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h0ney-gl0ws · 2 years ago

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Hades Boys! Kiss Headcanons!

Hello! Here are some headcanons about how/where the hades boys like to kiss/be kissed. Now including Dionysus and Ares! Hooray! Thanks for reading, and be mindful of the content warnings. CW: Mentions of PTSD and Panic attacks for Thanatos’, Intoxication for Dionysus (Obv), and mentions of blood with Ares’, oh and angst all around, read with caution!

Word Count (Approx): 1,765

Thanatos Hand Kisses|Soft

After a long shift of reaping souls Thanatos’ hands can get tired of holding his scythe. He’s not one for showing his emotions outwardly, and because of that they can seep through in more subtle ways. For instance, when Zagreus says something ignorant, or when he has to deal with a mortal whose not ready to go, or even when he runs into an Olympian he often finds himself subconsciously gripping his scythe tighter.

He does not realize until the time when he returns to your arms and he can catch his breath, the strain it puts on his hands. Aching and tired after long hours at work. Which is why he appreciates your kisses so.

You delicately ghost your soft lips across his knuckles in a most soothing way. He thinks your kisses are reminiscent of that of a butterfly’s wings. How fitting.

He would cup your face with a tired smile as you press a kiss into the palm of his hand. “Gentle kisses for Gentle Death!” You would proclaim in an attempt to make him laugh.

“My, I often wonder what it is that I did to deserve someone as kind as you…” Thanatos would say in return.

He does so much for the house the least you can do is try to relieve some of the stress. You may not be able to make less work for him, but you can show your appreciation to him by giving him the love and affection he deserves.

On certain days when Thanatos’ mood is dampened due to memories of terror from Sisyphus dirty tricks, the nights he wakes panic stricken with the phantom sting of shackles against his wrists. Your delicate kisses to his wrists help to soothe the burn. Snapping him out of his own mind into reality where he is safe, and you’re there to comfort him.

Your kisses are not only comforting to him, but you are a genuine anchor to him. He does not know how he was able to exist before you came into his life. And he is forever grateful he has you now.

Zagreus Cheek Kisses|Affectionate

For someone who so rarely sees the sunlight he certainly challenges Helios for being the embodiment of it, and his kisses reflect that.

Bright and happy is he as he presses kisses into your cheek at every chance he gets. When he passes you in the hall you bet he’s taking a detour to give you a peck before he has to continue on. When he greets you after coming back from a successful run a celebratory kiss on the cheek is practically mandatory haha.

He loves it when you celebrate with him, nuzzling your face into the side of his. It’s such a small but caring notion that makes Zagreus feel as if he’s falling in love with you all over again.

When he’s preparing to head out for another run you meet him in the courtyard to wish him luck and see him off. He smiles when he catches your figure out of the corner of his eye dashing up to you for a final embrace before he returns once again. You give him another fond kiss on the cheek there whispering in his ear to give it all he’s got and to kick Theseus’ butt once again. Earning a laugh out of Zagreus and the promise that he will dedicate his next victory against the pompous champions to you.

On nights when he has scuffles with his father, or when he’s missing his mother, and words are too much in the moment. He wants nothing more than to relish in your embrace with your kisses there to provide the comfort his parents could not.

He often doesn’t let his inner turmoil bother anyone else, and did not have anyone to confide in until you came along. There’s a lot of things left unsaid, but you will be there for Zagreus to love and support him until he is ready. Even if that day never comes, you’re glad you can a least help to alleviate his troubles for a short amount a time.

If what he needs from you is not words, but doting kisses. Then kisses he shall receive. And when Zagreus is ready to speak with you, you will listen for as long as he needs. Zagreus is so glad to have found you, and would trade anything to be able to be by your side for the rest of eternity.

Hypnos Forehead kisses|Loving

Whenever you get excited to share some news with your lover and rush to go tell him only to find him fast asleep per usual, it’s hard to not let an adoring smile come across your face as you decide to let him rest and that the news can wait, but you can’t just leave after coming all this way to see him. This often results in you giving him a caring kiss on his forehead followed by whispers for him to have sweet dreams.

Unbeknownst to you sometimes those sneaky kisses of your actually wake the sleep incarnate. He does not mind though, in fact its quite the contrary. He is able to discern your footsteps from others, and sometimes he is actually awoken but hearing you approach. Occasionally, he would pretend to be asleep if not for a bit longer in order to gain one of your tender kisses.

He doesn’t do it out of malice of course, it’s simply the thought that even when he supposedly can’t hear your or react to what you have to say, you are still kind and devoted to him.

Yes, he hears the whispers of Zagreus and his brothers. Even his own mother talks about him with distain, but when you are given the option to say or do whatever you want to him without repercussion you choose to be caring and loving.

Perhaps that is why he is so drawn to you, and why he appreciates your kisses in secret. It’s nice to have someone who genuinely loves him for him. Not someone who talks to him so “no one else has too” Nor gives him constant sarcastic and petty remarks when he’s honestly just trying to help.

Another addition of why he loves your kisses so, is they remind him of a sort of motherly love that he did not get from his own. Why when he was younger she was kind to him, yes, but as he grew and her attention divided he noticed that she began to treat him more as if he were a burden on others. Your kisses bring him back to a time when his mother still saw him as her son. It’s a warm, fluffy feeling Hypnos is always chasing more of.

So for now, he will continue to let you believe that only you can hear your words of love and adoration for him as well as your caring gestures of your love, at least until he can return the favor tenfold.

Dionysus Lip kisses|Sloppy

Where Dionysus goes jolly festivities and merriment follow, as well as you of course. And what are these festivities if not without a little bit of wine. It’d be absolutely preposterous after all to attend a feast without an offering you know.

And we all know how Dionysus is with wine. You see, when you attend a feast with Dionysus by the hands of the mortals, or any feast with Dionysus for that matter, he loves to show you off. Constantly gushing about what an amazing partner you are.

And with that showing off can come with a bit of possessiveness. So when Dionysus gets to be clingy, you remind him just how much you love him with some kisses.

Dionysus loves to kiss you as he swears he can get more drunk off of your lips than the wine. He reminds you constantly of how you taste better than the finest ambrosia.

You don’t mind his kisses yourself. Yes it can be messy, with Dionysus being constantly in a state of intoxication, but you can always taste the remnants of the contents of his everlasting goblet against his lips. Making the sweetness of his kisses worth all of the awkward nose bumps and accidental teeth clashes.

All in all if Dionysus were to have to choose between never drinking wine again and you, he’d choose you every time, as you provide all the happiness he could ever need in his lifetime.

Ares Neck kisses|Passionate

When the fires of war are blazing so are the fires of passion.

Yes, Ares loves nothing more than to watch the bloodshed of a raging battlefield with you by his side. He caresses your waist as he presses fiery kisses into your shoulder, trailing them slowly up to your neck.

The clashing of swords satiating his hunger for blood in the most intense way, leading him to sometimes get a bit too rough with you.

There are times when the battle can get to his head and that can cause him to almost lose himself, if only for a short moment. A bite, too hard for your liking. The sting against your neck intensifying the raging action on the war zone below. You gasp and flinch away, causing him to realize what he’d done.

He’d apologize by kissing you much more softer, but finds it hard to restrain himself when he seeing the droplets of blood seeping through the wound from his bite mark against your neck.

He holds back to the best of his abilities as he cleans the wound with his lips. It causes you slight pain, but this time you feel as if it is more tolerable when he is caring for you rather than going feral.

You know he never intends to hurt you, and if push comes to shove he will always try to fix it and take care of you afterwards. All you can do is be there when he needs you, when the hunger becomes too much for him to handle, and he needs someone to pull him back to reality.

He’d be lost without you, a friend, a lover, and a lifeline. He would fight to the ends of the earth for you, and you would do the same. Truly, all is fair in love and war.

#hades game #hades supergiant #zagreus x reader #zagreus hades #thanatos x reader #thanatos hades #hypnos x reader #hypnos hades #ares x reader #ares hades #dionysus hades #dionysus x reader #headcanon #h0ney gl0ws works!#angst #Fluff #kisses

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cuckoo-on-a-string · 2 years ago

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Civilian Asset 3.

Polyamorous/femme/female reader x multiple

Summary: Things go from bad to worse.

Master List / Prev chapter

Warnings: 18+, Mild/brief self harm (over-washing), language, peril, first aid/wound care, discussion of terrorism, emotional break downs

Tagging: A couple folks have asked about tagging. Unfortunately tagging breaks my posts, so I don't keep lists. But I DO reply to each comment on each chapter when I post something new. So it's like a hand-written invitation delivered by butler to your inbox.

A/N: Thank you for your continued support! I hope you enjoy this chapter. Barely edited, but made with love. Keeping chapters short for quicker updates, so that Soap teaser I dropped will actually be in 4. My bad.

You can’t think beyond my face hurts and I thought I died.

The men to either side have you packed in tight, shoulders pressing against yours, knees bumping with every sway and turn. All four of the soldiers keep their eyes on the passing landscape and the road leading through it. The men only speak to make note of potential tails, to confirm or deny the presence of new threats.

You left London a while back, and you’re in the patchwork of expanding towns spilling out beyond the green belt by the time you regain enough sense to notice.

You see very little. Fewer houses. More fields.

None of it really sinks in. The inside of the car smells like gun oil, sweat, and a coppery stink you know rises from your own clothes. Your own skin and hair and empty nail beds.

You let yourself disappear for a while. For maybe an hour, you let the static blanket your mind like snow. It’s like floating on the top of the lake, and if you break that surface tension, you’ll drown, so you let it blind your senses instead. So long as no one notices you, you don’t have to exist. You tell yourself it’s just for a minute, just for a bit, just until something else goes wrong and you have to remember pain, and fear, and whatever else makes up your life in the moment. The protective blur stretches on forever, and you lose track of time.

An itch pulls you back into your body. Eyes on you. Someone watching.

You glance up, and you meet death’s gaze in the rearview. There are eyes, but no face. Only a skull. For a brief instant you think of trying to jerk awake, like you would in a falling dream, because maybe the reaper isn’t real, unlike every other horror of the day. But then you notice the cloth beneath the bone and the military headgear.

It’s just a man in a mask, the one in the front passenger seat with the rifle you noticed as you piled in behind the Scotsman.

Skull-face blinks slowly, twice, confident you won’t look away while his eyes are closed, patiently enigmatic as a cat.

The SUV turns sharply onto a gravel track, and Skull-face turns back to the window, like he didn’t just stare you down through the mirror.

The uneven jolts as the tires dip into grooves and potholes drives away the last of the static. And you blink, eyes still on the mirror, trying to come to grips with reality.

What the actual fuck?

Around the bend, a farmhouse creeps into view. It sits low over the green turf, unassuming apart from old leaded windows that make it look too much like something out of a cottage core mood board for the situation. This isn’t a space for men with guns and tac vests.

But the man in the bucket hat taps on the brakes, nods, and says, “Ghost, Gaz: clear the house.” He doesn’t change gear. Doesn’t park. Even now, he’s ready for an ambush.

You don’t think the men who grabbed you were capable of thinking that far ahead. They did find the original safehouse, though, so maybe you should be a good civilian and keep those thoughts to yourself.

The Brit who clipped the zip ties off your wrists and helped you out of the warehouse pops out with a “Yes, sir.” So does the grim reaper up front. The doors slam shut again, and the two move in concert, guns raised, sights fixed on the windows and door as they approach. The man in the mask takes point, rushing through the door the instant his colleague turns the knob, and they disappear inside.

You’re uncomfortably aware of… everything. Your breath. The ants roving under your skin. The two men still in the car with you. It’s impossible to sit still, and you peer around your enclosure like a gerbil in a hamster ball – technically safe but in no control. The wind stirs the bushes at the edge of the driveway, and you imagine people behind them who move like your escorts. Cold. Efficient. And they’re already too close.

Your neck strains as you try to see through all the windows at once, struggling to catch a glimpse of doom before it drags you under.

“You broken?”

The leader, the man behind the wheel, must be addressing the Scot. It only registers he’s talking to you when you find said Scot watching you, too. There’s more room in the back now, but you still feel crowded and exposed in a horrible, nonsensical mess.

And – oh, right, the man is talking to you.

“Hey.” He doesn’t look through the mirror. He physically turns, arm over the back of the seat, so he can look you in the eye as he asks again, and his words come slow to your adrenaline-scoured brain. “Are you broken?”

You flounder. Puzzled. That… means what? You’re missing context. Is what broken? No bones. They didn’t – technically – hurt you that badly. Everything will fix itself in time. It could’ve been worse. You know that, even if in the moment all you want to do is sprint to the ends of the earth, find a blanket, and curl up in the darkest corner at the edge of the map.

Is he asking if you’re functional? If you can make it through debriefing?

That must be it.

And, fuck, you’d physically fight all four of them at this point if they tried to stop you from passing on the intelligence you’ve literally bled for.

“No.” You’re surprised by your own conviction (and how little your voice shakes). “Not broken.”

There’s an actual twinkle in his eye – and really, how dare he? – but his approval and the uptick of those bushy, bearded cheeks is the right kind of ridiculous in the moment. The Scot huffs beside you, but you don’t have the bandwidth for any more smirks, twinkles, or other bullshittery, so you keep your eyes forward and hope to fuck someone will tell you what to do. You can only hop between so many distractions before you miss a step and fall into a heaving mess on the floor.

“Good,” says Captain Fishing Hat. He turns back to the wheel just as Skull Face comes back.

The burly man signals, and as the boss finally turns off the engine, he opens the door and reports, “House is clear. Gaz is setting up for debrief.”

Gaz, then, must be the youngest Englishman. The Scot shifts, subtly ushering you out, and you scoot along as instructed, letting the men more or less herd you across the yard, through the door, into the kitchen. They keep their heads on a swivel, and that doesn’t help your nerves. Not at all. But they don’t give you time to stop and angst over it, either.

You find yourself in the kitchen, guided to one of four wooden chairs around a square table. It’s covered in tech. A black case sits open on one of the other seats, and the empty foam imprints inside match the boxes, cables, and laptop before you.

“Ready, Kyle?” Fishing Hat asks.

“Nearly, Captain,” Gaz replies. “Working on the connection now.”

So, Captain Fishing Hat is an actual captain. You aren’t shocked. Maybe in shock, but not surprised.

But as you sit where you’re told and watch the screen illuminate, a realization dawns on you. You won’t be debriefing to these men. Someone else at the other end of this connection is waiting for the whole story, and fear flutters to life in your gut like a startled pigeon. Loud, awkward, probably diseased.

What if you’ve misjudged all this? What if it’s a ploy? The enemy of your enemy is not always your friend, and the proper authorities aren’t the only ones hungry for the information you carry. Stiffening in your seat, you prepare for another fight, lifting the prickly guard you let drop as you knelt in the back of the SUV, clinging to the Scotsman’s tac vest.

Just as you’re glancing at the window over the kitchen sink and wondering if you jump high enough to break through the glass before any of the men grab you, a face appears on the screen, and the woman says your name.

You recognize her. Or at least her voice.

It’s the woman from the phone.

You physically droop against the back of the chair, gasping in relief.

Fuck. Fuck.

You’re going to be okay.

“Glad to see you in one piece,” she says.

“Me, too.” A rasp taints your voice, and you feel the phantom pressure of an arm crushing your trachea.

“Kate Laswell,” she introduces herself. “This is a secure line. Go ahead and tell me what you know.”

It’s easier than you expect. You’ve been thinking so much about everything you need to say, turning over pieces in your head, putting it into clearer words, ordering it by importance, that now it just flows. You lean forward, desperately ready to spill. But just because you’ve gathered everything into a coherent thread doesn’t make it any less painful to acknowledge. It’s like tugging up a string of barbed wire from your gut, pulling it out of your mouth inch by inch. You worry if you have to stop, the blades will lodge in your throat.

The woman is clearly a pro, though, and she saves her questions.

You list names first: people in American alphabet agencies with ties to a particularly violent white supremacist group. If there’s any chance they could be listening, she could end the call and try again in a secure location. But she must’ve guessed something was off when the official safehouse she sent you to was compromised. This time she’s prepared, and she lets you continue.

There’s a bomb, a new alliance with ultranationalists, someone named Makarov. It’s a test. To see if the American terrorists are as good as they say, if they’re worth Makarov’s investment. There’s a promise of more if they get the body count Makarov’s set (thousands).

The man whose blood you’ll always feel, slick between your fingers as you confused the thump of the nightclub’s base with your own pulse, kept his cover long enough to get the details of the attack. Date, location, time, target. He didn’t live long enough to give you more. He gave you what he thought was most important. You hope it’s enough. You hope it’s worth it.

Laswell thinks for a minute, then asks, “Did the men who kidnapped you indicate they knew how much of this information you possessed?”

“No. They, uh – that was the whole point, I think.” You lift you hand, so she can see the missing nails. “They wanted to know how compromised they were before they shot me.”

You say it so quickly it only clicks after it leaves your mouth. They were going to shoot you. You knew that, but away from the rough hands and zip ties it feels surreal. People like you don’t get shot. People like you have car accidents and a few too many fast food dinners for your general wellbeing. But the gun against your head was real. It’s a true thing that just happened, and that means people like you do get shot. Every safe, calm moment in your life looks like a lie, a skewed carnival mirror in retrospect.

People like you get shot.

People want to kill you.

You may still get shot. That’s why you’re in this safehouse with four heavily armed men.

Time isn’t the endless resource you imaged yesterday morning. It isn’t a solid path with clear, expected landmarks with which to gauge your progress. It’s ice, and the patch under your feet spiderwebs with ominous cracks.

You realize Laswell is speaking again.

“- handle the situation Stateside. Your current location is one of my private safehouses. Not on any list. Totally secure. I think it’s best to stay there and treat it as your base of operations for now, Captain.”

The captain, leaning over your shoulder to get in frame, nods. He’s too close without touching you, but no one’s indicated your part in this is finished. So you stay put.

“Rog,” he says.

“The attack is our chief priority, but closing the active cell in England and following their trail back to Makarov is a close second. I already have taps being set on a few of the names on that list.” Laswell says your name, and she clearly tries to soften her war face, but she’s all business right now. “I’m leaving you in the custody of the 141, under Captain Price.”

He gently claps you on the shoulder, like he’s assuming command. “Understood. Keep us in the loop, Kate.”

“Roger that. Keep your heads down. Stay safe. Over and out.”

The feed cuts out, Gaz – Kyle? – closes the laptop, moving the chaos out of the way as the Scotsman appears with a first aid kit. None of the soldiers leave space for an awkward pause. They all have a mission. Somewhere to be. Something to do.

The captain pulls a second chair up beside yours, meeting your gaze with another of his disarmingly charming smiles that crinkles at his eyes. As he and the Scot begin sorting through the kit, he says, “We’re overdue for introductions. Captain John Price.”

He holds out his hand, and you tentatively accept it in a piss poor handshake, but his smile doesn’t break, and he gestures at the Scotsman. “That’s Sergeant Johnny MacTavish, or Soap.”

The sergeant waves with a handful of cotton pads and disinfectant. He points into the corner, where Skull Face lurks. “Grumpy bastard in the corner’s Ghost. He’s a lieutenant. If you were curious.”

No one offers his real name, and you swallow down every question with a vengeance. The names make them seem real, concrete, and you seize the lifeline they’ve thrown.

You make eye contact with the last man, trying to prove you aren’t a sack of potatoes in human skin and have an actual, working brain between your ears. “And you’re Gaz?”

He smiles, reaching over the table to shake your hand in a way that makes you double down on your bet that he’s the youngest. Certainly the least jaded, even if he’s every bit the soldier the others are. “Sergeant Kyle Garrick, yeah.”

Ghost pushes off from the wall and heads back towards the front door. “I’ll take first watch.”

Whether he’ll be watching the road from a sniper’s perch or chilling by a window, you can only guess, but his captain gives him another nod, and off he goes. Sociable as an alley cat.

“Let’s see about that hand, then.” Calloused fingers rasp along the underside of your wrist as the captain lifts your hand into the light. He arranges it carefully on the table, keeping his touch gentle so you don’t feel the raw bands of irritated skin where the zip ties bruised you.

It isn’t like you’re resisting. The bloody nail beds don’t look right, and you’re struggling to believe they belong to you at all. There’s an experiment where people develop an artificial connection to and fear for an artificial hand. You feel like you’re in an opposite test. Your eyes say the hand on the table belongs to you, but it doesn’t feel that way. If the captain sawed it off instead of gingerly spraying antiseptic ointment over the exposed nerves, you might just shrug it off.

The bandages hurt, though.

The pain tugs at your gut, and you rejoin your whole body with a shudder. That hurts, too. You take a deep breath, and your stomach aches. Your free hand squeezes into a fist, and the scabs on your knuckles crack open. When tears flood your eyes, you can only imagine what new agonies they’d summon if you let them fall, so you blink furiously and pretend your eyelashes aren’t so wet they stick together.

As his captain finishes treating your hand, the Scot – MacTavish, Johnny, Soap, whatever the fuck you’re supposed to call him – takes a seat on the table, pinches your chin, and puts one of those little cleansing pads he’d been fussing with to work. It stings like a bitch, and you flinch despite your best efforts.

Still holding your chin, he angles your face up and blows over a series of cleaned scrapes on your cheek. The tiny breeze might as well be a hurricane. It knocks the soul from your body, and you go entirely still, befuddled.

“The fuck, Soap?” Gaz asks.

The Scot huffs, getting back to work with a fresh gauze pad, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “You’re supposed to blow on cuts,” he grumbles, like he’s trying to sound gruff to make up for the accidental sentiment. “So they don’t sting.”

It makes you want to smile. You can’t remember how right now, but maybe you’ll think back to this moment and smile about it later.

“Thanks,” you say instead.

Soap has not forgotten how to smile. “You’re welcome, bonnie. Let me put a butterfly plaster on this, and you’ll be fit as a fiddle again.”

A nice thought, and maybe true for a soldier like him, but every screaming inch of your body informs you this is a lie.

The captain taps your knee, pulling your attention back to the fading crinkles at the corners of his eyes. He lifts a finger and leads your gaze from side to side, leaning in close to see if your pupils are the same size. “Doesn’t look like you have a concussion. Are you hurt anywhere else? Any risk of internal bleeding? Cracked ribs?”

Gaz, seeing your confusion (because how the fuck would you KNOW if you were bleeding internally?) offers some helpful context. “Did they kick you in the stomach? Any sharp pains in your chest when you breathe?”

Did they kick you? You can’t really remember. Probably. It’s all a furious blur of motion and panic.

“I’m not sure.”

It’s the truth, but it’s a bad one. The captain nods as a wintery flash passes over Gaz’s face. “That’s all right. Let us know if you notice any unusual swelling or new pains, yeah?”

“Okay.”

One more big smile – a bit forced, definitely for show – lifts his whiskers, and he climbs out of his chair, pulling it out of your way.

Gaz steps up to lead you out of the kitchen. You feel like a football – always under someone’s control, being run by one teammate to the next. But what else is there to do to, really? You follow him up a narrow flight of stairs to a pokey hall on the second level. There are three doors, and the first you pass has three twin beds crammed inside. The second is smaller but only holds two beds. And the last door leads to a bathroom. Gaz, clearly used to safehouse etiquette, fishes a washcloth, towel, and little bar of soap out of the deep, dark depths of a cupboard too high for you to reach.

He sets them on the counter in a tidy pile and says, “You really shouldn’t get your bandages wet for forty-eight hours, but I bet you feel like hell. Washing up a little with just the sink might help.”

His big brown eyes fix on you, too soft and looking for some kind of confirmation you’re okay without getting in your face.

Are you broken?

Fuck. They’re all trying to make this normal. What happened isn’t their fault, and they’ve surely seen worse. They probably don’t have to babysit damaged goods after the fact very often, though. The least you can do is try to make this normal for them, too.

“Like a bus ran over me, backed up, and ran over me again.” You think for a minute and add: “Might’ve been some Nazgul, or cave trolls, or some other shit, too.”

The soldier snorts. A grin catches him by surprise and turns his whole face bright. The effort was definitely worth it.

“Tolkien? I like it.” As he moves out of the bathroom, he points at the smaller bedroom. “Take whatever bed in there you want. Since one of us will be on watch, we probably won’t need the other one. Give you a bit of privacy. Try to get some rest, yeah?”

You can’t imagine how you’ll fall asleep, but you act like his suggestion is as reasonable as it sounds.

“Of course.”

He leaves you alone.

You soak the washcloth in tepid water and peel off your shirt. There’s a countdown of little tasks in your head, ways to delay the inevitable. How long can you linger over the soap and cheap terrycloth? What if you just lock the door and keep wake sitting on the cold floor?

Then you notice your reflection.

You haven’t thought about what you look like. It’s less your face staring back and more a collection of hurts, and you struggle to find yourself through the bruises and bandages.

Everything aches, throbs, or stings. You’re so scared you want to smash your head into the counter just in case it’s like in the movies, and time rewinds, letting you wake up in bed at the hostel with a clear head and free day to play tourist. You know how to do that. Always going, doing, seeing. Always a task, a plan, an idea.

Now your hands are empty – apart from that one fucking piece of glitter you can’t get off between your thumb and forefinger. It winks in the light, and you scrub at it in a frenzy. You clean everything in a rush, too rough with your bruises, but you’re on the verge of a breakdown, and you don’t want to fall apart in anything resembling a public space.

It’s all been too much for too long.

You open the door carefully, peek up and down the hall, wary of minding eyes. Then you nearly trip over your own feet getting into the smaller bedroom.

Door shut.

Shoes off.

Everything else stays on, every layer between you and the world outside a blessing as you bury yourself alive under a stiff, scratchy blanket that probably came from a secondhand shop two decades ago. Your breath catches when you breathe in, like you’re choking on the stuff you need to live. The air bubbles out in gasps. Painful. On the verge of sobs. But that would be too loud. You must be quiet and still or something awful will find you again.

It's a good thing tears are silent. You soak the flat pillow with them, hiding in the dark under the covers.

Impossibly, you do sleep. It takes a while, but your body screams for rest, and it pulls you deep as you cry yourself out into nightmares of voices arguing just behind your head, and eyes that send beams of light around shadowed walls.

#simon ghost riley x reader #ghost x reader #john soap mactavish x reader #soap mactavish x reader #soap x reader #captain price x reader #john price x reader #141 x reader #cod fanfic #cod fanfiction #fanfiction

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aihoshiino · 3 months ago

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i wonder how different the story would have gone if, instead of sending ryosuke, kamiki would have visited ai on his own.

the part of me that needs them to be happy says that while he isn't necessarily enamored with the twins at first, he still tries to his best with them. maybe they think he's their new babysitter at first, that'd be funny.

anyways, kamiki awkwardly co-parenting with ai and both of them fumbling through being exes and parents and still caring so deeply for eachother but also being too traumatized to properly communicate.

aqua and ruby are first hostile when they realize that this is the man that got ai pregante™, and then they become the twos biggest shippers. cue incredibly convoluted attempts to get them together again. (i feel that it is important to point out that they're still toddlers at that time, which would make this extra funny)

So the thing about HKAI and the mess that was their relationship is that Hikaru sending Ryosuke in his place is ultimately a symptom, not a cause. It is a consequence of his arrested development in regards to Ai and his inability to conceive of a world where the two of them exist separate of their relationship. To a degree, asking 'could Hikaru and Ai be happy if he didn't send Ryosuke' is kind of asking for Hikaru to be a different character, because at the place he's at at the moment he makes that decision, he can't not make that choice. I've described Ai's tragedy in the past as being simultaneously preventable and unavoidable and the same goes for Hikaru. It's like a fucked up reverse Oroborous - in order to create the conditions for him to be a happier and healthier person, he must already have started taking the steps towards becoming that person - or at least to be further down the road than he is at the equivalent point in canon.

Even if we remove Ryosuke from the picture, I can't really imagine things going that well. I kind of touched on it in a previous ask but even the one-sided conversation we hear that seals Ai's fate raises a lot of red flags for me. He leaps to assuming that Ai is trying to get back together with him and when gently turned down romantically but still offered an opening back into her life as the father of her children, he chooses to betray her trust and send someone to terrorize and potentially hurt Ai and their children so she could 'feel his despair'. Even if we believe his insistence that he really didn't think Ryosuke would kill her, this is still an utterly reprehensible thing to do. It implies a level of not just desire but outright entitlement - that he feels he has the right to 'punish' Ai for… what? Not wanting to rush back into a relationship with him after like, five years of minimal-to-no contact? When he's gone right ahead and proved that the issues that caused their breakup have not been resolved?

Obviously, this is not to say that Hikaru doesn't sincerely love Ai with all his heart or that he doesn't care for her at all. I actually think that contradiction between his clearly observable feelings for her and the actions he nevertheless chooses to take is really fascinating in what it adds to him as a character. A big part of the reason why Hikaru's so fucked up is because he's so deeply in love with Ai and so utterly unable to cultivate a nuanced or healthy relationship with his idea of her.

So… I guess if I'm honest, my vision of it is more Hikaru using visiting the twins as a way of leveraging his way back into Ai's life, successfully or otherwise. I don't really see a scenario where Hikaru is able to work out his shit and become a decent father or partner for Ai, just because too many of his issues are tangled up in this longed-for codependence with her. Maybe this older and wiser Ai could find a way to save him like she wished for, but… is it really fair to put that weight on her shoulders? Why should she, a person with her own desperate struggles and lack of support, go right back to performing the backbreaking emotional labor that contributed to that all-consuming codependence in the first place?

To be clear, I'm saying this as a proud HikaAi shipper who loves a fucked up life-warping codependent romance, but in the context of Oshi no Ko and when we're talking about what would actually make these characters happy, I think Hikaru and Ai, at the place they are at the time of the tragedy, are not in a position to make each other truly fulfilled and happy.

askslmdslkdlsmdsl i'm so sorry anon you sent me such a cute prompt and got this utterly harrowing essay in response 😭 I'M SORRY THAT'S JUST HOW IT CAME OUT

#oshi no ko #oshi no posting #ai hoshino #onk spoilers #hikaru kamiki #hikaai #kamiai #onk asks

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afniel · 1 year ago

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(Sorry for stealing your post and going completely Special Interest ham on it but this topic awakens things in me.)

We have a small yard, no children, a pretty solid mid-level tech worker salary, and somehow actually own a home finally...so we're having the entire front's landscaping redone to be water-conscious, with tons of native pollinator-supporting plants, many of which are also edible, and the rest of the space is going to be a little water-friendly hardscaping and a lot of disability-friendly fruit, herb, and vegetable raised garden beds. Plus a native bee house! And a compost bin!

That's a way bigger project than anything listed here, but man, everything counts, do the smaller things. I'm so serious. At our old rental down the street I used to tell the gardeners to leave the yard alone because it was full of miner's lettuce, which is native here (and edible too, as long as you aren't prone to kidney stones since it's got a higher amount of oxalate. Tasty stuff. It's like a slightly more crunchy young spinach). Native bugs and small animals loved it. I kept the lemon tree there watered, partly because heck yeah free lemons for food and cleaning, but also because it fed so many native bees.

Getting real into native species is a fantastic way to get involved. Honestly, even if it doesn't sound interesting to you now, just give it a try for the sake of having a game of Where's Waldo to play when you're outdoors. Pick a few things to look for to start off and take pictures of anything that catches your eye to identify them later. Spotting something you don't see often is a delight (ask me how Ape Shitt I went when I went out to play some disc with friends back in Indiana in the early spring and found toadshade trillium and Dutchman's breeches growing in the forest course. Or the recent hike I took in the hills and I saw a newt trundling along!!! I'm STILL excited about the newt!!!!!). It's like all the fun of Pokémon Go, but instead you upload things to iNaturalist and also they're real things that exist and you find yourself lying in the mud holding your breath trying to take pictures of them, and only afterwards do you realize what you did to your clothes because you got so excited.

And it's like...little things like this really do matter! Catalogue your native species! Look for new ones! Look up invasive and naturalized species and make decisions about what you'll allow to grow in your spaces! Learn how these little guys live and survive! Once you have an emotional connection to them, it's so much easier to want to take steps to preserve them. Even the 'gross' ones aren't gross once you feel like they're Your gross little guys. Making an infographic about native wasps is hard. Making an infographic about Your native wasps, that live in your yard, that you've personally seen and watched feed and raise young, is like telling everyone about your favorite blorbo but even better because they're real and you can point them out in person and make a space for them to thrive.

Anyway I've taken my own advice here as you can tell and I am SO GODDAMN HYPE to eventually have valley carpenter bees living right in my yard, because have you SEEN the males? They're bright gold and FLUFFY! They're like TEDDY BEARS that fly around. They aren't aggressive or territorial to people, we're the wrong size for them to care like that, they just want to see what we're doing because they're curious and highly visual things. I love them with my entire heart and you can too! I have to this day a phobia of bees! I have overcome more of it than I ever thought possible because I decided to research the giant monster beast bees outside my door instead of just reacting in terror, because they were here first. Once I really internalized that invasive European yellow jackets are the aggressive guys (but even they can learn faces and acclimate to humans that don't harass them!) and native bees and wasps are 99% super chill, I finally don't suffocate just going outside, and I couldn't have done it without getting real into native species conservation and education.

Okay I'll stop rambling now but I absolutely have got to share a male valley carpenter before I go.

(Public domain photo via Wikipedia)

He is so handsome, you guys. How could I possibly stay afraid of him.

like, yknow, I get it, climate doomerism feels cleansing and just and right and important, but making yourself suffer with stress and fear over the future...does nothing. It's punishment, not work.

And capitalism puts us in this place of abject paralysis when the only options presented to us for things we, personally, can do are Buy Different Product and Buy Product Differently.

Isn't it a torture to try to fix the Earth by buying a different combination of products from the very industries that are killing it, and being told you're killing the planet because of Buying Product—by the entities that sold you the Product in the first place?

Do something outside capitalism. Join or start a community garden. Organize with gardeners in your neighborhood and start an initiative to grow native species. Yoink some seed heads from the side of the road. Write about the importance of insects. Make infographics about moths. Grow your own food and give it to others. Pull invasive species from an empty lot. Print out posters with lists of important native host plants for pollinating insects and leave them mysteriously all over your neighborhood. Grow milkweed, collect the seeds, and go door to door giving people milkweed seeds randomly. Plants are anarchists, the possibilities really are endless.

#SORRY I GOT REALLY EXCITED I FEEL VERY MANY WAYS ABOUT THIS #native species #conservation #nature #climate change #bee

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makeste · 4 years ago

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BnHA Chapter 299: No Chains Left

Previously on BnHA: Horikoshi was all “and then AFO broke out all of the inmates from six other prisons and took a nap. well anyways, here’s the hospital angst.” Kacchan woke up two days later and was all, “WAIT BUT HOW ARE DEKU AND TODOROKI AND ALL OF THE OTHER CHARACTERS EXCEPT IIDA DOING” and then we cut to Shouto’s room where the other U.A. kids were sitting around being Mutually Traumatized and giving each other moral support and such. Everyone was alll, “...”, and then the rest of the Todofam showed up, INCLUDING POSSIBLY REI?! which, omg. The chapter ended with Kacchan STOMPING THROUGH THE HALLS all “WHADDYA MEAN DEKU HASN’T WOKEN UP YET”, dragging along Satou and Mineta behind him, fueled by the power of ALL OF THE FUCKS HE NOW GIVES. He gives so many fucks now you guys. This boy cares so much he can probably deduct it on his taxes.

Today on BnHA: SPEAKING OF PEOPLE WHO GIVE A LOT OF FUCKS, the story cuts abruptly to Hawks, freshly recovering from his near-death experience, and pondering the threads that have weaved the tapestry of his life and led him to this moment. Basically he grew up in poverty with his Jerk Dad and Jerk Mom until his dad got arrested one day and his mom sent him off to go Find Money Or Something, and so he rescued a busload of people and found himself a new career. Back in the present day, Hawks and Jeanist ride around town in Jeanist’s Jamborghini having awkward encounters with civilians in a country on the brink of social collapse, and visiting Hawks’s mother’s home. Hawks is all “I know from an outsider’s perspective it must look like my life currently sucks, but now that the HPSC is gone, my public image is shot, and my parents are finally out of my life, I’m actually feeling SURPRISINGLY GOOD.” Anyway so he’s gonna go meet up with Endeavor now, and p.s. this chapter was fucking fantastic though, damn.

oh my god?? is this Hawks narration?? something about him growing up watching the heroes on TV and thinking of them as fictional characters

okay I scrolled down a little bit more to see the rest of that “Keigo” panel, and wow

this is basically a shed. poor boy definitely grew up rough. let me tell you guys, I came in here ready for some BakuDeku shenanigans; I was not prepared for Hawks Flashback Angst. I AM HERE FOR IT, but also wow I gotta brace myself now lol

HELLO MISTER HAWKS’S JERK DAD, SIR

BnHA sure does have an array of Jerk Dads, doesn’t it. makes me appreciate characters like Masaru and JirouDad all the more for bucking the trend

anyway. so Horikoshi, you really thought that one itty bitty chapter of hospital catharsis would be enough to calm us all before you went right back to showing us child abuse huh. my god man can we rest

BABY HAWKS

swear to god this kid can’t be more than five or six, and yet he has this completely blank look on his face even with his dad looming over him being all threatening and shit. like he’s shut down his emotions to protect himself. imagine what has to happen to a child for him to have learned this at such a young age. fuck

AND MEANWHILE THIS GUY

don’t mingle with humans?? not “other” humans, just humans?? what is this implying here?? and also holy shit Hawks definitely didn’t inherit his looks from his dad orz

then again he doesn’t really bear much of a resemblance to his strung-out mom here either

omg omg omg. and this child is basically trapped here in this environment with these two people. this explains a SHITLOAD about Hawks’s personality though you guys. his ability to completely separate his real thoughts from the face he presents to the outside world. his pragmatic approach to analyzing and solving problems. his layers of emotional walls. turns out almost none of that came from the HPSC training -- that was all learned hands-on in his own personal do-or-die survival nightmare childhood!! oh, boy

and small wonder then that he latched on to Endeavor so strongly if he really is the one who brought down his dad and inadvertently saved him from this. also, just putting this out there, I know people are always talking about him and Dabi being foils, and I think it’s very interesting how Touya grew up in a household where he saw firsthand the dark side of hero society, and so ended up becoming a villain in order to bring it down. whereas young Keigo had almost the exact opposite experience, growing up experiencing the dark side of villain society and becoming a hero in order to bring about a world where no one else has to experience that. just. both of them are so determined not to become their fathers. some interesting parallels there

so Hawks was sort of an accident after his parents had “thanks for helping me not get caught after I killed that guy” sex, and now this little boy is growing up in squalor and being beaten by his father for things like Sitting In The Wrong Out-Of-The-Way Corner Trying Not To Be A Bother To Anybody. holy fuck. this is so rough to read through you guys

wait so does Jerk Dad have a an eyeball manipulation quirk?? because he doesn’t have the wings like his son, but wth are these things??

this presumably also means that Keigo has never been to school or anything either. he basically doesn’t exist. he thinks heroes are fictional characters, he doesn’t realize that they’re real people. these are people who could help him if he could escape and find them, but he doesn’t know, and they don’t know about him

OH MY GOD HE’S JUST SITTING IN HIS CORNER HUGGLING HIS ENDEAVOR PLUSH OH MY GOD

how could this child possibly have an anti-fandom when he’s done NOTHING WRONG HIS ENTIRE LIFE. huh. just explain that to me. lol I mean I’m not looking to pick a fight with anyone, but also, MAYBE I AM, idk?? this kid has gotten me all riled up lmao

anyways, Protect Keigo 2021, and thank you Horikoshi for these three very terrible pages. I am pleased to inform you that you’ve effectively gotten your point across and you may now commence saving this kid already

YAY

oh no, Keigo’s dumbass jerk dad tried to steal a car and the popo nabbed his ass and now his mom can’t just sit around neglecting her VERY YOUNG SON all day long, oh horrors. sorry lady my tiny violin is on backorder. just imagine that I’m playing a very sarcastic song on it for you

anyway so what are you gonna do now, abandon him? I can hardly imagine he’d be worse off, if anything it might be a near-instant improvement

LMAO HE’S ALL “WAIT WHAT ENDEAVOR’S A REAL FUCKING DUDE?!”

AND THEY SAY THAT A HERO CAN SAVE US~~~~ I’M NOT GONNA STAND HERE AND WAAAAAIT~~~~~ I’LL HOLD ONTO THE WINGS OF THE EAGLES, WATCH AS WE ALL FLY AWAAAAAAY~~~~

lol what a randomly pivotal moment in his young life. TIME TO GO MAKE THESE MEMES INTO DREAMS YOUNG ONE

anyway so his mom freaked out and grabbed him and they wound up at a train station with her TELLING HIM TO GO GET HER SOME MONEY, oh my god. SURE MOM LEMME JUST WALTZ RIGHT ON DOWN TO THE “JOBS FOR FIVE-YEAR-OLDS” STORE AND TELL THEM I NEED SOME CASH. ffff manifesting someone to come help him in 3... 2...

...

SIGH, JUST GO RESCUE THE PEOPLE FROM THE BUS, KEIGO. is this the outfit he was wearing when that happened?? it must be, right?? I can’t imagine them surviving more than a couple days out here unless this starts getting REALLY dark in a way I know that even Horikoshi won’t explore, so yeah. cut to the HPSC now please. never thought we’d be glad to see them. I mean sure, it may be an “out of the frying pan...” case, but good god

THANK YOU!!

and I guess it was his mom’s eyeball quirk then. anyway, whatever, see you again never, hopefully. lol oh man. thaaaat, was upsetting. need to center myself here for a sec. NAMASTE

OH YAY THE PRESENT

so we cut from Baby Hawks Angst straight to Present Day Hawks Angst, huh. not that this exhausted and traumatized lil lad isn’t still a baby to me too, I’ll have you know

BEST JEANIST, ALWAYS WITH THE JOKES

“WHEW, THOUGHT YOU DIED ON ME FOR A SEC THERE KID.” lmao. Caleb will no doubt ruin this by making his word choice all stiffly formal as usual, so I’m just going to treasure this “WOULD YOU LOOK AT THAT, I’M FRESH OUT OF FUCKS” version of Jeanist while I can

look at him, driving his Jeanistmobile

again, is it any wonder Kacchan was bitching about Endeavor’s dinky little car when he was used to riding around town in style like this. anyone else staring at this panel trying to figure out how this car is somehow secretly made of jeans

NOOOOO

FUCK YOU DABI LMAO. PUTTING THESE VOICE ACTORS OUT OF A JOB ONE BY ONE

anyway so Jeanist is all “GOOD THING IT’S THE FUTURE AND WE’RE SO GOOD AT MEDICAL SCIENCE” to handwave how Hawks went from one step shy of being a very handsome corpse, to sitting around texting Jeanist in a car all of two days later

OH MY GOD, AND FINALLY AN EXPLANATION FOR THIS

wait a minute. I’m so confused lmfao. soooo, was Hawks all “anyway, here’s Jeanist’s dead body, you can examine it but please don’t look at him too closely and also I’m gonna need that back unharmed.” how tf did you pull that off lmao

(ETA: also isn’t this technically confirmation of the ol’ Noumu Jeanist theory lol. I’m gonna go ahead and say it is.)

NO BUT PLEASE, CONTINUE. I unironically love reading Horikoshi’s overly convoluted “SEE IT’S NOT A PLOT HOLE” explanations

lkldslfk so wait, you’re telling me Hawks convinced Dabi and the League to put Jeanist’s body in storage, and basically just hoped they wouldn’t use him for any experiments until he could put his plan into action and have the HPSC’s people break in and find and revive him?? WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG. A FOOLPROOF PLAN IF I’VE EVER HEARD ONE

fff this man really asked Jeanist to risk it all to prop up his little cover story, and Jeanist was all “sure why not” omfg. anyways, thanks for recapping all of this out loud for no particular reason in your car conversation you two

LMAO NOW WHAT

TROUBLE YOU SAY? GOOD THING THE NEW NUMBER ONE HERO IS ON THE JOB THEN

okay no it’s just some random thugs strolling around terrorizing the downtown. fuck ‘em. so Jeanist is making short work of them now

uh oh

won’t come? not can’t, but won’t?? what???

WOW

well I guess that makes the local heroes A BUNCH OF SHITHEADS now doesn’t it?? jesus

and okay, serious question, if the cops are spread too thin and the heroes have literally walked out on the job, what exactly is stopping everyone from deciding to use their quirks to defend themselves, legal or not? nothing, as far as I can tell. society just got a hell of a lot more chaotic

anyway so this is an interesting panel here

man, Dabi really did pull it off, didn’t he. well anyway so here’s that better world all of the villains were wanting, you guys! isn’t it so great?? everyone’s terrified and angry and losing hope and society is inches away from collapsing into total anarchy! but hey, at least we exposed the number one hero as a hypocrite

anyway so what are these guys up to

fucking hell, he’s visiting his mom. I really wasn’t prepared to commit this much emotional energy towards reading this chapter today. BUT VERY WELL, WE PRESS ON

?? wait she’s not there?

is this supposed to explain how Dabi knew who Hawks really was? except that there’s the little matter of how he even know where to find his mother in the first place. feels like we’re still missing something there, but oh well

OH MY GOD

RHA I TAKE BACK EVERY WORD I EVER SPOKE AGAINST YOU. YOU ARE A SCANLATION GROUP FILLED WITH ANGELS LMAO. I WILL TAKE THIS PANEL IN MY HANDS, AND TREASURE IT AND KEEP IT SAFE

ANYWAY, BECAUSE MY TIRED BIRD SON’S LIFE SUCKED SO MUCH ALREADY, IT TURNS OUT HE’S ACTUALLY PLEASED WITH THIS NEW TURN OF EVENTS LOL HOW ABOUT THAT

GOOD FOR YOU BBY. YOU GO OUT THERE AND BE YOUR OWN PERSON

and in all seriousness, I love that identity he chooses -- chooses, because it actually is him making a choice now, possibly for the very first time in his life -- is “guy who helps people”, though. it really is nothing short of miraculous that he held on to that kind of optimism and desire to do good even with everything he’s been through. there were so many times he could have chosen to turn his back on the world in retaliation for the way it treated him. but he didn’t!! and here he is now, finally free, and what he wants to do with the rest of his life now is simply to help others. anyway please excuse me for a moment, I need to go find some sort of basket or a big vase to put all of my fresh new Hawks Feels in, pardonne-moi

YEAH BOIIIIII

“FIRST ORDER OF BUSINESS, MISTER JEANIST, WHERE DID YOU FIND YOUSELF THAT SWEETASS CAR.” hey, all I’m saying is if this boy’s wings really aren’t growing back, he’s gonna need to find himself a new means of transportation y’know?

oh my god you guys it’s a flashback to his mom buying him the Endeavor plushie when he was like two because, and I quote, ALL MIGHT WAS TOO EXPENSIVE

oh my god oh my god. my boy out here with a new lease on life finding hope in the darkest of times

wasn’t your throat supposed to be all fucked up lmao. Horikoshi was suddenly all “oh shit the VAs are gonna be pissed at me if I keep this up huh”

“that’s why Bubaigawara was such a great guy” motherfucker IT IS A TERRIBLE DAY FOR RAIN. FORECAST SAID NOTHING ABOUT THIS

:’)

yes ma’am. yes indeed. confirmed, I really will straight up fight some motherfuckers for this child. well not really, but YOU KEEP YOUR DISCOURSE OFF MY LAWN AND OUT OF MY BLOG YOU HEAR. THIS IS A HAWKS-FRIENDLY SPACE. WE RESPECT TAKAMI KEIGO IN THESE STREETS

and he’s saying (or is he thinking?? what a weirdly shaped speech bubble this is) that even if what Dabi said about the Todoroki household is true, “I’m not sure it’s the same now.” which happens to be ABSOLUTELY CORRECT. man this whole chapter really is all about saying “fuck the past” and moving forward and I am living for it

SON!!!!

“the first step is at my beginning” fklkjlk. what an iconic fucking line??

AND HIS WINGS!!!! THEY ACTUALLY ARE GROWING BACK AHHHHHHH. “PUT A RAINCHECK ON THAT CAR, JEANIST-SAN.” THE HAWKSMOBILE CAN WAIT, RIGHT NOW HE HAS TO GO INSERT HIMSELF BACK INTO THE TODODRAMA WHETHER THEY LIKE IT OR NOT

you guys. I came here ready for some BAKUDEKU HOSPITAL ANGST, and I got DIDDLY SHIT of that, and none of my other kids were even in this chapter, but!!! ASK ME IF I CARE LMAO omg. because bird son is hanging with his new best friend, and he’s out here Finding Himself and picking up the pieces and putting them back together stronger than ever because RESILIENCE HAS A NAME, AND IT’S SPELLED H-A-W-K-S, and you guys. profound, my love for this child. holy shit. hey google, play Silence by Marshmello

#bnha 299 #takami keigo #hawks (bnha)#best jeanist #bnha #boku no hero academia #bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #bnha manga spoilers #makeste reads bnha #I found peace in your violence #can't tell me there's no point in trying #I'm at one #and I've been quiet for too long

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woulddieforperrytheplatypus · 4 years ago

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What're some of your favorite moments between Doof and Perry during Phineas and Ferb?

youtube

You have absolutely no idea how fucking long I spent making this video fhdsjahkjaf I’m gonna gush under the cut about why I liked each one so y’all don’t have to deal with me if you don’t want to lol

These are in no particular order. They’re just numbered to line up with the reasoning. I added lil descriptions to each of them but you’ll probably have to either watch the video first or have a pretty good memory of the show to understand them lol

1. “Dr. Wexler, you’re a platypus?” (A Hard Day’s Knight)

Literally just the way he says, “Dr. Wexler, you’re a platypus?”

2. “Is every platypus named Perry?” and then Perry bites him (AT2D)

M O N C H (also Heinz calls him cute) (also also “We do not bite the elderly!”)

3. Perry tries to fly him and Heinz home from the desert but Heinz flips the turbo switch and they lose the jetpack (Road to Danville)

“Like you didn’t know about my switch-flipping compulsion!” They’re literally an old married couple omfg I can’t even (also moment of appreciation for the fact that they’re close enough that Heinz just assumes Perry knows about his switch-flipping compulsion) (another moment of appreciation because Perry probably does)

4. The end of the Perry/Doof subplot of Terrifying Tri-State Trilogy of Terror

First of all, the way Perry decides to run under his giant floating head when going around would take two extra seconds? Beautiful. And, of course, Perry’s fucking smirk because that’s just not his problem lmaooo

5. The pause in the FIGHT FIGHT IT’S A PLATYPUS FIGHT (Doofapus)

I love that they literally just stop mid-fight to have tea. I firmly believe there is no other pair of nemeses that would do that and this is just how Heinz and Perry work. Also, Perry’s smile? He feels so understood? It’s so pure?

6. Vanessa lets Perry in before he can break down the door with his rocket launcher and then Perry accidentally shoots it through the wall (My Sweet Ride)

“This is why I can never have anything nice -_-”

7. Heinz doesn’t trap Perry (Road to Danville)

He’s so confused fjdahfksdhfak he literally goes out of his way to get trapped at that point (even if he pretends he doesn’t) and Heinz flipped the script on him without telling him and his lil shrug is so cute and I just jsfhkjadhsk

8. There’s a Platypus Controlling Me (Brain Drain)

You had to know this one was gonna be there

9. “In your letters, you said your nemesis was a suave, semi-aquatic personification of unstoppable dynamic fury” (Oil on Candace)

The fact that Heinz sent his ex-professor a letter gushing about his nemesis is just *chef’s kiss*

10. Perry and Dennis are fighting in giant puppets in the street and Heinz recognizes Perry piloting the puppet because of his fighting style (The Return of the Rogue Rabbit)

I’m pretty sure this is the only time Heinz ever recognizes Perry without his hat on (correct me if I’m wrong tho) and the fact that it’s literally just because Perry punched the fuckin camera kills me every time

11. Heinz is worried they won’t make his play in time so Perry tells him to flip the turbo switch (Road to Danville)

Perry just trusts him so much??? Flipping the switch was what got them into that mess in the first place??? But Perry cares so much about Heinz making his LOVEMUFFIN play that he’s willing to give it another go??? I love it???

12. DANCE BABY DANCE BABY HANDS IN THE AIR (Candace Disconnected)

I feel like we don’t get to see Perry just kinda hanging out like that a lot. He’s always doing that steely glare, even when they’re having fun. I don’t think Perry really realizes how emotionless he can look sometimes (the beginning and end of Sidetracked are from Perry’s POV especially at the end, the way he acts with the boys shows too much character for a secret agent, so even though he seems to think it’s obvious that he’s all lovey dovey with them, he does much too good a job at hiding his emotions) but it’s nice to see him drop the facade every now and then

13. Heinz calls Monogram because Perry hasn’t shown up (Perry the Actorpus)

I know Perry’s not technically in this one but I love that Heinz a) calls OWCA when Perry doesn’t show up and b) looks so nervous as he calls OWCA because Perry hasn’t shown up

14. Perry brings Heinz a glass of water (Road to Danville)

Half this episode is just them being mad at each other because they blame the other one for sticking them in the desert with way home, and I love that even though Perry’s been fuming pretty much the entire time, the second Heinz actually starts yelling at him, he’s immediately hit with a wave of guilt (also I love that he somehow found a glass of water in the middle of the desert?)

15. “YOU PEED ON MY COUCH!” (AT2D)

Not gonna lie, I mostly picked this one for shits and giggles BUT that doesn’t mean I can’t overanalyze it because that’s what I do best. Perry’s whole role in the show is to tie together the two completely unrelated plots, and that’s only so entertaining because not only does neither side know the other, but neither side knows what version of Perry the other side knows. This is the first time Heinz has really connected mindless pet Perry with Agent P Perry, and I feel like that was the most interesting part of the movie was that Phineas, Ferb, Candace, and Heinz all saw a side of Perry they didn’t know.

16. Heinz invites Perry out for lunch (The Quietest Day Ever)

Heinz doesn’t even know he got hit with the de-handsome-inator. He literally just thinks he lost, and his immediate reaction is to ask if Perry wants to hang out. I just love those lil insights into their relationship when they’re not fighting. Also, perry.exe has stopped working.

17. Honestly just all of Father’s Day

I hate knowing that chronologically, Father’s Day had to happen probably less than halfway through the summer and not towards the end like it does in the episode order. It’s such a sweet turning point in their relationship. Perry’s head all these horrible backstories about Mr. Doofenshmirtz and I can only assume he hates the guy, but he’s still so supportive of Heinz trying to win his approval -- and he’s supportive when that fails and Heinz needs someone to lean on.

18. Perry Lays An Egg

T H W A R T M E P E R R Y T H E P L A T Y P U S

19. Heinz proving he knows how to shut the fuck up by refusing to shut the fuck up (Road to Danville)

Perry’s literally about to fight a bitch and I can’t blame him. I also like the lil look into Heinz’s thoughts with the “it’s not like I have to fill the space” line because it really explains a lot about him.

20. Perry waiting for the New Year’s ball to drop and for Heinz to finish his scheme (Happy New Year!)

Once again, a beautiful look at how their entire relationship is based on their routine and knowing what to expect. It wouldn’t be Heinz and Perry if there was not punching and kicking involved. (Also, Perry’s smug face while he waits) (Also also, Perry’s lil shrug)

21. Heinz invites Perry to hang out in his house in the suburbs (Put That Putter Away)

GIVE PERRY A DAY OFF (but for real I love that Heinz literally just asked if he wanted to hang out, AND that he assured Perry that he’d make sure he didn’t get in trouble with Monogram for it)

22. The end of Sidetracked

THEY? HOLD? HAND???

23. “The thing that’s kept me from succeeding all these years is YOU!” *turns finger around* (Road to Danville)

PERRY IS SO DONE WITH HIS SHlT I CAN’T FDJAFHDJLSFHDSAKJ

24. Roger tries to say hi to sleeping Perry (Just Our Luck)

How often does Perry have to fall asleep around Heinz for the guy to know he gets testy when someone wakes him up?

25. The brief New Year’s dance break (Happy New Year!)

THEIR DANCING IS SO FAST AND SO IN SYNC EITHER THEY REHEARSED THIS OR THEY JUST KNOW EACH OTHER SO WELL THAT IT JUST HAPPENS NATURALLY AND I WOULD DIE FOR THEM OKAY

26. Perry accidentally became famous for advertising tools and then shows up at DEI (Perry the Actorpus)

He’s so happy to see his nemesis again :,)

27. “You think I’m evil, right?” *finger guns* (Oil on Candace)

Perry is at least partially responsible for how horribly that day went, but that’s his job is to make sure evil scientists don’t impress other evil scientists. You don’t want, like, an evil scientist team up or whatever. But I’m decently sure there’s nothing in the job description that says Perry has to stick around and assure his nemesis that he’s good at being evil, so that’s all Perry’s doing.

28. Perry pulled an all nighter and shows up at DEI asleep and Heinz has to try not to wake him up (Just Our Luck)

The amount of respect it takes for Heinz to see his nemesis sleeping on the job and go out of his way not to wake him up (but to make sure he’s still included, of course; he’s not a disrespectful guy, even if he is evil) warms my heart

29. Perry shows Heinz a bunch of their pictures together (This Is Your Backstory)

a) I love that Perry carries those pictures in his wallet

b) I love that those pictures exist at all

c) I love that Heinz has enjoyed his nemesisship with Perry so much that it basically negates every tragic backstory

#phineas and ferb #pnf #perry the platypus #heinz doofenshmirtz #look i have an ask #i have to save these as drafts to add tags on pc #and it's trying to tell me that this post was made in the app so I can't edit the ''post body content'' so let's hope this still works lol #(also no this post was not made in the app wtf?)

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emerald-amidst-gold · 3 years ago

Text

OC Questionnaire

Thank you @1000generations and @rosella-writes for the tags! I love things such as this that allow me to flesh out Fane more! :D

I’ll tag: @oxygenforthewicked @the-dreadful-canine @varric-tethras-editor @noire-pandora @blueheaded and anyone else that’d like to give it a go! :3

----

THE BASICS:

Character’s name: Fane Lavellan/Aterian (The second name is one he’s rarely called until later on. Mainly post-Trespasser by those in his contingent of agents.)

Role in story: The Inquisitor (highly derogatory)

Physical description: Short, messy snow white hair and eyes that hold two colors instead of one (emerald and gold). Bears the vallaslin of Sylaise (full-face). Relatively angular face and holds features that are more indicative to ancient elves than the ones of today. Overall height is 6′1 and is far more muscular in build than other elves, but still slender enough that he isn’t mistaken for a Qunari. Entire body is littered with patch-work scars and has a singular, long scar upon his left cheek (inflicted by Solas)

Age: Appears 24 (approximately 5,000 years old in actuality)

MBTI/Enneagram Personality Type: INTP-T (Logician). Fane is very much like me in the fact that he’s extremely analytical. He’s always questioning and trying to piece together ‘why’ or ‘how’. Sadly, social skills are lacking for him, and he comes across as proud or insensitive due to how he words things or his lack of understanding when it regards to why someone might be put off by his views.

INTERNAL LIFE:

What is their greatest fear?

To be forgotten/Himself

Inner motivation:

Rebirth. Fane wants to see the world restored to what he remembers (i.e. before the Veil was erected), and he wishes for his kin to thrive once more, to belong to no master but themselves. The birth of Yune (the last of Fane’s specific kin) awakens the ideal of ‘hope’ in his heart and allows him to believe that what he strives for is possible.

Kryptonite:

Pride and Wrath. Fane has a volatile temper that tends to get him into trouble, on and off the battlefield. He is prone to bouts of proud behavior due to the fact that he’s lived for so long and believes he knows what the ‘absolute’ in the world is.

What is their misbelief about the world?

That everything terrible that has happened to him or that he has done thus far since awakening/being awakened is his fault, his choice. At the beginning of my story and in regards to the world as a whole, Fane believes he knows exactly how each person is (personality, motivations, ideals, etc.), even though he has no idea who he is.

Lesson they need to learn:

That his existence is not a sin. That whoever or whatever he is doesn’t matter. He’s alive and he is loved, he is important. Labels do not need to define him.

What is the best thing in their life?

Family (Solas, Mhairi, Cyfrin, Yune, etc.)

What is the worst thing in their life?

That he had to betray family to support family. Fane will do whatever it takes to ensure Solas is never alone again and that his kin can be remembered for what they truly are, but in order to do that he has to make decisions, choices and those decisions carry a lot of pain and heart break. He’ll endure, however. He’ll always endure.

What do they most often look down on people for?

Ignorance and faith. The faith aspect is mainly people wholly relying on that which they can’t see rather than the strength and independent thought that they possess. Fane despises those who use faith as a tool to manipulate or those who are willfully blind to the cries of the world and the suffering.

What makes his/her/their heart feel alive?

Primarily, Solas awakens the hidden or muted sides of Fane. Solas represents ‘the sky’ to him, and just a glimpses into the other’s eyes can make Fane feel as if he’s able to fly again. Having someone understand and know him for more than his rage and bluntness also makes Fane feel more alive when he’s used to feeling grey.

What makes them feel loved, and who was the last person to make them feel that way?

Intimacy of presence. Fane feels most loved when those he cares for is content to merely be around him, words or no words. Solas is the one that does this the most often, the two of them having had to use this level of communication in the past due to Fane being a dragon unable to talk or link up mentally with anyone other than spirits. However, Cole, Mhairi and Cyfrin also utilize this means of communication. Solas is merely the one that offers it the most.

Top three things they value most in life?

Devotion, Independent thought, and Support.

EXTERNAL LIFE:

Is there an object they can’t bear to part with and why?

A crimson sash adorned with golden embroidery of halla and leafless trees. It was a gift from Mhairi, and it was given to Fane shortly after their father disappeared and the experiments upon his body ceased. Fane wears it either around his waist or as a scarf. He’s usually not one to accept gifts, family or not, but he kept this one because it offered a lot of comfort where it had been lacking for several years. Fane also adores his sister with all his heart, and to see that she chanced potential capture to gather the materials...how could he spit in the face of such love? He couldn’t, and that’s why he keeps it even Post-Trespasser. He rarely wears it as he used to during that time, but he keeps it safe and pulls it out when he’s alone to remember simpler days.

Describe a typical outfit for them from top to bottom.

Fane gravitates towards clothing that’s loose and practical. He refuses to wear any of the clothing that Josephine or Vivienne might choose for him. To start, Fane wraps his entire upper body in Elvhen wraps to cover the myriad of scars that litter his body. The wraps are usually dark brown, dark green, or black. Next, he opts for cotton tunics, short sleeved or long sleeves, but he’ll have tendency to roll them up to his elbow, and once again, they are either dark or neutral colors (black, grey, etc.). Plain trousers, somewhat form fitting, and most importantly; boots. Fane does not go barefoot unless he’s getting ready for bed or bathing. He also wears a small dagger that he keeps strapped to an upper thigh. Just in case. *winks*

What names or nicknames has they been called throughout their life?

Fae (generally by Cyfrin or Mhairi), ma’isenatha (’my dragon’ and is typically used by Solas), Blackened One (this is the translation of Fane’s ‘second’ name and is used both respectfully/derogatory), He Who Flew Above (used by the Elvhen agents in both Fane and Solas’ respective contingents), White One (Abelas generally refers to Fane as this once he drops the Inquisitor title, Wisdom also calls Fane this), vhenan or ma vhenan.

And last, but definitely not least, ‘Papae’ *whistles innocently* :3

What is their method of manipulation?

Fane has draconic abilities that can warp emotions. In a way, he implements a form of psychological warfare, but he only uses it as a last resort whether the enemy is a piece of absolute trash or not. Fane has had his mind broken multiple times, died from it once even, and unless given no other choice, he will not break another like that.

Describe their daily routine.

Fane wakes up at the crack of dawn. He doesn’t like to, but he usually has no control over it due to years upon years of waking up from nightmares and retching. If he manages to awaken without many issues, Fane strides right into his routine of training, with or without eating. Training helps quell his mind of lingering terrors, and establishes discipline to emotions that are volatile. Afterwards, Fane may eat on his own, but generally, Mhairi, Cyfrin or Solas have to acquire something for him and press him to eat. He always relents, even if he glowers and growls. Cole takes a more subtle approach and just leaves it where Fane can easily smell it, awakening the want.

Mid-day Fane is usually doing his rounds, checking on companions, maybe entertaining a conversation or request, or begrudgingly diving into Inquisition business. (paperwork, letters, etc.) If he’s having a rough day, headaches, mental exhaustion, or physical pain, then Fane is less likely to get much done and that’s because Solas will demand that he take it easy. In those cases, Fane will fight and protest and declare that he’s fine, but a single look that says, ‘Enough’, and he crumbles, taking the offering of a pillowed lap and potentially sleeping for at least half the afternoon. When he wakes up, Fane lingers in the rotunda and with attempt some form of work until evening.

That’s when Fane indulges in more personal pursuits. He whittles wood, reads and writes poetry, tinkers with one of his gauntlets or plating, and lets himself want. He’ll sometimes go to the tavern to see Varric or the Chargers, even if being around Bull makes him a tad uneasy. Or he’ll seek out his sister and see if she wishes to do something with him. Fane doesn’t ask, of course, but that’s because Mhairi bombards him the moment he appears and he accepts and agrees without fuss. Sometimes Fane will visit Leliana in the rookery and go over what she’s heard or what he’s hear, or he’ll spend time with Cole until Solas comes to see where he’s gone off to.

Their go-to cure for a bad day?

Usually, training or just outright destroying something. Fane has issues controlling some of his emotions, rage most of all, and the only way to get that specific emotion out is to physically take it out. Solas and Mhairi have attempted to help Fane diffuse in different ways, but the only one that seems to work the best is for a dragon to rampage. Thankfully, Fane retreats from Skyhold if that he feels his mind blackening. Solas or Cole will follow and keep an eye on him from a distance, but Solas will intervene if he feels Fane is close to spiraling beyond anger. Then, the go-to is words, soft, but firm.

GOALS:

How are they dissatisfied with their life?

Fane’s life Pre-Inquisition and within Inquisition is...rough. Life with the clan was torture for him, literally being called a mistake and monster due to how he acted and how he looked. No one understood why and neither did Fane beyond knowing his father’s abuse had...awoken something in him. That lack of understanding infuriated Fane, to the point where he chose to just...ignore it, turn his back. Add that to the burden placed upon his shoulders unwillingly, and once again being labeled as every manner of being except what would make him feel complete...yeah, Fane was highly dissatisfied with his life. It isn’t until he and Solas reconcile and vow to never be apart again that Fane starts to find purpose and the will to try in his life. That satisfaction only grows Pre-Trespasser once Fane uncovers a lot of answers concerning himself and his kin after going on a little field trip to a place that shall not be name while Solas attends to the Qunari.

What would bring them true happiness or contentment?

Simply put? Fane wants Solas to be able to rest. That would bring Fane so much joy, to see his sky finally throw down the mantle and rest. All he wants is for them both to be able to be together and not have the world demanding their lives on a silver platter every second of every hour.

What definitive step could they take to turn their dream into a reality?

Support. That is one of Fane’s guiding principles when it comes to Solas and what the mage has deemed he has to do. Fane helps to keep Solas on the path, but he knows when to step in if the fog rolls in. Fane doesn’t see right or wrong; he sees paths, choices. He supports what Solas wishes to do because he understands why the man feels the way that he does. Fane is Devotion and Tenacity, and he will die again and again and again before leaving Solas to walk this dark path alone, without support. Because that, all on its own, can change a person’s mind.

How has their fear kept them from taking this action already?

Fane is only fearful that his support could be causing Solas grief, making him upset due to the fact that the mage feels as if Fane should condemn him. However, Fane presses on and doesn’t let fear shackle him in this. Fear is potent in Fane, that’s the truth, but it all washes away when Solas requires him. Devotion is stronger than Fear, Tenacity grinds Terror into dust, and a dragon will always guard the sky it calls home.

How do they feel they can accomplish their goal while still steering clear of the thing they are afraid of?

So, Fane’s main fears are being forgotten and himself. The supporting aspect is to combat the being forgotten aspect, partially, but when in regards to himself... That’s a whole other story. Fane grapples with madness coutnless times in my story and the allure of power, something dragons cannot yearn for lest they cause irreversible harm to the world, and he is fearful that eventually...the clock will strike, the hourglass will run out and that he didn’t do enough. For Solas, for his kin, and for the world. Furthermore, Fane is terrified that that madness will eventually harm those he cares for, those he’s vowed to protect and support. So, Fane does whatever he can to keep his spirit from warping, to keep himself from breaking beyond what can be repaired, and having Yune and Solas, and seeing the progress of their endeavors helps keep Fane on the cliff he teeters on.

#tagged #oc: fane lavellan #my son is ball of devotion~#and loyalty~#some may call him a simp but that's not the truth as to why he does what he does for solas #it's a SECRET! >:D #oc questionnaire #dragon age #we reject canon and support the wolf because sometimes support helps a person realize what's TRULY important :3

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my-writings-and-musings · 4 years ago

Note

Could you perphaps do hc for Blitzwings reaction to his tiiny human S/O being hurt because the Autobots accidentally collapsed something on them in a fight because they didn't know they were there

I'm not quite as knowledgeable on TFA but I did a crash course and rewatched some of my favorite bits so I hope this fits what you had in mind!

·The size of all earth life respective to Cybertronians means that, even when absolute care is maintained by all, the odds of a nearby human staying safe are far from optimal when bots fight. This is a reality Blitzwing has had to consider carefully since bringing you into his life. Generally his solution has been to keep you as far away from his "work" as physically possible, but unfortunately enough for him, it occasionally tracks him to you. All he can do when that happens one day is insist you take cover in a nearby abandoned building while he goes on the attack. You heed him without question despite your worry for his safety, knowing that he tends to fight less effectively when stressed due to his personalities clashing, and also because his stories about "Autobots" paint a very brutal picture...

·The Autobots outnumber him as they move in, their goal being to drive him away from what they presume to be a human endangering mission, but it's quite obvious who has the advantage once things get started. You can soon hear him holding his own even from your little hiding spot, the roar of battle shaking the very ground beneath your feet, and a thick accent returning combat banter with ease. The Autobots may just be trying to guide the triple changer outside of civilization, but they still end up being driven back themselves quite swiftly, though they of course are unaware it's because he won't be leaving while you are in cover. He's hardly reveling in victory while holding his ground, as frankly he just wants to get this over with and return to you, for what was supposed to be an enjoyable day in this deserted area of the city... His Hothead self boils in rage at having lost precious time, which results in him focusing everything on driving the meddlesome Autobots into retreat as aggressively as possible. You're more than worth letting enemies get away just this once, but he fully intends on leaving them with a few scars for the trouble.

·The strategy appears to work, at least from your perspective, in that their responding attacks start to become more focused on distraction than corralling. He's told you enough about combat for you to recognize suppressive fire as the typical tactic of those seeking to retreat, and you find yourself sighing in relief from your crawlspace, hearing the blaster fire grow less frequent with every passing second. Being more or less ambivalent to the Autobots means that just seeing them leave is the ideal ending for you. Blitzwing gladly notes their impending escape with a touch of pride at having saved his tiny partner, ignoring that the Autobots are probably only giving up so easily because they've come to the baffling and somewhat accurate conclusion he's not here for anything malicious. There's scattered talk of establishing a perimeter to keep him from trying anything where humans actually live, but it's fading quickly as the team prepares an obvious final retreat.

·Blitzwing so delighted to be saving you that he'll smoothly alternate personalities to let them have a turn at the feeling, or at least, what each considers to be the feeling of victory. The thought of being your savior is appealing to all of them if he's quite honest, and admittedly he can't wait to gloat on his rescue to you in person. Unfortunately, his happiness is cut short when the Autobots just so happen to include the building you're shielding yourself within amongst their final shots, unintentionally causing dilapidated supports to crumble under the gunfire they only unleashed to distract. You don't have time to run before things collapse all around you, but you do manage to catch a glimpse of his expression before everything goes dark, and the sight of his hand reaching in your direction is the last thing you see... His concern for the battle ceases in that instant. Your tiny body, so fragile and soft he'd teased you for your lack of armor every time he'd held you, was now beneath countless tons of rubble he might never clear away in time... if there was still any time.

·Confused Autobots are left gaping as he turns tail to start digging into the remains of the building in a frenzy. His personalities start to fight for control, and for those listening he becomes and endless loop of arguments with himself while digging for what can't actually be a human, right? Because it sounds like he mentioned the word human but that must be a mistake, certainly? But if there's even a chance... Programming to fight Decepticons clashes with oaths to protect organic life, and Optimus is forced to act and offer assistance to the panicked con, an offer that is initially met with threats before his desperation results in him caving to the reassurance that any human within is their responsibility to rescue. Only his love for you could lead to him accepting help from Autobots, but he's still much too worried to feel very self conscious, because each minute is far too precious to waste.

·You aren't entirely aware of your own survival. Though you can hear heavy movement from the outside of your little crawlspace, battered and barely conscious as you are, only the faintest hint of a shout heavily colored with a familiar accent gives you hope help is near. Servos capable of warping steel overturn literal tons of rubble with each swipe in his desperate hazes, resulting in boulders of debris flying in the wake of an impossibly determined Decepticon. The Autobot's calls for strategy and teamwork are only met with silence or threats; if the human in this rubble can't be recovered, then he'll make certain their body isn't alone. He ignores their resulting debate with Optimus over whether or not to continue assisting. All that matters is you, his unexpected treasure amongst the cold chaos, and his absolute refusal to lose you while there's still a flicker of his spark in existence.

·Light strikes your eyes without much warning as the rubble above you shifts, forcing you to flinch in your tiny space and cough as the dust irritates your lungs, which in accordance with your current luck sends a pang through probably broken ribs. The only silver lining to it all is that your noises create an immediate reaction up above. Increasingly clearer voices come as the window of light grows and boulders of debris trapping you in are removed, spurring you to cover your eyes as the final hunk of mortar is removed and you're blessed with a rush of cool, fresh air as the sunshine streams in. To your incredible surprise the gruff voice that speaks first to comfort you is not one you know. There's hardly time for your dizzy head to wrap itself around the phenomenon before large but gentle hands reach down to skillfully pluck you free, but the relief of being rescued doesn't last long, and trouble is brewing even before you discern the team of surprised and worried faces circling you as the Autobots.

·You're in the hands of the Autobot medic when Blitzwing sees you've been pulled, injured but alive, from the collapsed building. His joy at seeing you breathing is matched only by his terror to see you in the hands of his enemy, which quickly turns into far more usable rage as he jumps back into rescuing you from the threat that started everything. Shouts to unhand you are his only warning before a charge, one that's quickly called as a bluff when he refuses to risk your safety and skids to a halt before his enemies. The same medic holding you carefully in his hands stares down the much larger triple changer without a flinch, though the remaining bots encircle him protectively, warning him not to hurt this human in their ignorance. A standoff forms in the tense moments where Blitzwing borders on panic, alternating between threats and demands and barely disguised pleading for the return of the human whilst the bots remain steadfast in their assumed defense. It's only through sheer grumpy determination that the medic, who you learn in this moment is called "Ratchet", is able to briefly cut through the shouting and try to force an understanding, starting with the fact that if any of them care about human safety they'll let him give this one some much needed help. Unfortunately mutual distrust keeps both sides moments from launching a new attack.

·You're in no position to fight and free yourself from the ambulance turned robot holding you, but even as Blitzwing stands just ahead and looks to you with that helpless expression, you realize you don't think you need to. There's no aggression in the arms supporting your battered body, just the cautious concern of an expert. But you know your partner; he feels deeply, and once his emotions take off he struggles to listen to reason. Thus you decide to speak up and help Ratchet act as mediator, partly to be relieved of at least a bit of this pain, but also to get back to the mech who you know only wants to see you safe. The hardest part is keeping down a cough as you try to speak...

·Everything stops when the voice of a weak and battered human pipes up, silencing the still intermittent arguing and turning the attention of all gathered bots to them. Blitzwing drops the entirety of his aggressive stance once he focuses only on you, stepping closer only to be stopped by the rest of the still distrustful Autobots. Your gentle pleading for him to stay calm and hear them out stops a brawl from erupting once again, and also creates a wave of surprise amongst the Autobots; this Decepticon has befriended a human?! His Icy personality is colder and more in control than ever when he prompts the medic to lay out his plans for your care, followed by a warning that you will decide whether or not to accept it, and that if they attempt to force anything on you or take you away there will be no Autobots left on earth by the time he stops them.

·Ratchet is mercifully to the point when he explains that he merely wants to ensure there is no immediate danger from your injuries, and to provide some basic aid to tide you over until a human proffesional can assist. In the grip of rather considerable pain, you can't help but concede to the logic of the plan, looking to your partner so he can see the certainty in your eyes as you express your consent. Ever true to his word regarding you, the triple changer nods his own assent, but insists he will be by your side through it all. Ratchet is able to locate a more sheltered location nearby, and despite the complaints of his fellows agrees to render aid in private, with only his patient and the Decepticon in question to assist him. The distrust crackling through the air makes it quite difficult for you to be relieved at the prospect of medical attention.

·Blitzwing is there for you at every moment, letting your tiny hand squeeze his large servo as the medic patches you up, his dexterity surprising you almost as much as the human medical kit he carries "for the sake of a different human that frequently gets herself hurt". Every whimper of pain from you makes the Decepticon growl through his whispered comforts to you, and by the time the medic has the immediate damage bandaged and secure each of Blitzwing's three personalities has had a turn threatening the old medic. Ratchet doesn't even seem to mind as he strongly encourages you to head for a hospital while he finishes putting away his supplies. The rest of the Autobots leave with a tense and awkward parting (as well as a few murmured apologies) that includes a promise that this incident may change things for Blitzwing, should he be so inclined... An Icy expression only bids them farewell, and when the two of you are alone he finally holds you close, whispering a thousand apologies for failing to protect you from his war. Though you hardly feel prepared to understand a several million year conflict, you embrace him in return, able to take a moment to just appreciate being back with your love. The moment only ends when he, somewhat bashfully, asks what a hospital is and if you could more effectively be transported there via tank or jet?

#transformers #tfa #transformers animated #blitzwing #blitzwing x reader #maccadam #tf #ratchet #my writing #my asks #requests #anon #human reader #self insert

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healingchildhoodtrauma · 4 years ago

Text

Anger Is Normal and Natural

Like Jane, many survivors of child abuse experience anger toward their abuser, their families, or the justice system, and the trauma that was caused. This anger is a legitimate reaction. It’s a rightful response toward what was, ultimately, a severe violation of her safety, health, and well-being.

Anger is important. Like each of our emotions, anger provides us with information that helps us investigate the environment around us. Anger sends us needed messages such as “I perceive injustice” or “Something is blocking me from achieving my goal” or “Someone is making me feel unsafe.” These messages embolden us to protect ourselves, motivate us to take needed action, and give us courage to correct what we perceive as unjust. Ultimately, anger can prompt us to assert our independence and define our personal boundaries.

Despite this, you may be afraid to express your anger. You may have perceived at a young age that the expression of anger, especially toward your perpetrator, was dangerous. Anger may have led to escalated abuse, admonishment, violence, or threats of harm toward your loved ones.2 Such punishments may have driven you to associate the expression of anger with terrifying consequences.

Survivors may feel they are not entitled to their anger, believing the abuse they suffered was somehow their fault or even deserved. So instead of allowing themselves to feel angry, they may deny their anger, push it away, or channel it toward themselves rather than toward the person responsible.3 Such coping strategies will likely send the survivor down a painful road of isolation, numbness, and self-blame.

As a survivor, you shouldn’t have to carry the burden and exhaustion of continuously locking your anger away or pretending it never existed. In fact, the complete elimination of anger is “neither possible nor desirable” according to renowned therapist Sandra Thomas.4 Anger is meant to be felt, not to be stamped out and invalidated.

Embracing the Feeling of Anger

You have a right to your anger. There is nothing shameful or toxic about feeling it. It’s a valid emotion you’re entitled to experience and process. Feeling or expressing anger doesn’t make you a bad person. It makes you a human being with natural responses to pain, terror, loss, and feelings of betrayal.

Knowing this, you may be unsure of where to start when it comes to examining your anger. A suggested first step is to mindfully acknowledge the anger you are feeling. You may have convinced yourself that you’re not actually angry because you’re not yelling or being hostile toward others. But anger doesn’t equal explosive rage. It takes on a wide variety of forms. Like Jane, your anger might cause you to shut down and become closed off from others. But quiet anger is still anger. Even if you never yell.

To become mindful of the anger you are currently feeling, take time to be fully present. Remember, you are not a passive victim of your anger but a mindful agent in control of your response. Think about the anger you’re experiencing and allow yourself to truly feel it and observe it. As an observer, watch your anger while, just for a moment, letting go of shame, guilt, or self-judgment about the anger. What sensations are you feeling? How is your anger manifesting physically? What is your anger a response to? What is it protecting you from? What is it motivating you to do? As you examine your anger, recognize it as an energy that is trying to tell you something. This energy is not inherently good or bad. It’s simply energy—energy you are allowed to feel.

Using Your Anger to Help You Heal

You might think, “Okay, so I’m angry. Now what?” Take that energy and decide what to do with it. What will you channel this energy toward? You could channel it into other parts of your healing journey—things that will be positive for your life. You might channel your energy into protecting others, bringing justice, or taking steps to heal. You might channel it into physical fitness or doing something good for someone else or committing yourself to a new skill.

Researchers have repeatedly found that most people are able to improve their mental and physical health after writing about deeply troubling experiences. According to James Pennebaker, PhD, putting traumatic memories into words can help ease emotional turmoil and defuse anger.5 Writing about a stressful event helps you break down overwhelming and troubling memories, thereby enabling you to make better sense of them, rendering them more manageable.

Habits, goals, and long-term planning aren’t the only things your energy can help you achieve. It can also help you in the here and now—not just with how you act, but how you react. On a day-to-day basis, you can direct this energy toward identifying red flags and managing your reactions to those red flags. An example of a red flag might be a triggering situation. In this instance you can use your energy to plan ahead on how to cope or avoid the situation entirely, thus protecting yourself from the pain it poses. Another example of a red flag might be distorted thoughts, or thoughts that don’t align with reality, like negative self-talk. You can channel the energy of your anger toward not only recognizing when your thoughts are distorted but to counteract them with thoughts that are calming and filled with self-compassion.

Another option might be using your energy to manage your body’s responses to red flags. For example, if you notice your heart rate is increasing, your muscles are tensing, and your stomach is tightening with panic, you might try slow breathing, relaxing your shoulders, and clenching and unclenching your fists. Maybe you will want to stretch or go for a walk. The options are endless, but they all demand some measure of energy. Take wherever you are in your healing process and channel the energy of your anger into a way that will help you.

Don’t be ashamed of your anger. Don’t try to hide it or push it away. It’s important for you to feel it. Then, once you’ve acknowledged the full extent of your anger and its purpose, decide what you will do with it.

Jane decided to stop suppressing her anger. She could see and embrace her anger without acting on it in a destructive way. She allowed herself to feel the emotional responses and the messages they were communicating. She was angry. And it was okay. Anger tells her she was wronged, she didn’t deserve what happened to her, and she does deserve to heal.

As she accepted these messages, the guilt and shame Jane experienced toward her anger began to fall away. Her anger is part of her recovery. It’s an energy she can use. It motivates her to take action, to move forward. Using the energy her anger provided, Jane was able to raise awareness to help protect others, devote time to her support group, and to take care of her body. As she does, the anger is replaced by a different kind of energy—hope.

At this point in her healing, Jane knows she can’t force herself into a state of peace and calm acceptance. And she certainly isn’t ready to think about forgiveness just yet—toward her perpetrator or even toward herself. But one day she will. And, in this present moment, she can use her anger to kick things into gear. Her anger is not bad. She needs it. Because it will help her get to a place in her recovery where, eventually, she can let it go.

https://youniquefoundation.org/anger-can-help-you-heal/

#cptsd #self protection #anger #mindfulness #self acceptance #inner child healing #reparenting #childhood trauma #developmental trauma #attachment trauma #self care #emotional health #healing from abuse #healing from shame #fawn trauma response #healing from codependency #healing from people pleasing

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akawrites000 · 4 years ago

Text

Red

The night breeze whisked past Villain, caressing their cheeks and making them feel colder than they were a minute ago.

"Ugh..." they groaned, pulling their red scarf further up so that it covered a better part of their chin. The fabric felt soft and warm against their cold fingertips, and it reminded Villain of Hero's cape. They had never thought that they would admit to liking how warm the cape felt, when Hero had covered them with it during one particularly cold night, quite like this one, and they were sitting on a high roof, facing the skyscrapers- Villain hadn't expected it to be that cold, so they hadn't worn any clothing that were designed to keep them warm. They were extremely grateful for that warm cape, much like it's owner and ended up buying a scarf that had the same shade to remind themselves about it (they would never tell Hero that though).

They smiled, the memory making them feel a little warm as two shadows zipped past them in a speed that didn't belong to a normal human. From the corner of their eyes, they caught sight of something red before it disappeared around the street corner. And who else other than Hero would wear bright red like that in the middle of the night , moving at a superhuman speed? It was definitely Hero, and they were chasing someone who wasn't them? That fact alone didn't sit well with Villain so they decided to follow them.

There have been new villains popping up here and there around town, not to mention the Supervillain as well... Villain mused, I'll just go take a quick look and then leave, it's not like I'm worried or anything... (Villain was dead set on denying it).

They turned a street corner there, and one more, leading to an alleyway with a dead end. It was pitch dark and the only source of light was a dilapidated lamp barely hanging onto the wall. Villain looked up to find some moonlight but nope, it just had to be a new moon night. They sighed, straining their eyes to spot even a glimpse of the two blurry figures that they had seen earlier and heard a loud crash to their left. They turned towards another lonely alleyway and followed it, heart hammering in their chest.

They hid themselves at the corner and peeped in, definitely not interested in getting involved in some unnecessary scuffle. They could see a figure slumped against a toppled trash can, trash littered eveywhere- so that's where the crashing sound came from. There was another figure looming over them, and even from there, Villain could feel bloodlust washing over their senses, making them freeze on spot. They pitied the person on the ground, unable to imagine the terror that must be coursing through their veins.

This alleyway had better lighting so Villain was able to see their faces a little better- the looming figure was definitely the Supervillain, that bloodlust was a dead giveaway. The slumped figure looked up and glared at the supervillain, eyes defiant and fierce, a symbol that they weren't going to give up that easily and Villain could feel their throat closing up, anxiety flaring up and burning their insides.

Hero... they knew, from the glimpse of red they knew from the start, a tiny inkling that it could've been Hero rushing through the streets in the dead of the night, chasing some terrible foe. Villain knew... but right now they wished that they were wrong, so wrong, because never did they really expect their foe to be the Supervillain. Villain had seen their powers firsthand and it had made them shiver, tremble to their bones. Never had they felt anxiety slap them in their face like that before. And now Hero was there, facing that devil with defiant eyes and a brave heart and Villain's chest almost felt full with something alien to them... was it pride?

Villain was jolted out of their thoughts by a scream that shattered their soul- it sounded so painful, wrecked, and hopeless and with every passing second, Villain thought that it sounded like Hero. They stared at the scene in front of them, immediately wishing that they didn't.

Red... why is there so much red?

To the Villain, red had become something that they associated with Hero- red cape, crimson cheeks, fiery passion, a warm heart, kind touches, sunny smile, and finally, the way they loved -it would put even Aphrodite to shame. Villain knew that too well, after all, they were the only recipient of that love. Hero was their lover and always will be.

Which only made their heart twist and turn with increasing agony because Hero's costume looked redder than usual and Villain refused to accept that it was blood- Hero's blood, their lover's blood.

You shouldn't do this.

Don't lose your cool.

If supervillain finds out that you've betrayed them, and worse, that you're in a relationship with their mortal nemesis, you're done for.

Don't worry, Hero will be fine.

They will be fine.

They-

Villain looked at Hero once again- bruised cheeks, a huge gash in their gut, bleeding out, shallow breaths, their head now leaning completely against the wall for support and Villain waited a couple more seconds, but Hero made no move to get up. And now there's more red, red... red... red... everywhere.

Before Villain could even think about reasoning with themselves again, their limbs moved and in a flash they stood in between their lover and Supervillain, whose face switched from surprise to amusement, as if they couldn't decide on which emotion to portray.

"Well well, Villain. What a pleasant surprise." Supervillain drawled and dread settled into Villain's veins- cold, gripping, merciless. They heard slight movement from behind them and glanced back coyly. Hero was looking at them, surprise written all over their face. Then they smiled (or at least tried to), to Villain, it looked more like a grimace. But they looked more alive than they did just a moment ago, and that single fact was enough to wash away the pooling dread and replace it with something else- courage.

Now, Villain was never a person who would do something so reckless, they were always the brains of their duo while Hero was the power, brains and power. That's how they had always worked together- and thanks to that, Villain got to know that Hero did not possess a single shred of self preservation whatsoever. It made their stomach crawl to think about how many times they had saved Hero from imminent death and Hero would just smile, all sweet and sunny, like they hadn't just almost died a second ago- and that's what they were doing now.

Ugh, the things I do for love, Villan mused, rolling their eyes at Hero.

"Ahem Villain, you alright there? You've been staring intensely at our nemesis for quite a few seconds now."

Villain heard a wheeze from Hero, which was probably meant to be a chuckle.

"Oh sorry, I was just distracted thinking about the numerous ways in which I could kill him."

Careful me. Supervillain cannot know about us- that would be like digging a grave and burying ourselves six feet deep in the ground. Careful.

Supervillain laughed out loud, acting like Villain had just told them the joke of the century and Villain had to hold themselves back from rolling their eyes at them.

" That's my Villain, always thinking about the best possible ways to kill someone."

Hero coughed abnoxiously and Villain wanted to smack them in their face- now is not the time to be getting jealous, idiot.

Supervillain glared at Hero and Villain subtly moved so that they were now blocking Hero completely from Supervillain's view. "I don't see why you have to think that much though, Hero looks like they're going to kick the bucket any minute."

The colour red flooded Villain's vision, making them stagger on their feet. How many more times did they have to see their lover dyed in red before the world would be satisfied?

"V-villain?" Hero croaked weakly and Villain flinched, feeling physical pain as if somebody had stabbed them. They stood back up straight, hoping that Hero got the message. They were okay. Now was no time to be getting distracted, they had to get Hero away from here, away to a safer place.

Supervillain crooked his head at Hero lying behind Villain, suddenly curious. Villain tensed, mind racing to bring back all of Supervillain's attention back on them. Look at me, don't look at them. Look at me, only me.

" Supervillain, I don't appreciate you giving that lowly Hero more attention than to me, you act as if I don't exist." Villain sneered, making their voice sound as deadly as they can. They desperately hoped that their voice didn't tremble.

"Oh, forgive me, I didn't mean to do that." Supervillain said but there was not a single ounce of sincerity in that. Villain simply glared, gaze sharp and cruel.

"Ouch, if only gazes could kill, I would certainly be dead right now Villain, I'm hurt." Supervillain mocked and Villain's brain was working overtime, trying to comprehend the change in Supervillain's attitude- why are they acting like they know something that I don't, they seem cockier than usual.

Villain decided to take a chance, "Why are you acting like this Supervillain, are you perhaps, hiding something from me? Some part of a plan that you don't want me to know about?"

Supervillain chuckled dryly, and Villain felt the temperature drop a few degrees at once, bloodlust making itself known once again. Hero whimpered from behind them and Villain's heart cried out.

"You tell me who's the one hiding things, Villain."

Villain barely had any time to react, their mind knew what was happening, but their body was too slow to comprehend.

A huge blast of power left the Supervillain's palm- right towards Hero.

Move... move... MOVE!!!

Villain was never in their life more thankful for their superspeed as they turned around, grabbed Hero in their arms and zipped past the blast, just as it connected with the concrete behind them, blasting it into pieces. Villain ran as fast as their legs could carry them, trying not to jostle the hurt Hero in their arms too much. They were going to turn around the next corner when they felt something digging into their side. They refused to acknowledge it, continuing to speed away, the only thing on their mind being getting Hero to safety.

Supervillain's coarse laughter echoed from far behind them, as they sped away.

"Llain... Villain... VILLAIN!!!"

Villain was forced to stop, crashing into a concrete wall. They made sure to turn around in the last second, so that their back came into contact with the wall and not Hero who they held in their arms.

Villain gasped out loud, any air residing in their lungs evicted, suddenly feeling more tired than they have felt in ages. They heard shuffling and peeked an eye open to see Hero crawling up to them- all bloody and bruised. Just stay put, idiot, you're hurt, they wanted to say but their voice refused to work.

"You're bleeding!" Hero wailed as loud as they could in their current state, but it sounded more like a whisper to Villain- am I becoming deaf?

Hero finally made it to them, hands clutching onto their leg and slowly pulling themselves up, touching everywhere and spreading warmth with their fingertips. Villain looked up at them from their bed of concrete, "You're so warm, Hero."

And Hero cried and cried and cried, fat tears rolling down their cheeks, just like the way they would cry after waking up from a nightmare (and oh how badly they wished that this was just another bad dream). Villain smiled at them and they cried more. Villain didn't want them to cry.

"S-stop crying, s-silly", Villain somehow managed to wheeze out, their body aching everywhere. Hero bent down, warm fingers touching their eyelids, cheeks and then lips. The next thing Villain could feel was a pair of lips on theirs, Hero's lips, warm just the way they remembered, kissing them like it was the last time they would ever get to do it. Hero pulled away, looking into Villain's eyes and began muttering strings of "sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry" and Villain wanted to keep staring at them but they just felt so tired.

They wanted to bring up their hand and wipe away those tears that had no business on their lover's face but their hand wouldn't move. They couldn't do anything.

"G-go and get yourself checked *cough cough* at a h-hospital okay?" Villain wheezed out, struck by another coughing fit.

And Hero just smiled, looking like the happiest person in the world which Villain scrunched their nose at because they were bleeding and this was no time to be happy.

" I will *wheeze*, I love you Villain, so so much." They burst into tears again.

"I l-love-

Villain closed their eyes.

Hero finally let themselves fall on their lover's bloody body- cold, lifeless, unmoving. They couldn't hear the heartbeats that they fell asleep to every night anymore. They knew that they themselves were beyond saving, and so they cried and wailed, wanting to spend the last moments of their life grieving- grieving for the only person who loved them and saw them for who they really were, not just as a hero.

"You kept worrying about me till your last breath huh? You were always too good for me Villain, you loved me too well, too much."

"Maybe if you didn't love me, you would still be alive."

Tears mingled with blood as Hero's warm hands found Villain's cold ones, interlacing their fingers together.

"So this is what they mean by being together until your last breath huh? I never really thought that it would happen to me because love just seemed like too good of a dream to be true."

Hero smiled, heart feeling full because they knew that they had the best lover that they could have ever asked for. And everything that had happened between them was true in every way.

"At least now, we don't have to see each other bleeding out and fighting to stay alive."

T-T

hero and villain really just wanna live life / but no, I had to go and make it angsty / I swear though, this was not how it played out in my head/ why do I do this to myself- /me playing with the word lover because it sounds so good / also let me know if you guys want an alternative HAPPY end for these two in the comments/ if you're okay with this, that's cool too.

#heroes and villains #prose #villain/hero #hero/villain #hero x villain #villain x hero #hero #villain #creative writing #writing #my writing #snippet #writing snippet #angst #im sorry #i made myself cry #writers on tumblr #writer #writeblr

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dirty-holy-things · 4 years ago

Text

The Space Between (your heart & mine)

Chapter 17 has been posted to Ao3, and below to Tumblr.

Catch up on chapters 1-16 on Ao3.

Notes: This fic is 18+ and explicit. Chapter contains canon-typical violence and descriptions of injuries. Reference to past abuse. Please exercise caution if this is a sensitive subject for you. Also - I promise there's a happy ending, but it might take a bit of angst to get there. For those who have kept up with this fic, sorry for the delay in updating - grad school has kept me busy, but regular updates should resume.

Words: 5.1k update, 80.9k total.

There had been changes within yourself as well, even though you struggled to admit it after having spent so much of your life suppressing that which was now showing itself within you. Your safety had always depended on your ability to mask your powers, or at least conveniently use them, and now they were unexpectedly breaking through your barriers. Through observation and meditation, you had started to put together that your abilities and powers swelled whenever your emotions did, just as they had when you were younger. When Din was once running behind schedule for a bounty, your nerves and fear alone were able to entirely warp the canteen you had purchased for yourself, crushing it to the point that it was unusable junk. And when Din finally returned home to you, bruised and battered, and yet focused only on touching and kissing every inch of you — you found that his cuts and bruises began to disappear from underneath your fingertips without any direct focus or attention. There was an undercurrent of power that was growing within you and Grogu, and it was beginning to breach the walls that you had put in place to hold it back; and you had no way of predicting when that wall may cave in.

These ever-increasing powers and revelations were both fascinating and terrifying. You did not know what would happen from here if you and Grogu continued down this unmapped path. You could understand that power without training could be exceptionally dangerous, but how would you even go about learning how to control it all? You had once been able to suppress your connection to the Force, but you never actually learned how to master this connection; repression is not true mastery or control, as it only delays the chaos.

But who was there to learn from? The Jedi Order was no more, the grasp of the Sith had receded with the rise of the New Republic, and the civilizations that connected with the Force as a form of magic were incredibly closed-off and tight-lipped. You had been extraordinarily lucky to stumble unto the teachings of Ixxith as you had, but now that the seal had been broken, now that Pandora’s box had been opened, you were faced with an impossible question — where do you go from here?

Image credit to my love @knivesareout as she makes beautiful things and supports my writing.

An eternal thank you to @soyelfuegoquearde for beta'ing my baby and giving me constructive feedback.

And love to @bdavishiddlesbatch and @louderrthanthunderr for all of their love and support.

"We fall in love because we long to escape from ourselves with someone ideal as we area corrupt. But what if such a being were one day to turn around and love us back? We can only be shocked. How could they be divine as we had hoped when they have the bad taste to approve of someone like us? If in order to love, we must believe that the beloved surpasses us in some way, does not a cruel paradox emerge when we witness this love returned? If they are really so wonderful, how could they love someone like me?" - Alain de Botton

The universe felt brighter as you traveled through it now, suspended in space and time within the secure confines of your roaming home. You continued to watch the stars streak past you on every journey, still feeling just as entranced by them as you had on the first flight from Chandrila — but it was even more of a beautiful and brilliant thing, as you now had the incomparable comfort of being known, and being loved. For a brief moment, you had worried that your admission of love would make things complicated, awkward, unbalanced; but your fears had been completely dismissed and rendered unnecessary, as it had brought you and Din closer than you could have imagined.

It was the little gestures and moments throughout the day that allowed those fears to be quieted. His hands would brush along your body in passing; he brought you a blanket to the cockpit after seeing you wrapped tightly around yourself to fight off the chill; he would gently tuck away the stray pieces of hair that fell across your face. And you became less reserved in showing your affections as well; you would often drape yourself across the back of the pilot’s seat and over his expansive shoulders as he navigated the Razor Crest through the atmospheres of new planets and hyperspace. You would bring him food and water, reminding him to take care of himself in ways that he often forgot to. And the two of you spent more time encased in the security of darkness, to the point where you joked that you might develop night vision. Very few things can grow in the absence of light, and yet here you were, your love thriving in this unexpected place.

You found that you didn’t necessarily feel as though you were missing anything, by not being able to see his face. Your love felt whole, comprehensive, and possibly even more valuable as it was so unconditional in its nature; you would love him endlessly, and you didn’t need a face to assign that love to, as he was so much more than the anatomical structure that existed behind the helmet. Somehow, the darkness felt more freeing than the light. The comfort and security of the darkness offered you both the opportunity to be completely and entirely exposed; no helmet, no clothing, no beskar, no self-doubt. It was infinite in its nature, and allowed for infinite possibilities.

How beautiful, these little infinities you had created together.

And while you never held any regrets for the life you shared with Din, you understood that some things were not worth repeating. You didn’t offer to help with a job again after Corellia, and it was a decision that you had come to by yourself. Again, you held no regrets for what had transpired on the industrial planet as it had been the catalyst that had brought the truth to the surface, the truth about your love, but it had left some wreckage in the process. Your sense of self-preservation and fear had been reignited when the Twi’lek had made unwanted physical advances, and although you knew you were safe now, it was challenging to quiet that instinctual part of yourself that had risen up, desperately seeking to sustain your hard-won survival.

Following the events of Corellia, you started to have the occasional nightmare, your mind resurfacing old wounds and memories that you had worked to let go of and leave on Chandrila. You would have dreams of the torrential thunderstorms of Eadu, threatening to drown you as your family watched, making no effort to help you stay afloat. You would feel the radiating pain of Orron’s blows throughout your body, every old wound somehow reemerging and aching anew. Sometimes the terror and pain of the nightmare was quick to pass upon waking, but there were some occasions in which you woke up crying and thrashing, a scream trapped in your constricted throat. Sometimes, you would wake up shaking like a leaf in a thunderstorm, chest heaving as the tears flowed; upon waking, you were always disoriented and scared for a moment, until you realized you were still at home and you were still wrapped securely in Din’s arms. You knew Din hated seeing you like that, tearful and distressed, and you didn’t want to cause any further hurt to yourself or to him. So you made the decision to no longer act as bait.

There was no sense in reopening old wounds, and creating new ones in the process. If you were to live with these pains, you could at least avoid inflicting them onto others.

Din had been supportive of your choice to no longer participate in bounties. He had reassured you that he still believed in your capabilities and value as a companion, but agreed that the reduction in stress would be worth the reduction in payouts. It had been tough to find a way to keep yourself occupied and still feel like a valuable, contributing asset; you knew you would never be content to simply exist here, offering nothing to Din except your body. While your originally agreed-upon partnership ended up not lending itself to you becoming a bounty hunter, you were not about to become a deadbeat, indolent passenger either.

The first few weeks after Corellia were alright, as you found odd jobs around the ship that you could tend to; repairing sagging panels, cleaning away the cobwebs, reorganizing equipment. These were tasks that you could manage, even with your limited mechanical and engineering knowledge. But eventually, as time wore on and your journeys carried you further along, you started to run out of tasks that could be done on the ship. Needing something to do, you then turned to managing additional business responsibilities, hoping to relieve Din of some of the stress that he carried on those broad shoulders. You kept a more organized, detailed record of his jobs and finances, and made sure there was an appropriate stock of supplies to support the Razor Crest’s three travelers.

And then there was the kid — you quite often found yourself managing him.

Following your journey to Bardotta, something had awoken in both you and Grogu; it was as if a creature that had laid dormant for many years had been awoken from its hibernation, and had returned with renewed strength. While you felt this change deeply within yourself, it presented itself most visibly in Grogu and his increasing abilities. You frequently had to search for him within the ship, as he had been working on learning how to cloak himself as you once had, adding this to his other skills. He was not able to fully vanish into his surroundings as you were, but he was decent enough at camouflaging himself to the point where you once had a panic attack that he had managed to escaped the ship into the wild forests of Dantooine while under your supervision. He was also experimenting with bringing larger and larger objects to his small green grasp, most noticeably larger and larger portions of food, or other comfort items like blankets. His growing curiosity and expansion of power hadn’t been allthat concerning until a particularly rough tantrum, during which he pushed both you and Din a good three feet back from him, without ever laying a hand on you. The changes occurring could no longer be denied or ignored, and you understood you would have to confront them at some point.

Your best attempt at navigating this next step was to seek out knowledge in a different format; as Din’s travels occasionally brought you to larger cities, you would spend a portion of the layover browsing the city’s libraries and book stores, if they existed, poring over the texts to see if there was any history, legends, instructions, or insights that could be obtained. You had very little success at finding anything that taught you about Force powers and how to use them, however you had managed to find several interesting texts that chronicled the historical power struggle between the Jedi and the Sith. You had heard whispered stories and legends as a child, tales of heroes and villains who carried out the unending battle of good versus evil.

And as you read of these wars and conflicts, you came to an interesting conclusion — depending on the perspective of the available source material, both Jedi and Sith could be considered good, or evil.

Thinking back to Ixxith’s teachings about the importance of balance, you could understand how these two diametrically opposed sides were continually fighting against the scale of the universe that sought balance. From your wide assortment of readings, you understood that the universe itself truly held no favor for good or evil, Jedi or Sith, and it only ever sought an equilibrium — and yet the universe’s occupants insisted on living within one extreme or the other, the scale never allowed to settle at a place of peace and balance.

You enjoyed studying the texts that you had managed to acquire, and learning more about the history of those with abilities like you, even though it may not have been the specific knowledge you had set out to find. Occasionally, you would talk with Din about the things that you discovered in these books, which prompted him to share more about the history of Mandalore and their role in the galaxy’s history and development. This newfound, strengthening point of connection between you was beautiful and valuable in its own right, even though it may not have offered much help for corralling yourself and the kid’s behaviors.

Reading had given you something to do during the down time while Din was working, and while the kid was self-contained or safely entertained. You had never had much time to dedicate to your own hobbies and interests before, and it was refreshing to be able to have your own passions that you could pursue as you desired.

Having few travel expenses of your own, you were still living quite comfortably off of the bounties you had profited from, and you were able to purchase the things that caught your eye or interest. This led to a steadily-expanding corner of the cabin that became yours as it was occupied with stacks of books, piles of blankets, an assortment of snacks, and a respectable wardrobe. The fresher also now showed evidence of your residency, as some of your specialty products had found their way to the shelves and the shower; silky lotions, a nice brush, hygiene products that didn’t exist in the shape of a bar. The Razor Crest was gradually becoming a shared space, a shared home, and were someone to step foot onto the ship, they would be able to determine that the fearsome Mandalorian was no longer maintaining a solitary existence.

This change in Din’s lifestyle was becoming more and more clear to outsiders as you now frequently accompanied him to his negotiations and trade-offs with Karga when on Nevarro. The older man had been excited by your reoccurring presence, and while he had teased Din for it in the beginning, he had since relaxed and always welcomed the two or three of you with a genuine smile. And with each visit to the volcanic planet, Din grew more comfortable with claiming your relationship openly; he almost always kept a hand on you, tracing pressured circles into your skin, or if you were seated with some degree of privacy, gently stroking the inside of your thigh from underneath the table as a tease for what was to come. There were rarely moments in which you were left alone, and you found you preferred it this way. While Orron had once insisted upon keeping you within arms reach, out of his own need for power and control, you understood Din’s motives to be different. He wanted to protect you, wanted to show you off, just genuinely wanted to be with you because he loved being with you. And you also knew that he would never deny you an opportunity to venture off on your own, to explore the town or take Grogu to play with the local children.

Today had been no exception to that truth; as Din and Karga haggled over upcoming bounties, you grew bored and restless, and decided you would prefer to stretch your legs with a walk around town, and feel some sunlight on your skin as it was a fairly nice day. You squeezed his knee gently, getting his attention before nodding your head to the door of the cantina, where the three of you had gathered for this business dealing. Din nodded wordlessly, trusting you to keep yourself safe and return to him when you were ready. This unconditional sense of trust was new to you, but you loved every moment of it, and loved Din for offering it so readily to you.

You excused yourself from the table and strolled out of the bar, knowing that Din’s eyes had followed your entire journey through the tables and patrons until you exited into the bustling town center. The sunlight felt nice on your skin, and the slight breeze kept the air from feeling heavy and stagnant around you; you stretched your limbs and you felt the cracking and popping of your joints. You needed breaks like this, to be able to physically stretch your body and keep it limber and in shape.

And yet, despite the small space of the Razor Crest, you had still found ways to keep your body moving; Din had certainly made physical exercise more enjoyable. You thought back to all of the nights that had now been spent on the floor of the Razor Crest, as your exhausted bodies had collapsed into one another; you loved every minute of the physical exertion the two of you created, but your body needed more. It needed to run, jump, stretch, bend, without the constraints of the small cabin space. But Maker, did making love with Din feel like the most glorious and exhilarating use of your body; you marveled at every moment of passion the two of you shared, holding nothing back in the pursuit of giving the other what they desired.

You were brought back to the moment by an oddly dressed man bumping into you; you turned to apologize, as you had been the one to have stopped in the middle of the street, but they had already run off by the time you looked for them. Shrugging, you carried on with your afternoon expedition. You had intentionally chosen comfortable and lightweight clothing today, knowing it would offer a nice opportunity to stretch your legs. As you strolled through town, you felt yourself start to pick up your pace gradually until you were jogging along at a decent speed, leaving the town behind you as you ascended the black volcanic hills that surrounded the area that had since become familiar to you. From atop the hills, you could see the cantina, the school, the marketplace, and off in the distance you could see the Razor Crest as it was undergoing refueling and maintenance.

Continuing to run for a while, just along the outskirts of the city, you relished the feeling of the breeze against your skin; while Nevarro was hot and the air somewhat sulfurous due to the volcanoes, it was still a nice change from the recycled air of the ship, and was certainly better than some of the atmospheres of other planets you had journeyed to. You could feel the lava rocks and ash shifting beneath your feet as you ran, offering just enough resistance to make your heart race and your lungs expand with forceful, concentrated inhalations.

Having now circled about half of the city, watching the landscape change from your position above it, you settled down onto a spot that offered some dry grass to sit comfortably on. You waited for your heart rate to slow back to a resting pace, and stretched your limbs out around you, loving the bit of soreness that came along as your muscles stretched and contracted. You allowed yourself to rest here for a while, clearing your mind as you worked to let the Force flow through you, just as Ixxith had taught you. You could feel the Force moving through you gently, almost like a breeze passing through an open window. You settled into this feeling, into the peace that it offered, as silence and tranquility had become rare within the steel confines of your home. Relaxing, you only barely noticed the breeze that seemed to push and pull the air through your lungs, as you sank into the comfortable silence for a while.

Sensing a growing chill in the air, your eyes opened to scene around you. The sun had begun its descent behind the volcanic hilltops and you knew it was time to be on your way, to return to Din and Grogu, to your home and to your bed. Pushing yourself up from the ground, you brushed off the dust and debris that had pressed into your body and clothing, before starting a comfortable pace down the hillside and back into the city.

As you passed some of the houses that made up the outskirts of the city, you could sense that something, or someone, was watching you; turning to look all around, you didn’t see anything unusual. You tried to shake off the feeling as you navigated yourself down a familiar city path, shifting your focus towards your upcoming reunion with Din; thinking of the way he had pinched the inside of your thigh earlier shot your heart rate right back up to its previously racing pace.

And yet there was a persistently odd feeling around you though, one that you couldn’t seem to shake, even with the thought of Din. Deciding to trust your gut, you stepped down what seemed to be a quiet alleyway to take better stock of the situation around you and determine what was causing this unsettling feeling of observation. No, observation wasn’t the right word. The word that came to mind was stalked. Like something was hiding in the shadows and corner of your vision, keeping in step with you but never being revealed. You scanned the street you had just been walking through, trying to find whatever was causing this unease, this growing sense of danger —

And then you felt a large hand grasping your forearm like a steel trap, crushing your wrist as whoever this was pulled you further into the alley and into the seclusion that it offered.

Whirling around as your free hand having found its way into a fist, you intended to punch this unexpected attacker in the face; but before you could complete your movement, a grey and leathery hand grabbed your entire fist and wrenched it away, but maintaining a tight hold on your hand to restrain you. Looking up, you saw a terrifyingly familiar humanoid face.

Maxir Bragant had been a close companion and business partner of Orron Jakar, and you had spent more time around this Delphidian man than you ever cared to recall. He had been a frequent visitor to your shop, and the individuals who he dumped onto your cot for healing rarely survived due to his brutal and unyielding attacks. Being quite fond of cleaving into others with his axe, there was generally very little you could do to improve his victim’s odds of survival; you were no miracle worker, and you recalled how you had been beaten mercilessly for your failures. As you looked down to see that very same black axe strapped to his belt, you felt bile and fear rise up in your throat, not confident that you would be able to escape the crushing grasp of this towering man who now had both of your arms restrained.

His voice hissed out coldly, as his pitch-black eyes stared into yours with the same kind of fury and hatred that you had often seen echoed in Orron’s icy blue ones. “What a surprise to find you here,” he laughed, and the sound turned the very blood pumping through your veins to acid, to ice. He sneered at you, lips curling back to reveal the same ugly grin that showed up in your nightmares. “Figured you’d know better than to show up in a town like this. But, you were never a very bright one, were you?”

You bit your tongue, trying not to snap at that bait that he had flung out to you; you knew he wanted you to respond, wanted you to get mouthy, so he would have an excuse to discipline you, just as Orron once had. He wanted an interesting fight — you knew that he thrived on crushing the life out of a terrified and desperate soul, and you were not going to give that to him. You needed to ignore his jabs, verbal and physical, and focus on how to get yourself out of this situation, how to alert Din, or the Marshal, or any bystander who could offer you some sort of reinforcement against what was surely about to be a horribly painful and ugly fight.

Bragant used his leverage to pull you in closely to him, and you could smell the putrid odor of sweat and blood that radiated from him. It was nauseating and made your head feel dizzy, but you couldn’t let this get to you, couldn’t let this throw you off. From this positioning, you knew that you wouldn’t be able to use your upper body to fight him off as he had your arms secured; making a quickly-calculated decision, you brought your knee up forcefully into his groin, and as he bent over in pain with a groan, he released one of your hands. Gods, was it satisfying to see this motherfucker writhing. Having some more leverage and momentum now, you kicked into his sternum forcefully, his massive body flying backwards into the stone wall behind him. You turned to run, willing your feet to move faster than the stars you had watched in hyperspace — but he recovered faster than you expected; you had only made it about four or five steps away when he wrapped his rough, scarred arm around your neck and brought your writhing, desperately fighting body up and into his, pressing his back into the wall to keep you out of sight.

“Stupid bitch,” he spit at you, and you could see the flecks of blood and saliva that landed in the dust around you, standing out in stark contrast to the dark volcanic ash. “Did you really think you’d get away with it, killing him?” You felt the cold and rough-hewn blade of his axe pressing into your chest, a jagged corner digging in just enough to make you gasp as it pierced your skin; the blade was pressed dangerously close to your heart, and you had seen the force with which he could swing his weapon.

“Still curious how the fuck you got out of there like you did, vanishing like that; but we’ll have plenty of time to ask questions when I bring you back home. There are a lot of people that have been missing you.”

You could sense the sick and cruel smile on his face as he pictured what would surely be a gruesome, horrific, and torturous death.

No. No, you were not going to go out that way. Not on his terms, not on Orron’s. Not like this.

You thought about the horrors that would await you if Bragant was able to bring you back to the cartel. You thought about the sickening fear and sadness that Din and Grogu would feel at your unplanned and unexplained departure. Thought about how Din would cut his way through each and every formidable cartel member trying to bring you back to him, to bring you back to safety, to bring you back home. Thought about how one man wouldn’t be enough to fight off an army, thought about how Din would die trying to bring you back, just as you had nearly died bringing him back on Bardotta.

Thought about how the love between the two of you would threaten to shatter the galaxy.

You thought about how Bragant had called the cartel home, and the anger that coursed through you felt as though it was moving through your very bloodstream, each desperate beat of your heart pushing that anger further and further into your body, fueling your muscles and your strength until it was threatening to burst forward from you like a seismic charge.

“Home?” You screeched, the words tearing their way through your throat with vitriol.

“Home?! You keep that word out of your goddamn fucking mouth!” You screamed forcefully, your voice echoing against the stone and clay walls; you heard a loud crack, and the wall that Bragant’s body was resting against collapsed in on itself.

This disruption and destruction caught Bragant by surprise, and he fell backwards into the pile of rubble that your anger alone had created, releasing you from his grasp in the process. Your chest was heaving as you inhaled deep lungfuls of air, feeling the oxygen feed more and more power to your body — you felt invincible, impossibly strong and powerful — and vengeful. Every violent revenge fantasy you had ever had came rushing back to you, as you saw the tidal wave of your abuser’s blood overtake the world around you.

Here was a man who had contributed to your pain and destruction, who had killed countless people with no mercy — and now, you didn’t have a single ounce of mercy to extend to him. And you were at peace with that.

A blinding hot, red wave of fury overtook your body, crashing around you and drowning out the fragile sense of humanity that was desperately clambering to stay afloat. It was as if you were possessed, as you watched your arm extend before you, muscles twitching beneath skin as your fingers pointed in Bragant’s direction, before your hand found itself curled into a tight fist. Your nails dug into the palm of your hand, and you could see redness dripping forth from it — and you saw Bragant’s writhing form being lifted from amongst the stones, until he was levitating in midair. His hands clawed desperately at his throat, and the sight of his now-bulging eyes filling with terror felt beautiful.

With a final, overwhelming rush of immense power, your wrist pulled your hand inwards to your body and you heard a nauseatingly satisfying crack reverberate through the alleyway as Bragant’s eyes went dark and his body went limp, collapsing onto the pile of rocks and clay beneath him with a dull thump.

Your head began to spin as the energy that had previously flowed through you was suddenly ripped away, and you felt as though every cell of your body was now collapsing in on itself in slow motion; the sky above you and the ground below you tumbled throughout your field of vision, spinning both together and apart as your body connected with the dusty floor of the alleyway.

You could vaguely see a blood red stain spreading in your field of vision. Whose blood was it?

Throughout all of the endless spinning and disorientation, your eyes eventually came to rest on one comforting and familiar sight — a tall figure clad in beskar rushed to your side, but you couldn’t feel anything, couldn’t feel the hands that you knew were on your body, couldn’t feel the shift in your form as you were hauled into his arms. Couldn’t feel the heavy breaths and terrified words that spilled around you, as your head lolled to the side in his arms. It felt as though the link between your mind and body had been snapped, like a harp string tuned too tightly, and as the universe continued to tumble through your field of vision, you closed your eyes tightly and prayed for it all to stop.

Stop. Stop.

Stop.

#Din Djarin #Pedro Pascal #din djarin fanfiction #Din Djarin fanfic #din djarin x reader #Mandalorian fanfic #the space between

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honeysuckle-venom · 3 years ago

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Ill send some more distraction asks to answer when you need them, pls dont feel pressured to 💛 take care of yourself today lovely

With your psychosis, what sort of symptoms do you experience? Are they ever heightened by other things you experience?

Thank you so very much for asking this!!! I really appreciate the message of support and self care, when you sent this I was having a really rough time, and also I really appreciate the chance to talk about my psychotic symptoms, because I often want to but feel self conscious about it or unsure where to start.

So I experience delusions much more frequently and with much greater intensity than hallucinations, but I do have tactile hallucinations and altered perceptual experiences that come close to being full on visual hallucinations when I'm in a psychotic episode, and I do occasionally visually hallucinate (strangely, I'm one of the few schizophrenic people who do not experience auditory hallucinations).

I have a low level of psychosis going in the background like 90% of the time. At any given moment I probably at least partially believe a variety of persecutory delusions and/or delusions of grandeur. It's low intensity enough that I can mostly ignore it most of the time, but I just generally believe that various organizations are out to get me/are watching me/have replaced my loved ones, etc, and/or that I am Special and have access to Special Information and Insights that only I and a few other Special People can know. But most of the time that's just kind of hovering in the background and I can function without focusing on it, or even occasionally dismiss it entirely.

But every so often (anywhere from once a month to multiple times a week) I experience more severe psychotic episodes. Usually this happens because of stress and/or an unusual or scary event that seems to reinforce one of my pre-existing delusions. The first thing I notice when I start to enter one of these episodes is that all of the colors around me seem strangely brighter and more vivid, while at the same time everything feels further away and less real. The main emotion when in a psychotic episode is extreme terror. I feel a deep and sustained fear that is very difficult to describe, but it suffuses every part of me and is completely overwhelming and lasts as long as the episode does, anywhere from a few hours to a few days usually. Accompanying this fear is usually an intense certainty that one of my delusions (or occasionally more than one) is true. I might know intellectually that it is completely irrational and highly unlikely to be true, but I believe it fully and am forced to behave as though it is true. Often when I'm having a psychotic episode I feel imaginary insects crawling all over my body, particularly when the episode was triggered by seeing an insect and my insect based delusions are at the forefront. Sometimes I have visual perceptual disturbances, such as furniture seeming to morph and shift, and I often become convinced that various inanimate objects are alive.

At its core psychosis is about confusion and a blurring of boundaries, particularly boundaries between reality and fantasy and between the self and others. I struggle with those things day to day, and when in a psychotic episode I become increasingly unable to tell what is and isn't real. I have to be very careful with media when in a psychotic episode, because it's hard for me to distinguish if it's real or not. Even jokes that seem obviously false become very confusing to me, and my dad has learned that he has to speak very clearly and literally when I'm psychotic, because I can't tell what is sarcasm and what is sincere and everything is overwhelming and confusing.

Related to the confusion are cognitive symptoms, and I also experience significant physical symptoms along with my psychosis, primarily forms of catatonia. This has already gotten quite long, so I'm happy to talk about the cognitive and physical symptoms that go along with it in another ask or post (this is a hint for someone to ask me about that lol). I also didn't 100% understand what you meant by "Are they ever heightened by other things you experience?" so if I managed to answer that, great, and if not feel free to ask it again with a bit more explanation or what you meant!

Thank you again for asking, I really appreciate the chance to talk about some of this!!!

#answers #about me #psychosis tag #s tag

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frosteee · 4 years ago

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The Existential Terror of Asura [Soul Eater]

It's been a long time since I've thought about Soul Eater, but I've been thinking about it a lot recently and I wanted to talk about it. I've been thinking maybe a bit too much, which is relevant.

Asura resonated (sorry) with me years ago when I first got into the series, and he does even more now, for what he says about fear and its effects, and how the wrong response to individuals suffering from that fear can cause a spiral into even worse depths.

[LONG ASS POST UNDER CUT]

Lord Death created the first Kishin, Asura. Literally and figuratively. There's no two ways about it. Excalibur tells him as much in his final moments, telling him how wrong it was to create a being out of his own fears. Lord Death acknowledges that Asura, his own son, was created as an experiment, a means to the end of becoming a perfect god of Absolute Order. The quote from Voltaire's short story 'Memnon' comes to mind here: 'One day, Memnon conceived the insane idea of becoming perfectly wise.'

This foolish, if well-intentioned, effort was successful in Lord Death's case, but the consequences for those around him were horrendous. Early in the manga, Lord Death is unable to admit it out loud. Even the way he recounts Asura's fall into madness and betrayal, and how he dealt with that consequence, speaks to Lord Death's detachment, his lack of compassion and understanding at that time. He removes his relation to Asura entirely, removing the truth of the matter and placing himself on the moral high ground in the process.

When he is recounting Asura's downfall, Lord Death remarks that he did not know what lay in Asura's heart, pondering if it was fear. He does not seem to realise or take responsibility for the fact that Asura is literally his anxiety incarnate. He understood on some level that no being, god or otherwise, could stand such a condition, and was careful not to make the same mistake with Kid, but Lord Death (at that point) was unable to admit or think of Asura as anything other than a traitor and a threat.

Lord Death taught Kid that the real purpose of a Reaper was balance - conveniently forgetting to mention how he came by that particular titbit of wisdom - his eldest son, the most unbalanced creature to ever breathe.

I remember being in the car on my way to school with my dad. At the time I was suffering from an intense anxious phase where I was deathly afraid of bad weather - even something as harmless as dark clouds. I would cry when I opened my curtains and looked out. I didn't want to leave the house. I remember my dad saying to me: "You keep this up, and you'll be a nervous wreck."

That scared me, but I didn't know what to do to stop being scared. My fixation with the weather passed, somehow, later, but when I was in the grip of it I was powerless to do anything because I didn't understand, and neither did my parents. I was already a nervous wreck, and the prospect of a future where this continued, or became worse, only terrified me more.

Luckily, while my dad was never the best at handling my fears (more from his own 'pick yourself up' mindset and fear for me than disinterest or lack of love), my mum was always there to get me the help I needed and talk to me about my feelings. I still struggle today, but I have a good support system and am better equipped to handle and understand my feelings.

Asura had nothing and nobody like that. His father, Lord Death, created a fully mature being with full concept of his own makeup - the fears that Lord Death had discarded, the fears that made Lord Death flawed, imperfect, and wrong. Lord Death made a son of one of the the most corrosive and self-sabotaging emotions and was surprised when that didn't turn out well!

Lord Death saw a man, his son, so utterly terrified by the world, people, and himself, that he couldn't bear to go out without the protection of layers upon layers of clothing, a being so crippled by fear that he kept everything and everybody at arm's length, even his own partner Vajra, and spent his days in a state of constant introspection, barely paying attention to the outside world and mumbling incoherently.

Lord Death looked at that man, that firstborn child of his, and allowed that to continue. There's no indication he tried to ease Asura's anxieties, or help him in any way. Asura was a powerful member of his elite order, and that seemed to be all that mattered until it was too late. What kind of parent sees their child in such a state and does nothing?

Who looks at this and does nothing?

Lord Death created a nervous wreck of a man, and was both surprised and furious when that nervous wreck finally broke under the strain. Lord Death and others talk about Asura 'forgetting his discipline/teachings' and disobeying, like he was supposed to magically be able to handle being mortally afraid!

Being so helpless against the condition of his being, Asura sought the only thing available to him - the only thing he was valued for: power, and disobeyed his father.

Lord Death's response? To rip all of Asura's skin off his body and seal him inside it for the next eight hundred years, and doing everything possible to keep Asura there.

We all know that sealing something away and putting a rug over it never works, especially in fiction, so it was only a matter of time before Asura was freed, but in an emotional and moral point of view it was so, so wrong.

Asura had been gripped in fear for all his life, unable to healthily cope with it, and spent so much time in his own head his thoughts were coming out of his mouth as frantic whispers. The worst thing Lord Death could have possibly thought of as a punishment was to isolate Asura entirely.

I don't remember if this appeared in the manga, but in the anime (Lord Death and Asura's second/final confrontation), Asura tells Death of the things he thought about while in that sack of skin, because the only freedom he had left was to think. The worst possible thing for anyone, especially someone suffering from anxiety, is to do nothing but think. All this exercise does, and did with Asura, is exacerbate and breed more anxieties, and further embed them into the mind.

Left with nobody but himself to find a way out of the existential terror of his own thoughts, Asura came to realise that he had been an experiment, a tool, not a son. He refers to our heroes at puppets of Lord Death, as he once was, and regards Lord Death as nothing but a tyrant. Up until the revelation that he and Kid are brothers, Kid himself had never questioned Lord Death. Asura had eight hundred years to do that.

Eight hundred years in a stew of your own existential dread.

In the anime series, Asura concluded that it was the ability to imagine the future that was the source of fear. He who had spent so long terrified of the what if's and maybes, tortured by uncertainty, he sought to create a world where there was nothing but the immediate, static present, where nothing like that could exist.

Lord Death's response? "Sorry, I'll kill you for real this time" or "I've had enough of your rants!"

In either anime or manga, he never addresses or responds to Asura's thoughts or feelings. Even when Lord Death realised the error of making his eldest son the way he was, he never communicated this to Asura personally. To Asura he was flippant, dismissive and angry, acting as if Asura was solely responsible for the evil he did when Lord Death knew it wasn't. He'd sooner punish and hurt Asura than actually help him, a consequence of becoming 'Order' with no room for those who challenge or question it. It's like taking a young offender into a prison full of nasty criminals and violence and being shocked when they come out worse than when they went in.

His suffering son is a blemish, a shame, a threat. At one point, Lord Death even threatens to put Asura through the same existential hell again. Can people really blame Asura for hating him and turning on everything Lord Death cares about (more than he ever did his own son)?

In making his anxiety a person, Lord Death was obviously going to detach himself from Asura as an individual. Asura is everything he wanted to dispose of, only powerful and capable of taking out his enemies en masse. He was clearly only kept around and tolerated for that purpose, but never looked upon or valued as a thinking being capable of feeling and reacting to the condition of his birth.

Asura is Lord Death's biggest, most horrendous and reprehensible act. It's not a mistake, either. Lord Death intentionally created Asura to be the way he was, with no mind for the consequences until it blew up in his face. And when it did, not only was Lord death not humbled or sorry, but he pinned all the blame on Asura in a fit of rage and punished him - and punished him in the worst way both for Asura himself and for the world in general.

Lord Death treated Asura and his mental breakdown like a rabid dog to be locked away and forgotten about. That is not something a good parent does. A good parent acknowledges their hand in their children's problems, they talk to them, they help them out.

Lord Death may have been a good father to Kid, but he was the absolute worst Asura could have had. And Kid, aside from that flicker of doubt, doesn't acknowledge it, continuing to praise Lord Death and be the true Death God Lord Death had wanted.

Asura lashes out and sees everything in the world as his enemy, a thing to fear, a thing to hate, and he could not conceive of anything except terror. He was completely unable to understand a state of peace, harmony, bravery, in the face of all the fear life throws at you. He was a nervous wreck until he died, and that scares me. I don't want to become like that, but it's difficult to imagine some days when you're gripped by this unnatural fear of something, even if you know what it is, that you can get better and be truly content.

Asura was never happy and always afraid. He was fucked over by his parent like Chrona was, but nobody (including the narrative) gave a shit. Yes, his actions were wrong, he had to be stopped, he couldn't be allowed lash out against the world and others like he was, but I still see Asura was a tragic figure who was fucked over by the person he needed most.

I'm sorry this is so long, I have a lot of feelings right now.

#Soul Eater #tw anxiety #anxiety discussion #mental health #Kishin Asura #Asura Soul Eater #Lord Death #Lord Death Soul Eater #Death the Kid #Death the Kid Soul Eater #spoilers #anime spoilers #Soul Eater spoilers #manga spoilers

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yodawgiherd · 4 years ago

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You Were Never Truly Gone ch.3

>>>Read on AO3<<<

The support I'm getting is blowing me away, thank you again, everyone <3 Let's get high on that copium together.

They stared at him.

He stared at them.

Mikasa stared at nothing in particular, her happy smile and blush speaking for themselves.

Returning from its quick trip to the see, the bird landed on that tree and turned its head, intently watching the red fabric wound around the woman’s neck. There had to be a way to peck at it again.

In the end, Jean lost it.

“Of course, this makes perfect sense.”, he blurted, “Three years, three fucking years you are dead and the first thing we see Eren doing is this – cramming his tongue down Mikasa’s throat. I mean…”

A cuff from behind silenced him, Pieck whispering.

“Not the time for this, Kirstein.”

Armin’s will snapped next. Unable and unwilling to talk, he crossed the distance in three long steps practically crashing his weight into Eren’s chest. The former enemy of humanity staggered backward but managed to stay up straight until a second person joined in on the pile. Jean’s weight was too much to bear, quickly followed by Connie’s, and Eren fell, for the second time that day, landing on his back with yet another pained grunt.

His fingers slipped out of Mikasa’s grip as he toppled, and she took a step back to watch them roll around on the grass, her smile widening. Mechanically, mind completely wiped, Pieck lit up a cigarette, then second, then third until she realized what she was doing, frowning at her treacherous hands. A single, fat bead of sweat ran down Reiner’s brow when the realization was dawning at him, his eyes staring at what his brain refused to believe.

The devil of Paradis drew breath, Eren Yeager was alive. Alive and currently being squished by three of his closest friends. This was a nightmare. With an expression of pure terror, Reiner turned to Pieck.

“What the hell do we do?”

And Pieck, the smart Pieck, Pieck who was always exactly right as Zeke used to say, shrugged helplessly. Two more, and now there were five burning cigarettes crammed between her lips, a faint attempt at having the nicotine rush calm her hammering heart, puffing like a chimney. It did not work.

“I can’t believe this.”, a voice from the pile of bodies, most likely belonging to Connie, “You’re back!”

An incoherent mumble that was most likely Eren, muffled by everyone on top of him. It was ignored.

“I thought I’d ever say this,”, Jean added, “but I’m happy to see you, blockhead.”

Not even a peep from Armin and Annie was having a funny feeling, watching the man she agreed to marry hug another man with an expression of pure bliss. On and on it went and Eren would probably perish if Mikasa didn’t rescue him, as she did so often. Gently yet firmly she pulled Connie off with one hand, Jean with the other, and Eren was finally able to breathe again.

Sitting up, he eyed the two members of the party who were watching him with mixed emotions.

“Reiner, Pieck.”

All of the cigarettes fell on the grass, Pieck stomping them out on a reflex. The blonde head next to her was shaking in continued denial.

“This can’t be happening.”, Reiner disagreed with the reality, “Not like this…”

Sensing the change in atmosphere Armin let go and Eren was free to regain his footing. Dusting himself off, the usurper stood up.

“I’m afraid that it is. I’m here.”

“How?”

A sidelong glance to Mikasa from Eren.

“It’s a long story….”

“Well, it’s not like we are leaving without hearing it.”, Annie said, “The sooner you start the sooner you finish.”

Once again intertwining his fingers with Mikasa’s, Eren linked them together, the bond giving him both strength and confidence. And here, under the tree and next to his own grave, he told them everything. His death and what followed, the never-ending search among founder’s memories to locate his, the terrible pains Eren went through to put the pieces of his person back together. Thousand times he died and thousand times he pushed through it, filled with nothing but will to move forward. The determination that he drew from Mikasa, from how much he wanted to be with her. The fear that he might be left forever in the collapsed paths, and the incredible joy he felt once his eyes opened on the trampled field – the site of the last battle.

“You are saying that you didn’t regenerate?”, Reiner’s eyes flew to the grave, inspecting the undisturbed surface.

“No, I was given a new body, that’s it.”, Eren tapped his chest, “I lost all my powers, just as you guys, I’m a regular human being now.”

“That does not matter.”, Pieck interjected, “You are alive, it changes everything.”

“And that is a huge problem.”, Reiner’s voice was weak, weak and tired.

Everything they worked for, everything they tried so hard to achieve was at risk now. The fragile peace would shatter into millions of pieces the second Eren came back, and the war would consume the remnants of the civilization. Tired, so tired from fighting, scared, terrified that the nightmare was not over, Reiner let the heavy words fall from his lips.

“Eren Yeager must stay dead. He can’t be allowed to live.”

What happened next was a blur. In a fraction of a second, Mikasa moved forward, stepping in front of Eren and shielding him with her body. Ice, pure ice appeared in her eyes as she rammed those freezing spikes into Reiner, her voice being the most threatening thing the group ever heard in their lives.

“Try it.”

Trauma is an interesting thing. Reiner had it under control lately, his panic attacks and helplessness weakening with the years following the war’s end. But now, they came back in full force when he was confronted by the image of protective Mikasa Ackerman in all her glory, defending the man who gave him nightmares. No ODM, no blades, not even a uniform, she was dressed in a pink skirt and white shirt, yet she was the most terrifying thing that Reiner ever saw in his life – not to forget, the man has been through the rumbling. His first impression of her, during their training years and later, was a flying demon that put his titan to shame. Later he discovered the other part of Mikasa, the beautiful and tortured young woman that was so incredibly caring and sad, coming to terms with the loss of the love of her life. Now the demon was back, even more terrifying than before, because she just regained the most important person in her life and that joy was threatened.

“Try and take him from me.”, she hissed, and Reiner no longer had the armored titan to protect him.

With a sound of pure terror he fell, raising a hand as if to keep her away from him. Pieck tensed, Jean and Connie were frozen in place, Annie regarded everyone with an unreadable face. If there ever was a situation that needed defusing it was this one, Armin knew, so he slipped between the vengeful Mikasa and cowering Reiner, raising his hands.

“Easy, I’m sure that he didn’t mean it like that. Did you, Reiner?”

Yes, he was scared shitless, but he couldn’t give up. They had to see, they had to comprehend the risk.

“I do, think about it Armin! Think about what would happen if Yeager came back! It would completely destroy everything we worked for!”

A flash of understanding deep in those ocean eyes and Reiner knew that he got his point across.

“I don’t care what you think, if you lay a finger on Eren…”, Mikasa’s whole body was tense, like a steel spring ready to jump, a feeling that she didn’t experience since the war.

The three years of relative peace melted away like nothing because that incredible happiness she just found, the joy that warmed her whole existence was challenged, and Mikasa would do anything to protect it. Luckily before anything could happen, Armin spoke up.

“Let’s take this somewhere else, sitting around Eren’s grave while he’s right here is creepy.”, he forced an awkward laugh, “Mikasa, you take Eren and head back to your cabin. I and the others will make a quick stop in the city, pick up some food and drinks and join you there. Hell, we must celebrate!”

It was obvious that the tension had to be broken, so no one protested. With a last dangerous look at Reiner, Mikasa walked away, hand clutching Eren’s. And Armin held, he held until they were far enough until he broke.

The grass was soft beneath him as he fell down to his knees, hands clutching his head.

“Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.”, the word was a mantra, repeated over and over as the reality truly sunk in, “This is so fucked.”

It was he who needed saving now, and Annie stepped up. Walking over to him, she pulled Armin back to his feet and then into a hug.

“It will be okay, it will be okay.”, she repeated into his shoulder, offering all the support that she could.

Behind them, Pieck helped Reiner stand while Jean and Connie exchanged a look, feeling ignored. When Annie pulled Armin back from the brink and Reiner put himself back together, the group headed back towards the civilization but this time the mood was entirely different. Armin was walking deep in thought, clutching Annie’s hand like a lifeline. Reiner’s expression was haunted, the old fears kept at bay creeping back in. Pieck patted her pockets only to find out that she was out of cigarettes, her usually cheerful smile turned upside down. Jean and Connie were the rear guards, their heads still trying to wrap around the situation. Silence, that ruled the group until they reached the edge of the city, the concrete making Armin turn.

“Guess I don’t have to tell you this, but not a word about Eren to anyone.”

There was a collective agreeing murmur.

“And about the situation…”, Armin sighed, “Reiner, you are right, him coming back is a huge issue. The second the information gets out the Yeagerists will immediately jump him, put him on the pedestal and use him to launch a crusade against the rest of the world. Mikasa is stronger than all of us, but she’s just one woman, she can’t protect him on her own. Obviously, we can’t let them have him, that cannot happen.”

He raised a finger.

“But. We are most definitely not killing Eren again, understood?”

“Yeah,”, Jean agreed, “Once was more than enough. He might be a suicidal blockhead but he’s still my f-friend.”

Yes, the last word was a stammer because Jean just called a man who killed eighty percent of the population his friend, still it was the truth, a bitter one.

“Would be easier if the Ackerman girl wasn’t so obsessed with him.”, Pieck muttered, but to everyone’s surprise was cut off by Annie.

“Obsessed? She’s not obsessed, she loves him.”, her hold on Armin’s hand tightened, “Love is beautiful.”

That shut Pieck up for now, yet her eyes were still calculating. Squeezing Annie’s hand back, Armin smiled at his fiancé before continuing.

“I will figure something out. For now, focus on the fact that our friend is alive, and we must celebrate that.”

Speech finished, Armin turned and headed towards the city, soon flanked by everyone else. After a short discussion on what do they even want to buy, Connie brought up wine, because drinking was now very high on the list of things he wanted to do. Jean was in favor of something stronger, and Pieck needed a new pack of cigarettes, so in the end the group split up, agreeing to meet in the square in half an hour.

The road ahead was treacherous, swimming in front of Connie’s eyes as he walked. Everything he knew, everything that he took for granted in those last three years was just turned upside down. A part of him was happy that Eren was back, a part of him was worried about what that might mean, and a small part of him was even angry. If Eren came back, why couldn’t Sasha? Why couldn’t Hange or Erwin? They didn’t deserve to die either…

But he couldn’t be mad at Eren. He did everything in his power to help them, to protect his friends against the cruel world, and allow Paradis to survive in the future. He even returned Connie’s mother to him, a fact that he was eternally grateful for. Still, the combination of all those feelings brought his legs back into an automatic mode, and he was entering Niccolo’s restaurant without even thinking about it.

Well, this could work, his friend always stocked some good wine.

Pushing the door open, Connie entered, seeing that there was quite a crowd inside. Not much of a surprise, as Niccolo’s place was popular. And still, the owner noticed him immediately.

“Connie!”, he shouted, pushing past his guests to hug him, “Man am I glad to see you.”

Normally, there would be a sort of ritual. They would sit down and drink, talk about what was happening, about Connie’s mission for a peaceful world and Niccolo’s restaurant he had with the Braus family. And as the bottles emptied they would end up talking about Sasha, remembering their dear comrade and crying on each other’s shoulder. But today was not such a day.

“Nicco, I’m so sorry but can I trouble you for a few bottles of wine? I need it for…”

“Mikasa.”, he understood immediately, “Today is the anniversary of his passing.”

“Is that why this place is so full?”

“Of course, Yeagerists love to celebrate.”

“Didn’t Eren get defeated today? Why are they celebrating that?”

“Eh, it's more like a promise to get revenge, a ritual in the honor of their war god to appease him.”, Niccolo rolled his eyes, “Pile of rubbish if you ask me, but their money is as good as anyone’s.”

He clapped Connie on the shoulder.

“Wait here, I’ll bring out something extra for you.”

Leaning on the counter, Connie let his eyes scan over the guests, noticing the number of uniforms. There were even some familiar faces, Hitch and Rico among others, and Connie was glad that Jean did not come here. Hitch had taken a liking to Jean lately, and it was difficult to separate her from him once she was attached.

The click of glass against wood woke him, noticing the vintage-looking bottles.

“One of my best.”, Niccolo said proudly, “Give them to Mikasa with my regards. I’ll probably drop by her cabin soon, a surprise visit with some of my homecooked food will cheer her up.”

The heart went cold in Connie’s chest, imagining what would happen if Niccolo came into Mikasa’s house and saw Eren standing there, very much alive and kicking.

“I-I don’t think that’s a good idea.”, he stammered, “I’d probably send a letter first or something, she didn’t look like she wants visitors.”

“Oh, okay. Thanks for the info, last thing I want is to make her uncomfortable.”, Niccolo’s face fell, “The poor girl suffered enough.”

Collecting the wine and thanking the cook again, Connie reunited with the others and together they walked, all the way to Mikasa’s secluded cabin. It wasn’t a short road but they were all former soldiers, easily crossing the distance even with Jean’s light complaining.

There was food on the outside table, ready to host them, but the woman who owned the place was busy. Busy with being seated in Eren’s lap on the bench, their faces pressed together. Not that Armin blamed her, they had a lot of catching up to do.

“Two minutes.”, Pieck remarked out loud, disturbing their moment, “Two minutes with no god damn kissing, is that too much to ask?”

Red-cheeked, Mikasa jumped down from Eren’s lap, yet her giddy expression quickly changed once her eyes found Reiner. Before she could terrorize him again, he held up his hands in surrender.

“Mikasa, I promise that I won’t try anything stupid, all right?”

She huffed in satisfaction and nodded, their short feud put to rest. The bottle of wine Reiner held towards her felt like a peace offering and Mikasa accepted it, pulling the cork out with her fingers alone, not having any issues. Damn.

Alcohol is truly humanity’s friend. With both the wine and the stronger stuff Jean picked up, the awkwardness and tension melted away, and Mikasa didn’t feel this relaxed ever since their drinking adventure in the refugee camp. Understandable, one could say, since the next time period was filled with literal apocalypse they had to stop. Not everyone made it, she knew, raising a glass in Sasha’s name, a toast that everyone joined. Another one was made for Hange.

And yet It was different in a better way. Eren was here, they were together, and Mikasa was free to do all the little couple things she always wanted - sitting on his lap or playing with his hair, stealing small kisses that made Pieck groan when she saw them. Mikasa was so happy that it felt like a dream. In the end, the emotional stress combined with her tiredness and Mikasa parked herself at the bench, watching her friends with a smile. It was no longer melancholic, it was no longer the feelings of a woman who was missing a huge part of herself because that part was returned, it came home. Now, it was a smile made of pure joy.

The group fell apart into smaller units, courtesy of the night slowly creeping in, and Eren joined Armin and Annie where they sat, staring into the fire.

“I believe that congratulations are in order.”, the ring on Annie’s finger glistened in the light, easily explaining what Eren meant.

“Thanks…”, Annie took a swig, her eyes not leaving Eren’s face, “I still can’t believe that you are alive.”

“Trust me, there are days when I do not believe it either.”

“Do you think that you deserve it?”, now it was Armin speaking, his voice slurred from the alcohol yet clear, “Back in the paths, you told me that you could never live with yourself, you didn’t want me to even try and bring you back. What changed?”

“You couldn’t have done anything, my body was dead and my mind was ruined by the founding titan. I had no understanding of time anymore, past, present and future blended into a mix.”, his fingers clutched the bottle tighter, “It is so terrifying for time to lose its meaning.”

Not wanting to crush the glass, Eren carefully eased his hold before continuing.

“I meant every word that I told you back then. I didn’t want to die, but it felt like the only way, I was damaged beyond repair. Only when the paths started collapsing, and all the memories began to die, I realized one thing.”, his eyes moved over to where Mikasa was sitting, “I could not let myself forget her. Ever.”

A chuckle from Annie.

“Gosh, you have it bad.”

Eren didn’t even bother with denying it, turning back to Armin instead.

“To answer your question, I still don’t think that I deserve to live. I have done things that can never be forgiven, I have destroyed this world.”

“Then why.”, Armin whispered, “Why do you live?”

“Because I was given another chance. Undeserved, but I got it, and I will not let it go to waste. War and death are the farthest things on my mind right now because I have a new goal in life.”, a tip of his bottle towards Mikasa, “I lived my first life for myself, and I will live the second one for her. There is only one thing I want, and that is making that girl the happiest that I can, every single day.”

“I’m not so sure that the world will let you do that. You may have died but your ideas went on, Eren, and not in a good way.”

“The Yeagerists?”

“Strong and growing stronger. Imagine how aggressive they would get the moment they knew that you are alive. Imagine the death and destruction your living will cause.”

“I do not want that, any of it.”

Armin gave him a tight smile.

“Sadly, that is the problem with gods. Their message can be twisted by the prophets.”

The heavy ocean gaze dropping back towards the fire, Eren understood the message and stood up, leaving the pair alone. They were right, of course, his life was bound to cause ripples, considering how important his death was. Yet there was no way in hell that he was ever leaving Mikasa alone again. As long as she would want him, he would be right there by her side. Forever.

Eren let his eyes graze over Reiner and the smoking Pieck but decided not to join them. The blond’s expression was still haunted and the girl’s guarded. They were never his friends, only enemies, they were brought together with the scouts by sheer necessity and Eren had to remember that. His return would cause a lot of trouble, and for Pieck and Reiner it was most definitely not worth it. So instead of poking the wasps' nest, Eren went over to the table where Connie was snoring with Jean at his side. The latter was watching the liquor in the bottle, frowning at the reflections, but he did look up when Eren sat down.

“Eren.”

“Jean.”

“Aah, it’s good to have you back.”

“Is it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well… My return must have caused quite a disturbance in your…”, Eren nodded his head towards Mikasa, “plans.”

“Do you really think so low of me?”

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way, I was dead, and you liked Mikasa for a long time.”

“Sure, but you aren’t dead anymore.”

“Good point,”, Eren raised his bottle, “I’ll drink to that.”

A clear clink produced by the glass invaded Connie’s dreams and he mumbled something, drooling on the table. Putting his bottle back down, Jean tapped it against the wood.

“You know, I don’t feel that way anymore.”

“Is that so…”

“Or maybe I do, but it's different.”, Jean sighed, “Look, you didn’t see her, Mikasa was an incredible wreck after you died. My own heart was bleeding just from seeing her, and even after she moved on she always broke when near your grave.”

A pang of guilt in Eren’s chest, growing stronger when Jean kept talking.

“She loves you, you dumb blockhead, she loves you so much that I can’t put it into words correctly and yet you kept being an asshole to her for so long. Fuck, I want to punch you.”

“Then go ahead, I promise I won’t fight back. I deserve it.”

And Jean almost did it, but then he remembered how Mikasa reacted when Reiner only implied hurting Eren, and his hand fell back to his side. Call him a pussy, but Jean didn’t feel like dying today.

“Maybe another time.”

The bottle caught the light as Eren twirled it in his fingers, obviously putting together another sentence.

“Listen, Jean, if I didn’t come back, if I stayed dead, would you make a move on her?”

And he thought about it, long and hard, put his drunk brain to work, and came up with a plausible theory.

“I guess I would, once she would heal. Mikasa is an amazing and well, incredibly beautiful woman, and I do like her. But that is meaningless now. If there is one thing I like more than Mikasa it’s seeing her happy, and your return made her the happiest that she ever was. This thing between me and you? That was never a competition. Her eyes were only for you, bastard, a blind man would see that. ”

“Well, I guess that you could call me blind.”, Eren chuckled.

“Blind and stupid, you are lucky that Mikasa has enough brains for both of you.”, Jean gestured with his bottle, “Go, go back to her, I feel like passing out now.”

And pass out he did, head hitting the table and bottle falling on the grass. Leaving his friends to rest, Eren crossed the distance to the bench, sitting down next to the woman with a red scarf and offering her his lap, an invitation that she took and climbed into.

Together they watched the stars but didn’t sleep, lost in each other’s presence while their friends snored all around them. Armin and Annie huddled together by the embers, Jean and Connie by the table, Reiner curled on the ground and Pieck that somehow managed to fall asleep in a sitting position, a burned cigarette butt between her fingers. The night was warm enough, there was no need to disturb their rest.

Hours passed yet Eren still didn’t feel tired, stargazing with the girl in his arms that meant more to him than all those lights in the sky combined. When the sun began to peek over the horizon, Eren broke the silence.

“Hey, Mikasa.”

She half turned in his arms, letting Eren see a part of her smile.

“Hm?”

“What am I to you?”

“Oh no,”, she giggled, shaking her head, “not this again.”

“Come on,”, nose sliding over her shoulder, Eren nudged her, “Tell me.”

It took a bit more persuasion from his side, but in the end she gave in. Fully turning on Eren’s lap, Mikasa took his face in her hands, pressing their foreheads together.

“If you need to know, then I will stand behind what I carved on the headstone.”, her lips came even closer, hot air washing over Eren’s as she spoke softly only for them to hear, “You are my most beloved, my dear.”

She kissed him, he kissed her, and everything was great until a bottle shattered on the wall, one that someone threw at them, albeit very inaccurately.

“Two. Minutes.”, Pieck groaned, “Damn you!”

The sound woke Connie up, jerking awake.

“I need to piss real bad.”

That was all he said before darting towards the forest.

The commotion eventually roused everyone, and the ragtag group had a small breakfast before saying their goodbyes.

“You know I’m super happy that you are alive, but please don’t do anything rash.”, Armin was saying, clutching Eren’s hand, “I promise that I will think of something. In the meantime, the Yeagerists can’t catch wind of you. Even worse, imagine what the rest of the world would do if they knew.”

Mikasa’s cabin was secluded, the risk was low but it was there, and Armin was feeling uneasy about this whole setup. Yet there was nothing better to be done. It would be an interesting meeting with the queen when the ambassadors were all nursing throbbing headaches, yet one does not keep Historia Reiss waiting. Apologizing for the mess they left, and Mikasa was once again alone. If one didn’t count the man that was supposed to be dead, that is.

They cleaned the bottles together, working in unison achieved by years and years of working under captain Levi. After that it was finally time to get some rest, but when Eren entered the cabin a certain fact came to the light. Mikasa had only one bedroom, as she was living alone, which presented a potential problem.

“I can take the couch.”, he offered immediately, never in his life wanting to push her into something she wouldn’t want.

All Mikasa did was tighten the hold on his hand, pulling him towards the bedroom.

“You died, came back to me, and still you want to hide behind those walls? I meant it when I said that I want to be with you, all of you, so please stop this nonsense. You claimed that you loved me, so give in to those feelings, nothing is stopping us from doing so anymore.”

It must have been the remnants of the alcohol that made Mikasa this bold, yet the slight blush was present on her cheeks anyway. That subtle pink dusting was incredibly endearing and Eren had to kiss it, making her redden even harder.

“Lead the way.”

Entranced by her graceful movements, by her ethereal beauty, Eren allowed himself to be pulled into that single bedroom, eyes only for the girl he loved so much that the feeling brought him back to life.

Literally.

#eremika #fanfic #snk #139 spoilers #copium

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botw-oneshots-and-other-bs · 3 years ago

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The Divine Beast

A/N: Everything in this story time-wise or travel I have spent doing in the game so it could be as accurate as possible. The photo above and on other Chapters of this story - when they are posted are drawn by the lovely @coconut-mocha.

Chapter 1 - To Hyrule Castle

Darkness, 10,000 years passed with nothing but darkness to show for it. Not a dream to be had besides the replaying of memories until they became nothing more than a distorted, distant lie. The feelings of happiness, anger, sadness, and love all sunk into the void of her mind as Alyss lay motionless, frozen in time, on a stone slab in a cold, damp cave. Visions of a familiar darkness, a sick and malicious darkness, filled her mind destroying anything she ever held dear. Villages and homes she used to recognize became desolated and desecrated by this malicious evil as faces – both new and old – were distorted to the point Alyss couldn’t recognize them anymore.

After years of torment at the hands of an unknown evil Alyss found herself standing in the middle of Hyrule Field. She watched as the guardians she vaguely remembered turned and wrought havoc upon all of the Kingdom. She watched as people grabbed their families and tried to escape, the last of the Hylian race trying to save itself from total annihilation. She heard the torturous beeps of the guardian’s laser beams, she heard the screams of the desolation around her, yet when she tried to call out to those around her to warn them she found that her voice was silent. She was powerless to do anything but sit and watch as Hyrule ceased to exist and a large cloud of malice followed a beast around Hyrule Castle. Alyss felt terror strike from her head to her feet at the beast’s enormous, blood curdling roar. She watched as a guardian seemingly aimed it’s beam at her, unsure of whether or not the beam was meant for something behind her. She closed her eyes and waited for the inevitable. After a few moments of nothing happening Alyss opened her eyes, but instead of a guardian all she saw when her eyes focused on the darkness was damp cave walls.

The cool damp air of the cave ravaged her body as Alyss tried to suck oxygen into her screaming lungs. Panic slowly left her body as the soft sounds of a village going about it’s daily life and the loud roaring of a waterfall caressed her ears reminding her that everything was okay. Very carefully this girl pushed herself up by her hands, testing her ability to move after what felt like a really long nap. Thanking Hylia that her muscles had not degenerated, Alyss sat up and looked around.

There wasn’t much to see in the small damp cave she resided in for Hylia knows how long except a small chest. Swinging her legs over the edge slowly she tested her leg's strength by slowly standing up. Once she was comfortable with standing Alyss took her first step of the past 10,000 years and – only losing her balance a couple of times – she made it to the chest. There she found some gemstones, rupees, and a brittle scroll. None of this interested Alyss so shutting the chest she made her way down the hall of the cave. It wasn’t long until the smallest rays of sunlight pierced the darkness Alyss had lived in all those years, and it wasn’t long after that that she found herself staring into a wall of an angry – yet peaceful – waterfall.

This new sensation scared her enough to force her backwards where she stepped on her soft, tangled hair and fell to the hard and unforgiving ground. After taking a moment to regain her equilibrium Alyss performed a once over on her body. Only when she was comfortable there were no cuts or bleeding she stood back up and continued on. Being very careful not to touch the falling water, Alyss looked over the edge of the waterfall to see nothing but a large pool of water. Looking back, she found herself wondering if she could return back to the stone slab she woke up on and go back to sleep, but with a shake of her head she turned back to the water, took a deep breath, and dived straight in.

The chill of the water embraced her body like a hug as she plunged into the depths of the waterfall’s basin. Alyss found herself swimming away from the waterfall without fully realizing what she was doing. It turns out that her survival instincts hadn’t completely dissipated and she had some form of basic survival knowledge. Her thoughts were cut short when her lungs screamed for oxygen as intensely as they had when she first awakened on the stone slab, and she found herself pushing herself towards the surface. When she broke the water, she found herself staring at a gigantic wall of stone supporting a large house made out of a dark wood. Alyss looked around for options but it was either follow the river and see where it took her or climb the gigantic stone wall and she wasn’t too keen on climbing right now.

Moving her arms under the water was a struggle the further she got from her starting point, and it took a good bit of willpower to keep pushing, but eventually she came upon land. Pulling herself up onto the shore slowly she sputtered for air and tried to catch her breath. As the top half of her body laid on the warm and welcoming grass of the land Alyss scanned the small village. It was peaceful and quaint. Children ran about freely, playing without a care, while others tended to their gardens, livestock, and other duties. In a way it made Alyss want to start crying, but before she could humor that emotion her vision started going blurry making it hard to see the figure that blocked out her view of the sun as she passed out.

The moon was at its peak in the sky by the time Alyss woke back up. This time she did not lay on a hard slab of stone in her torn and frayed clothes, but instead she woke up in a robe made of thin purple cloth on a soft bed of straw. Opening her eyes just enough to see in the candle lit room of the small, one roomed, hut Alyss saw a petite framed woman with long silver hair sitting next to the only table in the home. She had the clothes Alyss was wearing before in her small, fragile looking hands and was seemingly working to fix them. Alyss rolled her head back to the middle of the pillow she rested on and stared at the ceiling trying to piece together something, anything, of what happened to put her in this situation. Only bits and pieces came to her mind, most of them in the form of feelings, of Princess Zelda ordering for her to be locked away.

‘Guess they thought I’d never wake up…’ she thought to herself bitterly but before any more thoughts could be had a weak voice called out to her.

“Oh, you’re awake! I am happy to see you are alright.” Alyss watched as the younger woman put down her needle, thread, and the fabric to stand up and walk slowly over to the bed. “When the town guards found you passed out in the town’s lake they brought you to me to make sure you were alright before assuming the worst.” The fragile sounding woman reached over to the end of the bed and grabbed a worn cloth full of what Alyss assumed to be water. Wringing it out and placing it upon Alyss’s forehead to wipe away sweat or clean her face, Alyss did not know, before continuing. “I am the town healer, my name is Lasie. Might I know your name?”

Alyss turned to look at the woman named Lasie. At the moment her purple eyes met Lasie’s golden ones something inside of her felt like it clicked. She didn’t know what it was but the feeling was not a pleasant one as the fire-like pain that shot through her skull forced her hand up to try and make the pain stop. This, of course, worried the town healer as she hadn’t seen any kind of cause for this young woman’s head to hurt so suddenly.

“I’m sorry. Please, rest while you can,” she stood up and bowed to Alyss. “My questions are not of concern for I have already sent word to Lady Impa about your discovery. Please save your strength until they arrive.” Before Alyss could respond with anything, Lasie had run out the door into the night to do only Hylia knows what. This was somewhat of a relief to Alyss as the departure of the town healer made her headache lessen to a small, dull thud.

Alyss wasted no time once Lasie left in standing up and heading out the door into the cool night air. It was silent compared to the hustle and bustle of earlier that day and for that Alyss was kind of thankful. Taking a few methodical steps, she made her way to a railing and looked out over the town. The railing had a direct view of the large house in front of the waterfall she found herself behind when she woke up. The moon was directly located above the waterfalls and just looking at it’s silver beauty took Alyss’s breath away. She hadn’t seen the moon in Hylia knows how long and the sight literally brought tears to her eyes.

“It’s a beautiful night isn’t it?” A man spoke beside her, making Alyss jump and quickly wipe away the lone tears that had fallen. Her head snapped to the side and looked at him inquisitively. She had not seen someone that bore the logo of the Sheikah in quite some time and the sight of another Sheikah made her smile. “That’s a beautiful smile you have there. It almost rivals the sight of the full moon.” The man spoke gently, making his way closer to Alyss.

Letting her guard down for a second the young woman turned to look back at the luxurious moon, nodding as she agreed with him. Little did she know that the young man reached behind his back to a curved dagger he kept hidden. The beauty of the moon lured Alyss to it, completely unaware that someone was about to end her life.

“You know what else is beautiful,” the man continued in that same dulcet tone he had the entire time he was talking to her as he placed the dagger firmly into his right hand. Lifting it up slowly and silently, his gaze became one of sickening happiness at the event that was about to occur. Before Alyss could ask what or turn around he continued in a much more desperate tone, “the praise that Master Kogha will give me one he learns that I have wiped out the myth of the fifth Divine Beast!”

In the flash of an eye the curved dagger was flying towards the neck of the young woman. Everything that happened next occurred in slow motion to her. She turned just enough to spot an arrow running it’s way into the hand of the man behind her causing him to scream out in pain and drop the dagger. Turning completely around, Alyss saw five horses galloping down the slope of the hill, people had started to emerge from their huts to see what the commotion was, but all Alyss saw was a young man dressed as knight cutting down the man who had tried to assassinate Alyss.

The rest of the company dismounted their horses and ran up to Alyss as she stared at the lifeless, blood-stained body of the man who tried to slay her. Her eyes were wide and her legs started to quake from the shock of the events. Her legs started to give out on her, but Alyss felt a pair of strong arms reach out and grab her, holding her up enough to help her get to a nearby bench where she could sit down. “Are you ok?” The person who kept her from falling asked.

Alyss looked up slowly so her purple eyes could meet his… goggles? Looking up past his goggles she saw a large poof of hair on top of the man’s head which wasn’t as nearly weird to her as the double axe shape on the back of his head. It wasn’t until the man was saying “yoo-hoo” and waving his hand in front of her face jovially that she shook herself out of her stupor and nodded.

“Oh Robbie, leave the poor girl alone,” a high and happy female voice sounded from the other side of the man named Robbie. “she’s obviously been through enough!” A young woman with a magenta streak on the right side of her head popped up from behind the man and threw an arm around his shoulders. Once the woman got a good look at Alyss she tilted her head in confusion. “Hang on…” she took a step closer to Alyss to where she was practically in her face and put her fingers under her chin. “I’ve never seen you around here before. You’re very clearly a Sheikah as Robbie, my sister, and I, but I would remember a Sheikah with purple eyes. How odd…”

“Can you tell us your name?” Robbie questioned standing up and crossing one arm over his body and letting the other rest on it so he could also hold his chin with his fingers. This seemed to have gathered the attention of the other three members of their party. Alyss watched as they all turned to look at her, but there was one group member in particular that immediately made her blood boil.

Jumping to her feet, she backed as far away as she could from Zelda and pointed a shaking finger at her face. “Traitor!” She cried out in a small, crackly voice that sounded as though it hadn’t been used in a millennium. She didn’t stop backing up until she stepped on her hair and whipped her head backwards causing her to let out a shriek and fall to the ground.

Everyone standing witness to the scene felt the tense air about them when Link, the short knight, jumped forward in case he needed to protect the princess. They looked to Princess Zelda to see what she would do in this case only to see that Zelda was smiling. She pushed past Link and approached the girl on the ground who was trying to escape again. “Why do you state that I am a traitor?” She asked, standing over her.

Princess Zelda wasn’t trying to be intimidating, but from Alyss’s perspective the Princess looked as menacing as she did before she shut her away in that cave. “Get away from me,” she growled, some purple smog escaping her nostrils as she breathed out. This caught the attention of everyone but nobody said anything about it. No one dared to breathe too loud. Alyss watched with threatening eyes and an increasing breathing rate as the Princess leaned down to her level. This time, Alyss was not playing. Her ingrained fear and hatred for this woman was too much. “I said get AWAY,” she screamed at her. The skin around her eyes started to seemingly break. The texture had turned into a reptilian type of scale while her breathing turned more and more purple by the second. By the time Zelda had stood back up and allowed Link to drag her away from the woman, Alyss was emitting enough smog to engulf her body.

Her eyes focused on Zelda behind Link for a bit until she was content that the Princess would not advance further, only then did she allow her head to fall. Silver hair hiding her face as the purple smog started to evaporate and disappear from around her. “Don’t touch me Princess Zelda,” she whispered, shocking everyone that she knew her name. “The face of the one who locked me in that hell is not one I will ever forget.” Slowly raising her head to look at the Princess, Alyss felt herself starting to crack. The pain, the torment, the loneliness that she felt all those years with nothing but bad memories replaying in her head, like a broken record, had started to seep through.

Impa slowly approached Alyss making sure her actions were known by the woman. “Please come with us. We can take you to the castle and try to figure out where to go from here.” She paused when Alyss looked at her quickly. Impa knew she had to be cautious from this moment on. “Let us take you to the castle," she started back. "We have been working on recovering the Divine Beasts and Guardians to fight Calamity Ganon, so I’m sure we can figure something out to help you.”

Alyss furrowed her eyebrows and stood up slowly. “Recovering the Divine Beasts and Guardians? What do you mean recovering?” She looked down at the hair that graced her heels, the robe she was in and how tattered her previous clothes were. In remembering that scroll that looked as though it would break if someone touched it the pieces started to click into place. Slowly she looked back up and at each and every one of the people in front of her in horror. “How… How long was I gone?”

Princess Zelda, despite Link trying to push her back behind him, stepped forward just enough to make it known that she was about to speak. Despite the earlier aggression, this woman intrigued her and she wanted – no needed – to know more about her. “What is the last thing you remember before I placed you into your proverbial hell?”

Alyss took a good look at the Princess before responding to the Princess’s question, “we were preparing to attack Calamity Ganon. I was created to help in that purpose, but…” Alyss looked away unable to face the memories that caused her deep slumber, but in making eye contact with Robbie she forced herself to continue. “… I malfunctioned. The Princess sealed me away and focused her attention on the other Divine Beasts.” Clenching her fists to her chest, Alyss closed her eyes, “I failed.”

Robbie slowly approached Alyss and held his hand out for her to take. The night had started to turn into early morning and with the long ride from Hateno Village to Kakariko Village everyone was tired. “It’s been a long night for everyone here and I think some rest would do everyone here good.” He smiled welcomingly at Alyss trying to help her feel more at ease with their company and show that they aren’t hostile.

It took a minute but eventually Alyss’s small hand met Robbie’s larger one to show him that she trusted him enough to take her somewhere to rest. Robbie beamed as he looked at the rest of the company, “well let’s get to it then!”

The sun was high in the sky before anyone woke up the next day but Alyss was the absolute last to rise from her slumber. When she had risen she saw that the clothes she had been wearing the previous day were laid out for her on a nearby table with a note that mentioned they were from Lasie. Making a mental note to herself to thank her at a later date, Alyss looked at the clothes laid out for her. The white robe she had been wearing when she left the cavern had been repaired and fashioned to look more like modern Sheikah clothes by adding a dark red ribbon along the hem and open v neck collar. Red ribbons adorned the sleeves of her newly repaired robe while the sleeves themselves were open from the shoulder to the red ribbon.

Alyss picked up the turtleneck, tank top, tunic and changed into it quickly before anyone walked back into the open room. Slipping on the matching blue fingerless gloves Alyss slipped the freshly repaired robe over her head and grabbed the thigh high socks lying underneath it. Sitting on the bed Alyss placed her foot on the nearby table, thanking Hylia that her blue tunic was shorts instead of a skirt, and slid the black thigh-high up her leg slowly so as to not rip the gentle fabric. When she was done pulling it up her leg she laid back on the bed for a second to contemplate whether she actually wanted to go through the process again with the white thigh-high. During her thought process, the door to the inn opened up to reveal Robbie.

Alyss turned her head to the side to properly look at him and saw that he had his arms crossed over his chest and a light smile gracing his face. “Good morning sunshine, need some help with the other stocking?” When Alyss shook her head no and sat up to start sliding the other stocking up her other leg she could feel Robbie’s eyes on her as he continued talking. “Well, in any case, Impa would like me to take you to her.” He walked closer to Alyss and placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “I know you’re scared but please try to be accepting of the situation. You can’t exactly go back in time to the past but remember you're not alone.” He smiled a warm smile when Alyss looked up at him in surprise and continued, “now come on. Let’s go see Impa.”

It didn’t take long for Alyss and Robbie to meet with Impa as the house she resided in overnight was not far away from the town’s inn. Impa and Purah made it a point to help Alyss shape her hair while teaching her how to put it up the way that the Sheikah do. By the time the women were finished with her hair Alyss had been fully updated on the events of the past few years. It was a lot of overwhelming information for the Sheikah and she didn’t know where to begin on processing it. All she felt was a major storm cloud looming in her heart threatening to spill over and drown her in sadness.

Alyss didn’t really put up much of a fight after last night in doing what the Princess and her friends said to do. She was an outcast in this world so she might as well roll with it. Alyss mounted the horse she was given by the current Sheikah leader and headed out of Kakariko Village to Hyrule Castle with the rest of the company. The ride out of Kakariko Village and through the country gave Alyss time to think about everything that had changed since she was put into that cavern. Kakariko Village rang a bell in her mind but she couldn’t shake the feeling that it was vastly different when she lived there with her parents versus the version she saw today, yet if anyone asked her how it looked or where it was located she wouldn’t be able to say for sure. The same went for the country around the trail they followed. None of it looked familiar and the unfamiliarity of the land did nothing to quell Alyss’s feeling of being an outcast in this world.

The company traveled in silence with Impa, Purah, and Robbie leading and Princess Zelda and Link behind her. The moon had started to rise, but no one was quite tired yet since they had slept in so late from the previous night’s events. Once again Alyss found herself staring at the only piece of home she could find. The silver beauty of the nearly full moon made her wish that she could pick up and fly off into the sky away from this foreign world she was doomed to live in. It wasn’t until the moon was high in the sky that the company decided to stop and rest for the evening. Everyone unmounted their horse’s before leading them to a safe area of the field to graze and sleep for the night.

Alyss laid out the soft blankets she was given to create a sort of bed and sighed. She didn’t notice that as she let her hair down to be more comfortable she was approached by none other than the knight himself. Not turning to face him, Alyss moved her blankets back and sat down underneath them, rubbing her face with her hands.

Link watched as she settled into her makeshift cot before setting the plate of food he had made in front of her. Alyss stared at the bowl of pumpkin stew in front of her flabbergasted. She looked up to see that the knight had already turned to join the others by the fire where they were talking and laughing with one another. A quick moment of contemplation ran through her mind as she tried to make up her mind on how she wanted to act. Did she want to be the person who shunned people she barely knew, or did she want to try and make the best of a bad situation and use these people to help her figure stuff out?

With a small sigh and a quick glance at the moon, Alyss grabbed the bowl of pumpkin stew and stood up. The smell of the stew hit her nostrils almost immediately which made her stomach growl loudly. Apparently sleeping in a cave for goddess knows how many years would make you famished. Forgetting all about the knight nearby who was watching her put the bowl to her lips with secret satisfaction, Alyss took a large mouthful of the creamy soup. The soup was the perfect balance of fortified pumpkin, goat butter, milk, and wheat and it brought back memories of her time with the beloved Rito friends she had. The thought was bittersweet as she thought back on the times she would sing with them in their choirs, enjoy their cooking, and the way that her friends would allow her to ride on their backs to the hot springs where they would relax their cares away. These thoughts, mixed with the pumpkin stew, made her heart ache for moments like that again.

Licking the excess soup off of her lips, Alyss looked up to the company of friends gathered by the warm fire. Ever so slowly she walked up to the fire and cleared her throat, catching the attention of everyone there. “Can I join you,” she asked hesitantly as her eyes drifted back towards her feet. In looking at the ground Alyss didn’t notice everyone at the fire smile happily at her question.

“We would be delighted to have you join us,” Princess Zelda said in a cheery tone of voice. She motioned for Alyss to take a seat in between her and Link and watched as the young woman sank to the ground staring into her bowl.

“Alyss,” the Divine Beast muttered almost too quietly for anyone to hear her. Lifting her head to look Robbie and Purah in the eyes, “you asked me yesterday what my name is. It’s Alyss.”

There was a comfortable silence for a second as everyone let this new act of trust coast through their bodies, but it didn’t last long as Purah held her hands in front of her and shook them happily. “Oh my goddess does that mean you trust us?” She was looking right at Alyss who scratched the back of her head sort of awkwardly.

“Now Purah we shouldn’t scare her with questions like that. Let’s just be grateful that we now know her name, although I can’t help but feel like I’ve heard of that name somewhere…” Impa scolded her younger, more eccentric sister.

Alyss watched with wide eyes as they quickly were thrown into a heated discussion that only siblings would understand. To her sides Link and Zelda and Robbie were laughing at their antics causing her to smile for the first time in a long time. Alyss finally felt that maybe there was a small glance of hope for this world she was thrown into.

They arrived at Hyrule Castle’s town late the next day which was a relief to everyone in the company except Alyss. Alyss was riding between Link and Robbie as they led their horses at a slow pace through the town so as to not disturb the hustle and bustle of the town’s businesses. “You know,” she started off staring at the majesty of the looming castle. “The castle was only one room and as I got older it was nothing but a few more rooms connected together.”

Link turned his head to signify that he was listening, the hustle of the town not really worrying him since Hyrule Guardsmen were posted all over town to keep the peace if necessary. He was curious about her past but before he could make any sort of gesture towards her to keep her talking about it, Robbie looked over and continued the conversation. “Really? This must be a pretty big shock then to see the castle in all its glory. I wonder,” he continued. Alyss turned to him curiously as his tone had become a more serious one. “Just how old are you? The castle has been this way for thousands of years.”

The rest of the ride was silent as Alyss herself didn’t even know the answer to that question. Once back at the castle everyone dismounted and handed their horses off to the castle stable hands. The King - which Alyss had learned was named King Rhoam - had met with everyone to learn of the happenings in Kakariko Village. They told him of the Yiga Clan making an appearance, how Alyss was found, and her reaction to the Princess. King Rhoam hadn’t seemed super surprised but he definitely didn’t expect that the validity of her story was too accurate. He didn’t really ask Alyss many questions beyond where she woke up before ordering his Knights to go to the village and search the area she was found for anything that could provide an answer. In the meantime he ordered Alyss to be placed in a guest room and closely watched.

This is how Alyss found herself laying on the large, fluffy bed staring at the ceiling of her room. The room she was trapped in had many bookshelves full of books, a decent sized desk, and different odds and ends in decorations, but she was bored. There wasn’t much she could do as the books were in a language she could only partially understand and the window was too small for her to crawl through, yet large enough to let in a decent amount of light. Once the moon had appeared over the horizon, Alyss started to think about going to bed when her thoughts were interrupted by a soft knock at her bedroom door. She eyes the door before standing up and heading to it. When she opened the door, she expected to see a Hyrule Guard bringing her something, since that’s really the only visitor she has gotten over the past few days, but she was surprised to lay eyes on Robbie.

“Hello,” she said a little curtly, eyeing him up. She was a little pissed off that she was trapped in this goddess forsaken room for so long, but her curt attitude didn’t really seem to bother Robbie as he just smiled at her. “Can I help you?”

“Well, I brought you some lunch and some news,” Robbie spoke, stepping into the room and placing the silver tray down on the desk on the other wall. He turned around sassily and placed his hands on his hips to look at the woman who had moved back to laying down and staring at the ceiling. She was silent and didn’t really acknowledge him which bothered Robbie a little but he didn’t let it get to him. Moving to the other side of her bed, he sat on the edge and laid down beside her to also stare at the ceiling. “What are you looking at?”

Alyss cut her eyes at Robbie and sighed in irritation. “Can we get this over with please? I’ve been stuck in this room for days, alone, so if you don’t mind I would prefer to continue to be alone please. Thank you.” She rolled onto her side to face away from Robbie as to hide her saddened face. Unknown to literally everyone, she was having quite a hard time adjusting and being trapped in the one place she had all of her bad memories wasn’t making it any easier. Fighting back tears as her mind raced, she listened to Robbie sit up on the bed. She didn’t feel his weight leave the bed so she assumed he was looking at her. Rolling back to look at him, she was taken off guard by the fact he was removing his goggles.

“Are you alright,” he asked furrowing his eyebrows. His eyes were surprising to Alyss as they were a deep red and she was kind of expecting them to actually be his goggles at this point. When Robbie asked her this question, Alyss tried not to let her emotions get the best of her. She barely knew this man and the question was a little more personal than she wanted to get into at this point. She nodded her head and turned to face the other side of the room again.

“Ok…” Robbie said a little thrown off that she was so standoffish, but in a way he understood. She has been locked up for goddess knows how long and thrown into this strange new world. He continued cautiously, making sure to monitor her bodily expressions for any signs of discomfort. “Well, the news I have to tell you is that I have been given permission to take you home.”

Alyss turned quickly to him and glared, “excuse me?”

Robbie held his hands up in defense and backtracked realizing what he had said. “Let me explain, it’s nothing weird I promise.” Robbie continued when Alyss slowly turned her head back to its previous position. He laid back down on the bed and continued talking. “Well, some guards came back with some interesting finds. They found a chest full of ancient looking material, a curious gemstone, and a very brittle scroll.” Robbie paused for a second for Alyss to respond but when he got nothing he continued. “You see, the scroll was written about you, but it was a little hard to decipher as the ancient language was lost to us long ago. It said that you were an experiment of the Royal Court gone wrong.”

Alyss’s entire body stiffened at Robbie’s words. Her memories of her life played through her mind in a hazy, theatrical way as she listened to his recount of the letter.

“Princess, she’s awake,” a female voice called out. Alyss could hear bits and pieces of the conversation between the Princess and this other voice. The world was dark and her entire body burned. What had happened to her?

“Alyss…”

Alyss groaned and turned her head as the sunlight streaming through the room lit up the dark vision she was having. When the blurry images focused, Alyss saw a beautiful woman with long blonde hair and a long, silken, blue robe. The triforce adorned the middle of the golden belt wrapped around her waist making it no mistake that this was none other than Princess Zelda.

“Hello there, do you know who you are?”

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Alyss had been training all morning with Sheikah warriors to hone her new skills and test out her latest power, poisonous smog. Alyss watched as the newest hoard of Bokoblins came running at her. With a smirk, Alyss took a deep breath in and focused on connecting with her inner rage. Once the red bokoblins were close enough to touch her, Alyss exhaled hard surrounding the monsters with a dark purple smog. It didn’t take long before Alyss heard the Bokoblins make a choked screaming noise and a bunch of thudding. Opening her eyes, Alyss saw the Sheikah warriors standing there, some shocked and others recording the results. Looking down, Alyss’s eyes widened as they found themselves staring at a pile of at least thirty bokoblins dead on the ground. She noticed that with that last breath, her skin around her eyes was tight and incredibly dry feeling. Reaching up slowly she found that her once soft skin was now the skin of a reptile akin to a Lizalfos.

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“You have to continue training Alyss for the good of the Kingdom” Princess Zelda hollered after the Divine Beast as the latter stormed through the Castle. “You have to aid us in sealing away Calamity Ganon!”

Alyss had been having a hard time controlling her emotions as of late during training and it scared her. Never before has she lost her ability to calm down and now here she was trying not to lose her shit at someone bumping into her. Princess Zelda came on the scene when Alyss lost control of her emotions and body, almost murdering the poor woman with her own hands that had turned to talons and the same reptilian skin she’d come to expect. When the Princess called her name, Alyss did not answer. Purple smog flowed out of almost every pore of her body as her feet left the ground, dragging the poor choking woman with her. Her hair had started to form it’s way around her body and to the top of her head as Alyss lost herself to her anger.

Zelda had managed to stop Alyss from killing the poor servant woman by summoning her sacred bow and shooting an arrow into Alyss’s shoulder blade forcing her to drop the woman. As her anger faded into pain, Alyss’s body and mind slowly changed back to normal. When Alyss came to she looked at her hands, tears starting to roll down her face at what she had almost done. “I’m a monster,” she whispered, running away to be chased by the Princess.

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The four divine beasts, besides Alyss, were up and running. Vah Medoh, Vah Rudania, Vah Naboris, and Vah Ruta, they had their Champions to pilot them, and Alyss was doing well when it came to her training. She had been able to control her levitating and smog to use them sparsely outside of combat, but her guardian beam was the newest thing she had to focus on. It wasn’t until a few weeks later that the disaster that forced Zelda to seal her away would occur.

On that fateful day, Alyss stood in the small Sanctuary of the castle listening to the King ramble on and on in an update of the land. Alyss was drifting off where she sat until she heard faint noises, whispers and murmurs of terrible things to become and all the death and destruction the voice would bring. Looking to both of her sides where the other Champions sat, she saw that none of them were trying to get her attention in the slightest.

Alyss tried to shake the voice out of her head, but the more she tried to resist it, the quicker it got louder and became multiple voices, making it harder for her to ignore it. Alyss covered her ears trying to drown out the incessant whispers of doom, but soon it became too much. A loud, shrill scream erupted out of her mouth and her eyes became wide with panic, unknowingly scaring everyone in the room into a stunned silence. The Sanctuary had turned into a decrepit, broken down wreck while the bodies of everyone standing in that room littered the floor in a giant pool of blood.

Intense panic, fear, and anger at seeing her loved ones dead on the ground sent Alyss into a blind rage she couldn’t control. She couldn’t recognize the people in front of her who were still very much alive and trying to calm her down. She didn’t feel her hair grow longer and longer while two thick portions of hair floated to the top of her head to create horns. Her breathing had become more and more ragged, slowly replacing the oxygen in the room with smog. With tunnel vision, Alyss looked around at the dead people as they slowly rose up from the pools of their own blood. “Stay away,” she screamed, which let out a beam of blue light from the horns on her head which barely missed the King. She felt people using rope to grab her and push her down to the ground which she barely recognized as her Sheikah brethren doing their best to subdue her.

“Seal her away,” was the last thing she clearly heard coming from Princess Zelda before a bright white light knocked her unconscious.

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“Robbie,” Alyss pleaded gently for him to stop talking. She had curled up into a small ball at the memories flooding back to her, the tears which were threatening to fall out of her eyes before were now freely falling down her cheeks. Alyss didn’t have to look over to see that Robbie noticed her pained state and had sat up. “I can’t hear anymore of this. If I lose control again-” she whispered shakily, holding her unsteady hands up in front of her face disgusted as though they were covered in blood.

“Lose control again? What do you mean?” Robbie asked, placing a small supportive gesture to Alyss’s shoulder that caused her to flinch.

“I’m a monster,” she whispered, horrified.

“Nonsense,” Robbie scoffed, unable to believe that this girl they had just found could have done anything terrible enough to be called a monster. He watched as she sat up slowly. She was shaking as though she had just spent the night in the Hebra Mountains with nothing but a thin layer of clothes. Her purple eyes were wide and full of fear at whatever memory was flashing in front of them. She stared at the edge of the bed just past him and continued to torture herself. Robbie watched as her skin crinkled and turned into scales, the nails that were digging into her arms, as she held herself, turned into large talons that drew blood from her porcelain skin. He watched as her hair started to float and her eyes turned into slits. He had to hold back his excitement as he made mental notes of her sudden changes and what could have potentially caused them how he knew he had to help her.

Leaning over, Robbie grabbed Alyss’s shoulder and pulled her roughly into him. He wrapped his arms around her scaly skin, ignoring the cuts he received from it, as he gave her the only thing he could think of, a hug. Robbie felt her tense up at the sudden contact, but it wasn’t long before the open skin showing through his v-neck outfit started to feel little droplets of water. He felt her skin turn back to its former texture as she allowed herself to relax in his arms and release her emotional distress in the form of loud sobs. “I promise you’re not alone anymore,” he whispered to her, gently running his palm up and down her small, shaking back. “Come with Purah and I. Let us help you figure out what went wrong and what we can do to make it right. You’re not a monster,” he leaned back and smiled at Alyss gently.

Alyss nodded slowly as she searched Robbie’s eyes for any sign of insincerity and malice, but when she found none her cheeks turned a bright shade of pink. “Stay with me please. Don’t let me be alone,” she whispered in a plea.

Robbie smirked and threw his hand up to point into the air. “Oh yeah,” he shouted, making Alyss giggle at his eccentric and slightly ridiculous way of agreeing. Pulling the bands and sticks out of his and her hair to make both fall to their natural length, Robbie wasted no time in laying her back down cuddled up in his arms, whispering promises of a better future until she fell fast asleep.

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