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nokwisi · 2 years

Note

hi hi !!! idk idk this has been done before, but imagine the day Vik augments his leg with the hex core and does his sprint, he comes back home to the reader with a rush of adrenaline and has really rough sex with her since he’s finally able without his weak leg…. ;) love ur work! <3

whatever it takes—viktor x fem!reader note; hi hello! thanks for sending in such a lovely prompt! As per my norm, I got carried away. it's rough, it's emotional, it's maybe a little self indulgent...but I hope you like it nonetheless, anon! warnings/tags; nsfw, 18+, cunnilingus, biting, hair pulling, little bit of choking, rough sex, smut and angst, porn with feelings wc; 5.3k

Check out this amazing VA accompaniment by the lovely, talented, @kikorenart! Buy the full version, treat yo self.

Running.

He's running.

I am running—

—and although the throbbing ache that had ailed his leg his entire life has finally, finally been abated, there lingers a phantom pain in every single nerve of his remaining flesh-and-bone body; as though the evolution of a piece of him has in turn magnified the faults he carries elsewhere.

His back is throbbing, the metal embedded into his spine grinding against the bone as though whittling it away; he has never put so much strain on it before, he dismisses it. His head is pounding, exhaustion and dehydration hitting him in stacked waves; he knows he hasn't been taking care of himself—why care for a sanctum that has fallen to ruin?

But, there is something that transcends the physical, manifesting behind the cage of his sternum like an amorphous mass of everything he's ever regretted; everything he's held back, bottled up, kept buried. It swells within him, pushes him to push himself, like he could simply outrun the weight of it now that he has that option, but he can't.

It's infuriating, because he cannot diagnose the root of this problem. He cannot apply medicine, or science, or even his meager knowledge of the Arcane—and it rises up his throat, unbidden and out of his control, exorcised from his being with a shout; a long, agonized cry that is a coalesced purge of triumph, despair, and every single possible micro-emotion between.

It slices through the rain, shatters the preternatural silence of the docks, and Viktor finds there in the heady taste of catharsis on his tongue: dreams, goals, and desires. Things he has simply never been capable of accomplishing, now shining under the pulsating, purple light of possibility.

He thinks of you.

His heart thrums quick, like a chord struck and reverberating through him with the tonality of anticipation. He's riding a tidal-wave of a high, pushing him out of the realm of logic and into the depths of something baser—wants that have always come second to his work.

Friend, companion, lover, bystander to tragedy, future mourner; has he been selfish, in taking you, in keeping you? Viktor knows the answer to that already—knows that you deserve more than what he offers, that he has pushed you into the shadows to watch from afar as he tries, and fails, and tries again to save himself.

He was preoccupied with chasing down the end of his rope, grasping blindly to stop it from going abruptly taut, but now...now, he can root himself in the soil, keep himself grounded on this plane...and now, he can run to you.

Viktor is almost tempted to leave his crutch on the docks, abandoned and shunned as a part of him cast aside, much like the blood and sinew and bone of his leg, but he takes it nonetheless. If there is a sense of disdain in doing so, he pushes it down—a method he's also beginning to abhor, but he is not entirely without reason.

Should the infamously crippled half of the Hextech partners be seen suddenly galivanting around as though magically cured of his ailment, he may never have the opportunity to fix the rest of his crumbling body. In that, he may never be able to grasp all those buried, now bursting through the seams, dreams and goals and wants—never be able to show you just how desperately he wishes to give you everything he never could.

No, they wouldn't understand.

Viktor believes—knows, that you will.

It's well past midnight, and the worry that had started prickling under your skin earlier—when you'd gone to find him in his lab, and he was not there; and you'd asked Jayce, and he said he didn't know—is reaching a crescendo in your chest.

You're sitting in your shared apartment, center of the sofa in your living room that, admittedly, appears more like a workshop than a place of living. You both prefer it that way. Warm tones, ornate wood often graced with well-used parchment; bookshelves teeming with journals and the gold-embossed spines of thick academic books from years ago. Diagrams and schematics are tacked onto the wall, flickering with yellow light at the lanterns you'd strung from the ceiling six months prior in an effort to 'liven the place up'.

It feels distinctly desolate without him, however.

Normally, his prolonged absence wouldn't be a problem. Viktor is well known for stretching hours until they roll into days, and you never fault him for it—his drive and passion are integral to him, and the very reason you fell in love with him, in the first place.

This is not a normal time; the diagnosis he received days prior made sure of that, tainting everything with a looming shadow of dread.

Having bitten your nails down to the quick, you're nearly vibrating with the urge to jump from inertia and go seek him out. The only thing keeping you here, waiting and restless, is the very viable concept that he simply wants to be alone.

You would never consider Viktor to be a selfish man, but disappearing without a trace, leaving you to turn over worry and anxiety until it nearly aches—you can't help but be frustrated.

You sigh deeply, tugging your lower lip between your teeth to chew it with contemplation and uncertainty. His well-being, fragile and tenuous as it is, is far more important than his ego, you decide.

With that, you push yourself off the sofa, and into action.

Serendipitously, the door to your apartment swings open just as you venture into the bedroom, seeking out a jacket to shield you from the gentle down-pour that pelts against the gilded windows. You startle and pivot, and your heart feels as though it's been released from a vise-grasp of dismay, fluttering in relief at the sight of him.

"Viktor." You sigh, and then a knot forms between your brows, "you had me worried sick. You can't just disappear right now, not when you're—"

"I want to show you something." He cuts you off, and it's with an urgency and eagerness that immediately stuns you into silence. "I want to show you a great many things, and I hope you'll forgive me for the worry I've caused—for everything...but this...this is insurmountable."

Your prior worry melts away, and in it's stead, a tense curiosity.

"You've reached a breakthrough, haven't you?" Baited and waiting, you can discern the glimmer of thrilled excitement in Viktor's amber eyes, far away as he is. "Viktor, did you...did you find the answer?"

"I've found...an avenue. It is a dangerous one to venture, but my choices are limited." He steps into the apartment, the door closing behind him, and he swallows thickly and squares his gaze firmly with yours. "Whatever it takes. Do you remember?"

Of course you remember.

You'd whispered those words against his mouth naught days ago, bodies intertwined and trembling, grasping onto one another as though he may simply vanish in the span of an instant. It was after he'd received his diagnosis, both of you functioning with a desire that far surpassed anything physical. You told him you couldn't lose him. You begged him to save himself...whatever it takes.

There's a palpable tension in the air now, brought in with Viktor's presence, solidified with the recollection of those words—spoken with despair-charged passion and desperation then, but as this moment unravels, a sense of harrowing anticipation wraps itself around that invocation; around you.

"I remember." You whisper.

Suddenly, there is an urge to drag your attention over his body, scrutinize, seek out discrepancies; find the change. Something that would answer the question that rings in the back of your head, without having to voice it: what did you do?

Viktor appears no different than last you saw him. Frail, pallid, all hard angles stacked upon one another with a steadily shifting, off-kilter foundation—tragically beautiful.

"I've done nothing to afford such a request...but, I ask that you never forget what you said. No matter what the future has in store. Can you do that for me?" A tremor rattles his usual refined cadence; your heart quickens in the cage of your ribs.

Fraught—he sounds nearly fraught, and pleading, and you come to the conclusion, devastatingly quick because there is no other choice in your mind, that you never will.

You feel as though you're standing before an abyss, blind to what's before you, but for Viktor...you will gladly step into the unknown.

"I won't." You state with conviction. "I won't forget."

Viktor's gaze softens marginally, as though relieved, and just as quick, it hardens—like amber solidified to stone. Without another word, he lets his crutch fall free. The hard, metal clang as it hits the floor startles you, and before you can instinctively go to his side to aid him, he straightens out, and he goes to you.

Your breath catches, stunned and rendered inert as Viktor closes the distance between you two with a purposeful, undeterred, steady stride. His brows are knit, a sharp determination in his eyes, and coupled with the barely there curve of his lips, you cannot help but feel suddenly weak.

"Viktor—" is all you manage, the myriad of questions on your lips snuffed out as he presses his mouth against yours with a harshness that knocks your teeth together; cupping your face in a way that spans his touch to your neck, as though trying to hold as much of you as possible.

Your mind is reeling, questions rapid-firing and sizzling out just as quick with the way he kisses you; frenzied, packed with so much passion it makes your legs weak. Viktor holds nothing back, licking eagerly against the seam of your lips, delving in when you gasp at the way his hands venture up, combing through your hair to give a neat little tug, angling your head back.

"Let me have you." Viktor exhales hotly, coaxing your lashes to flutter, resurfacing from the daze his touch induces to connect with the molten gold of his eyes. "Please."

"Have I not answered that question already, Viktor?" Reaching up, you cradle his sharp jaw in your palms, stroke your thumbs from the corners of his mouth, outward. "You hardly have to ask, but I...I have questions, as well."

His lips curl into the faintest, wry smile. "Of course you do, and they will be answered...but, I still live on borrowed time, my love." He's searching your face, now; earnest, full of tenacity that simmers beneath the surface of his cool countenance. "I would be remiss not to take advantage of this, to not please you in ways that I have only imagined of doing."

"Advantage of what?" You push, curious, contrary to the lance of arousal that shoots through you via his words.

In response, Viktor closes the distance once more, kissing you hard, nipping at your lower lip to draw out a surprised, pleased whine from your throat. He's derailing you, and you hardly have the will to be frustrated about it. You can't remember the last time Viktor's been this emboldened, and you find yourself sinking into the embrace once more, your arms resting on the angled shelf of his shoulders; fingers dragging through the small hairs on the back of his head.

"I will show you." He supplies, close enough that his lips graze yours, and suddenly, he's pushing you back; herding you into the bedroom.

His kisses trail from the corner of your lips, to the cusp of your jaw and over, searing hot and open-mouthed down the column of your throat. Gasping quietly, you cling to him, follow his guidance, and internally question—theorize, hypothesize—just how he's managed to become the anchor, the stability, in a familiar dance where you always led.

This change, wherever it may root from, is enough to push you into a state of astounded compliancy, like nothing else matters except for him—letting him purge himself of this intense need with an eagerness that casts all your doubts and questions aside.

With the backs of your legs brushing against the bed, routine and familiarity has you shifting, tugging Viktor in a silent beckon for him to lay down, do as you've always done and slink your way atop him; take the lead. But Viktor remains rooted where he is, and instead, he lets his hands fall from where they are buried in your hair, to firmly push against your shoulders.

"No—not this time," he breathes, "on the bed, please." His tone is an intoxicating composition of steely demand, and searing desperation, and who are you to deny him?

So, you do as he bids; you let yourself drop down, sitting at the edge with anticipation, and the way Viktor lowers himself to kneel between your thighs—easy, fluid, not an iota of pain on his face—makes your heart leap with both joy and inquisition.

"I have always been plagued with the guilt of depriving you of what you deserve." Viktor states, his hands smoothing up your thighs, further still to your waist, where he deftly works the button of your pants through the eyelet, "there is not enough time left in the world for me to pay you what is due, miláček."

Swallowing thickly, Viktor's admission steeps into you, fills you with adoration, sentimentality, and the overwhelming urge to dissent.

Reaching for him, you brush the wayward hairs that've fallen in his eyes back, feel the skip of your heart when he leans into the touch. He gazes up at you beneath the lust-addled weight of his lashes, you say with sincerity: "You've always been enough for me, Viktor."

He huffs out a laugh through his nose, "a sentiment I truly cherish, but...I may have to disagree with you." He tugs on your pants, you raise your hips on instinct, a static warmth blooming on your skin as he catches your underwear as well; shucking them down your legs to leave you bare.

Viktor's attention drops down, a shuddering exhale leaving him at the salacious vision before him; the arousal that wets the inside of your thighs, which tremble just enough beneath his fingers as you part your knees that you're positive he can feel it.

Bashful and coquettish, you whisper, "I suppose we'll just have to agree, to disagree, then."

"I suppose, so." He whispers—it's distant, listless nearly, and it directly contradicts the sudden and zealous way Viktor glides his hands to the backs of your knees; long, spindly fingers digging into the sensitive skin as he hikes your legs high enough to rest on his shoulders. His breath billows onto your heat, "or perhaps, I'll change your mind."

A shiver weaves it's way down the track of your spine, bursting inside you like an electric jolt when Viktor closes the sparse distance, parting your slick with a broad, heavy swipe of his tongue. You curl your fingers in his hair, moan, and steady yourself with a shaking arm behind you.

Viktor hums against your cunt, caresses his hands from your knees, all the way up your flanks, before grasping your waist tight enough it aches; giving a firm tug that nearly has your ass hanging off the edge of the bed. You fall onto your back with a punched-out gasp, he doubles-down on the deadly precision of flicking his tongue against your clit, effectively thwarting whatever sense you have left.

It doesn't take long before you're riding the cusp of your orgasm—it never does, with him.

He moans against you, shedding any modicum of his signature decorum in favor of fucking you relentlessly with his mouth; lewd, wet, heavy breaths that roll over you in waves of heat. He sounds just as blissed out as you feel, follows eagerly when you pull his hair, willing him impossibly close—and you're so, so close—

"Viktor," you whine loudly, begging for something you're not entirely positive of; you just know that you need more, trust in that he will fill in the blank spaces of your lust-drunk plea, "please, oh—"

And he does, he knows precisely what you need—a perfect synchronization where you haven't the faintest means of knowing yourself. Viktor vocalizes a response that registers as nothing more than a bone-shuddering vibration; circling your clit in perfect little spirals with his tongue in tandem to two deft, long fingers pushing into the clutch of your heat.

The stretch is divine, the prominence of his knuckles felt acutely when he spreads his fingers, works you open, honing in against that hypersensitive bundle of nerves with an expertise that he's since mastered.

Viktor anticipates the responding buck of your hips, pushing down against you with the hand that brackets your waist—iron clad, unmoving, and you distantly picture the bruising he will leave; the intensity of him, imprinted on your skin like a brand—before he immediately picks up a steadfast, perfect piston of his fingers.

You're reduced to stuttering out his name, voice pitching higher and higher as though Viktor is tuning your body to his own preference—that being: coarse; piteous; debauched. Tightening around his fingers, blindly tugging his hair, you writhe and squirm against the tension threatening to snap within you, the pleasure reaching a fever-pitch.

"Come for me," he murmurs directly against you, sounding wicked and depraved.

Every muscle in your body spasms, going taut and rigid as you fall over the edge with a shattered cry; a frisson of euphoria throwing you into a stupor of utter bliss. You're helpless to the way your toes curl, legs drawing inward, back curving with an arch that pushes your head into the bed—contorted, thoughtless, neither here, nor there.

"You don't know how beautiful you are." Viktor muses breathily, his voice sounding far away, through the depths of ecstasy and the hum of your afterglow.

He eases his fingers out of you with an audible slickness that makes you shiver, immediately mourning the loss of him inside you, before he begins kissing against your hipbone, continuing upward from there. Pushing your blouse higher and higher, he presses his lips in a hot line up your heaving chest, and it's with a haste and need that fans the ember of desire inside you.

You move as though hypnotized, raising your arms, letting him strip you of your remaining clothes before he brings himself down and kisses you again. You taste the distinct bitterness of yourself when he licks a line along your tongue, firmly bracketing the underside of your jaw in the curve between his thumb, and forefinger.

It's a distinctly possessive hold; you find yourself thrilled by it—enough so to take his lower lip between your teeth in a borderline vicious bite, drawing back and tugging hard enough to earn a strangled, throaty groan in response.

You let go; he quickly chases you down, "yes—do not hold back, I want you to be rough."

"Only if you promise to return the favor." You rush out, aiming for cheeky, but landing somewhere in the realm of indigent.

"I intend to." He all but growls, kissing you again. It's harsh, all teeth and tongue with an underlying rumble of a moan in his chest.

You've almost forgotten Viktor's cryptic words from before, the mystery that lingers in the background of this embrace; the keystone that is fueling this entire moment. You're reminded when he brings himself closer, shifting you higher on the bed, kneeling so effortlessly between your still-trembling legs.

His right thigh is unyieldingly hard beneath yours; thrumming with a strange, pulsating type of warmth that you can physically feel.

Viktor, ever astute, breaks the kiss and presses his forehead against yours, panting against your mouth. "Whatever it takes." An aide-memoire, lilted in such a way that it nearly sounds solemn.

Your heart kicks into higher gear, compelled to impatience as anxiety and uncertainty fester behind your sternum. You cup Viktor's face for a brevity of acknowledgement, craning to kiss him quick before your hands start working haste on his tie, tugging it free; the buttons of his vest then; his dress shirt thereafter.

"Show me."

Viktor doesn't hesitate in shrugging off the layers of his clothes. You don't meander any longer on his chest say for a hastily reverent drag of your fingers over the front of his brace, down to the hem of his pants. It's a fumbling series of maneuvers; Viktor settling back, you leaning forward, tugging open the fastens—a shift, a trade in movement, and he's leaning over you, pushing his pants and briefs down, and he makes it no less challenging with the way he consistently chases down your lips with his own.

Stripped down, bare and exposed, you break from his kiss and glance down between the chasm of your bodies.

Your breath catches.

Viktor's attention quickly flits to your face; searching, anticipating, and perhaps disquieted.

The bedroom is shrouded in dark now, but the tracery of winking light embedded in Viktor's now-adamantine leg is enough to cast a violet glow across the room; highlighting and shadowing the dips and curves of your bodies. You reach out, and you touch him. Tentative at first, just the curious drag of your fingertips over the synthetic, wiry musculature. You feel the warmth he emanates, the eerie hum of something inhuman and yet, so very strangely alive.

"The Hexcore." Finally breaking the silence with an awed kind of wonder, you slant your gaze to Viktor. "You did it."

His brows arch, as though he is relieved, as though he ever doubted you to begin with; and he is quick to caress your face, an ardor of fondness and adoration softening his amber eyes before he bows himself over you, and kisses you firmly.

"For now...but I do not want to focus on such a grim topic." Viktor breathes against your mouth, "I have much more pressing matters to attend to."

Your legs are pushed higher beneath his thighs with the movement, the steel-hard plane of his augmented limb echoing heat into you, and coupled with the tantalizing way his cock presses against you, you're inclined to agree.

"I'd never stop you from achieving your goals." You whisper, equal parts playful and genuine as you wrap your arms around his neck, holding him close.

You have questions, but now...now you've got time. However fleeting it remains, it's more than what you had before. Enough time to indulge in this—to indulge in him.

Viktor huffs a laugh against you, "I know," and with a hand deftly disappearing between you two, he presses his cock flush against your throbbing heat. You hiccup a surprised moan that he eagerly swallows, kissing you breathless before pulling back just enough that your lips graze, "my goal is to pleasure you beyond anything I've ever been capable of. I want to hear every moan, every cry of my name that I have yet to earn."

You shudder, barely manage to lob out, and with a warbled tone that undermines whatever teasing you're going for: "quite the ambition, Viktor."

"Intention, my love." He parries easily, and proceeds to push against you, inexorable, stretching you out and filling you in one smooth, seamless thrust that chokes out whatever response you have.

Viktor barely stifles a groan, exhaling sharply as his hips press flush against you. You're trembling, clinging to him as you adjust to the size of him—always a feat, always a process—but it seems he doesn't intend to give you that reprieve.

But, he isn't entirely without clemency. "Should you reach the point of begging—I will stop." And it's with such a distinctly Viktor brand of self-satisfaction, that you can't find it in you to be anything other than aroused.

It's become such a rarity, this brazen confidence he's exhibiting, and you want nothing more than to kindle it; to give him this, take what he's so eagerly offering; feel what he's promised. You push your fingers up and through his hair, grabbing a fistful of wild, chestnut waves in either hand, and you pull him down with a force that makes him grunt in his throat.

"Perhaps you should let actions speak louder than words." You say, locking your gaze with his; and you watch as his eyes sharpen, seizing your explicit permission with a harsh kiss and a throaty moan.

Viktor wastes no more time. He brings himself low, braces his weight with an arm above your head, his other hand snaking around your throat in a grasp that is both gentle and grounding, pushing his tongue in your mouth as his hips roll smoothly against yours.

The friction is there, the heat and pressure of him inside you, the stretch and the drag and the depth of his thrusts making you moan and rock back, but you want so much more—you want to see him baser, driven to carnal want.

"Harder." You urge, feeding into his flame, "fuck me like you've always wanted to, Viktor."

Viktor groans, unabashedly effected by your words, tightening his grasp on your throat just enough to deliver a pleasant, hazy daze. "I want to fuck you until you cannot think straight." He admits in a rush, and you clench around him in response, bring a hand down to wrap around the taut, wiry muscle of his forearm—a silent consent.

"Want to—ah—to see you ruined by pleasure...I want to be the one to do that to you." His pace has picked up; hard, unrelenting thrusts that spear you deep enough it nearly aches, desperation lacing not just his tone, but his movements.

"F-Fuck, Viktor!" Digging your nails into his ivory skin, curling your legs around his waist, the metal and fastens of his brace chafe against your inner thighs, but you couldn't care less—you've never been able to do this; to put that weight on him with him above you, to drag him close and remain blissfully carefree on whether or not you're hurting him.

"Oh gods, yes—fuck...you feel so good." Moaning the words out best you can, you grind your hips against him with each forward stroke, will him deeper with the lure of your body; chasing down the intoxicating catch-drag of your clit against his pelvis.

Viktor visibly shudders at the praise, releasing his hold on your throat. You inhale raggedly, immediately reverting to whining; sweet, pleading little noises that spur him on.

"Louder." He hisses it in demand, finding purchase with his hands behind your knees, pushing your legs up to your chest. "I want to hear you."

The position has his cock slide impossibly deep, your breath snagging in your throat, hands scrambling to hold onto him by way of tugging his hair. Sound returns to you in the form of a reedy, trembling moan. The way he's fucking you is seismically different than anything you've ever done with him—raw, harsh, bruising. He hasn't faltered once, the steadfast, borderline brutal way he thrusts against you frying any coherence you might've had.

Nothing matters but him—the sounds he's making, the familiar and comforting scent of him, the way his body is pressed so tightly against yours that you feel every hard angle; every shift of bone; ripple of muscle, and the newfangled, bruising press of his steel leg colliding with the back of your thigh. He is all-encompassing, pounding pleasure into you that sings in your veins like magma, permeating you down to the marrow.

You're not going to last much longer.

Through stilted moans, Viktor leans in close enough to latch onto the soft palette beneath your ear; hot, heavy breath dampening your skin. A shiver racks your frame when he bites you sweetly, coalescing with your pleasure like a personalized dose of euphoria.

You wrap your arms around his head with a half-garbled cry of his name, and Viktor huffs out an amused breath, "have I truly been enough for you? Have I ever—mmph—f-fucked you to the point of speechlessness?"

How you can't even form a response is all the answer Viktor needs.

"I wanted to," he grits out, his grip on your legs fierce enough that you know you'll be bruised—you'll have a collection by the time he's done, and the concept makes you clench tighter around his cock, eliciting a sharp groan from him that vibrates against you, "always—every time I have been inside you, I have craved this."

As though charged with that declaration, he slows his pace, backs his movements with a force that rockets knife-sharp pleasure right up your spine, carving it into a radial bow off the bed, pushing your chest into his. The hard protrusions of his brace press into you. You don't care, you pull him closer, voice your pleasure with a keening moan every time his hips collide with your thighs.

"You...you are going to come again—hm?" He envelopes you in his arms, holds you with one hand buried in your hair, the other winding around the nape of your neck. You whine, delirious and broken and vaguely affirmative, and Viktor kisses your throat once more, "do it, so I can push you over the edge again, and again. Until I am satisfied with the mess I will make of you."

He's speaking rushed, quick and hot, and he punctuates his urgent statement by way of sinking his teeth into the sensitive apex between your neck, and shoulder.

Silk walls clench so tight around him that his hips stutter, that he groans against your skin and it ricochets a wild flourish of tingles throughout your entire body, that he has to grip you harder, hold you in place as you writhe and arch and shriek through the hard-press of your teeth.

Your orgasm hits you with cataclysmic force, and all you can do is hold on, ride it out, shiver and tremble in his arms as he chases down his own release. He bucks against you, his seamless movements pulling apart, short and choppy and desperate, Viktor groans and bites you harder.

You pull his hair hard enough to tune that throaty noise of his into a whine. Shivering with the heavy pulse of his cock, nestled deep inside you, you can feel the blooming warmth of him filling you to the brim, washing you over with a wave of pleasant goosebumps.

He relents from digging his teeth into your skin, gasping out foreign swears embellished with the reverent invocation of your name. Everything—his movements, his voice, his vise-grip, winds down in tandem, until it feels like time itself has reached a standstill.

With your lashes wetted with involuntary tears, leaden with post-orgasmic bliss, opening your eyes feels like resurfacing from the depths of rapture; catching your breath feels just the same.

Viktor rests his head against your collarbone, his body loosening, unraveling from the tense pressure he's put upon himself, allowing your legs to drop down on either side of his waist.

You can both feel and hear the rattle in his lungs as he chases down a steady inhale-exhale, spurring you to gently comb your fingers through his hair, soothing him; coaxing him silently to recuperate. As though he senses just that, finding the challenge as he's always had the proclivity to, he breathes in deep, and pushes himself up on trembling arms.

"Viktor." You croak, voice hoarse and lilted with concern. "You should rest." Cupping his face, you stroke beneath his eyes, which have sharpened once more with that zeal of determination.

He shakes his head—your heart swoops with both admiration and concern. It's so painfully obvious, so cuttingly worrying: he genuinely believes he has something to prove, burdened with the guilt of not being enough for you; driven to right what he believes is wrong. He's healed a fraction of himself, and in doing so, finds the mistakes he's left unchecked, and Viktor, always so headstrong, is convinced he can solve it with the fleeting strength he's been given.

But an augmented leg does not cure the sickness within him.

"No." He says, with a sense of finality. "I told you...time is precarious for me. If I cannot have this now—give this to you now—I may never have another opportunity."

Your brows knit, and you steady your hold on him; force him to look at you. There, in the depths of his gaze, glints something like despair. You pluck it easily from his obstinate front; you've spent enough time looking into those amber eyes to discern the cracks beneath the surface.

"You promised me, Viktor." You remind him, firmly. "We will find another chance...find more time." Gently pulling him closer, your tone slips into an imploring lilt. "Do you remember?"

Viktor's breath shudders, his expression softening with a telling gloss. He reaches up, overlays his hand over yours and leans into your palm. The smile on his lips is faint; sad, loving, grateful.

He echoes those words again. This time, they are weaved with a thread of forlorn optimism; saccharine and bitter; a multitude within five syllables.

"Whatever it takes."

#viktor x reader #viktor x you #WOOO this was a rollercoaster #hope you enjoyed the ride my loves #viktor #arcane #fanfiction #viktor x y/n #my writing #arcane fanfiction #viktor arcane

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deny-the-issue · 2 years

Text

The Villian Who Shagged Me

Arcane’s Silco as Dr. Evil rom Austin Powers

Synopsis: Silco returns from space to enact his revenge on the topsiders.

Warnings: partial nudity, cursing, comedic violence.

Word Count: 2.2k

Notes: This is my first one-shot and I just threw it together, enjoy!

Silco swiveled around in his oversized office chair to face the room with his mismatched gaze. Multiple pairs of eyes were on him, watching with fear as he slowly stroked the hairless cat in his lap. He had requested the room he once met with the Chembarons and was surprised to find the building completely renovated. It had a modern interior, missing the raw industrial style that Silco had coveted. Eager to try out a new feature of the room, he addressed the people.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to my underground lair. I have gathered here before me the world’s deadliest assassins and yet, each of you has failed to kill Vi. That makes me angry, and when Silco gets angry; Mr. Bigglesworth gets upset. And When Mr. Bigglesworth gets upset - people DIE.”

He pressed a series of buttons on the control pad in front of him. All but one of the chairs bent backward, dumping its occupants through a hole in the floor. A chorus of screams rang out before the slats snapped closed, filling the room with silence once again.

“Why must I be surrounded by frickin’ idiots?!”

Sevika eyed Silco suspiciously from the remaining undisturbed chair, not daring to challenge him. She cursed herself under her breath for installing the feature. It had seemed like a good idea at the time - but that was when she was in charge of everything.

“I trust you’ll take care of her; you never failed me before. Now, tell me how my business is doing.” He commanded lazily as the cat rolled over in his lap, undisturbed by the horror that just took place.

“We’ve moved away from Shimmer in favor of energy production. Moralicon has more warehouses and factories than any other power company.” Sevika reported with pride, “The topsiders are dependent on the undercity, now.”

“They’re vulnerable, hm?” Silco scratched the cat's chest pensively. “We could threaten to blow the bridge unless they relinquish the city to us.”

“Half of our power plants reside in Piltover, sir.”

“We’ll flood their streets with Shimmer, then.”

“Shimmer is already on their streets, sir. It’s a problem the undercity helps with. We provide rehabilitation centers for addicted topsiders.”

“I've been frozen for thirty years, throw me a frickin’ bone here!” Silco growled through chipped teeth. With an exasperated wave of his hand, he decided, “Oh hell, let's do what we always do - Hijack some explosives and hold Piltover hostage.”

Sevika’s mouth drooped lower and a soft sigh escaped her lips as she resigned herself to watching her empire crumble because of Silco’s freezer-burnt brain. Silco’s name still held weight in the undercity and a recent dip in her PR prevented her from dethroning her recently returned boss.

She couldn’t help but hope this was all a dream - that he had not, in fact, returned from space after thirty years. Who could survive such a thing? But here he was, in her seat, talking about Piltover’s destruction like there were still equality issues. He was a fucking cockroach. A lot more things ran through her mind at that moment, the foremost being: I’m too old for this.

Silco, however, was as spry as she remembered. Sevika may not even be a match for him, with her body physically twenty years older than him. The degradation in her shoulder caused by Shimmer over the years also handicapped her, preventing her from donning even the most basic prosthetics. Her stature was the only trait left to her now, and she was stronger than ever. Not that it would help her now.

“We can steal the explosives from a Noxian mining shipment that leaves tomorrow. They won’t notice anything’s missing until they're halfway home.”

“Riiiiight,” Silco exaggerated his agreement as he observed the telephone on the table with disdain.

“I’ll begin writing the ransom note while you take care of that.” Sevika chuckled at his words, drawing his ire. “What?”

“No one writes letters these days. We have telephones now, almost everyone has ‘em.”

“Telephones?”

“Yeah, just wait until you see a television. Moving pictures are all the rage right now.” She teased with a devilish smile, lighting a cigarillo.

Silco huffed at the concept. Moving pictures? What is she going to tell him next, undercity residents ruled Piltover? Ridiculous.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The meeting room was occupied by fresh, young faces, and Silco despised each and every one of them. Their unkempt hair and sparse, colorful clothing insulted his very being and he resisted the urge to dispose of them with a press of a button.

“What do you have for me, Sevika?” He asked impatiently as Mr. Bigglesworth jumped into his lap. Silco cooed at the cat, scooping it into his arms to hold. The room exchanged uneasy glances as they silently judged him.

“I have the perfect weapon to use against Vi.” She announced, opening the door to allow a scantily clad woman and a guard through. She had perfectly curled blond hair, alabaster skin, and ample breasts, with her nipples piercing the thin fabric of a pink chemise.

Silco’s brow furrowed in frustration, not seeing the point to this other than the obvious. Sevika turned to the guard and ordered him to kill her. The guard hesitated only a moment before drawing his pistol and aiming it at the woman.

She licked her lips seductively and smiled, causing him to falter some more. In a split second barrels erupted from her bra, protruding from her nipples, and fired. In a barrage of bullets, the guard fell to the floor and the barrels receded, leaving two holes in her nightwear. The woman winked at Silco and he could hardly contain his excitement as he grinned maliciously.

“No person attracted to women is able to resist the fembot’s charms.” Sevika gloated, speaking from personal experience.

“I like to see women of this caliber,” Silco mused to the silent room. Clearing his throat awkwardly he added, “Great work as always, Sevika.”

Sevika grunted and signaled the fembot to remove the deceased guard before taking a seat at the table. Silco eyed the flabbergasted expressions from the hippies at the table and sneered at them. Only one of the hipsters had the courage to speak their mind.

“This plan is so violent, man. Why can’t we all just get along? There’s no need for war.”

Silco wasted no time in slamming the button that correlated to the man’s chair, sending him careening backward and disappearing through the open chute with a scream.

“Does that address your concerns?” Silco inquired dangerously, resuming his steady petting of the cat in his arms. Panicked nodding satisfied him and he continued, “We have the explosives in place all around Piltover, all I have to do is ask for a hundred thousand gold pieces.”

The hippies shifted nervously in their seats, not wanting to correct him. Sevika knew better.

“Moralicon alone is worth five million,” She gently informed him. Silco’s lips thinned as his eyes narrowed at her in silent accusation and she rolled her eyes in response.

Why didn’t you bring this up sooner?

You didn’t ask.

“Fine, We’ll ask for a billion gold pieces.” He spoke with confidence but his eyes searched for reassurance. Sevika nodded in agreement and Silco’s face relaxed. “Everyone leave - except for Sevika.”

The others were all too happy to scramble out of the chairs, tripping over each other to leave the room. Sliding the foreign contraption her way, he commanded Sevika to call the head of the council. He picked up the handset, watching intently as she pressed a series of numbers. When she nodded he put his ear to the phone, hearing it ring.

“H-hello? Who is this?”

“You’ll know me soon enough. I’m calling to inform you of the presence of explosives carefully hidden around Piltover. They will be detonated unless you hand over a billion gold pieces.”

“And who do I send this money to?”

“Moralicon.”

“The power company? Don’t you already have enough money?”

“This is not up for debate. Get me the money or your city burns.”

Silco slammed the receiver down onto the tabletop, pleased with himself. Bringing Mr. Bigglesworth up to his face, he planted a big kiss on his head.

“Who’s a pretty boy? You are, yes you are.”

Sevika rushed over in two huge steps and hurriedly ended the call.

“Did they hear me?” He asked with his teal eye impossibly wide. She raised her brows to confirm and he groaned, “Fuck.”

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On the precipice of the completion of his plans, Sevika brought Vi to Silco in the meeting room. Hands bound, Vi fell into the chair as Sevika pushed her. When Vi’s defiant glare reached Silco, she began to laugh hysterically.

“You’re a cat person, now?”

“You’re in no position to be laughing. No one can stop me this time, not even you.”

Sevika sat down at the table with a huff, patience wearing dangerously thin. Why did he want Vi at the table with him?

“What’re gonna do, feed her?”

“No, Sevika, I’m going to place her in an easily escapable situation involving an overly elaborate exotic death.”

Wait - is he serious? Sevika’s face tensed as she searched for signs of humor and found none. He’s lost his shit.

“Guards!” He called and they approached Vi, dragging her out of the seat and through the large doors at the back of the room. She was forced onto a platform in the middle of a large pool where the bridge connecting it disappeared as the guard flipped a switch, stranding her there.

“Silco, do you really expect them to pay?”

“No Vi, I expect them to die. Even after they’ve paid me the money I’m still going to burn Piltover to the ground.” Silco sneered delightfully, standing from his seat to yell, “RELEASE THE SHARKS!”

“Vi, you’ll notice that all the sharks have laser beams attached to their heads - I figure every creature deserves a warm meal.” He placed his hands on the table, gracing Vi with an evil smirk. “Alright guard, begin the unnecessarily slow-moving dipping mechanism.”

The guard did as he was bid, shaking his head in disbelief all the while.

“CLOSE THE TANK!”

Sevika’s head snapped back to Silco, unable to hold in her outrage.

“Wait - a-aren’t you going to watch her? She could get away!”

“No, no, no. I’m going to leave her alone and not actually witness her death. I’m just going to assume it all went to plan. What?”

“I have a gun, you give me five seconds, BOOM, I’ll blow her brains out”

“Sevika, you just don’t get it do you? You don’t.”

“It’s no hassle!”

“SH-”

“But-”

“SH-”

“I’m-”

“SH-”

“She’s gonna get a-”

“SSSSHHHHH!”

Sevika ceased her arguing, the decision to leave firmly planted in her brain. She gave him a contemptuous look that caused him to start again.

“SH! That was a preemptive SH. Just know I have a whole bag of SH with your name on it.” He threatened as she contemplated shooting him. “Shall we move to the tower to oversee the destruction?”

He’ll have to do it alone, Sevika thought. She was planning on raiding the safe as soon as he left; Leaving the undercity with all the money she could carry wasn’t the retirement she planned on, but it would have to do. She earned a vacation from this shit show.

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Standing on the top of the tower in the Promenade, he surveyed his kingdom with new clarity. Significant portions of the undercity were visible: The pollution that once plagued the city was a mere afterthought with the technological advances of the last thirty years. He admired the fast pace of society and briefly entertained the idea that he no longer belonged in this world.

The idea quickly disintegrated as the fembot climbed the tower stairs, hands covered in blood. He had wanted Vi to escape that first room. In fact, he expected it. Placing the fembot in the room just beyond was the real trap.

“Is it done?”

“Yes,” She answered, coming to a stop by his side. “A large shipment of coins has arrived at headquarters.”

“That’ll be my ransom,” He crowed as he pulled the detonator from his pocket. “I’m not waiting a moment longer. Sevika’s going to regret missing this.”

Placing an arm over the fembot’s shoulders, he pulled her close as he flipped the switch. Several bright bursts of light illuminated the night sky as fire consumed entire neighborhoods of Piltover. The shockwave shattered the windows of every building in the undercity, hitting Silco and the fembot with heavy winds as he looked over it all with glittering eyes.

The black smoke that followed swirled around the flames, creating a mirror image of Silco’s corrupted eye. Without a thought for herself, The fembot offered a freshly clipped cigar, lighting it with a finger when he took it between his chipped front teeth.

Smoking the expensive tobacco, he relished the sight for a moment longer before leading the fembot down the stairs.

“Let’s go feed Mr. Bigglesworth.”

#silco my beloved #silco #fanfic #silco oneshot #oneshot #austin powers #Sharks and laser beams #my fanart

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mimik-u · 3 years

Text

Togetherness

Summary: The aftermath of Steven transforming into a huge reptilian monster brings back old memories for Pearl, who remembers another time Steven was scared so many years ago.

A/N: This piece was written for the Pearl-focused I am a Pearl! mini-zine a couple of months ago! It was a great opportunity to get to explore Pearl's mind space after the events of "I am My Monster" and how her friendship with Greg has evolved over the years. ;w; Thanks to the mods for a great zine experience! <3

AO3 Link / Zine Tumblr Link / @iamapearlzine

—

Steven is sixteen years old when he erupts into a scaly, pink monster—fifty-foot tall and inconsolable.

Everyone tells him that they love him, but because words are rarely ever enough, they show him that they do; they embrace him; they hold him; they press their fingertips into his reptilian skin. His scales are cold and sharp against Pearl’s palms, keratin hard and impenetrable. She tells him that he shouldn’t have to keep anything from her, all the while burning with shame that he’s kept so much from her.

He’s felt responsible for her fragility and loved her enough to tiptoe around the Diamond in the room.

His mother.

His mother and the complicated history between them.

The love.

The torture.

The grief.

The love.

(Because what is grief after all but a manifestation of love? A reminder, its echo, and its painful, lingering, lovely ghost.)

Connie kisses Steven, very lightly, very softly, and he falls from the sky, a boy again.

Pearl wraps him in a blanket.

Garnet carries him into the wreckage of their home.

And approximately one hour later, they’re all standing on the deck, waiting for Priyanka Maheswaran to finish her professional assessment of him as the sun sinks into a honey-colored sea.

Pearl cradles her face in her hands, elbows sinking into the railing, trying to retrace every missed sign in the blackness of her own head. She sees his skin glowing pink in the darkness—at the Reef, in Little Homeworld, just moments ago in the living room…

So many flares in the night.

And Pearl had watched them all fizzle.

—

Steven is six years old when he moves into the newly minted beach house, and he tells Greg that he’s afraid of the silence. Nearly all of his life, he’s been surrounded by noise—the gentle rumble of the van’s motor, the susurrant murmur of the sea, wind, rain, buskers playing guitars on the Boardwalk, the whoosh of the rollercoasters at Funland.

His dad’s snores echoing off the tin ceiling.

His dad’s laughter.

His softly-sung lullabies, too.

The beach house is really quiet at night, Steven tells Greg who tells the Gems, and he doesn’t like that…

He’s trying really hard to like it, though.

Maybe things’ll get better next week.

Pearl never looks at Greg as he delivers this news, tapping her fingers against the side of her leg as she sits at the kitchen table, ankles primly crossed. He stands in the doorway—right beneath Rose’s painted image—wringing his hands and looking too awkward to be allowed. She resents him for this—for his awkwardness, for his intrusion into their lives, and for everything else, too.

(Namely for Rose.)

She inwardly knows that she’s being unfair.

That loathing a person on the basis of his existence is morally suspect.

Wrong.

But what are rightness and wrongness to emotions? To the sheer primality of grief?

Grief is irrational, she rationalizes to herself—she self-justifies; it knows nothing of ethicality.

“Why didn’t Steman tell us this?” Amethyst asks, absently scratching her nose. “If it’s noise he wants, I got an old drum set he can knock himself out on.”

Pearl frowns, well-remembering the ten straight years Amethyst played the drums through the nineties. Rose loved it; Pearl spent many hours alone in her room to decompress.

“He’s still intimidated by you three,” Greg shrugs kindly. “And shy. You just have to give him reason enough to trust ya with stuff like this. Tucking him in at bed at night, y’know. Checking under the bed for monsters.”

“There aren’t monsters under his bed,” Garnet says, practical as ever. “They wouldn’t fit.”

Greg chuckles, running a flat hand across the back of his neck as he peers between the three gems. When he and Pearl lock eyes, she meets his stare coldly, her mouth pressed into a thin line.

“But Steven doesn’t know that,” he mumbles, glancing away, his cheeks flushing. “You gotta shine a flashlight down there and show him there’s nothing there.”

“Doesn’t that seem patronizing to you?” Pearl asks, taking little care to disguise the condescension in her voice. Across the room, Garnet’s visored stare finds her—blank, inscrutable, and arcane—but Pearl knows her fellow gem well enough to understand that this is chastisement, silent and brutal.

Arching a thin brow, she ignores Garnet.

She demands an answer from Greg.

“Maybe,” the man concedes, but when he acknowledges her gaze again, there’s a little defiance in his eyes, an edge in his scratchy voice. “But maybe not. That’s what being a parent is sometimes. Patronizing the kid! Playing along. Showing him that you’re listening to what he needs. Letting him know that you’re there… haven’t you ever been afraid before, Pearl?”

“No,” she protests immediately, bristling.

“Pssh,” Amethyst snorts. “Last week, you jumped ten feet in the air ‘cuz you saw a snake.”

“You did,” Garnet smiles wryly. “I was there.”

Pearl scoffs, trying and failing to ignore that her cheeks are suffused with blue blush…

… and that Greg is staring at her with an almost distinguishable emotion in his eyes.

If she didn’t know better, she would say it was pity.

—

Dr. Maheswaran tells them that Steven is okay; he’s tired and sore—transforming expended a lot of his energy—but he’s ready to see everyone now. She tells them to be quiet and to maybe go in one by one, so he doesn’t get too overwhelmed.

Firmly, she warns them that it’ll take more than a good night’s sleep for him to heal .

And she doesn’t mean physically.

“Here’s a number of a good therapist I know,” she says, placing a card in Pearl’s hand. “Her office opens at nine.”

Pearl folds her fingertips over the edges of the glossy card stock but doesn’t quite glance down to look at the name—too fixated on watching Greg stand in front of the doorway, palming the screen door as he seemingly steels himself to go in.

He’s aged so much in the twenty-something years that Pearl has known him—from his nearly bald head to the branching lines creasing the corners of his eyes—but for some reason, it is only now, in this ephemeral moment, that she realizes how old he is.

She doesn’t mean physically either.

As the others gather around Dr. Maheswaran, asking her questions, voicing their concerns, Pearl takes one deliberate step and then another.

—

Garnet tells Steven that it’s okay—there are no monsters under the bed—and when she shines a flashlight beneath the mattress, Amethyst is there, shapeshifted into a tiny kitten, purring at the child sweetly.

“See, dude?” She laughs, bounding out from beneath the bed. In an instant of blurred matter and color, she becomes herself again, her bangs sweeping inelegantly over her eye. “No monsters under the bed, only cute kittens.”

“Only kittens?” He repeats, grinning that famous gap-toothed smile that everyone adores. His legs are nearly swallowed by his oversized shirt.

“Kittens and dust bunnies,” Amethyst confirms, knuckling his curls playfully and smiling broadly when he laughs. “G’night, Steman.”

“Night, Amethyst!”

“Goodnight, Steven,” Garnet murmurs, lifting the six-year old into her arms and gently placing him onto the bed. She tucks him beneath the covers. She tenderly kisses him on the head.

“Nighty night, Garnet.”

And then it’s Pearl’s turn. Garnet and Amethyst head towards their temple rooms, and Pearl settles down on the edge of the comforter, balancing her left ankle on top of her right knee.

“Don’t forget about M.C. Bear Bear!” She teases softly, reaching over and placing the stuffed animal next to Steven’s arm. “He needs a snuggle buddy.”

Steven nods in agreement, his brow furrowed seriously over his eyes.

“Yep,” he says importantly. “I’ll be sure to hug him tight.”

“Excellent,” she says primly.

“Excellent,” he echoes playfully.

She lightly skims her knuckles across his soft cheek, smiling when he giggles a little, always ticklish…

… but then, when she withdraws her hand, letting it fall away from his face, the moment that immediately follows is quiet.

Too much so.

So quiet that Pearl can hear the softness of Steven’s breath, quiet enough that Greg’s words from earlier haunt her in the absence of noise.

Haven’t you ever been afraid before, Pearl?

Contrary to what Garnet and Amethyst may believe, she isn’t afraid of snakes —pestilent creatures though they are.

She’s surprised by snakes.

And afraid of much bigger things—five-thousand-year old secrets and equally ancient insecurities, for instance.

Six thousand years ago, after all, she was coded to believe that her highest order in life was to be a slave.

And sometimes—if only sometimes—she fears that her weaknesses were ingrained then, in the very moment she emerged from a shell and was called a pearl

One of so many.

Disposable.

Programmable.

Objectified.

Sometimes, she barely knows what it means to be herself, much less what it means to be a parent .

Indeed, Greg Universe of all people seems to have the idea down better than she ever could.

So, yes, Greg, she is afraid.

(Afraid of failing Steven.)

(Terrified that she’s already failed her. )

Patronize him, Greg suggested.

Play with him.

Show him that you’re listening.

Let him know that you’re there.

—

“Greg?”

Pearl places a light hand on Greg’s arm, startling him from his trance as he turns around to face her.

“Pearl!” He exhales, his breath coming in short bursts. “Y’scared me!”

“I’m sorry,” she says sincerely, not quite moving her hand away yet. His skin is warm beneath her fingertips, soft like wave-washed sand. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“Yes,” he returns immediately, and then—taking one look at her imperiously raised brow—just as quickly rectifies himself. “No. I don’t know. I’m freakin’ terrified, Pearl. I feel like a failure of a parent. I don’t know what to tell him. But I gotta go in there anyway.”

He says it all very rapidly, as though he’s talking to himself.

Encouraging himself.

And putting himself down to do it.

“I’m his dad,” he concludes, his voice breaking, tears standing in his dark eyes. “I’m his dad, and I didn’t… I wasn’t there for him, and I should have—“

“ Shh, ” Pearl cuts across him gently, patting his arm as tears threaten to slide down her own face. “Shh. There are so many hypothetical should haves that we’ll all have to face soon when it comes to Steven. But not today, Greg .”

With her free hand, she conjures a tissue from her gem and hands it to him, unflinching and kind, even when he needs to wipe his nose.

“Today,” she murmurs, her voice inhibited, a hundred emotions thick, “we just let him know that we’re here.”

—

“Pearl?” Steven asks.

Pearl blinks rapidly, coming back to herself; she’d been lost in her own thoughts, nearly consumed.

“Hey,” she smiles, placing her hand on top of Steven’s own. His skin is so warm and soft; she absently wonders if her alienness feels sharp to him… hard… cold… “Here’s an idea—how about I sing you a lullaby before you go to sleep?”

“You know how to sing?” Steven’s eyes widen incredulously, his mouth shaping itself into a delighted smile.

“Don’t look so surprised,” she laughs playfully. “When we were younger, your mother and I used to sing all the time—hymns from our home planet and the like…”

A pause, infinitesimal, hesitant.

“...I could sing one for you if you’d like?”

“You could?” The child dares to be hopeful; the very emotion shapes the pitch of his question, the light in his eyes.

He has his mother’s eyes.

Dark and full of stars.

“I could,” Pearl repeats. “I’d sing as long as you wanted me to.”

“How about fooooorever?”

“Let’s just start with until you fall asleep,” Pearl laughs. “That’s a part of forever, yes? This moment?”

“If you say so, Pearl,” he wrinkles his nose skeptically.

“I know so, Steven.”

As she sings him to sleep in her mother tongue, Pearl admits that this must be something that Greg knows, too.

The importance of hereness to a child.

Togetherness on scary nights.

#pearl #steven universe #greg universe #amethyst #garnet #s: future #mimiku #gosh i loved writing this

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omniscientwreck · 3 years

Note

Hi🖤 Omni! If you're looking for a fic request I've got one.

Okay so Essek is Feeblminded by remaining Volstrucker at his tower. Verin came to visit later that day and has been taling care of Essek, as they both would be scared of the Umavi's wrath should someone find out.

Well Caleb comes to visit a few day's later and Certainly gets a surprise.

Fluff ensues.

I'm talking the Unicorn from Despicable Me level Fluffy😁😁😁

Hi Umbra! Sorry I'm incredibly late answering this, life is weird but I hope the length makes up for it! I know I said drabble but like this just turned into a whole fic so I hope you enjoy!

Verin had worried when Essek’s door hadn’t opened of its own accord, usually he knows when he’s arrived. Deciding something was certainly wrong he barges his way into his brother’s tower. He finds it silent which is normal but unnerving and the unnatural stillness as he calls for Essek has his hackles up.

His knuckles pale as he grips the hilt of his sword and searches methodically throughout the tower. Finding the main floor empty he heads up the stairs to the library. There’s a shuffle, a falling book, a whimper. He draws his sword, adrenaline coursing through his veins. The door is ajar and he can hear shuffling. He thrusts it open is momentarily relieved to see his brother. His hair is tousled and white is stained with flecks of red, his robes are torn and his mantle is askew.

He’s never seen him like this before and his heart lurches. Surprise and fear are plastered across his features, far more freely than Verin’s ever seen him feel. He doesn’t talk and he seems to not even recognize him. Checking the rest of the room, the sword is returned to its sheath and Verin crouches, reaching a hand to Essek.

“Brother, what happened?” Silence, a whimper. “Essek? What’s wrong? It’s Verin, your brother.” His brows unknot, and the tension in his jaw slackens. There’s a looseness to his demeanor and as he stands he waves his hand as if to float, but nothing happens. He tries again and again. The first try was decisive, after watching him for so long Verin knows what it looks like when he casts it. The second time it’s not quite right, the third time it gets looser still. By the time Verin has stopped counting and Verin has grabbed Essek’s hands to calm him it seemed like Essek didn’t know what he was attempting to do.

“Is this some kind of spell? What happened?” His brother looks up with the face of a stranger. His eyes are open and sad, his ears fall just a touch and Essek leans in to hug Verin. He’s never wanted to do that before.

Verin hugs him back. “Oh Essie, what are we going to do?”

Caleb approaches Essek’s tower and is struck by immediate concern when the door doesn’t open for him. Essek always lets him in when he arrives, and with everything that’s happened he immediately panics. Caleb tries to tell himself Essek must be busy and has missed him tripping the wards. So, he lifts the knocker and gives the door a few raps.

He’d asked Caleb to meet him here to assist in the transport of his most important items after their trip to Aeor. He needs to run, he knows it and Caleb knows that turning himself in to the Dynasty would mean certain death so he’s agreed to help. No amount of good will from the Bright Queen would let them bargain for his favour. Selfishly, Caleb won’t allow him to get caught, so he will harbor Essek for some time, helping him stay out of the eyes of the Dynasty.

Eventually he knocks again, beginning to hold a firebolt just in case. “Uh, just a minute,” calls a stranger’s voice from behind the wood. “I’ll be right there.”

The door opens just a crack, “Who is it?”

“I am Caleb Widogast of the Mighty Nein, who is this?” His hand is up and encircled in flame.

“Oh thank the Light, one moment.” Whoever he is, he’s clearly relieved. Caleb’s firebolt stays held.

As the door opens Caleb is greeted by a tall drow, muscular with long braided back hair. He looks familiar but Caleb cannot place him. His features are slowly fading into relief from what must have been a deep concern. “Hello Caleb Widogast, I am Verin Thelyss and I am so glad you’re here. Your the wizard yes?”

Nodding, bewildered as he’s being dragged into Essek’s home by his brother, Caleb can hardly remember to respond, “Uh ja, that’s me. Where is Essek?”

“Well so I came by a few days ago and he didn’t let me into the tower which was weird. There have been some rumors going around and when our mother said he was back I had to ask. I don’t know if you know but… well it’s bad.”

He’s leading him upstairs as he explains and the back of Caleb’s neck is on fire. Verin doesn’t know, but there are rumors that are most likely true. Is he too late?

“So, I’m hoping since you also practice the arcane you might know what’s happened here and how to solve it.”

He leads Caleb into the library and Essek is seated on a chair idly flipping through a book far too quickly. It doesn’t even look like he’s reading, Caleb knows what he looks like when he’s reading. The quiet concentration and the tension it brings his jaw is completely missing. When Essek looks up at him there’s recognition but no words and when he rises to make his way to Caleb, he walks.

He’s wide-eyed and has a sweet smile across his face, it’s difficult to look away but if he doesn’t the heat rising in his cheeks will show. “Essek, what is it mein Freunde?”

No words. Why can’t he talk and why isn’t he floating?

“Essek?” A gentle hand reaches up to rest on his cheek and the heat takes over at the abrupt contact. Especially with Verin standing over his shoulder observing them. “Verin how long has he been like this?”

“About 2 days. I didn’t really know what had happened and if the Umavi found out well… I’m unsure what she would do.” Verin is a little more easier to map out than Essek had been initially and he’s been told enough stories about Dierta to understand the undercurrent of Verin’s words.

“Ja, I understand.” Verin starts at that and Caleb just continues past it, “I believe he has been affected by the spell Feeblemind. I - ah - have experience with this kind of thing. We have friends that can cure him but I will have to contact them, which I will not be able to do until tomorrow.”

Essek’s hand has wound its way into Caleb’s and he tries and fails miserably to contain the blush that he knows is spreading to his ears. Memories of little touches in Aeor flood back and Caleb pushes away thoughts of conversations he’d promised they’d have later, after Essek was safe. To call to attention this thing between them and get it out in the open before it drives him mad. Even if Essek’s feelings do not align with his it will be better to have it in the open.

“So this isn’t hurting him?”

Caleb turns to Essek, “Are you okay? Are you hurt?” He remembers a blur of time, when his mind had failed him. He remembers terror, looking down at his hands and not knowing whose they were. He didn’t have an anchor, nothing but his own thoughts, with someone there it might be different. Essek can’t understand him but the tone of voice seems to elicit some positive emotions and Essek squeezes his hand, a contented smile across his face, “He seems alright to me. It is unpleasant to be cut off from your casting, but he isn’t in pain and he isn’t alone.” It’s difficult to mitigate the emotion bleeding into his voice.

He pushes down memories of the years he’d been locked away and squeezes Essek’s hand back, reassuringly. “Have you gotten him to eat?”

Verin nods, “Occasionally. Probably not as much as he needs. I’m not exactly an excellent cook and nobody can see him like this so I’ve sent his staff away.”

“Alright, well I’ll just do this then.” he begins casting the tower, “I understand if you want to stay but if you need to go I can care for him.” he wants Verin to leave, he wants him gone so badly, to just take care of Essek properly without the shadow of somebody who doesn’t know hanging over them.

“I should be back to Bazzoxan soon. They’ll begin asking after me.” Caleb finishes casting the tower and leads Essek in. Just before he enters, Verin stops him, “You mean something to each other. I’ve never seen him act this way before, granted there’s an arcane influence but genuinely he has never smiled like he did when he saw you. I trust you with this because I think he would. Do not betray that.”

Caleb nods, “Of course not. We’ve faced the most difficult challenges of my life together and with our friends. I will care for him.” Verin seems satisfied with that and makes to leave, and Caleb enters the tower to find Essek waiting in the centre of the tower. He has an idea of where he wants to go. As the tower door closes behind Verin, he and Essek begin to drift upwards. Essek opens his mouth as if to reflexively murmur ‘up’ as had become their custom in their long travels together and his brows knot in distress, as if he’s realized again that his voice will not come. Caleb reaches for his hand, to comfort him and says it for them both, to which Essek smiles.

The drow releases Caleb’s hand and begins to swirl around, never leaving the central column and Caleb is forced to mirror his motions lest they collide. He flashes back to a moment of levity when they’d first come to Aeor. They had showboated then, dancing around each other as their works often did. This Essek is less restrained and his eyes and nose crinkle into a genuine smile when Caleb joins his frivolity.

They stop at the ninth floor which Caleb had known to be Esseks’ destination and immediately Essek lays on the pillows he always places in the corner. Usually, on their research expedition, he tranced in his room but on particularly emotional days they both preferred an expanse of stars above them as they rested. It became tradition and over time they’d drifted closer and closer together, until they would sometimes come to consciousness to find that through the night Essek had curled into Caleb’s side or that their hands had wound together unknowingly.

Now, Essek’s eyes are wide and his mouth hangs open in wonder as though it’s his first time seeing it all over again. Caleb stands over him, following his gaze up to the idly shifting starscape above. Caleb is quickly distracted by the versions of them that traverse different paths. Sometimes in each other’s company, other times in solitude. In a few they hold hands or make contact at the shoulders. Those are the ones he likes the most.

When his gaze is pulled back downwards, Essek stares up at him with a tenderness that quickly turns to expectation. He’s arranged burgundy cushions across the floor beside him for Caleb and so he obliges. As he stretches out across the crude bed slender, cool fingers interlock his own and he lays back and tells Essek of the constellations he’s hidden among the stars.

When Caleb himself was in this state he remembered lacking familiarity. Nothing around him made sense and the upheaval of his life only moments prior had only amplified the disorientation of the magic that kept him prisoner for 11 years.

Essek has someone to watch over him, he’s in a place that evidently brings him much joy and in recent months he’s found himself halfway to peace. Caleb finds his heart swell at the idea of making this experience bearable.

The silence was always the worst so he points to guide the elf’s eyes as he tells them the stories behind each constellation. He tells him of Nila, gentle and fierce. Of Twiggy, ever optimistic and wholly delightful. He tells him about Reani who Essek has spent some time with. Brief recognition flashes across his face, though it’s quickly replaced with frustration. Caleb remembers. He remembers knowing that someone was there who he should recognize but not having the words to know he had forgotten their name. He was in terror and treated everyone as a threat. Essek treats everything with wonder and discovery. The innocence is sweet and a syrupy feeling pools in Caleb’s throat as he’s again confronted with the way his heart swells when Essek looks at Caleb with that same contented smile.

He scoots closer and this is entirely too much. The idea that this version of Essek may curl into his side willingly, while they were fully conscious where the other version cannot unsettles him. Instead he stands, offering his hand, “Why don’t we get you something to eat ja?” There’s a momentary droop of his ears, much more pronounced than any movement he’d seen before before he lifts Essek and they go down to the dining room.

If there is to be anything significant between them it cannot be spurred under these circumstances. Caleb has to know he means it. As they wait while he cats prepare what had become their usual fare while traversing Aeor, he defaults to telling stories. First he tells him of the tunnels they traversed to reach the Dynasty, crafting an illusion as well as he can of the crystalline caves they made camp in. Food arrives and he continues weaving story and image as Essek picks at the well spiced soup comprised mainly of squash and potato. As he crafts an illusion of the dragon turtle they’d fought just after the peace talks out of amber and morphs its shape to a smaller turtle and then a sea slug, laughing to himself at the absurdity, he notices the clink of Essek’s spoon has long subsided.

Glancing over electric eyes focus on him instead of the illusion, so he drops it. “Ah, Es tut mir Leid, I know I tend to get carried away.” A little contented noise bubbles from Essek’s throat and his heart squeezes. In a desperate attempt to try and get Essek to eat more he turns back to his own soup and looks expectantly over to his friend.

Giving him a look of exasperation, he mirrors Caleb and eats most of the soup. Caleb rips up bread and encourages him to dip it in what’s left of the soup and finally, the bowl is empty. They leave the cats to clean up and Essek’s hand grasps Caleb’s again and squeezes. He knows he shouldn’t draw conclusions or let himself be taken by these gestures that the man wouldn’t make if he’d had the presence of mind, but it’s turning into a losing game.

With the time spent on the ninth floor and the prolonged battle of coaxing Essek to eat they only have a few hours until sleep. Essek takes his customary seat on the couch in the study and Caleb withdraws some of the lighter fiction that now populates the shelves. Lying back on the sofa, feet resting on the armrest, head by Essek he holds up the copy of Der Katzenprinz to show the illustrations. “You seem to like hearing me talk so why don’t I share this with you? Either way you won’t understand what I say so I will read it to you as it was originally intended.”

He begins, in Zemnian to tell him the fairy story that had brought him so much joy as a child, and the cats bring them hot chocolate as instructed. Warm mug in hand, Essek sits patiently through the story and as it turns to a close, picks up another of the books Caleb has gathered and thrusts it upon his chest. A real laugh bubbles up at that and he obliges.

As the night winds on and the mugs are emptied, Essek’s hand winds its way through Caleb’s hair, gently combing. When he looks up at Essek he’s met with soft, drooping eyes and a plain smile laced with nothing but care. He tries to stop Essek over the course of the book but finds that the drow always goes back to his hair so eventually, he leaves it. When Essek’s breaths even and elongate and he’s having trouble keeping his eyes open, Caleb sends him to trance.

He’s met with a slightly mournful look as Essek settles into the cushions he’s provided for trancing, but Caleb squeezes his shoulder, “If something goes wrong the cats will know to come get me. This is for the best.” Looking not at all reassured, but staying in place, Essek lets him leave without protest.

In the middle of sleep, dreamless and warm, there’s pressure. Then a caterwaul cuts through his subconscious followed by several more. He awakes with a start and immediately the cats gather around his feet as he pulls on slippers. They lead him to Essek’s room, where through the closed doors he can hear the sounds of furniture being disturbed.

Barging in, heart pounding, he finds Essek with tears streaming down his face. “Essek Schatz what’s wrong?” He kneels, abandoning any sense of propriety or boundaries and as he collapses into Caleb’s arms with nearly silent sobs he’s struck by how small the other man is.

“It’s alright Essek, whatever it was it cannot hurt you. I will keep you safe as you have done me.” They’ve never talked about the nights when the cats would do the same to Essek as they’d done to Caleb. When he’d been awoken from nightmares with angry red scratches down his forearms and a friend to bandage them. They’ve never quite discussed the comfort in Essek trancing just beside Caleb’s bed on difficult nights and he’s tried to stifle contemplation about the safety the man brings to his subconscious. The timing wasn’t right and despite his own longing he couldn’t make that step towards Essek. Not then.

Now, however, the elf shudders in his arms and he brings him into his lap, lighting soft amber globules of light to examine Essek. When he finds no physical harm he puts them out again and draws him in tighter as Essek clutches at the sides of his nightshirt and curls into his chest. He sings gentle lullabies his mother had once used to soothe him, voice cracking slightly as he flexes it in a long forgotten way. Eventually the shaking stops and breath becomes more solid, but hands stay grasped into his shirt so, with assistance from the cats, he maneuvers them into an easier sleeping position. Ever determined, Essek stays in his arms the whole time and when he tries to encourage him to trance beside him, arms wind around his waist.

“Okay, okay. If this will help.” Caleb resigns himself to creaky joints the next morning and sleeps with Essek in his arms, pushing away any indulgent thoughts of future nights spent with him in the same orientation.

When he awakes Essek is gone from his lap, though their fingers are laced and his head rests atop the drow’s on his shoulder. “Guten Morgen Essek.” He startles and smiles over at Caleb. Open, honest, vulnerable. They need to fix this. “I just need to prepare and then we will see Jester ja?” He receives a blank stare in return and nods to himself. “I will be back in a few moments and then we will go to Nicodranas. Just wait here.” He leaves and dresses quickly, returning to find Essek essentially where he’d been left. He takes a moment to glance over his spellbook and concentrates as he casts Sending, “Hallo Jester, I need your assistance with a pretty big restoration. Can you help today?”

She sounds half-asleep as she responds, “Caleb? Oh hi! Yeah I can help, just come to mama’s, we’re in Nicodranas. Oh my gosh I have to tell you, the dragon turtle-” her word economy same as ever.

“Okay Essek, Jester can help. I don’t know where you kept your parasol but I’m sure she can make you another.” With that they head out the door and Caleb transports them safely to the Lavish Chateau. Essek’s hand never leaves his.

Upon arrival they’re beset by a shouted greeting and Jester crushes Caleb in a hug before even realizing the other man is there. “Ohmigod Essek hi! I missed you!” Instead of awkwardly patting her back as he usually does, he wraps his arms around her waist and pulls her in. “Hey Caleb, what’s going on with Essek?”

She pulls back and sees his broad smile and dancing eyes and looks at Caleb distinctly concerned. “Ah- I’m afraid he is a victim of the Feeblemind spell. It’s what they used against me in… well.” Her face clouds with understanding. “He’s okay physically though, whoever attacked him clearly just needed him out of the way. If you can use Greater Restoration that will undo the effects. He’s been ah - rather clingy.”

She waggles her eyebrows at him, making suggestive noise, and gets out the required diamond dust, sprinkling it delicately over Essek who watches in wonder. She puts both hands on her shoulders and green radiant energy emanates from her and passes to him. Before long he’s shaking his head and stepping back, voice hoarse from disuse, “Where- Jester? Thank you oh my gods thank you.”

She grins back at him, “I’m glad you’re back Essek! It’s a good thing Caleb brought you here you were acting so weird-”

She’s cut off as he chokes out, “Caleb.” and looks over with a deep violet flush and wide, apologetic eyes. “I ah- I am sorry for putting you through that. I-”

“Nein, do not apologize. Maybe we should get back to your tower to try and piece together who did this to you and what they were after ja?’

Essek nods and casts his levitation cantrip, shoulders sagging with relief when it works. “Yes, of course. Thank you Jester, I’m sorry we can’t stay but-”

She hugs the both of them again, “It’s okay, you have lots to talk about probably I don’t know bye!” she gives Caleb a wink as he begins casting the spell again and to his surprise Essek’s hand winds itself in his as they vanish.

They’re back in the tower and Caleb looks down, Essek’s hand still in his. Essek drops it and there’s a flush set deep into his cheeks and it spreads to his cheeks as their eyes meet. “Caleb I-” he swallows “I remember most of what happened, though not very clearly. I um-” his eyes are downcast and Caleb braces for what he believes to be coming, “Thank you for your patience. I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable it is very difficult to explain but I think you’re aware of the feeling. I didn’t exactly have my full faculties and I fear I broke boundaries that may have encroached too far on your hospitality and our friendship.”

It’s difficult to see him so apologetic for the affection displayed. This thing between them has gone unspoken quite too long and before he realizes it he’s speaking, “Don’t apologize for that Schatz, I ah- I didn’t mind. There’s something I think we ought to discuss fairly plainly because I do not want to mince words about the way I feel anymore, it’s tiring.”

Essek looks up to meet him, steeling himself and as Caleb is about to speak he cuts him off, “I am aware enough of how I acted to realize I cannot properly hide my feelings further.” He takes a deep breath, the back of Caleb’s neck is burning and time has all but frozen, “I care deeply for you Caleb. It is difficult to bring myself to those words for I know this is the last thing I deserve but here I am, a fool for you. I know that there were moments in Aeor, I hold them close to my heart as precious things in a life of solitude. If you do not do the same, if you do not feel the same I will remain your friend if you’ll allow it, your research partner, anything. But-” he looks down almost sheepishly, “I owe it to you to be forthright and so I will tell you that if you’ll have me, I would very much like to see where this takes us.”

A smile breaks across Caleb’s face as their eyes meet, “May I kiss you?”

Essek draws in a sharp breath, eyes wide, and nods. It takes Caleb only a moment to close the gap, hands sliding around Essek’s waist and over the back of his neck as he leads them together. Essek’s hands hold his shoulders and his eyes flutter closed as their lips meet, electricity and heat mixing. When they finally pull back they’re both flushed. Essek lets out a huff of a laugh and Caleb wraps him tightly as he brings him in again, smiling into another kiss.

#shadowgast #critical role #essek thelyss #caleb widogast #the mighty nein #cr fanfic #cr #critrole #fan fiction #archive of our own #omniwrites

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yellowmagicalgirl · 3 years

Note

Krel, Douxie, Value Me?

Leave a “Value Me” in my ask, and I’ll write a drabble about one character telling another how they feel about them.

From send me characters and a prompt (no longer accepting)

And until I reblog this ask meme again, this is the last of these prompts I will be writing. They're finally out of my inbox! Yay!

This technically takes place during RotT (after Douxie and Nari get sent back to their own bodies) but I still refuse to actually watch the movie so the timeline and whatnot are probably not canon compliant with the movie.

CW: references to canon-typical death and torture.

AO3

FFN

Krel didn't have a problem with organizing his lab. Oh, sure, other people had a problem with the way he organized his lab. But was that really Krel's fault? He was the one who was going to be working in the lab, so it was best if he calibrated it to the maximum efficiency of himself. After all, he could find everything easily, so why would anyone else matter?

Douxie mattered, though. And Douxie looked incredibly frustrated by Krel's organizational skills. If it were anyone else, Krel would be inclined to brush it off as them not being able to understand the genius of Krel's mind and organization. But.

But Douxie mattered so much more than Krel's ego. That, and the two of them were trying to build a new amulet for Jim. They were working together, and Douxie deserved to be able to find what he was looking for.

Not failed projects, like what Douxie was currently holding.

"Krel? What's this flashlight-thing doing here?" Douxie flicked the switch and it started beeping, fast and loud and high-pitched. So it worked, even if only in the shortest of distances. "Please tell me it's not a Geiger counter."

"No, it's not a... why is everyone so worried about radioactivity?"

Douxie crossed his arms. "I don't know about you, but radiation sickness is a nasty way to die."

Krel wondered if it was a worse way to die than falling from the sky, a worse way than being tortured and having your soul ripped from another's body and forced back to your own.

"This was originally a core scanner," Krel said, taking the device from Douxie's hands and turning it off. "I modified it, though, but it seems to only work in a short range, so it wouldn't work for what I modified to for. To look for magic, and souls." Krel lifted his eyes off of the device to meet Douxie's. "To look for you."

"I... that makes sense." Douxie looks away from Krel. "You would've been able to find Nari's body, and maybe even the seals, and then this whole mess could've been prevented."

Douxie wasn't listening to him. Gently, Krel took Douxie's hands in his lower pair, and he put his upper pair on Douxie's shoulders. "No. I mean, that would've been helpful, but I wasn't looking for Nari's body, or the seals. I was looking for you. Just you, to bring you back to me. To us."

Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say, because Douxie burst into tears at that. He took a step forward, though, burying his face in the crook of Krel's neck. Krel dropped Douxie's hands in favor of wrapping three arms around Douxie's torso and using the fourth to card his fingers through Douxie's hair in a hopefully-comforting manner.

"I didn't think anyone was coming for me," Douxie confessed between sobs. "I tried to convince myself this was good, that you were focusing on keeping Nari safe and planning for when I failed to keep my hold on her body, but..." Someone inhaled sharply, and Krel couldn't tell who. "I was so scared, and I almost wanted someone to come for me, even if it seems selfish. But, but you were trying?"

"Oh, Douxie." Krel squeezed Douxie just a little tighter. "Of course I was. I'm not a warrior, and I can't promise I'll always be able to keep you safe in the first place. I can't promise I'll always be able to save you. But I promise you that I will do everything I can to try and save you anyways."

It was a promise Krel had accidentally made to himself when Douxie had fallen from the sky, back during that impossibly long and agonizing moment where they had crowded around Douxie's body. Krel hadn't even known Douxie yet beyond that he was a wizard who did reckless things like cut in line and take on demigods on his own, and yet Krel found himself silently promising that if Douxie survived this, Krel would do everything to ever keep him from being so hurt ever again.

Later, Krel would find out that this was called the bargaining phase of grief. The only difference was that it had worked and Krel's feelings for Douxie had been able to grow past grief.

"You would do that?" Douxie looked up at Krel. His tears had ceased falling, but there were still tears in his beautiful golden eyes. Tears, and disbelief. In that moment Krel hated everyone who had ever made Douxie feel like he wasn't worthy of being saved.

"Of course I would, Douxie. I..." Krel's eyes darted away. If Douxie didn't feel the same way, then making the amulet together might be awkward. But Douxie really needed to hear how much he was valued, and if that meant Krel had to be embarrassed... Oh, kleb it.

"I love you," Krel said, and Douxie's eyes widened. And then, he smiled before pressing his forehead to Krel's. A gentle, fluttering feeling overtook Krel's core. It was a feeling Krel wanted to last forever.

After a few wonderful moments, Douxie pulled away, still smiling. "I know a really good deli place. Assuming it doesn't get destroyed by the Order, do you want to grab dinner there next Friday?"

"Are you-"

"Yes, I'm asking you on a date."

Krel beamed. "Then yes. Of course I'd like to go on a date with you."

"Then let's make sure there's still a world by Friday," Douxie said, turning back to the workspace of the lab. His smile faded by a fraction. "You really need to find an organization system."

"I do organize things!"

Though, maybe, after they defeated the Arcane Order, Krel would re-organize his lab to be slightly more accessible to his boyfriend.

A/N: I feel like this ends one of 2.5 ways: 1) Due to this scene, Douxie and Krel are able to change things just enough that Jim decides not to go back in time. AKA, Gay Love Saves The Timeline™. Whether or not it saves the deli where the boys were gonna go for their date is a different story, though. 2) This changes nothing, or at least it doesn't change enough, and Jim resets the timeline, erasing this moment and all their character development... 2.5) ...or at least, it does until Jim is able to restore Douxie and Krel's memories. (Yes, I'm saying that this fic might be an unoffical prequel to Reunions and Revelations.)

#krexie #krel tarron #hisirdoux casperan #tales of arcadia #toawizards #rise of the titans #answered ask #anonymous #my writing

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aeruthien · 3 years

Text

A New Seed

Characters: Astrid Beck, Luc Brenatto, Caleb Widogast

------

A flash in her periphery is her only warning before a crossbow bolt appears out of nowhere. Just in time, Astrid flings up her shield, a follow up spell dancing on her finger tips, every sense alert.

Had they been found? Where there others? Who had-

"Wow, that was so cool!"

The high chirp sounds from her right, and half hidden in the leaves, she spots the head of the small halfling boy.

With a soft curse, Astrid lets the disintegrate spell fizzle.

"I can see you, you know," she snaps angrily. She ignores the responding "aww" with a roll of her eyes, and forces her quickened breath back under control. No child in Blumenthal would have been able to get away with such behaviour.

She sighs and leans back against the tree, idly spinning her dagger in her hand. The muscles of her underarm are tense, the unreleased arcane energy crackling through the crystals. Sure, the child might have been harmless, but another Volstrucker could sneak up at any moment. She wouldn't put it past her late master to have prepared a fail-safe, and given her fellow Volstrucker orders in case Bren proved more than they could handle. Master Ikithon always had a plan. He should not be underestimated, even with his hands bound and his voice silenced.

The dagger is light as it dances between her fingers. The aasimar protecting Ikithon would not be able to stop her if she forced her way inside. Only Caleb's soft but persistent whisper had stayed her hand thus far. But as she dragged up years and years of pain for her testimony, killing the source of her anger became harder and harder to resist.

She clenches her hand around the hilt, her knuckles turning white. One tiny cut and the world would be rid of him forever. He had taught her well. If she positioned it just beneath the collar, she could-

"Can you teach me that?"

Astrid flinches. The kid is standing in front of her, his wide gaze trained on the dagger.

"Mom only showed me how to shoot," the kid pouts, shifting from one foot to the other, his toy crossbow hanging limply in his little fist.

Astrid runs her hand through her hair and glances around. Sadly, there are no other adults are in sight to distract him.

"Has your Mom even used a dagger?" she huffs.

The boy nods eagerly, voice filled with awe.

"Mom had a dagger, but it was cursed! It ate her alive, and she almost died!"

Astrid grunts non-committally. It is hard to tell if the boy is telling the truth, but the story seems in line with the Mighty Nein's shenanigans.

"Have you ever fought a monster?"

Astrid blinks at the change of topic. Involuntarily, her mind flashes to the man locked inside the house. She pushes the thought away and rakes her memory for a suitable situation as the kids keeps staring up at her.

"I fought an ogre once," she admits.

The kid frowns.

"What's an ogre?"

"A very big man."

His face falls in disappointment.

"But my Mom has fought many of those," he whines. "That's boring!"

"Well, was your Mom only seventee-"

Astrid snaps her mouth shut, cutting off her own indignant retort.

What is she doing? Feeling upset that a four year old does not deign her monster 'cool' enough? It had been her first real mission, and she and Wulf had won through a clever use of a lightning bolt, which had triggered an avalanche. But she is a Volstrucker. They do not argue with children.

A tiny hand pats her own.

"Don't worry," the boy chirps. "You'll fight cool monsters someday too!"

Before she can reply, he darts away. As she stares after him, dumbfounded, she almost misses Caleb, who is approaching with two bowls. He glances at the boy and back at her.

"He likes you," he mutters with a soft smile.

Astrid shrugs, and for a second Caleb stares down at her.

"Ehm, Caduceus has made us some food. If you want."

Tentatively, he hands her the bowl, pointedly ignoring the dagger. Astrid slips it back into its sheath, refusing to feel self conscious, and takes the bowl.

"Danke," she mutters. The food smells good, as always. Caleb sinks down into the grass next to her, and she takes a tentative bite from what looks like to be an aubergine.

"You are good," Caleb says after a moment of silence. "With him"

Astrid raises an eyebrow and Caleb shrugs.

"You did not scare him away," he amends.

Astrid scoffs.

"You did not teach him proper fear."

Caleb chuckles. "Ja, that is true. He is a menace."

They both pick at their food, both glancing everywhere but at each other, until Astrid can't take the silence any more.

"Why are we here?" she blurts out.

He frowns, turning towards her. "You know why-"

"Not that. Why are we here?"

She gestures at the Grove. Down near the patch of destroyed plants, Wulf is holding a shovel, accompanied by the drow. The drow is wearing colourful mittens. Wulf is wearing a straw hat. Trent Ikithon is locked inside the house, being spoon-fed by a firbolg.

"This is ridiculous."

It comes out as a whine. A plea. Pathetic, she thinks, but she can't stop tears burning behind her eyes.

The firbolg has joined Wulf and the drow, holding flowers to replace the ones that died.

"Ridiculous, yes," Caleb mutters, following her gaze. "But that is life."

But Caleb's expression is not one of happiness. He looks at them with wistful longing and apprehension, and Astrid wants to scream. Because if he does not understand this, he who crashed back into her life, disrupting everything - if he can't show her what she is supposed to do, then how can she deal with it on her own?

Be Bren! she wants to yell at him. Be the boy who made me laugh. Who held me during the night and who kissed me until we were both breathless. Be the boy who was happy.

Instead, his voice stutters as he recounts Ikithon's experiments. Instead, he buries his head in the halfling's shoulder, whole body shaking. Instead, his gaze lingers on the drow, uncertain and prepared for disappointment.

Astrid takes a shuddering breath. Ikithon would have berated her for showing even a little emotion. Instead, she feels a brush against her palm as Caleb slips his hand in hers. He is watching her again, gauging her reaction.

She thinks of pulling away. They can't be what they were, the three of them. Too much has changed. Too much is steeped in regret. But she is so tired. And is she not allowed this one little comfort? So she rests back against the tree and closes her eyes, one hand clutching her waist and the other clenched in Caleb's.

Their fingers are still entwined when Jester bounces towards them to summon them for dinner. Caleb stands first, but before she can miss his touch, he holds out his hand to her with a small smile.

She swallows, before letting him pull her to her feet. He keeps holding on as they are submerged in the whirlwind that is the Mighty Nein, and they sit next to each other during dinner, Wulf having joined on her other side.

As the sounds wash over her, Astrid finally relaxes. The group is loud and overwhelming, but their clamour drowns out the sceptical voice inside her head. The expositor nods at her from across the table, expression serious. The halfing woman is recounting another one of their adventures to her awestruck child and exasperated husband.

"Astrid, I made my hair look like yours!"

Jester grins at her.

"Sehr schön," Astrid answers.

"Caleb, was that good? I assume it is good!"

"Ja, it was."

Astrid shakes her head as Jester turns her attention to the half-orc. Caleb squeezes her hand, and with a huff, she meets his small smile with her own.

It won't be the same as before. But maybe, with Ikithon truly locked away, they could plant something new.

#critical role #blumendrei #blumentrio #astrid x caleb #widobeck #widostrid #astrid beck #caleb widogast #luc brenatto #my fic #first CR fic!!#and of course it is going to blumentrio angst #shadowgast #mentioned #I have caught the FEELINGS you all

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trashmenofmarvel · 4 years

Text

Branded - Chapter 45

Pairing: Demon!Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Bucky will do whatever it takes to get her back.

(This is a fan AU of Falling’s Just Another Way to Fly by araniaart . Please check out this incredible series for all of your demon Bucky needs.)

Chapter Warnings: Anger, grief, thoughts of violence, angst

AO3

Bucky paced like a wild animal, back and forth, tail lashing with each circuit he made. He hadn’t slept. He hadn’t eaten. He hadn’t functioned much at all in the past few days, and he was always a heartbeat away from snapping like a wire pulled too taut.

He couldn’t go through the door he was pacing in front of, the demonic wards holding him at bay. It was just as well. Without them, he would have marched straight inside and ripped Helmut Zemo’s spine out his throat.

It wouldn’t have solved any of Bucky’s currents problems, but it would have improved his mood. And it might have distracted him for a few moments from the black hole currently residing within him. A negative space where the bond had been. Every moment that void was there, he wanted to tear out his own heart.

Maybe he’d still get the opportunity if they couldn’t find a way to bring her back. He’d end his own life for a fast one-way ticket to the demon realm if he had to, and there Bucky would stay until he found her.

And then… what? They’d be trapped there forever? Why didn’t that scare Bucky as much as the thought of being separated, with her being all alone in that place? He knew she was resourceful. She’d proven it by the fact they’d captured Zemo at all.

When the gun had gone off, Bucky had felt like he’d been the one shot, only it hurt so much worse because he actually knew what a bullet to the gut felt like. He’d barely made it in time to catch her as she fell, and he’d been in no state of mind to deal with Zemo after that. Steve had barely been conscious by the time Strange and the others had found them, so it wasn’t him who had caught the bastard.

No, it had been the Alp itself that had stopped Zemo. Before the man had even gotten a chance to order his demon to teleport him away, it had used its paralysis aerosol on Zemo and knocked him into a peaceful sleep. And then it had vanished in a puff of sulfurous smoke, leaving its master there to be collected by the sorcerers.

The thought made Bucky shake his head. Somehow, Bucky’s girl had managed to make a demon turn on its own master. Not once, but twice, if Bucky was including himself.

Leave it to her to befriend a demon and turn it to her side.

Leave it to her to give everything for Bucky, including her own life. And what had he done in the time since then except vacillate between rage and grief? Between shouting at Strange and standing by Steve’s healing bed like a mourner at a funeral, waiting for them to come up with a rescue mission.

The sorcerers had made little progress, and Bucky feared their only hope lie in the man that had murdered her.

Bucky would have gotten the answers out of Zemo himself, if only for the fact he couldn’t get his hands on him. The demons wards weren’t to keep Bucky out, they were to keep Zemo from calling his demon slave to teleport him away. No matter how had they’d tried, the sorcerers couldn’t break the demon bond. And no matter how much the Alp might not want to, it wouldn’t be able to resist the call of its master, no matter how far away it was. Bucky had learned that lesson the hard way with his own escape attempts from HYDRA.

So now they were at an impasse. Zemo imprisoned but refusing to cooperate, and the sorcerers unable to get anything useful out of him but having no choice but to keep him locked up. Bucky hadn’t be surprised the sorcerers had failed to take away Zemo’s last Hail Mary. If they were capable of breaking demons bonds, they wouldn’t be in this situation to begin with.

The door opened, and Strange had to wave him off before Bucky accosted him with questions.

“Well?” Bucky asked, impatient. “What did he say?”

“Still nothing helpful.” Strange glanced at Wong as he too strode toward the door. It shut with a heavy thud behind them, no doubt locked by all sorts of arcane spells. “It’s clear that Zemo doesn’t know how to work the demon gate with any expert knowledge and relied solely on the red book to achieve his goals.”

The circular stone archway they’d found in the basement of the Siberian compound, which Strange had named the “demon gate,” had remained inert no matter how the sorcerers tried to manipulate and power it. How Zemo had managed to summon the Alp through it, but it wouldn’t respond to the sorcerers, left Bucky short-tempered and frustrated.

It was nothing compared to the guilt. The shame at being controlled, manipulated into almost killing Steve. He was still being tended to by the healers, and the only reason he wasn’t in a hospital was because Strange had insisted they take him to the Sanctum.

And as if that wasn’t bad enough, then Bucky’d nearly killed her. His worst nightmare being played out before his eyes, or it almost had. Through their tenuous bond she’d somehow broken through to him, and Bucky had managed to stay his hand when he’d never been able to do so before.

It had been… freeing. Liberating to disobey a direct command. To be ordered to hurt someone he loved and having the strength to resist.

And then Bucky had failed to save her anyway. She’d died, right there in his arms, her heart going silent the loudest thing he’d ever heard. As if that hadn’t shattered his world enough, she’d turned to ashes in his hands, the stink of sulfur and brimstone stinging his eyes as she slipped through his fingers.

In that moment, Bucky’s bond to Zemo had been severed. One of the apparent benefits of a demon having a human slave. She’d gone to Hell so Bucky could be free.

And all he’d managed to do with that freedom was absolutely fuck-all.

Bucky’s fist flew, the jagged knuckles of his armored hand knocking a sizable chunk out of the stone wall.

Strange merely lifted his eyebrows. Wong frowned in disapproval. Bucky didn’t give a shit. They should have woken him as soon as she’d gone missing, but instead, he’d woken on his own, bursting through the cryo-chamber and shattering its door to pieces. He’d been so confused and enraged that the sorcerers had had to bind him with glowing ropes and wards until Bucky calmed down enough to explain she was being tortured, and he could lead them to exactly where.

So, yes. As far as Bucky was concerned, this was as much Strange’s fault as it was his, and the only reason he was even still tolerating the sorcerers is because they were her only chance of rescue.

If they could get the fucking gate to work, anyway. A big fucking if. Apparently, sorcerers could make portals on Earth without a problem, but crossing into other dimensions was even beyond Strange’s capability.

And yet, she had been able to do it as a ten year old child. Bucky had hoped, maybe, somehow, she would be able to summon that power within her once again and come back to him, but there had been no sign of any mysterious blue portals popping up on Earth.

So as pissed as he was, Bucky had to remain patient, and right now, he had to pay attention.

“I have an idea on how to power the gate,” Strange said, wearily eyeing the damaged wall before turning to Bucky. “We have more of HYDRA’s research that Zemo ever did, and I have no doubt we will be able to create a stable connection soon.”

“Soon isn’t good enough,” Bucky snapped, struggling not to snarl at the sorcerer. “Every minute here is hours over there. Each day wasted is weeks she has to endure, alone, in a place humans were never meant to survive. We can’t—“

The lump in his throat forced him to silence. Bucky couldn’t say what he’d been thinking, and from Strange’s sympathetic expression, it didn’t need to be said.

They might already be too late.

Bucky still wanted to punch Strange in the face. If he cared so damned much, why hadn’t he kept a closer eye on her? Zemo may have been smart, hell, he was probably a genius to figure out how demon magic worked, but how had he managed to outsmart a whole sect of sorcerers?

“We will move as quickly as we can,” Strange said, indicating Bucky should follow him. “I don’t wish to waste any more time than you do.”

Bucky somehow doubted that, but he still followed after the head sorcerer. His tail twitched as they made their way deeper into the Sanctum, to the place Bucky had spent every waking moment when he hadn’t been by Steve’s side.

“I am aware of the time dilation in the demon realm,” Strange said as they walked down a spiraling set of stone steps, “but it might not be uniform or even linear. Your experience may differ from hers.”

If Strange thought that would be comforting news, he was wrong. Bucky didn’t need an overactive imagination to come up with whatever horrors she might be facing now. He certainly didn’t want to dwell on the possibility of… of finally making it to the demon realm and realizing hundreds of years had passed.

Bucky couldn’t… he couldn’t think about it. He would lose his mind. Bucky would only let despair swallow him after he was a hundred percent sure that… that there was nothing left to hope for. That she was truly gone and wouldn’t be coming back.

That he would never get to see her again. To watch as her eyes brightened and that familiar mischievous grin tugged at her lips. To hold her in his arms while he buried his nose in her hair, filling his nostrils with her scent and—

Bucky shook his head and grit his teeth. He couldn’t afford to get distracted, not when they were closer to their goal, so he forced himself to focus on Strange’s words. Something about a power source needed to fuel the thing, and that Zemo must have hidden it away from the base because the sorcerers couldn’t sense it. Bucky honestly didn’t understand most of it, only that it would take an unnatural power source to get the gate running.

The underground lair, as he called it, left Bucky as awed as the first time he’d stepped food inside. The room was essentially a giant dome constructed of very large stones, but the most interesting aspect of the room was the glowing glyphs carved into the stones. The power thrummed under his skin and set his arm plates rigid as his tail flickered.

And there, in the middle of the room, lay the instrument that had been the focus of his frustration and anger over the past few days. A stone gateway, teleported here by great effort from the sorcerers. It was ancient, possibly constructed during the days of the Holy Roman Empire, or so Strange had rambled. Bucky was too fucking stressed to appreciate the mythical history lesson.

When the sorcerers working on the gateway turned to Strange and confirmed it couldn’t be powered by anything in their vaults, Bucky turned away, fists tightening, mentally preparing himself for what he had to do. But before he could take even a single step, Strange laid his hand on his shoulder.

“Just a moment, Sergeant.” Strange’s voice was gentle, and it was the only reason Bucky didn’t grab the hand on his shoulder and break it. “There’s one thing left to try. It’s not without danger and risk, but—“

“I’ll do it,” Bucky said immediately. “Whatever it is, I’ll do it.”

“I suspected you might say that.”

Strange’s smile was sad but accepting as he patted Bucky, and then let his hand drop. Bucky’s desire to strangle the man went down a few notches, and if this worked and he got her back, Bucky might even forgive him.

Might.

Strange straightened his posture and faced the stone archway, held his hands in front of his chest in a manner that meant he was about to cast a spell, and he said, “Though I must warn you, tapping into the power of the Infinity Stones can be quite dangerous.”

With an intricate pull of his fingers, glowing patterns in the air emerged, and that’s when Bucky finally noticed the green light shining from Strange’s amulet. He’d vaguely wondered around the thing always around the sorcerer’s neck, and now Bucky had an answer as to what it was. Something otherworldly, deadly, and strong enough to compare with the power of the blue cube HYDRA had once wielded.

A deep thrumming filled the room, vibrating through the air and up the stones, the potential of something building made Bucky’s wings flair behind his back.

Then the glyphs along the demon gate began to glow, first green like the stone and then to a bright blue that made Bucky’s heart clench with fear. Strange blue lights often accompanied the demonic rituals HYDRA had conducted on him, but he swallowed down the panic and didn’t blink.

The charge in the air built higher and higher, until with a crackle of electricity, the empty space between the archway suddenly filled with light. It pulled outward to the edges, a border of blue around a watery image that sharpened into something Bucky recognized.

The demon realm.

“I can’t hold it forever!” Strange yelled, his hands still in the same position as he somehow, impossibly, held the gateway open using the green stone around his neck. “Get moving, Sergeant!”

Bucky didn’t have to be told twice.

With none of the hesitancy he’d shown the first time being confronted by a blue portal, Bucky flared his wings as he raced forward and gave one hard flap, lifting off and darting through the gateway like a missile launched from its tube.

The dry wind buffeted him from the other side and Bucky nearly nosedived into the red sand, but he managed to right himself and soar up into the air. The human side of him balked at the alien surroundings, but it was the demon part of him that Bucky needed now.

Orienting himself to the familiar magnetic fields of the planet, because in a sick way he’d been alive longer here than on Earth, and he knew this place as intimately as his home.

Turning in the direction of his territory, Bucky pushed his body as far as it would take him and flew faster than he ever had before.

Hold on, sweetheart, he prayed to her, hoping he was heard. I’m coming.

Next Chapter

#branded #demon!bucky barnes #demon!bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes fanfiction #my writing #my fanfiction

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hellishhin · 3 years

Text

And They Fell

Length: ~1,500

Content warnings: Violence, blood, injury, magical attacks, electrocution, unconsciousness

Post themes: combat

Summary: This post is a little different because it's just the subsequent combat scene following up from the last post. This is my first real combat scene ever and I got a lot of great advice for it. If you want to, I would really love some solid critique on how this went. A few questions I'm wondering about most: is this confusing? Does it pace correctly for a fight scene? Did I jump around too much? You can reblog/reply with as much or as little critique as you want. You also can just read for fun and you don't have to critique anything if you don't want to! I also may repost this as a rewrite depending on advice I get, we will see :)

Intro with links to all previous posts

[next post]—-[previous post]

Taglist: (adds/removes always open!) @betwixtofficial @taerandcalentavar @talesfromaurea @faelanvance @definitelyquestionit @drippingmoon @dontcrywrite @a-wild-bloog

One time fight scene tag: @author-a-holmes thanks for being willing to look it over!

Kireen’s blade sang from its sheath and her warrior’s mind kicked into action. This was enough evidence to start an investigation so it was clear they wouldn’t be allowed to escape. Two strides, sword in motion, but it came to a jarring halt against two elvish scimitars belonging to the crossbow man’s comrade. Kireen was able to stave off the biting steel but she couldn’t match the speed of two swords forever.

Another bolt was being loaded but Kireen was too preoccupied to notice so K’lai’a’la, throwing knives at the ready, sent them hurtling in his direction. One caught the wood of the crossbow which did no more than mar its polished surface. The second struck his upper arm. She saw the crossbow shudder in his hands and his lips tighten but he slammed the bolt fully into place. K’lai’a’la knew it was coming. With her reflexes, it was nothing to sidestep the bolt and hear it clatter against the stone. Before he could load another, her attention was drawn to a battle cry from Brimir who had drawn his own sword and plunged into contest with the two remaining elves. Sadie seemed to be safely keeping behind the lines so K’lai’a’la drew her own scimitar and stepped to Brimir’s side.

It was vital to keep to one’s strengths so as her friends stepped up to engage the elves, Sadie stayed back. As another bolt was prepared, she knew she must target him to keep his attention off her friends.

“Hey!” she called and he turned his attention to her “if arrogance and stupidity had a baby, you would be the afterbirth.” Each word was wrapped tightly into the weave and entered his mind like a dozen shards of glass. She watched him recoil but regain his composure quickly and loose a bolt just for her. It breezed through her hair as she flinched away, unharmed. He was quickly placing another bolt and she shouted at him once more. “If you don’t start using your head for more than a hat rack, I’ll start using it to store my swords!” His shot went wide and lacking the patience to reload, he tossed the crossbow away and yelled something in elvish. Sadie grinned, knowing in her soul that she was just insulted, but his carried no magic.

A man twice her height barreled down on her but she drew her rapier and held her ground. One misdirection and his blade went wide. She went in for the groin but he backhanded her blade away. She could hear his blade whistling toward her again but she didn’t move in time, giving her a stinging bite across the jaw; her vision blurred. She thrust blindly and felt it give into something soft. She heard a grunt, steel flashed, her rapier lifted in defense to take a moment and make sense of the blur in front of her.

The elf who had intercepted Kireen was not prepared for her draconic strength. He was parrying her blows but losing ground and Kireen saw it. She pushed harder, increasing the force of each swing but she faltered when the man with the crossbow discarded his weapon and charged past her to where she knew Sadie was standing. Her opponent took his opportunity to step into her guard and thrust his sword into her underarm. Sensing his move she twisted so the armor took most of the blow only leaving her with a sharp ache. With him inside her guard, a quick pommel strike to his head crumpled him. Kireen spun and saw Sadie with blood dripping off her chin, barely holding her own against the onslaught. With a roar, Kireen charged.

Sweat beaded, muscles burned, breath rasped sharply but K’lai’a’la and Brimir kept pace with their two opponents. They all bled from several minor cuts but the pain heightened their instincts. One slip was all it took and when K’lai’a’la over-rotated her wrist, the enemy sword broke her guard and cut deeply into her arm. With a feral snarl she lashed out with pure instinct and landed a similar blow across his shoulder. Brimir’s peripheral caught the break in motion. He flipped his sword out, sinking the point into the other elf’s thigh but the one he had engaged swung for the opening. Brimir brought his arm up, catching the sword on his bracer and he winced at the force.

Seeing her opponent stumble to Brimir’s sword, like a predator to the weakest prey, K’lai’a’la redoubled her efforts. As her sword whistled through the air, she watched the elf’s lips move. The air around him rippled and he sidestepped, disappearing entirely. Her sword continued through the air with such force that the tip struck the ground. Brimir’s opponent balked, realizing it was now two on one. He retreated toward the open door just as an older elf with vicious blue eyes stepped through it. Lightning arced through his fingers and K’lai’a’la could hear the arcane language on his lips.

The draconic roar behind him made the elf turn his attention away from Sadie to see a blur of red scales and teeth grab him by the front of his armor. Kireen made to bite his face but he pulled away in terror and she only grabbed the side of his neck. Her mind was set on protecting Sadie so the elf’s dagger plunging into her side surprised her and she pulled away. This left her open for two more dagger thrusts to her gut almost bringing her to her knees. A third was incoming but was pulled up at the last second when Sadie’s rapier plunged into the back of the man’s thigh. Kireen was about to rally when a second set of swords appeared seemingly out of nowhere and began pressing her back.

There was a carnal satisfaction that flashed through Sadie when she saw the elf’s features contort with pain while her rapier embedded itself further into his thigh. All Kireen needed to do was take advantage of his distraction. Then the second elf from across the room stepped out of a ripple in the air.

The enemies were aware that the dragonborn was the bigger threat. With Kireen already weakened, Sadie knew it was now or never. With a deathgrip on the weave she twisted the strands around the mind of the elf who just appeared before them. His strangled mind succumbed to her power. He began to laugh, a horrible cackling laughter that rang above the clash of swords and scuff of boots. Sadie’s laughter rose with his but the elf laughed so hard he dropped to his knees. Presented with the opportunity, Kireen took it, her sword sprouting from his back in a wash of blood. He died with a twisted smile on his face.

Kireen’s entire body burned but whether from wounds or exertion she didn’t know. There was now a second elf or she was seeing double. Either way she was swinging frantically at both until one of them began to laugh. Once on his knees she thrust and found that it was no illusion. She wrenched her sword free of his corpse but her strength flagged, she was backed against the wall, her breath came in ragged gasps. Then she couldn’t see. Everything was white, her muscles contracted all at once and fire seared through her. She couldn’t even scream. It stopped as fast as it started and she welcomed the coolness of the floor on her cheek.

The arc of lightning ripped through his body and he staggered but managed to stay on his feet. Beside him, K’lai’a’la was not so lucky. She succumbed without a cry of pain, collapsing into a heap. He looked over his shoulder and saw Kireen fall as well but to his relief, Sadie remained standing. He had one chance to save his friends. One well-placed sword thrust and this mage would be done. Brimir made it one step before there was a silent concussive force around him and the man spoke a word. “Kneel”. The word echoed around in his thoughts erasing all others. He dropped to his knees.

When she could finally breathe again, Sadie let out a sob. She looked to Kireen for reassurance but saw her friend lifeless on the ground. Her thoughts were sluggish, looking to call K’lai’a’la for help but she too was on the ground and Brimir was kneeling before the man in the doorway. She was the only one left. It was up to her to get them out of this. Emotions hit her like rolling thunder and a scream of rage pealed out of her. She released her grip on the magic she handled with such care and brought her hands together. A shattering crack echoed around the room loud enough she thought the roof might collapse.

When the dust settled, all the elves were still standing. She had failed. Her last hope was to heal them, she had the magic, she could help her friends. Sadie took one step but a hand in her hair halted her. Pain blossomed across her cheek from a sadistic backhand and that was all it took for the world to go dark. Silence fell along with Sadie. Pure chaos, over in seconds that stretched out into a lifetime but not even the chaos stirred the unconscious people still laying in the corner.

#original work #high fantasy #oc #d&d #writeblr #sadieblaze #kireen #k'lai'a'la #brimir #combat #violence cw #blood cw #injury cw #electric shock cw

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midnighter13 · 3 years

Text

the world in mutable delight

Y'all I'm so full of feelings. So many of them. Anyway I've been shouting about Caleb using his Transmuter's Stone on Molly to anyone who will listen for actual years so now, please have more soft pre-widomauk feelings about it.

Read on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/31672169

The process of recovery, Caleb knows, can be a strange one. Of course, there is hardly anyone stranger than the singular Mollymauk Tealeaf, to begin with. Between the circumstances of his deaths, his lives, and all the magic that brought him back to them, it is hardly a surprise that he needs some time to gather up all the patchwork pieces of himself again. Caleb has no doubt that he will reclaim everything he wishes to, in time; after all, he has never known anyone better at creating beauty from shattered glass. The massive stained-glass tribute within his tower is as close as Caleb could come to capturing the artistry with which Molly created his style and his life and his whole self, and seeing him in vivid, vibrant life again has reminded Caleb that even his best effort could never possibly do him justice.

It is best that way, though. Mollymauk Tealeaf should never be captured in something so still as glass, so static as paint. A whirling dervish of color and laughter and terrible ideas and sheer wonder needs a living canvas to flourish, and thanks to a miracle, he has that chance again.

One day soon perhaps, Caleb would like to ask Molly about the decor of the tower. He is still fond of his best effort, the beauty that Molly’s memory lends to his library, but it needn’t be the same forever. It would be equally wonderful to listen to Mollymauk create something new, to see if Caleb can create with magic what Molly’s endless font of color and bullshit can imagine.

… Of course, that would require Caleb to overcome the way his mind goes blank every time he thinks about approaching Molly. There are so many things he wants to say, needs to say where Molly can hear him this time, but he doesn’t seem to have the language to express the maelstrom of emotions trapped inside his chest. There is so much happiness and relief and affection and amusement and delight and and and—

And it is all stopped at the back of his throat by the sharp point of the memory that springs up every time, the fact that the manifestation of all of Caleb’s magic, all of his drive and talent and hope and hunger, failed when Molly needed him. Again. Nine months ago, on Glory Run Road, Caleb’s magic was not enough to keep him alive. And two days ago, in the crumbling city in the Astral Sea, Caleb’s magic was not enough to bring him back.

So. There are a few things he must grapple with himself, before he can indulge in everything he wants to say to Molly.

It has been fairly easy to hang back, so far. He has managed to distance himself enough from the celebrations to keep from spilling his heart across the ground at Mollymauk’s feet. Simply looking at him, vibrant and energetic again, is enough to sustain him—simply hearing his voice, the handful of words he speaks with endless inflections, is a feast when he has been starving. So Caleb stands a handful of feet away at all times, and watches the rest of his family hug and touch and reconnect until his eyes go dry.

The first night of their return to the Material Plane would have been no good, anyway. With how tired they all are, how nearly broken and still very bruised each and every body among them is, it is not the time to show Molly around the whole tower. There will be time for that later, always time for that later, to his greatest elation—later, he will take Molly by the hand and show him everything that he built, every piece of his heart that he conjures to house his friends, his family. He will show him that no matter the time that passed, he kept Molly safe in his mind and gave him a place here, always waiting for him to come home.

But that will have to wait until Caleb’s hands no longer shake with the phantom weight of his Transmuter’s Stone; and besides, he would have to wait anyway until Molly and Yasha willingly part from each other, and those two certainly have shown no signs of budging from each other’s sides, not through the exhausted pile the (whole, finally whole) Mighty Nein slept in that first night, nor at meals with the welcoming Clay family the next day, nor the hours full of odd conversation and new acquainting and re-familiarizing that followed. There has been plenty to occupy Molly upon his return, more than enough to let Caleb sit outside of arm’s reach and drink in everyone else’s stories, and pretend that his heart has not leapt every time Molly’s bright, lively eyes have turned to him and lingered in return.

Now, basking in the afternoon sun on the second bright day since their family saved the world and was made whole, Caleb knows that he should be taking more action to recover his arcane stores. But each time he tells himself that he will get up and look for a suitable stone, his throat becomes tight again. He makes excuses to Essek, to Veth, when they ask: they are safe here in the Grove so he does not need the protection it grants him; they are among a family that seems very partial to glowing crystals as light sources, so he is in no rush to regain the darkvision he lost with the Eyes; why bother to make himself quicker to move, when they are all enjoying a well-earned rest? Neither of them question him further on it, though there is deep understanding in Essek’s eyes and a shrewd worry in Veth’s. They let him lie back and look up at the endlessly-shifting canopy of green, and try to reorganize his thoughts in peace.

Someone, however, does not abide by that peace. Only a half-hour into his meditation, and having made very little progress in unsnarling his tangled heart, Caleb hears the soft sound of bare feet on moss approach, and stop beside him. When he turns his head, there, of course, is Mollymauk.

“Magician,” Molly says firmly, and plunks himself down on the ground beside Caleb’s head. He settles in, wiggling his toes in the moss. One foot has nails freshly painted in bright teall, the other in charming pink. Both colors, of course, suit him perfectly. Then he says, “Mister Caleb,” with a widening grin, and Caleb’s breath catches once more in his throat.

“Hallo, Mister Mollymauk,” he says in return, the smallest greeting that settles sweetly on his tongue. He pushes himself upright, and turns to face Molly in kind. “Your words are returning to you, it seems.”

“Some,” Molly says, and the word that is not empty is accompanied by a decisive little nod. It takes effort, it seems, but Mollymauk has always been an obstinate individual. Regaining all his words may be like trying to pick up pieces of confetti one at a time, but if Mollymauk wants them back he will have the time to do so now. And hopefully, his friends can continue to help.

“That is very good to hear,” Caleb replies, and he cannot stop the smile that spreads across his face at Molly’s pleased expression.

“Magician,” Molly repeats, and holds out a closed fist between them. Caleb hesitates, unsure if this is a greeting or a request—then Molly shakes his hand a little, impatiently, and Caleb obligingly holds out his own open palm beneath it. Mollymauk’s tail swishes in broad strokes behind him, and he opens his hand to drop something into Caleb’s palm.

A blue-grey stone the size of a hen’s egg hits his palm with a soft sound. There is no ring around this one like his first, but when it catches the light it sparkles with countless tiny deposits of mica, glittering like stars. Caleb blinks at it, then up at Mollymauk. “Ah… thank you?”

“Magician,” Molly insists; then, after a pause, “lucky,” accompanied by that little flicker of his fingers that he used many times before, whenever he mentioned how little he understood about magic or asked Caleb if he could cast a spell. And perhaps it is not elegant, no kind of official communication that even a Comprehend Language could parse, but Caleb understands him perfectly, and his throat stings as though he might cry.

“Oh,” he says, and stares down at the stone in his hand. “Th-thank you, Molly. How did you know…?”

“Joy—” Molly clears his throat, a quick little cough and a wrinkle of his nose that spells frustration with his voice. “Jester,” he says carefully, clearly, “told me. What—hmm. Happened. Empty—”

He takes a deep breath, seems to gather his thoughts. He reaches out and closes Caleb’s fingers around the rock in his palm. “Empty,” he says again, softer now. Then he says, “Caleb,” and brings his hand up and presses his lips to Caleb’s fingers.

Caleb’s heart is nearly tripping with how quickly it hums. His ears are hot, and he knows that the afternoon sun cannot be to blame in the pleasant shade of the Grove. “Molly,” he says, helplessly. “Molly, I—I’m sor—”

Molly’s tail smacks gently into his knee. His eyes narrow as he looks up at Caleb, somewhere between playful and warning. Caleb swallows hard. He takes in the sight of Mollymauk’s face before him, and memorizes the new weight of the stone in his hand.

“Ja, okay,” he manages. “I can use this, Molly. Thank you.”

“Ja, ja,” Molly says, grinning wide and cheeky once again, and the laugh that bursts from Caleb feels like lightness, like relief, like forgiveness.

Molly is still smiling at him, his tail tapping softly against the moss. He releases Caleb’s hand from his grasp, the stone safely inside. Then he puts one hand up and crooks his finger at Caleb, in a universal gesture of come here.

Obligingly, Caleb leans forward, narrowing the space between them and trying very hard not to blush all the way to the roots of his hair. Molly puts his hand on the side of Caleb’s face—warm, his touch is so warm and firm and real again. It’s almost enough to distract him, enough that it takes him by surprise when Molly leans forward and kisses him firmly on the forehead. Then he lingers there, and Caleb lets his eyes close just for the moment as he memorizes the feeling of being here, with Mollymauk Tealeaf, safe and happy once more.

When Molly sits back, he folds his hands in his lap, contentment written so plainly across his face that he hardly needs the words to say it. Caleb thinks of five things he could say, a dozen, a hundred possibilities like fragments of fate. But Molly only has so many words to give, and it is better, for right now, that Caleb can speak his language in return.

He holds up his free hand and crooks his finger at Mollymauk in the same gesture of come here. Molly’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise, and his tail patters rapidly against his shin—but he leans forward, a smile lurking at the corners of his lips, just enough to show the dimples in his cheeks and the light dancing in his eyes. Caleb puts his hand to Molly’s cheek, and gives in to the temptation to run his thumb gently along the vibrant peacock feather there. Molly’s smile grows wide, showing teeth and crinkling the corners of his eyes, as Caleb leans forward and presses his lips gently to Molly’s forehead. He holds him there for a long moment, savoring the warmth of his skin and the once-again inescapable whiff of sandalwood and incense.

Words are few and far between, right now, but words are not the only thing they need. For now there is touch, and there is warmth, and there is magic, and there is Molly. And for anything else, there will be time for that later.

#Mollymauk Tealeaf #Caleb Widogast #widomauk #critical role #critical role spoilers #c2ep140 spoilers #critfic #fanfiction #my writing #Mollymauk Tealeaf/Caleb Widogast #I'M FULL OF FEELINGS ABOUT THAT TRANSMUTER'S STONE FOLKS #FULL OF FEELINGS ABOUT WIDOMAUK AGAIN #HAVE A WEE BIT OF ANGST WITH MORE JOY ANF FLUFF

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amateur-author597 · 3 years

Text

SERIOUS RISE OF THE TITANS SPOILERS

BUT I NEED TO RANT

SPOILERS ARE UNDER THE CUT I PROMISE

I STARTED ROTT TEN MINUTES AFTER IT CAME OUT AT 5:01 PM AEST AND FINISHED ROTT AT ROUGHLY 10 TO 7

I FINISHED THE MOVIE AND SAW 8 SPOILER POSTS WITHIN 2 MINUTES ON TUMBLR

PLEASE BE CONSIDERATE OF OTHERS AND PUT ALL SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT FOR YOUR POSTS AND TAG THEM PROPERLY

FIRST OFF

Everyone who said Blinky would die because of"and blinky" in the trailer

Fuck you

It was very fair but still I was so scared

Same to if those who said Archie died because he wasn't in the trailer

Again fair but I was terrified and anxious as hell

My heart could not have handled if he died or Douxie's grief but I'm still upset about what actually happened

And I wish Zoe showed up so they could give her some characterization

We find out she's known Douxie and been friends with him for over 900 years but she doesn't help with the Arcane Order?

And none of the hedge witches show up to help fight them to defend their home?!?!?!

SECOND!!! THE TRAIN SCENE!!!

YES

LOVED IT

GREAT

Jim you stupid string bean, I love you though

Claire, good job, that was some hard magic

Toby, go duke!

Douxie my husband, YAAASS QUEEN, GET IT BABY

The Police Station

It was so funny

Everything about it I loved

Douxari confusing the officers and being neutrally chaotic

Claire trying to be tough and silent

Toby spilling ALL the tea and the officers not believing him

Archie just being Archie and enjoying the confusion of the humans

KREL SHOWING UP WITH RICKY AND LUCY

YES

OMFG

Keep casually listing just about every spy agency in order

and then just

"And your mum"

What a legend

Literal King 👑

Honestly

Walter and Barbara

Them being engaged and happy

Y E S

Jim being best man

Y E S

Walter DYING before they could get married

N O

H E L L N O

ELI GREW UP!!!!!

MPREG STEVE

Very unpopular opinion

I loved it, so fucking funny

I don't even like mpreg normally

But I loved it as a random side plot cause they probably couldn't find an import part for every character and still give them their deserved screen time

Also, funny!

Krel was way too smug explaining to Steve that he would be pregnant, not Aja

You know how we as a fandom have all decided Krel is Aro/Ace icon or at least Aro spec and/or grey ace (something like that) I have no problem with this and love it, it makes me feel very validated, but what Krel just doesn't want kids and decided it's easier to not have romantic relationships, that's also a legitimate thing a lot of woman do

Does that mean gay guys can have biological kids on Akiridion 5?

BACK TO STEVE

I wish there was a bit where Steve called Lawrence on the phone calling him "dad" or "coach dad" and being like "Hey, I know you're probably busy, you're at school but I'm seriously freaking out and I need your help or advice" and explaining the whole Akiridion pregnancy and Coach just reassuring him gently and telling him that he and Steve's mum would support him and he wasn't alone and they weren't mad at him.

Douxie figuring out the sigil

Good job baby! Smart boy! I am very proud

You very smart

The Order bringing the Titans with Nari mind controlled

😬

That's all

Numora dying

Why! It's was so unnecessary!

I don't necessarily love her by any means

But still!

Dndndbebhsvehehrdidjbdisbeurbvtisjbsgsneosbsyneyjsosnsjdbdynsvsidbfindbzhndhdushdhushdbudhnm

*key spams in frustration*

This began much irritation that just increased

THE BRIDGE

ARCHIE LEFT DOUXIE HIS LONG LIFE FRIEND AND PLATONIC SOULMATE (NOBODY CAN CONVINCE ME THAT NOT JOW FAMILIARS WORK IDC)

YES HE WAS STAYING WITH HIS DAD AND I RESPECT THAT

BUT GODDAMN IT CHARLIE

CHARLEMAGNE COULD HAVE JUST LIT THE TROLLS FOLLOWING THEM ON FIRE AND THEN FLOWN OUT

THE PORTAL WOULD HAVE CLOSED AT THE SAME TIME

OR THEY COULD HAVE FREED THE TROLLS

EITHER WAY

THEY COULD HAVE GOTTEN OUT

WTF HAPPENED THE WHOLE FOUND FAMILY THING THEH WERE PUSHING IN WIZARDS

WHY PUSH A GRIEVING DOUXIE TO ESSENTIALLY GET OVER IT AND ACCEPT ARCHIE AS HIS FAMILY CUZ HE WAS ALWAYS THERE JUST TO GET RID OF ARCHIE ANYWAY

DOUXIE WOULD HAVE NEVER SEEN HIM AGAIN

HE WOULD HAVE JUST SEEN "TELL DOUXIE I SAID GOODBYE" IN THE KRONOSPHERE AS HIS LAST MEMORY OF HIM

*INCREASING FRUSTRATION*

"No More Running"DOUXIE ALMOST DIED BRINGING NARI BACK

I KNEW HE WOULDNT DIE BUT I WAS STILL SCARED

I was sad

NARI AND SKRAEL'S BATTLE WAS PERFECT

CINEMATIC MASTERPIECE I WAS NOT PLEASED WITH NARI DYING

NOR DOUXIE BEING HELD BACK ONCE AGAIN FROM SAVING A LOVED ONE

"Nor more running"

Simple line

Sweet

Shattered me and my very being THE SWITCHING SPELL

AMAZING.YES.ILOVEDIT.

DOUXIE YOU SMART BRILLIANT BOY I AM SO FUCKING PROUD

Douxari was so chaotic and funny and pure in a very weird way

I was sad that THAT screenshot of Douxie and Archie wasn't actually Archie because he looked so happy chddling his familiar but it was still cute

Narxie was so fucking sarcastic when the Arcane Order realized the spell didn't work and I live for it

Walter and Barbara

Them being engaged and happy

Y E S

Jim being best man

Y E S

Walter DYING before they could get married

N O

H E L L N O

ELI GREW UP!!!!!

MPREG STEVE

I loved it, so fucking funny

Krel was way too smug explaining to Steve that he would be pregnant, not Aja

Does that mean gay guys can have biological kids on Akiridion 5?

BACK TO STEVE

Douxie figuring out the sigil

Good job baby! Smart boy! I am very proud

You very smart

The Order bringing the Titans with Nari mind controlled

😬

That's all

Numora dying

Why! It's was so unnecessary!

Dndndbebhsve hehr didjbdisbeurbvtisjbsgsneosbsyneyjsosnsjdbdynsvsidbfindbzhndhdushdhushdbud

*key spams in frustration*

THE BRIDGE

ARCHIE LEFT DOUXIE HIS LONG LIFE FRIEND AND PLATONIC SOULMATE (NOBODY CAN CONVINCE ME THAT NOT JOW FAMILIARS WORK IDC)

YES HE WAS STAYING WITH HIS DAD AND I RESPECT THAT

BUT GODDAMN IT CHARLIE

CHARLEMAGNE COULD HAVE JUST LIT THE TROLLS FOLLOWING THEM ON FIRE AND THEN FLOWN OUT

THE PORTAL WOULD HAVE CLOSED AT THE SAME TIME

OR THEY COULD HAVE FREED THE TROLLS

EITHER WAY

THEY COULD HAVE GOTTEN OUT

Titan Nari

I was so scared when Douxie nearly passes out from lack of oxygen trying to save her

Claire did a great job and I like her but I feel like they're overpowering her without developing her

Nari and Skrael's battle was a cinematic masterpiece

Coach Lawrence seriously needs a break

NARI DYING WAS UNACCEPTABLE

DOUXIE BEING HELD BACK FROM HELPING HER WAS UNACCEPTABLE

"No more running" destroyed me

I AM STILL NOT OK

I DON'T THINK I EVER WILL BE

The 9th configuration

FOUND. FAMILY. CENTRAL.

I'M THE CHOSEN ONE BUT I CAN'T DO IT ALONE

YES

The Final Battle

I don't even know what to say

Aja. QUEEN.

RIP Varvatos

Rip Douxie that fall would have really fucking hurt

He definitely had broken ribs from that

I'm surprised he could walk after even while being supported against someone else to stand

Jim should have just stabbed Bellroc instead of talking

Jim should not have been able to walk and run perfectly fine after being stabbed even with all the adrenaline

Toby WTF MAN

GOOD JOB BUT FUCKING HELL

I LEGIT CAN'T EVEN FIGURE OUT HOW IT HAPPENED

THE MOVIE CAME OUT 4 DAYS AGO (IT TOOK ME FOREVER TO WRITE THE RANT DONT JUDGE) AND I'VE WATCHED IT 5 TIMES AND I STILL DON'T KNOW HOW I MISSED IT EACH TIME

HOW DID TOBY CRASH?!?!

ANYWAY

TOBY DYING WAS NOT ACCEPTABLE

JIM SCREAMING OUT HIS NAME AS SOON AS HE REALIZED TOBY WASNT THERE

BLINKY AND ARGH LOOK OF PANIC AND WORRY CUZ THEY REALIZED TOBY DIDNT COME BACK WITH JIM

DOUXIE REALIZING HE FAILED TO PROTECT SOMEONE ELSE IMPORTANT TO HIM (EVEN IF HE DOESNT HAVE MUCH OF AN ESTABLISHED RELATIONSHIP WITH TOBY, I REFUSE TO BELIEVE HE DIDN'T ADOPT THEM ALL AS HIS YOUNGER SIBLINGS)

"Always was, always will be" hurt my entire soul

The Time stone

This frustrated me so much it took me 3 days to write just this bit

Go back in time and save everyone?

Yes! Awesome!

Go back to the start the start

Also, I love and adore Toby

BUT IT MAKES NO SENSE

JIM GIVING THE AMULET AND RESPONSIBILITIES AWAY WHEN HE HAS 2 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE AND KNOWS ALL OF HIS MISTAKES AND HOW TO FIX THEM

WTF

AS I SAID I LOVE TOBY AND I LIKE HIM ACHIEVING STUFF

BUT HES NOT TREATED AS BADLY AS THE FANDOM ACTS LIKE HE IS

AND LOGICALLY JIM MADE A STUPID DECISION CONSIDERING WHAT HE KNOWS

I get that he was tired of being the trollhunter

Largely because he was tired of not thinking he would do a good enough job

But odds are Toby will make some of the same mistakes and they'll be right back in that same position except maybe Claire will die that time around

And if you're sick of the trauma and responsibility of it than why would you dump it on your best friend

Once again I say, it was an illogical and dumb decision

I WILL BE RUNNING TO FANFICTIONS TO ESCAPE THIS CANON

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chockfullofsecrets · 3 years

Text

Critical Role: Unnecessary

(Read on AO3)

Rating: Gen

Summary: The thought stays with her the next time she visits Nicodranas, though, and she determines to make an experiment of it. Maybe without the shoulder bumping - she is here as an emissary, after all.

Allura's new mage friend in Wildemount seems a little lonely and very reckless. She takes it upon herself to investigate.

Wordcount: 2.3k

A/N: MORE WIZARDS

one more @ticklesofcolor event fill for @ticklishnonsense - i am starting to think that assigning us each other in this event is taking the shared braincells to a whole new level 😅 Prompt was “Allura, early in her friendship with Yussa, discovers he's very touch-starved and very ticklish, and takes advantage of this.”

---

The first time it happens, Allura is fairly sure that she’s just caused an intercontinental diplomatic incident.

She can hardly fault herself, though. There are certain instincts one develops when one regularly dines with adventurers and has the pleasure of being married to a halfling paladin who takes particular delight in tackling her every so often. Her arms are full of books, newly on loan from the only mage she’s found in Wildemount that doesn’t seem to be completely obsessed with politics, and she needs to bid her new friend farewell somehow. It seems perfectly logical to knock her shoulder lightly against his as she brightly thanks him for the pleasure of their meeting and turns to leave.

Apparently, this is not a logic that Arcanist Errenis shares.

The air itself seems to still as he stares at her. Stares some more. Then reaches up, cautiously, and presses his palm against one silk-covered shoulder as if he’s reaching for some unidentified magical artifact.

Allura winces. She can’t see any of the signifiers of elven disgust that Vex has mentioned to her, being uniquely suited to identify them, but to have such a reaction - “Oh - oh dear, I apologize. A rather uncouth habit I’ve picked up from my wife, I’m afraid.”

And she’s going to have quite a time confessing that particular sidestep to Kima later, but Errenis holds up the same hand to cut her off and lifts his chin, instantly settling into his usual placid composure with enough ease to lull her heartbeat back down to a reasonable rate. “No harm done, Arcanist Vysoren, merely… unnecessary.”

He blinks, slow as melted gold, and frowns lightly at her for a moment before turning away and gesturing sharply for a nearby tea set. “I trust that you can activate the circle yourself?”

She can, as well as take a hint - bemused, she casts without looking and steps backwards into the glowing circle, barely catching a last glimpse of him reaching for his shoulder again.

---

She tells her wife.

“Kima - Kima, darling, I’m glad you think this is funny, but it’s hardly helpful-”

Kima sighs a little, wiping a tear from her eye, and wraps her arms a little more securely around Allura’s waist where they’re lounging together. “Aw, Al, the poor thing’s just lonely! You antisocial wizards and your pretty little towers and your, what was it called? Oh, intellectual property-”

“I am perfectly social,” Allura says, prim, and promptly ruins it when she can’t help smiling at Kima as she laces their fingers together. “I certainly became acquainted quickly with you, didn’t I?”

“Oh?” Kima responds, catching Allura’s other hand in hers. Her eyes brighten in that unique combination of challenge and affection that Allura will never tire of seeing. “Is that how you remember it?”

Allura sniffs. “Well, if you’d like a refresher - mmm-”

And, well, it’s a little hard to remember anything after that.

---

The thought stays with her the next time she visits Nicodranas, though, and she determines to make an experiment of it. Maybe without the shoulder bumping - she is here as an emissary, after all.

Acquiring an adequate sample size becomes. Frustrating. He levitates everything, removing any chance to pat his hand in thanks when he offers her a cup of fragrant cardamom tea or to tap her knee against his as they pass a tome back and forth.

They are making progress, though, equally enthralled by the arcane, and it’s genuine excitement that does it in the end. A particularly difficult passage of an ancient spell untangles under their combined effort, bandying translated syllables back and forth with increasing urgency until they fall into blessed, triumphant silence, and she sweeps over and claps him between the shoulders in celebration. “Wonderful! You know, this might be quite useful for facilitating crop growth in arid land-”

He freezes under her touch in what seems like genuine shock. She pats him again and he lets out a little surprised huff, ears twitching confusedly even as his gaze remains pointed firmly ahead. It’s like blowing dust off a statue that hasn’t been touched for centuries.

Which, considering his introduction - I have been a practitioner of the arcane arts in seclusion for over 200 years, he’d told her, neither proud nor regretful - may be somewhat too close to the truth.

He sways back slightly towards her when she retreats to the other side of the room, shoulders rising and falling at a degree just shy of unpracticed. Interesting.

She does it again, and again, over the next few months - shoulders, back, arms, anywhere suitably innocuous, watching closely for any sign of annoyance. He is, after all, far older than her and perfectly capable of enforcing his own preferences. To say nothing of the way he tilts his head, when he’s deep in thought, in a way that seems so other that such petty mortal things as touch might be of no concern to him at all.

At one point, her hands are full of charcoal as they successfully cast another new spell and all she can do is smile at him. He glances over at her, implacable as always, but there’s a nearly imperceptible tightness as he turns away that she just barely knows him well enough to catch.

The next time, he brusquely commands her to put everything down before he casts. It’s sweet - nearly as sweet as the surprise on his face when she does so and completes the spell before he can.

---

There is, of course, increasingly apparent over time, Yussa’s irrepressible lack of instinct for danger. There have been fires. There have been many frantic castings of Dispel Magic. Allura starts to understand why his faithful goblin manservant is constantly twitching.

Today, she arrives in his study with a tired smile and sore fingers. “Yussa, I’m sorry - I’m afraid that I haven’t got a Dispel in me today, I’ve been Identifying a cache of arcane items all morning.”

“No matter.” Yussa waves off her raised eyebrow with a casual flick of his hand that serves the double purpose of summoning a tea set from thin air. “Tea?”

She accepts the cup. “Are you certain that we shouldn’t wait?”

“Unnecessary. Come.”

His study is as brilliant as always, cramped only in the sense that combined the artifacts lining his walls hold enough arcane power to reduce a rather large portion of the coast to rubble.

She’s a little jealous, honestly.

Yussa plucks a little beaker of gold dust up in one hand and a crisp sheet of paper in the other, beckoning her over with a brusque tilt of his chin that would be highly annoying from anyone else. “Now, there have been whispers of Kryn spies using a spell that renders objects immovable to cover their retreat on multiple occasions. I believe I’ve finally been able to recreate it, to some degree.”

“Oh!” Any lingering exhaustion forgotten, applications are already racing in her mind. “How interesting, please show me!”

He hands over the page and she scans the runes eagerly as he flicks his long sleeves back over his wrists and prepares to cast. “A little gold dust, and - it seems quite inelegant, at the moment, as if they are using some frame we have yet to find reference of, but-”

He gestures towards an empty box on his desk, sending gold dust and bright energy scattering. For a moment, there is only light.

And then, the spell shrinks back onto him, sinking into the fabric of his golden robes. Allura gapes - she has wondered, certainly, but to wear actual gold on a daily basis, especially when casting a spell that has it as a component-

Yussa stands very, very stiffly.

She presses her lips together as tightly as she can to hold back the surprised, giddy laughter brewing in the back of her throat. “You - the components-”

The sleeve of his robe looks slightly duller. The box, on the other hand, sparkles merrily under its powdering of gold dust.

Yussa sighs at her as she fails entirely to contain her amusement. “I seem to recall that you are lacking spell slots at the moment.”

She takes a deep breath, regaining her composure, and shakes her head. “Maybe I can go fetch someone-”

He grimaces instantly. “Absolutely not.”

Both of them spend a fruitless moment tugging at the robes, but it seems that Yussa has indeed managed to create a temporarily immovable object. He sighs again, after a minute, and lets his hands flap loosely against the stiff material. “Well, it’s only meant to last for an hour - I’m sure we have a Teleport spell stored somewhere around here, if you would call Wensforth-”

Allura bristles. “I can’t just leave you like this!”

“An hour passes quickly with meditation-”

“No, no, certainly we can do something.” She steps away and paces around him. “You know, your robes are quite, ah, voluminous - do you think you could squirm out, perhaps?”

Yussa sniffs in clear distaste. “I’m quite sure there’s no need.”

Really, she shouldn’t find his arrogance half as endearing as she does. “Oh come, Arcanist Errenis,” she teases, smiling despite herself, “surely you can do better than that, for a friend.” She crouches in front of him, heedless of her dress trailing onto the floor, and tries to gauge the possibility herself from what she can see through the open front of his robes - his legs, dressed in equally fine trousers, shift indignantly as she does. “Here, just bend your knees a little-”

She prods lightly at the back of one of them, hoping to spur him into action, and Yussa jumps. “Arcanist Vysoren-” he begins, and - there, almost unrecognizable for its novelty, a thread of nervousness creeps into his voice.

Allura tends more towards caution than mischief in most cases - a necessity, with the company she keeps - but she’s already grinning as she leans back a little to catch his eye. “Oh, this will be quite simple after all, I think.”

Yussa’s ears twitch up in clear, startled embarrassment as his legs attempt to press themselves to the back of his robes. “Arcanist Vysoren, I would thank you to - mmM-” She reaches for him again, sending one hand to wriggle behind the vulnerable joint and the other to scratch gently across his kneecap, and watches happily as his entire leg buckles under the attack. “Ah - haaah-”

The tremulous gasp that wrenches from him as she takes hold of his other knee to repeat the process is music to her ears - clearly, what her experiment has been needing all this time is a more direct approach. “This will be a little faster if you help,” she tells him, and crowds her fingertips up into the tender dip of flesh before he has a chance to respond.

“Vysoren-” Yussa tries, as tersely as he can with a frantic whine climbing up behind his words, and promptly cuts himself off as his other knee gives out. His robes are, in fact, made more for their drapery than their fit, and as what could graciously be called standing dissolves into ticklish squirming he’s slowly but surely sliding out of them and onto the floor. “Ihi - I can handle this from here, don’t-”

“Don’t what?” she responds innocently. The bottom of his silken shirt, neatly tucked into his waistband and glimmering even in the dim light, sinks into view. She elects to confirm its luxurious quality by prodding along the softness of his belly until he sputters and curses and drops another few inches, his indoor slippers sliding uselessly against the tiled floor. “You’ll have to offer an alternative solution - we’re a bit limited, at the moment.”

He’s laughing outright now, high and stilted and quite a bit more ticklish than she expected he might be. The way she’s kneading at his sides certainly isn’t helping. “Ahaaaaha - the damned - unnecessary - eheeh! -”

“Unnecessary,” she says, raising her voice enough that he can hopefully hear her through all the layers of fabric he’s trapped in, “would be insisting on testing a spell without taking any of the proper precautions beforehand. This, I fear, is entirely necessary, Yussa.”

And fun, besides, but there’s no need to tell him that. Besides, it seems that he shares the sentiment somewhat - she hasn’t been kicked in the face yet, and he’s hardly trying to get away from her hands, for all his grumbling. She wonders, absently, if he might allow her to do this again, the same way he’s slowly becoming accustomed to her casual friendly overtures.

He’s far too ticklish to let her wonder for long, though - it’s hardly a moment more before he squirms his way entirely free, tumbling nearly into her lap and grabbing desperately at her hands with his own elegant fingers. His face is flushed with laughter, hair falling into his eyes, and he looks like an entirely different person as he flops tiredly away from her and curls up on the floor.

It’s enough to send Allura straight back into her own startled amusement - she reaches for him, unable to help herself, and smooths a hand over his back. “Alright, alright,” she soothes, “you’re free, no harm done-”

Yussa grumbles something under his breath and twists to butt his head up against her hand instead. Allura nearly freezes in shock - and so does he, realizing, eyes wide just under the heel of her palm.

They stare. Yussa’s jaw works for a moment. “Your hand,” he says, glacially slow, “is on my head.”

“You put it there - oh, fuck it,” Allura decides, and leans forwards to drag her friend in a proper hug. “That could have been much worse, you fool. ”

Yussa stiffens and then relaxes all at once into the hug, bonelessly dropping his head onto her shoulder - he’s breathing unevenly, still, the aftereffects of laughter working their way through. “This is unnecessary, too,” he murmurs. “But I offer you my thanks, regardless.”

Chin resting atop his head, Allura smiles and plans a slight revision to her experiment.

#critical role #tickling #allura vysoren #yussa errenis #chocfic #i hear that allura is in campaign 1 and so i apologize in advance for whatever i got wrong but. wizards good.

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tigerkirby215 · 3 years

Text

5e Katarina, the Sinister Blade build (League of Legends)

(Artwork by Riot Games. In b4 Tumblr gives me ToS for this picture.)

In my defense I had this build planned since pre-Tasha’s. With Katarina being absolutely nuts in preseason right now along with her just generally being one of League’s most popular champs I’d have to get around to making a build for her eventually.

Look it was either her or Zac. The only other build I really want to do right now is Miss Fortune and truthfully I’m kinda stumped on her. This build isn’t a build it’s a cry for help.

GOALS

Preparation - We’ll need to always be ready for a fight, with a weapon in hand and ways to rush in.

Shunpo - We’ll also need a way to jump on our foes, or jump away.

Death Lotus - When push comes to shove we’ll need to shred through everyone close by spinning and throwing daggers at a rapid pace!

RACE

Katarina is a human but with some special, magical talents. I’m sure by now people know my aversion to Variant Humans and my love of Eberron Dragonmarks so the Mark of Finding is perfect for finding marks and ending them.

With the Mark of Finding you get some Ability Score Improvements but thanks to Tasha’s we can get a +2 to our Intelligence and a +1 to our Dexterity. You also have Darkvision up to 60 feet, and Hunter’s Intuition, letting you add a d4 to Perception and Survival checks. Finally Finder’s Magic giving you some innate spells.

ABILITY SCORES

15; DEXTERITY - You’re an assassin who hops, skips, and jumps around the battlefield.

14; INTELLIGENCE - For whatever reason Katerina does AP damage? I mean she did. Now she builds Kraken Slayer because lol Rito balance.

13; CHARISMA - People don’t only main you because you’re strong.

12; WISDOM - Kata in lore is a bit of a hot-head but Wisdom is attached to many skills that an assassin needs.

10; CONSTITUTION - You’re a squishy midlaner.

8; STRENGTH - We simply don’t need Strength and with your build I doubt you have much. Even if jumping around like that requires a lot of muscles in the legs and chest.

BACKGROUND

So apparently Katerina is part of a Noxian Noble family? Regardless as a Noble you gain proficiency in History but I’d suggest swapping your Persuasion proficiency with Intimidation instead. You also get proficiency with a gaming set and a language of your choice.

Thanks to your noble birth you have a Position of Privilege, meaning that other nobles will welcome you within their circles and common folk will do their best to please you in order to avoid getting a dagger in their throat. You can even secure an audience with a noble if you need to! Perhaps you need to put a knife in their throat? An assassin doesn’t ask questions.

(Artwork by Riot Games)

THE BUILD

LEVEL 1 - ROGUE 1

Starting off as a Rogue for skill proficiencies also because yeah duh. As a Rogue you get proficiency in four skills from the Rogue list: Acrobatics is an obvious choice, Athletics will help your poor Strength score, Perception will help you spot incoming hooded assassins, and Stealth will let you do Rogue things. Rogue things like Sneak Attack if an ally is near an enemy or you have advantage, granting you an extra d6 on the attack roll.

You also get Expertise in two of your skills: both Stealth and Acrobatics make sense for an assassin. Speaking of assassin Thieves’ Cant will let you communicate with them in a way that your enemies can’t understand. And to top it off Finder’s Magic you can cast Hunter’s Mark once per Long Rest. Smite and Ignite to get First Blood.

LEVEL 2 - ROGUE 2

Second level Rogues get Cunning Action to Dash, Disengage, or Hide as a Bonus Action. "Never play fair."

LEVEL 3 - ROGUE 3

Third level Rogues get to choose their Roguish Archetype and there’s two important things about your knives:

They do magic damage (for some reason.)

You throw them a lot.

With that in mind we shall be going for the Soulknife from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything. As a Soulknife you get Psionic Power for a pool of d6 Psionic Energy die that can be used for a variety of features. Psi-Bolstered Knack will let you boost your ability checks as long as you’re proficient, and Psychic Whispers will let you keep assassination plans to team chat.

Of course what we’re really here for is Psychic Blades, a magic d6 psychic damage knife that you can make when you attack which can be dual-wielded and thrown up to 60 feet. You can also attack again with your Bonus Action if you already stabbed with your main action, but the extra attack will only do a d4 instead of a d6.

Speaking of magic: you also get Locate Object from Finder’s Magic. Perhaps not as useful as Find Person, but thievery isn’t beneath you. Your Sneak Attack also increases to 2d6.

LEVEL 4 - ROGUE 4

4th level Rogues get an Ability Score Improvement: turns out Dexterity is pretty important for a Rogue so increase that by 2.

(Artwork by Jennifer Wuestling. Made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 5 - WIZARD 1

Time for an AP boost. First level Wizards get Spellcasting because what else did you think they got? You learn three cantrips and six leveled spells when starting out as a Wizard, even if you can only prepare a number of spells equal to your Wizard level plus your Intelligence modifier:

CANTRIPS

Instead of making a dinky d4 knife empower it with Booming Blade for some Thunder damage, and even more damage if the enemy moves.

To twirl around with Voracity Sword Burst will strike everyone near one of your daggers with your knives.

For a long ranged damage tool that inflicts Grievous Wounds Chill Touch will let you make sure your lane opponent doesn’t run away and heal up.

SPELLS

Mage Armor will help you avoid a few more hits.

For a Bouncing Blade (sorta) take Ice Knife to hit your target and anyone close to them.

For a shield thanks to Gunblade (like it’s TFT) take False Life to bolster yourself somewhat.

Disguise Self will be helpful for any infiltration missions.

Detect Magic likewise is useful to locate any magical traps.

Every good Rogue has a backup plan: Feather Fall is always useful in a pinch.

You also get Arcane Recovery, allowing you to recover spell slots with a combined total level of half your Wizard level.

LEVEL 6 - WIZARD 2

Second level Wizards get to choose their Arcane Tradition. There is actually a school for magic knives and that school is the art of Bladesinging! As a Bladesinger you get Training in War and Song for proficiency in Performance along with a one-handed melee weapon of your choice: for whatever reason Rogues don’t get proficiency in Scimitars so grab that I guess?

But much more importantly you can invoke a Bladesong as a Bonus Action, which lasts for 1 minute but ends early if you are incapacitated. (Or if you don medium or heavy armor or a shield, or if you use two hands to make an attack with a weapon. I guess.) You can also dismiss the Bladesong at any time with no action required.

While your Bladesong is active you gain a bonus to your AC equal to your Intelligence modifier, your walking speed increases by 10 feet, you have advantage on Acrobatics checks, and you gain a bonus to Concentration checks equal to your Intelligence modifier. You can activate Bladesong a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses of it when you finish a long rest.

You can also learn more spells like Color Spray for a getaway option, or Cause Fear of incoming ganks.

LEVEL 7 - WIZARD 3

Third level Wizards can learn second level spells like Mirror Image to be everywhere at once, and Misty Step for legally not Flash.

LEVEL 8 - WIZARD 4

4th level Wizards get an Ability Score Improvement: more Dexterity means more AC and deadlier stabs with your knife.

You can also learn more spells like Invisibility for some Duskblade resets, and Enhance Ability (ty Tasha’s) to make sure you’re the best around. And you can learn another cantrip like Prestidigitation for some generic utility sorcery.

LEVEL 9 - WIZARD 5

5th level Wizards can learn third level spells like Haste to up your APM, and Spirit Shroud to make all your stabs all the deadlier.

LEVEL 10 - WIZARD 6

At 6th level you get an Extra Attack as a Bladesinger, but unlike most Extra Attacks you can also cast a cantrip along with attacking! The interesting thing about this is that (rules as written) you can attack twice after casting Booming Blade with this! And depending on your DM you might even still have your Cunning Action!

And on the subject of spells you can learn two more such as Clairvoyance for some Farsight Alterations, and Nondetection to... not be detected...

(Artwork by Atey Ghailan. Made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 11 - ROGUE 5

5th level Rogues get Uncanny Dodge. When you’re hit with an attack you can use your reaction to halve the damage. Additionally your Psionic Energy die increases to a d8, and your Sneak Attack increases to 3d6.

LEVEL 12 - ROGUE 6

6th level Rogues get Expertise in two more skills: Perception will help you avoid ganks and Intimidation will help you extract information.

LEVEL 13 - ROGUE 7

7th level Rogues get Evasion. If you’re forced to make a Dexterity save you can make some pro plays to dodge, taking no damage on a successful save and half damage on a failed save.

Your Sneak Attack also increases to 4d6, so you can jump onto them after dodging their skill shot.

LEVEL 14 - ROGUE 8

8th level Rogues get another Ability Score Improvement: since your Dexterity is maxed let’s invest in that Intelligence... sorta. The Observant feat will let you increase your Intelligence by 1 along with granting a +5 bonus to passive Perception and Investigation so you can watch those wards, and the ability to read lips! Definitely helpful for an assassin.

(Artwork by Katie “TeaTime” De Sousa. Made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 15 - ROGUE 9

Hey how about we get your actual abilities at total level 15? Finally with level 9 in Soul KInife you get Soul Blades for two new abilities that use your Psionic Energy die. Homing Strikes will let you add your Psionic Energy die to an attack roll if you miss, and Psychic Teleportation will let you throw out a knife and teleport to it!

Something something read how the ability works yourself because these are guides on how to make a character and I won’t tell you what every class in Tasha’s does. Oh your Sneak Attack also increases to 5d6 now.

LEVEL 16 - WIZARD 7

7th level Wizards get 4th level spells like Phantasmal Killer to make your own jungler (one who’ll actually gank!), and Dimension Door to Teleport into lane. Or out!

LEVEL 17 - WIZARD 8

Level 8? How about an ASI? You may notice that we have two uneven ability scores: increase both your Intelligence and Charisma by 1.

You can also learn more spells but there honestly isn’t much I want from fourth level so hop back to level 3 for Sending. But you can also take Greater Invisibility for some Duskblade resets. Look I just really need a 5th level spell but it’s hard to justify magic on a champion who throws knives and nothing else.

LEVEL 18 - WIZARD 9

Time to finally get the last ability we’re missing: Death Lotus. Or more precisely Steel Wind Strike to hit everyone with your daggers and then maybe Shunpo to them after the fact. Speaking of Shunpo for seemingly unlimited jumps take Far Step, allowing you to be everywhere at once. Just know that you’ll only have one 5th level slot.

(Artwork by Esben Lash Rasmussen. Made for Riot Games.)

LEVEL 19 - ROGUE 10

Picking up our last two levels in Rogue: level 10 means another ASI. Capped off Intelligence woo!

LEVEL 20 - ROGUE 11

11th level Rogues get Reliable Talent, meaning that you can’t roll below a 10 on any skill you’re proficient in. As a capstone skill let’s check what the minimum roll you can get on your skills is:

27 on Acrobatics and Stealth

24 on Intimidation

23 on Perception

21 on History

18 on Performance (Bladesinger lul)

15 on Athletics

And to top it off your Psionic Energy die increases to a d10, along with your Sneak Attack capping off at 6d6!

FINAL BUILD

PROS

They fear my weapons? I am the weapon - Regardless of your choice of tools you are extremely deadly. On one hand 6d6 sneak attack daggers you can apply 3d8 Booming Blade damage to, and on the other hand plenty of potent spells like Haste and Spirit Shroud.

If you run, you won't see me stab you! - You are also incredibly mobile with Misty Step, Far Step, Psychic Teleportation, Bladesong, and just general Cunning Actions. Not to mention that Bladesong gives a big boost to AC which combines well with Uncanny Dodge and Evasion.

A victory is sweetest when it leads to another - Rogues are meant to be skilled professionals and you are certainly that. The skills you are proficient in can be boosted by psionics. Oh and 28 Passive Perception thanks to Observant is just a little bit nutty.

CONS

Ready for trouble? - While you have many a skill you have many more that are lacking. You can put on a mean face sure, but for an important check like Arcana your psionic potential won’t save you.

Better dead than dull - Your spell slots are limited, and quite notably you only have one 5th level slot for Death Lotus IE Steel Wind Strike. While magic can supplement you nicely remember to ration yourself appropriately.

Come on, live a little... while you can! - You know what class doesn’t have a lot of health? Wizards, and half your levels are in Wizard. With a 10 in CON and most of your hit die being d6s your enemies won’t even need to hit you to Power Word Kill you.

But as an assassin you prove why your house is the best in the business. Talk is cheap and you’re always prepared: go in with knives at the ready, take out your target and anyone in their way before slipping out unscathed. You can always reset after a rest; just be sure to remember your cooldowns.

(Artwork by West Studios. Made for Riot Games.)

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