#imagine being born solely to be a weapon to use against something not even god will face

[limeinaltime]

You were born for this

[leosmiserables]

this has been said soooo many times before but MAG 139… what a fucking episode. imagine being agnes montague, having been born for the sole purpose of being a power of destruction and only being able to feed on other people’s suffering. being trapped forever as a young woman (”agnes had reached adulthood but would age no further”), being forced to cope with all the power inside of you but not being able to do anything about it (”so much fire and destruction trapped raging inside her as she simply sat, placid, waiting for… something”). being more powerful than your creators (”even some of our most devout could not touch her for more than a few seconds”) but not being able to in any way doubt them or rebel against them, because if you don’t play out the role they made for you, what’s the point of your existence? to them, you’ve never been a person, you’re a weapon for them to use. bred for a specific purpose that you have to give your whole life to, and if you question it for a second you might as well die. but you’re also a young woman. waiting for something to happen. a god with no free will. an incredibly powerful being whose life, because of this, never could have been her own. ”though i couldn’t tell you if she loved her as a god, or as a woman. or as both”.

[turnpage]

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generator here quotes compiled from here inspired by

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❨1❩ ❛ They are dreams, but I’m too out of control, I lose myself in them, and I’ve already lost too much to let them take over. ❜
 ❨2❩ ❛ Sometimes human places create inhuman monsters. ❜ ❨3❩ ❛ I'm not gonna hurt ya. I'm just going to bash your brains in. ❜ ❨4❩ ❛ Monsters are real. Ghosts are too. They live inside of us, and sometimes, they win. ❜ ❨5❩ ❛ The world's a hard place. It doesn't care. It doesn't hate you and me, but it doesn't love us, either. ❜ ❨6❩ ❛ The tears that heal are also the tears that scald and scourge. ❜ ❨7❩ ❛ Pull your act together and just go on. ❜ ❨8❩ ❛ I had never dreamed there could be so much pain in a life when there is nothing physically wrong. I hurt all the time. ❜ ❨9❩ ❛ Tough old world, baby. If you're not bolted together tightly, you're gonna shake, rattle, and roll before you turn thirty. ❜ ❨10❩ ❛ Are you sure self-pity is a luxury you can afford? ❜ ❨11❩ ❛ Truth comes out. In the end it always comes out. ❜ ❨12❩ ❛ Living by your wits is always knowing where the wasps are. ❜ ❨13❩ ❛ No matter where you go, the same asshole gets off the plane. ❜ ❨14❩ ❛ We sometimes need to create unreal monsters and bogies to stand in for all the things we fear in our real lives. ❜ ❨15❩ ❛ That’s your job in this hard world, to keep your love alive and see that you get on, no matter what. ❜ ❨16❩ ❛ Human nature, baby. Grab it and growl. ❜ ❨17❩ ❛ God wiped snot out of his nose and that was you. ❜ ❨18❩ ❛ Run away. Quick. And remember how much I love you. ❜ ❨19❩ ❛ How many times, over how many years, have I—a grown adult—asked for the mercy of another chance? ❜ ❨20❩ ❛ I was suddenly so sick of myself, so revolted. ❜ ❨21❩ ❛ You listen to me. I’m going to talk to you about it this once and never again this same way. ❜ ❨22❩ ❛ But those pieces, they’ll never fit just the same way again. Never in this world. ❜ ❨23❩ ❛ Dying is a part of living. You have to keep tuning in to that if you expect to be a whole person. ❜ ❨24❩ ❛ Officious little prick. ❜ ❨25❩ ❛ I’ve been sleepwalking again, my dear. — The plants are moving under the rug. ❜ ❨26❩ ❛ How I wish you were fear. ❜ ❨27❩ ❛ But it was a dreadful kind of curiosity, the kind that makes you peek through your fingers during the scariest parts of a scary movie. ❜ ❨28❩ ❛ All we have is time, you know. An eternity of time. Or shall we end it? Might as well. After all, we're missing the party. ❜ ❨29❩ ❛ We all remember our pleasant dreams more clearly than the scary ones. ❜ ❨30❩ ❛ The way things should be and the way things are hardly ever get together. ❜ ❨31❩ ❛ Got to be regular if you want to be happy. ❜ ❨32❩ ❛ But in a solitary life, there are rare moments when another soul dips near yours, as stars once a year brush the earth. ❜ ❨33❩ ❛ He showed me his scars, and in return he let me pretend that I had none. ❜ ❨34❩ ❛ Humbling women seems to me a chief pastime of poets. As if there can be no story unless we crawl and weep. ❜ ❨35❩ ❛ It is a common saying that women are delicate creatures, flowers, eggs, anything that may be crushed in a moment's carelessness.  ❜ ❨36❩ ❛ If I had ever believed it, I no longer do. ❜ ❨37❩ ❛ I thought once that gods are the opposite of death, but I see now they are more dead than anything, for they are unchanging, and can hold nothing in their hands. ❜ ❨38❩ ❛ I cannot bear this world a moment longer. ❜ ❨39❩ ❛ I have a better idea. I will do as I please. ❜ ❨40❩ ❛ All my life has been murk and depths, but I am not a part of that dark water. I am a creature within it. ❜ ❨41❩ ❛ You cannot know how frightened gods are of pain. There is nothing more foreign to them, and so nothing they ache more deeply to see. ❜ ❨42❩ ❛ When we are young, we think ourselves the first to have each feeling in the world. ❜ ❨43❩ ❛ When I was born, the word for what I was did not exist. ❜ ❨44❩ ❛ But perhaps no parent can truly see their child. When we look we see only the mirror of our own faults. ❜ ❨45❩ ❛ I will not be like a bird bred in a cage, too dull to fly even when the door stands open. ❜ ❨46❩ ❛ This is what it means to swim in the tide, to walk the earth and feel it touch your feet. This is what it means to be alive. ❜ ❨47❩ ❛ You threw me to the crows, but it turns out I prefer them to you. ❜ ❨48❩ ❛ Yet because I knew nothing, nothing was beneath me. ❜ ❨49❩ ❛ If now I am wise, it is only because I have been fool enough for a hundred lifetimes. ❜ ❨50❩ ❛ You can teach a viper to eat from your hands, but you cannot take away how much it likes to bite. ❜ ❨51❩ ❛ Give me the blade. Some things are worth spilling blood for. ❜ ❨52❩ ❛ I have been old and stern for so long, carved with regrets and years like a monolith. But that is only a shape I’ve been poured into. I do not have to keep it. ❜ ❨53❩ ❛ I wake sometimes in the dark terrified by my life's precariousness, its thready breath. ❜ ❨54❩ ❛ Understanding the world is a matter of keeping very still and showing no emotions, leaving room for others to reveal themselves. ❜ ❨55❩ ❛ Beneath the smooth, familiar face of things is another that waits to tear the world in two. ❜ ❨56❩ ❛ The truth is, men make terrible pigs. ❜ ❨57❩ ❛ My father has never been able to imagine the world without himself in it. ❜ ❨58❩ ❛ This is the grief that makes our kind choose to be stones and trees rather than flesh. ❜ ❨59❩ ❛ Witches are not so delicate. ❜ ❨60❩ ❛ Those who fight against prophecy only draw it more tightly around their throats. ❜ ❨61❩ ❛ I learned that I could bend the world to my will, as a bow is bent for an arrow. I would have done that toil a thousand times to keep such power in my hands. ❜ ❨62❩ ❛ There's the story, then there's the real story, then there's the story of how the story came to be told. Then there's what you leave out of the story. Which is part of the story too. ❜ ❨63❩ ❛ The best way of being kind to bears is not to be very close to them. ❜ ❨64❩ ❛ Life is warped. I'm just in sync. ❜ ❨65❩ ❛ Now it's a whisper from the past. ❜ ❨66❩ ❛ But hatred and viciousness are addictive. You can get high on them. Once you've had a little, you start shaking if you don't get more. ❜ ❨67❩ ❛ Why is it always such a surprise? The moon. Even though we know it's coming. Every time we see it, it makes us pause, and hush. ❜ ❨68❩ ❛ Perfection exacts a price, but it's the imperfect who pay it. ❜ ❨69❩ ❛ What is 'belief' but a willingness to suspend the negatives?  ❜ ❨70❩ ❛ I have scars, inside me. ❜ ❨71❩ ❛ The dead are not entirely dead but are alive in a different way; a paler way admittedly, and somewhat darker. ❜ ❨72❩ ❛ However dark, a darkness with voices in it is better than a silent void. ❜ ❨73❩ ❛ Amazing how quickly the past becomes idyllic. ❜ ❨74❩ ❛ It is another way of saying tough luck. To people you aren’t going to help out. ❜ ❨75❩ ❛ I'm waiting, far off in the future. ❜ ❨76❩ ❛ The only sure camouflage is unpredictability. ❜ ❨77❩ ❛ There are so many of them, and each one of them is doing part of the killing, whether they know it or not. ❜ ❨78❩ ❛ First rule: limit bloodshed by making sure that none of your own gets spilled. ❜ ❨79❩ ❛ I long to swim in liquid moonlight. ❜ ❨80❩ ❛ That's right, I don’t like to be summoned on trivial matters. ❜ ❨81❩ ❛ The part that really made me happy was that you wanted me to be happy. ❜ ❨82❩ ❛ Cut that part out of us: the grinning, elemental malice. Begin us anew. ❜ ❨83❩ ❛ Where there are wars, there will be crows, the carrion-fanciers. And ravens too, the warbirds, the eyeball gourmands. And vultures, the holy birds of yore, old connoisseurs of rot. ❜ ❨84❩ ❛ At last. It's you. ❜ ❨85❩ ❛ No, you will not be cooked on a fire when you die. Because you are not a fish. ❜ ❨86❩ ❛ Take what the moment offers. Don’t close doors. Be thankful. ❜ ❨87❩ ❛ How many others have stood in this place? Left behind, with all gone, all swept away. ❜ ❨88❩ ❛ Is it disapproval or extreme lust? With some men it’s hard to tell the difference. ❜ ❨89❩ ❛ My hair was driving me crazy, but then … I died. ❜ ❨90❩ ❛ Seek and ye shall find, eventually. And you found. You’re right, I don’t dispute that. Sorry. ❜ ❨91❩ ❛ Everything digests, and is digested. ❜ ❨92❩ ❛ My head was once a filing cabinet. Now it’s a flurry of papers, floating on a draft. ❜ ❨93❩ ❛ You cannot keep bumping your head against reality and saying it is not there. ❜ ❨94❩ ❛ I have a feeling that inside you somewhere, there’s something nobody knows about. ❜ ❨95❩ ❛ And if I don’t want to die, I’ve got to start living. ❜ ❨96❩ ❛ The world is a beautiful place. Don’t forget that. And don’t miss it. ❜ ❨97❩ ❛ I was fighting for my life. So I must not want to die. ❜ ❨98❩ ❛ Something’s happening to me, through me, something dangerous and new. ❜ ❨99❩ ❛ It’s taken root, a poison tree; it’s grown, fanning out, vines winding round my gut, my lungs, my heart. ❜ ❨100❩ ❛ We’re interpreters. We’re translators. ❜ ❨101❩ ❛ You’ll notice I’m not asking what made you this way. ❜ ❨102❩ ❛ No family, happy or unhappy, is quite like any other. Tolstoy was chock-fullo’shit. Remember that. ❜ ❨103❩ ❛ We lived in monochrome those nights. ❜ ❨104❩ ❛ You live in a dream. You’re a sleepwalker, blind. How do you know what the world is like? ❜ ❨105❩ ❛ Do you know, if you rip off the fronts of houses, you’d find swine? ❜ ❨106❩ ❛ I stand here in the dark: cold, utterly alone, full of fear and something that feels like longing. ❜ ❨107❩ ❛ The definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results. ❜ ❨108❩ ❛ Not to warm the flesh, but solely to please the eye. ❜ ❨109❩ ❛ Selective emotional detachment. ❜ ❨110❩ ❛ Not for me, or at least not today. ❜ ❨111❩ ❛ Dead but not gone, watching life surge forward around me, powerless to intervene. ❜ ❨112❩ ❛ Do I sound like a hillbilly saying that? ❜ ❨113❩ ❛ Remember, you’ve got your secret weapon. ❜ ❨114❩ ❛ The dream drains away like water. The memory, really. I try to scoop it up in my palms, but it’s gone. ❜ ❨115❩ ❛ My shadow stretches along the carpet, as though trying to detach itself from me. ❜ ❨116❩ ❛ It curls away from me, like blood in water. ❜ ❨117❩ ❛ It’s been so long since I felt the rain. Or wind—the caress of wind. ❜ ❨118❩ ❛ But snow I never want to feel again. ❜ ❨119❩ ❛ Through adversity to the stars. ❜ ❨120❩ ❛ No hero. No sleuth. I am locked in. I am locked out. ❜ ❨121❩ ❛ Thinking hasn't gotten me anywhere so far. ❜ ❨122❩ ❛ The face you give the world tells the world how to treat you. ❜ ❨123❩ ❛ Sometimes I think illness sits inside every woman, waiting for the right moment to bloom. ❜ ❨124❩ ❛ Women get consumed. ❜ ❨125❩ ❛ Sometimes if you let people do things to you, you're really doing it to them. ❜ ❨126❩ ❛ A child weaned on poison considers harm a comfort. ❜ ❨127❩ ❛ Safer to be feared than loved. ❜ ❨128❩ ❛ I ached once, hard, like a period typed at the end of a sentence. ❜ ❨129❩ ❛ It's impossible to compete with the dead. I wish I could stop trying. ❜ ❨130❩ ❛ I always feel sad for the girl that I was. ❜ ❨131❩ ❛ Every time people said I was pretty, I thought of everything ugly swarming beneath my clothes. ❜ ❨132❩ ❛ How do you keep safe when your whole day is as wide and empty as the sky? Anything could happen. ❜ ❨133❩ ❛ See, there I am. I told you I lived. I told you I was. ❜ ❨134❩ ❛ Sometimes I think I won't ever feel safe until I can count my last days on one hand. ❜ ❨135❩ ❛ To refuse has so many more consequences than submitting. ❜ ❨136❩ ❛ I'm here. I don't usually feel that I am. ❜ ❨137❩ ❛ I'm tired of dying. ❜ ❨138❩ ❛ What if you hurt because it feels so good? ❜ ❨139❩ ❛ How confusing to live in the shadow of a shadow. ❜ ❨140❩ ❛ Do you ever feel like bad things are going to happen, and you can’t stop them? You can’t do anything, you just have to wait? ❜ ❨141❩ ❛ Sometimes my scars have a mind of their own. ❜ ❨142❩ ❛ Everyone has their own version of a memory. ❜ ❨143❩ ❛ Isn’t a smile a girl’s best weapon? ❜ ❨144❩ ❛ My sense of weightlessness, I think, comes from the fact that I know so little about my past. ❜ ❨145❩ ❛ Do what I want; I might like you. ❜ ❨146❩ ❛ I feel sorry for Persephone because even when she’s back with the living, people are afraid of her because of where’s she’s been. ❜ ❨147❩ ❛ She has never told me she loved me, and I never assumed she did. ❜ ❨148❩ ❛ The sight of it actually does something to you, makes you less human. ❜ ❨149❩ ❛ It infects you. It ruined me. ❜ ❨150❩ ❛ Your health is not a debt you just cancel. The body collects. ❜ ❨151❩ ❛ Men love to put things inside women, don’t they? ❜ ❨152❩ ❛ We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom. ❜ ❨153❩ ❛ Nothing is so necessary for a young man as the company of intelligent women. ❜ ❨154❩ ❛ The strongest of all warriors are these two — time and patience. ❜ ❨155❩ ❛ If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war. ❜ ❨156❩ ❛ There is no greatness where there is not simplicity, goodness, and truth. ❜ ❨157❩ ❛ The whole world is divided for me into two parts: one is she, and there is all happiness, hope, light; the other is where she is not, and there is dejection and darkness. ❜ ❨158❩ ❛ Let the dead bury the dead, but while I'm alive, I must live and be happy. ❜ ❨159❩ ❛ It's not given to people to judge what's right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong. ❜ ❨160❩ ❛ You can love a person dear to you with a human love, but an enemy can only be loved with divine love. ❜ ❨161❩ ❛ If we admit that human life can be ruled by reason, then all possibility of life is destroyed. ❜ ❨162❩ ❛ We are asleep until we fall in love! ❜ ❨163❩ ❛ I simply want to live; to cause no evil to anyone but myself. ❜ ❨164❩ ❛ Everything I know, I know because of love. ❜ ❨165❩ ❛ Man cannot possess anything as long as he fears death. But to him who does not fear it, everything belongs. ❜ ❨166❩ ❛ If there was no suffering, man would not know his limits, would not know himself. ❜ ❨167❩ ❛ Yes, love, but not the love that loves for something, to gain something, or because of something, but that love that I felt for the first time, when dying, I saw my enemy and yet loved him. ❜ ❨168❩ ❛ How can one be well...when one suffers morally? ❜ ❨169❩ ❛ Kings are the slaves of history. ❜ ❨170❩ ❛ God is the same everywhere. ❜ ❨171❩ ❛ Pure and complete sorrow is as impossible as pure and complete joy. ❜ ❨172❩ ❛ One must be cunning and wicked in this world. ❜ ❨173❩ ❛ We love people not so much for the good they've done us, as for the good we've done them. ❜ ❨174❩ ❛ When one's head is gone one doesn't weep over one's hair! ❜ ❨175❩ ❛ For what, for whom, must I kill and be killed? ❜ ❨176❩ ❛ He did what heroes do after their work is accomplished; he died. ❜ ❨177❩ ❛ Life is too long to say anything definitely; always say perhaps. ❜ ❨178❩ ❛ Everything ends in death, everything. Death is terrible. ❜ ❨179❩ ❛ The distant and impossible suddenly became near, possible, and inevitable. ❜ ❨180❩ ❛ How often we sin, how much we deceive, and all for what? ❜ ❨181❩ ❛ The wolves should be fed and the sheep kept safe. ❜ ❨182❩ ❛ When I was a child, adults would tell me not to make things up, warning me of what would happen if I did. ❜ ❨183❩ ❛ My memory is a patchwork of occurrences, of discontinuous events roughly sewn together: the parts I remember, I remember precisely, whilst other sections seem to have vanished completely. ❜ ❨184❩ ❛ Would it be worse to love someone who is no longer there, or not to love someone who is? ❜ ❨185❩ ❛ Like mirrors stories prepare us for the day to come. They distract us from the things in darkness. ❜ ❨186❩ ❛ It is not that I was credulous, simply that I believed in all things dark and dangerous. ❜ ❨187❩ ❛ Sometimes you do things you regret, but there's nothing you can do about them. Times change. Doors close behind you. You move on. ❜ ❨188❩ ❛ Love will be an impulse that will inspire and ruin in equal measure. ❜ ❨189❩ ❛ He died alone. It don't matter a rat's ass whether there was anyone with him or not. He died alone. ❜ ❨190❩ ❛ It was love, I knew, and it tasted like champagne in my mind. ❜ ❨191❩ ❛ The end of the world is a strange concept. The world is always ending, and the end is always being averted, by love or foolishness or just plain old dumb luck. ❜ ❨192❩ ❛ She was my dream; and if you touch a dream it vanishes, like a soap bubble. ❜ ❨193❩ ❛ Daylight is always safe. ❜ ❨194❩ ❛ If not for death, they'd be content to simply exist, but with death, well, their lives will have meaning. ❜ ❨195❩ ❛ You want to know the future, love? Then wait. ❜ ❨196❩ ❛ There are things in the darkness beneath us that wish us harm. ❜ ❨197❩ ❛ Fairy tales are more than true. Not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be defeated ❜ ❨198❩ ❛ But sometimes you leave blood on your instruments. ❜ ❨199❩ ❛ I'd like to be a wolf. Not all the time. Just sometimes. In the dark. I would run through the forests. ❜ ❨200❩ ❛ You've seen them. They have mouths that twitch, and eyes that stare, and they babble and they mewl and they whimper. ❜ ❨201❩ ❛ They are not mad, or rather, the loss of their sanity is the lesser of their problems. ❜ ❨202❩ ❛ Good a reason for writing as I know: releasing demons, letting them fly. ❜ ❨203❩ ❛ That miserable state in which everything seems flat and of equal importance; when nothing matters, and in which reality seems scraped thin and threadbare. ❜ ❨204❩ ❛ Someone had scrawled graffiti in black marker on the metal: JUST DIE, it said. Like it is easy. ❜ ❨205❩ ❛ Winter started today. The sky turned grey and the snow began to fall and it did not stop falling until well after dark. ❜ ❨206❩ ❛ Memory is the great deceiver. ❜ ❨207❩ ❛ Silly things do cease to be silly if they are done by sensible people in an impudent way. ❜ ❨208❩ ❛ I may have lost my heart, but not my self-control.  ❜ ❨209❩ ❛ If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more. ❜ ❨210❩ ❛ I always deserve the best treatment because I never put up with any other. ❜ ❨211❩ ❛ But you know what I am. You hear nothing but truth from me. ❜ ❨212❩ ❛ I have blamed you, and lectured you, and you have borne it as no other would have borne it. ❜ ❨213❩ ❛ There are people, who the more you do for them, the less they will do for themselves. ❜ ❨214❩ ❛ One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other. ❜ ❨215❩ ❛ Better be without sense than misapply it as you do. ❜ ❨216❩ ❛ You must be the best judge of your own happiness. ❜ ❨217❩ ❛ Were I to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing ; but I have never been in love ; it is not my way, or my nature ; and I do not think I ever shall. ❜ ❨218❩ ❛ Indeed, I am very sorry to be right in this instance. I would much rather have been merry than wise. ❜ ❨219❩ ❛ If I have not spoken, it is because I am afraid I will awaken myself from this dream. ❜ ❨220❩ ❛ If a woman doubts as to whether she should accept a man or not, she certainly ought to refuse him. ❜ ❨221❩ ❛ Faultless in spite of all her faults. ❜ ❨222❩ ❛ A heroine whom no one but myself will much like. ❜ ❨223❩ ❛ There is no charm equal to tenderness of heart. ❜ ❨224❩ ❛ Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, and waste its fragrance on the desert air. ❜ ❨225❩ ❛ I pity you. I thought you cleverer. ❜ ❨226❩ ❛ Evil to some is always good to others. ❜ ❨227❩ ❛ I certainly will not persuade myself to feel more than I do. ❜ ❨228❩ ❛ She is loveliness itself. ❜ ❨229❩ ❛ Time does not compose me. ❜ ❨230❩ ❛ A man always imagines a woman to be ready for anybody who asks her. ❜ ❨231❩ ❛ I do not find myself making any use of the word sacrifice. ❜ ❨232❩ ❛ I am quite enough in love. I should be sorry to be any more. ❜ ❨233❩ ❛ I must tell you what you will not ask, though I may wish it unsaid the next moment. ❜ ❨234❩ ❛ I examined my own heart. And there you were. Never, I fear, to be removed. ❜ ❨235❩ ❛ With all your little faults, you are an excellent creature. ❜ ❨236❩ ❛ You have another long walk before you. ❜ ❨237❩ ❛ The child's laughter is pure until he first laughs at a clown. ❜ ❨238❩ ❛ What is marriage but prostitution to one man instead of many? ❜ ❨239❩ ❛ Out of the frying pan into the fire! ❜ ❨240❩ ❛ We must all make do with the rags of love we find flapping on the scarecrow of humanity. ❜ ❨241❩ ❛ She sleeps. And now she wakes each day a little less. ❜ ❨242❩ ❛ And, oh, God . . . how frequently I weep! ❜ ❨243❩ ❛ From the coffin of your madness there is no escape. ❜ ❨244❩ ❛ I am feeling supernatural tonight. I want to eat diamonds. ❜ ❨245❩ ❛ All the same there is a chance that if we keep on shaking our chains, one day, some day, the clasps upon the shackles will part. ❜ ❨246❩ ❛ It was sad music fit to make you cut your throat. ❜ ❨247❩ ❛ Nothing is more boring than being forced to play. ❜ ❨248❩ ❛ Amongst the monsters, I am well hidden; who looks for a leaf in a forest? ❜ ❨249❩ ❛ Wherein does a woman’s honour reside? In her vagina or in her spirit? ❜ ❨250❩ ❛ Perhaps...I could not be content with mere contentment! ❜ ❨251❩ ❛ Have you ever stared stark failure in the face? The trick is to outstare it. ❜ ❨252❩ ❛ Sometimes it seems that the faces exist of themselves, in a disembodied somewhere, waiting for the one who will wear them, who will bring them to life. ❜ ❨253❩ ❛ I have the febrile gaiety of a being without a past, without a present, yet I exist. ❜ ❨254❩ ❛ I felt myself turning, willy-nilly, from a woman into an idea. ❜ ❨255❩ ❛ She looks wonderful, but she doesn't look right. ❜ ❨256❩ ❛ The one-eyed man will be King in the country of the blind. ❜ ❨257❩ ❛ I raised you up to fly to the heavens, not to brood over a clutch of eggs! ❜ ❨258❩ ❛ I love to hear my bones rattle. That’s how I know I’m alive. ❜ ❨259❩ ❛ I learnt, first, as the birds do, from the birds. ❜ ❨260❩ ❛ Inside and outside match exactly, but both are badly wrong. ❜ ❨261❩ ❛ During the less-than-blink of time it took the last chime to die, there came a vertiginous sensation. ❜ ❨262❩ ❛ I fear a wound not of the body but the soul, an irreconcilable division between myself and the rest of humankind. ❜ ❨263❩ ❛ I fear the proof of my own singularity. ❜ ❨264❩ ❛ Still nothing could calm the fearful storm in my erupting skin. ❜ ❨265❩ ❛ Petersburg, loveliest of all hallucinations. ❜ ❨266❩ ❛ A breathless second between black forest and the frozen sea. ❜ ❨267❩ ❛ I'm beginning to feel totally cut off from the world. ❜ ❨268❩ ❛ What does this all mean? Where are we? ❜ ❨269❩ ❛ Sometimes I bleed. ❜ ❨270❩ ❛ If you see a ghost, you say "hello". ❜ ❨271❩ ❛ The war is not over. ❜ ❨272❩ ❛ You're not going. You left us once already. ❜ ❨273❩ ❛ You can’t go! ❜ ❨274❩ ❛ I loved you, but that wasn't enough, was it? ❜ ❨275❩ ❛ If you're dead, then leave me in peace. ❜ ❨276❩ ❛ The only thing that moves here is the light, but it changes everything. ❜ ❨277❩ ❛ I won't ask for forgiveness for something I didn't do! ❜ ❨278❩ ❛ Sometimes the world of the living gets mixed up with the world of the dead. ❜ ❨279❩ ❛ Death of a loved one can lead people to do the strangest things. ❜ ❨280❩ ❛ Sooner or later, they will find you. ❜ ❨281❩ ❛ They're everywhere - they say this house is theirs. ❜ ❨282❩ ❛ You're always teasing me, and telling lies. I'm sick of it. ❜ ❨283❩ ❛ Others will come. Sometimes we'll sense them. Other times, we won't. ❜ ❨284❩ ❛ No crying now. No crying. Stop that. Here. Look what an awful face you've got when you cry. ❜ ❨285❩ ❛ You listen to me. I've seen them too. ❜ ❨286❩ ❛ You'll see. There are going to be some big surprises. There are going to be... changes. ❜ ❨287❩ ❛ Why did you go and fight that stupid war that had nothing to do with us? Why didn't you stay like the others did? ❜ ❨288❩ ❛ Your place was here with your family. ❜ ❨289❩ ❛ So you say you know this house well? ❜ ❨290❩ ❛ I wasn't expecting you so soon. ❜ ❨291❩ ❛ What's the matter? Has the cat got your tongue? ❜ ❨292❩ ❛ You mean they just vanished? Into thin air? ❜ ❨293❩ ❛ No door must be opened without the previous one being closed first. ❜ ❨294❩ ❛ Here, most of the time, you can hardly see your way. ❜ ❨295❩ ❛ Whatever you do, don't open the curtains. ❜ ❨296❩ ❛ Now, come on. Eyes closed. ❜ ❨297❩ ❛ We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. We realise that we’re all going to die, without really finding out the big answers. ❜ ❨298❩ ❛ By definition, you have to live until you die. Better to make that life as complete and enjoyable an experience as possible, in case death is shite, which I suspect it will be. ❜ ❨299❩ ❛ I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin’ else. ❜ ❨300❩ ❛ And the reasons? There are no reasons. ❜ ❨301❩ ❛ Love does not exist, it's like religion, made to control you. ❜ ❨302❩ ❛ After all, we're not fucking stupid. At least, we're not that fucking stupid. ❜ ❨303❩ ❛ You fucking knew that fucking cunt would fuck some cunt. ❜ ❨304❩ ❛ Everything in the street today seems soft focus. ❜ ❨305❩ ❛ What does that make us? The lowest of the low. ❜ ❨306❩ ❛ Take your best orgasm, multiply the feeling by twenty, and you're still fuckin’ miles off the pace. ❜ ❨307❩ ❛ It’s as if everything is a copy of what you knew before, similar, yet somehow lacking in its usual qualities, a bit like the way things are in a dream. ❜ ❨308❩ ❛ It’s all okay, it’s all beautiful; but I fear that this internal sea is going to subside soon, leaving this poisonous shite washed up, stranded up in my body. ❜ ❨309❩ ❛ It cuts me up. It confuses me. ❜ ❨310❩ ❛ It's not funny laughter. This is lynch mob laughter. ❜ ❨311❩ ❛ Protect me from those who wish to help us. ❜ ❨312❩ ❛ They mean well, and they mean well to me, but there's no way under the sun that they can appreciate what I feel, what I need. ❜ ❨313❩ ❛ The pit of melancholy is a bottomless one, and I am descending fast. ❜ ❨314❩ ❛ Living like this is a full-time business. ❜ ❨315❩ ❛ I’ll stand or fall alone. ❜ ❨316❩ ❛ We are no wiser now than at the start. ❜ ❨317❩ ❛ This is pathetic, and fucking boring. ❜ ❨318❩ ❛ Death is usually a process, rather than an event. ❜ ❨319❩ ❛ We're ruled by effete arseholes. What does that make us? ❜ ❨320❩ ❛ We are all acquaintances now. ❜ ❨321❩ ❛ The problem is that this beautiful ocean carries with it loads of poisonous flotsam and jetsam. ❜ ❨322❩ ❛ Life is beautiful. I'm going to enjoy it, and I'm going to have a long life. ❜ ❨323❩ ❛ The grim reality of impending death can be talked away by trying to invest in the present reality of life. ❜ ❨324❩ ❛ There must be more to life than this. ❜ ❨325❩ ❛ We all see what we want to see. ❜ ❨326❩ ❛ Statistically speaking, you're more likely to be killed by a member of your own family or a close friend, than by anyone else. ❜ ❨327❩ ❛ What am I living for and what am I dying for are the same question. ❜ ❨328❩ ❛ Maybe that's what love is: it's being pissed off. ❜ ❨329❩ ❛ You can forget who you are if you're alone too much. ❜ ❨330❩ ❛ Any religion is a shadow of God. But the shadows of God are not God. ❜ ❨331❩ ❛ Human understanding is fallible, and we see through a glass, darkly.  ❜ ❨332❩ ❛ We must be a beacon of hope, because if you tell people there's nothing they can do, they will do worse than nothing. ❜ ❨333❩ ❛ Everyone wants to feel like a princess, and princesses are selfish and overbearing. ❜ ❨334❩ ❛ We shouldn't have been so scornful; we should have had compassion. But compassion takes work, and we were young. ❜ ❨335❩ ❛ How easy it is, treachery. You just slide into it. ❜ ❨336❩ ❛ Amazing how the heart clutches at anything familiar, whimpering: Mine! Mine! ❜ ❨337❩ ❛ All creatures know that some must die ; that all the rest may take and eat. ❜ ❨338❩ ❛ Is this the image of a god? My tooth for yours, your eye for mine? ❜ ❨339❩ ❛ Without the light, no chance; without the dark, no dance. ❜ ❨340❩ ❛ Why are we designed to see the world as supremely beautiful just as we're about to be snuffed? Do rabbits feel the same as the fox teeth bite down on their necks? Is it mercy? ❜ ❨341❩ ❛ Love is useless, it leads you into dumb exchanges in which you give too much away, and then you get bitter and mean. ❜ ❨342❩ ❛ Maybe sadness is a kind of hunger. Maybe the two go together. ❜ ❨343❩ ❛ Now I can see how that can happen. You can fall in love with anybody -- a fool, a criminal, a nothing. There are no good rules. ❜ ❨344❩ ❛ If you really want to stay the same age you are now forever and ever, try jumping off the roof: death's a sure-fire method for stopping time. ❜ ❨345❩ ❛ You couldn’t leave words lying around where our enemies might find them. ❜ ❨346❩ ❛ I'm fine, for the moment. And the moment is the only time we can be fine in. ❜ ❨347❩ ❛ Because if you can't wish, why bother? ❜ ❨348❩ ❛ It's better to hope than mope! ❜ ❨349❩ ❛ Reality has too much darkness in it. Too many crows. ❜ ❨350❩ ❛ In any case, time is not a thing that passes, it’s a sea on which you float. ❜ ❨351❩ ❛ I know I’m deceiving myself, but I prefer to deceive myself. I desperately need to believe such pure joy is still possible. ❜ ❨352❩ ❛ Too much God and you overdose. God needs to be filtered. ❜ ❨353❩ ❛ Behind my eyelids I saw an animal. It was golden colour, with gentle green eyes and canine teeth, and curly wool instead of fur. It opened its mouth, but it did not speak. Instead, it yawned. ❜ ❨354❩ ❛ ‘Why can't I believe?’ I asked the darkness. ❜ ❨355❩ ❛ Everyone’s too sad for everything. ❜ ❨356❩ ❛ If you can’t stop the waves, go sailing. ❜ ❨357❩ ❛ I would like to be the air that inhabits you for a moment only. I would like to be that unnoticed and that necessary. ❜ ❨358❩ ❛ Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them. ❜ ❨359❩ ❛ In the end, we'll all become stories. ❜ ❨360❩ ❛ I am inadequate and stupid, without worth. I might as well be dead. ❜ ❨361❩ ❛ If you knew what was going to happen, if you knew everything that was going to happen next—if you knew in advance the consequences of your own actions—you'd be doomed. You'd be ruined as God. ❜ ❨362❩ ❛ If you can't go through an obstacle, go around it. ❜ ❨363❩ ❛ Stupidity is the same as evil if you judge by the results. ❜ ❨364❩ ❛ Time in dreams is frozen. You can never get away from where you've been. ❜ ❨365❩ ❛ Male fantasies, male fantasies, is everything run by male fantasies? ❜ ❨366❩ ❛ We still think of a powerful man as a born leader and a powerful woman as an anomaly. ❜ ❨367❩ ❛ If I love you, is that a fact or a weapon? ❜ ❨368❩ ❛ You fit into me like a hook into an eye. ❜ ❨369❩ ❛ Knowing too much about other people puts you in their power, they have a claim on you, you are forced to understand their reasons for doing things and then you are weakened. ❜ ❨370❩ ❛ Farewells can be shattering, but returns are surely worse. ❜ ❨371❩ ❛ Women have curious ways of hurting someone else. ❜ ❨372❩ ❛ This is the one song everyone would like to learn: the song that is irresistible: the song that forces men to leap overboard in squadrons. ❜ ❨373❩ ❛ Get rid of death. Make it be spring. ❜ ❨374❩ ❛ You are innocent as a bathtub full of bullets. ❜ ❨375❩ ❛ I am the space you desecrate as you pass through. ❜ ❨376❩ ❛ Favour me and give me riches, destroy my enemies. Save me from death. ❜ ❨377❩ ❛ She is a raw voice loose in the rooms beneath me. ❜ ❨378❩ ❛ Isn't the moon warm enough for you, why do you need the blanket of another body? ❜ ❨379❩ ❛ This is a torch song. Touch me and you'll burn. ❜ ❨380❩ ❛ If you look long enough eventually you will see me. ❜ ❨381❩ ❛ I would like to sleep with you, to enter your sleep as its smooth dark wave slides over my head. ❜ ❨382❩ ❛ I would like to give you the silver branch, the small white flower, the one word that will protect you from the grief. ❜ ❨383❩ ❛ But some people can't tell where it hurts. They can't calm down. They can't ever stop howling. ❜ ❨384❩ ❛ How else can we live, these days, except in the midst of ruin? ❜ ❨385❩ ❛ What am I living for and what am I dying for are the same question. ❜ ❨386❩ ❛ Gods always come in handy, they justify almost anything. ❜ ❨387❩ ❛ We loved with a love that was more than love. ❜ ❨388❩ ❛ Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ❜ ❨389❩ ❛ The boundaries which divide life from death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins? ❜ ❨390❩ ❛ There is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in the proportion. ❜ ❨391❩ ❛ Never to suffer would never to have been blessed. ❜ ❨392❩ ❛ Believe only half of what you see and nothing that you hear. ❜ ❨393❩ ❛ And all I loved, I loved alone. ❜ ❨394❩ ❛ Years of love have been forgot, in the hatred of a minute. ❜ ❨395❩ ❛ The best things in life make you sweaty. ❜ ❨396❩ ❛ There are some secrets which do not permit themselves to be told. ❜ ❨397❩ ❛ Anything is better than this agony. ❜ ❨398❩ ❛ You fancy me mad. ❜ ❨399❩ ❛ I hear all things in the heaven and in the earth. ❜ ❨400❩ ❛ Who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? ❜ ❨401❩ ❛ Leave my loneliness unbroken! ❜ ❨402❩ ❛ A more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrills every fibre of my frame. ❜ ❨403❩ ❛ The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. ❜ ❨404❩ ❛ Let my heart be still a moment. ❜ ❨405❩ ❛ You call it hope —  It is but agony of desire. ❜ ❨406❩ ❛ Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or silly action for no other reason than because he knows he should not? ❜ ❨407❩ ❛ To die laughing must be the most glorious of all glorious deaths! ❜ ❨408❩ ❛ The beating of a drum stimulates the soldier into courage. ❜ ❨409❩ ❛ Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive. ❜ ❨410❩ ❛ I have been happy, though in a dream. ❜ ❨411❩ ❛ Nevermore. ❜ ❨412❩ ❛ The truth is, I am heartily sick of this life. ❜ ❨413❩ ❛ I am convinced that every thing is going wrong. ❜ ❨414❩ ❛ The scariest monsters are the ones that lurk within our souls. ❜ ❨415❩ ❛ And if I died, at least I will have died for you! ❜ ❨416❩ ❛ It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night. ❜ ❨417❩ ❛ Hurt and humiliation — But this, I can not take. ❜ ❨418❩ ❛ The walls in there have ears. ❜ ❨419❩ ❛ This is for your ears only. ❜ ❨420❩ ❛ What is it? You have me scared. ❜ ❨421❩ ❛ Whoever isn’t for us, is against us. ❜ ❨422❩ ❛ You are just a body; to be dumped, disposed of like a carcass, left out for the birds to feed on. ❜ ❨423❩ ❛ The dead will have to forgive me. ❜ ❨424❩ ❛ From now on and no matter how your mind may I change, I will not accept your help. ❜ ❨425❩ ❛ If death comes, so be it. There will be glory in it. ❜ ❨426❩ ❛ Live, then; and live with your choice. ❜ ❨427❩ ❛ I am doing what has to be done. ❜ ❨428❩ ❛ Nothing is going to stop the ones that love you from keeping on loving you. ❜ ❨429❩ ❛ Worst is the man who has all the good advice, and then because his nerve fails, fails to act in accordance with it, as a leader should. ❜ ❨430❩ ❛ Only a loony would walk himself into this. ❜ ❨431❩ ❛ Why do you need such fences and defences? ❜ ❨432❩ ❛ Enough. Do not anger me. ❜ ❨433❩ ❛ The gods, you think, will side with the likes of him? ❜ ❨434❩ ❛ Watch it. You are over stepping. ❜ ❨435❩ ❛ I warn you. You should keep a civil tongue. ❜ ❨436❩ ❛ There is no such thing as an oath the can not be broken. ❜ ❨437❩ ❛ Every now and then, the things you’d hardly let yourself imagine, actually happen. ❜ ❨438❩ ❛ And you stand over this? This is the truth? ❜ ❨439❩ ❛ The bigger the resistance, the bigger the collapse. ❜ ❨440❩ ❛ Iron that’s forged the hardest, snaps the quickest. ❜ ❨441❩ ❛ Even the wildest horses come to heel when they are reined & bitted right. ❜ ❨442❩ ❛ That’s how guilt affects some people. They break and everything comes out. ❜ ❨443❩ ❛ Will it be enough for you? To see me executed? ❜ ❨444❩ ❛ So you know something no one else knows? ❜ ❨445❩ ❛ They know it too. They are just too afraid to say it. ❜ ❨446❩ ❛ If you die, how will I keep on living? ❜ ❨447❩ ❛ There was a star riding through clouds one night, & I said to the star, 'Consume me'. ❜ ❨448❩ ❛ How much better to sit by myself like the solitary sea-bird that opens its wings on the stake. ❜ ❨449❩ ❛ Alone, I often fall down into nothingness. I have to bang my head against some hard door to call myself back to the body. ❜ ❨450❩ ❛ I am made and remade continually. Different people draw different words from me. ❜ ❨451❩ ❛ For this moment, this one moment, we are together.  ❜ ❨452❩ ❛ Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. ❜ ❨453❩ ❛ I am as neat as a cat in my habits. ❜ ❨454❩ ❛ Everything falls in a tremendous shower, dissolving me. ❜ ❨455❩ ❛ I am the foam that sweeps and fills the uttermost rims of the rocks with whiteness; I am also a girl, here in this room. ❜ ❨456❩ ❛ We are cut, we are fallen. We are become part of that unfeeling universe ❨457❩ that sleeps when we are at our quickest and burns red when we lie ❨458❩ asleep. ❜ ❨459❩ ❛ These moments of escape are not to be despised. They come too seldom. ❜ ❨460❩ ❛ Up here my eyes are green leaves, unseeing. ❜ ❨461❩ ❛ The moment is all; the moment is enough. ❜ ❨462❩ ❛ I do not want to be admired. I want to give, to be given. ❜ ❨463❩ ❛ I am not one and simple, but complex and many. ❜ ❨464❩ ❛ And if you are dead, I shall weep. ❜ ❨465❩ ❛ But beauty must be broken daily to remain beautiful. ❜ ❨466❩ ❛ But our hatred is almost indistinguishable from our love. ❜ ❨467❩ ❛ I desired always to stretch the night and fill it fuller and fuller with dreams. ❜ ❨468❩ ❛ Life is a dream surely. ❜ ❨469❩ ❛ I think sometimes I am not a woman, but the light that falls on this gate, on this ground. I am the seasons, I think sometimes, January, May, November; the mud, the mist, the dawn. ❜ ❨470❩ ❛ Oh, I am in love with life! ❜ ❨471❩ ❛ I have been knotted; I have been torn apart. ❜ ❨472❩ ❛ There was no freedom in life, and certainly there was none in death. ❜ ❨473❩ ❛ I do not know. I do not know myself sometimes, or how to measure and name and count out the grains that make me what I am. ❜ ❨474❩ ❛ I ride rough waters, and shall sink with no one to save me. ❜ ❨475❩ ❛ I am above the earth now. I am no longer upright, to be knocked against and damaged. ❜ ❨476❩ ❛ I see it all. I feel it all. ❜ ❨477❩ ❛ Death is woven in with the violets. Death and again death. ❜ ❨478❩ ❛ We have been walking for hours it seems. But where? I cannot remember. ❜ ❨479❩ ❛ If we were all on trial for our thoughts, we would all be hanged. ❜ ❨480❩ ❛ When you are in the middle of a story it isn't a story at all, but only a confusion; a dark roaring, a blindness, a wreckage of shattered glass. ❜ ❨481❩ ❛ Murderess is a strong word to have attached to you. It has a smell to it, that word; - musky and oppressive, like dead flowers in a vase.  ❜ ❨482❩ ❛ Sometimes at night I whisper it over to myself: Murderess, murderess. It rustles, like a taffeta skirt across the floor. ❜ ❨483❩ ❛ If the world treats you well, you come to believe you are deserving of it. ❜ ❨484❩ ❛ If I am good enough and quiet enough, perhaps after all they will let me go. ❜ ❨485❩ ❛ It’s not easy being quiet and good, it’s like hanging on to the edge of a bridge when you’ve already fallen over; you don’t seem to be moving, just dangling there, and yet it is taking all your strength. ❜ ❨486❩ ❛ There is no fool like an educated fool. ❜ ❨487❩ ❛ There are many dangerous things that may take place in a bed. ❜ ❨488❩ ❛ I am afraid of falling into hopeless despair, over my wasted life, and I am still not sure how it happened. ❜ ❨489❩ ❛ Underneath it all is another feeling, a feeling of being wide-eyed awake and watchful. ❜ ❨490❩ ❛ And underneath all that is another feeling still, a feeling like being torn open; not like a body of flesh, it is not painful as such, but like a peach; and not even torn open, but ripe and splitting open of its own accord.  ❜ ❨491❩ ❛ The small details of life often hide a great significance. ❜ ❨492❩ ❛ Guilt comes to you not from the things you've done, but from the things that others have done to you. ❜ ❨493❩ ❛ I wonder, how can I be all of these different things at once? ❜ ❨494❩ ❛ It is always a mistake to curse back openly at those who are stronger than you unless there is a fence between. ❜ ❨495❩ ❛ Some call this "Eve's curse," but I think that is stupid because the real curse of Eve was having to put up with the nonsense of Adam. ❜ ❨496❩ ❛ I don't know why they are all so eager to be remembered. What good will it do them? There are some things that should be forgotten by everyone, and never spoken of again. ❜ ❨497❩ ❛ I would never blame a human creature for feeling lonely. ❜ ❨498❩ ❛ If they want a monster so badly they ought to be provided by one. ❜ ❨499❩ ❛ It’s as if I never existed, because no trace of me remains, I have left no marks. And that way I cannot be followed. It is almost the same as being innocent. ❜ ❨500❩ ❛ Today you wear your habitual expression of strained anxiety; you smell of violets. ❜ ❨501❩ ❛ Of course you have always been an idealist, and filled with your optimistic dreams; but reality must at some time obtrude. ❜ ❨502❩ ❛ I wonder what would become of me, and comfort myself that in a hundred years I will be dead and at peace. ❜ ❨503❩ ❛ For it is not always the one that strikes the blow that is the actual murderer. ❜ ❨504❩ ❛ There is a “do this” or “do that” with God, but not any “because”. ❜ ❨505❩ ❛ If you have a need and they find it out, they will use it against you. The best way is to stop from wanting anything. ❜ ❨506❩ ❛ They say, why don’t you ever smile or laugh, we never see you smiling, and I say I suppose I have gotten out of the way of it, my face won’t bend in that direction any more. ❜ ❨507❩ ❛ I was shut up inside that doll of myself, and my true voice could not get out. ❜ ❨508❩ ❛ I see what you’re after. You are a collector. You think all you have to do is give me an apple, and then you can collect me. ❜ ❨509❩ ❛ If you want to be an asshole, it's a free country. Millions before you have made the same life choice. ❜ ❨510❩ ❛ Then there's the future. Sheer vertigo. ❜ ❨511❩ ❛ Nature is to zoos as God is to churches. ❜ ❨512❩ ❛ After everything that's happened, how can the world still be so beautiful? ❜ ❨513❩ ❛ There's something to be said for hunger: at least it lets you know you're still alive. ❜ ❨514❩ ❛ These things sneak up on me for no reason, these flashes of irrational happiness. It's probably a vitamin deficiency. ❜ ❨515❩ ❛ Toast cannot be explained by any rational means. Toast is me. I am toast. ❜ ❨516❩ ❛ You can’t buy it, but it has a price. Everything has a price. ❜ ❨517❩ ❛ As a species were doomed by hope, then? You could call it hope. That, or desperation. ❜ ❨518❩ ❛ I am not my childhood. ❜ ❨519❩ ❛ Human beings hope they can stick their souls into someone else and live on forever. ❜ ❨520❩ ❛ “I'll make you mine”, lovers said in old books. They never said, “I'll make you me.” ❜ ❨521❩ ❛ How much is too much, how far is too far? ❜ ❨522❩ ❛ Expectation isn't the same as desire. ❜ ❨523❩ ❛ Why not cut to the chase? ❜ ❨524❩ ❛ Maybe there aren't any solutions. Human society, corpses and rubble. ❜ ❨525❩ ❛ I thought you didn’t believe in God. ❜ ❨526❩ ❛ I need at least the illusion of being understood. ❜ ❨527❩ ❛ What change would have altered the course of events? In the big picture, nothing. In the small picture, so much. ❜ ❨528❩ ❛ You are only looking at the dirt under your feet. It's not good for you. ❜ ❨529❩ ❛ I like to keep only the bright side of myself turned towards you.  ❜ ❨530❩ ❛ Grief in the face of inevitable death. The wish to stop time. The human condition. ❜ ❨531❩ ❛ So many crucial events take place behind people’s backs, when they aren’t in a position to watch: birth and death, for instance. ❜ ❨532❩ ❛ Would you kill someone you loved to spare them pain? ❜ ❨533❩ ❛ When the water’s moving faster than the boat, you can’t control a thing. ❜ ❨534❩ ❛ Don't be so fucking sentimental. ❜ ❨535❩ ❛ Wrong, as usual. ❜ ❨536❩ ❛ Why do you want to talk about ugly things? ❜ ❨537❩ ❛ I understand why serial killers send helpful clues to the police. ❜ ❨538❩ ❛ Take your time, leave mine alone. ❜ ❨539❩ ❛ You will hear thunder and remember me. ❜ ❨540❩ ❛ If you were music, I would listen to you ceaselessly. ❜ ❨541❩ ❛ I seem to myself an accidental guest in this dreadful body. ❜ ❨542❩ ❛ Call me a sinner, mock me maliciously. ❜ ❨543❩ ❛ I, from the very beginning, seemed to myself like someone's dream or delirium. Or a reflection in someone else's mirror. Without flesh, without meaning, without a name. ❜ ❨544❩ ❛ I knew the list of crimes that I was destined to commit. ❜ ❨545❩ ❛ The future ripens in the past, so the past rots in the future. ❜ ❨546❩ ❛ You are untranslatable into any one tongue. ❜ ❨547❩ ❛ I was hoping my silence would fit yours. ❜ ❨548❩ ❛ See, we were never about butterflies. All about us is unearthly and radiant. ❜ ❨549❩ ❛ You do not know just what you've been forgiven. ❜ ❨550❩ ❛ I need to slaughter my memory.  ❜ ❨551❩ ❛ Forgive me that I appeared to you in waking dreams. ❜ ❨552❩ ❛ I will condemn, I will forget, I will give comfort to the enemy. ❜ ❨553❩ ❛ I know beginnings, I know endings too, and life-in-death. ❜ ❨554❩ ❛ Wild honey smells of freedom. But gold smells of nothing. ❜ ❨555❩ ❛ You are three times more beautiful than angels. ❜ ❨556❩ ❛ I will kill you without spilling your blood on the ground, not touching you with my hand, not giving you one glance. ❜ ❨557❩ ❛ You invented me. There is no such earthly being. ❜ ❨558❩ ❛ You’re late. Way too late. I’m glad to see you, nonetheless. ❜ ❨559❩ ❛ Forgive me that I felt forsaken. Forgive me that I kept mistaking too many others for you. ❜ ❨560❩ ❛ Real tenderness can’t be confused, it’s quiet and can’t be heard. ❜ ❨561❩ ❛ What else lived in that house besides us? ❜ ❨562❩ ❛ How unhappy we are together! ❜ ❨563❩ ❛ I defend not my voice, but my silence. ❜ ❨564❩ ❛ Without love, I'm more at ease, I'm sure. ❜ ❨565❩ ❛ I've got no more tears or explanations. ❜ ❨566❩ ❛ I’m not complaining. Happiness is not for me. ❜ ❨567❩ ❛ Are you not the only tie between good and evil, earthly pits and paradise? ❜ ❨568❩ ❛ In the morning we shall find out who has died in the night. ❜ ❨569❩ ❛ I was not a lovable child, and I've grown into a deeply unlovable adult. ❜ ❨570❩ ❛ The truly frightening flaw in humanity is our capacity for cruelty - we all have it. ❜ ❨571❩ ❛ I have a meanness inside me, real as an organ. Slit me at my belly and it might slide out, meaty and dark. ❜ ❨572❩ ❛ I am not angry or sad or happy to see you. I could not give a shit. You don't even ripple. ❜ ❨573❩ ❛ I was raised feral, and I mostly stayed that way. ❜ ❨574❩ ❛ I can feel a better version of me somewhere in there - hidden behind a liver or attached to a bit of spleen. But the meanness usually wins out. ❜ ❨575❩ ❛ I felt something loosen in me, that shouldn't have loosened. A stitch come undone. ❜ ❨576❩ ❛ Everyone who keeps a secret, itches to tell it. ❜ ❨577❩ ❛ Coffee goes great with sudden death. ❜ ❨578❩ ❛ I should just listen to my gut and then do the opposite. ❜ ❨579❩ ❛ “Smile, it can't be that bad!” Yeah, actually, it can, jackwad. ❜ ❨580❩ ❛ Everything bad in the world already did happen. ❜ ❨581❩ ❛ You’re going to find peace? Like knowing is somehow going to fix you? ❜ ❨582❩ ❛ Instead of asking yourself what happened, just accept that it happened. ❜ ❨583❩ ❛ Homesick for a place I've never been. ❜ ❨584❩ ❛ Worries find you easily enough without inviting them. ❜ ❨585❩ ❛ It is always consoling to think of suicide. It's what gets one through many a bad night. ❜ ❨586❩ ❛ Do you understand this is serious? ❜ ❨587❩ ❛ Sometimes it feels good to fuck with something. Instead of always being fucked with. ❜ ❨588❩ ❛ How could you kill something you cared enough to name? ❜ ❨589❩ ❛ Draw a picture of my soul, and it’d be a scribble with fangs. ❜ ❨590❩ ❛ We have the same chemicals in our blood: shame, anger, greed. Unjustified nostalgia. ❜ ❨591❩ ❛ I appreciate a straightforward apology the way a tone-deaf person enjoys a fine piece of music. ❜ ❨592❩ ❛ The phrase fuck you may not rest on the tip of my tongue, but it’s near. Midtongue. ❜ ❨593❩ ❛ Nothing to it but to do it. ❜ ❨594❩ ❛ There are a lot of people who deserve a lesson, deserve to really understand, that nothing comes easy, that most things are going to go sour. ❜ ❨595❩ ❛ If ifs and buts were candies and nuts we’d all have a very Merry Christmas. ❜ ❨596❩ ❛ Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. ❜ ❨597❩ ❛ What does it do to a girl who knows her mother is a murderer? ❜ ❨598❩ ❛ That mean old bitch across the street bit it. ❜ ❨599❩ ❛ Survival is a talent. ❜ ❨600❩ ❛ Crazy isn't being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It’s you or me amplified. If you ever told a lie and enjoyed it. If you ever wished you could be a child forever. ❜ ❨601❩ ❛ Who has the courage to burn themselves? ❜ ❨602❩ ❛ Is insanity just a matter of dropping the act? ❜ ❨603❩ ❛ Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you have the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while sitting still? ❜ ❨604❩ ❛ You need to be well fed, clothed, and housed to have time for this much self-pity. ❜ ❨605❩ ❛ When I am supposed to be awake, I am asleep; when I am supposed to speak, I am silent. When a pleasure offers itself to me, I avoid it. ❜ ❨606❩ ❛ There is thought, and then there is thinking about thoughts, and they don't feel the same. ❜ ❨607❩ ❛ In a strange way we are free. We've reached the end of the line. We have nothing more to lose. ❜ ❨608❩ ❛ The world won’t stop because we aren’t in it anymore. ❜ ❨609❩ ❛ I can't answer the real question. All I can tell you is, it's easy. ❜ ❨610❩ ❛ I am lighter, airier than I’ve been in years. ❜ ❨611❩ ❛ I am not dead, yet something in me definitely is. ❜ ❨612❩ ❛ You meant that as an insult but I am taking it as a compliment. ❜ ❨613❩ ❛ What life can recover from that? ❜ ❨614❩ ❛ It's a fairly accurate portrait of me. It's accurate but it isn't profound. ❜ ❨615❩ ❛ Pull yourself together! There's nothing wrong with you. ❜ ❨616❩ ❛ It's quiet. It's like― I don't know. It's like falling off a cliff. ❜ ❨617❩ ❛ Once you start parsing a face, it's a peculiar item: squishy, pointy, with lots of air vents and wet spots. ❜ ❨618❩ ❛ I lost him. I did it on purpose. ❜ ❨619❩ ❛ It’s a mean world. There’s nobody to take care of you out there. ❜ ❨620❩ ❛ Reality is getting too dense. ❜ ❨621❩ ❛ I'm ambivalent. In fact that's my new favourite word. ❜ ❨622❩ ❛ I can't come up with reassuring answers to the terrible questions you raise. ❜ ❨623❩ ❛ A spring day, the sort that gives people hope: all soft winds and delicate smells of warm earth. Suicide weather. ❜ ❨624❩ ❛ Twenty-five chocolate chip cookies would be the perfect dinner. ❜ ❨625❩ ❛ A thought is a hard thing to control. ❜ ❨626❩ ❛ Life demands skills I don’t have. ❜ ❨627❩ ❛ Light like this does not exist, but we wish it did. We wish the sun could make us young and beautiful. Most of all, we wish that everyone we knew could be brightened simply by our looking at them. ❜ ❨628❩ ❛ It never stops, even at night, it’s my lullaby. ❜ ❨629❩ ❛ Love blurs your vision; but after it recedes, you can see more clearly than ever. ❜ ❨630❩ ❛ This is the kind of thing you see if you sit in the darkness with open eyes. ❜ ❨631❩ ❛ I have done something wrong, something so huge I can't even see it, something that's drowning me. ❜ ❨632❩ ❛ Whatever is happening to me is my own fault. ❜ ❨633❩ ❛ Hatred is easier. Hatred is clear, metallic, one-handed, unwavering; unlike love. ❜ ❨634❩ ❛ Potential has a shelf life. ❜ ❨635❩ ❛ Don’t move. Stay like that, let me have that. ❜ ❨636❩ ❛ I have come to the edge, of the land. I could get pushed over. ❜ ❨637❩ ❛ Never pray for justice, because you might get some. ❜ ❨638❩ ❛ It disturbs me to learn I have hurt someone unintentionally. I want all my hurts to be intentional. ❜ ❨639❩ ❛ We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat. That counts for something. ❜ ❨640❩ ❛ This is what I miss, not something that’s gone, but something that will never happen. ❜ ❨641❩ ❛ I am not good. I know too much to be good. I know myself. I know myself to be vengeful, greedy, secretive and sly. ❜ ❨642❩ ❛ You are amazing. Amazing and agonising and almost lethal. ❜ ❨643❩ ❛ In my dreams of this city I am always lost. ❜ ❨644❩ ❛ I don't know where these feelings have come from, I don’t know what I've done. ❜ ❨645❩ ❛ I am not the centre of your story, you are.  ❜ ❨646❩ ❛ I’m mad because you’re an asshole. ❜ ❨647❩ ❛ It's enormously pleasing to me, walking away. It's like being able to make people appear and vanish, at will. ❜ ❨648❩ ❛ There is never only one of anyone. ❜ ❨649❩ ❛ I can't do this without feeling I'm acting. ❜ ❨650❩ ❛ I am prepared for almost anything; except absence, except silence. ❜ ❨651❩ ❛ I’m losing my appetite for strangers. ❜ ❨652❩ ❛ You wear your cravings on the outside, like the suckers on a squid. You want it all. ❜ ❨653❩ ❛ Knowing too much about other people weakens you. You are forced to understand their reasons for doing things. ❜ ❨654❩ ❛ I have lost confidence: perhaps all I will ever be is what I am now. ❜ ❨655❩ ❛ Echoes of light, shining out of the midst of nothing. It's old light, and there's not much of it. But it's enough to see by. ❜ ❨656❩ ❛ Whoever cares the most will lose. ❜ ❨657❩ ❛ Young women need unfairness, it’s one of their few defences.  ❜ ❨658❩ ❛ Time has gone on without you. ❜ ❨659❩ ❛ Don't let the bastards grind you down. ❜ ❨660❩ ❛ Who can remember pain, once it’s over? Pain marks you, but too deep to see. Out of sight, out of mind. ❜ ❨661❩ ❛ Better never means better for everyone. It always means worse, for some. ❜ ❨662❩ ❛ There is more than one kind of freedom. Freedom to and freedom from. ❜ ❨663❩ ❛ Remember that forgiveness too is a power. ❜ ❨664❩ ❛ I am not your justification for existence. ❜ ❨665❩ ❛ I want to be valued, in ways that I am not; I want to be more than valuable. ❜ ❨666❩ ❛ If it's a story I'm telling, then I have control over the ending. ❜ ❨667❩ ❛ All you have to do is keep your mouth shut and look stupid. It shouldn't be that hard. ❜ ❨668❩ ❛ Truly amazing, what people can get used to, as long as there are a few compensations. ❜ ❨669❩ ❛ I want everything back, the way it was. ❜ ❨670❩ ❛ You can't help what you feel, but you can help how you behave. ❜ ❨671❩ ❛ Nothing changes instantaneously: in a gradually heating bathtub you'd be boiled to death before you knew it. ❜ ❨672❩ ❛ To want is to have a weakness. ❜ ❨673❩ ❛ There isn't even an enemy you could put your finger on. ❜ ❨674❩ ❛ The past is a great darkness, filled with echoes. ❜ ❨675❩ ❛ Ordinary is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary. ❜ ❨676❩ ❛ I wish this story were different. I wish it were more civilised. I wish it showed me in a better light. ❜ ❨677❩ ❛ The night is mine, my own time, to do with it as I will, as long as I am quiet. As long as I don't move. As long as I lie still. ❜ ❨678❩ ❛ By telling you anything at all I'm at least believing in you. ❜ ❨679❩ ❛ Whatever is silenced will clamour to be heard. ❜ ❨680❩ ❛ Don't worry about forgiving me right now. There are more important things. ❜ ❨681❩ ❛ Keep the others safe. Don't let them suffer too much. If they have to die, let it be fast. ❜ ❨682❩ ❛ The body is so easily damaged, so easily disposed of, water and chemicals is all it is, hardly more to it than a jellyfish, drying on sand. ❜ ❨683❩ ❛ The world is full of weapons if you're looking for them. ❜ ❨684❩ ❛ Nobody's heart is perfect. ❜ ❨685❩ ❛ One false move and I'm dead. ❜ ❨686❩ ❛ Watch out. I've got my eye on you. ❜ ❨687❩ ❛ Fear is a powerful stimulant. ❜ ❨688❩ ❛ I couldn't afford to lose you. ❜ ❨689❩ ❛ Name one hero who was happy. ---- You can’t. ❜ ❨690❩ ❛ I feel like I could eat the world raw. ❜ ❨691❩ ❛ We are like gods at the dawning of the world. ❜ ❨692❩ ❛ I could recognise him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world. ❜ ❨693❩ ❛ There are no bargains between lion and men. I will kill you and eat you raw. ❜ ❨694❩ ❛ You can use a spear as a walking stick, but that will not change its nature. ❜ ❨695❩ ❛ He is a weapon, a killer. Do not forget it. ❜ ❨696❩ ❛ Some men gain glory after they die, others fade. ❜ ❨697❩ ❛ I am made of memories. ❜ ❨698❩ ❛ Will you come with me? ❜ ❨699❩ ❛ I wish I had let you all die. ❜ ❨700❩ ❛ It is right to seek peace for the dead. You and I both know there is no peace for those who live after. ❜ ❨701❩ ❛ Bury us. Let us be free. ❜ ❨702❩ ❛ Go. He waits for you. ❜ ❨703❩ ❛ Nothing could eclipse the stain of this dirty, mortal mediocrity. ❜ ❨704❩ ❛ I know I have told you of this. ❜ ❨705❩ ❛ I don't know how you remember them all. I swear they look the same to me. ❜ ❨706❩ ❛ Perhaps you should get some new stories, so I don’t fucking kill myself of boredom. ❜ ❨707❩ ❛ I yearn for the darkness and silence of the underworld, where I can rest. ❜ ❨708❩ ❛ There is no honour in betraying your friends. ❜ ❨709❩ ❛ There is no answer. Whichever you choose, you are wrong. ❜ ❨710❩ ❛ Divine blood flows differently. ❜ ❨711❩ ❛ How is there glory in taking life? We die so easily. ❜ ❨712❩ ❛ This is what I will miss, I think. I will kill myself rather than miss it. ❜ ❨713❩ ❛ How long do we have? ❜ ❨714❩ ❛ Do you think we fight hopeless wars? ❜ ❨715❩ ❛ There is no law that gods must be fair. ❜ ❨716❩ ❛ I do not fear ridicule. I never have. ❜ ❨717❩ ❛ You were always better with words than I. ❜ ❨718❩ ❛ Who can be ashamed to lose to such beauty? ❜ ❨719❩ ❛ When you see beauty in desolation it changes something inside you. ❜ ❨720❩ ❛ That's how the madness of the world tries to colonise you: from the outside in, forcing you to live in its reality. ❜ ❨721❩ ❛ The shadows of the abyss are like the petals of a monstrous flower that shall blossom within the skull and expand the mind beyond what any man can bear. ❜ ❨722❩ ❛ Silence creates violence. ❜ ❨723❩ ❛ Some questions will ruin you if you are denied the answer long enough. ❜ ❨724❩ ❛ There are certain kinds of connections that are so deep that when broken you feel the snap of it inside you. ❜ ❨725❩ ❛ Nothing that ever lived and breathed was truly objective—even in a vacuum, even if all that possessed the brain was a self-immolating desire for the truth. ❜ ❨726❩ ❛ We all live in a kind of continuous dream. ❜ ❨727❩ ❛ You can either waste time worrying about a death that might not come or concentrate on what’s left to you. ❜ ❨728❩ ❛ What can you do when your five senses are not enough? ❜ ❨729❩ ❛ We will neither be what we had been nor what we would become once we reach our destination. ❜ ❨730❩ ❛ Perhaps my only real expertise, my only talent, is to endure beyond the endurable. ❜ ❨731❩ ❛ When you are too close to the centre of a mystery there is no way to pull back. ❜ ❨732❩ ❛ I long ago stopped believing in promises. Biological imperatives, yes. Environmental factors, yes. Promises, no. ❜ ❨733❩ ❛ I look not for shooting stars but for fixed ones, and I try to imagine what kind of life lives in those celestial tidal pools so far from us. ❜ ❨734❩ ❛ I hesitated for just a moment. Some part of me wanted to see the creature, I think. If so, it was a very small part. I ran. ❜ ❨735❩ ❛ I don’t require any of this to have a deeper meaning. ❜ ❨736❩ ❛ All of this speculation is incomplete, inexact, inaccurate, useless. ❜ ❨737❩ ❛ We don’t have real answers, because we still don’t know what questions to ask. Our instruments are useless, our methodology broken, our motivations selfish. ❜ ❨738❩ ❛ This part I will do alone. Don’t follow. ❜ ❨739❩ ❛ People my entire life have told me I am too much in control, but that has never been the case. I have never truly been in control. ❜ ❨740❩ ❛ Has there always been someone like me to bury the bodies, to have regrets, to carry on after everyone else was dead? ❜ ❨741❩ ❛ I loved them, but I didn’t need them, and I thought that was the way it was supposed to be. ❜ ❨742❩ ❛ Places can impress themselves upon me, and I can become part of them with ease. ❜ ❨743❩ ❛ There is no one with me. I am all by myself. ❜ ❨744❩ ❛ Pretending often leads to becoming a reasonable facsimile of what you mimic. ❜ ❨745❩ ❛ I think you're confusing suicide with self-destruction, and they're very different. Almost none of us commit suicide, whereas almost all of us self-destruct. ❜ ❨746❩ ❛ What did you eat? You had rations for only two weeks. You were there for nearly four months. ❜ ❨747❩ ❛ Something here is making giant waves in the gene pool. ❜ ❨748❩ ❛ I need to know what’s inside. ❜ ❨749❩ ❛ These aren't decisions. They're impulses ❜ ❨750❩ ❛ What do you think I do when you’re away? Do you think I’m out in the garden pinning, looking up at the sky? ❜ ❨751❩ ❛ If I know what’s happened I can save their life. ❜ ❨752❩ ❛ They either went crazy or something in here killed them. ❜ ❨753❩ ❛ Something is coming through the fence! ❜ ❨754❩ ❛ Nothing is written in the stars. Not these stars, nor any others. No one controls your destiny. ❜ ❨755❩ ❛ People who claim that they're evil are usually no worse than the rest of us. ❜ ❨756❩ ❛ Happy endings are still endings. ❜ ❨757❩ ❛ We believe in all sorts of things that aren't true; -- we call it history. ❜ ❨758❩ ❛ Does the devil ever struggle to be good again, or if so is he not a devil? ❜ ❨759❩ ❛ In the lives of children, pumpkins turn into coaches, mice and rats turn into men. When we grow up, we realise it is far more common for men to turn into rats. ❜ ❨760❩ ❛ Girls need cold anger. They need the cold simmer, the ceaseless grudge, the talent to avoid forgiveness, the side stepping of compromise.  ❜ ❨761❩ ❛ Love makes hunters of us all. ❜ ❨762❩ ❛ There is much to hate in this world and way too much to love. ❜ ❨763❩ ❛ You confuse not speaking with not listening. ❜ ❨764❩ ❛ As long as people are going to call you a lunatic anyway, why not get the benefit of it? It liberates you from convention. ❜ ❨765❩ ❛ The eye is always caught by light, but shadows have more to say. ❜ ❨766❩ ❛ Not everyone is born a witch or a saint. Not everyone is born talented, or crooked, or blessed; some are born definite in no particular at all. ❜ ❨767❩ ❛ We are a fountain of shimmering contradictions, most of us. ❜ ❨768❩ ❛ The wickedness of men is that their power breeds stupidity and blindness. ❜ ❨769❩ ❛ I know you don't want to hear this but someone has to say it! You are out of control! ❜ ❨770❩ ❛ Even at the very worst - there is always choice. ❜ ❨771❩ ❛ Maybe the definition of home is the place where you are never forgiven. So you may always belong there, bound by guilt. And maybe the cost of belonging is worth it. ❜ ❨772❩ ❛ Cross a man and you struggle, one of you wins, you adjust and go on -- or you lie there dead. Cross a woman and the entire universe is changed. ❜ ❨773❩ ❛ That was such a wonderful time, even in its strangeness and sadness. Life isn't the same now. It's wonderful, but it isn't the same. ❜ ❨774❩ ❛ I don't care for approval, and I don't mind doing without. ❜ ❨775❩ ❛ It's where I live. A permanent state of bereavement. This is nothing new. ❜ ❨776❩ ❛ Always the bridesmaid, never the bride. Always the godfather, never the god. ❜ ❨777❩ ❛ The world unwraps itself to you, again and again as soon as you are ready to see it anew. ❜ ❨778❩ ❛ Evil is an act, not an appetite. Everyone has the appetite. If you give in to it, that act is evil. The appetite is normal. ❜ ❨779❩ ❛ How many haven't wanted to slash the throat of some boor across the dining room table?  ❜ ❨780❩ ❛ Even God used silence as a strategy. ❜ ❨781❩ ❛ I learned failure early and mastered it. ❜ ❨782❩ ❛ It isn't whether you do it well or ill, it's that you do it all. ❜ ❨783❩ ❛ This is why you shouldn't fall in love, it blinds you. Love is a very wicked distraction. ❜ ❨784❩ ❛ Wisdom is not the understanding of mystery. Wisdom is accepting that mystery is beyond understanding. That's what makes it mystery. ❜ ❨785❩ ❛ Wrong takes an awful long time to be proven, in my experience. ❜ ❨786❩ ❛ Such brightness, as you know, decays brilliantly. ❜ ❨787❩ ❛ I take responsibility only for the future, not the past. The past can't hurt you the way the future can. ❜ ❨788❩ ❛ Tell me to mind my own business, tell me to go fuck myself, to piss off, go on, say it, but don’t tell me nothing’s wrong. ❜ ❨789❩ ❛ The truth isn't a thing of fact or reason. It is simply what everyone agrees on. ❜ ❨790❩ ❛ One can't make peace with another by force. ❜ ❨791❩ ❛ I am a forgettable leaf on a tree. ❜ ❨792❩ ❛ That's all I want; --- to do no harm. ❜ ❨793❩ ❛ I only believe in the opposite of luck, whatever that is. ❜ ❨794❩ ❛ Human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves. ❜ ❨795❩ ❛ You’re too young to know that the heart's memory eliminates the bad and magnifies the good, and thanks to that we manage to endure the burden of the past. ❜ ❨796❩ ❛ Love, no matter what else it might be, is a natural talent. You are either born knowing how, or you never know. ❜ ❨797❩ ❛ Whatever you do, you will be sorry all the rest of your life. ❜ ❨798❩ ❛ There is no God worth worrying about. ❜ ❨799❩ ❛ The only regret I will have in dying is if it is not for love. ❜ ❨800❩ ❛ Wisdom comes to us when it can no longer do any good. ❜ ❨801❩ ❛ Think of love as a state of grace, not the means to anything, but the very end in itself. ❜ ❨802❩ ❛ Only God knows how much I love you. ❜ ❨803❩ ❛ There is no greater glory than to die for love. ❜ ❨804❩ ❛ Nothing resembles a person as much as the way he dies. ❜ ❨805❩ ❛ Take advantage of it now, while you are young, and suffer all you can, because these things don't last your whole life. ❜ ❨806❩ ❛ Today, when I saw you, I realised that what is between us is nothing more than an illusion. ❜ ❨807❩ ❛ I have waited for this opportunity for more than half a century. ❜ ❨808❩ ❛ I want to be myself again, to recover all that I was obliged to give up. ❜ ❨809❩ ❛ The only thing worse than bad health is a bad name. ❜ ❨810❩ ❛ This soup tastes like windows. ❜ ❨811❩ ❛ Why do you insist on talking about what does not exist? ❜ ❨812❩ ❛ One has to live a long time to know a man's true nature. ❜ ❨813❩ ❛ No, not rich, I am a poor man with money, which is not the same thing. ❜ ❨814❩ ❛ My heart has more rooms than a whorehouse. ❜ ❨815❩ ❛ That may be the reason he does so many things, so that he will not have to think. ❜ ❨816❩ ❛ Love if it exists, is something separate: another life. ❜ ❨817❩ ❛ Things did not go as badly for me as they would for you. ❜ ❨818❩ ❛ There are things you do only for love. ❜ ❨819❩ ❛ I’ll have plenty of time to rest when I die. ❜ ❨820❩ ❛ There is no innocence more dangerous than the innocence of age. ❜ ❨821❩ ❛ You treat me as if I were just anybody. ❜ ❨822❩ ❛ The symptoms of love are the same as those of cholera. ❜ ❨823❩ ❛ There is no law, human or divine, that you have not ignored. ❜ ❨824❩ ❛ Why is it that I feel I've known you so many years? ❜ ❨825❩ ❛ Stuff your eyes with wonder, live as if you'd drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It's more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories. ❜ ❨826❩ ❛ It doesn't matter what you do, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. ❜ ❨827❩ ❛ We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you were really bothered? About something important, about something real? ❜ ❨828❩ ❛ There must be something, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing. ❜ ❨829❩ ❛ If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you'll never learn. ❜ ❨830❩ ❛ If you drown, at least die knowing you were heading for shore. ❜ ❨831❩ ❛ You can't make people listen. They have to come round in their own time, wondering what happened and why the world blew up around them. ❜ ❨832❩ ❛ It was a pleasure to burn. ❜ ❨833❩ ❛ I'm antisocial, they say. I don't mix. It's so strange. I'm very social indeed. It all depends on what you mean by social, doesn't it? ❜ ❨834❩ ❛ Being with people is nice. But I don't think it's social to get a bunch of people together and then not let them talk, do you? ❜ ❨835❩ ❛ Do you notice how people hurt each other nowadays? ❜ ❨836❩ ❛ Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man? ❜ ❨837❩ ❛ I don't talk things. I talk the meaning of things. ❜ ❨838❩ ❛ I'll hold on to the world tight some day. I've got one finger on it now; that's a beginning. ❜ ❨839❩ ❛ I just want someone to hear what I have to say. And maybe if I talk long enough it'll make sense. ❜ ❨840❩ ❛ That's the good part of dying; when you've nothing to lose, you run any risk you want. ❜ ❨841❩ ❛ Someday we'll build the biggest goddamn steamshovel in history and dig the biggest grave of all time and shove war in it and cover it up. ❜ ❨842❩ ❛ You're not like the others. I've seen a few; I know. When I talk, you look at me. ❜ ❨843❩ ❛ You're afraid of making mistakes. Don't be. Mistakes can be profited by. ❜ ❨844❩ ❛ When they give you lined paper, write the other way. ❜ ❨845❩ ❛ The sun burnt every day. It burnt time. ❜ ❨846❩ ❛ We have everything we need to be happy but we aren't happy. Something is missing. ❜ ❨847❩ ❛ I feel I'm doing what I should've done a lifetime ago. ❜ ❨848❩ ❛ I'm not afraid. Maybe it's because I'm doing the right thing at last. Maybe it's because I've done a rash thing and don't want to look the coward to you. ❜ ❨849❩ ❛ Good God, who were those men? I never saw them before in my life! ❜ ❨850❩ ❛ How do you get so empty? Who takes it out of you? ❜ ❨851❩ ❛ It must be right. It seems so right. ❜ ❨852❩ ❛ To everything there is a season. Yes. A time to break down, and a time to build up. A time to keep silence and a time to speak. ❜ ❨853❩ ❛ It's my game. And no one can help me. Not even you. ❜ ❨854❩ ❛ What makes earth feel like hell is our expectation that it should feel like heaven. Earth is earth. Dead is dead. You’ll find out for yourself soon enough. ❜ ❨855❩ ❛ Death is a long process. Your body is just the first part of you that croaks. Beyond that, your dreams have to die. Then your expectations. Your anger and memories must die. Your ego. Your pride and shame and ambition and hope. ❜ ❨856❩ ❛ Help me give up my addiction to hope. ❜ ❨857❩ ❛ Life is short, death is forever. ❜ ❨858❩ ❛ Hope is something really tough and tenacious you have to give up. It’s an addiction to break. ❜ ❨859❩ ❛ If the living are haunted by the dead, then the dead are haunted by their own mistakes. ❜ ❨860❩ ❛ We all wish to be pursued. We all long to be desired. ❜ ❨861❩ ❛ All the demons of hell formerly reigned as gods in previous cultures. No it's not fair, but one man's god is another man's devil. ❜ ❨862❩ ❛ I can become someone else, not out of pressure and desperation, but merely because a new life sounds fun or interesting or joyful. ❜ ❨863❩ ❛ It's my petty fear of personal rejection that allows so many true evils to exist. My cowardice enables atrocities. ❜ ❨864❩ ❛ You fucked up. Game over. So just relax. ❜ ❨865❩ ❛ The greatest weapon any warrior can carry into battle is absolute certainty of her eternal soul. ❜ ❨866❩ ❛ If killing you will end my existence as well, be it. Small loss. Such a life, as your puppet, is not worth living. ❜ ❨867❩ ❛ I might be a touch of a sadist and a little bit jejune but at least I'm not a victim, not any longer. I hope. ❜ ❨868❩ ❛ Dying seems like the greatest weakness, and in a world where people say you're lazy for not shaving your legs, then being dead seems like the ultimate character flaw. ❜ ❨869❩ ❛ Any concept of right versus wrong, is merely a cultural construct relative to one specific time and place. ❜ ❨870❩ ❛ To prove that I exist I must kill you. ❜ ❨871❩ ❛ I'd say that my life has been a way-too-long case history of chasing rainbows. ❜ ❨872❩ ❛ The world is a battle for attention, a war to be heard. ❜ ❨873❩ ❛ Every garden looks beautiful in May. ❜ ❨874❩ ❛ When we neglect to fear such brittle monstrosity, we render it powerless. ❜ ❨875❩ ❛ My taste for power continues to grow, as does my ability to accrue it. ❜ ❨876❩ ❛ Such language! Why don't you just take a dump in my ears? ❜ ❨877❩ ❛ You’d be foolish to count on people displaying high standards of honesty. ❜ ❨878❩ ❛ Depending on her mood, she can be more frightening than any demon or devil you might ever run across. ❜ ❨879❩ ❛ Cross your fingers! Maybe death won't happen to you. ❜ ❨880❩ ❛ Do not die while wearing cheap shoes. ❜ ❨881❩ ❛ Old habits die hard. ❜ ❨882❩ ❛ It's our attachments to a fixed identity that torture us. ❜ ❨883❩ ❛ What do I think I am? In a thousand words; I don't have a clue. ❨884❩ ❛ If I am to be saved it is because your love redeems me. ❜ ❨885❩ ❛ All I wanted was to be loved for myself. ❜ ❨886❩ ❛ I have tasted all the happiness the world can offer. ❜ ❨887❩ ❛ Shall we pity him? Shall we curse him? ❜ ❨888❩ ❛ You have a heart that can hold the entire empire of the world. ❜ ❨889❩ ❛ Look, I am not laughing now, crying, crying for you. ❜ ❨890❩ ❛ Tonight I gave you my soul, and I am dead. ❜ ❨891❩ ❛ You are afraid of me! And yet I am not really wicked. Love me and you shall see! ❜ ❨892❩ ❛ Are people so unhappy when they love? --- Yes, when they love and are not sure of being loved. ❜ ❨893❩ ❛ Your soul is a beautiful thing. No emperor received so fair a gift. The angels wept tonight. ❜ ❨894❩ ❛ Blood!...Blood!... That's a good thing! ❜ ❨895❩ ❛ Now I want to live like everybody else. I want to have a life like everybody else. ❜ ❨896❩ ❛ You will be the happiest of women. And we will sing, all by ourselves, till we swoon away with delight. ❜ ❨897❩ ❛ I should be as gentle as a lamb; and you could do anything with me that you pleased. ❜ ❨898❩ ❛ I am going to die of love, I am dying of love. That's how it is. I loved you so. I still love you so. ❜ ❨899❩ ❛ I am dying of love for her, I tell you! If only you knew how beautiful she was when she let me kiss her. ❜ ❨900❩ ❛ He fills me with horror but I do not hate him. How can I hate him? ❜ ❨901❩ ❛ Holy angel, in Heaven blessed, my spirit longs with thee to rest. ❜ ❨902❩ ❛ Nothing is colder or more dead than my heart. ❜ ❨903❩ ❛ I had loved an angel and now I despise a woman. ❜ ❨904❩ ❛ Our lives are one masked ball. ❜ ❨905❩ ❛ Why do you condemn a man whom you have never met, whom no one knows and about whom even you yourself know nothing? ❜ ❨906❩ ❛ He would commit murder for me. ❜ ❨907❩ ❛ If I don't save her from the hands of that humbug, she is lost. But I shall save her. ❜ ❨908❩ ❛ We will go from here together or die together. ❜ ❨909❩ ❛ Your fear, your terror, all of that is just love and love of the most exquisite kind, the kind which people do not admit even to themselves. The kind that gives you a thrill, when you think of it. ❜ ❨910❩ ❛ Destiny has chained you to me forever. ❜ ❨911❩ ❛ You must never ask me that. ❜ ❨912❩ ❛ Are you afraid that you will change your mind? ❜ ❨913❩ ❛ You must come and fetch me in my dressing room at midnight exactly. ❜ ❨914❩ ❛ The holes in your life are permanent. You have to grow around them, like tree roots around concrete; you mould yourself through the gaps. ❜ ❨915❩ ❛ I have never understood how people can blithely disregard the damage they do by following their hearts. ❜ ❨916❩ ❛ There’s something comforting about the sight of strangers safe at home. ❜ ❨917❩ ❛ I have lost control over everything, even the places in my head. ❜ ❨918❩ ❛ It’s possible to miss what you’ve never had, to even mourn for it. ❜ ❨919❩ ❛ There’s nothing so painful, so corrosive, as suspicion. ❜ ❨920❩ ❛ When did you become so weak? ❜ ❨921❩ ��� I don’t know where that strength went, I don’t remember losing it. I think that over time it got chipped away, bit by bit, by life, by the living of it. ❜ ❨922❩ ❛ Let’s be honest: women are still only really valued for two things—their looks and their role as mothers. ❜ ❨923❩ ❛ Sadness gets boring after a while, for the sad person and for everyone around them. ❜ ❨924❩ ❛ I’m playing at real life instead of actually living it. ❜ ❨925❩ ❛ I’ve just got to let myself feel the pain, because if I don’t, if I keep numbing it, it’ll never really go away. ❜ ❨926❩ ❛ I am not the girl I used to be. I am no longer desirable, I’m off-putting in some way. It’s as if people can see the damage written all over me, can see it in my face, the way I hold myself, the way I move. ❜ ❨927❩ ❛ Who was it that said following your heart is a good thing? It is pure egotism, a selfishness to conquer all. ❜ ❨928❩ ❛ It’s impossible to resist the kindness of strangers. ❜ ❨929❩ ❛ Sometimes I catch myself trying to remember the last time I had meaningful physical contact with another person, just a hug or a heartfelt squeeze of my hand, and my heart twitches. ❜ ❨930❩ ❛ I have to find a way of making myself happy, I have to stop looking for happiness elsewhere. ❜ ❨931❩ ❛ How did I find myself here? I wonder where it started, my decline; I wonder at what point I could have halted it. Where did I take the wrong turn? ❜ ❨932❩ ❛ Now look -- Now look what you made me do. ❜ ❨933❩ ❛ It’s okay, whatever you did, whatever you’ve done: you suffered, you hurt, you deserve forgiveness. ❜ ❨934❩ ❛ They’re what I lost, they’re everything I want to be. ❜ ❨935❩ ❛ You broke me and I broke us. ❜ ❨936❩ ❛ I’ve been the fool. If he does it with you, he’ll do it to you. ❜ ❨937❩ ❛ I’d never realised, not until now, how shameful it is to be pitied. ❜ ❨938❩ ❛ Sometimes, I don’t want to go anywhere, I think I’ll be happy if I never have to set foot outside the house again. ❜ ❨939❩ ❛ I don’t believe in soul mates, but there’s an understanding between us that I just haven’t felt before, or at least, not for a long time. ❜ ❨940❩ ❛ There can be no greater agony, nothing can be more painful than the not knowing, which will never end. ❜ ❨941❩ ❛ Being the other woman is a huge turn-on, there’s no point in denying it: you’re the one he can’t help but betray his wife for, even though he loves her. That’s just how irresistible you are. ❜ ❨942❩ ❛ I feel a rush of gratitude so strong, it feels almost like love. ❜ ❨943❩ ❛ You don’t know how determined I can be. Once I’ve made my mind up, I’m a force to be reckoned with. ❜ ❨944❩ ❛ The more I want to be oblivious, the less I can be. Life and light will not let me be. ❜ ❨945❩ ❛ You don’t have to be afraid of being alone. It’s not the worst thing, is it? ❜ ❨946❩ ❛ I have felt this way before. On a larger scale, to a more intense degree, of course, but I remember the quality of the pain. You don’t forget it. ❜ ❨947❩ ❛ If he thinks I’m going to sit around crying, he’s got another thing coming. ❜ ❨948❩ ❛ I don’t like to lose. It’s not like me. None of this is like me. I don’t get rejected. I’m the one who walks away. ❜ ❨949❩ ❛ I don’t remember anger, raging fury. I remember fear. ❜ ❨950❩ ❛ I can’t sleep. I haven’t slept in days. I hate it, hate insomnia more than anything, just lying there, brain going round, tick, tick, tick, tick. ❜ ❨951❩ ❛ Maybe the courage I need has nothing to do with telling the truth and everything to do with walking away. ❜ ❨952❩ ❛ I’m not beautiful, and I can’t have kids, so what does that make me? Worthless. ❜ ❨953❩ ❛ Failure cloaked me like a mantle, it overwhelmed me, dragged me under and I gave up hope. ❜ ❨954❩ ❛ It’s an odd thing to say, but I think this all the time; I don’t feel bad enough. ❜ ❨955❩ ❛ Some battles aren’t worth fighting. ❜ ❨956❩ ❛ I never felt guilty. I pretended I did. I had to. ❜ ❨957❩ ❛ I never meant for any of this to happen, we fell in love, what could we do? ❜ ❨958❩ ❛ What bothers me most is that I haven’t got to the end of my story, and I can’t start over with someone else, it’s too hard. ❜ ❨959❩ ❛ A person is, among all else, a material thing, easily torn and not easily mended. ❜ ❨960❩ ❛ It isn’t only wickedness and scheming that make people unhappy, it is confusion and misunderstanding. ❜ ❨961❩ ❛ Falling in love can be achieved in a single word—a glance. ❜ ❨962❩ ❛ Though you think the world is at your feet, it can rise up and tread on you. ❜ ❨963❩ ❛ I’ve never had a moment’s doubt. I love you. I believe in you completely. You are my dearest one. My reason for life. ❜ ❨964❩ ❛ It might hurt, it is horribly inconvenient, no good might come of it, but it is what it is to be in love. ❜ ❨965❩ ❛ It was always an impossible task, and that was precisely the point. ❜ ❨966❩ ❛ Come back, come back to me. ❜ ❨967❩ ❛ In my thoughts I make love to you all day long. ❜ ❨968❩ ❛ The truth is I feel rather light headed and foolish in your presence and I don’t think I can blame the heat. ❜ ❨969❩ ❛ Beauty occupies a narrow band. Ugliness, on the other hand, has infinite variation. ❜ ❨970❩ ❛ Is there any meaning in my life that the inevitable death awaiting me does not destroy? ❜ ❨971❩ ❛ However, withered, I still feel myself to be exactly the same person I’ve always been. ❜ ❨972❩ ❛ Hate is a feeling as pure as love, but dispassionate and icily rational. ❜ ❨973❩ ❛ I’m going mad. Let me not be mad. ❜ ❨974❩ ❛ Is everyone really as alive as I am? ❜ ❨975❩ ❛ Every now and then, quite unintentionally, someone teaches you something about yourself. ❜ ❨976❩ ❛ Something has happened, hasn’t it? ❜ ❨977❩ ❛ I like to think that it isn’t weakness or evasion, but a final act of kindness. ❜ ❨978❩ ❛ Is it possible that I am, in the modern term, in denial? ❜ ❨979❩ ❛ How could anyone presume to know the world through the eyes of an insect? ❜ ❨980❩ ❛ Not everything has a cause. Some things are simply so. ❜ ❨981❩ ❛ I’ll be quite honest with you. I’m torn between breaking your neck here and throwing you down the stairs. ❜ ❨982❩ ❛ How old do you have to be before you know the difference between right and wrong? ❜ ❨983❩ ❛ It was never meant to be read. ❜ ❨984❩ ❛ If I fell in the river, would you save me? ❜ ❨985❩ ❛ That was an incredibly bloody stupid thing to do. ❜ ❨986❩ ❛ I want to thank you for saving my life. I’ll be eternally grateful to you. ❜ ❨987❩ ❛ I’m very, very sorry for the terrible distress that I have caused. I’m very, very sorry. ❜ ❨988❩ ❛ Don’t call me that! – Please don’t call me that. ❜ ❨989❩ ❛ It may be the wrong decision, but fuck it, it’s mine. ❜ ❨990❩ ❛ Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: pati. It does not mean to flow with exuberance. It means to suffer. ❜ ❨991❩ ❛ No one ever really gets used to nightmares. ❜ ❨992❩ ❛ I still get nightmares. In fact, I get them so often I should be used to them by now. I’m not. ❜ ❨993❩ ❛ Sublime is something you choke on after a shot of tequila. ❜ ❨994❩ ❛ Some people reflect light, some deflect it, you by some miracle, seem to collect it. ❜ ❨995❩ ❛ Beautiful women are always drawn to men they think will keep them beautiful. ❜ ❨996❩ ❛ The ruminations are mine, let the world be yours. ❜ ❨997❩ ❛ You will fulfil a promise I made years ago but failed to keep. ❜ ❨998❩ ❛ Darkness never satisfies. Especially if it takes something away which it almost always invariably does. ❜ ❨999❩ ❛ I want something else. I’m not even sure what to call it anymore. ❜ ❨1000❩ ❛ What can I say, I’m a sucker for abandoned stuff, misplaced stuff, forgotten stuff, any old stuff. ❜ ❨1001❩ ❛ Is it possible to love something so much, you imagine it wants to destroy you only because it has denied you? ❜ ❨1002❩ ❛ It’s just silent, no sound at all. It’s like something’s waiting. ❜ ❨1003❩ ❛ I guess I’m hoping the weapons will make me feel better, grant me some kind of fucking control. ❜ ❨1004❩ ❛ Oh and something else: – Fuck you. ❜ ❨1005❩ ❛ God I’ve never been afraid like this. ❜ ❨1006❩ ❛ I miss you. I love you. There’s no second I’ve lived that you can’t call your own. ❜ ❨1007❩ ❛ I’m so tired. Sleep’s been stalking me for too long to remember. Inevitable I suppose. ❜ ❨1008❩ ❛ Not seeing the rip doesn’t mean you automatically get to keep clear of the Hey-I’m-Bleeding part. ❜ ❨1009❩ ❛ These days fantasies flourish and die like summer flies. ❜ ❨1010❩ ❛ Yeah I know, I know. This shit’s getting ridiculous. ❜ ❨1011❩ ❛ ‘Fuck’ and 'fall for’ have very different meanings. The first one you do as much as you can. The second one you never ever, ever do. ❜ ❨1012❩ ❛ It’s a nice idea but it reeks of hope. False hope. ❜ ❨1013❩ ❛ It’s, well…one thing in two words: fucked up…very fucked up. Okay three words, four words, who the hell cares…very very fucked up. ❜ ❨1014❩ ❛ Do you think I could spend the night at your place?  ❜ ❨1015❩ ❛ Any fool can pray. ❜ ❨1016❩ ❛ I feel like I haven’t slept in months. My neighbours are scared of me. ❜ ❨1017❩ ❛ I’ve lost my mind? Maybe, maybe, maybe. Maybe I’m just really drunk. ❜ ❨1018❩ ❛ Perhaps by cleaning out my system I’ll come to a clearing where I can ease myself into peace. ❜ ❨1019❩ ❛ I should be dead. Why am I still here? ❜ ❨1020❩ ❛ Fuck if I know. Your guess is as good as mine. ❜ ❨1021❩ ❛ You are my flesh. You are my bones. I know you too well. I read you too perfectly. ❜ ❨1022❩ ❛ Not all complex problems have easy solutions. ❜ ❨1023❩ ❛ Do you believe in God? I don’t think I ever asked you that one. ❜ ❨1024❩ ❛ We all create stories to protect ourselves. ❜ ❨1025❩ ❛ Are you kidding me? This place is scary. ❜ ❨1026❩ ❛ These days the only thing that gets me outside is when I say: Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck you. Fuck me. Fuck this. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. ❜ ❨1027❩ ❛ You like that crap because it reminds you of you. ❜ ❨1028❩ ❛ You may suddenly realise things are not how you perceived them to be at all. ❜ ❨1029❩ ❛ The two hardest tests are the patience to wait for the right moment and the courage not to be disappointed with what we encounter. ❜ ❨1030❩ ❛ People never learn anything by being told, they have to find out for themselves. ❜ ❨1031❩ ❛ Be crazy! But learn how to be crazy without being the center of attention. Be brave enough to live different. ❜ ❨1032❩ ❛ You are someone who is different, but who wants to be the same as everyone else. And that in my view is a serious illness. ❜ ❨1033❩ ❛ God chose you to be different. ❜ ❨1034❩ ❛ Why are you disappointing God with this kind of attitude? ❜ ❨1035❩ ❛ You have two choices, to control your mind or to let your mind control you. ❜ ❨1036❩ ❛ Everyone is indeed crazy, but the craziest are the ones who don't know they're crazy; they just keep repeating what others tell them to. ❜ ❨1037❩ ❛ Haven't you learned anything, not even with the approach of death?  ❜ ❨1038❩ ❛ If people don't like it, they can complain. And if they don't have the courage to complain, that's their problem. ❜ ❨1039❩ ❛ Nothing in this world happens by chance. ❜ ❨1040❩ ❛ I want to continue living my life the way I dream it, and not the way the other people want it to be. ❜ ❨1041❩ ❛ Be like the fountain that overflows, not like the cistern that merely contains. ❜ ❨1042❩ ❛ Collective madness is called sanity. ❜ ❨1043❩ ❛ Consider each day a miracle - which indeed it is, when you consider the number of unexpected things that could happen in each second of our fragile existences. ❜ ❨1044❩ ❛ You say they create their own reality, but what is reality? ❜ ❨1045❩ ❛ Many people don't allow themselves to love because there are a lot of things at risk. A lot of future and a lot of past. ❜ ❨1046❩ ❛ Death frees from the fear of dying. ❜ ❨1047❩ ❛ The danger of an adventure is worth a thousand days of ease and comfort. ❜ ❨1048❩ ❛ The happier people can be, the unhappier they are. ❜ ❨1049❩ ❛ Life is always a matter of waiting for the right moment to act. ❜ ❨1050❩ ❛ It's best to accept life as it really is and not as you imagined it to be. ❜ ❨1051❩ ❛ You don't seem mad at all. ❜ ❨1052❩ ❛ We’re allowed to make a lot of mistakes in our lives, except the mistake that destroys us. ❜ ❨1053❩ ❛ You’re what you are, not what others make of you. ❜ ❨1054❩ ❛ Am I cured? ❜ ❨1055❩ ❛ Real love changes and grows with time and discovers new ways of expressing itself. ❜ ❨1056❩ ❛ A lot of people think something is right, and so that thing becomes right. Is that it? ❜ ❨1057❩ ❛ They think they're normal, because they all do the same thing. ❜ ❨1058❩ ❛ I didn't know that other ‘me’s existed inside me, ‘Me’s that I could love. ❜ ❨1059❩ ❛ I have no idea what's awaiting me. ❜ ❨1060❩ ❛ What will happen when this all ends? ❜ ❨1061❩ ❛ I know that you are capable of great deeds. ❜ ❨1062❩ ❛ A loveless world is a dead world, and always there comes an hour when one is weary of prisons, of one's work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart. ❜ ❨1063❩ ❛ The truth is that everyone is bored. ❜ ❨1064❩ ❛ I feel more fellowship with the defeated than with saints. Heroism and sanctity don't really appeal to me, I imagine. ❜ ❨1065❩ ❛ If there is one thing one can always yearn for, and sometimes attain, it is human love. ❜ ❨1066❩ ❛ Who would dare to assert that eternal happiness can compensate for even a single moment's suffering? ❜ ❨1067❩ ❛ It's not easy. I've been thinking it over for years. ❜ ❨1068❩ ❛ While we loved each other we didn't need words to make ourselves understood. ❜ ❨1069❩ ❛ People are more often bad than good. ❜ ❨1070❩ ❛ I don't believe in heroism; I know it's easy and I've learned that it can be murderous. ❜ ❨1071❩ ❛ What interests me is living and dying for what one loves. ❜ ❨1072❩ ❛ In fact, nobody is capable of really thinking about anyone, even in the worst calamity. ❜ ❨1073❩ ❛ Nothing in the world is worth turning one's back on what one loves. ❜ ❨1074❩ ❛ Again and again there comes a time in history when the man who dares to say that two and two make four is punished with death. ❜ ❨1075❩ ❛ There are more things to admire in men then to despise. ❜ ❨1076❩ ❛ It is in the thick of calamity that one gets hardened to the truth - in other words, to silence. ❜ ❨1077❩ ❛ What on earth prompted you to take a hand in this? ❜ ❨1078❩ ❛ Your code of morals? What code, if I may ask? ❜ ❨1079❩ ❛ I'm fumbling in the dark, struggling to make something out. But I've long ceased finding anything. ❜ ❨1080❩ ❛ No doubt our love is still there, but quite simply it is unusable, heavy to carry, inert inside of us, sterile as crime or condemnation. ❜ ❨1081❩ ❛ I’m not happy to go, but one needn't be happy to make another start. ❜ ❨1082❩ ❛ I am incapable of suffering for a long time, or being happy for a long time. Which means that I am incapable of anything really worth while. ❜ ❨1083❩ ❛ I should have found the words to keep her with me. ❜ ❨1084❩ ❛ We can't stir a finger in this world without the risk of bringing death to somebody. ❜ ❨1085❩ ❛ The evil that is in the world comes out of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. ❜ ❨1086❩ ❛ There are always flies and itches. That’s why life is difficult to live. ❜ ❨1087❩ ❛ The best protection against anything is a good bottle of wine. ❜ ❨1088❩ ❛ There is no peace without hope. ❜ ❨1089❩ ❛ It's enough for me to be sure that you and I exist at this moment. ❜ ❨1090❩ ❛ There is always something left to love. ❜ ❨1091❩ ❛ A person doesn’t die when he should but when he can. ❜ ❨1092❩ ❛ Things have a life of their own. It's simply a matter of waking up their souls. ❜ ❨1093❩ ❛ Tell me something: why are you fighting? ❜ ❨1094❩ ❛ I've come to realise only just now that I'm fighting because of pride. ❜ ❨1095❩ ❛ One minute of reconciliation is worth more than a whole life of friendship. ❜ ❨1096❩ ❛ It's better than not knowing why you're fighting. Or fighting, like you, for something that doesn't have any meaning for anyone. ❜ ❨1097❩ ❛ Holy Mother of God! ❜ ❨1098❩ ❛ A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground. ❜ ❨1099❩ ❛ I was born a son of a bitch and I'm going to die a son of a bitch. ❜ ❨1100❩ ❛ Bad luck doesn't have any chinks in it. ❜ ❨1101❩ ❛ I plead youth as a mitigating circumstance. ❜ ❨1102❩ ❛ Get those bad thoughts out of your head. You're going to be happy. ❜ ❨1103❩ ❛ Children inherit their parents' madness. ❜ ❨1104❩ ❛ I'll turn to ashes in here but I won't give this miserable town the pleasure of seeing me weep. ❜ ❨1105❩ ❛ You would be good in a war. Where you put your eye, you put your bullet. ❜ ❨1106❩ ❛ Men demand much more than you think. ❜ ❨1107❩ ❛ Even the craziest and most persistent love is just a temporary truth. ❜ ❨1108❩ ❛ If we’re alone you can whisper in my ear any crap you can think of. ❜ ❨1109❩ ❛ You have taken this horrible game very seriously and you have done well because you are doing your duty. ❜ ❨1110❩ ❛ We have the right to pull down your pants and give you a whipping at the first sign of disrespect. ❜ ❨1111❩ ❛ What worries me is not your shooting me, because after all, for people like us it's a natural death. ❜ ❨1112❩ ❛ What worries me is that you've ended up as bad as they are. ❜ ❨1113❩ ❛ It is characteristic of men to deny hunger once their appetites are satisfied. ❜ ❨1114❩ ❛ Dying is much more difficult than one imagines. ❜ ❨1115❩ ❛ If you have to go crazy, please go crazy all by yourself! ❜ ❨1116❩ ❛ We have still not had a death. ❜ ❨1117❩ ❛ How awful, the way time passes. ❜ ❨1118❩ ❛ You may be in command of your war, but I'm in command of my house. ❜ ❨1119❩ ❛ I missed you every hour. ❜ ❨1120❩ ❛ You know what the worst part was? It caught me completely by surprise. ❜ ❨1121❩ ❛ I’ve risked my life for you. ❜ ❨1122❩ ❛ The problem with wanting is that it makes us weak. ❜ ❨1123❩ ❛ I love you, even the part of you that loved him. ❜ ❨1124❩ ❛ I’m sorry it took me so long to see you. ❜ ❨1125❩ ❛ I never really belonged anywhere. ❜ ❨1126❩ ❛ Thanks for being my best friend and making my life bearable.  ❜ ❨1127❩ ❛ Thanks for finding me. ❜ ❨1128❩ ❛ You and I are going to change the world. ❜ ❨1129❩ ❛ I’ve been waiting for you a long time. ❜ ❨1130❩ ❛ I’m not used to people trying to kill me. ❜ ❨1131❩ ❛ You’re shaking. ❜ ❨1132❩ ❛ There's nothing wrong with being a lizard. Unless you were born to be a hawk. ❜ ❨1133❩ ❛ Make me your villain. ❜ ❨1134❩ ❛ Just you and me. It’s always just you and me. ❜ ❨1135❩ ❛ Do you blame me for every mistake I made? For every dumb thing I’ve said? ❜ ❨1136❩ ❛ Well, if it gets too bad, give me a signal. ❜ ❨1137❩ ❛ Did you tell him what I showed you in the dark? ❜ ❨1138❩ ❛ Did you miss me when you were gone? ❜ ❨1139❩ ❛ What is infinite? The universe and the greed of men. ❜ ❨1140❩ ❛ You’re interfering with my plan. ❜ ❨1141❩ ❛ Too much champagne? ❜ ❨1142❩ ❛ I hope you don’t expect fairness from me. It isn’t one of my specialties. ❜ ❨1143❩ ❛ There is something more powerful than any army. Something strong enough to topple kings. Faith. ❜ ❨1144❩ ❛ All you said was that I had to kill you. You didn’t say how. ❜ ❨1145❩ ❛ What is she? She’s everything, you dumb son of a bitch. ❜ ❨1146❩ ❛ She’s an ugly little thing. No child should look like that. Pale and sour, like a glass of milk that’s turned. ❜ ❨1147❩ ❛ I wouldn’t make that mistake again. ❜ ❨1148❩ ❛ It’s a great honor, to save a life. You saved many. ❜ ❨1149❩ ❛ In this world, there are things you can only do alone. ❜ ❨1150❩ ❛ What seems like a reasonable distance to one person might feel too far to somebody else. ❜ ❨1151❩ ❛ If you really want to know something, you have to be willing to pay the price. ❜ ❨1152❩ ❛ Why should you be interested in me? ❜ ❨1153❩ ❛ I have been told I've got a darkish personality. A few times. ❜ ❨1154❩ ❛ It's not as if our lives are divided simply into light and dark. There's shadowy middle ground. ❜ ❨1155❩ ❛ I'll write to you. A super-long letter, like in an old-fashioned novel. ❜ ❨1156❩ ❛ The spotlight doesn't suit me. I'm more of a side dish. ❜ ❨1157❩ ❛ The ground we stand on looks solid enough, but if something happens it can drop right out from under you.  ❜ ❨1158❩ ❛ So once you're dead there's just nothing? ❜ ❨1159❩ ❛ If only I could fall sound asleep and wake up in my old reality. ❜ ❨1160❩ ❛ Is action merely the incidental product of thought, or is thought the consequential product of action? ❜ ❨1161❩ ❛ Nobody can shake off their own shadow. ❜ ❨1162❩ ❛ The silence is so deep it hurts. ❜ ❨1163❩ ❛ I may not look it, but I can be a very patient guy. ❜ ❨1164❩ ❛ Killing time is one of my specialities. ❜ ❨1165❩ ❛ You can't fight it. ❜ ❨1166❩ ❛ Tell me something,—do you believe in reincarnation? ❜ ❨1167❩ ❛ I can’t understand nothingness. I can’t understand it and I can’t imagine it. ❜ ❨1168❩ ❛ I can hardly breathe, and my whole body wants to shrink into a corner.  ❜ ❨1169❩ ❛ I do have a few things wrong with me, but those are strictly problems I keep inside. ❜ ❨1170❩ ❛ I can't take it any more, I can't go on any more. ❜ ❨1171❩ ❛ You don't really have it together. ❜ ❨1172❩ ❛ Is it against the law for me to know it? ❜ ❨1173❩ ❛ I keep having the same dream. ❜ ❨1174❩ ❛ Are you asking because you really want an answer? ❜ ❨1175❩ ❛ I hate this! I don't want to be changed this way! ❜ ❨1176❩ ❛ No contradictions, no irony. They do everything according to numerical formulas. ❜ ❨1177❩ ❛ Want to hear the rest? If you’re not interested, I can stop. ❜ ❨1178❩ ❛ If I didn’t have these memories inside me, I would’ve snapped a long time ago. I would’ve curled up in a ditch somewhere and died. ❜ ❨1179❩ ❛ I don’t know what you’re feeling. I won’t even pretend. ❜ ❨1180❩ ❛ What are you doing here, honey? ❜ ❨1181❩ ❛ You're not even old enough to know how bad life gets. ❜ ❨1182❩ ❛ You don't understand me. ❜ ❨1183❩ ❛ All wisdom ends in paradox. ❜ ❨1184❩ ❛ It is love that overthrows empire. Love that binds two hearts together, come hellfire & brimstone. ❜ ❨1185❩ ❛ I have lost my gift. ❜ ❨1186❩ ❛ Winter is the season of alcoholism and despair. ❜ ❨1187❩ ❛ The seeds of death get lost in the mess that God made us. ❜ ❨1188❩ ❛ They're just memories now. It’s time to forget. ❜ ❨1189❩ ❛ The time has to be right and the heart willing. ❜ ❨1190❩ ❛ The world, a tired performer, offers us another half-assed season. ❜ ❨1191❩ ❛ Capitalism has resulted in material well-being but spiritual bankruptcy. ❜ ❨1192❩ ❛ Grief is natural, overcoming it is a matter of choice. ❜ ❨1193❩ ❛ I want out of that decorating scheme. ❜ ❨1194❩ ❛ With most people suicide is like Russian roulette. Only one chamber has a bullet. ❜ ❨1195❩ ❛ You never get over it but you get where it doesn't bother you so much. ❜ ❨1196❩ ❛ Don't waste your time on life. ❜ ❨1197❩ ❛ I'm a teenager. I've got problems! ❜ ❨1198❩ ❛ Adolescents tend to seek love where they can find it. ❜ ❨1199❩ ❛ Obviously, you've never been a thirteen-year-old girl. ❜ ❨1200❩ ❛ It was a mistake. ❜ ❨1201❩ ❛ It seemed like we were supposed to feel sorry for everything that ever happened, ever. ❜ ❨1202❩ ❛ Buffeted but not broken. ❜ ❨1203❩ ❛ Shit. What have kids got to be worried about now? ❜ ❨1204❩ ❛ If they want trouble, they should go live in Bangladesh. ❜ ❨1205❩ ❛ I can't wait until I get out of here. ❜ ❨1206❩ ❛ When she jumped she probably thought she’d fly. ❜ ❨1207❩ ❛ I do not think the patient truly meant to end her life. Her act was a cry for help. ❜ ❨1208❩ ❛ You're a stone fox. ❜ ❨1209❩ ❛ It was love at first sight, at last sight, at ever and ever sight. ❜ ❨1210❩ ❛ Light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. ❜ ❨1211❩ ❛ He broke my heart. You merely broke my life. ❜ ❨1212❩ ❛ I'm sorry to have deceived you so much, but that's how life is. ❜ ❨1213❩ ❛ Words without experience are meaningless. ❜ ❨1214❩ ❛ I loved you. I was a monster, but I loved you. ❜ ❨1215❩ ❛ Come just as you are. ❜ ❨1216❩ ❛ If a violin string could ache, i would be that string. ❜ ❨1217❩ ❛ Perhaps, somewhere, some day, at a less miserable time, we may see each other again. ❜ ❨1218❩ ❛ What's so dreadful about dying is that you are completely on your own. ❜ ❨1219❩ ❛ Don't touch me; I'll die if you touch me. ❜ ❨1220❩ ❛ You took advantage of my disadvantage. ❜ ❨1221❩ ❛ I walk in a maze I cannot get out of. ❜ ❨1222❩ ❛ Life is just one small piece of light between two eternal darknesses. ❜ ❨1223❩ ❛ Imagine me; I shall not exist if you do not imagine me. ❜ ❨1224❩ ❛ There is no harm in smiling. ❜ ❨1225❩ ❛ There is no point in staying here. There is no point in staying anywhere. ❜ ❨1226❩ ❛ There is nothing more atrociously cruel than an adored child. ❜ ❨1227❩ ❛ I am so tired of being cynical. ❜ ❨1228❩ ❛ Come to live with me, and die with me, and everything with me. ❜ ❨1229❩ ❛ This is the only immortality that you and I may share. ❜ ❨1230❩ ❛ I loved her more than anything I had ever seen or imagined on earth, or hoped for anywhere else. ❜ ❨1231❩ ❛ I was despicable and brutal, and turpid, and everything, mais je t’aimais, je t’aimais! ❜ ❨1232❩ ❛ Years of secret suffering has taught me superhuman self-control. ❜ ❨1233❩ ❛ Solitude is corrupting me. I need company and care. ❜ ❨1234❩ ❛ I've missed you terribly. ❜ ❨1235❩ ❛ I've been revoltingly unfaithful to you. ❜ ❨1236❩ ❛ It doesn't matter a bit, because you've stopped caring anyway. ❜ ❨1237❩ ❛ What makes you say I've stopped caring for you? ❜ ❨1238❩ ❛ Nowadays you have to be a scientist if you want to be a killer. ❜ ❨1239❩ ❛ The sun climbs high in the sky, then starts down. People come, then go. ❜ ❨1240❩ ❛ Tell me, have you ever thought of killing me? ❜ ❨1241❩ ❛ I can not believe you are the same human being. ❜ ❨1242❩ ❛ Just how urgent is it? ❜ ❨1243❩ ❛ It is time for you to be going. ❜ ❨1244❩ ❛ How is it you know something like that? ❜ ❨1245❩ ❛ I don’t mind. Your mess is my mess. ❜ ❨1246❩ ❛ Everybody has one thing they do not want to lose. ❜ ❨1247❩ ❛ I’ll be late tonight, so don’t wait up for me. ❜ ❨1248❩ ❛ Nothing I’ve tried to do by myself has ever come off. ❜ ❨1249❩ ❛ I am not catching you in the middle of anything important, am I? ❜ ❨1250❩ ❛ Some things are forgotten, some things disappear, some things die. ❜ ❨1251❩ ❛ My biggest fault is that the faults I was born with grow bigger each year. ❜ ❨1252❩ ❛ To get irritated is to lose our way in life. ❜ ❨1253❩ ❛ A friend to kill time is a friend sublime. ❜ ❨1254❩ ❛ I don't really know if it's the right thing to do. ❜ ❨1255❩ ❛ Faster cars and more cats run over? Who needs it? ❜ ❨1256❩ ❛ Most of everything you think you know about me is nothing more than memories. ❜ ❨1257❩ ❛ Your fate is and will always be the fate of a dreamer. ❜ ❨1258❩ ❛ You’re loads better than you think you are. ❜ ❨1259❩ ❛ You’re only half-living, the other half is still untapped somewhere. ❜ ❨1260❩ ❛ The song is over. But the melody lingers on. ❜ ❨1261❩ ❛ You are extraordinary. ❜ ❨1262❩ ❛ We tend to fool ourselves into thinking that time is our size, but it really goes on and on. ❜ ❨1263❩ ❛ It could be five years or ten years or one month. It's all the same. ❜ ❨1264❩ ❛ I’m forever realising things too late. ❜ ❨1265❩ ❛ I’m not complaining when I say my life is boring. ❜ ❨1266❩ ❛ Weakness is something that rots in the body. ❜ ❨1267❩ ❛ Coming from your mouth, it has the ring of truth, but I doubt anyone would believe me if I told them. ❜ ❨1268❩ ❛ You can't expect something unreal to last anyway, can you? ❜ ❨1269❩ ❛ A wise man does not step betwixt the beast and his meat. ❜ ❨1270❩ ❛ So, kill me. Tell the others I attacked you so you killed me. ❜ ❨1271❩ ❛ Should never have come here. ❜ ❨1272❩ ❛ Hard to guess my tastes. ❜ ❨1273❩ ❛ Can’t it wait until the morning? ❜ ❨1274❩ ❛ You’ll find temper tantrums won’t help you here. ❜ ❨1275❩ ❛ It must have taken courage to return. ❜ ❨1276❩ ❛ It all sounds grimly dystopian. ❜ ❨1277❩ ❛ I am not afraid of you! ❜ ❨1278❩ ❛ All this could be avoided! ❜ ❨1279❩ ❛ You consider me a murderer? ❜ ❨1280❩ ❛ Gross way to die. ❜ ❨1281❩ ❛ What sparks wars? The will to power, the backbone of human nature. ❜ ❨1282❩ ❛ My life amounts to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean. Yet what is any ocean, but a multitude of drops? ❜ ❨1283❩ ❛ Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others. ❜ ❨1284❩ ❛ I believe there is another world waiting for us. A better world. And I'll be waiting for you there. ❜ ❨1285❩ ❛ You are allowed to feel messed up and inside out. It doesn't mean you're defective - it just means you're human. ❜ ❨1286❩ ❛ Power, time, gravity, love. The forces that really kick ass are all invisible. ❜ ❨1287❩ ❛ Unlimited power in the hands of limited people always leads to cruelty. ❜ ❨1288❩ ❛ Truth is singular. Its 'versions' are mistruths. ❜ ❨1289❩ ❛ Dreams are all I have ever truly owned. ❜ ❨1290❩ ❛ Your version of the truth is the only thing that matters. ❜ ❨1291❩ ❛ I believe death is only a door. One closes, and another opens. ❜ ❨1292❩ ❛ By each crime and every kindness, we birth our future. ❜ ❨1293❩ ❛ The healthy can't understand the emptied, the broken. ❜ ❨1294❩ ❛ Lying's wrong, but when the world spins backwards, a small wrong may be a big right. ❜ ❨1295❩ ❛ The weak are meat the strong do eat. ❜ ❨1296❩ ❛ Do whatever you can't not do. ❜ ❨1297❩ ❛ What precipitates outcomes? Vicious acts & virtuous acts. ❜ ❨1298❩ ❛ I remain thankful to God for all his mercies. ❜ ❨1299❩ ❛ You can maintain power over people, as long as you give them something. Rob a man of everything, and that man will no longer be in your power. ❜ ❨1300❩ ❛ Power. The ability to determine another man's luck. ❜ ❨1301❩ ❛ Pain is strong, aye - but friends' eyes, more strong. ❜ ❨1302❩ ❛ Perhaps those deprived of beauty perceive it most instinctively. ❜ ❨1303❩ ❛ Why ask a question whose answer would demand ten more questions? ❜ ❨1304❩ ❛ You can’t lie to your soul. ❜ ❨1305❩ ❛ Why would I want to do a thing like that? ❜ ❨1306❩ ❛ We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. ❜ ❨1307❩ ❛ Better to make life as complete and enjoyable an experience as possible, in case death is shite, which I suspect it will be. ❜ ❨1308❩ ❛ I’m not running away, I’m moving on. ❜ ❨1309❩ ❛ The reasons? There are no reasons. ❜ ❨1310❩ ❛ Some people are easier to love when you don’t have to be around them. ❜ ❨1311❩ ❛ Love does not exist. ❜ ❨1312❩ ❛ Fuck that ‘regrets’ bullshit. ❜ ❨1313❩ ❛ How does it make you feel? ❜ ❨1314❩ ❛ It’s horrible how we always die alone, but no worse than living alone. ❜ ❨1315❩ ❛ Choose us. Choose life. ❜ ❨1316❩ ❛ You fucking knew that fucking cunt would fuck some cunt. ❜ ❨1317❩ ❛ I’m more of a warrior than you’ll ever be. ❜ ❨1318❩ ❛ What does that make us? The lowest of the low, the scum of the earth. ❜ ❨1319❩ ❛ You don’t have to run away.  ❜ ❨1320❩ ❛ I tried to stop because it was only causing pain. I couldn’t. ❜ ❨1321❩ ❛ I’m not going to get crushed. ❜ ❨1322❩ ❛ I love doubt in a woman. It’s nearly as sexy as determination. ❜ ❨1323❩ ❛ Take your best orgasm, multiply the feeling by twenty. ❜ ❨1324❩ ❛ You’re a mess. ❜ ❨1325❩ ❛ I know that it’s never left you alone. ❜ ❨1326❩ ❛ Are you asking me or telling me? ❜ ❨1327❩ ❛ You just get used to all the shit. ❜ ❨1328❩ ❛ You can’t afford a conscience in this life. ❜ ❨1329❩ ❛ None of us are saints and scapegoats are always handy. ❜ ❨1330❩ ❛ Doing things doesn’t hurt you; you get hurt by avoiding them. ❜ ❨1331❩ ❛ What was that? ❜ ❨1332❩ ❛ Protect me from those who wish to help us. ❜ ❨1333❩ ❛ You can’t love yourself if you want to hurt things like that. ❜ ❨1334❩ ❛ What happens when people open their hearts? ❜ ❨1335❩ ❛ Nobody likes being alone that much. ❜ ❨1336❩ ❛ I don’t go out of my way to make friends, that’s all. It just leads to disappointment.” ❨1337❩ ❛ Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Only assholes do that. ❜ ❨1338❩ ❛ You need to grab whatever chance you have of happiness where you find it, and not worry about other people too much. ❜ ❨1339❩ ❛ I want you always to remember me. ❜ ❨1340❩ ❛ Despite your best efforts, people are going to be hurt when it’s time for them to be hurt. ❜ ❨1341❩ ❛ What stays in your heart will stay; keep them, and what vanishes will vanish. ❜ ❨1342❩ ❛ All I want in this world is you. ❜ ❨1343❩ ❛ I want the two of us to begin everything from the beginning. ❜ ❨1344❩ ❛ No truth can cure the sorrow we feel from losing a loved one. ❜ ❨1345❩ ❛ What a terrible thing it is to wound someone you really care for and to do it so unconsciously. ❜ ❨1346❩ ❛ If you’re in pitch blackness, all you can do is sit tight until your eyes get used to the dark. ❜ ❨1347❩ ❛ I’ve had enough hurt already in my life. More than enough. Now I want to be happy. ❜ ❨1348❩ ❛ People leave strange little memories of themselves behind when they die. ❜ ❨1349❩ ❛ Stop eating yourself up alive. Things will go where they’re supposed to go if you just let them take their natural course. ❜ ❨1350❩ ❛ When your feelings build up and harden and die inside, then you’re in big trouble. ❜ ❨1351❩ ❛ When you fall in love, the natural thing to do is give yourself to it. ❜ ❨1352❩ ❛ If I have left a wound inside you, it is not just your wound but mine as well. ❜ ❨1353❩ ❛ Hey, what is it with you? Why are you so spaced out? You still haven’t answered me. ❜ ❨1354❩ ❛ People are strange when you’re a stranger. ❜ ❨1355❩ ❛ The dead will always be dead, but we have to go on living. ❜ ❨1356❩ ❛ You don’t get it, do you? ❜ ❨1357❩ ❛ I am a flawed human being - a far more flawed human being than you ❨1358❩ realise. ❜ ❨1359❩ ❛ At least let me know whether or not I hurt you. ❜ ❨1360❩ ❛ All of us are imperfect human beings living in an imperfect world. ❜ ❨1361❩ ❛ I’ve never once thought about how I was going to die. ❜ ❨1362❩ ❛ So I’m not crazy after all! ❜ ❨1363❩ ❛ I miss you terribly sometimes, but in general I go on living with all the energy I can muster. ❜ ❨1364❩ ❛ Will you wait for me forever? ❜ ❨1365❩ ❛ I don’t want our relationship to end like this. ❜ ❨1366❩ ❛ When am I going to be able to talk to you? I want you to tell me that much, at least. ❜ ❨1367❩ ❛ It hurts not being able to see you. ❜ ❨1368❩ ❛ I’m not totally mad at you. I’m just sad. ❜ ❨1369❩ ❛ The world is an inherently unfair place. ❜ ❨1370❩ ❛ Life frightens me sometimes. I don’t happen to take that as the premise for everything else though. ❜ ❨1371❩ ❛ I’m a real bargain, don’t you think? If you don’t take me, I’ll end up going somewhere else. ❜ ❨1372❩ ❛ We’re all kind of weird and twisted and drowning. ❜ ❨1373❩ ❛ Don’t you think it would be wonderful to get rid of everything and everybody and just go some place where you don’t know a soul? ❜ ❨1374❩ ❛ You’re not telling me anything I don’t know already. ❜ ❨1375❩ ❛ He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past. ❜ ❨1376❩ ❛ If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself. ❜ ❨1377❩ ❛ We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness. ❜ ❨1378❩ ❛ Until they become conscious they will never rebel. ❜ ❨1379❩ ❛ Power is not a means; it is an end. ❜ ❨1380❩ ❛ They are not interested in the good of others; they are interested solely in power, pure power. ❜ ❨1381❩ ❛ Now you begin to understand me. ❜ ❨1382❩ ❛ In the face of pain there are no heroes. ❜ ❨1383❩ ❛ Big Brother is watching you. ❜ ❨1384❩ ❛ Power is tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing. ❜ ❨1385❩ ❛ It’s a beautiful thing, the destruction of words. ❜ ❨1386❩ ❛ The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better. ❜ ❨1387❩ ❛ Your mind appeals to me. It resembles my own mind. ❜ ❨1388❩ ❛ Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else. ❜ ❨1389❩ ❛ We do not merely destroy our enemies; we change them. ❜ ❨1390❩ ❛ How can I help it? How can I help but see what is in front of my eyes? ❜ ❨1391❩ ❛ You must try harder. ❜ ❨1392❩ ❛ Confession is not betrayal. ❜ ❨1393❩ ❛ What you say or do doesn’t matter; only feelings matter. ❜ ❨1394❩ ❛ If they could make me stop loving you —- that would be the real betrayal. ❜ ❨1395❩ ❛ Of pain you can wish only one thing: that it should stop. ❜ ❨1396❩ ❛ To die hating them, that will be freedom. ❜ ❨1397❩ ❛ No one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. ❜ ❨1398❩ ❛ What can you do against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself? ❜ ❨1399❩ ❛ To keep them in control is not difficult. ❜ ❨1400❩ ❛ So long as they are not permitted to have standards of comparison, they never even become aware that they are oppressed. ❜ ❨1401❩ ❛ The consequences of every act are included in the act itself. ❜ ❨1402❩ ❛ The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. ❜ ❨1403❩ ❛ Stupidity is as necessary as intelligence, and as difficult to attain. ❜ ❨1404❩ ❛ I hate purity, I hate goodness! I don’t want virtue to exist anywhere. I want everyone to be corrupt to the bones. ❜ ❨1405❩ ❛ The past is dead, the future is unimaginable. ❜ ❨1406❩ ❛ You know the answer already. Everyone knows it. ❜ ❨1407❩ ❛ You don’t give a damn what they suffer. All you care is yourself. ❜ ❨1408❩ ❛ It is not easy to become sane. ❜ ❨1409❩ ❛ No emotion is pure anymore, because everything is mixed up with fear and hatred. ❜ ❨1410❩ ❛ They say that time heals all things —- they say you can always forget. ❜ ❨1411❩ ❛ The object of waging a war is always to be in a better position in which to wage another war. ❜ ❨1412❩ ❛ I sold you and you sold me. ❜ ❨1413❩ ❛ You do not exist. ❜ ❨1414❩ ❛ How does one man assert his power over another? By making him suffer. ❜ ❨1415❩ ❛ Obedience is not enough. Unless he is suffering, how can you be sure that he is obeying your will and not his own? ❜ ❨1416❩ ❛ Everything else we shall destroy – everything. ❜ ❨1417❩ ❛ Two and two makes five. ❜ ❨1418❩ ❛ Facts, at any rate, can not be kept hidden. ❜ ❨1419❩ ❛ The past is whatever the records and the memories agree upon. ❜ ❨1420❩ ❛ So long as human beings stay human, death and life are the same thing. ❜ ❨1421❩ ❛ If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable—what then? ❜ ❨1422❩ ❛ The lie became the truth. ❜ ❨1423❩ ❛ It is like swimming against a current that sweeps you backwards however hard you struggle. ❜ ❨1424❩ ❛ Turn round and go with the current instead of opposing it. ❜ ❨1425❩ ❛ It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything. ❜ ❨1426❩ ❛ I don’t want to die without any scars. ❜ ❨1427❩ ❛ This is your life and it’s ending one moment at a time. ❜ ❨1428❩ ❛ You know how they say you only hurt the ones you love? Well, it works both ways. ❜ ❨1429❩ ❛ You are not your job, you’re not how much money you have in the bank. You are not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet. ❜ ❨1430❩ ❛ You are not special. ❜ ❨1431❩ ❛ You’re not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You’re the same decaying organic matter as everything else. ❜ ❨1432❩ ❛ The things you used to own, now they own you. ❜ ❨1433❩ ❛ Today is the sort of day where the sun only comes up to humiliate you. ❜ ❨1434❩ ❛ Maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves. ❜ ❨1435❩ ❛ Only after disaster can we be resurrected. ❜ ❨1436❩ ❛ Everything is evolving, everything is falling apart. ❜ ❨1437❩ ❛ We’ve all been raised believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. ❜ ❨1438❩ ❛ Don’t you have other things to do? ❜ ❨1439❩ ❛ Prove you’re alive. If you don’t claim your humanity you will become a statistic. ❜ ❨1440❩ ❛ You have been warned. ❜ ❨1441❩ ❛ If you don’t know what you want, you end up with a lot you don’t. ❜ ❨1442❩ ❛ It’s not love or anything, but I think I like you, too. ❜ ❨1443❩ ❛ If I could wake up in a different place, at a different time, could I wake up as a different person? ❜ ❨1444❩ ❛ Why did I cause so much pain? ❜ ❨1445❩ ❛ The lower you fall, the higher you’ll fly. ❜ ❨1446❩ ❛ Maybe self-improvement isn’t the answer, maybe self-destruction is the answer. ❜ ❨1447❩ ❛ May I never be complete. May I never be content. May I never be perfect. ❜ ❨1448❩ ❛ Everyone smiles with that invisible gun to their head. ❜ ❨1449❩ ❛ We are not special. We are not crap or trash, either. We just are. We just are, and what happens just happens. ❜ ❨1450❩ ❛ The girl is infectious human waste. ❜ ❨1451❩ ❛ I want to destroy everything beautiful I’ll never have. ❜ ❨1452❩ ❛ On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero. ❜ ❨1453❩ ❛ If you could be either God’s worst enemy or nothing, which would you choose? ❜ ❨1454❩ ❛ It is like you’re never really awake; but you’re never really asleep. ❜ ❨1455❩ ❛ Worker bees can leave. Even drones can fly away. The Queen is their slave. ❜ ❨1456❩ ❛ A moment is the most you could ever expect from perfection. ❜ ❨1457❩ ❛ The people you’re trying to step on, we’re everyone you depend on. ❜ ❨1458❩ ❛ You have to give up! ❜ ❨1459❩ ❛ Reject the basic assumptions of civilisation, especially the importance of material possessions. ❜ ❨1460❩ ❛ Without pain, without sacrifice we would have nothing. ❜ ❨1461❩ ❛ You have to realise that someday you will die, Until you know that, you are useless. ❜ ❨1462❩ ❛ A tiger can smile. A snake will say it loves you. ❜ ❨1463❩ ❛ Lies make us evil. ❜ ❨1464❩ ❛ If you died right now, how would you feel about your life? ❜ ❨1465❩ ❛ You always kill the one you love. ❜ ❨1466❩ ❛ Maybe we should always assume the worst. ❜ ❨1467❩ ❛ Put a gun to my head and paint the wall with my brains. ❜ ❨1468❩ ❛ Which is worse? Hell or nothing? ❜ ❨1469❩ ❛ A minute of perfection is worth the effort. ❜ ❨1470❩ ❛ You’re going to die, tonight. You might die in one second or in one hour, you decide. ❜ ❨1471❩ ❛ Lie to me. Tell me the first thing off the top of your head. Make something up. ❜ ❨1472❩ ❛ I don’t give a shit. I have a gun. ❜ ❨1473❩ ❛ I know who you are. I know where you live. ❜ ❨1474❩ ❛ Tomorrow will be the most beautiful day of your life. ❜ ❨1475❩ ❛ My philosophy of life is that I can die at any moment. And the tragedy of my life is that I do not. ❜ ❨1476❩ ❛ Everything is so far away, a copy of a copy of a copy. You can’t touch anything and nothing can touch you. ❜ ❨1477❩ ❛ There are a lot of things we don’t want to know about the people we love. ❜ ❨1478❩ ❛ We just had a near-life experience. ❜ ❨1479❩ ❛ If people think you are dying, they give you their full attention. They listen instead of just waiting for their turn to speak. ❜ ❨1480❩ ❛ I am nothing, and not even that. ❜ ❨1481❩ ❛ This isn’t really death. —- We’ll be legends. We won’t grow old. ❜ ❨1482❩ ❛ Stop trying to control everything and just let go. Let go. ❜ ❨1483❩ ❛ The amazing miracle of death, when one second you’re walking and talking, and the next second you’re an object. ❜ ❨1484❩ ❛ Only if we’re caught and punished can we be saved. ❜ ❨1485❩ ❛ I never thought about how important the sky was until I didn't have one. ❜ ❨1486❩ ❛ Dreams are like that: they go in and out of memories and scenes, but they're never real. They're never real, and I hate them because they aren't. ❜ ❨1487❩ ❛ Power isn’t control at all — power is strength, and giving that strength to others. ❜ ❨1488❩ ❛ A leader isn’t someone who forces others to make him stronger. ❜ ❨1489❩ ❛ A leader is someone willing to give his strength to others that they may have the strength to stand on their own. ❜ ❨1490❩ ❛ In the end, we are alone. ❜ ❨1491❩ ❛ It is like a piece of my soul is lost, empty. ❜ ❨1492❩ ❛ If my life on Earth must end, let it end with a promise. Let it end with hope. ❜ ❨1493❩ ❛ Sorry? Sorry isn't enough. ❜ ❨1494❩ ❛ Every single thing I ever loved is beyond my reach now. Everything I ever wanted. Everything I ever was. ❜ ❨1495❩ ❛ Will you stay with me? ❜ ❨1496❩ ❛ A leader doesn't make pawns - he makes people. ❜ ❨1497❩ ❛ Do you hear that? The pulse of life from your heart, the slow in-and-out from your lungs? Even when you are silent, even when you block out all noise, your body is still a cacophony of life. Mine is not. ❜ ❨1498❩ ❛ It is the silence that drives me mad. The silence that drives the nightmares to me. ❜ ❨1499❩ ❛ There is nothing between us but rain. There is nothing between us at all. ❜ ❨1500❩ ❛ I like a little chaos. ❜

[readermishok]

Top 20: my favorite interactive stories

Hello, guys!

Once I saw that one of my popular and mostly likeable posts was about IF, I decided to share with you my personal top of the best IF authors I have known. 

I read a lot of WIPs (work in progress) and finished novels since three long years, so I might recommend truly incredible stories. I apologies for adding pics and some additional info about my MC, but I wanted to bring spark of life into this top.

MC – Julia (deShanre), she|her.

I'll start with telling about quartet of works greatly affected on me. It was almost like… living my second life. It felt so real, so vibrant. In the darkest times it gave me the strenght to meet the next day.

1. Samurai of Hyuga, Books 1-4 by Devon Connell (WIP, planned 7 books). Patreon. Buy Book 1.  Buy Book 2. Buy Book 3. Buy Book 4.

Samurai of Hyuga is a brutal, heart-pounding interactive tale. Prepare to enter the land of silk and steel, where fantasy clashes against grim reality, and where the good guys don't always win in the end. It's a harsh world with tough choices at every turn. Good thing you're the toughest ronin around.

My MC: Ronin, the master of the Jigoku Ittō-ryū, The Sword Who Cuts the Heavens

Jigoku:

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2. Fallen Hero by Malin Ryden (WIP, planned 4 books). Tumblr: @fallenhero-rebirth​. Patreon. Buy Book 1.

Become the greatest telepathic villain Los Diablos has ever known! Once you were famous; soon you will be infamous. That is, unless your old friends in the Rangers stop you first. Juggle different identities and preserve your secrets as you build new alliances and try to forget the friendships you've left behind.

My MC: Sidestep Puppetmaster:

Jane (puppet):

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3. I, the Forgotten one by Bacondoneright (WIP, planned dilogy). No tumblr or Patreon|Ko-fi. Demo.

It has been five long years since the end of The Border Wars. Five long years without a purpose. Endlessly drifting around from one job to the next, serving your apathetic father only to receive no credit. Nobody in Kanton truly knows what you did. How you won The War, leading the armies of Kanton as a youth.

Nobody knows what it took out of you. Spending your formative years in war is not good for one’s outlook on life. Your emotions now lie behind a mask of stoicism. After all, all emotions do is cloud one’s judgement and wind up costing lives.

Nobody knows how much it hurt to be cast down from the throne and succession. To be disinherited, cast away from the family, and left aside to die.

My MC: The Marshal, the bastard child:

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4. The Exile by Pheo (WIP). Tumblr: @exilethegame​. Patreon. Demo.

You’re the ex-commander of the Kingdom of Plaithus, and your name is known by all. It used to be whispered in fear by your enemies, and the very mention of it could send men fleeing. Your people had cried it out in battle, swords raised in your honor as they faced death fearlessly. You were a hero, and to some, a legend.

Until you weren’t.

You can’t remember what happened. All that’s left are blurry faces, screams, and the feeling of blood on your hands. The only reason you still have your head is because of the pity of an old friend.

And now? It’s only been a year since the incident, and already things are going wrong again when a rather peculiar sorcerer offers you absurd amounts of gold in exchange for protection from… well, that’s the problem, isn’t it? You don’t know.

My MC: the Commander:

Ex-commander.

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Shepherds of Haven by Lena Nguyen (WIP). Tumblr: @shepherds-of-haven​ Patreon. Demo.

Shepherds of Haven is a dark fantasy interactive fiction game. In it, you play as a Mage living in a world where magic is outlawed and your people—those possessing supernatural powers—are oppressed and reviled. The world is ruled by humans who believe in science, technology, and industry: at best, you and your kind are nothing more than a fairytale, and at worst you are the state’s greatest threat.

My MC: Human Mage, gunner

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God of the Red Mountain (WIP). Tumblr: @friendlybowlofsoup​​​ Demo.

You are a spirit born of the Red Mountain–though you’ve run away from it long ago. You’d be content to stay away, too, if not for the mountain god who suddenly comes looking for you. But what purpose do they have? And what exactly is your end goal?

Based on East Asian myths and folklore, you play as a powerful, nameless spirit in a shifting world. As a being caught between death and life, you are connected to a stream of limitless power, and the more you are known, the more powerful you become.

However, your journey will not be so smooth. You have been cursed by powerful, malignant beings known as Foxes, and it’s only a matter of time before you fall from sanity yourself.

My MC: Owl spirit, human appearance

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The Bastard of Camelot by Rebelgirl (WIP). Tumblr: @llamagirl28​ Demo. Ko-fi.

Your child will be the undoing of Camelot. Born under an ominous prophecy, you are the incestuous bastard of King Arthur and Morgana Le Fay. Will you fulfill the prophecy, or rebel?

Be the villain they expect you to be, or the hero they don’t- be remorseful or unapologetic, make your destiny or be Morgana’s tool of revenge.

Arthur can’t have any more children, making you the sole blood heir, and sole other Pendragon. As a Pendragon, you have the power of dragons.

The Bastard of Camelot is a trilogy following Mordred as they become a knight of the Round Table, and save or destroy Camelot.

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The Seven Heirs of Ophaesia: Part One by (WIP). Tumblr: @fantasyfawkes​​​ Demo. Patreon.

The Seven Heirs of Ophaesia is a low-fantasy game set in a Renaissance-esque world where you play as one of seven heirs to a fictional kingdom rife with intrigue. As the King’s seventh child, you are a prince or princess of Ophaesia, a luxurious nation along the southern coast of Selanes. You are the first child of your father’s third wife, a woman hated throughout the realm due to the pervasive suspicion that she poisoned the previous queen, and her poor reputation taints your image in the eyes of the court and beyond. From your days in the palace nursery all the way to adulthood, you must navigate treacherous court politics and delicate foreign affairs while trying to find your place in the world — and your family.

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 Attollo by A.E. Jendryke (WIP). Tumblr: @attollogame Demo. Patreon.

After several years of radio silence, you receive a message from your younger sibling that carries a strange sense of urgency to it. Either out of familial concern, or boredom, you embark on a journey from your residence to your siblings apartment in New Hampshire to see what’s wrong and then get on with your life. Too bad it’s never so simple.

Deal with cults, interdimensional entities, and far too many people with superpowers (where, for once, you’re the odd one out) in your journey to bring your sibling back from an underworld far out of your control.

My MC: lawyer

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 Land of the Dragon (WIP) by Hilsee Foo. Demo. Last update was long ago... (crying)

Welcome to the Land of the Dragon! Here you shall experience an adventure in an ancient land, navigate court politics, forge friendships, and maybe even pursue romance if you so choose!

The Dragon Emperor sits upon the throne, as he inherited it from his father before him. But all is not well in the realm. In the provinces, an Uprising is gaining both strength and popularity. At court, the Elder Prince plots in secret to usurp his brother's throne. And within the Emperor's harem, the Empress and Imperial Consort vie for power.

As the Emperor and Empress' only trueborn child, you are at the centre of this power struggle. When all hell breaks lose on your 21st nameday, what will you do to find your place in this world?

All this, and more... In the Land of the Dragon.

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The Northern Passage by Kit H.J. (WIP). Tumblr: @northern-passage​ Demo. 

The Northern Passage is a horror fantasy CYOA, where you play as a hunter sent up north to investigate a series of missing people along the border and in the port cities of the Blackwater.

Working with your handler, Lea, you will travel north and discover that things are far worse than you ever could have imagined, and that there is something powerful lurking out in the deep, dark sea…

My MC: Hunter

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 The Nameless by Parker Lyn (WIP). Tumblr: @parkerlyn​​ Demo. Ko-fi.

The Nameless is a low fantasy WIP that is character and romance driven, with your race (sheevra) loosely based on stories about the fey and other myths. Where deals are a weapon and a name is the most intimate secret someone can offer. You play as a sheevra investigating the city of Renescen after the complete disappearance of one of four sheevra Clans in the world, running across a ragtag group of both sheevra and mortalis along the way.

Will you find out what happened before it comes for you?

Mortalis appearance

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Virtue’s End by Crimsis (WIP). Tumblr: @virtuesend-if​​​ Demo. Patreon.

In a dark world overrun by monsters from the shadow plane, you exist as a hybrid monster hunter called a helvling, a human whose very soul has been Bound to one such entity. Travelling from warded settlement to warded settlement with your surly Keeper, Shea, you have the thankless task of defending the common folk against these horrors from Hel.

Usually, a fate such as yours is only reserved for the lowest of criminals, as penance for their loathsome deeds… You wouldn’t know if your fate has been deserved, however, since upon completion of your Binding seven years ago, all former memories of your human life have been lost.

You’ve been moulded into a weapon by the Virtuous Order, trained to be an unfeeling and ruthlessly efficient hunter… But is that who you are? Who are you, truly?

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A Tale of Crowns (WIP). Tumblr: @ataleofcrowns​​​​ Itch.

A Tale of Crowns is a high fantasy love story with Middle Eastern roots, both on pc as well as mobile! It’s entirely text-based, with choices throughout to shape both your main character’s personality and skills as well as influence their relationships with others. There are four love interests for you to choose from, both female as well as male, each with their own stories and secrets for you to uncover!

Crown of Arsur

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 Wayfarer (WIP). Tumblr: @idrellegames​ Demo. Patreon.

When your mercenary work backs you into a corner, you take the only option available and accept a contract: to travel to the city of Velantis and steal an ancient artifact said to be blessed by the gods. Simple, right?

But Velantis holds more than you bargained for. Gathering a ragtag party of malcontents and renegades from across the city, you must navigate enemy factions, meddling guilds, and escalating political tensions. Your choices will ultimately determine the city’s fate – and the fate of every person who lives there. 

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When Twilight Strikes by evertidings (WIP). Tumblr: @evertidings​ Demo. 

You are a bounty hunter. Responsible for taking in rogue supernaturals, you work for IAOS—the International Agency of Supernaturals—where, alongside your best friend and partner, you two have quickly become the best hunting duo of the branch. After a particular tricky hunt, you brief your boss, Caine Atheron, and come back to work the next day to find that he has mysteriously disappeared overnight, the company is now in the hands of his best friend, Sebastian Mai. And though no one else seems to question it, something tells you that there’s more to the story.

With bounty cases rising at an alarming rate and a second mystery unfolding, you and your ragtag team of allies set out to find the truth.

But as you go further and further, the secrets you uncover begin to make you question: who… or what exactly are you fighting for? 

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Passanger by Pime (WIP). Tumblr: @the-passenger-if Demo. Ko-fi.

Do you like monsters? Do you think they are the best part of their respective movies, books, and shows? Then The Passenger might be the game for you.

The Passenger is a choice script work in progress in which you are an eldritch abomination that’s about to be devoured by another unthinkable creature. Good news is you are pretty crafty and know how to jump dimensions to escape your ghastly fate; bad news is, you’re now stuck on Earth, trapped inside a dumb human larva.

As years go by, you realize the amount of energy you need to leave this horrible dimension behind is a lot more than you anticipated. Not to mention the creature that almost ate you all those years ago never really stopped looking for you. But there’s no way it’ll pinpoint your actual location… right?

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Scout: An Apocalypse Story by Anya (WIP). Tumblr: @anya-dev​ Itch.

It has been over a decade since a worldwide natural disaster obliterated the natural planet and decimated human civilization. There are small groups of humans still alive, fending for themselves, trying to create communities amongst the rubble.

You are a 24-year old scout living in a small community on the edge of the Orange Plains. You lost your mother and your sister before finding your way here. You are primarily an academic, and you put your skills to use on regular scouting missions. With your best friend and your scouting team leader in tow, your small group is a pillar of the Community.

On your first scouting mission of the hot season, you meet the leader of the People Across the Orange Plains. Will you break from the Community you have known your whole life? Ask a romantic partner to join you? Discover secrets that your own people have been hiding? Become a leader yourself?

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Body Count by Nell Bolton (WIP). Tumblr: @bodycountgame​ Demo. Ko-fi.

Your life isn’t going how you’d hoped. Despite having big plans when you graduated, you’re stuck in a dead end job and a crappy flat with zero romantic life to speak of. All until a friend convinces you to join the cast of a new reality TV show.

The premise is simple: 12 singles are sent to a villa on a tropical island and they live there together for a month. After 28 days, the couple who is voted by the other islanders as being most likely to withstand the test of time will win £500,000. In addition, the couple with the highest body count will win £500,000. Total prize pool? £1,000,000.

In this context, “body count” refers to how many people you’ve slept with… right? Well, that’s what you think when you sign your contract. Turns out, though, that not all of your fellow cast members will be using that definition to get to the prize.

Fall in love, win big money, solve some murders and try to stay.

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Project Hadea by nyehilism (WIP). Tumblr: @nyehilismwriting​​ Itch. Ko-fi.

You play as an OPERATIVE of Scytha Industries, a highly selective private security company. As their most elite Operative, you possess many skills and talents, not to mention top-of-the-line equipment - including your very own AI module, IVI.

This, of course, puts a price on your head. An AI module goes for billions on the black market; carrying one around in your skull is, perhaps, not the safest idea. Sure, you’re more than a match for anyone who might come after you - but no-one outside the high levels of Scytha knows about it, so you should be safe anyway, right?

Wrong.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

I do want to thank all these tremendously talented authors for creating such complex and beautiful worlds. I love it with all my soul.

Thanks for reading, I hope you will find story for yourself. I’ll gradually extand this top! 

Stay tuned.

[rithalie-sideblog]

The daughters of Dracula

When Vlad Dracula first hears the prophecy he laughs and bellows with a voice that shakes his castle to the bone. 

Him? Falling in love with a mortal woman? Inconceivable, unheard of, simply a figment of an old man's scribbling imagination.

But then Vlad Dracula starts to think. And wonder. Because for all of his wealth and goods he managed to accumulate he was born a beggar and a thinker, as such happens when one learns life on the streets.

Prophecies have power.

So Vlad Dracula devises a plan. To make sure, he won't fall for the novelty that is a mortal woman, much less give her a son to fulfil the damned prophecy.

The first step he takes, he scours the village for his prey.

Mortal women, of all height and weight, from the plump daughter of the baker to the muscled heiress of the mercenary group. He kidnaps them from ungrateful families and bargains for them and soon his castle is filled with women's voices, their whimpers and terrified sobs. 

He avoids the young ones, as pretty as they might appear because Vlad Dracula might be a monster, but even he had rules by which to live his immortal life.

He never harms the women, despite their hostility and suspicion towards him. He leaves them be for the longest of times and watches as they slowly make the castle their home.

The women clean the spider webs, dust the old forgotten rooms and chambers. 

As they slowly grow more bold, they begin to take down the most horrid paintings from the walls, wash their clothes in the well in the middle of the cursed garden, stringing lines of laundry between the sculptures of demons and gargoyles.

Vlad watches it all happen from his tower, curiosity taking over him as he waits. Observes. Studies.

Finally, one woman seeks him out.

A pretty one, with her hair the color of honey, tangled way past her knees with her unable to cut it without any sharp object.

She demands a knife with a trembling voice and desperation laced with fear.

"Give it back soon." Says Dracula in his velvet voice as he gives her a dagger.

The woman never takes her eyes off of him as she backs away from the room, weapon held tightly in her hand.

By the end of the next week, most women have their hair cut, or braided into something new.

The honey-colored woman comes back with the dagger, placing it delicately in Vlad's outstretched hand. 

And she stays to talk.

A few years pass before most of the women warm up to Dracula, even if for him, it hadn't been much more than a blink.

They smile at him when he passes the corridors of his once gloomy castle, some wave to him, kneeled over the freshly planted potatoes in the gardens that once hosted the most exquisite of Louvre's hedges.

They come to him for his judgement, they trust him with their pleas and for his part, Dracula does his best to judge fairly. Years after Dracula's decision, the first woman wishes for more. He does not chase her away, even if his dark heart remains unchanged, curiosity driving him dangerously close to the edge of destiny's sword.

Vlad wonders if he should kill the woman before she can give birth to his descendant. If she were to bear a boy, the prophecy would come true and everything Dracula had done would have been for naught.

"It's a girl." announces one of the women as she comes out of the birth chamber, hands covered in blood up to her elbows. Vlad tries to not stare at them much as the relief washes over him.

A daughter, no son to slay him, no vengeance to come forth from his mother's mistreatment.

His plan is saved.

There are two more births that follow, and with each child being born a female Vlad grows more confident. Convinced he managed to beat the prophecy, he once again disappears into his tower.

He meets his daughters sometimes.

Pretty creatures, not a flaw to be seen on them. With hair the color of honey, mahogany and obsidian, they look at him with eyes of crimson and sunlight and moonlight, their sharpened ears uncovered proudly in the safety of his home, his vast galleries and libraries.

Dracula goes down deep into the guts of his castle and brings up the jewelry, old dress materials and sewing kits for them to use. He does not care what they do with the gift, but something like pride flashes in his eyes as he catches a glimpse of them covered in gold and silk.

As they grow, they get more and more bold, coming to his tower and asking questions about the world and life outside their castle.

Their Inquiries rarely go unanswered.

Dracula begins to let the mortal women go, the youngest of them past the age of her prime now. Some of them leave, but some of them stay, unwilling to uproot their lives again and comfortable with what they learned. Dracula begins to travel, living his years free of the burden of the prophecy, confident that his fate has finally been changed.

So when an angry woman shows up at the door of the castle, a three-year-old with crimson eyes' hand, gripped in hers, it comes as quite a surprise.

Dracula kills the woman, for she was not one of his, one of them, despite the claim she made upon Dracula's paternal role in the child's life. 

The daughters that greeted her warmly once she arrived had not known such violence before. They lick their lips and wrangle their hands at the sight of blood before them, and when Dracula sees that he gives them the woman's body to feast upon.

The boy is spared, if only for the foolishness of one of the women who rushes him outside when the carnage begins. 

He runs and when Vlad finds out about it, he flies after him in hot pursuit, but the boy is nowhere to be found. The prophecy protects him and fate is on his side and no matter where Dracula looks he cannot find him.

No harm befalls the woman who helped him, but upon hearing about the prophecy she weeps, for she did not know what calamity she brought upon her host. She leaves the castle in shame.

Three daughters of the Dracula grow hungry for blood, their beauty shining in its ethereal light brighter than before. Vlad feeds them and begins to teach them. Slowly but steadily he allows them entrance upon his dark and shrunken heart. They become his confidants as Dracula admits his defeat against the prophecy, preparing for the final act of the play. 

If his daughters showed promise even unattended, they shine with brilliance under his attention. Soon the castle is alive with the sound of magic, verbal disputes and turned pages.

When the child, now a man fully grown, comes back, bearing the Alucard title, Dracula steps forward to battle his destiny. He makes his daughters swear not to join him, and stay far away from the fight, for he had made arrangements for his knowledge to live on in them were he to fail.

Alucard is strong, but not as strong as his father.

He is quick, but not as quick as Dracula.

He is vengeful and drunk on the prophecy's promises, but not quite as desperate as Vlad is.

And yet, what finally brings The almighty Dracula to his knees is the fact that Alucard isn't quite as honorable as him.

When the edge of Alucard's blade rests against the honey-haired daughter of the Dracula he stops fighting.

After many years of undead existence, his daughters became his legacy, and he refuses to lose even a slight part of it.

Dracula's pause gives Alucard a chance to defeat him, and as he does that, all three daughters cry out in anguish.

Dracula's body caves in itself and turns to ash, and as Alucard lifts his fist in triumph, ready to claim the castle and all of its wealth as he was promised, he is met not with the radiant smiles of the saved woman but with weeping and sneers. The woman may have hardly loved the monster who kidnapped them, but his presence meant safety. It meant freedom to pursue what they desired, no mortal husband or any kin present to dictate their lives.

Three daughters of the Dracula weep the loudest, and through their tears they growl and hiss, blind in their rage. They chase Alucard out of the castle, the man unable to defend himself against their fury.

The brown and dark-haired ones stay on the stairs of the castle, but the honey-colored one chases Alucard to the edge of the woods, red droplets of blood flying from the spot where he threatened her. She almost gets him, her claws marking the tree, behind which he ducked with three deep lines.

And when the dust finally settles and the castle stops trembling with the sobs of the grieving women, they all come together to plan.

The rumors grow, ones of an imposing castle deep in the woods, that one day disappeared from all maps. 

Some say it's still there, just concealed with the magic of a really powerful witch, no matter what the church claims about having burned them all.

Others think it crumbled to the ground, unable to stand any more without its master there to keep it together. 

The Vatican claims to have destroyed it in the name of God, the village men grow bold enough to boast about the treasure they supposedly stole from there.

Alucard's tale grows, even as the man shrinks into itself, once his prophecy has been fulfilled and his sole reason to exist finally slayed. 

Very few remember Vlad Dracula's daughters, but there are traces of them left in the history.

Hushed female voices telling each other stories over the fire. Tales of the place where husbands' heavy hand won't ever reach. 

Rumors of libraries and workshops where all the knowledge is at your fingertips, your fate finally yours to choose.

Whispered clues to find the farthest tree on the south of the main road, its bark marked with three fine lines in the shape of the hand, and to march three hundred steps north of it.

And finally, three names to call forth when you reach the clearing, given to their daughters by the desperate mothers who wish for a better life to happen upon them.

Do you know the names? 

Did you ever have to call for them, deep in the night, three hundred steps away from the tree where a daughter almost avenged her father's death?

Don't you know the heart of greed and entitled desires? Have you ever heard of self-fulfilled prophecies? Didn't you see the hate in the eyes of the people?

Don't let them know.

Whisper the daughters names in the night, gain their strength. 

And don't let the world know where we are.

[savagesbonergarage]

Nightsister OC pics and backstory ❤️

So I kinda got my Nightsister oc worked out today!

Meet Eilantha!

No makeup and with makeup since I like both. :) I know her outfit is Rey’s, but it turned out to be the one I liked best after going through all of them. This was so much fun to do! I’m on mobile rn so I don’t have a link, but search ‘rinmaru star wars avatar creator’ and it should be the first result.

The nightbrother is also an oc called Sever. He’s more bulky in my head and his tattoos are different and more brown than black, but whatevs. Also he looks more like a teenager here, which is NOT the vibe, lads. Mans is in his late 20's-early 30's. 👍

I know I’m sorta biased and all since she’s mine, but I’m in love with her? I’m not a huge fan of the Nightsisters and their misandry and general terrible-ness, but this girl is the exception. 💕 Learn more about her under the cut if you’d like. :)

She was born in 46BBY, making her around 27 in the final year of the clone wars. From the time she was a youngling it was clear that she had a natural affinity for magicks and spellcasting, which allowed her to participate in more advanced rituals and rites from an early age. This inevitably caused some contention among the sisters in her age group that felt this privilege was wasted on her, and therefore she had few friends during her time within the coven. She didn’t really mind, as she preferred to spend her days on her own anyway, learning as much as she could about whatever she fancied (usually spells that piqued her interest whose texts she discreetly snuck from within the cavern).

When she wasn’t studying, she loved music - writing, playing, and singing. It wasn’t anything like the typical malicious sounds of tribal chanting and drums you’d hear from within the grotto; not that she didn’t appreciate that also as she practiced it well, but her heart leaned toward a softer, more soothing genre of arias and melodies, bordering on lullabies based on her wanderlust, and, though she’d never admit it, her loneliness.

As she reached adulthood, she underwent the trials for her dark baptism as all Sisters did, which consisted of returning from a challenging hunt to add a token from her kill to the Water Of Life, and receiving her ichor tattoos that signified her coming-of-age before being ritualistically bathed in the ominous liquid which sanctioned her as an active member of the Nightsisters.

After this, I have two different routes (or however many, depending on who I’m shipping her with at the moment 😅 bc I ship her with everyone, no lie) that I like to take with her story. The first is expanded upon in the fic by @fallenrepublick here (still my favorite thing!) where she starts sneaking away into the nightbrother village and befriends Savage and Feral before they go through Asajj’s selection trails. This is the nicer, less-traumatic arc.

This next one gets really, really dark. I'm not going to post it all here bc honestly this post doesn't need all that angst, so I'll save that for later. Essentially, I like to think that Eilantha did at one time have a nightbrother of her own (Sever) that she actually loved, rather than treated as a slave. As you can imagine it doesn't end well, but we're not gonna get into that. We'll talk about how they meet. :)

Instead of sneaking away to the village, Eilantha is pressured into conducting her own selection trails by Mother Talzin. She doesn’t inherently have any reason to object, after all, she was taught that this is was simply the way of things. Part of her even looked forward to obtaining a manservant, whose loyalty would belong to her and her alone.

Perhaps he’d be a useful asset when it came to sneaking spelltomes to and from the vaults, and maybe he’d even be the only one staying by her side while she practiced her songs. What if he’d even appreciate them? Not that he’d have much of a choice, but the thought was comforting nonetheless.

From the moment she stepped foot in the village, all she could focus on was the feeling of the uneasy and fearful gazes of the men who undoubtedly knew more of what was to come than she did. She chose her roster at random, unsure of what she should have really been looking for or what she actually wanted from a servant. Even before the fighting, she knew deep down that she didn’t want to inflict any unnecessary harm on them…but why? From what she’d overheard at home, the violence was half the fun.

It wasn’t.

She evaded and blocked every blow with ease, yet avoided retaliating and taking the offensive in any manner that would prove fatal, causing the battle to go on far longer than anticipated to the point where Brother Viscus insisted that she take the next opening for the kill. With reluctance, the blade of her weapon collided with the ribs of the next brother to reveal himself a target. She watched in horror as the light faded from his hateful, reflective eyes, and she was nearly sick. She didn’t want to do it, but it had been done, and it couldn’t be undone. His body thudded against the ground and she screamed.

“Enough!”

The battlefield went silent, and as she came to her senses she attempted to save face.

“I’ll have none of them!”

Before Brother Viscus could interject with any alternative propositions, she was gone. She ran, fleeing as far away across the rocky terrain as she could. She didn’t cry; at least not until she was certain she was alone. She felt so pathetic - Nightbrothers were meant to be disposable, yet she couldn’t handle killing one. Her shame shifted into heartbreak, and she crouched low and wept for the death of the brother she’d just caused, as well as for all those who came before him. All the needless, thankless, mindless deaths of these men whose lives may not have mattered to the Sisters, but they mattered to someone.

As night fell, she trudged along the jagged landscape and thought of what explaination she’d give to Mother Talzin upon returning home. She had run in the opposite direction of where her speeder was stationed at the base of the village, so she had plenty of time to consider on the long journey back. She casually hummed a tune to herself in some meager attempt to self-soothe, which served to distract the shadow that had been trailing her for some time. The sound of a twig snapping in the rocks behind her alerted her to the presence and she confronted him.

"Are you lost?" she asked in a derogatory tone after he revealed himself.

"I'm not."

Of course not, this was his home, after all. She couldn't say the same for herself, however, she pressed him further.

"Then why are you following me? I never asked for an escort."

The amber-skinned nightbrother looked as though he were choosing his words carefully, though if his aim was self-preservation he'd done a terrible job of it.

"I saw you crying."

Eilantha was hit with a pang of embarrassment, though she feigned otherwise as her eyes met the ground.

"Well, you can forget what you saw. Now leave me alone."

She turned away, but the brother remained there in quiet contemplation before he spoke again.

"I've never seen a Sister cry. I've never seen a Sister feel."

Something about those words struck her directly in her heart. The confirmation that she was inherently considered to be a heartless monster in the view of these villagers hurt a little more than anticipated, though she had no right to refute it. No amount of apologies would ever remedy the divide that separated the Nightsisters from the Nightbrothers, regardless of how she felt. She clenched her fist as she turned to face him again.

“I said, leave me alone. Don’t make me-”

She actually choked on her words, unable to say the rest.

Don’t make me put you in your place.

Despite her partial warning, the nightbrother stepped closer. He grabbed the edge of his already tattered tunic and tore a piece of it off, inspecting it for cleanliness before holding it out to her. Eilantha froze, uncertain of what to make of this interaction.

“You aren’t done,” he explained.

She hadn’t realized that her hot tears continued pouring down her cheeks during her retort. She accepted the cloth with some reluctance, her dainty fingers lightly brushing against his as she took it and dabbed it against her wet face. He promptly turned and started walking away, as instructed. This strange...kindness, or rather, strange act of servitude via obligation perturbed the young witch, whose thoughts were now fixated solely on the zabrak male.

“Wait, Brother,” she implored.

He paused, resuming his attention to her after hearing the endearing use of “brother” from a Sister’s lips for the first time. She continued, an unusual softness in her tone.

“What is your name?”

“It’s Sever,” he revealed, “May I ask yours, Sister?”

She repeated his name in her mind, determined never to lose it.

“Eilantha.”

He did the same, only out loud. Gods, it was an enticing sound.

"Will you be returning?"

This was a question she wasn't prepared to receive, and one that she herself didn't fully know the answer to. Her reply was engineered from a concerned sigh.

"I'm not sure. It might be problematic returning to the coven empty-handed. I may come back, I may not. I don't know what the future holds."

Sever pursed his lips slightly.

"If you do find yourself here again, will you..."

He coughed into his fist and centered himself before continuing.

"Will you consider me?"

Her eyes shot up to meet his hopeful gaze, a golden yellow in the night. She had a hunch as to what he was alluding to, but a little clarification was needed.

"Consider you...?"

He swallowed, his countenance displaying concern that perhaps he was stepping too far out-of-bounds this time, but he wanted to know all the same.

"As your mate."

Eilantha clutched the piece of fabric in her hand. This man was offering himself to her. The images of all the nightbrothers staring her down when she first arrived with fear in their faces raced through her mind, revealing the dread the men felt when they were met with her kind, and yet this one was volunteering. She wasn't sure if she should be flattered or angry, as any other Sister likely would be at a savage that dared to seek special permissions. Of course, she wasn't like that.

Imagining him as her mate, however, was certainly...something. She thought of how she would discover just how much of him was tattooed and he would learn the same of her. She could claim him right then and there if she wanted, and he would be obliged to obey. It would solve her worries about returning home if she decided on a servant after all, although, her soul was unsteady. Though she was entitled to any male she desired, she couldn't allow herself to do it. Even though this man was offering, it would weigh on her conscience knowing that even a part of him would only be with her out of fear and obligation, rather than his own free will. This nightbrother wasn't free. None of them were.

"I'll consider it," she replied genuinely.

This news seemed to please him to some extent, a tiny smirk curling at the corner of his lip.

"I'll look forward to the possibility of serving you, Sister Eilantha."

She watched as he turned a final time and disappeared further into the darkness, leaving her alone with her busied mind.

The course was set for the Nightsister temple once she finally got to her speeder, servant-less. She looked over her shoulder to see multiple pairs of glowing golden eyes quizzically prying at her in the darkness, and she smiled before taking off.

It was a long journey home, and the entire trip her mind was occupied with thoughts of the intriguing zabrak male who saw her for what she truly was. She pulled out the tattered cloth from her pocket and pressed it against her chest as the wind rushed all around her before bringing it to her lips and kissing it.

It became her greatest treasure.

That is, until she finally had the real deal in her arms months later when the separation became too much to bear, and they arranged to meet in secret during their first rendezvous of many.

Sever, my treasure.

[angelfishofthelord]

good tidings of great joy

“And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.” --Luke 2:10, KJV 

--A Christmas SPN fic--

Angels from the realm of glory

Wing your flight o’er all the earth

There’s very little glory remaining, either above or below. The absence has become a part of you, aching between the bone and marrow of this vessel. You walk this earth on feet strapped in the confines of shoes, with back bent carrying the remains of extinguished brilliance. Few can tell the difference between you and any of the other burdened mortals crossing the sidewalk; the aurora that used to halo you is less than a dull sheen.

You don’t mind the invisibility; the seamless stitches that hide you allow you to move unnoticed among humanity, like the air between the falling snowflakes. Humans have always been terrified of your kind anyways. Fear not is the most repeated command in the Bible. It appears 365 times; one sixth of those times is spoken by an angel.

Angels we have heard on high

Sweetly singing o’er the plains

The sweetness was never there in the first place, but you stop to listen to sidewalk carolers singing the lie, their upturned faces flushed with cold and joy. Humans have always written their own narratives about angels, from inventing their own version of your powers to restructuring your appearance and mannerisms. The fairy tales that shroud your essence would do well to remain instead of the nightmare of the truth.

You weren’t part of the flight who first appeared to the shepherds, but you’ve heard the story passed from battalion to battalion. How they were only half-shielded by the night to dim the inferno of their forms; how burnt wool and charred grass had the shepherds crying out in voiceless fear, had the captain begging for them not to be afraid. As if the human heart could anymore contain the palpitations towards the unknown than the heavens could not thunder in its every breath.

One caroler offers you a candy cane and you hesitate to take it.

“I have nothing to give you,” you inform the young woman. Receiving requires something like in kind, this you know. Nothing is free; a cost lies behind every extended hand or smile or place to belong.

“You don’t need to,” she beams. Snowflakes gather around her, glittering in her wool cap. “It’s Christmas.”

The shepherds ran to the village to spread the news, but not out of belief in the lore of a savior. They took one look at the distortion of celestial bodies and immediately vowed to spend their lives in devotion to whatever command was given in exchange for having their lives spared. Their declaration was one of warning, their faith born of terror.

“I can give it to my son,” you say finally. If you are not claiming it for yourself then perhaps the price can be waived.

She gives you two candy canes “so you can enjoy them together.”

  The angels knew what was to come

The reason God had sent his son

They knew that it was a test to humanity, to determine how to proceed with future involvement judging by mankind’s reaction to him. You don’t know which archangel came up with the plan; you were still under the delusion at the time that instructions were coming from your Father. The word spread among the hosts was that they should convince mortals that their Father had a single son; not thousands upon thousands cloistered in heaven, misshapen and deformed to the human eye. No, people needed to believe that God’s child looked like them and bled like them, not the other way around. Not the way angels made the earth bleed and burned brighter than the sun.

You pause under the awning of a closed church to check your phone. Dean wants to know when you’ll be back so they can start decorating the tree. “The kid’s impatient,” says the text. “We can only make so many cookies.” You think of Jack half covered in iced sugar and flour, licking the batter off his fingers and taking the tray out of the oven before they’re done. When the boy had called earlier that afternoon to ask if you could pick up some decorations on the way home the word “rainbow lights” had burst from his lips with such delight that you could almost see his smile, the way his eyes crinkled when he was happy.

Your son is happy. The thought is enough to move you out from under the shadow of the wooden cross above and continue on your way home.

Hark the herald angels sing

Glory to the newborn king

There never was any singing among the hosts. Choirs were the measurement term for the size of a flight one commanded. The strength of angel’s voices were used to contact each other midst battle, to send for help or reinforcements, and, on occasion when other weapons were exhausted, as a weapon against the enemy. You remember your own voice when you first spoke to Dean, how the pale faces of windows screamed and the parched throats of radios split. Your Father created you to be a creature that needed to be contained in order to be heard or seen; an anomaly suppressed in borrowed bodies that would remain forever incomprehensible by those you were charged to protect.

You can wrap yourself in cells and hair like them and still remain alien to them. Even as long as you’ve been on earth there are still words in your language this body’s tongue cannot pronounce, and colors you cannot find paints that come close to, and sounds no instrument can come close to mimicking.

There is still you, bundled beneath clothes and tissue and skeleton. You are the unknowable.

Sam brushes snow off your coat shoulders as you step into the bunker and he smiles at the face of the knowable you. Dean looks up from a tangle of evergreen boughs and welcomes you, the you that can fit in the door frame of this structure.

Jack. Jack looks at you, the entire visage of you in every increment of decaying glory.

And says your name like a song.

Sing choirs of angels

Sing in exultation

There hasn’t been any exaltation among your siblings for centuries now. Sorrow and greed and chaos have been the sole harmony they have sung, and not just since the averted apocalypse. Even in the earliest days when the presence of your Father blessed the halls of heaven strife still wrestled among the purity, staining it with betrayal and rejection that bled into Lucifer’s fall.

But here, in the warm womb of the earth with two humans and one child, there are notes of that wondrous jubilation the writers imagined in their seasonal songs.

Jack wraps himself up in the Christmas lights and Sam turns them on before he realizes it. When the boy laughs, unfazed by the buzzing bulbs braided around his arms, the panic disappears from Dean’s eyes. They open up boxes of decorations and scrape glitter from their fingertips, grumbling when it smears onto their clothes. Dean throws tinsel at Sam to put on the higher branches and his brother protests that he’s not a ladder. Jack picks up a small figurine and bends his small mouth into a frown.

“Angels don’t look like this,” Jack says and you look over at the small white fluffy statue in his palm.

Fear not. Humans have always sought to transform that which appeared unseemly. They have sanded down every possible edge and muted the scars of what it means to be angelic, turning an enormous and terrible being into something diminutive and fragile so even a child could smile at it.

“I think if I put a tiny trench coat on that Cas would kick my ass,” Dean remarks from under the handful of silver strands that a disgruntled Sam has dumped back on his head.

“No,” Jack repeats, holding the figurine between two fingers, “I mean, they don’t only have two wings. Or even one head.”

Sam bends back one unruly branch that is determined to attack him. “Do you…do you have more than one head?”

You shake your head. “Jack is a child, but more than that he's half human. He doesn’t have a true form like--” you push a finger against your chest “--we do, and he’s not in a vessel. He might get more wings later,” you add thoughtfully. There’s no archetype for nephilim growth, but when you look at Jack you see the strands of his soul and how the blend of hues there are unlike any other humans. You see the shiver of his two wings, full and bristling against the edges of space and time.

“We’ve seen your wings, Cas--well, shadowy thingies.” Dean stands up and squints as if straining his retina can enable him to better glimpse your frightening truth.

“That’s not how he really looks,” Jack beams and before you can put out a hand to stop him he pushes a finger against either brother’s forehead. “Let me show you.”

“Don’t.” The request escapes your lips too late, trailing after a plane that’s already left the runaway. Jack’s eyes are halos of gold and Sam and Dean stand awash in the tremors of his light, staring at you with speechlessly. You close your eyes, a very human habit that will shield you from nothing at all. Terror can slip through the seal of eyelashes as easily as a shadow under the door.

Fall on your knees

O hear the angel’s voices

There were very few who didn’t bow at the sight of your arrival. You wanted to tell them that they didn’t need to drop to the ground; you wanted to tell them you had no choice over the shape of your being. Eventually you let yourself believe that their reaction was because of the uniform you wore; soldiers are always greeted with trepidation, even human soldiers. They only appear in times of war and death; so you could reason that the hidden faces were because of that and not because of the horror of you.

But Sam and Dean are your family. They should not have to associate you with something as unnatural and ghastly as your mutilated true form. You know how the mind of humans work, how it loves the familiar and loathes the foreign. They see you as one of them because you look like them, and act much like them now, a comfort that will be erased now that they are seeing the difference of you.

Especially this you. Cut off from Heaven for years and eroded by the rivers of poison and possession that have ravaged your form, there remains nothing but mangled remains of monstrosity to see.

“Oh.” The breath swells from Sam, followed by an extended version of the vowel from his older brother.

When Jack pulls his fingers away and the illumination fades you open your eyes but keep your gaze to the floor. It won’t hurt any less but you want to delay being witness to the restrained revulsion in their eyes.

“I didn’t always look like that,” you say, as if it offers any excuse. “I had more…” you try to capture an appropriate English word to describe it “…fingers.”

“Where?” Dean sounds… curious. He sounds curious. Excited.

“On the..ah..faces.” You lift your head a little, waiting for their unease to fall like unannounced snow.

“Ah, the arches,” Sam says with pride, only to be contradicted by Dean.

“Wouldn’t that make them eyelids? Or eyebrows?”

“The faces aren’t structured like that; they could be arches or even parallel lines.”

“Okay, well, I know what I saw, and it was definitely eye-ish. I mean, that face was a leopard right? Leopards have eyes.”

“Cheetah,” Sam returns. “The spots are different, dude.”

“Those aren’t spots, those are the eyes,” Jack interrupts.

“So then the fingers do go on the eyebrow-y things. Like this.” Dean grabs a pencil and paper off the stack of books on the table and starts scrawling hurried lines. “And then the five and a half wings go there--and there---and I think one was there.”

“No, you’re getting the angles wrong, it came out of the elbow there.” Sam snatches a pen and scribbles out a corner of his brother’s drawing and adds something else.

Jack peers over their shoulders. “You’re forgetting the wheels.”

“They’re broken,” you point out shamefully, but no one hears you. Dean is swinging the pencil around the white sheet and Sam is accusing him of not knowing how to draw a circle and then Jack disappears and reappears with a box of crayons.

“Pink? I thought it was purple.”

“More like magenta.”

“Don’t get smart with me, Sammy. Jack, back me up here.”

They cluster around, crayon crumbs smearing into the white and elbows nudging each other for space to draw, and you stand there with a growing lump in your throat because they're not afraid.

Because Dean goes and grabs that little plush figurine and a white board marker and starts dotting the lace wings with spots for eyes. Because Sam gets toothpicks to stab the paper cut heads he’s drawn into the styrofoam body and Jack is twisting pipe cleaners into the bent lines of your wings. Because they fight over which side of the figurine to put two or three wings, and whether or not the rotating ram head should be in the front or back.

When they finally turn around and ask you if the bottle-cap wheel should be taped below or above the waist you try to answer without crying and it doesn’t work.

Fear not then said the angel

Let nothing you affright

There isn’t anyone else awake when Christmas morning first dawns. You leave behind the warmth of your room and go towards the center of this place you’ve christened home. Behind the staircase you find the plug and switch on the lights for the tree. They blink in a rainbow flutter against the synthetic branches, throwing tiny halos across the dangling snowmen and reindeer. Sitting on the table atop a stack of books is the angel figurine, now sporting a variety of hand-made appendages and hand-drawn additions to create some kind of composite creature.

It looks absolutely nothing like you.

You’ve never seen anything more beautiful.

Your hand slides into your coat pocket and you find the two candy canes from the caroler the day before. You find a branch to hang the red and white striped hooks on, somewhere between the mismatching socks that have definitely been put there without either brother’s knowledge and the actual baked gingerbread man that has Jack’s distinctive wiggly smile drawn on it in red frosting.

Before the sounds of your waking family come drifting down the hall you pause, fingers hesitating over the newly-crafted angel. You pick it up and move it to the top of the tree, wiggling it back and forth until it stands proud with all three crayoned faces to the sky.

You weren’t there for the first Christmas. And angels don’t sing or rejoice.

But you are here now, in this moment of Christmas.

Later Dean will be humming off-key when he pops marshmallows in the mugs of hot chocolate and Jack’s little squeal will ring out when Sam tries to stop him from opening the presents first. Later Jack will come tuck his arms around you for a sleepy hug and Dean will flash you a grin while he surreptitiously witches his mug for Sam’s. You will sit on the sofa cradling your own mug of hot chocolate and Sam will lean against your knees as he sits cross-legged on the floor flipping through the dictionary of dead languages you wrote for him. Later Jack will be wearing his new gloves and shadow boxing with Dean, both moving dangerously close to the tree. You will whisper “Merry Christmas” right before Dean’s leg twists around one of the lower branches and the six foot evergreen bows to the ground, sending the composite angel flying away on the wings of your laughter.

And ever o’er its Babel sounds

The blessed angels sing

Songs mentioned, in order of appearance: Angels From the Realms of Glory//Angles We Have Heard on High//The Angels Cried//Hark the Herald Angels Sing//O Come All Ye Faithful//O Holy Night//God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen//It Came Upon A Midnight Clear

[andhereisthetea]

Just finished Season 3

I have been watching She-Ra for the past seven days non-spot and I just finished season 3 and...

god

dammit

I am just....

UGH.

I want to talk about a lot of things after this, but I know I can’t just sandwich them in this post. I watched all three seasons in less time than I should have, I feel so damn conflicted right now about certain things, even if I spoiled myself about it before.

I spoiled myself about the whole Entrapta and Hordak arc, I watched gifsets and I saw your beautiful fan arts both in tumblr and twitter, but watching it, like... really watching it, it’s a whole different thing and now I feel both sad but also relieved I’m watching this after the show ended because 1) I am sad I didn’t experience things at the same time the fandom and most Entrapdak shippers did BUT 2) this would have made a mess of me, I get affected very easily with things like what I watched.

Ok, I have some things to say about the three seasons:

First... Entrapta.

There are some things I find refreshing and others that I don’t, I am not going to point it out in this post, also I can’t expect a lot from a family show.

The thing is... I feel they should have made up a backstory for Entrapta.

I understand the lore and the plot Crew-Ra focused into, but also I knew the Lore before the creation of this show, I feel there should have been a better way to explore more characters from Masters of the Universe.

Think about the complete mystery she is.

We knows most of the characters’ backstories, at least the most complex and important ones, we knows for example that Mermisa got her ruined kingdom from her father who was killed in the first battle against the Horde. We knows basically all the story of Bow’s family, we knows about Glimmer, about Scorpia, about Perfuma’s kingdom, about even Adora, Catra who was an orphaned, and also about Shadow Weaver.

But Entrapta? she is a complete damn mystery.

She is the Princess of Dryl, she designed the Crypto Castle, a literal labyrinth without sense, she is obsessed with First One’s tech since who knows how long, she isn’t an elemental princess but she can move her hair as if it were extra limbs and evn fight with it as a weapon, something that no other specie in the whole planet of Etheria can do, she has an intelligence even bigger than Tony Stark, nobody even talks about what happened to her parents, NOBODY, like they didn’t even existed and she popped up from nowhere and created her robotic parents herself. And even if her seeking for data and more and more progress and tech can be seen as a clear symptom her Autism (like autistic people focusing so much in something they can’t do anything else, I have that) or the fact she is looking for something else but not even her know what the hell is...

She knows or is implicit that she knows about the language of the First Ones, she understand their technology better than anyone else, also, her kingdom is the most advanced, they are considered to be in the industrial era compared to other kingdoms controlled by the elemental princesses. Where did all that technology knowledge, and also First One’s knowledge, came from? I don't think that in 20 years since she had reason and enough skill to be able to learn by herself Dryl has built all that; Dryl's kingdom had been working that way since before she was even born, so who told her? who taught her?

In addition to the fact that she has access to mining in her kingdom where she has been able to find who knows how much of the first one’s technology... right under her feet. The sole fact they put someone so important for the plot as a princess who has no runestone is just mysterious, she used the Black Garnet even better than Shadow Weaver, I can completely see her or someone before her doing the same with her own Runestone (which I picture as an Amethist btw).

I think they chose to put Entrapta’s possibilities of a backstory aside because, after seeing how the character became increasingly important and popular, they realized that once they had started to create her backstory and origins, they wouldn’t have been able to stop, and the central plot wasn’t about her at all, and is very likely that whatever idea of backstory they had about her would have been focused in the central plot. 

For example (and call me crazy, I don't care) if they had said that she was the granddaughter or daughter of Keldor AKA Skeletor, I would have totally believed it.

The thing with that is... even though they chose for her an Etheria region, which in the original Lore was unimportant, everything to do with Entrapta in She-Ra becomes important immediately, but ultimately it would have distracted them from the central plot with Adora as She-Ra, and Horde Prime, who is the main villain they choose for the show.

For now I just want to imagine what could have been if she had more protagonism and wasn’t only the geek princess, she has so much potential and I haven’t seen a character so refreshing like her in long time.

Okay, I want to talk about the seasons I just watched while the information is still fresh inside my head.

One of the main things that frustrated me about the final season is how Crew-Ra COMPLETELY NAILED IT in making me hate Catra. They didn’t make her sympathetic, she is toxic and most of the time she remembered me people who I had to avoid in my personal life, so the natural reaction to all her actions is to dislike her, that is exactly what Crew-Ra wanted for us to feel.

But in some point it got to the point that if you tell me the character was unpredictable, it lost it a bit in the final episodes, she started to become predictable in her actions because as an impulsive person constantly in denial over her emotions and projecting her problems over everyone else, it was obvious she was going to go through a destructive path wanting for everyone to die together with herself because it wouldn’t have seen less like a suicide.

And as a self-centered character with tunnel vision over her purpose and actions, she was going to completely underestimate Entrapta and wasn’t going to understand why Hordak found her interesting, she would attribute everything to power and fight for positions just like SW taught her, instead of something as pure as friendship, in fact she might have know it, but she didn’t want to admit it, because to know that someone as hateful and intimidating as Lord Hordak suddenly has someone who loves him beyond that is just too much for her, who doesn’t understand and is hurt by the fact that Adora doesn’t love her back, but doesn’t want to change one bit for fear to lost the life that ironically she hates so much without Adora in it.

So of course she was gonna electrocute Entrapta and send her to Beast Island, and her impulsive decision was made out of pure fear over what she did not only to Entrapta, but to Hordak himself and what he might do to her when he finds out what she did, and no matter how much she wants to hide behind a curtain of falsehood, is a matter of time he realizes Entrapta is nowhere in Etheria to be seen.

She is a character who does not measure her actions until the consequences are so horrible that she runs away, because reality is too painful for her to even accept what she has done, also she usually thinks that EVERYONE thinks just like her, every one of her speeches about fake friendship, power and winning is just about how she sees the world work from her perspective, she has zero notions over someone’s else vision of the world.

That's one of the biggest reasons why I liked Adora in the last episode of the third season; Catra made a decision, her desire to win basically led her to condemn Entrapta to death, almost destroy the planet and ultimately kill Angella or worse. I have seen posts about people saying that Catra hasn’t killed anyone directly, but I am sorry, she did this season, and she lied about it to everyone and to herself, but Adora knows better.

Now, Hordak

God how I start with this.

Hordak, opposite to the original Lore of Masters of the Universe, is right now basically an alien version of Lucifer from John Milton’s Paradise Lost but with God being fucking evil.

Just like Lucifer, he wants to replicate his creator’s creation on Etheria, choosing to rule in hell rather than heaven, but unlike Lucifer, he stills has a connection with his creator and just like Catra, wants to satify his wished to conquer Etheria all by himself.

But unlike Horde Prime, he is in fact a good leader, and a logical one. He appreciates when his soldiers thinks by themselves and achieves their goals, unlike Prime, and he in fact doesn’t accept empty adulation, if you are good at something, you have to prove it, not to him, but to yourself.

So I just love how with every season they are adding more complexity to his whole being, and now they have added the emotional factor with Entrapta’s friendship and ultimately “betrayal”, I want to watch how this at first glance stoic character loses the shit out of his stoicism, even if I already knows what is going to happen. The fact he already got affected by Catra’s lies over Entrapta betraying him proves how far he has gone since Entrapta came to his life, if he was just impressed by Entrapta or wanted to use her, that wouldn’t have affected him that much, he already feels something for her, but he struggles to know what it is, and even if he denies it due to what just happened, he is still feeling it.

Which makes the anticipation to the discovery of Catra’s lies so much more painful. 

Also, the fact he believed Catra, just like that, made me feel disappointed, but that is based on the complexity of the character and his self-loathing, he feels he doesn’t deserves friendship nor love; he is a defective clone after all, in his own mind he is imperfect and she is the complete opposite of that, so believing it is easy, but that doesn’t make it less painful, and that is what I am sure Hordak will realize ultimately.

I don’t know how long will took me to watch the season 4, but I know is worth the effort if I want to see Entrapta and Hordak together again, I love them, they are pure brain and incredible refreshing to watch, and the affection they feel for each other is obvious, one of the most bittersweet scenes for me was when Entrapta remembered Hordak due to the trio saying his name, her suddenly quiet behavior and calmed and painful smiled was so unlikely of her that one has to admit something more is going on, also her choice of language, “I had a lab partner”, not “I have”, gives a sense of sadness to the whole scene that broke my damn heart.

I will tag you guys @cruelfeline @ineffablelabpartners @etherian-affairs because I want to know your opinions about this, I never thought Entrapdak was gonna affect me that way, in fact I never expected to ship them at all, but here we are, dying for them and I just can’t escape.

[luckyjak]

ficlet: time stop

cr2 e56 ficlet. Shadowgast but just barely. Essek meets the Mighty Nein in the Bright Queen’s hall just before they give her the Beacon, and they have no fucking idea thanks to time magic. Extra liberties taken with the Time Stop spell but I imagine choosing dunamancy as your specialty gives you a little more than 6 seconds.

“The Empire is working against you! Wildemont is working against you, we have brought the proof if you will allow me to show it to you,” the red haired human, dressed as a slave, pleaded with the Bright Queen. “I need to approach my friend. I mean no harm, I just need to remove something from--”

The room got quiet as the guard looked to the Queen, who nodded cautiously. “You have a moment. Anything strange, and I cut off your head,” One of the Queen’s guards threatened, his sword at the ready.

“Jester, I am coming towards you. I am just going to open this bag--”

There could be anything in that bag, Essek knew. An explosion. A spell. An artifact that could summon a magnificent demon whose sole desire was to eliminate the Queen. And with the Queen, the Council, so many others gathered here in the hall, it was the perfect opportunity for the Empire to strike and take a great deal of their most important people with them. Time was a luxury they did not have.

Or at least, that would be true, except that time was Essek’s specialty.

With a mere glance from the Bright Queen, Essek knew immediately what his orders were. Access the threat. Disarm them if needed.

A simple enough task, even if it did require him to burn his only 9th level cast for the day. It was worth it, however, to protect the Dynasty, and to protect his queen.

With a snap of his fingers and the command word spoken, time stopped in the Bright Queen’s throne room for everyone except Essek Thelyss. With the world frozen in place, Essek moved like a ghost down to investigate the strangers who stood perfectly still, frozen in time in his lady’s court.

Honestly, they were not the most impressive mercenaries to ever step foot in the hall. He investigated the human first--the other one, the blue one, not the one currently digging through a backpack, although he’d get to him in a moment--and found he wasn’t too concerned. She was no wizard, and she wore no armor, and almost no weapons outside of a few kunai and a stick. It wasn’t even a magic stick. He had no doubt she could do some damage with it--he knew enough to know the damage those trained in monastic traditions could do--but it was nothing the guards surrounding her couldn’t handle.

Next, he turned his attention to the half-orc, and came to a similar conclusion. He was a bard, Essek thought, or maybe a warlock of some kind? He wasn’t a sorcerer, although he was handsome enough to be one. But he didn’t have the spell components on him that most wizards and sorcerers did, and he lacked a holy symbol. He also didn’t have a weapon on him. So he must be a bard, then.

The blue tiefling was tricky--he thought she was a ranger at first, given the dog and the weasel she carried. Strange animal companions, but animal companions nonetheless. It took some searching, but he did find her holy symbol, hanging off her waist on her belt, although he didn’t recognize the emblem. He would move a few of the guards closer to her. The last thing they needed was an errant spellcaster on the loose.

The goblin carried a rather impressive crossbow, but like the monk, it was nothing the guards couldn’t handle. Honestly, in Essek’s opinion, the two biggest threats were the two quiet ones in the back--the aasimar and the firbolg were both armed with magical weapons and seemed at least capable of a good fight. Luckily, they were also the ones who were surrounded by the largest number of guards, so Essek felt good about their chances.

Which left only the other human. The one with his hands in the backpack, pulling something out.

“Let’s see what you are hiding then, shall we?” Essek said to no one in particular, the room still frozen around him.

He was filthy; dressed and bound like a slave, with dirt and mud caked on his face and his clothing. It would be easy to underestimate him, and Essek wondered if that wasn’t part of the act: pretend to be helpless, pretend to be useless, and then no one would see the knife headed for your back. It was a clever ruse, one Essek had used himself when he needed to. But despite the dirt and the raggedy clothing, Essek would even go so far as to describe the human as handsome--beneath the layer of filth there were piercing blue eyes, a rugged jaw, copper colored hair. Standing before the Bright Queen, he was a curious juxtaposition: a madman or a prophet, something holy and sacred and crazed, all at the same time. There was something wild and almost faelike about the man: the brown flecks of darkened skin on his cheeks, the arcane scars that ran down his arms...the half-orc man had been handsome, yes, but this man was different. This man was a curiosity, and Essek? 

Well, he loved a good mystery.

It didn’t take him long to find the spell book, and the spell components. The spellbook wouldn’t open, of course, a simple protection any wizard worth their salt would do, so Essek had no way of knowing just what the wizard knew, but at least now he knew what the man was. Like him, in a way, but his opposite: the man was born and bred of the Empire and their kin, while Essek was a loyal servant of the Dynasty. In a different life, they’d have met on the battlefield. Hell, depending on what the man was holding on to, they still might.

He hoped he wouldn’t have to kill him. But that all depended on what was in the bag.

Which was--

Oh.

It was a Beacon. Not just any beacon--one of the Luxon’s beacon, the body of the god Essek worshiped. And it was here, in Rosana, in a bright pink backpack, of all things! Being carried by humans!

What were their plans with it? Were they going to give it up? Threaten to destroy it? Did they, too, worship the Luxon, and if so, had they traveled here to deliver it? If so, why not start with that, instead of gaining the trust of Den Mother Olios first? And if they didn’t worship the Luxon, then did they have any idea just what it was, exactly, that they held?

“Congratulations,” Essek whispered in the wizard’s ear. This close, the man smelled of smoke and sweat; earthy and warm and slightly alluring. He would not remember what Essek said--no one ever did. It was the flaw of stopping time: when time resumed, it would be as if Essek hadn’t moved at all. “You just became the most fascinating man in the Dynasty.”

He would have to keep a close eye on the group at large; perhaps, if the next few moments went well, he’d volunteer to watch them for his queen. But in particular, he needed to watch the red haired wizard

As the last few seconds of his spell began to fade, Essek made his way back to the Bright Queen’s side, and watched as hesitant curiosity gave way to awe--like everyone around him--at what the group known as the Mighty Nein would do next.

[electronicdelusionstarlight]

Anyway, would you imagine the madness that would be the Civil War (2006) Event if it was released today?

Like...

1- There is a major explosion wiping out a suburban, white picked american town in the midwest, explosion started right next to a school, caused by a team of C List superheroes literally attacking a group of B list Supervillains, who were having a barbecue there for some reason, just to get more ratings on their reality show rather than any heroic duty. Many people die, mostly kids due to the school, and we see the bloody aftermath. Even the Sentinels, compared to burning crosses in terms of racial sensitivity by Wolverine, help out to fish out people from the debris.

2- Because of this, major Anti Superhero Sentiments start sprouting up in the country. One of the victims’ mother (A major player in the event believe it or not) spits on Tony Stark’s face. The Human Torch gets lynched by some black stereotypes because he was allowed to go into a exclusive nightclub with a white girl due to his celebrity status and they weren’t, major protests start going trough the nation, all demanding SOMETHING to be done against those pesky superheroes, As monuments are being torn down and what not, as ALL superheroes, as a social class, at fault for what has happened there during the explosion.

3- This brings us to the Government Regulation Thing, THE Superhero Registration Program. Maria Hill, who wasn’t a Skrull Chaos Agent and has never been (It’s important you remember this), announces to Captain America that the... senate? chamber? Anyway, someone is going to approve this new law (Which, you know, isn’t law yet btw) that will require all superheroes to have their Identity revealed to the public and become paid government workers. They get a pension and health insurance and insurance for any collateral damage they cause as long as they do what they are told and do not step out of line.

You know, Normal, TOTALLY not fascist shit.

4- Anyway, Cap obviously is outraged by this, for “How Long until it will be Washington that tells us who the real villain is” (Which is, you know, SUPER RELEVANT), and claims will never sign up for any of this, which Maria Hill, who, again, is not a Undercover Skrull Chaos Agent, knew he was going to say so she tries to arrest him for breaking a law that isn’t a law yet, unleashing plenty of armed guards and a couple of attack helicopters on him. She fails, he runs away, and the other superheroes are presented with a choice.

CONFORM OR BE HUNTED DOWN LIKE DOGS.

5- If you think this was bad prepare for the real bad shit to start now, because you have to keep in mind this:

The registration side are the supposed good guys here. They are what the narrative consider to be the one who win at the end, whose ideals were better than Captain Fucking America’s. Keep this in mind as you read this:

6- The Major 3 players of the Registration Side are Tony Stark, Mister Fantastic and Hank Pym.

6A- Tony Stark is a war criminal. He tries to stage a terrorist attack on Independent Nation Atlantis, using a “Mind Controlled” Norman Osborn (More on this later) to pull the trigger, so he could both kill Namor and start war with the underwater kingdom, whose Non Namor Rulers will surely try to get revenge against the surface for such happenings, sell weapons during the ensuing war, AND unite the divided superhero community against a common enemy, in this case, Atlantis.

Tony Stark is also responsible for the Supervillain Rehabilitation Program, which is taking willing and unwilling supervillains alike and putting bombs in their brains, ready to blow up at a sign of disobedience, so to use as enforcers for the registration side. Many of those villains have a kill count on the double digits. Many of those villains where later deployed in hunt down and capture missions of Superheroes who had defected, superheroes they all had a hate boner for and loved nothing more but to beat up and potentially kill/maim. One of the fucking Hobgoblins was among them. BULLSEYE WAS FUCKING AMONG THEM.

He manipulated Spider-Man into revealing his identity to the world, something that caused major Bullshit to everyone involved, for, once Spider-Man realized what kind of bullshit he had signed up for and decided to go rogue, Tony first hacks the stark patented supersuit he gave him as a gift so it malfunctions, then sends 2 bloodthirsty supervillains armed to the teeth with explosives and with bombs in their brain to capture him and rough him up a little, then removes peter’s wife and aunt from the family protection/hostage program, which forces them to hide out in a crappy motel in fear that one day a supervillain discovers where they are and bombs them, which guess what is what fucking happens in the end since a sniper finds out they are there and shoots Aunt May, which is what ultimately leads to the worst story in comic book history ONE MORE (FUCKING) DAY.

6B- Reed “Mister Fantastic” Richards is presented by the narrative as emotionally distant and abusive to his wife. He will, with the help of Tony Stark and Hank Pym, create a mechanical clone of Thor, who was absent from earth at the time, with the sole purpose of crowd control and dispersion in the event of a superhero vs superhero fight.

Lethal Force is apparently authorized and approved, for The first mission he is deployed in, Clone-Thor, the clone of a bloody Norse god, ends up Killing Black Goliath, a black superhero, something not contested, in fact almost condoned by the narrative and the registration side, and both the reason why Spider-Man defects and a Hydra Scientist (Oh, yeah, they also conscript Hydra Scientists in the thing so tho create more bio weapons and shit) finds the reason why he considers those three his favorite superheroes.

Also Reed Richards is a McCarthy apologist. He talks about this one uncle of his, a artist, who was considered a communist and was put on trials for having left leaning, liberal views/just being a plain weird artist (I think he was also gay coded?), and he says how he mocked the question and the absurdity of the whole situation in particular and McCarthyism in general, which ultimately blacklists him from work and makes him die alone and without money, so Reed Fucking Richards of course said that the moral of that story is that “My uncle was wrong, If there is a law that might seem unjust, you shouldn’t be down to clown but you should just shut your mouth and keep going.”

The Fucker.

6C- Hank Pym starts a fucking child soldiers conscription program. Teen Superheroes discovered by shield will be captured and separated from their families, Identical Robotic Decoys put in their place to prevent the families from finding out, and will be conscripted into the registration program as child soldiers.

They will be given a usa army approved regiment of training, and will be soon deployed on real, life or death missions, either involving the capture of rogue superheroes or fighting “enemy” forces such as AIM or HYDRA, what the government seems more fit to fight at the time.

The Kids, for ages seemed to vary from 15 to 19, will be trained and encouraged to kill, especially if faced with faceless hydra goons as they blast down their aircraft in a dog fight in the skies. This will of course scar and traumatize the, again, 15 years old government sanctioned child FUCKING soldiers, but not as much as the alternative to this.

For, as it is shown, failure to comply with orders, as well as emotional instability due to being, you know, a 16 years old girl in stressful situations such as, you know, a guy turning into a giant spider in front of you, will cause the government to “terminate” your employment under them, which will result in them forcibly taking away your powers, most of whom you were born with, with invasive, unwilling, non sedated surgery on you, as it happens to a girl whose arm is a literal magic gun who had her, you know, magic arm cut off after she accidentally misfired and kills another of the kids watching from the, you know, not that safe watching room not even a glass mirror away from the training room.

No wonder the girl whose superpower is literally just “can make pretty clouds with her mind” is so eager to kill as many people the government as her to after being conscripted while she was just flying around on her cloud and has to witness... you know, all of this shit.

6C- Maria Hill, Director of Shield and, again, not a fucking Skrull Chaos Agent, starts hunting down unregistered superheroes. Any superhero that didn’t sign up the registration list at least on the exact midnight of the day the law is made law, will be hunted down and forcibly imprisoned without a due process.

This happens to Luke Cage, who, again, on the exact midnight the law is enforced, not a minute more, had his apartment swarmed up with cops in tactical gear ready to “arrest him” despite him doing nothing yet, all the while shooting around the, you know, predominantly black neighbor like they are the Simpsons’ Texan guy. His wife and newborn daughter are also hunted down, the two fleeing to Canada, a safe heaven for superheroes and their families in this time of crisis, for undefended families of superheroes become leverage the registration side can use against them to make them sign up, for at some point a superhero must have revealed his identity to another superhero, another superhero that will statistically be either on the registration side snitching on you, or, you know, a Undercover Skrull Chaos Agent, if not both.

Captured heroes are shipped off to a private prison owned by Tony Stark and his goons in the Negative Zone (Think hell, but more depressing), where they will be interned without, again, any semblance of due process, and will be fucking kept in torture pod of virtual reality for the entirety of their stay. They will not be allowed any contact with the other inmates, or even to feed, relieve or just wash themselves, everything will be done by the pods, so that they will be in eternal, perfect imprisonment until they “see the error of their ways”.

Somewhat worse than the Barry Allen’s private prison in the Flash, if only by just a little.

Some brain washing was also implied to happen.

7- Cap’s Side is, of course, against all of this, yet it will be Cap’s side to lose the civil war, for , when Captain America is pummeling Tony to the ground for everything that has been going on in the middle of a devastated time square, some REAL WORLD HEROES (You know, a cop, a nurse, a fireman, and so on), tackle Steve to the ground, blame HIM for everything wrong that has happened, and ask him to stop in his futile resistance.

Statistically Speaking, at least 2 of those people were a Skrull Chaos Agents BTW.

Steve “sees the error of his ways,” surrenders to the police, is about to be given a sham process (He gets one but fucking daredevil, a lawyer, doesn’t as he’s shipped off to Tony’s Hell Prison? I guess there is a upside on getting arrested by the program in front of witnesses that you cannot all silence) until Sharon Carter shoots him on the steps to the courtroom because he was being mind controlled by a undercover hydra hypnotist that might or might have not been conscripted by the “let’s conscript supervillain scientists in the registration program, WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?” thing.

8- Also Hawkeye comes back to life for a bit and is immediately almost manipulated by Tony into taking the Captain America’s role after Steve's death, except this time working for the registration side against his friends, which he ALMOST accepts because he doesn't know what the fuck is going on yet but he trusts tony until he meets Hawkeye (The girl one) and Patriot during his first mission as Registration Cap who tell him “Duuuuude, Steve’s body isn’t even cold yet, what the fuck” which makes him go “Holy shit Tony, what the fuck?” and make him decide to abandon the shield and shit and lay low for a while.

9- Oh, yeah, also this happens:

(Recognize that journalist? Is the same journalist that gives Hydra Cap a interview about how inhumane Hydra was during their regime, the one he sends to the labor camps and mocks with “I’m sure you can complain about it on Twitter later.” That wasn’t just a dig at the (Justified, oh so justified) detractors of Hydra Cap on social medias, but also a dig at THIS. FUCKING. SCENE. THAT WILL LIVE IN INFAMY FOR ALL DAY TO COME, FOR CAPTAIN AMERICA IS OUT OF TOUCH WITH THE REAL AMERICA BECAUSE HE DOESN'T USE MY FUCKING SPACE).

10- What else what else... Oh, yeah, everyone favorite absolute monarch T’challa, King of Wakanda and Black Panther, married with X-Men’s Storm at the time, X-Man that, btw, have been pretty much neutral during this whole shitstorm due to, you know, the “genocide” they recently suffered by the hands and mystical powers of one Wanda Maximoff, both of whom have diplomatic immunity due to the, you know, status as the rulers of a hyper advanced nation who holds the cure for cancer among other things, has his wife taken hostage by the united states. They go to the united states on a joint diplomatic mission, and are promptly ambushed and kept grounded in the states, separated from each other, until at least Ororo signs the registration program, T’challa having to follow closely behind, and then they will be allowed to be let go.

Again, I can’t stress this enough, The United States try to strong arm 2 foreign rulers, one of whom a mutant, into signing up a domestic policy about domestic internal affairs of public security.

Because of course they do.

10- I think I forgot some minor shit happening like speedball’s entire arc or Wolverine’s revenge plan or the Latverian Caper, but I think the gist of WHY this bullshit would have blown up today is all here.

For you see, now, imagine all this shit all the implications, the crimes, the horrors and stuff...

Just Imagine, all this shit is going on... with a Secret Invasion of Skrull Chaos Agent coming soon to shake thing even more...

And the president of the united states, the one that, again, ultimately will decide who the REAL enemy is, where the real supervillain to fight is...

Is Donald Fucking Trump.

How long until the superhero child soldiers are tasked to guard the border I wonder...

[tarotdeckshuffle]

This has been raging in my mind for a while, but what Lantern Corps do you think the chocobros, Ravus, Ardyn, Luna, Nyx, and Arenea would belong to? For example, I think Luna would be a Star Sapphire (violet light of love), Prompto would be a Blue Lantern (blue light of hope), and Ignis would be a Green Lantern (green light of willpower), but you're welcome to disagree with me XD. Just curious to see what you think!

So, I’m going to be fully honest here and say I know almost nothing about the Green Lantern comics. I’m a Marvel fan and an X-Men nut, but I never really got into DC comics. I also never really had an opportunity to get into the Green Lantern world…

On that note, I’m not one of those writers who will leave you hanging. Here is what I think would happen, based solely off of the Lantern Corps Wiki, lol. You’re the expert, so I’d love to here what you think and why!

Taglist: @idiotflowerex, @laststory1013, @sayaoqueen, @jophinabean, @mysme-already

If you like what you read, please consider supporting me on Patreon or buying me a Ko-fi!

Noctis

Green Light of Willpower

I totally see your point!

To add to it, I think it’d take quite a while for Noct to find his full power.

At the end, he really does, because it takes a great amount of willpower to overcome our fear of death to the point of accepting it.

But also because that’s one of his greatest fears due to how many people have died for him.

His willpower to finally accept death’s role in this journey would truly bring out his power.

Prompto

Blue Light of Hope

Especially because he gives Noctis hope.

Hope at returning to a normal life, hope that he people like him not just because he’s the prince, and hope that he’ll smile again.

I think Prompto’s cheery nature brings hope to those around him.

He’s his most powerful when he’s around his friends, too.

Ignis

Violet Light of Love

“Violet is the other color furthest from the center, and represents the emotion of love. Those who are capable of great love, who have lost their loves, or been rejected are capable of wielding the violet light.”

I base this off of mostly Ep. Ignis (lots of spoilers in this post, just stop now).

So Ignis is the most controlled of all of the bros.

If anyone can control a fierce weapon, it’s him.

Also, everything he does, he does for Noct.

Just look at his DLC.

All the feels.

This man has a deep love for those around him which gives him the strength that he has.

While it’s hard to control, this man has the know-how to do so.

Gladio

Yellow Light of Fear

“A being capable of instilling great fear in others is capable of wielding this power.”

I would like to see feel anything but fear if Gladio was about to crash that giant broadsword down on you.

Ok, you’re right, I might be horny, too.

But let’s be honest, if anyone can instill fear into others and knows how to use it, it’s this big guy.

Ravus

Violet Light of Love

Ok, so here come some of my personal HCs about this guy.

The colors that are the farthest on the spectrum are the hardest to control.

Ravus’s stoic manner has always made me think that he’s hiding something, but it could also work that he’s always fighting to control something.

I also HC about his actions in Kingsglaive (spoilers ahead):

I don’t (want to) think that he put on the Ring of the Lucai just because he thought he’d make a better king than Regis.

I think he put it on in hopes of ending everything.

If he could control the ring, maybe he could end the darkness without having to wait for Noctis.

The Empire would back away from destroying Insomnia because he controlled the crystal they wanted.

He could end this whole prophecy before it began and save his sister.

I mean, the guy does everything for Luna and loves her more than anyone.

Look at Altissa.

No one switches from that (horribly written) mullet brandishing frat boy, who locks his sister away in her room for years,  to our gray, spectral, pained prince who speaks to his sister in a sensitive, touching manner THAT FREAKING FAST.

He also loved his mom and lost her early on.

TL;DR: I have a love/hate relationship with Kingsglaive because they did Ravus dirty. I think he’s a way more loving character than that movie lets him on to be.

Luna

Indigo Light of Compassion

“The Indigo light can be wielded by one with great compassion for other beings, used to heal the sick and wounded.However, compassion can also be forced upon a person…”

I mean…yeah, the first part fits.

But also the second part.

Luna never chose to be the Oracle, she was born into it.

So I have to wonder what she would be like if given more of a chance to fight and defend herself.

I mean, she goes to face the gods on her own the first chance she gets: No hesitation!

So, imagine what she’d be like if she and Ravus switched birth places…

But I totally see your point about being a Violet, I just think she was forced into the Indigo role so early on that that’s what we’d see. 

Ardyn

Red Light of Rage

I mean, depending on the ending you pick to Ep. Ardyn (Spoilers, sorry), he is either doing everything he does to get back at the gods and Somnus’s bloodline, or in a twisted way to help Noctis.

I like to play that he’s raging against Somnus and the gods, btw.

But I think this light would fit his descent into the darkness and into madness.

And it just fits the bad guy.

Nyx

Green Light of Willpower

I’d really love to say Nyx is a blue light of hope, but he acts way too well on his own.

He has this indomitable will to just keep going!

Giant ass daemon? Cool, let’s kill it.

City falling apart? Well, let’s save what’s left.

Certain death from this power? Bring it.

This guy just keeps going.

It’s only an end of his own choosing that he finally comes down.

Aranea

Indigo Light of Compassion

So, she’s really hard to decide and it comes down to how you read her.

I think she’s really quite compassionate, even if she doesn’t communicate that well.

She decides that she doesn’t like the Empire anymore and is immediately saving people.

She goes to find Prompto because Noctis asked her to and she knows he’s all alone.

She helps Prompto through his shit by saying the things he needed to hear.

She has a motley crew that she KNOWS THE NAMES OF!

We never see that with anyone else!

She takes the time to know people, to help them, and to do what needs to be done for them.

Part of being compassionate, is the passion!

She gives every fight her all,

And that candy apple red airship? I don’t know a better vehicle for someone with passion, lol.

I think she is very compassionate, even if she doesn’t know how to say it.

[crescentmoon223]

Two Worlds Collide - Chapter 5

Read it on AO3 | Rated: NC-17 | Stella x Scully

Chapter 5

Scully sat cross-legged beside Stella in bed, room service trays laid open on the sheets between them. She’d never done this before, ordered over-priced burgers and eaten them half-naked in bed with the woman she’d just fucked. And why hadn’t she? Why did she so rarely allow herself this kind of indulgence?

If she’d learned anything in her six years with the FBI, it was that tomorrow was never guaranteed. This was the part of the job Stella seemed to have embraced most readily, allowing herself all the fanciful indulgences Scully had gone so long without. Stella worked hard and played hard, then got up the next morning and worked even harder.

Right now, she was eating a French fry—a chip, she would call it—and watching Scully watch her eat. She had on the hotel’s robe again, while Scully wore a plain black T-shirt, both of them bare-legged against the sheets. Stella’s hair hung long and tousled down her back, wavy from being tied in a knot at the back of her head all day.

Scully was struck again by how young she looked, unbuttoned and out of the office. If she removed the makeup and the attitude, dressed in jeans and a ponytail, she could go undercover as a high school student.

“How old are you?” she blurted, curiosity getting the better of her.

Stella straightened, tossing a lock of golden hair over her shoulder. “Twenty-nine.”

Still in her twenties. Scully smiled as she poked the last bite of her burger into her mouth.

“Why are you looking at me like that? How old are you?” Stella asked.

“Thirty-three.”

Stella blinked, plainly not having suspected Scully to be older, when Scully had assumed it since they’d met. Stella’s worldliness was born out of a confidence not backed by her years. She’d forged her way through the ranks on grit, smarts, and determination, and no doubt she’d keep right on climbing.

“I’m glad you’re here.” Scully had the sudden, strong urge to hug her, but she held herself in check, unsure how Stella would react to the gesture. There was a closeness between them, not just the intimacy they’d shared, but a mutual sort of trust and comfort, something Scully had so rarely experienced in her life, she wanted to treasure it forever.

Stella half-smiled as she rose and carried her tray to the door, setting it in the hall. Scully followed with her own tray, grabbing the discarded bag of fudge on her way back to the bed.

“Dessert?” She crawled onto the bed and opened the bag.

“Mm.” Stella gave her a heated look before reaching inside and pulling out a chunk of dark chocolate. She made a little sound of pleasure as she chewed, and Scully wondered how anyone ever managed to spend time in her presence and not fall madly in love with her.

How many people were out there even now, swooning over her without her knowledge? Because already Scully had no idea how she was supposed to forget her when she returned to DC in the morning. How could she forget any of this? Or was that the whole point? She should remember every moment in as much detail as possible.

They ate as much fudge as either of them could stomach, and then Stella leaned over to place the bag on the nightstand. That was when Scully saw the scars on the soles of her feet. Dear God, how much more pain had she etched into her own body? Stella turned, tucking her feet beneath the robe as she saw Scully looking.

I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.

But Scully only smiled, leaning in to wipe a morsel of fudge from Stella’s cheek, kissing her until the tension in her body released. They lay on the sheets facing each other, and Scully was imagining an alternate life in which she lived here in London, fighting crimes she actually stood a chance of solving and coming home every night to Stella in her bed. Of course, it was a fantasy. Even if she lived here, she wasn’t foolish enough to think Stella was the kind of woman who’d settle down, not with Scully or anyone else.

There was a reason they were in a hotel room instead of Stella’s home, after all. This was only temporary, like the room they were in. Their relationship was as neat and clean as the sheets below them, except it wasn’t. Scully didn’t do temporary very well. She’d been forced to accept it in too many aspects of her life over the years, and she would accept it again tomorrow when she said goodbye to Stella.

But that didn’t mean she had to like it. And it didn’t mean this had been meaningless. She could still taste the pain of Stella’s scars against her lips. That ladder of thin white lines carved into her delicate, intimate skin might as well have been a map to her soul, because Scully saw things there that she knew without asking Stella didn’t share readily, if ever.

She saw a teenaged Stella, angry, frightened, hurting herself to numb other pain, attempting to take control of things that were beyond her control. Somewhere along the way, she’d traded the razor blade for a badge, wielding control and power with an iron fist, making hardened criminals cower with a single look, causing men—and women—to fall all over themselves for her attention.

Stella Gibson, endlessly, effortlessly in control, had shown Scully her vulnerability. And she would never, ever forget it.

Right now, Stella was watching her out of sleep-glazed eyes, weary from the day but still alert, still hungry, a heat glowing there that re-ignited the ache between Scully’s thighs that burned whenever they were together, whenever she so much as thought of her.

Wordlessly, they slid together, kissing, touching, hands roaming under clothes. Stella’s robe slid onto the sheets behind her as she pushed Scully’s T-shirt over her head, leaving them both naked. Scully traced her fingers over the freckles on Stella’s chest, rolling Stella to her back so she could look her fill. Stella’s breasts were fuller than Scully’s, rounder. She palmed them, rolling her thumbs over Stella’s nipples so that they contracted into tight pink buds.

“So pretty,” she murmured as she bent her head to kiss first one, then the other.

Stella was quiet, but her gaze was calm, her body loose and pliant beneath Scully’s fingers, no trace of her earlier insecurities. She was leaner than Scully, her body lithe and toned. Scully had felt those muscles last night in the dark, and now she could see them in all their glory. She trailed her fingers over Stella’s six-pack abs.

“Don’t let this go to your head, but do you work out?” she asked, grinning at Stella, who used the moment to flip them, pinning Scully beneath her with the full force of those muscles she’d just been admiring.

“I swim,” she whispered, thrusting her hips against Scully’s. “And I spend my free time in the gym at the station.”

“Not all of your free time.”

“I believe this also counts as working out,” Stella said between kisses, hips still moving, one strong swimmer’s thigh between Scully’s to give her the friction she needed. “Can’t let anyone get the drop on me.”

“Never,” Scully murmured, picturing Stella in the gym, lifting weights to pull her weight in a man’s world. She knew the feeling, had found herself physically disadvantaged in enough situations where she’d wished for a few more inches, a little more muscle, but more often, she’d had to rely on her wits—and her weapon.

Stella kept moving, riding Scully’s thigh while Scully moved against her from below, matching the rhythm of Stella’s hips, rocking together, moaning as the pressure inside her mounted. She wanted to close her eyes, concentrate fully on grinding herself against Stella’s thigh until she’d found release, but she couldn’t look away from the beautiful woman on top of her.

Stella threw her head back, bottom lip clenched between her teeth as she moved. Her blonde hair spilled over her shoulders in messy waves, cascading over her breasts, which bounced with every thrust of her hips. Scully felt powerful in this position, seeing Stella from this angle, the way she would look if she were riding a man. Caught up in the fantasy, she reached a hand between them, touching Stella, carefully pushing two fingers inside her.

Stella gasped, leaning forward, riding Scully’s fingers with abandon. Scully felt separate from her own need, wholly focused on giving Stella pleasure, on making her lose control. And she was close, Scully could tell. She arched her fingers inside Stella, and Stella let out a soft cry, swaying forward to rest her hands on Scully’s shoulders, a fine sheen of sweat gleaming on her chest.

Stella whimpered as she came, her body clenching around Scully’s fingers. Scully held her breath, watching in awe as Stella rode out her orgasm. Her hands trembled as she lowered herself, body covering Scully’s from head to foot, kissing her deeply as she slipped a hand between Scully’s thighs.

It didn’t take her long to send Scully over the edge too, and they lay together for a long time afterward, limbs entwined as they caught their breath. Scully felt an irrational urge to hold on to her forever. The solid, mortal weight of Stella resting against her heart felt so good, tears brimmed in Scully’s eyes. How long had it been since she’d held someone like this? Naked bodies pressed together in the aftermath of pleasure, relaxed and content with the world.

“Stay the night?” she asked quietly.

Stella hesitated, her gaze drifting to the door as if searching for the conviction to walk out of it. Scully released her, dropping her arms to her sides, but then Stella nodded. “Yes, all right.”

And Scully smiled as she brought her arms around Stella again.

Tomorrow, Scully would fly home to DC and figure out what to do about Mulder and the X Files, about her life in general. Tomorrow, Stella would hunt down that little girl’s killer and see him punished. But tonight…tonight was just for them, two women seizing comfort where they could find it, a refuge from the insanity of their day-to-day lives.

Eventually, Stella disentangled herself and went into the bathroom. When she returned to the bed, she reached for the robe where it had fallen, eyes locking on Scully’s as she hesitated for a moment before covering herself. Scully didn’t mind; she wanted Stella to be comfortable, wanted to tell her how much she appreciated the things Stella had shown her, but she sensed the words didn’t need to be said, that she’d only make Stella self-conscious if she tried.

Instead, she turned to put her T-shirt back on, stopped by the feel of Stella’s hands gripping her waist from behind. Stella’s fingertips traced the tattoo on her lower back, circling the ouroboros inked there.

“I like it,” she said, her voice soft and cool as spun silk.

“I don’t,” Scully confessed, the hot sting of embarrassment flowing through her as she remembered her ill-fated night with Ed Jerse.

“Why not?” Stella crawled over to lay beside Scully, facing her.

“It was a stupid, impulsive decision that almost got me killed.”

Stella’s eyebrows rose. “Explain.”

So, she did. She told Stella about her ill-fated solo trip to Philadelphia, her night with Ed, the way he’d nearly killed her, and the cancer that had driven her to such a rash decision in the first place.

“It’s fitting, then,” Stella said. “The snake eating its own tale. It symbolizes rebirth. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, right? Maybe you did get the tattoo you deserve.”

“Maybe.” She tended to get so caught up in the hurt and embarrassment of what had happened with Ed, and then the fear and pain of the cancer, she sometimes forgot about the tattoo itself. Maybe Stella was right. Maybe it symbolized the things she had survived. And maybe these nights with Stella were part of her rebirth.

***

Stella crept along the dark alley, careful to keep her weight on the balls of her feet so her heels didn’t make noise against the damp asphalt. Alissa Pine’s screams echoed from somewhere ahead. If Stella could just get there in time, she could stop this.

She could save Alissa.

But no matter how far she walked, no matter how fast, Alissa’s screams never drew any closer. She turned left, following Alissa’s cry for help, following the alley like an endless maze. Now she could hear him. Garrett Hunt, Alissa’s stepfather, was attacking her. Stella broke into a run, heels clacking down the alley.

She drew her weapon as she rounded the corner, and there they were. Garrett loomed over the girl’s body. Alissa screamed.

“Stop!” Stella yelled. “Put your hands where I can see them.”

But when he turned around, it wasn’t Garrett Hunt at all.

“Come here, my little shining star,” he said, reaching for her. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

Stella lurched upright in bed, heart racing, body drenched in sweat. Gasping for air, she reached for the lamp beside the bed and switched it on, fumbling for her dream journal before her surroundings registered. She was in Scully’s hotel room. Her journal was at home.

“You okay?” Scully asked groggily from behind her.

“Fine. Sorry. Bad dream.” Stella shut the light off, feeling ridiculous for having turned it on in the first place. Sometimes revisiting old scars reopened old wounds, a lesson she ought to know by now. She lay back in bed, rolling toward Scully to replace the unwelcome face in her dreams with Scully’s bare-faced beauty, just visible in the light filtering from the window.

“Our line of work causes a lot of those,” Scully murmured, wrapping an arm around Stella to pull her in for a kiss.

Stella stiffened. She wasn’t used to having someone in her bed when she had a nightmare, and she wasn’t used to liking it. She wasn’t used to heartbreakingly beautiful redheads who stripped away her defenses with a single touch.

Beside her, Scully’s breathing evened out, and Stella focused on the rhythm of it as she willed herself back to sleep. She felt as if she’d only just closed her eyes when the phone began to ring, rousing her for the day. This morning, though, Scully got up with her, puttering around the room in that black T-shirt that barely covered her ass as she packed her suitcase.

Stella came up behind her, pressing her against the wall as she slid her hands beneath the hem of that fucking T-shirt. “How much time do you have?”

“About an hour until I need to check out.” Scully gasped as Stella’s fingers reached their destination. “When do you need to be at the office?”

“I can be a few minutes late.”

“And I can be time efficient.” Scully spun to face her, one hand sliding beneath Stella’s robe.

Stella exhaled as Scully touched her, pinning her against the wall for a messy kiss. Their hips moved together as their hands stroked each other toward release. Scully broke first, head thunking against the wall, pussy fluttering around her fingers as she came.

Scully’s hands went to her own hair as she regained her senses, eyes blinking open to meet Stella’s. The next thing she knew, Scully had spun them to pin Stella against the wall before dropping to her knees. Stella’s breath caught in her throat as Scully looked up at her with a wicked smile right before she put her mouth on her.

Stella flattened both palms against the wall, focused on keeping herself upright as Scully licked and sucked. Desire coiled inside her, hot and tight. The hotel room melted away. She forgot about the time, the open files on her desk, the little girl in the morgue waiting for justice. All she knew was the pleasure of Scully’s tongue as she carried her over the edge.

Release radiated from her core in blissful waves. She heard the cry that escaped her lips, felt the way her legs shook, her nails scoring the paint as she slid down the wall to join Scully on the floor. For a moment, they sat there together, arms entwined as they caught their breath. Stella blinked back the unexpected moisture in her eyes.

She slipped out of the robe, leaving it on the floor as she stood and went into the bathroom for a shower. She rinsed herself off as quickly as possible—careful not to get her hair wet—and redressed in yesterday’s clothes, hoping she had something clean left at the office. As she fixed her appearance in the mirror, Scully showered.

It was all strangely comfortable, as if they’d gotten ready together hundreds of times, despite there being nothing comfortable about it at all. Scully’s packed suitcase lay on the bed, plane ticket protruding from the zipper pocket at the top.

“I guess this is goodbye,” she said quietly from behind Stella.

She turned to find Scully in black jeans and a white button-down shirt, blazer draped over her arm. “It is.”

Scully walked to the bed and picked up the little notepad and pen the hotel had provided her. She wrote several lines on it before folding it into a little square and handing it to Stella. “Now you’ve got my home number and my email address. Drop me a line sometime.” Her smile was hesitant. “Or, you know, at least let me know how Ronnie Strickland makes out at trial.”

“I’ll do that,” Stella told her, relieved to have a professional reason to contact her. And then, because she wasn’t overly fond of goodbyes, she led the way out of Scully’s room. They rode the elevator to the lobby as silence spread between them like a sticky web, seeping into the empty spaces and choking Stella when she tried to find words—any words at all—to say.

Luckily, Scully saved her. She propped her suitcase upright and reached for Stella’s hands before leaning in to place a quick kiss on her lips. “Take care.”

“You too.” Stella’s fingers clenched around the neat little square of paper in her palm as she walked away.

[hereliesbitches--me]

~Atrolian~

What the hell is that?

Well, it's the root of why Rosie has animal features.

She's not just a product of being a furry at some point in my life [not entirely] but there is in fact an explanation within her lore.

Atrolians are an Alien race to humans. They were the test run subjects before humanity, and by test run I mean they are humanoid in all aspects, except they were given animal attributes to them. They are.larger, faster, with more keen sense and durability than any human thanks to the added animal features. They developed as a race with the aid of other older races which cultivated and inspired them to develop into their own civilization of a rather peaceful, technologically advanced society.

Upon learning of Earth’s new formation of growing life  [Taking into consideration that the presence of sentient life was a gradual process and did not happen simultaneous across the universe. Some races and sections are much older and more developed than others. ]  The race figured they would pay it forward and travel across the galaxy to meet the developing race and aid them- much like many other alien races did. For them, and to Earth.

Earth proves to be a melting pot planet. It was significant in creation, it being the place of battle where the heavens were divided because of opposing views on the significance of human life.

Before then, Many races felt the need to aid along the developing life with secrets and skills that would push them along as a civilization. It was only natural at the start that the naive humanity would so eagerly accept these beings and revere them as Gods ( The definition of gods and delties will be worked on innanlther post- there is a difference by what makes them so, but humanity didn't know the difference)

The Atrolians never cared for titles, and simply enjoyed coming to the aid of the small humans. They, along with the other otherwordly beings, would be the greatest influence inspiring and guiding the development of human culture across the regions of the planet. Over time, much like many other races, Atrolains too would take mates among humanity

And eventually, that offspring would be the first halflings in a long line to start bearing the animalistic Qualities.

It was a typically dominant trait that overpowered human genetics, to have a child with an Atrolain could almost always guarantee the animal features. Even Halflings continued to carry the strong trait for centuries to come, up until the divide.

~The Divide~

   Atrolian are a naturally peaceful race. They didn’t believe in having currency, and rather bargain and trade goods, believing in taking what was needed and never just hoarding because you could. They had allies among the stars but never affiliated with tyrannical or war-prone species that fight for selfish reasons to conquer one another. As you imagine, Humanity down the line would eventually evolve into just that. Much to the horror of the Atrolians, humans had begun to show signs of greed and aggression over time as their population grew. They slaughtered each other, they conquered and sold each other, and turned a blind eye to each other in times of need. They had divided themselves into groups that warred for the sole purpose of claiming to be the more supreme, and they slaughtered anyone who did not agree. They used the technology and the skills taught to them to harm each other, and the view of their race had begun a rift in Atrolian society of just what to do with them.

For centuries, as mankind grows, develops, and divides themselves over self-created differences and greed, There was increasing unrest and debate in Atrolian society. It was going against their ways to continue to aid a violent race, and yet they continued to do so because of their shared religious beliefs, being guarded by the same angels. They insisted neutrality and continued to make routine trips with new tools and goods, up until the betrayal.

When one fleet of Atrolian aids failed to come back from the routine trip to Earth, there came instant backlash and demand to investigate. Another military group had been sent on the rescue mission to retrieve them, perhaps suspecting something had happened to the ship and the fleet could not communicate; But what they found were the bodies of Atrolian comrades, stripped of their armor, and the ship raided for all its weapons and other goods. In response is absolute outrage.. To find the culprits, Atrolian blood is easily traceable by scent.. *(Within their society, Violence is only a factor in mating season when defending or trying to win over a mate. The scent of blood will linger on a champion no matter how many times it is washed away, no matter how long. The poignant scent proves as a warning to what the bloodspiller is capable of. Violence is also incited when rules have been broken and betrayed- once you’re considered an outsider, or someone being punished, there is no sympathy or kindness, and the Atrolians demand bloodshed and death, or banishment) The military team wastes no time using tech and their noses to find the group, a group from a warring kingdom, and with little hesitation they are slaughtered- though the team does not bother in recovering stolen technology. The team takes the bodies of their comrades back to the home planet to report the events.

The event proved to be the final straw amongst the Atrolian society, and despite their normal preaching of peace, when outraged they turn as savage and sporadic as the animal genetics that make them. They demanded that ties be cut from the humans of Earth, and that included wiping it from their bloodline and home planet. In a rather frantic mass order unanimously decided by the Kings and Queens of each kingdom, Humans who had been taken as mate on Atrolize at the time were rounded up and were going to be shipped back to earth where they came from. Halflings who lacked animal features were to be sent with their human parent, and the full blooded Atrolain has the option to either go with their mate, or stay behind. Any who fought this order were killed if they interfere with the divide in any way, shape, or form. The option was to go quietly, or else be part of the cleansing, and it would mark a defining part in Atrolian history.

Though Earth is never forgotten, over the centuries it comes as a sensitive subject to discuss. Many Atrolians did not share the agreement with the order but nonetheless had to comply to the wishes of their kingdom’s leaders. The tarnished view of humanity was passed down with the generations, and though many Atrolians today would have never known what Earth is like for themselves, it is a strict law against  returning to the wretched place- many older generations hold the belief that Earth can simply not be helped. Up until now..(To be elaborated later )

~What became of the Halflings on Earth?~

Thousands of families had been separated in the mass divide. Hundreds killed in their refusal to go,  and those left scattered at different points across Earth were left to pick up the shambles of the life they knew. Many of the full humans had grown accustomed to the peace of Atrolize, the system of simple bargaining and caring for your neighbors- they were not used to the ideals of using money, or that there were legitimate threats from stranger whose intentions could never be clear. They would have to adapt and thrive in this new world.. And it is with them that the last roots of the Atrolians can be found.. Only to become lost in history.

Over time, the typical dominant trait of Atrolian genetics became diluted in a similar fashion as it did with Angels and their wings. It becomes recessive, and the visible animal features such as ears, tails, feathers, or even wings have become a rarity that occured. Over time, it becomes a recessive trait that needs to be such a perfect setup in order to actually produce a child that has animal features, but the dormant gene shows itself in other ways. Easily dismissed as simple gifts, having the gene can manifest itself in subtle features such as in the Eyes( be it in the pupils, the coloration, the keen sight), Ears (might be more pointed at the tips with some ability to be moved and twitched in response to stimuli) ,  Teeth ( Longer Canines, stronger jaws, sharper teeth varying by person), Body structure (Sturdier, higher metabolism in some cases, stronger nail growth, higher endurance capability and damage resistance, stronger bones, etc) , and even in some behavioral mannerisms.

The appearance of animal features has steadily become rare for the same reason the features of angel wings are- these sorts of people are often victims of human trafficking for their exoticness, and often die away before ever having any child. The appearance of features is primarily an occurence in female, the genetic proven to be carried more in the X chromosome, but a male still has the potential to carry the gene in their chromosomes as well. It's rare, but not impossible, for a male to have visible features under the right circumstances given that both parents carries the gene (Which is often unknown to the parents, thus their surprise that the child is born with these foreign features ) . It is uncommon in the world to find anytone with visible features anymore, however it still exists in the world. The history of Atrolians have been lost in time through human history, and the genetic can only be regarded as a mutation from an unknown source.

Things to know about Atrolians that can be found in their earthly descendants :

- If the females have a heat, they do not have a period. Like most animals, at the end of a cycle, there is no bleeding, the body simply reabsorbs the endometrium that would have been shed during a period. Having heats means, unlike a regular person, fertility has specified windows in the cycle for ovulating (depending on the Atrolian gene basis, the animal gene which its based on will determine that window per person ). A person can have the atrolian gene dormant in them, showing only subtle physical qualities, and not experience heat. And that is because their system is more primarily human based.

- A male with traces of Atrolian genes may find themselves with a keener sense of smell and other senses, and are subconsciously incredibly receptive to scents. They might find themselves drawn to a person who’s emitting, and become aroused instinctively to appease- which can be incredibly inconvenient , especially if its a female that rejects them. Can easily be mistaken for the usual random boner incidents. Two people with Atrolian genes can strengthen the instinct they don’t even know they have, and if one goes into heat then a male might just go into his own form of it in order to stay with his mate. - A male, once finding a partner, can become rather territorial over their lover. Especially one which they’ve marked in some way (Atrolian tradition is a bite scar to the shoulder, but in huan terms it can be expressed through hickies left behind in visible places ).  They may become moodier, more clingy , and standoffish against others. Have a tendency to bare teeth and get between other, though again it can simply be passed off as typical guy behavior, Its an almost unbearable impulse when the gene is carried. They also might rub on things in an unconscious act of leaving their scent behind. You might also find they’re much easier to set off and prone to fighting easily when it comes to a significant other.

- A person can display certain quirks, even certain vocalizations, of an animal their genes may have descended from. Atrolians had a wide variety of animalistic qualities they were mixed with, though primarily mammals and even birds. That means farther down the line, sometimes old qualities do come back and certain abilities are granted. - Elongated life. A full blooded Atrolian age at a slower rate once they hit adulthood, and can life on average about 200 years maximum, with a minimum of at the very least of 130. This is because of their sturdy builds and rather healthy lifestyles, combined with genetics, lets them thrive for so long within consideration of their life duties. In their halfling descendants, That sturdy build passed down can allow them be withstand and live healthier for a longer time. They are less likely to succumb to illnesses or hereditary diseases, and can enjoy appearing to age at a slower rate. If the environment and lifestyle allows it. Someone can easily push past 100 and still function well.

[ruleandruinrpg]

MARGARETE STARIKOV

EIGHTEEN ❈ HEALER ORDER OF THE LIVING & THE DEAD (CORPORALKI)

She was an accident, as children like her often are—beloved, but never truly belonging, a porcelain doll among an army of toy soldiers—and the world has never let her forget it. Born the youngest and littlest daughter in a family of killers, she was treated like glass, like silk—like anything but the steel from which she was built. It hardly mattered that she, too, could steal the breath from her sibling’s lungs, or that her heart beat so strongly that even her Corporalki mother hadn’t been able to slow it; she was their Molly, their baby, their lamb born in a lion’s den, and such a sentiment followed her wherever she went, a shadow nipping playfully at her heels. The Starikov children were a ruthless sort, bred for the sole purpose of being harbingers of death itself, but she was born different: dainty, soft-spoken, fragile enough to break. Margarete Starikov was an anomaly of the loveliest sort in the eyes of her parents, war-torn and weary as they were; it came as quite a surprise to all who knew of their cruelty to see their youngest not only tolerated, but treasured, but the truth of it all wasn’t that two of the Second Army’s fiercest soldiers had gone soft; it was that they’d buried one too many children and sent still more to die for a cause not entirely their own, and for their sacrifices—or perhaps as their penance, they deserved to hold in their hands something good and gentle without fear of seeing it harden and shatter.

But Margarete, for all that she was eager to make her parents happy, had seen the way they looked at her deadly brothers and sisters—like they were the future, the legacy they’d leave in their wake, and not a fleeting moment of softness, an exception—and decided that making them proud would be a far greater honor. So she did—or so she tried. She spent her days roaming the halls of the Little Palace, resilient and restless and desperate to prove she could be more than a doll in a red kefta; she ran and sparred and studied until she was more machine than girl, but in the years that followed, it made little difference. When the time came for the Corporalki to be divided up as spoils—some to Death and some to Life—she was ceremoniously gifted to the latter, to safety, to mediocrity. It was a death sentence, being saddled with the burden of undoing the same damage her siblings could inflict—a death sentence she didn’t have the grace to accept quietly, honorably. She raged against it, against the recognition she’d always wanted slipping through her fingers like sand, but they disregarded her as they always had, insisting that it was better this way, that a girl her size and stature would only get herself killed. They couldn’t fathom the thought that sweet little Molly, all chestnut curls and doe eyes and a laugh like tinkling bells, might be as bloodthirsty as the rest and twice as cruel. They couldn’t fathom the thought that the girl who picked at her dinner like a bird wanted to swallow chaos whole.

They should’ve known better than to try to make a dove out of a hawk, for the unbecoming of an innocent is perhaps even more terrifying than the rise of a sinner; a fall from grace that high would kill a lesser girl and harden a greater one, and harden her it did. The first man to die was a soldier, a First Army lieutenant with wounds pathetically easy to mend; the second was a noble, a young lady who’d caught a chill while returning home from an excursion in the North. After the third, she stopped counting. It was her own quiet rebellion, ruthless and indiscriminate, but far from bloodless, and though it took much longer than it should’ve for suspicions to arise, she slowly became something dangerous, something to be feared. She’d always been bigger than the body she was given, a roaring, wicked thing with a smile that hid sharp teeth, but it wasn’t until she stopped asking for their attention and began demanding it that the seedlings of doubt took root. Perhaps they’d been wrong about the Starikov girl; perhaps Molly had only ever been a figment of their imaginations, their hothouse flower blooming in the shadows of her superiors. The whispers were satisfying; the rumors, even more so. Murderess, they called her. A girl that collects dead hearts like trinkets. And they were right; she was the product of generations of men and women who killed as easily as they breathed, and she’d steal the breath from their very lungs to prove it.

But the path to greatness is ill-paved, and they’ve yet to give her killing a title—black instead of silver, poison instead of the cure. She’s become the type of Grisha otkazat’sya warn their children about, a girl with a gaping hole where her heart should be, but infamy isn’t true unless it’s total, and she won’t stop until the world knows her name—and perhaps not even then. But it seems she won’t have long to wait, for the war raging at their back door has drawn closer still, and it’s only a matter of time before her peers realize that they’d fare far better letting her fell the enemy than forcing her to prey on the kingdom’s weakened own. But until then, she waits, a flower wilting into something deadly, a soldier stationed in the wings. By the end of this war, Margarete Starikov will be a name whispered behind shaking palms, hearts quaking in anticipation, in reverence. Let her be as brutal as she is gentle, as hard as she is soft; let her show the world that her hands are every bit as adept at taking lives as they are saving them. Death may wait for no one, but it bows to her.

CONNECTIONS

ALTAN YUL-SUHE: He holds what she’s always wanted—recognition, respect, power—with an iron fist, and she loathes him for it; yet everything she’s done—everything she is, she owes, in a way, to him. The lesser of the two men with the authority to make her the weapon she’s always known herself to be, Altan Yul-Suhe is, perhaps more than any other mortal, the one man she seeks recognition from the most, second only to the god of a man he serves. She envies him as much as she seeks his adoration—hates him as much as she longs for his praise, but above all, she sees the older man as a challenge, something to be conquered. He tried to keep the girl from the war, but the girl will bring the war to him.

KONSTANTIN MIRONOV: She’s playing with fire, and she knows it. To rob a man of his wife and son is to test fate, but to look him in the eye and dare him not to call her what she truly is—a murderer, a traitor, a harbinger even Death hadn’t thought to send—is blasphemy of the highest degree. But her family never groveled at the feet of otkazat’sya, and she’s nothing if not devoted to tradition. Let him mourn his losses while she mourns the legend she could’ve been, the legend she still could be; let him learn that there’s a price that comes with being remembered, and the only recompense is blood.

RITA JAKOV:  There’s something within the older girl that she can’t quite place—pulsing, wishing, longing, as strange and yet familiar as a bruise, and she’d like to manipulate it, to spread the damage like a cancer no healer can erase. The tailor has devoted herself to making everything—and everyone—beautiful, as if a prettier smile and more vibrantly-colored eyes might hide the decay lingering just beneath it all, and for that, Margarete considers her a fool of the worst sort. But even fools have their uses, and there is beauty to be found in darkness, in death. Red is such a lovely color; wouldn’t you like to be a kingkiller?

MARGARETE IS PORTRAYED BY MOYA PALK & IS TAKEN BY ADMIN ROSEY.

[imagine-loki]

A Warrior’s Life

TITLE: A Warrior’s Life CHAPTER NO./ONE SHOT: Chapter Sixteen AUTHOR: wolfpawn ORIGINAL IMAGINE:

Imagine Viking Loki coming to your village, raiding and pillaging, before deciding there is something about you that intrigues him and deciding to take you back to Asgard with him. There, you are forced to learn a new life and language, and though you hate what has happened to you, you learn that Loki is not as bad as you think.

RATING: Mature.

Loki watched as Maebh jumped down from the horse before it even had a chance to stop and ran over to an eagerly awaiting Nafi, who immediately wrapped his arms around her waist. Loki watched them as he dismounted his horse and collected Maebh’s one before handing over both sets of reins to the farmhand, before walking over to his son with a content smile on his face. “Wait, why did Maebh get attention before me?” he feigned hurt.

“Well, why did you take longer to get off your horse to get over to him?” Maebh countered sticking her tongue out at him in jest. Nafi let go of her and ran to his father who knelt to embrace his son. “How about I finish making that dinner?” Maebh headed straight to the house, leaving father and son alone outside.

“Father?” Loki looked at his son. “Will you do some training with me like Maebh does?”

“No,” Loki replied. Nafi just stared at the floor, Loki saw there was a small glistening on the child’s cheek and then realised he had taken too long to explain why. “Nafi, the reason I will not train you like Maebh does is simply because I cannot. I know not her fighting methods” Nafi wiped the tears from his large eyes and looked up at his father. “I know, it is difficult to recall sometimes that she is actually from Midgard.”

“But you said she is from here now and that she is one of us.” Nafi sniffed.

“And she is, or is quite close to being, but that still does not erase the fact that she was born and raised on another realm. Just recall this time last year; she was not even here. She speaks our tongue well, but it is not her natural dialect, she only knows it because you have taught it to her. There are many differences between her and us, I too forget so sometimes.” Loki picked up the wooden sword he had carved for Nafi; he gave the boy his toy shield and began to test his defences, teaching him their way of defending in formation to add to whatever Maebh had taught him.

Loki began to see why Maebh spent so much time teaching Nafi such things; the boy clearly enjoyed the learning process. He watched as Nafi defended blow after blow, before using the defensive weapon offensively. “You are a natural.” Loki praised, much to Nafi’s delight.

After a while, he could see Nafi’s mind begin to drift. “Father, if I ask you something, will you be truthful?”

Loki felt an ill chill shiver within him. “Son, I may share a name with the God of Lies, but I am not he; if I can answer honestly, I shall.”

“Did you ever love my mother?” Loki was shocked at the question from such a young child.

“Do you have reason to think to the contrary?” Loki asked, trying to keep a cool exterior.

“You only ever fought with one another, I never got a brother or sister, you never kissed, smiled or even laughed,” Nafi explained. “With Maebh all you ever do is smile and laugh, and you only argued once, and after that, all the kissing started.” There was an innocence to his statement, but Loki could not help but realise just how astute his son was too.

“My marriage to your mother was a political one, set up between her father and mine, you grandfathers. Love never really was a factor, the first time I really spoke to your mother was the day before our wedding,  and it did not go well, it was an omen for our marriage really.”

“Do you wish you never married her?”

Loki looked at his son sadly. “No, I would not change my marriage to your mother, it brought forth you, and for that reason, how could I ever regret it?”

“But if you did not marry my mother, you could have just met Maebh and married her instead.”

“Nafi at my age I would have been married regardless of if it was to Aslaug or not, it was a good thing I was married to her, if I had married another, there may not have been Maebh here to marry now. I brought her back thinking she would be a good carer for you. And if you were to ask Maebh, she would say that she would never change anything because of you too. For the Norn’s sake, she jumped off a still cantering horse to run to you, does that not tell you her love for you?” Nafi smiled remembering her rash actions. “Do not feel your existence is a burden Nafi, you are a treasured part of both of our lives, more than you will ever know.” He smiled, ruffling Nafi’s hair.

“I hate to disturb you two, but the food is ready.” Maebh stood leaning against the doorway, a smiled on her face. Nafi ran past her to get to the table, Loki picked up the shield and the toy sword and placed them safely in the outhouse before going back to the house, Maebh stood at the door waiting for him.

“How much of that did you hear?” He asked nervously.

“Most of it.” she admitted.

“I do not regret my marriage to her.”

“I know, nor would I, as you stated, if you were happily married you may never have looked at me twice, and I would have been forced to sell myself to thwart starvation back in Midgard after what those two monsters did.” Loki’s face turned cold at the thought. “Do you think he noticed your slip?” she decided to change the subject.

“What slip?” Loki scrunched his features as he recalled the conversation with Nafi for anything.

‘“If I had married another, there may not have been Maebh here to marry now’” she quoted.

Loki wrapped his arms around her and smiled “I will never get away with anything with you will I?”

“Is there reason for you to?” she responded with an eyebrow raised in suspicion, as she leant up to kiss him.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

“We should tell him.” Loki thought aloud as he watched Nafi sleep.

“And what good would that do? He would spend the week over-excited and uncontrollable talking about it.” Maebh countered.

“It feels so wrong hiding something so joyous from him.” Loki never felt so conflicted.

“It is for the best for now.” Maebh sighed. “Now, let me teach you some of my language.” She pulled him from the doorway and towards the kitchen, getting him to sit at the table.

“I have another idea.” He pulled her onto his lap and began to kiss her passionately.

Maebh had to force herself from the kiss reluctantly. “And how, pray tell, will this aid you in Midgard?”

“You shall be there, you can translate,” Loki replied simply, leaning in and kissing her again, his hand sliding up her leg under her dress and along her thigh.

“Your hand can cease its journey.” She warned against his lips.

“But…” he pulled back shocked.

“But nothing, I am not your wife, I will not be tainted.” She insisted, getting to rise from her position.

Loki rose as she was still rising, lifting her onto the table, so she landed on her back with a slight thud. “Not my wife…yet.” He smiled wickedly.

“I am sure you can wait the few days. You have waited this long, have you not?” Loki groaned, he was convinced she used that sultry tone of voice solely to torture him. “Patience” she smiled.

“You are pure evil, my love. A temptress sent by Hela herself.” He leant down and kissed her again.

“Well, that is just a horrid thing to say.” She scolded jokingly.

“Do you deny you use your tones, your eyes and your body to torment mine?”

“Come now, why would I do just that, I would hope to inflict suffering on your mind too.” She sneered. Loki became still and silent at her admission. “I can hardly have it that you would think of another, can I?” her smile was devious beyond measure.

“Were it not for your conviction I would think you no maiden.”

“You will see for yourself soon enough, I am.” She said almost braggingly. Loki bit his bottom lip just thinking about it. Her brave façade soon fell however as she thought of her wedding night. “Though I must admit, I am somewhat fearful of it.” She fumbled with the string on his shirt as she spoke, refusing to meet his eyes.

Loki pulled back a bit to look at her. “How so?”

“I have heard many things from women, that it hurts, that it is not very pleasurable.” Still, she refused to look at his face.

“What women told you this?” Loki asked slightly confused.

“The nearest dwelling to our, and the only ones nearby that would aid us was a brothel. I used to have to trade for food with the Madame there, I often heard those girls complaining of pains, especially the new ones.” She explained nervously.

“It can hurt yes, if the man is not careful, especially for the first time. But you need not worry, I would never force myself upon you.” Loki gently tried to get Maebh to look at him, but she kept averting her eyes. “As for pleasure, again it is in what the man does for a woman that dictates her pleasure.” He gently slid his hand up her dress once more, looking at her face as he did. Maebh’s eyes shot open and she stared at him. Slowly it made its way up her thigh, and long before it ever reached her centre, her breathing became deeper and she began leaning toward it. “You see, does that hurt?”

“No.” She moaned before troubling her lip with her teeth, barely able to keep her eyes open. Loki pulled his hand back out and she moaned again from the loss.

“Soon my love, I promise.” He smiled, knowing she would thank him for it later. “Though I am glad to see you are willing.” Maebh pouted at him at the slight exhibition she felt she made of herself. “I have come to the conclusion Midgard is far more conservative on such matters than here.” He noted.

“Really? I would never have gathered.” Sarcasm dripped from every word. “I think the truly defining moment of that epiphany was Thor’s severe lack of humility in his home that day.”

Loki laughed recalling Maebh’s shock at the naked man, he then realised something. “Maebh?” she looked at him suspiciously due to his tone of voice. “Was Thor the first man outside of your brothers you had seen naked?” she just nodded red faced. “It figures.” There was a bitterness in Loki’s voice that Maebh could not ignore.

“It’s not like I wanted to see him naked if that’s any consolation.” She snapped defensively.

“No sweetheart, I am not annoyed at that, it’s just quite literally, I have always been second to Thor in every way. And even now something as simple as that irks me about him being the first you had seen.”

“I have no interest in him, though, you, on the other hand, I am quite eager to see.” Still red-faced, Maebh did what she could to display her honesty to Loki. She had figured Odin’s obvious preference to Thor had caused a lot of jealousy on Loki’s behalf. The difference in their standard of living alone proved the king's unequal affection for his sons.

Loki smiled at her, taking her in his lap again. “You are highly perceptive my dear. I shall have to remember that.”

“I won’t be long reminding you if you forget.” She wrapped her arms around him.

“What time is mother expecting you in the afternoon?”

“Morning actually, after we are finished the chores. May I steal your horse again?”

“You may as well take him as yours now.” Loki kissed her. “You’ll need him the next few days.”

“Am I to see much of you both at all?”

“No, and the day of you will hardly see us either,” Loki explained. “You will be shown off as the Midgard princess, meeting more people than you can stomach, most of which are judgemental fools.”

“My father would have liked you, you are very similar. He never wanted to be king; he was just the better option. He had little time for fools.”

“I can imagine his court.”

“I doubt it.” She thought about her father for a minute, and what she would do on Midgard given the chance. “Oh, and you are learning my tongue, I am not going to be able to do everything on Midgard, and what if something happens me that I cannot speak? Then you are at greater risk of not being able to get out of a tight situation.”

“What could happen you that would not permit you to speak?” Loki realised he had not thought about something bad happening Maebh there, but considering where they were going and what she planned to do, he realised quickly that she could very easily be killed. “Is this such a good idea?”

“Loki, I will not back down from this.” She voiced sternly. “I am not letting you go to Midgard without me; you will have to cut my arms and legs off to loosen my grip on you if you try. With me there, it greatly enhances your chances of survival. Even Odin and Heimdall thought so, as long as I am not simply plotting against you all that is.” She laughed, recalling what the king had said to her.

“Indeed.” Loki smiled. “I cannot have you making a nuisance of yourself trying to kill us all there. It is very distracting from our work and the reason we usually do not bring women.” Maebh giggled again into his chest. “Very well, where shall we start this learning, my betrothed?”

[ruleandruinrpg]

MARGARETE STARIKOV

EIGHTEEN ❈ HEALER ORDER OF THE LIVING & THE DEAD (CORPORALKI)

She was an accident, as children like her often are—beloved, but never truly belonging, a porcelain doll among an army of toy soldiers—and the world has never let her forget it. Born the youngest and littlest daughter in a family of killers, she was treated like glass, like silk—like anything but the steel from which she was built. It hardly mattered that she, too, could steal the breath from her sibling’s lungs, or that her heart beat so strongly that even her Corporalki mother hadn’t been able to slow it; she was their Molly, their baby, their lamb born in a lion’s den, and such a sentiment followed her wherever she went, a shadow nipping playfully at her heels. The Starikov children were a ruthless sort, bred for the sole purpose of being harbingers of death itself, but she was born different: dainty, soft-spoken, fragile enough to break. Margarete Starikov was an anomaly of the loveliest sort in the eyes of her parents, war-torn and weary as they were; it came as quite a surprise to all who knew of their cruelty to see their youngest not only tolerated, but treasured, but the truth of it all wasn’t that two of the Second Army’s fiercest soldiers had gone soft; it was that they’d buried one too many children and sent still more to die for a cause not entirely their own, and for their sacrifices—or perhaps as their penance, they deserved to hold in their hands something good and gentle without fear of seeing it harden and shatter.

But Margarete, for all that she was eager to make her parents happy, had seen the way they looked at her deadly brothers and sisters—like they were the future, the legacy they’d leave in their wake, and not a fleeting moment of softness, an exception—and decided that making them proud would be a far greater honor. So she did—or so she tried. She spent her days roaming the halls of the Little Palace, resilient and restless and desperate to prove she could be more than a doll in a red kefta; she ran and sparred and studied until she was more machine than girl, but in the years that followed, it made little difference. When the time came for the Corporalki to be divided up as spoils—some to Death and some to Life—she was ceremoniously gifted to the latter, to safety, to mediocrity. It was a death sentence, being saddled with the burden of undoing the same damage her siblings could inflict—a death sentence she didn’t have the grace to accept quietly, honorably. She raged against it, against the recognition she’d always wanted slipping through her fingers like sand, but they disregarded her as they always had, insisting that it was better this way, that a girl her size and stature would only get herself killed. They couldn’t fathom the thought that sweet little Molly, all chestnut curls and doe eyes and a laugh like tinkling bells, might be as bloodthirsty as the rest and twice as cruel. They couldn’t fathom the thought that the girl who picked at her dinner like a bird wanted to swallow chaos whole.

They should’ve known better than to try to make a dove out of a hawk, for the unbecoming of an innocent is perhaps even more terrifying than the rise of a sinner; a fall from grace that high would kill a lesser girl and harden a greater one, and harden her it did. The first man to die was a soldier, a First Army lieutenant with wounds pathetically easy to mend; the second was a noble, a young lady who’d caught a chill while returning home from an excursion in the North. After the third, she stopped counting. It was her own quiet rebellion, ruthless and indiscriminate, but far from bloodless, and though it took much longer than it should’ve for suspicions to arise, she slowly became something dangerous, something to be feared. She’d always been bigger than the body she was given, a roaring, wicked thing with a smile that hid sharp teeth, but it wasn’t until she stopped asking for their attention and began demanding it that the seedlings of doubt took root. Perhaps they’d been wrong about the Starikov girl; perhaps Molly had only ever been a figment of their imaginations, their hothouse flower blooming in the shadows of her superiors. The whispers were satisfying; the rumors, even more so. Murderess, they called her. A girl that collects dead hearts like trinkets. And they were right; she was the product of generations of men and women who killed as easily as they breathed, and she’d steal the breath from their very lungs to prove it.

But the path to greatness is ill-paved, and they’ve yet to give her killing a title—black instead of silver, poison instead of the cure. She’s become the type of Grisha otkazat’sya warn their children about, a girl with a gaping hole where her heart should be, but infamy isn’t true unless it’s total, and she won’t stop until the world knows her name—and perhaps not even then. But it seems she won’t have long to wait, for the war raging at their back door has drawn closer still, and it’s only a matter of time before her peers realize that they’d fare far better letting her fell the enemy than forcing her to prey on the kingdom’s weakened own. But until then, she waits, a flower wilting into something deadly, a soldier stationed in the wings. By the end of this war, Margarete Starikov will be a name whispered behind shaking palms, hearts quaking in anticipation, in reverence. Let her be as brutal as she is gentle, as hard as she is soft; let her show the world that her hands are every bit as adept at taking lives as they are saving them. Death may wait for no one, but it bows to her.

CONNECTIONS

ALTAN YUL-SUHE: He holds what she’s always wanted—recognition, respect, power—with an iron fist, and she loathes him for it; yet everything she’s done—everything she is, she owes, in a way, to him. The lesser of the two men with the authority to make her the weapon she’s always known herself to be, Altan Yul-Suhe is, perhaps more than any other mortal, the one man she seeks recognition from the most, second only to the god of a man he serves. She envies him as much as she seeks his adoration—hates him as much as she longs for his praise, but above all, she sees the older man as a challenge, something to be conquered. He tried to keep the girl from the war, but the girl will bring the war to him.

KONSTANTIN MIRONOV: She’s playing with fire, and she knows it. To rob a man of his wife and son is to test fate, but to look him in the eye and dare him not to call her what she truly is—a murderer, a traitor, a harbinger even Death hadn’t thought to send—is blasphemy of the highest degree. But her family never groveled at the feet of otkazat’sya, and she’s nothing if not devoted to tradition. Let him mourn his losses while she mourns the legend she could’ve been, the legend she still could be; let him learn that there’s a price that comes with being remembered, and the only recompense is blood.

RITA JAKOV:  There’s something within the older girl that she can’t quite place—pulsing, wishing, longing, as strange and yet familiar as a bruise, and she’d like to manipulate it, to spread the damage like a cancer no healer can erase. The tailor has devoted herself to making everything—and everyone—beautiful, as if a prettier smile and more vibrantly-colored eyes might hide the decay lingering just beneath it all, and for that, Margarete considers her a fool of the worst sort. But even fools have their uses, and there is beauty to be found in darkness, in death. Red is such a lovely color; wouldn’t you like to be a kingkiller?

MARGARETE IS PORTRAYED BY MOYA PALK & IS TAKEN BY ADMIN ROSEY.