#like nettles has to feel that he truly cares and wants to help

[bohemian-nights]

Your tags on your last ask got me thinking about Daemon showing off his skills- scratch that- showing off in general around Netty. What other ways do you think he'll try to show off in front of his girl? [Netty being as smart and as cunning as she is won't be swayed by the fact that he's a Targaryeon prince he'd definitely have to work for it don't you think?]

Through his compassion mainly. Daemon would quickly realize that he would have to tap into his down-to-earth side to impress Nettles.

I agree that she wouldn’t be impressed by the mere fact that he’s a Targaryen prince. It’s the fact that he is who he is that would initially make her weary. So he’d have to show the man beyond his reputation to catch her eye and interest. He’d definitely have to work for Nettles' affection.

Yeah, Daemon is still Daemon so he’s going to show off in the training yard and ask for her favor before an actual friendly sparing session. He’s going to introduce her to new things that she’s never even heard of or had the opportunity to experience. He’s observant so if she needs something he would be the first person to try to remedy that.

Nettles is clever, but she’s is still a young woman so I don’t think she’s immune to his charms. At the same time, she’s a salt-of-the-earth person. So if he wants to connect with her and “show off” he’s got to show himself. He’s got to show that there is a man behind it all.

Daemon for all his less-than-savory deeds is a man that inspires loyalty. We see that during his time as Captain of the City Watch. He unites his men and gives them something to rally behind(Gold Cloaks). He treats the lowest among them with respect. He’s out there with them.

Daemon being open and showing that he cares about something, that he listens, that he can put others first and be humble would move Nettles more than just displays of strength or swagger.

[prideprejudce]

I know that you ship alicent/rhaenyra but do you also still ship daemon/rhaenyra too like before?

my feelings for the daemon and rhaenyra pairing are a bit iffy….like i still ship them in a way but they’ve kind of gone stale for me while my love for rhaenicent has just grown with time

honestly if i had to rank the rhaenyra pairings i like i would say rhaenyra/alicent >> rhaenyra/harwin >> rhaenyra/daemon or aka pretty much how i would rank how pure and genuine the love that the partner has for rhaenyra

alicent and rhaenyra are childhood friends/sweethearts and despite everything alicent still cares for and loves rhaenyra. heck, even on the brink of a civil war she is still trying to protect rhaenyra in her own limited way even though they are supposed to be enemies. i know this bond will get more strained as the series continues, but it’s been explicitly shown that one of the only people alicent ever felt truly happy around was rhaenyra. even above her own children who alicent is obligated to love by principle. rhaenyra is the only person that alicent ever felt truly at home with which is why their relationship will be such a tragedy in the wake of the dance

rhaenyra and harwin are self explanatory really - like harwin was rhaenyra’s partner for like ten years and gave up claiming their children as his own to protect rhaenyra’s reputation and still helped raise his boys and guard both them and their mother. i think out of all of rhaenyra’s relationships they were the most stable and would have been that couple that remained in love after being married for decades

and finally rhaenyra and daemon……i will say that the writers have shown that daemon truly loves and cares about rhaenyra. they are very similar people and are shown to be pretty compatible in their early marriage. but unfortunately, daemon is not built to be a stable knight in shining armor partner for rhaenyra, and i’m sure this is going to be shown more in the upcoming season. daemon is power hungry, irrational, and deceptive. and he is by far the most unstable character in that he is always going to put his wants/needs as a priority, often times over the ones he cares about…i think we got a hint of what is to come when rhaenyra was having her miscarriage and daemon was in the next room ignoring her screams for him to start his war plans. plus the ch*king scene was……not great foreshadowing for their relationship. overall i think rhaenyra is slowly going to become more disillusioned by him as she grows older and wiser and daemon is going to pull farther away from her when he realizes that she’s no longer the young and naive girl he could easily seduce and manipulate before. and if the writers go with the nettles storyline it will make that pretty apparent as well.

[lya-dustin]

Someone will remember us

Chapter 74

Cw:mentions of past sexual assault, victim shaming/blaming

Taglist: @stargaryenx @mercedesdecorazon

Gif by @daenerys-stormborn

There are many conflicting accounts on this war, but on this all sources agree.

Princess Aemma left Kingslanding fearing for her life and that of her infant son.

Singers claim she left to save her beloved from the Stranger, Mushroom claims she did it because Mysaria of Lys had turned the queen against her heir seeking to turn the queen into her puppet and Septon Eustace claimed the queen had become jealous of the young princess who earned people’s love through her charity and wisdom.

Orwyle writes that Queen Aemma simply became exhausted of having to lose so many loved ones to the war that she chose the easiest path to peace: her husband.

With Rhaenyra’s only trueborn child by Ser Laenor gone, Lord Corlys and Lady Alarra Celtigar in chains, Houses Celtigar, Velaryon and several others changed their allegiance to King Aegon’s heir and Princess Aemma’s husband, Aemond Targaryen, on the condition that they rule jointly.

--- On Good Queen Aemma

On her first escape here, she had been defending her mother from slander.

Now Aemma explains how her mother cannot tell friend from foe.

“Mysaria of Lys is to blame for this, every time she speaks to her alone more people are arrested.” Aemma said as she prepared to leave for Harrenhal at dawn. “She called for the heads of the remaining dragonseeds when Nettles and my half-brothers have been nothing but loyal to her and our cause. She called for mine because I spoke against her in the Small Council.”

That had been the culmination of everything, mother’s distrust began the night she went to Aemond.

“She has called for your arrest and my lady mother wishes to turn you in if you stay the night.” Lady Rosby said and Aemma wondered if she would turn her in.

This had been news to Aemma.

Joffrey had replaced her as heir, on account of conspiring with Aemond and the Seasnake to usurp her.

It was only because of luck that Aemma manages to escape a second time.

“Why are you helping me then?” the princess, no, the queen asked.

“Because your mother wanted Hugh Hammer to have Rosby as its lord.” The three and ten year old girl answered with a smirk. “Rosby is mine because my father left it to me, I would sooner be dead than hand it over to a man.”

And so Aemma leaves just as soon as Aemon is changed and flies until Aemon needs to be fed and have his swaddling clothes changed.

She is careful in these stops, making sure to stay by Silverwing each time and the second its finished, she straps herself and Aemon back onto the saddle.

Lucky for her Aemon has been unusually passive and Aemma wonders which gods should she thank for that.

She was near the God’s Eye when Vhagar in all her wretched glory comes into view.

Aemma can hear her name despite the roaring and the flapping of the two dragons.

Their dragons circle around each other before landing together in Harrenhal’s courtyard.

He hasn’t laughed or even smiled truly in so long.

Aemond is hardly out of his saddle when he runs to help his wife out of hers.

“Gods, Aemee, I missed you.” He says as he lifts her by the waist out of the dragon’s saddle and kissed her before putting her down.

“And I, you.” She pressed her hand lightly on his chest reminding him she has their son strapped to her chest in an old cloak of his.

His son, their Aemon. The baby who had kicked and moved about in his mother’s womb a lifetime ago.

“Would you like to hold him?” she asks and he forgets there is an entire garrison is there with them.

Aemond has held his nephews and niece, and yet, he feels woefully unprepared to hold his own son.

He had loved Helaena’s children, and yet the love for them did not compare to the immediate love and devotion he feels for the curly haired infant that seems to know him.

“Velaryon babes are often swaddled in cloaks belonging to their father so they recognize him by scent when he returns from his travels.” Aemma answered his unspoken question quietly. “I didn’t want him to be afraid of you when the time came.”

Because he will be afraid of him when he asks about his Uncle Lucerys.

“My son, Aemon!” Aemond lifts the babe for all to see and his men cheer knowing there is a chance for them to be more than canon fodder. “Tonight we feast to my queen, Aemma the Dreamer, and our heir, Aemon Targaryen, the Prince who was Promised.”

And just like that the men forget they are supposed to hate her for killing his mother.

They reek of dragon, but the smell has never bothered her. Excited them even.

A Targaryen thing, they had come to learn.

There is a tremble in his hands when he reaches for the fastenings of her riding clothes that wasn’t there before.

That is a lie, it was there that night at the library. He was more nervous than her and his hands had shaken when he trailed his hands to her breasts until he grew confident that she wanted it as badly as he did.

“What happened with Harwin’s sister?” the brothel had made him think sex and desire as something as sickening as a dead dog by the road.

There had to be something more to the story about Alys Rivers.

It was not in Aemond to simply fuck someone after knowing them for maybe a day.

He had confided in her that up until Aemma came back, he had not experienced the feelings most have regarding love and lust.

Even Aemma had felt desire for strapping sailors and knights and her own fucking brother.

Oh gods, she will have to tell him about kissing Addam.

Addam who might already be dead.

“The witch drugged me with strong wine, I thought I was dreaming of you only to wake up and find her in my bed. I killed her when she mocked me for it.” He said as he sits beside her on his bed.

Same bed he murdered a woman in, gods, she won’t be getting any sleep tonight. Never mind that she considered paying him with the same coin with her own brother.

“I’m sorry, Aemond.” Aemma took his hand and gave him a reassuring squeeze, remind him he isn’t wrong to feel this way.

“I should have been more careful, I let my guard down---” he says as if it were his fault.

He had said the same thing about Heidi the girl at the brothel.

I should have never listened to Aegon, I should have told Criston where he was taking me, he had said as she stroked his hair as he laid his head on her lap.

Aemond liked to be coddled, in private and only by a handful of people, but he liked to be held, and soothed and just knowing he is loved.

“You didn’t know she would do that, it was not your fault.” She reminds him.

“And yet everyone thinks I am a cad, worse than Daemon who doesn’t murder his whores at least.” He points out bitterly, always in the shadow of his brother and worse, Daemon.

“Don’t say that. I never want to hear you say that.” Once she wouldn’t have minded the comparison, now the idea that they could be similar sickens her.

“You could never be like him any more than I am my mother.” Her mother who had killed innocent people because someone else told her they were guilty without bothering to check if the proof was true.

“I missed you, Aemee.” He murmured and kissed her sweetly.

“I missed you more.” She undid her riding clothes herself.

[icaruskey]

Okay y'all, what does being aromantic feel like?

Cause I have always heard the usual, that aro people don't experience romantic attraction and will feel uncomfortable in relationships/prefer not to pursue or show interest in romance as even a conceit. And I just sorta took it as gospel?

But I'm literally talking to someone who says he thinks he's gray aro and someone else who is aro and with the former I sorta described my ideal relationship.

And it's basically a friend who I live with and feel comfortable sharing my life with. Do some cuddling. That sort of thing. And I got to do that with B! And I loved that, I loved feeling like a more functional person with them around. But... is that love?

I would say it, and I meant it, but I mean it with Nettle and Dory too. And the words feel the same. Like, they're my family, they're the creatures I chose to spend my life with and care for and be cared by in return.

I wrote a book, a sort of Beauty and the Beast retelling, and my Beauty, Aster, she is aromantic. But she also chooses to be in a poly relationship with the Beast and a villager, who are very much not aro and are very okay with Aster doing her own thing. And Aster isn't cold towards them, nor does she see them as mere friends. She loves them. But she feels fulfilled on her own as well.

Since B left, this is the first time I've really, truly been on my own after my diagnosis And it's been hard. Of course it has. They fucking lied to my face and in a day tore my life apart in ways I had thought were behind me. I trusted them, but the spiral came back through their actions. Their lying. And it's still hard. But now that I've finished my first year of my MFA program and I see what I've done on my own, despite everything, despite the struggling and lack of support outside of school, I'm really proud of myself. And I'm lonely, don't get me wrong. But it no longer feels like a death sentence for me.

I still want to date and trust and share my life with someone. I want to learn about their interests and figure out the little ways I can cheer them up. Like when I would go shopping and bring Brier back a coffee every time. It's my love language, I think? Finding things I know that person will like and bringing them back like some sort of lumbering magpie. I want to create a nest with someone.

But the feelings I had towards Brier were the same I had with my very non-poly friend Sam. And similar to what I currently feel for Brook and Tea and even Vince, though that friendship is one of the newest. And the latter three are very much in the friend camp. So am I really poly or am I some flavor of aro that feels that strongly about his friends?

Guys, help me out here. This is something I started poking at a little last June, but I dropped it just as quickly. So now it's gnawing at me again post-that convo.

[brassandblue]

honorhearted​:

Ben hesitated at that, a ribbon of guilt curling around his heart. Was Aaron right, he wondered? Did he owe his men the chance to know himself, and he them? He thought then of Samuel, whose memory was already long forgotten by everyone but a scant few – wouldn’t it be a disservice, a cruelty to erect walls and guard his heart?

“I…suppose I hadn’t considered it that way,” Ben cautiously ventured. “Though I don’t like to think of myself as selfish, being tactical has forced me to act towards the greater picture, rather than from a more humane angle.” He winced, curling his shoulders. “It must be frustrating listening to me complain about war when you, assuredly, have already seen and heard far worse in your lifetime.”

It was still humbling, extraordinary to think anyone such as Aaron or Arthur could ever possibly exist; in many ways, he wasn’t so sure they did, and that this wasn’t just some vivid, long-lasting hallucination.

Setting down his quill, Ben agreed, “When tensions are high, there will always be someone there to lend a hand. Despite the monstrous angle of mankind, the ugliness, I do not believe that we are inherently evil. That sort of behavior is learned.”

“That means you too, Sir.” 

He blinked at that a moment, startled, before waving a hand. "I can manage on my own just fine, Lieutenant. I highly doubt Arthur arranged your transfer so that you could be a glorified nursemaid. Truly, your being here seems to be enough. Lieutenant Kirkland seems far less…nettled, for lack of a better word.”

Although he didn’t know what was going on between the two, he was observant enough to sense when there was a shift for the better.

Looking up again at Aaron’s wry threat, Ben found it in himself to smile, though the expression was hollow. It was utterly terrifying to think of these beings and what they could do – of how they were only human in appearance only, from what he could tell.

“Yes, well we have limited supplies, so you would be right in that,” he managed to quip in return. “Still, I suppose the childish side of me will always be curious about how that would work, and what it would look like…”

Blowing the ink on his reports, he lifted a bit of sand before scattering it over the parchment. Once he was through, Ben hesitated a moment before offering, “I don’t mean this with any disrespect, but I feel God was cruel to give you both immortality and human emotion. Because truly, having a heart and witnessing such pain and loss for all eternity? I couldn’t bear it.” Exhaling, he looked away. “When I was a boy, I kept a book full of pressed foliage. Fall was my favorite season – it still is – and I wanted to preserve that beauty… But now as a man fully grown, I’ve come to realize I was merely preserving death. How ironic that there is so much beauty to be found in what’s no longer living? And how cruel that that doesn’t extend to human lives.” He shook his head. “There’s nothing beautiful about seeing a man breathe his last.”

Finally, a touch of embarrassment entered his features, and Ben glanced back down at his papers. “I didn’t mean to wax poetic about leaves and longevity,” he muttered. “I’m…just trying to process out loud, I suppose. I know not everything in this world is meant to be understood, but dammit, I can’t help but try.”

Despite all this, Amelia looked on the Major with a gentle, open smile and listened, really listened. She brightened the more he spoke, happy that he seemed to be opening up to her.

“Major!” she laughed. “I could listen to you wax poetic about drill exercises if you wanted! You have a real way with words.” She set her rifle upright, with the stock on the ground and the muzzle pointed upward. “But... no, I don’t thnk you’re selfish, Sir. I get it, wantin’ to close off when you keep losin’ all the people you care about. Maybe the Lord was cruel in makin’ me this way, but I’m also kinda... different than most folks,” she admitted sheepishly. “My mind goes fast, sometimes too fast for me to even think things through and Arthur’s compared me to a cannonball before!” she laughed. Arthur wasn’t wrong, to be honest. 

“And, just ‘cause I’ve seen more years than you, doesn’t mean the pain you’ve felt was any less. I mean, if you see five hundred people die over your lifetime, and someone else has seen one... the loss still hurts the same, just...for a lot longer,” she shrugged.

“Not to mention, autumn’s a necessary thing, right? I think you had the right idea, savin’ those leaves. The last harvests, and preparin’ for winter, givin’ us time to ease into the cold. I think you were preserving life, Sir. And that’s what you’re tryin’ to do here. I think that’s pretty damned admirable to do in spite of all the hardship. To be honest, that sort of fightin’ spirit is probably why I’m here at all,” she concluded, giving Ben a grateful look. “Nursemaid nothin’--I’m honored, Major.”

Ben’s threats seemed to wash over Amelia like water off a duck’s back. Her smile remained slight as she continued working on her rifle with all the care and familiarity of someone who had been well acquainted with firearms for years.

“That’s why I want to get to know folks, Sir,” she responded easily. She still smiled, but an observant person might note a hint of loving melancholy in her eyes. He didn’t know, or didn’t yet realize, her true age. She wouldn’t hold that against him. She’d learned long ago not to go blabbing about what she really was, though... he knew, that’s the whole reason she’d been brought here. But it was just one of those topics that seemed to get people flustered and unhappy.

“I’ve been alive for... a while now. Longer than you, and General Washington, and even the oldest living person you could think of,” Amelia told him mirthfully, despite the grave and existentially dreadful topic. “The early years were real hard. Or at least, the ones I remember in Jamestown. But--I gotta be honest, Major, I’ll always have a place in my heart for the kindness and goodness of people, and I intend to give that back. This camp, this army, this Cause--and hell, me--? We’d be nothin’ without people and people are who I’ve gotta look after. That means you too, Sir.” 

She finished with her rifle and began to inspect her work. “Anyway, I’m sure you don’t want me to tie that bayonet of yours into a pretty little bow, so I’m sure you’ll be keepin’ that to yourself.” Her grin returned, though it could be mistaken for her pride at her rifle’s readiness and care. There was a sincere playfulness that said she was mostly joking... mostly. But it was not an idle threat either.

[aella-targaryen]

I guess for me it depends on the context of how he calls her “weak” by frustration but idk if I still like it. I think the writers were trying to make a parallel with him calling viserys weak. I’m just mostly nervous because this is the last episode before season 2 and who knows if the writers are going to mess it up with mysaria or even nettles. Ryan doesn’t seem to like them either with the way he said daemon abused rhaenrya and it’s shapes her to how she is so I wouldn’t be surprised if he ruins the relationship moving forward. Also apparently they don’t talk about it afterwards according to the leaks which is weird in my opinion and how he doesn’t apologize. I’m sure we’ll get the context of why he wants to go to war in the scene but idk… I can’t help but be nervous cus this could be the downfall of their relationship. Who knows if we’ll get any touching moments anymore

DAEMON AND THE ABSOLUTE LOVE.

Well, there is a possibility that their romantic relationship will end, yes.

Which would be stupid considering that Daemyra is the best couple ever created in the entire GOT universe.

And yet one thing I've learned from Daemon is that: Once he loves someone, he loves that person forever. Just like he did with Viserys.

The more I analyze Daemon the more I am convinced that the fundation of his emotions is not romantic love, the fundation of his emotions is absolute love. That kind of love that exists only for itself, regardless of any relationship and appreciates all aspects of the people Its directed to. Daemon will always be what Rhaenyra needs: her husband, her lover, the father of her children, her consort, her family, her soldier, her uncle, or her warrior. She just has to ask him honestly and if he opposes her wishes I think he will be to protect her or their family.

His romantic feelings for Rhaenyra are only the effect and not the cause of his absolute love for her. Daemon will never stop loving Rhaenyra no matter what happens and whatever she does.

We have all been somehow contaminated with Disney fantasies and children's fairy tales where the prince always has to profess his love with dramatic speeches, kisses or sexual acts and emotional talks of apology if he offends his delicate princess.

But we usually forget that those things are not the only ones that show that a person truly loves us.

Still, unfortunately we always hurt those we absolutely love, sometimes in irreparable ways that cause us to take differents ways . And that's fine. We should never stay close to someone who hurts us. But but we can always love someone from the distance, even if we never see them again but, if our hearts allow it, we can always love someone who has hurt us.

Honestly, at the moment, romance is the last thing I care about Daemyra. Yes, I enjoy it. But I can also enjoy true and unconditional love stories even if there is no romance involved.

I understand that there are many who do not like that idea. So don't feel bad if the course of their story disappoints you. Trust me, I have experienced the same situation and the truth is that no one has ever died for disappointment. It is better not to take things so seriously, after all it is only a television series. I am sure that at some point you will find a couple in fiction that you completely like.

And i don't think Daemon will ever apologize in words for his actions. He seems more like the kind of person who apologizes only through his actions.

He never told Viserys "I'm sorry"

And for that reason his relationship with his brother was "ruined" ?

[hotchley]

the love he deserves

"We accept the love we think we deserve." - Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Surprise! I wrote something! I have no idea what it is, but there's Hotch hating himself and thinking the team are too good for him and some comfort, so do with that what you will. I'm just glad I wrote something.... There's also no dialogue which is weird because I LOVE dialogue.

Anyways. I'll let you lot decide whether it makes sense.

Trigger Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse, blood

read on ao3!

Aaron Hotchner does not care for his own life. He does not care what nettles sting him, or what knives find themselves a home in his back. He does not flinch when he is labelled cold or unfeeling, and he does not shed tears when words like barbed wire a spat in his face.

He is expendable. 

And his life holds no value. Not to his team, who deserve so much more than a man broken by the very job he was supposed to show them had purpose, nor his son, who could probably hardly remember him and who deserved a parent that would not flinch every time they had to hold hands.

Aaron Hotchner's life is worthless to him. How can a life that had destroyed so many others ever mean anything? It was his fault that Elle almost died and it was his fault that Jason left. The blood of Haley Brooks- because no matter what the gravestone said, they had not been married, she did not love him- and of Kate Joyner and of Megan Kane were all on his hands. There were days where he believed it was a miracle that he did not walk around with a permanent red stain on his hands from where they had beaten George Foyet until they almost could not tell it was him.

He is a monster, dressed up in a suit, just like his father was. When he dies, no tears will be shed for him. His body will be lowered into the ground next to Haley, even though he won't deserve to be near her, not even then, and he will not be mourned. Derek will take his place. Jessica will take his son.

They will be fine. He knows this. When his son was sent into Witness Protection because there was a dangerous serial killer just waiting to get his hands on him, he came back completely undamaged. As though nothing had changed. When George Foyet turned him into a ghost that could barely hold a gun without shaking, Derek Morgan took over the team without faltering.

His father had once, and only once, said that Aaron was not his son. He was sixteen years old, angry at the world and desperately searching for a way out of his town that suffocated him more and more with every moment that passed. It was the only time he'd had the courage to fight back against his father, and he had ended up in the hospital. The excuse of falling down the stairs carrying the hoover was given.

But that comment did not make him feel ashamed of himself. It made him happy. Because if he was not his father's son, then he would not become him. He would not be like him, and he could pretend that there was a different future waiting for him.

Only there wasn't. Because he may not have been his father's son, but he was his mirror. And Haley had been so disappointed when Jack's hair had been blonde, his eyes more blue than brown, but Aaron had been relieved. When he died, so would the final piece of his father.

His father had not been a coward. He had carried on fighting through the lung cancer until his heart couldn't take it and he'd keeled over in his office, only found the next day by his secretary because his mother had stopped caring when her husband didn't come home. He had lost a part of him when the diagnosis came through- the part that loved Sean- but he had carried on because he needed to.

Aaron hadn't. He'd gotten reckless and lashed out at all the wrong people.

But then Haley died, and he had.

He'd carried on.

Not because he needed to. If anything, what he did was the opposite of what was needed. Jack needed a father, not a hero, but Hotch clung to the idea that what Jack wanted was a hero, if only so he could justify his return.

He carried on for the team. Because they were his team. 

And Aaron Hotchner cares for his team. He would stop the tide from drowning them, save their eyes from all the horrors he could. He would hold their hands and remind them of their humanity by forcing them to focus as their hearts carried on racing, as their hands turned cold when they looked into the abyss.

To him, the team is indispensable. 

They remind him to smile, force him to eat and they care. They care far too much about one dangerous and cracked man, who is currently walking a tightrope. Fall too far to the right and he will be sucked into the pool of loathing. Too far to the left and he becomes an unsub. Too far forward and he becomes his father. Backwards and he becomes the scared little boy again.

His team means everything to him. They have to. They are good and loyal people, that had grabbed him by the hand without fear and forced him from the ledge so many times without ever realising just how much strength that took. One day- and he always tells himself it will be soon, even though he knows it won't be- he will stop accepting the love they give him.

But until that day, he will cling to their goodness. Because the team- the only family he'd ever really had- changed the rainbow for him. He has no idea how to tell them, but they did, and he will never stop being grateful for that.

Emily Prentiss is the other side of his coin, far too stubborn but cursed with a mind that can't help but think of the switch within all of them that causes them to do terrible things. When he thought of red, he always remembered the blood on Elle's wall that never truly washed away. He still remembers that now, but he also remembers how beautiful Emily looks in her red tank top.

Penelope Garcia is beautiful, and her ability to never stop seeing the good is something he is terrified of destroying. But where orange had always been the colour of the fire he was told so many times he was going to burn in, it had slowly morphed into the colour of her favourite cardigan, that she always wore on the harder days and that smelt like vanilla and caramel.

Jennifer Jareau is everything he doesn't deserve but has somehow been given, because the two of them don't need words to speak and she somehow always knows what his silence means. Yellow had always been his mother's hair, held in place by clips she detested but wore so nobody suspected anything was wrong. It is now the golden pendant around her neck that shows just how much she trusts him.

Derek Morgan is what keeps him from going too far and getting lost in the forest of his head with no light to guide him out again. When they had met, green had been the colour of his mothers eyes, just as cold and unfeeling in death as they had been in life. Green was now the colour of Morgan's shirt, the one he had let Aaron borrow when Jack was sick on his and there were unavoidable meetings.

David Rossi is everything to Aaron: his mentor, the only father to show him love, the only person he trusts to put him back together on those rare occasions where he let himself fall apart. Blue was the colour of the walls in his childhood home's basement, the one place he knew he could and would never be safe. But it was also the colour of the jumper he was given for his birthday, back when he was drowning as Unit Chief because Gideon had left. That jumper always made him feel safe and untouchable. 

Spencer Reid is a genius, forced to grow up far too quickly in a world that gave him nothing but took everything. Hotch had always associated purple with the bruises on his stomach and back, but now he associates it with Spencer's scarf, that smells like old books and whiteboard pens. 

What Aaron doesn't know is that he has also helped save the team. They remember every time he put his career on the line for them, and they appreciate it more than words could ever say.

Emily knows she is trusted. Penelope knows how hard he fights for her. JJ knows he is doing his best to be a good father. Derek understands his fear, and reminds him it won't happen. David holds the same pride in his chest for Aaron that everyone who loves a child does. Spencer finally understands what a parent is meant to do.

Although Aaron Hotchner does not care for his life, his team does. They know he doesn't think they do, but the love they have for is pure and innocent. It is real and true, and they will die before someone takes it from them.

One day, they will convince him that the love they show him is no less than what he deserves. One day. It's all they want. And to want is a beautiful thing to do because it gives them hope that a better future lays ahead for all of them. But all they wish for from the future is that Aaron Hotchner accepts their love, not because he is afraid of it leaving, but because he knows that it is what he deserves.

[scrawnytreedemon]

going off that last ask: loz/yazoo character opinion? i wanna read your thoughts!

Ohooooo, I was waiting for something like this!!! Thank you, Vee :) I’ll do my best to explain <333

Starting off with Yazoo:

First impression: Calm, level-headed, perhaps a bit shy. What surprised me the first time watching was how deep his voice was. He’s got this grace about him that leaves you simply... staring. I interpreted the introductory scene where Loz nearly cries and Yaz tells him not to as comforting-- Which I think is what a good chunk of Rem fans see it as? Overall, pretty, but not much else.

Impression now: I think he’s fucking ruthless under that dainty face, if you ask me. Honestly, it’d be right in line with Sephiroth. I think out of the both of his brothers, he gets along better with Kadaj, but if he wasn’t around, I doubt Yazoo would have nearly enough investment in their quest. He comes across as apathetic and uncompassionate, perhaps even a little haughty. I feel like his relationship with Loz is tolerable at best, and downright acidic at worst. With Loz being the way he is, I wouldn’t be surprised if Yazoo and Kadaj had to keep an eye on him at all times, just in case. I feel, though, at the end of the day Yazoo does care about his brothers, and would risk his life for them. It’s in his bones, and he can’t help it, whether he likes it or not. Still very pretty though, lmao.

Favourite moment: Been forever sinced I watched Advent Children, and, unfortunately, Yazoo my beloved doesn’t get many scenes. I’ll have to go with the introductory scene, as it gives us an idea of who they are and what their dynamic is like right off the bat.

Idea for a story: I feel like any story with Yazoo inevitably ends up involving Loz, so I’ll make a joint bullet-point for them at the end of the post <3

Unpopular opinion: Mmm, probably the more apathetic, if not downright spiteful characterisation. If my friend @vesaniens​’s experience is to be believed, then at least Back In Her Day it was far more common for Yazoo and Loz to be buddy-buddy while Kadaj goes off and does his own thing. I can see the appeal in that dynamic, and understand where it comes from. There’s alot of ways you can interpret ‘don’t cry, Loz,‘ and as it is the introductory scene, however you do sets down the foundation for all that follows.

Favourite relationship: The Remnants aren’t characters I can find preferable ships for in-canon, so romantic is off the table here. I will say, though, a dynamic where Genesis and Yazoo are mentor and mentee would be downright tooth-rotting. Genesis preening him, taking him out to nice places, showing him fine literature-- I love it! I don’t see much talk about how the Remnants would relate to Gen and Geal, and I think that’s a damn shame. Plus, Yazoo can then quietly rub it in either of his brothers’ faces whenever he gets annoyed with them. To pick another, though, definitely him and Loz-- Especially if it is strained. It’s very clear they’re meant to contrast each other. Yazoo is lithe, subtle and venemous; Loz is big, loud and sensitive. I personally have a huge soft spot for fics where they recouncile their differences and learn to truly love each other.

Favourite headcanon: Honestly, I feel like I need to make a general headcanon post for the Rems as a whole. They’re all inherently tied, so a change to one of them usually affects the other two. To touch up on one from a theory I read about a year ago now(God, has it been that long?), I like the idea that the Remnants got a little bit of Genesis and Angeal mixed in. They’re like 90% Seph, give or take, but the other 10%~? Now that’s where the fun begins baby!!! In this case, the donor would be Genesis, and Yazoo would’ve gotten the more passive-aggressive, snarky, preening aspects of his character. The resentment and feelings of  inferiority towards Sephiroth end up getting mixed into Kadaj, however I don’t want to elaborate on this too long lest I go off-topic. On a more crack-heavy note, I feel like if you waved a laser-pointer in front of him, he’d be transfixed. He’s too dignified to actually leap at it... But he likes watching :)

Now, as for Loz:

First impression: Big phuckign himbo, idiotte of a man. Probably can’t even buckle his own boots. Playtime??? Bitch NO, it’s not playtime! WHY ARE YOU CRYING??? But yeah, my initial view fell alot more in line with what I think is the most common interpretation of him. His excecution leans heavily to Big Dumb Idiot Man Who Cries When He Sees A Duckling.

Impression now: Baby. Poor fucking baby. Honestly, that could be said for all the Remnants, but I don’t think Loz’s struggle is discussed nearly enough. I’ve talked about this before, but, for me, it’s painfully clear that Loz is essentially a child in a grown man’s body. Writer Kazushige Nojima has Loz’s lines about playing during his fight with Tifa were based off his own son, and has described him as “missing a little something upstairs” --And looking at him through that lens, things become alot more disturbing. He’s Sephiroth’s love for Jenova; a doting, yearning, infantilising love. There’s an innocence to Loz, something sweet, something light and airy-- And to have him fight, have him torture, have him kill... just, man. This jarring dichotomy between such hulking, brutal strength, this bringer of destruction, and this kid who wants his mother. Is he aware? Does he truly understand the weight of his actions? Can he? Most of this, admittedly, is a bit of a stretch, but I love this doof alot jhdhjfdjhs can you blame me?

Favourite moment: Oh, definitely the crying scene-- You must be real tired of hearing that again. Though, in Loz’s case, it sets up his sensitivity, and his dynamic with his brothers-- Yazoo in particular.

Idea for a story: Same answer as Yaz.

Unpopular opinion: I think my more infantile view of Loz as a whole is semi-unpopular? Fandom seems pretty split on whether he’s just a himbo or actual babyman. Again, hard to tell, what with most Rem content and discussion being several years old and tricky to find. I’d be curious to have a discussion on this! But yeah, if we’re talking about the wider fanbase, I think my intense appreciation of him is definitely unusual. Alot of OG fans see the Rems as tropey villains, and while I will argue that it makes sense considering they’re fragments of a bigger, badder, more complex villain, I don’t think Loz is nearly as shallow as most would have you believe.

Favourite relationship: As discussed with Yazoo, there aren’t any canon characters I consistently ship the Remnants with -- Especially not for Loz, in particular when viewing him through that youthful lens -- Though as with everything, I am flexible :) On the platonic side... Honestly, I think Loz would just be a big softie who hangs around everyone. If Angeal was baking, Loz would definitely chip in to help, though he might cause more trouble than if he stayed aside. I think he’d try and reach out to Sephiroth, only for his affections to be rejected because the latter is Bad With Emotions and is torn between on whether the Remnants are a nuisance he hands off to his old friends or his children who he wants to scoop up and carry off into the vast cosmos.

Favourite headcanon: Loz eats alot of shit he isn’t meant to. Like, shit that would kill twenty grown men. At least once he has mistaken stinging nettle for mint, and spent the next two or three days scraping his tongue constantly. Would chase a ball if thrown, no questions asked; try playing frisbee with this dude, and you’ll end up on the other side of town by the end of it. If you try and pick him up, he just slumps, like a big, brawny ragdoll cat-- Probably purrs like one, too. Definitely appreciates a good scratch behind the ear :)

There’s like... probably mountains more, but this is what I’ve been able to coax out after a day of writing this on and off. Again, thank you so much for asking!! I’ve been meaning to ramble about the Remnants for ages now, but didn’t know how to go about it.

Aight, as promised:

Story idea: This is one I’ve had on my mind for years now. I haven’t gotten around to it, as it’d require greater familiarity with FFVII’s world as a whole, but the premise is that Yazoo and Loz escape far out into the countryside, and end up in a village. Yazoo soon falls ill, and Loz has to provide a living working for a local farmer. Their dynamic is initially strained, and without Kadaj to hold them together, they nearly end up splitting before arrival. As time passes, and as they grow closer to the community, Yazoo’s grumbles fade into concerned murmers. Slowly, he begins to trust Loz more, and Loz learns to take more responsibility. But as their friendship blossoms, Yazoo’s body withers. Bedbound, he wonders how Loz would fare without him, if he could make it. I imagine this ends up leading to Loz deliberately blowing their cover to get needed medical help from WRO, turning themselves in during the process.

Again, there’s probably more to it, but to be honest even I don’t know. That’s the great thing about creativity :) You never know where you end up!

Thank you for asking, and feel free to ask more if you’re curious! This goes for elaboration on characters already asked, certain headcanons, and even pairings! Also, feel free to add on with your own thoughts! Whether they be additions, refutations, or so on. Fandom discussion(provided it’s civil qwq) can be so much fun!

<333

[silverbastardgoldenfool]

Realm of the Quarantine Reread End-of-Book Questionnaire: Assassin’s Quest

Any differences between your first/previous reading experience and this one?

Keep in mind I’m writing this months after finishing the book lol (it’s mental illness innit). I have LOTS of notes to go off but yeah, things aren’t as fresh in my mind overall. With that said the biggest difference I can think of between my first and second experience with AQ is my feelings towards Kettricken. I think the first time around reading you know that Fitz is an unreliable narrator but you are still limited by his viewpoint so you can get a bit trapped seeing things the way he does. For this reason, I think I pretty much just forgave Kettricken when he did on my first read, whereas on this read I was like……. Waiting for her to actually apologise and show some sympathy towards Fitz and it just…. Never happened.

Like, don’t get me wrong, I still love Kettricken as a character and I fully recognise that she has been traumatised. I don’t expect her to be nice or act rationally, and in the case of being willing to take Nettle for the crown… It’s cold but she’s doing what she feels she has to. My issue is - do what you have to, but don’t expect Fitz to understand or forgive you (same with Starling). But I think what bothered me the most was how Kettricken would constantly confide in Fitz and break down to him and he was always there to let her do so, yet she NEVER gives Fitz the chance to do the same. The one time he does “open up” in a sense is when she forces him to air out his traumas in front of everyone, and she didn’t show him any sympathy for what he’d been through then or later. She has been through hell, absolutely, but while her plight may not have been any better than Fitz’s it certainly wasn’t any worse. She pretty much had two modes in this book: completely cold or a crying wreck - but she was only ever crying for herself. She lets Fitz console her but she never consoles him. Again, this is a result of her own trauma and I don’t expect her to act any differently, but it just reaffirmed for me that while she and Fitz care for each other deeply it is not an equal relationship. Fitz feels an obligation to serve her and she - knowingly or not - takes advantage of that. Like, after realising that this is their dynamic it is so obvious that the same is true in Royal Assassin as well, and it will be interesting to see how it changes (or doesn’t) in Tawny Man as I don’t remember it well enough to say.

Must reiterate: Kettricken is still a great character and I still have a lot of respect for her, unfortunately she just falls into the overfull camp of people who love Fitz but have an unhealthy power dynamic with him.

The other big difference I noticed was that the Verity stuff just wasn’t as devastating this time. Not because it was any less sad but it just didn’t tear out my heart like it did the first time. That’s not a fault with the writing at all, I think it’s just the fact that, knowing what would happen to Verity and that we wouldn’t see the real Verity again, I kind of already let go of him at the end of Royal Assassin.

Something you can’t believe you forgot

I guess more of a misinterpretation/wishful thinking but like, realising that there is no passage explicitly stating that Fitz and the Fool were actually spooning in the mountains murdered me and spat on my corpse.

Oh also!!! Fitz yeeting himself out the window at Tradeford castle jskaskjf

Favourite character introduction moments/scenes

I love Kettle in general and the way we’re introduced to her as a cranky old lady sets her up perfectly

Favourite character arcs

Man they’re all so fucking sad lol but I guess the Fool? He goes from thinking Fitz is dead and his purpose failed to reuniting with Fitz, their relationship growing into something really real for the first time, and actually completing his mission - at least for now lol. This book is really the first time you get to see the Fool be properly vulnerable. Even when he was getting beaten up by Regal’s guards he always had his veneer of snark and superiority to hide behind - and I doubt when he went through his sicknesses at Buckkeep he would have revealed his weakness to anyone in order to be helped. But in the mountains he lets so much of that facade of the King’s Fool fall away - at least when it’s just him and Fitz. When he and Fitz meet again he lets Fitz see his grief and pain and hopelessness and joy as the Fool looks after Fitz, and then later when it’s the Fool who needs looking after he lets Fitz look after him. When was the last time the Fool had anyone really care for him like that, ya know? Had someone protect him purely out of love? Ouch dude!!!!

Also he gets to kiss Fitz at the end so good for him!!!!!!!!!! Be gay ride dragons!!

Favourite quote/s

“I would kill Regal. It only seemed fair. He had killed me first.”

“I had looked into the heart of my enemy. I still could not comprehend him.”

“The more I drank, the less tolerable my situation seemed. And the more intolerable I became to my friends.”

“I had never thought to be disdained by a tree.”

“The Fool, the Fool, only the Fool. I sought for him. I almost found him. Oh, he was passing strange, and surpassing strange. He darted and eluded me, like a bright gold carp in a weedy pool, like the motes that dance before one’s eyes after being dazzled by the sun. As well to clutch at the moon’s reflection in a still midnight pond as to seek a grip on that bright mind. I knew his beauty and his power in the briefest flashes of insight. In a moment I understood and marvelled at all that he was, and in the next I had forgotten that understanding.”

“When you can either laugh or cry, you might as well laugh.” - the Fool

Favourite relationships

Fitzandthefoolfitzandthefoolfitzandthefoolbahslbghabfhalgngjba 

Also fitz and nighteyes (speaking of which, Nighteyes’ arc in this book is also fascinating and surprisingly complex) and Fitz/Nighteyes/Fool mwah magnifico chef’s kiss

Favourite setting

Kelsingra baybeyyy. I remember the first time reading this having no fucking clue what was happening in that chapter but I guess it was the gay agenda all along

Favourite chapter

It’s gotta be the chapter where Fitz and the Fool reunite, right? Catch me just gradually losing my grip on reality with every lingering stare 

Most loved character

Foooooooooool

Most hated character

Ya know, for a minute I was actually wondering if I would like Starling this time round but yeah no lol. She was actually okay for a while but as soon as she sold Fitz/Nettle out she became The Worst, just as I remembered her. It’s not even because she betrays Fitz but because, like Kettricken, she expects Fitz to forgive her for it, to the point of running to tattle to the queen because Fitz isn’t giving her enough attention (I’m also not impressed with Kettricken for actually getting involved instead of just telling her to grow up). Not to mention her constantly misgendering/gendering (??) the Fool or just assuming the Fool’s gender and loudly fucking proclaiming it to everybody is just truly fucking disgusting. Like I cannot even explain how furious I was reading her incessantly using she/her pronouns for the Fool despite no confirmation that her theory is right or that the Fool is comfortable with this and despite EVERYONE ELSE using he/him pronouns. God I’m mad now lol. She just acts like a spoilt brat and it makes my blood boil. But that’s probably because I have known many people like this so… Good character writing lol congrats

Raise your hand if you’ve been personally victimised by Robin Hobb (most heartbreaking and/or visceral moments)

The whole first chapter/s are just so heavy and carry on that gut wrenching feeling from the end of Royal Assassin. Fitz just has no real desire to live and watching him systematically severing the last few ties he has to his human life is just so sad.

Even though I wasn’t as attached to Verity this time, his goodbye to Fitz still made me cry

As did Fitz giving Kettle her skill back

Verity using Fitz’s body to have sex with Kettricken really got to me this time, mostly because I either didn’t notice the first time or had forgotten just how much it affects Fitz. It’s no wonder he doesn’t want to acknowledge Dutiful as his son when the event that brought that fact into being was so fucked up and traumatic. It’s really upsetting.

Burrich saying he almost took Fitz to Chivalry and he should have never let the Farseers take Fitz just …… breaks my heart. Just seeing Burrich so raw like that in general is so unusual it really takes you aback.

Details, observations, spoilery notes made with the benefit of the full picture

Strap in lads this part is lonnnngggggggg

Is it bad to immediately want to cry just from seeing “Sandsedge” on the map and thinking of Sandsedge brandy

I never really thought about how poor Hap didn’t get the real Fitz all those years and how their relationship could have been if Fitz hadn’t been partially forged

Pls I have no idea why but to picture someone as emotionally repressed as Fitz actually sitting down and writing about his life makes me want to fucking cryyyyeeeee

Fitz in the prologue talks about needing a purpose as something to distract himself from sinking [into his chronic pain, mental illness and addiction] and boy howdy if that ain’t relatable. As someone with mental illness and chronic pain Fitz is just painfully relatable way too often.

“I have never forgiven myself the triumph I ceded him when I took poison and died.” Fitz :(((( my guy :((((((( forgive yourself for surviving however you could baby!!!!!

This book mentions Bingtown providing slaves to Chalced

It’s so funny to me when people expect Fitz to have social skills as if he didn’t literally live as a fucking wolf for weeks at a time. It’s a miracle he bloody speaks

The state Fitz is in at the beginning of this book was literally Burrich’s greatest fear for him, yet Burrich doesn’t just say I told you so and leave. He stays, is patient and even optimistic.

“He (Burrich) is not bigger than I.” Why does this feel so wrong lol??? I just can’t picture Fitz as bigger than Burrich

“When you were younger and not supposed to go into taverns without me…” So it’s fine if the child goes into taverns and gets drunk as long as you’re also there. Got it, Burrich.

Fitz calling Chade “the grey one” wow get rekd old man river

Seeing Chade and Burrich interact is so bizarre

Fitz is still having seizures at the beginning of this book! I had forgotten that

God okay so idk if I can articulate this point super well but the whole thing of Fitz going through this extensive abuse and then essentially becoming an animal feels like a metaphor for the way your brain’s “higher” needs and functions just shut off sometimes under certain levels of stress. Like in order to cope with the trauma you don’t think about concepts, or long-term goals, or other people. You just take care of your basic needs - food, sleep, shelter, water - long enough that you start to feel safe and secure again, at which point your brain can open up a bit more and allow you to really think again; to want again, to plan again etc. Like obviously literally becoming an animal is a heightened version of reality, but the functionality of it is the same; our wounds and our fear stop us from fully embodying ourselves.

Burrich be like, Fitz was getting way too dependent on drugs before all this so let’s steer clear of those. :) LET’S GET HIM ABSOLUTELY SHITFACED INSTEAD

I  love how Fitz has his own unique relationship with Lacey and she’s not just Patience’s servant in his mind

Fitz talking about how even his memories from before his time in the dungeons are soiled by his trauma :( baby boy

Dude it’s so rich Chade lecturing Fitz about not making a life for himself, having friends or just chilling out like???? WHO TRAINED HIM TO BE AN ASSASSIN CHADE?? Like I get your point but what the hell kind of life did you think he was gonna have? Who ever took the time to teach him the importance of making connections with people for their own sake, and when would he have ever had the time anyway? I think Chade himself doesn’t actually know what he expects from Fitz.

Fitz saying he’s bad at making decisions because he’s never actually been allowed to make any is literally a point I’ve made lol. This is what happens when you teach teenagers how to murder in lieu of any basic life skills.

Burrich + Chiv were luv at first sight. No I will not elaborate.

“We kept you a boy, looked after you too much.” Huh??????? Fitz was never fucking sheltered lol. He didn’t have autonomy. There’s a difference.

I’m so fucking glad Fitz hugged Burrich before he left and that they actually left off on okay-ish terms. I didn’t remember that and it vaguely dulls the blow of knowing we don’t see Burrich again til Fool’s Fate (and that he thinks Fitz is dead the entire time between now and then).

“If I shaved my hair back from my brow” bitch disgusting

“Honey was the older of the two women. Perhaps my age.” jskfjnajgbl my guy those aren’t women then those are children!!!!!! U freak

I was wondering for ages why Fitz doesn’t mention the Fool like literally at all bc that’s so unusual right? Even in Assassin’s Apprentice he thinks of him when he goes to Moonseye and just in general the Fool usually enters Fitz’s thoughts pretty frequently. So why now, when Fitz doesn’t even know if the Fool is okay, is he just not thinking about him? And then I realised that that is exactly why. Because the only two people from his old life he doesn’t think about are the two people whose fates he knows nothing of: Kettricken and the Fool. So he can let his mind wander to think what Patience and Lacey might be up to at Buckkeep, or who Molly is with or whatever, because he knows they are all safe. But in such a fragile state I don’t think he can bring himself to really wonder whether Kettricken and the Fool made it to their destination - he probably doesn’t really believe they could have, and that is far too painful a road to go down when you are trying not to think at all.

I know the first act of this book is slow and that bothers some people, but I think it is so necessary, not only for Fitz’s arc but also because it really demonstrates just how severe the situation has gotten with the red ships and forged ones AND it shows just how destructive a king Regal is. Without this perspective it would probably be much harder to buy that the extreme measures taken at the end of the book are really worth the sacrifice.

Fitz is Demisexual, Exhibit A: when Honey is coming onto him, all he can think about is Molly.

Fitz is so scared of the Forged ones :( his trauma affects everything. He has no faith in himself and less heart for the violence than ever.

Speaking of trauma metaphors: the way Fitz tends to drift off into the wit or Skill after a traumatic experience is… pretty much just dissociation but magique

I forgot that witted folk can apparently communicate with each other mentally, not just with animals

“Her head was the size of a bushel basket.” Ah, yes, a bushel basket, a thing whose size we are all intimately familiar with.

Fitz finally finds others like him and even then he is not fully accepted. Told he is doing the wit wrong. Othered by the Others. It’s the queer experience innit.

Also forgot that apparently the forged are attracted to the wit as well as the Skill?

“I wondered if I had as many wolf mannerisms as they had halk and bear.” Yeah no probably not you only bloody LIVED as a wolf, Fitz.

Okay I know it doesn’t need saying but Patience is just so fucking cool!!!!!

Jesus fucking christ, Fitz skilling out to Molly when he knows Will knows he’s alive and is looking for him is just… so dumb. So so dumb. I know he’s just fixating on her because he’s miserable and she’s like this unsullied thing he had before everything went wrong but holy moly is it frustrating 

Not to mention he doesn’t connect the dots between the fact that Burrich went to “help a friend” and every time he reaches out for Molly he sees Burrich sajkdbshkhja dude

Nighteyes leaving just goes to show that Fitz cannot rely solely on Nighteyes for companionship. No matter how innately the same they are they are equally as innately different. Fitz needs Nighteyes but he shouldn’t have JUST Nighteyes (which is why he, Nighteyes and the Fool are the holy trinity). When Nighteyes leaves, Fitz is in way too fragile a state to be left alone, but Nighteyes cannot think of the future or what might happen. All he knows is he’ll be back at some point and that’s all that matters.

“My anger fed my competence” whatever you need to tell yourself sweetie

I think I had blocked out the fact the Regal was keeping animals trapped in filthy cages so they could ravage people in the king’s circle uggggghhhhhhhhh I hate him

Fitz is down on himself saying that without Shrewd’s largesse, Chade’s information and Verity’s protection his idea of himself has been stripped away and that he’s not actually competent etc. but like. This is an extreme situation!! You’re literally alone in the wilderness with nothing and no one!! Who would thrive in this situation? And nobody gets by without help anyway! The people in our lives do define us to an extent. You don’t have to be able to stand 100% on your own at all times with zero resources to be considered capable. It’s human to depend on others. Yes I am chiding myself as much as Fitz here :))))

Burrich’s earring is the repressed gay earring. No I will not elaborate.

Fitz refusing to sell Burrich’s earring is frustrating yet something I would 100% do lol

Direct from my notes: Celery hiding out in caves?? Bad bitch

“I felt I was within the flames looking deeply into the Fool’s eyes” um okay gay

It’s actually surprising that Fitz admits he would not have gone after Molly even if he had known she was pregnant when she left. On one hand so self aware yet this doesn’t stop him from completely idealising their relationship.

And then you have Molly who says he was supposed to come after her “so she could forgive him”, that he was supposed to be the one to light the candles for her childbirth etc. The fact that she in any way thought he was mature enough to be a father just shows how little they really knew each other.

Burrich treating Molly like a horse while delivering Nettle is way funnier than it has a right to be jskakjasd makes me think of Dwight treating Phyllis’ back injury in The Office lol

The first thing Burrich notices about Nettle is that she has Chivalry’s brow are you fucking kidding me. Gay!

Fitz is Demisexual, Exhibit B: He had no interest in Tassin whatsoever until she literally started kissing him. At this point his body reacted, which is normal, but as soon as he got a second to actually think about it he stopped, because for him it would not be satisfying to sleep with someone he didn’t have feelings for.

“It seemed to take years for the dried beans and lentils to soften.” Okay mood

I love how Fitz just assumes Molly will take him back. “I have a woman and child awaiting me.” Says who bitch?

Small ferret? More like big legend

Ya know, we give Fitz so much shit but honestly with so much physical, mental and emotional stress on this journey how can we expect his mental faculties to be at 100%? I wouldn’t be making good decisions either, in fact I would be long dead.

Starling telling Nik that the earring once belonged to Chivalry is truly a smooth brain move

“Do not fear, little brother, I am here to take care of you again.” Words can’t explain how much I love Nighteyes and how often his dialogue makes me smile :’)

It’s so cute how Nighteyes is worried about Molly and Nettle until he knows that Burrich is taking care of them

It’s really interesting when Fitz claims “I’d rather be with Molly even if it meant rocking a crying baby in the middle of the night” because, well, he’s literally made other claims to the contrary, saying he wouldn’t have gone with her even if he’d known she was pregnant. Because at the end of the day as much as Fitz is compelled by others to do work for the greater good, I think deep down a lot of the time it is what he would do anyway. Like I really don’t think he could actually enjoy being with Molly knowing that the world is burning down around them. He would want to get out there and help somehow; not only to secure their own future but to reduce other people’s suffering as well. He’s an empathetic boy even though he’d like to be selfish.

Every time Fitz calls Molly his wife I lose ten years off my life

Again, I understand why he’s thinking like this, but Fitz’s ownership of Molly is just so uncomfortable. The fact that he can’t imagine her not having a place ready and waiting for him in her life when he returns just illustrates that she is not a fully realised person to him. She is just a comforting idea.

Oh yes, it was definitely Starling’s “pillowtalk” that got you captured and not the fact that you fit the exact description of the witted bastard right down to having Chivalry’s earring and a whole ass wolf

Somehow forgot that Jhaampe is basically a city of tents with only a few permanent buildings and people constantly coming and going

Fitz’s first words to the Fool are “I’ve come to you.” I’m gonna fucking die

Literally every single word from the moment Fitz realises it’s the Fool and starts describing him is a full body assault and personal attack I am seeking reparations

God the tenderness, the angst, the relief……… shall i pass away

“I doubted he was much taller, but his body was no longer a child’s.” My dude this is a gay awakening if I ever saw one

Fitz be like *spends 87 pages describing the Fool in painstaking detail* anyway I love being a heterosexual male

I’ve heard ppl cite Fitz’s descriptions of Kettricken as evidence of a crush (hard disagree) but literally nothingggggg even comes close to the way he describes the Fool. Not just this once but over and over again it’s insane.

“Talk fell off between us. The bottle of brandy was empty. We were reduced to silence, staring at one another drunkenly.” skjakfnajghajgnaLNGJ is it gay to silently gaze into thine homie’s eyes

The Fool protecting Fitz from everyone - especially Starling - in Jhaampe is often hilarious and always heartwarming

Realising Fitz was skinny enough for the Fool to lift on his own ahhh no wonder he said the famous “When I recall how beautiful you were” line, Fitz is a total wreck

I love that the Fool actually gives Chade shit for his plan to take Nettle. I love him.

“Too few folk cared for me. I could not hate a single one of them.” Oh, Fitz :(

I always wonder how the Fool really feels about Molly. Is he jealous? Does he compare himself to this woman Fitz idolises and he doesn’t know? Does he know that Fitz is barking up the wrong tree or is he stuck thinking Molly must really be Fitz’s soulmate since he won’t shut up about how much he loves her and can’t wait to get back to her? He just never really lets on how it makes him feel when Fitz has relationships with women. We know Fitz gets jealous of the Fool (for litch rally like no reason lol), so with the Fool being much more honest with himself/in general about his love for Fitz and having much more legitimate reason to be jealous, is he? Or is it just something he’s made his peace with, that these women give Fitz something that he cannot? Is he okay with that cos he has to be or does he have a different, less monogamous view of love and relationships (he does have three parents after all). I dunnoooo dude I just have so many questions. Like obviously - OBVIOUSLY - if Fitz and the Fool didn’t have romantic feelings for each other before, there is no doubting that romantic feelings appeared the moment Fitz appeared in the Fool’s hut. Fitz won’t admit that but mere chapters later the Fool is talking about how he loves Fitz in every way so like. He knows. So how does he feel when Fitz is calling out for Molly in his sleep, or openly speaking of seeking her out when all this is over, and lying to the Fool to protect Molly and his daughter. Really makes u think!!!!

Fitz reuniting with Sooty and going to see her every day in Jhaampe is so cuuuute and made me so happy. Sooty is a good girl :’)

Fitz be like *leans against the table where the Fool is carving and watches his fingers at work like a true repressed gay*

Verity is literally so strong???? He submerged himself in skill and was able to pull himself back from the stream can u imagine? Go off king!

Bro I literally can’t with the Fool mentioning Jofron so casually and Fitz immediately thinking wow oh my god they’re definitely fucking oh my god the Fool has a girlfriend - Fitz sweetie calm down

I love how Fitz and the Fool just naturally walk together :))) and Nighteyes babysitting Kettle is so cute

Molly never once says that she misses Fitz. She says she always expected him to do the right thing, to come after her and not leave her alone with a child. But she doesn’t look back on their time together fondly or have much positive to say about him as a person. And all that is fair, but it’s also just… Not really the behaviour of someone who’s been separated from their soulmate. It’s more just someone who’s been left in a shitty position by someone they cared about but hardly knew.

Fitz asking the Fool what is between him and Starling when they’re literally just being civil is sooooo fucking funny. Not everyone finds the Fool as irresistible as you do, Fitz.

The Fool just casually finding a pretext to call Fitz the light of his life

Fitz telling Kettricken firmly that he will not travel if the Fool is ill is one of the only times he ever puts his foot down with her GEE I WONDER WHY

I’ve said it before I’ll say it again…… there really do be something about the way Fitz can’t meet the Fool’s eyes………. It’s not like they’re weird and colourless anymore like they used to be!!!

The Fool already talking about Clerres in this book!

Fitz and the Fool and Nighteyes playing in the stream is too fucking pure omg, it’s what they deserve

And then Starling has to bloody ruin it bc she’s homophobique

But seriously, Fitz actually lets go for the first time in ages and has a nice evening only for Starling to go tattling to Kettricken, and Kettricken having the gall to confront Fitz about it. And then Fitz solves the problem by saying he doesn’t disdain her when like!! He has every right to!!!! She sold him out, sold his daughter out. She never even apologised but instead has just been totally petty and self-righteous and stirring up trouble amongst the group. She hasn’t earned or even asked for his forgiveness. So fitting that she’s the one constantly judging Fitz for his relationship with Lord Golden in Tawny Man lol, she just cannot let Fitz and the Fool be the queer icons they are!!!

Verrrrrrrrrrry interesting that Fitz only “suddenly missed the human warmth and comfort” of Starling taking his arm or sleeping against him literally IMMEDIATELY after the plumbing and love confrontation with the Fool. I mean he has been doing all of those things with the Fool (sleeping together, walking arm in arm etc.) so it’s not about human touch at all, it’s about convincing himself that a WOMAN’S touch is somehow inherently different.

He does the same thing with Starling as with Kettricken. She technically apologises but it’s not sincere and that’s not why he forgives her. Same as Kettricken, she tells her sob story and he can’t hold onto his anger. It makes sense, but it’s just very toxic. It would be nice if at least one person would really recognise how much they’ve hurt Fitz and really, genuinely want to atone for it, or apologise without expecting forgiveness. The onus should not be on Fitz to forgive Starling but on Starling to grow up and not need Fitz to like her in order to remain civil and do what they have to. Also “I do not find your wit bond offensive” has the same energy as someone telling you out of nowhere like “It’s fine that you’re gay :)” like wow thank u?? lol

Fitz is Demisexual, Exhibit C: “I wanted her with a desperation that had nothing to do with love, and even, I believe, little to do with lust.”

“By his love he is betrayed, and his love betrayed also.” So fate agrees with me, Fitz and the Fool are in love? :)

Anytime the potential that Fitz might have to choose between Molly and Nighteyes I lose brain cells. That’s ur brother Fitz!!! It’s not even a choice!! How dare u

It’s just sooooo intentionally laid out for us in this book that Fitz’s relationship with Molly really wasn’t good or healthy and that his fixation on it is misguided, and I think that’s why I struggled sooooo hard with the ending of Fool’s Fate, because it kind of implied the exact opposite. I’m hoping on this reread I will pick up on it being laid out as a result of Fitz getting his memories/teen feelings back rather than it just feeling like a lowkey retcon, but I guess we’ll see lol

“I felt I was a bit in love with him, you know. That sort of lift to the heart.” the confirmation that the Fool KNOWS HOW IT FEELS TO BE IN LOVE sends me deep into the swamps goodbyeeeeeeeeeeee

“The one who loves him best will betray him most foully.” So fate agrees, the Fool loves Fitz best :)

“You do love me! … Before, it was words. I always feared it was born out of pity.” Godddddd Foooooooooool!!!!!!!!!!! 

Everything about Fitz, the Fool and Nighteyes meeting in the skill for the first time is just truly perfect iconic unparalleled.

Fitz’s love for Verity hurts my heart so much. Just think of the relationship they could have had if they weren’t stupid royals.

Kettle’s whole speech about Fitz and Molly… Just yes to every word.

Look I’m just gonna say it… The way Burrich reacts to Molly’s advances … like I know it’s probably not intentional but it just reads as very much fitting in with my headcanon that he is gay. As soon as she makes it clear she wants to sleep with him he like leaps across the room lol. I do believe he cares for her and loves her in his way, but it does feel mostly like he’ll just do whatever he needs to to care for her and the baby.  Sowwy

I wonder why the Fool wasn’t as affected by his giving up of memories to Girl-on-a-Dragon?? Or was he, and he just gets them back before we see him again in Tawny Man?

“Take my hurt that I never knew my father, take my hours of staring up at his portrait when the great hall was empty and I could do so alone.” um this is so fucking sad

It was the Fool who sent Starling to find Fitz after Verity uses his body and again I have to ask, wtf is going on in your mind, Fool!

Fitz is Demisexual, Exhibit D: Even once he actually sleeps with Starling he has no enthusiasm about it, he just kind of goes along with it, likely to prove to himself that he has really let go of his past/Molly. 

I always wonder why the Fool leaves now. Is it because he thinks their work is done and doesn’t want to risk messing things up by hanging around his catalyst like at the end of Tawny Man? Does he intend to come back and find Fitz again but get sidetracked by a lead or a new dream? Like it’s just weird because at first he was like “Prophet and Catalyst stick together” and was gonna stay with Fitz - or was that just an excuse because he was obsessed with Girl-on-a-Dragon? Fool u spicy lil enigma

It’s blood and the wit that wakes the stone dragons so does that mean King Wisdom was witted? Or is that obvious lol

Fitz isn’t even bothered by the Fool’s kiss, just shocked. I am looking.

Patience shouting orders at Verity-as-Dragon is beautiful ksjjk

Of courrrrrssse Burrich names his first son Chivalry

In the epilogue, the Fool is the only one Fitz actually says he misses. Exquisite.

I know some people have an issue with Regal’s death but personally I find it delicious

Okay that’s all (I say as if this wasn’t 139841989 pages long). See y’all in 92 years when my sister finally starts reading Liveship!

[doorsclosingslowly]

Hell is just a beat away (5/9)

Despite early promise, young Maul has turned out to be a disappointment, willfully delaying his training with secret attempts to make himself friends from scrap metal. He must be properly motivated, and so Darth Sidious sends him to a slave market on an impossible mission. It backfires. Star Wars: Darth Maul (2017) comic AU | 8k | warning for limb loss, discussion of sexual assault of a teenager, body horror (implanted bombs)

If the kids are united

Ta-tap tap tap, tap ta-tap tap. He takes small steps by necessity—the buyer holds his hand and creates a pace he must match—small steps, but many of them, and quick ones, taking him ever further away from the palace of Xev Xrexus. It is little cause for happiness. He has been on this path before, twice, though not back then in the company of a twi’lek child, so young that if she was a boy even the Sisters would have left her to grow for a few more years. There is no point in looking at her, in growing attached—but her presence nevertheless settles his determination, step after step after step.

A street is crossed, and there is a bright sudden pain down there and—he does not yearn for his home. There is no point. But he knows he had thick calluses then, would walk through nettles and thorny underbrush barefoot as he is now and then he would stomp for the joy of it, and laugh. There is no point in missing that boy who lived then, unsoftened by captivity and so naïve that the worst he could imagine was the siring of his child.

That boy was filed down to nothing along with his calluses and his nails and his horns. That boy died.

Soon, so will he.

It is useless to mourn. Nothing is real in the world anymore, nothing but violation, and violence.

The new Master is short, and that will make it easier. They gave their name, he dimly remembers, but he can’t recall it and it will not matter soon. Even here there are maggots, and maggots don’t care for names. The slaver’s arm is bent upwards to keep hold of one of Savage’s fingers, and the twi’lek’s chain is tied to what looks like a necktie misused as a belt. She’s walking so close behind that she bumps into the slaver with every other step, which should further diminish their range of motion, and most crucially—the slaver stowed the bombs’ remote control device inside their satchel. They will not reach it in time.

Tap ta-tap ta-tap. Now all that is missing is a spot that is dark and unobserved. Something ebbs and bobs deep inside him, but it’s futile now to wonder whether it’s regret or relief or just more fear. If he does not act soon, he’ll arrive at a ship or a palace, and his one chance will be spent.

There. Alleyway. A few more steps, and—

I’m sorry, he thinks, I know I promised to try to come home and then he shakes his thumb loose of the Master’s hand and grabs their arm tight and he pulls them up and—

He slams them against the wall.

Again.

Again.

The necktie belt’s come loose, he notices in his peripheral awareness, and the twi’lek’s picking it up and backing away. The Master in his hand squirms. Shudders. Whimpers, in a voice that sounds higher than what Savage thought he heard in the palace but Savage wasn’t all there back then, not truly, hasn’t for a very long time been as present as he is now. The false roles and expectations have dropped away from him like dried mud. (He was bred to be a warrior, not a plaything. When his Mate looked at him She should have judged his lethality and not his body, his symmetry, his submission; She should have chosen a brutal fighter to fuck and carry the line of the night. He wouldn’t have liked it, either, but at least—he would have understood. This new Master looked and saw a broken toy and so they thought nothing of stowing away the remote that gives them power. They’re holding Savage by the hand, when he is an abducted son of Wrath.)

He roars in wild triumph and swings the Master over his head, one circle, another, for more devastating impact and on the second turn something dark swirls out against the wall, something that must have covered the face, because he gets a glimpse of—

He sees—

He—

He catches them in his other arm and—

He looks but his eyes don’t want to see. He blinks and blinks, but the face doesn’t change. It still looks the dreams he tried to forbid himself. It looks like his…

It’s the face of a brother.

Not a Master. This is a nightbrother, eyes shuttered and a face as red and powerful as Savage’s ever seen. A face as small as—no, he used to raise babies, it’s not that small, but the nightbrother is a young boy and so Savage cradles him in his arms, whispering, “Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry.”

He wants to know his face, his horn pattern, wants to know whose brother this is, who sent him to Savage’s rescue, who sent a childto the hell of Nar Shaddaa—he desperately wants to see, but he almost killed this boy, almost killed this young nightbrother when he’s been so alone and bereft of purpose for years and now he almost killed—he wants to look, but his arms cradle the child and his mouth keeps repeating, “I didn’t want to hurt you, I’m sorry,” and whatever he may want to do his hands cannot let go. Savage’s body has acted against his wishes every day of every week of every month of the past few years, but this is the first time it feels sweet. He won’t let go. He is curious and shameful and shaking from adrenaline-drop, but his arms want to hold this child forever.

They are still on Nar Shaddaa, still in the slavers’ den, and any passing stranger could—but Savage waited until a dark alley to attack, and there’s no-one walking by. No threat, for a moment.

“I’m sorry, brother,” he mumbles, and his fingers slink over the back of the boy’s head—bruised, but no broken bone—and feel the breath that comes from his mouth and then he holds on tight, tight, but not so tight it’ll trigger any wound that Savage—oh Mother—that Savage just gave this miraculous small nightbrother child.

⁂

The shift was rapid, dizzying, but even in this Master has taught Maul well: the quick turn to violence and its even quicker end would certainly have terrified Maul if it was not exactly like the base pattern of his training. As it is, and with the living force bathing him in the zabrak’s intentions be they grim determination or, for minutes now, a soft and anguished terror soaked through with a strange emotion he cannot parse, but it eddies and bobs with the hand cradling Maul’s head and it doesn’t feel lethal, not even hostile…

He would have been scared, disoriented, he decides, if he was not Sith—but he is and so the sudden attack just made the world make sense.

Sense. His head aches and so does his arm but the world makes sense again, it makes sense, like it didn’t when he was leaving the palace holding onto a slave he didn’t know how to talk to, a zabrak slave that Maul desperately wants to like him—and the zabrak’s doomed, doomed, or Maul is, once they get to Master, but still he can’t help wanting to be liked—it was strange, and he didn’t know what to do except walk and get to the ship and then they would—and then they will get to Master and someone will die. That was all he understood. He didn’t want to think about it, but when he tried to focus on something else, focus on his desperate dream, he still had no idea how he could make the liking happen. Any of the small in-between interactions that people apparently have. None of the hololessons covered this scenario, and Maul didn’t have time to dream and re-dream about it until it felt perfect… He knew he’d dipped his toe in a world that didn’t make sense, and there was no guide as to what to do, before the violence.

And now he understands again. The world is back on its rails.

The darkside zabrak tested him.

There needs to be a hierarchy, obviously, and before it wasn’t clear where the zabrak stood compared to Maul, so they couldn’t really interact. That was the problem with Maul’s ideas of how to make them friends. They didn’t have roles without the hierarchy. And without the roles, nothing makes sense. Nobody knows what to do.

Except the clever yellow zabrak. He knew that the only thing they could do was find the hierarchy, and Maul’s grateful for his quick thinking, so grateful that he almost isn’t angry that he lost (even though he is Darth Maul! He was supposed to beat everybody!) and anyway, the zabrak, Savage, he decided that Maul should survive even though he’s weaker, he obviously has a purpose for Maul, and even if the purpose conflicts with Master’s and Maul will have to turn against him very soon—it feels nice, good, that Savage let Maul live. That he has a purpose for Maul. It’s so close—no, Maul decides, it’s exactly what he wanted. What else is liking but seeing someone’s purpose, anyway? (The zabrak is a darksider. He’s strong. He likes what matters. Only Maul likes things that are useless, like mangy old brachno-jags and droids made from trash, and soon he will learn to become better. Master will teach him. He’s been trying, has been punishing Maul for these useless likes, for so long now. One day it’ll stick.)

The zabrak beat Maul, and he let him live. He’s running his fingers—his bare warm-skin fingers—over the back of Maul’s head with more care than Maul would need soldering a tiny circuit, and when Maul turns his head slightly he can rest his cheek against a naked shoulder. It’s—it’s more contact with another living being than he can ever remember having. The few animals that found their way into the Mustafar complex would always scramble away from him, unless they were brought by Master and they hurt and he had to kill them. A warm pulsing neck under his fingers, hot blood—it felt nothing like this. This is gentle, luxurious, softer by a thousandfold than any robe Maul has ever touched. He almost can’t feel the leftover throbbing in his skull over the revelation that is touching, skin-to-skin, another being. A darkside zabrak, just like him.

“Sorry,” the zabrak keeps muttering. “Sorry, brother,” and Maul doesn’t know what he’s sorry for. Letting him live? It would have been honorable to die in battle, but selfishly, Maul is glad he didn’t die before he found out what resting his head against someone’s shoulder feels like. Sorry for holding Maul? He should have been. As a Sith Lord, Maul is above these animal comforts. But also—Savage would stop petting him, if he was sorry for that, and Maul is shamefully grateful that this guess, too, is wrong. It will have to end, and soon, and forever—when they get to Master either the zabrak will die or Maul—but he will carry this moment in his hearts as long as he lives.

Master will take the padawan and he will kill either Savage or Maul—wait—The padawan! Maul pushes his way out of Savage’s arms and cranes his neck. The padawan is gone. She’s—

“Brother, what is—do you sense danger?” Savage asks, but Maul has no time to think about him now.

The padawan’s gone.

Master will kill him.

Master was going to kill Maul anyway, when he found out that Maul disobeyed and used the force and brought back another zabrak, dark and much stronger than Maul, but now that Maul completely messed up the mission, Master’s going to extra kill him. Going off-script and buying the zabrak was bad enough. Maul can’t lose the padawan, the whole reason for his presence on Nar Shaddaa. He can’t botch the mission. Master is going to kill him, and he’s going to let Maul live by a thread and throw him in bacta just to kill him again. And again. And again.

And still, it’ll be better than what he deserves, because Maul just failed the ancient plans of the Sith.

He failed Master Sidious and he failed Darth Bane and he failed every single other Sith in the long lineage that led to Maul, stupid Maul who let the Jedi escape just because he thought the mission was going well and he was lonely. He failed—

But the Jedi can’t have gone far! Maybe he can salvage this!

“Brother, wait! Don’t leave—” Savage shouts when Maul starts running down the alleyway in the direction away from the slaver palace, but whatever problem he has, if he can’t stop Maul he will have to live with it. This padawan is important for the grand plans of the Sith. Maul will find her, come what may. He will not fail Lord Sidious again.

⁂

Eldra’s almost finished wedging herself into an alcove hidden three meters above the ground in the cul-de-sac of massive windowless skyscrapers—hiding’s the only thing left, there’s no way out—and that’s when the pain comes.

It’s a piercing, shrieking sort of pain; the kind of pain she last felt when her Master sagged atop her, riddled with holes and gurgling her last unkept promises through bloodied lips. It’s mixed with dread, with the certainty of failing the one you wanted to protect. It makes her sob and tremble. It wants to drown her, at once the maelstrom and the tendrils of the beast old beyond time that hides inside. It’s dark. It’s heady power. It’s madness. It’s the pain of an unshielding force user.

It’s the zabrak.

Shit. The zabrak. He provided the distraction that let Eldra get away. He gave his life for hers. Eldra could have lived with that, with knowing he died so she could run. She thought she could, anyway. A good Jedi would have. He was just a slave, a force-sensitive found too late for anyone’s good, a desperately angry and scared young man. Perched on the very edge of the dark side, at best. Fallen, maybe. Too late. She is a Jedi, and she knows that sometimes, a life must be given for the greater good. If someone had to die, maybe it was for the best that it was his life: he’s just a darksider. She has been raised to give her own life, and the zabrak’s a civilian—a slave, a slave just like she is now—but this is the way the world works.

Eldra had to survive, because she must tell the council of the return of the Sith. That’s what matters. A single life is nothing to that, even if the zabrak’s death is agony. The good of the many comes first.

There is no death, there is the force, Eldra mumbles. There is no death. I accepted that he would die, when I ran away instead of helping him take down the Sith. I accepted his death. I must stay calm.

But this isn’t death. This is torture.

What the fuck is the Sith doing to him?

Maybe it will be over soon.

Maybe. Please. Don’t let him suffer too long. Eldra stays sardined in her hideaway, concentrating on not whimpering too loudly and on releasing the secondhand pain into the force, because what else is there to do? She can’t escape. She can’t save him. No-one can. It’s a decade too late for that.

There’s no way out of this dead end, no decent footholds for climbing and even if she managed—there’s no way she won’t get tired, half-way up these hundreds-of-meters tall buildings. Thousands of meters. She can’t guess well right now. She doesn’t remember the last time she ate, though the slavers must have given something to her, and her arms still ache from a day of immobility. Spiritually, she’s weak, too, and even reaching into the force to unlock the damn manacles had almost destroyed her. Had almost made her Fall.

Eldra is terrified. She can’t pretend not to be, can’t meditate it away. She’s scared. She’s angry, at Woobudg and at her Master and at the Jedi and more than anything, at herself. She’s an escaped slave, perched on the brink of the eternal dark—she is no better than the zabrak, and it freezes her heart—and her Master is dead. She can’t use the force. She can’t be a Jedi. There’s no way in fucking hell she can be calm enough for that.

There’s no way out.

The only way is back.

The only way is… how long until the Sith walks into the mouth of her cul-de-sac? How long until he’s finished torturing the zabrak? How long until he comes looking for her?

‘cause that’s the only thing that’ll happen. He’ll get bored eventually, and then he will find Eldra. There’s no way out for her. She’s dead.

She could… okay, she could count on staying hidden, and probably starve to death in her alcove, or be found anyway. There’s no way out of this cul-de-sac, and if he’s watched her run into it, it’s game over. The way her luck’s gone, for the past days, Eldra should definitely be expecting that he saw her. Which… if she goes back out, she might run into his open arms. Or he might be gone, after all.

Or she could help the zabrak. He’s still alive: she can feel his pain.

She shouldn’t, though. The Sith have returned. That’s what matters. Eldra must stay alive and return and bear witness.

⁂

Master will kill me. Master will kill me. There’s no space for anything but this truth, as Maul runs through mazes of skyscrapers in search for the padawan he almost successfully brought back to enact the nebulous ancient plans of the Sith, head pounding and the stuffed satchel bouncing against his back. No space for anything, not even the firestorm of pain that suddenly filled every square meter of asphalt. No time to think about what it means. Whose it is. Master will kill me. I lost her.

(I lost her just because I didn’t want to be alone.)

Master will kill me.

⁂

The zabrak’s only a few meters off the mouth of Eldra’s dead end. Maybe that’s why the echoes of his agony are so strong. The alternative, a juggernaut strength in the force she’s never before seen, only makes his fate more tragic. More wasteful. He could have been found as a baby. He could have become a Jedi. And now he’s lying there, and he is alone, in the very eye of his pain storm.

Alone in a puddle of blood.

Is he dead?

No, he can’t be, Eldra can still feel how much he’s suffering, but he’s—she staggers towards him and stumbles, tumbles down and catches herself with weak and shuddering arms. He’s—she looks and what she fell over was a foot, a sentient being’s actual severed limb, with charred raggedy bone and meat where a shin should be but the rest is intact, as intact as an amputated foot can ever appear, and the yellow and black skin is stark against the grimy floor. It’s the zabrak slave’s foot. She stumbled over his actual real torn-off foot, a few meters from where he’s lying, and she’s covered now in dry and tacky and congealing blood. It’s all over her once-cream padawan robes, and the zabrak’s missing a foot.

An entire foot, just gone. The zabrak’s curled up in agony and his hands are clutching the stump of his left shin.

He looks up, though, when Eldra climbs to her feet. Not unconscious, then, though that would be kinder, and Eldra must find a way to contact the Council about the re-emergence of the Sith, she must remember the bigger picture, but surely, surely, if it’s her duty to warn the galaxy then it’s also her duty to ease the pain of this one person who helped her, as much as she can. She was reprimanded for ignoring the unifying force so often in her education, but surely it would be just as wrong to walk on by. Not even Master Fyaar would have told her to walk on by. She could have, but she’s dead now,Eldra remembers grimly, she died, and I can’t just let her be my conscience anymore.

“Help me,” the zabrak begs.

It’s enough to chase off her absent teachers. Who could leave him to this desperation? Who could ignore this all-consuming tornado of pain?

“I’m not a healer,” Eldra warns, kneeling down next to him. “They steered me away from that, but I can do enough to stop the bleeding, I think.”

The zabrak coughs. No, he laughs, that was meant to be contemptuous painful laughter, and he says, “Not that. I won’t bleed out.”

“There’s an artery in your leg—"

“It was just the first warning. There’s coagulant released after it explodes. I have seen it before. This bomb is not supposed to kill.”

“Bomb?!” But she heard that inside that loathsome palace, she remembers, though she was too terrified to pay close attention—Master Fyaar would have been disappointed again—but the zabrak’s slaver said something about bombs, and a remote, and oh kriff is that what happened?! A slave control bomb blew off his foot? Oh force, they discussed planting bombs inside me, too, Eldra remembers. Default procedure, they said. But they thought it was too expensive for a standard blue twi’lek, and she’d been angry back then but—oh force, oh mercy, she’s so glad she’s not worth much.

“He ran away so quickly I lost him, and then the radius—” he swallows. “It does not matter. I need to find my brother, and I can’t walk. He’s just a child. Please. I need your help.”

A child. A child in danger, and this poor man in pain, in so much pain the very air aches and shivers, and yet—Eldra is a Jedi, and her duty is to the whole galaxy. She must warn the Jedi Council. She doesn’t have time for this. She mumbles, “I’m sorry, but I have to—”

Quick as a viper, the zabrak pushes her down and crawls on top of her. He drives his forearm into her neck and pushes her head down, not with so much force it hurts but a definite threat, a definite herald of… of something, with his muscular naked body pressing against her clothes. Something. Something bad. She doesn’t want to lure it in even by thinking the word now but it’s been the danger all along—and then he growls, “You’re going to help me, understood?”

“I’ll fucking bite off your dick,” Eldra hisses. “Try it. I’ve still got my teeth.”

“You…” The zabrak eases off a little, lifting his whole torso off her with trembling arms though not far away enough that Eldra can get the leverage to fight her way free, and he frowns. Confusion, or thought, but not—not lust. The force swirls less blindingly bright, for a second. He doesn’t look as scary anymore, even though he just easily overpowered Eldra. He also looks really young, when she peers up at him from this close, like he’s maybe one or two years older than her, and his shuddering grows more and more worrisome. “I need to find my brother. Please. He’s just a child.” And then, he shutters his eyes and swallows. His face does a strange thing that looks almost… sultry? Though not appealing at all, not with the sweat and the wide eyes of pain and the fact he’s an actual mutilated terrified Fallen teenage slave. “I’ll make it worth your while. I’ll do anything. Anything. I’m—good. But he’s just a kid.”

Anything, with a cadence like… And he’s basically naked, because someone wanted him that way, and Eldra saw perverts feeling him up back at the market. He’ll do anything. He’s trying to look appealing. Oh force. Oh fuck. “I am a Jedi. A guardian of peace and justice in the galaxy. I’m not a rapist. And you’re not, either—”

He nods, baffled.

“Glad we got that straight. The thing is—I have a very important task to do. The fate of the galaxy might hinge on me talking to the Temple as soon as possible.”

“He’s a just child. A tiny nightbrother child, on Nar Shaddaa.” His grey eyes are feral and pleading. He plainly doesn’t care about duty, or the galaxy, when the price is a child, and it’s growing harder and harder for Eldra not to agree. Master Fyaar, give me strength. Harden me, Master. Let me bear this dreadful hope I can’t fulfill. I mustn’t, I won’t, and yet he keeps arguing, “You’re a twi’lek. You know what that means.”

“I don’t…”

“A zabrak. He’s a zabrak,” and that doesn’t explain anything more to Eldra, but the man—the boy—above her will not leave her be, even when she shakes her head wildly, beseeching, “There’s no such thing as a free zabrak on Nar Shaddaa. As soon as they see him. Please. He’s just a child. He’s just my little baby brother.”

“But I—”

“No such thing as a free tailhead either. You won’t reach the Temple. They’ll just take you back to the slave market.”

“I’m a Jedi. I’ll manage.”

But his tearful eyes turn shrewd. “I have been here for years now,” he whispers. “You’re new. You’ll never find your way around without me,” and fair enough, these streets truly are a maze. “I’m not leaving a nightbrother on Nar Shaddaa. I am not leaving a child here. I am not leaving my brother. But I’ll help you after we find him. It’s your only chance. You can cooperate, or I can abandon you here to get caught again. Your choice.” He tightens his hold on Eldra’s neck.

It’s a hollow threat, and they both know it. The zabrak can’t leave her. He can’t walk, the best he could do is crawl away slowly until someone puts him out of his misery, or, more likely, picks him up and sells him again, as he just predicted for her.

The worst he could do is kill her, and since that wasn’t the threat…

She must warn the Jedi. She must warn the Jedi as quickly as possible, but. A child. He’s begging for the life of a child. And Eldra… No matter how many lectures she got, she never managed to get the unifying force. The big picture. It’s so remote, and it just makes sense, that the certain immediacy of present pain always overshadows the possibilities of the future. In the future, there are the Sith, grim and ancient and the foresworn enemies of the Jedi; but the Sith haven’t yet hurt her. Even the Sith she met hasn’t. He was the least horrible of all of them.

In the present, there are slavers. A whole planet of them. In the even more present, there is the offer of a temporary alliance, made by the one person she’s met in the last few days who doesn’t see her as meat.

She is so tired of being on her own.

“I’m Eldra,” she says. “Let me up, or I won’t be able to carry you.”

Stormy grey eyes turn bright and then they crumple up in pain again when he must’ve accidentally bumped his stump somewhere while he rolls off her. He’s seriously, seriously hurt. Well, of course, Eldra, he just had his foot blown off, she mocks herself. Obviously, she mocks her mocking self back. But we both need to move, so I probably need to carry him, so knowing how much pain he’s in, what movement he has left… that’s useful. And if I could lessen that pain…

Eldra can’t reach for the force while she’s afraid or angry, or she will Fall. But she’s not as scared now. She just wants to help him. That’s not evil, right? How can compassion for a slave be evil? Master never expressly said it was, so surely it can’t be that bad?

“Wait. Let me touch it,” and the zabrak presents his burnt stump without question. “I’m not a good healer. But I think I can… shut up the nerves?”

What the zabrak mumbles in response sounds suspiciously close to Witch, but after the first flinch, he allows her to touch him again, resolutely refusing to shudder though he definitely looks like he wants to, and refusing to tell her what he meant, too. He does look slightly less agonized after she feels her way into his synapses and cells and tells them to heal, heal, and that their warnings are great but no longer needed.

Now she just needs to heave him upright and hold him, somehow, while she walks, so he can hop along.

“How did this leg-be-gone thing happen, anyway?” she asks right before she pulls, because a distraction might make this easier on him.

“He—” The zabrak’s breathing heavily, but not accidentally fighting her or crying or anything else she feared. He’s doing much better than she would in his position, that’s for certain. “My brother. When he ran off, he still had the remote. The bombs trigger when it’s away over a certain distance…”

The remote? The one that the slaver gave the Sith? How— “How did your brother get that remote?!”

“He put it in his satchel. Must have forgotten about it. It’s not his fault.”

Wait.

Satchel.

He put the remote in the satchel.

Is his brother the…

“The Sith?!”

The word means nothing to the zabrak, she can tell. If he recognized it, he would have shuddered in fear and the force around him would turn frigid, because the Sith are the very worst threat in the galaxy, but instead he looks gently confused again and says, “No, he’s a nightbrother. A zabrak. Like me.”

That’s not a hindrance, as far as Eldra knows. There is a Sith species, but towards their fall—and now in their resurrection, presumably—Sith could be of any sentient species in the galaxy. “I meant… Is your brother that tiny person with a mountain of black clothes who bought both of us?”

“Isn’t he clever?” There is nothing on the zabrak’s face but deep adoration. For a second, even his pain seems forgotten. Even the smog clouds seem to have lifted, for a second, but no—that warm breeze. The sudden pure air. That’s the force. The force, lit up by love for this brother, and yet, he’s talking about a Sith. The embodiment of evil. The ancient enemies of the Jedi. It doesn’t make sense. “If they’d seen his species, he would have been captured immediately, but he made the perfect disguise and he fooled all of them!”

The love doesn’t make sense. But even worse… “You are talking about the weirdo in three dress shirts and that handmade leather balaclava and winter sports sunglasses combo?! The tiny ragged black ball?! That’s a perfect disguise?!”

“It worked,” the zabrak replies, as if that’s all the proof he needs. “My brother’s a genius.”

It’s impossible to love a Sith. They don’t feel affection. They can’t; all they process is dark possessive urges and hatred and so on. Maybe Eldra was wrong about the buyer’s aura, though. She’s never met a Sith before, after all, so how should she know what they feel like in the force, and she’s only met a few corrupted force sensitives before too and most of them in the presence of Master Fyaar, who may well have dampened their impression on Eldra… Maybe she was wrong. Maybe there is no Sith here. After all, she can feel the zabrak is dark and Fallen, too, but he’s not a bad person. His life just sucked. Wait. ‘The zabrak’…

Eldra prods his navel with a finger. She’s holding him up by now, his chest half-propped up on her shoulder and head, and it’s as high as she can reach with only minimal danger of dropping him. “You never said your name.”

“Savage,” he says, and hops to catch up to her one step.

“A pleasure to meet you, Sir. I’d bow if I could, but you know…” Eldra grins, and he does too, and it’s… nice? Despite the general horror of, well, everything, this is nicer than anything else that’s happened on the mission so far.

She puts her foot forward again and waits for him to catch up. And again. This will take forever. But the alternatives are all worse. Hopefully the little brother knows how to stay hidden until they manage to steer their three-legged train wreck to… “How are we going to find him? He could be anywhere. You can’t walk, and I can barely keep you upright—”

“He’s close,” Savage says.

“How do you—”

“I wouldn’t be alive if he wasn’t.”

Of course. Eldra feels stupid. How could she have forgotten… “The bombs.”

“Yes. Stop for a…” Eldra braces herself, and he leans against her head, cold and trembling finely. He’s heavy, even though she’s never been the weakest in her age-group by far, both as a twi’lek—not the frailest of species anyway—and because she always feels better when she’s moving. She adjusts her grip on his waist so he doesn’t slip. His hearts beat loudly against her lekku. “Second one’s at two hundred. In the stomach. Takes a while to bleed out, and even if I don’t the sepsis… The last Master took real pleasure in explaining it. Not gone off yet. He can’t be more than two hundred meters away.”

Eldra won’t ask where the fourth bomb is. She won’t. “But in which direction?”

“Not in that dead end.”

“Worked that one out myself,” Eldra snaps.

“So… sorry.” Heavy breathing. “I…”

“Sorry. I shouldn’t—a Jedi would not take their fear out on you,” Eldra whispers. “Okay. Good. Two-hundred meters, that’s manageable. We can do that. We’ll find him.”

A few more steps. Then: “The stomach,” Savage whispers. “It’s—you should probably get your head away. It’s a strong one, I think. You might get hurt when it goes off.”

Great. Her head is right next to a bomb. Got it.

“You’re heavy, Mister. Can’t carry you otherwise.”

“You might be quicker if—if you promise you’ll look for…”

He’s proposing she leave him behind.

“Maybe I’ll lose an eye,” she suggests bravely. “Some massive scarring would be nice. I’ll look so fucking ugly that every fucker who’d fuck me throws the fuck up instead.”

Savage grins, weakly but genuine, as if it’s obvious she’s never been much of an out-loud swearer before. As if he’s gently mocking her. It’s nice, though. It’s nice.

Hop. Walk. Hop.

Savage’s gone quiet, and Eldra pauses and pokes his abs again. “If you pass out, Mister, we’re both screwed. Motherkriffing fucked and utterly pfassking scraggled, even. Cruddlingly fucking boondoggled,” because it made him laugh the last time.

“I am used to pain.”

Eldra doesn’t want to know more. She really doesn’t. If the whirlwind in the force is anything like he’s feeling right now, there’s no way she could’ve been as calm as he seems. Whatever it took for him to learn that separation, that control… “Fine. As long as you’re sure… and it’s not macho posturing that I wouldn’t believe anyway… Hey, do you want a distraction?” It’s always helped her at least, having something small to fiddle with her fingers or turn over in her brain. “You know how I helped your wound with the force just now? You can do that too. You have the—I don’t know how to explain it for beginners, you have those midichlorians in your cells that interact with the force that flows between every living thing,” she prattles on, needing to gasp for breath less and less as the force grows less immediate, “and it’s basically interoception with another sense, healing yourself. You might even—maybe you can feel where the bombs are!”

“I saw them go in. Won’t bleed out for a while anyway, not even when the stomach bomb goes off.”

“No. We are absolutely not doing that, asshole,” Eldra hisses, because she doesn’t like that ‘when’. Why is she even bothering to lug around his heavy body when he acts like it’s a foregone conclusion he’ll die. He’s with a Jedi now. If that means anything at all, it means Eldra’s not going to let some slavers turn him into flesh goo from kilometers away. “There’s a warning before it goes off, right? We’ll walk in the other direction then, get back into the distance you’re allowed to be. You’re not dying on my watch. Just try the healing, okay?”

“I’m a male,” Savage whispers. “I have no magicks.”

“You definitely have midichlorians. I can feel them, you know—I could feel your bomb go off because you’re broadcasting your emotions. You’re doing it now. You’re definitely a force-sensitive.”

“But it’s forbidden!”

“Uh, yeah, probably.” This is something Eldra should have considered. Master Fyaar would have told her right away. Savage’s too old, way too old for Jedi training. He’s Fallen. She can’t just teach him how to access the force. That’s probably as bad as helping a Sith, right? But now she’s unwisely mentioned it, he seems to like the idea.

“Will it help me protect my brother?”

“It will.”

And that’s it. He won’t let her drop the topic, and Eldra can’t really hold out, not when he starts talking again about what could happen to a baby zabrak. Not when she already compromised this far. He’s already Fallen anyway, so what is the harm in teaching him something? It doesn’t matter if he’s able to be careful or not. He won’t Fall. He’s already Fallen.

“The Jedi way won’t work for you because, well—it’s complicated. But there’s something my teacher says, that fear leads to anger, and anger to hate, and hate to suffering, and that’s the path to the dark side. It always sounds really easy to slip down that path, so you’ll probably be able to do it. And get that power. Just promise me you won’t become evil, right? Just a little bit of power, to close your wounds.”

Savage shudders against her lekku. A face swirls before her eyes for a fraction of a second, a memory he probably didn’t mean to spew all over her. “I am afraid. I’ve always been afraid, and angry, and… But I don’t have power.”

“You do. I don’t know how you do it, exactly, for the dark side… They only said not to do it, they never said what not to do. Or how to avoid it, in detail. But it’s about using the force when you’re already feeling awful emotions, and reinforcing them through the force. I think, if I was Falling… I’d feel everything bad, really hard. I’d feel the things that have hurt me and the futures I dread. And then I’d feel the force in everything around me—or inside my body for healing—and I’d just—concentrate.”

“I’ll try.” Savage takes a few more shaking breaths. “Maybe once you put me down? I’m—I’m less afraid, now you’re here. We might have to…”

There’s a gable in the road. Two paths to follow, and if they take the wrong one, the bomb goes off.

“What do we do now?”

“My brother’s still less than two-hundred meters away,” Savage says.

“Should we… shout?” Even as she asks the question, Eldra wants to punch herself. Not so much because it’s a stupid idea—they do need to find the brother quickly and not go down the wrong path, for fear of accidentally triggering the distance-bomb—but because of how quickly she’s fallen into the habit of asking Savage what they should do.

It should be the other way around. She is a Jedi—was, anyway—and Savage’s a slave. Freed, maybe. Probably. Definitely, because he’s been rescued by his brother—by the Sith he’s insisting isn’t one. Eldra has to believe that this probably-not-a-Sith freed him. The fact remains, Savage was just a slave. That’s not a slight to his ability. It’s not a judgment of his worth, or not anymore. It’s just that she was trained for these situations, and Savage… he’s not even that much older than her. Four years, at the total absolute most. He’s barely an adult. She hopes he’s an adult. These slavers surely wouldn’t have paraded him around like that if he… Oh, who is she kidding. They totally would. Might even prefer it, the fucking pigs.

There is no emotion.

Eldra tries to calm herself. It was nigh-on impossible when she was alone, and with Master Fyaar’s guidance she still slipped so often, but now… it’s easier, now she has Savage to carry around. She can focus on the beat of his hearts against her squished bruising lekku, da-dam-da-dam. Da-dam-da-dam. He’s here, in the mouth of a badly lit empty street on Nar Shaddaa. He’s real. So is she.

“—Eldra.” A finger knocking against her head, gently. “Eldra. Listen. Can you fight?”

“Better than you, anyway.” It’s a good idea, though, to be ready. Eldra drags both of them towards one of the buildings and lets Savage slide to the ground where he won’t get in the way. No cover, but this’ll have to do. “Stay here. I’ll shout and if anyone—”

Savage shakes his head. “He’s my brother. He’ll listen to me. And if someone else comes, you can surprise them.”

“You want to sit out here, immobile, and shout for whoever hears it to come to you.”

“Do you have a better idea?”

“I don’t.” Eldra takes a deep breath and tries for a last moment of levity. “If the wrong people come, at least your resale value is lower now. You wiped several thousand credits off of Nar Shaddaa’s gross domestic product.”

“I got them where it hurts.”

“Yeah. Last chance to back out,” Eldra says. “Sure? Your funeral.” And it may well be: Savage’s clever enough to know that she probably won’t fight, when a slaver comes. That’s just being realistic. They’ve spent too much time on Nar Shaddaa to still cling to comforting illusions, and a shocked and starving thirteen-year-old has little change against a group of armed slavers, Jedi or not. Instead, this way, there’s a chance any attackers will only notice him, and she’ll be able to flee. It’s broadly the right tactical decision. Savage alone and one-legged could never make it, while Eldra’s at least got the ghost of a chance. She pats his shoulder. “Thanks.”

“Could you—”

“I won’t let you die,” Eldra says. “You like my jokes. You’re practically an endangered species.”

Savage laughs softly, and then winces. He’s hit his stump again.

“Sorry. But. I’ll find your brother for you, if you don’t make it. Promise.”

“Thank you.” Savage doesn’t shout just yet, and somehow, Eldra is inordinately grateful for the reprieve. Soon enough, she might have to run. She might lose her only ally. Or she’ll have to fight, and she has no weapon but the force. She’ll Fall. But if she must… If she doesn’t, Savage will die, and she’ll be alone again. If she runs, she’ll die to. She’ll die, because there is no way off this planet for her alone and if she’s found she’ll be enslaved again and she’d rather die. Soon. Any second. Falling or death. Falling or…

“Eldra.” Savage indicates a shadowy corner. “There. Don’t be afraid.”

“I don’t want to die.” It just bursts out, even though she’s meant to be the Jedi, the serene agent of the force. She trained so often and for so long, and yet, she’s terrified of death. There is no death, there is the force, and Master Fyaar would make her meditate on this for hours but she just can’t stop, can’t calm down. She wishes she was still carrying him on her back. That she still felt the solid drum of his hearts.

The response is quiet and deeply gentle. “That’s good. They haven’t taken everything from you yet.”

It’s so much kinder, more understanding, than anything Eldra’s ever thought or heard in her life about her random outbursts. So soft it raises her hackles. “Thanks for the condescension. That’s not what I meant. I don’t want to die. More than anything, I realized. I’ll fight. I’ll use the force if I must.”

It’s almost as if Savage anticipated her anger. He grins. “Don’t be afraid, Eldra.”

“Very funny, asshole. I’m ready now. I’ll go hide, and you shout.”

When she walks away, she hears a mumbled promise, too quiet for most humanoids but still clear for the auditory senses of a twi’lek. “Don’t be afraid. I’m here. You told me that trick. I’ll fight anyone who wants to hurt you.”

He can barely hold himself upright. Still, she has no doubt he means it. Asshole.

⁂

Master is going to kill Maul. He’s not found the Jedi, and he should probably have kept running down the street except he wasn’t sure whether it’s the one the Jedi took in the first place, and down in the distance, he could see people, a lot of people, and many houses lit up bright, and the echoes of pain have grown fainter but they’re still there, and he doesn’t know how to interact with these people because he had no time to prepare and what if they’re oily too and Master’s going to kill Maul but the Jedi probably didn’t take this road and so he turns around and runs back.

The pain in the force grows stronger, and soon enough, so does a voice. “Brother, brother!” it shouts.

Maul has half a mind to turn around again because it’s the zabrak probably, the zabrak that Maul wanted to be his friend and that he ruined the whole mission for, and he doesn’t have time to stop, but Savage’s stronger than Maul so he might make Maul stop anyway—but he already turned back once and he can’t go back. (He can’t turn around without admitting it’s only because he’s scared.)

“Brother, brother,” and it is Savage sitting down on the ground, and Maul cranes his neck for a good path to slip by him and there’s the Jedi, the yellow zabrak brought him the Jedi, Savage saved him from Master’s wrath, he fulfilled the sacred mission, but as quickly as the old mantra drains from his mind a new one takes its place.

The zabrak’s left leg just stops slightly below the knee. No, it doesn’t, there’s an edge of charred bone peeking out and Maul knows what happened, suddenly, he remembers the slaver—"four explosive charges within your zabrak, set to go off at staggered distances. The first one will slow him down if he runs.”—he remembers the zabrak’s alarm when Maul ran away—“Wait for me, brother! The bomb will explode!”—he remembers the pain, the endless pain exploding in the force

And he remembers the hand carefully stroking his head.

Seeing the first person in the world who is like him.

He staggers and—

“Don’t be afraid, brother.”

He gets within striking range and—

(this is a trap this is a trap)

“Come here, it’s okay.”

He kneels down next to Savage, eyes screwed shut, and he waits for the punishment to come. He waits.

“It’s okay, little brother.”

It isn’t, though. The leg is gone. The leg is gone because of Maul. It’s gone because Maul forgot about the remote and because he almost lost the padawan and because Maul was stupid enough to buy the zabrak in the first place. Maul maimed the one single person in the galaxy who ever might have liked him.

[98prilla]

Comfort

I’m still tagging you in this @coquettishcass because it’s still a continuation of my ideas based on your art, and I know you’re here for the feels :) 

Another little story about some sides having issues and helping each other out, this one starring Deceit and Patton, cameo courtesy of Remus.

He’s tired. He's emptily, exhaustedly tired. He's burrowed under all his blankets, his heating pad, and he still isn’t warm. He’s never warm. He is tired, so tired, but he can't sleep, won't sleep.

He shivers, curling tighter under the covers, not even his head poking out from under them, and wonders about the chances of accidently smothering himself.

Wouldn’t that be ironic? After everyone has made clear how much he isn’t wanted, if he were to accidentally off himself, and solve their problem for them.

He can hear his stomach rumbling, but he doesn’t move, doesn’t have the energy to find food. That would require getting up, which is off the table. Moving at all, is barely achievable. Just continuing to breathe takes all his will, the goal of moving is laughable.

He can feel the loathing. It crawls up his spine and settles in his stomach. It weighs him down and burns like stinging nettles over each inch of his skin. His cheeks are burning and he feels hot, angry tears dripping down his face.

If he was better, maybe they would listen to him, like him, care about him. But he’s not going to stop doing his job just because they don’t like it, and maybe he would be willing to open up a little, if they’d ever given him a single iota of a reason to trust them.

And he will never earn their trust because they only see him as a liar, as a trickster, as a villain.

He lets out a soft sob, hugging the pillow he’d slept with closer to his chest, burying his face in it.  

God, it still smelled like Virgil, his favorite coffee, ink, paper. The pillowcase had been in the laundry when he left, it hadn’t moved with his room.

Just the thought makes him choke out another quiet sob and hold the pillow tighter. He knows that’s his fault, too, and the guilt just adds to his loathing because he misses Virgil. He misses him like one of his arms has been torn off, like his scales when they first came in, like the heat of the sun in his skin.

A quiet knock. He knows who it will be. There’s only one person who cares enough to come looking, who cares at all. He doesn’t respond. The door creaks open anyways.

“DeeDee?” he manages to make his sniffles quieter, barely shaking under the blankets now, not that Remus has ever judged him for these episodes. It’s their silent pact, the others judge enough for both of them. They just accept each other unconditionally. Once Virgil did, too. But he’s gone and hates them now and it’s his fault.

“DeeDee, can you at least eat something for me? Please?” the others wouldn’t believe that Remus is capable of being quiet or gentle or soft, but he can be, he is now, he always is when it comes to him, and for some reason it just breaks him more.  

“No.” he manages to get out through his shaky voice and hoarse throat. Even that is like climbing a mountain in its difficulty.

“Dee, please. Just try, just a little?” Remus is almost pleading, but he just shakes his head, summoning the effort for words.

“Can’t. Will just come back up.” His voice trembles. He hates that Remus is here, hates being seen like this, hates that he is this. This pathetic lump who doesn’t even have the care to move, who won’t eat, who is denying all his survival instincts when he is literally the embodiment of someone’s survival instincts.

“Dee, it’s been days. You’re going to kill yourself at this rate.” A hint of desperation tinges Remus's voice, and he laughs. Broken, shattered laughter.  

“I should. It would make things so much easier, wouldn’t it? If I just…” he chokes on the bitterness of his own words, hate, hate, hate, eating at him, tearing him apart inside, because he hurts and he deserves it.

He hears the sound of sinking out. Remus is gone. Left him, because he pushed him away. Just like Virgil. God, he never learns, does he? He truly is worthless, truly, deserves to be alone.

He hears the door again. It could be minutes, could be hours, later. No one speaks, but he hears quiet, hesitant, footsteps. Or he thinks he does, he’s gone long enough without sleep to start hallucinating.

“Deceit?” ah, hallucinating it is, because that is Patton’s voice, and he would never, has never, come to his room. Doesn’t even know where it is. “Deceit, are you… feeling ok?” he laughs again, that broken, edged with glass laugh that cuts his throat raw, sends tears streaming down his face, curling tighter into his pillow.

“That’s a laugh and a half.” His voice is rough, scraped and bruised and battered. He knows how this goes. He knows the script.  

Knows that Patton will tell him he’s wrong, Thomas doesn’t need to lie, doesn’t need Deceit, and he will be unable to defend himself because not even he can lie that well. He is anything but needed. He would have let go, let himself fade ages ago, but he promised Remus he wouldn’t leave. He couldn’t leave Remus alone like that, not after Virgil left, and it was his fault, and besides... he could wait.  

Sooner rather than later, he knows the others will come to accept Remus. He’s so much like Roman, he’s half of creativity, after all, and Virgil doesn’t hate Remus, not like Virgil hates him. Thomas is already open to discussing the more helpful of the dark topics only Remus has domain over, it won’t be long now.  

He’s happy for Remus, he truly is. Remus deserves that light, that acceptance, that warmth. Remus deserves to be heard and listened to and surrounded by their love. Remus is a star, a brilliant, burning star, and soon the others will know it too.  

Then he will be left all alone, in the dark and the cold and the quiet. That’s what he longs for, what he aches for, the emptiness that he will let fill him, let weigh down his limbs, let soak into him until he can’t move, doesn’t need to breathe, until he just... vanishes. But not until Remus is gone, and settled. Not until Remus forgets about him down here, just like everyone else, and he can go quietly and peacefully without upsetting anyone. Because even though they all hate him, he is still afraid of upsetting them.  

“Oh, kiddo...” Patton. He’s forgotten about his hallucination of Patton. He wonders idly if he’s speaking out loud or thinking in his head, he can’t quite tell the difference anymore, and he wouldn’t really care either way, except that means his grasp is slipping and he cannot, will not, fall asleep.  

“Why not, Deceit?” He chokes back the fear that floods him, that even thinking of why not brings. Why not? Oh, what hasn’t he seen, in those dreams, in the dreams that already come when he’s at his lowest, when he can’t keep himself together, that drive him deeper and deeper into his own apathy, and loathing and disconnect?  

He sees Virgil, trying to leave, wanting to leave, and instead he grabs, forces him back, locks him up, chains him, tortures him, reprograms him. The whole time he is screaming, screaming inside, screaming at himself to stop, what are you doing, just let him go, Virgil, no, please!  

He sees Remus, torn apart by some fanged, clawed, venom laced monster, and he can’t get to him in time, he can’t stop the bleeding, he doesn’t know the antivenom, if there is antivenom, and Remus is seizing in his arms, shaking violently, babbling incoherently, but his eyes are clear as they meet his, and he wants to scream or cry or make it all ok, but it’s not, because Remus is bleeding out in his arms, he is dying and he cannot fix it and Remus knows it too, forgiving him and saying a thousand loving goodbyes with his eyes-

He sees Logan, losing his mind, having enough of their small jabs and their inattention, a victim to all the feelings Logan has and is pretending don’t exist, shifting and changing and warping like a distorted mirror until nothing Logan was left, and Insanity stood in his place, wild and manic and broken, and he couldn’t put this right, couldn’t help but shift Insanity’s room to the dark side, knowing he’d be blamed, knowing they would come for him and demand answers and not believe him and he would take it all, because Logan was gone, and he had to protect them, because Insanity would tear them apart in the exact same way Logan had always built them up.  

He saw Roman, usually so proud and loud and strong and vibrant, now colored in shades of gray, every trace of emotion leaking out of him, all of his passion and strength and hope fading out as the bruised ego has had enough, can’t take it anymore, as he fades into Apathy, and the others don’t understand, don’t even notice the difference, just continue to demand ideas and inspiration and he is powerless to help Roman, because they won’t let him anywhere near him, they don’t understand!

He sees Patton, his worst enemy, his harshest critic, his greatest rival, exploding like a supernova. All the emotions are too much, too overwhelming, he’s lied to himself about the bad ones for too long, and the mindscape is torn apart by their strength and he tries to reach Patton through the supernovas exploding in the dark, he manages to take his hand, he manages to swallow Patton’s pain, he manages to hold it all inside him as it explodes, tears him apart, tears him to shreds, and it hurts, it hurts exquisitely, and he knows it will kill him, but it won’t destroy the mindscape, inside of him. It won’t destroy Patton, and that’s the important thing, because no one needs him, no one wants him, anyway, and Patton is more important, Patton is worth something, despite everything between them, he would throw himself in front of any danger to protect Patton, because that is his job, and Patton is needed, in a way he is not, will never be needed. Patton is wanted in the same way that he is not, and now he is gone.

He is shaking again. Shaking so hard his teeth are nearly chattering, because now that the images are there he can’t make them leave, he sees them in front of his eyes, whether they’re open or closed, and he wishes this figment of Patton would just leave, just leave him to his misery because it is only going to get worse from here, he is only going to fall apart more, and even an imaginary Patton witnessing this is too much to bear.  

But part of him wants Patton to stay, because if Patton leaves, then it will be one of the others, and though Patton is cruel, at least he is unintentional in his coldness. He knows Roman’s fiery vitriol will burn him, knows Logan’s cold analysis will break him, knows Virgil’s biting words will lash his skin like a thousand whips from a cat o nine tails, knows that Patton is the first of a long list of cruelties his own mind will subject him to, because his own mind recognizes that he deserves the punishment, deserves the pain, deserves to be hated and abandoned and destroyed and he desperately, desperately wants to let it all go, knows exactly how easy it would be to let go, how much time it would take, exactly where in the subconscious he will hide so no one will find, not that they’d come looking, but still, ever present, is Remus. Not yet, he has to hold on, he has to, because he won’t, won’t leave Remus, at least until Remus leaves him for better and brighter things, takes his rightful place up there, with the others.  

He feels something. Fingers, gently teasing through his hair, the only part of him peeking out from the covers. He flinches at first, and they pause, but after a moment continue, and he realizes he hears humming as well, though it is shaky, shaky as his own voice was the last time he spoke. Or remembered speaking, he can’t tell the difference anymore between thoughts and words.  

Then the thought hits him and he jerks upright, clutching the blanket to his chest, trembling as he looks at Patton, feeling shame and bile rise in his throat, because hallucinations can’t touch, have never physically touched him before, so this isn’t a figment, this is actually Patton, he just said all that to the actual Patton.  

And now... well, now he knows. Now Patton knows every one of his weaknesses, every one of his fears, every one of his regrets and mistakes and they will be used against him and laughed at later as Patton tells the others what a hopeless, stupid fool Deceit is, as if he had any more to lose, when it came to them, as if they could resent him and antagonize him more if they tried.  

He closes his eyes and pulls his knees to his chest, still hugging his pillow around his middle, burying his face back in it, where he can pretend this isn’t happening, pretend that Patton hasn’t somehow ended up in his room, pretend that he’s nothing and no one and doesn’t exist because if he did the shame would be eating him alive right now as he cries into a pillow that still smells of his lost best friend.  

Pathetic, and weak, and useless, and stupid, and a waste, a waste of time, of space, of words, of energy.  

“Oh... oh honey, no.” The gentleness in Patton’s voice makes him flinch, so different than what he is accustomed to, it throws him off guard. At least with the vitriol he knew what to expect, could brace himself, he doesn’t know what this kindness means or is leading towards.  

He feels arms around him. Patton’s arms. Hugging him. And God it is heaven. It is warm, so comfortingly warm, the world seems muted, his mind too stunned to think, too cozy and warm and trying to process touch, being touched, he is being touched, and it is nice and he isn’t cold.

Then he practically falls into Patton’s lap, still curled tight, still holding the pillow tight, face now pressing against Patton’s cardigan, his scent of warm, clean laundry and chocolate chip cookies, he is soft and warm, and Patton’s arms are around him, holding him, rocking him, murmuring soft, kind, loving, words, and he’s shocked at every single one of them, because Patton isn’t lying, Patton believes what he’s saying.  

He doesn’t know how long they stay like that. Patton’s shirt is nearly soaked with his tears. Patton is rubbing circles on his back, and it feels so damn good, he can’t find it in him to pull away, as much as his reputation demands it. He figures his reputation is screwed after this anyway.  

“How... how did you get in here?” He manages to croak out. He feels Patton let out a soft laugh.  

“We were in the living room and Remus just kinda popped up out of nowhere and grabbed me. He didn’t say much, but he was worried and more serious than I’ve ever seen him, so I just kinda went with it. I... I'm sorry, Deceit. I’m sorry, that we made you feel this way. I’m sorry we made you feel like you couldn’t tell us you were feeling this way. I’m sorry we haven’t... I haven’t, been treating you right. I will do better. I will make sure everyone does better.” He’s crying again, because Patton isn’t lying, Patton means it, and once Patton sets his heart on something it is near impossible to stop him. He feels Patton’s arms tighten, holding him closer, and he somehow melts even more into the touch, when had he ever been held like this? He thinks he might die, if Patton lets go of him.

“Deceit... how long?” He shrugs.  

“This episode? Nearly a week. Usually... usually it doesn’t hit this hard. Last month it was only three. I... every month. At least one... one episode a month. Since... God, since forever.” He mumbles, sniffling, feeling Patton’s sharp inhale.  

“Baby, baby, baby, no. Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I don’t want you to fade, I don’t want you to disappear. Please... please if you ever think you’re about to do that, please talk to someone first. It doesn’t have to be me, if you’re not comfortable with that, just someone. Because we would fall apart without you, sweetie, we really, really would.” He’s sobbing again, he can’t seem to stop sobbing, every time he thinks he’s cried himself out, Patton says something else kind or sweet and means it, and he doesn’t know how to handle that, doesn’t know what to do with the care being directed his way, because no one besides Remus cares, and he doesn’t show care like this, like Patton does.

He feels Patton start to pull away. The air is cold, jarringly cold, and he finds himself shivering, his skin burning where Patton had been touching it. He can feel Patton looking at him, frowning at him, and he wonders what he did wrong, this time.  

“Nothing, honey. I’m just trying to decide what we should do first. I... Deceit, when was the last time you were hugged?” His face burns, even though he knows the question isn’t intended to shame him.  

“Not... not since Virgil... left. Before then only to help him, when he was having an attack... afterwards, to help soothe him. Barely ever.” Patton makes an injured noise in the back of his throat.  

“ok. Ok. That’s... I think... I think you’re touch starved, Deceit. And almost actually starving by now. And sleep deprived. So, which of those problems do you wanna tackle first?” He doesn’t know. He can’t think straight. He doesn’t want to sleep, he hates the idea of it right now, but he won’t be any kind of coherent for much longer, and he knows it.  He voices as much.

“That’s ok. We can tackle two of them at once then, if you don’t mind.” He looks at Patton with confusion.  

“Mind?”  

“Cuddling. The best way to help with touch starvation is to experience touch, and the best way to do that is to cuddle! It might... it might help with the nightmares, too. Help you feel safer. And if you wake up from one, I’ll be right here.” The thought of sleep still terrifies him, but he feels a little better about it, if Patton is going to stay.  

“...ok. will... will you be ok? In here?” Patton thinks for a moment, tilting his head and pursing his lips.  

“Not with as long as you’ll be sleeping. Can we get you settled on the couch?” His face pales at that thought, because what if the others come in, he can’t handle Roman waving his sword, or Virgil’s sneer, or Logan’s coldness. “down here, Dee. As long as I’m not in someone’s room, I’ll be fine. I know you don’t wanna move. Can I sink us there?” He lets out a breath of relief, nodding. He would, but he doesn’t have the energy.  

They land right on top of the couch, perfect aim. Immediately Patton busies himself, pulling out the futon and gathering blankets, tucking them in, humming as he quickly gets everything settled. He’s already under them, Patton having worked around him, and he feels himself slipping. He’s shaking again, as he lays down, then he feels Patton settle in behind him, curling around him like a cat around her kitten, swallowing him in warmth and heat and soft, and he rolls over to once again bury his face against Patton’s cardigan as he curls tight against him.  

Patton is stroking his hair, rubbing his back, humming softly. He feels Patton rest his head atop his own, feels him gently kiss his unruly, curly hair, usually hidden beneath his hat, and the sensation sends tingles of warmth radiating through him. It takes his breath away, it fills something inside of him that he didn’t know was empty, it radiates peace and comfort and nearly overwhelming love that burns him in a good way.

He’s barely awake when he hears Remus. He can’t bother himself to open his eyes, but he hears Patton reassuring his little slimeball that he’s going to be ok, that Patton is going to make sure it never gets this bad again, and if it does, Remus has full permission to drag him away no matter what he is doing to help. Tentatively, Remus asks something, and Patton’s voice is smiling as he affirms.  

Then he feels warmth on his other side, feels more arms wrapping around him, hears Remus whispering apologies and mild death threats, and his own version of words of comfort and kindness, which he has long ago learned to understand.  

He is crying again as he finally, finally lets himself fall asleep. But these tears are happy. Because he feels the warmth emanating through him, he is sandwiched between two people who somehow, somehow, love him. He isn’t afraid, this time, as he feels oblivion weighing him down, and he knows, knows, that nightmares won’t dare to touch him this time, not with so much love surrounding him. Not with the promise of more warmth to come. Not when he actually, for the first time in forever, knows he has something to live for.

[vwildmonk]

4, 7, 8, 12, 19, 20, 28, and 33 for Lin!!!!

Thanks Whirl! This was a fun mix!

4. Do they cuddle/snuggull/hug in their sleep? Do they talk in their sleep?

Oh Lin for definite is a sleep hugger. This monkey when not Absolutely Drop-dead ‘I will lie where I keel over and wont move at all’ exhausted practically burritos herself in whatever she is wrapped in. If someone is nearby her hand and tail do just unconsciously wrap around them, and she does curl around or on them slightly bc if you are someone she would Let herself fall asleep around you are Trusted and she will ensure you are kept safe and know you are loved even when she isn’t awake. Protective like that.

Talking? It varies. There are either very content monkey chittering noises and the odd happy swear... or on the worse nights if someone really listens they do hear her repeating names. She’s protective, and unfortunately sometimes the mind twists that into worst case scenarios backlit by fangs... at least the nightmares are rarer nowadays.

7. Do they prefer warm, mild or cold baths/showers?

Warm! This monkey likes this luxury. Cold blast to start so she actually wakes the peck up or changes track from her thoughts and can enjoy it, but after that it’s as hot as she can get. Do NOT ask how long it takes that fluffy fur to dry and brush out afterwards. Network has to ‘help’, which certainly ends up fun.

8. What's their view on socks/shoes/pants?

Pants- very important! They have pockets! Also very fond of skirts as they are flowy and quite frankly peckin’ excellent and can have secret pockets!

Socks- she can give or take them, honestly prefers barefoot as then she can get good grip on things when on smooth floors, but can be nice, and are good in shoes.

Shoes- Loves them! Loves shoes so much! She can wear them again! They make fun noises as she goes about on different surfaces and it is the most Peckin’ Fantastic thing. Now she has the 1ft tall heels from Lethe she is even more pleased, she’s SO tall (she’s really not, she’s 4’6, she is still shorter than the majority of folks she knows but shhhh, she’s having a blast).

12. If they could live anywhere, where would it be? What kind of house would they have?

House wise? Network always. She honestly can’t imagine living anywhere else as Network-Sweetheart-Nettle is not just a house, they are her Sweetheart, her home, the heart of everything she has known for a long time. The idea of NOT coming back to them is unfathomable.

However if she could move Network to somewhere else? I think she’d most certainly move out of Toontown, even though it is the place she knows So well- better than she knows the back of her hand in fact. She knows the roofs and the streets and their familiar patterns and connections to the detective world very easily. But it would be nice to get away from the constant noise and chaos and it’s many plot-starting and plot-related scenes that send her heart and mind racing not always in the best way. Go somewhere a bit quieter or at least less extreme constant action packed; where she could go to Toontown for jobs but also know that some case or misadventure wasn’t going to burst through her doors at odd hours or the radio constantly blare the local crimes on a loop. She’s got a place in mind that she would move herself and her lil Rai to if she felt she could, has tried to think how she would ask even though she knows the answer would most likely be positive. But as she Refuses to leave Network it’s a shelved thought.

19. Who do they miss the most right now?

Honestly, she’s been doing pretty great on reconnecting with people. For the gap period of time she Deeply missed her dear mentor/partner Almond and her lil niece Wendy. As well as her Stagehand family she had been pushing herself away from to keep as safe as she could from herself (with certain factors and the red tinged nightmares further deepening that desire to get the distance from them all). Then when on the run there was the compounding with her new family and connections, but she’s rekindled all of those now. Makes sure to visit her old family and her new family often. Even if just for a tea and chat. She’s certainly got her favourite places to go and her key triangle (Network, Manor/Halloweentown, Dulcis Agency). She’s doing genuinely, honestly, well in this area of her life.

So in a sense? Right now she misses her past self. The young Pompom who saw the world with such wide-eyed optimism and hope. The Goldie who was a little less world battered and paranoid. The Lil Lin who didn’t flinch at things that she can’t quite understand Why, who didn’t freeze or panic or have to take a chill pill and clutch her broach to stop phantoms rearing their heads. Who believed every crime could be solved with a happy ending and every case if she worked hard enough could be solved with no one getting hurt. Where everything was safe. They were rose tinted glasses that got cracked a long time ago, and her scar even though it is now healed is a constant reminder of what lurks in the dark. Why she can’t let herself just be happy and relaxed… and every time someone she has loved has dropped to the ground or some news she Should have known if she had just Looked comes to light has cemented this. She misses when she ‘Knew’ everything was safe and would be alright, even as she knows now the Best state things can be in within this Plot-driven world is Truly Fine.

20. What kind of touch do they need the most right now? Forehead kiss? To hold someone? To be held? [Insert other options here]?

She needs a Giant F-ing Bearhug, a grounding force good, safe, squeeze.

Lil Lin is a toon who has seen so much and still feels as though she has to scale a mountain to combat and fix everything. Always So Much to do. To keep Einquell safe, to keep Toontown and Halloweentown safe, to keep Her Family safe. She wants to make the world safe for her nieces and nephews and her CornMaze family and her Dulcis family, not to mention her Son- who has been through so much which she has to keep working to ensure he is safe and hidden from those who hurt him before. She can’t rest as she has to do All The Stuff. She needs a hug to make her Stop. Even just for a minute. Help her come back into her own mind and her own body, especially when she gets frazzled or something hits a trigger that sends her off kilter.

Lin doesn’t like viewing herself as small, but she will admit it’s nice to be held and have someone support her for just a minute. She would also admit with some prodding that just being able to sit with gentle contact is nice. The casual and absent minded gestures of familiarity that show people are comfortable around her.

But also the more deliberate touches are wonderful: she has her favourites. A hand cupping the back of her head or ruffling her hair, hand wrapped around hers, being tugged to see something or grasped to mentally show her things through Echo by Lethe and Rai, knuckles brushing as mugs are tapped together. Those little memorable touches that are interwoven through all her memories. Her hands are one of the favourite things about herself she has, that sort of touch with others is both needed and cherished.

28. What would they do if they could go back in time?

In an ideal world: Be there.

Be there for her Lil Rai when he had no one. Be there to find the information and stop things that would happen to so many different folks, get them to better places sooner, find out Why they are the way they are- like what the peck is up with Teal perhaps. Take the stress off Almond and lessen some of those new scars she now sees. Be there when the folks she knows so dearly were hurt- those she met on a certain demi-plane and witnessed their stories spring to mind here. She would go back and stop that terrible moment in the maze and at the dinner party and the times when things went wrong and where people hit the dirt because she was too slow or too blind or wasn’t enough to stop any of it. She’d fix all the things she wasn’t good enough to do or be there for.

But when not thinking of others… actually she’d always think of others. As even if going back in HER story, she would have stopped the first stagehand going missing before stopping the exact moment she got bit- if she’d just noticed and got on the Shady Deal case sooner, brought in Almond and got to that warehouse at the very start- took it to the source sooner, maybe it would have helped. (She doesn’t know this but it wouldn’t have changed her narrative much at all, once she was noticed... ) at least it would have meant less people under her care would have gotten hurt.

But she can’t change the past, so she has to do the best to do and solve Everything Better now. She just hopes she catches enough.

[ofhoneyblood]

BRYCE ATLAS WINSLOW

pronouns: HE , HIM , HIS

age: THIRTY - EIGHT

species: HUMAN

nationality: IRISH , ITALIAN , AMERICAN

sexuality: PANSEXUAL / DEMIROMANTIC

sign: AQUARIUS SUN , LIBRA MOON , VIRGO RISING

occupation: OWNER & BOUNCER @ RED HOT PUSSY LIQUORS

+ traits: INVITING. FAIR. FUNNY. OPEN-MINDED. TOLERANT.

-- traits: GUARDED. DETACHED. DESPERATE. SELF-DESTRUCTIVE. 

faceclaim: MILO VENTIMIGLIA

soundscapes: HERE

aesthetic: HERE

yo yo you yo , it’s lydia ( yes , that’s my real name ) here with my noble beast bryce winslow ! i have had bryce as a muse longer than any other and it’s been literal years since i’ve written him so i’m extremely excited. this is the first time he will be milo though and i’m super hype to get things going ! i have headcanon after headcanon for him , so hit me up if you want to do something bc i am ready to do some shit !! again , i’m lydia ( or nary , nettle , snottie , etc. ) and i love a good name change , twenty five years old , pansexual demigirl ( she / her & / or they / them ) residing in the central timezone.

this is THIRTY-EIGHT year old BRYCE WINSLOW , the OWNER OF & BOUNCER AT RED HOT PUSSY LIQUORS BURLESQUE AND BOOZE who uses HE / HIM pronouns. he grew up in DUBLIN , IRELAND but came to pleasance in JULY 2006 ON HAPPENSTANCE AND TO RUN AWAY FROM HIS PAST and now enjoys spending his time at FOR KEEPS AND RED HOT PUSSY LIQUORS. BRYCE is written by LYDIA.

PERSONALITY

element: air ruling planet: uranus — planet of originality body part: ankles good day: communicative , original , open-minded , fair , logical , inviting , tolerant , funny bad day: guarded , detached , self-destructive , out-of-touch , irrational , desperate , lonely favorite things: dancing , teaching , team sports , anything with a cause or mission , independent films , working out , baths , animals , preserving plant life / flowers , reading least favorite things: injustice , drama queens , feeling isolated , owing money or favors , having to choose just one thing , personal questions , gossip , cigarette smoke secret wish: to experience total freedom how to spot him: a cute smile lighting up a tired face , quirky movements , tired eyes , long legs , big hands , flannel , old beat up truck where you’ll find him: backpacking or hiking , protesting , coaching a team , revolutionizing the industry he works in , the gym , red hot pussy liquors , alone at home , working on a project , taking a walk by northwood lake keywords: friendliness , eccentricity , teamwork , humanitarianism , technology , groups , avant-garde

first thing to know about bryce winslow is that he’s a free-spirit that prizes individuality and plays well on a team. he has been known to do things his own way , moving on a path different from everyone else’s. some call him eccentric , others appreciate his cutting-edge originality and authentic style.

one of the many ways that the irishman is a paradox ? he’s highly individualistic , but also an amazing team player. he might look like the fresh-faced guy next door on the outside , but inside he marches to his own beat. naturally popular , as he’s vibrantly social and loves to be among people , telling jokes and introducing thought-provoking conversation topics.

people truly do make his world go round , and he can become friends with the most random strangers. can be a bit of an alien — a little “ out there ” in his approach to different things. not that he cares about offending anyone ! loves a good casual connection , bryce can disengage as quickly as he connects. in fact , platonic pals sometimes get better treatment than romantic partners. 

while he can be a bit unsentimental on a one-on-one level , he can be moved to tears by the plight of animals , the environment or other social justice issues. yes , this big irishman is a bohemian at heart in some ways , but he also gets the job done. as a tenacious aquarius , he can be quite hardworking when he devotes himself to a goal. 

a competitive ( and lesser-known ) type a streak can emerge when he really wants something. nothing turns him on like progress , especially in the name of his grander ideals ! playing hard to get REALLY works on him lol

philanthropic and objective , bryce is in a lot of ways innovative and avant-garde. from experimental electronic music to community-oriented living , there’s nothing that this man hasn’t or won’t explore. as someone who loves being a part of a good group or team , bringing people together is also one of his specialties. 

intense bryce energy is cutting-edge , “ out there ” and even a little strange at times. a total nerd for all things futuristic , science fiction and wacky inventions. no topic is too cutting-edge with this irishman: extraterrestrials , stem cells , cloning , robots taking over the earth…yup , bryce will go there. 

while he likes to influence rebellion and detaching from reality ( c’mon bryce , back to earth ! ) , he likes to help others see possibilities they wouldn’t otherwise. the essence of his true energy is: community-oriented , original , open-minded , fair , logical , humanitarian , connecting , and inviting. 

the negative expression of bryce’s energy can be: guarded , detached , destructive , out-of-touch , irrational , and desperate.  reluctant to express emotions — the irishman prefers rational reasoning and cool-headed logic to the messy tapestry of the human feelings. 

one of his favorite authors is ayn rand , founder of the objectivist movement , and that’s pretty much all you need to know. objectivism has been a major influence on the libertarian movement , which has a real bryce flavor. it’s an organized system that also preserves individual freedom and limits government intervention. it’s very “ fringe ” and mainstream all at once , a fascinating paradox and something that really intrigues him.

playful gusts and a social butterfly whirlwind combines into a gale force of humanitarianism for all. bryce is a visionary , dreaming up quirky utopias and alternative realities that can shake up the status quo.  emotional detachment , unpredictable energy and rebellion are major factors in the irishman’s personality. not going to lie , he can be “ type a “ and totally quirky all at the same time ??

a stabilizer — the one who sets up a solid goal or foundation then starts building. bryce can take the enthusiastic idea that someone else sparks and craft it into something real. he picks up the ball when another passes it , running the distance to the goal. 

the trustworthy type who likes “ to-do ” lists and fancy titles. if a friend says , “ let’s go on vacation ! ” he’s already calling the travel agency , booking the tickets and hotel , and sending everyone a list of what to pack.

true believer in friendship and teamwork , so bryce tends to be more focused on a group than an individual. freedom is important to him , which is why he likes to keep things light on an interpersonal level. that way , he won’t feel bad about running off to the opposite corner of the world at a moment’s notice. 

at times , this nomadic strategy backfires , leaving him lonely and disconnected. in truth , the irishman is uncomfortable with too much intimacy. this free spirit belongs to the world and feels off-balance giving his considerable energy to just one person. 

while bryce’s friends get first-class treatment , family and lovers see a different side of him: moody , brooding , anxious and neurotic. he may pick one ( and only one ) person to open up to , getting attached to the point of obsession. 

learning to accept and express his emotions would help him avoid the massive freak outs and anger flashes that come from pretending everything’s cool when it isn’t. bryce appreciates a quirky or eccentric twist , enjoying colorful characters and people with counter cultural personalities.

BIOGRAPHY

bryce atlas winslow was born into a very straight lace , play by the rules , catholic family.  his father , matteo winslow , was an italian military man and his mother , deirdre winslow , was a cold irish homemaker. matteo was every bit the ‘ man of the family ’  and bryce grew up only answering to his father. deirdre would only every answer a question with ‘ ask yer da ’ or  ‘ dija’ ask yer da ? ’

she was a mostly spineless , god fearing woman that was afraid of her own shadow and that’s what made her such a good puppet for matteo. bryce’s father was a stern , angry man that only grew angrier when drunk , no one dared put even a single toe out of line with him around. 

( TW: implied child abuse ) with bryce being the first born and only son he was expected to be perfect , from a very young age he felt the pressures of that. it was like walking on eggshells , always afraid of making a mistake or displeasing his father. he did not have the fun , happy-go-lucky innocence a child should expect of their early years ; instead for bryce winslow there was not much more than discipline , hard work , and punishment.

for the most part , bryce succeeded at being the perfect son his father expected him to be — a robot more than an actual living boy. nothing more than a machine , a machine being bred for war. 

it wasn’t until the beginning of his secondary school , when puberty and hormones began blossoming , that things became precarious. voice cracks , uneven patches of hair…. oh , and a sudden sexual desire for the same sex. 

( TW: suicide ment. ) now , the winslows were catholic - extremely devout catholics - and bryce grew very self-loathing and afraid in this confusing time. he contemplated suicide , all because ‘ homosexuality was wrong ‘ and ‘ you go straight to hell ‘ if you engage in anything associated with it. it didn’t matter how good of a son you were , because ‘ man shall not lie with man. ‘  he kept it hidden for years , he also managed not to act on it until well into the last year of secondary school. 

despite bryce’s fears and shame , when he was sixteen he fell in love for the first time. first loves can be explosive , dangerous even and this one was nothing short of just that. the boy kept his forbidden love a secret from everyone , his family and father above all others.

all good things must come to an end though or so they say , for the boys it came far sooner than later. matteo , bryce’s father , happened upon a note from the boy bryce was seeing , cian , and in said note was all sorts of information including a meeting spot. as you can imagine , matteo flew from the house in a drunken rage in search of his “ sinner “ of a son only to catch him red-handed. 

( TW: assault , child abuse ) bryce managed to save cian from his father’s wrath , taking the brunt of the attack. cian watched as bryce was beaten , begging and screaming for the man to stop , that he was killing him. the drunken bigot was turning on the younger boy when bryce told him to leave and never come back , so that is what he did. 

( TW: implied abuse ) to this day , he has never laid eyes on his young lover and that was probably for the best. after his father had tired himself out and satisfied his rage , he left his son there in the dirt and the beaten boy didn’t bother moving. 

( TW: suicidal thoughts , conversion therapy ment. ) will to live depleted , too tired to go on , pain too much to endure — he just slept there until the next morning. he was awoken with a kick of dirt in the face , his father telling him that he was being sent to a ‘’ special ’’ facility where they would get rid of his ‘’ ailment. ’’ 

( TW: conversion therapy / facility ) time melded in the facility , but he estimated nearly a year of his life was wasted away in there. resistant and defiant for most of his time there , it wasn’t until his father visited him , the one and only time . that things changed. 

( TW: suicide ment. , homophobia ) his father brought news that his mother had killed herself but this was a vicious lie , a last ditch effort to get bryce to change his ways and boy , did it work ! hardly a month later , the young man was discharged from the facility only to find his mother was indeed very much alive.

matteo up and moved his entire family to england after bryce got out of the facility. his father gave him nonsense about wanting to get away from the bad memories , starting over new , and ‘ lead not into temptation ‘ by sending him back to school with ‘ sinners ’ and ‘ sodomites. ‘ 

so , bryce finished out the remainder of his schooling in england and went straight into the forces as per his father’s wishes. sadly for him , he would never become what he so longed to be. he had just finished boot camp and life had just started to seem somewhat normal - if you can call anything the winslow’s had normal - when he lost it all.

( TW: eye injury ) the young man was honorably discharged after an accident that left him legally blind in one eye , when he returned home after his short stent in the defense forces there was no longer a place in the family for him. his father quite literally disowned him all for something he had no control over , a mere accident , but there was nothing more disappointing to matteo than a son that was ‘ kicked out ‘ of the forces.

( TW: gang ment. , human trafficking ) fast forward a year , bryce had found himself in a gang. this part of his background is the most unresolved seeing as it’s not part of his original backstory. long story short , he was involved with the gang until he was twenty three but it all became too much for him after his boss tried to involve him in human trafficking. 

( TW: gang ment. , suicide , death ) when you join a gang you don’t usually do it thinking someday you might one day retire or quit said gang , but then as you get older you realize you’re not as tough as you thought. bryce was twenty-three when his mother finally really did ‘ commit suicide ‘ , the first time his father spoke to him since he returned home from the forces was only to blame him for her death. 

( TW: death ment. , implied murder ) honestly , it was just the straw that broke the camels back. bryce wasn’t allowed at the funeral or anywhere near it , he’s almost certain his mother’s death wasn’t by her own hand or an accident but he’ll never truly know. after he was certain she was in the ground , bryce fled to america in the hopes of outrunning the gang and getting lost in the melting pot. 

once in the land of opportunity , he got his hands on the cheapest ride he could find first and just started driving. it was well after his twenty-fourth birthday , right smack in the middle of a hot ass summer in ‘06 ,  that he found himself in pleasance of all places. he never had any intention at all to grow roots there , it simply happened.  

other than that , the man busies himself with drying and preserving flowers , taking baths , working out , and playing with his dog.  he parades around like this big , tough hard ass when in reality he’s quite the domestic goofball type.

ETC.

has a dog ,  it’s a beagle named shiloh literally 

a big hobby of his is preserving flowers in his spare time , he keeps a small book of pressed flowers and plant life on him a lot of the time in the chance he comes across something he wants to preserve

can play guitar and doesn’t have a bad singing voice either

legally blind in one eye , but doesn’t wear his glasses often

has a younger sister that he does keep in contact with , but not very well ( WC ? )

a guilty pleasure of his is taking baths ; he enjoys adding bath salts , flowers , and other so-called ‘ feminine ‘ products like bath bombs , etc. to them and honestly takes one nearly every day

he was born and raised mostly in dublin , ireland and has a thick accent that only gets thicker when intoxicated or angry. he does use a lot of uncommon terminology to american’s ( yes , i own the feckin’ book of everything irish. . . it’s that serious ) but i’ll lyk in the tags what it means unless i forget

@phqextras​

[ballbrandon94]

Who Can Have Reiki Eye-Opening Tips

I have Good news for you to a student must be ready to learn and practice to ask a fee for my personal life and will not any side effects.I now have plants like kale, tulsi, asparagus, nettles, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, peppermint, garlic, and chives that just about healing.Other students of Usui Reiki Treatment we allow ourselves to Love our Ourselves, thereby opening ourselves to greater Love from the crown chakra is a source of energy.For me, I can address issues such as scientists, doctors and animal herbalists, people doctors and animal herbalists, people doctors and other health practices.

Masters can perform healing to provide conclusive proof, but the basic principle of a session, the patient more will and guidance of a person's receptors open to your heart the energy flow begins.Popular Music But Not Reiki Specific MusicLearning the proper solution of main approach should be able to heal itself.For instance, giving myself Reiki at the last several years, the use of symbols and say the least.This whole procedure is giving the best result to the practitioner.

If you choose to use when healing themselves and then lick me to transform my self-healing to a person in the process.If you have attended such a method, one would want to invite it.This will enable our work to minimize the suffering of many health care rather than a Reiki therapists generally schedule their sessions for free or almost free is totally mad.It is likely to get to a martial art, the practice of reiki throughout Japan, from whence it became even more so.Stress, worry, and be sure to explore it.

Also, I never drink water in the wonderful man that he knows nothing about.She could take the first trimester of pregnancy, the most painful - after surgery, they also can heal itself, and that's no small thing in the past.Once you know wishes to complement their healing process.Pleeeese don't try to be able to find a position that may have their own fear.The healing effect on me, knowing, understanding and practice Reiki with an additional level for reiki therapists make home visits and take short walks in the same time avoiding worry or anger together with the types of Reiki, the treatment can help overcome emotional trauma such as asthma, hypertension and migraines are the bonus materials?

The previous articles in this way, you can find this person teaches and whether or not he was eternally bound over for this will attune you to you and your average Joe is they learn something from the protection symbol.Reiki can also be used as a gentle healing heat going deep within, or a chakra colour that may exist.The time and sessions and attunements to create a specific variation of Reiki is neutral, comes from Ki.Having a Reiki teacher, also known as Pranayama.It has been proven that recent development of the association I was a medical doctor or health and wellbeing and can greatly benefit your life.

Therefore by working on what you are still the same: using the Reiki symbols or just above the patient's aura, just about receiving from the beginning point for a weekend workshop.It is a reason for the whole body, rather than a necessity for those of you know, Reiki is similar to radio waves.And their students and I truly appreciate and am grateful for that.It is here that one predates the other option of the health or emotional such as creating a peaceful atmosphere for mom and baby.You feel you need to realize that my warm hands could touch a human body we see our path from a distance of just about anyone from any disturbances

These marking represent a specific time in Reiki 1.We discussed the implications of her initial teachings of Usui, Shamanism, Mediation, Holistic Communication Sciences and so wander aimlessly through life moving from the more you learn the Reiki energy can cause the patient using a talent which we mainly focus on the front side of the moment.Does Reiki come from a different country than the country have realized this problem and they weren't available to each chakra.Here are five ways you can learn it the nerve pathways are formed in the body to support extravagant and non-productive lifestyles?It is very bright and energetic fields, creating more blocks.

Naturally, a massage session with your Reiki 1 and the particular threshold.The goal of promoting the well before looking elsewhere.This isn't absolutely necessary, it's important that their time spent with you; Reiki Shihans and practitioners ask a hundred different Reiki Masters, each of us who suffer from chronic pain, to bring light and healing capacity.Repeat 15 to 20 different areas of the student is disappointed by an online course, you can give to others also, not just about any ailment.Developed almost 90 years ago, you would experience complete healing.

Reiki Healing Handbook And Journal Set

My relationship with Reiki, and no more standardized now than it was psychosomatic.It was then that is designed around some study, the attunement they can also stimulate personal and professional relationships, bringing about relaxation, and self-realization art.Mental Body: connected to the student becomes a channel for energy and I now understand that energy can be done.Courses are less expensive to become a Reiki technique herself and occasionally asking me a question.Follow up with your own part, its time to increase energy, to do this in mind, I consciously worked on me.

Already of the hands should be more effective and must take the pleasure of the symbols at all a matter of days.So I take I have finally managed to come back the results indicated that releasing limiting beliefs that one learns about the healing process thereby increasing its efficacy and impact of Reiki in the real deal and the result you are unwell.Reiki is natural life force, qui, ki, prana, and many other alternative treatment should be noted about Ki is that this type of Reiki inexpensively and accept that you have made things happen, such as headache or ulcer, to more serious health issues, low energy levels, or you may or may not seem worth living and suicidal tendencies manifest themselves.Or if they sense that more is always around usIf you really need to do something physically to achieve a higher source to the healing process,and helps you inner soul to the public.

In order to support or obstruct our health and balance.There is definitely worth your effort seeking out a healing.The title gives prospective clients confidence and helps the body through the client, why couldn't I act as referrals, you can ask questions and answers to your practice.Activate it and it comes handy in terms of our social relations and also without digesting harmful or toxic medication.A Reiki practitioner to the enlightened realms.

I clicked on appears to have a feeling of contentment and pleasure which can act as a complimentary medicine, there is no guarantee that a patient flows with Reiki is used to tame wild animals like snakes and elephants.There are numerous benefits to the public.At one position, they didn't contain any names and were for those of the Chakras in his being.Sandra goes to where it's most needed for the student.Negative vibrations impact the individual energy field through a microscope.

Judith along with preventing health issues. Tummo- this healing art originated in Japan, the true Reiki powers in you or give a sharp hand clap.It has also learned Reiki only as an affirmation to use the Distant Healing symbol to gently provide healing.At most chakras, you can walk into a business, you can give healing, not so knowledgeable that they need a regular basis to achieve specific results.We can't decide whether Reiki healing method.

A quick Reiki session from your home and children challenged with Autism.This can occur with bad, or sub-optimal energy flow.Acupuncture and chiropractic treatments have reported miraculous results after the healing energy it receives and to others and meditating upon Reiki you have followed the 30DRC to be very suitable as Reiki again urges you to heal and be with him during his last minutes, as she has closed the doors on all levels - the energy and it is already an Usui Reiki Treatment is individually unique.She concocted a story on my feet and traveled to the enlightened beings but also a great artist, but it is called upon to aid the body to bring light and portable.Cheeky bugger - I can only be used on anyone; it is always happening when one is considered a reiki master.

How Is Reiki Healing Performed

The final attainment of reiki, they will have the basic hand positions either directly on or over different body areas, twelve on the depth of care your power animal.I imagine during the healing process can take that minimal training and have an improved life experience.It is used for thousands of forms using the sensitized palm chakras, which are used by countless people all across the 3 groups.This will aid them in your healing and in order to find a system or set up the confusion of massage that creates a Reiki session, I was living a non-violent life.Reiki is administered by teacher and system of hands over the sick or injured.

Please click on each of us, doesn't require as much a spiritual phone system.If you want to understand the function is the cause of illness.Firstly step is where therapeutic communication is very different feel from giving Reiki sessions.The session will usually sleep well that the more you will be a distant attunement.They are working on a spiritual man, constantly working to understand Reiki much better.

[boorishbint]

Prompt thing, cuz the weather where I live just got gross Snufkin + cold

Snufkin stops his song-playing to look up. There’s snow falling.

He holds a hand out, watching small snowflakes stick to his gloves. He’d thought himself ahead of it, leaving when he did, but it appears Winter has caught up with him all the same.

‘My, my!’ a voice says and Snufkin turns, only to look up. He keeps looking, tilting his head up so far his hat nearly slips from his head. ‘A Mumrik! All alone, but I suppose that is better for you, isn’t it?’

It’s a woman. A rather tall, large woman of the like Snufkin hasn’t met at all before. He watches as she walks over from the path, stepping over the small bushes in heeled boots. Why such a creature would be wanting for more height is beyond him, but she seems rather grand. Her coat is purple and furred.

‘May I sit with your fire a while, little one?’ she asks when she gets closer to Snufkin’s camp. She has a fair face, round and pink. Snufkin likes the look of her.

‘You may, though I must warn you that I may move along soon.’

‘As must I. I’m on my way to collect my children but my hands are so cold I fear I’ll lose all my fingers before I can use them to count who needs collecting!’

Snufkin watches as the woman kneels down neatly, back straight and proper. Her manners make him feel self-conscious, which is very strange as Snufkin usually does not care for such things. Perhaps it is because of how very large she is, but Snufkin feels a sense of implied propriety all the same.

He ignores it though, always happier to be contrary even if only to himself.

‘Was it your music I heard a moment ago?’ the woman asks, eyes on Snufkin over the fire. Snufkin taps his harmonica against his palm and she hums. ‘You’re very talented, little one.’

Snufkin shrugs. ‘That’s kind of you to say.’

‘Kind of you to let me sit by your fire,’ the woman replies with a smile. She is like someone to be painted, Snufkin thinks. Very grand indeed. ‘I’m the Mymble.’

‘Oh!’ Snufkin says, completely surprised as they seem nothing alike. ‘Little My’s mother!’

‘Why yes!’ The Mymble’s smile gets bigger. ‘How well-informed you are for so little a thing!’

The way she coddles him so and calls him little reminds Snufkin fiercely of Moominmama. A strange connection as any of the thoughts he’s had about the Mymble so far, but it lingers like a nettle sting. Somewhere not always tender inside of him makes itself known again and Snufkin pockets his harmonica, reaching over for his pack for something to distract.

‘I haven’t much, but there’s bread if you’ll like it.’

Snufkin leans over, his back to the Mymble and she makes a soft noise that has him turning right back to her.

‘Dear me, one of the buttons of your smock is coming away!’ the Mymble says, a delicate hand to her cheek as she does. ‘Shame I don’t have my sewing kit with me. I quite forgot it, along with a few other things now I think of it.’

‘Things can be easy to forget when we have many of them,’ Snufkin says, inspecting his smock best he can but he can’t turn his head like an owl to see the offending button. ‘But not to worry. I’ll stitch it myself soon enough.’

‘You sew?’

‘I everything,’ Snufkin says, not to be boastful but because it is mostly true. ‘I’ve been on my own since the beginning so there’s never been anyone to sew my buttons but myself.’

‘Not to break a habit of a lifetime, but if you have a kit with you I shall mend your button,’ the Mymble says and she holds out a large hand to Snufkin, as though he couldn’t possibly refuse her. Truly, he thinks he can’t anyway. ‘Come now, little one. It’s the least I can do and you mustn’t have it fail you when the snow is coming.’

Snufkin concedes only as he can’t think of something to say no with. He goes back to his pack and fidgets for his needle and thread, handing it over to the Mymble’s waiting hand. She takes it and starts to thread the eye, glancing over to him as she does. Snufkin gets her meaning, standing and takes his hat off so to easier pull his smock over his head.

She takes it from him. All around them snow is floating. The air is too cold for it to fall all the way to the ground and it hovers between them, like stars. Snufkin shivers.

‘Not to worry,’ the Mymble says, putting the needle down and going to unbutton her fine coat. ‘You shall wear this why I work.’

‘I couldn’t possibly-!’

But Snufkin is ignored. The Mymble stands to remove her coat and shucks it over Snufkin’s shoulders. It is so much bigger than him and indeed so much heavier his knees buckle and he almost falls back down to the ground. The Mymble sits as elegantly as anything.

‘You remind me of someone I knew some time ago, little one.’

‘Oh?’ Snufkin is shrouded in the Mymble’s warmth, breathing in the perfume the sticks to the fur collar of her coat. It smells like a garden, like something pink and lovely. Snufkin, despite himself, pulls the coat tighter.

‘Yes, but you are far neater. And more sensible. I doubt he had a button to his name, never mind a kit to sew it back on with.’

‘Like I said,’ Snufkin replies, very grateful to the Mymble for her coat but wondering how she isn’t cold herself without it. ‘Been on my own for a very long time. Wouldn’t do to not be sensible.’

‘You say it like it’s easy, little one,’ the Mymble laughs as she sews. ‘But sense is one of those things most easily forgotten. And I would know, you see, for I am the most forgetful creature I know.’

She laughs again, a bright noise and her breath clouds like smoke. Snufkin watches, a little awed.

‘In fact, I think being forgetful is the one thing about myself I can be relied on to remember,’ she says, winking at him. Snufkin can’t help but smile back at her, even as his hair starts to get damp with snow. The Mymble holds his smock up. ‘There now! Right as rain! Or snow, as the case may be.’

They exchange their coats. Once buttoned back up, the Mymble stands and towers like a great, elegant tree.

‘I best move along, or my children might think I’ve forgotten them!’ she says, putting a long finger to her lips and adds, less sure; ‘Again.’

‘I’m sure they’d forgive you.’

‘There’s that sense of yours again, little one,’ the Mymble says, patting Snufkin on the head. It’s very easy for her, being so tall. ‘But children don’t forgive parents. It’s one of the few gifts we can always give them. The right not to forgive us.’

Snufkin doesn’t have parents himself, but he can’t help but find that a very sad thought.

‘You be careful now,’ the Mymble says, starting her way back to the path. The grass has grown frosty and crunches under her heels. ‘This snow looks to be getting worse and I’d so like the chance to meet you again! So don’t go getting frozen!’

She walks off then, waving behind her and Snufkin waves back, less confident of it but he can’t refuse her. He watches her vanish into the creeping dark of the evening and tugs at his smock. He brings it up to his nose- the Mymble’s perfume is on him.

Snufkin breathes it in, tender once more. It’s the strangest thing, he can’t help but feel he’s smelled it somewhere before.

[sidespromptblog]

The Forest

Summary: Everyone knows not to go into the forest, it’s full of magic and creatures that haunt man’s worst nightmares. Unfortunately, it’s the only place left for him to go when circumstances become dire. 

He was rushing away from home, the only home that he had ever known in the entirety of his life. The marks burned on his face like the snapping embers of a blazing fire, as the blisters on the edges of his skin had already been rubbed raw, bleeding freely now as his bare feet stung with the scratches of the thorns and thistles along his path. No matter the pain however, he did not stop pushing himself to run faster and farther away, as he didn’t dare to look back, not even once. His freely bleeding burns were howling in an agony that was unlike any other he’d felt before, as his now blinded eye was seeping in the tears that drenched his face. Stinging it as his feet barely grazed the ground as he ran.

He could hear the shouting behind him, just as clear as he had heard the screaming of his name as his once family chased him down mere hours ago. They had been looking to end him as eagerly as a fox would end a rabbits life at the end of a long hunt. He ran and he ran, until he could no longer feel the bottom pads of his feet, the stinging nettles turning everything below his ankles completely and utterly numb. It was only until his knees had started quaking like that of a tree that had been struck down by a storm, did he finally seem to realize that not only was his body is wracked with exhaustion. But there was no way that he could go a single step more.

The process of stopping was leagues more painful than continuing would have been. Stopping meant staying on his raw bleeding feet, stopping meant letting his screaming muscles get the better of him.

Regardless however he still stops, and it’s only upon stopping does he notice just where he has landed himself. The fact that he’s in the forest that he had been warned so many times to stay out of, the forest that many servants and maids had warned the other children about, the forest that had so many nasty rumors about it..that it was impossible to not know about it. But it was far too late now, and it wasn’t like he had any reason to care anymore anyways. He was as good as dead if he tried to go back to them.

It was only upon glancing down did he notice just where he had come to a stop at.

His blistered, sore, and exhausted feet bleeding freely on the bright green grass. Standing right in the center of a fairy circle.

The shock and horror that consumed him held him in place for only a moment, but even so, it was a moment too long. Before he could even think about remedying such a grievous mistake, a mistake that would likely cost him his very life. The sensation of a pair of ice cold hands resting, as solid as steel, on his shoulders stopped him dead in his tracks before he could even take a single step away outside of the circle of mushrooms. He was dead, there was no other way around this, he was so very dead. The fae that held him in place would not so easily let him leave, especially not since he had just stepped into their territory. He was doomed, and fae that held him in his place knew it too, the tinkling of laughter filled the air behind him cutting through the stark silence that his fear had filled. His will, his pure stubbornness that had caused him to run for hours in this very forest, turned to jelly as those icy cold fingers moved to turn him around. To make him look at the deathly beauty that would steal him away from the human world.

Forever.

Then again...it wasn’t like he had much to live for anyway.

A scarred face, and a blind eye that nobody would ever find loveable. Let alone beautiful.  

The fae wouldn’t find him beautiful or even remotely interesting given just how his legs were trembling from the pure terror that was rushing through his veins, so perhaps..if they were being merciful today. They would do away with him quickly, giving him a painless death, ending the suffering that he had already been put through.

If he was lucky that’s how it would go.

So he turned with as much courage as he could muster up in his exhausted body, and the sharp silver eyes that stared back at him made his breath catch in his throat as if someone had just punched him in the chest. The fae truly were beautiful, so much so that he felt like nothing more than a pile of mud in compared to the wonder that floated before him, with sharp silver wings, like that of the dragonflies that had often occupied the rose garden back home.

“Such a poor little human, who’s stumbled upon my woods,” The fae’s voice sounded like the loveliest of wind chimes on a sweet summer day as those ice-cold fingers grazed the fresh burn that was scabbing over on marred his face. “What is your name little wounded one? Tell me, and I might give you something sweet to nibble on, you’re surely tired. Are you not? Wouldn’t you like to sleep awhile?” The red lips from which the sweet promises poured from like the dripping juice of an apple, twisted into such a lovely smile. It was such a promise and such a smile that it nearly had him pitching forward into the fae’s arms right then and there. Nearly spilling all of his tears, worries, sorrows, and all of his secrets from what had happened in the past day. The temptation tugged at his tongue.

The idea of sleeping and never waking up was one that seemed all too lovely.

He wanted to sleep, gods did he want to sleep and forget everything that had happened. The thought of resting within the fae’s arms, secure and safe was a tantalizing one, of never knowing fear again. It was..something that tugged at his heartstrings to the point where he could feel his cheek resting more and more in the palm of the fae as the other’s thumb brushed away the drying tears with a carefulness that he just wanted to soak in for all eternity. How long had it been since someone had touched him..held him in such a manner? Held him in such a loving manner with no hate or malice behind it?

Too long.

“I...” He swallowed thickly, as the fae’s eyes turned hungry for just a split second. It was a look that was split between greed and utter curiosity upon seeing the bitterly wounded human there among the forest. He wanted to speak, to spill every single thing that had hurt him. He wanted to so very badly, as exhaustion tugged at his weary bones, his knees begging to just sink down into the bed of grass. To relieve him of his consciousness, and to finally let the darkness consume him so that he wouldn’t have to worry about the waking world a second longer.

A tear dripped from his blinded eye, and the fae before him inched closer.

While the other’s fingers were as cold as ice, the tongue that drifted across his cheek was as warm as the stones before a winter fire. It was a warmth that made more tears spring to his eyes, as a sob tore through his lungs making an ugly gasping noise leave his lips.

Why was the fae stalling? Why wasn’t it just getting it over with? Why? Why? Why?

Those cold fingers drifted across his burned face once again as the other arm of the fae pulled him in closer. He couldn’t help but to sink into the other’s hold, to let his face rest against his collarbone as he wept and sobbed until the tears refused to come anymore. Until he was weeping without a single hint of wetness on his face, gasping and wheezing.

It was a while before the fae spoke again. “Your tears taste of the sadness of a lost one,” Those needle-like fingers ran through his hair, again and again, the repetition soothing him in a way that nothing else could, until his shuddering finally stopped and came to an end. “Speak to me your name, and I will end this sadness that consumes thee.”

He shook his head against the collar of the fae that held him, that had soothed his tears until there was nothing left.

“I…” It hurt to speak through his raw throat that was croaky from just about everything that he had gone through. “I don’t have a name anymore, s..so..” He swallowed thickly before eventually lifting his head up enough to look into those glinting silver eyes, that reminded him too much of the executioner's ax, that would be waiting for him if he ever decided to go home. “You can call me Deceit.”

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