#its also the first Jon POV in a while!!

[fissions-chips]

fresh air

('bad karma' AU pt 6- tw for mild violence and blood, and implied abuse/violence)

   The fluorescent lights of the department store were harsh and gleaming, reflecting upon every pale surface with a sickly, too-white light- Jon narrowed his eyes against it, reaching up to scrub at them with the heel of one palm as he stood, waiting. In a way, they reminded him of home.

   It was late. Late enough that the light outside had been swallowed up by the shadows of the city buildings, and all Jon wanted to do was go back to sleep. 

   Five days- that was all it had taken for Butler to go stir-crazy, unable to stay inside the dojo any longer- that, at least, was a feeling Jon could understand. It was too small and too sparse a space to be trapped in, with nothing to do but sleep, or train, in Butler’s case, though Jon had yet to see him do so. Given the chance to stretch his legs by accompanying the bodyguard on a list of errands, the man should have felt relief, or excitement- instead, he only found himself miserable. 

   He was only here because Butler didn’t trust him enough to stay locked up in the dojo, and knew that, if he had tied the man hand and foot to leave him behind, Jon would have broken his own fingers trying to get loose. He’d tied his hands on the way here anyways, Jon forced into the back of the car and struggling to stay upright against sharp turns and the occasional pothole, but the bindings had quickly been cut when they’d arrived in Dublin, replaced by a hand curling around his good wrist in warning, as the bodyguard had told him, firmly, not to do anything stupid.

   Looking down at his wrists, one still bruised and throbbing, wrapped in clumsy bandaging, Jon felt his lip curl unbidden. There was a tearing sensation, every time it moved- he hadn’t known how to bind it so that it would heal. A patchwork job done by shaking fingers… how attempts to mend his own injuries usually went. It wasn’t the first time. 

   Won’t be the last, either.

   Jon was surprised that they were even here, in all truth- the Fowls even had their own wormery, whatever the hell that meant. Butler didn’t seem the ‘department store’ type. Then again, he supposed that even the bodyguard could reason that there was only so ‘high-end’ one could find a toothbrush, or a comb. Small, basic shit. Dragging a hand through his hair, Jon was grateful he’d have one, now- it had thinned somewhat in the past few months, and Jon swore it hadn’t used to be this brittle, but at least he would be able to tidy it up. 

   His facial hair had been cleaned up now, too. He’d been allowed to shave properly under the bodyguard’s supervision- when it was decided they would be going out for the day, Butler had waited so that Jon could arrange himself into something approaching presentable. The blue tracksuit he was wearing fit him far better than the bodyguard’s clothing had, apparently stolen from the patriarch of the Fowl family, a man of slimmer build than Butler himself. It still hung loose on his sides and at his shoulders, but it was comfortably warm, and it hid the worst of Jon’s condition from the rest of the world.

   Butler moved methodically between the isles, grabbing the things he had hurriedly jotted down this morning, items that would make the dojo a little more manageable. Food that Jon could make on his own, mostly- and, notably, his own first aid kit. 

   Something about that stung, slightly- it had been nice to have someone else patch up his wounds, wipe the blood from his face. As hazy as his memory had been at the time, the bodyguard had been gentle when he had first checked him over. Jon wasn’t used to that. 

   Then, his wrist twinged, and Jon pushed it to the back of his mind, bitterness rising in the back of his throat. 

   He distracted himself by meandering around, aimless, careful to keep within sight of the other- pulling cans off of shelves to read the back of them, flipping through magazines as he passed by. He hummed along to the music playing over the speakers, though he couldn’t quite make out the words, too deep in his own thoughts at the moment to follow along. He considered glancing at the books for a moment as they passed. He wasn’t much of a reader anymore, but it would be nice to have something to do in the dojo.

   Suddenly, a hand clamped around his shoulder.

   “-on!” 

   Butler’s voice was sharp in his ear, tinged with frustration- Jon flinched away, free hand clawing at the man’s own as he stifled a yelp between his teeth.

   “Keep up,” The bodyguard muttered, dragging him along. “I don’t know if that man has sent anyone after you, so don’t wander off.” 

   Oh. Bristling, Jon broke away from the other man, letting Butler fall in front of him once again. It was the most the bodyguard had said to him since the incident with the knife- ever since Jon had cut him, the man had been stony and near-silent with him, only speaking to Jon when absolutely necessary and interacting with him as little as possible. He kept to the main room while Jon hid away in the bedroom, sleeping on the couch- whenever Jon opened the door, to grab something from the kitchen or simply see if he was awake, the man was met with a sharp glare and a deepening frown. 

   He hated it. Jon hated it. Now, when the bodyguard said his name, he couldn’t help but imagine it spat like a curse, Butler’s eyes closed off and cold. He couldn’t blame him, not really- it was hard for anyone to look a man in the face who had hurt them, once, twice. Jon knew that well enough. But silence was miserable, and suffocating. It offered no distractions, no comfort, and so Jon found his hands roaming, constantly picking and clawing at his own skin in some desperate, unbidden effort to quell his nerves. He'd already split his scarring jaw back open, worn his wrists raw against his bindings in the handful of hours it had taken to drive here. His fingertips stung where he’d bitten his nails down to the beds. 

   Sullenly, he tried to push it from his mind, letting his gaze drop to the ground, catching faint flickers of his reflection in the smudged tile below. His eyes were hollow and tired- he waved his hand at himself in a small, sardonic greeting. 

   A few more minutes found Butler moving to check out- Jon stood some distance behind, head bowed. A small gleam of light caught his eye, and, after quickly glancing ahead to find the bodyguard distracted, walked across the aisle to find himself in front of a stand of jewelry. Cheap things, compared to what he’d used to wear, but Jon felt his stomach drop all the same, slowly reaching out to pluck a bracelet off the rack and spin it in his fingers. The metal was cold, and glittering, and golden- his vision blurred slightly as he stared down at it, his eyes stinging. 

   God, he missed his jewelry. He missed his jewelry so badly it ached. It had all been stolen away from him, when he’d first been captured- Jon still didn’t know what had happened to it. They’d had to wrestle him to the ground to pull it off of him, Jon breaking more than a few guard’s fingers and teeth on the way down. All of his bracelets, his rings, his necklaces… sold now, most likely, or passed around Valentine’s circle of friends as little gifts. Maybe the other CEO was wearing some right now, wherever he was. Jon’s face fell at the memory of the other man, sneering, grinding his boot into the back of Jon’s head as he’d pocketed the metal. 

   These will look far better on me than you, you ugly fuck~ jewelry can only do so much for one’s appearance.

   Staring down at himself now, Jon couldn’t help but agree- dressed in the stolen tracksuit of his enemy’s kin, face dotted with bruising marks and with his wrist clumsily bound in smudged, crooked gauze, he could hardly recognize himself. Slipping the bracelet onto his own wrist couldn’t help with the state he was in, or where he was trapped, but it made him feel slightly more like himself, for the first time since he had woken up on the floor of Butler’s bedroom. Spinning it slightly around his arm, Jon’s expression softened as he stared down at the golden metal, tracing the etching along its outer edge with his thumb. Beautiful, even under the dingy white lights-

   “Jon!” 

   He stiffened, head snapping up to find Butler glaring at him, gesturing sharply for Jon to join him. He was currently preoccupied, it seemed, with someone else- Butler was pointing to something on a different screen and talking to a smaller, older woman, seemingly explaining whatever it said. Their own items weren’t even bagged yet.

   For a moment, Jon almost considered dumping the bracelet alongside everything else the bodyguard had gathered- asking, even, if he could get it. Now that it was on his wrist, Jon couldn’t bear the thought of leaving without it, without the smallest semblance of his former finery. His free hand continued to trace the grooves of it, spinning it around his wrist, curling protectively over the metal when he saw the way Butler’s eyes narrowed as the bodyguard glanced over his shoulder, still sharp with frustration. When he saw the jewelry, the man sighed, gesturing again sharply for Jon to join him. 

   Jon’s face fell. What a stupid fuckin’ notion, asking for it, he cursed himself. Unhooking the bracelet from his arm, Jon spun it in his fingers as he watched Butler turn back to the older woman with a small shake of his head, his expression immediately softening as he continued to direct her in how to use the machine. Something bitter bubbled up in the back of Jon’s throat, his good hand clenching in a fist as he looked back down at the bracelet, and then cast a glance behind him. 

   He could move to follow Butler. He could put the bracelet back and wait, quiet and tired, until the bodyguard finished what he was doing, and then he could wait beside the car- for everything to get set in the back, for his own hands to get tied by the wrists so he too could be shoved in the backseat. He could sit in contemptible silence for hours on the long ride back and stare out the window at a country he couldn’t navigate. He could wind up back in the dojo, back in that damn bedroom all by himself, waiting. In silence, for who knew how long, just waiting for something to happen and for Butler to snap again, like he had- 

   Jon lifted a hand, absentmindedly picking at the faint, pale line beneath his throat where the bodyguard’s knife had brushed it. It had healed in the span of a day- it would fade after another. He could have killed me. There had been nothing behind Butler’s eyes in the moment but cold, clear focus- nothing when he had twisted Jon’s wrist to the snapping point, and nothing when he had screamed in his face for the man to drop the knife. The knife he had handed him. It had all happened without warning.

   His lip curled for a moment, there and then gone. That same bitter, roiling feeling filled his chest, familiar, and Jon sank into it, eyes narrowing. I’m too fucking tired for this, he thought. He gave one last look to the bracelet, and another to the bodyguard. 

   Then, without a word, Jon turned on his heel and walked away. 

— — — — — 

   The evening air was colder than he had anticipated, rattling in his lungs as Jon slowly made his way down the sideway, shoulders hunched and eyes cast to the ground- the tracksuit was warm, however, and he was grateful for it. Crossing his arms, his breath fogged in front of his face as he rounded a corner, barely pausing to glance around as he continued on his winding, crazed path through the city streets.

   Jon didn’t know where he was going. All sense of direction had abandoned him completely as of late, and his mind was too scattered to bother reading the street signs as he passed. The names wouldn’t have meant much to him, anyways- he hadn’t been to Dublin before. Looking up for a moment, Jon peered at the buildings looming around him, etched in shadow as the sun continued to set. The streetlights cast a soft, hazy glow across the bricks and mortar, and Jon felt some of the tension ease from his body as he tilted his head. 

   Nice place, he thought. Bet it’s pretty when the sun’s out. 

   Surrounded by city lights and the quiet sounds of downtown, he felt more at home than he had in… who knew how long, actually. Chicago was far busier than the small side roads he had chosen to wander down- the few people sharing the sidewalk paid him little mind as they passed, eyes averted and stepping aside to avoid bumping shoulders. A small part of Jon flinched at that, missing the close-packed, bustling streets of his home- then again, someone looking too closely might risk recognition, and Jon didn’t know what he would do if word got out about his reappearance. 

   Val could find me again. 

   A cold chill ran down his back, colder than the air that fogged his breath, and Jon’s fingers dug into his arms until they ached. Does he think I’m dead? He wondered, unbidden- sudden anxiety pulsed through him. Does the world think I’m dead? How had Valentine explained his disappearance- him fleeing from his crimes, or snatched up and killed by some other enemy? Had the man simply sat back, watching as Jon’s company scrambled to find some easy excuse? 

   He pushed the thought from his mind, forcing himself to focus back on where he was now- whole oceans away, in the backstreets of Ireland. Completely aimless, yes, but already he had walked further and seen more than he’d had the privilege to in weeks, possibly months. Unlit storefronts and the cobblestone street beside him were miles more interesting than a near-empty bedroom, or the cramped coat closet Valentine had kept him locked in. 

   His heart skipped a beat. Don’t think about it.

   It would be completely dark soon- and some small, grounded part of him knew that, no doubt, Butler was already on his way to find him. Tracking him down like a bloodhound. Jon turned his head and cast a quick glance around him, finding nothing of note- he looked forward once again, free hand fiddling with the bracelet still wrapped around his wrist. Stolen, now, but Jon couldn’t have cared less. 

   He had left out the back. It might have been mere moments before Butler himself had followed, already on his trail. Or maybe the bodyguard had assumed that Jon would follow, not noticing the lack of his presence until he reached the car. Either way, he wouldn’t stop until he had hunted Jon down- of that the man was certain. Regardless of whatever self-imposed risk Butler felt it might cause to let Jon roam, he was a professional, and professionals didn’t let their targets go so easily. 

   Pausing for a moment beneath the warm glow of a streetlight, Jon lifted his hands to his face and tried to warm them, his fingers trembling. The cold was starting to bleed through the warmth of the tracksuit as the sun vanished beneath the horizon, and with it came a quiet, creeping unease. There weren’t any people out now, it seemed- the street was empty around him, and the sudden silence and stillness sent a spike of anxiety stabbing through him. 

   “Fuck,” he muttered. “M’ lost.”

   A strangled little laugh slipped from his throat as Jon pressed his back against the metal pole. Can’t be lost if you’ve got nowhere to go, some small part of him crowed. Fucking hell. What’s gonna happen when that bastard catches up to me? 

   His injured wrist twinged, and Jon tucked it to his chest. Bet he’ll break the other one, that same little voice sang in the back of his mind, half-hysterical. Bet he’ll break your fingers too, like Marcus.

   “He… no. Probably not.” Jon muttered to himself, wringing his hands together as he looked around warily, trying to swallow back his nerves. It was a pointless effort- he could feel nausea beginning to claw its way up the back of his throat, his heartbeat hammering in his chest. “He’s professional, professionals don’t…” He stopped himself. 

   It was the professional in Butler that had caused him to nearly snap Jon’s wrist- the training of the ‘Blue Diamond’ clear in his immediate reaction and the way he had effortlessly disarmed him, ready to slit his throat at a moment’s notice. And that was over a slashed hand, an accident. What was going to happen the next time Jon slipped up? 

   Something worse. 

   Jon paused as he felt a sudden, sharp sting beneath his jaw- drawing his hand back, he found rust-red gathering beneath his nails. He’d picked his wound open again. Looking down at the blood now dusting his fingers, sickness stirred in his gut. 

   At least he’s not Val, Jon reminded himself. He jammed his hands into his pockets, forcing himself to keep walking, eyes fixed on the next pool of light the streetlights provided. He’s not Val- he doesn’t want to hurt me... I don’t think he wants to hurt me. He swallowed thickly. 

   I wouldn’t blame him if he did. Business was business, and Jon had once had him shot dead. Any other criminal would have jumped at the opportunity to beat him bloody- or worse, make a mockery of him like Valentine had. A pet. 

   Memories flashed into his mind, of the other CEO’s voice growing cold and furious as he’d spilled wine over his head, as he’d kicked him in the stomach, as he dragged him around by his hair and forced him onto his hands and knees. That damned shallow smile- still, his hands in his hair had been the closest thing Jon had always had to someone else, even as Valentine had loathed the thought. That was how it had always been. Things had been better between them once, yes, but that’s what the man had always boiled down to. The best substitute Jon could find for humanity in a world that made creatures of men.

   And now. Now there was Butler. His hands had been kinder. Jon began to bristle as a whirlwind of some unreadable, uncomfortable emotion bubbled up in his body. Fuck. 

   Butler’s hands had been gentle. Even as Jon had kicked and snapped at him, blind with fear and blind with fury alike. Jon hadn’t had anyone to treat his wounds like that, anyone to wash his hair or make him good food, for as far back as he could remember. Butler had bought things for him to make his stay easier, even though he was a hostage- a hostage who had done him harm, no less. What was Jon supposed to do with that? 

   He dug his nails into the joint of his wrist, biting back a hiss as he tried to focus on the ache of it, reminding himself of the bodyguard’s cold eyes as he’d stared down at him. “Not again.” He hissed beneath his breath. Not again, you stupid fuck. What you’re going to do is go. As soon as you can, as far as you can. It won’t just be your wrist, next time- you know that. It’ll be your neck.

   At some point, the bodyguard’s good grace was going to run out. It had to. The knife in the kitchen was just the start.

   All things considered… a snapped neck is more than I can usually hope for.

   Jon paused again at a streetlight, letting his head fall back against the metal. At this point, he was likely walking in circles- the chill had long since seeped into his bones, and his feet were numb. His head pounded in time with the racing of his heart, the world blurring slightly before him as sudden frustration beat a drumbeat tattoo in the back of his mind. Frustration at what, he wasn’t quite sure- his situation, Butler, and himself, perhaps, all coiling together in a thick knot in the pit of his stomach. 

   “Fuck it all.” He muttered, voice cracking slightly. He let his head fall into his hands, digging his fingers into his hair and pulling sharply. “Fuck it all!” He shouted- a small, hysterical laugh slipped from his mouth, and he slammed one fist into the side of his head. 

   “There’s nowhere to go! It never fucking stops!” 

   Pushing himself away from the light pole, Jon hugged his arms to his chest and forced himself onwards, turning streets at random, no longer watching where he was going as his shoulders clipped corners and his feet caught on cobblestones. His whole body was shivering now, anxiety and anger mingling on the back of his tongue- his mind was racing too violently to catch, and a small part of him ached to be back in the car again. 

   Jon didn’t notice when the side streets began to widen once again, or when the occasional streetlight became a faint, but constant glow of dim light. The distant sounds of tires on pavement met his ears and passed right through, the man lost in a haze of his own thoughts. Scattered figures occasionally loomed in his vision, and Jon snapped at them, flinching away until they disappeared once again, and he was alone. 

   His foot caught on a lip of concrete, and he staggered- Jon cursed, whirling on his heel and struggling to keep his balance. 

   Sudden, white light filled his vision, and Jon froze as a sharp, blaring sound wailed in his ears. 

   The fu- 

   Something caught him by the back of his shirt and pulled, the man snatched clear off his feet and dragged backwards violently. The wailing and lights raced past, Jon’s head snapping back against the brick as he was pulled into an alleyway and shoved up against the side of a building, hands slamming onto his shoulders to shake him. 

   “-on! Jon!”

   Stern, dark eyes stared back at him. 

   With sense, sight and sound utterly disoriented, something sparked in Jon’s chest, white-hot and screaming- the man snapped his knee upwards and kicked, feeling the weight of the other pull away from him slightly as he bared his teeth and snarled. 

   “Piss off!” 

   The hands digging into his shoulders didn’t let go, but he heard a grunt of pain, and Jon began to thrash, voice going splintery and strained with fury. “Get the fuck offa me, you prick!” 

   “What the fuck was that?” 

   Butler’s sudden shout brought reality crashing into Jon like a bolt of lightning- the man stilled, blinking owlishly as he found the bodyguard glaring down at him, brow furrowed and eyes blazing. 

   “You were standing in the middle of the street- did you not see that truck? Spiro, what the hell has gotten into you?“ 

   His words were suddenly cut off by another grunt as Jon kicked him again, right in the shin. “I didn’t see it, asshole! Get off of me before I kick you in the-“

   “Jon-“ 

   “No,” Jon hissed, teeth snapping in the other man’s face as he struggled violently beneath him, voice cracking sharply. “Get off of me, you stupid fuck, or I swear to god I will slit you up the middle the second I get the fucking chance! Get off-“ 

   “Calm down,” Butler gritted out as Jon’s fist caught him sharply in the ribs. “Before you wake up the entire city. Why did you run off?“ 

   Panting for breath, Jon tried to slam his head into the other’s nose- Butler leaned back just in time, grabbing him by his good wrist and shaking him again. His voice grated in Jon’s ears, the man completely rattled and shaken by the memory of the near-collision- his heart pounded so loudly in his skull that he could hardly hear the bodyguard speak. 

   “It’s past midnight. We need to get back to the-“ 

   “NO!” 

   Jon’s fist caught him right in the scarring tissue above his heart as his eyes glittered madly.  “If you think-“ He shouted, shaking beneath Butler’s hands. “That I’m gonna go back to that goddamn house and that goddamn room, just so I can sit and stew in how badly you wanna kill me-“ 

   He paused for breath, letting his head fall back into the wall. “Then you are a bigger fuckin’ idiot than I thought.“ 

   Butler stared back at him, dumbfounded. “W…what?” He muttered, eyes wide and bewildered by the sudden display of rage.

   For some reason, his confusion only sparked more fury in Jon’s chest, and the man sneered, voice dripping with venom. “So you can just- you can snap my neck right now, or get the fuck off of me.” He faltered, slightly- something briefly flickered over Jon’s face, face falling slightly as he hissed in the other man’s face. “Or just… just go on and fuckin’ hit me-“ 

   “Hit you?” Butler mumbled. Then, his brow furrowed. “Jon, I’m not going to hit you. I just pulled you out of the road!”

   “Oh, but that’s what big, dumb fucks like you like to do, right?” Jon hissed nastily, bared teeth gleaming in the faint light from the road. “Hit. And hit, and hit, and hit-“

   He threw his head back, his voice rising to a sharp, hysterical shout. 

   “Go on! Get it out of your system! I’m right here, asshole, so take your swing! Make it hurt!” 

   At the last word, he aimed another kick at Butler’s abdomen- the next thing Jon knew, his back was on the ground as the bodyguard loomed over him, both arms pinned to the cold stone beneath. His injured wrist throbbed, and Jon tried to wrench it away, only to earn a knee slammed into his chest for his trouble. 

   “Jon. Calm down,” the bodyguard repeated. He waited until the man had ceased struggling beneath him before he continued. “I’m not going to hit you, for fuck’s sake. Take a moment and breathe-“

   “You broke my wrist easily enough.“ 

   “It’s a sprain!” Butler snapped, unable to bite back his exasperation any longer. “You tried to stab me, I was disarming you! What else was I supposed to do?” 

   Jon let out another mocking laugh as his fury began to ebb alongside his burst of energy, dissolving into the same sick bitterness as before. “Stab you? Stab you? You asshole, you handed the knife to me!” 

   Butler paused. 

   “Why the hell would I stab you?” Jon spat, beginning to struggle slightly once again as his injured wrist spasmed. “Do I look like an idiot? What the hell would that have even done? You were making me dinner- next thing I know I’m on the ground with a bloody giant screaming at me! What the hell was I supposed to do, wait for you to kill me? You didn’t even ask for it back first!”

   His eyes narrowed. “Things were almost okay for a bit there. Now, it’s the fuckin’ silent treatment, and you glaring at me like you just can’t wait till you can put a bullet between my eyes. Do me a favor, eh? Get it over with. I’m sick of this shit.”  

   Jon let his head fall back, then, closing his eyes. Exhaustion still dragged at him- he took a deep breath, let it out slowly through his nose, waiting for the bodyguard to move. He didn’t, for several moments- when the man opened his eyes, he found Butler staring down at him, his expression unreadable. 

   After another moment, he spoke. 

   “Jon, I’m going to say this again. I’m not going to hit you. I’m not going to shoot you. I don’t know how many more times I can tell you.” Shifting back, he released the smaller man and stepped back, one hand lifting to press at the space between his eyes. “It’d be a waste, at this point. Your wrist was an accident- I thought you were going to stab me. Can you actually blame me for that, given everything?” 

   Jon glanced away- his silence was answer enough. 

   “My training- that’s how it is. For what it’s worth, I could have actually snapped it. In any other circumstance, I would have. I didn’t. I’m not going to make the mistake of handing you a knife again- and you cut my hand open. It’s still split, by the way, so we’re even.” 

   Nonetheless, Butler’s eyes flicked to his wounded wrist with something almost like guilt on his face as his grip loosened slightly, only for the bodyguard to double-take as he caught sight of the gold bracelet, still wrapped around Jon’s wrist and glittering faintly. He blinked, shocked, before reaching out automatically as if to take it-

   “Wait- did you… did you shoplift-“ 

   “Don’t.”  

   Jon’s voice, suddenly shrill with panic, caused the man to pause- he glanced across to find Jon with eyes wide, fixed on that golden bracelet as he tucked his arm against his chest. “D-don’t- don’t you fucking take it I swear to god-“ Jon’s mouth snapped shut as his face fell. 

   Shoplifted. Holy shit. Common, petty crime- Jon didn’t care about the fact he had stolen it, not really, but the fact that he, Jon Spiro, once-feared CEO and mob man, had stolen a cheap little bracelet hit him like a bat to the stomach. 

   “…Please, don’t.” He spoke, after a long moment. “Break something, or… I don’t know, I don’t know what you’ll do, just please don’t take the bracelet. Val took every piece I had.” 

   Butler’s brow furrowed. “…Okay.” He muttered, after a long moment. “Okay.” 

   Jon could see gears turning in his mind, something sad behind his eyes- his mouth opened slightly, as if to speak, only to close again as he decided against it. Instead, he offered his hand. 

   Jon didn’t take it for several seconds- instead, he heaved himself half-upright and paused, staring at the ground. He didn’t know what to make of Butler anymore- he didn’t trust him, and he sure as hell didn’t want to take his hand. His wrist still throbbed… but the bodyguard had admitted to his error, and Jon’s bracelet was still in his possession. Nothing was broken. He was cold and tired and hungry, and there wasn’t any more point in running. He had nowhere else to go.

   He sighed. Then, he reached up and let the bodyguard pull him to his feet. 

   The walk back to the car was silent- Jon kept his head bowed, hands jammed into his pockets. His breath fogged in front of his face, blurring his view of Butler ahead of him. The bodyguard was visibly lost in thought, and Jon didn’t feel like dragging him out of them. He didn’t feel like much of anything. 

   Thankfully, the car had been moved closer- Jon leaned against the side door as Butler rummaged around in the front seat, turning on the heat and moving bags to the back. When the bodyguard shut the door, Jon closed his eyes and held his wrists out, waiting for them to be tied again. 

   Instead, he found himself steered to the passenger door. “Get in,” Butler muttered, gesturing to the seat. “Don’t do anything stupid. You need to warm up.” 

   The seat warmer, at least, was certainly appreciated. 

   As the bodyguard drove them back in silence, Jon busied himself with rifling through the items Butler had bought. A comb, shaving materials, the first aid kit- the handful of clothing items, all pale in color, was a welcome surprise. Jon found himself brightening slightly, exhausted as he was. It was a dull, hollow sort of contentment, but it was better than the misery of before, and Jon even smiled slightly as he unearthed a mass-market paperback from the bottom of one bag, plucked from the department store shelf. 

   Trashy romance, eh? I didn’t take him for the type. 

   Butler didn’t dignify him with an answer when Jon lifted it in his hand and lifted his brows at him, amused- the slight flush to his face, however, revealed his embarrassment.  

   After an hour or two, Jon found himself half-dozing against the window, the rumbling of the engine too loud to let him nod off completely- suddenly, the bodyguard’s voice startled him out of his stupor, and he jolted upright. 

   “I’ll wrap your wrist when we get back.”

   Jon blinked owlishly at the dark road ahead. “Hmm?” He muttered, biting back a yawn.

   “Your wrist,” Butler repeated, his eyes fixed on the horizon before them. “… I’ll wrap it when we get back. So it’ll heal.” 

   “Oh.” Jon looked down at his hands. “Uh… thanks.” 

   Butler shrugged. 

   “Go back to sleep. I’ll wake you when we get there.”

[atlabeth]

weight of the world

series masterlist

pairing: luke castellan x daughter of poseidon!reader

summary: percy returns to camp after a successful quest. luke battles his guilt.

a/n: a lot of you guys seemed to like the percy pov and the pure angst of luke doing all this stuff to his first love's brother percy jackson instead of just percy jackson and first and foremost i would like to say you're all crazy but i also agree. so here you go. title from the jon bellion song

wc: 5.6k

warning(s): reader is dead (i feel like i have to tag this every time lmao). angst made angstier with fluffy flashbacks. tlt betrayal scene (pit scorpion edition). everyone is so sad

When Percy returned to camp with Annabeth and Grover, they were hailed as heroes. 

It might not have felt like it on the road, isolated with just the three of them, but they’d prevented a third World War. They certainly stopped camp from getting destroyed, if what Luke told them was true about the cabins taking sides. 

Burning their burial shrouds felt even better, especially with the Ares cabin’s expert craftsmanship. Apparently it was a tradition because demigods died so frequently on quests—Percy took pride in breaking that unsettling standard. 

It turned out all he needed to come into his own was to go on a quest everyone thought would kill him and not die. 

He excelled during his sword fighting lessons—going against a god would do that for you—he’d gotten much better at using his powers—going against a god would also do that for you—and his team always dominated on the lake during races, though that might’ve just been him cheating. 

He’d even started getting used to the Poseidon cabin in all its emptiness. It still felt too lonely, but he was working on it. The first thing he did when he got back to the cabin was pin your photo on the wall—Cabin Three belonged to you as much as it did to him.

And of course, everyone wanted to hear about how Percy saved the world. He’d told the story of his quest about a hundred times since he got back, sometimes with Annabeth piping in to set the record straight, sometimes with Grover dramatically setting the scene, always with a million different questions in between about how everything went down. 

Tonight was no different in the amphitheater—a group of Athena kids wanted to hear about his fight against Ares again—but he managed to get out of giving them the excruciating play-by-play courtesy of campfire songs. Percy didn’t really mind, though—any night with a large, golden fire was a good night in his books. 

Which was kind of how he ended up giving Luke the play-by-play of his quest. Maybe it was bragging, but he hadn’t seen who he considered his first friend at camp in a while. And yeah, sue him, but he wanted to impress Luke. He was cool and nice and good at everything, and Percy wanted to prove he’d made him proud. 

“—And I thought I didn’t stand a chance, but she taunted me and told me to jump into the water if I was really Poseidon’s kid. So I did, and it worked, and somehow I lived.” Percy shook his head with a slight laugh. “It ended up all over the news. I was a nationally wanted criminal for a couple days. We also blew a bus up, and rode with a zebra and a lion to Vegas, and went to the Underworld— gods, we did so much. It was crazy, honestly.” 

Luke chuckled. “I’m sure.” 

Percy glanced over at him, his brows creasing when he saw his distant gaze. He didn’t think Luke heard a single word. “You good, man?” 

He blinked and focused back on Percy, and though he smiled it was strained. “Yeah. Sorry—spaced out for a second. You were talking about your quest?” 

Percy nodded slowly. “Yeah. The whole criminal thing.” 

His smile turned a little more genuine. “You made front page news, too. I think you became the idol of a lotta kids here.”

“Oh, god,” he said with a frown. “You guys get news here?” 

“Couple New York papers,” he nodded. “You’re camp-famous.” 

Percy huffed a laugh and shook his head. “It feels crazy. I just got here a month ago, and everything’s already changed so much.” He looked over at Luke. “What did you do after you got home from your quest?” 

“...It takes some getting used to,” he admitted with a shrug. “I mean, getting to camp after so many years on the road was rough—coming back to camp after getting this—” he tapped his scar— “didn’t help.” 

“How did you get that?” he asked. 

“You’re always trying to get the saddest stories out of me,” Luke said wryly. “You know you can read books, right?” 

“I can’t, actually,” Percy said. "Not well."

Luke laughed and shook his head, his gaze falling back to the fire. Percy took it as him moving on. 

“I— I know I’m kind of proving your point, but… I wanted to ask you if I could have a couple more pictures” Percy cleared his throat, brushing a few dark strands of hair out of his face. “Of my sister, I mean. Obviously, you have way more of a right to them than I do, but— but Cabin Three’s a little bare. I thought adding a couple current things to the old stuff she put up would be nice.” 

His throat bobbed, and it took him a second, but he nodded. “Yeah. Yeah— sure.”

“Tomorrow after breakfast?” he asked. “I’ve got some free time before I have to go down to the forge.”

Luke nodded again. “Sure. You still have that picture I gave you?”

“Of course,” he said. “I already put it up on the wall. Do you want it back?”

His smile was bittersweet as he shook his head. “Nah. Like I said, you deserve to have a piece of her with you. And I’m sure she’d say the same.”

“I asked my dad about her, y’know,” Percy said. Luke’s eyes widened a bit as he looked back at him. “I went to Olympus on my own to return Zeus’s bolt, and the two of them were there. My dad and I got some alone time, and…” he shrugged. “I already annoyed two gods that day. Figured a third wouldn’t be that crazy.”

“What did he say?” 

“That it was one of his greatest regrets,” Percy said. “And he’d never forgive himself for letting her die, and for what it did to her mom.” He glanced at Luke. “And to you.”

Luke’s chest stilled, his gaze going out of focus for a moment as a muscle worked in his jaw. He hid it well, but Percy knew. He’d spent enough time at home with his mom and step-dad, overheard enough one-sided arguments. 

“You’re braver than me,” he finally said, and he stood up. “I’m gonna turn in—it’s been a long day.”

“I’m sorry, Luke,” he said. “And Poseidon is too, for whatever it’s worth.” 

Luke didn’t look back at him as he started towards the path. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Percy.” 

-

“Are you sure you’re allowed to put lights up?” Luke asked. 

“Okay, Chiron,” you said cloyingly. “I didn’t know you were such a stickler for the rules.” 

“I’m just worried about fire safety!” he exclaimed. “The Hephaestus kids nearly burn down their cabin at least five times a week.” 

“They’re working with actual fire. These are just Christmas lights.” You glanced down at him and he handed you the next strand. “Besides, this is the safest cabin for possible fire hazards. And they look pretty—that’s all that matters.” 

Luke chuckled as you hung them up, and he took a step back as you jumped off the chair and moved it to the other side of the room. You usually hung fairy lights, but with the holidays just around the corner, you wanted to make the place more festive. You asked Luke if he wanted to hang out with you while you decorated, and he obviously accepted. He took all the time he could get with you. 

“It’s so quiet in here,” Luke said as you got back up, taking the next strand with you. “I’m not used to an empty cabin.” 

“That’s what happens when you’re not supposed to be alive,” you mused. 

“You of all people can’t say that.” He huffed a laugh and shook his head. “Do you ever get lonely in here?” 

“‘Course not,” you said. “I’ve always got you following me around.” 

“Can you blame me?” he asked. “Your company’s the best.” 

You grinned and looked back down at him, and Luke gave you the next string of lights. “Or maybe you’re just a little crazy. You’ve gotta be to spend three years on the road with me.” 

“Being around you is what’s kept me sane,” he corrected. “Especially in the Hermes cabin of chaos.” 

You got up on your toes and lifted a leg up so you could lean to reach the last hook. “Oh, come on. Your siblings are so fun to be around!” 

“Maybe in small doses,” he said wryly. “And be careful, gods—” 

You looked down at him, your grin only growing. “Are you saying you’re worried about me?” 

“Always,” he said, still watching you, “but the last thing you need is to break your leg.” 

“It’s a five foot fall, Luke,” you said, amused as you got back on even footing. You hopped back down and tilted your head. “I’ve survived much higher falls.” 

Luke frowned. “You don’t get to joke about that.” 

“I thought you were dead too,” you defended. “That means it’s fair game.” 

His chest twisted. He’d played that day over in his head thousands of times since he first lost you, wondering if he could have done something different or if he should have searched more—he stayed in those woods for a week and a half searching for you before another monster attack forced him out of the area. It was the whole reason he came up with a designated meeting area with Thalia and Annabeth if they got separated—he never wanted to lose someone again the way he lost you. 

He shook his head with a sigh. “Sometimes I still can’t believe it, y’know? 

“Thank my dad,” you said. “I would have died if I didn’t fall into water. And he’s the reason I got to camp.” 

He’s also the reason you ended up on the streets in the first place, Luke wanted to say, but he held his tongue. You’d never shared his disdain for the gods, and he didn’t want to spoil your mood with his bitterness. 

So he doesn’t. He tilted his head and focused back on you. “Do I ever tell you how thankful I am that you're still alive?”

You smiled as you pushed the chair in front of your desk. “I could always stand to hear it more.” 

“Well, I’m thankful that you’re alive,” Luke said. He could have stared at your smile forever. “Mourning you was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.” 

“With any luck, you won’t have to do it again,” you joked. “I get it, though. Sometimes it feels like a dream. I thought I was hallucinating when you came over that hill.”  

The best and the worst day of his life—he found you again and lost Thalia in the same five-minute span. It wasn’t fair—Luke had told Thalia so many stories about you, and she was the one that brought him back from the edge your supposed death sent him to. On his worst days, Luke blamed himself for both. 

“Luke,” you said, jarring him out of his thoughts. “What do you think of the lights? Tacky, or festive, or both?” 

He blinked, then took a step back with you so you could get the full view. He nodded. “Festive, definitely. Where’d you even get them?” 

“The Big House attic,” you said. “It’s not just full of Oracles and spoils of war.” 

He chuckled. “And how did you convince Chiron to give you those?” 

You shrugged. “You know I’m persuasive.” 

Luke shook his head. “I’m jealous. No one else really gets to decorate their place like this.” 

“No siblings means full creative control,” you mused. “And Big Three dad means a big cabin all for me.” 

“And yet you still get a twin bed,” he said with a smile. “We’re all equal, really.” 

“Like you wouldn’t prefer a full.” You fluffed your pillow then set it back down. “You spend as much time in here as I do.” 

“Can you blame me?” Luke shrugged. “There’s no privacy there. We can get away with basically anything in here.” 

“And because you love me,” you said cloyingly as you rustled your hair with his hand. 

“Yeah,” he said with a smile. “I really do.” 

Your smile widened and you gestured at your box of decorations. “Wanna prove it, loverboy? Help me get the rest of this up before sword lessons.”

“Y’know, I’m leading them today,” Luke said, picking up a stack of snowflake cutouts. He was pretty sure you just took all the rejects after you were in charge of the crafts for a week. “Technically, that means we’ve got as long as we want.” 

“Oh, Luke Castellan,” you said airily, pressing a hand to your chest. “You know the way to my heart.” 

-

“Oh,” Percy said. “Wow.” 

“Yeah. And this is only one of them.” Luke set a cardboard box full of things on an empty bed and sighed. “She made this place her own while she was here.”

Percy took out a stack of baseball cards on top—Red Sox, of course, the only bad thing about you—and shuffled through them. “Everything’s a little dusty.” 

“No one really wanted to come in here after she died,” Luke said. He had a tangled mess of Christmas lights in his hands. “All this stuff stayed up for a year or two before I took it all down.” He huffed a mirthless laugh. “You’re probably the only one apart from me to be in here since she left.” 

Percy set the cards down. “Do you mind if I put some of it back up?” 

Luke glanced at him. “Why do you always ask me? This is your place.” 

“It’s not just my place,” he said. “I… I want to make sure I’m honoring her well. And I don’t wanna make it harder for you. Especially if you took it down for a reason.” 

Luke was silent for a moment as he stared at the lights. He brushed off some dust with his thumb. 

Percy felt bad for pushing the matter every time he was around Luke, but there was a tug inside of him—an innate need to know more about her, a desperation to honor her life despite never meeting her. 

“I appreciate it,” he finally said. “But go for it, man. You don’t have to get my permission.” 

Percy nodded, and he took a poster out, wedged in the side of the box. A Blondie poster, based off the huge block letters above a blonde singer stylized in pop art. It had a torn corner, and bits of tape had been folded over some parts of the edges. 

Luke chuckled. “She was a huge Blondie fan. She brought her Walkman when she ran away—I lost count of how many times we listened to Parallel Lines. Definitely put that one back up.” 

Percy nodded and set it on his bed. He looked at the lights in Luke’s hand. “Why’d she have those?” 

“She loved to light the cabin up,” he explained. “Said it made it feel more homey, and she liked to change it with the seasons. And when she enlisted the Aphrodite kids, it was like a— a HomeGoods warzone.” Luke shook his head with the most genuine smile he’d seen all day. “She really was something special.”  

Again, Percy’s heart clenched. It wasn’t fair he only got to learn about you through stories, only through the past tense. If he could get his mom back, why the hell couldn’t he get you back? Why couldn’t his dad have stepped in? 

What good was regret when you have all the power in the world to stop it? What good was being a god if you couldn’t save your family when it mattered most? 

“Y’know, I decorated this place a million times with her,” he said, and Percy was thankful for the interruption with his thoughts. “She wanted it to be a welcoming cabin, open to the whole camp if they ever got homesick.” 

“So the opposite of what it used to be,” Percy said wryly. 

“Yeah,” Luke nodded. “You two are the first Poseidon kids in a long time because of the oath—it was just here for respect. She didn’t just make it into her home, she made it into a home for anyone that needed some extra warmth.” 

Percy looked around, trying to imagine you and a younger, unscarred Luke putting all this stuff on the walls, him helping you hang Christmas lights. You sitting on a bed, maybe what he’d chosen as his bed, talking a younger camper through their fears or their homesickness. You forcing the innate coldness of Cabin Three out and replacing it with warmth of your own. 

“Did you bring any pictures?” he asked. 

Luke nodded again and took a few out of his pockets, offering them to Percy. He took the one sticking out the most and smiled a bit. 

“Very Poseidon of her,” he commented. 

“She loved the beach,” Luke said, smiling wistfully. “No matter what state we were in, she would always try to find one. We could’ve walked twenty miles that day, and the moment she stepped into the water she would be good as new. I should’ve known who her dad was a lot sooner.”

Percy’s hand lingered on the picture he’d just put up. You stood on a sandy shore with your arms spread and head tilted back, and you looked wholly in your element. 

He wondered what you would think of Montauk. 

“This was one of those times?” he asked. 

Luke nodded. “North Carolina. A year and a half in, I think. We missed the East Coast after being in the Midwest for so long, and naturally, she found a beach immediately.” His eyes softened. “She was always so happy around the water, even after she knew what it meant.”

Percy frowned. “What do you mean?”

He shrugged. “Finding out the thing you’ve always loved is the domain of the father who abandoned you is a little rough.” 

Luke always spoke with more nerve towards the gods than any other camper he knew. Funny, considering he was one of the first ones to tell him that names had power.

And he’d been acting weird since Percy got back from the quest. He thought maybe he was jealous, but Luke didn’t really seem like the jealous type—especially when he was already so cool. 

Then again, they did just come back from the brink of a possible world war. Percy should’ve been surprised more people weren’t acting weird. 

His attention drifted to the clock on the wall in the midst of his thoughts—Chiron’s last ditch effort in a camp full of time-blind kids—and his eyes widened. 

Percy muttered under his breath—Annabeth had taught him some Ancient Greek curse words on the road, and he was sure his mom would love them—and looked up at Luke. “Sorry, man. I’ve gotta go. Time really got away from me.” 

“I get it,” he nodded. “Have you gotten any better?” 

He glanced away bashfully. “Not really. But Beckendorf has the patience of a saint. Maybe someday I’ll make an actually functional sword.” 

Luke chuckled, though it was wistful. “Good luck. You mind if I stay here for a bit? I can put up some of her things.” 

“Yeah,” he nodded, “of course. Stay as long as you want.” 

Percy stopped once he got out of the door. Luke’s gaze was glued to a picture of you on the wall, his expression softer than he’d ever seen before at odds with something indistinguishable in his eyes. Again, Percy felt that all-encompassing dread, and he swallowed the lump in his throat. 

He left before it could consume him, but the haunted look in Luke’s eyes didn’t leave his head for the rest of the day. 

-

You took in a deep breath of salty air. The sea breeze blew over you as waves gently rolled into shore, and you smiled. You never felt more like yourself than when you were at the beach, and when you and Luke were constantly on the run fighting for your lives, sometimes you desperately needed to feel like yourself. 

You exhaled long and slow. It had been a particularly rough week—Luke did his best patching up your shoulder, but it would definitely scar—and this was just what you needed to wind down before you started moving again. 

You and your mom went to Cape Cod a lot when you were growing up, and though this wasn’t anywhere close to the same, it made for an alright stand-in.

The click of a polaroid camera interrupted your peace, and you opened your eyes and turned your head to see the culprit. 

“And you made fun of me for constantly taking pictures,” you said wryly. 

Luke smiled. “I made fun of you for taking up valuable space in your bag to bring your camera with you. I can’t not take pictures of you—especially when you’re so photogenic.” 

“Flatterer.” 

“Not if it’s true,” he remarked. He held out the camera to you. “Wanna get any pictures of the sea? You’ve got a better eye than me.” 

“Well, the sea’s a better subject than me,” you said. “Hold onto it.” 

He chuckled and took it back, drying out the newly printed picture. “How’re you feeling, by the way? I know it’s been a hard few days.”  

“Never better,” you said. “I needed a break from the road.”

“I get why you wanted to stop here,” he said. “It’s… calming.”

“Isn’t it?” You spread your arms out, breathing in deep once more. “I always feel better out here. More free.”

Another camera click, and your smile grew. “How do you feel?” 

“Better too, surprisingly. But that might just be because we’re walking instead of running.” You heard his footsteps and he came up next to you. You took the picture he offered and chuckled. You had your head back and your arms spread, soaking up every bit of sun and sea air you could. 

“I look like a stock photo.” 

“Does that mean I can get a job as a photographer?” he asked. “We could use some extra cash.” 

“Half of the pictures are either random parts of nature or me,” you said. “Who’d buy those?” 

“Me,” Luke said. “But I don’t think that would help with our money problems.” 

“All this flattery won’t get you anywhere,” you said. 

“It got me here,” he said. “I think it’s worked out pretty well.” 

You smiled as you looped arms with Luke, and after you gestured with your head, you started walking down the sand together. Whereas you always felt like you were blurting out the first thing that came to mind when you were around him, Luke always knew exactly what to say to make you feel better. “Do you like it here?” 

Luke nodded. “It’s nice. I get why you like the water so much.” 

“At least one beach a week going forward now that we’re on the coast again, then,” you said. “Deal?” 

“Deal,” he agreed. 

“Good,” you said with a smile. “I’ve been wanting to go back to Virginia Beach. Last time, those giant ant things ruined it for us.” 

“Gods,” Luke grumbled, and you felt him shiver. “Don’t remind me of those things. I’ll never forget what their poison smelled like—and I’ll never forgive them for ruining my favorite shirt.” 

“Don’t worry,” you said. “I’ll get you a Red Sox one someday, and it’ll become your new favorite shirt.” 

Luke shook his head. “Your Boston baseball propaganda isn’t gonna work. I was raised as a Yankee.” 

“And I’m here to undo that awful brainwashing,” you said sagely. “Next time we go through Massachusetts, I’ll have to get you one. And we can stop by Cape Cod—I think being close to the water is good for my health.” 

“And I like seeing you happy,” he mused. “So I guess it works out for both of us.” 

You laughed. “We’ll have to stop at a music store before the day ends, too. I’ve nearly worn out my Cyndi Lauper tape, and I need to get some new ones. You should pick out an album you like too.h” 

“‘Course,” he said. “I think we’ve got some extra cash saved up. And if we have to—” 

“We shouldn’t steal anything yet,” you interrupted. “I don’t wanna get the cops on our backs so soon.” 

“You say that like I would get caught,” Luke remarked. “It’s literally in my genes. I’m making my father proud, and I’m helping you. I see no reason not to do it.” 

“Cool it,” you said. “We’re not becoming Bonnie and Clyde at the ripe old age of eleven.” 

“Fine.” You couldn’t see it, but you could sense his smile. “I’ll hold off. For now.” 

That got another laugh out of you as you leaned your head against his shoulder. It felt like you’d been on the run for a week straight—this was the best break you could have asked for. Maybe the sea was good for your health, you thought. Or maybe it was just Luke. 

Either worked for you. 

-

Percy could hardly breathe as he stared down at the scorpion, slowly inching its way up his pants leg. It wasn’t every day one of your friends betrayed and tried to kill you in the woods, but this seemed like the year he started checking things off his bucket list. 

“So this was your plan all along,” he said, attention split between the pit scorpion and the traitor. “Gain my trust, send me to Tartarus, start a war for Kronos.” 

The air got colder, and Luke tilted his head. “You should be careful with names.”

“And you should do the job yourself,” he challenged. “You want to kill me? Fight me like a man.” 

“I’m not Ares,” he said tartly. “You can’t bait me.” 

“So you’re a coward too?” Red hot anger rose within him, and the words left him before he could really think about them. “Did you also lie about my sister? Got a hobby of killing Poseidon kids?”

“Zeus got her killed, Percy!” Luke yelled. There was something wild in his eyes as he gestured with his sword. “I loved her more than anything—I held her as she died, and your dad let it happen. If it weren’t for the gods, both her and Thalia would be alive!” 

Maybe it was a good thing Percy didn’t know that until now. If he knew the king of gods was responsible for his sister’s death, he would’ve gotten himself burnt to a crisp on Olympus. 

“This isn’t what my sister would have wanted,” he said. “She—”

“Don’t you dare talk about her!” His voice continued to rise. “You don’t know her— you don’t know what she would have wanted!” 

“She couldn’t have wanted this!” he exclaimed. Percy’s breath caught momentarily as the scorpion inched closer and he forced his muscles to remain as still as possible as his gaze flicked back over to Luke. “This isn’t the way to fix things, Luke. I promise.” 

He shook his head, and he could have been a son of Ares the way fire seemed to blaze in his eyes. “She died because of Zeus, Percy. She was so close to sixteen, and that meant she was a threat to his power. He sent monsters to kill her, and your dad could have saved her, but he didn’t do a damn thing about it. And y’know,” Luke huffed a laugh, cold and mirthless, “the same thing’s gonna happen to you.” 

His blood had turned to ice. “He knows the pain of losing a daughter. Why would he—” 

“Because they don’t care, Percy!” he yelled, his sword cutting through the air again. “All they care about is keeping their power and their position. Your dad would rather send you on a death quest than stop stroking his ego for one measly second. Hades sent monsters to kill Thalia, and Zeus sent monsters to kill your sister—they can’t punish each other, so they punish us, and the cycle will never stop until we make it stop.”

“And you think that this is the way to do it?” he asked desperately. “By betraying camp and all your friends? We’re in the same position as you are!” 

“And anyone that’s smart will join our cause,” Luke said. “Do you really think I’m the only one that’s upset with the gods? I’ve been here for five years—I’ve seen kids leave for the school year and never come back. I’ve seen kids die without ever being claimed. My own dad turned me away at every opportunity. Our numbers are bigger than you know, Percy.” 

“You say I don’t know my sister,” Percy said, “but I know her enough to know she wouldn’t want this. Not in her name. Not against our father.” 

“You don’t know her at all,” Luke said, voice trembling. “If she knew that Zeus killed her for nothing but paranoia over a bullshit prophecy, she would be fighting against the gods right beside me.” 

“I lost her once,” he continued, shaky but full of anger, “and then I got her back, just to lose her all over again. The gods will never know that kind of pain—if they did, they wouldn’t have let it happen in the first place.” 

The scorpion was at his knee now. Percy was running out of time, and his mind was working in overdrive on how to get more, but he found himself rendered speechless. What could he say to a boy who’d lost everything? 

Luke was the lightning thief, he’d fully intended to kill Percy with those shoes, he meant to turn the gods against each other and raise Kronos, and now he was really trying to kill him.  

And yet, he couldn’t help but feel sympathy.

Percy thought he’d lost his mother, but now she was back. He’d met his father in person. He had a sister he’d never meet, that he would never be able to fully grieve. Luke loved her and grew up with her and grieved her twice.

Percy didn’t care—anyone who his sister loved couldn’t be a bad person. Not fully.  

“Please, Luke,” he said, voice low. “I don’t know how to solve it, but this isn’t the way. You think the gods are using you? Kronos is doing the exact same thing.” 

“You’re twelve, Percy, and you’re already the chosen one,” Luke said. “Hades and Ares would have both killed you if they got their way, and it was your job to stop a war between the gods because they couldn’t see beyond their egos. How is that fair to you?”  

“There was no other choice,” Percy insisted. “If either of them backed down, they would look weak. We’re the only ones that can do quests like this.” 

“Exactly,” he said. “They start petty fights that they can’t finish and it gets taken out on us. We have to be their heroes, and we have to praise them as we die.”

Percy remembered their bus exploding. Medusa, an innocent woman favored by Poseidon and punished by Athena for it. The endless souls in the Asphodel Fields, and even more waiting in line for their chance to be judged. Luke’s quest given to him by his father permanently scarring him, Thalia Grace sacrificing herself for her friends, his sister never getting the chance to see sixteen—Percy himself being used as a pawn to enact Kronos’s plan. 

“You don’t have to be a hero,” Luke continued, almost begging at this point. “You can join our cause—you can prove you’re so much more than the prophecies want you to be. Say the word and I’ll call it off.”

Percy wasn’t exactly the pinnacle of godly respect. He tricked Hades, insulted Zeus, and actually fought Ares. But his dad loved him—or loved his mom, at least. Annabeth’s determination and Grover’s steadfastness and all the friends he’d made at camp—all innocent children like himself. He couldn’t turn his back on that. 

Percy clenched his jaw. “I will never serve Kronos.”

Pain flashed in Luke’s dark eyes, but he shut it down just as soon. “So be it.”

He slashed his sword through the air and a ripple of darkness appeared, the void bleeding into the forest. 

“I really am sorry it came to this, Percy,” Luke said quietly. “But it’ll be quick. And that’s a bigger mercy than Zeus gave your sister.”

Luke disappeared into the darkness and it vanished soon after. Percy didn’t have time to think about his words—the scorpion had reached his thigh. Sixty seconds, Luke had said, then it was over. 

Percy had about five seconds to think of a plan before it lunged at him. He batted it away with one hand and uncapped his sword with the other, cutting the scorpion in half before it could reach the ground. 

He thought he did it. Then he looked at his hand, a red welt already sweltering on his palm, oozing sticky yellow liquid. 

Percy stumbled to the creek and submerged his hand, but nothing happened. He muttered a delusional prayer to his dad, then to his mother, then to you as he stumbled his way towards camp. Nymphs emerged from their trees, and he croaked a plea for help. 

As Percy collapsed, barely caught by nymphs on either side, he swore that he saw you. Did that mean he was dying? You had kind eyes like his mother, an aura of warmth unlike the feverish heat in his body, and it made the idea of it a lot less scary. 

He wondered if he’d meet you in Elysium. 

Percy reached a leaden arm out to you, mumbling your name despite his cottonmouth, and then his vision went black. 

[transdimensional-void]

My fav jonsa foreshadowing is the 'blood of winterfell' bit. Because while all the Starks identify strongly with wolf/Stark/winterfell/north motifs, this term is only ever used for Jon and Sansa, and once by Stannis for a potential ruler of Winterfell. Its on the nose that whose blood will continue the Stark line.

hi, anon! that is a really interesting bit of foreshadowing. considering how often discussions of the stark family, winterfell, and the succession thereof come up over the course of the series, it seems pointed that this specific phrase—"the blood of winterfell"—exists but is only mentioned on these specific occasions.

jon calls himself "the blood of winterfell" in asos as part of a drug-addled fever-dream he has where he is bathing with ygritte in the pool beneath the heart tree at winterfell. specifically, he says it as a reclamation of his identity after having finally fled the wildlings. considering that he also repeats that he is a man of the night's watch, it seems as though jon is repeating what qhorin halfhand told him right before jon killed him and joined the freefolk. thus, the phrase bookends his time with them. this bookending imbues the phrase with even more significance. this is jon's mantra for reminding himself of who he really is even while he is playing traitor among the freefolk.

in the dream, he also says it as part of a denial of his relationship with ygritte: "i will not father a bastard." but of course ygritte's response in the dream is "you know nothing, jon snow." he didn't father a bastard with ygritte...so why is his declaration being refuted?

this phrase "the blood of winterfell" comes up immediately before jon speaks about fathering children...with his kissed-by-fire lover with whom he is in a sexually-charged situation in the godswood at winterfell. it's really hard not to see a huge amount of foreshadowing in this!

and then, as if that were not enough, the phrase "the blood of winterfell" shows up again twice more. once in sansa's POV in affc where she too is using it as a mantra to remind herself of her identity while playing the role of littlefinger's bastard. and once more in jon's POV in adwd when stannis is trying yet again to persuade jon to serve him as lord of winterfell and jon is yet again reaffirming that winterfell should be sansa's. so, first the phrase gets attached to jon's identity and then to sansa's, and then to both of theirs during the same conversation.

so, to review, the phrase "the blood of winterfell" is used to:

reaffirm jon's true identity while he is playing a role that goes against it

reclaim jon's true identity when is done playing the part

refute the idea that jon will father a bastard with ygritte, while hinting that he might still break his vow to father no sons

reaffirm sansa's true identity when she is playing a role that goes against it

describe who is worthy of becoming the future ruler of winterfell

the fact that this phrase is only used these four specific times, and these are the associations it has...? yeah, the foreshadowing is practically screaming at us.

[trashbin-nie]

CHAPTER 3: Car Ride Home

Do NOT copy/translate my fics. Reblogs are always welcome!

TW: mild sibling violence (typical sibling things)

Summary: Rosa Winters NXT women's champion, cousin Trinity (aka Naomi), introduces her to Josh Fatu, her boyfriends brother, and they hit it off this is their story

Hehehehe, you guys commenting brings me joy! We gon’ pretend there wasn’t like a 3-week break in between here. Also, Spanish is NOT my first language. It’s also super rusty, so lmk if the grammar/sentence structure is off

Anyways, enjoy chapter 3. It's kinda short though apologies

Tags: @reignsboy19 @yana3sworld

Rosa fell asleep

Also, these two are my very first tags, so thanks, guys. I'm glad you're enjoying the story so far 🥹

.

.

(Josh POV)

She fell asleep.

Damn near right after her story too. 

She went to our school and had a crush on a guy who slammed her with a football during my senior year. I was on the football team, and, of course, what luck, she conveniently doesn’t remember the guy’s name! 

This has to be some sick joke.

“Hey man, sorry,” Jon said glancing back at me. I guess Trin fell asleep too, didn’t have time to notice, all wrapped in my head and shit.

“Nah uce, it’s fine. She don’ know who it was,” I shrugged and continued glaring out the window with my arms crossed.

Jon sighed and shook his head. “Lil’ bro c’mon we both know it was you. You da only one on the team that damn near murdered a cheerleader our senior year!”

“Jon, ain’t neither one of us knows that for sure. Could’ve been anyone else she talked to afterwards might not have been me. I can’t even remember,” I said waving him off. I could feel him rolling his eyes.

“Boy- You gon tell me that you don’ remember us walkin’ home after that day you sent that poor tiny girl flying off that people tower and talkin’ ‘bout “bro that girl was fuckin’ hot as all hell” and a bunch of other things? I ain’ buying what chu sellin Uce,” he said. 

“You both are real lucky that girl could sleep through a damn nuclear bomb cuz you ain’t quiet,” Trin said adjusting her position.

“Sorry Trin, but he trippin,” Jon said pointing at me.

“I ain’t trippin Jonathan,” I said shaking my head.

“You are Josh. I only brought it up cuz Jon was tellin me ‘bout it a while ago,” She said, unmoving. “I’m sorry she couldn’t remember your name, or whoever’s name if you’re insisting.” She raised her arms feeling my glare.

“Can you three musketeers shut the hell up? Some of us are trying to fuckin’ sleep in this damn car an I’m tellin you right now it’ll be all queen of hearts, hablando mal de la cabeza. Pendejas,” Rosie said groggly.

She angrily threw her pillow on my lap, ripped off her seatbelt, and slammed herself onto it on her side quickly going back to sleep.

We all froze.

“Trin… I thought you said she'd sleep through a hurricane?!” I whisper-yelled holding my arms up avoiding touching the girl suddenly sleeping in my lap

Trin stared in shock, “she's never woken up through talking before!” She yelled.

Thankfully the rest of the ride went smoothly, Trin fell asleep an hour after the fiasco, and I wasn't far behind. Jon woke us up when we arrived at the girls house.

It was a large two-story home painted white with stonework by the door and a black roof. The lights were still on when we pulled in, so someone was awake.

Jon shook Trin, waking her up.

“Oh good, the twins are still up,” she said, wiping the sleep from her eyes. She unbuckled and got out heading to the door, and before long two tall skinny men emerged from the house. Jon and I both slid out of the car, me more gently trying not to wake Rosie.

“Guys, this is David and Daniel, the Winters twins, and Rosie's older brothers,” Trin said.

“Sup, names Daniel, just call me Danny. I take it the ray of sunshine is passed out in the back seat as usual?” He asked, All of us nodded. “Well, David, its yo’ turn I woke her ass last time, and I'm still recovering from the  black eye.”

“I never-” David started, but after a dark glare from his brother changed his mind “ugh fine!”

David slowly shuffled his way to the back seat on the passenger side and slowly, with a shaky hand patted his sister's shoulder lightly she adjusted a little but stayed asleep  Danny rolled his eyes telling him he had to shake her harder. He looked at his twin with the nerves written on his face. 

He shoved her a lot harder and we heard a groan.

“I thought I told you that I was trying to sleep!” She groggily yelled, her brother being met with a shoe to the forehead.

“Well, you ungrateful whelp. You're home now so go to yo’ damn bed,” David said.

“Just carry me,” she said. David rolled his eyes.

“Absolutely not, you can walk in after that nice black eye you just gave me,” He said.

Rosie gave him a stank face ripping her bag from the floor, slamming the car door, and stomping up to the door.

“Damn worse than usual what did y’all do?” Daniel asked holding a fist to his mouth.

“Woke her up in the car,” Trin said, laughing as we watched a big beefy Rottweiler jump on Rosies half asleep form. “Now Dexter is all riled up.”

Jon and I shared a look.

Ain’t no one told us there was a big ass Rottweiler here!

[andthemoonsingswisely]

Arya, Lyanna, Nature Motifs, Harrenhal, and Femininity

When we’re introduced to Lyanna in the first chapter, it’s through the POVs of Robert and Ned. What I found interesting was that both Robert and Ned remember her love for the outdoors.

"She should be on a hill somewhere, under a fruit tree, with the sun and clouds above her and the rain to wash her clean." - Robert, AGOT Eddard I

The little crannogman, Howland Reed, had taken her hand from his. Ned could recall none of it. "I bring her flowers when I can," he said. "Lyanna was … fond of flowers." - Ned, AGOT Eddard I

From the start, it’s established that Lyanna loved nature and the outdoors. Both Robert and Ned know this to be true, yet Ned tells Robert in a later chapter that he never really knew Lyanna; while it’s true that knowing something such as someone’s preference for the outdoors doesn’t translate to knowing them, and we can just leave it at that, I want to take a look at the deeper implications of nature, especially in regards to its relationship with femininity.

"You never knew Lyanna as I did, Robert," Ned told him. "You saw her beauty, but not the iron underneath.” AGOT Eddard VII

the truth is, Robert loves this idealized version of Lyanna—he loves Lyanna because she’s dead, because she can be the beautiful dead girl sitting passively as nature happens to her, as she gets washed by rain as opposed to actively wading into the water. To Robert, Lyanna’s love of the outdoors is a symbol of her femininity only because he associates it with the passiveness of a dead girl. However, we know that in life, Lyanna was seldom passive, and made choices which would affect herself and those she loved.

She becomes the Knight of the Laughing Tree to get justice for Howland Reed during the Tourney of Harrenhal. She wears a crown of winter roses given to her (in a controversial move) by the man she loves. Lyanna’s association with nature is her choosing justice and love. It’s no coincidence that she’s subverting the trope of “male knight defending a maiden’s honor” and pushing past the barriers of traditional femininity through the guise of nature.

now, where does Arya come into this? Well, now that Lyanna’s dead, Arya’s similar personality and paralleling themes of justice and love act to reveal more about who Lyanna was as a person while placing heightened importance to these characteristics of Arya, basically telling the reader: hey, watch out, this is going to be important.

In AGOT, Arya picking flowers displays her connection towards nature that, like Lyanna’s, is more active than passive. But it isn’t until ACOK when the real “tree arc” happens. A slave in Harrenhal, Arya witnesses and is the victim of severe abuse and injustice, with trauma and grief adding to her feelings of powerlessness. And then this happens:

“"But there is no pack," she whispered to the weirwood. Bran and Rickon were dead, the Lannisters had Sansa, Jon had gone to the Wall. "I'm not even me now, I'm Nan."

"You are Arya of Winterfell, daughter of the north. You told me you could be strong. You have the wolf blood in you."

"The wolf blood." Arya remembered now. "I'll be as strong as Robb. I said I would." She took a deep breath, then lifted the broomstick in both hands and brought it down across her knee. It broke with a loud crack, and she threw the pieces aside. I am a direwolf, and done with wooden teeth.”

The weirwood is a symbol of strength for Arya, and a way she can break the barriers of not just traditional femininity, but also her slave status. Moreover, the godswood is also tied to her encounters with Jaqen. Like Lyanna, Arya also uses her connection to nature to get justice. Arya being the ghost in harrenhal is an important thematic parallel to Lyanna, highlighting their courage and shared internal values.

(I have a pet headcanon that Lyanna was the one speaking to Arya with the help of the old gods, which COULD be canon if TWOW came out before I died—just write the damn books grrm!)

But we’re not done yet, because justice is only one half—as I mentioned earlier, nature is associated with BOTH justice and love for Lyanna, and for Arya as well, as I’m about to show you.

In ASOS, while Arya and Gendry are in Acorn Hall, Tom of Sevens sings “My Featherbed” which contain these lyrics:

“And how she smiled and how she laughed, the maiden of the tree. She spun away and said to him, no featherbed for me. I’ll wear a gown of golden leaves, and bind my hair with grass, But you can be my forest love, and me your forest lass"

Gendry is strongly hinted to be a potential romantic interest for Arya, and I’m not even going to mention all their shared experiences with nature because that would just be me quoting the entirety of Arya’s chapters in ACOK and ASOS. I found it quite neat that like Lyanna, Arya’s “love” also breaks barriers, since Gendry is a lowborn bastard and since Arya herself doesn’t fit into the mold of a proper lady.

I feel like this could def be more fleshed out, but I’m typing this on a time crunch so tldr; Arya’s relationship with nature parallels Lyanna’s, as they are both rooted in justice and love, and as they both subvert the traditionally feminine idea of a woman who has nature happen to her instead of being a part of and acting with nature.

[trans-jon-rights]

Unpopular opinion, but I don't really like Jmart that much ?

I mean, I like how they are handled in the show. They truly brighten season 5 and bring a nice touch to both of their character arcs.

And I won't be off put by a Jmart fic, although I prefer when they don't impact the plot too much.

By that, I mean that I probably won't read a Jmart fic that's there purely for the Jmart. I'll mostly read it for the plot, and if the entire plot revolves around them getting together, going on dates, etc...

Well, I probably won't read that, while I would probably read it if it was JonTim or JonSasha.

There's also the problem of 'fanon' vs 'canon'. Canon Jmart is very different from their fanon depiction, and they're not always lovey dovey. In fact, I particularly struggle with s1 Jmart, the versions where Jon is less of an arse and get with Martin quickly. S1 Jon is my favourite character, and that's not really the depiction of him I prefer. I appreciate much more a good s1 JonTim or JonSasha because those two are characters he's already got a chemistry with, and a history as well. S1 Jmart just doesn't work for me.

And s5 Jmart is great too, just not the same as fanon, because it often doesn't take into account the trauma both of them went through.

I remember one particular fic (which I don't remember the name of, sorry), in which Jon and Martin time travel and meet up with their past selves. And not AU past selves, actual, canon past selves. The fic in itself was good, objectively. Great pacing, wonderful writing, interesting choice of POV, everything, really. Although it was heavily Jmart, I read it through to the end because it was really popular, and I was like, "Well, it must be that good, right ?"

It was that good. Maybe not to my taste, but it was.

Two points really bothered me, though. The first was that s5 Jmart never actually talked about their problems. Never went to therapy, just dealt with Jonah and done. But they were actually way too healthy for a couple like them. To me, Canon Jmart would never truly work in a non-apocalyptic situation, not without a lot of work and talking that wasn't there in the fic. They just arrived back in time and poof, no more problems.

The second point was, well, the s1 Jmart that formed next to it. That's the only true downside that almost made me drop it. Because it shouldn't work. It shouldn't, and I feel too much like the author decided to jumble the pieces together and force them into it. (Again, it's not an insult on their writing, but I could just feel it was a heavily Jmart fic, and this aspect gave me this impression).

One example of a great fic with a similar premise (still no name, sorry) was one in which there was s5 Jmart, true, but they ended up fighting and talking about their issues. And at the same time, s1 Jon and Martin talked together and said, "Well, our counterparts have clearly gone through a lot. But I don't like you/love you beyond a stupid office crush, and I think it'd be better if we stayed acquaintances."

And that was great !

And beyond AUs abd all that. The way they got together in the first place wasn't great for a long relationship, mostly based on huge trauma induced attachment issues.

Martin needed not to feel Lonely and to have warmth and proximity, while Jon was desperately in need of closure from someone he wouldn't be afraid of, e.i. who didn't hurt him physically. Because Martin did hurt him psychologically, but Jon, at this stage, doesn't consider this a 'valid' kind of harm to be applied to him. (Which he would if only he'd gone to therapy but alas.)

I think the fic I prefer the most in terms of how it handles its Jmart (and it's one of my all-time favourites, too) is Rewind.Reset.Rewrite by DarkrystalSky. I mean, I read it multiple times for the plot, but really, the Jmart there is almost flawless.

They fight, talk it through, Jon's dependence on Martin is very well handled, and it highlights both of their character arcs.

Martin is shown as desperate for attention from his crush, then once he is in the committed relationship he does his best until he realises how he shouldn't be the one to handle Jon throwing themself into danger at all and any occasions. He works a bit through his own trauma with his mum and talk with Jon until finally they come back together much happier.

Jon has to deal with sudden feelings for Martin and accepts them, going into a relationship that they take for granted, and puts in second to their mission. They take time to realise that they may be ready to doom a world for Martin, but it doesn't do everything in the relationship, and that they have to do things for their partner beyond just loving him.

Alright, that was all I had to say. Rather long rant, but I got it out.

TL;DR, Jmart isn't my favourite ship, and I don't like the way it's handled in most fanfictions compared to their canon version.

[asoiaf-essays-collector]

For me, idk if Sansa is the girl in grey in Melisandre's prophecy and i don't care if they reunite at the Wall, in the Vale, in Winterfell or on the way, because the thing is its almost given that Sansa and Jon will be the first Starks to reunite since they are the most distant ones. Its how grrm works. The Starks are the central family of the series and out of their four povs that remain, Jon and Sansa are the only ones to not have a defined relationship and their reunion in twow before others will give them time to develop one.

In defence of the girl in grey theory - at this point it almost impossible to imagine her being not sansa. As much as I would prefer the vale meeting. Just think of it - Jon and Melisandre were thinking that the girl in grey would be Arya but ironically it was Jeyne Pool/Alys Karstark who happened to be geographically more convenient? Nah, that's not the irony of GRRM. Now, Sansa who Jon barely registers as sister in his inner pov - that would be the irony that we are used to in ASOIAF.

The girl in grey being not the Stark but someone else entirely just because this girl fits the criteria? It's not interesting. It gives the same vibes as theory that Cersei's valonqar is neither Tyrion nor Jaime and some other person that just happens to be someone else's younger sibling. That's just boring.

"Jon and Sansa are the only ones to not have a defined relationship" - oooh, now that's the topic I can speculate about for hours.

I'm rereading ASOS right now and gosh, the ways GRRM chooses to portray these two while their lack of any established relationship in books? That's simply fascinating how he dances around some words and names.

One of the most interesting part of this lack of interactions is the fact that it doesn't mean that they don't have this defined relationship. Their meeting and then dynamic will be a total wild card - unlike any other pair of siblings. They can literally have any dynamic and shared history or lack of it and we have no idea what it will be. I'm so excited!

And it's not only that. There is a conflict between them too - until they learn that Bran and Rickon are alive they both are kinda heirs of Starks and Winterfell, both are ruler coded since AGOT and their political strengths complement each other's weaknesses. Moreover, both can support each other's claim. Sansa Stark while being legitimate heir in many lords eyes is still married to Lannister and everyone knows it and she is also a girl who doesn't know how to wage a war. On the other hand Jon Snow even with Stark blood printed on his Ned Stark (who is still beloved in the North) face is still a bastard and can't interfere with claim of legitimate heirs (given that Robb's will is still unknown). One of them on his/her own can raise a lot of questions but two can make a decent claim.

So yeah.

Sansa and Jon meeting first of the pack is making quite a lot of sense from every point of view. It's not just that they are most distant siblings and thus make more interesting pair to interact, it's also very practical for GRRM if he wants Starks to go on the offensive - two of them combined can actually form a decent political power (in terms of both claim and set of skills). No other pair of Starks has that.

[tigwrbwetle]

TMA general update:

Okay so I’ve finished season 2 and now I’m almost done season 3, so we’ve got a lot to cover.

There have been so many death flags for Tim, even before he asked Elias to kill him :((( Finding out about Sasha really broke him, and then we find out The Stranger took his brother from him too. I have a feeling he will not survive the third season, rip. I’m putting off listening to the ‘Masquerade’ episode cause my guess is that’s when he’ll die, or something worse will happen to him while they’re trying to stop The Unknowing.

Jon’s character development has been truly masterful. He’s gone from a paranoid wreck to an avatar getting used to his burgeoning powers, I’m proud of him tbh, even though he’s literally becoming a monster. I like the new style in S3 where Jon travels around collecting statements and Martin reads more back at the Institute. The reappearing characters are great to see too! MAG111 was so interesting, we finally got an explanation and names for ‘The 14’ entities that have been behind all the spooks and abominations! And of course we met Gerry, another assistant Gertrude fed to the horrors without hesitation. Michael’s statement in MAG101 was also a big piece of lore, considering he’s a main antagonist/meddler. Finding out about the Impossible Altar, the Watcher’s Crown, (Eye-pocalypse?) and the other rituals was so exciting! I sense the overarching plot at work here…

Elias finally getting his hands dirty with some good old-fashioned pipe murder for the S2 finale was something else. He’s certainly been showing his true character in S3, snarky and devious but also has powers and knows how to use them. And ya’know, I thought it was fanon, but from the two Peter Lukas visits I’ve listened to so far, they really do act like an old married (for convenience) couple. Speaking of, the second time he showed up, Martin got transported to The Lonely when Peter Lukas talked to him!! Not his first time in an entity’s realm/domain, and luckily not his first time escaping from one. I’m so glad he got let go, I was really scared for him for a sec there.

Melanie and Basira have joined the team, (Elias’s prison), and it’s nice to have more pov characters to follow! I love how they made Basira a bookworm so much, it warms my nerdy heart! I was sad when Elias revealed Melanie’s father was a victim of The Corruption at that old folks home, (something-Ivy?), although I do appreciate her attempts at offing Elias, and I want to see where her research into war ghosts leads her. (We finally found out how she got shot by a ghost!)

This is the “oh yeah, it’s all coming together” point in the story and I am living for it! TMA is doing the mystery + horror balance very well; we’re learning some important lore in between getting scared by monsters. The darkness one from MAG86 still haunts me, its “the blanket never did anything” line was so cold, it would’ve terrified me particularly bad as a kid.

That’s all for now! I’ll do another one of these around season 4, probably.

[therainscene]

I’ve been rolling the Mike thinks Will is in love with El theory around in my head some more. I like it, but it’s not without its flaws.

One especially damning counter-argument a few folks have brought up is that Mike heard Will refer to himself as El’s brother at the police station:

Will’s line contrasts Jonathan’s earlier “I’m her brother... uh, step-brother...”, indicating that Will has fully embraced her as family where Jon doesn’t quite see her that way yet.

It’s a great point. The only justification I’ve seen for it is that Mike wasn’t put off from kissing El after he’d already implied he wanted to be her brother... but that doesn’t wash with me. Just because he had no idea how to reconcile his feelings with heteronormative expectations at 12 doesn’t mean he's still clueless at 15.

So let’s give him some credit and try a different angle: When we step outside of the Byers POV, Will’s line is actually quite ambiguous.

The unsympathetic receptionist refused to let them see El on the grounds they weren’t a parent or legal guardian, so Will jumped in with an argument he hoped would win her over: we’re her legal next of kin. He’s just saying whatever he thinks will grant them access to El -- there’s no reason it has to be reflective of his true feelings.

After all, it’s not as though Will “be gay do crime” Byers has any qualms about being dishonest with authorities when it suits him.

Mike was present for both of the above moments, so he definitely knows this about Will. And this is only one piece of evidence amongst many -- the rest of it is undeniably suggesting that Will’s in love with one half of Milevn:

Will’s been acting weird in a likes-someone way around El;

Will sulked at Rink-o-Mania over getting third-wheeled by Milevn and rarely took his eyes off El;

Will is always eager to talk about El and brings her up in conversations with Mike more than Mike does;

Will hinted that he was hiding an uncomfortable secret from Mike in the scrapyard heart-to-heart;

Will is the more trustworthy party in the “maybe it is for [someone he likes]”/“El commissioned it” painting lie conflict;

Will was on the verge of tears the whole time he was pushing Mike back into El’s arms in the van and the pizzeria.

It’s obvious to the audience what conclusion to draw here because we had the benefit of seeing it all through Will’s sad gay puppy eyes...

...But Mike is forced to assess the evidence through his own biased POV.

This kid has severe self-worth issues, which are tied up in his feelings for El, which are in turn tied up in heteronormativity. It’s also been hinted that he has depression -- messy room, slipping grades, parallels with Max -- an illness that’s notorious for twisting your thought processes into the most pessimistic directions possible.

So while Mike may very well suspect the truth, I’m not sure he’s in the right headspace to accept it. There’s a good chance he’s torn between the two interpretations:

Will likes El: Mike is forced to choose between making Will happy vs. holding on to the one thing that makes him feel like he has value. But he can tell that El doesn’t need him anymore, and he couldn’t live with himself if he hurt Will... after all, aren’t a straight boy’s feelings more important than some pathetic queer who’s lying to himself?

Will likes Mike: Mike gets to make Will happy and he gets to make himself happy. Letting go of El might be difficult, but he knows she’ll be fine without him, and Will has already proven that his unbridled love can help Mike see his inherent self-worth -- a much healthier approach than tying his self-worth up in being someone’s boyfriend.

The first interpretation reinforces Mike’s heteronormative beliefs and ensures he continues to feel worthless, whereas the second allows him to feel hope that things can get better.

Which interpretation would a depressed brain find more appealing? Or, more to the point, since Stranger Things tends to explore these struggles through metaphor--

--which interpretation would give Mr. Everyone-is-Just-Waiting-For-it-All-To-Be-Over an opportunity to break through Mike’s defenses?

[pumpkinstrawbrew]

❣️.ĐØ₥Ɇ₴₮ł₵₳₮Ɇ V₴ ₵₳₱₮ɄⱤɆ. ☠️

...

(i love playing with various branches of scarebat inside my head. even if it's one-note idea. but in this current bit, i was thinking about a core view on certain things, that most of their versions have in common. mainly the difference between jon's n' bruce's outlooks on how they picture 'ideal' encounter between one another. or more so, what the best outcome of it might be. what their 'great end game might look like.

bruce *for the most part* wants to believe in reabilitation. in a change for the better. it's possible to tame n' domesticate a wild crow. it might not change its habbits fully, but it's possible to make the bird less harmful *to smaller animals as they do feed on them* by keeping it happy and fed. by nurturing it into state, where it'll be mostly comfy with getting food by less extreme means. n' where it might trust you to not to harm it or stop giving it food. while, i view this set-up from a perspective of a shipper, i also can see gen approach here as well. mostly, bc i don't think that bruce would have ever left any of his *potentially ex* rogues fully unsurpivised. esp someone with history like crane's. batman is too much of a control freak to not peak into his villain's personal affairs, even if just to make sure, that they haven't went back to crime. him befriending / having a chance to impose influence on a troubled, malevolent 'crow via smth other, than use of force would have been a nice change of pace. batman is pragmatic, but i love how he doesn't ever fully dismiss the idea of 'what if', n' desire to see his rogues improving themselves. but at the same time, usually, he's the one who puts said crow back into cage *arkham*, so there is that too. he wants to do the right thing, but the bird keeps glaring at him through the narrow bars, bc it doesn't get why must it be caged for hurting n' killing other animals, when they *totally* picked on it first.

now, jon would have almost an oposite view of this, i imagine. where bruce can picture a second variant, another *brighter* path, crane kinda just cannot do the same. from his pov, there is no way for batman to ever become a villain. somebody who would team up with him. so they can't be 'together' this way. there is also no way for crane to ever get onto batman's level. esp bc he doesn't want *can't* change this drastically. therefore, the only way to keep the bat in his possession is to lock it up, trap it n' hold it in a little metalic box. hide it inside his basement, bc so many other people would love to have the bat too. he doesn't want to clip its wings, but part of him is paranoid enough to consider it. he has no idea how else to make a wild bat stay. it doesn't listen to him, like his birds do. but crane will take good care of it, anyway. make it dependent on him. caged by him, n' no one else can steal it away this time.

maybe, this reads as gibberish to some, but i really love how both bruce n' jonathan have animal analog / name in their aliases. bruce's is more apperent, bc well, batman lol. he even dress up as this. crane's case is more subtitle, but still, the scarecrow. even if he supposed to scare said birds away, he keeps them as pets as offten as we see bats hanging inside bruce's herocave lol. those animals also suit their personalities to a degree. the only other animal, that i can see crane as be a possum lol. sharp teeth, always hissing, long rat tail, but despite the ragged apperance, they are the only mamal that cannot get rabies bc of their body temperature, even tho by looking at it, you'd think that it surely would have that disease, haha. that's kinda very crane. he tends to subvert expectations, but in a strange ways.

an' well, where bruce can step down to extremes, n' i don't mean putting crane's scawny ass back into asylum, i mean also consider other methods of keeping him declawed. including trapping him inside his cave / basement. still, i feel like for jon's those said extremes are default line of thinking. socially inept, distrustful n' lonely, it would make sense for him to assume, that he can only co-exist with batman, if he will lock him up n' be the only one, who has a key to his prison. generally, it always seems that while jon's views on things n' his way of persiving / feeling affection are twisted, it's also pretty sad too. technically, he doesn't have any frame of referance here. of affection, that is returned n' not played as a joke at his expense. an' being humilated by the bat in such manner would sting way harder, than his high school crush rejecting him. he'd also would have that yandere u-turn. but not in like 'if i can't have you none one has'. more like 'i really want to have you, so i'd do every terrible thing in the book to make it possible'. well, almost 'every'. i feel like there be things, that jonathan *most versions of him, anyways* just kinda won't do. he does have some class, after all.

overall tho, i do love jon as that needy 'creep' archetype *which is pretty much a canon in old comics too*, who would kidnap / do awful things to a guy he likes, simply bc he has no idea what else he can do with him. at most times, he's that meme of 'idk how to hit on him, so he has to die'. meanwhile, bruce thinks that if you feed a stray bird enough, it might consider staying or well, not being as troublesome as it usually is.

in some timelines, this even might work out, who knows.

less so jonathan's side of things, since i feel like he would end up screwing his own plan over. i even have a lil drafty thing for a fic with similar premise, but it's for some other time. atm. just lil art, while i'm working on bigger things, haha. gotta store all these bits / concepts somewhere, so that i don't forget that they exist.)

[horizon-verizon]

Sorry, but I really have to say it, I can’t take it anymore.

A lot of anons you’ve been getting and answering are so incredibly annoying and disingenuous. It’s not a you problem, it’s those weird people. Aside from the fact that they clearly did not read the pov chapters of the characters they hate, they also tie themselves into tight knots because of theories not rooted in canon. Drawing half-assed parallels between characters that don’t have anything in common, coming up with baseless theories and then foaming at the mouth about them as if they’ve been confirmed by George himself. This is weird. Obsessive, even.

While disheartening, it’s understandable when people start hating characters because of said character’s annoying and vocal fans. But let’s not pretend that just because you can come up with theories where you villainise a character or other to justify your weird hatred that it somehow makes sense.

And to be clear, I’m not saying you can’t have absolute favourites, that you can’t be ride of die for a character. You can even ignore any other pov but the one of your fav. I have my favourites as well, it’s normal. But how can you talk stupid shit about a character that you don’t care to read about? You call the antis of your favourite “brainless”, but you act just like them towards other characters and their fans. This is called hypocrisy, btw, and you’re contributing to the disease in this fandom just as much as them.

Truly, I don’t want to be rude or whatever, and this is not meant as an attack to you personally. I’ve just seen like 5 of those insane anons in the asoiaf tag and I had to say something. I hope I did not somehow hurt you, though, tumblr user horizon-verizon, that was not my intention. I wish you a very good day.

Since I don't know exactly which "antis of Dany" you're saying I'm acting like, I don't know if I can take this ask's points to heart, anon. I was under the impression that I've been fair to Jon Snow, Helaena, Alicent, Catelyn, any of these characters that you could be saying that I am not very fair towards; the last Jon snow post (at least my own answer) was about him not being TPTWP...bc he isn't. It's quite obvious in-text. If that anon who said that he was boring offended you and you were offended that I didn't say that they were being too extreme, I can't really help you there. I still said in that post that Jon was important...just not in the way some people try to say. And yes, i still read his PoV chapters, I have said that I just tend to read Dany's and reread them more often. Not that I never read him, that's a gross exaggeration.

Jon Snow is not and never will be Azor Ahai. And never was/never will be TPTWP. This is fact, not "opinion". It's not about "favorites", it's about reading the books and understanding patterns of thoughts and references and reading mythologies and seeing patterns of human behavior within the text. And this isn't "extremism", it is simply reading the books. (As if I ever tried to tail Dany antis in the first place?)

If not about Jon and about how I refute TG's numerous and various points about Jaehaera or Helaena or Alicent, do you expect me to agree with their factually incorrect statements? you know that some even think Jaehaera was supposed to be Azor Ahai or GRRM means to invalidate his entire years worth of writing Daenaera to be mother to Aegon III's kids, right? Am I supposed to say nothing to these egregious absurdities?

All to say that since you still remain vague about what exactly your point is coming from and which character(s) you think I'm being grossly unfair to, I can't really take your points under any advisement. It certainly makes it look like I don't bring up material to back up my claims for all my thoughts about ASoIaF and its fandom, which is certainly not the case. You may look under my "example of green stan nonsense" to see what people say from their own posts.

[missholloween]

⭐ for the director's cut game you reblogged!

I may be late, but that doesn't mean I'm not doing this

Given that I can choose, I'll pick one of my favorites of all time and one you have read: What lies beyond, my Wilbur character study <3

To talk about this fic I need to talk about its two major influences, that are The Magnus Archives and Harrow the Ninth.

The Magnus Archives's influence is blatant through the whole fic. When I started the project, I knew I wanted to do something similar to a statement, but more specifically an avatar statement. Something I really like about tma is how they present monstrousity as something both desirable and frightening, but also something one actively chooses, in one way or another. I've often joked about Wilbur being a tma avatar for me, as, for the little we've seen of him, it doesn't seem he was manipulated or brainwashed to serve the Lords, he willingly does so. Wilbur is also very smart, and it's far from a crazed lunatic that blindly follows: his personal beliefs mix with his loyalty to the lords, as we saw in Black Friday with the critique to capitalism.

That's why the statement format was so fitting: it would not only be the framing device and a guideline of sorts to know the structure that I wanted to follow, but also a huge tonal inspiration. I think Jonny Sims is a really big influence in all of my writing, but in this case it was a concious choice. You can see that in the use of metaphors to describe the most cosmic horror-like parts of the fic, as I find that it is the most efficient way to describe the indescribable while also being chill-inducing. The dance between fear and admiration Wilbur has drinks also a lot from tma, with episodes like mag32 or mag151 as direct inspirations.

Lastly, the statement format also demanded a context for that statement to happen. I'm not too fond of fics outside of tma where there's a random archivist (usually jon himself?) reading the statement, as they usually don't add anything to the plot. I decided to go for a radio transmition to MacNamara, as that would let me appeal to someone (as Annabelle does in mag147) AND anchor Wilbur to the last remains of his humanity, that in this case is John.

The inclusion of John is also one of the Terror Factors™: the reader is positioned in John's place as the listener, creating an identification with him that also makes you understand how drastic Wilbur's change must have been for someone close to him. I thought of including some lines said by John, but I think it works better left to interpretation: what did John think listening to that? Does he reach out? Does he go after Wilbur to end things once are for all? Was he frightened? Full of sorrow? Relieved? I have my own answers that might see the light if I ever do a series of tma adjacent Hatchetfield cases, but I do encourage everyone to have their own readings :]

But recovering the first person and the complicated interpersonal relationships, Harrow the Ninth was the other big influence for this fic. HtN was the book where I learned all the possibilities first and second person offer in writing. You can give so much information just by what the character chooses to say and how they say it. You're inside their pysche, completely imbued in their POV, and that might include when a character fails to understand something or are met by something they're incapable of explaining. I knew it had to be a 1st person fic because of all of this. HtN also affected how I wrote some of Wilbur's lines towards John, but I don't want to go into spoilery territory (I really recommend tlt though, htn it's my favorite book ever)

[consumed-by-fandom]

Bear with me while I ramble about how Your Father’s Son by Shayfer James fits the dork squad PAINFULLY WELL - particularly from Jon’s POV

If you subscribe to the idea of Crane working at Arkham as a psychologist at some point like I do then you may also entertain the idea of him assessing Ed or Jervis at some point, or otherwise just having his own (un)professional opinion of their psychological profile.

The first verse is very obviously fitting to Ed, someone who uses his words to show off both his intelligence but also his own egocentric nature and tendency to insult and belittle everyone he knows.

The second one is very Jervis, with the clock metaphors (if you see Jervis as a hypnotist which I do, but even in general since Alice has some time related themes with the white rabbit) and his habit of using fantasy to cope with reality, choosing his own interpretation over the truth.

The main chorus and bridge i’ll use to explain the main idea I get with this song - Jon believes they are the spitting image of however their father treated them, an opinion influenced from his own experiences with his father (so absolutely terrible). Whatever trauma they’ve been through has fuelled their dysfunctional traits to present day, and it doesn’t matter who they blame for it. And God help them if they find themselves in need of someone, because it sure as hell isn’t gonna be easy for them to ever keep someone.

I also get this vibe of Jon being very self-loathing towards himself, knowing he’s no better than the other two, perhaps even worse with what he’s done in the name of his research and obsessions, and so its so easy for him to be brutally blunt about what’s wrong with everyone else.

Do i think the song fits perfectly? Not quite, personally I usually go with the hc that Jervis had quite loving parents who he lost early on in his childhood, and that kickstarted his fear of abandonment (among other things not caused by losing them), but i found it insane how fitting this song is for the three of them.

Anyway go listen to Your Father’s Son its a REALLY GOOD SONG i’ll even put it down below :3

[asongofstarkandtargaryen]

The concept of freedom on ASOS JON I:

The first chapter of Jon Snow on ASOS is an important one in terms of world building as we finally get to visit the Free folk camp and witness their way of life. It's also a chapter where the subject of freedom and what it means to be free is heavily featured and that is something I wanted to share my views on.

Ygritte informs Jon that he's a free man. Jon very much doubts it and question whether he's free to leave the free folks. To which Ygritte replies that he's free to do so but her people are also free to kill him for his choice.

This conversation proves what Jon already knew; that despite what Ygritte or any other from the free folk might say, he's far from being a free man. He's still being watched closely and on the first mistake he makes he's gonna lose his head.

Ygritte believes that all brothers of the night's watch secretly want to abandon their order " in your hearts you all want to fly free" but since we read Jon's pov chapter we know that this ain't true for the boy.

In a way, Jon is like Orell's eagle. On this chapter the bird is shown to fly free:

Somewhere above an eagle soared on great blue-grey wings, while below came men and dogs and one white direwolf.

The reality is sadder thought, since the bird is controlled by its new warg master. Similarly, Jon while being told he's "free" is anything but that.

Later on Mance shares his own reasons for abandoning his post on the Night's Watch and -you guessed it - it has lots to do with freedom or the lack of it. When he was attacked by a shadowcat beyond the Wall, he was healed by a woman belonging to the free folk who mended his torn cloak with red silk. For Mance, this cloak was important but for the Night's Watch it was unacceptable to let him keep a cloak that wasn't totally black. This lack of freedom was what lead him to abandon the order.

Before his first appearance on page, it was easy to imagine Mance as the antagonist to the Night's Watch who was a traitor at his core. But this chapter with his introduction and his backstory did a great job humanising him. It also gives food for thought, about what is freedom and how important is (or isn't) to each individual compared to other virtues.

[lemonhemlock]

I'm a 'Martin won't ever publish another ASOIAF book' truther but in addition to King Bran being profoundly idiotic, Martin has major structural issues that are now too 'big' to 'fix' imo. Namely, the ages of the characters are ridiculous and are all wrong for where their arcs need to go. The characters on the show were aged up and even the younger ones grew up on screen so Bran and Sansa and Arya were at least into late teens/adulthood at the end of the show - one is 13 and other is currently 11 and Bran is like, what, 8 in books? sksksksksk Just absolutely disastrous.

The characters should have been in their mid to late teens at the start of AGOT, at minimum. Especially because Martin essentially treated them, and has them act, like adults. I'm sorry, but I don't think that man has any understanding between the mental and physical developmental differences between, say, a 14 year old girl and a 17 year old girl. Every character appears and acts like they are anywhere from 3 to 5 years older than they are.

Also, the POV structure, while interesting, has also been disastrous in actually getting the story moving because certain characters have to be in certain places for things to happen while others are just sitting around killing time.

Hmmm, I don't really agree about the POV structure. It functioned fine for three books and offered compelling court drama, battles, magical elements and intriguing plot-twists. AGOT / ACOK / ASOS are pretty well paced and I've even seen someone making the case that the series could even have ended in that point and would have been one of the best fictional fantasy experiments. I found myself agreeing and disagreeing. I think the ASOS ending would have still distinguished ASOIAF from other fantasy series in its toppling of the good-guys-win-everything type of wrap-up, but it would be way less ambitious than what GRRM ended up pursuing.

The pacing problems came about with AFFC/ADWD. And I'm not one to talk here, because I'm an AFFC truther and it's always been my favourite of the series, so my two cents on this is that Dany's Slaver's Bay plotline is too damn long. Tyrion is also taking too damn long to get to her. It's a drag. In the book she is supposed to solve the Quaithe riddle,* escape Vaes Dothrak, get herself an army + navy, make the decision to leave Slaver's Bay AND sail to Westeros, so that in TWOW she can fight Young Gryff, face-off the Others, become a mask-off tyrant AND get deposed? It's a lot.

I honestly think he should just give up the 7 book compartmentation, admit defeat and just add another damn book to the series to get Dany to Westeros and fit in his fAegon plotline. It's not like he doesn't have the pages. No one's gonna care if there are 8 books instead of magic no 7. But my guess is that he's hung up over some decisions he's made in the past and kept trying to make the gargantuan plot fit inside this neat box he envisioned - 7 books, King Bran, Caesar!Jon etc. It would explain why he tried a time skip between ASOS and AFFC and had to scrap it - it would make more sense for the Stark children to be older. But he characterized himself as a gardener-style writing who doesn't plan everything in advance and lets the story grow organically. In that case, he should make allowances if the story grew in a direction he did not initially predict and make the required changes! Maybe King Bran made sense when he first wrote the initial three-book outline, but that was a long time ago & many other plot points changed.

My advice is to just stop trying to make the plot fit the previous designs, stay true to the way the characters evolved and respect the themes you've painstakingly developed over the course of nearly 30 years. Otherwise what's the point? If your original ending doesn't fit anymore, think of another ending ffs. The show is irrelevant at this point, so what if the endgame will be different? IDK, I'd be thinking that this is my life's work and I have every right to do it justice. Perhaps that's what he's thinking too and why it's taking him so long.

I agree that the ages of the characters are ridiculous, but if a time skip really, really can't fit anywhere, it's better to compromise on the age issue and leave off with a teen monarch than it would be to impose a surveillance state in Westeros as the solution with all-seeing, all-knowing Bran. That's a starkly dystopic ending, if you ask me.

Not to mention that it clashes directly with the end of magic - how is Bran supposed to be the Tree of Sauron if there's no magic anymore and everything goes back to normal? On what basis does he even get to be king at all if he's just a regular boy? How will he even survive being pulled out of the weirwood net if magic leaves the realm of men?

*“To go north, you must journey south. To reach the west, you must go east. To go forward you must go back, and to touch the light you must pass beneath the shadow.” JFC, if Dany has to get to Asshai, I will fucking scream.

[sailorshadzter]

Drogon shows aggression toward Sansa in the field (The dragon mirrors D*ny's feelings). Rhaegal comes to the rescue with Jon racing to Sansa's side. Ends like Hunger Games: Catching Fire when Peeta hit the wall ----- Sansa calms Jon down while outsider POV's realize something about the two.

Thank you!!

anon, i must confess, ive never seen the hunger games! not one of them! so, i couldnt really take any inspiration from that moment you mentioned. hopefully you like this all the same. :)

also, side note, first piece ive written to speak now (taylors version) and it felt soooo good! SO THANKS.

send me prompts

Sansa can’t say what draws her out to the dragon’s field- as they’ve come to call it since their arrival- but her footsteps lead her out to it all the same. A cold sense of anticipation flutters through her limbs but she cannot quite call it fear, but rather, she is intrigued by the beasts that once were thought long dead to the world. She knows what she’s doing is absolutely stupid, reckless, and she can hear Brienne and Arya both scolding her fiercely even now as she walks, though it does not deter her as she makes her way to the field. 

As she steps through the line of trees, she can hear it, the low rumble of the black-scaled dragon that sits several yards away, its wings tucked against its back, its head low as it rips apart what she can only assume is a sheep. The other dragon, the greenish one, she sees is not here, perhaps off hunting something of its own. With her first foot step onto the field, the dragon raises its head, ever so slightly, those hellish red eyes staring back at her as a wisp of smoke escapes its open jaws. Drogon, she knows this one is called, the larger of the two dragons and certainly the Targaryen queen’s favorite. Of the two, she also knows this one to be a bit more aggressive, more like his mother than perhaps anyone else might dare to say. “I haven’t come to hurt you,” she calls out, softly, hopefully, gloved hands rising up in a gesture of fealty. “Mere curiosity,” she continues, knowing the dragon likely doesn’t even understand her. She wishes now that she knew even a small phrase in the dragon queen’s native tongue, for perhaps then she might say something to the dragon it would know. 

Well, beyond that one phrase, she supposes. 

Back at Winterfell, Jon is suddenly overcome with a sense of dread that he cannot shake. And so, he excuses himself from the conversation he’s been engaging in and steps out into the main hallway, Stark colored eyes searching for something. It takes him but a moment more to realize he wasn’t searching for something, but rather, someone. “Have you seen Lady Stark?” He asks the nearest lord, who’s come round the corner, only to shake his head before passing on. Jon purses his lips and moves towards the double doors that would lead out into the courtyard. “Lord Royce, have you seen my sister?” He questions the older man, who is standing in a semi circle of other lords, overseeing some carts of supplies being unloaded. 

“Ah, yes, she said she was to take a quick stroll around the grounds, last I saw of her she was headed west,” the man replies before he returns to his task at hand, falling back into the conversation Jon had just interrupted. 

That sense of dread rushes through him, colder, stronger, as his eyes glance in the direction Lord Royce had pointed. West… He swallows just as Rhaegal flies overhead, letting out a piercing shriek that has every man in the courtyard ducking for cover. But, the dragon does not stop, does not swoop lower, but rather continues on towards the field in which he and Drogon are often found feeding.

And then it clicks. 

Jon turns on his heel and begins to run. 

The dragon hovers before her, those gleaming eyes unwavering in their glare as he looms even closer. She’s holding her breath, daring not to move, cursing herself for what she’s gotten herself into. Truth was, she hadn’t thought for a moment the dragon would hurt her without his mother’s word, but now that she’s staring him in the face, she quite remembers that dragons are, well, dragons. Her heart is hammering hard within her chest and she glances left and then right, wondering for a split second if she might be able to run, but even that thought is laughable to her. No, the truth was, she’s gotten herself into quite a mess. 

But then, from overhead, she hears the shrieking of the other dragon. 

Rhaegal circles inward and touches down, not beside his brother as she assumed he would, but rather beside her, facing his brother. Those bronze colored eyes glare back at the red, as if daring the other dragon to make a move, any move at all. 

“Sansa!” She whips her head back at the sound of her name being shouted, no, bellowed, from the treeline. And it’s Jon there, frantic and wild as he races towards her, his arm coming around her and dragging her backwards just as Drogon lets out a belch of fire, pitched upwards towards the sky, but one which they both feel the heat from as they slip back into the trees, back to safety. “What were you thinking?” He’s asking at once, taking her by the shoulders, holding her at arm’s length, voice torn between concern and anger. 

“I was curious,” she says simply, breathlessly, sagging against him as his arms come around her. “I’m alright, Jon, I promise,” she says when she draws back, noting his pallor, his shaking hands. “I am sorry for worrying you like that,” she goes on, gently patting his cheek, tilting her head as she holds fast to his gaze. “I don’t quite know what came over me, but I had to see them up close, with my own two eyes.” Jon musters up a laugh because somehow, someway, this makes sense to hear. It was as she said, she was alright, but he must hold her close once more, drawing her in as closely as he can, breathing her in, relishing in the softness of her body against him. 

And that would how they’d stay, if only for a short while longer.

From where she stands, Arya watches with wide eyes.

She had heard the shrieking of the dragons and Lord Royce had mentioned Jon had run off in that same general direction, so off she’d followed, wondering what could have him rushing off in haste. Now, she understands, now she sees. Truth was, Arya supposes she isn’t all that surprised by what she sees- there had always been something different between the two of them, something that had not been there when they’d been children within the walls of Winterfell. But rather something new and beautiful that blossomed between two people who knew and understood one another in a way no one else ever really could. 

Arya smirks and then lets out a soft chuckle, then turns away, heading back towards Winterfell, leaving them there, locked in an embrace with only the trees to bear witness to whatever might come next.