#like. not afterlife type thing but like a place where all the lost people caught in the beams were held | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

creativeashproductions · 4 years ago

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Elysium // Luke Patterson

Summary: The boys of Julie and the Phantoms need a hail Mary to dethrone Downslide from opening for Panic! At the Disco. While Willie is done to help his blue eyed crush and his friends there’s one issue: Willie can’t drive the bus. Moving a bench is one thing but driving an entire tour bus? There’s only one person who can and Willie’s not sure where she is after year of no communication

Warnings: Swearing, angst, talk of death (it’s a ghost show, why is this a warning??), mention of assault, violence, and fluff.

Words: 11.5k

A/N: This is why I haven’t posted much in the last week. I’ve been writing this massive fic that I refused to turn into a series. My god, 11k words. I don’t think I’ll be doing this again. Enjoy and comment if you figured out who Rudy is!

Masterlist

There wasn’t much in the afterlife that you enjoyed after time spent in the limbo between the living and dead. Listening to songs before they were released lost its appeal just as much as dancing on stage with the ballet companies around the world, of being an unseen extra in shows and films being filmed.

Then you found a purpose a couple, well it could be more than a couple, years ago when you found a lost soul. William Young, Willie to his friends, had been sitting on the curb staring at the pavement entirely still as he had for two days.

The time from the last breath you took to walking the streets of Los Angeles was a blur in all honesty. The years bled together as you stayed stationary in a world that kept on spinning and changing, growing up. You had watched your friends hit new milestones you could only daydream about. Friends that graduated college and built new lives on the ashes of memories that included you.

Today’s walk was an attempt to escape your friends’ greying versions standing in front of a once vibrant sculpture. It happened every single year, but this one hurt the most. Listening to your friends recall stories of all the adventures you did together.

From being drunken idiots jumping off cliffs into that one lake the summer of freshman year. Or making a bonfire on the school’s roof with all the entryways blocked, rather stupid with the exits being blocked as well. Sneaking into concerts and stealing that one car that came close to sending you to boarding school.

The rebellion that still lived in you had mellowed in the five individuals with the adult responsibilities of family and work. Martha had removed all piercings but her lobes while Chase quit dying his hair colour. Jordan now had three children and a bought house.

Seeing the group no longer young had made your feet swiftly move from the memorial for a walk. The only thing that stopped you in your tracks was tripping over something in front of you.

“Ouch.” You hissed rolling onto your back with a moan of pain that faded with the sniffles.

Curled into his knees, sitting on the curb was a teenage boy about your age. Long hair curtaining his profile you found your eyes grasping the cracked helmet that spoke for itself abandoned by his side.

“Your kinda a hazard there.” You simply spoke sitting down next to the distraught teenager, “Heads up, I suck at comforting people.”

At his silence, you spoke once more, “I’m digging the tie-dye. Did you do it yourself?”

“This is some kind of stupid coma dream right?” The boy’s voice was husky from crying and disuse, “I’m probably in some kind of hospital with a tube down my throat.”

“I’d say yes, but it would be a blatant lie.” You spoke twirling a loose thread on your jeans while the stranger gazed at a spot on the street.

His dark brown eyes bloodshot as he remembered the car honking mere seconds before he heard the sound of a thud. He recalled struggling to breathe with his broken ribs and his screams being illustrated with bloodstains.

He remembered thinking how he had just bought that board a week ago with his allowance.

“Am I really dead?”

“Yes. We’re are a couple ghosts in a lively city.” You informed him with one handheld in the space between your ethereal forms. The teen hesitantly placed his hand in yours with a firm shake.

“William but call me Willie.” He softly told you, catching sight of the patch on your jean jacket—one of many from both when your grandma owned it and then when you did.

“I’m Y/N. Let’s blow this disappointment. I’m gonna teach you everything you need to know.” Brushing off the invisible dust on your jeans, you held your hand out to him, “We’re about to make the afterlife our bitch.”

A stark contrast to his former hesitance he immediately grasped your hand to tug himself off the curb. The forlorn skater didn’t question the board in your hand or how he could possibly even touch his own board. He didn’t wonder how it wasn’t in pieces like it had been when he first got hit.

That rebellion that ended your life flared again in the presence of your best friend with crashing Justin Bieber’s house. Of rearranging items in classrooms to freak teachers out and sitting in the cars turning the radio on and off. Haunting the living until the friendship fractured under the influence of a powerful ghost.

Caleb Covington had bewitched the skater with promises and extravagant gifts until Willie had taken the offer.

“He’s not like you said he was! I think you should give him a chance!” Willie cried following you around the place you had taken to be home.

“Willie he’s a bad guy! He butters you up until you give him what you want! That’s when you see his true colours. All he wants is your soul to power his magic and spread his reach!”

“I got to talk to my sister!”

“Your sister is five years old! It’s not Covington that gave you the opportunity. She won’t remember the experience as anything other than an invisible friend!”

“There are so many people at the Club that we can talk to. Aren’t you tired of the same routine and people we see?”

Willie’s pleading brought your full attention to the skater avoiding your gaze, “William Young…you took his offer.”

Willie tore his gaze from the art on the wall to find yours blatantly glaring at him with a bucket of random colour in your hand.

“The Club is going to France to tour around the country for a while. I’m dead, so I might as well make the best of it. Besides who gets to skate through the Louvre!” Willie beamed, watching as a small smile, found its way on your face at his excitement, “I’m sure Caleb would let you come to the Club tonight!”

“Willie, you are my best friend, but I’ve already seen the Club. It’s not my style, and I want nothing to do with it.”

That interaction was one of the very few speckled through the years when Caleb discovered who you were. No matter his offers, you never took the deal and when he saw how close you and Willie where he kept the skater busy. The Club didn’t appear in Los Angeles for a long time until Willie’s distance seemed too great to bridge.

“So, you need a way for the slot to be empty?” Willie asked the trio of ghosts all spread around the area.

Unfortunately for Luke, the only person they could get help from was from the very guy that placed them in a predicament. While Alex was the one spearheading the conversation with the long-haired skater Luke was glowering in his direction.

“The Orpheum was the thing we never got to do. We spent hours practising and performing with one goal-“

“Play the Orpheum and get distance from our parents. Well, at the time that streetdog and becoming legendary was my main focus.” Reggie recounted the feeling of suffocating in a house filled with fighting. A home he wished still stood, now dead all he wanted was to see his parents.

“We almost did it too.” Luke pouted relaxing his glare at the skater who openly sent apologetic gazes at Alex’s bandmates.

“So, we need to get rid of the opening band.” Willie nodded to himself, thinking about ways before he caught sight of the abject horror on the band. The skater’s eyebrows raised, “I know I deeply fractured the trust, but I’m not suggesting murder.”

“Okay. Good.” Reggie whistled relaxing his tense posture while Luke grumbled under his breath an insult that in turn got Alex’s arm into the guitarist’s ribs.

“Your best bet would be getting the bus out of LA. The band will probably celebrate the upcoming gig.”

“Could you make the bus disappear?” Alex hesitantly questioned shifting in his now vintage sneakers. The blonde-haired drummer flushed slightly under the endearing smile from the skater. The feelings create a confliction within Alex under Willie’s issue, leading them straight into a madman’s hands.

“I can move a bench, turn sirens on, but a bus is outside my paygrade.” Willie openly admitted showing his hands deep in his pockets, “The only person other than Caleb that has enough power-“

“-is he just as evil?” Luke demanded crossing his arms to glare at the male that had unfortunately caught the interest of Alex.

However, Luke couldn’t blame Alex for falling for this guy because well, Luke saw the teenage ghost’s appeal. Willie was attractive, but he wasn’t the type of person Luke would fall for. Plus he had initially made Alex incredibly happy, and Luke would never blame Alex for that.

“She is as different from Caleb as one can be. She uh…she taught me everything about being a ghost. Actually, found me where I died.” Willie cleared his throat as the guilt and sadness reared its head from deep within him. The guilt of leaving his little sister to grow up without him and the sorrow of not growing up with the girl.

It wasn’t often Willie allowed himself to remember the little girl, barely five when he died, who was always dancing. His little sister adored the colour purple and anything shiny and more than once Willie had let her dress him up. Willie’s greatest regret is that he’d never have that interaction with her. God, she’d be around his age now and in high school.

“Okay, so where is she?” Reggie clapped his hands, bringing the skater out of his thoughts and back into the present.

Luke saw the hesitation in Willie, “There’s a catch, isn’t there?”

“Kinda?” Willie trailed off bouncing on the balls of his feet, “I haven’t seen her in years now. Last time I saw her we fought about the whole joining Caleb thing? I’m not even sure if she’s still in LA.”

“Of fucking course,” Luke grunted shoving both hands in his hair taking a few steps away from the other ghosts.

First, he dies, then he gets caught up in some bullshit revenge plot, then makes a deal with the devil without realizing it, and now their one chance is going up in flames. Luke Patterson was livid with the universe and the shitty hand he had been dealt, but at least he had his friends with him.

“It can’t hurt to look for her?” Reggie innocently offered with a shake of his shoulders, “It’s not like we have any other option.”

“Did we ever even have options?” Luke hissed, causing Willie and Alex each to flinch with the different guilt they carried.

Alex was guilty of going to Willie for help when getting back at Bobby was the biggest thing. Willie was guilty of ignoring his instincts on keeping Alex as far from Caleb as he could be he just wanted to impress the drummer. It’s not like Willie had many options for dating, and well, Alex was the first to get his entire focus.

“Dude. Stop. No one saw it coming.” Reggie bumped his hip against the annoyed guitarist, “Let’s find this ghost and get our shot at playing.”

The quartet of dead guys didn’t have high hopes of finding the girl in question, but it seemed the universe took pity on Luke Patterson. Just two hours into their search on the edges of the city limits an individual was walking.

The person’s stature leaned against a smashed concrete wall of the skeleton of where a building once was. The only thing the group could make out was a faded jean jacket with splotches of colour. Her ankles crossed as her back leaned against the cement, oozed laid back confidence. Coming closer, Luke noticed the sunglasses perched on top of her head and the lips painted dark.

“What do you need Willie? I heard you were looking for me.” The husky voice drew Luke in the most. The lead guitarist of Julie and the Phantoms enamoured with the girl.

“How’d-“Willie’s question was cut off as you simply tapped your right index finger against your temple.

“How do you think you managed to get here?” You inquired pushing off the cement to stride over to the group. To Willie’s surprise, he was tugged into your embrace before swiftly pushed away, “Come on. We should head in before someone catches us.”

In the dark as much as the other three ghosts, Willie dutifully followed you past the pieces of cement littered around the area. Gasps of surprise sounded as the once empty space became filled with buildings. It was not as extravagant as the hotel the Club worked out of, but it was hidden from the living and dead eyes.

“Where did this come from?” Reggie gasped astounded by the people once hidden from his view, moving around the area.

“This is Elysium. Don’t judge the name I lost the right in a poker game with Susie and Rudy. I’m Y/N.” You informed the group leading them to the gate where two people stood stoically guarding it, “Rudy was hellbent on calling it Valhalla.”

“This is Luke, Reggie and Alex.” Willie gestured to the awed trio of musicians only lingering on the blonde. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see the attraction between the skater and the blonde; finding a date in the afterlife was a lot harder than the living.

Nodding a greeting to the two ghosts, you lead the group to a building painted a pretty turquoise blue colour. The sign above the double doors a stark white with calligraphy writing simply stating Elysium Management. It was a building set up like an administrative office of three stories, and you led the group right up to the top floor.

“Just a heads up…Rudy is a little suspicious of people.” You admitted standing outside a door with a nameplate the only descriptor, “He’ll come off a little gruff and rude, but when you get passed that he doesn’t shut up.”

“I can hear you through the door dumbass.” The words were called out from the office door opening.

The man standing in the entry wore a crisp white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His honey-brown eyes lit up with a teasing look before it shuttered at the sight of four strangers behind you. Rudy had valid reasons to not fully trust people after the shitshow in his hometown when he was alive.

“And you’ve brought strangers.” Rudy deadpanned with a sigh concluding his sentence as he stepped back into the office. It appeared like the world repositioned itself on the young man’s shoulders once more.

“I should be done within the hour. We can go over everything.” You informed your business partner and friend. Receiving only a nod from Rudy, you closed the door to his office, cutting off the view from your guests.

“He’s..uh.”

“Standoffish? Rudy keeps his past to himself, all he’s ever revealed is that he’s from a town a few hours away.” You spoke, opening the door to your own office decorated differently from Rudy’s more sterile black and white aesthetic.

Your office had splashes of colour with vintage posters of both music and film framed on the walls—a plush couch in the corner with a basket of blankets next to it. Instead of sitting behind the dark desk, you chose the couch instead. As you settled in the corner, you flicked one finger bringing an extra seat over.

The motion shocking the three boys accompanying Willie who had seen the abilities himself.

“Okay so why did you want to search for me?” You questioned the skater leaning back in the seat.

“When did this all happen?” Willie countered gesturing to the office in a building settled in the middle of a ghost town. A literal ghost town.

“There’s an empty lot in LA that used to house an abandoned apartment building that Rudy and I both called home. Of course, it was torn down, and we kinda knew that there’s wasn’t a place that didn’t have the threat of being annihilated at some point.” The memories of those unknown days trickled into your mind among the more positive ones, “We wanted a home. A place to call our own.”

“A week or so later a skittish pixie of a brunette crashed into us full speed. Susie had a certain ability that Caleb desired to have under his thumb. There are so many ghosts he had manipulated into selling him their soul. Rudy and I both wanted to stop Caleb from having that chance for everyone.” You continued, “Can I show you?”

The moon shone through the light clouds as a duo wandered LA’s streets in different mental states. The only home you had known had been unceremoniously ripped down with no future plans in place. Your entire life had been in that apartment in a building you had once thought only you inhabited. You had been unaware that on a separate floor, Rudy had been dwelling.

The two teens in starkly different clothing grew close with each other through the whole being the dead thing they shared. The mission was to find another place too, use but the feeling of home being ripped away tore at their hearts. The apartment was a place Caleb Covington hadn’t been aware of.

Your thoughts threatened to turn darker as a force knocked you onto your bac—aA short brunette groaning in pain to the left of you. The girl was Gwen, who would become very important to both Rudy and you.

I’ve always been a little different than most people. I can move things short distances, but I developed a specific talent. I can get inside people’s minds to plant, remove or alter memories or simply talk and read their thoughts.

The sound of your voice in their heads freaked them out more than they would like to admit. The intrusive tickle of something in their brains unsettling as you made a more present entry so they could feel it.

“What?”

“This is why I can’t be anywhere near Caleb. The whole reason he gives people stamps and takes their souls is because of me.” You fully admitted clasping your fingers in your lap, “He couldn’t cope with the fear of another ghost leaving so added a stipulation to joining his Club.”

“How did you come to create Elysium?” Alex inquired leaning forward in his seat to rest his elbows on his knees. Luke and Reggie followed his posture as the anticipation built.

“Everyone deserves a safe place. A place as far away from Caleb as possible and we do so for free. No fee is required, and ghosts are free to come and go as they please. They are welcome as long as their unfinished business keeps them in this plane.”

It sounded like a sweet deal to the group of teens, but they had other commitments, “You can tell us more, but we need your help.”

The pleading in the messy-haired brunette tore at your heartstrings like the one time Willie brought you to his house. It had been shortly before your friendship fractured, a few years ago. He had brought you to a suburb for low-income families and straight to the backyard where a twelve-year-old year danced.

The dead skater boy and the rebel sat in the patio chair on the tiny porch nestled in the postmark sized backyard. A quintet of pre-pubescent girls danced on the lawn to some bubblegum pop song. The Young girl was submissive to a more confident girl even when the venue was the Young girl’s home.

“The girl to the left is my little sister Kayla. She’s twelve now, it’s been seven years since I died.” Willie’s brown eyes saddened at the dancer who had a spark of maturity in her eyes, “I check in every once in a while. These are Kayla’s friends. The bossy girl is Carrie, and while the band is a group, she is the unofficial leader of the band Carrie’s Constellations.”

“She looks happy.”

“Kayla’s always been bubbly in personality, but she had questionable friends.” Willie outright admitted keeping his eyes pinned to the girl that had grown up in a blink of an eye. Her dark hair concealed by the gaudy purple wig; the colour assigned to the teenager.

“It’s nice that she still enjoys dance.” Willie finished reaching out to grab your hand in his and just like that Willie transitioned back into carefree, “I found this really cool skatepark I think you’d like.”

“We don’t have a lot of time.” Alex winced as the three musicians flinched as a sudden purple spark of colour lit up their midsections.

Like a tentacle, your mind reached into the quiet raven-haired boy with the leather jacket. Beyond the imagery of docile golden retrievers and steaming plates of food, you found the regret and fear in the boy. Stepping into a recent memory, you watched their experience at the Hollywood Ghost Club.

“You’ve met Caleb.” You sighed roughly pushing your index finger between your brows feeling the familiar ache.

“It was a stupid decision,” Luke spoke up, tearing his focus from the mysterious girl that ultimately had the power in her hands. The entire plan was weighing on the decision you would give, “Either we join his house band, or we don’t exist.”

“Hm.” You spoke as the kaleidoscope of colours in Luke’s eyes glittered under the sterile lights of the room. It was difficult to look away from the enthralling teenage ghost, but the emotion wafting off Willie was concerning.

“They died before they could perform at the Orpheum. We’re banking that getting the opening slot with giving them the push into crossing over.” The long-haired skater leaned closer, “I know we haven’t talked in a while, but I can’t do much.”

“So, you want to pull ’09 incident again?” You completely ignored the trio on the couch staring directly at the sheepish skater with raised eyebrows, “Only this time without the train?”

“Train?” Alex whispered, looking between the two long-time friends with interest and then next thing he knew Alex was in the backseat of a van crushed between Reggie and Luke equally confused.

Chicago, Illinois 2009

William Young and Y/N Y/L/N were complete hellions in the ghost world, creating havoc that fascinated the living population. The recent event being the highjacking of a van filled with drunk teenage boys. These boys had been the sole reason a young girl was recovering in a hospital with life-threatening injuries. The scene changed to a hospital room with Willie and Y/N watching a girl with massive bruising laid.

It had hit both Willie and Y/N hard catching the tail end of the new report, Willie thinking of how that could have been his sister. Even if Kayla was only five years old, having a sister set things more in perspective. For you it was a flashback to when you were alive and thus led you to the ICU room for the girl.

Slipping into her unconscious mind was easy but while the injured teen appeared peaceful to the hospital staff, she was anything but. The poor girl’s mind replayed the traumatic incident over and over like a movie; keeping in the shadows, you gently repainted the portrait with lighter and brighter images.

For Willie, he watched as you wavered on your ghostly feet and smoothed out the features of the girl. The heart monitor subtly changing as the injured girl relaxed, and suddenly your interference heightened her chances of survival.

“I got it.” You spoke to Willie with a heated glare on your features and when the ghostly musician trio blinked they were back in the van.

Your hands gripped the van’s steering wheel with Willie turned in the passenger seat to watch a group of living boys scream. To the living eyes in the van, no one was in the front seats but whispered words spoke into their minds.

You’re going to go straight to the police and tell them what you did. You’ll hand over the photographic evidence and demand the worst punishment. You’ll leave the girl alone, or we’ll come back to finish our job. You will pay for the hospital bills if the family agrees.

The boys trembled with the putrid scent of urine permeating the enclosed vehicle. The distant sound of a train echoed in the distance as the van stopped on the tracks. No matter how much the living boys moved the doors refused to open, and the windows remained unbreakable.

“WE promise!” The ringleader cried, slamming his shoulder against the door with the train’s bright lights illuminating the van.

“Let us go!” The other screamed, slamming his bruising hands on the window.

Alex was flinching at each slam of fists on the glass, leaving smears of blood. Knuckles broke from the window. At the very last second, your foot slammed the gas pedal taking the van millimetres from the train screeching on the tracks.

You and Willie stared at the stationary train lit up from the van’s headlights with the rhythmic flashes of the red and blue police lights. The van’s seat arrangement was different with the ringleader in the driver’s seat.

The three ghost musicians standing unseen behind the duo but in the real world out of the dreamlike memory you knew.

Elysium, Present Day

“Holy fucking shit.” Alex cussed out of breath, leaning back on the couch with shaking limbs and fear in his bloodless veins.

Luke’s eyes blinked owlishly at the boy that he had once thought could never do something as terrifying and torturous. He was afraid to even ask the outcome of the life-threatening incident you did on the assailants.

“That is the reason for the train.” You barely glanced at the shaken trio to stare at who had once been your partner in crime, “Willie, I have responsibilities here. We just opened a new division for the children we house here.”

“It would take a few hours.” Willie pleaded, positioning his hands into a pleading position turning on his charm. The puppy eyes you had always struggled to say no to as if you weren’t the type of person easily capable of staying strong.

“We’ll do anything.” Luke pleaded just as much recalling the countless times he had charmed himself out of situations, “Please help us.”

“I’ll have to make arrangements with Rudy and Susie, but I might be able to pull some strings. I’m really sorry Willie, but I’m gonna need to erase your knowledge of this place. There are too many people depending on this setup.”

Outside the Orpheum

Outside the legendary venue, three out of four band members for Julie and the Phantoms walked up to the marquee. Hopefully, the letters for Downslide would be changed into their band name just under the main act. Everything was riding on Willie and Y/N’s capabilities. Trusting the skater was challenging to do and more so someone they didn’t fully know.

“Look, don’t worry, guys. Willie said he’d get us on that marquee.” Alex soothed his friends on each side of him. All three wearing concerned expressions at the place that hopefully was their last stop before crossing over.

“This is gonna work, right?” Reggie questioned with his hand confidently sliding into the pockets of his black jeans. The relaxed posture a juxtaposition to the anxiety and nerves on his flushed face.

“It has to.” Luke’s lips pursed into a pout with his words tinged with a dialect different from his best friends. The faint souvenir from the place he spent a few years growing up before moving to LA.

Luke’s words were highlighted by the groans of pain as that flash of purple courtesy of Caleb’s death stamp appeared. All three hunched over clutched their chests breathing through the pain; Luke was the first to unfurl his form.

“Whoa!” You gasped flashing underneath the marquee beside Willie. Rushing to give Luke support without even a second thought.

When the aftershock faded, the guitarist stood straight up with a thankful smile that boarded on adoration.

“Are you guys, okay?” Willie asked, keeping back with the swell of guilt that happened, seeing the familiar symptoms of post-shock. He had felt them a time or two in the time he had sold his soul to his unfortunate boss.

“Yeah, it’s nothing we haven’t felt before,” Alex replied, rubbing his hand over the baby blue shirt he had chosen today. His blue eyes doing their best to avoid looking into the puppy-like ones of the skater, “How’d it go?”

“Well, when that opening band wakes up, they’re gonna find their bus 200 miles outside of Vegas.” Willie proudly announcing turning on his heel to show off the Downslide jacket he took from the lead singer. His fist extending to bump yours instinctively before he did so with Luke.

“With no chance of getting back in time.” You snickered in response living on the adrenaline and nostalgia of the rebellion. With Elysium, you had turned around your life, “Meaning-“

“-there’s probably a promoter upstairs right about now freakin’ out.”

“Nah. This is Hollywood, man.” Willie scoffed with a wave of his hand matching the one you supplied, “I’m sure he’s being very professional.”

As Willie finished his sentence up in the promotor’s office out of earshot of the ghosts stood a very pissed adult. His finger-wagging his finger with teeth clenched, his flushed skin a juxtaposition to the cheery blue Hawaiian style shirt. Frank Wolfe couldn’t believe how stupid his once opening band was.

“What do you mean the bus drove itself into the middle of the desert?” Frank questioned progressively growing more and more frustrated. His assistant Tasha casting concerned looks to her typically collected boss, “BUSES DON’T DRIVE THEMSELVES!”

Tasha flinched at the sudden loud growl of the sentence but more so as Wolfe starting slamming the phone into the cradle. Her fingers halting on her keyboard, going over the list of frequent acts. Unfortunately, the five acts had other commitments causing Tasha to fear tonight. The blonde lady was worried Wolfe could have a breakdown once more.

While Willie snickered to his own words, your eyes, not your mind, could read that Alex wanted to talk to the skater. With only a teasing jab of your elbow in Willie’s ribs you shuffled around the drummer to join Reggie and Luke away from the ‘will they won’t they’ couple.

“So, can you do me a favour?” Luke hesitantly questioned you with his inquisitive eyes a greener colour in the sunlight. His attractive eyes took your full attention with a simple tilt of your head, “Julie’s family means a lot to us, and could you keep an eye on them?”

“And Carlos,” Reggie interjected rocking on his polished pleather boots he had spent ages on finding for his rocker aesthetic back in the ’90s.

“-Julie’s little brother.” Luke supplied at the confusion painted clearly on your pretty features. His green eyes scoured your face as he always did that flushed both his and your faces red.

“Yeah, of course, I can.” You firmly told the two dead boys each standing tense in front of you.

You could easily see the love they held for the living family that had come to mean so much in such a short amount of time. Since first meeting them you had always gotten the feeling that their living years weren’t the best. For Alex, it was living in the ’90s as a young gay teenager during a terrifying time for the LGBTQ+ community. Reggie flinched at the raised voices, and Luke had longingly stared after the happy families milling around the Elysium.

“Did you ever find out what your unfinished business was?” Reggie inquired fixing a strand of his dark hair that had fallen onto his blemish-free skin. Your smile faltered at his question; nonetheless, you answered.

“I did.” The two words carried a sense of pain with them. Your eyes unfocused recalling the euphoric feeling of seeing the breathtaking white light of the peace exuding from the beyond and the agony of denying crossing over.

“How-“

“Hey! Y/N!” Willie called out to the young denim wearing ghost with his beaming grin, “Don’t go stealing buses without me!”

Luke swore he could see your laughter in the air, just as endearing as the smoky quality your voice carried.

“Don’t go glitter bombing criminals.” You returned as your best friend dropped his board to skate off to wherever he was needed. It was bittersweet to reconnect with him knowing that it could be the last time.

When Caleb found out, not an if but a when Willie had a hand in helping his desired band it was high chance Willie would be gone. Caleb was all too powerful, and when he was betrayed, it never ended well.

“I need to get back to Elysium. Susie’s arrival is tonight. Good luck with tonight.” Your words were accompanied by a hug for each of the boys. The one with Luke lingering the most, “I wish you could play for the kids.”

“Yeah. Me too.” The brunette, messy-haired boy’s words carried a hidden desire simply to be in your space more. The teenage ghost helps those in limbo while wearing a jean jacket with patches from many decades. The jacket creating an unknown time you had lived.

“Goodbye, boys.” You told the trio before you poofed away from the busy streets of Hollywood where the band had come full circle in death.

“Are you guys, okay?” Reggie inquired his best friends, forgoing his casual personality for the layers underneath. His blue-green eyes filled with only concern.

Alex and Luke shared a lingering look, ��Yeah. We’re okay.”

The dining hall was filled with long tables and chairs populated by the ghostly forms of everyone currently living at Elysium. It was reminiscent of a British book turned film series of youth with magic abilities. The series had been a favourite of a former resident.

“Incredible.” Susie breathed staring at the joyful people having a place to call home. Making the limbo between life and death more bearable.

“We’ve done well. You smiled, wrapping an arm around her waist, “It’s so nice to have you back.”

Elysium was so much more than you could ever hope for. It kept growing and growing with more ghosts. Since the founding of the haven, new developments continuously happened with one resident’s unique ability.

Harvey had joined the haven a year into the founding bringing the ability to gift the residents with the capacity to eat. During his life, Harvey had been a renowned chef and the dream to make food it carried into his death. As long as Harvey cooked the food with his volunteer staff ghosts were able to eat it.

“Harvey has outdone himself again,” Rudy announced his arrival at your side with his arms crossed, displaying his corded muscles. The constellation of moles on his face standing on his pale creamy skin.

“Rudy!” Susie squealed, throwing herself into his arms with the same glee that came each time. Susie and Rudy since their first meeting had a special bond as chosen siblings who bonded over heartache.

Rudy had died, leaving his best friend and his strawberry blonde girlfriend in the living world back in their dark hometown. It was just one tidbit he had revealed throughout your friendship. The only physical connection to his living friends was the three picture on his desk of a group of people.

The first picture had a lean version of Rudy with his arms thrown over a Hispanic boy with a crooked jaw and glimmering brown eyes. The Hispanic boy had his arm around a pretty brunette girl with deep dimples and wavy brown hair. The two boys wore a sports uniform of some kind holding lacrosse sticks.

The second picture had Rudy and the Hispanic teen again but with a beautiful petite strawberry blonde. Along with them was a brunette with blunt chin-length hair and hardened features besides a shorter blonde male with blue eyes.

The last picture was of Rudy with the same Hispanic boy wearing graduation caps and gowns with two beaming adults. The male adult wore a tan shirt adorned with a star on his left pec and dark brown pants. He had to be Rudy’s father with similar features. The woman was of Hispanic descent with laugh lines, and thick dark curly hair pulled into a half do; obviously the Hispanic teen’s mother.

The pain in Rudy’s face each time he saw the pictures closed off a desire to ask him about the people.

“Hello, Susie.” Rudy chuckled, wrapping his arms around her small stature, “How was Europe?”

“Why don’t you ask the five newcomers I found before Caleb?” Susie teased gesturing to the ragtag of new ghosts immersed in conversations.

“Family?”

“A boarding school had a fire. Those five were in the fire when it happened and the only victims out of seven that didn’t cross over.” Susie’s tone faded into a melancholy tone with her small arms wrapping around her middle. Faded brown eyes staring at the younger of the five seeing herself in them.

“That’s terrible.” You whispered, staring at the table with one finger picking the patch of a band from the ’70s, “I can’t imagine how scary that could have been.”

“Yeah.” Susie softly spoke, pushing a strand of her hair off her temple just as equally sad for the way that death had no qualms of how it took.

The youngest ghost in Elysium had been a three-year-old toddler who passed over quickly when he was found by the deceased mother. The two had been separated at death and luckily shared the same unfinished business of finding each other.

“Miss Reynold’s has twelve spirits that finished their business.” Rudy softly informed his two partners. Soft smiles formed on their faces at the happy news of Elysium’s goal being accomplished again.

“May they find everlasting peace and serenity.” Your words intertwined with Susie in perfect sync of the motto coined after the first crossover, “I suppose the Serenity will begin planning?”

“Have the Serenity ever not performed their duty?” Rudy raised one dark eyebrow with a rhetorical question. E/c and faded brown met recalling the countless times Elysium had hosted a celebration for those who found their unfinished business.

“That is-whoa.” You gasped stumbling at the scream echoing in your mind accessorized with the vintage sound of a band.

Calloused hands grasped your shaking form from collapsing onto the ground from a proverbial psionic shove. Agony slammed your brain flickering into an old fashioned club filled with people in both colour or black and white attire. You caught sight of baby pink, deep royal blue and bright red suits. The pained screams of a skater in a dark room overtaking the music in the Club.

“No.” You whispered clenching your hands on your head, feeling the dread building in the pit of your stomach.

The joyful voices in the hall muted while your body flickered with the deep instinct to leave the haven for the one place that utterly terrified you. It was the familiar touch of Susie and Rudy that kept you from finding the one person that meant the world. Willie’s soul was on the cutting board, and Caleb obsession with performing was the only reason Willie still existed.

“Willie.” You whimpered tears rolling down your flushed cheeks, feeling the panic in the skater’s mind.

“Susie help me.” Rudy stonily spoke ushering the distraught girl from the busy hall into an empty room.

Your shaking body finding purchase on the plush sofa with Susie holding one hand in hers and Rudy brushing the sweaty hair from your forehead. It wasn’t often your psionic abilities left you in such a state, but the distance proved difficult.

“Shit.” Rudy grumbled frowning, “This is bad. Y/N, we need to get you to Willie. You’re flickering, and the distance isn’t helping.”

“You want to take one of Elysium’s strongest ghosts straight into Caleb’s domain? You know how much he wants her in his Club.” Susie hissed to the co-founder of the haven they had to take extraordinary measures to protect, “It won’t work! You’re throwing her to the dogs!”

“Susanne I wouldn’t do this if it wasn’t necessary. Besides, we always have a plan.” Rudy retorted narrowing his whiskey eyes at the younger girl, “I’ll take her to get Willie, but you need to stay here to make sure everything runs smooth.”

“Are you sure you can-“Susie cut herself off with a nod as Rudy displayed the reason he could do it, “Okay, yep, you can do it.”

Rudy came back into her vision in his signature position with one eyebrow raised, and his arms crossed. The reason why Elysium worked so well was Rudy’s ability to erase an object from the view of anyone. He could make himself invisible to anyone and in practice, developed it to hide items and location. With his ability, Elysium was permanently hidden to anyone outside of his power. Illusions were his unique ability.

“You aren’t the first person to doubt my capability.” Rudy informed the other ghost reaching one hand out. With his fingers caressing your temple, he snapped his fingers, transporting you and him away from Elysium.

The empty room of Elysium’s dining hall was exchanged for the business streets of Los Angeles, bringing an improvement in your body. Pushing away from Rudy, your eyes frantically scoured the unfamiliar area for any hint of Willie.

“He’s close.” You exclaimed closing your e/c eyes to focus solely on your sixth sense kicking in. Rudy’s gasp snapped your eyes open to see his eyes pinned on your feet where a glowing neon purple smoke wisped.

“What is that?” Rudy demanded crouching to touch it, but it was like nothing was there. His whiskey brown eyes meeting your confused gaze.

“I have no clue, but I feel like I have to follow it.” Robotically your feet started walking following the smoke through the streets.

Rudy was silent as you came upon a park swallowed by the darkness of the night with the moon barely showing through the clouds. The odd purple smoke the only offering of light so far from the path with street lights.

“Of course we have to go through a park.” Rudy grumbled, “Nothing good ever happens in wooded areas at night.”

Lifting your eyes from the smoke, you looked at a deeply unsettled Rudy lost in the past only he knew. His mind recalling traipsing through the forest with his asthmatic best friend in the middle of the night. The last night before the unknown took over his life. Oddly enough dying and returning as a ghost was the most normal with everything that happened with his friends alive.

“You can go ba-“

“We’re not splitting up,” Rudy growled plainly scowling at your hesitant features. Rudy’s slammed the door closed on his past life.

Sensing unease Rudy’s calloused hand reached over to slide into yours in platonic support. You continued your mission, unaware that three certain ghosts in breathtaking suits were searching for you.

Alex, Reggie, and Luke, affected by the purple jolts, failed to find the one place where their plan B could work. What Julie hadn’t known was that the guys had a plan just in case the Orpheum wasn’t their unfinished business. The three would go to Elysium to accept their fate and ensure Julie believed they crossed over.

With no Elysium in sight, the boys returned to the Molina garage hoping that one thing would go their way: Julie would go straight to bed.

The glow purple smoke trailed through the city park into an older part of Los Angeles before it stopped. Where the smoke stopped was a vast empty space surrounded by trees.

“Well, that’s a little anticlimactic.” You grumbled crossing your arms, “Willie’s somewhere here. Do you think Caleb has an underground lair?”

Rudy cast an unamused expression at you, “From past experience. No, that’s not likely. He probably has an apartment downtown. An underground network of caves in the woods is more shapeshifter style but still not true.”

“One: You’re rambling. Two: What the hell kind of life did you have?” You questioned furrowing your eyebrows at his rather odd piece of information.

“An old one.” Rudy spoke, staring ahead, “Besides, I think we should check out whatever building is hidden from our sight.”

“Hid-“Your mouth halted when Rudy roughly gripped your shoulders to twist you to face the empty space.

“Close your eyes. Trust your senses.” Rudy spoke softly, “Or pay attention to the slab of concrete in the middle of an empty space with well-kempt grass.”

Your palm slammed your forehead with a resounding thump in the night with distance lights from surrounding buildings. Rudy squeezed your shoulders as he stepped to the side once more in turn, closing his eyes.

“Walk in my mind.” Rudy stated for the first time in your friendship, allowing you to look in his mind. Your hesitance was met with another squeeze of comfort in his calloused grip.

Your tired eyes closed as your mind timidly stepped into the rather breathtaking mind of Rudy, who felt guilt the most. While Susie’s mind was like a summer day spent at a lake with brightness and gorgeous field of flowers, Rudy’s mind was different.

It was dark in Rudy’s mind but not as if evil, but as if he had been touched by the darkness and painted permanently. There’s was the odd whisper of childlike laughter intermingled with the full adult laugh of a woman; the laughter overshadowed with the sound of funeral music. You felt the lose near that memory. Rudy’s mind was painful to be in and drowning in the feelings he had.

Your breath caught seeing a door you assumed was of his childhood room with a name you couldn’t pronounce for the life of you.

“My parents named me after my mom’s dad.” Rudy spoke through his mind with a soft smile on his face, “I couldn’t say it, so I called myself Mischief. I stopped using it when my mom died, and I went by a shortened version of my last name.”

Your eyes watched as the door disappeared, and the reason you were in his mind came back to the forefront. Your eyes watched the image forming of a vintage hotel rippling in the air before it solidified. The size reminded you of a castle, and it felt like you were storming it.

Without any more mental interaction, you stepped out of Rudy’s mind back into the real world. The very same hotel in plain sight to both Rudy and your surprised elation.

“Honestly didn’t think that would work.” Rudy breathlessly laughed, staring at the hotel once hidden to them. A dark comparison to Elysium.

“How do we play this, Rudy?” You inquired looking over at him, “This is very different from stealing cars and scaring teens.”

“Easy. We blend in.” Rudy responded, holding one hand out to grasp yours in which you noticed your attire had changed, “Perks of illusion? I can alter our own perception of ourselves.”

“Oh, wow. That looks expensive.” You replied, staring at the diamond bracelet on your wrist matching the necklace you wore.

Rudy’s attire had changed from his normal button-up with the sleeves rolled to be layered under a charcoal grey vest and jacket. Sleek matching pants to his coat and the dark black-tie matching the elegant black dress you wore. He had taken pity on your footwear to fit your ability to walk and for the fancy place.

He even had diamond cufflinks that matched you, but the wedding rings on your fingers took you aback. Your widened eyes staring at him.

“Tonight we’re Mr and Mrs Martin,” Rudy spoke choking on the last name he gave as it was the upscale name toppled from his lips.

“Okay. This is a test of our abilities.”

“This is if our plan A of being invisible doesn’t work. The one thing we know for sure is that Caleb has never seen either one of us.” Rudy soothed your nerves with a half-smile,” Let’s get Willie out.”

Your arm slipped into the crook of his to walk to the front door, “I feel like a spy. I feel like that Naomi Roma-“

“It’s Natasha Romanoff. Have you ever seen one of the marvel movies?” Rudy demanded walking up the entrance with a pained smile, “You’re like my best friend and when he wouldn’t watch Star Wars! Never caught one of my references!”

“Okay! Sorry, we can watch the movies when this over.” You grumbled as your heels clicked in the foyer of the hotel. The inside made you feel like you were sent back in time to the roaring ’20s.

“Oh damn, this is nice,” Rudy whispered, staring at the chandelier in the extravagant lobby of the last place you wanted to be.

While on the outside the two ghosts appeared cool, calm and collected they were anything but. Both a wreck inside from the perilous errand they had done that could very well be the ending of Elysium. Rudy nudged you to begin finding Willie with your mind, but you didn’t need to.

That same glowing mist was on the ground pulling you in the direction of a dark hall away from the route to the Club. Rudy kept his eye out, a characteristic carried into the afterlife from his time with the FBI, as you followed the mist. The hall continued to get more and more dark as the walk continued.

Finally at the end was a blood-red door.

“I swear to god if he kills his Club members, I’ll lose it.” You hissed to your arm candy, “What if he’s really H. H. Holmes disguised as a former magician? His door is blood red!”

“Have you been using your serial killer colouring book again?” Rudy demanded stuttering his steps to place his whiskey brown eyes on you. The sheepish expression on your face was enough of a response to gain the look of disbelief could have sent you into hysterics had the time not been too serious.

With a grin belying the situation, you twisted your wrist to open the door to hopefully where Willie was being held.

“What a cliché. He’s keeping Willie in the basement?”

“Will you shut up!” Rudy hissed right back with a clenched jaw entering the somewhat unfinished basement. It was cold even to your dead standards where the cold didn’t bother that much.

At the bottom in front of a desk with only a small lamp as illumination sat a vacant-eyed Willie painstakingly detailing a fabric. The lush purple velvet fabric was bougie, to say the least, and rather outlandish for the skater.

“Willie.” You softly coaxed the teen to glance up from the fabric you found to be something Caleb would wear. Willie’s brown eyes barely met yours before they returned to the sewing needle in his hand and the tiny beads in the bowl.

“Caleb is actually forcing him to be his personal seamstress?” Rudy scoffed,d stepping right up by your side to look at the work.

Both trying unsuccessfully to coaxed Willie out of the stupor he was engaged in the sudden poofing wasn’t heard.

“Mrs. Young taught both Willie and Kayla how to sew. She’s quite the seamstress, reminds me of my old one.” Caleb wistfully responded with a smarmy smile on his face, “Well if it isn’t little Y/N and whoever she brought. Nice threads.”

“Let him go.”

Caleb’s index finger caressed the corner of his mouth so gently to ensure the stage makeup didn’t budge. His clear ocean blue eyes turning thunderstorm navy as his lips parted in such a bone-chilling sinister grin.

“Let him go? He tried to take my new house band from me. He thinks that those boys not crossing over is his punishment. I think that adorable but so very wrong.” Caleb shrugged, dragging his finger down the bicep of his puppet.

“What can we do to- “

“You see after he’s done fixing the tuxedo jacket I’m going to tie him up on the table and slowly strip away his soul piece by piece. No, Willie won’t get the quick and easy zap erasing him. I’ll personally see it’s the most painful thing he experiences and I’ll do so happily.”

“Willie! Wake up!” Rudy shouted, shaking the skater’s shoulder frantically with his focus never entirely leaving the mad man. The whiskey brown eyes panicking at the odd displaced feeling of reliving his living life.

“That won’t work.” Caleb chuckled crossing his arms, “It’s rather amusing you think you can beat me. I’m Caleb Covington! I’m persuasive enough for hundred of memberships to financially benefit the Club.”

“And I’m Y/N Y/L/N bitch.” You snarled viciously throwing your mind into the nefarious narcissistic mind of the washed-up magician.

Caleb Convington had started to bore his audience with the same tricks at every previous show. The lack of interest depleting the attendance numbers and severely hurting the financials. So Caleb decided to broaden his talent by copying the likes of Harry Houdini.

He had a knack for both the dramatics and swindling his audience to be tricked by the illusions he created. The heightened popularity increased Caleb’s thirst for status and fame, so he overestimated himself.

Surrounded by adoring fans and journalists, Caleb had his assistant lock him in a safe with no key, to the audience’s knowledge, and push the safe into the river. Unfortunately from the infamous magician and escape artist the safe warped due to the material it as made out of. Caleb Covington died drowning in a safe at the bottom of the river.

You flinched feeling the emotion at the time Caleb had died and the feeling of disappointment at not leaving a legacy. Your continued your trek in the struggling mind of a man who viewed himself as invincible. You caught glimpses of a young Caleb with his family and the moments of tragedy that shaped him.

You saw his first taste of power in death and the content since the first time he erased a ghost from existence. It sickened you more as you reached the point where Willie came into Caleb’s path.

I’m unique, Caleb. Unlike you with the illusions and empty promises, I have real power that you could only dream of. Hearing your thoughts and planting my own words is just the tip of the iceberg.

Caleb screamed in response holding his aching head as you cruelly ripped every memory of Willie from his mind. The screams echoed not only in the basement but through the hotel the Club worked out of.

“Stop!” Caleb pleaded, shaking his head back and forth. The anguish was un-fazing to both the lucid people in the room. Rudy too busy trying to wake your best friend from the trance he had been placed in.

“I can alter memories. Remove them and even plant memories of my own design. You may take from people, but I give to people. I refused to give you anything.” You circled the man seeing double from outside and inside his mind.

I’m everything you wish you could be.

Your last action in his mind was searing a burn that flashed across his entire body from a nerve stroked. With the heat equivalent to magma in his veins, you burrowed to where Caleb controlled the souls. With a smear of your fingers, Willie’s soul was released from Caleb clutches.

“C’mon. Get Willie.” You told Rudy sending Caleb into an empty trance as if he was no more than a wax figure. Rudy eased the skater up from the desk while you exchanged Caleb to sit on the chair holding the needle, “We need to leave. I’ll get rid of any speck of Willie in memories.”

“I didn’t even get to punch the guy.” Rudy pouted, dragging his feet up the stairs away from the magician.

“That’s a good thing. I’m sure Caleb would be more pissed about his nose being damaged than losing Willie.” You scoffed helping the man urge Willie to walk up the stairs and then down the hallway to the entrance.

As you walked you brushed the minds of every individual in the building, all members in attendance, you gently removed all traces of Willie. By the time you reached the edge of the park, you had relaxed.

“We should get him to Alex, they didn’t crossover. I can still feel their imprint.”

“He’d be safer at Elysium to lay low.” Rudy replied, keeping on eye on the skater and on anyone he could see.

With only a nod, you ushered the ghost to teleport both the skater and himself back to the safe walls of Elysium. As he did so, you reached out with your mind to the blonde-haired sweet male in adoration with your best friend.

Clicking his place was easy enough for your draining power after the taxing bond with Willie’s absent presence. Instead of walking as you would generally choose you poofed on the cement pad in the backyard of a home. The surrounding skirt of the backyard encased with plants and flowers.

“Hello?” You called out in the darkness. The soft, mumbled words had your feet moving in the direction.

Standing in a circle mesmerized at the purple tattoos lifting off their skin was the boys of Julie and the Phantoms. The teenage beautiful Puerto Rican girl stood across from Luke with Reggie and Alex on each side.

“Alex?” You called out to the boy wearing a baby pink vintage tuxedo that complimented his skin and hair exquisitely. The outfit definitely screamed that Caleb had something to do with it, especially with the missing fanny pack.

“Y/N?” Luke gasped turning to see you in incredibly fancy attire matching his gorgeous blue suit modified to having no sleeves. The anticipation of eating at you to find Reggie rocking a red suit with butterflies on the fabric.

“I’m sorry you didn’t crossover.” Your words soothed the sad teenagers that had accepted their fate only to have no control again. An introduction was brought between you and Julie when the living girl elbowed Alex.

“Not that we mind but what are you doing here? How did you get here, and why are you dressed up?” Luke inquired, pushing his hands into his suit pockets, engrossed with your gorgeous appearance.

“Well when you crash a fancy Club with a narcissistic founder…any means to blend in is necessary.” You responded, “As for your second question.”

Your finger tapped your temple before continuing to speak, “I’m here because Alex deserves to know. You all do.”

The boy in baby pink frantically stepped forward, “What happened?”

“Maybe it’s best, I just show you?” Your brows furrowed to your own question accompanied by your lower lip being bitten by your teeth. The red lipstick not budging as it was an illusion as well.

“Hu-“Reggie grunted as he spiralled with his two dead bandmates into the scene that had sent you on your determined mission.

The rough action of being drawn into your memories as jarring as the first time and just as scary. The maniacal magician pacing the dark basement simply to heighten his dramatic speech. Alex’s heart clenched at the vacant look in the skater’s eyes with the faintest tinge of purple in the gorgeous brown.

“I feel like I got carsick.” Reggie moaned leaning over to clutch his midsection once you released the ghostly trio. Reggie would often gain a look of disbelief and horror from the blonde drummer, but his entire brain was centred on Willie.

“Rudy took Willie back to Elysium where he’ll be safe. If you want, you can join us.” The words were offered to both the dead and living currently in the room.

Opting out, Julie retired to her bedroom to calm down from the rush of performing at the Orpheum of all places. Besides she felt like going to Elysium was best for the three boys, and maybe they would move there. Julie would miss them, but she knew they’d always come back.

Susie was quick to hug you tightly as you stepped through the gates with the dead members of Julie’s band. The boys changed out of the tuxedos they had dropped off at a donation centre, Reggie had wanted to burn them. After living on the streets for a short while, Luke understood the need for clothing, so the clothing was taken to shelters.

“I’m so glad you’re okay. Rudy told me you overexerted yourself again.” Susie spoke with a deeply furrowed brow oblivious to the puppy dog look from the bassist in red flannel.

“If I didn’t, Willie would be gone.”

“You’re pale yet flushed cheeks. I can see you have a fever. You need to rest.”

“I need to soothe Willie out of the trance that psychotic prick put him in.” You scoffed shaking Susie’s hand off your shoulder to sidestep her, “I’ll rest when he’s fine.”

“I-“

“At least gab something from the cafeteria for energy.” Susie’s brown eyes dimmed at your typical brush off. The same routine of overusing your powers and not recharging correctly, “He’s in Cottage A!”

The boys were on your heels as you power-walked through the streets of the ghost city with one location in mind. The living streets with homes of all style and colours appeared passed the bakery, the school and the clothing stores.

“You can eat?” Reggie whispered as a little ghost girl licked an ice cream cone walked by.

“Harvey adored cooking for people when he living, so he continued in death. Harvey can make food for ghosts, and so can his staff if they work in his kitchen. His pastry chef provides baked goods to Flora’s Bakery and makes the best ice cream.”

“Oh my god.” Reggie practically squealed wholly flabbergasted by the almost perfect place you created, “How do you pay for things?”

“We don’t. What Harvey doesn’t grow in his garden, he can make ingredients out of thin air. We all have some kind of job we do. Everyone has a role in fulfilling to keep Elysium running.” You simply spoke keeping your eyes on the cottage with the robin’s egg blue door.

As if he knew Rudy flung the door open elated to see you standing there. Both of you still wearing the illusioned attire. IN milliseconds he wiped the illusion away, returning you back into your street clothes.

“How is he?”

“No change.” Rudy replied, following your steps in the living room. The skater was staring blankly at the wall.

“Willie!” Alex cried, rushing over to kneel beside the boy that had so swiftly stolen his heart without him realizing. The emotion in his word didn’t get a microscopic flinch from the formerly so-called enemy.

“Everyone be quiet.” You demanded forcibly staring each person in the room down for a mere second. With the desired silence continued, you ignored the headache forming in your head to step into the skater’s mind.

William Young was screaming to be released by the prison of his own mind Caleb had forced him into. He had felt the restriction on his soul lifted and the mist of purple leaving his brain, but he was still stuck.

He could barely breathe with the weight on his chest. Willie didn’t like feeling stuck in one place as he was a wanderer at heart. It was a reason why he had joined the Hollywood Ghost Club with the promise of travel.

Willie come back

In his mind, the sound of your voice firstly grounded the young man as a mirage of your form flickered. Your eyes screamed worry while the smile was one of relief.

Caleb can’t hurt you anymore. Come home.

The spectators watching see your flinching wavering expression and the tensing of Willie’s facial muscles. Everyone sat on the edge of their seat as the two pairs eyes opened in synch of the yells of hurt.

What they didn’t expect was your eyes to roll into the back of your skull and you to collapse onto the floor.

“Y/N!” Willie cried, stumbling off the couch onto the cold floor where your body lay prone, “Wake up!”

It seemed everyone forgot the little detail of being dead.

“She’s fine.” Rudy remarked, shaking your arm with such gentle care matching the four guys’ care in the room.

Your eyelids fluttered open under the bright lights of the unused cottage still waiting for an owner.

“Susie was right.” You grumbled allowing Willie to help you sit up against the blue velvet couch. Your mussed hair adorable in the eyes of the guitarist utterly enamoured with everything about you.

“She usually is.” Rudy mused, thinking of the many times she had proven everyone wrong, “She punched me for not bringing you home.”

“Gotta love her.” You snorted turning to face the four ghosts awkwardly gazing around the room. It was barren of personality with the lack of inhabitants. The yearning quickly found in the boys’ eyes, “You know this isn’t the only cottage in need of people.”

“What do-“

“You’re welcome to live here. I know you three live in that studio, but here you can have a real bed. You can eat and having your own place. You can come and go as you please.” You offered without looking, Rudy.

“I don’-“

“If you don’t want to live here, it’s okay, but the option is always there. Willie, we make plans for a skatepark-“

“Oh, you had me from the start.” Willie beamed tugging you into his arms, “I missed this. I missed you.”

“Me too.” You murmured into his warm embrace equally relaxed at knowing he was safe again. Your eyes clashing with the soft blue had Ideas songwriting already filled with lyrics of a pretty girl wearing a jean jacket with patches.

The lyrics turned into songs both in the studio and the cottage that Luke, Reggie and Alex accepted in Elysium. It had been a spirited discussion with Julie on moving to Elysium, but the boys were always there when she wasn’t in school. Often Elysium hosted a concert for the residents with the visitation of Julie.

Your reciprocated attraction with the messy-haired hazel-eyed guitarist flourished into a serious relationship. Luke took on the role of teaching how to play the guitar and songwriting. Alex took of mediation while Reggie worked with Harvey.

Willie quickly took on designing the skatepark he taught at while also taking a position at the ghost school.

“Morning.” The soft whisper roused your sleep into the golden glow of the morning light and chirping birds.

The growling aspect of his voice coming from only just waking up. The sight of Luke’s bleary eyes was heartwarming.

A year into moving into Elysium, Luke had asked if you’d like to move in as he was the only one in the original house. Alex had moved into the little cottage with Willie three months into the relationship while Reggie was going back and forth between Susie’s room and his own place.

“Morning.” You hummed leaning forward to kiss his cheek.

“You know I thought my life ended when I died. That I could never find someone and have a family. That I couldn’t share my music with the world. I was wrong.” Luke murmured as he cupped your cheek in his hand, “The band is growing more and more each day. I found the love of my life, and we have a family with everyone. I haven’t felt like I had had home for so long, but I get it now. You’re my home. I love you.”

Your cheeks warmed up at the adoration Luke displayed in his expressive hazel green gaze just as it had since day one. The awe fell from his lips before you pressed a kiss to his lips, only one of the many in the eons to come.

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ranmanjuu · 3 years ago

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titled “shin shin”.txt

came across a post... a long, long while ago about a god of death type reader and got super interested, since of all the cyikemen games, ikesen is the one most surrounded by death on a larger scale (cause, war and stuff), so i wrote this at... 2020? almost one year before, at 21th of july. i had more of it written, but i really didn’t like it cause it felt too “quirky wattpad reader” and plus me just copying from the original prlogue without adding anything, so... yeah. enjoy!

(also, very important that anyone who wants to do whatever with this idea, feel free, no need to ask me)

You didn’t like your existence

To call it “your life” would be simply wrong; you don’t breathe, you don’t eat, you don’t sleep. All you are is a walking, talking existence that has a job to do until you fade away. You didn’t even like your job.

To lead a soul from their death to the Land of the Dead was a grim job. You learnt their regrets, their anger, their sadness, all which you knew was personal. But you had to be there. You had to ensure that their soul is at peace, so when the time comes to cross to the afterlife, they don’t get reincarnated as a ghost, stuck forever with their past emotions.

Shinigami, was your kinds’ name. God of Death.

You were a part of the blanket term ‘yokai’, or as some would call in other names such as ‘ayakashi’. Those who fall under the category were spirits, demons, animal-like creatures, or, similar to you, gods. For as long as you’ve known, supernatural creatures didn’t mesh with humans well most of the time.

Fear of unknown from both parties led to anger, rashness, and cut communication and involvement altogether for perhaps half your life.

You’ve existed for long; you stopped remembering the exact number after 1.000 years. All you did now was remember the year you came to the world, and do the math. But that doesn’t matter much, does it? The only thing you concerned yourself with is when you’ll fade away.

However, for your own sake, you do take a break. Such a job is heavy for the heart, and a walk doesn’t help as much, but it’s a nice thing nonetheless.

Kyoto. You were just done leading a soul that got caught in a traffic accident. You never traveled outside of the country, but would it really matter if you did? You still appreciated everything as it were; there has to be some light in a life to look forward to.

This particular city was rich in human history, you knew that. Maybe it’d be a fun thing to do, even if you didn’t have much an interest in it.

“All your famous warlord knowledge, packed in a mag! Come get one now!” A boy’s shouts filled the nearby streets, attracting attention from the occasional passerby’s. Including you. A Quick Guide To Your Warlords, the magazine read on the cover. Sounds interesting, and you were bored, so you took one and stuffed it in your pocket.

With a blank mind, you were brought forth to a temple by your wandering legs. Honno-ji. A small, quiet, quaint place. The setting sky burned up above as the small cries of the crickets sounded all around.

You’ve heard some stories of the small memorial in front of you. One of the unifiers of Japan died here—betrayed, as you remembered. But you can’t draw an exact name.

While drowning in your thoughts, the approaching presence coming to you was acknowledged but not paid mind to further. Until you shift your eyes to the side as said figure was in your peripheral vision—a man dressed in a lab coat. The two of you said no words, only continuing to gaze at the stone in front of you.

You only started to react when the sky above you turned darker and darker—not by the setting sun, but by the awfully black and almost purple clouds gathering up above you. That’s unusual, you’ve never seen anything like that in your life.

The once bright and bold sky now rained down drops of water on your face. You didn’t even notice you shifted to your human form—and a look at your hands covered in specks of droplets confirmed that.

“What poor timing.” The man next to you said, causing your eyes to glance at him. He looked solemnly to the monument, then to you, “Are you alright? Do you have an umbrella?”

“No, unfortunately. I didn’t expect it to rain. . .” your eyes linger to above his head, where a set of numbers and a small text was visible to you only. The death profile, as the others call. A set of information that shinigamis can see in most creatures, usually entailing their names, time of death, and cause of it.

It’s a cursing bit of information; always reminding you of what you are.

Out of nowhere, a thunder ripped through the clouds and hit directly on the small monument—a loud crackle following along. Your arm flew up to protect the man next to you by reflex, as your body stood there in momentary shock. You’ve seen death by lightning, but that was unlikely to happen now.

You whipped your head towards the human next to you, who seems the slightest bit appalled, but stood his ground. A strange thing catches your attention. . .

His death date. It’s flickering—changing.

From a century where he was supposed to die. . .to the 15-16th century.

A date of death changing has been a rare thing that happens, however unlikely, but—it’s never jumped that far before! To the past, too?

Utter shock froze you in place as the numbers flicker back and forth, leading your attention away from everything else—him asking you if you were okay, and most importantly—

—the black ball that formed where the stone was.

“Watch ou—“ before you can warn the man, the image of him next to you twisted and distorted, slowly getting sucked in whatever it was.

And so were you.

Wait! He isn’t supposed to die yet—!

The world faded to black.

Ugh. . .my head. . .

Your vision fades in and out, clear then blurry, until you’re finally wide awake. The scenery around you changed drastically, what was first a small place in the city of Kyoto is now. . .a dark forest. You’ve seen this kind of environment before in your memories—you just don’t know how you got here.

The lab coat guy—!

You immediately stood up from the dirt beneath you, looking around and trying to sense his soul around you. Nothing. Pursing your lips in slight unease, you started making your way through the criminally underlighted woods.

You’ve roamed around in the forest before. Most of your time on this world, you didn’t settle in a house or anything, you preferred to just wander around like a lost ghost. You didn’t have a need for one—you don’t need shelter, not food, not clothes, nor drinks. You were a lost ghost.

The branches and rocks and whatever else you tripped on didn’t bother you. All you were focusing on is now just. . .walking. Without even a set destination. The only guidance you had was the occasional moonlight that peeked through the trees up above.

As minutes pass by, you start feeling a faint presence of human souls.

It’s distant, and not much from how weak it is, but I should go and see.

All other senses were rendered useless for now as you focused on the source of the souls, and slowly marched your way to it. It grew closer and closer, until you saw a faint light coming in the middle of the forest.

Two people, you now concluded. Your footsteps remained silent and your presence unknown as you creep near the light.

A fire was set in a small clearing, and you can now see the two people. A man with dark hair, dressed in monk’s clothes and a scar marking his face, with another feminime-looking boy, purple-haired in armor.

“Are you ready for this, Ranmaru?” The monk spoke in a low voice. “You’re about to kill the demon. Bring him down for good.”

Kill, huh. An assassination was about to commence.

“. . .Yes, Master Kennyo.” The boy—Ranmaru—spoke, wavering in unease but still tried to be certain.

‘Master Kennyo’ smiled; a bitter, unresting one, “Good. They’ve light the fire at Honno-ji, arrive there and kill him. I will follow shortly once the fire has spread,”

“. . .Understood.”

Clutching his sword until it shook in his hand, Ranmaru turned around and walked off from the clearing.

You overheard the conversation and calmly watched his figure fade away. It isn’t your place to intervene—not if this is fate, but even so—you’ll follow him. At least you can rest the soul of the victim.

In silent steps trailing him, you heard a last piece from Kennyo. “Finally, we’ll have our revenge. . .”

You took your time in following Ranmaru’s path. If whoever’s assassinated dies, it’s soul will still remain until they can go to the afterlife. Time stops for them as long as it takes to get their soul guided away from the living land. Is it immoral in a way? Perhaps.

Unless. . .you can stop them from getting killed. But often when you try to intervene, the death happens either way.

So what’s the point?

Nihilistic thoughts aside, you sensed more human souls coming your way; five, from what you can tell. But you paid no mind to that. Until it got nearer, and nearer, and nearer, and—

“Oof.” In your blank stated mind, you bumped into someone, causing them to huff in surprise. You yourself paused and looked—a brown haired man wearing red armor, “Hey, watch where you’re going—!”

His complaints died on his tongue as soon as he finally saw who he bumped into. His expression, from a slightly irritated frown, turned more into one of confusion, “Huh? Hey, what’s someone like you doing here in the woods? Nighttime, also? Such weird clothing, too. . .”

His spoken words made you raise an eyebrow, “Ignoring all that, I’m sorry for bumping into you. I just had some business is all.”

“In the dead of night? What are you, an. . .enchantress? Those stories of w-witches in the forest?” The man’s voice wavered more with each passing word. The quirk in your eyebrow deepens.

“I assure you, I’m not—“

“Yuki~! We leave you for a few seconds and you’ve already found yourself a partner?” A velvet and rich voice arose from behind the dark bushes and trees, all of them being pushed aside to reveal an auburn haired man, this one more built in his body.

The one you’ve been talking to—Yuki—blushed and shook his head vehemently, “Ugh, no! I’m not like you; we just bumped into each other is all. And I think it’s some kind of witch, too—”

The redhead man tutted at Yuki in a disapproving manner, “Now, now, Yuki. Have I not taught you how to talk properly in front of such a beauty all this time?” His attention turns to you, and in a second, his eyes lit in passion, “Forgive me for his prudeness, my goddess, dear Yuki needs a lot more lessons than I thought. However. . .if you want to be with a real man, I’m always up for service.”

“Will you stop flirting with everything you meet. It’s disgusting.”

Three more people emerge from the shadows, the small bits of moonlight pouring to their features. The one who spoke was a blond one, cladded in blue armor and with eyes that said he wanted to have nothing to do with any of this.

“But Kenshin, you can’t just turn away at such a beauty laid in front of your eyes.” The flirt replied to the cold comment with a smirk.

“Stop. Or I’ll kill you.”

The bickering of the two were left unnoticed as another man with dark blue hair stepped up, far closer than what you were expecting. His hand reaches and caresses lightly on your clothes, “I have never seen such a design or material like this before. How fascinating. Would you like to switch with one of my kimonos?”

“Yoshimoto, I’ve already claimed them! Don’t steal them right under my nose.” Flirt Man threw a light complaint, turning away from Kenshin for a moment.

“Art is to be appreciated by everyone, Shingen.” Yoshimoto simply responds, now tugging lightly at the sleeves of your shirt.

Okay, you’ll admit it. You’re slightly overwhelmed.

So far, you haven’t said anything, mainly because you don’t want to. It feels like anything you say won’t make the situation better anyway. But still. . .even in your long life, this is quite bizzare.

You observed each of them one by one. Then your eyes landed to the last one, the same brown haired man you saw earlier. Now, in. . .some sort of ninja attire. While you tilted your head in slight curiosity, you’re at least satisfied to see he was safe.

And his death date has changed, too. . .

Speaking of death, you’re finally reminded of following. . .who was it, Ranmaru? to an assassination.

Gently freeing yourself from Yoshimoto’s admiring touches to your clothes, you bowed slightly in front of them, “I appreciate meeting all of you, but I have to go.”

You don’t see Sasuke opening his mouth to say something, and neither do the others, as you walked off to the darkness.

You thought by losing your way from your unofficial guide, you wouldn’t find the destination. But luckily, even going in the same direction as he did led you to it. Honno-ji. This time, it’s in the midst of drowning in fire. You made your way through the front door and entered where the fire wouldn’t reach you—but it wouldn’t make a difference anyway.

And in the middle of the room not yet entirely covered in flames, was who you assume the victim, sleeping. The cause of death, “died in an assassination while the building was set on fire”, said as much. Dressed in black armor, you could tell he was important, somehow. Not everyone can casually wear one, despite the past few people you’ve met been donning it.

The text displayed above the man’s head displayed the same old. Nobunaga Oda.

On the other side, you see a silhouette approaching steadily, sword in hand. Ranmaru, you guessed. You double checked yourself to make sure you weren’t visible to the human’s eye, and you were just fine with watching another death as you have—

Until, for the second time today, the death date for Nobunaga Oda flickered.

You froze as what was 21st of July, 1582, blinked into a later date. Much later.

What. . .?! That was the second time today—what am I supposed to—

Your chest felt heavy, and your hands trembled in uncertainty of what you should do. Do you save him? Watch him die? Would he even die at this moment? Or would it be later? You’ve never been in this position—the answer was always clear. And now you’re terrified.

Your body swayed back and forth violently, as two sides fought in your head of what to do. But time was running out—he’d be assassinated if you didn’t take this chance. And he’d die. That’s the same as you killing him, you thought, and you’ve sworn to never do such a thing.

From your disarrayed thoughts, your legs moved on their own and walked to him. You’re saving him, then.

#ikemen sengoku #ikesen #cyikemen #*writing #scenario #ikesen nobunaga #ikesen ranmaru #ikesen kennyo #ikesen sasuke #ikesen yuki #ikesen shingen #ikesen kenshin #ikesen yoshimoto

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hypnomicimagines · 4 years ago

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☂️Rainy Day Blues☂️[Nurude Sasara]☂️

Oh, how tragedy loved to strike Sasara when he least expected it.

He had been walking to your house with an extra pep in his step, the fresh bouquet he’d picked up along the way only lifting his mood. He was stuck in daydreams even before he reached you, thinking about how lovely you’d look that night and how he couldn’t wait to do the little things like hold your hand as you were on the way to your date destination. He thought that nothing could possibly dampen his happiness, that him finally confessing after years of being in relationship purgatory had made him see the brighter side of any situation, but it seemed he still had blinders on in some aspects. His parade was about to be rained on.

Literally.

Sasara didn’t know where the icy rain had come from but it hit him like a sack of bricks, goosebumps rising on his skin as his leisurely walk turned into a marathon run as he made his way to your apartment complex. He hadn’t checked the weather forecast, who did that anymore? Clearly Sasara’s hubris had upset the weather Gods as he caught sight of himself in a window, no longer looking like your handsome suitor but a sad clown that had just walked through a door with a bucket of water precariously balanced on top of it. The bouquet is just as pathetic as he is, and hey, aren’t flowers supposed to like water? Why were they drooping like that? You’d probably laugh in his face when you saw them.

You did.

He had to get you back somehow for laughing at his plight despite the fact your laughter had quickly washed away every negative emotion he’d previously been feeling. He had to get you back somehow and decided to show you his best ‘wet dog’ impersonation, shaking his hair out in your doorway and giving you a little preview of what it was like outside. The rain had only started to come down harder, thunder and lightning being added to the mix, meaning it was unlikely the date would continue as planned. Not to mention his hair which he had spent an entire three minutes and seven seconds on was now a poofed out mess due to how he chose to dry out his hair, not that you seemed to mind. You laughed again at his saggy bouquet, telling him you loved it no matter how pathetic it looked (he hoped that was the last time he ever heard that).

“We can just spend the night in. Why do you look so excited that I said that? Did you think I’d tell you to walk home?”

“I’d never accuse you of something so cold-hearted!”

“Good, I’m glad to see the rain hasn’t washed away your remaining brain cell. Come in and change your clothes, too, as much as I love seeing you be a complete eyesore, I don’t want you to catch a cold.”

“Shouldn’t you stripping me of my clothes wait until after dinner? Not that I mind.”

“You know what… Maybe walking home in the rain is just what you need. Maybe you’ll get struck by lightning and have some sort of epiphany that’ll make you funny.”

“Now you really sound like Rosho,” Sasara sighed out, fighting the smile that wanted to break out on his face so he could keep up the ‘hurt’ façade he was putting on, “To think that the person I love most would say such things to me… I’ll go back outside to hide my tears!”

“Bye.”

You closed the door behind him as he stepped into your apartment, heading straight to your bedroom and thinking about how he had essentially done a speed run of the date. He hadn’t suspected he’d be here until a little bit later but he couldn’t say he was complaining as you joined him, digging through your drawers for some spare clothes that he had left behind the various other times he’d stayed over on a whim. He purposely left his clothes with you just so you’d always have something to remember him by, weaseling his way into your heart first and now your home, hoping that he might even get a whole draw just for his stuff one day. His apartment was certainly the winner with its scenic view but since you had yet to talk about the whole ‘moving in’ thing, he decided he’d get you used to the idea by leaving random things of his behind so you were used to it when it finally did happen.

“Here you go.” You set the clothes down on the counter, taking a second to admire how cute he looked with a wet mop of hair on his head, reaching over to run your fingers through it just for good measure, “I’d say take a shower but I don’t actually want you struck by lightning.”

“But you seem to like my hair so much… It could become a permanent fixture with the help of electricity.”

“I do like it,” You confirmed, smiling as you stroked his hair fondly, Sasara’s heart pounding loudly in his chest, “Almost as much as I like you. Get changed while I try to find some candles. I can’t imagine we’re going to have power too long so…”

You spoke the unfortunate lightning strike into existence that completely knocked out anything electrical in the apartment building and part of Sasara wonders if you had spoken the rain into existence, too. Had this been your plan all along? Had you wanted to just trap him in your room from the get-go, using him for your own needs and then discarding him afterward? Sasara considered suggesting that type of supervillain roleplay on a less romantic night but for now his head was still in the clouds, wanting to do simple things like hold your hand and cuddle against you, sucking the warmth out of you as he had no spare warmth to give at this point.

“Y-You’re cold!” Sasara had reached out to touch you when the lights had first gone out, wanting to assure you were still there and okay first, “Just be careful as you get changed! I’ll be right back!”

You’re only gone about ten minutes but it’s so painfully lonely in the bathroom without you, Sasara already thinking about the letter he’d write to you if you had gone off to war. He would be the lonely maiden waiting by the window, longing to see their love again, dramatically falling to the ground as he received the news that you had passed away. He was already thinking about how he’d meet your ghost in the afterlife to confirm he never fell in love again when you entered the bathroom, face highlighted by a small candle that he’s almost positive he had gifted you.

“Come on, come on! It’s a little better in the living room and the blankets are all out.” You moved the candle to one hand and reached down to grab his, fingers lacing together without words having to even be exchanged. “I don’t want you getting lost.”

“The only place I’ll get lost is in your eyes, beautiful.”

“Have I ever told you that you’re lucky you’re cute? Because you’re sooo lucky you’re cute!” He can tell from your tone that there’s a wide smile on your face, the one that made him feel like the most successful comedian in the world. Getting you to laugh was no easy task and you had never been one to show him even a dollop of mercy when it came to his material but it made it all the more worth it when he got to hear you laugh. Every time you laughed an angel grew its wings, that’s how the saying went, right? It doesn’t matter as his brain is entirely centered around you and only you, especially as the two of you seat yourselves on your ridiculously comfortable couch.

“I don’t know what we’ll eat… It’s gonna be cold and sad.”

“As long as we’re not cold and sad, it’s fine, right?”

“Fair enough.”

His arm wrapped around you as you threw your legs across his lap, the blanket quickly following suit as you curled up into his side. You wondered how many people would be surprised that Mr. Tragic Comedy was not only a total romantic but a stage five clinger, unlikely to give you a moment alone now that you had both finally settled in together. Sasara valued his privacy from time to time but when it came to you, it seemed his social battery could never run out; he wanted to be around you, to be with you, to be touching you and talking to you as much as he possibly could.

“What should we do?” Sasara quickly grew uncomfortable with the silence and you felt bad for your boyfriend, knowing his anxiety tended to spike in the silence. You wished you had something to act as white noise in the background but it seemed all you could do to distract him was talk, or listen to a slew of jokes that would have you standing in the rain rather than being in your own apartment if they were on par with the normal puns he liked to deliver.

“Tell me about your day before you got here. Did you talk to Rosho about your birthday plans?”

Sasara is grateful for the conversation starter as once he’s begun to talk, he’s adept at not shutting up again.

It was going to be a long, rainy night, but at least you got to spend it together.

#Nurude Sasara #Sasara Nurude #Hypnosis Mic #Hypnosis Microphone #Hypmic #Hypnomic #Hypnosis Mic x Reader #Hypnosis Microphone x Reader #Hypmic x Reader #hypnomic x reader #Hypnosis Mic Imagines #Hypnosis Microphone Imagines #Hypmic Imagines #Hypnomic Imagines #Nurude Sasara x Reader #Sasara Nurude x Reader #Scenario

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modern-inheritance · 3 years ago

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MIC!Arya and the Infamous Tarnag Temple Argument : Modern Inheritance’s Take on Trauma, Religion, and Arya F***ing Apologizing

Everyone gives Canon!Arya shit for the scene in the books where she gives Gannel shit in his own temple for having religion. I agree that it’s a bad moment for her character. I also feel it comes out of left field for Arya’s character up to that point but I’ll get smacked from here to the core mantle boundary for that by some of the fandom. I digress. This is very much not about my feelings on the canon version.

Let’s move on to how it might go for my Modern Inheritance!Arya and my version of events.

Arya’s coming off from a hell of a time. You don’t exactly process deaths of loved ones very well while being tortured, and while she’s juggling all that plus two near death experiences that occurred probably within a week of each other, Eragon nearly dying and his back spasms, the guy that tortured her and killed her best friend and her mate is dead but she didn’t get to have a swing at him, mentally preparing to face her queen/mother, the ‘a whole clan now wants to murder Saphira and Eragon’ situation, civil unrest in the city they’re in, just Brom being Brom, physical stresses from the whole *waves hands at previous paragraph*, she’s suddenly reminded that hey…the dwarves and humans have something that elves don’t.

What’s that? Religion. And what usually comes with a religion?

The concept of an afterlife. The general idea that when someone dies they have not really left. The comfort that if you pray, meditate, visit a grave, do something special to you/your faith then you can make a connection to your lost loved ones and friends. The promise that even though they’ve left this world, they’re still looking out for you. And one day you’ll see them again. The separation is only brief.

And damn. Right then, that hurts for Arya. It’s like being kicked while you’re down.

Deep down, Arya sees what the dwarves have. This comfort in thinking that the dead aren’t all gone, and that all it takes is reaching out to them to share thoughts and feelings, and that you’ll see them again.

And she wants that too. She wants it so badly. She envies their ability to think that way, to simply have faith in what they cannot see. She wants to talk to Fäolin and Glenwing (who is still alive in MIC but at this point she doesn’t know that) again, she wants to tell them that she misses them and that Eragon and Saphira exist and their deaths weren’t for nothing and tell them all the things unsaid…but no matter how much she wants to, she can’t get past everything that’s happened in the past 6+ months and her own cultural beliefs.

It hurts. She can’t think of anything else to say past the hurt and so she lashes out. She doesn’t understand why really, but knows that religion and afterlives and all of it just make her…angry. Because what else could that cold rock in her chest be?

In MIC, Arya is not as stubborn when it comes to atheism or other cultures. Before the ambush, she frequently asked questions about the dwarvish religion, not exactly realizing that her questions could be considered more of ‘you dare question the faith’ than ‘so wait what if this happens? Do you still get to go to the afterlife? But what about when you feel a mind die? Where does it go?’ innocent type questions that come from curiosity. She still has the feeling that the money donated to religions could go to better places, but also realizes that sometimes the religions actually send said donations TO those places/the needy, and that structures/art/etc that were built long ago do kinda need upkeep. So instead of being a dick about it, when the dwarves at the temple bluntly tell her ‘would you shut up and leave already we don’t want to answer your questions’ she adds a cheeky ‘sure I’ll go as long as you donate to the Varden’s current fundraiser’ and goes on her way when they agree to donate.

But Arya still blatantly crosses a line by confronting Gannel rather sharply about her newfound feelings on religion while Eragon is there. She’s been following them as Eragon’s bodyguard (why the HELL did canon!Arya leave Eragon alone, even in a temple full of warrior monks, wheN A WHOLE CLAN WAS TRYING TO KILL HIM?!) and she doesn’t even realize that she’s said anything until Eragon looks back at her like ‘Ooooh nooooooOO ARYA WHAT THE HELL?! WAS THAT?!’ and she sees that the back of Gannel’s head is turning purple with rage.

Eragon manages to extricate himself from it all and meet up with Saphira, and after a rather…heated…uh…”discussion,” Gannel finally flames that while Arya’s questions before pushed the limit, this was beyond unacceptable and asks what the fuck is wrong with her. Arya just storms out.

Arya comes back to the temple later that night, asks for Gannel, and pretty much kneels down and puts her forehead on the floor in front of him (MIC elves do this only when they realize they REALLY fucked up and use this stance as an open way of saying that they fucked up, apologize, and will accept the consequences) with a sincere apology for her earlier conduct. Honestly, her ear is still red from where Brom had twisted it when he caught wind of what she had done, but she’s not apologizing just because of that.

She wants to learn how to pray.

Not to a god or spirit, but how to talk to the ones she’s lost. The idea of religion giving a false sense of hope still hurts and angers her…but she’s realized that maybe there’s a reason why it can bring comfort.

Gannel awkwardly explains that a way to get started is to simply speak aloud, as if talking to someone that isn’t there. When he realizes Arya isn’t pulling his leg or going to go off on him again, he decides to give her the ‘how to talk to dead people’ primer course over some mead and does his best to keep the more hard religion stuff out of it. As a priest/monk, he’s used to consoling people who have lost family and loved ones. He can pick up the signs easily enough…when the person isn’t ready to punch a hole in his fancy history wall.

As she leaves, Arya apologizes again.

And prods Gannel to donate to the Varden’s current fundraiser.

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theparanormalperiodical · 4 years ago

Text

The Real Story Behind Insidious (2010) And The 5 WEIRDEST Stories Of Astral Projection You Need To Know About feat. The Cold War

It's one of those horror films that just gets it right.

Yes, it wears all the trademarks of overworked tropes, and sure, it has yet to shed its transphobic skin. But the beast that emerged from James Wan's mind and slithered onto the cinema screen recaptured timeless traditions with a new sense of terror.

And yet somehow the rosy cheeks of the Lipstick-Faced Demon gleaming in his various jump scares aren't the scariest thing about this film.

You see, most of the horror movies that manage to scar me for life are allegedly based on real stories - James Wan (who also directed The Conjuring franchise) is no stranger to fleshing out his dark ideas with even more twisted truths. So it was only recently when I discovered how accurate Insidious (2010) was to real paranormal phenomena that young Dalton's venture into the Further became far more terrifying.

And I need to tell someone about it. From the supernatural to the Soviet Union, Insidious is grounded in far more than rumours of a haunted house.

Insidious is based on real historic events and real experiences.

The first installment of one of horror’s most famous franchises, Insidious is already celebrating its 10th birthday. In fact, that’s how old Dalton was when he fell into a mysterious coma - and then stumbled into purgatory.

Instead of having anxiety dreams about not studying for the french exam like the rest of us, Dalton is falling asleep, separating his soul from his body, and having a gander ‘round an astral realm (like heaven or hell) called The Further. The Further is crammed full of dead people and they all want to possess the fresh young body that basically walked into the wrong room.

The first 2 films follow Dalton and his family as they navigate the all-American struggle of being followed by endless paranormal activity and various family members being stuck in purgatory.

After strange occurrences follow the family from house-to-house (which only seems to extend as far as hot-topic-goth-demons standing by the beds of Dalton and his younger siblings) a local psychic is summoned to figure out what in the f*ck is going on. Elise uses her spidey senses to determine that yep, there’s a demon and no, the house isn’t haunted.

It’s the boy, it’s Dalton.

It then turns out that this ability is hereditary (*piano wire flashback*) and comes from Dalton’s father. Josh actually worked with Elise when he was a kid after his astral projecting resulted in a ‘parasitic spirit’ of an old woman following him the afterlife. Elise therefore sends Daddy-O into The Further to fetch Dalton and bring him home.

Daddy-O does the job, and Dalton returns to his body safely and wakes up. But Daddy-O ain’t Daddy-O. Josh’s body has been possessed by the female spirit that stalks him and his soul is stuck back in The Further. The next film follows up on this plot twist and deepens our exploration into the capabilities of astral projection - namely the potential for time travel. But Insidious 2: Papa Don’t Preach mainly revolves around the backstory of the female spirit that possesses Josh.

[INSERT TRANSPHOBIA]

I’ve already dissected what Hollywood Horror gets wrong with transphobia. But I’ve yet to tumble into the world of astral projection - a world full of proof of the paranormal and political chaos, too. Dalton and his daddy issues are only the tip of the iceberg.

What Is Astral Projection?

Astral projection is an intentional out of body experience and is practised by those that follow esotericism (a religion which combines loads of different Western religious ideas) but it is present in many different belief systems. During projection the soul separates from the physical body.

The soul, or the astral body, is a body of light that links the rational soul to the physical body and is considered to be a silvery spine-like ‘cord’. The astral body travels to different astral planes which can be populated by all types of entities including angels, demons, and dead people. The Further represents one of these astral planes.

Each culture and each religion has a different take on projection, for example the Japanese believe those who are ill or comatose - like dear Dalton - are more prone to astral projection.

In Insidious we also see astral projection take a number of forms: there’s obviously the travel to different planes like The Further, but we see time travel, too. This chimes in with the different schools of thought regarding astral travel.

The history of this practice dates back to the Roman Empire, but only in the 18th century did discussion of astral projection take place when Emanuel Swedenborg wrote about his own out of body experiences. Interest in projection increased throughout the 20th century with many notable historic figures claiming they’ve ventured into other realms including noted American activist Helen Keller (she claimed she astral projected to Athens):

"I have been far away all this time, and I haven't left the room...It was clear to me that it was because I was a spirit that I had so vividly 'seen' and felt a place a thousand miles away. Space was nothing to spirit!"

Aside from being practised by historic figures, it took centre stage in a historic era, too. It was during the Cold War that the study and practice of projection took off and it became a political weapon. Beyond the cultural war, however, was a plethora of evidence suggesting the events we see in Insidious might be all too real.

The Soviet Union & The Supernatural

Unclassified CIA documents are a staple amongst paranormal enthusiasts, especially those who have a habit of following mysterious lights in the sky. A top secret memo from 1974, proposed an experiment where Patrick Price, a former police officer, would use astral projection to gain information regarding a Soviet installation in the Ural Mountains. They wanted entry and exit points, they wanted floor plans, and they wanted operations details. This was a covert operation that used paranormal capabilities already being tested and trialled by their communist rivals.

In the 1970s the Cold War took a different turn: thanks to Soviet research into ordinary people’s supernatural abilities including astral projection, American intelligence agencies sought to do the same. Just as the atomic bomb was being built, scientists Seymon and Valentina Kirlian were developing technology that could capture one’s aura in a photograph. They were investigating energy fields, trying to mentally influence animal behaviour, and practicing telepathic communication.

Yogis and masters of ancient magic were even brought in in an attempt to harness the potential of paranormal forces.

“the major impetus behind the Soviet drive to harness the possible capabilities of telepathic communication, telekinetics, and bionics is said to come from the Soviet military and the KGB”

A Defense Intelligence Agency report

Throughout the 1960s a surge in parapsychological research centres took place as ordered by a Kremlin edict. As per the Cold War, the US swiftly did the same.

But it was when the US caught wind experiments using bioplasma they grew concerned. Bioplasmic connectors to human beings echoed claims of the silver cord which - as mentioned previously - was a key part of astral projection.

A Soviet agent could travel across realms, eras, and countries in spirit-form and be going through American filing cabinets. The Americans needed to make astral projection a weapon of their own. Dr Eugene Bernard was one of the many doctors who would pioneer research into projection and sought people willing to travel to these distant realms.

Bernard was quickly caught up with the Soviet-supernatural-situ which included theories of an army of psychic spies.

Soon dozens of recruits would practice astral projection and recount their experiences including a woman called Beverly Chalker: she travelled in spirit from Dallas to a house in New Jersey and described in detail the things she saw. She saw a man asleep with a book on the floor, describing his pyjamas and the decor of the room. The team investigating her astral projection verified her claims.

She was right.

Similar stories soon leaked to the public and many ordinary Americans began to try their hand at exploring spiritual realms. Books, articles, and even a set of infamous tapes released in 1973 claimed to reveal how one could separate their soul from their body.

It used a rhythmic ticking noise to hypnotise those seeking new paranormal abilities - something we hear throughout Insidious. The tapes would be used by one Robert Antoszczyk, an infamous practitioner of projection who would mysteriously die in during a session. 6 weeks later, Patrick Price died, too. We will talk about Antoszczyk later.

Even security in the White House was allegedly amped up over reports the Russians were looking into giving their astral soldiers physical strength so they could become assassins. Interest in projection soon grew out of control, and by the 1980s the surge in serial killers was pinned on a vast number of them practicing it in prison.

(Many followed a range of extremist religious beliefs - practicing astral projection doesn’t make you a serial killer.)

Concerns also claimed some projectors could become ‘zombies’ if the soul got lost, just like Dalton was in Insidious. In fact, one practitioner demarcated several zones of astral travel with Zone C being the limbo where souls were trapped. According to some, The Further was real.

And Robert Antoszczyk was stuck there.

5 Craziest Stories & Accounts Of Astral Projection

#1 - Robert Antoszczyk

Antoszczyk was one of the many Americans swept by the incoming tide of astral projection. He had been taught the practice by a yogi whilst in India, but unlike many other Americans who tumbled into amateur projection, he delved in head-first.

He then began to have dreams about a beautiful woman. Her exotic looks and compelling voice was calling to him from a different realm and he wanted to follow it.

On the 1st of June 1975, he told his roommate not to disturb him. He went into his bedroom, locked the door, and followed the method of astral projection as explained by those tapes released in 1973.

3 days passed. His roommate grew concerned. He broke down the door to discover that Robert was dead. His seemingly healthy roommate was lying on his bed and smiling. There was no signs of a struggle or a seizure or any other cause of death.

Medical experts could offer no answer as to how he died. A local astrologer, however, claimed the answer was obvious: he simply decided not to return to his body. His death would be blamed on his astral projection and it would make headlines across the states.

But some alleged that he was not fully at fault - he was drawn in by a beautiful female entity that would call out to many others with her enticing voice. The descriptions of the woman all related to Ammut, an ancient Egyptian female demonness. And according to the Ancient Egyptians, she existed in astral planes and consumed souls of those she came across.

Laverne Landis heard the same voice. It might have killed her, too.

#2 - Laverne Landis

This mother of five was found dead in the woods in Minnesota by a construction worker in winter of 1982. She wasn’t a typical recruit for projection as a nurse working at a local hospital - but she had started hearing a voice.

The voice was from an astral spirit that promised her the power to heal the sick. So she quit her job, abandoned her children, and drove for 6 months with the voice of Ammut as her guide.

The voice grew stronger and she felt the voice vibrating in the wilderness around her. Her psychic group warned her against astral projection, claiming she might get stuck in limbo. She ignored them, and Landis and her boyfriend followed the voice to Loon Lake on a long trail road through the wilderness.

“We’ve got to stay here. They’re going to be in. I know it, I can feel it, they’re almost here.”

After Laverne passed away, probably from starvation or hypothermia, her boyfriend pulled himself through the snow and alerted a local.

Landis also reportedly was very interest in UFOs and was part of a UFO ‘cult’, and might have also gone to the woods to wait for a flying saucer to land. Either way, she was waiting for something out of this world.

#3 - Seton High School

In 1975 an entire class of students in a prep school in Cincinnati attempted astral projection. They were led in an experiment from which they would ‘travel’ home, report back what they saw, and phone calls home would prove travel via spirit was real.

(Unfortunately, this is all I can uncover on this case, but it is still creepy AF.)

#4 - Robert Monroe

Robert Monroe was obsessed with astral projection. He had often practiced it during the 1970s, even becoming angry seeing a man sleeping next to his wife in bed - before realising it was him. He subjected himself to examination at a local hospital by a psychiatrist.

They verified his astral projection put him into a comatose state rather than a sleeping state.

Monroe then spent a huge fortune on an institute in Virginia to specialise in research into projection featuring an isolation chamber to provide optimal circumstances for projection. And on one occasion he even felt a ‘trunk’ in his back during projection, something he believes was the silver cord.

The United States Army Intelligence and Security Command investigated his techniques and used his claims to inform their desire to create an army of astral projectors.

#5 - Cadell Jeansen Raja

What do Charles Manson, Herbert Mullin, and David Berkowitz have in common? Yes, they are some of America’s most infamous serial killers. But they also all studied astral projection with a desire to harness paranormal abilities they believed would provide new tools to accompany their horrific acts.

(I don’t often make mention of serial killers on this blog, but the perplexing and evil acts committed by Cadell Jeansen Raja should be mentioned.)

In 2017, Raja killed each member of his family over several days. He constantly changed the motive for murder to mislead the police, but later admitted he harboured anger against his successful family members and was obsessed by the occult.

He experimented with the separation of the soul from the body and was living in a ‘virtual world’. He then claimed his family members were killed during their own astral projection.

***

Would you dare venture into The Further?

Let me know in a comment below!

Make sure you also like and reblog this post and then hit follow to read a new article on the paranormal every weekend.

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recurring-polynya · 4 years ago

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I have to say I knew that at one point renji, ikkaku, yumichika and iba were in the same squad with kenpachi but good god you managed to paint a beautiful picture for me. I simply assumed that for them it was simply party time all the time along with a few bald jokes but this is much better. Emotionally healthy squad 11 which still love fighting more than anything. I always cringed when someone would just describe them as hooligans that do nothing but fighting. I mean they do that too but I love the idea that they are all emotionally healthy and mature, a loving and supportive family to their own - in their own wakka doodoo kind of way thats endearing - and of course they are in my opinion they single capable force against sexisim. Because they don't care about anything else - gendere, sexuality, gender performances, race, mentality or anything - other than if you fight good you respectable and if you fight good in squad 11 you family. ( like when kenpachi just became captain he made yachiru his lieutenant and no one was against it no one thought it was beneath them, sure thru nag at her sometimes but that's mostly in a banter like way because she call them stupid nicknames but no one hates her for being unrightfully their superior. One day they got a new captain and a new lieutenant that's a child and they just went with it.) I admit their disdain and disrespect to squad 4 is still frowned upon but I do believe some squad 4s can handle their own, it's just that we saw the really peaceful ones. Anyways sorry for ranting. Just wanted to say that yeah, I really like how the past squad 11 with iba and renji in it was a great place in general. I think if they found out some one was being sexist - for whatever reason - they would be there right next to nanao - or iba's mom protesting. Kenpachi and yachiru as well. And that makes me want to be squad 11 ,despite not being much for fighting, so bad.

So, for starters, thanks! I try to have fun whenever I write Squad 11, and I’m glad you enjoy my take on them.

My Squad 11 is just... really not very canon, though. Canon Squad 11 is actually pretty gross and sexist. Yumichika is transphobic, Kenpachi makes homophobic remarks about Yumichika, they bully Squad 4, there’s a filler episode devoted to a guy that Ikkaku bullied for, like 100 years because the guy lost his reiatsu saving Ikkaku’s dumb ass.

When you write fanfic, you occasionally run into these more problematic aspects of the source media, and you can choose to dig in and analyze them, or just... remake them in your own way. Take for example, Gin. If you read fanfic about Gin, there are some people who will peel away the layers of him and his fears and insecurities and still make him be a horrible gremlin, and it’s really stellar writing. Other people prefer to write him in an AU where maybe less bad stuff happened to him, and he’s more mischievous than sociopathic, and this is a less meaty interpretation, but it’s also more fun. Sometimes fanfic is a meal and sometimes it’s candy. It fulfills different needs and different fantasies and all of it is welcome.

Yumichika, who for me is the fulcrum of Squad 11, presents this problem. I really don’t like the way his “appreciation for beauty” plays out in canon. He doesn’t actually appreciate beauty, he just likes telling other people they’re ugly. I don’t think he’s ever pointed out beauty in anyone else aside from himself or his zanpakutou. I remember the first time I watched his fight with Charlotte and it struck me as so off -- why wouldn’t he find her beautiful? I mean, I know it’s a transmysogynistic joke, that’s why, men dressed as women is funny, hurr hurr, but Yumichika is gender nonconforming himself. This was an opportunity to make a cool character point, and Kubo took the cheap laughs road instead. Going back to what I said last paragraph, a skilled writer could, in theory, write about his insecurities and his brittleness and meanness and write a pretty compelling story, but a) Kubo certainly doesn’t, and I have never actually found a Yumichika-centric fanfic of this nature, and b) this doesn’t fit the role I need him to play in my stories. I am rarely really interested in writing about Squad 11 for its own sake. I like to write them as a backdrop for the period of Renji’s afterlife where he hit absolute rock bottom and bounced back up again. We already know the role Ikkaku played in this, except that Ikkaku is a complete moron in terms of mental health, and I really, really felt like this is where Yumichika needed to come in.

I like to massage Yumichika’s character a bit, but I do want to keep the flavor of some of his character flaws-- he’s still shallow and mean and judgy, and I love that for him, but I like to add in a positive side to his appreciation for beauty. Having Yumichika make fun of Izuru’s pores is funny but it’s even funnier if he’s just given Renji a compliment on his hair first. The idea that a Yumichika compliment is attainable makes all his drags the more vicious. Yumichika also judged people by their beauty instead of their moral character, which is humorous to me. He dislikes Byakuya as a person, but is obsessed with his haircare regime. I like to have him treat Rangiku as an equal, beauty-wise, and a person whose opinion he respects based on her aesthetic. Rangiku is actually a pretty savvy and very emotionally intelligent person whom many people write off because she likes to present herself as a lazy airhead, so in an extremely convoluted way, this all works out. I like to think that Yumichika’s ideas of beauty are also caught up in boldness and risk-taking and having one’s outward presentation ring true to their inner self. To me, this is the core of why he loves Ikkaku. To him, Ikkaku’s devotion to doing the most Ikkaku thing at all times, no matter how stupid, is irresistibly sexy.

Aside: At some point, I decided that the fact that a lot of people in Bleach have colorful marks on their faces and elaborate hairstyle and accessory games implied that make-up in Soul Society is gender neutral. I like to think there is actually more of a divide between the nobility, who like their make-up to follow rules and be classy, and, well, Squad 11, who like to get make-up ideas from Jem and the Holograms. I don’t even wear makeup (I don’t know how and it’s expensive and I am ashamed of myself, we can talk about my own gender presentation later) but I like to write about both my male and female characters wearing make-up. I don’t actually know how my readers feel about it, but it just falls under the “Is that what people want?”/“It’s what we do” philosophy of all my writing.

I think one of the theses of my writing is that middle management is more important to the character of a squad than the person at the top. Captains sort of act as ideals to strive for, but they are generally unapproachable for one reason or another. Yachiru is more like her captain in this respect (which makes sense, since she is, in fact part of her captain). Ikkaku and Yumichika present this dual idea that 1) strength is awesome, fighting and being the best is awesome, and 2) part of strength is presenting yourself to the world in a bold and confrontational way. (The fact that both of them are hiding huge parts of themselves is laughably ironic). Kenpachi and Yachiru are shining examples of Do Whatever You Want and Be So Strong That No One Can Stop You.

What really makes this work is that you need someone one layer down-- does anyone actually subscribe to this nonsense, and that’s why Iba - Abarai Squad 11 is Best Squad 11. I really, really enjoy the genre of Reddit posts where a total bro will find out that his girlfriend is trans and react by becoming a vehement advocate for trans rights. I love the bodybuilders typing encouragement to each other meme. Our world is flooded with disingenuous messages from concern trolls trying to tell us why being kind and inclusive to one another is bad or that you should reject help because struggle makes you stronger and the idea of a Himbo looking at something like that and saying “that seems dumb" is delightful to me.

I actually feel like there are a lot of awful people with bad ideas in Squad 11, it’s just that Renji and Iba don’t put up with their shit, and over time, that becomes the culture of Squad 11. I think that Squad 11 has incredibly turnover, but the ones who stay are the ones who subscribe to the ideas you mentioned-- fighting is what matters, if you wanna go argue about shit, go join Squad 5. In the IkkaYumi story I wrote, which happens shortly after Zaraki takes over, a ton of people leave. The Bount Arc (which I know a lot of people skipped) features a dude who was extremely pissed off because he had liked the old Kenpachi and thought Zaraki sucked and was so mad about it that he betrayed Soul Society. You might think that this arc would feature Zaraki caring about this in some way shape or form, but he really didn’t. So, I think there are a lot of Soul Reapers that took issue with serving under a little girl as a vice captain, they just aren’t in Squad 11 anymore.

Oh, one last note on Iba’s mom. I am of an age where a number of my friends have mothers who were Second Wave Feminists. The moms in question are a real mixed bag, because they Came From a Different Time, and on one hand, you have to respect what they went through, and on the other hand, they are very difficult to get along with. I liked the idea that Iba has always chafed against his mom and her big personality, and then Renji comes in, and is like, “hey, your mom is strong as hell and she has a lot of ideas that I never thought of but they make sense” and Iba realizes that, even though she’s still a huge pain in his ass, his mom is the person who made him who he is. Moms are complex.

Uhhhh, I have definitely lost the thread of wherever I was going with this post. Thank you for enjoying my Squad 11, which is nothing like canon Squad 11. Hopefully maybe this year, I will actually finish my Squad 11 Self Care story, where Renji stops being a drunk disaster person after Yumichika teaches him how to fill his brows; I got stuck on a part where Rangiku gives Renji a talk on ethical sluttery.

#squad 11 #sometimes i look at Things I Have Wrought and pull a full Talking Heads style 'how did i get here?'#my squad 11 stuff is my absolutely weirdest most bonkers writing #i am glad people seem to like it #just trying to find some meaning in this hot mess #i think i blame The Toast

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alpaca-writes · 3 years ago

Text

Mystics, Chapter 36

84,000 words later....

I can’t thank everyone enough who sent in asks, commented, liked, and reblogged Mystics as it was being created. It meant the world to me and gave me so much inspiration to continue! Special thanks to Myst, of course. Continue to send in asks for the OCs as much as you want. A part 2 is in the works.

Enjoy Mystics’ final chapter. I hope its been as much fun to read as it was for me to write! <3

Xx -Alpaca

Taglist: @myst-in-the-mirror & @livingforthewhump

CW: captivity, blood mention, drug mention, cheesy dancing at the end.

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

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX: THREE LITTLE BIRDS

Remember: Matter. How tiny your share of it. Time. How brief and fleeting your allotment of it. Fate. How small a role you play in it.

- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations.

Shining white, pristine walls lined the hall. It didn’t take long for Hekate to catch up. Paimon didn’t know why he expected anything less. Now his arms were held behind his back by a cosmic force, unknown even to him, and the inorganic urge to continue walking by her side pushed him forward. He spoke little, and listened even less to what the old hag was saying.

“I cannot promise you will be happy here, but at least you will not be alone in your imprisonment,” Hekate said.

They turned around a corner through the maze of halls and landed upon a wide set of sliding doors. The whole realm was practically space-age. Hekate was clever to disguise the entryway to her realm as his own Labyrinth.

He should never have jumped through. That was a rookie mistake. The moment Apollo was released, he should have known something was amiss. Lyrem certainly didn’t have the talents to perform such a feat.

“This is best for you, Pan,” Hekate continued. “I know that with a little more helpful guidance, you can return to your true nature, and your true glory.”

“Paimon.”

Hekate paused. “No, no, no, my dear. You are Pan. You always have been Pan. You will always be Pan.”

The sliding doors opened. Inside this room there was yet another hallway, but instead of previous areas, this one was lined with clear walls. Perfect for seeing through into the cells that would hold a chosen prisoner.

Many of them were empty. Hekate continued toward the end, until Paimon reached the last of the cells. There was a simple bed and some books on a nightstand that had been left untouched. The room was covered in a white rubber. The bed, made of wood.

“I am not going in there,” Paimon said, his brows furrowed.

Hekate agreed with a nod of her head.

“You are correct. You are going into this one.”

The cell door across from the one that had taken Paimon’s attention opened with a whirring noise. Unable to stop himself, Paimon stepped through the threshold. The door whirred shut behind him and he was released, finally, from whatever command Hekate had over him.

“This is an abuse of power!”

“An abuse of power is what you had for many, many years on Earth my darling dear. And quite frankly, I have had enough of your games,” Hekate observed calmly. “You will have much in common with your cellmate. Let me put it simply, Pan. The sooner you behave, the sooner you will be released.”

Pan- no! Paimon looked around his new home as new objects formed around him out of nothingness. A simple bed, nightstand, all as white as snow on Christmas day and one thing in the corner that stood out among everything else because of its red mahogany sheen- a Pan flute.

“If you wish to have anything more, then you will need to earn it,” Hekate stated.

Darkly, Paimon turned around, meeting his great aunt’s eyes.

“I will destroy you for this. I will ruin you. I will make sure no one ever knows of you. I will turn you into a forgotten relic! Just as you deserve to be!”

Hekate raised a brow to show how meaningless Paimon’s threats truly were to her.

“I would think it something to be admired, if you could do any one of those things, darling dear. Certainly, if even your own father could not do those things, then it would be worth true congratulation.”

Paimon charged the clear wall and then stole a glance to the cell across from him, where someone had returned from using a restroom. The mysterious person sat on the edge of his bed. Someone vaguely familiar, with light eyes and a trimmed white beard, looking drastically different than he remembered. Paimon blinked.

“Dad?”

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

“Have you ever heard the tale of Sisyphus?”

“It may shock you to learn I haven’t ever quite finished the Iliad, but yes, I have.” Lyrem replied to Hades’ question. “So, you’ll have repeat a meaningless, trivial task for all eternity in my afterlife as a punishment for imprisoning you as per Pan’s command. How very original. Did you think of that all on your own, or did you need your brother’s help?”

“My brother Zeus has not been heard from for a millennia. While he had given me some inspiration, I thought it better to put my own ironic flair into your suffering.”

Persephone interrupted with a short squeak.

“No, uncle, please don’t be so ruthless. He’s lost so much already!”

Artemis had switched back into her cat-like form, comforting her brother Apollo in his lap and purring. She had let out a protest of her own in Lyrem’s favour as well.

Apollo translated. “Arty agrees. We should be kind to him. Truly uncle, I have to imagine that Pan had quite the psychological hold on this man. Perhaps it would be wise to show him a tad bit of mercy?”

Hades looked to the naïve children and back to the human-mortal-man with growing disinterest. Then a light crossed his face, as though an idea dawned on him. He allowed himself to smile, ever so gently.

“Well, I can see that you have created quite the positive rapport with my nieces and nephew already. I don’t know why I am so surprised.”

Lyrem shot a quick wink to Persephone as a thank you.

“Which is why, I shall grant you eternal life.” Hades continued.

Lyrem looked back to him, and stammered.

“What- what did… Did you just say what I think you said?"

Hades nodded. Everyone looked joyful. Excited even. Lyrem could last forever- very nearly be one of them. Yes, everyone thought this to be a grand idea, except for obviously, Lyrem.

“When you die, I will refuse to take your soul. Every time without fail. You will forever grow old, then older… then older. And you will never die.”

“No.”

“Welcome to a lifetime of arthritis and aching legs and never-ending cataract surgery,” Hades said. “Oh, yes, that is right, Thomas. I know how old you are, and how much older you will get before your cells no longer hold you together. Consider this a gift.”

“No, please, God Hades. I need to find Ros-”

“Goodbye ‘Lyrem’. Have yourself a wonderful life.”

He was gone. All the mortals had left the Underworld, finally. Now, Hades could return to restoring his realm to its proper state.

Persephone perked up, realizing she was free to create and grow everything back to the way it was in the Underworld.

“My pond!” She cried, running out the dining room doors towards the Depths of Despair. “I swear, if Pan killed my koi, I am going to be furious!”

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

“Why the hell are there empty bins in the hall?! Where are all my photos?! What on earth happened to my stereo?!”

Arch groaned, sitting up from the floor of the living room. Their mother was already back to her old self, standing and shouting and asking questions that no one would care to answer for her.

“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Arthur answered. He stood to his feet and limped slowly down the hall. “I’m pouring myself a bath.”

Charlotte rushed past her brother and her child, throwing herself through the house in a frenzy. Arch stood with their back against the wall, arms crossed. It wasn’t anything defiant. They just wanted to be held.

“Where are all my clothes?!”

DING DONG

“Arch, I swear to God, you will tell me what happened while I was away, and where all my f-” ding dong “stuff is!”

Arch removed their bloody apron from their body, moved a short few steps to the kitchen sink and rinsed their hands that were still stained red.

DING DING DING DING DING DONG!

Arch rubbed their temple with their hands and out of instinct, walked to the front door.

It was Benji. Through the screen door, Arch saw him standing on the sidewalk in front of their house. He had just pressed play on his Bluetooth speaker sitting in the grass. It started playing a bizarre melody.

“Hey! You answered! I was hoping you would! You have no idea how many texts I’ve sent!”

Arch stepped out onto the top of the stairs, still puzzled to know what was happening. The summer heat still lingered in the air.

“Look, I don’t know what I did to deserve the cold-shoulder, but I thought you deserved a visit at least on your birthday, okay? So, sue me.”

“My birthday?” Arch said. “It’s… It’s August? Thirteenth?”

‘Me, my, oh, what a life So lean on my people, gon' be stepping in time’

“Yeah, dude! Did you seriously forget?!” Benji exclaimed, bobbing his head from side to side.

‘So, thank you!

For coming to my birthday party!

I am one minute old today

And everything is going great-’

Arch sputtered a reflexive, well-needed laugh. Benji had started dancing like an absolute fool on their front lawn. He pulled out a birthday candle from the recesses of his pocket and held it forward.

“Look, I’ve been wanting you to show me that magic trick again, I can’t stop thinking about it.”

Arch placed their hands in their pockets, trying to work past their tears of both exhaustion and entertainment. They shook their head. They really didn’t want to know if they could still perform that trick.

“I… forgot how.”

Benji stared back up, crestfallen. He checked his phone and lowered the volume on his music player.

“Fine, okay. Whatever. You don’t want me around. That’s cool. I get it. I’m a big shot. Not really your type to hang with-”

“What?”

Benji swallowed back his pain, and shrugged.

“It’s cool Arch. School’s over and we gotta go our separate ways. I understand.”

He started backing away. Arch leapt forward, and caught him by the elbow before he turned away completely.

“I want you to stay!” Arch admitted. “It’s totally cool if you want to hang out. Please stay... I… Honestly, I have been so lonely...”

How did the air get so thick?

“And I have missed you… so much.”

Benji’s sad, soulful eyes skeptically narrowed, and then widened with a realization.

“Dude… Have you been struggling? This whole time…? All summer? You gotta come to me with your shit! Don’t bottle it up, bud.” Benji wrapped them in a tight hug and rocked them to and fro. “Oh, I had no idea... You’re my main enby, Arch… I’ll be your Rick Astley forever… The Bernie to your Elton… Okay? Always. No doubt. No doubt.”

Arch took a moment to sob grossly into his shoulder. They pulled away before it got too squishy for their liking. If allowed, they knew Benji would let them cry on him until the end of time.

Arch took a deep breath of relief.

“Sorry, I’ve just been really stressed.”

“Yeah, hey. No kidding.” Benji said. “Look, here’s the plan, Shazia said that if I could reach you today that she’d meet us at the park with some of that fancy hash we like so that we can smoke up cakes.”

Arch scrunched their face.

“Cupcakes. Shazia would meet us in the park with cupcakes. Hey, Charlotte,” Benji cleared his throat, seeing the dark haired woman, who seemed to be hanging by a very fine thread from behind the screen door. “How are you?”

“I’m fine, Benji. Arch, just go.”

“Wait. Really?” Arch turned around, wondering how she could be serious.

“You’re eighteen now, aren’t you?” Charlotte asked.

Arch nodded.

“Then get out.”

There wasn’t anything warm about the way Charlotte said those words. Instead of lingering too long on the nuance, Arch only nodded, watching the door to the house shut its inhabitants in.

Benji bent over to pick up his speaker. He didn’t miss a beat cutting the music.

“What was that all about?” He asked. Like Arch, he looked up at the closed door.

Arch wiped the wetness away from their face with a couple fingers.

“I… I think I was just kicked out.”

Arch cleared their throat. They turned back to Benji as the summer sun beat down on them both.

Oh Benji. He was the most welcome sight in this world. The only good thing left that Arch had yet to ruin. Shazia would soon await them both in the park. Their life with Paimon, Lyrem, and hell, was now in the past. A future containing Arthur and Charlotte filled with shame and regret awaited them.

That didn’t matter yet. All that mattered was what was right in front of them.

And Arch really, really, really wanted to get high.

“Anyways, you said something about smoking up?”

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vergilthelibrarian · 4 years ago

Text

I was just writing and I don’t know what this is but enjoy ^^

Yandere!KunxGenderNetural!Reader

You stared at the body of your late husband that was laid in the brown wooden casket, not shedding a single tear.

Everyone was consoling you, asking you if you were okay but how could you be okay?

Did you love Kun?

It was complicated.

Very complicated.

Kun loved you, at least that’s what he would always tell you because the moment you two got married, everything changed. Slowly but surely the dynamics of the relationship changed.

The thing about Kun was that he was always protective.

Maybe it was because of him being a Capricorn or maybe it was because of his personality, but his protective personality soon turned possessive and you in turn grew concerned.

He would mutter and say slick remarks about your friends and family to you but the moment he was in front of them, he turned up his charm, making them not see what you saw.

What he was beginning to show you.

Then he started making comments about your clothes, not liking you showing off skin.

“I just don’t like people staring at you…” he first started saying which soon turned into, “No one should even be looking at you besides me.”

He even forced you to quit your job simply because he hated knowing that other people looked and talked to you and he felt as though only that should be his privilege.

Sometimes, you’d just catch him staring at you, his brown eyes focus on your form and whenever you would nervously ask him why was he staring at you, he’d usually comment on how beautiful he found you.

Though that was happening, you didn’t really tell anyone and maybe it was because of you not telling anyone, it was easier for Kun to trick everyone into thinking that you were going insane when he started just locking you away in the basement for hours on end.

When he started doing this, he said it was just a joke, but then he started locking you up for a couple of days, then weeks, then months.

But whenever he did let you out and you would tell people, they would just look at you like as if you were crazy.

Kun was just such a charming man that no one took you seriously.

He’d still let you out though… that was until you ran to a cop, panicking as you told him that your husband was keeping you isolated and before the cop could calm you down enough to listen, Kun caught you, apologizing to the officer, saying that you forgot to take your meds and dragged you away.

Once you were back home, he scolded you, saying that he didn’t care about you telling your friends and family and even random stranger because no one would actually believe you but telling a police officer? That was a huge no no and as your punishment, you would never leave the house again.

You truly didn’t know what had gotten into Kun and you wondered if he always had this side to him but just hid it from you. They did say that abusive men usually showed their real personality once they thought they had their partner trapped and the more controlling he got, the more you realized that that was the case.

He didn’t really give you rules but you had to be good to him or else he wouldn’t feed you. He wouldn’t talk to you or show you affection. He’d just leave you trapped in that basement until you’d cry for him, which he loved seeing you do.

Having you beg for him always made him felt special because he was the one making you feel this way. It was the reason why he didn’t have any solid rules set in place because it gave him more freedom to punish you.

I guess you can say it gave him a type of gratification that you were always trying to please him.

After some years has passed, it got worse.

Kun started threatening to kill your family and friends if you do something that he deemed unforgivable.

At first, you thought he didn’t meant it but one day, you simply had enough of him and just simply fought him.

You lost of course because he was way stronger than you and being locked up with no food does make you pretty weak.

You were beaten up and knew you would be bruised up for some time.

Kun though, was very pissed.

The fact that you put your hands on him despite all the things hes done for you? He needed to teach you a lesson.

And when he one day threw the body of your close relative down the basement, their glossed over eyes wide open and staring at you, you felt yourself break because that was when you finally realized that Kun really was a monster.

You trembled as you heard the wooden steps creek, Kun walking slowly down the steps.

“This is what happens when you do stupid shit.” you remember him sneering at you. “You loved them right? I think you’ll be fine with their body down here with you for a bit.” his face was stoic as those words left his mouth.

“Hey? Are you sure you’re okay?” you blinked out of your trip down memory lane as you turned your head to the side to see Renjun looking at you with concern.

You nodded.

“Y-yeah. I’m fine.” you answered him, looking back at Kun’s body.

You sighed because you didn’t know how you felt.

Before you two got married, Kun was sweet and nice. Intelligent and always seemed to have your best interests at heart but maybe that was just as mask he wore in order to get you.

“I’m gonna go.” you told Renjun, turning away.

“Are you sure?” he asked and you nodded, saying yes quietly before leaving the funeral home.

You awoke to your name being called which honestly scared the hell out of you because no one live in this house besides you.

Though Kun was gone, you didn’t leave the house because you genuinely felt too afraid to leave.

Kun drilled into your head that the world outside of this house was evil and out to get you and even though you knew he was wrong, a part of you believed it a little.

You kept hearing your name being called and you gulped as you recognized the voice that was calling you.

It was Kun.

His disembodied voice continued cooing your name and slowly, you got up from the bed and walked out of the bedroom. You turned on your hallway light as you walked down the hallway and down the steps.

His voice seemed to get louder and louder as you walked, his chuckling digging its way into your brain.

Soon it stopped once you were in front of the basement.

Come downstairs.

Your hand shakily turned the knob of the door, your heart racing fast. You should be running out of this house but you couldn’t.

Even though he was gone, he still had control over you.

You opened the door and began walking down the steps, turning on the dim light and walking down.

Once you were down the steps and in the spacious basement, you jumped when you heard the door slam close.

You looked up to where the door was in shock only to scream in terror when you looked in front of you.

“What are you doing here?! You’re dead! You’re dead, I killed you!” you cried out.

A dark aura surrounded Kun’s ghostly figure as he walked to you, he deathly pale skin covered in blood.

Though his aura yelled danger, the smile on his face said otherwise as he gave you that sweet smile that use to make your stomach do flips.

“I am dead and honestly… I feel so better this way. Much freer. I have to thank you love.” he said.

You gulped as your back felt the cool wall, moving away when you felt his cold hand cup the side of your face.

“You know, the afterlife isn’t so bad though it was kind of dark there… and the screams, lots of screams...” his smile dropped for a second as he looked away before it grew back again, his attention back on you.

“But I can take you with me there and no one will be able to have you, to look at you, touch you or talk to you. It just be you and me… Like how it should always be.”

“But I- I killed you.” you stuttered shakily, tears falling down your cheeks.

“Yes, you did. And it was painful the way how you just stabbed me repeatedly… I must have treated you so badly huh?” he said, his face showing regret.

You stared at him.

Though he was acting nice, you still felt a dark aura around him and you knew it was just all an act.

“Stop trying to trick me!” you yelled at him backing away.

“Trick you?” he asked you, his head tilting curiously.

You furiously nodded your head.

“Yes! Trick me! You’re pretending that you regret being a controlling abusive asshole! But I won’t fall for it!” you turned and ran up the steps.

“Come back here.” Kun growled and you felt your body fall down the steps suddenly. You crumpled on the floor, moaning in pain.

“You’re so goddamn stubborn. This is why I did the things I did because you just never listened to me!” he yelled.

You sat up on the ground, looking up at the angry ghost.

Suddenly, you grabbed at your throat as you felt the air cut off from you.

“This is the only way we can be together now without you trying to get away from me...”

You thrashed around, as you felt your heartbeat slow down, falling down on the ground.

“I would say I’m sorry but truthfully I’m not.”

As you lost consciousness, the last thing you heard was.

“You’ll be so happy with me. I promise you that I’ll treat you better.” he paused, noticing that you weren’t moving anymore.

“It’ll be just you and me living in our own personal heaven, like how it was always meant to be.”

#i hope this is okay lol like i was just writing whatever came to my mind tbh #yandere nct #yandere wayv #yandere nct u #yandere kun #kun x you #kun x reader #kun x male reader #qian kun x reader #qian kun x male reader #qian kun x you

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side-shawty · 5 years ago

Text

The Unimaginable

Title: The Unimaginable

Fandom: Marvel (MCU)

Type: one-shot

Prompt/Summary: “Hi! I love your writing! Can I request a Tony x daughter!reader where reader goes to Vormir with Nat and Clint and sacrifices herself? Then Tony learns. Big yikes. And then when he dies they reunite in the afterlife 🤧”

Pairing(s): Tony Stark x daughter!reader, Avengers x reader

Requested? YES by @daughter-of-stark

As per usual; this is also inspired by two Hamilton songs

Also, I added my own little twist.

-Duckie

When Morgan was born everything kind of fell into place again. The snap had rocked everyone to their core and you were one of the few people who got to keep both of their parents.

You lost friends and people you had come to view as family. You spent the first year or so crying when you thought about Peter, Wanda, Sam, and so many others. Morgan was a miracle baby, she brought a kind of light back into such a dark world.

After a while, you lost contact with Avengers you once referred to as your aunt and uncles. Your father took it the hardest. He carried the burden of the snap on his shoulders each and every day and it killed you to see.

So that’s why you didn’t hesitate to interrupt when Clint and Natasha began to debate on who would be sacrificed for the stone on Vormir.

“You’ve got kids Barton,” Nat began, voice strained, “I’m not going to let you go.”

“I need to do this, give myself to get them back I—“ he stopped when you spoke up.

“She’s right,” you began, and they turned to look at your face, eyes already filling with tears, “That’s why I’m going to go.”

They looked at you as if you’d just grown a second head.

“Absolutely not,” Nat said, finality in her tone.

“Why not? It’s my fault, too. I couldn’t stop Quill from losing it when we were so close to getting the gauntlet. I look at Morgan every day and know that she’ll never get to live in a normal world. This is my chance to give her that,” You said, as the tears began to fall.

Nat’s eyes glowed with understanding.

“She’s yours isn’t she?” She asked quietly.

You nodded, “Mine and Peter’s. But she doesn’t know. I couldn’t do that to her, let her grow up without both her parents.”

You took a subtle step towards the edge of the cliff.

They moved at lightning speed to each grab one of your wrists.

“You’re not doing this,” Nat said.

“I don’t think you get to make that choice right now,” you said before breaking free of their hold.

They stood in a defensive position quickly, they knew what you were doing. They trained you after all.

You fought both of them with all of your strength. In their absence, you had spent time with Brunnhilde and she taught you how to fight like a Valkyrie. Your techniques were new and they weren’t ready.

But Black Widow and Hawkeye adapted. Fighting tooth and nail as you got closer to the cliff's edge.

Clint tried to grab your arm but you shifted so he pushed your abdomen instead. You used the momentum to lose your footing on the edge and let yourself begin your descent.

Clint and Nat dove at the same time, grabbing the same arm and trying to pull you up as you let yourself become dead weight.

“Don’t do this, Y/N/N,” Nat cried as you looked up at them with nothing by desperation in your eyes.

“I have too. Please tell Morgan how much I love her. Give her her father back. Tell my parents that I love them and that I’m sorry,” You said, allowing the tears to flow freely now.

“I love you all, so much,” you said before shifting your weight so quickly that there was absolutely no way for them to have caught you.

You heard their screams of desperation as you fell.

But you were happy because you were doing this for your friends, your family, your daughter.

They would all be alright.

————

When Nat and Clint arrived back at the compound with the soul stone your absence was profound.

Their eyes were solemn and they stood quiet as everyone in the room began to understand what this meant.

“Where’s my daughter?” Tony asked in a sorrow-filled tone, already knowing the answer.

“I’m sorry Tony,” Natasha said and fell to her knees as sobs ripped through her.

Tony fell next, feeling as if someone had punched yet another hole through his chest.

But this one would never heal.

—————

Tony Stark lived for another 40 years after the death of his daughter.

He honored her name in every possible way and told Morgan the truth when she was old enough to understand.

Every day he hoped and prayed that something would get her back to him but he knew better.

Instead, he held Morgan tight for her and made sure Peter was always a part of her life.

Like her mother, she had grown up to be one of the best heroes the world had ever seen and an even greater scientist. His heart swelled every time he looked at her.

Now, on his deathbed that little girl who he had loved so much, who looked just like her mother reassured him that he could rest now, the world was alright now.

“I love you,” Morgan whispered and he couldn’t think of better last words to drift off too.

————

When Tony awoke again he was young, about the same age as when he first became Iron Man and he outside of his old house in Malibu.

Walking in he saw a figure standing in front of the large glass windows. Illuminated angelically in the midday sun.

Squinting, she turned to look at him and a smile immediately lit up her features.

“Hi Dad,” She spoke in a voice he missed every single day of his life.

Tony allowed his feet to carry him as fast as possible to her and crushed her in a hug as he allowed the tears to flow.

Y/N’s own hot tears began to wet her cheeks as she squeezed him back for dear life.

“I missed you so much,” he spoke into her hair.

“I missed you too, I’m so sorry for not coming back,” you told him as he finally pulled back to look you.

You were as perfect as the day he brought you home.

“It’s alright,” he said cupping your cheek, “I have so much to tell you.”

“Well, it’s a good thing we’ve got all the time in the world.”

#tony stark daughter #tony stark x daughter!reader #tony stark x pepper potts #morgan stark x reader #avengers x reader #marvel imagine #marvel one shot

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missblissy · 5 years ago

Note

What if Alastor had a s/o who was deaf? 🤔

((WHEEZE. COUGHS. VIBRATES UNCONTROLLABLY. I’m living for this, okay?? This is my shit. I’m obsessed. Thank you anon. U have blessed me. THIS GOT REALLY LONG AAAAAAA. i did not mean for this to happen. There is a link down in the story that is underlined that will send you to a song you guys might want to listen to when you get to that part of the HCs. :)) Trust me... You guys are gonna want to listen to that song, I don’t want to spoil it so!! Just trust me!! You’ll like it!! If you cant find the link down there.. HERE IT IS TOO~~!! ENJOY!!!!!!! ))

((They/Them))

At first, he thought you were just ignoring him. You caught his eye standing pretty at the bar. A new resident? Oh, how exciting! He simply had to introduce himself to you. You were already quite attentive to him, falling into almost category of his type.

But when he approached and said, “Why, hello there!” And when you didn’t react, respond, or turn to face him, Alastor was a little shocked to be so blatantly ignored. His smile seemed more forced as another handful of seconds past by. That was until Husk chuckled from the other side of the bar, “You’re an idiot” he told the Radio Demon while cleaning a whiskey glass.

“Excuse me?” Alastor gave a wide eye blink with a never-fading smile. You had finally noticed someone standing behind you, only because you saw Husk’s lips move. You turned around and noticed the menacing presence of Alastor. It was hard to see, but you noticed the twitch of irritation at his brow. “They’re deaf, dumb ass.” Husk explained, seeing as he already knew you a little bit.

Ah. Well then. Alastor wasn’t sure how to respond so he just kept smiling while his eyes flicker between you and Husk. Lucky for you, you could read lips pretty well but for the most part, you depended on sign language as your preferred method of communication. You knew your voice sounded off, clumsy and slurred if you tried to speak, seeing as you couldn’t d hear yourself. You were very self-conscious about the way you sounded for a deaf person.

And yet this started the steady slow-building friendship between you and Alastor. He kept his distance for the longest time. You always felt his eyes on you though. He’d watch you sign to others. Husk knew a lot of sign language so you spent a large part of your time at the bar talking to him. Over time, as Alastor watched you from afar, he studied every hand motion, every sign and every little mannerism there was to know about you. You weren’t sure how to feel about him. The two of you never actually talked or communicated in any way shape or form. You couldn’t lie though, there was just something about him that you were drawn into, and it was hard to keep him out of your thoughts.

Weeks went by where you’d pass each other in the hallway and wave, smile, and sometimes Alastor would give you a nod of his head. He stilled watch you all the time, and he never hid it. You’d look at him from across the room and meet his gaze, then turn back and focus on whatever Charlie was saying. Five minutes would pass then you’d dash your gaze back over and see Alastor’s eyes still glued to you.

One day you were sitting by yourself at the bar. You were nose deep in a book that you couldn’t get enough off. Suddenly someone tapped on your shoulder. It took you by surprise so you let out a little and startled yelp. It was Alastor standing behind you with a smile that seemed too large for his face. His eyes had a low reddish glow to them and you could feel the static electricity wave off him in shallow pulses similar to a heartbeat. Your senses were heightened. He smelled like wild roses and what you could only assume was death. The air around him was freezing cold and extremely still.

Suddenly he gave you a formal bow. One of his hands laid across his chest while the other stretched behind him. He ducked his head down and stayed like that for a few seconds. Then he stood tall again and to your surprise, he signed “Hello,” and you watched his lips move as he said it too. Little did you know that he had kept his distance for so long because he was learning how to communicate with you. Over the weeks, he was drawn to you. The way you dressed, laughed, hummed and genuinely sought out redemption. You signed back “Hi,” while Alastor went on to say, “Our first introduction didn’t really go very well. I didn’t know you were deaf. So I’m sorry if I seemed rude,” His grin was forever wide and smeared across his face, lips moving to each word, though you couldn’t tell if he spoke them out loud or whispered them to himself. ((He was talking allowed, which caused Husk to grow irritated enough to leave the bar to restock it full of more liquor.

You signed back with a smile “I didn’t know you could use sign language,” You mouthed each word, but not a sound came from you until a soft little giggle escaped your lips. It made his dead heart twitch to life. It was almost enough to make HIM blush. The two of you instantly hit it of right there.

From that day on, Alastor was never far from you. He lingered here and near. You could always tell when he was around even if you couldn’t see him. Alastor gave off this very unique pulsing wave of electricity into the air, but not nearly enough people noticed this. When you asked Charlie if she’d ever felt it before, she had no idea what you were talking about. Angel said he felt something like that before but didn’t put it together that it may have been Alastor.

It became commonplace for Alastor to keep you company whenever he had a moment to spar. He’d ask you a lot of questions, things about yourself, your life and afterlife. He wanted to get to know you.

One day Alastor brought you into a large empty theater in the back of the Hotel. It was filled with rows and rows rotting tables with broken chairs. But a piano stood alone on the stage. He held his arm out and walk you between the rows of tables and chairs and down to the stage. You kept asking him what was going on or what he had planned, but he only smiled and told you to just wait and see.

The piano was sleek and clean. Alastor closed the lid of the grand piano and freed the keyboard from its cover. He didn’t ask or wait a second to lift you up from bridal style and place you on top of the piano. He signed, “You should lay on down for this, trust me.”

You did as told. You laid down on your back with your eyes fixed up at the rafters above the stage. While you did that, Alastor sat down in front of Piano and got ready to express himself in a way that he had not done in decades.

Suddenly you felt the vibrations of the key strings of the piano being struck at the rate of a thousand full. You’ve never felt anything like this before. You sat up enough to spin around and face Alastor. His quick fingers paused for a second or two. He wore a smile and his eyes were closed. You stared at him when suddenly his fingers smashed the keys and a loud thunderous wave of vibrations and static washed over you. The song he played was fast and you could feel every note course through your bones. There were so many emotions in this song and even though you couldn’t hear it, you could feel it.

You’ve never had the chance to experience music. It was something that always fell on dead ears. If you could have anything in the world, it would be the chance to just hear one song. It didn’t even have to be a good one. And somehow Alastor was making this possible in a way you never thought of. As he raced one, smashing key after key with such speed and aggression you couldn’t even focus on his hands. You could feel every high and low note, every note that was pressed with force or delicacy. Alastor finally started to slow down when his eyes flashed open but as soon as he did that he slammed down on the keys again and proved you wrong. He went faster and faster, staring at you the entire time with a glowing grin and flashing red eyes that somehow flicker their own light that matched the speed of his song.

The song had finally come to an end and you were moved in a way that made you emotional. Alastor leaned on an elbow while resting his cheek in his hand. You saw him mouth the word, “So?” He was asking what you thought about his little ‘surprise.’ It was amazing. It was something you had never experienced before, and that song... it was hypnotizing, intoxicating and a high you wanted to feel again if that was even possible. You first signed “That was amazing!” then signed “Thank you!” Over and over again. You felt little tears prick your eyes but they never fell.

You nearly fell off the piano while throwing your arms around Alastor. He stiffened the second you touch him, but relaxed and let you hug him. As you lingered there you did your best to pass air through your lungs and voice out, “Thank you, Al,” So that’s what your voice sounded like? There was no stopping it now. He simply adored it while finding himself liking you more and more. Alastor returned your hug and found himself getting lost in it, and not wanting to let go.

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damianwaynerocks · 5 years ago

Text

Ghosts in Gotham

Danny Phantom / DC Comics

Dedicated to: @wisegirlandseaweedbrainforever

Summary: The Batfamily has been through their fair share of the supernatural. That’s why they originally weren’t worried whenever ghosts started showing up in Gotham City. Until one day, something happens; Batman is captured and taken into the Ghost Zone. With no way to go in there themselves, with no way to fight the ghosts inside, the bats decide to call the person who can; Danny Phantom. Together, Danny takes Tim Drake, Stephanie Brown and Damian Wayne into the Ghost Zone before the Batman is lost forever.

Words: 3599

Ch 1 Masterlist

Chapter 2:

"Wow. This is the gloomiest place I've ever been to." Danny rested his head against the window as he stared dully outside the vehicle.

"Now Danny, that is not true." Maddie looked over her shoulder at her son from the front seat. "We've been to some dark places in the Ghost Zone."

"I guess."

The Fentons were in a large white and green van. They had left Amity Park the day before and were finally arriving in Gotham City.

"Well, I think it's beautiful." Jazz said cheerfully. "My future home. Just look at it!" She gestured outside. Danny followed her gaze.

Dark clouds blocked out the sun above Gotham City. There weren't too many people walking around, probably due to the insanely high crime rate the city was infamous for. Danny raised an eyebrow. "Uh-huh. Sure."

"Don't be so glum, Danny boy!" Jack said, grinning at his son in the rear view mirror. "I've heard that there's ghosts afoot here! Maybe you can catch the ghost of Jason Todd!

Jason Todd was the second child of Batman, who died just a few years after being adopted. Recently, pictures had been popping up of a man who looked like an older version of Jason Todd walking around Gotham. A few people had even supposedly spoken to him, and apparently the man said his name was Jason. The Waynes vehemently denied the theory, but many people believed it.

Danny snorted. "I bet if I caught Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne would sue me."

Jazz scowled. "No way! He would be so grateful that you brought his son home! Bruce Wayne is a good man!" Danny laughed.

"We get it, you think Bruce Wayne is hot." he ducked a swing from his sister as he added to his father, "I don't think that guy is Jason Todd. It looks like a human, not a ghost."

"So did Johnny 13."

Despite his air of nonchalance, Danny was on alert. Gotham City had had an influx of ghost activity the past few weeks, and he knew he might have to go ghost at any moment.

He just hoped he would be able to eat first.

"I'm excited about the food," he voiced his thoughts, putting his hands behind on his head as he reclined his seat. "Like, this guy's a billionaire. The food is going to be so good."

"Oh ho ho, that's what I'm most excited for too! Uh, but not as excited as I am that Jazz is getting this opportunity!" Jack quickly added after Maddie's glare.

"Do you remember where the letter said our hotel is?" she asked. Jack nodded.

"Of course, Maddie!" he said. "It's right where Brucie said! Wayne Motel! And we get a master suite!"

"Sweet!" Danny and Jazz exclaimed simultaneously as the family pulled into the parking garage.

They opened the door to their suite, dragging their obscenely large amount of luggage with them. They had packed some ghost hunting gear just in case they encountered a ghost, and they took up a lot of room and a lot of suitcases.

Jack breathed in. "Home sweet Hotel!" he grinned. "Danny, Jazz, go pick a room! But not the one with the water bed, that belongs to your mom and me."

The two siblings exchanged a look and then darted in different directions. Danny skidded to a halt as he reached the last room at the end of the hall, and opened the door.

It was a massive room. It had marble floors, a canopy bed, a huge tv, and a private bathroom. Danny smirked, his eyelids relaxing. "This pleases me."

"Danny! Hurry up!" Jazz yelled two hours later. "The limo's gonna get here in twenty minutes!" Wayne Enterprises was sending each intern a limo to take them to Wayne Manor.

"I'm coming, I'm coming!" Danny grumbled, adjusting his bow tie. They were expected to wear the nicest clothes possible, so his parents had forced him into a suit. He sighed into the mirror. "Well," he muttered. "Here we go."

He met his family in the living room and grabbed a soda from the fridge. He was about to drink it whenever Jazz smacked it out of his hand. "Hey! What gives!?"

"You can't risk anything staining your suit!" His sister snapped. "Are you crazy? I don't want the Waynes to think I come from a weird family!"

Danny gave her an incredulous look. "Um, you are from a weird family. Your parents are ghost hunters and your brother is part ghost." Jazz scowled.

"Well, we don't need to make a scene!" she retorted. "Which means no going ghost."

"Fine, I won't go ghost unless I see one." Danny put his hands up in the universal don't shoot, I'm unarmed stance, almost unnerved by the ferocity in her eyes.

Jazz gritted her teeth. "Yeah, well, don't let anyone see you do it."

"Okay, if you say so."

Jazz nodded stiffly. She fished her phone out of her pocket as it vibrated. Her eyes lit up.

"Oh! The limo's here!" She opened the door excitedly and rushed down the stairs. She stopped at the entranceway to the hotel, Danny smacking into her at her sudden stop. She laughed nervously at her brother's glare. "Sorry. Just nervous," she cleared her throat and combed her fingers through her hair. "Let's go."

They arrived at the manor thirty minutes later, and Danny's eyes widened.

The manor was huge. Easily three times as large as his high school. He couldn't believe only one man a few kids lived in such a large house.

He was still gawking as he stumbled out of the limo and walked inside. His eyes widened even further as he took in his surroundings.

The manor seemed even bigger on the inside. It looked like a castle. And the people? They looked like royalty with how fancy they were dressed. And the food?

There was more food than he'd ever seen in one place.

"This. Is. Amazing." he whispered, almost salivating. Jazz glared at him.

"Please, don't make a scene," she hissed. "Eat like a normal person." Danny didn't seem to hear her, though, as he walked towards the food in a trance-like state.

The food bar had everything. Every type of meat he could name, as well as a plethora of vegan options. It was beautiful. And the smell? Danny had never smelled anything better in both his life and the afterlife.

His mouth watered as he picked up a plate and put a few chicken wings on it. "This is so cool!" he whispered to himself as he continued adding food. "This is amazing." he put a few ribs on his plate.

He inhaled the aroma coming off of his plate and sighed. The only thing that could mess this up is that rude kid Damian. he thought with a smile on his face.

"Excuse me." Danny jumped in surprise at the voice behind him, whirling around and spilling his food in the process all over the person in front of him.

The person in front of him? Damian Wayne himself. Danny chuckled nervously.

"Oh, uh- hey Mr. Wayne! Or is it Damian? I'm so so sorry, please let me clean that up." He stammered as he used his napkin to try to wipe the food off of Damian. The latter scowled, clenching his fist.

"Don't bother," Damian snapped, slapping Danny's trembling hands aside. He looked down at his filthy suit in disgust. "I cannot believe somebody so incompetent at the mere act of standing was allowed in!" he shoved Danny aside as he stomped towards a door that Danny hadn't previously noticed.

Danny winced, closing his eyes tightly as if to shield himself from what had just happened.

"Don't mind him," another voice from behind him sighed. Danny turned around, hoping it wouldn't be a Wayne that saw him piss off the youngest.

But of course, Danny had never had the best of luck.

Tim Drake-Wayne, the CEO of Wayne Enterprises, was smiling at him. "He's just in a bad mood because he isn't allowed to go on a business trip with us."

"So, you're not mad? I'm not kicked out or anything?" Danny asked, rubbing the back of his neck nervously as he knelt down to clean the food off of the ground. Tim knelt down beside him, assisting him in cleaning up.

"No, you're good," he reassured him. "I'm Tim Drake-Wayne." He balanced on his heels as he held his hand out for Danny to the shake. The latter grasped his hand.

"Danny Fenton. My sister has an internship with Wayne Medical." Tim's eyes flickered with something Danny didn't recognize before he smiled again.

"It looks like you got sauce on your jacket," Danny looked down and grimaced as he realized Tim was right, but before he could say anything, Tim continued. "Here, I can get you another one. Follow me." He stood up, extended a hand to help Danny off of the floor and led him to the door Damian had stormed into.

They stepped into a large room with velvet seats and two pool tables. Tim walked into a nearby closet and pulled out another jacket that matched what Danny had on. "Here you go," Tim said as he tossed the jacket to him. "Catch."

"Thanks," Danny said as he caught the jacket, slipping it on. "You're a lifesaver, my sister would have killed me."

"I know the feeling, one time I embarrassed Damian by moonwalking out of movie theater and he chased me with a kitchen knife when we got home."

Damian ran a hand through his hair. "And that is why that kid scares me."

"He's not that scary once you get to know him," Tim shrugged, and motioned for Danny to follow him. "Come on dude, let's go." Danny blinked. Did arguably the richest seventeen-year-old in the world just call him dude?

The pair walked outside, Tim leading him to the rest of the Fentons, who were chatting with Bruce Wayne. Jazz turned around and waved him over.

"And this is my little brother Danny!" she introduced through gritted teeth. "Where you been, little brother?"

Before Danny could think of an excuse, Tim spoke up. "Oh, he was just helping me with something."

"Yeah," Danny agreed with a relieved smile. Jazz smiled.

"Oh, well, yeah, that's Danny! Always being helpful." she chirped. Danny sat down in the seat beside her and clasped his hands together, tuning into the conversation.

"Yes, Jasmine has always been passionate about helping people," Maddie said, smiling at the billionaire. "She's always known that she's wanted to be a neurosurgeon!"

"That's great!" Bruce responded, flashing a bright smile. "That's exactly what we're looking for here; driven people. People with a passion for helping others." His icy blue eyes rested on Danny. "How do you like the food, Mr. Fenton?"

"Oh, uh, it's great, Mr. Wayne!" Danny stuttered as he smiled nervously. "Best food I've ever had. And I should know because I definitely ate some!"

"That's great!" Bruce replied. "You look like you're an athlete. Do you play any sports?"

Danny had an athlete's body because of how often he fought ghosts. That was the closest thing he had to sports. "Well, I really like e-sports!" he raised his shoulders and smiled nervously as he answered.

Bruce chuckled. "So does my son, Tim." he then turned his attention back to Jazz.

Danny breathed a sigh of relief, sliding down a bit in his chair. He felt a sharp, cold burst in his chest as he breathed out a wisp of blue vapor.

There was a ghost nearby.

"Hey, uh," Danny stood up from the table. "I have to go to the bathroom." With a final smile at Bruce Wayne, Danny quickly left the ballroom and went through the door he and Tim had gone through.

Danny shut the door behind him, and in a bright ring of light, he transformed into the white-haired green-eyed Phantom. "Okay," he muttered, "Where are you?" He turned his body intangible and flew through the wall. He looked both ways as he entered into a massive hallway the length of a football field, with many doors on either side. "Great. This place is a maze."

Danny's eyes shot to his right as he sensed the ghost. He walked that way, still intangible, into a library. Danny froze as he spotted a butler, but continued on his way as the man walked right through him.

He saw a glowing light through one of the shelves and shot through the books. He skidded to a halt as he saw-

"Box Ghost!" Danny yelled, "Are you kidding me? You got the worst timing, pal."

Box Ghost turned around and flinched. In a blink of an eye, Box Ghost had disappeared through the floor. Danny followed suit and went to punch the ghost, before freezing. Box Ghost had vanished, but that wasn't the reason Danny was in shock.

He was in a cave. A dark cave with a plethora of high-tech machines. To his left was what looked like a row of memorials. There was one that had an old Robin suit, the one without pants, encased in glass. Another had a Batman suit. Danny's eyes widened as he realized where he must be.

His head was spinning, and he took a step back. The Bat Cave. He was in the Bat Cave. Bruce Wayne was Batman. And if Bruce Wayne was Batman, then that meant that Damian Wayne was Ro-

"No!" an angry voice interrupted the silent breakdown. Danny, still intangible, floated down to the bottom of the stairs in front of a large computer. Danny's eyes widened again as he saw an even better sight;

"Cheese Viking!" he yelled, and yelped in shock as Damian plunged a knife directly where Danny's chest was. Thankfully, the knife went straight through him, but it startled Danny enough to revert back to human form.

"You!" Damian snarled as he stood up. "How did you get in! This is a secure compound, you should not have bee-"

"Dude, that's the newest Cheese Viking!" Danny interrupted, his eyes still trained on the screen. "They were all sold out when I tried to get them!"

"Yes, well, I did not wait and set an alarm so I would know what time to order. That's called being prepared."

"Well you sure are luc-" Danny's jaw dropped. "Wait wait wait hold on hold on." He put his hands on his head as he paced back and forth. "You're Robin? This is the Bat Cave? Bruce Wayne is Batman!? Tucker was right!?"

"You're Phantom!?" Damian said as he realized who he was with. He hadn't seen a photo of Danny as a human before, as he had been too busy memorizing what he looked like as a ghost.

"Oh. I see you've found it." Tim said from behind Danny. Danny's eyes were still as wide as saucers.

"When did you get here? And does this mean you're the restaurant guy!?"

"Yes," Tim answered tightly as Damian snickered. "Yes, Red Robin."

"This is insane." Danny put his hands down, bringing his pacing to a still. "I'm in the Bat Cave! Wait, what do you mean 'found it?'" he added, frowning at Tim.

"I was going to show you later, but you found it on your own," Tim replied with a shrug.

"Why were you going to show me?"

"Because we need your help."

Danny blinked. "Me? Batman needs help from me? Is it about the ghosts?"

"Bingo," Tim snapped his fingers, pointing a finger gun at Danny. "He really does. He's missing."

"What?" Danny asked, confused. "But I just saw him up there. He was fine."

"No, that was our brother, Dick," Tim explained. "He has a mask that makes him look like Bruce."

"Oh."

Tim put his hand on Danny's back, leading him towards the Bat Computer. Tim sat down in the chair, and pulled something up on to the screen. It was a video from Bruce's camera that was hidden in his cowl, which let the video feed of his night stream to the Bat Computer.

"We were fighting a ghost a few nights ago, whenever one grabbed him and pulled him into the portal," Tim narrated as the video showed exactly that. "We tried to follow him, but it just bounced us out. We've concluded that the only way a human or anything earthly could pass through needs a ghost to accompany them."

"That's not true," Danny said, crossing his arms. "Mine at home will let anything in. Trust me, I've lost things to the Ghost Zone." His mind flashed to when Jack's anniversary gift for Maddie had gone into the portal, and how chaotic things got whenever Danny tried to get it back.

"Well, it is true," Damian retorted, copying the action. "We would know. We've seen it. Yours must be different."

"So you need me to take you guys into the Ghost Zone to find him." It was more of a statement than a question. "I can do that, but that video didn't show who took him, and the Infi-Map doesn't work on humans."

"Infi-Map?" Tim asked.

"Yeah, it's a map that takes you anywhere you want to go. You can find anything in the Ghost Zone with it, besides anything with a heartbeat."

"Well, with or without it, we need your help," Tim turned around to face Danny, turning away from the computer. "He's been in there for three days. We need to find him."

"Yeah, I can help," Danny said instantly. "But we'll need some weapons for you two. The Infi-Map will take us to my place, and we can get some from there."

"No, Damian isn't going-" Tim began, but was cut off by Bruce walking down the stairs to join them.

No, not Bruce, Danny reminded himself as the man took off his bowtie and his face shifted to that of another. Dick Grayson.

"Damian's going," Dick said. "I know we agreed that he wasn't, but Jason can't go now. Something about Artemis, so Damian's taking his place.

Lovely, Danny thought, wincing at the idea of Damian snapping at him in the middle of a fight. He blinked as another thought entered his mind. "Jason? You don't mean Jason Todd, do you?"

"Yes sir, we do," Dick replied.

"He's alive?"

"Yeah, he was resurrected a couple of years ago. Long story. Don't ask him about it, he gets grumpy." Dick stretched his arms as he made his way to the group. "Steph is almost here, too, but she got delayed by some guy trying to mug an old lady."

"What a coward," Damian said.

"The lowest of the low." Tim agreed.

"So," Danny counted on his fingers, "Me, Tim, Damian, and someone named Steph?"

"Yep," Dick answered, and looked up as the group heard a motor running. "And here she is."

A teenage girl with blonde hair in a purple Bat-suit that drove into the cave. She skidded to a halt, and hopped off. Seeing Danny, she smiled a wide toothy grin.

"No way!" Stephanie Brown, yelled as she walked closer. "You're Danny Phantom! I'm a huge fan!" She encased one of Danny's hands with both of her own. "Stephanie Brown, also known as Batgirl, one-time Robin even though nobody ever remembers, nice to meet you!"

"Nice to meet you!" Maybe Damian wouldn't try anything if Danny had someone who liked him, someone he could use for backup.

"Alright, kiddos," Dick said, putting his tie back on, turning himself back into Bruce Wayne. "Suit up and then you better go. Bruce doesn't have much time to spare."

"Right," Danny said with a nod, simultaneously transforming back into Phantom. He pulled out the Infi-Map from his pocket. He looked back up, surprised to see Tim and Damian in their respective vigilante suits.

Holy fast dressing, Batman.

"All of you, grab on to me," Danny said as he unrolled the map. "Take me home!"

At the word, the map pulled the four out of the cave and into Gotham City at hyperspeed. The map found the portal and went through. In an instant, the foursome fell out of the portal in Danny's house, the Infi-Map having dragged them through the Ghost Zone in milliseconds.

"Home sweet home," Danny said as Tim, Stephanie, and Damian got to their feet.

"Oh, wow," Stephanie groaned. "That was crazy. Is this how Bart feels?"

Damian was already wandering around. "Hey," he turned his attention to Danny, "What are the chances you have a ghost sword?"

Danny waved him to the right, and the boy's eyes gleamed at the pile of swords Jack had been making. Tim and Stephanie were looking around too, picking up various weapons. Tim was putting grenades and other weapons into his utility belt, Stephanie doing the same.

"Fenton," Danny turned around to face Damian behind him, who had found a sword of his liking. "Do you have any capri-suns in this house?"

"Uh, yeah, upstairs in the fri- hey, you don't know where the kitchen is!" Damian had sprinted up the stairs as soon as Danny had confirmed that there were capri-suns in the house.

"I'll find it!" Damian's voice could be faintly heard. Danny rolled his eyes.

Tim had found a bo-staff, and Stephanie was looking at one of the vehicles. "What's this?" she asked.

"It's the Specter Speeder 2.0," Danny answered. "It's what we're taking. It's a ship that can fly in the Ghost Zone."

"Is it ready?"

"Yeah."

"Then what are we waiting for?" Damian, who was now sporting a mini cooler filled with capri-suns, opened the door to the Speeder. "Let's go save Father."

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weirdponytail · 4 years ago

Text

MIC!Arya and the Infamous Tarnag Temple Argument in IC Canon (AKA Modern Inheritance’s Take on Trauma, Religion, and Arya F***ing Apologizing)

Let’s move on to how it might go for my Modern Inheritance!Arya and my version of events.

A lot of what I write about in MIC is trauma related. Arya’s one of the easiest characters for me to write for in that regard for obvious reasons, and because I’ve shaped my mental picture of her over the years so she’s the one I have the most practice with. Please note that usually when I go to bat for Arya I tend to get my MIC version of her muddled in with canon, so I apologize for any sharp words, brow beating, etc. Anyway...what was I talking about? OH RIGHT, TRAUMA AND THAT WHOLE TARNAG THING.

So just to further stress, this is Modern Inheritance/MIC right now.

Arya’s coming off from a hell of a time. You don’t exactly process deaths of loved ones very well while being tortured, and while she’s juggling all that plus two near death experiences that occurred probably within a week of each other, Eragon nearly dying and his back spasms, the guy that tortured her and killed her best friend and her mate is dead but she didn’t get to have a swing at him, mentally preparing to face her queen/mother, the ‘a whole clan now wants to murder Saphira and Eragon’ situation, civil unrest in the city they’re in, just Brom being Brom, physical stresses from the whole *waves hands at previous paragraph*, she’s suddenly reminded that hey...the dwarves and humans have something that elves don’t.

What’s that? Religion. And what usually comes with a religion?

And damn. Right then, that hurts for Arya. It’s like being kicked while you’re down.

TMI and on but off topic: My mother died when I was 12. She had a progressive neural disease which pretty much destroyed her mentally and physically over the course of a year or so. During that year, there were a bunch of ‘spiritual’ people coming over. Not mainstream religion types, but still.

I hated them with a passion. I hated them, the stuff they said about any type of afterlife or spirituality, prayer, the idea that the dead were not all gone, I fucking HATED that bumper sticker that says ‘if anything can go well, it will’ because ho BOY did that say something for the shit I was seeing and going through at the time.

I had been agnostic bordering on atheist before but this was the nail in it for me. After mom finally died I was a real sourpuss/snarky little shit whenever religion came up. I insulted every religion any time it came up. I shut down anything having to do with my mom ‘watching over me’ or ‘being with me/us in spirit.’

It took me years to understand it. I was angry because I couldn’t bring myself to believe that after all the shit I saw, the pain my dad went through, that I went through, and the whole year of watching a bright, loving, intelligent woman that was my whole world turn to a fully paralyzed drooling mess with mood swings and no voice besides a pained moan...that there was any sort of god or spiritual energy or other bullshit out there. Because then why would it happen? And why to her? People say that ‘well if there is a god then why does war/famine/assault/torture/disease/etc. happen?’ but when it happens to you, and you were already teetering on the edge of ‘does it or does it not, maybe there is something out there…’ it’s like being smacked in the face with a shovel.

I’ve got nothing against religion now, as long as it isn’t toxic or manipulative, etc. But I can see where Arya would be coming from.

Because deep down, Arya sees what the dwarves have. This comfort in thinking that the dead aren’t all gone, and that all it takes is reaching out to them to share thoughts and feelings, and that you’ll see them again.

And she wants that too. She wants it so badly. She envies their ability to think that way, to simply have faith in what they cannot see. She wants to talk to Fäolin and Glenwing (who is still alive in MIC but at this point she doesn’t know that) again, she wants to tell them that she misses them and that Eragon and Saphira exist and their deaths weren’t for nothing and tell them all the things unsaid...but no matter how much she wants to, she can’t get past everything thats happened in the past 6+ months and her own cultural beliefs.

It hurts. She can’t think of anything else to say past the hurt and so she lashes out like I did. She doesn’t understand why really, but knows that religion and afterlives and all of it just make her...angry. Because what else could that cold rock in her chest be?

But Arya still blatantly crosses a line by confronting Gannel rather sharply about her newfound feelings on religion while Eragon is there. She’s been following them as Eragon’s bodyguard (why the HELL did canon!Arya leave Eragon alone, even in a temple full of warrior monks, wheN A WHOLE CLAN WAS TRYING TO KILL HIM?!) and she doesn’t even realize that she’s said anything until Eragon looks back at her like ‘ooooh nooooooOO ARYA WHAT THE HELL?! WAS THAT?!’ and she sees that the back of Gannel’s head is turning purple with rage.

Eragon manages to extricate himself from it all and meet up with Saphira, and after a rather...heated...uh…”discussion,” Gannel finally flames that while Arya’s questions before pushed the limit, this was beyond unacceptable and asks what the fuck is wrong with her. Arya just storms out.

She wants to learn how to pray.

Not to a god or spirit, but how to talk to the ones she’s lost. The idea of religion giving a false sense of hope still hurts and angers her...but she’s realized that maybe there’s a reason why it can bring comfort.

Gannel awkwardly explains that a way to get started is to simply speak aloud, as if talking to someone that isn’t there. When he realizes Arya isn’t pulling his leg or going to go off on him again, he decides to give her the ‘how to talk to dead people’ primer course over some mead and does his best to keep the more hard religion stuff out of it. As a priest/monk, he’s used to consoling people who have lost family and loved ones. He can pick up the signs easily enough...when the person isn’t ready to punch a hole in his fancy history wall.

As she leaves, Arya apologizes again.

And prods Gannel to donate to the Varden’s current fundraiser.

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evils-corner · 5 years ago

Text

LUIGI'S MANSION 3 HEADCANONS

There's a lot of headcanons I have for everyone sosnsjsnsn so enjoy!!!

~~~~~~~

General ghost headcanons

Ghosts don't technically NEED TO eat and sleep, but a lot of them do both anyways because it's a pleasant experience, and a lot of them never stopped those habits after they died.

Ghosts can make themselves solid and transparent as they like; meaning they can make themselves solid to interact with objects and people (like Luigi), but can also make themselves transparent to go through walls, people, etc.

Not all ghosts are people who died - some ghosts are born that way. Portrait Ghosts/Boss Ghosts however ARE people who died.

Ghosts curl their tails together as a sign of affection, akin to holding hands.

Ghosts can change their bodies a little bit, like extending limbs, etc. Some ghosts (like Morty....mostly just him) like to change their tails into legs from time to time!

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Hotel Staff

The hotel was functional before the events of the game, and served as a hotel for ghosts. The staffing was the same (i.e. all of the portrait ghosts were there) as well as some of the Goobs and other ghosts working for the hotel.

Even though they're ghosts and don't technically NEED TO rest or anything, the staff still have an end to their work days to sleep and do as they'd like...but they still have to work LONG days.

On the second floor on the left side of the hallway, there's a door that leads to a hallway containing a set of rooms for the hotel staff to stay in, since they all live there.

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Steward

He died in the 1940s at the age of 25, working as a bellboy - he lost control of a trolley of luggage and fell down a flight of stairs, snapped his spine, and was smothered/suffocated under the luggage when it fell on top of him.

He has nightmares sometimes about his death.

He overworks himself to please Hellen because he MUST Be A Good Worker. He does the jobs of at least three people all at once and is constantly moving.

He's very anxious and is prone to having anxiety attacks.....about work and just life in general.

He's trans and gay and is dating Kruller!

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Chambrea

Chambrea was murdered in the 1940s on her way home from work one evening, by an unknown man. She was 36.

She's a HUGE Gossip, and she loves to listen in on people's conversations to get the Tea. She's known to spread rumors and not have all the facts though...so take her gossip with a grain of salt.

She has a HUGE crush on Johnny Deepend. (She's into very toned guys.)

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Kruller

Kruller died in the 1980s at 42 years old, from a heart attack while running around on the job. He had high blood pressure and high cholesterol from poor diet his whole life that led to the heart attack.

He feels much more confident with his sunglasses on.

He wears glasses when he's off the clock. Poor guy can't see without them! His sunglasses are prescription too.

He LOVES board games!

He's really nervous and easily flustered! He tries really hard to be tough, but in the end he can't do it because he's just a really sweet guy.

He falls asleep on the job a lot.

He's Bi and loves his boyfriend Steward!

He's best friends with Morty and DJ Phantasmagloria!

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Chef Soulfflé

Soulfflé died in the early 1910s after getting locked in the freezer overnight of the kitchen he worked at. He was 51.

He thinks all of the food he made is Top of the Line, and he WILL get angry if you say otherwise.

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Amadeus Wolfgeist

Amadeus died in the late 1700s from an aneurysm brought on by his temper after a performance. He was 49 years old.

He sleeps in his piano more often than in his room in the hotel. He prefers solitude and doesn't like being around the others. Most of his free time IS spent alone in his theater or dressing room.

He has a BIG sweet tooth and can't resist sweets....especially donuts!

He doesn't like DJ Phantasmagloria's music.

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King MacFrights

Died in the mid 1300s at the age of 41 in battle, when he took a Lance to the chest and was impaled.

He's very sensitive about his height and he will get VERY angry if you comment on it at all.

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Dr. Potter

Died in the late 1970s from old age at 85.

He was a recluse and took care of dozens upon dozens of plants all at once and he loved every one of them dearly.

He sweet talked his plants and would Hum to them softly as he made his way through his gardens.

He names every single one of his plants!

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Morty

Morty died in 1972 at 37 years old, when a stage light fell on him after he uttered the word "Macbeth" in the theater. He didn't believe the superstition.

His real name is Mortimer, but he prefers Morty. Don't ever call him Mort he will Kill You (unless You're Kruller. He's the only friend who's allowed to call him that)

Morty was an actor as well as a director when he was alive and performed in theater, plays, musicals, etc as well as on film.

He was fluent in a handful of languages including English, French, and Italian.

He has a wonderful singing voice and also performed in an opera or two!

After he died Morty continued to haunt the theater he died in for a good decade at least. Mostly he spent his time moping about and crying in the theater, upset over his death.....the locals began to tell stories of the Weeping Ghost that haunted the theater, and his death became a sort of joke - the man who died because of a superstition and now spent his days crying about it. Morty did NOT like that and that just made him ANGRIER.

Eventually he got fed up with that place and in a fit of rage absolutely trashed the place before leaving to find a new place to live, coming upon the Hotel and being given a job there by Hellen.

He's got a big gay crush on Luigi let's be real here guys. They're dating!

He has a fainting couch in the studio that he'll throw himself onto while wailing....he's a big drama king after all!

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Ug was trampled to death and then eaten by a T-rex, around 30 years old.

He doesn't understand anything going on in the rest of the hotel and is prone to destroying everything he sees, so he just stays in the museum.

Thog Ug don't care.

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Clem

Clem died in the 1960s due to exposure from the various toxins, diseases, etc. In the sewers where he worked. He was about 28 years old.

He has a rubby ducky collection!

He collects things that people drop down the drains/that end up in the sewers with him, and will bring them back up to be found and collected.

He's dating that weird mop with a face drawn onto it. It's been a steady three year relationship so far.

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Serpci

Serpci died around 2000 BC~ at the age of 31, being sacrificed to the Gods. She was the reigning queen at the time, and gave herself up to the Gods for a better afterlife, as well as to help her people flourish.

She's very attentive to how she looks and dresses; a queen such as herself must always look the part, you know.

She's intrigued by all of the new technology and things around the hotel, and enjoys going from floor to floor, learning about it all. Though she does get a bit scared of things like movies, DJ Phantasmagloria's music, etc...

She's a lesbian and is dating DJ Phantasmagloria!

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Nikki, Ginny, Lindsey

The triplets died at the age of 12 when a magic trick misfired, and caused the building they were performing in to catch fire and burn to the ground, in the early 1980s.

Ginny is the oldest, Lindsey is the middle child, and Nikki is the youngest.

They like to switch and change hairstyles to confuse others as to which triplet is which!

They think all love and romance and affection between the adults is GROSS!!

The three of them will flock to Chambrea when in need of comfort....the maid is almost like a pseudo-guardian to the three girls, and reminds them of their mom.

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Captain Fishhook

Died in the late 1600s during a conflict between his pirate ship, and a band of soldiers. He was shot in the chest and fell overboard, only to be ripped apart by a shark.

The shark however did not survive attempting to eat the captain and died as well.

He very much likes how he looks now and thinks he's a lot more intimidating than he ever was when he was alive!!!

Despite the fact that he thinks and acts like a human, he has an animalistic side as well and sometimes succumbs to those instincts.

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Johnny Deepend

He died at the age of 26 around the 1980s, when his swimming trunks got caught on the drain of a pool and he drowned.

He's very cocky and confident about his looks and he loves to show off his muscles.

He's a bit of an asshole......he's just a straight fuck boy, honestly.

He knows Chambrea's head over heels for him, but she isn't his.....type. Not thin or young or pretty enough for him.

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DJ Phantasmagloria

She died in the 1970s after overdosing on ecstasy, when she was 29 years old.

She's self conscious of her actual hair and doesn't like it all that much, which is a big reason as to why she wears wigs all the time.

DJ Phantasmagloria is her stage name! When she's not performing, she just goes by Gloria.

She tends to call people "baby" and "sweetheart" as friendly pet names.

She's dating Serpci and is very.....very gay for her gorgeous girlfriend!!

She really enjoys Amadeus' music, even if he doesn't like hers. She understands! She loves listening to him perform.

---------

Hellen Gravely

She killed herself in the 1930s at the age of 43.

She was a model for a period of time before her death. She didn't become the owner of the hotel until she'd already been dead for a few years, but it had been an ambition of hers in her life.

She HATED how she looked as she started to get older, and layered on the makeup to make herself look young and pretty again.

326 notes · View notes

gabriel4sam · 5 years ago

Text

Rex, Duke Consort of Mandalore

Order 66 breaks the galaxy and everything Rex ever knew. Desperate, grieving Cody, Obi-Wan, his General, his brothers lost because of the chip, he takes Ahsoka and runs to the only place with a chance of standing against the Empire: Mandalore. Mandalore and its Duchesse.

Under the cut, a fic for the awesome @wrennette

You really should read her work with Rex, Cody, Obi-wan and Satine, because i’s a delight!

The Republic burned.

The Republic burned and Rex and Ahsoka ran from their men, who had gone in a few seconds from searching for Maul with them in the Outer Rim to trying to murder the former Padawan.

The Republic was no more.

The Jedi were no more.

Desperate, feeling himself responsible for the young Tortuga, even if she insisted it was the other way, Rex only thought of one way to turn.

Mandalore.

Mandalore….Why choose Mandalore?

Well, it was one of the only worlds he had visited that wasn't somehow on fire at the time. It was backed up by all the Neutral party subsisting. It was strong, it was very much not the type to open the door to a tyrant from another world.

And more important, it was the only world where he knew personally the leader.

As the long way to the planet passed, Rex asked himself numerous times if he was right. Would Satine even remember him? It had been almost one year ago and so much had come to pass in that time.

In his memory, she was a moment of pleasure, a harbour. Of course, there had been other pleasures. Since the moment Cody and Obi-Wan had become an item, he had been invited in their bunk regularly, and there had been other experiences. But that night, that single perfect night, Satine, Cody, Obi-Wan and him, was a clear memory, a warm coal against the shadows of war.

Perhaps it had been different for her. Perhaps Cody and he had just been a kinky game between Obi-Wan and herself, a naughty night with sex toys...

No, he didn't really believe it. He knew that what Cody and Obi-Wan had, that had been real, had been love.

That's why the idea that one of the two had probably killed the other hurt so deep. He had tried to com them once, before Ahsoka and he had to throw away their comms and there had been no answer. If Cody had killed Obi-Wan, his eyes empty, with that damn sentence on his lips like the brothers who had tried to kill Ahsoka.... good soldiers follow orders. What did that even mean?

Or if Obi-Wan had killed Cody in self-defence?

The Commander had always been just one step behind the Jedi, guarding his back, after all. And all over the galaxy, vode had killed the Jedi that had their back to them. Next to him, Ahsoka was sleeping, exhaustion having finally beaten her, after days where she had been almost delirious, Seeing and Feeling things Rex couldn’t guard her off.

He touched carefully the bandage on her shoulder. Blood stained it, but it was dry. He examined the stain. No, it didn’t seem it had started to bleed again. The memory came back, the noise his brother’s had made when Rex had put a blaster charge in his skull, to save Ashoka’s life.

He had been a shiny, without a proper name yet.

With a sigh, Rex put his head against the shuttle wall and regretted to have no religion. Now would have been a good time to pray. How did people find religion? Did they just pick one they liked? If so, he would choose one where the world make kriffin sense and the thrice damned Sith burned in the afterlife, and where brothers found each other again. And if that particular religion didn’t exist, he was half ready to create one!

They arrived on Mandalore in the middle of the night.

It was....ok, it was an administrative mess. People can't exactly arrive in orbit in a stolen shuttle and ask to speak with the planetary leader. But Rex spoke to someone who spoke to someone who spoke to someone and two hours after they were escorted by guards armed to the teeth to the palace.

“Aren't you pacifist now?” Rex asked, nearing the end of his patience, and eying the blaster of the leader of their escort, a petite woman who had not deigned to offer a name or to take his helmet down to salute them.

“We are no easy prey,” the woman answered and even with the helmet Rex could hear the teeth in her grin, an impressive trick.

He didn’t have to fear Satine’s reaction. She was as he remembered, she was more even, bigger than life, strong, decisive. That woman had fought all her life to make the galaxy a better place, her life a long line of tasks, each as momentous as possible, from the bettering of Mandalore to the Council of Neutral systems. She had made horrible mistakes, she had taken the wrong roads sometimes, but her heart always had been in the right place. Satine had never despaired, never renounced and she wouldn’t now, at the darkest hour. She bore that new mantle with her usual grace.

Mandalore opened his arms to all people fleeing from the Empire.

Mandalore opened his arms to the surviving Jedi.

Mandalore opened his arms to the vode with disfunctionning chips.

The clones trickled down slowly, grim-faced, and placed themselves under Rex’s command. Every day, the captain consulted the list of new arrivals. Cody and Obi-Wan were never on it.

The Jedi were even fewer. After a time, Ahsoka started to bunk with them. She was the only one of them who turned her back on the vode. Even if it hurt, Rex understood.

On the holonet for a few days, the images had been easy to find. Troopers suddenly turning against their Jedi, shooting them in the back. The desperate few parades the Jedi had the time to do, so surprised a first blaster shoot easily slipped past. And then so many others, even when the Jedi were down, the body twitching with it.

After a few days, the images disappeared. Someone smarter in the new Empire command had probably understood video of Jedi gunned down by thirty time their number, in the back, weren’t such good propaganda.

Satine offered two places on her Council, one for Rex, representing the vode deserting and running to Mandalore, and one for Master Knol Ven'nari, a Bothan female Jedi Master the few surviving Jedi had elected as their leader.

One day, a shiny who had been on the Negotiator manning communications, arrived in a stolen fighter. He had heard Rex’s message, relayed by Mandalore on every channel. He came with only his armour on his back and a tale of another Jedi, gunned down by his troops.

“I don’t think General Kenobi had the time to understand,” he said, as nicely as he could, when he saw the expression of Rex. Master Knol Ven'nari, seated next to Rex, growled low, what Rex had quickly learned was an expression of mourning in Bothan.

“Commander Cody made them use a very big calibre. No time to suffer with such a wound. And then the fall from the cliff… It went very quick.”

“And Cod- Commander Cody?”

“He was called to the Imperial Center. Apparently, Vader wanted him to lead his personal legion. Vader’s fist. They…hem, they were your men, sir. The 501th. But his transport was caught in one of the last pocket of resistance. I mean, one of the last, apart Mandalore. The transport exploded.”

Rex told it to Satine and Ahsoka himself. Satine thanked him very politely, and then asked him to leave. Ahsoka wailed in his arms for hours and he finally let himself cry too.

That night, he dreamed of them. They were in bed, the three of them, Obi-Wan between Cody and Rex, smiling, laughing. Rex was covering Obi-Wan’s bellies with hundreds of kisses. Then the laugh stopped and when Rex straightened up to look at him, there was blood everywhere, from Obi-Wan’s throat to Cody’s hands.

Every day, new refugees arrived.

“The Empire will come,” Bo-Katan whispered to her sister, when they were watching another long column exiting a ship and Satine nodded, her soul weighted by all her dead dreams.

“Oh, I know. The Empire will not let anything free. And offering refuge to those fleeing it will only put us higher on the list of targets.”

“This could be the end of Mandalore,” Bo-Katan remarked, as they observed Korkie working with Ahsoka and two young Mandalorians, handing out cups of warm soup. The first stopping place of the refuge were the medics, Mandalore really didn’t need some strange of outbreaks of little known virus right now, but nobody said they had to do it with empty bellies.

Satine took her sister gauntleted hand in her bare one.

“Then, I’m happy you’re here with me. If Mandalore must burn against the Empire, we’ll give it an end worthy of songs.”

Bo-Katan gripped her hand in return.

Mandalore was pacifist, officially, but Mandalore remembered the old ways. It didn’t need long to arm the planet to the teeth, probably less than would have made Satine comfortable. Soon, Mandalore was ready for a siege.

“It’s like even children had cache of weapons,” Satine remarked to Rex. They had listened all morning to her closest advisors preparing for what would probably be the first wave of the Empire attack and then she had asked Rex for her arm and took him for a stroll in the palace whose purpose he couldn’t understand.

“Your Highn-“he stopped himself. Pacifism had been her dreams and now she was probably the only Mandalorian not wearing plastoid. He didn’t know what words to offer.

She snorted.

“You should call me Satine. It would be strange not to, with our past,” She said and it was the first time they acknowledged what had happened, half an eternity ago. That one, perfect night, the four of them on the Coronet.

“If we are using our first name, can I convince you to wear armour? That would really make everyone in your immediate entourage happy.”

“No.”

“Pretty sure your sister would even smile.”

“She hasn’t in ten years.”

“Best reason to help her, then.”

“Still no.”

She touched his hand and he closed his mouth, already open for an answer.

“I didn’t ask you for a walk together for a discussion about my security. The stars known I have enough of that with Korkie and my sister. I have a mission for you. It will be a difficult one. That chip you told us about in your debrief….”

“Yes?”

“The medics need one of your brother. Alive, with the chip working.”

“To dechip him?”

She grimaced.

“Not like you think. The Empire is too big. We’ll lose. Nobody is saying it, but the minute they have finished to put out fire left and right, the full might of the GAR, ex-GAR I should say, will fall on Mandalore. It’s only a question of time. We’re strong, and armed, but we’re also the only one in the Neutral Systems. At the end, it won’t be enough. We will resist first, we’ll make it costly for them, but at the end…We need a way to destroy the chip still in the skulls of your brothers. The medics extracted some chips malfunctioning on the brothers who joined us at your call, and they designed a prototype, a sonic weapon. But we need a functioning chip to be sure. ”

Rex wanted to throw up. He let her arm go, took a few steps away from her. What had he been thinking, talking about that damn chip? All natural born were the same, even the ones speaking of friendship and equality of rights.

“Are you saying…. No. No, as much as I want the Empire down. I can’t help you design a weapon to kill all my brothers.”

He trembled, furious. He wanted to strike her. He thought of his brothers, enslaved and brainwashed, eyes empty, and Satine had probably never been in such danger, because he could have throttled her.

His anger probably was open on his face, still, she marched to him and put a hand on his cheek, despite his instinctive movement away.

“I want to save them,” she whispered fervently, “Yes, there is a risk, there is always a risk in medical experimentation, but I want a weapon that will make them free, not a weapon that will make their heads explode. I want to see the chips die in their heads and your brother picking up their weapons and turning on the Empire. We can’t rescue them and de-chip them one at a time. There are too many of them. I want to make them free, legion by legion, hundred by hundred…I want to rescue every single one of the victims of the Sith. Help me, Rex. For all those we can’t help anymore. I want to see Palpatine burn, the stars forgive me, burn, him and his shadow enforcer with that red saber. I want to see Palpatine down and spit on his corpse and then, Obi-Wan and Cody’s souls will have peace.”

She was beautiful like that, the fire of her soul in the open, calling for the blood of those who had destroyed the world and their lost ones. Rex felt the world titling on his axis. Adrenaline was still burning in his blood and he reacted before thinking and took her mouth in a brutal kiss, that wonderful, extraordinary woman.

It was like a spark falling on gasoline.

One instant, they were standing in a hall of the palace, the other Satine had opened the closest door, locked them in a small room, still kissing.

They had endured high level of stress those last days, those last months, something had to give and they came together violently.

Satine couldn’t touch him, too much armour in the way, but she kissed him hard, with an edge of desperation, opened his codpiece herself. He rucked up her skirt until he could touch skin, then swore remembering his gauntlets and took them down, almost trembling. He was hard, as he hadn’t been for months, too stressed, too exhausted, and now his dick was curving towards his belly and so hard it almost hurt.

There were pearls of sweat in the hollow of her throat and he swiped his tongue to taste them, then bit down once, probably harder than was protocol with a lover still so unknown.

Satine ran her nails on his neck in answer and they bit each other in another hungry kiss. He was tearing her underwear off her before really thinking and she hoped on a table.

They fucked like that, Satine still dressed to the last button of her dress, Rex with only his codpiece opened, and he saw her grimace when he entered her. He stopped, suddenly remembering he had saw Obi-Wan use his mouth first on her their only time together, and cursing his inexperience. That night, more than one year ago, had been his only experience with a human woman, and he wasn’t sure two nights with a Rhodian female once qualified.

“Don’t stop!” She protested, urging her from her legs around him.

In her eyes, darker than usual, he saw the same despair of something, of a moment without weigh on their shoulders. He kissed her again, deep and hard. That, he knew how to do. He kissed her again and again as he started to move and he fucked her on that table, Satine nails hard on his neck, her voice encouraging. It was less about pleasure and more about need. He came too fast, muffling his groans against her lips and observed with keen eyes when she made herself come with her fingers, swearing silently to himself to remember the way she did it.

It startled him to realize he hoped for another time. He remembered Cody had used his mouth on her, too, when Rex had been busy with Obi-Wan. He wanted to try that, another day, if he lived to ask.

Ten hours after, he left Mandalore with nine brothers, all volunteers. Ahsoka had wanted to come with them, but he had refused.

“If we have to kill some vode to kidnap another, we want to do it ourselves.” The former Commander had protested and he had hugged her hard, until she had relented and hugged back, as hard.

“Take care of the vode here and the Jedi, ok? They need someone helping them connect again. We’re gonna need to be united.”

“They know it’s not your fault,” Ahsoka answered him. “You know the Jedi know. It’s just…”

“It’s difficult and perfectly understandable. But they still need to be battle ready. War is coming for us. We’ll deal with trauma later, if there is a later.”

He hugged her a second time.

“And take care of the Duchess, too,” he added, not watching her face as he entered the shuttle.

If he had looked at Ahoska, he wasn’t sure he would have the strength to leave. For how much he liked them, he didn’t really know any of the brothers that had joined them. He didn’t even really know Satine. He only had Ahoska and she only had him. He hoped she could herself connect with the other surviving Jedi, if he didn’t came back.

For the end of their lives, the ten brothers of the strike team would refuse to speak about this mission, ever. No debriefing, no questions, no tender asking would ever make them tell the tale of that particular part of their lives.

Whatever had happened, it ended like that: a fortnight after leaving, they came back, all alive if a little burned in some case. Rex dropped off three sedated brothers from the 91st Mobile Reconnaissance Corps into the waiting arms of Satine’s medics.

The Duchess had come to the medical compound at the news of their arrival. She saw his face and wisely didn’t ask questions, only took him back to her apartment. This time, they got as far as finding some softer surfaces before her underwear lost its fight against Rex’s fingers. He knelt on the carpet and did his best with his mouth, but was sure that one or twice, that had been too much for her, his fingers and mouth too insistent. He took her against the arm rest of a sofa, still half in armour, Satine cursing in a language he had never heard of her, asking for more.

After, he cried, without a word, the horrors of this particular mission pouring in his tears, and Satine never asked, just stayed there, with him, and for that, in that second, he adored her, for her compassion, her strength, for more than the memories of a late night during the war.

For Satine, not for the memories of Cody and Obi-Wan who tied them together.

She didn’t let him go to the barracks that night and he slept in her bed, a bed even bigger that the one she had on the Coronet, round and with a high head of wood forming the Kryze sigil. He didn’t even know bed so comfortable existed.

The sleep was good, deep, the morning not so much, when he saw the bruises on her hips, her thighs, and realized he had done that, fucked her with his armour still on and bruised her.

“This is nothing,” she insisted after his babbling, horrified excuses. On her fair skin, the bruises seemed as black as the empty void between the stars. The inner thighs were particularly marked and he remembered how hard he had taken her, searching in her body some absolution.

“No, no, Duchesse, Satine, this isn’t… I hurt you!”

“I remember asking for more, for harder, didn’t I?”

He rolled over on the bed, got out of it, still naked, searching for his clothes.

“I won’t be the way you use to punish yourself,” he spat, but her hand hold him back.

“I have some bacta cream in the bathroom,” she said and he recognized it as some sort of peace offering.

He hesitated for a second, searching her gaze, then abandoned his black on the floor. He followed her into the bathroom, examining the bath, more a pool than anything, the walls of precious mosaic. She saw his expression.

“Too pompous?”

“Perhaps a little strange, after the barracks.”

He put the cream on her himself. Every bruise he covered in cream and then bandaged, to stop the cream from soiling her clothes, was an apology.

“Would you still want me in your bed, if I don’t keep my armour?” He asked after, because they had never talked, just fucked violently, and he wasn’t sure if she wanted pleasure, some sort of memories of Obi-Wan by proxy, or simply human contacts. He didn’t even know what he wanted, apart from a moment of reprise.

She touched his cheek and, feeling bold, he kissed her palm. She didn’t answer his question directly, instead she asked another question:

“I have a dinner with some Separatist Senators tonight. There are some parts of the Separtist Space that the Empire haven’t seized yet, they could be good allies. I would be happy if you came with me.”

“Am I some sort of message for them?” He hated politics. Cody had been so much better at it. Once again, the intensity of the loss closed his throat.

On tiptoe, she kissed him and he answered. It was slow, hesitant, and very different from the other kisses they had shared the two times they had come together. They were still totally naked, save for her bandages, and he grew hard, and broke the kiss because he really wasn’t in the mood for the demands of his libido.

“Can’t it be both? I don’t have the luxuries of making decisions only for myself. Everything I do engage Mandalore too. Can’t I want you by my side because I appreciate your company, and also because having the representative of the clones at my side will help?”

He had a small laugh and he asked another question, instead of answering:

“I made the medics swore they wouldn’t test the sonic weapon on my brothers without me. Will you come with me?” And it was perhaps cruel of him to ask it, because she would possibly assist to the death of the three vode, but he wanted, he needed someone to bear that weight with him, and Ahsoka had enough problems trying to find a place in the small Jedi settlement, after leaving the Order.

Satine nodded.

“Then I will come to your Separatist party with you.”

Rex didn’t know Master Knol Ven'nari. He had never heard of her when the Bothan had arrived on Mandalore, coming in answer to the Duchess’s message on the Holonet. In fact, he had never meet any Bothan before. The races were numerous in the Republic, but less in the GAR, and the few Bothans had worked in counterintelligence service, a part of the army Rex preferred to have as less contact as possible: they were even worse than the politicians.

Ahsoka had come to Rex, when the small Jedi contingent had elected Master Knol Ven'nari as their leader and briefed him, something he appreciated, even if the Jedi would probably have think less nicely about it with the tension between their two groups.

“She’s quite a legend,” Ahsoka had said, “She came rarely to the Temple, never took a Padawan, but every Initiate knew of her work in the Outer Rims. She’s the Fire Eater, you know.”

“Tell me it doesn’t mean what I think it mean,” Rex had grumbled, “It’s already complicated enough to keep up with Jedi who don’t play with fire!”

Ahsoka’s face had become chagrined.

“I’m not sure she want to work with the vode, you know. She is one of the survivors because she wasn’t with the troops when Order 66 was enacted.”

Rex had nodded, grim. He was sure the surviving Jedi and the few free vode needed to work together, in coordination with Mandalorians, but he couldn’t exactly force the Jedi’s hands. He could even understand their reluctance. Rex’s vode had still a chance to be rescued. For the Jedi…. Perhaps they could still rescue a few others, but at the end….

At the end, the Jedi had been the victims of the genocide and even with brainwashing, it was difficult for the Force Users to see the vode, the same face who had shoot their brethren in the back.

Master Ven'nari and Rex had ignored each other pointedly until the day after he had come back from kidnapping vode for the study of the chips. When he left Satine’s wing of the palace that morning, he had a message in his comm’, inviting him for breakfast, in a small cantina near the Jedi’s barracks.

A neutral ground, smart.

He send a message to the clones’s barracks, because he had imposed a rule that every clone on Mandalore should check up every fourteen hours and he respected the rules he issued for his men.

Master Ven'nari was already there. A second of hesitation. Was he supposed to salute or would it be worse? He was in armour, he couldn’t exactly hope she would miraculously forget who he was. On a side node, he really needed to find clothes that weren’t armour, uniform, or his blacks.

When she turned to him, he bowed, as a Jedi did to another and he saw a nuance of surprise in her eyes. She bowed to him in return and there was a strange moment where they pretended to be busy with the selection of pastries but were in fact studying each other. He had seen her on Satine’s Council, even if always on the other side of the room. She was shorter than him, with a nice chestnut fur and a deep, throaty voice and this close, he was surprised by her scent, animal and musky.

They seated down, her with some sort of infusion and amethyst eggs, whatever that was, and Rex with caff and the only thing he recognized in the food list: spicy sausages.

He hoped he wouldn’t make a fool of himself and the Duchesse at that Separatist party. They probably wouldn’t serve spicy sausages.

On the other side of the small table, the Jedi Master was observing him with piercing brown eyes. Strangely, it made him think of Obi-Wan. Jedi mannerisms transcended species.

It was the Jedi who fired the first volley.

“Captain Rex. Young Ahsoka has told all of us numerous things about you.”

“Did she, Master Ven'nari? Don’t forget that she’s very young. It would be unfair of the Jedi to reproach her our friendship, when it had only become so strong because she was exiled from your Order.”

She smirked, like she could appreciate the hit.

“Nevertheless,” the Bothan started again, “Ahsoka has now found back her people.”

“And no one is more happy for her than myself,” Rex affirmed, even if a possessive part of him protested that the Jedi had let her go and were not worthy to have her back.

“Are you? Or do you fear we will hurt her again?”

The question surprised him. He observed the Jedi Master who endured the close inspection with grace.

“Commander Tano is a good being,” he said finally, “and not only because she always fought valiantly at our side. She’s a good person, compassionate, smart, and caring. I deeply respect her. I killed brothers for her and will do it again if circumstances don’t give me a choice. If you ask me to walk away from her, I will respectfully tell you to fuck off, Master Jedi. Not because I think she can’t be happy with Jedi, but because I wouldn’t trust with…I wouldn’t trust with one of my vode a person trying to separate her from people who love her and want to protect her.”

He hadn’t planned to tell all of that. He had probably shattered every possibilities of Jedi and vode working together. He was so, so bad at it, Cody, Cody should have been there, he would have known…

A chuckle interrupted his self-recriminations. The chuckle slowly became a booming laugh and Master Knol Ven'nari soon was laughing so hard she hold on to the table, to Rex’s infinite surprise.

When she was calmer, she gave him a smile, and oh Stars, the Bothans had really, really sharp teeth.

“Captain, I think we’ll be fine. I ask that clones continue to respect the Jedi barracks as a no go-zone, and we’ll give you the same curtesy. Nevertheless, the Mandalorian troops have offered us the possibility to train with them, to prepare for the invasion who will come. And we’ll be happy if the …you say the vode, right, if the vode came too.”

“Gener-, eh, Sir, we’ll come.”

“Good. And now, you should try my eggs.”

“Sir?”

“Please, just call me Master, or Ven’nari. Kerch Kushi will be in your little Separatist Party. In fact, he’s the leader and his voice is deeply respected. It is really important you impress him. His specie only eat this particular food. Bloody inefficient, if you ask me; a shortage would kill of them, what was evolution thinking? They have a saying that other sentients eating amethyst eggs are people who can be trusted.”

“How do you know about the party?”

“Even if the Jedi Order demonstrated a terrible blindness those last years in mistaking the Sith for a simple power hungry politician, intelligence gathering had always been one of my specie forte and was, sometimes, one of the things I did for the Order. You’re quite the gossip right now. People know you’re invited by the Duchess herself. And that you left her apartment in the morning.”

Rex eyed her plate. He understood it was a peace banner she offered him, in helping him prepare for the Separatist meeting.

And it was terribly important, too: big chunks of Separatist space were still independent from the Empire: if they joined Mandalore and the Council of Neutral systems, their chances against the Empire would be better.

The eggs still looked horrible. Purple and…moving. Food shouldn’t be moving, in Rex’s opinion.

“Is there a polite way to eat that stuff?” He asked. He wouldn’t be defeated by food. Peace was worth the food poisoning.

She gave him her cutlery and coached him until he ate the repulsive thing in a way that would impress the Separatist leader. He was grateful, but still thought she could have refrained from stealing his spicy sausages.

After, a fragile truce between the Jedi leader and himself in place, he went to visit his poor vode in the lab. The three of them were still only repeating their numbers like a mantra and refused to give their names. Rex wasn’t sure if that was because they thought they were prisoners of war, or because they didn’t remember they had once chosen names for themselves.

They were calm, if they didn’t see Jedi or free vode. Then, they went berserks, yelling traitors and trying to escape the cells to harm them.

“Sir, you should leave,” one of the scientists finally insisted, “You’re only making them furious and we prefer to not sedate them.”

“Remember that-”

“We won’t test the weapon without you. We’ll message you, but it isn’t ready right now. The Duchess insisted we do another round of simulations before we test it on the subjects.”

“You should say, on humans,” Rex growled and the other man, a head taller than Rex, took a step back.

The Captain wasn’t in the mood to feel guilty about that.

He spend his day in the clone barracks, reading everything he could about the Separatists he would meet soon. Preparation. Preparation couldn’t give him a head for politics, but it could help, certainly. Also, when he was working, his mind busy, he didn’t think too much about the three prisoners vode calling him traitor, about Obi-Wan’s body probably still in that natural pool on the bottom of that cliff, about Cody’s death, about General Skywalker’s fate he still ignored, about his own men under Vader’s command, or the probable failure of their resistance effort.

After, he cleaned his blaster and his armour, even if he couldn’t go with them to the dinner. He examined his helmet, the Jaig eyes, then went to find his brothers.

“Does one of you has paint?”

When he left for the party, his armour was drying. He had kept the blue marks. It was what had formed him and he didn’t pretend it wasn’t him, but he had highlighted every blue part in gold, for revenge.

He thought he would find the Separatist senators making small talks with the Councillors of Satine, with everybody seeming talking about some simple stuff and in fact having three other meanings in the sentence that he would be the only one not understanding.

Instead, he found them in half circle around a hover chair. Standing next to the chair, Satine’s face was red, frowning, her mouth unhappy. She seemed ready to bite and he was sure she had been yelling at people when he had entered the room. Next to her, her sister had the same expression.

As one, the fifty person in the romm turned into his direction when he entered.

“Eehrr… Is this a bad time?” Rex asked, feeling like a small animal in a speeder’s headlights.

“Captain,” Satine said, reaching out with her hand, advancing a few steps in his direction and he came to her naturally, as if he had been taking his orders from her for a long time. He kissed her hand, as he had seen people do and to his surprise, she put her other hand on his shoulder in a gesture of comfort and familiarity she only had with Korkie and Bo-Katan in public.

“Captain, Voe Atell, of the Separatist Senate, brought here tonight what she called a gift for you, in a demonstration of peaceful intentions. We were having…”

Satine searched for words, something Rex had never seen her do before.

“We were having a discussion about the simple fact that she was in position to make you this gesture and the ethics of her choices.”

In the Duchess’ voice, there was steel, hard, unforgiving and furious. That was a woman who would go to war, a Mandalorian in everything, wearing silk or not. Rex had never found her more attractive but he was beginning to feel suspicious.

Next to the hover chair a green-skinned, horned woman was cringing and Bo-Katan came just behind her, as if she wanted to be sure the other wouldn’t run.

“Come, Captain,” Satine encouraged and she led him by his hand to the hover chair.

“He was a prisoner of Wat Tambor, who disappeared in the Fall of the Republic, and he was then – ”

Satine was still speaking but Rex didn’t understand a word anymore, the sound of blood rushing to his ears covering everything.

Emaciated, bald, covered in cybernetic implants, his eyes haunted, a vod was in the chair. He had a pale smile when he saw Rex’s expression.

“CT-1409 reporting for duty, Captain” he said, his voice a pale drizzle.

“Echo,” Rex whispered and in the silence of the room, it sounded almost like a sob.

The Empire attacked. It was only a question of when, after all, not of if. Grim faced around the holoprojector, the Duchess’s Council watched the first image of Taris under attack. The first reports arrived only one hour ago and it wasn’t looking good.

“It’s only the beginning. They will pick one by one every member of the Neutral Systems and then end their quest with us,” Satine said, her mouth a rigid line. She was wearing grey that day, from her shoes to the strange thing on her head that was either an avant-gardist tiara or a hand grenade and the only spot of colour was the red paint of her lips. To Rex’s eyes, it looked like blood.

“It’s a good way to break our alliance,” one of the advisers, whose name Rex had already forgotten, answered, “We don’t have enough troops to protect at the same time Mandalore and the 1,500 star systems of the Neutral Systems.”

“We still have to try,” Master Ven’nari intervened, “the former Separatist will never join an Alliance which doesn’t defend his members. The Jedi are ready, your Higness.”

Satine had a pale smile.

“We thank you for that, Master Jedi, but my sister will only lead Mandalorians troops in this for now.”

As everybody began to protest, she raised a hand.

“The courage of the Jedi and the vode isn’t in question. But we still don’t have a functional weapon against the chip. Exposing Jedi to chipped soldiers of the former GAR would be particularly dangerous for the Jedi, who would have to kill to survive, instead of the prisoners than the Mandalorians could perhaps make. And for your men, Captain Rex, it would be cruel to send them to affront their brothers right now, when perhaps in a few days, we’ll have a way to free their minds.”

It was very strange for Rex to stand on a balcony and see others march into battle. As he stand with the rest of the Duchesse’s Council and watched the first Mandalorian troops embark, he felt like reality was distorting itself even more. Then, to add to the strangeness of the day, he was cornered by Ursa Wren, the new Minister of Finance. She was a short woman with black hair and skin the colour of freshly polished brass and she wore armour, like every Mandalorian in the Council apart Satine.

“Sir?” He asked, because the day was strange enough without ex-Death Watch people leading him into dark corners. He understood Satine’s decisions to bring all Mandalore together in those dark times but groups who had tried to murder the Duchess before made him want to reach for his blaster.

“I’m new in this posting, as you knew, Captain.”

“…Congratulations?” Rex offered because he didn’t know what else to say. What did he knew about Finance, frankly?

“And your brothers and you will be one of my first projects. Perhaps not the most urgent tactically speaking, but it should have been done the moment you arrived to ally yourself with Mandalore,” she continued, as if he hadn’t spoken.

“Sir?” Rex was beginning to feel himself ill at ease.

“I understand you’re a busy man, but I suppose you have a second.”

“Not exactly, Sir, we haven’t reformed a new command structure yet.”

“You should do it, then, and send me someone who can speak for all of you.”

“Sir with all respect, but for what exactly?”

“To negotiate your pay.”

“Our – what?”

“There will be back interest, of course, for the money you should have received from the moment you came to Mandalore.”

“But, I…Sir. M’dam. The vode aren’t in the habit-“

“Of getting paid?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“We aren’t the Republic, Captain. You’ll led your brothers to fight for Mandalore against the Empire?”

“Yes, sir, of course.”

“Then you’ll be paid, as every soldier should. Send me you second, Captain, my services are already working on opening all of you bank accounts.”

And she left him there, perhaps without realizing the shock she had given to his system.

Rex sat down on a nearby bench. From there, he could see the ships readying for depart, without him and his brothers because it had been deem cruel to pitch them against their chipped brothers when they had another solution for now. And now they were getting paid.

After a time, he stood up and went in search of Ahsoka. He needed a friend in that moment.

His comm’ biped a location in answer of his question and he went to the medical wing.

Ahsoka was sitting on Echo’s bedside. The clone had refused the bacta tank he needed, because it felt too much like getting stashed again like a tool in a drawer, so the medics were doing it the old ways. Longer, but more easy to handle for Echo. He was snoring like a motor and Ahsoka working on a datapad when Rex entered the room.

He sat next to her and they stayed a moment in silence, comfortable with each other, observing the sleeping man. After a time, she hold out to him her datapad.

“Still no news about Skyguy,” she said and Rex put his arm around her shoulders, quickly scrolling the list of newly confirmed Jedi’s deaths. Most of them he didn’t recognize, but as always, it was long. Most of them listed a death in the first hours of Order 66 but some of them were more recent. Some Jedi were still alive, lost in the galaxy, and he hoped a few of them found their ways to Mandalore. Every hour, Mandalore still broadcasted, in every way possible, its message to offer a safe place for Jedi, or for everyone else fleeing the Empire.

“Skywalker’s too stubborn to die like that. You’ll see, one day a ship leaking fuel and flying with too much missing parts to be capable of it in theory will arrive on Mandalore, and he’ll be in it, to join our merry band of rebels,” Rex affirmed. He couldn’t believe General Skywalker was dead, he couldn’t. Not when they had already lost so much people. The spies of Mandalore had reported than Vader, that mysterious Sith helmeted in black and murder, had the mission to track and kill the surviving Jedi but Rex knew his General. Anakin Skywalker wouldn’t let a Sith defeat him. His Jedi General was probably busy rescuing other Jedi all across the Empire and would soon lead them on Mandalore. If only he contacted them, Rex and Ahsoka could go help him.

They stayed together a long moment, exchanging the latest news. When Ahsoka found so natural that the clones were paid, he realized how deep the usual dehumanizing the clones had suffered on the hands of the Kaminoan and then most of the Republic had ran. Yes, they were getting paid. It was normal. They always should have been payed.

After, he went back to the clones’ barrack. He was the highest ranking officer free of his chip and had naturally assumed command but if they were starting anew, was it right for him to give orders like that? There wasn’t a room big enough in the barracks for the three hundred and twenty nine clones on Mandalore right now, so they gathered outside on a shuttle platform.

Rex had searched on his datapad for voting procedures and he felt giddy. Whatever would happen after, they would have that. Their leader elected. Their choices. He insisted in his speech that no clone was forced to stay in the fight. They weren’t slaves anymore.

“Yeah, but if Mandalore lose against the Empire, we’ll be decommissioned as malfunctioning. I’m fighting. Vive the Duchess! Death to the Emperor” One of his brothers remarked and soon, they were all yelling “Vive the Duchess!!”

Rex was elected as their Captain and Sinker, a former Sergeant of the 104th, was elected as his second. After another long discussion all clones put the Kryze’s sigil on their armour, most of them on their shoulders. Some were only wearing that spot on colours on white amour, other had kept also their former colours, some, like Rex, had kept their former colours and added new as a message. But it felt important to add the Kryze’s sigil.

Vive the Duchess.

The planetary leader they choose to follow, instead of the one enslaving their brothers.

Vive the Duchess.

Rex decided he would show it to her. Satine wasn’t exactly the armour biggest fan but he was sure she would happy to hear about their elections, even if it was probably an amateur one. They hadn’t been alone since that last morning after their night together and he felt perhaps a little daring when he entered the private wing but he wanted to share that joy.

On the third hallway, he found an old trap door opened on the floor and wet traces leaving the service tunnel under the palace. Rex followed the wet traces on the floor. Whatever it was, it shouldn’t be there. And if someone had penetrated that part of the palace, it could only mean one thing.

He started to run, as if a murderous Grievious was behind him. At the same time, he activated his comm.

“Attack on the Duchess. I repeat, attack on the Duchess.”

He found two bodies on the threshold of the apartment, wearing Mandalorian armour in Kryze colours. Satine’s bodyguards. He didn’t even stop to check if they were alive, barrelled into her private rooms. He almost tripped over a body, big reptilian being, covered in blood, probably hurt by the bodyguards, and rushed to the bedroom, from where he could hear the sound of a fight. Satine had succeed in disarming her opponent, a thin human or near human in Mandalorian armour, and the attacker had improvised in putting his hands around her neck.

Rex didn’t dare shoot him so close to the shoulder and he simply charged into the fray.

Rex’s shoulder caught the attacker under the arm and the Captain threw him over his shoulder. The other was fast, trained, and understood Rex would shoot him at the first occasion, so he stayed too close for that. They fought violently, trashing the room. The unknown assailant was good and Rex recognized some of his movements, but the build was too thin for a brother, and he was too small. Rex finally succeed in pining him under him, using his superior build, and he took his helmet down.

“Let me see your fa-“

A surprised yelp escaped him when the face was free. It was his own. Or well, it had been, a few years ago.

“A cadet!” He swore.

“My name is Boba Fett,” the young man yelled, apparently outraged to be mistaken for a common clone.

In his surprise, Rex had loosened up his grip and the younger man used it. He freed himself, stabbed Rex in the joint of the armour on the hip, and started his jetpack, breaking the window and escaping. Swearing, Rex put his hand on the knife protruding between two parts of the armour, when a bip alerted him.

Boba Fett had left a bomb as parting gift.

Satine was already up, her clothes in disarray, blood on her temple. She was the one who guided him. He was still too shocked by Boba’s presence to make the good choice: he would have tried the window and it was way too high.

The moment they were piled up in the bath tub, the bomb exploded. The blast still was a shock but the bath tub was strong enough. It cracked but succeed in protecting them. When Rex lifted his head, the apartments were a ruin and a fire was starting in the bedroom but they were, more or less, intact.

He turned to the woman who had just saved his life, just after he saved her. She was breathing really fast and she was really close, her grip strong on Rex’s hand.

Another inch and Rex kissed her. No like he had done the other times. Not in passion that famous night with Satine, Cody and Obi-Wan. Not in the crazy lust and violence he had shared with her since the fall of the Republic. It was hesitant, a search of comfort. Their mouths slipped against each other, came back, tried again. Satine made a noise than Rex couldn’t have identified for all the blasters in the world against his head. She pushed herself up, threw a leg over his for a better angle. A second of hesitation, then she took his lower lip between hers and tipped his head up with a hand under his chin. He opened his mouth and felt a shock when their tongues touched and just at that instant, a whole squad of Mandalorian armed to the teeth flew into the ruined rooms.

Later, after Rex was bandaged and Korkie had hugged him just after hugging his aunt, to Rex’s intense surprise, the Duchess was installed in Bo-Katan’s rooms, since the other Kryze’s sister was away leading troops against the Empire.

Rex had difficulties leaving. What if another bounty hunter succeeded? The Empire offered a small fortune for either of the Kryze’s sisters, the faces of the Council of Neutral Systems politics an army. The Captain had chewed out the head of the palace security team, even if it wasn’t his place to do it. The words “better response time when I was two years old” had been yelled.

He was sitting on a couch and composing in his head a message to Sinker to bring two brothers as new bodyguards for the Duchess when the door of the bathroom opened. Satine’s face was bear of make-up, she was only wearing a dressing gown. Bare of any regalia, she had never seemed more human, accessible, but the way she stood still commanded respect, even with the spot of bacta on the side of her head.

“Your Highness”, Rex stood up.

“I really think you should call me Satine when we are alone. Not only you shared my bed, you saved my life,” she gently chided.

“Satine,” he corrected. He lifted a hand in an impulsive moment and before he could stop himself, he touched the side of her head, gently turning it to inspect the bacta bandage.

She pushed her head into his hand and he cupped her neck, marvelling at the golden hair, so soft and silken. Kissing her seemed natural after that. Her lips were soft, fresh. It was slow, very chaste for a long time. She curled her arms around him, bringing him closer. She smelled like soap and she was warm, and alive, alive in a world where almost everybody he knew was dead or missing. In that moment, he didn’t care that their liaison was probably ill-advised and perhaps a way to cling to their dead, in memory of Obi-Wan, Cody and that night more than a year ago.

In that moment, only Satine counted.

They never went to Bo-Katan’s bedroom, because that would have felt like a violation. But, even more practical than her sister, Bo-Katan was royalty, and her couch would have been enough for a squad of clones to sleep comfortably, big enough for the two of them.

They needed that, after that close escape. Something soft like the skin of Satine’s legs, which Rex explored. The two last times had been hard and fast, still dressed for her, still in armour for him. Now, he discovered those legs that seemed without end, miles and miles of pale skin that he kissed and explored, as gentle as he ever had been. And the breasts! How sensitive they were. They were fascinating and Satine made the most delicious noises when he played with them. She was patient, letting him discover, caressing his shoulders, his back. Around them, the palace slept and they could have believed they were the only ones awake on Mandalore. Then finally, he found the wet secret of her sex between her legs. Here too he took his time. The female human body was still an ongoing mystery for him. Three times with Satine, especially with how this three times had gone, a pleasant orgy the first time and violent sex the other two, three times like that didn’t teach a lot of things. The last time, he had taken better attentions to her body, but he was still an apprentice, and ready to learn more.

Curious, he rubbed her wet folds, cataloguing her reactions, a choked moan.

“Am I being a tease?” He asked, rubbing her thighs from his other hand and parting her folds with his fingers.

“A little, but I don’t care,” she whispered.

His fingers explored. The lips of her sex, that little nub that made her mewl every time, the opening of her vagina. Curious, he leaned down and licked. The taste was strange, new, but not strange enough to stop him and he licked that little nub. Satine was panting, her hands crisped on his shoulders.

“I don’t know if I will be good enough to make you come like that,” Rex confessed.

“That’s ok,” Satine said, “take your time. Practice make it perfect.”

“Are all human women bare here? It seems strange since male have some pilosity.”

“No, we have too. And I have, most of the time. I just needed to try something new.”

Rex leaned down again and this time he tried to push a finger into her. He caressed, he licked, he let her nails mark his skin. She never directed him, let him explore her body to his heart content until finally, he found a combination of acts that pushed into orgasm. He wouldn’t have been prouder if he had defeated the Empire all by himself.

She needed a moment to calm, then she pushed him firmly until he was seated against the back of the couch and crawled on his lap. The sensation of his cock filling her up, so wet, so tight, so warm, had Rex bitting his lips to stop himself from coming too soon. She rode him leisurely, slowly, easily, with so many kisses and caress.

He pressed kisses on every part of her skin he could and he vowed, once again, to kill every menace to that woman.

They tested the sonic weapon on a misty morning. Ashoka had offered to come as moral support but Rex had politely declined. If it had been him, eyes empty and a puppet, he would have wanted the less people possible seeing him like that. He even tried to stop Satine from coming, despite the promise he had extracted of her before to witness the experiment on the three clones prisoners.

Trying to make a Mandalorian change their mind…. Meteors had been known to be more ready to change their course!

Just Satine, Echo and Rex himself, and the scientists themselves, of course, and it was already too many people seeing his brothers like that, foaming at the mouth and trying to break their manacles to brain Rex, yelling that word, Traitor, again and again.

The weapon wasn’t really much what Rex had expected, meaning it wasn’t exactly portable.

“How do you want us to take that thing in battle?” He had asked the chief scientist, when they had been presented with some machinery the size of the room. The transmitter itself was almost as tall as Rex.

“It wasn’t exactly easy, Captain,” the other had frowned, “The Kaminoans had years to perfect their chips and the brain is a fragile organ. If we had more time-”

“But you don’t,” Satine had stopped him, “If you take the time normally needed by such a project, the Emperor will have conquered all the known universe three time before you have a prototype.”

Rex had taken her words like a kick to the ribs.

“You’re really not sure it will work,” he said the scientist, and it wasn’t a question.

The other had passed a hand on his bare skull. He seemed ten years older than when Rex had meet him the first time, only two months before.

“We did more than our best,” the man responded to Rex, “Don’t think we didn’t work so hard because they’re clones than we would have for, eh natural born I suppose would be the word. This thing, the chip, is a horror which should have never left the pages of a horror novel. All the neuro-scientists of Mandalore have worked on nothing else for the last two months, around the clock.”

“Do it. No need to prolong it. Just test it.” Rex said, and he observed how the man looked at Satine, searching for confirmation.

“The Captain’s words are the only one you should listen, when it comes to his brothers,” and the scientist nodded and scrambled behind a consol.

It wasn’t an impressive show light, like Rex had somehow expected. He didn’t even hear anything. He saw some lights on the side of the machinery, but it was simply an indicator.

The first brother went down hard, convulsing like he had touched a live wire.

“Stop, stop!!!” Rex yelled, struggling with the lock of the cell, trying to reach his brother. He didn’t even know his name, he hadn’t meet the other before Order 66, and the only thing the other man had given them since he was prisoner was his matricule, but in that second, that man was every lost brother, he was Cody, he was Fives, he was Hardcase, he was every brother still in the Empire’s clutch, he was every brother who had died under the Republic’s banner, he was even every cadet of Kamino who Rex would probably never see, never rescue.

“Don’t enter when it’s-”Someone shrieked, but it was too late, Rex was in the cell, reaching for the other, and then he knew no more.

He came back in the infirmary, a Star Destroyer firing all batteries behind his eyes, and Ashoka sleeping in a chair next to his bed.

“What?” He croaked and she jumped on her feet, her sleep light.

“How are you feeling?”, She said, leaning down on him.

“What the kriff happened?” He tried to sit down but his body refused even that simple order.

“You went into the weapon’ emission.” Ahsoka said, her montral white almost grey with retrospective terror, and for a second, Rex didn’t understand.

Weapon? What weapon? Then it all came rushing back. The chips, the experiment.

“The vod?�� And he saw the answer on his friend’s face. She took his hand and Rex let that small part of comfort, even if he wasn’t sure he deserved it.

“They thought we would lose you too. What were you thinking…”

“I was thinking my brother needed help.”

“All your brothers need help. That’s why they’re trying to do in the labs!”

“Well, it isn’t very effective!”

“It’s still the only idea we have!”

Rex closed his eyes.

“Couldn’t you…I can’t open my eyes without wanting to hurl.”

Her hand touched the side of his head and he let out a careful breath as pain receded. He hadn’t realized how much of pain he was until it stopped.

“Eh,” he said, “and with the Force-“

“Don’t you think we thought about it? Every Jedi on Mandalore went to meditate in the labs.”

“Oh, I-“

“No, we didn’t tell you. It’s still complicated to see a vod for most of them. But we had to try.”

“And?”

“You would be the first to know. But we can’t even feel the chips. It’s like there is nothing here.”

Rex stayed silent a long time then he started again:

“They can’t have understood. The Jedi.”

“When they were killed, you mean? No, they can’t have sensed the chip coming online.”

Rex turned to see the window. It was night outside.

“Have I been unconscious more than a day?”

“Just teen hours. They say they will have another protocol to try in three days. And the Duchess, she asked to comm her when you-”

“No. Don’t tell her I’m awake. Not now.”

He patted her and hand closed his eyes, pretending he was trying for sleep; and Ahsoka had the compassion to pretend she didn’t know what he was doing. Somewhere between thinking about that brother whose name he would never know and thinking about Obi-Wan’s last thought, when Cody had gunned him down, Rex’s lies become a truth and sleep took him.

The second brother used for testing died too, but not as quickly as the first.

There were sixty wonderful seconds of lucidity before he took his last breath, and Rex had the time to learn his name, a last whisper, a last act of defiance against the Empire. “I am Harpoon,” the poor guy choked out, shaking against Rex and Rex felt those words piercing him like a lightsaber in the heart.

The chief scientist himself was crying, not full sobs but almost there. All around the round, the neuroscientists had misty eyes, as they try to pretend they didn’t watch Harpoon die in Rex’s arms.

Rex refused to feel a kinship for the man and his team, no matters how the fate of the entire galaxy, and the fate of all his brothers, hinge on those people works. He couldn’t, even if he was the one who had delivered Harpoon to them like a sacrificial lamb.

“Use the data,” Rex spat to him, “Go to work. That kriffin thing must work…”

“Sir…”

“Go the kriff to work! If you fail ….Go the kriff to work!”

Because if they failed, the world would slowly suffocate under the Emperor’s grip, and the blood of those three brothers on Rex’s hands would have been in vain.

They buried him at dusk, a funeral so different that was usual for a vod. To rest in the earth, that was something for natural born, something for rich people, in Rex and his brothers’ minds, but Satine had offered a spot in the palace necropolis, and poor Harpoon would march away between kings and queens and other Mandalore princes and so other many titles that Rex couldn’t even read some of the tombstones.

“His life was worth as much as any of them,” Ahsoka had said, her smaller hand holding one of his in a show of support and it was an effort not to dig his fingernails in her flesh, between the grief and the anger and the ache of lose. It was a brother’s death, amongst thousands and thousands of brothers’ deaths, but Rex felt like that one was particularly unfair.

Sixty seconds of freedom.

That night, he searched for Satine.

Not for sex, nothing was more far away from his mind that sex, but he wanted…He didn’t know.

Companionship.

A presence.

Someone who had known Cody and who wasn’t the vode, because Rex was leading them and would have felt like a terrible officer if he had made them carry his grief and his doubts, on top of their own, and someone who wasn’t Ahsoka, whose family had been gunned down by Harpoon and his brothers, no matters how unintentionally.

He found her crying and he hesitated. Would it be intrusive to go to her? Whatever had pushed such a strong woman to tears, was Rex the person to help, burdened as he was by his own grief?

At the end, his feet choose for him. He sat down next to her and took her hand and she pushed her face against his shoulder. It wasn’t like women crying in holodramas. It was messy and noisy and her face was red and wet and Rex wished to kill those responsible for those tears. Something that probably would have horrified Satine, but it still would have feel good, in Rex’s opinion, to put their heads; whoever they were, at her feet.

He put one of his arms around her and made some calming noises, or what he imagined were calming noises. He was so out of his comfort zone. The only person he had ever regularly comforted was Cody every time Obi-Wan did something stupid, or when the numbers of lost vod was higher than usual; and alcohol had been their usual motto in those circumstances. He felt under armed for the mission of helping her in her pain, but he would never have left her alone, unless she asked.

“Bail Organa is dead,” she told him later, when she had cried every tear in her body.

“I met him once,” Rex said, “tall guy, Senator, was stubborn as hell?”

“Yes. Yes, that was him. He was my friend. For years. I was a guest to his wedding, I….He was my friend.”

“What happened?” Rex asked slowly. It was a strange discovery that offering his shoulder to her pain made his own easier to bear. The grief which had clouded his brain for weeks hadn’t disappeared; and Harpoon was still in his mind, but trying to help her helped him….

“He tried to come to Mandalore and his ship was blasted down when they tried to pass the blockade between the Core and the Council of Neutral Systems.”

“What…but…” Rex spluttered. He had meet Organa on Christophis, and it was a smart man, not a man who would ran away to such a dangerous path without reason, when he had been safe on Coruscant.

“It doesn’t make sense. Why did he do such a thing?”

The usual calm mask of politics was already covering her face and Rex couldn’t stop himself, took her hand, as he tried to stop that. He wanted Satine as she was when they were alone sometimes, when it was late and she was tired, he hoped for the woman who had cried in his arms. Her hand turned in his, their fingers entangling themselves.

“He send a message,” she continued, “before leaving Coruscant. To warn me of his arrival. He said….he said he had an important piece of information.”

“What piece?”

“That’s the problem, Rex, I don’t know. Whatever it was, it was something so important, so game changing that Bail wouldn’t let a message carry it. And now, I fear that secret is gone with him.”

Third time apparently was the charm, like in old fairytales.

“My name is Droid-Breaker,” his brother said, once he had stopped puking after the chip had died inside his skull and Rex had taken him into his arms, like Droid-Breaker was Cody reborn. The poor guy looked sea sick for a few days, but every test possible under the sun was inflicted on him by the medics, and also a few which were invented for the occasion, and it was a complete success, minus the vomiting.

Droid-Breaker was free, he would stay free. He described to Rex the moment the chip had started working, stripping him of his humanity, and how it had seemed natural at the time. How there were no questioning orders, not even the possibilities of question. How even killing the Padawans they were in charge of forming to working with clones, since their Masters were dead, had been normal.

After, Rex had spent the night in Satine’s arms. No sex, just the comforting warmth of another human being and a tender voice in his ear, repeating how much human they were. How Mandalore wouldn’t find peace until every clone brother was rescued, until every Kaminoan was brought to justice.

It was, of course, easier to say than to do.

The process for freeing clones’ minds worked, but the machine was enormous, and fragile, and difficult to operate. They needed three days just to put it apart, then back, into a ship, and there were, so, so many rules about what the ship could and couldn’t do, to not disturb the fragile engine.

Like go into hyperspace more than a fleeting moment.

“The specialist are working around the clock to find a better way. To miniaturize it, or to reduce the size even a little bit, and to make it less complicated, quicker, or whatever they can. Something to use more easily on a battlefield,” Satine was telling her sister via holo. Bo-Katan’s dark circles under her eyes were particularly unflattering in the transmission’s colours, but despite the exhaustion, she still seemed ready to rear apart everybody who suggested she could need help leading the troops. And from the reports Rex had read, she was good, very good at it.

The red head was doing her usual evening report to her sister and the Council, and every word from Satine about the chip and its solution were making her frown a little harder.

Satine was continuing: “But there are no certitude it would work. It’s already miraculous they found something in only a few months.”

“It would be too late, even if it was week and not months,” Bo-Katan admitted, “Send the ship and your enormous engine, or Taris will fall in days.”

“I’m going,” Rex decided, totally forgetting in a moment than in front of the Council, he could have put it perhaps a little less like an order, and more like a request to the Duchess, but still, Satine nodded, and gave to the vod all they wanted for their trip to Taris. The Jedi contingent even proposed help, which Rex refused, phrasing it diplomatically enough. Some day, he was sure they would have to work together, but if the machine didn’t work on a big scale enough, and they all died, he preferred to know the Jedi on Mandalore, as a last rampart.

Not that it would be enough against the entire Empire’s might.

Their survival was quite dependent on the quality of Mandalore neurologist work. There was not even the silver of a chance, if they couldn’t turn some of the vod back into human, and not puppets doing Palpatine’s bindings.

Before going, he hugged Ahsoka on last time, made her swore she would protect Echo, then made Echo swear to protect Ahsoka, the best way to be sure one of the two wouldn’t try to sneak on the ship.

He didn’t have private farewell with Satine, there was no time. When he was leaving the Council, he saw her hesitate, something she rarely did in public, then she took of one of the fresh lilies adorning her crown, and offered it to him, despite their audience.

Rex kept it into one of his belt pouches, even when it was dried, during what would be known in galactic history as the great Taris’ siege, an episode which would be studied for centuries, and would offer Rex a place in the list of great generals of the Republic.

Sometimes, during sleepless nights only rhythmed by the noises of heavy artillery, he carefully took it out and kept it on his open hand, careful, so careful of the dried flower. He wasn’t sure why.

It was so useless in a war, a flower.

It was like a promises than not all there was to know of the galaxy, of life, was war.

For weeks, him and Bo-Katan, the clones and the Mandalorian, pushed back against the Empire, using the machine, which had been nicknamed the Anti-Kamino by the vod, to break attacks, stealing clones from the Empire’s ranks when they arrived close enough from their position, mounting their own attacks to extract whole squads, who were then either going back to Mandalore to reinforce its defence, or put to work under Rex. No one of them took the choice, given to all of them, to sit this war out, to go into the Unknown regions, far away.

Rex had never been prouder.

Slowly, they started to push back. The Empire had understood something strange was happening with the clones send against the Mandalore’s troops, and they were clearly experimenting with the range of Rex’s countermeasures.

The fight took to the sky, to space. Across all the Neutral territories, the Empire and the troops under Rex and Bo-Katan’s commands played a strange game of cat and mouse.

They could never pin down long enough the Empire troops in a sector to free all the clones, and the Empire could never do enough damages to defeat them definitely before the Anti-Kamino came online.

After two years, they had arrived to a strange stand-off, troops watching troops across a line, and nobody putting a toe across it. What had once been the Galactic Republic was now halved, one part still in the hands of Palpatine, and the other, which had been nicknamed the Surviving Republic, in the hands of a hastily elected Senate, sieging on Mandalore. Satine, after a terrible row with her sister via holo communication than half the troops had did their best to pretend they hadn’t heard, had renounced her throne…and promptly be elected Mandalore Senator, because Mandalorians were contrary beings. They had tried to assassinate her a few times, and now that she was letting power go, all of them wanted her to exercise it. Her people had nicknamed her the Last Duchess, because they didn’t want her strip of her title, and because, well…she would be the last. Whoever her heir was, her nephew, children who would perhaps come one day, they would inherit the Kryze estate, but no throne, no title.

“You should go back to Mandalore,” Bo-Katan said to Rex one morning after the morning debrief.

“We aren’t making progress, they aren’t making progress. Something new needs to be done, but I have no idea what. Go see my sister. If the war isn’t the solution, perhaps she will find something.”

And for the first time in two years, after countless late nights conversations via holo, where Rex and Satine had talked about everything, from the war to their most secret dreams, where they had talked and talked and talked and talked, where they had confided to each other things they had never told a soul before, not even Cody, or Obi-Wan or Bo-Katan, where they had talked about everything but what they were or they could be to each other, Rex and Satine saw each other in real life, on a land pad in front of the Palace, which had become the Surviving Republic Senate.

And Satine threw herself into his arms, in the less thought-out instinct of a life always politically examined before every move.

And Rex kissed her, and it was like every promises untold by that dried flower had been kept.

They were married only two hours after, no pump, no fanfare. Just Ahsoka and Echo and an officer of the law, and Bo-Katan via holo, pretending she wasn’t crying, and Rex, captain, clone, slave, freedom fighter, General of the Army of the Surviving Republic, became Duke Consort of the Last Duchess of Mandalore.

Nothing passed the frontier.

Nothing.

On either side, ships armed to the teeth waited, watchful, and dangerous guard dogs.

On his side, Palpatine schemed and raged for the part of the galaxy which had escaped him. His plans were supposed to be perfect. He was supposed to have everything, everyone, every life in his grasp, and the Chosen One as his attack Sith. Instead, half of what had been the Republic was still resisting, led by that woman, and by clones, his own flesh weapons! And the Chosen One! Broken and burnt by that thrice-damned Kenobi. Oh, Darth Vader was still terrifying, even more, but a broken tool was still broken even repurposed, and he would have been more useful beautiful, clearly Anakin Skywalker. He would have sold better the Jedi’s betrayal, when now most people saw them as martyrs.

And the chip!

What a failure….Half the Kaminoan scientists had had their neck broken by Vader, but nothing seemed to protect the clones’s chips from that Mandalore-made machine, whatever metal, holo-plastic, or whatever idea they had, was tested to shield their helmet.

Palpatine raged and planned, and on the other side of the frontier, Satine raged against the impossibility to see fall the man who had burnt half the world down, and indirectly killed so many, and her dear Ben, the Mandalorian temper only cooled off superficially by her silks and her pacifism. She raged and she planned, and her Senator’s colleagues could only be swept off by her convictions, by the fire in her voice.

But still, nothing passed the frontier.

“It’s definitely a Rhodian stand-off,” Bo-Katan had said one day sadly to Rex, and she had been surprised realizing he didn’t know the term.

“It’s when a goddam confrontation has no issues. The Empire can’t try to destroy us, we would steal their clones-“

“-not stealing, Bo-Katan, we aren’t objects.”

“Sorry, we would liberate the clones, but we don’t have the fire power to destroy them either. I’m surprised you don’t know the term, with all your Kamino war training.”

“We were supposed to die if necessary, if you listen to our training. Our destruction was never a problem, so, no Rhodian stand-off, just suicide missions.”

“…I really hope there are one or two Kaminoans alive when, and I say when, we take Kamino. I want to wreck their long-necks myself.”

“Well, get in line.”

And time passed. Mandalore and its Surviving Republic stopped playing the message asking for people to join them, because every ship crossing the line was destroyed and its passengers lost. It has been the first serious quarrel between Satine and Rex. Rex, thinking of all his brothers trapped on the other side, hoping that one day their chip would stop working, wanted to continue broadcasting, thinking his brothers ferocious enough to find a way to cross the frontier. Satine took every ship trying to cross and destroyed as a shard thrust into her heart. At the end, she prevailed, and they slept separate for two weeks until Echo finally had enough and pleaded Rex’s case with Satine, and Satine’s with Rex.

Echo had thrived up, once he had left his medical bed. He could have let the horrors of what had happened weigh on him, but instead he seemed ready to live for all the vod who couldn’t.

Instead of the first message, conceived in the first days of Rex’s presence of Mandalore after the fall of the Republic, they played messages of hope, for those on the other side of the line. One day, the Empire found the way to block every communication, and their side stopped learning what was happening in the Empire.

And time passed. Rex hadn’t before experienced time outside of war and was surprised how this long waiting war could leave place for long stretches of life.

Mandalore and its allies prepared for the final confrontation which would, fatally, happen one day. They conceived and built ships made to house specifically Anti-Kamino machines, which could take the only way to free the vode through hyperspace for more than micro-jump, the only way. They trained an army from every planet, every space station, every colonies. All united, the vod and the Mandalorian acting as instructors.

Everybody understood that the day the Empire would come, it would be all or nothing. They understood that on the other side of the frontier, the same preparation was happening. Armies amassing. Weapons built. Research on the chip, trying to counteract the Anti-Kamino.

But during all of that, life happened.

Korkie grew up and took his place as the Kryze’s heir. He wasn’t interested in politics, told every time his aunt he would never try to be elected as Mandalore Senator, which despair her, but he was making Rex and Bo-Katan proud in his efforts for the coalition. He met a young woman of Taris and they had a beautiful, and quite accidental, boy, and no plan to marry, which made Satine go pale in the name of protocol.

Life happened.

Ahsoka was made a Knight, not that she needed it in Rex’s opinion, she was the best of the whole Jedi contingent. She was taking long diplomatic missions all across the Surviving Republic, like all Jedi, coming back to the roots of their Order. Helping that mismatch of cultures that was the new Republic found a unity, without renouncing their individuality. She was a ferocious warrior when time called for it, but seeing her helping people reach compromise, promoting peace in their little corner of the galaxy, Rex remembered that Jedi should never had been Generals. It had been the first step of the end, for everyone. Seeing her hold the floor in public meeting, she was much more Obi-Wan’s Padawan in those moment than poor General Skywalker’s, whose fate they had never known. And he saw Satine in her, too, her influence on the young Tortuga, and Padme Amidala’s whose death had been confirmed long before the balck-out of communications.

Life happened and time passed, and Rex and Satine’s marriage, not exactly destined to succeed in most people opinion, only grew stronger, not a simple link to the people they had loved and lost together, but a love standing itself, without the crutch of the past.

Life happened and Echo married one of Satine’s advisor. Echo cried during the wedding. They had adopted five war orphans, and had a little girl, named Fives. Rex was sure it was asking for her to be a rule-breaker, but if she had even a tenth of their dead brother’s tenacity, he was sure she would grow up glorious.

Life happened and Droid-Breaker, the first clone freed because of the Anti-Kamino, was killed in a stupid speeder accident. The funeral broke Rex’s heart and he was surprised to find in him new well of griefs, when he thought everything had been used.

Life happened and Rex could say his sister in law was one of his best friends, Korkie was the son Satine and him had decided to not try to conceive, and his surviving vod were happy, and Ahsoka was thriving.

Life happened and the Mandalore scientists finally cracked down the secrets of the accelerating aging, giving Rex and the vod numerous years more.

Life happened and ruling a planet was more work than Rex would have ever thought, and Satine and him were so, so busy.

Days could happen without Rex thinking of Obi-Wan and Cody, to busy helping prepare the Surviving Republic for the coming attack; too busy helping his wife govern Mandalore, too busy with his surviving vod.

It saddened him.

It made him feel guilty.

But he had married a woman who had lost almost her entire family to murder, and Satine understood grief, and how it mutated with time, to give people a chance to live, and she helped the best she could.

Life happened and Rex and Satine let go a little of their pain, and built an army, and a life together.

Then, it happened.

Ten years after the fall of the Republic, seven years after their wedding, refugee started to cross the border, bringing with them the news of the Emperor’s ultimate demise.

Vader had killed him.

Nobody was very clear about the why and the what and the how. Some told Vader had done it to seize the throne. Some told he had done it to protect Jedi children. Some told he had done it for so many reasons, that there was only one way to know.

The ships of the Surviving Republic crossed the frontier and entered an Empire in chaos.

And Rex and Ahsoka were on them.

“Talk to me, my love,” Satine asked and Rex had a pale smile, his eyes fixed on the small blue silhouette of his wife. The holotransmission didn’t do justice to the light in her eyes.

“You listened to my report, the same as the rest of the Senate.”

“I listened to our best general’s report. I want my dear husband to discharge a part of his pain on my shoulders.”

The smile of Rex became a little more real, then turned sour.

“This is horrible, cyare. People squeezed of their last credits, Moffs a little less than the most violent warlords, democracy’s corpse on the floor in every system. To put that into shape, even in a shape like it was in the decaying last times of the Galactic Republic, it will be years. I thought our people had difficult years, preparing for war like we did, but this was nothing to what I saw here…And the people! A lot of them are no more than wolves, ready to sell their neighbours for the smallest advantage.”

“Ten years of tyranny can’t change the sentient nature like that. I refuse to believe people’s nature is evil.”

“Ahsoka said…well, she said a lot of Jedi aphorisms, but I think she meant that Sidious’s presence warped people in this corner of the galaxy.”

“If this that, the good news are that they will get better.”

“And we will help, won’t we?”

“Well, we spend ten years building strength, time to put it in use. We will repurpose the troops and I’m pretty sure our scientists can find a way to use packs of energy of canon for a better purpose.”

Rex had a gesture like he wanted to touch the small silhouette, even if he knew Satine wasn’t there.

“You should go to sleep,” she said tenderly, “Coruscant will be the biggest trial for your expedition.”

“But the answer to a lot of questions.”

“That, too.”

They stayed in silence a long moment, uncomfortable together for the first time in years.

“I could-“ Rex started.

“You could-“ Satine started at the same time.

An awkward laugh, shared. Rex felt his heart squeeze painfully. He hated to be far away from her. Those three months since they had passed the frontier had been the longest they had been separated since their wedding.

“I will check what happened to them,” Rex said finally, “if the Empire has records. To be sure the reports were true.”

“And you’ll bring their remains home if possible,” Satine completed.

“Of course, I will.”

No more words where needed. There were only two people who could be those They.

Cody and Obi-Wan. Lost love. Bloodied flowers of their memories.

Other, of course, were shards in their hearts. General Skywalker, for example, whose fate Rex would check in third, and Ahsoka probably in first. A lot of brothers, of Jedi.

Rex had already put his greedy hands, his grateful hands, on Kix and Bly, who had been in one of the units trying to resist to the progression of the Surviving Republic Forces in the mess of the decaying Empire.

Those two had been promptly dechipped and even Bly’s tears once he had remembered his General couldn’t stop Rex’s joy to have brought back a few more vod’s home, even if they didn’t know yet the way Mandalore could be home.

Ahsoka had personally rescued a good chunk of other clones, but those two were the only ones Rex had known personally before Order 66. Ahoska had also killed two Inquisitors in their third battle, asked for ten hours on a lost moon and burnt their bodies. Rex hadn’t asked questions, yet, because she needed to be at the top of her game, but he would have sworn her reactions meant she had knew the two of them, or only one, before. Once she would be home, she could be sure he would corner her about that.

Jedi.

No matters the generation, they really needed help to admit their grief.

He knew the other expeditions, led by Master Ven'nari for the second ones, and by a bunch of officers formed by Rex and Bo-Katan for the others, had also encountered resistance, but minimal. The Empire was disintegrating too fast, it was every Moff for himself, and Rex was sure their expedition wouldn’t ever face real danger. The carrion feeders were too busy stuffing themselves.

With years, Rex understood how love was more than what he had had with Cody and Obi-Wan. It was love, really, but it never had the time to blossom, like what he shared with Satine. To build itself, months after months, years after years, trials fought together after trials fought together, grief shared and long nights of pleasure.

The Empire had taken the possibilities of growing like that from Cody and Obi-Wan, a simple line in the long, long, long list of its crimes. And now Rex hoped for closure, in bringing if possible remains on Mandalore. They already had a shared stele in Mandalore necropolis, where Ahsoka, Satine and himself went regularly. It was between the one they had put for Padme Amidala and Anakin and their dead before birth child, and between the one of Fives, those two empty too.

Soon, perhaps, bones could sleep here.

When they left hyperspace in front of Coruscant, all defences were down, and all channels sending a message which could be summed by “Please don’t shot.”

Certainly not redacted by a brother.

“I am Senator Mon Mothma,” a regal-looking woman with hair as red as a setting sun, had said in answer to their communication, “I have been designed by the remains of the Senate to handle the transition, until elections can be prepared.”

“Seems too easy”, murmured one of the officers in Rex’s ears, and Rex was totally of the same opinion. At his right, he could feel the tension in Ahsoka. They had seen so much horrors in their long crawl across the former Empire to believe things could be as simple on Coruscant.

“I’m very happy for you,” Rex said, “But, Madam, we’ll still check. Starting with the security bands of the throne room on the last day of the Empire.”

“They will wait for you in the former Palace, General”, the Senator answered, “and all explanations you could feel necessary.”

“Not vague at all…”

“Some things, you have to see to believe. I awaits you in the Senate rotund tomorrow. Something tell me you would need more time than that, but we need to move swiftly, if we want to reduce the blood shed to a minimum in other parts of the Republic.”

“Was that a menace?” Rex asked, once the communication was cut, “I can never tell, with politicians.”

At the same instant, the terminal beeped with the coordinate of Palpatine’s palace and Rex swore.

“That son of a bitch…The Temple.”

Ahsoka’s fangs seemed even sharper than usual in her anger.

“I almost regret he’s already dead,” she growled, and it was so different than her usual Jedi calm than Rex insisted for a long hug before embarking into a shuttle, despite her protests. Finding answers about dead friends and dead enemies was good, but not at the disadvantage of alive friends. He didn’t let her go until he felt her body posture relaxing a little, despite her protests than she was an adult, now.

Rex left three shuttles full of Mandalorian armed to the teeth right next to their ones, right in front of the former Palace, former Temple, whatever it should be called. No brothers, they had all stayed in orbit. Despite the progress of the Anti-Kamino, Rex didn’t want to take the risks of brothers having to fight brothers.

“Stay there,” he said to them, “Knight Tano and I will do a first reconnaissance.”

The men didn’t even protest. They had long renounced to force their General to stay safe. Rex was sure he was responsible for half the grey hairs in his second’s fur, and Ahsoka for the rest of them!

They entered the Temple side by side, the Jedi and the vode, the Knight and the Mandalorian General, Rex and Ahsoka, coming back from their long exile to mourn their dead, half prodigal children coming home, half refugee. It was fitting, in a way. They had fled alone, at the end of their world, started together on their new life. Whatever closure they would found there, they would do together, two vod in a way different but no less precious than the link shared with the other clones of Jango Fett.

The Temple was deserted.

“Feel something?” He asked Ahoska and her gaze had this vacant flavour meaning she was checking on things he couldn’t see.

“Death,” she said, then she frowned, hesitated, and added “And renewal. This way, come.”

He followed.

The structure was the same as it had been during the time of the Order but the decoration was Palpatine in all his glory: creepy, full of lore of the old Sith and with way, way too much red.

“If the Order wants to come back to Coruscant, it would perhaps be more hygienic to burn the whole thing down and starts afresh,” Rex remarked at the third dismemberment tapestries. “Do dead Sith release evil germs or something?”

Ahsoka didn’t answer. Her steps were firm, her path unwavering. The Knight leading, Rex following, they went further. Everybody had deserted the Palace, once the Emperor dead, and the tactician part in Rex’s brain hoped it meant there would be no utter idiot ready to burn the world to maintain the crumbling Empire. With the troops amassed to fight Palpatine, they would fight if necessary, but a peaceful transition would be such a fresh balm on the wounds of the people, already decimated by the Clones War and then the dictatorial reign…

Rex’s heart would have beaten twice the usual rhythm if he hadn’t long ago learnt to master the rush of adrenaline. It was not only the possibilities of danger, perhaps still lurking in the hallways, since they didn’t know the number of Inquisitors who had been formed. It was memories. He could almost see Obi-Wan just out or reach at a corner, he could feel under his lips the caress of facial hair, and smell that damn after shave Cody had started to put on, the Force only knew why.

In what had been the throne room, and long before the Room of the Thousand Fountains, two silhouettes were waiting for them, grey and white, one of them using the other as a crutch and Rex needed a minute to be sure his eyes were correctly working.

He only started to believe, really believe, when Ahsoka threw herself in their arms, with so much strength they ended on the floor in a pile.

There would be tears, later. Swearing, so, so much swearing, because despite all the progress Rex had made to handle emotions in a positive ways since his wedding, when he had decided Satine couldn’t do all the emotional work in their relationship, he would have to resort to anger to handle such a revelation. Ten years, and not a word. And lost in his feelings, he wouldn’t care than for almost seven of those years, communication had been impossible between them and the Empire.

Satine, Satine herself would have to take him by the hand one day, to guide him to the apartments of the Mandalore Palace which Cody and Obi-Wan shared with the twin they were raising. Beautiful, wonderful twins, the reasons Vader had killed the Emperor and succumbed to his wounds, to stop him to pit them, one against the other, because Palpatine only needed one.

Obi-Wan would need to tell him the tale of the life of their little family, in the farthest island of Alderaan, a lot of time, before the reality of their survival would really touch Rex.

Cody would need to tell him the tale of that last fight, Vader against the Emperor, Obi-Wan and Cody himself crushed on the floor by the power of the Dark Side, unable to rescue the twins. He would need to tell him again and again the terrible revelation of the identity of Vader for Rex to admit what had become of his General.

Satine would need to tell him, again and again, that the love he still found in his heart for them wasn’t a betrayal of their vows, and that she could share him, if he could share her.

And Rex would need to tell the tale of his life, of how he had become the last Duke Consort of Mandalore, for the two other men to learn him.

All those conversations, all those moments where the four of them believed it was too late, their fate couldn’t be intertwined again, all the work needed to learn each other again. All of that would come later.

For in that moment, Rex scrambled to help Ahsoka, Cody and Obi-Wan of the floor, crying in his helmet like he never had, scrambling for his communicator on his belt at the same time, because Satine needed to know, right now, Satine needed to share that joy.

There would be much work, for the work of Jedi, Duchesse and vod is never really done.

But there, there, all of them crying at the same time, Ahsoka and the three men in pile on the floor, Satine’s fuzzy in image, crying and already yelling orders for a ship at someone outside of the communicator image….. That moment repaid everything.

#captain rex #satine kryze #star wars #the clone wars #commander cody #obi wan kenobi #my fics

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