER FINISHED THIS D:)

Water's Edge

Turtle Beach

Allen, Joseph, and the Mizutsune (I need to. Finish this.)

Streak of Lightning

Guest

(Not So) Secret Island

Son of a Champion (Nuzlocke gone wrong not clickbait)

Kars' 100% Accurate Retelling of Meeting Joseph (It's not accurate)

Through Ghost Eye

Dance of the Decorous

March of the Profane (So I made this challenge where I wrote two fics at the same time (This and Dance of the Decorous) that share the same amount of sentences, and chose two songs that are the same but remixes as the titles. I wanna continue these fics sometime cause I'm kinda proud of them ngl...)

Purest Sky and Sea (Started this with Ink and. Forgot abt it)

Wrong Seat, Right Timing (Ink and I have to finish this! :D)

Blue on the Run

Dawn (Another fic named Dawn??? It's... Stardew???)

Temporal Rift (THIS WASN'T EVEN TAGGED AS STORY I JUST STUMBLED ACROSS IT WHILE TRYING TO FIND SMTH. HELP I MIGHT HAVE A LOT OF FICS I'M MISSING)

Shadows on the East (This is one of my most important fics and it wasn't tagged as story...)

Up towards the sky (I wrote a Caejose New Years fic??? What??? When???)

Where it all went wrong

Poffins (Continuation to Underground on Ao3!)

Eye of Memory

Sunflowers Spring Forth Day

~ℜ𝔢𝔴𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔢~ Bluebells Sound Death

Sunset Orange (I think I've written more oneshots for this AU than the actual main story...)

Sunrise Yellow

EC x SDV (Aka Boredom/Commas everywhere) (I REMEMBER THAT I COULDN'T FINISH THIS BECAUSE IT WENT OVER THE GOOGLE KEEP WORD LIMIT LOL)

The Mystery of the Two Pranksters

Lost Memory

I know who you are (Well that's not cryptic as heck)

Token

Dreaming of Shooting Stars

Dreams (3 SoSS fics in a row again. Huh.)

Love?

Name

Nest

Golden Friendships

No name, Eye of the Sea intro for EotD

Who are you?

Valentines (ANOTHER VALENTINES FIC???)

Stairwell (This was a story where anything stupid that happened to me at this stairwell would be rewritten with characters but... I'm not at that school anymore... this might be finished...)

Full

Orchid

The Legendary Wolf Likes Coke (COCA COLA. NOT COCAINE)

America? (America is not real)

JOeStar rEcreation: Project Hamon (J.O.S.E.P.H ;) )

Rain under the Trees

It feels like midnight

The Revolution Comes Around Again

Before I say goodbye to you

Collab Story

The end of the 10 year story (10 years irl)

Null

Rumours

The Mentor Servant's Name

Who's She? (Sounds kinda angsty but it's not... It's SoSS)

Shadows of the Past (White Deal)

Scarf (OH LOL I'VE USED THIS TITLE TWICE)

Sea of Fire

Visit

Left in Ruins

The Concept of Love

A little spider goes a long way (Eden why did you name the spider that) (My friend named a spider Joseph and then we talked abt it and a crackfic spawned...)

Safari Zone

Another

DD rewritten

Around the World

One and the Same

Royalty is not for us

Entralinked

Servant of the Worlds

The Evillious Chair

Why does a flaming arrow hold a curse instead of killing the victim straight away?

Strengths and Weaknesses

Christmas Snack

Happy birthday Sonic!

Back in Time

Blossom Storm

Hanahaki

A day in the life of the Kagamine/Lucifin Twins (TYPO SPOTTED. IT'S SPELT "LUCIFEN")

Tricksters in the Lucifenia Palace

Slice of Life - Ancestral Bonds (I'm 100% sure there's a continuation to this somewhere that's unfinished but I can't find it...)

As Faith Foretold

Dimensional Defenders - 1 (My first ever fic!!! Wow!!!)

Experiment TS-#042 (Sad that I didn't get far in this, I had so many ideas for this AU as a kid)

Mirai

A day in the Lucifenian Castle

Len's Adventures at Gakupo's Sushiria (Collab with my friend, who wrote Miku's Scooperia)

Tuna why did you make me do this you peckneck smh (Speaking of said friend...)

Shattered Mirrors

One

Through the desert's flames

Pocky

Earthen Guardians

Ships on a Spaceship (There are 3 separate stories for this, and 2 more planned. Why would I do that to myself)

Azure Gold

Azure Wind (These two fics are not related to each other. Azure Gold and In Love with a Wyvern are. What.)

Mirror Cave

In love with a wyvern

New World, New Beginnings (JOJO MINECRAFT ISEKAI FIC I WROTE AND FORGOT ABT??? HELLO???)

Lab AU??? (The AU has a name y'know, past me)

Among Us there are Two (Part 3) (ONE DAY I WILL FINISH THIS)

Cookies

And that's all! If you made it this far, thank you for dealing with my disaster!

[boogiewuu]

Fortune's drop

This is a part of the backstory of one of my obey me oc, Desdemona, an angel with cursed eyes who soon will completely change her life.

Tw: mentioning of blood, gore, dead people

Please, remember that this is an Original Character's backstory, nothing here is canon.

I'm sorry for the grammar errors you might find but English isn't my first language.

You can find the complete cover post drawing here if you want to check out some drawings about it

«remember this...»

Why there are so many voices? What's happening out there?... I can feel the floor trembling under my feet... the cold wind crashing on me behind my back like an upcoming storm, this the first time I could feel this here in the Celestial Realms.

«...for any reason...»

My lungs are taking less oxygen by the time... Why my hands are shaking so much? The pressure on my body is pushing me down.

«...you must tell...»

Am I sick? Am I about to die? Is this the moment when your life is taken away from your own body?

«...that you're blind.»

.

.

.

For all my life, I was forced to wear a mask, or a "crown of vision" like my father said to me the first time I had to put it on. No light could go through the thin and metallic layer of that angelic artefact. Why do I wear this? Father said so... And he explicitly said I can't take it off, under any circumstances, my eyes must be hidden from the world. I don't know why... Back then, I was too little to understand the horrible faith my life was twisted on. I don't even know how I look, or how my family look because for it. I just know I have a very long hair because Mother loves to comb them for me, probably she even made me some strange yet angelic hairstyle multiple times without even got the chance to see that.

I hate this.

I hate all of this.

For all this lie, I can't have many friends. I met some angels who were kind to me and tried to make me more comfortable with my condition... but I always felt horrible, useless... I wasn't complete. How can I have friends if I can't even know how they look like? I can't see, so I can't fly like all the angels do or swim... How frustrating is it. I could hear their wings flapping in the sky while playing... And I was there on the ground, in silence. I was living a loop... From the minute I was awake to the moment I was asleep, because all the angels had one particular job... But what job could have a blind angel of fortune when there is another one who was actually able to see? When I tried to talk about it to Mother and Father, they said I shouldn't care about it... They could be my friends... I had already my twin who I can play with.

I'm feeling like another bird on a cage.

One day, something different happened, a break in the loop. There was too many strange sounds in the distance, so I tried to reach the source of it but, out of nowhere, an hand grab mine firmly and pull me on the opposite of my direction. «Follow me!! I got you!! Don't take off your mask!!» the person kept yelling... It was my brother's voice. I couldn't stand behind his steps... We both started to running but he should be my eyes for see the safer path, but he was just... Scared... So his priority was survive, running as fast as possible...but I kept falling on the ground. I could sense the angelic aura of my brother growing... He's been trying to use the magic to protect us but seems like both my fortune and his aren't helping like it should be...

Interesting.

I didn't knew emotions like this could ever exist... The nerves running down your spine... The drops of sweat mixing with the dust painting your hot face... And the new sounds were something else too. I kept heard many times breaking sounds of all the type you could even imagine... I believe there were even the cuts of visceral material too. I could smell something burning like meat and wood. I could heard screams but they weren't joyful and the heavy breathing of many people... The splitting sound of some liquid crashing on some surfaces and the finals drops. Something surely was happening. All of this was new to me...

And my curiosity kept me hunger for new sensations.

But my brother doesn't want me to go where the sounds come from... I wonder why?

Aren't these sounds amazing? Why my brother wanted me to cover my ears and pretend I didn't heard a thing? They are so different from the usual stuff...

...why my brother was acting like Father? Why I can't see? And why I'm the only one who has the eyes covered? That's not fair at all!!

My head was spinning... I think I was still running, but all these questions about the forbidden stuff was taking control over my thoughts...my lungs were killing me and I could hear my heartbeat speeding up, I could feel it in my chest. I hit something with my feet and I felt faceplate on the ground... I searched the warm hand of Madoc, calling him back... But there was no response. I didn't have enough strength for get myself up, so I stand there like I was sleeping. My skin could feel the soft leaves landing on the floor and the wind come back running through my hair.

I was outside? I could hear them, the angels screaming and the clicking of the metallic weapons... And I was there, landing on the grass, with a weak body, vulnerable.

After some time, I took back my stamina and managed to stand up on my bare feet, waving my arms around to feel the nearest obstacles but I was in an empty zone... But where? I felt a warm liquid falling on my face, wetting my skin. What is it? I touched the tear with the index and put it under the nose... It doesn't have a smell. I tried to put it on the top of the tongue... It tasted sweet yet nothing came up to my knowledge. I tried to follow the trace with the fingers and there it is. A burning pain on the skin on my forehead but my fingers where full of that sweet liquid. My finger was barely touching a cut who seems incredibly huge... My face was half covered with it...

Blood.

Oh dear Lord... My tongue tasted my own blood? Angels shouldn't even touch or see the blood, and look at what I did!! Oh, if Father would've see me, I was easily grounded for the rest of my immortal life!!

Wait... My Father isn't here, no one is here except me. I was lost and alone, if everyone was running then there's must be a danger near us... I need to run...

I need to see.

My hands shakily took the corner of the metallic mask... My heart pounding on and on. My first time see the world where I lived until now...

I have to... Or I won't be able to survive

The mask went slowly separated from the bandages over my eyes and drop it on the ground making a little jingle with the pebbles behind the leaves. I'll finally be able to see everybody...

I started to unwrapped the many layers of the dirty bandages, full of dust, blood and sweat.

That's it. Now, the only thing between the world and my eyes were the eyelids. Nothing more, nothing less.

.

.

.

The bright light of the sun blinded me for a second. My eyes were never need exposed my the light like this... I had a hard time to make them get used to, but was worth it. The world was beautiful... All the colours I only could learn weren't just words!! Ohhh I'm dreaming!! The sky was full of dark clouds, making less light going through, white feathers were falling like snow and cover all the ground around me. I looked at my hands with my own blood stained on, painting my caramel skin with a dark red.

So this is the world I've been living on for thousands of years!! Why everybody tried to hide this from me??

I heard again that melodic screams on the distance... I ended up searching with my eyes. Look up. In that gray sky there were other angels with their golden bright armor and their weapon on their hands.

They were covered with red, their armor, their weapon, their skins... Even those beautiful white feathers on the wings had blood stinks.

Angels don't attack or hurt other creatures... But that blood surely wasn't their.

I was petrified... The world was always like this? That would explain why Father and my brother tried to keep me away though.

The Angels were up to me, they took a big opening of the wings and then down, targeting me with a surreal velocity, I couldn't move... My eyes were locked on them.

They seems so determined...

I'm about to die, aren't I?

The world become soundless. The spears of the two angels were one feet close to me, yet the world seems so slow... I wonder why.

The Angels were looking at me, directly in my eyes... They had an peculiar expression, a mix of surprise and pain, yet they were looking be enchanted by the meeting of our eyes.

My lungs were running off oxygen, it was hard to breathe, blood were running down their nose, then their mouth... but that gaze weren't going away. I could feel a shock down my spine, my hands shaking again and my facial muscles reacts, I couldn't help but softly smiles and that view. They were petrified like statues, their pupils disappeared, trembling under the layer of tears. I could heard the crackling sound of their jaws opened willing to screaming until their vocal cords would be tore apart.

That twisted expression... I never knew a creature could have such an expressive face. The time looked frozen but I knew this was just my perspective... Their body hardly avoided me, crashing on the floor with enough force to destroy the splendid grass near us. They painted the ground with a scarlet red and that wet breaking sounds again... But in a combo. They turned red and purple... But I couldn't help but notice the broken bones coming out the skin like spines...weird. They looked in pain... But right now, their body was twisted like an origami.

They're no longer alive, that's for sure.

The noises, the screams... That chaos never stopped in the distance. They were full of rage and fear, I could feel the fear in those... But they were full of life and colours too,and that was new.

A twisted way to show everybody that they were alive, and God only knows they will fight for that life with teeth and claws.

Those voices, oh I recognize those voices... My friends were living this moment against everybody else. They were fighting not only to survive... But to live too. To be free. Free like me.

I wasn't alone to feel this way, huh?i my gray sky... I couldn't fly so I had to help on the other half... but the curiosity and the fun was taking me over. Those angels understand my will... They'll having so much fun

I must join... I will join.

.

.

.

I kept repeating me those words... I was covered in all the shades or red the blood could take, I wasn't trained for battle so of course I couldn't survive without having several cuts. My spear was severely damaged by all the angels' bones I destroyed, my clothes were all ruined too, if I knew angelic clothes were this uncomfortable for fighting, I would change it many years ago. Angels couldn't recognize me, but one look and I'll found them dead on the ground like they've been in overdose.

So, the curse on my eyes was really this bad? A common folk you would stare at them for too long, they died in a pot of blood?

I was taking deep breaths, while my hand was covering a bloody cut on my shoulder, I was controlling around me and then I saw that scene...

Two angels, flying towards themselves... The bigger angel had ginger and short hair while the smallest had blue hair with some white hair on the bottom of them. The ginger one was flying holding the blue one, but the other angels was standing an hand on the back of the big one. When I looked on the same direction on the angel's hand, I noticed something else. It was a girl, flying near them... But the second I was watching, that same girl was hitting in the back, falling on the void like a dead bird.

And I was there... Watching in silence that scene.

She wasn't even fighting... And yet, she was hit by this war, and that same girl was falling into the void like she deserves it. How many angels had the same faith of that girl?

I couldn't move a single muscle... What a bad timing to stay there and think.

An enemy took me from behind, I woke up form the shocked and we ended up fighting. He had a Dagger and I had my cursed eyes. I got stabbed many times, but I managed to block his head with my hands and forced it to watch my eyes. Soon enough, he was screaming and vomit blood, but loosing the balance was a fatal act.

His body pressed me down, until we both fall from the edge of the clouds. My face turned pale as we were falling... I took off of me that body and tried to use my wings to reach the surface, but nothing was worth it. More we were going down, more speed we acquired... It was an endless fall, the air was burning my lungs. I couldn't breathe, the pressure was crashing me... My wings couldn't take this. An excruciating pain was hitting my back!! My wings!! I could feel them unravelling my skin... I couldn't hear anything, not even my screams and my cries. I could feel my skin burning, my halo were melting on my face.

All of this couldn't happen If I didn't took off my mask... I shouldn't been fight with those angels, it wasn't non of my business. My friends... Are they dead? I didn't hear them anymore... And I'm going to do the same.

Did I deserve it?

.

.

.

I lost consciousness for who knows how much days or years, I was rotting in the deepest seabed. I didn't know how I was alive or where am I... But something was telling me "someone had other plans for me." Something grabbed my arm and pulled me up, reaching the surface. When I was feeling the ground again, I put my face on the ground, starting to coughing, let the water free my lungs. «where am I?» the only thing I could say. An unfamiliar voices started to talk to me «you're in the Devildom, the reign of demons. You're lucky to be alive.» says the voice. It was a deep male voice, one of that voices you can hear trembling inside you, and I doubt it was an angel...

«Are you... going to kill me?» I asked, trembling, making the demon laughed «I can... but why should I do that?» he asked, but I couldn't reply «what's your name, fallen angel» «...I have no longer a name...» I reply, I know my name... But why should I keep using that name? «...then, how the others angel used to call you?» «The Fortune's pearl... I used to bring good luck» I whispered with a low profile «looks like your luck didn't make it... you looks more of a misfortune demon» commented the demon, I felt a touch on the back «what happened to your wings and your eyes?» asked in a low voice, I let out a single gasp «I... lost my wings during the fall. And for your safety, I need to cover my eyes.» the demon didn't reply, but I felt a strip of cloth on my face, that startle me for a moment, but as soon as I felt my eyes been covered, I slowly high my head towards the demon and thank him «...You're a demon now, you're under my responsibility. Come with me so we can heal you from your wounds» says the demon «for now on, you'll be Desdemona... the misfortune's pearl.» a little giggle escaped from my mouth, a little tear goes on my cheeks, I'm finally worth it for a job

«seems like you really have plans for me...»

[lustrumlane]

The Applebright's Rot

“We hear it in your hearts: Emerson Tiels.”

“The sound is dolorous, the painful ringing in your mind: ‘why?’”

The Emissaries begin their performance dutifully, bringing two of their hands together: they clasp one over the other and grip tightly before raising the shape between them.

Part I

“An apple is a sanctuary to that inside, the skin is a barrier to that which would eat. It will one day die, it must be eaten, but the skin does not want this; it exists to lose.”

They bring their other hands over the two joined, making two four and holding tighter.

”The skin outlived the tree and became too tough; the seeds inside could not grow, suffocated by the apple itself. So long as the meat was sweet, the seeds could not tell the rest was long dead. The skin became harder and harder to protect that which was soft.”

They turn their hands and push their fingers through the bottom two hands, twisting all four hands together.

“This seed met a worm who said: there is so much more, you should be a tree, not a seed. If you stay, you and this skin will rot together; you’ll all become nothing.”

“We do not understand the item itself, but the keys you have been given appear to be powerful things.”

They take their hands apart, leaving them touching at the fingertips, making an expanded, square-like shape with two of their hands as they turn to face the audience again.

“Using this key, the seed approached his captor. He sought his truth by force: with this key, he accessed the knowledge that lay deep in its mind: what are you hiding from me?”

“From this seed grew a poison tree; watered in fears, with tears.”

“And it grew both day and night, till it bore an apple bright.”

One Emissary turns to the other and takes them by the chest, grabbing their scarf and rocking them back and forth.

“This hurt was repaid again and again until the futility felt sickening; a thing cannot die by any meager means when caught in Lustrum’s web, so the machine would reappear again and again, greeting him over and over no matter what action was taken.”

Then, suddenly, they let go, letting the other fall away.

“Maddening, to be caught in another cycle. Do the days ever end?”

They regain their footing and step together again, facing one another.

“Something had to change. He became a tool again. Telling everything he knew to the machine, he was given a plan.”

“The programming was done in elegant script to give the tool all he needed: two locked rooms only he could pass between. If no one knew, he would be safe. It should have been perfect.”

Part II

Now one starts to walk while the other follows, a weaving sway to their movements.

“Meanwhile, the song-sick composite pursued that annoying relict around the arcade, begging for sweet things he hardly cared to hear.”

“‘Anything, friend, anything; I’ll take whatever you have, just please let me have it, for it is what I am without what it is, and to live without is not to live!’”

“With a plan of his own, the relict agreed; but plans half-baked do not rise.”

One Emissary sweeps an arm out wide, the other’s arm low as they crouch.

“It draws a path of violence and panic, it seeks the familiar and finds the foreign, danger around every corner!”

“It’s only solace is in the tool’s machine, who, on hearing such horrible chaos, knows its own plan has been compromised: if this thing is here, it cannot be there, thus, the arcade’s doors cannot lock as they should, such as we’ve already programmed it to.”

“Such a simple error. The thought of its tool being seen and caught unaware in the act could not be abided, so it formed a new plan to patch this hole.”

“The composite was filled with not one but two, and the two repaired his tools of violence. Before the machine could properly take control, a bysander wandered in; and you know how this goes, and you’re familiar with the song.”

One Emissary points at the other, making a swinging motion with their arm, and the other kneels quickly, leaning back. The one standing turns away, and the one on the ground rises to step around them and they join hands again.

“Retreat to safety, to the arcade, to the familiar: the machine and relict are in agreement on the destination.”

“Here, they find an accomplice for a crime uncommitted, and more importantly, a place to dispose of the stubborn program that would not leave.”

“The automaton listened to the panicked thing’s cries and held it in its palms, it told it not to worry: it would protect it in itself, it would protect it from it all.”

“A savior, a bulwark, a light in the dark to this haggard lemming. ‘I would make them cut through me before they can consider hurting you’ it says as the worm is placed in its own skull.”

“Genuine, truly, this compassion was real; moreso, a convenient thing for the other machine, who removed the spells placed on the composite and exited the arcade to patrol, ensuring no one would step inside and interrupt its tool’s plan.”

Part III

The Emissaries walk in a circle, matching one another.

“All this time, the plan had been afoot. With his peers, the tool had entered the arcade with everything he needed. He knew which test must be chosen for the separation, all had been made clear thanks to the test operator’s knowledge.”

Then, they stand back to back, one holding their hands in front of their face.

“They step in as one and the machine’s tool is left alone in the console room. He knew, so long as he stayed quiet and sweet, the real operator would have no reason to look; so much became clear to him when he saw her files laid out.”

“Using the sleeping copy of the test operator, he was able to exit: acting as her, he has full permissions to do as he wanted. This is the privilege of an administrator.”

“He sets a standard for practice and connects the phone to the console, plumbing the sleeping copy of the test operator’s mind for answers. She would know what comes next, for the answers do not change.”

“This is the moment in which the music was heard, that of the arcade: the small thing on the phone heard, but could not see, she could not act, she had been disabled down to nearly nothing.”

“All she knew was something was wrong. Nothing to be done. The door closed behind him, for he only used her credentials to open it for a moment.”

They separate and walk in a circle again, the opposite way now.

“Who was Uroro Zenzen?”

“A coveted moppet, an effigy of power. He thought himself a hurricane when he was only the rain.”

“Raw and tempestuous, wild and natural; nothing without the wind, nothing without guidance.”

“Left alone for a final time, he stood alone: it was a targeting of convenience. His nature was not known, not truly, for a tool struggles with nothing more than that it is not made for.”

“A drug transformed, seaweed slipped into a snack. An ordinary man would have fallen into a peaceful slumber, but this one woke to a terrible nightmare.”

One Emissary grabs the other and spins them around a few times before tossing them roughly to the ground, causing them to roll before catching themself.

“Cruel, violent; now this is fear, now this is rage. He saw the tool, he lashed out: this story would have ended differently should this have continued.”

“The machine saw this from its post and could not stand by. Mercilessly, the monster was taken down, for this could not be a human, no.”

“Could any of you be, when by every logical process, you have been dead for years and years and years? Deaths calculated or even recorded? Only one man is truly alive: all else is nothing to this machine.”

The one on the ground rights itself and hops towards the other, stepping behind them with a spin before taking their neck and putting their hands around it.

“Intercession. This monster continues to fight until the last, but the machine tips the tides. Lucky, with a nearby mallet, he is finished.”

One’s head falls to the side. Then, they step apart and walk opposite ways.

“The tool uses his bracelet, with the administrative credentials copied onto it, to re-enter: this causes an error, as this device is not recognized. He does not realize this, but the door remains open.”

“The machine exits and runs to the House of Refulgences to return to its cage before it's caught: it does not make it. It hides in the composite as quiet as one can be.”

“And a guest is invited into Uroro Zenzen who answers, rising to his feet to pursue the tool. Damaged, he only enters the room as the others enter the victor’s hall, the killer escapes.”

“He knows discovery is near, he knows we will remove him, he knows he should not be here, so he performs a rite to seal himself in this corpse so that we cannot send him away.”

“Petulant.”

“Thus, here we are.”

The pair then stop, releasing one another and standing side by side.

“This is how it happened. We give you this truth.”

“Your judgement is correct. Emerson Tiels did the deed.”

[arealdisappointment]

Ay yo, you know what I love about Tumblr the fact that you can just do stuff and I'm bored it's 1am and I'm losing my marbles cuz my parents didn't pay for therapy, take some stuff from the note I have saved in my phone called don't trust your mind past 9pm

(all of these are separate)

I think my whole purpose in life is to hate myself, i was made out of a false sense of love and how can you love something thats not real, something made out of lies? It has come time again that i try to reinvent myself because the only thing that consumes my every waking thought is that i hate myself and i will continue to hate myself until i can find a version of me that is worth love. The version of me that is worthwhile the version of me that is enough for you. And while it drives me insane it is the only thing that allows me to keep my sanity.

I miss my mom, and whats so heartbreaking is the fact that i look nothing like her in my day to day life. There is very little reflection of the woman who made me in myself. But over time I've noticed one thing, when i cry and when i am at my lowest i see her in my reflection. I see it in the way my eyes gloss over with unshed tears and the way my mouth curves in a frown as i try desperately to keep my voice from breaking. I see her so clearly im the way my brows furrow together in anger at how unfair the word is. I see it in the way my dimples come out of hiding, and the way the edges of my face soften. I see her when i am in pain and when my anguish and anger are no longer contained inside me, the way i assume she existed because despite the fact that she is my mother, i know next to nothing about her.

There is something so pathetic in the sense of desperately wanting, needing, begging to be loved and admired and wanting to love yourself. How is it that I've hated every aspect of myself since early childhood. I guess ive always known that I'd never amount even a fraction of what my peers were like.I haven't been able to look at myself in the mirror since i was a toddler . I am like an ugly beast trying to fool the world into believing that im just like them, trying to fool them into thinking that i am socially acceptable. No matter how much makeup you put on a pig it'll still be ugly. Theres nothing more that i want than to be loved, wanted, desired. I wish there was someone out there who could look at me and want me. In any way shape or form i wish to be loved. I crave validation like it's my only source of life, it fuels me but in a sick twisted way i will never be good enough for anyone. I sit desperate on my knees in front of god begging to be loved, to see the image that i was made in, to believe that im worth it. Every small mistake i make chips away at the armor ive so carefully crafted until the doubt and self loathing have infected me, till the belief that im worthless crawls under my skin and infrcts my very being. My mind corrupted with the idea of dying, if i cant find my worth here whats stopping me from looking on other planes.

"I wish there was someone in my life who I could lean on and tell me it's going to be okay and explain grief to me and walk me through it and hell even just let me cry and express my anguish and this pain that consumes every fiber of my being. Instead I am forced to listen to the sorrows of everyone around me. Forced to comfort those who only ignore my pain. I want my pain to be recognized too, does that make me selfish ? Am I a bad person for wanting to express my pain too? How much do I have to hurt in order to be seen. When will I ever be enough. Am I just meant to bottle everything up and let it eat me from the inside out. Why is it that no one is there for me the way I am there for them. What did I do so wrong in a past life to be forced to suffer alone and yet be surrounded by people"