#i might be a jaded little asshole that really just hates the world WAY too much tho

[a-whisper-in-the-closet]

Blame @xinhua-jun for me posting this. But, like. Just listen for a sec. Hear me out.

Annabeth is cat love

Nico is dog love

Annabeth would never back down or change her life for anyone. The fact she accepts a person into her life is it. That is the final form of trust she can give. That is her sincerest love. The ability to help and the chance to understand is her utmost affection. She can leave whenever she pleases and will do so if she finds anything displeasing. That is the deal. Both parties have to be happy with all of it, or at least content, or she'll leave for the both of them

Nico would follow someone to the end and beyond. He would eat them. He would keep them. He would take scraps if it meant being fed by his love. He would doggedly, stubbornly follow because devotion is his love language. He would not care how corrupt a path him and his love take, as long as they are safe. His love can be used as teeth. He would tear throats out at a word, and he would feel only happy that his love is now safer. He would end the world just to make sure everything was okay for what is his.

It's not kitty love or puppy love, to be clear. They're both too violent and jaded. It's a dog and a cat. There is nothing romantic about it, only the tragedy and pain of children learning what it means to have nothing and be even less.

[trippinsorrows]

through your eyes + au 3

authors note: well. this got freaky. some smut ahead, folks. this really is starting to feel like a completely different story, low key.

part one // part two // au solana instagram

warnings: smut

taglist: @sayyestoheav3nn @fearlesschimera @cyberdejos2 @annfg8 @trentybenty @sabrina-carpenter-stan-account @zoeyybellex3

word count: 4.3k

"I need to talk to you."

Solana should have been talked to someone about this.

But, she's felt torn.

Torn on just who she can talk to about it.

And lack of options hasn't been the issue.

If anything, there's a copious amount of resources and trusted confidants she could go to. Courtesy of her large family, host of cousins, and other good friends.

It's actually easier to start with who would absolutely be the worst person to go to.

And her mom, interestingly enough, is that person. Ironic given how close she is to her madre. One of her best friends, in many ways.

But, not for this. Because Nina will go to Xavier, Solana's dad, and somehow Wes, Solana's brother, will get involved, and it'll just be a whole mess.

Beyond that, there's her cousins. Jade and Anriel will scold the living shit out of her and probably confide in their mom, Solana's aunt Sharmell, out of concern. Aunt Sharmell will go to her husband, Booker, who won't hesitate to literally fly out to Miami just to tell his brother, Xavier, Solana's dad. Thus, the whole damn family knowing.

Then there's her cousin, Roxanne. Roxanne would be great if not for her inability to hold water. And Solana definitely doesn't need her mom's side of the family knowing. They'll kidnap her and force her to live in Mexico for the rest of her life, believing she's gone mad.

Might not be too far off though.

Rhea will just kick her ass for being so 'fawkin stoopid'. Jaida will encourage it, because Jaida encourages all things questionable. But Kayden....Kayden could be the one.

She's also bound to not respond well, but still, someone Solana knows will ultimately keep this between the two of them.

Kayden Carter looks over at Solana with intrigue. With over 15 years of friendship, she knows when her roommate and best friend is truly in a dilemma, that nervous, panicked voice she typically uses present already. This is definitely one of those times.

"Okay." Kayden motions for Solana to sit down on the other end of the sofa, waiting until she does so to ask, "what's going on?"

Solana takes a deep breath, both hating and needing to share this. "You know the event I attended with my family this weekend?" Kayden nods. "I—I met someone there."

At that, Kayden lifts a pierced brow. "Oh?"

Solana looks away, explaining, "I was trying to get away from Ethan and ran into this man by accident, and he ended up helping me out. Pretending to be my date or whatever. It got Ethan to leave me alone, so that was good."

"Forget about Page's annoying ass, what about the man? Is he attractive?"

Solana scoffs. "Very." She's not quite sure how to describe just how fine Roman Reigns is. "But—"

Kayden's expression sours. "He's an asshole, isn't he?"

"Notorious." Though Solana does her best to stay tucked away in her little corner of the world within that's away from the mafia life, she's not stupid nor entirely disconnected. It's common knowledge that Roman is a dick.

And yet....

"But, he was nice to me. He's been nice to me." Kayden's expression shifts into confusion, Solana clarifying, "he—he came to my job this morning."

"Holy shit, he's serious about this." Kayden scoffs and smiles, clearly intrigued by the mystery of it all. "Wait, who is this guy, Sola?"

And now, here comes the part that Solana has been dreading since decided she would confide in Kayden. "It's....it's Roman."

Kayden blinks, not catching on. "Roman who?" And it's just one 'you know' look from Solana that has her eyes widening. "No." Solana closes her eyes. "Please tell me you're kidding." More silence provides the answer she's certain her roommate didn't and doesn't want to hear. "Roman fuckin' Reigns? Solana, have you lost your mind? Do you know who he is?"

Solana leans back into the sofa, murmuring, "of course."

"No, you must not, because this man is the devil himself. He's a monster, Solana. If you heard half the things he's done, you'd be running the opposite way. You'd be on the other side of the goddamn world to get away from him." Kayden continues to freak out, lecturing and chiding Solana for what she clearly feels is a bad call. "I just-I don't understand. Solana, you've always been so against our world. You've essentially lived in seclusion just because you don't want to be a part of it, and now you're entertaining the literal embodiment of said world?"

Solana runs her hands over her face. "It's not—it's not like that."

"Then tell me what it's like, because maybe I'm just confused, but I'm pretty sure you're telling me that you're talking to Roman Reigns?"

That's exactly what she is, but Solana is lost on just how to express that despite everything that's been said about this man, in the two interactions she's had with him, he's been nothing but kind. In his own way, of course.

"He....he hasn't been that way with me," she finds herself defending while also recognizing that it truly is a weak defense. "He's been....nice. He helped me out with Ethan. He came to see me at my job just to ask me out--"

"Wait, he already asked you out?" Kayden looks like she's about to spazz out even more. She shakes her head, taking a second to calm down. "Solana, you're my best friend, and I love you, but he's probably just trying to fuck you. You're gorgeous with a great body, and he obviously sees how innocent you are. It's just a chase."

It makes sense, and Roman more or less confirmed as such with his comment about wanting her with no clothes on. That should be enough evidence for her to find a way to ward off his advances.

But.....

There's this part of her that's absolutely intrigued by him, as he so smugly pointed out. A part of her that wouldn't mind to get to know him more. Even if it makes no damn sense to her.

"I can take care of myself." It doesn't come out as confident and assured as she would like it to be, nor is she entirely certain of her assertion herself, but it's expressed regardless. "I—I can handle this."

Kayden looks just as unsure as Solana feels. "Your family doesn't know, do they?"

"No." Her eyes widen a bit. "No one does, except you now. So please, please don't say anything to anyone." Solana needs to at least figure out just what's going on before she has to face the inevitable backlash from her family and others.

Kayden shakes her head. "You know I got you, girl. Even though I do think you're fuckin' crazy, you've always supported me in my fucked up relationships, so I'll do the same with you." Kayden suddenly gives her that teasing expression, poking her arm. "Besides, it's not like he's ugly, am I right?"

So right.

"I get so nervous around him," Solana whines, laying her head back against the sofa. "He's just so....he comes on so strong."

Kayden smirks, leaning over and playfully nudging. "He wants him some Sola, girl." She laughs as Solana covers her blushing face. "Who could blame him? You're gorgeous, babe."

It's such weird experience. Solana is still trying to heal and learn to love herself again after calling off her engagement, so a man like Roman Reigns coming into her life out of nowhere and being so intent on just....her....it's a lot to digest. Because taking away all of the things about him that make him dangerous and avoidant worthy, he's still, hands down, the most handsome man she's ever seen.

"So where are ya'll going?"

Solana bites down on her bottom lip. "He invited me to WarGames. Said he'll send a car for me."

There's obvious surprise on the face of her best friend. "First date is watching him beat the shit out of other men?" Kayden says aloud, nodding and shrugging. "It tracks." Solana rolls her eyes. "Well, what are you gonna wear?"

She shrugs, truly unsure when she remembers what he said. "Something....something red." Kayden is curious, as Solana shares a version of what Roman said. "He....he asked me to wear red."

Told. He told her to wear red, but Kayden doesn't need to know that part.

Smirking, Kayden nods, impressed almost. "Damn. He already wants you wearing Bloodline colors? First lady type shit." Solana grabs a pillow and throws it Kayden's way, her friend laughing and then gasping. "Holy shit, you have to wear that red dress I got you last year for your birthday!"

The mention of that little piece Solana swore would never see beyond the back of her closet has her eyes widening. "Kayden, no, I can't. That's way too revealing."

"That's the point, duh." Kayden tosses the pillow back and stands up off the sofa, pulling Solana up with her. She then looks over at Dulce who's been sleeping peacefully as her mama stumbles into one of the most questionable decision of her life. "Come on, Dulce. We gotta get mama ready to get dicked down."

"Kayden!"

--------

Solana is a nervous wreck.

She hasn't been this anxiety ridden since taking her NCLEX-RN, and that was a damn near traumatic experience.

This is literally just a date.

Kind of.

Cause she's never actually been on a date before where the man will be preoccupied the whole night.

But, she's also never been on a date with someone like Roman before either. It's just all around a brand new experience that has her so in her head. She's in it during the car ride and especially when she arrives at the Warehouse and is escorted to Roman's locker room.

She nearly has a heart attack when the door is opened and she expects to see him waiting, but it's postponed, God looking out for her, when she sees he's absent.

The security leave her alone without any guidance or clue as to just what she's supposed to do, so Solana takes that time to text Kayden and let her know she's arrived and that she's safe.

For now.

Not wanting to focus too much on the unknown of it all, she takes in his locker room which is much nicer than what's probably necessary. Craft table. Weights section. Sofa. Flat screen TV. A trainers table. The works, essentially.

It makes sense when she thinks about it.

Roman seems like a man who only accepts the finer things in life, if not the finest.

But, it's the section on the craft table with a bottle of wine that keeps snatching her attention.

Drinking is probably the last thing she needs to be doing, but that's exactly what she does.

She quickly grabs the bottle and and a wine glass, filling it up halfway before downing almost all of it. It's the perfect combination of sweet and bitter and hopefully helpful in taking some of this edge off.

"You sure don't disappoint, do you?"

It's a pure stroke of luck that she doesn't drop the glass in her hand at the rumble of his deep voice behind her. But, it's truly a miracle that both the glass and herself don't fall to the ground when she turns around to look at him.

Mio dios.

Roman is standing by the door, his hair down and clearly wet, water droplets sliding down his bare chest, Solana unable to take her eyes off his bulging muscles and the intricate tribal tattoos that somehow add to the magnanimity and beauty of this man. He's wearing black cargo pants tucked into black boots, with the sacred, red ula fala resting around his majestic neck.

Roman Reigns in a suit is one thing.

But Roman Reigns shirtless is something entirely different.

She's almost certain the ground underneath her shakes a bit, also deeply impacted by the god among mere mortal men.

If not for Roman initiating something beyond her embarrassing gawking. she would continue to stare. For a long time. A very long time.

He walks toward her, every step bringing her closer and closer to melting into the ground. This man is a giant. In every sense of the word.

But, it's when he takes his finger under her chin, lifting her head a little and has the audacity to say, "you can do more than just look, if you want" that Solana just about spontaneous combusts on the spot.

He's maybe said a total of 8 to 10 sentences to her in the entire time they've 'known' each other, yet even in the midst of that brevity, he still gives her more of a visceral, bodily reaction than her ex ever did.

"I—" Words are a thing of the past, something she was once capable of but not anymore. The sight of God himself has a tendency to rob anyone of the right to verbalization.

Roman chuckles, his other hand moving to her hip. "You listened."

Solana is certain it's her that's trembling and not the room around her. It takes her a minute to process he's referring to her dress. "You—you said wear red, didn't you?."

"I did." He acknowledges, once again giving her a one over as he bites on his bottom lip. "Good girl."

Oh, fuck.

Solana has to get the hell out of here. The room is freaking in shambles at this point.

Or, maybe that's just her.

She's a stuttering mess trying to communicate with this man. "I—you—probably have to get r—ready."

Roman smiles, and her entire world flutters. "Do I not look ready to you?"

Hardly. This man probably doesn't even know what it's like to be unready. Never experienced that. That's a mortal thing.

"No—I just.....S—sorry."

Similar to their last two interactions, Roman brings his hand to her back and tugs her into him. Solana, once again, places one hand on his chest, not even thinking about the fact that the water from his hair continues to dampen his body.

Until water hits her palm.

Solana is on fire. In all areas. She stammers out, feeling stupid as all the outdoors for stating the obvious. "You're wet...."

His gaze flicks to the space between her legs. "I'd bet you are too."

What the hell?

How is he so.....raw?

She absolutely refuses to move an inch, refuses to cause any kind of movement with her legs that could alert her to the fact that he's probably not wrong.

Not wrong at all.

If only Roman was on the same page.

"You are, aren't you?" His eyes narrow slightly, hand gradually starting to move down from the her back to the sizable swell of her ass. "I bet that pussy dripping for me already."

Solana's eyes shut, her nails clawing against his chest. "R—roman." Her breathing is labored, heart beating a mile per fucking minute, and that only intensifies when he squeezes her ass. Her natural reaction being to arch into him, her breast pressing against his solid body. "Oh my God....."

"God can't do for you what I can, sweetheart."

Blasphemy. Filth. Pure disrespect, and yet her head drops against his chest as he slides his hand to the front of her, wiggling it between her thighs.

Solana means to stop him, means to push him away, but her body seems to have a mind of its own, because she finds herself widening her stance, giving him all the access he needs.

The go ahead.

And he takes full advantage of that, Solana gasping loudly when he moves to cup her through her underwear. Her soaked underwear. "Dripping." He taunts, and it's true. Legs no longer mushed together, she absolutely feels the wetness dripping down, soaking her panties. "I'm taking you out to dinner after the match, but I think we should just skip to dessert right now."

Eyes widening, she gasps again when Roman removes his hand and picks her up, her thighs naturally wrapping around his waist. He carries her over to the trainers table, plopping her down on the edge.

"Lay back."

Her stomach is all kinds of twists and turns. She's not stupid. Far from it. There's only one place this is headed. "I—what?"

Roman, however, looks bored, stating so plainly. "I don't make it a habit to repeat myself, Solana. Even with a pretty thing like you, so do me a favor and just lay back."

If someone told her this is how the night would kick off, she'd call them crazy as all the outdoors. There's no way in hell this man is about to do what she thinks he is.

Is he?

Voicing her thoughts, she struggles with just how to word what is an otherwise simple thing to ask. "Are you...."

His gaze is piercing. "Can I?"

What a fucking question.

Once

Once has she had someone go down on her, and it wasn't even her ex-fiance. It was a guy she dated in college for a few months. To say it was......disappointing would be an understatement.

She didn't even finish.

Back to the borderline crisis at hand, she finds herself oversharing. "My ex. He didn't—he wouldn't....."

"Well, he's a fucking idiot." Roman's cruel but accurate remark is accompanied by his big hand moving up the sides of her dress until its scrunched by her stomach. "Eating pussy is a delicacy."

Her eyes shut again. He's so nasty.

So why is it only making her wetter?

Roman's fingers lightly tugging the waistband of her underwear reminds her of the proposed question.

This is a bad idea. A very bad idea. She doesn't sleep around. Doesn't let random men go down on her, and yet, the minute Roman licks his lips, the decision is almost made for her.

"Y—yes."

That alluring, small smile is back as he moves his hand to her stomach, pushing down just enough to get her in position. "Lay down, and let me show you what it's like to be with a real man."

Sweet baby Jesus.

Solana is on the verge of a nervous breakdown, back flat against the cool table when he goes to pull down her panties, leaving her open and exposed.

She hears Roman make a sound. "Mmm. Pussy just as pretty as I imagined."

Her hands clench at her side. He's thought about this? About her? About her—

"Ahhh." Her back is almost entirely off the table the minute his thick tongue gives one full, sensation stirring lick up her cunt. "Roman...." she moans, hands planted on the table, head thrown back as his cool breath blows against her pussy.

Seconds later, his tongue is back on her, fingers spreading her lips while his tongue teases a languid circle around her clit. "Oh my....."

The sound of his deep chuckle travels from his space between her legs. "I'm gonna make a fucking mess out of you."

And before she can process that, he tugs her by her thighs, diving face first into her cunt. Solana is a mewling, writhing mess as he sucks on her pussy like its the fuel and energy he needs for the fight to come. Laps at her with a hunger and desire that nearly matches her own, because whatever her ex did to her that one time is nothing compared to what he's doing to her right now.

"Shit...." Her body is hot, her nipples hardening by the second, and Solana can't help the way her thighs squeeze against his head, her lower half coiling and twisting from pleasure she's never experienced.

"You like that, don't you?" He hums, voice haughty and knowing. "Like me eating this pretty pussy, don't you, sweetheart?"

Her answer is an obvious one, breathed out over and through heavy pants. "Shit, yes." He sucks on her clit, the slurping sound practically filling the room and egging on her moans.

He pulls away, the absence something that's so much more noticable and painful than it should be. Only for her to arch again when his finger plays around with her nectar that feels like it's spread all over her lower half at this point. "Look how wet you are. I can tell she been neglected." Roman swirls his finger in circles around her clit, thumb applying just the lightest pressure. "Can tell she been needing me."

Solana can't and won't disagree. Not that she could anyway. Logic is very much a thing of the past. The only thing on her mind is ecstasy, and he's giving her more of that than she's ever had in all sexual interactions with all of her ex's put together.

"Goddamn, you taste good." He goes back to licking and sucking on her again, groaning almost. "Would stay down here all night if I could."

Solana nearly comes right then and there.

She wouldn't be opposed.

At all.

He stays with his head between her legs for what feels like inhumanly possible, long enough for that feeling she's only ever been able to give herself starting to rise. Toes curling and stomach twisting, she manages to whine out, "Roman, I—I'm gonna—"

He kisses her clit, coaxing her, guiding her, encouraging her. "I know, baby." She can practically visualize the smirk on his face. "Now be a good girl and come in daddy's mouth."

It's disgusting how that one filthy command manages to evoke her orgasm from her, Solana nearly sitting all the way up as her release shoots through her entire body. Roman continuing to suck on her and lap up every bit of it until there's not a fucking drop left.

Solana's practically lifeless body collapses against the table. Everything below her belly button is numb. Eyes shut, pulse probably in the danger range, she has no ability to do anything other than lay there and recover.

She's never come that hard, that much, that long.

Who is this man?

Solana whimpers a bit when she feels something against her, wiping her. A towel most likely. Strong but surprisingly gentle hands help her body to lift up only for her to fall against a solid chest, her forehead against Roman's shoulder.

She clutches onto him as he kisses her temple. "That's my girl." His girl. His anything. She's whatever he says and more. That's how fucked out he has her. "I'll see you after the match, okay?"

Sure. Fine. Whatever. Her ability to agree to anything was sucked out of her by that dangerous tongue of his, so the most she can do is nod against him.

Roman chuckles and gradually pulls away, Solana gripping on the edge of the table, eyes opening just enough to see that strong, muscular back of his as he walks out the door, closing it behind him.

She isn't sure how long she sits there, dress pulled up, towel covering her bottom half. She just knows that even after sitting for what should be a long enough time, her legs are still wobbly. Even as she moves around the room to look for her underwear only to see they're nowhere to be found, leaving her with one conclusion.

Roman took them with him.

The thought shouldn't make her pussy flutter. It really shouldn't and yet, here she is.

God, what did he do to her?

Swallowing, she does her best to maintain her pride and walks out, guided by the same guard who escorted her to Roman in the first place. He takes her up to what must be VIP seating. It's the perfect view of the celled ring and cages on the side intended for the participants.

Sitting there alone and with nothing else to occupy her mind, Solana's mind starts racing. That shouldn't have happened. She should have stopped him. Should have said no.

Even if she did want it just as much as he seemingly did. Nevertheless, that shouldn't matter. He's him. She's her. They're very different people. She's supposed to have morals and standards. Women who have that don't let men who are practically strangers go down on them.

But, that's exactly what she did, and she feels terrible about it.

"You must be my brother's flavor of the night."

Solana is already nervous as all the outdoors, yet somehow the interruption of her overthinking only serves to exacerbate that anxiety.

But, when she looks over and sees the source, Solana is unsure which is worse: what's said or who said it.

Rosalia Reigns isn't as tall or built as her twin brother. Not at all. A given considering their different sexes, but she's every bit as intimidating as him, and they do share some similar features. Same set of pretty brown eyes. Those full, pink lips and that overall powerful aura.

You know just by looking at her that she's an important person.

And she is. She comes only second to her brother.

Roman

Solana swallows and adjusts her dress as Rosalia gives her a oneover, not even trying to hide her distaste. "H—hi. I'm—"

"I don't care." Rosalia interrupts, a level of venom in her voice. "You'll be an afterthought come tomorrow morning when you join the rest of his whores on the island of forgettables."

Sting.

Solana shouldn't be surprised nor hurt by such cruel words. Rosalia, much like her brother, has never been known for kindness. Regardless, that knowledge doesn't stop the tears from pooling in her eyes.

Cause the words hit way too close to home given what just happened.

Something noticed by the other woman. An equally cruel smile growing on her face. "Aww, did I hurt your feelings?" Her smile deepens as she scoffs, sitting down in her chair. "Yeah, Ro definitely dropped the ball with you. You're dumber and more naive than the other stupid bitches my brother loves to entertain."

A stupid bitch. Any other time, Solana would disagree. She may not verbalize as such, but she would inwardly reject such a thing. But, she can't. She can't because it's true.

She gave Roman exactly what he wanted. Fell into his trap. Another of many nameless, faceless, forgettable conquests.

She's no different or better than any of the other women Roman messes around with.

She's now one of them.

And she feels disgusted with herself.

Not wanting Rosalia to see her cry, or anyone else, Solana mumbles a quiet 'excuse me' and rushes past the smirking woman. She needs to get out of here. Needs to go home.

Needs to never see or speak to Roman Reigns ever again.

This was a mistake. All of it.

And it can never happen again.

[lazy-dog24601]

It doesn't fucking work, the VN plug-in for Homestuck^2: Beyond Canon doesn't work at all. All the little icons are still greyed out despite them being things that have been released. For the record. This is on chrome. The date is 9/15/2024. I've done what it's said at the bottom and it still doesn't work.

Here's hoping page 667 is a wet t-shirt contest. If this "Beyond Canon" team really is the shaft and sack they describe themselves to be then they'll start adding a bunch of on-screen graphic sexual content. It's literally the only way they could make up for this VN blunder.

Look, we're all adults here. This ain't a story about teenagers anymore, these are grown-ass adults that fuck, piss on each other, hold wet t-shirt contests, and get divorced.

Forget about Davekat or Teriska or June Egbert- where the FUCK is the Jade Harley golden shower? Freaking cowards. THIS is what it means to exist for the sake of existing. The horror of being a sequel? Of begin in a story that doesn't need to exist? Of being the sad continuation of a happily ever after? Of being non-canon? Of being a story that exists because your fans kept bugging you to write more of the story you ended?

It's all piss, baby. Calliope, the ugly green flesh skeleton lesboy, said that. Yeah, they call people baby. They know what the fuck is up. They've given Roxy a golden shower. You wanna know why? Well, first off, it's because they're two consenting legal adults. But the second and more important answer is that. Because that's how reality works, bitch. Yeah, I just called you a bitch. The person reading this.

That's what this all is. Homestuck 2. Beyond Canon. The Epilogues. This is the heavy shit of reality breaking through the constipated asshole that is Homestuck, the first. Hussie was one-upping God itself by taking the laxatives know as truth and shitting out the reality bomb known as "everything after homestuck." It was so fucking real and truthful that Hussie completely abandoned Homestuck^2, along with the first team of writers and artists and script writers and story boarders and producers and story consultants and assistant writers. What a bunch of pogchamps, my next shit is dedicated to you legends for creating such a massive piece of shit.

But, you might be wondering, what about Hussie's clown VN- Psycholonials? That came after Homestuck. And my answer is. I don't know, bitch. Oh yeah, that's still a thing. You being a bitch. It wasn't a thing that stopped being a thing. You're still a bitch.

Psycholonials is something I haven't read. And will probably never read. Because clowns are lame. Clowns are for people too scared and too horny to use blackface, although everyone knows Hussie doesn't have a sexual bone in her body, because why else did Hussie not draw John Egbert's soaking wet vagina during any point of her active involvement in the Homestuck franchise.

Hussie saw Joker, that conservative movie that made fun of disabled people, the one that was made by a billion-dollar company, and was like, oh shit I wanna do that. I don't even care if that doesn't line up properly on the timeline. Clowns are lame and I refuse to read her VN. It's not about truth or reality or piss, I just don't want to read Hussie's clown VN because I genuinely never want to give them the light of day. They've had their dream- I'll let them wake up and enjoy what they have left.

I don't care for Hussie. If that comes off as disrespectful, or immoral, or something along the lines of "that's not how you treat people, that's not how you treat people that write stories you don't like, you're being really mean" then fuck you I don't like Andrew Hussie. I also don't like Kinoko Nasu, so keep that in mind. I refuse to read F/GO or the Tsukihime remake because the art is really fucking bad in both and I hate the whole "secret organization" crap that's in F/GO that leaks in Tsukihime remake.

I hate secret government organizations. Stupid fucking blood libel anti-semitic New World Order Illuminati bullshit, the entire concept. Like, fuck you Kinoko Nasu for writing a story about a giant underground organization that fights aliens and magic monsters and keeps it hidden from the rest of the world, you're literally writing nazi fanfic. Fuck you Nasu, you anti-semitic piece of shit.

I also don't like that fucker who made the Nier games. Yoko Taro. I hate all the Nier games. I refuse to play his shitty, "insightful" and "deconstructive" games. They're all edgy garbage. Not my flavor at all.

I'm also not a big fan of that Uro-butcher guy. Gen Urobuchi. Fate/zero is alright but Madoka Magica is pure fucking garbage, based solely on what all the Madoka Magica fans say about the show. The only reason I don't despise him like the rest is that he worked on Thunderbolt Fantasy, which is peak from what I've heard. Genuine peak, unlike Madoka Magica or Nier.

TL:DR- Homestuck^2: Beyond Canon Vriska VN isn't working.

[ibijau]

27 for chengxian! (◍•ᴗ•◍)❤

(Losing their memory only to have it come back after a much awaited true love’s kiss.)

Y'all really like that prompt lol I think I have at least one more ask for that one somewhere?

“And he’s been like this the whole time?” Jiang Cheng asked, repressing a shiver of disgust.

“Yes, zongzhu.”

“He didn’t even make a single inappropriate joke?”

“Not so much as a smile, zongzhu. And he said he was sorry for the inconvenience.”

Jiang Cheng gave Wei Wuxian another long look. He would have suspected a joke, but that style of humour would have more been Nie Huaisang’s thing. Wei Wuxian usually went for pranks instead of comedy. Besides, several Jiang disciples had been there when Wei Wuxian had taken in hand the cursed box, and they’d all testified to feeling a powerful discharge of Yin energy. Not only that, but the owner of the box had apparently warned them beforehand of the risk, and explained as well how to cure the curse.

True love’s kiss, of all things.

Normally, when it came to Wei Wuxian, that would have been quite an easy cure to organise. If anything, it was preventing him from indulging in those true love’s kisses that proved a challenge.

So of course this whole mess had to happen when, for once, Jiang Cheng had managed to get his shixiong to come without that damn icicle he called a husband. A favour he had only obtained because Lan Wangji was away on a Night Hunt in a place where resentment toward the feared Yiling patriarch remained too great for Wei Wuxian to go with him. It would take a few days until Lan Wangji could be warned of this incident and returned to administer his cure.

Until then, Jiang Cheng was stuck with this stranger who didn’t look like his shixiong, and didn’t even act like him either.

“At least it’s an improvement over his normal personality,” his first disciple scoffed. “Let’s all enjoy it while it lasts.”

“Am I really that bad?” Wei Wuxian asked with open concern. “If it is inconvenient for others when I am myself, perhaps I’d better stay like this.”

Jiang Cheng huffed. Lan Wangji would never have allowed that, he knew. Someone in that marriage needed to have a personality, and it wasn’t going to be the second jade of Gusu Lan. Although perhaps if they were both equally boring, then perhaps there would be a divorce, and Jiang Cheng could get his shixiong back.

A most tempting plan, except for the fact that this man before him just wasn’t Wei Wuxian, and thus wasn’t worth keeping around.

“Send for Lan Wangji,” Jiang Cheng reluctantly ordered. “And you, come with me,” he added toward Wei Wuxian. “I’m not letting you sleep at some inn when you’re in that state. I’ll have your room prepared, you’re staying where I can see you until you’re better.”

The man who wasn’t Wei Wuxian meekly followed him without a single objection, nor any attempt at teasing. Jiang Cheng found it almost sickening, which surprised him. He’d spent most of his life wishing Wei Wuxian would learn to act more appropriately and to show proper deference to those around him. By all accounts, this should have pleased Jiang Cheng to finally behold a version of his shixiong that knew his place.

He refused to dwell on that, mostly because it never did him good to think too long about that insufferable shixiong of his. Instead, Jiang Cheng congratulated himself on his decision to have had a room prepared for Wei Wuxian the instant he’d heard Lan Wangji wasn’t with him. If he wasn’t going to have shameless intercourse during the whole night, there was no need to banish Wei Wuxian to an inn. Of course Jiang Cheng hadn’t been sure how to offer that bedroom to the other man without being accused of being friendly, so at least one positive side to that curse had been to remove the need for an explanation.

-

After a few days together, Jiang Cheng had determined that being stuck with that unnatural version of Wei Wuxian was the worst torture he’d ever endured, even counting being struck by discipline whips and having his golden core torn from him.

Now that he’d had time to observe the amnesiac man during the afternoon and at dinner, Jiang Cheng had realised that contrary to his first impression, something of Wei Wuxian remained through the loss of memory. It was only small things, a manner of movement, the way he held his glass of tea, or the gesture with which he sprinkled additional spices over his dinner without even tasting it. A hundred ghosts of who Wei Wuxian was, lingering in a man who had too much politeness and not enough humour.

It was striking also to realise just how little Wei Wuxian looked like himself in his current body. Usually it wasn’t noticeable because his personality made up for the difference, but at the moment he truly looked like nothing but a complete stranger wearing a disguise.

Jiang Cheng hated it.

And Wei Wuxian, apparently, noticed it.

“If you tell me more about what I’m normally like, I can try to act more like it,” he said in a forlorn voice on the fourth afternoon, while watching Jiang Cheng take care of his correspondence.

Jiang Cheng only grunted.

“Though from what everyone says, aren’t I more pleasant to have around like this?”

Another grunt. Others were idiots for not appreciating Wei Wuxian as he naturally behaved, while Jiang Cheng was equally stupid for missing it.

“Just tell me what to do,” Wei Wuxian insisted, and Jiang Cheng hated that those were words he’d always wished to hear but now felt so wrong. “Should I smile? Should I be…” he hesitated. “Should I be obnoxious?” he asked in a trembling voice, just pathetic enough that in a roundabout way, it did sound like something Wei Wuxian might say if he were joking.

Jiang Cheng, exhausted and on edge, almost laughed.

Sadly Wei Wuxian noticed, and took it as encouragement.

“I think I can do that,” he claimed, coming to sit closer until he was nearly on Jiang Cheng’s lap.

That, too, felt a little too much like the real Wei Wuxian, though normally he kept that sort of behaviour for Lan Wangji.

Well perhaps that damn icicle liked being climbed over, but Jiang Cheng did not. Not at all, not one bit, that scenario had never once appeared in his dreams, when his mind thought it could betray his good sense. So Jiang Cheng tried to push away Wei Wuxian, who quickly threw his arms around Jiang Cheng’s neck to make it harder.

“Isn’t this the sort of things I’d do?” Wei Wuxian pleaded, pressing himself harder against Jiang Cheng the more his shidi tried to get rid of him, until he was all but straddling him. “I’ve heard people say I’m flirty.”

“Yes, toward your husband!”

“Well, I don’t know him. But I know you. You’ve been kind to me those few days, even when it was obvious that you don’t like seeing me like this. You shout a lot, but I think you’re a very good person at heart.”

“I’ve tried to kill you in the past,” Jiang Cheng blurted, though he gave up on trying to push Wei Wuxian away. “More than once.”

“From what I’ve heard, you’re hardly the only one.”

Two thoughts crossed Jiang Cheng’s mind.

The first was that he might have to borrow some ideas and forbid gossip in the Lotus Pier, if Wei Wuxian had heard so much in so little time.

The second was that he probably ought to hate a little more the way Wei Wuxian was straddling him, and how close he was. Close enough that if someone were to come in, they’d get the wrong idea and think they were about to…

Jiang Cheng’s eyes flickered to Wei Wuxian’s lips. He wondered, and then mentally slapped himself for wondering.

“The cure is a true love’s kiss, isn’t it?” Wei Wuxian asked in a whisper.

“Your damn true love is going to arrive tonight or tomorrow,” Jiang Cheng retorted in a voice that failed to be anything but pleading. “Wait for him instead of playing games.”

“If I wait for him, I’ll never be sure about you,” came the answer, before Wei Wuxian pressed their lips together.

Jiang Cheng, at first, merely allowed it to happen, unsure what to do with his hands, with his mouth even. Wei Wuxian appeared to understand and, without breaking the kiss, placed Jiang Cheng’s hands on his hips while also moving his lips in a gentle manner, as if trying to show him what to do.

When they parted, Wei Wuxian’s cheeks were flushed and his eyes shining with emotion. Then, slowly, his lips parted into the most obnoxious grin in the world, one that Jiang Cheng hadn’t seen once in those last few days.

“Jiang Cheng!” Wei Wuxian laughed, his voice just as annoying as ever. “Jiang Cheng, who knew!”

“Shut up! Get off my lap now that you’re cured!”

Wei Wuxian laughed again, sounding like a demented wolf, and Jiang Cheng hated how much he had missed that.

“Jiang Cheng, don’t pretend, I know you care, you can’t hide it anymore!”

“Who’d care for an asshole like you!” Jiang Cheng exploded, trying again to push away the other man, only for Wei Wuxian to laugh and press another quick kiss to his lips.

“Look at you, all embarrassed! Jiang Cheng, you’re an idiot, you know.”

“I’ll murder you!”

“Been there, done that,” Wei Wuxian retorted with another kiss. “Now listen. The cure was true love’s kiss, not ‘somewhat unrequited long lasting crush kiss’, alright?”

Jiang Cheng stopped fighting instantly, thus giving Wei Wuxian the chance to kiss him again, a little longer this time. Without any input from his brain, Jiang Cheng’s hands found their way to the other man’s hips, this time pulling him closer.

“What about your Hanguang-Jun then?” Jiang Cheng breathlessly asked when they parted. “Does that mean he’s…”

“I’m a very spoiled man,” Wei Wuxian said. “I can have two true loves, to make up for the fact that they’re both absolute bitches.”

The idea of sharing Wei Wuxian, now that Jiang Cheng knew he could have him, was particularly unpleasant. The only thing that would make it bearable, Jiang Cheng decided, was the certainty that Lan Wangji would be appalled that they had anything in common.

Happy with this petty thought, Jiang Cheng kissed Wei Wuxian again.

[sour-n-salty-citrus]

Do you like the backstory for rick? Idk I kinda preferred it when Rick's past was a complete mystery and i dont really care about diane at all. I didn't expect the writers to actually write a canon for him either but I guess they realised how much the audience wanted one for him

Ajdjdjeidjs ack, I'll be honest I'm not... keen on it.

(Bolly-quinn actually puts it into words well how I feel about Rick's backstory here)

I liked the mystery element of his backstory! I know it's always exciting to have things in canon, but like... it being open to interpretation was something I always appreciated.

And... ugh, hoo boy. I'm torn. I mean, I love that Rick is completely different from what dudebros and like- "high iq" redditors present him as. He's a man who loved his wife and daughter, loved them so much he would rather give up travelling the multiverse, becoming a genius scientist, just to stay with them. He was vulnerable, soft, and caring. He wasn't nihilistic and reckless and selfish and some "alpha male who wouldn't let anything tie him down". He was ridiculously romantic, optimistic, sweet and loving, and maybe even kind.

And I don't give a shit.

I don't! I don't care. This might sound incredibly cruel and unfair, but I don't care that Rick lost his family.

Ok- let me explain.

I'm... disappointed. I'm disappointed that losing Beth and Diane is all it was that made Rick into the complete and utter monster he is today (or the start of the series anyway). I don't mean to undermine his loss and grief- at all! It's just... for him to go on a (seemingly decades long) killing spree, slaughtering any version of himself he seemed to come across... christ. Maybe in his eyes, they were all as bad as that One. Which is understandable. I'm very lucky to have not experienced that kind of loss. I haven't had to Grieve the way Rick did. Maybe I just don't get it, because I've never felt it. That's fair.

It just felt... god, I don't want to say excessive. I know, people process grief in different ways, and for some it manifests in unhealthy ways, some lash out at the world, fixate on trying to find an explanation, to find justice, etc. And I like how Rick was an absolute inconsolable wreck at first. Something like that, it needs time to process and overcome before you can start moving again.

I just- I don't know. Something rubbed me the wrong way about it all.

It's like- it's not that I wanted Rick to have spent all that time partying or something. It's just- argh, i don't know! Maybe someone else can put it into better words lol.

I hate that he immediately jumped into not giving a single shit about other people (save birdperson and squanchy!). Like- when he blew up those aliens who gave him whatever it was he needed. Ah- ok, they probably weren't exactly innocent or anything, but still. I think it was just I felt if we ever saw Rick's backstory, I'd want it to be a slow decline into who he is, show him gradually losing so much of his morality and becoming so jaded. Idk i guess i just wanted it to be like, a series of significant (and lesser but still important) events that lead to him going down that path rather than- this ONE thing that just apparently completely ruined him? And yeah ik ik it was a BIG thing, but like- i guess i was expecting.... more? Maybe something like idk Rick trying to save all the other Beths and Dianes and failing, idk, just... something more.

I actually would have preferred it if Diane lived. I dont know, I just- man I really hate the dead wife/daughter turns ordinary man into callous asshole trope. I agree, it's hard to really care all that much for Diane, and for a while I couldn't understand why. I thought, idk, is it internalised misogyny? Do I just not like Diane because I want to ship Rick with someone else?

I think I get it now. Diane, for all her significance in Rick's backstory, just... isn't a character. She's just- the motivation Rick needed to kick off the story. You could replace her with literally anybody else Rick could have loved and it wouldn't feel any different. She just doesn't feel special. She's no more unique than any other Dead Wife. We get nothing, literally nothing of her. I kept thinking, why? Why does this just not hit that hard? Rick's had emotional moments with Beth, with Birdperson, even with Summer and Jerry. And then I got it- it doesn't feel earned. It felt like how you feel when you see side characters or extras in the background of an action movie die. Maybe some faint sadness, but mainly nothing. We as an audience get nothing from Diane, we don't know her, don't get to see how she matters to Rick, don't get to see her relationship with Rick, we don't get any chance to connect with her character. So when she dies and Rick gets his montage of seeking revenge, it doesn't feel earned. It feels more like I'm being told about how this guy suffered than really seeing it (which i believe, may have been the writers intention actually...). It's kind of like a feeling of "damn that sucks bro... and?". There's no real heavy emotional response that I could really get from it...

I actually would have preferred if Rick and Diane broke up, divorced. I feel like that would offer so much more for them BOTH as chatacters. Instead of their relationship being happy and sunshine and rainbows until a Big Bad came in and took that away, I'd prefer it if Rick's downfall was just... his fault. (Actually His fault.) If his marriage fell apart because he couldn't make it work. If he estranged his daughter because he couldn't properly handle fatherhood, despite loving her. If he was flawed, terribly flawed, because of his own misjudgement and shortcomings. I guess my biggest problem, is that this is presented as someone having the perfect life, which is then taken away as a result of someone Else. It's too easy to then say, oh, it's not his fault he's like that! He had his heart broken, his life ruined! He lost himself in a revenge spree, poor thing... I'd have rathered if it was just a little bit more... realistic? If Rick had been the root cause of his own problems. If he'd experienced tragedy, but also been the cause of much more. I just wish there'd been more of a balance? It just felt so rushed. And not because of the montage- it just like Rick became completely apathetic way too fast. I just hate hate HATE the "he was a good guy with the perfect little life until tragedy struck and he was never the same". Rick never made the effort to improve his life, to do better, to be better. He's actively a cruel, callous, unkind person (complex, yes, but these are traits no one can deny he harbours). He's done far worse than was done to him, and that will never be justifiable to me... it just all feels so very cliche and out of place, and out of everything, this was the one thing I had hoped they wouldn't do.

I think the writers are aware of this, strangely enough. I mean, Rick even calls it his "crybaby backstory". I think they didn't want to leave it open any longer, and just got it out of the way. I don't think they really want to elaborate on it anymore. From what I predict, they want to focus on the here and now of Rick (and Morty, haha), and the development of who Rick is NOW, instead of who he WAS. I think they kind of just went, here's your gut-punch, your tragic backstory, now leave it alone. Diane is dead, Rick had a hard past, the series is about moving on and change. Now can we PLEASE get back to the sci-fi shenanigans?

(There was something I LOVED about the backstory though, and that was the soundtrack! Like the music for the Battle of Bloodridge, it fucking SLAPPPEDDDD. I can't imagine making synthwave emotional, but it actually kind of worked! The swell of the music actually did a lot more for getting a reaction out of me than the content lmaooo. It kind of reminded me of Kurzegast's "optimistic nihilism" for some reason... I actually liked the Bloodridge track so much, it got me a little into synthwave, which i never listened to before! The music producers this season have just KILLED IT!)

[lesetoilesfous]

Fenders, #45 dialogue “How much of that did you hear?” please and thank you

Hey! Thank you so much for this, I had fun! I really hope you enjoy it!!!

(If you’d like me to write you a dragon age fic, send me a prompt from here!)

@dadrunkwriting

Pairing: Fenders

Characters: Fenris, Anders, Garrett Hawke

Tags: past trauma, reference to past abuse, the Circles are terrible

Rating: Mature

“Yeah, well, fuck me then. Fuck me because I’m a fucking idiot and I’m in love with him. Is that what you wanted me to say, Garrett? Fine, I’ll do it, I’m in love with yet another fucking man who wants me dead and I really can’t tell whether that’s just the general fuckery of growing up in a prison where the first people you’re attracted to are the assholes with swords because you’re a kid and you don’t know any better and they’re giving you compliments. So of course I’m in love with a man who wants me dead or branded or worse.

“Or it’s worse than that. Or it’s because he’s the bravest, kindest, most intelligent man I’ve ever met and he stands for everything that I never had the courage to do before I met the literal embodiment of Justice and he hates me because of what I am and I have spent nearly forty years trying not to listen to the whole blighted world telling me I was born poisonous but the worst part is that when he says it I might actually believe it.” Anders stops himself on a choked sob, and Fenris, frozen outside the door to the Hawke manor, stands and waits and listens in the dark, blood rushing in his ears.

“Anders,” Garrett’s voice is soft and low, harder to hear through the wood of the door, gentle and less loud or shrill with grief and fury than Anders in this moment. Over Fenris’ head, the moon over Kirkwall is full and silver. “He doesn’t -”

“What does magic touch that it doesn’t spoil?” Anders spits the words like a whip, and outside in the cool shadow of the night Fenris flinches, fingers curling back and away from the door. Anders laughs, and the sound is bright and sharp as copper. “You know the stupid thing? My first thought wasn’t for the mages - for the kids I saw beaten bloody by that line of thinking just for being born dirty. Oh no. Selfish, stupid, shallow man that I am, the first thing I wanted to say was that it didn’t ruin him.” Anders’ voice breaks, and there’s silence for a moment in which Fenris imagines another, quieter sob and his chest lurches. 

Hawke’s voice is a little louder this time, firm with his rebuttal. “It didn’t ruin either of you.”

Anders barks another sharp laugh, and in Hawke’s doorway sweat trickles down Fenris’ spine as he tries to force himself to leave and some stupid, uncontrollable part of him locks his muscles in place. 

“No? I’m an abomination, Hawke! I’m possessed!” Anders laughs again, loud and manic. “I’m exactly what everyone always said I would be, and now they get to put me down like the dog I am.”

“No one is putting you down,” There’s a hint of real anger in Hawke’s voice, now, and this at last unlocks Fenris’ body enough for him to move. He raises his hand over the door, forcing his courage to overcome the fear and anxiety telling him to just leave, to flee and nurse these revelations like a wound, alone and private and in the dark. 

Fenris’ fingers are curled over the wood of the door, but he doesn’t knock, waiting instead for Anders’ response. When it comes, it’s so quiet that Fenris finds himself leaning closer, the ivy over the doorway brushing the tip of his ear. 

“Just...just don’t let them make me a puppet. Kill me, I don’t care how. Don’t let me live like that.”

Garrett’s voice when he replies is equally soft. “Anders, that’s not going to happen.”

Anders laughs again, sudden and loud and bitter. “That’s what I like about you, Garrett. You’ve always been an idealist.”

Then there are footsteps, and Fenris barely has time to beat a hurried rap against the wood before the door is swinging open, and warm air bursts out into the night like an ocean wave, crashing over Fenris’ head as he stares up at Anders, freckled face pinched with anger, eyes red with tears. 

For a long moment Anders stares at him, mouth parted in a perfect ‘o’. Then he gives Fenris a tight, jaded smile and straightens as if he’s waiting for a blow. “How much of that did you hear?”

Fenris looks at him: at this man he has known for five years and loved for three, two despite his better judgement and the third at last, reluctantly, willingly. Backlit by the warm fire and candlelight of Hawke’s mansion he looks ethereal, a figure cut in charcoal, wreathed by flame, hair glittering gold around his head. At last, Fenris finds his voice. 

He says, “Enough.”

Then he reaches up, curling his fingers around one of the brass rings fastening Anders’ coat in a way he’s fantasised about for years, and pulls him down, firmly. Anders makes a soft sound of protest, but when Fenris pauses, the mage’s eyes fall to his lips, and in the moment Fenris takes that as permission enough. One hand in Anders’ coat, Fenris pulls him close and kisses him, deeply. At first, Anders is stiff beneath him, frozen. But then his mouth softens and moves, lips velvet and giving under Fenris, breath sighing over his skin. Fenris feels the corner of his mouth curl despite himself, breaking the kiss to grin, and he feels the answering parting of Anders lips, the soft shiver of his chuckle when he laughs. 

They pull apart, and when Anders meets Fenris’ gaze, his eyes are bright in the shadow like sunken gold. Impulsively, Fenris kisses the tip of his nose, and Anders blinks, startled as a cat. Fenris feels warmth rushing up his neck and through his cheeks, into his ears and across his chest. His fingers are still curled in the brass ring of Anders’ coat. With his other hand, carefully, tenderly, Fenris pushes a lock of Anders’ hair back behind his ear. When he speaks, he does so quietly. “I love you, too, mage.”

Anders’ expression crumples. But when he folds, Fenris catches him.

[dreamoonverse]

"Love I see you now..." Sam POV

You were born into hydra, this was your life. Expected to be nothing but perfect...but what happens when things go south and someone might change your ways...

(Hey guys! God it's been who knows how long since i have posted on here, working nightshifts is hard. But im slowly coming back to the writing world, in the meantime i wrote this POV a while back and for my all my Sam lovers i think you will like this one! Not my best work but hope you enjoy! 😘❤)

"We are under attack! Get to your positions now!"

It was like breathing how you responded to protocol from the commanders. The avengers ugh...every base, plane, whatever or wherever you were they attacked or you heard of another hydra base going down. Made you disgusted with them how hydra never gets a win. You were born into this, your parents made you into the person you are today.

"Remember princessa, this is your place, your responsibility," your father always told you from a young age. Everyone said that all hydra people were bad, but to you. Your dad was your rolemodel, everything you learned was from him especially after mom passed.

Now it was your turn to carry on the legacy...but how? Could you really live up to it, would be good enough? And was this really the life you wanted.

You could hear gunshots, yelling. Someone leading the group. Ugh captain America that asshole, number one reason why everything got screwed up...had he not put those damn chips in the helicarrier...your mother would still be here. So you spent countless hours making sure you were perfect, built up to become at least a Sargent in your division.

You sprang to your monitors calling out orders watching the camera footage. "Fuck," you growled you hated how good they were and these are your top men too and you watched them drop like bowling pins.

You never gave up, or give in. Too stubborn as your friend Jade put it but you wouldn't stop till hydra gets ontop not this time. You thought to yourself.

"Then a light broke through the black,"

Then a arrow wizzed passed you in slow motion through the air into wall beeping right next to jade at her station. "NO!" Before you could react it goes off sending all your colleagues in different directions.

"I was standing on a track...that little light began to glow,"

Everything was blurry and you could feel the wind pick up as you stood where the window used to one more step and that was it. You saw jade on her back laying there...the light once in her hazel eyes now faded. "No..." you breathe out looking around. This...this wasn't supposed to happen you had them...but actually they had you and you stumbled back falling off the carrier at a rapid speed in free fall.

"There was no where I could go

And the ground began to shake,"

The world around suddenly started to close in and you thought this was it, everything, your whole life would be gone in a split second so the only thing you could do was close your eyes and just wait for black.

"No time left to hit the brake

That little light was closing in

And suddenly, I'm floating"

You took what you thought was your last breath before something grabbed you out of nowhere and your eyes shot open meeting a pair dark brown eyes. "Watch where you step babygirl..." None other than Sam Wilson winking at you. His firm grip gave you the confidence that he wasn't letting you go and you were just stunned in the moment. Before you knew it, he set you down on the ground this warm smile on his face and you couldn't help as one crept on your face not sure what to even say before he had to take off again.

"Love, I see you now

You found me here

Underground,"

[incorrect-ikevamp-quotes]

pls scream about Leo a lil bit cause my love for that man is neverending and i live for you guys' blog,,, and ur comte love fuels me??? head empty except for those two pureblood clowns

HNGNGNG I hope that both you and everyone that reads my shenanigans knows how utterly understood I feel when I see anyone stan Comte, if not both of those idiot purebloods bc good lord...I live for two tired fossil men that just want DOMESTIC BLISS. Literally they have no brain cells beyond respect women and we love that for us, it’s spectacular!!

Under a cut bc I went off and is long:

That being said I’d be happy to yell abt Leo!! Where do I even begin, this man was the reason I got into Ikevamp in the first place, and I’ve read just about every single one of his events at this point. He just makes me so TENDER!!!!!! For whatever reason the first thing that came to mind was this one time he lies about being jealous and MC is lolol u a fool if you think I can’t tell when you lie to me. And he’s so fuckiNG SHOOK?????? It’s even funnier because she’s internally like [I’m not 100% sure but for a second there he almost looked mad...time to test this theory even if it’s just A GAME T H E O R Y] And he’s so fucking pikachu meme that shit sends me. I can’t handle the fact that he’s so used to people just assuming he’s fine, that he can handle himself. That he’s lived for so long without really anyone noticing at all. (Comte absolutely notices and will lightly roast him, but doesn’t really push him about it or wants to overstep). And so when MC just actively pays attention and is so gentle with him he’s just floored???

God I’m crying now, but I will just never forget the funeral scene in his fucking rt. This asshole, this absolute moron, straight up tries to come at us with “yOu GeT uSeD tO iT aFtEr HaLf A mIlLeNiUm, i’M nOt SaD”. Like are you serious. Come here and let me hold you before I throttle you. Absolute clown. He’s just always trying so hard to get by on his own and it breaks my heart. How long...how long has he lived just getting by, nursing his own wounds and dragging himself up all by himself. HE LEFT HOME AT LIKE 14 (whatever the fuCK SOME TOO YOUNG AGE) AND RAN STRAIGHT INTO THE HANDS OF PEOPLE THAT HATED HIM FOR HIS TALENT. HE REMEMBERS HIS MENTORS DESTROYING HIS UTENSILS WHILE TRYING TO ESCAPE PARENTS THAT WHOLEHEARTEDLY REJECTED ANY EXPRESSION OF LOVE OR COMPASSION FOR HUMANITY THAT HE CHERISHED SO DEEPLY. I DON’T NEED SLEEP I NEED TO HUG HIM IMMEDIATELY FUCKING HELL.

Like.........there’s just........I don’t know how to explain it, but I once saw it explained so well in a post. It was basically talking about Castlevania, and how in that show Dracula sees humanity’s folly and develops so much hatred he just goes straight to murder rage. And while in some ways I understand that, I understand even more deeply Trevor’s response to humanity’s fear and violence. He says that he knows they’re short-sighted, that maybe we all just don’t deserve saving...but that he’s going to do it anyway. Leonardo just so much gives me that energy of knowing there’s so much pain in the world, but all we can do is keep walking--keep trying, even if we have to claw our way forward. Because if you only see the awfulness in front of you, you forget the way that strangers make silly faces at babies to make them laugh on the train, how a friend will put everything down to race over to someone and comfort them with some ice cream--do anything they can to distract them from the hurt. How the sight of a child crying will prompt careful cooing from a stranger as to their bravery, an offering of cool water, the gentle placement of a bandaid. How a pair of teenagers will spot a lost child in milliseconds and help them seek out their parents protectively. There is so much wretchedness, but also so much beauty in it all, and the older I get the more I see myself wanting to believe in the latter. I want to be hopeful, and easily impressed, and full of love. To be bitter and jaded accomplishes nothing, and only becomes a worsening self-fulfilling prophecy. The more you seek negativity, the more you will find it; and worse, create it.

I also scream a little bit bc like. I’ve gone on and on about how Comte is very obviously in love with MC all the time, and sure that may be true. But...I really don’t think Leo is exempt from that either if I’m honest lmfao. Only because what does Leonardo do when it isn’t his route? He almost never shows up. Once in a while he might appear for a split second in a scene, but he almost never converses with MC beyond those short moments. While Comte is the one to pine openly, I’d wager Leo is the opposite. He pines in absolute silence, because he knows that if he gets any closer--he’s going to fall. He’s going to enjoy it too much, going to keep seeking out more before he can stop himself. And losing another person he loves...he just can’t do it anymore. In his first meeting story he talks about seeing MC’s eyes and feeling like he’d known them all his life, and even in his MS he speaks to just being completely fascinated by and enamored of her. She doesn’t hesitate, always does her best, meets people head-on and without much hesitation. After a lifetime of people that are probably just immediately interested in him for his talents, or always seeking out his company for the novelty, this is someone that doesn’t give a single fuck if he’s Leonardo da Vinci. Sure she’s aware, and sure she’s impressed to some extent, but her respect--her attraction and admiration--is something that has to be earned. 

There’s something so refreshing about how their love was written. Sure it’s the whole fake marriage to a real relationship, but it’s also a kind of subtle enemies to lovers pulled off masterfully. MC is 100% minding her own business, just wants to do what she must in order to get home, tries to focus on her work to keep from thinking about how much she misses her old life. She doesn’t rely on anyone, doesn’t talk about how hard it is or how scary it is or how confusing. And even Leonardo forgets in his curiosity, is just chillin and also just trying to do the bare minimum to keep from getting too attached--figures he can admire her from a distance. And then he sees her staring at the hourglass. And suddenly, he can’t just watch her do that herself. Just wait for the hard times to pass, just sit with her own loneliness--that hollowing silence. There’s something so moving about it because he reaches out precisely because he knows that feeling to his fucking marrow, and literally just cannot watch somebody else do that to themselves. Sure he’s been dealing with it for three hundred years, BUT THIS GOOD BABIE CHILD DOES NOT DESERVE THIS. SHE WORKS HARD AND DESERVES NICE THINGS!!!!!!!! And so he drives her crazy as he races ahead of her, intercepting any attempt for her to preserve that silence and hide. She doesn’t see any pattern to it, and that’s just how he likes it--he doesn’t want her to worry about the how or why. 

Like I fully remembering playing in Japanese and being like oh my fucking god this is hilarious, this man is just a wild fucker and I love this. I was enjoying myself, mostly laughing and shaking my head. But then it just gets so, so serious. I was having so much fun that I, like a fool, forgot the anime effect. If you’re having fun, it’s going to come crashing down without mercy soon enough. And it does. He helps a little girl without any hope play her violin again, and maybe I’m just too English major but I was fucking FLOORED when I realized I didn’t see that that was straight foreshadowing. That little girl without hope? That was MC (and by extension depending on how you play, us). Though the metaphor isn’t quite so easily mapped without a physical space, the connection is clear when you think about it. With his careful social awareness, he makes a place for MC to exist in the mansion so naturally--as though she was meant to be there from the start, crafts a positive impression of her presence with each of the residents. And he does it with zero expectation of anything in return; he’s just happy to see her not stressing herself out anymore or trying to do everything alone. MC doesn’t fall in love with him despite their differences, she falls in love with him because they are the same in a singular and all-encompassing way that matters; they both care about other people so deeply, to the point where they will forego any personal needs in order to make that person’s life easier. Whether it be muting their own hardship, or working to involve another person in a new space (or opening up to the point of self-destruction to keep a person from feeling alone), they go above and beyond what anybody asks of them--perhaps strong to the point of their own detriment, in some cases. 

It’s why I always laugh when he says to Sebastian “That cara mia, she has a good heart.” Of course she does, Leonardo; it certainly takes one to know one. 

And because I literally have no brain cells beyond being in fucking love with Leonardo THE LAKE SCENE IS AN AFFRONT TO MY DIGNITY AND SELF-CONTROL. HOW DARE YOU, SIGNORE. HOW DARE YOU ASK ME TO SIT THERE AND WATCH YOU OPEN YOUR HEART TO ME AND NOT BAWL MY EYES OUT AND TRY TO KISS YOU ALL AT THE SAME TIME. SIGNORE “hAhA yOu’Re So SmAlL yOu LoOk LiKe YoU’rE DrOwNiNg In My CoAt.” I WOULD DROWN AND DIE HAPPY--BITCH I TELL YOU THAT.

Like. I can’t think of another route I’ve ever done where I spent a good amount of time like “lmfao this guy is so wild im gonna punch him” to just be in a whirlpool of my own tears, regretting my entire fucking LIFE days later. Like Leonardo’s cultural impact???? Fucking immeasurable, I wish every white man disaster I ever met had a hidden heart of gold in all of his boyish dumbassery, an ICONIC himbo of our time. 

Also because I remembered it before posting and I am Dying^TM. The event where MC was a pureblood and he was human. That entire fucking event. I literally can’t think about it without screaming and crying. Her just so flustered at his reaction to her like “oh look, free real estate” as he plops her in his lap, absolutely no fear, treating her like a princess because of her noble title despite NO NECESSITY BEYOND PLAYFULNESS BUT ALSO STILL MEANING IT IN AN EARNEST WAY, being charming to no END just to see her laugh or look away shyly. 

WHEN HE SAID. WHEN HE SAID “...Can’t leave you alone, or you might go off someplace I can’t follow.” I. CONGRATULATIONS, YOU STRIPPED DEVOTION DOWN TO ITS BARE ESSENTIALS!!!!!! GAH HOW MC HERSELF SAYS “I would tell him the truth but...he’s much too generous for a human. I know he would offer his life without a moment’s hesitation.” How Leo describes the aftermath of her biting him: “Lucky for you, I’m a true gentleman, Unlike my principessa, who took me like a storm” HELLO??????? H E L  L O ???????????????????????? ARE WE JUST GOING TO SLEEP ON THE FACT THAT HE LOST HIS ENTIRE SOUL WHEN SHE BIT HIM???? I--

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

(Also as much as I love him the cigarillos have got to go at some point, boy do you have any idea the shit secondhand smoke does good lordt)

[ohsweetflips]

☕️ bakugou katsuki :)

[just as a general statement: i’m only at the start of season 4 !!!]

okay i LOVE bakugo like tbh i spent seasons 1 and 2 being like “oh my god i love him he’s such a shithead” but then once season 3 happened w/ the training camp and everything after i was like “oh..... OH..............” and also bc i think s3 is really when we start to see him.......... kinda reach out to his classmates? like i dont even remember the context or what he said but i remember early s3 thinking to myself “oh hey bakugo just..... gave his own form of motivation”

but like........ here is where bakugo GETS ME like, the fight he and deku had after the provisional licensing exam......... holy shit like 

1) of all things, i thought bakugo was going on the “i hate myself bc i was too weak and i got caught” route, which would’ve been heartbreaking in itself!!!! but instead we got “i hate myself bc i was too weak and i got caught and that in turn destroyed the hero i’ve admired my entire life and all might absolutely blames me” and that like. really got me tbh like i’ve always seen bakugo as a character whose pride will be his downfall and i think they really did it in such an interesting way bc bakugo truly blames himself for what happened to all might, even after all might assures him that he was going to lose his power anyway, and it just. makes me really sad, you know? bc yeah bakugo can be. aggressive. to say the least. but he’s still a kid, you know? and all might obviously cares for his students and he truly felt like he failed as bakugo’s teacher because bakugo was feeling so guilty and like. thinking back? i think we really do see that guilt? or at least the Effects of that guilt? and it makes me big sad :( not to mention the fact that, maybe it was just my interpretation, but the bakugo we see kidnapped by the LOV seemed to be scared, in his own way? like if im remembering correctly, he was like “you assholes won’t kill me, you want me for your league” but he was still Actually Thinking about his movements and what he was going to do? and during the fight with all for one, he actually admitted to himself that he was stuck? that he couldn’t get away from the LOV and therefore all might couldn’t fight to his full potential bc of the collateral damage? and just like to see bakugo Actually Accept that he’s in a bad situation + the guilt like........ oh boy

2) and also bakugo and deku’s actual fight was top tier holy shit like. the fact that deku was like “i’m not going to back down from this fight, not only am i the only one who understands what bakugo is going through and i know he needs to blow off some steam, but i’m also going to show him that he can’t push me around anymore” and bakugo like....... genuinely being upset that he beat deku? like i just keep thinking abt him asking all might why he chose deku to have one for all, especially bc bakugo then asks something along the lines of “but don’t you see that i’m weak now, too?” like.......... the fight was just so good and we saw how deku has progressed and made one for all his own quirk and also like. we almost see this tragic downfall-esque moment for bakugo? like bakugo’s fatal flaw is his pride and how he sees Any Type Of Help as a sign that he’s weak, and he finally felt this true moment of “everything i have done in my life has been wrong.” like, when he asks deku, “does this mean everything i’ve done to become just like all might has been wrong?” oh boy............. like i really want bakugo to learn that help =/= weakness, and even all might pointed it out that, while deku admires bakugo’s desire to win, bakugo “fears deku’s spirit” bc deku always acts with the intention to help others, and bakugo has always viewed that type of..... team work as a sign of weakness. i think it’s why he’s always going off on his own (like in the licensing exam), though hot take i wouldn’t be surprised if his penchant for doing his own thing is also tied to his guilt over what happened with all might

also though his friendship with kirishima???? top tier like tbh i love how kirishima seems to kinda see through bakugo and they really do seem to get each other :’)

i think my main thing with bakugo, and maybe this is a little too much heart-on-my-sleeve, but i kinda tend to have a bit of a soft spot for characters who are Angry A Lot like. maybe this sounds dumb but it’s very much this protective feeling of “ik what it’s like to be so consumed by anger that it sometimes feels like it’s the core of your personality and God do i want to see you heal” but i think that might be some projection on my end akjdsjkdjkds like i just get a bit sad bc bakugo, along with all the students, are Kids and the show doesn’t let you forget that they are Kids who always happen to be at the wrong place in the wrong time and it’s just like. i want him + all the characters to be able to heal

also tbh ik she’s only been seen like.......... twice but i have :/ thoughts :/ on bakugo’s mom and this is DEFINITELY projection but it really stood out to me how the way she described his quirk was “stupid awesome” in kinda a dismissive way and how she has that same aggressive behavior and. okay. that might have been for comedic effect like “ahahaha see how similar they are!!” like i get it and it also got a few chuckles out of me but also like. i am :/ bc parental figures play a Big Role in the show (such as deku’s love for his mom while all might essentially stands in as a father figure, todoroki having to actually address the hate he has towards his father [though i have hmm thoughts abt his situation with his mom too], and tbh i’ll even put iida with his older brother here bc of how much his goals align with making his brother/family proud) and it Really stands out to me how bakugo’s mom shares his anger/aggressive behavior but also seems to see him like. the rest of the world sees him. like while she did show care in being like “obviously i was worried about him, but when aizawa said that the LOV wouldn’t break his spirit, i knew he was in the right hands,” but i am overall very warily :/ at how similar they are, especially in a show that has already shown the depths of parental/guardian influence on its main cast of teenagers

and also there’s already been stuff said about how deku and bakugo eerily parallel all might and endeavor, right? like someone has already wrote a think-piece about that? bc with a show that actually has a very big commentary on breaking cycles of abuse (especially with todoroki), i am Big Eyes Emoji

(this isn’t to like. brush aside the mean things bakugo has done/said to deku and the other characters but like. i think it’s more than just “oh he’s just an asshole” like yeah he’s definitely abrasive and aggressive and jaded but it stems from this overwhelming sense of pride + a warped view of what it means to be a hero) (bc he really did only view being a hero as Winning and while that’s definitely a part of it, he ignored the more emotional side of it) (also don’t get me wrong his pride drives me up the wall a lot, especially thinking back to the sports festival, and again maybe this is me thinking too much or projecting, but it’s very obvious that he was heralded from the moment his quirk developed and that immediately made a recipe for disaster)

tldr: i love bakugo! a lot! he drives me up a wall but GOD get this kid some therapy <3

[alternativewinxcontinuity]

Well, I read the ‘sneak peak’. God I hope they cut a lot out because there were places where the pacing felt like they cut something out.

The was... a general level of ‘I think I’d have more fun beating my head against the wall’, but there were a few places where I had some things that needed to be said.

Under the cut because I’ve included the full available text in addition to my b*tchy little notes.

So I’ve just realised the whole thing +sneak peak is 14,232 words, that’s a bit excessive for a single post.

I might leave just the snark here (I chucked the +sneak peak chapters up on AO3, it’s just for more contexts.)

Prologue

Under her list of ideas, she’d written the results of her experiments.

July 6th—candles—no burns.

July 8th—camping stove—no burns.

July 10th—blowtorch—no burns.

Experimenting on herself had been scary, but not as scary as the memory of her home burning.

You set shit on fire and your only experiments thus far are: “does this burn me? How about this?” CHILD! Start with a candle, a lighter and a f*cking FIRE EXTINGUISHER and practice putting out a single flame!!!! Then: light a single candle!

Stop putting your hand in fire if it scares you! “I am this many kinds of fire proof” does not equal “control of fire so I don't hurt anyone else”!!!!

Also, the wall behind the woman had opened into a shimmering portal of light. Just another clue that something unusual was going on.

Bloom waved this off. “Is this the part where you tell me I’m magic now?”

“You always were, Bloom,” said Headmistress Dowling. “You just didn’t know it yet.”

That was enough. She might have mysterious powers that were out of control, the world might be going mad, but her parents hadn’t raised her to listen to strange adults who approached in the dead of night with what sounded like a cult recruitment speech. Bloom snorted, abandoned her sleeping bag, and made for the door.

The woman’s voice stopped her at the mouth of the warehouse.

“I know about the fire, Bloom.”

Bloom trembled like a candle flame in a gust of wind. Slowly, she turned around. The woman was watching her with a steady gaze, keen but not unkind.

“Where are you going? You can’t go home. You’re too afraid you’ll hurt your parents again.”

Headmistress Dowling was right.

Kay, so obvious magic goes unremarked upon, not even a “nice trick with the lights, is that suppose to convince me”.

Also, either someone's been stalking Bloom, or Dowling is some kind of Mind Fairy.

FIRE

Once upon a time, it was my favorite possession, the fanciest book I owned, with golden swirls on the cover. But I’d grown up and packed the book into my old toy chest along with my teddy bears. I’d thought I was long past fairy tales.

That was before I used magic to burn down my house. My toy chest and my fairy-tale book had burned, too.

Creators kick my nostalgia for the lulz: 01

My book of fairy tales hadn’t included a swarm of kids around my age. One long-legged, capable-looking African American chick strode by, wearing a denim jacket and carrying a bag full of athletic gear. Wait, she wasn’t African American. Fairies didn’t have Africa or America. I didn’t know the name of the fairy realm I was currently in. Also, I hadn’t pictured fairies being into extreme sports.

Another girl, pale with a cloud of brown hair, was clutching several plants to her bosom as she hurried across the courtyard. A third sauntered by, vaguely punk rock and olive-skinned and wearing enormous headphones that buzzed faintly on her ears. I hadn’t pictured fairies rocking out, either.

Oh look, this Bloom also subscribes to the: “it's not whitewashing if they're aliens” theory

There was a rangy guy with skinny jeans, overly sardonic eyebrows, and a knife-bridge nose. California had plenty of white boy edgelords, but this edgelord had an actual knife. Oh no, actual knife! I wasn’t interested in getting to know Knife Boy better.

Called out Riven.

A stunning blonde girl with porcelain skin was taking a selfie with a group of overawed younger students. A luminous wisp floated in the air, making her glossy hair shine. Talk about a beauty angle. Seemingly, fairies could create their own beauty lighting.

Bloom is gay for Stella count: 01

I sneaked a look at him and grinned. His hair had coiffed peaks like a gold helmet and his shirt was pink, which I liked because gender stereotypes were for the weak. He even had a summer tan that fishbelly-pale redheaded me could only dream of. But no matter how cute he was, I wasn’t going to encourage him.

“I guess that means we have to do this forever. There are worse things, but—”

I stopped and turned to him. “I don’t need help, but thanks.”

Now I was looking at him properly, Some Guy was very cute, with a hero jawline and a confident air. Some Guy might be cute, but I was the independent type.

By the way, it's very important you all know that Bloom is a strong independent woman™  who scoff at gender roles, because she's hip and edgy, but she's like, totes not an edgelord(!) She's cool(!) Even if she hates her super pale skin.

Some of the chandeliers in this place were so dainty and delicate, they looked like stars suspended on gilt ribbons. The rooms were large and bright, with sunbeams dyed by stained-glass windows that were as intricate as the embroidery on a princess’s hem. Much of the stained glass was different shades of green, subtly coloring the air around us as though we were in a world made of jade and emerald.

Welcome to the Emerald City of Oz?

She continued talking, full of ennui about the fairy-tale castle, while I sneaked another look at her ring. “If you ever want to go back,” Stella said as she deliberately flashed it at me. She was making some kind of power play, and I didn’t know why.

Stella might be a bitch now, but I'm pretty sure It's only because Stella is also Diaspro in this reality?

FIRE

There was a realm called Eraklyon, which sounded like a dragon clearing its throat.

I mean... that's one way to pronounce it? I guess?

FIRE

I’d do anything for my parents, including lie to them about my new boarding school in Definitely Switzerland. 

Your parents didn't ask about any paper work? They just accepted that you were moving overseas without warning? Who's paying for this alleged boarding school? Actually how are you paying for school?

We’d get dressed up and she’d play me cheerleader-type music. I remembered one chant that went Close your eyes and open your heart! The cheesy brainwashing hadn’t worked. I never much cared about frilly princess gowns, but I liked the idea of being at home in my princess castle.

Creators kick my nostalgia for the lulz: 02

In what beautiful blonde Stella had called the Winx suite—a bright series of rooms with tall windows and a view I couldn’t allow my parents to see—only one person got a room of their own. To my total lack of surprise, that person was Stella.

Bloom is gay for Stella count: 02

Creators kick my nostalgia for the lulz: 03

Really? That's how you're chosing to shoe-horn the Winx brand in? It just happens to be the name of their dorm. Sorry, their 'suite'.

When Mom, always waiting for my transformation into Ms. Popular, asked about the other girls, I shrugged. “Honestly, it’s five girls in an enclosed space, so … it’s only a matter of time before we descend into a Lord of the Flies situation and kill one another.”

So... no. Lord of the Flies is an extension of a study in relation to a very specific mono-ethnic (white), male and privileged group. It is literally young rich white boys, and the break down in community and sense of ethics that results in their single bias attitudes in the face of adversity.

The Winx are firstly female, multi-ethnic (not as much as they should be) and from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds. If it devolves into murder, it will be vicious but it will not be “Lord of the Flies.” Find a better reference.

I busied myself with unpacking to hide my discomfort. “Ms. Dowling said there’s a fairy somewhere in my family tree? A long-dormant magical bloodline?” I sighed. “One day I will get used to how ridiculous all this sounds.”

Aisha’s surprise became wry amusement. “Oh my God. Have I just met the one person in the universe who’s never read Harry Potter?”

… why is that your conclusion? Long lost princess/prince/hero/magical heir swept up for adventure is a common trope. It doesn't make it feel any less ridiculous.

I wondered if any of my new suitemates ever felt that way. Happy bustling Terra, cool girl Musa, glamorous Stella, and Aisha who seemed so grounded.

It is so amazing how the girls that Bloom just happened to notice outside, you know, the only girls Bloom noticed outside, are all her roommates.

MIND

Terra’s super sweet voice revved into overdrive, picking up speed and frantic pleasantness on the way. “She’s just having fun. And I know it’s a lot. Shocker, Earth Fairy named Terra likes plants. It’s a family thing. I’ve got a cousin named Flora. My mom’s name is Rose, and my dad works in the greenhouse here. That’s why I know a lot of the second years. I grew up around Alfea, and—”

ohp, there it is

Creators kick my nostalgia for the lulz:04

“Stella’s a second year? Why is she in a suite full of first years?”

“Oh yeah. Actually … I don’t know. Some administrative thing last year? I mean, I think …”

I think you’re lying, thought Musa. She turned her back and dipped her power toward Terra, getting a faint sense that …

Somehow I doubt it was blowing up a potions lab in pursuit of a new shade of pink.

SPECIALIST

Less cool was Sky, Riven’s super annoying best friend in the whole world, who was rattling on about the ginger girl from the human world he’d met yesterday. Riven was sure she was crazy. He knew this because crazy was what Sky looked for in a woman.

So Riven is Riven and Brandon, okay.

I hate these assholes.

Riven bared his teeth. “Correction: I got high this summer.”

… : /

There was no real point trying to beat Sky. He was the best. Anyone in Alfea could tell you that … right after they told you Riven was the worst.

There was no real point, but Riven kept trying to beat Sky, anyway. Hey, nobody ever said Riven was smart.

… >:(

Sky’s dad was Andreas of Eraklyon, the dead legendary hero, slayer of the Burned Ones. Sky’s dad-substitute was Specialist Headmaster Silva, their fearless leader with the cold blue eyes and passion for early morning runs.

So many dead parents suddenly

He passed the blue, shimmering Barrier and went into the deep, dark woods. He could almost hear Silva���s voice now, telling the first years that the Barrier was their magical shield against the Burned Ones. Beware those merciless monsters with their inhuman strength and speed, never mind that nobody’s seen one in sixteen years, woo woo, so scary.

And Bloom is how old? Also: guess who’s about to start showing up suddenly! Trick question, it’s the Burned Ones, the ones we’ve already been told are the new series’ enemy.

EARTH

Their suite was called the Winx suite, which was such a cool name. Maybe they could call themselves the Winx Club?

Yep, they're going with that, okay. 

You couldn’t even name the suit Wings in the kind of obnoxious cursive that makes it look like Winx and have Bloom misread it and become a running joke amongst the girls?!?!?!

Terra nervously eyed the food laid out on the tables before them. Sometimes she felt as if food might bite her before she bit into it. She couldn’t take cookies. All the other girls in the Winx suite were so skinny and pretty. If Terra ate a bunch of cookies, people would say, “No wonder she looks like that.” But if Terra got a plate full of carrots, people would say, “Who does she think she’s kidding, when she looks like that?” It was hard to know what to do.

Wow, just, wow. Terra honey, they do you so dirty. Fat girls don't have to hate themselves, just a note for the creators. And Terra, baby, if people gonna talk shit either way, you eat whatever the f*ck you want.

(If this is not the set up for a personal growth arc in which Terra learns to not-hate-her-body and that she is worth loving regardless, and the creators really think plus sized folks just hate themselves as a constant state of being, I'mma be so unbelievably pissed off.)

She wasn’t going to hunt for her annoying brother.

Hold up, Terra has a brother?

FIRE

I still needed a breather. “Where can I go that’s the opposite of this? What’s outside?”

Cute Guy looked alarmed. “Past the Barrier? Depending on the rumors, bears or wolves or something much scarier.”

Did you not hear about the dead body? The very mutilated dead body? Sky, buddy? You're not going to bring up the very murdered and mutilated dead body in order to prevent the new girl from a foreign world (that you want to bang) from going into actual and legitimate danger? No?

I thought about Stella saying once she knew me, she’d find something to love about me.

It made me smile.

Bloom is gay for Stella count: 03

As if I’d conjured her by thinking about her, Stella’s voice rang out. “Hey, Sky. Can we talk?”

Stella was wearing her flawless new outfit and holding two drinks. Every twinkly light in the courtyard caught gold in her hair. She was looking right at Cute Guy, whose name was apparently Sky. From Sky’s expression, he knew Stella pretty well.

Yeah, Stella is Diaspro now

EARTH

Oh, for the love of … Riven was menace-flirting at some poor Specialist boy. This was Riven’s typical behavior when he felt off balance. Terra had once witnessed Riven looming at a fern in a way that suggested he either wanted to prune viciously or make out.

I... what???

“Really? Bullying the new kid? Be more obvious.”

Riven smirked, because of course he did. “Can’t bully the willing. Right?”

There was something loaded about Riven’s tone.

“I don’t know what that means!” the new boy said sharply.

The new boy was clearly feeling uncomfortable. Terra sympathized. The poor thing mustn’t take Riven’s terrible personality personally.

Well, someone belongs on a sex offenders registry. What the f*ck Terra, don't excuse this shit, it's not okay.

“But sometimes we’ve had a bad day, and a scrawny little twerp says the wrong thing at the wrong time,” Terra purred. “And all of a sudden, we’re not happy you’re talking to us. And we’re not nice. And most of all, we’re not harmless.”

“purred”, really? You gonna make it sound sensual? Let the girl Snarl! Damnit!

The vines were suffocating him so he couldn’t even talk. It was so nice and peaceful.

Terra smiled sweetly. “What’s that, Riv? I’m sure it’s clever. I just can’t hear you.”

His face turned red. He was about to pass out, Terra noted, still with that feeling of cheery distance. She shouldn’t actually let him faint. Riven would hate that.

Uhhh, so Terra might have psychopathic tendencies and maybe a dissociative disorder.

She shouldn’t actually let him faint. Riven would hate that.

Yeah, and his victim would have hated being assaulted, choke this douche.

Gods above I cannot stress how much I hate this Riven in comparison to OG Riven, and I was not OG Riven's biggest fan.

FIRE

THESE ARE THE SCENES FROM THE TRAILER!!!!!

Bloom continues to be a dumbass.

WATER

Aisha wasn’t used to Alfea, but she was used to being part of a team. 

Well someone hasn't watched the show.

How her mother and Bloom had been fighting about her social life, and how Bloom would rather fix old lamps than cheerlead.

Who is this woman, where is Vanessa? And Bloom's art thing? The lamps sounds interesting, but I've never seen sign of it yet, was it cut for time?

“It was almost like the fire had a life of its own,” Bloom went on. “I don’t remember how long I let it burn. I just remember their screams.”

When Bloom finished the story, she was clearly fighting back tears. A subtle, weary tremor went through her frame, like a runner past her endurance. It seemed like Bloom had been fighting for a long time.

“My mom was covered in third-degree burns,” Bloom said. “Because of me. And if I hadn’t gone in there to stop it? To stop what I started?” She looked completely burned out.

“Every night after that, I sneaked out. I was so scared I’d hurt them again that I slept in this creepy-ass warehouse near home. Until Ms. Dowling found me and …”

Given the Tragic Backstory™ , I'm actually a little surprised Bloom didn't straight up run away from home completely, the fact that she went back at all...

“I’ve heard the story of my birth a million times.” Bloom’s tone brooked no argument. “Miracle baby. There was a problem with my heart in the womb, but the day after I was born, it was gone.”

Aisha went cold. “Oh God,” she breathed. “You’re a changeling.”

Because Bloom needs to be even more Special™, this is doing nothing to ruin my theory Bloom is a Burned One, by the way. (Actually starting to think Burned Ones are Fire Fairies whose powers pretty much consumed them or cursed that way or something along those lines.)

So where's the “real” Bloom Peters? Was the fetus even real, or just a simulacrum to have something to switch MC Bloom with?

MIND

Stella’s tone gave Musa pause. Plus, Musa could tell Aisha was really upset. Deliberately, she let her powers turn on, and faced Stella with her eyes glowing.

I'm sorry, I thought Musa couldn't control her powers and that’s why she “has to wear her headphones at all times to block out the noise of other peoples emotions”, now she can 'deliberately turn them on'? When did this happen? Did I miss some Implications?

“You’re a Mind Fairy,” Aisha observed, but there was no other judgment.

Aisha turned to Stella just as Terra came out of her and Musa’s room.

“A Mind Fairy?” Terra repeated sharply. “What’s your connection? Memories, thoughts—”

Okay, so now we learn there are different types of mind fairies. Explain to me why Musa is an Empath with Synthetic input? ('hearing' feelings, or experiencing them in a way that registers as audio.) Is this a “Song of their Hearts” reference, because I don't feel like that was done on purpose if it is.

Only Terra was moving toward Stella, and the way she moved wasn’t Terra’s usual going-nowhere happy bustle. The way Terra moved was that of a woman on the warpath.

Musa was almost impressed.

“She was talking to Sky, wasn’t she?” Terra demanded.

“And?” Stella demanded haughtily in return.

Terra pursued: “And I know what happened to the last person who talked to Sky. I was here last year, remember?”

A crack appeared in Stella’s veneer as she shot back, “You don’t know the full story!”

Didn’t seem like Terra cared. “Ricki was your best friend, then she talked to Sky. Now she’s not here anymore. Why is that again?”

Yeah, definitely getting the feeling DiaStella isn't being held back for a Pursuit of Pink Potions accident.

FIRE

There was even more rustling than usual in the detritus piled in the warehouse corners, but I didn’t care.

Why teleport there? Is there a Rule about where Portals can go? Or is is just Because Bloom felt this was the best place to pop in?

“You don’t have to be okay,” Mom assured me. “You’re only sixteen. Being that far away is a huge deal.”

Dad said gently, “I couldn’t have done it when I was your age. Be thankful you got your mom’s bravery.”

But now I knew that wasn’t true. I didn’t get anything from my mom. No wonder I was always such a disappointment to her.

Osmosis [noun] Def. 2. the process of gradual or unconscious assimilation of ideas, knowledge, etc..

You have some damn decent parents by the sounds of this scene, even if your mother is sure you're a likeable human being who will have friends one day, why are you this way?! For the Angst points?!

Only I could see Mom through the kitchen window. She didn’t seem disappointed. She looked so happy just to be talking to me. How could I ever tell her what I did to her? How could I ever tell her what I was?

Okay, so this line is bringing back the “they deserve to know what I am” line from the trailer, and now I'm torn between “The Winx deserve to know Bloom is a Burned One” and “my parents deserve to know I'm a Magical Fire Fairy (who burned down our house) and maybe a Changeling and thus not their biological daughter technically, maybe.”

My parents told me they loved me. I knew I loved them. And I knew I didn’t belong here. Maybe I never had.

May I advise you: remove your angst blanket, turn on a light and clean the room to remove the Dark and Gritty filters of your life.

I heard faint whispers. Sibilant. Strange.

Sibilant means hissing by the way. In case anyone was wondering.

The monster was on the grate above me.

I crawled as fast as I could. The ring was on the other side of the mesh, but there was a hole just big enough for my hand to get through. I reached for the ring, almost had it.

But in the crawl space in front of me, past the barrier, the shadow of the creature passed on top of the grate. The monster bashed frantically at the grate. Once. Twice. Until with a ringing metallic crash, the monster fell into the claustrophobic space with me.

I made one last grab for the ring, but the monster slammed its hand down on it.

Oh man, if only telekinesis was one of the most basic of Fairy abilities Bloom might have been able to do something, but no, it's basic bitch elements or nothing.

SPECIALIST

I really freaking hate this version of Sky, just, so much.

Terra has her suspicions about the Stella-Sky dynamic and she just, 'oh they's in love at first sigh nothing could possibly go wrong here' hand the number over? Really?

Diaspro!Stella confirmed?

[thisdiscontentedwinter]

What the Water Gave Me

Happy holidays, @gryvon!  And thank you to @stetersecretsanta​ for putting this all together! 

You can also check it out here on AO3: 

https://archiveofourown.org/works/21876028

A run in with a rusalka leaves Detective Stiles Stilinski with a crippling fear of the water. And help comes from an unexpected quarter.

Or, that time Stiles hates Peter Hale, right up until he doesn't.

What the Water Gave Me

“I don’t like him,” Stiles says.

“I don’t even know why you think your opinion matters here, kiddo,” John replies as he tips a jar of salsa into a serving dish because, yeah, that’s about as classy as things get around chez Stilinski. “This is my weekly poker game, and I can invite whoever I damn well please.”

Stiles growls.

He’s not proud of it, but he growls.

“By the sound of that, I’m not the one who’s been spending too much time hanging out with werewolves,” John says. “And you and Derek…?”

“Are me and Derek what?” Stiles asks, and then mentally backpedals. “No, don’t answer that. Me and Derek have never been and are never going to be a thing, okay?”

Stiles and Derek are bros. There was some awkwardness there when Stiles was pubescent and drowning in hormones, but he’s over it now. He’s not sure that Derek ever will be, because at the same time Stiles was at the mercy of his raging hormones he was also at the mercy of his raging nascent spark, and he might have maybe magicked all of Derek’s clothes off him this one time. To be fair to Stiles, it was a total accident, but Derek’s never really forgiven him. To be fair to Derek, it was in Whole Foods.

Not all of Stiles’s memories of his spark in those formative years make him laugh. Magic is... magic can be terrifying. As someone who lives with it in his bones, Stiles would rather not dwell on that. It’s much easier to think of Derek’s pale naked ass and chortle.

But no, Stiles and Derek are bros. Stiles likes Derek. He does not like his asshole of an uncle, Peter, with his expensive suits, his smirk, and his habit of looking at Stiles like he’s some sort of interesting and slightly gross scientific specimen: Gentlemen, the dung beetle.

And it doesn’t help that Peter Hale is Beacon Hills’ foremost attorney. Defense attorney. How John can even bear to have him in the house is a total mystery to Stiles. Peter’s life’s work is literally to screw John. In a professional way, not a fun one, because ew. Point is, Peter is the enemy.

His dad should not be inviting the enemy to poker games.

John lifts an unimpressed eyebrow at the expression on Stiles’s face. “Son, while you’re living under my roof—”

“Stop right there,” Stiles says, dragging a corn chip through the salsa. “I’m twenty-five years old, and the only reason I’m living under your roof is because you broke into my motel room and stole all my things.”

John snorts. “After I fought the cockroaches for them! That place was a fleapit, Stiles!”

“I had an aesthetic going on!”

He did, too. He was a weary jaded detective, all hard-bitten cynicism and jagged edges, living in the gutter and staring bleakly into the void while he listened to slow jazz on his phone. It was very emotive. Very noir. He’d been considering taking up smoking.

“An aesthetic? You had a fungal infection!”

Okay, so that’s technically true. But when Stiles had applied for the newly created detective’s position in the Beacon Hills Sheriff’s Department after a few years in Sacramento, he was adamant that he would be coming back as an independent adult. Apparently though, that was not negotiable once his dad actually saw where he was living. So here he is, back living in his dad’s house like he’s a kid all over again, and although it’s nice not to have to worry about dying of cholera or whatever else was lurking in that motel, it hasn’t been without friction.

Like tonight, for example.

“How about this, then?” John asks, rubbing a hand over his forehead. “I don’t pull the ‘while you’re living under my roof ‘card and—”

“Deal!”

John fixes him with a challenging stare. “And you don’t tell me which friends I can invite over for poker night?”

Dammit. Stiles knows when he’s been stymied.

In a final act of petty revenge, he grabs the chips and salsa and flees upstairs.

He eats them in his childhood bedroom with the lights off, staring at the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling that he put there when he was eight and listening to Dad and his friends—including Peter Hale—laughing and talking downstairs.

It’s no good.

Even Miles Davis and his Blue Moods album are never going to get Stiles’s fledgling noir aesthetic back now, are they?

The Yoda plushie on Stiles’s bookshelf gives him a look of wry agreement.

***

Stiles is the first detective in the Beacon Hills Sheriff’s Department to be Supernatural Certified. That means he knows his weird shit, basically, and has done the courses to prove it. It means that whenever a case can’t be explained away by the usual measures, it lands on his desk. Which means, in a town with a nemeton close by, that Stiles gets a hell of a lot of overtime. It’s routine stuff mostly, and not at all as dangerous as his dad worries. Most supernaturals are just regular people, after all, with a little extra going on, and Stiles can hold his own with a spark as strong as his. The long hours he works are great for the student debt he came out of school with, but not so great for his social life. As in, apart from catching up with Derek a few times a week for coffee, Stiles doesn’t have a social life.

Derek’s eyebrows judge him on a Tuesday morning as Stiles pours what might be an entire cup of sugar into his coffee.

“Look,” Stiles says, “I’m not saying I hate Peter, but why does he have to be such a smug asshole?”

“Weird,” Derek says and sips his tea. “He says the same thing about you.”

Stiles jolts. Peter talks about him? But also, wait. “He says I’m a smug asshole?”

Derek considers for a moment. “No, he says you’re a little asshole.”

“I’m not even smug?” Stiles gasps. “Does he think I’m not smart enough to be smug? I can be smug, Derek!”

“I am aware.”

Stiles glares at his coffee.

Peter Hale is the first werewolf he ever met. Well, not the first, since he’s known all the Hales forever, but he’s the first one he ever saw shift. Before that, werewolves existed for Stiles conceptually, but only like, say, Iceland did. It was a thing, and Stiles knew about it, but he’d never actually figured it was something he’d have to deal with on a daily basis. All that snow and herring, ugh.  

Anyway, when Stiles was twelve and his spark manifested for the first time and some bad shit happened—there may have been explosions involved—suddenly a rampaging, slavering beast was charging right at him, tackling him to the ground while he screamed and the world erupted into flames around him.

And then, just when Stiles thought he was going to die, the rampaging, slavering beast turned into a naked man—which Stiles would like to point out was disturbing on a whole new level—and yelled, “Are you trying to burn down the whole fucking forest?”

And that was how Stiles found out that Peter—and all of the Hales—were werewolves.

He wasn’t brought into the circle of trust so much as he accidentally incinerated his way into it, because while people nowadays know that the supernatural is real, most supernatural beings prefer to keep their status to themselves.

Stiles has a bunch of files on his desk relating to what he suspects is hunter activity that show exactly why that’s still the case.

He tips more sugar into his coffee. “Anyway, how’s the rest of the pack?”

Derek’s resting bitch face softens into a smile. “Good. Cora and her girlfriend are thinking of moving back to the States. And Laura is expecting again.”

“Again?” Stiles blinks. “That woman is a baby machine!”

“And if you call her that,” Derek begins.

“Yeah, yeah,” Stiles says. “My throat, her teeth, I know. What is this now though? Baby three?”

“And four,” Derek says. “Twins.”

“Jesus.” Stiles says. “We definitely need to take Patrick out drinking. Like in commiseration or something.”

“You mean in congratulation.”

“With twins on the way? I know what I mean.”

Derek raises his eyebrows. “You know, some functioning adults actually treat children as a good thing.”

Stiles wrinkles his nose. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Derek says. “Maybe when you’re a functioning adult, you’ll understand.”

“Excuse you!”

Derek quirks a brow. “How’s Yoda?”

Stiles glares at him, and drinks his sugary sludge.

***

Stiles is halfway through lunch, brushing fallen lettuce from his burger off his open case files, when Tara leans into the bullpen. “Stiles? Hale’s here to see you.”

“Good,” Stiles says, leaping up and barging toward the door to the foyer. “He owes me an apology for this mor—”

It’s not Derek.

Of course it’s not. It’s Peter Hale, looking smug and sharp in a suit that probably cost more than what Stiles still owes in student debt. It’s pinstriped for fuck’s sake. Who wears pinstripes in Beacon Hills? Stiles is barely wearing a shirt with buttons. If it wasn’t for stupid regulations he’d be wearing a t-shirt. And his Converse.

“Detective Stilinski,” Peter Hale says smoothly, looking him up and down.

Stiles picks a piece of lettuce off his tie. “Mr. Hale.”

“I’d like to discuss a client with you.”

Stiles sighs, and holds the door open to let him through. He sets his burger down on his desk. “Which client?”

“Clare Stepanova,” Peter says.

Stiles rolls his eyes, grabs the file, and uses it to wave Peter Hale through to the nearest free interview room. He takes his burger too, because fuck it, he’s hungry.

Stiles takes a seat on one side of the table.

Peter takes one on the other side, and checks his reflection in the two-way glass. Does something to his already-immaculate hair, because he’s as vain as he is arrogant.

Stiles rolls his eyes and flips open the file on Clare Stepanova.

Clare Stepanova. Twenty-one years old—though Stiles doubts that—absolutely gorgeous, and a mouth on her like a Prussian sailor. Stiles wasn’t her arresting officer, but he definitely remembers being shocked by her language when Tara hauled her out the back to the cells. And it takes a lot of language to shock Stiles. Still, at least her curses weren’t literal. Stiles knows they could have been.

“Now how did Clare Stepanova afford an attorney like you?” he asks, leaning back in his chair.

“She has wealthy parents,” Peter says.

Stiles snorts. “No, she doesn’t.”

“Well, she has wealthy people who call themselves her parents, and were able to pay my retainer,” Peter says.

Stiles eats the rest of his burger and folds his arms over his chest. “What do you want?”

“I want you, as a Supernatural Certified detective, to go over her file.”

Stiles nods down at it. “Already did.”

“Then you’re aware that this isn’t a regular case.”

“Bullshit,” Stiles says. “She’s not a regular collar, but this is sure as shit a regular case. This isn’t a newly-bitten beta wolfing out on a full moon and breaking indecent exposure laws, or some wendigo kid slipping up and eating the neighbor’s cat. Clare Stepanova has no biological imperative to walk out of Sephora with $600 worth of cosmetics shoved down her jeans. Her being a rusalka has no bearing on this case.”

“Ah,” Peter says, his eyes lighting up for a moment.

“You didn’t know?”

“I got the vague impression of water,” Peter says. “Your spark has come a long way, it seems, now that you have it under control. Finally.”

One of Stiles’s most useful and valuable skills is his spark-given ability to know exactly what supernaturals he’s dealing with at a glance.

Kevin from the grocery store: fae.

Mrs. Iravani from the library: peri.

Clare Stepanova: rusalka.

Peter Hale: asshole.

“I would have expected,” Peter continues, “someone with a spark to have a little more empathy to the supernatural.”

Peter Hale: asshole.

Peter Hale: Grade A asshole.

“I have plenty of empathy,” Stiles says. “But until you can prove to me that rusalki need three different types of top-of-the-line lipstick and a bunch of other overpriced glittery shit to live, then I’m afraid I’m going to reserve that empathy for people who actually need it.”

Peter smiles slightly.

“I think we’re done here,” Stiles says. “I have reports to get back to, and you have to go and break it to your client that she’s shit out of luck.” He closes the file and rises from his chair. “Have fun with that, I guess.”

Peter doesn’t even have the decency to look slightly miffed at his wasted trip.

***

Stiles spends the rest of the afternoon writing a recommendation to the DA’s office for dropping charges in a case against a wiccan who was going sky-clad under the full moon last month. Mrs. McIntyre isn’t technically a supernatural—she has as much magic in her as you’d expect from your average elementary school teacher—so she doesn’t necessarily fall under Stiles’s purview, but she’s sixty-eight years old, never had as much as a parking ticket, and Stiles has incredibly fond memories of her back from when she was his third grade teacher.

It’s late when he gets out of work.

John has already left and gone home, but he sends Stiles a text asking him to pick up some milk, so Stiles swings by the gas station on the way home. He parks away from the pumps, wanders in to get the milk and whatever Skittles happen to catch his eye—four different packets do—and then heads outside again.

And steps immediately into a puddle.

Stiles groans and looks down. He doesn’t remember that puddle being there when he walked inside, and it’s not raining so where—

The water glistens in the light like an oil slick, and Stiles can’t tear his gaze away.

For a second he watches the colours, mesmerised, and then the truth of it hits him.

He can’t tear his gaze away.

He doesn’t want to, but also he literally fucking can’t.

His chest squeezes as fear grips him. He hears footsteps behind him, but he can’t tear his gaze away.

Feels soft, cool fingertips brush his cheek, but he can’t tear his gaze away.

He drops the milk and Skittles.

Feels the tickle of her hair against his face as she leans in, and he can’t tear his gaze away.

His phone. He needs…

He can’t make his hands move.

She smells like fresh water, like nature, like a cold, clear stream he wants to drown himself in.

“Hello again, Detective Stilinski,” she says.

Stiles stares at the colors in the puddle, and he can’t tear his gaze away.

And then her hands are covering his eyes, and everything goes black.

***

It’s dark when Stiles blinks away again.

He’s…

He squints into the gloom, but he doesn’t know where he is. He’s cold and wet.

He’s…

He’s been stripped down to his underwear, and he’s lying in about an inch or two of water. There are rough bricks underneath him, and…

Is he in a cellar?

He might be in a cellar. There’s a crack of light some distance away that might be a door? If it is, it’s some distance away and also higher than Stiles is, so he guesses there are stairs. It’s too dark to make them out though. There doesn’t appear to be any other light source.

Stiles shifts slightly, and the water tickles him.

It’s cold. Not shiver-to-death cold, but cold enough that hypothermia might become an issue. Does the light from under the door mean it’s daylight up there? When the temperature drops at night, the cold is definitely going to be a problem. If he lives that long.

If it’s daylight up there, has he already been here an entire night?

Dad must be looking for him then. Dad, and every cop from the station.

Stiles’s hand goes instinctively for his phone in his pocket, and only brushes against naked skin.

Underwear only, right.

He closes his eyes, not that it makes much difference, and reaches for his spark. It’s always there are the core of him, both hidden behind and intrinsically bound to his heartbeat. It’s—Stiles knows it sounds lame as fuck, but he’s always thought of it as his soul. Something uniquely him, but also something that’s not bound to his physical form. His spark encompasses so much more than bone and muscle and meat and, Stiles likes to think, it will last longer than those things too.

He finds it shining warmly behind his breastbone and he focuses on it.

If he can summon it, he can use it to—

And then the cold water is lapping at his skin, higher and higher, and Stiles opens his mouth to suck in a breath but he gets a mouthful of water instead. It rushes down his throat, suddenly a torrent.

Stiles flings himself upright, coughing and hacking, wiping at his mouth with his shaking hands.

The water recedes again, sliding down his skin like an icy caress. It leaves a shiver in its wake that Stiles feels through to his bones.

He doesn’t reach for his spark again.

***

“Hello again, Detective Stilinski,” Clare Stepanova says for the third time, or maybe the fourth, as Stiles chokes and coughs and tries to clear his lungs.

The water rises when she speaks, like tides pulled to the moon. And she’s beautiful, so beautiful, but she won’t let the water take him. He’s cold and he’s weak and he wants to sleep, wants to stop fighting the heaviness in his lungs, but she won’t let him go. She draws the water out of him with a flick of her wrist, her gold hair gleaming like moonlight in the gloom, and then she smiles and commands the water to drown him again.

The weight in his lungs is like lead. His head throbs. His chest aches. His heartbeat turns sluggish.

And then she pulls him back.

“Hello again, Detective Stilinski.”

Five times now, maybe six.

***

He’s lying on the floor, staring into the gloom. The water laps at his ears but he hasn’t got the strength to move. He’s going to die here. Every breath is harder than the last. Every one sounds like the wheeze of squeaky bellows. He’s going to drown in two inches of freezing water. He’s cold, he thinks, but he can no longer feel it. And his spark, that part of him he always thought of as indestructible, flickers on and off like a faulty lightbulb.

The water creeps up him again, icy fingers climbing his clammy skin, and a hot tear leaks out of the corner of Stiles’s eye and slides down his temple.

He’s going to die here.

And when the door crashes open and Stiles is blinded by the sudden blazing light, he thinks, for a moment, that’s what’s happened. And then there’s a dark shape moving down the stairs, and footsteps splashing toward him, and the roar of a werewolf fills the cellar room, and Stiles passes out.

***

“No,” John says firmly as Stiles blinks awake. He covers Stiles hand in his, and draws it away from the scratchy thing in his nose. “That’s your oxygen, kiddo. You need to leave that alone.”

Stiles squints at him.

His dad looks tired; about as tired and wrung out as Stiles feels right now. He’s sitting in a chair beside Stiles’s hospital bed, and he’s wearing a uniform that looks at least three days old, judging by the creases and what look like coffee stains down the shirt. His stubble’s about three days old too, and grayer than it should be.

Stiles pulls in a wheezing breath.

“You had pulmonary edema,” Dad says. “They’ve drained the water from your lungs, but you also have pneumonia, so that’s what’s causing you some issues now. You’re gonna be in here for a few more days before they’ll let me take you home.”

It’s a lot to take in, especially since Stiles can’t even remember for sure how he got here. His brow creases. “Clare?”

The name comes out like a croak.

John’s expression hardens into one of grim satisfaction. “Dead.”

Stiles tries to summon up a bit of feeling for that, but he’s mostly numb. Also, he’s mostly astonished that she was prepared to kill a cop over a shoplifting charge, but that’s the way of it with some supernaturals, isn’t it? Especially the old ones. Centuries of feeling superior to mundane and mortal humans tends to result in more than a few egotists who don’t see why they should be bound by human laws. Like vampires, for example. Total assholes who think they’re better than everyone else just because they saw Beethoven live in concert or whatever. Vampires are the fucking worst. Well, at least they were the worst, but for the record Stiles is going to shift rusalki up to the top of the list now.

He thinks back to the cellar. “Werewolf?”

John squeezes his hand and nods. “Peter.”

Stiles feels a jolt of surprise at that. For some reason he’d thought Derek, mostly because Derek is his best friend and has always had his back. Or maybe angry Talia, because she loves him like a mother. But Peter? Clare’s defense attorney Peter? Clare’s defense attorney Peter who thinks Stiles is a little asshole? Yeah, that’s definitely out of left field.

“The pack was tracking you the whole time,” John says. “Turns out that rusalki can hide scents. Who knew, huh?”

Well, Stiles knew. He’s done the course. But now isn’t really the time to bring it up.

“Anyway,” John continues, “Peter figured it might have been Clare, so he set up a meeting to talk about her case, and followed her after that. He was supposed to wait for backup, but, well…” He grimaces. “Apparently you didn’t have that much time left.”

Stiles sucks in another wheezing breath. “Wait… won’t he get in trouble? With the Bar Association or something?”

“Oh, son,” John says, and his mouth quirks. “If you think Peter Hale gives a flying fuck about the Bar Association, you really don’t know him at all. Besides, attorney client privilege doesn’t cover crimes in progress.”

He nods, and a rush of dizziness leaves him with black spots in his vision.

“Careful,” John says, with mild rebuke in his tone like Stiles has just tried to run a marathon, not nod. “You need to take it easy, kiddo.”

“Yeah,” Stiles rasps, and feels a sudden prick of tears in his eyes. He doesn’t even know why. He’s just… it’s all been too much, he guesses. Clare Stepanova tried to kill him, and he didn’t even fight back. He’s never had that happen before. And he knows it was because he was in her thrall, and he knows it wasn’t his fault, but he still hates that he made it so easy for her. Stiles has always been a fighter, oftentimes against all advice to the contrary, and it’s terrifying how Clare just shut down that part of him. Like it was nothing. Like he was nothing.

Stiles was supposed to be stronger than that, smarter than that. He feels as helpless now as he did when the water was rushing into his lungs.

John squeezes his hand again, and Stiles summons up a weak smile for him.

And then Derek turns up with a massive blue teddy bear wearing an It’s a boy! ribbon from the hospital gift shop.

“You can put it with your Yoda,” he says, glowering at Stiles like Stiles’s near-death experience has personally offended him.

“I love it,” Stiles says, his voice still rasping, and opens his arms for a hug.

Both his dad and Derek get in there, and Stiles closes his eyes and feels warm again for the first time in days. And he wonders where Peter is right now.  

***

It’s four days before Stiles is allowed to go home. He curls up in a blanket on his dad’s couch, and doesn’t move for hours. He stares unblinkingly at the television until John makes him move into the kitchen for dinner. Then, after they’ve eaten, John herds Stiles upstairs and toward the bathroom.

“You stink, kiddo,” John says.

“Way to pull your punches, Dad.”

“Get cleaned up and get in bed,” John tells him. “I’ll bring you your meds.”

Stiles shuts the bathroom door and strips off. Steps into the shower and…

He can’t turn the tap. The thought of water on skin is…

He can’t.

And he knows he should. He knows his dad is right. He stinks. And he knows the steam from a hot shower will be good for his pneumonia. But he just can’t bring himself to do it.

He steps back out of the shower and crouches down in front of the bathroom sink instead. Ferrets around in the cabinet until he finds a bunch of wipes, and cleans himself with those instead.

He’ll shower tomorrow.

***

Three days later, and Stiles is out of wipes. His skin is greasy, and his hair is an oily mess. He’s also got a gross scraggly excuse for a beard, but he can’t bring himself to shave. Not even when the blast of water in the kitchen sink, or the trickle of it through the coffee machine is enough to make him freeze up. He’s pretty sure they can smell him all the way downtown, because there’s only so much that deodorant can do. Spoiler alert: not much.

“Poker night tonight,” John says. “Want to join us?”

Stiles pokes his spoon at his cereal. “I’m good.”

John’s face is creased with worry. “Stiles,” he says, “what’s going on, kid? You’re…”

Decaying, Stiles thinks. Moldering. Something.

“Not yourself,” John finishes. “Do you need to talk to someone? A professional?”

“I’m tired,” Stiles says. “Once I get over the pneumonia, I’ll bounce back.”

John holds his gaze for a long moment, and then nods.

Stiles knows better than to think his dad is letting this go though. The Stilinskis are a stubborn bunch.

He waves his dad off to work, and dozes on the couch for most of the day. He’s jolted awake sometime in the afternoon when the door opens and footsteps tread down the hallway.

“Good lord,” Peter Hale says, looking at where Stiles is nesting like a rat on the couch, surrounded by blankets and junk food wrappers. “You smell like you’ve been dead for a month.”

Stiles grunts and shows him his middle finger. “Thanks for rescuing me.”

“Please,” Peter says. “Your father and Derek would have been on my case for eternity if I hadn’t ripped that bitch’s throat out.” He grins and shows his teeth.

“Well, thanks anyway.” Stiles feels a sudden thrill at the thought of Peter wolfing out over him, and pretends he doesn’t. “How did you get in here anyway? Do you have a key?”

Peter raises his eyebrows. “As though I’d need a key.”

Stiles rolls his eyes. Peter is such an asshole.

Peter strides over to him, and wrenches his blankets off. “Come on. You’re a mess, and your father’s worried about you. So is the pack.”

Stiles allows himself to be bullied all the way upstairs and into the bathroom. He baulks when he sees the shower.

“Peter, I…” He can’t finish the sentence. He can’t admit his fear, even when he knows it’s etched into his skin, and written into every expression. Even when he knows he literally reeks of it.

“Shirt off,” Peter says. “And then sit on the edge of the bath for me.”

Peter’s no-nonsense tone is easy to obey, and it gives Stiles something to rail against. He’s grateful for both those things as he pulls his shirt off and grumbles about overbearing asshole werewolves getting all up in his business, and this is bullshit, Peter, bullshit.

The blast of water in the sink makes his blood run cold and freezes the words in his throat.

Peter squeezes out the washcloth under the tap, and then grabs the bar of soap from the shower stall. When he turns back to face Stiles, his expression is grim.

“I thought you were a corpse,” he says. “When I found you in that cellar. I could barely hear your heartbeat.”

Stiles hunches over and looks away.

Peter crouches down in front of him. He takes Stiles wrist in his hand, and draws his arm out straight. Stiles shivers when Peter drags the warm washcloth from his shoulder to his wrist. “You scared me, Stiles.”

There’s no hint of rebuke in his tone. There’s only something softer than that; an admission, not an accusation.

“Scared me too,” Stiles murmurs.

Peter scrubs the soap along the washcloth, and then drags the cloth down Stiles’s arm again, leaving foamy bubbles in its wake. “So scared you can’t even face the thought of a shower?” He pinches the skin on the back of Stiles’s hand, and the mark doesn’t vanish. “So scared you’re letting yourself go dehydrated?”

Stiles nods, his eyes stinging with shame and helplessness.  

“She’s dead,” Peter says, his blue eyes shining. “She’s dead, and she can’t hurt you now.”

“I know,” Stiles rasps. “I know that, but…”

“But you don’t feel it,” Peter says, and hums slightly. “You know what you need, Stiles?”

“A therapist?”

“Well, possibly.” Peter smiles slightly. “But in the meantime would you settle for an amoral and slightly sociopathic werewolf by your side who’d tear out the hearts of your enemies if they even looked at you sideways?”

Stiles should be embarrassed at how long it takes him to get that. “But you hate me.”

“Nonsense,” Peter says, and swipes the washcloth over Stiles’s collarbone. “You are the thorn in my side and the pebble in my shoe, Stiles, but I’ve never hated you.”

“Really?”

“Do you think I break into the houses of people I hate and give them sponge baths?”

Stiles blinks. “No. That would be weird. I mean, this is weird enough, but that would be super weird.”

Peter’s laugh is low and full of warmth. He rises to rinse the washcloth out, and then he’s back, lifting Stiles’s other arm up and washing it gently. Stiles feels almost dizzy at the touch. He feels weak and helpless, but a part of him melts into this too. The part of him that wants to be cared for, wants to be allowed to need this without judgement.

Stiles is pretty sure he’ll judge himself harshly enough for this at a later date, but that’s a problem for future Stiles.

He closes his eyes and lets it happen. Drifts for a while on the feeling of being looked after.

“Okay, sweetheart,” Peter says softly. “Take the rest off.”

It should be humiliating, probably, but Stiles is floating from Peter’s touches, so he lifts his hips and lets Peter pull his sweatpants down and off. The hospital sponge baths were perfunctory and clinical; this is not. This feels almost like an act of quiet worship, and Stiles might be drunk on it.

“Good boy,” Peter murmurs, and Stiles melts a little more.

He’s zoned out enough that he can almost pretend the careful swipe of the warm washcloth over his dick and balls doesn’t happen. Almost. But by the time he jolts and his eyes flash open, Peter has already moved on to his thighs. He finishes up at Stiles’s feet, and Stiles toes curl at the slight tickle.

Peter smiles up at him, and then stands. “Now how about your hair, sweetheart? You look like a weasel dipped in oil.”

Stiles snorts. There’s the asshole he knows and… knows. There’s the asshole he knows, period, full stop, and nothing further to add.

Peter’s expression turns serious. “It needs a wash, Stiles. Do you think you could handle some water through it, if I’m here?”

Stiles’s heartbeat quickens, and he’s afraid that it he so much as blinks he’ll be back in that cellar, water rushing into his throat and drowning his screams.

“I have an idea,” Peter says, and then disappears from the bathroom. He’s back a moment later, wheeling Stiles’s computer chair with him. “Let’s do this salon style.”

He flings a clean pair of sweatpants at Stiles, and Stiles climbs into them. Then he sits on the chair, and Peter wheels it back toward the sink. It’s not quite the right height, but Peter pillows a rolled-up towel under the back of his neck, and folds a dry washcloth over his forehead.

“I’ll do my best to keep the water off your face, hmm?”

Stiles nods. He wants to close his eyes, but he doesn’t dare.

It’s… it’s not as bad as he was afraid it would be. The tickle of water on his scalp makes his skin crawl, and makes him want to leap out of the chair, but Peter works quickly and calmly, and his fingers massage Stiles’s scalp deftly.

“What do you know about this Braeden person?” he asks.

“Which Braeden person?”

“The incredibly attractive and intimidating woman that Derek has fallen head over heels for,” Peter says. “I like her, but on the other hand I feel like I shouldn’t approve.”

“Because she’s very possibly a mercenary?” Stiles asks curiously.

“No, I think that’s hilarious,” Peter says. “You should see Talia’s face! I just feel like I shouldn’t approve because, well, I like to make Derek squirm.”

“You’re such an asshole,” Stiles says.

Peter catches a trickle of water before it escapes the washcloth on Stiles’s forehead. “He’s my nephew. It’s my job.”

“It’s really not.”

Peter shrugs. “Well, we’ll agree to disagree. Now, want me to attack that abomination you call a beard? No water, sweetheart. Just shaving cream and a washcloth.”

Stiles nods warily. “Just… just keep talking, okay?”

Peter smirks. “I’m a lawyer, Stiles. That was never going to be an issue.”

***

When it’s done, all of Stiles’s doubts and insecurities come rushing back in. He’s clean and he’s shaved, but at what cost? Peter Hale saw him naked, and not just naked, but a whole other level of nakedness than Stiles is comfortable with. Peter didn’t just see his skin; he saw his vulnerability. Somehow Stiles knows that’s the thing that’s going to be hardest to reconcile.

He sits on his bed and stares out the window, and wonders if tomorrow he’ll be able to actually brave a shower, or if he’s going to be scared of water for the rest of his life. Which would be fine, if it was swimming in the stuff. But showering? Doing the laundry? Hydrating? These aren’t optional activities.

Stiles sighs, and grabs his laptop off his desk, and queues up an episode of Star Trek. Why aren’t sonic showers a thing yet? They need to be a thing.

The knock on his door doesn’t really surprise him.

“Come in, Peter.”

Peter opens the door. He’s holding a glass of orange juice.

“Shouldn’t you be downstairs playing poker with my dad and all his friends?”

Peter ignores the question and sits next to Stiles. He sets the orange juice down on his bedside table. “I think you and I got off on the wrong foot, Stiles.”

“What, when you broke into my house without a key?” Stiles grouses.

“No,” Peter says. “When you were a twelve-year-old with a newly manifested spark, and I scared the hell out of you.”

Stiles feels the faint echo of that fear as he thinks back to that day. And what a hell of a day it was. “To be fair, I was exploding the forest at the time.”

Peter nods. “True. But still, I feel that being lunged at by a werewolf was probably quite traumatizing.”

“It was actually more traumatizing when I saw your dick,” Stiles says. “Werewolves, that was totally out of left field. But naked men jumping on me? Dad had warned me about how dangerous those were.”

Peter’s eyebrows do something complicated. It’s a Hale trait. “You thought I was a child molester?”

“Not for long! But, in my defense, you were a naked man who jumped on me. I was twelve, Peter. There wasn’t a lot of nuanced thought involved!”

“Well,” Peter says at last, “When it comes to nakedness, I suppose that we’re even now after today, sweetheart, aren’t we?”

There’s a strange weight in the air as Stiles avoids Peter’s gaze, and he thinks it’s all in the way he just said the word ‘sweetheart’. Usually Peter uses the word like it’s a sharp weapon, but now—and ever since he walked into the house this afternoon, if Stiles is honest—there’s no barb in the word at all. It sounds almost…

Almost real.

“Peter,” he asks cautiously, lifting his gaze again, “do you like me?”

“Yes,” Peter says.

“I mean, not because I’m pack adjacent, and Derek’s best friend, and Talia refers to me as the son she always wanted, but like-like, like—”

“Jesus Christ, Stiles,” Peter says, and rolls his eyes. “Yes.”

This is the part where they should fall into a kiss, right? Stiles reaches for Peter, only to find a splayed hand on his chest.

“Nu-uh-uh,” Peter says. “Not until you drink your juice, sweetheart.”

Well, Stiles guesses, there’s some incentive.

He drinks his juice.

***

Stiles narrows his eyes at the bottle of water on his desk. He’s been back at work for three days now, and he’s mostly a lot better, but still not a total fan of this whole hydration business. It’s a shitty thing to develop a trigger over, but he’s working on it. He’s downloaded an app on his phone that reminds him when to drink, so he’s no longer got an excuse to avoid it. Also, his therapist prescribed him a shitload of Ativan, so that’s pretty sweet.

“Stiles?” Tara calls from the door. “Hale’s here to see you.”

Stiles leaps up from his desk, anticipation bubbling through him. Peter promised to bring him lunch, and he’s been counting down the minutes. Not because he gives a fuck about the new fusion place on Third that Peter’s been raving about, but because, well, Peter. Peter has been visiting Stiles every day, both at work and at home, checking that he’s functioning. They’ve got into a weird pattern now where when Stiles showers, Peter sits in the bathroom and talks to him. It should feel humiliating, but it doesn’t. And Peter isn’t even a jerk about it. He’s still a jerk about everything else, but, well, that’s Peter. It turns out that there’s just a lot more to him than that asshole exterior. As embarrassing as it is to admit it, Stiles might actually be in love.

Ugh. He has taste in his ass.

But so does Peter, probably, so it all works out.

And frankly, Stiles can’t wait for the day when showering with Peter means something a whole lot more sexy than their current arrangement.

He wrenches the door open. “Hey, Peter, I—motherfucker.”

Derek blinks at him.

“It’s always the wrong Hale,” Stiles says. “Every damn time.” He plasters on a smile. “Hey, Der-bear. It is great to see you!”

“Clearly,” Derek deadpans. “Anyway, Mom wanted me to remind you that it’s pack dinner this Friday, and she expects to see you there. And she said she’s making extra cookies so you can take a bunch home, and not try to smuggle them out in your pockets like last time.”

“She can’t prove that ever happened.”

“Stiles, your jeans smelled like chocolate for days. You should do your laundry more often.”

“You’re not actually supposed to wash your jeans after every wear.”

Derek raises his eyebrows. “You are if they have chocolate in the pockets.”

“Point,” Stiles admits.

“See you Friday,” Derek says, and claps him on the shoulder before leaving.

Stiles heads back inside to the bullpen—and discovers Peter sitting at his desk, his fancy Italian ankle boots resting on Stiles’s open files. He’s eating something from a takeout container. It smells fucking orgasmic.

“How the hell did you get in here?” he demands. “Did you break into a police station?”

Peter smirks. “I brought you lunch, sweetheart. Let’s not quibble over the details of why, and how, and whether or not it’s really an indictable offence.”

“Someone let you in the back door, didn’t they?”

“Your father,” Peter admits. “I met him in the parking lot.”

Stiles leans his ass on his desk. “You’re such a dick,” he said fondly.

Peter shrugs, and nudges Stiles’s water bottle closer to him. “Takes one to know one.”

“Touché.” Stiles takes a sip of his water, trying not to grimace, and Peter rubs his knee gently in silent encouragement. Then Stiles steals his takeout and starts shoveling it into his mouth. “When I finish this, want to go make out in the file room?”

“Sweetheart,” Peter says with a broad grin, “I can’t think of a better way to spend my day.”

And how weird is Stiles’s life now? Because it turns out that neither can he. He wouldn’t say he’s grateful to Clare Stepanova—fuck that evil bitch—but Stiles knows that if he hadn’t been attacked, he and Peter would still be bitching about each other to their families, and snarking at each other when they met, and both of them dancing around the fact that maybe, just maybe, there was a spark of something between them that wasn’t sheer contempt. And, since they’re both such assholes, they would have died of old age before admitting it.

So there’s an upside, Stiles guesses. A crazy weird upside to being drowned repeatedly by a rusalka, and it turns out it’s the bastard of a werewolf pointedly nudging Stiles’s water bottle toward him again.

When Stiles had come back to Beacon Hills, he’d tried to like the idea of being alone. Romanticized it even, in that gross fleapit of a motel where he pretended to be a hard-bitten cynical film noir detective. But it turns out Stiles isn’t that kind of guy at all.

The corners of his mouth turn up as Peter nudges the water bottle against his thigh. Stiles picks it up and sips from it, and Peter makes a smug, satisfied noise.

It turns out it’s nice to be cared for after all.

[bladekindeyewear]

HS^2 bloggin’ mainline 2020-03-12

I have been told only a few things about the upd8 that just landed, over Discord by two people:

upd19 feat. 4,901,157 read it. now. note: the featuring note is accurate if in a different base than what you might be expecting

What the fuck does that even mean.

Okay Pretty good chapter.

...from another friend who VERY dislikes HS^2?  Oh shit.

I also glimpsed a post that may or may not have been about Homestuck at all at the top of my Tumblr feed for an instant that said “YES YES YES YES YES” in huge bold print.  I have no idea whether to be excited or nervous.

Okay, it’s not a Bonus update... let me comb through from an earlier page to be careful not to get a spoilerlook at the pagecount...

...huh.  That seems... like a conversation that would be up my alley, but not necessarily unique so far or worth all this crowing about.  I thought we were about to get Dirk-aliens with a full Horschestra backing... are we getting something else?

> CHAPTER 6. A Conversation Regarding Relevance

Hmmmmmmmm.  With the contrast between their reactions and this ominous buildup, there’s got to be a serious fun-twist coming.  Right?  --I’ll stop with that talk for the moment though.

space is vast. an unproductive statement, almost a tautology. [...]

Alright, that and the starry background are riffing the fuck off Star Trek.  Nice homage to Andrew’s roots.

the lives of the many are far too volatile and instinct-driven

Alt!Callie what the fuck are you doing.  This is intentional now.  You can’t play this off as “what’s a Star Trek”.

tautologies are, in general, reserved for stories. for narrative device. for finding new and inventive ways to tell an audience that which they already know.

God damnit she’s still doing it

neither of us ever able to convince the other of the righteousness of our stance. we were never meant to agree. it isn’t in our blood.

Blah blah overanalyzing classpect blah

when they scoff at my tautology ‘space is vast’, what do they really know? nothing. as far as any of them have experienced, space does not exist.

It’s still nice to see some real personality leak through on Alt!Callie.  We definitely know from her other self that she can develop quite a relatable and colorful one.  Have the years helped?

> ==>

dramantic pouse... ........

Also,

-look at that collar.  Damn, Callie, that is a collar

very few have stood and looked into the abyss, the true gulf of nothingness that spreads out around the single point of consciousness adrift in a constellation. all the combined weight of sentient endeavour would quail underneath that sheer, irresistible truth. the realization that they are so small, that the universe cares about their puny lives so very little. sitting in the glowing light of the stars this becomes even more apparent

In the official aspect quiz I never took the time to analyze, the aspects were put on a wheel where Space was a neighbor to Void, if I recall correctly.  I wonder how much those aspects engender feelings of goddamnit I’m doing it again aren’t I

...

are we out of orange juice?

Yesss let more personality Alt!Callie bleed through, more of it~

Wait, does Alt!Callie even taste through Jade?  Isn’t this remote control?  Is she vicariously drawing pleasure from Jade’s not-just-meat-or-candy mostly-human taste buds or?

> ==>

JADE: are you talking to me? JADE: because if you are i would like to remind you that i hate!! orange juice!!

OH FUCK YES!!! SHE’S IN THERE AND AWAKE!!! SHE STILL HAS AT LEAST ENOUGH AGENCY TO BE PRESENT AND ARGUE WITH CALLIE! YESSSSSS

no you don’t.

JADE: well i guess i never really had a strong opinion on it before JADE: but now i cant stand it!! JADE: its all you drink!

i like the pulp.

QUIT INADVERTANTLY FORCING SHIT ON JADE WITH NARRATIVESPEAK GIVE HER A BIT OF LEEWAY ALT!CALLIE YOU CONTROLLING--

JADE: its my body and i dont want orange juice! JADE: i hate pulp, and i didnt just make that up to spite you JADE: who wants strings in their juice?

i do.

JADE: ughhhhhhhhh

I have had friends hopefully fantasize about and/or therapeutically roleplay this exact situation with Jade breaking through and arguing with Alt!Callie’s control to make this all a fair bit more palatable but I didn’t dare to hope we’d get even THIS much

Maybe the HS^2 authors DO care about not leaving us wallowing in hopeless witness to the characters’ constant torture and existential turbosuffering!!!! :#D

i realize that jade’s situation is less than ideal from a characterization perspective, but i still politely point out that nobody likes a whiner.

Fuck you, this isn’t CALIBORN you’re trying to repress you asshole!  Leave Jade some AGENCY!!!!!  She deserves it!!

JADE: fuck you rude calliope inside my head!

YES EXACTLY

JADE: why dont you try being possessed by the spirit of some other version of a good friend of yours, and floated around a spaceship full of people you love JADE: unable to affect anything or say hello to anyone! JADE: then tell me about whiners!

i killed my brother and consumed him.

JADE: sounds like a you problem

Compromise and give her some agency finally come on compromise and give her some agency you red-text twatwaffle

i suggest to the witch that i have spent untold eons in the void between universes, waiting for the moment i would be needed to prevent the dissipation of reality as we know it. her appeals to emotion will not help her. i will remain unmoved.

Oh god damnit.

JADE: well i had to watch my boyfriend and my brother die in front of me on a tiny scaled version of a world that i shrunk for them! JADE: and then spend the next three years talking to myself, wracked with guilt that id killed them!

Oh. God. Damnit.  This had better not be where the Suicide trigger warning was coming from.  Are there going to be any characters left who DIDN’T emerge from this mess feeling suicidal?!?  (I mean if there were any understandable case it would be three years alone on the golden ship Jade but-- I mean COME ON, we have to discuss that in our FIRST GLIMPSE at her since the epilogues?!?)

> ==>

i remind the witch that my time was in the void, which is far darker and lonelier [...]

Oh fuck you don’t compare suffering as an excuse to COMPLETELY body-enslave and squash the agency of someone when you probably don’t have to.  You’re just doing what’s COMFORTABLE alt!Callie admit it.  There’s a way you could give her some leeway, I’m almost positive.

JADE: even if i had the powers of a first guardian, my brain still worked in modules of human pattern recognition! JADE: three years is a long time for a human teenager, i dont care how many of her molecules are made of a god!

(i love it when jade talks smart, that bit of the epilogues was a treat too, plz reveal more of the big brain on jade)

It seems Jade can’t see or quite understand the full import of there being a “narrative”.  Or THINKS she cant, because she still says:

JADE: your voice is impossible to read and i cant see your face

If she’s “reading” alt!Callie’s remarks, that means she’s breaking through to understand the narrative to SOME extent.  She might be one of the ones who learns to do that a little more and better in the future, especially with alt!Callie almost unintentionally training her to see it.

> ==>

Oh, good.  So A!C’s not above being considerate.  That’s a step in the right direction.

> ==>

D’aww, Jade conceding and trying to empathize like her usual self.  I appreciate it.  :)  --but Alt!Callie’s definitely in the wrong here.

JADE: but i think it is a very natural thing to be silly when you are used to being able to control your own body, but now cant

i will allow that, yes.

Thanks.  Learn some damned reason.

jade smiles. dave and karkat will always be a source of pain for her, a low ache somewhere in her center of gravity, but she is happy for them. she knows that there is really no other alternative for how to be. they chose each other over her, and they always will. they are the two people who matter to her the most in every universe, and that will not change, no matter how much she wishes it would, no matter how--

JADE: do you actually know that?

pardon me?

Oh, shit.

JADE: do you actually know that im doomed to pine over dave and karkat across every iteration of reality? JADE: like, can you actually see that? JADE: because youre a space player, like i am. JADE: i know that you are more powerful than me, but i dont think you can see other timelines any better than i can JADE: so i think you are just being dramatic JADE: for the “audience”, whatever the heck that means

i experience a moment of unease as jade looks at me. keeping her out of my thoughts is proving to be more difficult than i had first assumed it would be.

That’s a damned interesting question.  I was giving the narrative the benefit of the doubt, but given everything the Epilogues warned us about when it came to the narrators and alt!Callie’s occasional slips into her own bias, I really should have known better.

i had begun confident that i could keep her consciousness sleeping peacefully inside the shell of her body, tamed and quiescent, but she has proved to be more irascible than i initially gave her credit for.

JADE: heheh JADE: i have never been particularly tamable, and my consciousness is huge!

This might end up playing out more like my friend’s Jade-breaks-out roleplays than I initially assumed.  (What does she mean “huge consciousness” though?  Superpowered due to part-First-Guardian, like she alluded earlier in the conversation?  That never got much play before, so it’s great to see that potential realized here a bit...)

> ==>

...I’m a fucking idiot.  Of COURSE “huge consciousness” and the whole line around it was just an unsubtle double-entendre.  A small part of me actually wondered if it was and dismissed it as a clumsy reading in an instant.  How stupid am I?  Jade is the best.

If only this sort of thing worked on Cherubs.

> ==>

Yeah.  It really doesn’t.

...Alt!Callie, you are a fucking war-criminal for bottling all these double-entendres up where none of the others can appreciate them.

> ==>

JADE: you are a pretty tough crowd, evil callie JADE: but yes, i can hear most of what you are thinking to yourself JADE: it took a little while to separate it from my own thoughts, just like it did with dirk JADE: because thats what he was doing the whole time, wasnt it? JADE: controlling our thoughts JADE: making us believe things we never would, things he thought we SHOULD believe

Fucking excellent.  She’s definitely training herself on this shit.  The more people who have a harder time getting fooled by this nonsense the better.

jade knows all of this, i don’t have to tell her. she is a very bright girl, and even if she didn’t have partial access to my thoughts, she is good at compiling data and using it to fill in gaps. as she herself had rather licentiously mentioned, her brain is quite large.

C:

and all of these reasons are why i know i can count on her to be reasonable and realistic about her situation. i need a body to continue interfacing with this timeline, and her body is the only one that will do.

Dammit.  Trying to get her to logic her way back into keeping Alt!Callie in complete control.  That’s a tactic that will probably work.  :(

what about [kanaya], jade? she is a space player, it is true, but her powers are nothing compared to yours. for one, she isn’t god tier, and for two, she is dead. a living dead, but dead nonetheless.

Hm.  Are you saying she maybe has less relevance, less of an effect on her surroundings because she spent some of her “cred” on unconventional partial resurrection?  To the extent where she’d make a less influential vessel?  Hmm.

For that to even matter, you have to be planning to use Jade’s Space powers too.  Taking a far more active role in things than narrative beacon.

and a sylph’s specializations lie on a different end of the spectrum from my own. a witch is a far closer match.

!!!!!

Sounds like details of the classpect system that we don’t know will have relevance in HS^2, and we’re indeed gonna possibly get some actual new, clearer details about the system Andrew invented unlike the dearth of new info the Epilogues brought us.  That is... promising.

no, jade understands and sympathizes with my assurance that her body, and her body alone, will do for my purposes.

JADE: um...no i dont!

YES.  Jade is now officially immune to absolute command! :D :D :D

she does. after all, she would not wish this sort of state of being on anyone else, and especially not on one of her friends. jade may have undergone a lopsided number of narrative hardships in her life, but at least she is used to them. why spread that suffering to another?

What the fucking shit???  You’re using that on her?  You think it’ll WORK?!

jade understands and accepts her place in the story, which has always been to enable events to play out around her, just as it has been mine.

..........yeah Jade’s gonna bust the fuck out on the very next page, isn’t she.

What the fuck is Alt!Callie thinking, here?  Wasn’t the other Calliope the one to let us know that the Witch is one of the most active classes there is??  ...what exactly does a Witch officially do anyway, for Alt!Callie to think saying such a thing wasn’t dead wrong?  This sounds MUCH more like the sort of statement someone might make after breezing through Homestuck and confusing the old Jade (cough) for the person she grew up into.

And the fact that you’re phrasing this as a narrative command to try and make her forcibly THINK this way deserves you a smack in the non-literal depictive face.  Let’s see if you get one:

> ==>

Oh wow, no smack yet?!  That’s some restraint!

because what is a story, truly? nothing but a series of misadventures and connections, actions spurring reactions, tumbling into one another, over and over and over. with so many competing interests, clearly the story cannot account for all perspectives, for all threads? it would be laughable, childish, even selfish, to demand that they do.

in other words, not everyone will achieve a happy ending. this is a truth that jade had come to grips with a long time ago.

JADE: wait. JADE: stop. JADE: why are you saying all of this?

Ohh.  Because she still had even MORE smackworthy stuff left to say, to make the smack even SMACKIER, didn’t she.  Alt!Callie you asshole.  If this gets you kicked out of her almost entirely and jeopardizes the crew as Jade struggles to combat Dirk’s narrative influence on her OWN, then I’m fucking blaming YOU!  Do you realize how horrible it’ll be if Dirk gets to almost singlehandedly write the whole story around her and the others for the first section of HS^2 with only one or two characters aware and trying to mentally avert it??  We already TRIED that in the Epilogues!  It was awful!

jade’s body is my vessel, and it is through this realization that she will understand her true role in the story. her true relevance.

Go fuck yourself, Alt!Callie.  Read the audience a bit!

if i released my hold on her consciousness, there would be no guarantee that i would be allowed in again. therefore i cannot permit her the control of herself that she so desperately craves, and she understands that.

THAT’S your reasoning your used-to-surpressing-Caliborn ignorant--!??

JADE: wait. so...you could give me my body back, and then just hop back in when you need to?

in theory, yes.

JADE: then what the hell callie!

because i don’t trust you to cooperate when the time comes.

MotherfuckerTheMusical.mp4

(or real existing equivalent that’s just off the top of my head)

JADE: why not? JADE: i thought you said i was a reasonable girl with a huge brain!

you are, to an extent.

she is. but the truth of the matter remains that humans are capricious and emotional. and even jade herself can admit that she hasn’t been the most...committed example of her species in the last few years.

Oh my fucking god.  I know they’re trying to make this more satisfying when she actually DOES take control in a few panels, but, Alt!Callie, seriously, get more on your other self’s level!!!

> ==>

Yes, please >:O some more

moving from lover to lover, job to job, interest to interest. over the last few years jade had found herself listless, unable to settle and unwilling to commit to anything or anyone. she knows there’s nothing wrong with that on a moral level, but on a personal level she’s always believed that she could be more, could do better. be better. and now, because of this, she realizes that sacrifices must be made.

and that she, as a space player, is uniquely built for sacrifice.

JADE: yeah JADE: i guess youre right JADE: i have been such a silly little slut! JADE: hey callie

yes, jade?

JADE: oh my god, whats that!!!!

You are so fucking screwed Alt!Callie.

this space is utterly under my control. jade could control it too, if she had any access to her own powers. but with my grip around her cortex, there is no chance of that.

(Wait, there’s an extent to which this space is “real” and not imaginary?  Or does holding her space powers in check also mean keeping her imaginary space powers in check?)

Anyway, here comes the smack.  And, though Alt!Callie deserves this, I hope Dirk isn’t let in too often amidst the others as a result.

> ==>

Yup, poising to pounce...

> ==>

I thought there was a weird infinity symbol underneath them but it’s just two spotlights and a shadow cast by her head.

and here i make my first mistake.

No you made your first mistakes WAAAY earlier in this conversation.  And what you did to Jade in general.  She’s a hero/player for a reason, she doesn’t take stuff lying down forever.

but bringing her into a place where we can both physically manifest has left me, foolishly, vulnerable.

First, physically manifest?  This isn’t pure imaginationspace?  And second, she’s going to blame her polite concession to Jade for this and hold on even tighter the next time, isn’t she.  God damnit, not looking forward to that.  Alt!Callie won’t learn her lesson til the end, will she?  :(

her fingers tear at my throat, trying to find purchase. she won’t be able to kill me here, but it is certainly unpleasant, and not to mention slightly repetitive. we just saw this in the previous chapter, although this particular fight will not end as amorously as the last one did. so don’t get your hopes up.

JADE: who! JADE: are you talking to!

I really hope Jade ends up with full narrative powerOOOOOHHHH FUCK THEY COULD GO FOR THAT HUH

Dirk was able to become an Ultimate Self in his own body because it was the uniting of an irrepressible “self” that he always unbreakably represented.  The others had more trouble.

But Jade

has a BIG PART-GOD BRAIN as reinforced in the narrative repeatedly!!

Meaning that later, SHE could Ultimate Self without ANY PHYSICAL CONSEQUENCE.  :D

I was hoping Jade would end up with full narrative-dictating-and-reading power when she wants to use it, at some point, but I might’ve been aiming too low! :D :D :D

Yaaaaaaaaaaaay

Now all the playfully-horny omnipotent Jade fanfics are true, what that totally isn’t part of why I love this go ahead and admit she doesn’t deserve it

> ==>

Yesss flashy gif struggle against control!  (Though, not as elegant as one of Andrew’s might’ve been. Gotta say.)

> ==>

Blinky-eyes about to resolve normal-Jade-colored....!

> ==>

Wait, what?  I thought Jade was about to snap in and--

during the ship’s trip through space, there have been numerous experiments; modifications to the nutrition output of the various machines designed to create sustenance for the various species on board. i myself have been content with orange juice and synthetic proteins, but dave and roxy have both expressed longing for various ‘earth snacks’, and so the trials and errors began.

What the fuck?  I don’t even know where this is going if it’s punways.

Is there like a dog treat somewhere that’s gonna push her over the edge?  Where is this headed even.

> ==>

Wh...

WHa??????

the results were mixed. as roxy told us in a previous chapter, alchemized food all sort of tastes the same, although the visuals really help to bring about the flavor. and at the end of the day, isn’t it the journey that is more important than the destination? the stories you tell as you create the strangely flavored nutritional paste?

JADE: ????????????

Um??  What’s even going on.

so far, everyone’s favorite attempt has been a vaguely peanut-butter and chocolate flavored creation called "Rices'". nobody eats them really. they just sit in a bowl on the counter.

i’m not actually sure what the witch is trying to accomplish here.

Is Jade trying to humorously gross Alt!Callie out of her body with a candy she doesn’t like or?  But, “suicide threat”? Why joke--

JADE: you dont? JADE: really?

i don’t know what she is trying to accomplish, because surely she would not be doing what it appears she is trying to do. making such a meaningless threat.

JADE: meaningless? JADE: do you even know anything about the body you stole? JADE: shouldnt you have run some sort of psychic physical before you possessed it? JADE: its definitely what i would have done!

Oh SHIT.  You mean Jade has the same peanut allergy JOHN does?!?

> ==>

jade must know that i am well-aware of her family-wide peanut allergy. a story thread that has been extremely important and weighed in on in multiple parts of the narrative. how could i have forgotten such a key detail?

...yes, she totally forgot, but more than that.

I’m betting John is the ONLY one with a peanut allergy.  That Jade is USING that fact to bluff like hell.  :D

(Allergies aren’t usually inherited that way you alien!)

there is nothing remotely just or heroic about dying from self-imposed anaphylactic shock in the throes of a childish tantrum. at the most i’ll get a relaxing few minutes of sleep.

Is Alt!Callie bluffing now?  Even a resurrecting death could throw her off.

> ==>

FUCK YES JADE.

JADE: do you really want to risk it?

what are you talking about, jade? i just said--

FUCK YES JADE, BE A HUGE WITCH

(i say in the most witch-connotatively and non-classpect-related way)

JADE: i dont know, callie JADE: ive never really understood the rules that govern the death of a god tier, have you? JADE: it seems pretty arbitrary from where im standing JADE: who makes the decision whether or not something is heroic or just?

...that’s unclear. but it certainly isn’t you.

JADE: right, of course not JADE: but are you so confident that youre a good guy? JADE: are you sure that the alpha timeline WANTS you to be here?

...what.

JADE: youve done some stuff, callie JADE: im only saying you shouldnt be so quick to assume that me killing you wouldnt be just JADE: and that taking my own life to do it wouldnt be heroic

Even with JUST this one fucking situation Alt!Callie put her in, throwing off her control forever by dying would be shortsighted but HELLA JUST.  What Alt!Callie is doing to her is a crime.

Oh shit!?!?

> [S] ==>

What is this, HTML5?  *clicks play*

...for a second, I thought this was gonna launch into a huge thing with that clock ticking song from the Felt album.

Having Rose and Dirk’s colors competing here really reinforces that... Prospit vs Derse vibe that was feeding the whole this-is-the-basis-for-the-game’s-structure-and-the-birth-of-Paradox-Space theory more earlier.

> ==>

i don’t let the witch manipulate me. i refuse to falter in the face of her whispers. without my careful planning and swift action, the prince would have taken full control over this timeline. none of my friends could even begin to imagine the turmoil.

In the end, you’re ignoring what’s right and brave in this instance to instead do something EXPEDIENT, to the exclusion of trust and compassion when things COULD work out just as well without taking the worst actions -- which is textbook villainous.

> ==>

JADE: they arent your friends!! JADE: you took them from me!

Now isn’t THAT a way to put it. :D :D :D

Alt!Callie is sinning almost as badly as Dirk, here.  Viewing everyone else as characters in a story, the only way she’s ever viewed “friends”, and her as the not-so-humble narrator doing what’s best for all of them.  If she’s going to win against Dirk -- or if that victory is going to MEAN anything -- she will HAVE to realize that she needs to be different.

JADE: you keep saying that youre doing all of this for my own good, but youre just lonely! JADE: i know you are, because so am i!

Ouch.

Will Alt!Callie force her to swallow it?

JADE: you said that being a space player is all about sacrifice JADE: well

> ==>

JADE: bet

...I guess she really might have an allergy.

> ==>

Aaaand the candy drops.  A W A K E ! ! ! !

Yaaaaay Jade is BACK and we’ll get to see even more of her!!!

...please tell me on the next page she grabs the candy, noms it, and mentions she doesn’t have a peanut allergy after all.  That would be sweet.

> ==>

...

Nope, you just leave us on a sad.  Dammit, why do you gotta be all adult and showin’ us both sides in a moment of triumph, HS^2.  Shucks.

Anyway, YAY JADE!  C:

I am happy by this, if slightly too emotionally-rollercoastered by the past 24-hours to give this the full-rejoicing it deserves.  That, and worried about the openings Dirk will get because of this... joy now for potential frustration later, even if Jade tries her best to let Alt!Callie back in in-time.

See y’all next time!  And, uhm.  I guess I’ll comment on whatever other asks I promised to comment on another less-eventful day.  Keep reminding me and holding me to it though!

[inkprintedfox]

OC Study

Tagged by @advena87 to fill out -THIS- OC question prompt.

I tag @starsandskies @1orweth @kanawolf

This is time consuming so I can understand if you guys don't want to do it, so no pressure. I spent roughly a week and a half, almost two weeks on this? No regrets, mostly took so long for me because I work full time and I tend to space out a lot and ramble. Lol

It is quite a bit of fun and a good exercise to help develop your characters so I do recommend It! Don't recommend doing more than three OCs at a time though, three was hard for me and usually I'm an over-achiever. Go easy and dont burn yourself out! Also would be a good exercise if you're writing with a canon character and want to get a handle on working with them.

I wanted to answer this in character originally but it would have been twice as long and probably taken me a month or more. 😅 Perhaps I'll do something like that one day....

Dragon Age OCs per usual for me.

Warden-Commander and Hero of Fereldan (DAO & DAOA)

Growing up in the Denerim Alienage has made Feiell a very bitter, angry, and agressive person. Biting and scrabbling to survive she also had to fight to keep her family and neighbors safe from the rich humans that liked to exploit the destitute elves. She gained a reputation as a protector but also a very hard woman.

She redibly accepted her conscription into the Grey Wardens, not only to escape the persecution of the law, but also to escape the narrow world of the Alianage. Collecting the people that would later be affectionately called "The Blight Brigade" exposed her to many new adventures as well as lifelong friendships, love, and personal growth that could not have happened otherwise.

The Champion of Kirkwall (DA2)

Laid-back, vain, and honestly somewhat lazy, Aiden has never wanted to be anyone's savior let alone a whole city's. Family has been the only thing that mattered in his life and after his father's death, he naturally took on the role of protector and main provider for his mother and siblings. This also made it very natural to take in the stray band of misfits that became almost like family and also why it is so natural for Aiden to constantly help people, even at times he would rather not.

His bleeding heart drags Aiden into the center of conflict far more often than he likes and he constantly berates himself for it. This automatic altruism has jaded him which fuels his sarcastic and sometimes bitter, self-deprecating humor. A tad over dramatic at times means that while he rarely, it ever, says no to aiding someone in need, it certainly doesn't mean he has to be quiet about it either.

The Inqusitor (DAI)

Max has been fortunate for most of his life, from growing up in the wealthy Trevelyan family, to his good looks and, quiet frankly, fantastic smile it's easy to assume he'd be another spoiled rich brat. You'd be giving in to a stereotype that doesn't, quiet, fit him though. From a young age Max has always been outgoing and adventurous which made him a handful to raise. His father frequently grappled with finding things to keep his youngest son occupied in ways that he hadn't had to do with his previous three children.

Born with a naturally sharp mind and quick wit, Max picks up new concepts quickly and with ease. Which means he often grew board with tutors, burned through the family library in a handful of years, quickly became very competent on horseback as well as the breeding and rearing of them (part of the family business), and often terrorized his siblings as well as the hired staff. Once he exhausted most of the interesting things at home he started running off to search for new adventures. Boredom and frequent arguments with his father often lead to habitual bouts of running away from home. Hence where Max got to truly learn about the world and open his eyes to the kind of privilege he's been so lucky to be born with. Unfortunately this also has ingrained his habit of running away from problems he doesn't see a forward solution to. (*cough*theinqusiton*cough*)

OC Study

Featuring:

Warden-Commander Feiell “Fe" Tabris

Champion of Kirkwall Aiden Hawke

Inquisitor Maxwell “Max" Trevelyan

1. Is your OC easily bothered by things?

Feiell – Small things don’t really bother her but she is a tad hot-headed so if you give her a hard time you might not be in for the best experience. She also has zero tolerance for idiots or assholes.

Aiden – He’s a petty bitch that mostly whines and complains to annoy his friends. Also whining about petty things is a good cover for the bigger worries and anxieties he hides underneath.

Max – Mostly an easygoing, carefree type. It takes the numerous responsibilities of the Inquisition weighing down on him all at once before he starts cracking.

2. How easily does your OC make friends?

Feiell – Most defiantly not a people person. Her natural stoic demure and biting sarcasm keeps people at bay. You have to spend quite a bit of time around her before she warms up to you.

Aiden – For reasons he doesn’t really understand people like Aiden. It’s probably his easy smile and sense of humor which he uses to get what he wants or needs out of them. Not really manipulative just doesn’t feel like he deserves the attention. The humor mostly hides his pain and keeps people at arms length, mostly unintentionally. He hates to burden those he loves.

Max – Max loves people, mostly entertaining, or teasing them. His signature charming smile and good looks usually put people at ease which makes him very likable. It also lets him get away with the mischief he often gets into.

3. Does your OC go beyond what they have to do or do they usually do just enough work to get by?

Feiell – Has almost literally killed herself to get where she is. Her work ethic is legendary and she’ll do almost anything to support her family and friends.

Aiden – Will do the barest minimum to get by. Her lazy as hell, even though he is incapable of saying no when someone needs help.

Max – Believes in doing things right the first time and if not the first time then defiantly the second time. Whatever the job needs to get done he willing to do and if it’s a favorite project he can lose himself in it indefinitely.

4. Is your OC respectful of others?

Feiell – She will be as respectful to you as you are to her, but will out match you if you’re a dick to her or her friends.

Aiden – Respectful enough to not cause trouble and get people to leave him alone.

Max – Perfect manners, and ridiculously charming. He believes everyone deserves respect unless they prove otherwise.

5. Is your OC imaginative or more down-to-earth?

Feiell – Defiantly no-nonsense and down-to-earth. She believes in hard work to active your goals.

Aiden – More of a day-dreamer but pulls a practical side together to care for and help family and friends. Dreams are nice but plans put food on the table.

Max – Total idealist, truly believes even the most impossible is attainable if you work at it long enough. Most of that idealistic optimism is broken after Trespasser, but that’s a long story.

6. Is your OC comfortable with themselves?

Feiell – She’s always been comfortable with who she is and has never felt any shame for it. She owes that to her parents and cousin.

Aiden – Feels like a constant failure and a burden despite how hard he tries not to. Doesn’t feel comfortable with opening up about his feelings and weighing others down with them. Is also terrible with expressing more painful emotions.

Max – Is mostly comfortable with himself. Always felt like a disappointment to his family because he never had the kind of goals for his life he thought they would want from him. Also never really saw himself as reliable but the Inquisition changed all that.

7. Does your OC plan things and stick to it or do they make it up as their go?

Feiell – Always has a plan and is a master of adjusting things on the fly if needed. Prefers to stick to the plan but has accepted how rarely that can happen.

Aiden – He’s been winging his whole life and it somehow hasn’t killed him yet.

Max – Usually has more of an outline than a hard plan. Trial & error are his best friends and somehow he’s still alive, that’s probably because he uses educated guesses more that throwing things to the wind.

8. Was their life eventful before the start of the story, or was it more dull?

Feiell – Depends if living in poverty and oppression is dull to you. I guess since it was normal for her it was boring.

Aiden – The stress of hiding a mage father and sister was more than Aiden ever wanted. He would have preferred boring.

Max – While the constant mischief Max got himself into means things were never dull they certainly seem boring when compared to life in the Inquisition. Josephine certainly had her hands full going through all of Max’s past exploits.

9. Do they have the habit to insult other people?

Feiell – Is a salty, little bitch so defiantly yes. She has a sharp tongue.

Aiden – Bit of a smart-ass and occasionally he can’t help it so it gets him in trouble.

Max – Mostly no, it takes quite a bit to get on his nerves enough to make him snap at you. Usually very polite.

10. Would your OC be described as “the life of the party”?

Feiell – She can be described as the death of the party.

Aiden – Likes to think he is.

Max – Is the actual life of the party if he wants to be. Usually he is.

11. Are they critical of others?

Feiell – To a degree, yes

Aiden - Mostly critical of himself

Max – Not really, he’s pretty non-judgmental

12. Do they like art? what is their favorite type (paintings, songs, fashion, etc)?

Feiell – The art of war perhaps, but music is good too.

Aiden – He considers Fenris a work of art if that counts.

Max – Paintings, music, nature, pretty clothes (mostly on Dorian), Max loves it all. He was especially fond of watching Solar paint his murals.

13. Are they more accepting or more controlling of the people in their life?

Feiell – As long as you’re not bothering her and no one gets hurt she doesn’t really care what people do.

Aiden – He has no control over his own life let alone any one else.

Max – Very accepting of people but not above a subtle nudge to do things he feels might benefit them.

14. Is your OC a good listener?

Feiell – She listens more than she talks, so yes.

Aiden – The one who’s always there to listen when you need him.

Max - Yes, he also has a great memory so he's very good at keeping track of all the drama in life. Lol

15. Are they opinionated or more willing to change their minds?

Feiell – Pretty opinionated but not impossible to change her mind, not that it is easy to do so mind you.

Aiden – Too changeable at times and mostly keeps his opinions to himself.

Max – A few solid moral opinions that he won’t move on but open-minded on nearly everything else.

16. Are they the kind of person who’s always on the defensive?

Feiell – Much less than she use to be but definitely yes.

Aiden – Only when he feels blamed for everything, which he is often.

Max – No, he dose his best to own up to his mistakes and rarely takes things personally.

17. Do people like hanging around them? do they have a positive, friendly energy?

Feiell – I will file this under HELL NO. She scares the crap out of most people if she doesn’t piss them off. It can take quite awhile for friends to warm up to her, if at all.

Aiden – People love Aiden, but the older he gets the less Aiden likes people. They demand too much from him but he’ll never be able to say no, or miss a chance at a passive-aggressive joke. Or a regular bad joke for that matter.

Max – People love Max almost from the moment they meet him. There is just something about him that puts everyone at ease and makes it easier to trust and smile. Must be the charming smile, yeah, has to be. He’s not bad looking either.

18. Is your OC a procrastinator? if they are, what’s an example of how much?

Feiell – People die if she puts things off, so no. Some days she wishes she could put many things off though. Like dying anytime soon, there’s too much to accomplish.

Aiden – What is productivity? If nobody is dying or it’s not dragging him, kicking and screaming, by the hair then its probably not getting done. At least no time soon. Guilt trip him hard to speed things up.

Max – Important things get done but if it’s not a pressing issue then it often can be temporarily abandoned for more enjoyable activities. Even if it’s set aside, the thing will still be done in a reasonable amount of time. Unless he forgets, which can happen frequently.

19. Do they tend to panic in certain situations or are they more calm?

Feiell – Always calm, if something bothers her you’ll never know.

Aiden – Panics constantly. Somewhat hides it well…somewhat…

Max – Takes most things in stride, the sudden dump of responsibility and people’s lives was really stressful but he adjusted to it.

20. Are they vengeful?

Feiell – I literally made a post of her being a deity of vengeance lol.

Aiden – Petty or bitter, perhaps, but not full on vengeful.

Max – Yes, touch the people he loves and see a whole different side of him.

21. What are some skills your OC has a talent for and what are some that they worked for?

Feiell – She’s has a natural flair for swordsmanship, her mother started training her and Fe kept up the practice even after her mother’s passing. Her leadership skills were…a little more rough. She had to learn how to organize and lead people on the fly because of the Blight but luckily she learns quickly.

Aiden – He’s scary good at lying, not even Varric can catch him in one. (Honestly most of his book is just Varric's best guess on Aiden's thoughts) Knife throwing took quite a bit of practice though. He can now nail someone at 100 pages and is unmatched at darts.

Max – Politics and navigating the Great Game are weirdly natural for Max even though he kinda hates it. His archery skill is something he is extremely proud of because he’s practiced relentlessly to be as good as he is. And he really is good, until a natural like Sera comes and shatters his ego. Lol

22. Are they more socially awkward or socially confident?

Feiell – Awkward, but in the way that she doesn’t care what people do or say. She dose her own thing and ignores everyone else.

Aiden – Smooth on the outside, tired wreak on the inside. Not that anyone will ever know.

Max – Social chameleon, and life of the party. Until he slips away unnoticed somehow.

23. What is something really dumb that irritates your OC a lot?

Feiell – Dumb questions about her hair: “How long is it?”, “Why do you keep it that long?”, “Is it really that red?”. Usually answered with “Why do you care so much, it’s not your hair.” Also people touching her constantly, she doesn’t see the need to constantly clap people on the shoulder or grab their arms when somethings funny.

Aiden – Orlesians, if you don’t know anything about DA then I’m sorry, this probably doesn’t make sense to you.

Max – Assuming he's stupid or that because of his wealth that he doesn't do any work. He's a natural busy-body so assuming he sits on his are all day is really irritating.

24. Do they tend to see the good in people?

Feiell – No, she’s had too many bad experiences before so distrust is her default until proven otherwise.

Aiden – Sometimes, mostly sees people in shades of grey. No one is 100% good or bad.

Max – He sees the good in people as often as he can and tries to pull some good out of those who are sometimes a little lost.

25. What does it take for your OC to trust someone?

Feiell – Doing what you say you will, not hiding things, sticking up for others when it clearly has no benefit for you, and give it a few weeks….or months and she may trust you.

Aiden – Help him out in a hard spot, or help family/friends.

Max – If you’re not openly malicious or he doesn’t feel like you’re lying/hiding anything his default if to trust until proven otherwise.

26. Do they have a lot of mood swings?

Feiell – Not really, she’s not a very emotional person. Unless you count her temper which can light like a matchstick.

Aiden - Known to be moody, to the point of it being a well known joke among friends. On bad days he can even out do Anders.

Max – Only if the stress is overwhelming him or he’s pretty sick. Otherwise he’s pretty even tempered.

27. Do they like to be the center of attention or do they prefer to be in the background?

Feiell – Hates being the center of attention and would rather be left alone. Unfortunately she’s had to get use to the attention after becoming Warden-Commander.

Aiden – If people could forget who he is it would be really nice. Likes being the center of attention among friends and family, doesn’t like it with crowds of strangers.

Max – Loves entertaining people and making them laugh which makes him great for parties. He grew up attending big gatherings and is an expert at navigating them, which means he's also very good at slipping away from them when he tires of the crowds.

28. Do people think they’re pretentious?

Feiell – Sometimes, her natural expression can give that impression but most of those people that make this mistake are racist shems that don’t like the power she has. Or the fact that she could kill them without breaking a sweat.

Aiden – No, his face is too friendly and if that doesn’t do it the self-deprecating jokes do.

Max – Yes, it’s easy for people to assume that since he comes from money. He’s never thought himself better than anyone though and tries to dispel that impression, but you can’t control what people want to think of you.

29. Is your OC detail oriented or do they focus more on the big picture?

Feiell – Details, details, you add them all up and that’s how you get a bigger picture. Other words, very detail oriented.

Aiden – Big picture. How you get there is a mystery though.

Max – Big picture first then an outline of the main details to get there.

30. Which high school movie stereotype would they fit best?

Feiell – The ice queen/The strict, scary teacher.

Aiden – Class clown/Troublemaker/Weird but laid back teacher

Max – The jock that befriends the weird kid/Hot science teacher

31. Are they good giving advice?

Feiell – Defiantly not, she’s better at giving orders.

Aiden – Only ask if you want to get in trouble. Ok, that’s not completely true, occasionally he can give good advice. Particularly to help cheer someone up.

Max – I would say yes, he’s gotten quite a bit of good advice over the years and likes to pass it on.

32. Which one of the 7 deadly sins fit your OC more? do they see it as a flaw?

Feiell – Wrath: Only a flaw if you think beating your enemies is a bad thing.

Aiden - Sloth: Regrets this flaw. If he had acted sooner on many things they might not have escalated the way they did.

Max – Pride: A flaw he has worked hard to temper over the years. Was more of a problem when he was younger than now.

33. Is your OC more likely to keep their feelings to themselves or to share them?

Feiell – Keeps them mostly to herself. A couple close friends may get a glimpse but only Zevran knows her well. He’s learned when to prod to get her to open up.

Aiden – Doesn’t like to burden others so keeps his feelings to himself even when he shouldn’t.

Max – His oldest sister is his best friend and confidant, she gets to hear everything. Max has started to lean on Dorian in this way too. Basically immediate family and good friends will know what’s up.

[oveliagirlhaditright]

My dark Kairi story “Swallow” chapter six.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/21456412/chapters/67338394

Author’s Note: Just so you all know, the world they're visiting in this chapter is Pixel Perfect.

Thunder and Lightning

Sora’s PoV

Sora and Yozora were walking through Yozora's castle now--a temporary reprieve that Sora knew Yozora was giving him, since Sora was useless without his Keyblade--but Sora appreciated it for what it was.

Eventually, Yozora asked him the question that Sora knew he would, whilst he was taking in the grapes engraved into the walls beside him.

"Tell me about your Stella."

"Her name's Kairi. She's feisty... and I love it. And unlike you, I wouldn't lock her up for it," Sora quipped, even in knowing he was on thin ice here.

"Stella tried to kill me and enslave my entire country, Sora. Somehow, I think you'd be less than forgiving of Kairi if she did the same to you."

And Sora wanted to argue that he would be... and that Kairi would never do something like that, so it was a moot point. And that maybe it was somewhat justified, since Yozora could turn into a possessed asshole.

But he didn't. Instead, he said arrogantly as he noticed the walls turning darker and darker--perhaps to hint at the end of his freedom--"You still shouldn't have put her in that box. Even though with her Princess of Heart-like powers, she can be the world's hope."

"...Even if the cost of giving her better living conditions was the World?" Yozora asked, with sorrow in his voice, as he placed a hand upon Sora's shoulder. And Sora hated this closeness... hated Yozora being like this, because it made him doubt everything.

The truth was, he had put his duty before Kairi for a long time. And he'd finally chosen her over it, in deciding to die for her... But if it ever came down to it... when he did get back to Kairi and the choice ever came, would he choose her life over the World's? Sora wasn't sure.

"No, probably not..." and it was for his hideous answer here, that Sora would allow himself to be locked up again this time.

The original being of Yozora was too dangerous for Yozora's world of Verum Rex, after all. What if the former's subjects started to listen to him instead? That was Yozora'a fear... and even Sora's, somewhat.

Kairi’s PoV

“Kairi, you really shouldn’t be doing this,” Pip admonished Kairi, as he hopped into the gummi ship’s bathroom, and saw her pick up a razor that she’d meant to slice her legs open with.

And because Kairi cared about her new best friend’s innocent eyes, she didn’t do so before him… but she promised the nagging thought in the back of her head, that she would later.

“And if you don’t stop what you’re doing, I’ll tell Riku and make sure he sends you to therapy.”

Well, that put a damper on things, didn’t it? Because even with as much progress she and Riku had made lately, Kairi still didn’t want him knowing this little secret of hers.

Kairi thought that, perhaps, she could lie to Pip now and hurt herself in secret later, but she also wasn’t going to risk it… at least not at the moment. So, instead, she leaned over where Pip was sitting on the sink and kissed the top of head. “Thank you so much, my most cherished friend, for keeping me in a good head space,” she whispered.

And the princess meant it—that was true—since the bonds between humans and animals were often times even stronger than that of humans’, since the love there was unconditional. But she was also trying to get him off her back, it was true.

Kairi even found herself thinking how she’d received a few kisses to the cheek at the last world. Riku’s made sense, it had been brotherly… but since kisses on the cheek usually were between family and friends, Kairi found herself wondering if that meant something when it came to Ava or not.

“Kairi, are you okay?” Pip asked, as he craned his head to the side and regarded her now. And since Kairi didn’t exactly have a good answer for him, she wondered if he might go write about it to try and figure out her “character”.

“I don’t know, Pip… I think there might be some sort of connection between the Foreteller Ava and me—she seemed somehow familiar—but I can’t imagine what it would be.” She couldn’t be another Nobody of hers, could she? Or a Replica? But then, that didn’t make sense, seeing as how Master Yen Sid seemed to think they were from the distant past.

“She seems to have some sort of time magic,” Pip muttered now, as he now seemed to be on the wavelength of theorizing with Kairi. Which was good. So good, for so many reasons… “What do you think that could mean?”

“I- have no idea,” Kairi answered. And knowing so little about their new enemy terrified her, so that she forgot about the blade in her hand and it fell to her leg and cut her of its own accord. She smiled at the pain; and Pip may have teared up just the slightest bit as Kairi was hurt by some unforgiving fate.

…

“I think the world my gummiphone has pinned is actually a data one this time,” Riku was telling Kairi, as she made her way out of the restroom and joined him by the driver’s seat. The picture on his phone certainly looked “data” enough for Kairi, with some swirling neon green web wrapped around part of the world.

Speaking of green, if Kairi looked close enough… Riku’s hair had the faintest tint of that color in it now. She wondered if that had to do with when they were swimming in the Caribbean. Or if his hair was slightly changing color with age, and she just hadn’t noticed it now—as wrapped up as she was with Sora, even if she was trying to care about Riku again—it could have been either, neither, or both, she supposed.

“You know what else I’ve noticed, Riku?” Kairi questioned now, as she went and stood beside some of the sharper jade areas of his gummi ship, almost wishing they were the amethyst of her own for some reason. “I think the theory that Sora was going to worlds I’d like is a flop… I don’t think he’s been able to leave wherever it is that he’s at. And maybe, if we think he was originally sending us to worlds I’d like by being on the same wavelength as me—us—I think he’s stopped now, for whatever reason. But that’s okay… I’m a quitter too, aren’t I?”

And there were numerous examples of this that Kairi could think of… How she’d told Donald and Goofy that she wouldn’t leave Sora and Riku behind, only to run away as a Heartless (Sora, though she hadn’t known that at the time) had approached her… how she’d told Sora and Riku that wherever one of them went, the other followed from now on… only to not train at all between the boys’ defeat of Xemnas and their Mark of Mastery exam, so that they had to leave her again… Or how she’d told Sora she’d protect him in the Keyblade War, but really hadn’t… so that he’d had to make the ultimate sacrifice for her.

She thought now, that maybe she even should have held onto some of her recent anger at Riku—for “stealing” a spotlight that she wished was hers, or that she could at least share—and for liking Sora (had there ever been a moment where he’d been a rival for his affections)? But she couldn’t bring herself to do it. If Riku was “quitting Sora” to be her friend again, then she would easily do the same.

Maybe the truth was, they were all quitters. Like, Sora hadn’t seemed too adamant about trying for the Mark again, after he’d failed… and he’d given up on life to save her, even though Kairi wouldn’t have made that choice for them herself. So why should this new development even surprise her? It was old news at this point, really.

And Kairi didn’t even realize she’d fallen into the co-pilot seat and was ridiculously crying—sobbing, even—until Riku was kneeling at her feet and then wrapping her in a hug. “Let it all out, Kairi… I think you’ve been trying to be too strong for too long… I imagine you think you’ve cried too much. But Kairi, there’s just too much going on… if you don’t allow yourself to feel, it’ll suffocate you. So, come apart.”

And Kairi noticed that as he was telling he this, he himself had begun to shake and there were slight tears falling from his eyes, too. And Kairi held onto Riku, as if he was her anchor at sea—she imagined that she was that to him now; and Gods, why hadn’t they allowed themselves to grieve for their best friend together until now?—and she wondered just how long Riku had kept everything locked tight, in trying to be there for her. She’d been the worst friend ever… to both Sora and Riku, in so many was because she was weak. But maybe she could finally be strong now?

“Riku…” Kairi whispered, for she thought if she tried to make her voice go louder than this, she might not ever be able to say what she had to now. “When we find Sora… you can have him. You love him, I know. And you deserve him so more than I do, so…”

Except that Riku was telling Kairi not to be stupid the moment she was speaking. “Sora loves you, Kairi. You. He always has, and I imagine he always will. And I know you love him, too. ‘Deserving’ has nothing to do with loving. You two taught me that. And you’ve done more than you know. What I want more than anything now, is for the two of you to live happy and long lives together. You’ve both earned that. Hell, we’ve all earned seeing you guys get that. And how do you know that Sora isn’t guiding us to worlds you love now, even with the data connection? Do you just hate yourself that much? Believe in your heart, Kairi… like Sora always did, and always will.”

Kairi wanted to tease Riku here, that his speech was too perfect and he really sounded like Sora again. But she didn’t. Because she didn’t want everything between them to just be about Sora anymore. It hadn’t used to be, and she wanted to capture those days again.

So Kairi followed her heart, and pulled out some of the alcohol she’d saved from George and Ursula’s wedding—she’d thought that maybe she’d been being a baby in only enjoying cyder in that world, and that maybe she should try to be spirited as Riku had been—and gave it to Riku in thanks, since she knew he loved the stuff.

She then directed the gummi ship to take them to the world that Riku’s phone had connected to, praying that this would be the world they’d finally find Sora and they could both tackle-hug him.

…Kairi hadn’t told Riku what the Master of Masters had done to her last time—how he’d picked a fight with her and knocked her out—because she didn’t want to worry him, or make him feel horrible for having missed that while enjoying the party.

And he’d deserved to enjoy that party, as even she knew they sometimes needed some joy now… The brain could only take so much pain and trauma, after all.

But there was something about his fixation on her, that bothered Kairi. And she had no idea why he had one, because it was starting to seem like it had nothing to do whatever plans he probably had with the Princesses of Heart so he could rule the worlds.

As Kairi bit into her lip, as they were being pulled into this new destination’s atmosphere, she prayed to the gods on Mount Olympus, that she wouldn’t run into him here.

“Kairi,” Pip said, as he sat on her head now. “If that freak makes a show again, I’ll bite him in the jugular and kill him.” And Kairi sincerely hoped that he would.

…

The new world that the two were in was very suburban. And Kairi thought that the weather was fair here, for what looked like fall.

Kairi was about to mention to Riku, that the brown leaves looked lovely near so many roofs of the same color, but she was distracted when she took in a woman who looked like Naminé—though older—fighting a foe that Kairi had never seen before.

She thought they were probably Heartless… but they had an almost faded effect to them, that Kairi had never seen with the beasts before. And she might have been imagining things… but it didn’t seem like they were easy to defeat, but rather would disappear and reappear somewhere else.

The woman was fighting them with what appeared to be a trident and light magic—and so Kairi wondered if she was like Keyblade wielders—but she was also singing some opera-like tune… it was pretty.

And just as she’d finished up her ditty, a massive hand seemed to appear out of the ether and smashed many of the Heartless surrounding her, before dissipating again.

But as even that wasn’t enough to get rid of the menace, Kairi and Riku decided to stop gawking at that moment and go help the lady out.

“Naminé!” Riku yelled, as he charged her way… and while Riku was clearly wrong and this wasn’t Naminé—but Kairi could easily see why he’d make that mistake—it made her heart soar to know that he cared so much about her former Nobody.

Kairi shot a homing Firaga spell at all of the Heartless around her, and Riku used his Dark Firaga to get at all the ones around him. And within a few moments, the threat that all three of them had been fighting so surely finally ended.

Before Kairi or Riku could say anything to the woman, however, she was already speaking herself. “If you don’t mind… please don’t tell anyone you saw me using such magic. My city is mostly normal, and I don’t how they’d react to it… But when these creatures showed up, I also couldn’t simply stand by and do nothing.”

“Of course we won’t. Just thank you for doing what you do, Miss…” Riku began.

And here, the platinum blonde smiled ever so slightly. “Lunafreya. And of course. Thank you for your aid, as well. Before I followed the call to try and best these beasts, my boyfriend—Noctis—also took up the mantle to try and fight them. Though it did not go well for him, and he ended up in the hospital soon after. I wonder if he somehow could have been allergic to him. But seeing you two battle… it gives me hope that maybe we are supposed to do this, and he’ll be alright. And in fact, I should really be with him right now for moral support.”

And before the friends could introduce themselves, this Lunafreya was already running away. Kairi could hardly blame her—for if it was Sora, she knew that she and Riku would be the same. She prayed that the girl’s boyfriend would be alright, and that these new Heartless would stop making such a scene.

But speaking of the girl’s similar looks to Naminé, Kairi remembered something she had to do. She pulled out her gummi phone and left her sister a voice mail—since it seemed she still wouldn’t answer her phone—and spoke from her heart. “Naminé, Sora’s fate right now has nothing to do with what happened in Castle Oblivion. None of that was your fault. And you brought Sora and I back together, when the Organization would have kept us apart. You put too much on your shoulders… but I know that I’m the same. Go out… and have fun. Let all of your pain go. From the way you dress, I feel like you’d be a lovely figure skater. Maybe go out and give that a try—make a day of it—and get back to Riku and me when you see the beautiful girl when you look in the mirror that we do.”

And Kairi made sure that Riku’s self-satisfied “hmph” was heard over the speaker, before she hung up and preceded into some sort of strange restaurant before them.

…

The first thing Kairi heard, when she went into the restaurant that wasn’t a bar—since it was going for a family atmosphere—but was still clearly trying to be a bar, was loud rock music. And though Kairi had been miserable lately… she felt herself feeling good again, in hearing it.

Once upon a time, she'd been edgy, after all. So, the music was actually right up her alley.

And the dancer on stage was amazing! Her moves reminded Kairi a lot of Aqua… and of Sora. So needless to say, she was transfixed.

"You may find me just a little strange... I like dancing barefoot in the pouring rain," the singer—the same person as the amazing dancer—sang. And Kairi couldn't help relating to these lyrics. Hadn't she just thought about the girl she had been, who had loved Queen and all? (1) And she'd always loved water, with her namesake and all…

Kairi was having... fun here, as strobe lights danced over her when they were meant to travel over the band instead.

But Riku brought her attention back to the matter at hand, in speaking in terms that Kairi couldn’t help feeling didn’t belong in this place. "I wonder how this is a data world?" And she had to wonder the same thing… though a large part of her thought that it wasn’t that at all, and they’d somehow gotten off track.

"I don't know. But we'll find out, we always do," Kairi answered sternly. But then she found herself being drawn into the show before her again.

Or, she was at first. But then Kairi spotted a redhead like herself standing at the back of the stage... and looking towards the blonde singer resentfully. And Kairi found herself thinking that... if she'd been as lost in the past as she currently was now, that maybe she would have been as jealous of Naminé, as this girl was of their lead singer.

And maybe it was that empathy that she still felt within her heart that prompted Kairi to act. "Do you see that girl? …She looks so upset, Riku. I'm going to see if she needs a glass of water or something."

"...Kairi, they're in the middle of a performance. You just can't-"

"But I can."

And without stopping to overthink it, Kairi went up on stage and asked the redhead if she was alright... to which the girl's reply was a clearly baffled, "Yes." But Kairi could tell she was lying.

But the princess had been so caught up in this poor girl seeming to be heartbroken, that she'd missed what Riku had been getting at earlier: Kairi was near ruining this band’s performance!

But fortunately, since Kairi always had a melodic-sounding speaking voice, and often spoke poetically—and since she'd nearly sat in the girl’s lap, as she’d gotten so close to question her—the judge thought it was part of the group’s act and gave them a gig, after the blonde’s voice rose beautifully.

And somewhat bashful now, the ginger took Kairi’s hand in her own and thanked her. “Uhh, it’s weird to say… but thank you for caring about me? And coming up on stage like you did? It actually seemed to help us get the gig, so…”

“Seriously.” Said a new voice on the scene. But if Kairi thought about it, she imagined she might have seen him in the front row watching them the whole time. He had short, spiky hair and eyes that seemed to smile from behind his glasses. He reminded Kairi of Sora a little bit, just in looks alone, but he was so unlike him in other ways. “You have no idea how long Sam has been waiting for a chance like this. She might not tell you how thankful she is—she’s gotta hide behind that cold aloofness, after all—but I know how much this means to her, so thanks. I’m Roscoe, by the way.”

“Kairi,” the New Seven Heart introduced herself, as she pointed a finger to her chest. She then indicated Riku. “And this is my best friend Riku. And I’m so glad that I was able to help… but I’m confused. I assumed this was the blonde’s band.”

And just as Kairi said that, said blonde girl—Loretta, she would soon learn—blinked out of existence as they all stood backstage.

Roscoe—and to a lesser extent, Sam—seemed clearly panicked that Kairi and Riku had just seen that, but Kairi (and Riku too, she was sure) thought it was the coolest thing in the world. So, their lead singer was a hologram! Was that why they had been called here?

“I guess I get why it’s Sam’s band now,” Kairi whispered, whilst she kept staring at where Loretta had just been, waiting for her to come back again—though it seemed she wouldn’t at the moment, because Roscoe’s laptop was out of battery—“and I think it’s neat. If you want… Riku and I can be a part of your band, so you have more people in it and since the judge seemed to like me.” And after Sam and Roscoe exchanged a look, they seemed to decide that that was a fine idea. So, the two from Destiny Islands headed over to Sam’s house.

…

And it was when Kairi was going under the beads hanging over the door at the top of the stairs—and trying to make an entrance—that Riku pulled her aside. “Kairi… I get that maybe one of your dreams was to be a rock star. Who’s isn’t? But I think you should slow your roll some. It’s clear that Loretta stole Sam’s dream, for whatever reason. And you don’t want to do the same, do you?”

And Kairi certainly knew what Riku was talking about, just as an image of Sam’s jealous and pained expression returned to her. Right. She wouldn’t do anything to cause Sam more pain—even if an evil part of her wanted everyone to ache the way that she was right now—so that also meant no finding a way to get Pip involved in the routine. She gave him a meaningful look now, so he’d know not to begin singing to “Nothing’s Wrong With Me”—the song from this band that Kairi had just learned—and then sat down on the floor amidst new friends, pretzels, drinks, and board games.

"So…  why do you have a hologram as the lead singer, if you want to be the star, Sam?" Kairi asked the question that had been plaguing her mind for a half-an-hour now, as she inched closer to the other girl.

But Sam—even though she didn’t seem to have an issue with Kairi herself—didn’t seem to enjoy the proximity. What? Did she think she was competition too, and was trying to compare their bodies as she got closer to her?

That seemed to be the answer. Because after holding the bridge of her nose and sighing irritably, Sam responded with: "Because apparently, if you want to be a singer now you also have to dance. And be hot."

‘But you’re definitely hot,’ Kairi found herself thinking about Sam, but not saying out loud since she didn’t know how well that would go over. She was, however, about to say that she could teach Sam how to dance if she wanted to, but before she could Riku was speaking.

"That's... rough. And seems unfair. Who comes up with these dumb rules?" Riku muttered, crossing his arms over his chest and shaking his head. And Kairi wondered if he was thinking about what she was: of some of Sora's rough dancing—when he'd wanted to be an idol—before he'd gotten good at it... But people still hadn't turned him down from singing when he’d been unable to dance. What a critical world this was.

“It is rough,” Roscoe allowed. He was fiddling with his computer and seeming to be downloading some new outfits for Loretta to wear. And Kairi didn’t know how to feel, with him being here kindly defending Sam… while his mind was in cyberspace, seemingly being Loretta’s number one fanboy. “But Sam’s music is too good not to get out there. She’s worked too hard. And if nothing else, I’m glad Loretta can help her to succeed.”

Except that it sucked that Sam couldn’t make it succeed with her own talent in this heartless world! Kairi somewhat knew the feeling: of how, during the Keyblade War, she’d probably learned fast and done better than anyone else who had never held a weapon before would have… but it still hadn’t been enough. And she hated everything for that reason.

"…If you want, Sam, maybe I can be your back-up dancer? Maybe you can watch me as you do backup vocals and play your guitar, and can eventually carry some of that into your own routine. Background dancing is easy, and I’m sure you can pick it up no problem. Riku can help, too… He’s a pretty good dancer. But more than that, he’s a good singer… Even better than me, when usually girls are supposed to sing better than boys or whatever.”

“That sounds… really sweet. Thank you, Kairi. I’d love that. And if Riku wants to help, too! The Zetta Bytes doesn’t have any guy vocalists, but maybe that’s exactly what it needs to make it to the top!”

“We’re going to be stars!” Someone exclaimed. And at first, Kairi had thought that it was her—because Riku was right about this being a dream of hers… about it being anyone’s dream, really—but she was shocked to see that it had been Riku, as he punched at the sky… Apparently he wasn’t as above seeking stardom as he had wanted to believe. And it was refreshing to see.

Everyone laughed, but then they threw themselves into mastering some new songs. Loretta too, for she was up and running again—with a new blue shirt with a circle on it, as opposed to the white blouse and pants she’d been wearing earlier—and Kairi couldn’t help noticing that Loretta sent Sam some nasty looks now and then… even while Roscoe fiddled with making Loretta’s voice even better.

And all of that would spill into a very cruel discussion that Sam and Loretta would have with each other, that Kairi would not recount because she wanted women to support women, okay? …Not this.

…

“So, Kairi… Do you think we’re here to make Roscoe realize he’s missing the great girl in front of him, as opposed to his invention that he’s fallen in love with?” Riku asked Kairi, as the two of them were walking downtown to find stylish outfits to go with Sam’s new song “Get Real”. Kairi supposed they really should have been finding ensembles for “Notice Me”, what they were going to sing at their gig—where a number of record companies would be, apparently—but since that was the song that Sam and Loretta had had a huge fight over, it now left a bad taste in her mouth… even if it was a lovely song that Kairi could understand.

“I suppose that’s possible, since romance seems to be a big deal in a lot of the worlds we go to. And Sora and I are in a romance… but I don’t know. We could just as easily be here to defeat the strange Heartless here. “Which, speaking of… I think they are part hologram. Which makes it seem like they’re connected to Loretta. But how? Do we think she’s getting real emotions and creating something like the Unversed?” Kairi pondered. And it was just when she had mentioned said Heartless, that more showed up that moment to attack her and Riku.

Kairi swatted him here, but then they would just show up again over there. It was frustrating… and she wished that Luna were here to help them again, but she also didn’t: since Luna not being here hopefully meant she was spending some lovely time with her healed boyfriend.

Eventually, Kairi and Riku learned if they used water on these Heartless and then electrocuted them, it would destroy them… But then one hundred more showed up to take their place. But defeating them like this was the best lead they had… so they would keep at it. And they did.

…

Unfortunately, Kairi and Riku showed up late for their moment… and a right mess. Thankfully, they were on deck and weren’t supposed to be on stage yet, but it was still a nightmare. The part of Kairi who had been a punctual girl going to school still, while Sora and Riku had been off being heroes, was horrified at herself.

Riku was a guy and had it easier than her… so once he’d splashed some water onto his face, he was up on stage making sure their equipment was ready. He even took Pip with him, so he could tell Riku if even a toddler would be able to see them from the balcony if a parent held them in their lap.

And while Riku and Pip were out bonding, Kairi heard an angry conversation between Sam and Roscoe and it almost made her sick.

“I just… want to know what part of me you used to make her. What part you thought was good enough to keep.”

On stage, music had started up. Kairi assumed that the band before them had ordered Riku to worry about their equipment later and give them their turn, already. Kairi heard the lyrics “don’t even try it” being sung, but all she could listen to was Rosco’s whispered answer of, “…I gave her your ears.”

And now Sam was storming off angrily—Kairi could hardly blame her—to the stage where Riku and even Loretta were presumably already at. Kairi should have been going in that direction, too, but she was rooted to the spot… and ashamedly let Loretta, Sam, Riku, and even Pip perform without her.

Because she was just… so disgusted that Rosco was clearly in love with Sam—even if he couldn’t see it—but was so lost in a pursuit of perfection, that the only thing he’d taken from the girl of his dreams to put “onto perfection” were her ears!

Kairi was near walking up to Rosco and yelling at him for this… when she heard mad cheering coming from out near the stage. And there were shouts of “she’s not real!”, “she’s a hologram!”

…So, it seemed that the crowd had learned Loretta’s secret but didn’t care. Rather, they seemed to love the Zetta Bytes more as they screamed out for them to do an encore now. And Kairi was finally found where she was at backstage, pulled on stage, and forced to sing for their gleeful audience: their gleeful audience who had apparently just gotten them a record deal—Sam was whispering in Kairi’s ear now—and was snapping picture after picture.

Still in a daze, as she carried her violin backstage, Kairi mostly missed Loretta wanting to go outside where it was raining and telling Rosco that he should have made her real.

…

Kairi and Riku—now that they were richer than they had ever been before, and in just a few days’ time. Who would’ve guessed?—were staying at a lush apartment together. Though it wasn’t just lush because they were being selfish! No, it needed all the technological advancements, because sometimes Rosco asked the two to house Loretta here… since Rosco’s dad now wanted to steal her for his business.

(And speaking of Loretta, Kairi was closer to her than she ever had been before. The two of them had recently had a conversation… Kairi had told Loretta that she’d heard some of her conversation. And that she somewhat understood her, because she’d once had another version of herself that hadn’t been real: a version that sometimes Kairi could see the memories of. And Loretta had smiled, then, and stolen all of these clothes online for Kairi and had had them shipped here… Not that Kairi had wanted her to do that. But it was done now, and Kairi was happy for the attempt at friendship.)

But anyway… the group was finally about to do something with Kairi’s favorite song “Get Real”—to record a demo of it, actually—and while they waited for the limo to come pick them up, Kairi found herself doing some research on the laptop she had here.

“…Riku, the Internet tells me that I’m right. Holograms should be incorporeal. So it can’t be holograms we’re fighting, right? Unless the darkness has found a way to possess them and change their consistency?” Kairi asked, as she nibbled at a mushroom. She had used to hate these fungi when they’d lived on Destiny Islands… but she’d become stronger in doing things she thought she’d never be able to, so why not also this?

“It’s a good theory,” Riku admitted. But just as soon as he was done saying those few words, he dove back for another drink of water. Kairi swore that ever since he’d discovered just what a good singer he was here, it seemed like he was drinking a gallon a minute.

But she wouldn’t complain. After everything Riku had been through, he deserved to have a little fun. And water was good for you, anyway.

“But what if they’re this way because it has something to do with Sora? Going off of the theory that he’s somehow controlling the worlds we’re going to.”

Kairi playfully threw a pillow at Riku for that remark (which he just laughed at, before he gently put it on the couch beside him, then).

This room was so big… and there were so many red plush pillows around them, that she doubted anyone would notice one had been moved, if they came into the room now.

She got where Riku was coming from, of course… Since this place reminded Kairi a lot of what had happened to Sora at Castle Oblivion—and could he have wanted them to see something in that? Like how he wanted to thank Naminé still?—but in order to do what Riku was saying… it suggested that Sora would have used the power of darkness to make it happen. And Kairi just couldn’t imagine that.

“Maybe the world is supposed to tell us something about you…” Kairi started now, as she put a finger under her chin and considered. “You told me that when you went to the Grid during your Mark of Mastery, that a Flynn had to realize that perfection was right in front of him. Do you think the same thing is going on here, and we have to help Rosco—and maybe his dad, who invented this technology—see that?”

Now it was Riku’s turn to consider, as he came closer to sit beside Kairi.

And man, how she had missed being close to her older brother like this. How had she ever pushed him away?

“Maybe… in which case, I’ll go talk to the men here. Maybe it’ll help us ‘finish this world’, so we can get our next clue about Sora. You keep working on the Heartless riddle.” Kairi didn’t have to be told twice. And she didn’t watch Riku go, but rather desperately looking at her screen again. She would have liked an excuse to eat more before she got back to work... but oh well. Riku had given her an order, so she would follow it. Her health be damned.

Riku's PoV

It was funny how fast things changed, Riku thought. He’d just been in this world for a few weeks, and he and his friends were somehow already popstars.

But he should have supposed this sort of thing was possible, since he’d been the one to say during his Mark of Mastery exam that time moved differently in every world.

And boy, did it. It made no sense that he should feel no nervousness in now being on the billboard charts, but was scared to just have dinner with his new friend and his father. Yet here he was, anyway.

And since Riku was here on a mission, he decided to rip the bandage off and get to the heart of the issue. “Sir… I hate to say this… but Rosco’s mother left you, didn’t she? And is that why you started working in holograms… and why this house is so immaculate?”

Rosco breathed sharply at Riku’s line of questioning, and he dropped his knife and fork onto his plate in a loud clutter. “Riku-” Rosco started, in turning betrayed eyes towards Riku: a gaze that he held, because he’d done way worse than this, of course. “Why-”

But the man who was just Rosco in thirty-years-time—if he didn’t change his ways—held a hand up, to halt whatever defense Rosco may have laid at his father’s feet. And he laughed without humor. “Why deny what this man has so easily seen? Especially when I have no one to blame but myself for my own unhappiness.

“Listen to this, Roscoe,” And the middle-aged man held up his wineglass into the light spilling in from the window. “Look at all of the colors this refracts. One would easily look at this and deem it as perfection, wouldn’t they? Except if you look just here, this cup is splintered at the side… But somehow, that allows it to make even more patterns on the wall. So, it’s quite perfect in its perfection, isn’t it?”

Riku could practically see the wheels turning in Roscoe’s head here. And he wondered if he was imagining the lipstick he saw on the corner of his lips. Had Sam kissed him earlier, or-

“So, you’re saying that even a- design flaw is something that can be beautiful and should be ignored?”

“I think,” Riku chimed in—his thoughts thinking about both his best friends Sora and Kairi here. Naminé, too—“that perfection is something we made up in our heads. And the more we chase it, instead of trying to love without boundaries, the more insane we become and the more harm we do.”

“Precisely,” Roscoe’s father said with a sharp nod and smile in Riku’s direction, as the three of them finally dug into their steaks.

 Kairi’s PoV

In the near future—when everything would go horribly wrong with Sam—Kairi would realize she should have known that Loretta would take too long getting there.

She had come to Kairi in her dreams—much like Ava had. But Kairi sensed that this was somehow more… real than what had occurred with that Foreteller, maybe—and when Kairi was at first confused about this, Loretta waved her concern away with a flick of her hand.

“I think the girl who was once in you—your Nobody, I believe you said—delved into machinery that connected to her mind. And because of that, I can get into your mind. But Kairi… Harshtone Records wants to steal my will. All holograms they now create’s wills, actually. But Daryl Fibbs is offering me my freedom. He’s going to upload me onto the net and act like I just got away… so I’m not going to be able to be at our next performance from the get-go. You need to stall. But you think this was the right choice, right?”

“Yes,” Kairi promised the girl, as she got up out of her bed in this dream and strode forward to touch Loretta’s face—for she felt the blonde wanted to feel anything, and it broke her heart that she was still unable to—“you’re definitely growing your own heart. I’ve- seen that, now that I think about it. So, don’t let anyone take that away from you. I’ll stall as long as I need to. Take- take care, Loretta.”

And while Kairi didn’t know it at the time, that would be the last time that she really got to see Loretta… and that they’d be on good terms.

…

As Loretta had promised, she wasn’t there right away when they were debuting “Get Real” for the first time.

And the people wanted Loretta… so Sam had chosen to go on stage pretending to be her. She had a wig for it… and Loretta’s ears, as well as part of her voice. Sam also knew Loretta’s moves like no one else did—of course she did. This band was really hers—and had apparently been practicing Loretta’s dancing in her spare time.

So even while Kairi thought she could have handled Loretta’s dancing better—she had the Keyblade, after all. And that gave her certain powers—she didn’t want to destroy Sam’s confidence even more than it already had been. So both she and Riku smiled and nodded at Sam when she jumped into the fray… And while it started out okay—with Sam twirling and flipping like the rest of them—it ended in disaster: with Sam falling off the stage and banging her head on the concrete.

She was unconscious immediately, and responding to nothing… in a coma, it would seem. “Riku, Roscoe’s panicking! Tell him he needs to call the hospital of this world! We can’t heal her; you know we can’t. Not out of a coma. But maybe there’s something else we can do… unless-”

What if Kairi went into a coma, too, and tried to find Sam in the haze?

Riku, seeming to read Kairi’s mind like he so often did these days, was shaking his head at her as Kairi rose to her feet. But she was paying him no heed. Instead, she stabbed herself in the heart with Destiny’s Embrace, just like Sora had for her years ago.

Kairi didn't mean to release her heart or anything like that, but rather have a near death experience. And she knew that Riku could chastely kiss her to wake her up. It wouldn't be a kiss of love... but he did love her, so Kairi knew that that would work, as her eyes closed and her mind drifted elsewhere.

…And though a part of her had selfishly wanted to see Sora when she fell asleep, it was actually Sam who Kairi witnessed... and she was glad for it.

The poor girl looked like a drowned rat. And it seemed as though she couldn't speak... or that if she could, talking took too much effort for her to even want to do it. She strummed a broken guitar; and when Loretta found her—what was she doing here?—Kairi tried to decide, as she hung back now—the guitar seemed to be the only thing that Sam cared about. "It's broken," she whispered listless, as Kairi crept slightly closer to the two girls in this barren wasteland.

"No, it's not," Loretta said with the sweetest of smiles, that Kairi had ever seen and with a false smile. "You're just looking at it the wrong way." Loretta then gently touched the acoustic guitar, and it was instantly restored...

And Kairi—as she stood there in a lovely gust of wind, that turned the desert into a lush meadow—couldn't help thinking that these were the powers a Princess of Heart should have had... but she didn't.

She was just destruction now.

The torrent had pushed Kairi further back; and more hologram Heartless showed up to help keep it that way.

If she was hearing correctly, Sam was now telling Loretta that this sort of thing was why she’d been so jealous of her. Because she was perfect.

And Loretta snorted, in what was a beautiful moment—or at least should have been, because Kairi couldn’t help feeling… suspicious—and poured her heart out. “If I’m perfect, then why do I feel so limited?! You can grow… change… get better. And I’ll always just be this… Which is why youneed to wake up.”

Except… why didn’t Kairi believe Loretta as far as she could throw her? Why did this whole area feel as though it was charged with lies?

If Kairi was being honest with herself… she had used to think that Naminé had once been a manifestation of her insecurities. A part of herself that she couldn’t forgive. But in her heart now… had Loretta somehow become that?

Very many things seemed to happen then, in just the blink of an eye.

Kairi found herself waking up, ever so slightly, and this world blurring, as she felt Riku's lips pecking hers.

And Kairi heard Loretta telling Sam that she was currently healing her body... but she'd unintentionally taken it over, but that she would give it back in a moment... But did Kairi really believe that?

Kairi felt rain all around her—and ignored how Loretta had always wanted to feel that, and how now was probably her only chance to—and then there was a flash of lightning. And Kairi didn't know what would and would not be out there in the real world, when the flash ended.

So, she dove at Loretta, just as Kairi thought she felt Riku jumping at something, too (was he shaking her body, trying to get her to wake up?), and struck her with her Keyblade... with water and electricity coming off of it.

And Loretta smiled—something that would haunt Kairi's nightmares forever—and then broke apart: like an astral body shattering into pieces and giving way to light.

And then Kairi was in her own body again—in the hospital?—and Sam was to the side of her… sobbing about Loretta. For in her mind, Loretta had just somehow died as the two of them had finally become friends. And maybe she had. And maybe Kairi had been responsible for it, because she thought that she was trying to steal Sam’s body for her own.

She… she was a murderer! And for some reason, Riku seemed as shaken as Kairi herself was about something. What? Had he thought he was close to losing her, too?

“Roscoe, you should… you should just create Loretta again. You have the files, right?” Kairi cried, sitting up as nurses ordered her not to. But even as she said that, she knew it would be a cop-out because it wouldn’t quite be the same Loretta they had all known and come to love.

And everyone seemed to realize that, too. So, they said nothing, and just tried to move on… and move on, they did.

Shockingly, the Zetta Bytes made it without Loretta, since everyone had been amazed by Sam’s performance when the news got out that it had been her going that far for her beloved audience, and not Loretta. The public was actually pretty understanding in general at the loss of Loretta, as they saw how disturbed the band was without her.

Sam was having a concert now (with her now-boyfriend, Roscoe, happily waiting in the wings)—a more laid-back one, as she sat on a stool and sang about the rain falling—and Kairi and Riku were aiding her in it, to try and help her get her footing without Loretta (until her new band mates Rachel and Cindy got here).

And while Kairi thought Riku in particular did a good job in harmonizing with Sam… it was nothing like Loretta would have done. Kairi wishes that the poor girl was here, to be on Sam’s side just like this, but she wasn’t.

And that was why Kairi was again feeling like she deserved nothing again… and that she should just stay here and bury herself, instead of finding her life’s dream in Sora.

It was on one day when Kairi was buried under her covers on the couch, staring unseeing at the TV before her, that Pip tried to get through to her. “Kairi… what happened to Loretta? I was watching that whole scene from your hood. And I don’t think it was you. I think-”

“What-” Kairi started.

But she was cut off, when there was suddenly a Corridor of Light in front of her and a beautiful girl standing in front of her in her living room. She was gorgeous, with long black hair, yellow eyes, a white and black jacket, and a jean skirt. “Who are you?” Kairi asked, as she cocked her head to the side and regarded the girl. Because that’s what you did in this sort of situation.

“I… am someone who was experimented on by Ansem, just like you. Though… he did much worse to me, if you don’t mind my saying. But then- then I was taken away, to a place with spaceships and holograms. I was- locked away there. But I finally learned how to mess with their technology… and I ended up here. Finally, free. I- I don’t know my name, though. How silly is that? I believe it may have started with an ‘S’, but I don’t know. You can call me… Soul, I suppose.”

“I-” There was so much Kairi wanted to say to all of this. So much she wanted to do.

First off, this girl seemed like she had just escaped from some terrible fate, so she and Riku needed to take her somewhere safe as soon as possible.

And they would. That was why Kairi screamed at Riku to join her now, and started rambling as she pointed at the girl who was now hiding under their sofa.

Secondly, Kairi figured they had just cracked where the hologram Heartless in this world had come from. “Soul” had somehow created them in trying to escape her prison.

And thirdly, “Where you’re from… it sounds like a great prison to keep someone you don’t want to be found, doesn’t it, Soul?”

“Con-considering that I’ve been there for near thirteen years—and no one ever found me—I would say so,” Soul answered. She was slightly calmer now. Riku had called Merlin on the gummiphone, and he’d teleported over here post-haste. He was now entertaining Soul with some of his magic… and had even put her in a lovely purple dress to try and disguise her from her captors.

“And, question: if the Heartless you created somehow created a path to this world, do you think it works in reverse?”

But Kairi didn’t wait to hear the answer to that. She ran outside with Riku and waited. With the hearts of two Keyblade wielders in front of them, no doubt Heartless would be cornering them soo-

There they were! Before Kairi could think better of it, she grabbed Riku’s hand and dove with her hand outstretched towards one. And as her flesh touched its… data? Kairi soon found herself, Riku, and Pip transported to somewhere else entirely: with constellations as far as the eye could see.

Kairi felt horrid that she was leaving things with the Zetta Bytes as badly as she did… but maybe it was for the best. While they’d always be in her heart, she’d never forgive herself for what she did to Loretta… and neither would they, if they knew. So probably best to leave things like this in a somewhat positive place for them, huh?

But those sorts of thoughts were exactly why Kairi deserved to be locked up and not find Sora, huh?

Author’s Note: Oh, man. I feel like I had so much to say this chapter, but I’ve probably forgotten a lot of it. First off, I swear I’m not trying to make all these worlds live-action (and they all won’t be). But just at the start of this story, that’s how it’s somehow ending up.

(1) Kairi liking Queen is a reference to my story “The Best Laid Plans”, that I may have just made canon to this story (though you don’t have to read that to understand this). It’s basically an alternate Re:Mind, that I wrote before Re:Mind came out.

So… I changed up the end to Pixel Perfect somewhat, and my inner-child who loves this movie and Loretta is hating me for it. But tbh, Loretta seemed a bit sketch in that ending, so I can get why Kairi and Riku jumped to the wrong conclusion. It also happened, because I needed Kairi to mess up and do something bad since this is still a “dark Kairi” story.

But actually… while Kairi tried to kill Loretta, and will definitely be feeling the guilt for that, it was Riku who did it. Though Kairi doesn’t realize that (yet) and Riku might not tell her. But that was what Pip was trying to tell her at the end of this chapter. Because Riku was jumping to the same conclusions that Kairi was: that Loretta might try and take Sam’s body for her own… and that in doing that, Kairi might stay trapped in their weird dreamscape somehow, and Riku couldn’t take that chance. Tbh, I’m not entirely sure what Riku did to manage it (wow, me. I’m the author of this story, and I don’t even know). I want to say he deleted her file… but would that even work if she was in Sam’s head at the time? Or maybe he extracted her heart from Sam’s… but then where did he put it afterwards? Ehh. Hopefully I’ll work it out next chapter. Or you guys tell ME how he should have done it, with all this weird science stuff this movie did with Loretta.

And, yes: Riku pecked Kairi on the lips to wake her up, but I swear they’re still completely platonic and will continue to be.

This chapter was probably rushed—and I’m not editing chapters as much now as I probably should be, but it actually allows me to get them out—but whatever.

I actually was not going to have Skuld be in this chapter at all (maybe not even in this fic). I was just going to have the hologram Heartless (and Loretta?) be the “threat” of this chapter, because I’m falling into a “Foretellers show up every chapter and say cryptic things and then leave” trap. But then I realized she was kind of needed to get them to the next world. And Skuld isn’t a Foreteller, so I guess it’s kind of different. -shrugs-

Riku can sing in this as sort of a joke—or to differentiate him from his English voice actor, David Gallagher—because David Gallagher can’t. And singing didn’t seem like a Riku thing to do… which is exactly why I had him do so for fun.

Oh! And Luna! Luna is here because I realized this story needs Final Fantasy cameos, and I wanted a Final Fantasy character who could sing, with all the singing stuff going on. But it’s one of those FF cameos like, “Squall is totally from Radiant Garden and never lived in a place called Gaia” ones. She’s not her FFXV self. She’s from the Pixel Perfect world (her, and this Noct. And this world’s Chocobos, probably). And it’s probably the last we’ll see of her, sadly, to not confuse her and the other FFXV characters with the Verum Rex ones, but at least it was something.

I hope everyone’s enjoying Melody of Memory!

Also, I did this entire movie from memory, because Disney does

-Shanna

[ravenaveira]

Okay I get why you might not like Alisha from ToZ, but you hate /Luke/?????? I cannot understand. Why do you hate Luke I gotta know

Ok Im gonna be honest and admit Im a little biased when it comes to Luke, and when I say little I really mean ALOT lol I’ll explain

First off he started off pretty bad but I could already tell he was going to develop as his journey went on and I was right, I was really proud of his development and growth. But then he got all those people killed, ignoring everyone who tried to warn him because of his arrogance which caused everyone to hate him for a short time and rightfully so, hell I was pissed at him still even AFTER they forgave him.

But after he cut his hair and really resolved to change and actually put in the effort, I started to like him again, I really admired his growth and that he acknowledged he screwed up instead of continuing to make excuses for it, he effed up, he realized his mistake and took responsibility for it and worked hard to change. It reminded me somewhat of Zuko’s redemption arc in Avatar with how he kept messing up at first but then realized where he went wrong and did his best to change, I respect that.

So how did I grow to dislike Luke after all that? well as I said Im very biased against him for one reason and one reason only.

Asch

Now from the very beginning we know theres more to Asch than meets the eye, theres a reason he and Luke look so much alike but we just dont know what yet, then when we find out things only get worse from there as we slowly find out his backstory and what happened to him. It was so bad it actually made me dislike Luke because he essentially took literally EVERYTHING from him, although unknowingly the fact is he still stole Asch’s entire life.

His fiance, his kingdom, his best friend, his parents, even his name, literally everything. Asch was kidnapped and forced to go through agonizing experiments to create that replica Luke that they used to replace him and take over his life while Van continued to use and abuse Asch for his own gain. And what happens when Asch finally escapes and makes his way home? he sees his family and friends all moved on happily with his replica, that was beyond sad and hard to watch.

So where my bias comes in is that I like Asch more than I like Luke, why? because Asch is the original and he also just has a way more interesting backstory and personality compared to Luke who pretty much had it made his entire life and took it for granted, replica or not Luke still had it far easier than Asch did. His only real struggle was trying to have his own identity while Asch was trying to cope with having his stolen, which was a far more compelling dilemma in my opinion that I felt could have used more focus.

There was even one point in the game where everyone was against Luke and spent time with Asch in his place for a while and it just felt awkward, Guy and Natalia were originally friends with him, not Luke but at the end of the day, Guy sides with Luke and basically ditched Asch for the copy, which Asch even says he expected him to do. Even so, Guy siding with Luke over him clearly hurt him since that WAS originally his friend, even Jade points it out.

Yes its understandable since he spent more time with Luke after Asch was taken but at the same time it just felt like nobody really gave much thought to Asch’s situation and that somehow Luke was just far more important than Asch even though he’s the original whose life was stolen from him. To me, Asch was just treated beyond unfair and he just accepted it because he felt like he was inferior and had no place with them now. Just the charred remains of who he once was.

Natalia at least made the effort to reach out to Asch more than anyone else did and understood him even though he pushed her away, at least she was the only one who truly tried to console and reach out to him over the ordeal whether he accepted it or not. Luke did too but to be honest thats the LAST person he wanted to listen to for obvious reasons.

Yeah Asch pushed them away but nobody but Luke and Natalia actually took the time to see things from his perspective and tried to empathize with him, he was literally all alone through everything so its understandable why he has such a hard time with ‘teamwork’.

His attitude, like Lukes, is completely understandable when you look at their upbringing. Luke was royalty and behaved like an arrogant spoiled brat because of his privilege and lack of knowledge about the real world, so him being an asshole at first makes sense.

Asch was cold and impersonal at first because he was being groomed to be the ruler of Kimlasca but was also treated coldly by his father, then he was kidnapped at a very young age and experimented on to create a replica that completely highjacked his life and took all his friends and family away from him. So for him to be cold, distant, apathetic and rude makes total sense given what he’s been through, why wouldnt he be resentful towards Luke especially but everyone else too? he felt abandoned and forgotten and worst of all replaced, who wouldnt feel bitterness after that? in many ways, he even felt inferior to Luke which only rubbed salt in the wound.

But even with all of that, ALL OF THAT, I still liked both but just liked Asch more, however, something happened that made it impossible for me to like Luke anymore and forever hate him for it.

Asch dies, and Luke lives, that is unforgivable.

Now listen, I know it was foreshadowed but there were several things that happened that made this impossible to accept. Starting with the fact that near the end of the game all the replicas were supposed to die, keyword ALL so that includes Luke, so it was also foreshadowed that Luke would die as well. Asch from the side effects of the replication and Luke because replicas tend to be unstable and fall apart eventually which is why formicry was banned, yet in the end, only Asch dies and in one of the worst ways possible

He lived in constant pain and suffering both physical and emotional and now he dies in excruciating pain and suffering too, why? protecting Luke, and not just that, but from an experiment he never signed up for and was forced to go through, that was beyond unfair and unforgivable.

His whole life he has lost and sacrificed everything, EVERYTHING because of Luke, not only could he not live his own life but he couldnt even die his own death either. Luke got to live his life and got to escape his death and he’s the friggin replica who was supposed to die with all the rest, make that make sense to me.

The original dies but the fake lives even though its said replicas are unstable and doomed to fall apart eventually and we see it happen to every single human replica except for Luke, I just cant accept that.

They even have the nerve to leave the ending ambiguous where it sort of seems like Luke and Asch fuse and its left open-ended where you could assume its Asch or Luke but we all know its Luke because he goes directly to Tear in the end which doesnt make sense for Asch to do if it was him so Im just…UGH!!!!

So you wanna know why I dont like Luke? because he got to have everything Asch lost, he took everything from him and Asch literally gets nothing in the end, everybody moved on, Asch couldnt go back, Asch was slowly dying anyway from the experiment and Luke just gets to have everything in the end. He stole Asch’s life and in the end, he gets to keep it while Asch just dies protecting his copy, I just cannot accept that.

Its just unfair that Asch had to give up everything and Luke has to give up nothing, he really doesnt lose anything in the end, only Asch does. I know that sounds weird and a little sadistic but it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth ya know? the original dies having everything taken from him while the replica lives on with virtually everything? did Asch really get anything besides suffering in the end? no, thats where my hatred stems from.

So yeah my hatred for Luke stems from my bias for Asch, its not so much that Luke did something BAD that made him unlikeable but more like the ending the creators chose made me dislike him because I found it unfair and wanted Asch to have a happy ending too after all he’s been through but in the end, he dies because of something he had no control over and was forced to go through while Luke gets to go on living happily with everyone in the life Asch will never have, that is unacceptable.

So yea sorry this is so long but I wanted to go over how my admiration and respect for Luke turned to hate, its really of no fault of his own but the ending itself. I also hate that the fandom prefers Luke over Asch or even hate him when he’s the victim of so much but eh to each their own, but that just saddens me that even amongst the fandom Asch gets the short end of the stick while Luke gets all the praise.

Long story short this game just destroyed me lol which is why its my favorite Tales of games in the entire series despite my hatred for the ending, it was such a rollercoaster of emotion and pain that it really stands out from all the other Tales of in the series and IMO Tales of the Abyss is the best out of them all thus far and will always remain one of my top favorite games of all time. It’s such an underated gem.

[tetrakys]

Falling - part 6 (Finale)

Lance/Guardienne route following the events of episode 26.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

The first time I’d been on a boat with Lance I had no idea he was even there, hiding below deck for the whole duration of the trip to the Jade coast.

The second time he’d kidnapped me, knife at my throat, just to be able to escape HQ and get to Memoria.

Both times I hadn’t been a willing participant in that forced partnership.

This time though… it was completely my choice.

I rested my arms on the railing of the boat, looking at the lights in the distance, getting further away the longer we sailed.

Had I really left the guard for good? It sounded almost crazy to me. Those were my friends, people that I loved, and I was abandoning them to join their sworn enemy.

They were planning to sacrifice me though… the thought should’ve put things into perspective, truth was that part of me understood them, desperate times called for desperate measures.

But I wanted to live and, more importantly, I wanted my friends to live.

Friends… the word didn’t sound right in my mind.

Valkyon was a friend, no doubt about that, but I had to admit we’d always walked a thin line between friendship and something more. When we’d been possessed by the spirits of Yeu and Tihn and kissed, I’d seriously wondered about my feelings for him.

But then… there was Leiftan. He was the person I went to when I needed to talk, he was always there for me, so sweet and understanding, I fell head over heels for him. As much as he’d lied and hurt me there was no way I would let anyone kill him.

Time heels all wounds they say, and maybe it was true, but I wasn’t sure I would ever be able to feel again a love so pure and unconditional.

And then there was him.

I turned around to look at the third element of my equation.

Lance was at the wheel, guiding the boat with mastery. I looked at the rigid posture of his body in the dark armour, his severe gaze pointed towards the horizon while he took us away from HQ as quickly as possible. He hadn’t said a word to me since our escape, and in that moment I would’ve done anything to get into that head of his.

But the fact was… I’d been there. I’d seen his thoughts and as messy and complicated as they were one thing was clear: he felt something for me. What? I had no idea, but it was deep.

Also, it didn’t escape me the fact that the spell that was supposed to let me access the mind of whoever I desired the most had showed me his.

Yeah, friendship indeed.

Whatever we had was raw, messy, deep and… inevitable. I was done fighting this, I was done pretending.

So I stayed there, leaning against the railing, looking at him while he took us away. He didn’t look in my direction one single time, as if he were trying to avoid my gaze.

I would’ve been embarrassed if roles were reversed and he’d been the one accessing my memories and most intimate thoughts, but Lance didn’t do embarrassment. He wasn’t that kind of man. There was something else.

Sooner than I thought we stopped and I realised we were still in El… we’d simply circumnavigated the peninsula where HQ was built.

“Jump” he suddenly said, the first words he’d spoken to me in hours were an order… typical.

“What do you mean ‘jump’?” I asked crossing my arms, I wasn’t going to move one inch. “Aren’t we a little to close to the guard, here?”

“It means,” he replied tiredly, as if grasping for patience, “that the boat is damaged and we can’t go any further than this, we’re going to spend the night in the cave.”

“The cave?” I asked confused. “You mean the Immersed Cave? The one that is, you know, immersed?”

“Hence why I said jump, we need to swim to get there.”

“If you think that I’m going to…”

The words died in my mouth as soon as, with an annoyed grunt, he grabbed me by the waist and dropped me off the boat in the freezing night water.

The asshole!

I kicked my feet to raise to surface and find him already swimming towards the cave.

“Move your pretty ass, little aengel, we don’t have the whole night” he said from above his shoulder.

Cursing him in my mind, I followed him to the dark entrance in front of us.

I had been right, the cave was indeed submerged, but only partially. After a ten-minute swim we reached the shore or what was its dark, rocky version under the cave.

“It’s too dark,” I said once we reached the ground and I managed to feel my way to a mostly dry area.

“Well, why don’t you take care of it, instead of whining?” he replied, charming as ever. “You’re an aengel, light is kinda your thing.”

He was… actually right. Damn, I hated it. I concentrated on that spark I’d been feeling inside me since the moment my powers had awaken and pushed it to surface. Two seconds later I was covered in a pure, white light.

“Nice, he commented unimpressed from some point in front of me, “but I don’t think you want to spend the night as a human torch.”

“I don’t know what to do, it’s not like I had someone teaching me these past few weeks.” Well, I had one in theory, the only other aengel who could help me navigate my new powers, but he’d been locked in the prison and I’d been too angry to ask him for anything.

“You need to project the power towards the outside,” he replied, strangely patient. “I know your instincts tell you to keep it close, that it’s part of you, but exactly because it’s in you, you won’t lose it. Try it, picture it in your head and do it.”

I did it as he suggested, I closed my eyes and imagined a ball of light hovering us, strong and warm.

After a minute I opened them again and saw a decent sized ball of low intensity hovering our heads, a little too high than what I’d planned, still… it was a start.

The dim light was enough to give an idea of the area. I could tell the cave was huge, most of it was immersed but there were little areas, here and there, like the one we were on that were over the level of water.

I was sitting against one side of the rocky wall, Lance was sitting against the opposite one, but the place was so small that if I stretched out my legs I could easily touch his.

Without a word he started removing his armour.

“W-what are you doing?” I asked suddenly nervous.

He looked at me raising an eyebrow.

“I’m not going to spend the whole night wearing drenched clothes, and since you’re not able to produce anything warmer that that pitiful ball over there, I guess we need to undress.”

“W-wait… let me try again.”

I tried several times, I didn’t manage to produce anything warmer than a couple of matches. I was tired, after our escape from HQ we hadn’t stopped one moment, also I’d never learned any of that, what I did was purely by instinct. I needed a full night sleep, a good meal and a teacher.

With a sardonic smirk he resumed undressing and, trying with all my strength to keep my cool, I started doing the same.

“I bet this is the moment where you wished you’d escaped with the fire dragon, not the ice one.”

I looked at him unimpressed.

“There are many aspects that make me prefer the fire dragon.”

That shut him up. But what was I doing? I’d decided I wasn’t going to antagonise him anymore. That I was going to stay true to my feelings.

“But, right now, I’m exactly with whom I want to be.”

He looked at me seemingly annoyed, but I could tell he was surprised, I was starting to learn all his fake expression and telltale signs.

“And why would that be? You spend five minutes in my head and think you understand me now? Girl, you’re so out of your depths.”

“Am I?” We were both done to our underwear, without removing my gaze from his I lowered my bra straps, all his attention focusing on my movements.

“You’ve spent so much time alone in this angry Ashkore persona of yours that you don’t even have the guts to admit what you really feel and what you really want.”

I removed everything that was still on and stood there completely naked in front of him.

I thought he would come out with another snarky remark, another excuse of some kind but, taking one step, he grabbed me by the hips and with one swift movement I found myself with my back on the ground and him on top of me.

“You know…” he said with a heated look, “I’m done playing nice.”

“W-what? That was you… being nice?”

“Extremely nice, yes.”

“All the times you’ve manhandled me and snapped at me… you were being nice?” I asked sceptical.

“Foreplay,” he replied with his trademark smirk, while his hands moved to my waist and started raising up and up towards my chest.

“Even when you tried to kill me, more than once I might add?”

“You’re still alive, aren’t you?” he paused and, looking into my eyes, the most earnest and sincere I’d ever seen him, “You said it yourself… I can’t. I just can’t.”

My breath caught in my throat at his shaky words.

“Believe me, I tried,” he continued. “You know, you saw it. Killing you would’ve been the best way to ensure the success of all my plans, but it’s been a while since I realised that the end of the world is not worth the end of you.”

I raised my hand to cup his face, for the first time I’d known him, the ice in his eyes seemed to melt a little as he looked into mine. “If you can’t beat them, join them?” I said smiling, “I’m here with you, and I’m not going anywhere.”

He almost seemed relieved, but something else was there, something he was not telling me. But Lance was a complicated man, I couldn’t expect him to completely open up to me in one night after he had locked himself away for so many years. I raised my head and put my lips on his.

I kissed him slowly, tentatively, and when I was confident he wasn’t going reject me, I tangled my fingers into his hair and pushed him towards me, his weight pressing me into the rocky pavement of the cave.

He must have felt my discomfort because, with one movement, he grabbed me by the waist and changed our position, so that now I was sitting on top of him, straddling him.

This was so completely out of character for him, putting himself in a position of vulnerability, giving me power to do whatever I wanted to him.

I rested my hands on his abs and drew the lines of his muscles with my fingertips, in the dim light I’d created I could barely see his marks and scars, but I touched them all, with my hands, then with my lips and finally with my tongue.

I could feel him getting harder against my belly, and I was so ready for him. Without another moment of hesitation, I reached in his boxer briefs and took him in my hand.

He was huge and perfect, I couldn’t wait to feel him inside me. I looked into his blue, deep eyes and, where I usually could find only cold anger, now I saw heat, desire and something else. He stared into mine, and I was sure he could see the same. I’d never wanted anything as much as I wanted him in that moment. Without breaking our gazes apart, I lowered myself onto him.

Gosh… I was so full. As wet as I was, I had to take a second to adjust to his size inside me. Then, he rested his hands on my hips, and helped me guiding my movements.

That night, many things happened in that cave.

Our movements, in perfect synchrony, bringing us to the peak of pleasure.

His lips on my neck, my shoulders, my chest… sending shivers down my spine and goosebumps on my skin.

My hands in his hair, on his arms, grabbing for dear life as our movements got more and more frantic.

It was sex, it was passion, it was desperate and raw, but it was also deep and meaningful, and while none of us wanted to label it out of fear and leftover arrogance, I knew exactly what it was.

It was love.

 ————

Hours later, we were hiding in the middle of El’s forest, waiting for the right moment to sneak inside HQ undisturbed.

That morning, at dawn, once we were both resting trying to catch our breath, he told me that if we wanted to stop the Guard for good, we had to get to the Crystal and perform a ritual, one that would froze it in its current state and prevent any new sacrifice.

We had argued a little about what consequences this would’ve had on Eldarya, I didn’t want to sacrifice anyone but also wasn’t on board with his plan of destroying the world. Once he’d assured me that the ritual would nether worsen nor improve the land’s current situation (that was getting pretty bad by the minute anyway), I accepted.

His men were going to attack HQ from one side, granting us the perfect diversion to sneak into the Crystal room.

Indeed it went easier than expected. Among the commotion, no one noticed us. I knew he had plenty of experience getting in and out of HQ as he wished, so it wasn’t really a surprise.

He’d even been able to remove Miiko’s seals and put stronger ones once we were in.

The Crystal looked even worse now than when I’d seen him last only a few days ago. I felt slightly guilty for what we were about to do, but I knew that we currently had no other options.

I helped Lance set everything up, I didn’t know how this ritual worked and we hadn’t had time to properly discuss this morning.

“Take this,” he said passing me what looked like a water bottle with a small pouch.

“What do I have to do with this?”

“You’re going to need it later, you’ll see,” he replied almost cryptically. He looked very busy though, so I didn’t ask for extra information.

At some point I saw something I wasn’t expecting.

“Ugh… is that… a piece of bone?” I asked a little disgusted.

He didn’t reply and just took out other objects.

“Wait… I know what these are…”

Dragon Tears, Dragon Scales, Dragon Heart… I’d studied so much about the subject that I sure confident I was right.

“You… this is not a ritual… you’re opening a portal!”

Laying one last object on the improvised altar he had created, he burned a parchment that probably contained words I would never find out, and a big ominous-looking black hole opened at my back.

“I’m sorry little aengel, this was the first and last time I lied to you,” he said with his smirk that didn’t look at all like his usual one, he tried, but he looked sad and almost dejected.

“Lance! What are you doing?” I asked frantic, grabbing his arm.

“This world is doomed, there’s nothing you can do to save it, unless you want to sacrifice yourself in the process, and I won’t allow it. Go back to your world, your life is there, with the humans.”

He paused, then cupped my face and added, almost pleadingly.

“Live. Please.”

I wanted to protest, wanted to make him understand that it wasn’t his choice to make, that I wasn’t going to save myself and leave them all in trouble. I could see he had enough ingredients for one trip, he wasn’t going to come with me, and I knew he would never leave his brother to die here alone.

But before I could say anything, he kissed me. He kissed me with all he’d got, like he hadn’t done the previous night when we’d spent hours in each other’s arms, when he was still trying to put some distance between us, and now I knew the reason why. He’d been planning this for a while, all those times he’d sneaked into HQ stealing stuff, he was preparing for this.

Save me and damn the world at the same time.

We kissed with fervour and passion, there was everything in that kiss, anger, desire, hurt, longing and devotion.

When he finally broke his lips away from mine, I heard him whisper.

“I love you, Erika.”

Grabbing me by the arms, he pushed me into the portal.

The last thing I saw of Eldarya were his eyes, his beautiful, striking, icy eyes.

“Lance!” I cried out.

Then darkness, darkness and nothing else.

And I kept falling.

 ———

Epilogue

“This is your only option,” I said after what felt hours of pointless discussion, but it couldn’t have been that long, there wasn’t enough time, the world was about to end.

Miiko looked at me with hatred in her eyes, the whole guard did, they wanted to kill me, maybe, probably, but they knew deep down I was right and there was nothing else that could be done.

“If we do this,” she said, “it’d be like a second Blue Sacrifice.”

“Similar, but not the same,” I replied annoyed by their stupidity. “No genocide this time, no senseless selective suicide, the price this time will be paid by everyone.”

I looked into their eyes, “this is going to take away from you everything you took away from her.”

 .

“Erika… Erika!” I felt someone call my name and woke up to find Candy shaking my shoulder.

“Geez… you slept the whole hour, luckily Miss Paltry didn’t see you, otherwise you’d have been in trouble.”

Ah, right… the personal development class.

It always took me a few moments to remember where I was when I had one of these dreams, which looked more real than reality itself, because I was back in Eldarya, looking at the world with his eyes, experiencing his thoughts.

But, alas, those were only dreams, Eldarya had been destroyed and everyone was dead.

When I woke up, a few months ago, in the forest on Earth close to the mushroom circle where this story had begun, I was desperate. I’d tried so hard to go back to my world and, now that I was there, I wanted to go back to Eldarya.

I couldn’t accept the fact that I was the only one who’d survived.

I couldn’t accept my friends were all dead.

I couldn’t accept he was dead.

A part of me hated him for what he’d done, for taking the choice away from me.

Another loved him even more.

This was definitely the case when I realised that the water bottle he’d given me contained Lethe water, and a formula that reversed engineered the memory potion that had took everything away from me.

I was back into my world, back to my family, back to my life.

But I wasn’t the same person who’d stepped foot in that mushroom circle.

I tried to move on with my life, I really did. I went back to school for my last year of college, made new friends, went out, but everything felt off, as if I was living half a life.

And that spark… it was still there. I still felt it in me, but didn’t have the guts to call it to surface, as if it’d be too painful to access that part of me that I was supposed to forget.

But how could I? I kept having those strange dreams and, as absurd as it sounded, I kept seeing people from Eldarya everywhere I went.

Once I was sure I’d seen Kero in the library, there was a boy who looked exactly like him minus the horn. I even ran to him and hugged him, the poor guy was so distressed he fled the library.

Another time I thought Karuto was serving me at the cafeteria, he was wearing a protective mask though so I wasn’t completely positive. When I asked the man his name, he just mumbled something annoyed and left.

And these were only two examples, one time I thought I saw Miiko in the crowd of a concert, and another time, at the gym, there was a guy who looked incredibly like a human version of Jamon.

I was becoming completely crazy. I even thought about going to therapy, but what could I say? I’m back from a magic parallel world and I can’t readjust to life on Earth?

Yeah, sure.

Candy and I left the class idly chatting about thesis ad plans for the weekend. She was nice, I’d met her at the first personal development class I’d attended, but we didn’t have any other classes together, she was in the History of Art program. Still, we’d become good friends in the past few months.

“Ugh…” she said pointing towards a wall. “You know I love art, but this is too much.”

There was a huge mural freshly painted in the corridor. It wasn’t the first time this month, apparently there was someone sneaking into Anteros at night, painting these things on the wall, I could tell they were trying to denounce something, but the message wasn’t quite clear to me, strangely familiar but unclear. Still, the university had tried anything to capture this guy, but they’d never made any progress.

Candy left to meet her friends Rosa and Alexy, she asked me if I wanted to join but I wasn’t in the mood this time, I went to the library and spent a few hours trying to study.

I must have fallen asleep again on my books, because when I woke up, it was the middle of the night and the library was deserted.

I grabbed my stuff and quickly made my way towards the dorms. Before I could get into the building though, a strange noise caught my attention.

I turned the corner to find an unexpected sight. A guy, a tall guy dressed in black with a bandanna on his face and a hood covering his head, was painting a huge mural at the back of the dorms building.

It was… familiar. The painting was abstract, but its colours… I could see they were blue and white… and it reminded me so much about Eldarya and the Crystal… I had to look at it closer.

When I stepped towards it, the guy turned around and grabbed me by the arm, pushing me to the wall.

“Who the hell are you, and what do you want?” his hostile voice said.

But that voice… sounded too familiar. I looked up into his eyes, the only thing visible of his face and I almost felt like crying. Icy blue eyes… looking at me with a cold, aggressive stare I knew only too well.

“Lance…” I whispered.

Those eyes rounded in shock. “How do you know my n…”

And then I understood.

Those dreams hadn’t been dreams at all, they were his memories, somehow I was still connected to him.

He’d found a way to save everyone, Eldarya was gone but everyone was here on Earth, and the sacrifice for that were their… memories, their memories of each other and their life.

This is going to take away from you everything you took away from her.

Before I could say anything else, we heard a guard coming our way and Lance ran, disappearing from my sight.

I ran too, towards the dorms, my mind and heart in turmoil, but it felt like I was finally breathing again.

Maybe this was what the Oracle had meant, saving Eldarya had nothing to do with the place but everything to do with its people, I was the only one with her memories intact, maybe my purpose was to awake them all and help them find themselves again. Help the faeries live in the world they’d originally escaped.

Prove that faeries and humans could coexist.

It wasn’t going to be easy, but I could do it. I could save them all.

I could save him.

I smiled, finally relieved, he was here, with me, in my world.

And I was going to get him back.

THE END.

——–

Thanks to the anons who inspired this story with their prompts, you’re amazing! ;)