#linking it here because tumblr keeps runing the formating

[lateraniansweets]

Angel Devil/ Reader

“You look like shit.” You tell Angel when he wakes up, it’s the first thing he hears after being asleep for a good two weeks. 

“Take a look at a mirror,” he responds, rolling his eyes when he notices you sitting in a wheelchair with both of your legs in casts

[botwstoriesandsuch]

Sidequests are part of the story so it’s still my ballpark shut up it’s time for

Read Part 1 here!

Part 2 || Part 3

If you’re on mobile, and tumblr hates this post, follow along on this google doc!

Rules/overview this rewrite in the beginning of Part 1

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Side quests, side quests, side quests. What are they? And what are they doing here, on an Age of Calamity rewrite? I must admit, game design is not an inherent forte of mine, and I like to think that my only “expertise” would be on writing and storytelling. So what the fuck is a fool like me doing here

Well my dear ladies, lads, and gentlefolk, if your memory does serve, I did say that the format of Age of Calamity was one that served the major plot and story beats for it’s cutscenes, and its worldbuilding and good parts of it’s character development for its gameplay and side quests. It’s actually a concept that can be seen in shows and movies too, although obviously it’s origins are in TTRPGs and videogames. Definition wise, a side quest is any deviation from the main story and plot that serves to flesh out an optional/overseen aspect of the game. So there’s out perfect outlet for worldbuilding, characters, and even a bit of humour. Side quests, by definition, can’t simply be just XP grinders, because otherwise you could…..just make an XP grinder. It’s like saying you’re getting your kids a bike, but then you get them a stationary exercise one. Sure it’s functionally the same and gives the same benefits, but it could be so much more. 

Does Age of Calamity have good side quests? I’d actually argue, yes. I mean sure, it’s not exactly gonna hold a candle to Fallout or Witcher 3, but there are great memorable side quests that do serve their purposes in this game. 

A fan favourite is “The So-Called Knight,” in which Link spars Mipha, Teba, Sidon, and Revali, a conflict of the Sidon’s confidence and belief in Link, with Revali’s skepticism and grudge against him. Not only is it great fandom content, but it explores the carrying POVs of several characters in a fun way. We also have Hestu’s Dance Competition, and the Miss Vai Battle Pageant. What they lack in serious character tone, they make up for in humour and world building. Even the quests that have nothing to do with the main cast of characters, like the Questionable Escort Mission, still provide funny and interesting details about the world, like how the Yiga Clan is still ever persistent in trying to take down Link with monsters and Windcleavers alike. 

It’s not like those side quests were functionally useless either, all of them still provided great amounts of exp and materials. What specifically made them great and memorable was their small little stories and character/world details. Of course, that’s not to say you can’t have the occasional plotless boss rush every now and again, those are fun in their own right and it’s good to have variety. But just thinking about it...what were everyone’s least favourite sidequests? The timed Yiga Escape?  The ones where you sit around defending strongholds? The one hit death Hair-Width Trials? Ah...so all the least enjoyable side quests were the ones that were difficult, with no enjoyable character or worldbuilding to back it up….interesting interesting….interesting pattern indeed. 

So, let’s improve the game a bit further. I do need to pace out my future character arcs somehow. I tried to make use of the existing quests where I could, but it’s just eaaaasier to just not think about it and do it from scratch. Just shove these in place of all those quests whose only description is “monsters have been spotted here! Take Mipha and go to work!” and stuff like that. Alrighty then! Here’s my take on cool side quests for every single character thus far, along with their paired gambit attacks. Prepare for heists! Drama! Simping! And Bananas!

Link: Mastering Stasis

Ok I have no idea when this quest unlocks so just for my purposes assume this only becomes available after Link pulls the Master Sword. 

Engage the hordes of monsters that have been spotted in Hyrule Field. Now is a great time to master the use of the Stasis Rune. Impa and Zelda accompany you, but it seems stasised monsters aren’t the only thing coming to a tense standstill…

This isn’t anything that special, I just want to further highlight this tension that Zelda and Link have, as it’s something touched upon in Botw, but never really mentioned or used ever in Hwaoc. Now more than ever, Zelda has an excuse to have a rocky relationship with him because she could actively see just how far he’s coming in such a short amount of time. Classic “he probably hates me so I guess I’ll hate him” thing.

You play as Link, the game gives you your little prompts on how to use Stasis, you take out a few hordes of Bokoblins and blah blah blah. I wanted to use an earlier level to establish Zelda’s relationship sooner as obviously it’s gonna be important to the story. But of course like all side quests it won’t kill you to skip out. Text dialogue can be Zelda saying science shit like “This will be a good opportunity to test out the full limits of the Stasis rune” and then Impa’s all “Yep! We got your back, Princess! We’ll clear out these monsters in no time.”Then Link the little angsty shit that he is says nothing, and as you play you clear out more and more bokoblins Zelda just says “...” and then we can toss in a Moblin or two in there for gambit voice stuff.  

Gambit dialogue with Impa would be supportive, her usual spunky dialogue. I had two ideas for Gambit attacks with Link: One where Impa does that thing where she cuts a giant laser through the air, but it’s aimed towards Link and he parries it right in a monster’s FACE because I think it’s badass and also a good way to show trust and stuff. The second thing was Impa’s giant bomb barrels, but Link is the one to somehow ignite them, because he is an arsonist after all. He can even have a chaotic Sheikah blue glint in his eyes like blue flame, I can already picture it so clearly given how anime/dramatic Impa’s movements are. Impa sets bombs, Link *teleports behind Moblin* nothin personal, kid. 

Also right at the end of their gambit attacks, Impa and Link should try to fist bump or something (cause the whole “cool guys don’t look at explosions” thing that Impa usually does on her own) but are interrupted by eggbot jumping up to try and join in. And then Impa can be annoyed and try to punt it or something. That’s not just self-indulgent that’s in her character she totally would and I want to make use of the fact that eggbot travels around with Link. The success of her attempts to punt him can vary.

If Link does a gambit with Zelda, her dialogue can just be her usual monotone Princess stuff, “Thanks for lending your strength,” or “There is still much more to do!” just purely professional, we’re not at a stage yet where she’s buddy buddy with Link. Their gambit attacks can still be cool though. One idea I had was Zelda using stasis, and you know how when you use it in botw everything lights up with that sonar effect? So Link stands besides Zelda, and she activates stasis, the first “sonar” light wave reveals the stasised monster, and you see it from the view of the Sheikah Slate. Then with each additional flash of sonar you just see this silhouette of Link going absolute ham on a monster. And then when the stasis “ding ding ding ding ding” is done, everything’s just dead. Can you see my inspiration from Persona 5 yet? Second idea was Zelda using cryonis and makes an ice ramp for Link to shield surf on and ram into a monster. For entertainment purposes Zelda should also be putting frogs on said slide. (Also also the reason I’m putting Link as the main focus for those gambit attacks is because I want to juxtapose it with future gambits where Zelda may or may not be more powerful…)

Anyhow anyhow, so this side quest, you beat some bokoblins, theres a moblin or two. However as you progress Zelda’s dialogue because a bit more passive aggressive, maybe Zelda can be a bit irritated at how quickly Link is defeating everything before she can even contribute. Impa can comment on this like “She hasn’t exactly been warming up to you, has she…” and then the last point of the side quest, Zelda runs off, there’s a...let’s say a big horde of blue or black Moblins. Or a horde of Wizzrobes, I’m not too picky on it. Link can save her and do a gambit or whatever, but the point of importance is that Zelda leaves with the clear mindset off, “You don’t need to keep coddling me, I can handle my own” to Link, but is “Thank you, I’m glad you’re here,” to Impa. 

Now I stole was inspired to use this based on this comic by @novellanova, and you should check it out here. But basically, at the end when all the monsters are dead and the last few text boxes are rolling, Impa says something like “Gee, at this rate I might have to protect you from the princess! Hmm…. you know, maybe if you two had the opportunity to hang out more and get to know each other, she’d warm up to you! Ha! That’s it! I’ve made up my mind. Listen up Link, from now on I’m gonna let you man the wheel when it comes to protecting Zelda. So with me out of the picture you better take the opportunity to be the nicest, most helpful, and most effective body guard there is. I know you already are, but still, if I hear that one little Chuchu so much as splat in her direction I will take you down...got it?” And, that’s that.

Side quest done. Fun Link gambits with Impa and Zelda, some little character POVs on the situation, plus an explanation as to why Impa doesn’t accompany Zelda everywhere/nods to the cutscenes of Botw as to what happened to Impa. Alright, that was probably the most boring one so let’s move on to

Daruk: A Rumbling Stomach

Alright I’ll be honest...I have no idea what to do with Daruk. Especially when Yunobo’s not here, I got zip-zero to work with considering his character is non-existent. Further down the line I’ll certainly try to give him more nuances and the like, but I’m afraid the majority of my character efforts have been towards Astor, Revali, Zelda, and [REDACTED] so this is my apology ahead of time, rock fuckers.

This is my take on how to make those timed quests more fun. So basically, the premise of this stage is that Daruk was just happily hanging around trying to enjoy his rock roast, when a monster surprised him and he dropped it, and now it’s rolling down the hill. This is based on my real Breath of the Wild experience where I had to trek up that Volcano path to bring a rock roast for that shrine quest, but at the very top I dropped it and had to chase it down before it fell into the lava below. 

Daruk is eager to chow down on the finest rock roasts this year has to offer! It’s too bad things go downhill when monsters start to ambush. Defeat key enemies and rescue Daruk’s tumbling meal before this year’s wait goes to waste!

So, that’s what this is. The stage opens and Daruk says “NOOooOO! My rock roast! Damn monsters!” and you have to defeat baddies and catch up to the rock roast before the timer runs out and it falls into lava. And then when you finish and get back the rock roast that’s pretty much it….except SIKE no it’s not. Because a lot of these timed quests usually have a “surprise! There’s more!” thing at the end so I’ll do that here too. So Daruk has saved his rock roast and he’s talking about how he’s going to enjoy it in all its deliciousness, when he’s cut off by a random Goron’s scream. Turns out, Daruk’s yelling at the monsters about desperation to retrieve his lost lunch has attracted monsters to some traveling civilians, and now you gotta go beat a Talus, or a couple of Moblins, or something...Again I don’t really have level set or idea when these side quests unlock so just use your imagination. Once Daruk defeats the monster(s) the Gorons can thank him, and then one of the Goron kids can be like “Ooo! Is that a super special rock roast?!?” And Daruk is all:  “Ah! Well all the best Goron heroes eat plenty of rocks! This here is the gourmet stuff. You can only get it once a—” And the kid’s like “Woah! I’ve always wanted to have one, that’s why I’ve been training hard so I can explore more of the mountain. Where’d you get it??” And Daruk can sputter a bit, before finally sighing and giving into his instincts. “Ah….well, why don’t you have it? You’re probably really hungry after running around with those monsters…”

“Woah really?? Are you sure—”

“YEAH JUST TAKE IT ALREADY GO”

“Woah, thank you!” and then the Goron kid and co run off. Cue Daruk crying to himself in the background. Daruk may have an appetite, but I like to characterize him as the Goron Hero first and foremost.  

I’m sure that doesn’t stop him from mourning his rock though.

Mipha: Stronger Sentiments

Mipha and Daruk talked a whole bunch about training together so that Mipha can grow stronger, and Daruk was catching on to her crush on Link and it was a nice interaction in between them except for the fact that we never see them do the damn training so that’s what this is.

I think this is as good an opportunity as any to make this a Hair-Width quest, the ones where you can’t take one hit. The difficulty of a level is one of the most effective ways to put the players in the boots of a character to experience the same struggles they do. If the player works hard, then they automatically associate that with the character working hard. So, yeah, let’s have Mipha kicking ass and working to be strong enough to protect Link.

Mipha is determined to grow stronger. Daruk and the other Gorons are helping out with an intense training session by Gut Check Rock. Prove yourself by defeating all the enemies you encounter!

So Mipha is sparring with the Gorons, you fight through them and the captains and blah blah, the final boss is fighting Daruk without getting hit. 

“I promise not to hurt you more than I’m capable of reversing.”

“Ha! Give me all you’ve got, princess!”

You fight, cue the special music or whatever. I mentioned that gambit dialogue/attacks could also work to be custom for the character that you’re fighting, so I’m thinking something like this. Daruk slams the ground and rocks and magma sprout up around him like jagged pieces of glass, but Mipha is no where to be seen. Daruk’s kinda huffing and puffing, “Where’d you go Mipha…” and then FWOOSH, giant geyser right behind him. [yes I KNOW I overuse the *teleports behind you* “nothing personal, kid” thing but I think it’s COOL and you can’t stop me] So anyhow, you know that thing in Avatar where Pakku is just riding at the top of a whirlpool and destroying everything? That’s Mipha.

Daruk turns around and scratches the back of his head. “...huh….that’s not good.” Cue Mipha swooping down to deal the defeating blow. 

So Mipha wins, she can mention how wonderful it was and how much stronger she feels. And she can thank Daruk, and he’s all “No problem!” but he mutters something like “And I thought Gorons hit hard...now I know how Link feels.” End side quest….SIKE it’s another surprise boss at the end. A Goron captain suddenly reports that an Igneo Talus has appeared nearby. 

Mipha goes up to fight it, but wow! Link is already there. They both fight it, but it’s clear that Link didn’t need her help that much. You can defeat the Talus with a Mipha/Link gambit. It’s similar to Link’s usual “swing sword in a giant circle and become a death windmill” but Mipha kinda enhances it with water or something and it puts out the Talus. I wanted this ending with a focus on how strong Link is just to show that while Mipha is improving, she’s still not yet where she needs to be. 

Daruk: “Sorry I wasn’t much help at the end there, I was busy, uh, stretching.”

Mipha: “Oh it’s quite alright, Daruk. We were both quite tired from today’s training.”

Daruk: “Well I dunno about that...seems to me you were quite lively and active as you fought beside Link. *wink*”

Mipha: “Huh!?!? W-What is that supposed to mean??”

Cue laughter from Daruk. Mipha is flustered. And Link is just...confused, as always. 

Urbosa: Mighty Thunder of the Gerudo

So in the game this is just some normal outpost capturing, stronghold defending side quest, but we’re gonna spice it up just a bit. 

An important excavation site is being overrun by monsters, and Urbosa has set out to engage them. Defend and capture the outposts, in order to prevent this valuable place from falling into enemy hands…

So you fight as Urbosa, defeat some enemies and blah blah. When you first arrive there, I want one of the Gerudo Captains to be like “Lady Urbosa? Where did you come—What are you doing here? Aren’t there areas of greater importance for you to be at right now?” Urbosa says something like “Nevermind that now, let us focus on achieving victory over these rotten beasts.” 

As the battle goes through, it is revealed that this excavation site is where Zelda’s mother would often work and hang out with Urbosa. Urbosa says some stuff like “Her Majesty would not be happy to see all these monsters heading here!” *decapitates Moblin* and then she can say other dramatic stuff at the end like “We have fought well...for her memory” and other classic lesbian pining. Some guard at the end can say “Perhaps you should move on and help out somewhere else, Lady Urbosa. We can handle the clean up from here.” 

“Sure,” Urbosa replies, “Just another moment.” And then cue reminiscing. “She always did love these machines…”

And just other sentimental stuff like that. If you’re gonna be a coward and hold out on the Champion death angst, then you best be pumping that angst and emotion from somewhere, you know?

Also yay for worldbuilding! At least in my rewrite, the Guardian excavations and stuff were overseen by the Queen. Could be a reason Zelda hangs out with Sheikah tech so much...who knows who knows... who knows what other implications this has, it’s just a side quest after all.

Revali: Anti-Ice Training [get it??? Cause in this one, Revali’s gonna break the ice with some other characters?? I’m funny I swear]

Ok so for this one, I want to pull Revali’s character away from just “the birb that doesn’t like Link” and give him some other stuff to stand on. Obviously, there would be other side quests in a fully fleshed out game that did even more to characterize him, but for my rewrite I’m only dedicated this post and one other future post to sidequests, so I gotta really bring out what I can for the few side quest stories I have time to tell

Revali sets out alone to deal with some monsters by the Hebra trail. Although intended as an isolated moment to hone his skills, he finds himself with unexpected company. Defeat key enemies.

So you play as Revali and at first you’re alone, taking out Ice Lizalfos and the like. Revali’s text dialogue can say stuff like “Hmm...not fast enough” “My current needs to be stronger” “*mutters* Can’t compete with lightning and magma with aim like that.” Just stuff that establishes that he’s working hard to really prove himself as the best, but is still a bit insecure about his position. He thinks he’s better than Link, sure, and he certainly thinks that being a princess or a chief doesn’t automatically make you the best. However by this point, Revali has battled alongside the other Champions and seen their skill in battle, and has developed some respect for them. Afterall, Champions were chosen in some part for their skills, unlike Link or Zelda who destiny just thrust greatness upon. 

So Revali has this slight insecurity that compared to lightning, and magic healing, and magma, with chiefs and princesses and titles of heroes, he and his efforts will be overshadowed and forgotten, unfairly deemed the useless one. Thus, here he is, training in solitude, not wanting anyone to see the imperfections and mistakes until he is absolutely perfect.

Except for the fact that after you beat a Wizzrobe, the other three Champions show up. 

Revali: Wh—Huh?? What are you all doing here?

Urbosa: Well, we all have to travel with the princess to that Tower in a few hours, so I recommended we find you and hang out until then

Mipha: And a good thing too! Look how many monsters there are

Revali: I’m actually doing very well on my own right now. Wouldn’t want you to catch a cold or something, so why don’t you head on back and let me handle this.

Daruk: Aw, it’s not that we think you can’t do this. It’s that you’re hogging all the fun! Urbosa: And that it would be more efficient if all of us went to work

Daruk: That too

Revali: Look it’s not—you all can’t just—this is not just about—AUGH, look, I’m just trying to train myself at the moment, and I don’t need you all to mess with my drills

Urbosa: Training, hm? Well how about this...you let us continue helping you with these monsters, and after, I’ll let you in on a good Gerudo training technique

Revali: Hmph. Fine, whatever gets you out of my tail feathers faster

So Revali and the Champions clear out the monsters. Revali can have gambit attacks/dialogue with each of the other Champions. This is already incredibly long so perhaps I’ll save specifics for another time, feel free to use your imagination. Urbosa teasing Revali and they make a thunderstorm, Mipha and Revali swimming in the sky and kissing—wait that’s— 

When all the monsters are cleared, which honestly isn’t tooooo many, Revali speaks again.

Revali: So what’s this oh-so-holy technique you had in mind, then?

Urbosa: Ah yes, well really it’s quite simple. It’s called…

Urbosa: One-on-one combat

Now Revali fights Urbosa. It think it’d be really fun if your allies on a stage could swap to a boss, and I wish hwaoc had a bit more freedom with the interactions as a whole, but ah well, that’s what I’m here for I guess.

So when you/Revali defeat her, it’s a good accomplishment! Not only for you the player, as Urbosa would not be the easiest to beat, but also because match-up wise, Revali prevailing over Urbosa is a big feat as their styles are quite opposite, arguably with the strength in favour for Urbosa.

Revali might at first have the mindset that Urbosa is overconfident and thinks she’s got an easy win on Revali, but that mindset is quickly proven wrong when 1) the difficulty of the gameplay itself shows how they’re both doing their best and 2) Urbosa with her Gerudo qualities is probably shouting stuff like “give it your all!” and things.

And so, as you beat her...

Revali, kinda huffing and puffing, but just a bit:: ...you….held back

Urbosa: Come now, do you really think of me as someone who’d do that? I’m almost insulted.  

Revali: Hmm...perhaps not then....

Mipha: Wow! What a wonderful fight from both of you. 

And then insert some other dialogue from Daruk or something that shows the Champions acknowledging the training and hard work Revali must have put in to be so skilled. Perhaps it’s not so bad, when you train with others and your skill is fully appreciated by your frie—GAH. Perish the thought, they’re all just a bunch of royal fools who can’t hold a candle to the skill of a Rito Master….probably…

Revali: Well unlike you lax fools, I tend to take my job seriously. I don’t have time to longue and banter when the princess is still expecting me in an hour or two

Urbosa: Oh alright, let’s get to it then. What’s the expression? “The early bird gets the w—”

Revali: Gross. No. Don’t finish that sentence, I beg you. 

Urbosa: Oh? Well why don’t you fly off to escape my dreadful tones then?

Revali: ...Heh, don’t be absurd…

Revali: Without me, you’ll all probably get lost. So, I suppose I should stick around for that sake Great Fairies: Dress to Oppress 

The Great Fairies are holding a fashion competition and rating people’s outfits. Poorly judged outfits gives them the right to compensation combat. Defeat all your less than fashionable allies.

...

...yeah.

It seemed funny in my head, alright? cOme on, just imagine…

Revali, fully expecting to win: Well?

Great Fairies: Hm...I don’t know dear, all the colors are very clustered. Perhaps if you were taller—?

Revali: bWHAKT!? *other angry bird noises*

- - - 

Daruk: I brought my BEST out today! :D

Great Fairies: Is that a….chain?

Daruk: TWO chains, actually. :D

Great Fairies: Oh honey…

- - - 

Great Fairies: Ooo! Our little hero is about to come out! Wonder what he chose...a knight in shining armour? A handsome desert voe? Ooo!! And those Snowquill braids always made him look so cute…

Link: *comes out in the Tingle Outfit*

Great Fairies: …

Great Fairies: …………..hm…..

At the end of the side quest, after you beat everyone, the Great Fairy wins because of course they do. 

Great Fairies: Oh my! What an unexpected outcome...but it really couldn’t have gone any other way. I declare the judges the winner! I mean just look at me, I’m as dazzling as a jeweled desert flower, because I am! Ohohohoho…

This side quests unlocks the Tingle Outfit

Hestu: Forest Dance Festival

Alright this quest was already pretty perfect, BUT, I just want to use this opportunity to say that all of Hestu’s gambit attacks makes his allies and enemies do special dances. Absolutely abSURD that Hestu can only make the lesser smaller enemies dance on occasion, nonononono, my guy Hestu is making everyone dance. You can’t stop this. Nothing I say will ever top the imagination, so just take my word that this is a good thing. [Reluctant Revali doing the macarena against his will in sync with Hestu and they bash someone’s head in...ah the possibilities.] 

Maz Koshia: Links to the Past

Ok so before I get into this, a few things. This quest takes place well after the tower activations in Akkala. Age of Calamity leaves a whole lot of plots holes as to why a Monk is just...here, and what the point of the shrines are, and personally my first reaction to all this was just a five minute extended “huuhhhhhh???” 

So here is my headcanon, explanation, thing, canon to the world of the Kip Cut story. Ones all the Sheikah Towers were activated, that officially woke up all the Shrines, because we know that the Towers and Shrines are all connected to the same system. [See Great Plateau Tower activating all the Shrines and Towers, and Creating a Champion explanation on the system] But when all the monks were in their little altars and noticed how Link hadn’t dont a single one, they were like “what the fuck.” Monk Maz Koshia, who is kinda the head honcho of the monks and probably the only one powerful enough to go out in the world anyhow, sets out to see what the deal is, and after many a teleportation and telepathic communication, he figures out that Link is just running around with the Master Sword already. This kinda confuses him, because the whole point of the Shrines was to test Link and give him the spirit orbs so that he could grow strong enough to get the Master Sword, but he somehow already has it...so hmmmm something fishy is going on in this timeline. So Link technically hasn’t proven himself at all, Maz Koshia ambushes him, they do their little combat trial, Link passes, and Maz Koshia’s like “ok cool so you’re not useless.”

So now Monk Maz Koshia has cast aside his old monk duties of waiting around for a couple hundred years, in favour of just hanging out with Link and continuing to train him combat wise. Shrines are still explored by Zelda and co because they are important areas to establish teleportation pads, and whenever they’re there, Maz Koshia forces Link to get in a shrine to get a spirit orb, which is not only useful in general for health, but since Link already has the Master Sword, the other characters can get the spirit orb too. (So all those little heart upgrades that you see on the map, those are all just in the real Botw Shrine locations, rather than just scattered around randomly. Also I’m ignoring the stuff about talking to Hylia in order to exchange for stamina or heart containers because the game never talks about her, or stamina, and I’m not about to create an entirely new custom gameplay feature for this game, fuck you.)

I like to think that Maz Koshia is very selective about the Shrines he encourages people to try out. “Oh nonono, don’t bother with Qukah’s….lazy ass, only set up one little mountain that you have to blast through with lightning and that’s the entire puzzle! Disgraceful...Here, Kaam Ya’tak has set up a wonderful Trial of Power for you. I’m sure you’ll find the level design quite thrilling. They spent a lot of time on the critical thinking aspects so have fun!”

“I should warn you that this one was made by one of the millennials...yes, those youngins who were only initiated 1000 years of age. Honestly, they lack so much experience. Ms. Agana over here was experimenting with something called ‘motion controls?’ Pretty lazy if you ask me. Traditionally I would just stick to combat and block and switch stuff...but ah well, variety I suppose.”

Right, what was I talking about? Oh right! This is a sidequest. So Monk Maz Koshia doesn’t really have...a character??? Or a personality??? So I don’t really know what to do with him other than use him as an outlet for world building. Apologies to the Monk….fuckers? Stans? Feel free to leave me a comment about how I missed all the nuances of his character or something I’m all ears.

On an expedition to mark more Shrines and establish more teleports for the Kingdom, a large horde of monsters is spotted, seemingly with the intention to destroy these Ancient relics. Link and Maz Koshia use this opportunity to sharpen their combat skills. Protect the stronghold and defeat key enemies.

And then that quest would just kinda echo the stuff I said earlier about the world. (As Maz Koshia defends a Shrine, somewhere Qukah Nata is smugly shouting “Bet you wish ALL of them were protected with a giant mountain now, do ya?)

Also Link and Maz Koshia’s gambit attack involves the Master Cycle. I don’t have the specifics, but damn if I want some call backs to Botw while also having fun.

Impa: Steal Yourself [Yiga Clan Escape]

In an act of pure hatred and malice, the Yiga Clan has snuck into Kakariko Village in the dead of night…and stolen all the Swift Carrots! Impa sets out to get them back, as well as taking something else as a form of swift revenge...Escape before the time runs out.

Ok I can explain.

So you know how the Yiga and the Sheikah have kiiiiinda been murdering each other a bunch in Botw, going as far as to kill a deserter’s wife and threatening to murder his kids, and also people on both sides were sorta massacred for no reason? And alsoooo one of those people who literally lived during that time of the massacre is just kinda floating around now?  And you knooooooooww how the Yiga Clan just kinda joins Zelda’s side later on and we’re not supposed to think about the implications of that too hard because they’re the funny banana ninjas, haha? Yeah well neither Age of Calamity or I really have time to explore the moral grey areas of an alliance between two warring factions, one of which has a leader who doesn’t really seem to remember the reason why they hate Hyrule which brings into question whether the lackeys even know their clan’s history, and brings about the moral dilemma of criminalizing the ignorant, and also there’s the whole other dilemma of depicting the side that submitted to their oppression as being “in the right” and the topic of a race of people being pitted against their own by a higher power is really brushed over sO WE’RE JUST GONNA TOSS ALL THAT OUT THE WINDOW AND MAKE THEM ACT LIKE RIVALLING HIGH SCHOOLS, OKAY? OKAY! This is fine this is fine— 

So I have dubbed the High School mascot of the Sheikah, the Swift Carrot. And although there does seem to be some internal debate about whether the carrot should be replaced by the Fortified Pumpkin, the hero of Hyrule Link favours carrots so that’s that. Then of course, the mascot for the Yiga Clan is the Mighty Banana. The two sides hate each other and steal their food symbols to be petty. I’ll be covering the side quests of Kohga and the other later characters in another later post, but just know that Kohga will have his banana heist sidequest too. 

So anyhow, you play as Impa. Maybe she can say a piece of dialogue or two about how she has to uphold the image of her people as she has to lead them one day. And then, this side quest is just her retrieving the carrots and running off with the Yiga’s big banana supply before she’s caught. This is based on that “Escape the Yiga Clan” quest if you couldn’t tell.

Custom gambit defeat of Impa vs Kohga: On one hand I think it would be badass to see Impa’s Sheikah skills go up against the Yiga Clan tactics. Kohga summons a giant metal ball to throw, Impa teleports behind him “nothing personal, kid” nO fuck I’m doing it again away goes to swing a blade at his face. He blocks it with his little energy shield thing, but not before an entire conga line of Impa clones start slashing at him until he’s defeated by a giant explosion. So yeah, that’d be badass and cool. But on the other hand…

Kohga, stomping his feet and having a fit: I cARROT believe you would do something this terrible! Give us back those bananas right now! D: ….please? You can keep the gross orange sticks.

Sooga: He asked nicely. You wouldn’t deny the wishes of the most polite and charming Yiga Chief there is, would you?

Impa: No can do, Yiga scum! I’m afraid this cruel action wasn’t veggie nice of you so I must exact justice! Now it’s my time to split. *Impa clones gather and throw Kohga into a giant frog’s mouth. Impa runs off with a sack of fruit [fruit (derogatory) if you will] cackling into the horizon*

Zelda: The Path She Laid For You

The King has order Zelda to head to the Temple of Time, in order to see if anything there could help awaken her powers. Zelda sets off quietly, with minimal company, as not to attract too much attention lest the Town’s folk be hit with another attack. It seems, however, that these precautions won’t be enough...Defeat key enemies

So this is a pure Zelda sidequest, with no other characters except for eggbot because I said so. Starts out normal when SURPRISE! Bunch of monsters appear and Zelda has to whip out her iphone and fight them. 

Also!! Good time for the Hollows to show up, and you know, tell her what a failure she is and all that. Convince her that she's useless and gonna doom everyone. All that good stuff!! It’s just nice to catch up with the villains and see how they’re doing, you know? ‘Sup Hollow Urbosa, last I saw you were barely spitting words in the Lost Woods, and now you’re giving full hard-hitting insults to Zelda’s character and ability? Good for you, Queen, good for you.

So Zelda and a handful of guards are fighting off monsters, and Zelda has to beat the Hollows too. Her gambit dialogue when she defeats Hollows can be stuff like “You’re not the real ___” or something idk, I don’t have a lot of experience with the evil clone trope, I’ve never played Ocarina of Time. But one specific I DO want to highlight is that Zelda uses the nearby Sheikah Tech to defeat the enemies. I find it a bit weird how Zelda just knows how to use those random water canons in the Faron region in later chapters, so we’re just gonna at least set up a pattern so that it makes a bit more sense later. Plus! This is in front of the Great Plateau, AKA Gate Post Town/Garrisons AKA oh lOOK it’s that area where Link and Impa and eggbot first meet in that Impa introduction scene of my rewrite so we have already established that Sheikah Technology is being stored here and ready to use! Continuity in world building! Nice.

So Zelda uses her knowledge of Sheikah Tech to defeat the Hollows, when...dun dun dun! Astor appears. But you don’t fight him...

Astor: Have you listened to one word spoken to you today? Why are you still resisting? Let me help you.

Zelda: And what exactly is your plan? You wish to kill me, then?

Astor: Not quite. I mean, if you do die, there are ways I can manage, so if some stray Yiga blade happens to strike you I’m not completely doomed.

Astor: But no, the most optimal outcome for everyone is the one where you live yet. You must see the truth as I do, and let me fix this. I can undo this terrible knot destiny has thread for you. [and insert other fate sisters and sewing metaphors here]

Zelda: But how? What’s your game here, if you’re truly claiming to be in everyone’s best interest then why all this secrecy?

Astor: Ah...ever the one to look for the facts and logic, hmm? Can’t blame you, you get it straight from your mother.

Zelda: …!

Astor: But...I’m afraid even if I did tell you now, you’re in no state to truly grasp it. No...the only way this works is for you to truly understand the position you're in, and the stakes that hang in the path before you. 

Astor: And if I have to kill every King, Champion, or knight to get you to understand…

Astor: Then so be it. 

[dun dun dun]

Zelda: No! I won’t let you hurt anyone, I swear it!

Eggbot [just pretend eggbot can have dialogue boxes too]: *chirps* 

Astor, suddenly noticing eggbot: ...You…you’re one thing I still don’t—

Eggbot chirps again beside Zelda, both seeming to be angry at Astor’s words. Eggbot releases a glowing flash of light. Kinda like a...flash bang? [is that the right word idk]

Astor: Ah—! *and he teleports away to escape* Astor: Until next time then...Princess

And that’s pretty much the sidequest. Zelda can question what exactly eggbot did, but he’s not exactly the most verbal in responses. Finally it ends with Zelda going home, “He was still right though...I’m still sitting in failure, with not a hint of my powers awakening. All I have is some Sheikah tech, some exhausted shoulders….and well, you, I suppose, little one.”

“Come, it’d be a waste to continue forth in this condition. Let’s go back to the castle.”

Eggbot: *happy whistles and chirps*

= = = = = 

Tune in next time folks, as we dive back into the main event! Needless to say, Chapter 4 is where the shit starts to go down...

[jemmaginary-blog1]

Agents of SHIELD Promo Poster

Because I can never just leave things alone, below is my analysis/thoughts of the poster and what I think it could mean. I very well may be wrong as this is Agents of SHIELD and they like to keep us guessing and make us think we know what’s going to happen but I did try. Some of this may be a reaching a bit or wrong and feel free to correct me/tell me what you agree or disagree with! So I apologise if this is a mess as I’m new to all of this and new to Tumblr so the formatting may not be great.

I shortened this down as I didn’t want to annoy people with my six page ramble.

(Also credit/thank you to jemannesimmons for pointing out that Fitz wasn’t grabbing Daisy’s hand as that is what sent me on this mad spiral trying to see what else I missed and what subtle clues were lurking in the poster.)

(Also did a quick speculation of the previous poster down at the bottom as I hadn’t really seen it before!)

(Also my computer isn’t great so I may have missed things to do with the kree writing as it’s currently impossible for me to zoom in on this picture without it becoming impossible to actually look at and see something other than pixels.)

(Alsoooo need to come up with a word other than also wondering if anyone has any breakdowns of previous season cast photos? Joined this Fandom during the break between S5 and S6 and curious as to what predictions people made last year.)

(Yay it’s been confirmed that there ARE easter eggs/clues in this poster so yay for that. Though easter eggs and clues/hints are different.)

The Last Supper

The fact that it's positioned in a similar way to the Last Supper could be accidental but I doubt it as 'faith,' has been a bit of a theme in AoS and so I think with Mack being director and becoming more of a main character it would be interesting to use the Last Supper as a way to hint to what's going to presumably be a season with a lot of focus on him. So here is me breaking down that side of it first.

I think multiple characters match with the same character or could due to the smaller number of characters in AoS when compared to The Last Supper and the different grouping.

You can somewhat match them up with the identity of the apostles and their grouping, either by their reactions to what’s happening or their placement in the photo frame. Though it does change depending on which one you do.

In The Last Supper it’s broken down into four groups of Apostles:

GROUP 1: Bartholomew, James the Less and Andrew are all surprised.

GROUP 2: Judas Iscariot is taken aback; next to him, Peter holds a knife and looks stormy, while the boyish John, the youngest apostle, simply swoons.

GROUP 3: Thomas is upset; James is shocked. Philip wants an explanation.

GROUP 4: In the final group of three, Jude Thaddeus and Matthew turn to Simon the Zealot for answers.

Out of our eight I’d roughly match them up, reaction wise, as follows:

Group 1: Fitzsimmons and Deke, they’re all surprised although Deke also appears to be up to something. 

Group 2: May and Not!Coulson

Group 3: Daisy

Group 4: Elena

Mack: On a framing/position basis he matches up with Jesus. Like Jesus in the Last Supper he has an expansive pose that contrasts with everyone around him, he's the focus and the centre of the frame. The new leader and he has his agents(apostles/followers) around him. Mack appears to be positioned in a similar place to Jesus, opening up the idea of him suffering some kind of betrayal from those closest to him. Similar to how Jesus was betrayed by Judas. I don't see Fitzsimmons being the ones betraying him because of last season, he's already had conflict with Fitz and then saw him die - so I don't think it'll be Fitz and Simmons had a minor betrayal by siding with Fitz rather than following orders and helping lock him up. For me the most likely candidates are May, Daisy or Elena as they are all close to him.

Judas Candidates:

May could betray Mack for Not!Coulson, Ming hinted towards May having some kind of motive/alternate mission this season that isn't to do with SHIELD/Being a SHIELD Agent and so she could be delving into that.  If May is Judas then perhaps Not!Coulson is Peter although that could shift old Coulson into being Jesus (depending on if when referring to Peter saying he doesn't know who Christ is he's referring to not knowing what SHIELD is - like in the trailer or Coulson.)

Elena and Mack are already slightly strained, the conflict over the death of Ruby and the repeated idea that Elena seems to feel like she has to do what’s right regardless of the others opinions of it. She’s impulsive and headstrong (I love her, putting that in here as it sounds like I’m just criticising her,) which could cause problems as she’s the Directors girlfriend and she’ll probably be going against orders during the Season. He’ll not want to seem like he’s playing favourites, especially as in S2 it was shown he wanted a fair SHIELD and I’m assuming he’ll still want that. Plus Mack will be extremely busy, too busy for them to be as close as they have been. And Coulson/Fitz’s deaths will place a strain on Mack. He’s lost Coulson, been placed into the position of Director and has a hologram with the face of Coulson telling him what to do. I really doubt he’ll be in a great place during Season 6.

Daisy: To me she’s the most unlikely candidate for Judas but I will admit it’s a possibility. Similarly to May it could be a Not!Coulson caused rift as Coulson was a Father to her and she may be feeling guilty over his death considering it was a give the serum to her or him situation. Or it could be because she wants to be the Director, Coulson had been grooming her to be the new Director or at least the new face of SHIELD and maybe she’ll disagree with Mack over how he decides to run things as he will do things differently this season as he’s called Coulson out/disagreed with him multiple times.

Other thoughts:

Fitzsimmons and Daisy are grouped together, hopefully showing that at some point that rift between Daisy and Fitz will be healed. I simultaneously want that Fitz/Daisy bromance back and want Daisy’s trauma to be addressed because it got somewhat ignored last season.

May is drinking what is presumably Haig, somewhat heartbreaking.

Elena is wearing the ill-fated SHIELD jacket of death if Season 3 is anything to go by.

As mentioned in many other posts Mack has his toolbox, offically the Director of SHIELD.

Daisy appears to have different gauntlets, presumably because her powers are stronger this season (after taking the serum) this will probably affect her in some way. Also backs up how she seems to be more powerful/confident in her powers in the Season 6 trailer.

Red Lights

The red light seems to be focusing on three people: May, Fitz and Deke with a focus on May and Fitz especially. 

All people that were separated from the team in some way at the end of the last season.

May: She lost Coulson and was with him as he died. The team left her on the beach as they flew off to find Fitz and so we can assume there’ll be some distance between her and the rest of the team. She is also physically separated from them in 5x22 with the ship flying off into space, though the s6 trailer does show she reunites with SHIELD at some point it doesn’t mean it’s immediate. With her I think the ‘danger,’ is Not!Coulson and whatever his mission/motive is - he looks like the man she lost and loved and so he’s in a position to manipulate her. 

Fitz: He’s out frozen in space and the team are going to find him. Though he may have been abducted which only separates them further. There will also be emotional distance as he died, he hurt Daisy and so he’s going to be shocked. They’re dealing with finding him whilst knowing their Fitz who rescued them from space died and dealing with what happened to Fitz (mental break.) The danger when it comes to him is the physical/literal danger he’s in if he’s been taken captive and taken away from cryo!chamber the team are heading to and the mental danger (maybe why the red light covers his head - brain -> brain injury -> framework!Fitz - the whole dual personality thing) as this Fitz has been hearing the Doctor and there’s still a chance he could go through what Loop!Fitz did. Whether that be because of something that has happened during the time between Season 5 and 6 or sometime during the season.

Deke: The canary in the coal mine, their proof that the timeline changed. As far as the team know he’s gone, he never existed and so to them he’s dead. Rather than them searching for him I think it’ll be the other way around, Deke finding them or them finding him accidentally.

These people are the most isolated from the others and so are in the most vulnerable position. They are in the most hypothetical danger and have the greatest chance of being hurt/influenced right now.

Red is traditionally used to symbolise danger and so the light could be representing that, danger and anger and a warning to the audience that none of these characters are safe. Either during or at the start of the season.

With Fitz there are also alien runes surrounding him, symbolising the fact that he’s lost in space/surrounded by aliens? May’s is simply light reflecting on the metal grating of the background, seeming much more ‘normal.’ Reflecting the fact that she’s on earth/focusing mainly on earth in terms of her plot-line?

In contrast the light around May seems darker, emotionally she’s in a dark place and she’s also in the dark when it comes to the mystery surrounding Not!Coulson.

Also may be reaching slightly but Not!Coulson (how are we actually referring to him?) is looking towards her and the light follows the arrows in his eye-line heading towards May with the light increasing in brightness. Showing he’s influencing/manipulating her this season? Or placing her in danger.

With Fitz and May it could also link to the religious symbolism.

The light around Fitz almost resembles a half halo (because he died and was reborn? Angel? Or because this Fitz is innocent compared to Loop!Fitz) and his light is also the brightest shade of red.

The way the brightest red forms a red triangle almost horn shape. Indicating she could be Judas? or influenced by the devil/Lucifer (Not!Coulson) although I don’t feel as if Not!Coulson is going to be a villain after Captain Marvel (he could be but that movie changed how I felt about the Skrulls and so far I think he’ll be a Skrull.) Maybe it indicates that whilst Fitz was reborn she’s going to die (hopefully not!) or ‘fall,’ by doing some bad deed and/or betraying the team/SHIED.

Look who’s in front of the ‘D,’ and guess what word starts with D?  Doctor.

Also does anyone else see figures in the background of the pink/orange bit? Behind the writing

[raendown]

My very first commission story! I went a little over what you paid for @uintuva but that right there is my own fault. I got excited! :p

I had this formatted to look so nice in Word and forgot that I only have limited functions on AO3/tumblr. How rude. 

Pairing: TobiramaKakashi Rated: G Word count: 2540 Summary: Kakashi takes shelter from a freak blizzard in a cave that looks relatively harmless. What he finds within is anything but.

Follow the link or read it under the cut!

KO-FI and commission info in the blog header!

Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost

Kakashi’s fingers swirled through the air absently as he peered around the inside of the cave. Most people didn’t have the imagination to think you could do anything with lightning magic other than the obvious use of shooting bolts of it around willy-nilly. People with an actual brain in their head – people like him – were able to find other ways to utilize the gifts they had been born with. Sure it would have been much easier to warm himself in this surprise blizzard if he had been a fire wielder but he had made due in the past with his lightning and he would survive again with it now.

Separating the heat from his lightning was a delicate business but it was a trick he had learned to do when he was barely in to his double digits and it took very little of his attention, leaving him free to scout the unexpectedly spacious area in search of wood. Magic could only keep him warm for as long as he was awake to maintain it, after all. Kakashi was many things but a master of runes he was not.

To his dismay, however, there was precious little wood to be found, barely enough to scrape together a small mound that would probably sputter out before he managed to fall asleep if he lit it now. With a sigh he hunkered down and prepared to stay awake for as long as he could before lighting it. Hopefully the worst of the snow would have abated by tomorrow; staying awake half the night to keep himself warm would leave his magic stores seriously depleted, which would make staying here another night dangerous indeed.

He was kicking at his pitiful collection of sticks when he dropped his head back against the wall of his shelter and let his eyes stare aimlessly upwards, only to narrow them in interest. Why was the ceiling covered in scratch marks?

Actually once he looked a little closer they weren’t scratch marks at all. Gouged in to the rock, protected by a thick layer of accumulated ice, the entire ceiling was covered with ancient sigils. The closer he looked the more mesmerizing he found them. Whatever hand had carved them was steady and artistic with an eye for beauty, confident and bold. Not a single stroke was out of place in any of them and each sat a perfect equal distance from the others around it. It was beautiful.

It was glowing.

Kakashi jolted and scrambled to regain his feet when he realized that the sigils had slowly begun to gather a soft blue light while he sat there staring mindlessly. He’d had enough encounters with the weird runes that Obito sometimes dug out of his massive family treasury to know that glowing was not a good thing, glowing usually meant that one should begin running quickly and immediately. And he did try. His sad little attempt at preparing a fire scattered when he crashed through it hurrying towards the entrance, ignoring the sound of wood cracking underfoot as he reached the entrance only to be thrown back when he encountered an invisible barrier.

“Maa,” he mumbled under his breath. “That can’t mean anything good.” Banging a fist against the barrier proved it to be solid so he turned around and swept his eyes from side to side as he tried to figure out what was going on. A trap of some sort, perhaps, meant to capture unwary travelers. What for he didn’t know.

His ruminations didn’t get much farther than that. All thoughts in his head jangled to a terrified halt when he heard something rumble from deeper within the cavern, down the dark passageway that he hadn’t explored because it somehow hadn’t even registered on his mind. Now that his attention was drawn to it he realized he hadn’t even seen it until now. Only seriously powerful magic could have concealed something as massive as a giant tunnel from his senses, keener than most as they were.

Swallowing thickly and pressing back against the barrier, Kakashi prayed to the Five Temples as he watched the shadows in the passageway shift and sway. There was something massive hiding in there and it had clearly noticed him. And he just as clearly had no way to escape it. Suddenly he regretted leaving behind that ‘emergency teleportation rune’ that Obito had tried to press on him before he left home. It hadn’t seemed safe at the time – most of Obito’s gifts weren’t even if they were always well intended – but at the moment even getting caught in the void between spaces seemed like a better option than getting eaten by whatever the fuck was about to come out of that darkness.

“YOU SMELL OF HUMAN.” The voice rumbled through his very skull when it spoke and Kakashi could not have said how exactly he knew but immediately he became aware of three things: the creature was a male, he was ancient, and he was more curious than angry at being disturbed. None of that managed to completely abate the fear clutching at his chest though.

“Makes sense,” he murmured in to the cold air. “I was human last time I checked.”

“WITH A SENSE OF HUMOR IN THE FACE OF DANGER. HOW NOVEL.”

Kakashi resisted the urge to pull nervously at his collar. In part because it would only make his fear even more obvious to a creature who could probably smell it on him and in part because doing so would dislodge his tightly wound scarf. He didn’t want to die cold, after all.

“TELL ME, WHAT BRINGS YOU TO MY NEST, LITTLE ONE?”

“Well you know...if not warmer it just sort of seemed…less cold in here. Just trying to survive and what not. And what reason have you to, uh, kill me? Any chance I could…talk you out of that?” He offered a winning smile before realizing that it was covered by the scarf pulled up over half of his face.

Smoke drifting out from the shadows. Or rather, he realized after a moment, not smoke but steam, massive white clouds of hot breath steaming in the cold air as the creature chuckled with a rumbling sound he would have compared to rock grinding together thousands of feet beneath the earth. He wasn’t sure where that comparison came from but once the thought was there he couldn’t shake it.

He staggered a moment later when the ground shifted under him, shaking with the force of massive footsteps as the creature moved at last. When he looked up the shadows were just parting and his first impression was of white purer than snow could ever hope to be. Millions upon millions of glittering scales covered the sinuous body, all lean muscle and graceful movements despite his size. His eyes were the same deep red as one of Kakashi’s own, the same as the three slashes equally spaced around his snout which also matched to the line going down Kakashi’s face, and if not for the ceiling of the cavern being so low it was clear that his head would been held three times the height with pride.

“Well aren’t you something,” Kakashi breathed, only half aware he’d said anything. The dragon parted its lips to reveal fangs as thick as his arm and just as long. Steam rushed out in another rumbling chuckle but when he spoke his jaw moved not at all.

They were speaking in each other’s minds.

“YOU DO NOT HAVE THE MARK OF DEATH, HUMAN.” Between one step and the next his form began to shift, shrinking and changing shape, until within moments there was only a human man striding across the snow clad in nothing but mere wisps of cloth draped loosely around him to preserve little more than his modesty, held in place with what looked like his own scales. When he spoke this time it was at a much more normal volume – but it was still only inside their heads. “You are marked for something far more precious than that.”

“Ah, you’ll have to forgive me if that just sounds more ominous.” Kakashi chewed on his bottom lip as he watched the dragon in human form cover the last few inches between them, grinning to reveal that his teeth were still just as sharp in this body.

“I will not hurt you. Tell me your name.”

“Maa, will you talk normally if I do? Can you talk normally?” The creature looked more amused than offended, giving him the confidence to go on. “You just…it’s weird, your mouth not moving when you say something.”

Nodding, the creature tilted its head to look at him from another angle. Something about his eyes made Kakashi feel as though he were being pursues despite the fact that they were both standing completely still. Even stranger, the thought sent a thrill down his spine that was either fear or excitement and he couldn’t tell which.

“My name is Kakashi,” he said, adding a curious lilt to the last word in the hope that his possible doom might return the favor in kind.

“Kakashi,” the dragon creature rolled his name through his mouth as though tasting each syllable. “Welcome, Kakashi. My name is Tobirama and by ancient rites you have been marked.”

That certainly didn’t sound like anything good.

“Marked how? By what?”

He nearly leapt out of his skin when the creature, Tobirama, lifted a hand and brushed the side of his face with one finger tipped by a nail that tapered in to something more like a claw. This time when he felt the sensations sparking through him he recognized one that had absolutely no place in this encounter, something that hadn’t plagued him outside of his favorite forbidden novels in a long time. Why in the Temples’ names he should find this beast attractive was beyond him but by the Sage he did.

“Okay. Touching. Sure. Any chance we could get back to the part where you said I was marked? By what exactly? For what purpose?”

“To be mine,” Tobirama told him, teeth bared eyes shining with a dangerous sort of satisfaction. He peeled Kakashi’s scarf down with the tip of one claw and cupped his cheek. Then something in the air grew bright and close and in the next moment they were gone from the cave – or rather they had reappeared in what looked like a different part of what must have been an entire system of caves.

Usually it took several hours of preparation and the right combination of crystals to complete a teleportation spell and here it had been done without any of that, not so much as a single gesture or word, seemingly with barely even a thought. Kakashi would have been boggled if he hadn’t been so distracted with his new location.

So this is a dragon’s den, was all he could think. Above him the ceiling was coated in glittering ice protecting the same web of glowing sigils, blue and white and so beautiful it made him ache to look at them. The room they were in was massive and yet mostly filled with a bed that could have easily fit a fully grown dragon. It was a wonder when he found himself pushed down on to one edge of the mattress only to feel the surface under him as soft and springy as though it had never cradled a creature three times the size of a house. More magic at work, undoubtedly.

He was just thinking of how he wasn’t sure how many more surprises his poor heart could take when Tobirama pressed him down and gracefully spread out across his lap like a great white cat. Or perhaps a very small dragon, as it were. Kakashi held his arms out awkwardly until Tobirama huffed and drew them back in to set them atop his own head.

“Maa…so when you said…yours…”

“Mine,” Tobirama rumbled without moving or opening his eyes, a languid grin of satisfaction practically taking up his whole face. “My mate, come to me after all the years of lonely waiting. You are late but I will forgive you this transgression.”

“How kind of you,” Kakashi mumbled faintly. “Am I stuck here?”

Tobirama opened one eye to watch him very carefully. “Is the thought abhorrent to you?”

Something in his tone had changed, for the first time afflicted with the slightest hint of uncertainty, and as they stared at each other Kakashi recalled his vague memories of the elective he had taken at the University where he studied his lightning abilities, the class on ancient beasts that he had chosen on a whim. Kushina-sensei loved kitsune above all else but even she had spoken in a reverent tone when teaching them all she could of dragons. The one lesson that came back to him with sudden clarity was that dragons, like many other mythical beasts of unknown origin, had very complicated yet very sacred mating rituals.

Watching the tension slowly grow in Tobirama’s shoulders even as he remained deceptively at ease, Kakashi determined that this creature who could tear him limb from limb without effort was actually nervous for his opinion. Tobirama wanted him to stay. More than that, he wanted Kakashi to want to stay. Something in his deep magic had told him that Kakashi was the one he had been waiting for – presumably for decades, dragons’ lifespans were unbelievable – but no matter how ingrained his own instincts were he could not force them upon a human.

Probably the most important decision of his entire life, this should have been something he asked for a little time to think about. He had always been someone who showed up late and jumped in with both feet though.

“Are you going to sleep on me like this a lot?” he asked. Tobirama blinked once before the tension released and his entire body began to rumble with a purring noise.

“Yes. All dragons slumber upon their most treasured possessions.”

“Well isn’t that sweet.”

Tobirama snorted and Kakashi dared to pet the hair that his hands had been forcefully set upon. He was rewarded with an even louder rumbling purr, almost enough to echo off the walls in this great cavern. It was lucky, he supposed, that he hadn’t been on any sort of official errand. Asuma would forgive him if he happened to show up late for his visit. He could always claim the weather had held him back and he wouldn’t exactly be lying.

He wondered if Tobirama would be open to going out in to the world with him. Either way, life as a dragon’s partner sounded like a grand new adventure. Kakashi closed his eyes and laid back on the furs underneath them with his fingers still idly carding through his companion’s beautiful hair. He was just happy to have stumbled upon this adventure without having to go look for it.

[whysperingwoods]

Witch-Owned Shops Directory & Follow Train

We have enough entries now to get this thing rolling, so here it is. This is going to be the main thread that I’ll keep updated, so if you’re seeing a reblog of this click here to make sure you’re looking at the most up-to-date version. 

Listings are all below the cut, in case this ends up getting longer than it is. Shops will be listed in the order they requested to be added, so if you’re looking for newer additions they’ll be towards the bottom. 

Listing Requirements: - The shop needs to be owned by a magic practitioner. You don’t need to sell goods related to witchcraft. - You must have active listings. - Must be willing to follow and like other shops in the directory. A follow train is pointless if no one participates. Please be considerate and return likes/follows. You don’t need to return every single one, but if you’re found to be collecting likes and not giving any in return at all, you’ll be removed from the listing. - Let me know if your information changes so I can update the listing. If this interests you, please reblog this post and add your shop info using the following format: • Shop name [url linked to your store] • blogname [url linked to your blog] • overview of the goods and services you offer [i may edit this so keywords are consistent between listings] •

Ex: Wyrd Witchcraft • ChaosKyan • tarot, past life readings, fire scrying, custom sigils Please send me a DM if you’d like to be added to the listing, because Tumblr isn’t currently showing notifications. If you find a listing that is no longer active or has any other issue, please let me know so I can update accordingly.

Edit 16-Jun-18: As some people have pointed out to me, with Etsy’s massive fee increase and tiered subscriptions a lot of people will be moving over to different platforms. There’s no particular reason for this list to not include any and all platforms, so I’ve updated the list accordingly. Feel free to have your listing adding regardless of which platform you’re using. And, yes, this does include commissions for artwork (just link your portfolio and include your preferred mode of payment). 

• Wyrd Witchcraft • ChaosKyan • tarot, past life readings, fire scrying, custom sigils •

• Mnchld Designs • hazeleyesvioletskies • charm and pendant jewellery, crystal pendants, mini jar charm necklaces •

• Mercurial Magick • thatgoldenglow • tarot, divination, Hellenic mini altars, jewelry, crystals •

• Pleiadic Tarot • pleiadic-magic • tarot readings, tarot bags, sigils, patches, jewelry •

• AubraKnitCreations • desertedcactus • magical knitting, stuffed animals, jughead hats, mini pride rainbows •

• The Menagerie of Magic • themenagerieofmagic • witchy aesthetic art, potions & spells, altars, mini altars, incognito altars, grimoires, leather dragon eggs •

• Rocks From Space • basilnmint • art commissions and paintings •

•  Lauren Vaccaro Art • amewtu • art, including BoS design and custom spell jars • 

• Raven-Enchanted • readings with tarot, runes, pendulums and energy, and sigils •

•  Tid Bit's From a Raven's Nest •  ravenbara •  handspun yarns, crochet, paper craft, polymer clay, soaps and lotion bars [only in cool weather] •

[beelieveinfandom]

Haunted and Hunted Chapter Four

Chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5               AO3 Link

AO3 is highly advised due to Tumblr having formatting issues.

“And you’re sure this won't kill me somehow?” Charlie asked.

  “Yes. Absolutely. If anything goes wrong we’ll stop at once, and even if we don’t, anything going unusually will activate this spell, instantly ending the ritual.” Renee was pointing at a ring of runes inside the arcane circle.

  The circle was, outside of the killswitch addition, a very simple one. A pentacle drawn in chalk on the hard cement floor with the five symbols of banishment at each of the star’s corners. It was the simplest reliable banishment spell possible, pretty much only able to work on consenting entities or those who lacked any sort of intent of their own.

  I worked pretty hard on that cancel button and I’m like, 80% sure it’ll be fine.

  You’re telling me this has a 20% chance of killing me‽

  I mean, maybe?

  I’m pretty much pulling numbers out of my ass here, to be quite honest.

  everything you say is so reassuring.

  Hey, I’m the one that advocated against this from the start.

  You wanted us to do nothing!

  I wanted us to wait for more data. My friend will get us the original summoning circle, and reverse engineering it will be way easier and safer than just guessing at what might work.

  But how long will that take? And how will your ‘friend’ even contact us, assuming they get the plans? We’re gonna be in the middle of the woods away from all electronics for a while.

  That’s hardly a concern. He’ll find a way; he’s quite crafty.

  Anyway.

  You’re the one at risk so it’s your decision. You don’t trust my friend? Fine. Try banishing me. Just know that there is danger involved.

  “Charlie?” Renee said, “are you ready for us to begin?”

  “Um,” Charlie said. “Sure. Let’s… Let’s get this over with.”

“Make sure to let us know if anything feels off.”

  “How am I supposed to know if something feels of if I don’t know what getting exorcised is suppose to feel like?”

  “Um…” Renee said, “we’ll go slowly. Try and imagine what a normal exorcism might feel like and let us know if this feels different.”

  “I’m having second thoughts. Actually, I think I’m probably on fifth or sixth thoughts by now.”

  “It’s okay to back out. We don’t have to do this.”

  “I’ll be the first to admit I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Vin said. “On the other hand, how much worse can shit actually get?”

  “That’s actually a good point,” Charlie said. “I already could easily die via possession, or get captured by creepy scientists, or like, trip on a rock and die. Why not add ‘death from good intentions’ to the list? Yeah, let’s do this!”

  Charlie walked into the center of the circle and sat down. Renee started chanting a simple chant in modern English. Older dialects and languages tended to be more powerful, but they were easier to fuck up and there was little need for making the ritual as powerful as possible.

  “Um,” Charlie said after a minute, “is it supposed to hurt? Like a lot? Like my skin’s on fire?”

  Renee stopped chanting at once. “No, it’s not supposed to hurt at all! Are you okay?”

  “Define ‘okay’,” Charlie said. “If your definition includes ‘feels like I just got a really bad sunburn but it’s kinda fading’ then yeah, I’m okay. Or at least as okay as I was before, which was already pushing the definition of ‘okay’.”

  “I’m sorry. It would seem that they did tie your skin into the ritual they used.” Renee sighed. “I have no idea where to go from here.”

  “Well, maybe mysterious computer friend will come through,” Charlie said. “If not, well, guess I’ll die.”

  “Charlie.” Renee met Charlie’s gaze. “You’re not going to die. There are still other things we can try.”

  “Really?” Charlie broke away from Renee’s eye contact, shifting zir gaze to the floor. “Like what?”

  “Ah...” Renee’s face passed through several expressions before settling on ‘student woken up when called upon to demonstrate a problem for the class’. “Well, we still have time to think of things we can try.”

  “Or maybe the situation is just boned and there is nothing we can do,” Vin said. “Like I hate to be that guy but sometimes shit’s just irrevocably fucked.”

  “Vin!”

  “What? We were all thinkin’ it. Someone had to unpack that shit from the back of their mind and put it on the table to be beheld in all its awful smelly glory.” Vin shrugged. “I still got a bad feeling; I don’t think we’re going to find something that will work.”

  “You still have a bad feeling even after we stopped the ritual?” Renee asked. “Are you sure it’s about Charlie at all?”

  He shrugged. “What part of ‘I don’t know a thing, my guy’ do you have trouble understanding?”

  “That’s not good.” Renee slithered around the chalk circle on the ground. “Maybe we should start moving.”

  “Yeah,” Vin said. “Maybe.”

  Cleaning the circle off the rough cement floor was easy, which was good because they were in a hurry and it was generally considered rude to leave ritual materials strewn about someone else’s place.

  Getting their things together was also pretty quick as they hadn’t had any reason to unpack much the night before. It took only a few minutes to add the few items that Marcus had given them to their things.

  Their footsteps echoed faintly through the otherwise silent early morning hallways as they went back through the same path that Marcus had led them through the day before. Walking through the dim corridors they saw no sign of their host, but they figured that she wouldn’t mind them disappearing without saying goodbye.

  The crisp outdoor air chilled their lungs as they left the building. They headed East - Marcus had said that it was the shortest way out of the forest and Renee wanted to scout out the area outside. She wasn’t sure she wanted to leave the woods yet - they didn’t have anywhere to go and the woods were large and secluded enough to be a decent place to hide - but she at least wanted a solid idea of what was beyond.

  Cliffs rose to either side of them as they walked. It made Renee nervous, but suggesting alternate paths didn’t alleviate the dark feeling that hung over Vin like a bad toupée, and this path seemed to be the easiest way East. The relative flatness and rocky nature of the ground suggested that they were in a dried out riverbed, and none of them were going to complain about having slightly less underbrush to navigate through.

  Renee was being careful. Vin’s intuition was telling them something was wrong and she was not going to let whatever fate had in store catch them unawares. She was almost entirely focused on her farsight, trusting in her companions to keep an eye on the immediate surroundings.

  Her first thought had been that something was happening at the facility, but when she checked she found the place utterly immersed in chaos. People were rushing out of the place, alarm lights were flashing, a small fire (normal and red/orange in appearance for once) was raging in one of the computer rooms. It seemed unlikely that they were going to be able try anything. She supposed it could be an elaborate ruse but it seemed unlikely that they would actually set their building on fire just in case she happened to check on them.

  So whatever was going to happen was already in the works. And was quite possibly unavoidable, judging from Vin’s current state.

  She supposed it was possible that whatever was going to happen had nothing to do with the facility at all, and that they were about to die to a supervolcano explosion or a meteor strike or something. There wasn’t really anything that they would be able to do about a natural disaster, and it would explain why no suggestions altered Vin’s intuition.

  She decided to stop thinking about that. There was no point wasting her time worrying about things she couldn’t do anything about.

  It was possible the small fire at the facility could rage out of control and burn the whole forest down. It was kinda dry. How dry did it even need to be to burn green wood anyway? She really should have studied more wilderness survival. Now they were all going to burn to death and she wouldn’t even know how impressed to be that the fire managed to spread.

  She decided to Stop Thinking About That. She wasn’t wasting her time worrying about things she couldn’t do anything about.

  She managed to go about a minute before checking back on the fire at the facility. It seemed to be smaller than it had been when she first noticed it. There were sprinklers on. They were probably going to wreck all the computer hardware in that room.

  She took a few breaths and shifted her focus away from the facility. The fire wasn’t going be a problem. There was no point watching the facility anymore. Whatever threat menaced them now was already on its way.

  The other day the doctor - Dana, their name had been Dana - had been adamant on getting someone involved who was qualified to deal with Tyrone. That was probably what was happening. Not a massive fire, not a supervolcano, just someone who had some way of tracking them and good enough mobility that they couldn’t be evaded with good intuition alone. Someone who would have a computer on them and wouldn’t be fooled by simple illusions.

  Renee still had no idea how, exactly, she was supposed to deal with this, but combed through the woods with her farsight anyway, figuring that if she could at least see the threat she might be able to better assess the situation.

  The group continued in silence for a ways. No one really felt like talking.

  The silence that hung over them wasn’t a comfortable one. The sense of dread that weighed down Vin had spread to everyone, and they were all just waiting to hear the grenade’s pin drop.

  And drop it most certainly did.

  There was nothing unusual about the patch of thin forest they were traversing through until the trees wavered and disappeared, revealing a clearing with a single short person grinning ahead of them.

  The group stopped suddenly, with Renee putting herself in front of the other two.

  Looking around, she noticed people with guns pointed towards them on the cliffs to either side.

  “You didn’t think you were the only one that could make illusions, did you?” the person said. Their skin was dark and their white hair reached just past the small of their back. They were dressed very formally, in well-fitting clothing that was far too clean for someone trekking through the forest to be wearing.

  “Oh, you really shouldn’t look so shocked, dear.” Their voice was high pitched and sounded sort of like someone attempting to talk with a German accent after having one described secondhand to them, which happened to be exactly what a modern Australian accent sounded like.

  “You didn’t actually think that a few simple illusions and a bit of luck could keep you from me, did you? Now, that’s just darling? ” they said, clapping their hands together. “Anyways, let’s get on with things, shall we?”

  A magicore floated to their hands from behind them. It was a smooth orb, covered with yellow lines of light that danced around at the magi’s touch. The magi made a few sweeping gestures, strumming the magicore as their hands moved around it, and then flicked both their wrists, causing a bright yellow light to shoot away from them at Charlie.

  Charlie barely had time to register the light before it hit zir, lifting zir off the ground and illuminating zir body in a blinding flash. This only lasted a moment before ze fell out of the air and consciousness.

  Alcor managed to land in a manner that didn’t even vaguely resemble elegant, but at least didn’t hurt the body at all.

  “So you cannot be sedated, such a shame,” they said. “I take it that now I’m dealing you and not some little child?”

  “I’m amazed you still have the resources left to bother with us.”

  “Oh, they paid me in advance darling; I couldn’t care less about what happens to them.”

  “You might want to double check that that transfer actually went through.”

  “Who cares . What matters is that this is you! Oh, how exciting this all is. I’ve been waiting for years for this moment, you know. Admittedly, this is not quite how I saw this encounter going, but you can’t let a few details get you down, am I right?”

  Alcor stared at the magi.

  “Let’s do introductions, shall we? Not that you need any introductions, your reputation precedes you, but I’m afraid mine does not. At least, not in your current state. Normally I imagine you have no need for introductions at all. Must make social encounters very convenient. Anyway, I’m Magi Briana Hurtzog, she/her, at your service. Well, not at your service per say, but you know what I mean.”

  “Am I supposed to be pleased to meet you or something?” Alcor all but snarled. “Because I really cannot fully encapsulate how much that is not the case.”

  “How could you say such a thing? This scar goes deep into my heart.” She dramatically covered her heart with a hand. “Anyways you should come with me and we can go get you out of that ridiculous body.”

  “And then what?” Alcor crossed Charlie’s arms.

  “I’m not going to lie,” she said. “What happens next is not exactly in your favor. But it will be a great learning opportunity for everybody involved and I think we can all agree that that is what really matters.”

  “And what about the kids?” Alcor asked. “What happens to them?”

  “What? Them? I don’t care about them . They can go back to prancing through the woods or whatever it is that they were doing. I’m not their babysitter.” She waved her hand absently. “That said, if you don’t come along nicely, well, I don’t care about them. Or specifically what will happen to them. What all of these armed guards will do to them. I’m going to have them killed is what I’m saying here.”

  “No, I got that.”

  “Oh good. One can never be sure.”

  “I’m many things, but a moron isn’t one of them,” he said dryly.

  “Some people have trouble with the subtext, darling.” She spread her fingers wide. “There is no shame in that.”

  “Do you people have any tricks up your sleeve besides threatening children?”

  “Oh!” Her face lit up. “I could also threaten you directly if you’d prefer.”

  Briana’s hands spun around her magicore, tiny bolts of electricity reaching between it and her fingers.

  She snapped, pointing at Alcor.

  It was like being slammed into a wall. Pain - and not the interesting kind - blossomed through his very being. The world spun. He stumbled backwards, or maybe just thought he did because the body didn’t seem to actually change position.

  “Not very pleasant, I hope? Just a little something I’ve been working on in my spare time. That was roughly one percent of what it’s capable of. If my calculations are correct I imagine that at full power it would be capable of rendering you incapacitated for a number of hours.”

  “Why the hell didn’t you start with that?” he growled.

  “Language, darling. There are children about. As for your question, I was hoping we could keep this civil and not have to resort to threats of torture.”

  “So instead you open with threats of child murder.”

  “Exactly, darling. Now I think we’ve wasted enough time with all of this chitter chatter. Shall we be going, or are you going to make things unnecessarily difficult?”

 Renee looked around. She was not going to panic this time. There was a way out, she knew that. She just had to find it. She was smart. Clever. She could do this. Would do this.

  Breathe in

  1

  2

  3

  4

  Breathe out

  Alcor was still talking, having taken a few steps towards the magi. It was hard to say if he had a plan or was just testing the waters. She had to assume that he didn’t have a plan. Worst case scenario, there would be redundancy. Who was she kidding, worst case scenario they were all going to BE FINE. This was Fine. She just needed a plan.

  1

  2

  3

  4

  Breathe in

  She was fine.

  Vin was casually looking at the gunpeople periodically spaced around the cliff’s edge.

  1

  2

  3

  4

  Breathe out.

  Good. Now go talk to Vin.

  “How are you so calm about all this?” Renee whispered, more harshly than she intended. It wasn’t what she intended to say, but upon reflection she couldn’t figure out what she meant to say outside of ‘something else’.

  “What?” he replied. “It’s not like we were going to remain valuable assets forever. This was pretty inevitable.”

  “Not it isn’t! We’ve gotten so far. Their building is on fire, for Pete’s sake. We just need to find a way out, it’s going to be okay. We are going to be okay.”

Breathe.

“Hey Renee?” Vin said.

  “What?”

  “I just wanted to say, thanks for everything. These last few days,” he laughed, “okay, these last few days have been a fucking shitshow, but it’s a shitshow that I’m really glad I got the opportunity to experience. I never would have gotten out of there on my own. If it wasn’t for you...  I didn’t really have any memories from before, you know, so just having this time out here, having gotten to see and do all this shit before I die… It means a lot to me.”

  “Vin, stop talking like that, we’re going to be fine -”

  “This is fine,” he shrugged. “Well, it’s kinda bullshit that they are going to kill you too. I’m sorry I can’t help you there; someone as great as you really does deserve better.”

  “Vin please, no one is going to die. We just need a plan.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to be the realistic one? We’ve seen way too much. The only reason we aren’t dead yet is they want to make sure that Tyrone’s pacified first so he doesn’t get mad enough to explode Charlie and burninate everyone.”

  “But hey!” He beamed. “Look on the bright side. This is by far the coolest thing to ever happen to us, and I don’t know about you but I’ve been dying to participate in something this dramatic.”

  “How can you -” She shook her head. “No. We are going to get out of this alive. We just… can’t you feel anything about the future? There has to be something.”

  “Nah. I ain’t got shit right now.”

  “Please! You have to have something. Anything! It just... even some little random impulse.”

  “Hey, you know that I can’t control this shit.” He laughed completely mirthlessly. “And I really don’t think you want me to follow my impulses right now. Not really any need to rush it at this point, anyway.”

  “Vin come on, there’s something. There has to be something. What about what they were having you do back at the lab? You had some amount of control over that, didn’t you?”

  “Renee! I can’t just…”

  “You haven’t even tried! You’ve said yourself that you don’t know how this works, the extents of your capabilities!”

  “Fine.” He rolled his eyes and then closed them. “Look, I’m making my best constipated face while wishing really hard on -”

  His eyes went wide, pupils constricted to nothing.

  “Oh fuck.”

  The scar along his forehead shot open, his third eye dilated to blackness.

  Vin crumpled.

  Collapsed.

  Renee froze. Balled her hands, nails drawing blood. Reached out, grabbing, pulling him to her chest.

  “I’m so sorry. Fuck I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have pushed you. I shouldn’t have… I’m sorry. Please say something. Please be okay. You have to be okay.”

  She was shaking. Holding him. Tighter, probably, than was wise. Lower torso curling in on itself, pushing and flipping. Slamming against the ground. Her eyes raced around, looking for answers, a way out, something, anything . For.

  The gunpeople were alarmed by something, shuffling around, taking aim. Had she made too large of a scene? She wrapped herself around Vin as much as she could. She had a lot of body mass; she could probably take a shot or two, right?

  She again looked for any sort of out. For a sign. For a plan.

  She could… she could probably project pain with her illusions. Pain was a sensory thing.

  That would have to make aiming harder, right?

  The gunpeople weren’t aiming at her and Vin. They were focused farther away.

  At Charlie.

  No.

  At Tyrone.

  He was next to the magi.

  When did that happen?

  He didn’t seem to notice the guns. He didn’t seem to notice the danger he was in.

  That he was putting Charlie in.

  The magi was weaving her arm through the air, casting some spell.

  Tyrone was so close. He took the arm.

  The gun people were going to-

  Renee closed her eyes, keeping the location of the gunpeople in her mind.

  She thought about needles. Of scalpels. Of being huddled on a bed too small for her as something ripped through her brain, through her insides.

  Screams broke her concentration. The people with guns were screaming.

  She was doing that. Oh god that was her she -

  No.

  She was doing this. This was the plan now. They were screaming and she had to do this.

  The magi pulled her arm back.

  “Really?” she said. “I think I can manage to handle all the might and physical prowess of an overweight child, darling.”

  He was smiling. Baring teeth. Lips stretched farther than they should.

  He pushed his claws into her arm. Through the thick fingers and useless nails of the body that contained him. He pushed , sinking into her arm, sinking past her skin, past her flesh, past her bones, into Her.

  She realized what he was doing. All her cockiness evaporated in an instant, confidence replaced by desperate anger.

  She yanked her arm back, shouting with no words but purely emotion.

  Her skin, her flesh, her bones: they easily pulled out of the weak and bloody grip of the child.

  His claws were still gripping her Arm, though.

  And without her Arm, her skin, flesh, and bones fell limp at her shoulder.

  Alcor.

  Pulled.

  She was screaming. She was panic. She was terror. The emotions filled Alcor, rushing through him like fire. It had been far too long since he had done anything like this. It had been far too long since he let himself do anything fun .

  She was writhing in agony, her scream becoming the air he breathed. She genuinely seemed to think that somehow, with the right combination of movements and actions, she could possibly get out of this.

  Watching her final sliver of hope die was hilarious.

  Her soul was everything. Even the small amount he consumed through his grip was freedom from the tight compressed confinement that he hadn’t realized he’d been feeling. Energy rushed through him as a wave, giddy lightning that tingled and vibrated and pushed out all the stress and frustration and utter bullshit of the past. It was taking a beautiful, intricate mechanism and slamming it on the ground, watching it shatter into something new and even more beautiful. It was jumping on a table in a crowd and screaming . It was overturning a picnic table into a river. It was standing up and decking someone after years of silent discomfort. It was freedom, true freedom. It was the promise that this moment could be truly wonderful if you would just let it.

  Who cared what these stupid mortals had been trying to do? He was Alcor! He was the single strongest entity in the whole dimension! They only existed because he permitted it, because they were entertaining. Why should he give a fuck about what ridiculous things they did to each other? About what they did on their comically absurd destiny to ensure their own destruction. Why the fuck had he let any of their petty bullshit tie him down?

  He was laughing. He was hysterical. Why wouldn’t he be? What did he care if his body ran out of air? It wasn’t like he needed it.

WRONG.

  He stopped, smile fading from his face. The magi reduced to a twitching pile of limbs, her soul frozen in his firm grasp.

  Oh. that was right. He cared. Him with his stupid boring killjoy self.

  He was Alcor. He was the twin star, the brother, the gruncle, and he was strong enough to ignore the temptation of one measly soul.

  One really, really tasty soul. That was right there. Bright. Beautiful. Perfect in every way, really. Tingly and light and -

  There would be other souls. Better ones.

  But there was also this soul right here, and really the future wasn’t real anyway, so…

  That would hurt Charlie. The body was absolutely not going to survive having that much energy going through it.

  Ze was already dying, though. Would it really be worth it to waste such a wonderful opportunity if ze was just going to die anyway ? Really, who cared about this one person?

  Him. He cared. He absolutely cared. He pushed the soul away from his - from Charlie’s body, a tiny spark flickering from where he rejected the energy he already absorbed from it.

  He stared at the cyan flame.

  Well now.

  It wasn’t much of a consolation prize, but if it worked it would be absolutely hilarious.

  Charlie’s face resumed its unnatural grin.

  He pushed, ever so gently, on the soul. Its energy was already connected to him so it really should take no effort at all to…

  The soul exploded in brilliant fire, racing through the valley with the slightest command. Up the cliffs it raced, searing through the rocks, silicon rich sediments melting into hard and rough glass. It was at the top in an instant. At the gunpeople, who were for some reason a disorganized mess, in an instant. It burned -

  That would be crossing a line, wouldn’t it.

  It melted their guns. And burned their clothes off. People didn’t need clothes to survive. Or hair.

  The remaining energy of the soul roared around him like a maelstorm. It was screaming. The tiny bond that connected it to him was a dagger lancing through him - the real him - not the body he wore. It was wonderfully satisfying and delightfully real in a way most magic just wasn’t and -

  TYRONE!

  Alcor froze, confused, at the sound that echoed around his mind. Tyrone. That meant something to him, right? He looked away from the beautiful storm of fire that danced around him for a source of the interruption.

  There was a person close by. The cloud of fear around them was so thick it was almost impossible to see them through it.

  “That’s enough,” they (Renee Iris Etheridge, ~16.853 years old, dead in - ) said.

  This mortal was trying to tell him what to do.

  This mortal was trying to tell him what to do.

  Something was wrong. Obviously. He was going to have to teach her a lesson.

  No.

  Something else was wrong.

  He knew the exact time and place of Renee’s death.

  His omniscience was trickling in.

  His omniscience was trickling through.

  Charlie's dreamscape wasn’t strong enough anymore.

  He had forgotten about Charlie.

  A quick internal check revealed that Charlie was still around, but ze felt faint. Which was entirely his fault. He had forgotten about Charlie. He -

  “That’s enough, ” Renee said, surprisingly firmly for how much fear swirled around her. “They aren’t a threat anymore. You can let that go.”

  For a moment Alcor had no idea what she was talking about. Then he followed her gaze upward, at the soul that he had entrapped.

  He stared at the spinning vortex of soul above him. It was screaming just like Henry had screamed. He couldn’t - wouldn’t - do that. Even if the person did deserve it. Wasn’t going to make it beg for the mercy of centuries of digestion.

  He.

  He let go of the soul. Watched it practically explode in order to dissipate away. Felt its screams fade.

  He was going to fucking slaughter some cults when this was all over.

  He let Charlie’s body relax.

  Renee was curled up around Vin staring wide eyed at Alcor. She was trembling slightly, clutching Vin like a lifesaver.

  Vin didn’t look well.

  “What was that?” Renee asked, leaning away from Alcor, putting the bulk of herself between them. “I could feel that with senses I can’t even… What was that?”

  He paused. There was definitely a wrong answer here.

  “As you know, living organisms, especially those with higher levels of cognizance, produce significant amounts of magical energy from their emotions and intent. I just realized that this was an external source of power I could use without channeling it through Charlie’s body.”

  “Was that her soul ?” Renee pushed herself a titch farther away from the demon.

  “Yes.”

  “What’s going to happen to it now?”

  “It’s going to need a little time to regenerate the energy I burned,” Alcor said. “But it should reincarnate just like any other soul removed from its body.”

  “You’re not a ghost, are you,” she said quietly.

  “I never claimed to be one.”

  “What are you?

  He smiled. “I think that you are a very smart girl with a lot of evidence at her disposal and probably shouldn’t ask questions when you don’t want to know the answer.”

  She kept looking at him.

  “Now, do you have the first aid kit that Marcus gave us? I fucked up Charlie’s hand pretty bad back there.” Which was really putting it mildly. Charlie's right palm, where Alcor had pushed through, resembled a failed attempt to cook hamburger more than it did a hand. The skin was badly and unevenly torn, there was uneven charring all over, and it was so bloody that assessing the extent of the damage was impossible.

  “Right,” she said, uncurling to get access to her bag. “Right.”

  Renee shifted through the contents of her pack. She had thought that she had put things away neatly, but the inside was a mess.

  “Why are you helping us?” she asked, looking up.

  “Because I want to. Which is pretty much the reason I do anything, really.”

  She pulled the first aid pack out of the mess. “That is not... reassuring.”

  Alcor sat down and put the first aid kit in Charlie’s lap, picking though it. “It isn’t exactly new information. I’ve been pretty open about the fact that I could leave at any time so long as I didn’t mind killing Charlie.”

  “I know that, but I guess I hadn’t really internalized it.” She watched as Alcor cleaned the wound. “Despite what you said, it has felt like you were stuck in the same boat as the rest of us. But you’re only here as long as you want to be. I’ll admit, it makes me nervous. That you might stop wanting to help us. That you could just get tired of all this and leave, taking Charlie’s life with you.”

  “I’m not willing to kill Charlie. That isn’t likely to change.” He covered Charlie’s hand with a skin growth spray. “And I’m confident that the friend I contacted will be able to help. Not just with Charlie and my thing, but with getting all of us past this. I may not be stuck here, but I am still in the same boat as you - and we’re going to hit shore soon. Speaking of which -”

  Alcor walked over to Magi Briana’s body. Body being the key word - it was not a corpse. One might assume that a body, upon having its soul violently ripped out, might die. One would be wrong. A body doesn’t need a soul to survive. A body needs a soul to be a person. From the body formerly belonging to Magi Briana’s perspective, all that had happened over the past few minutes was that a child gripped its arm with all the strength that a child doesn’t have and it suddenly found itself in the market for a new a tenant. The biohazardous blood from Charlie’s wound was closer to being a threat to the body than anything Alcor had intentionally done.

  The body didn’t react to Alcor’s approach. Giving a shit about a literal demon coming towards you while looking like it wants something was the business of a person, which was no longer the body’s problem as of a minute ago.

  Alcor took the headset from the body. It, unsurprisingly, did not resist. It didn’t do anything. Soulless bodies were boring .

  “Are you seriously leaving Charlie’s hand like that?” Renee asked before Alcor could say anything into the microphone. “You can’t just spray skin growth formula on tissue that’s that badly damaged. You need to treat the injury first.”

  “Do you know how to treat something this bad?” Alcor asked.

  “When it’s this bad is when you seek medical attention.” She shook her head. “Actually, you should go to a doctor even if it’s a lot better than this. But I can at least make a dressing for it, make sure it stays moist. Let me see it.”

  She carefully set Vin down next to her.

  Alcor offered her the hand, which she took and started cleaning more thoroughly.

  “Hey kid,” Alcor said into the microphone.

  The headset was an old fashioned two way radio. It was specifically designed to only use one frequency. The computer on it was so simple that calling it a computer was like calling chihuahua an apex predator. From a logical standpoint, there should be no way it could be infected by a computer virus, as there was really nothing to infect. The Alcor Virus realized this, decided that he didn’t much care for that line of logic, and infected it anyway.

  “Hey Dad,” the virus said. “Guess who has no thumbs and fucked up?”

  “What happened?”

  “They figured out it was me almost as soon as I started doing anything,” the virus said. “Which isn’t surprising; I think they were expecting me. Anyway the long and short of it is they destroyed the servers that had the information you need before I could get it.”

  Alcor pinched the bridge of Charlie's nose with zir good hand. “I’m starting to think that they want me to kill them in the most gruesome way possible.”

  “It’s not entirely lost, though: I have located a backup. Unfortunately, my ability to access it depends on the cooperation of a human person. I think I should be able to make it work, though.”

  “We should plan for what happens if you can’t.”

  “For sure. What chance of success do you think you’d have of fixing this on your own?”

  “Fairly low.” Alcor sighed. “We’ve determined they’ve incorporated zir skin into the binding ritual but we don't know any details about what they did besides that. If we actually had the skin things might be easier, but we don’t.”

  “Why don’t you go get it?”

  Alcor raised Charlie’s eyebrows. “You’re suggesting we go back?”

  “Why not? Thanks to me and the literal fire the place is pretty well cleared out.”

  “Right. Renee mentioned that earlier. Why exactly was the place on fire?”

  “They started it,” the Alcor Virus said. “Some moron wanted to be very sure I couldn’t get at those files, I guess. And they weren’t very careful about the surroundings. It’s died down by now, but the combination of that and what I was doing mean that the place is pretty empty now.”

  “And you can make sure it stays that way?”

  “I pretty much tripped every alarm they had. And since they have no way of knowing if I just tripped an alarm or actually broke something, releasing dangerous quantities of ionizing radiation or carbon monoxide or one of the other half dozen things they were monitoring, it’s going to take more than a day or two for them to determine if it’s safe to actually enter the place. Assuming that they can even get there, which I plan on making hard for them. Did you know that it takes about forty miles for the single road leading to the facility to connect with anything?”

  Alcor smiled. “What are you planning on doing with it?”

  “I’m not sure yet. I was thinking of taking control of a forklift and stacking some cars on top of each other to make a pileup. There’s also a logging company nearby so it might be easier to just pile some trees on the road, but that’s less fun.”

  “Those both sound like they’d work just fine.”

  “There’s also a satellite launch happening two states over in a few hours. I’m pretty sure I could hijack the rocket and crash it into the street. They specifically design them to not turn around mid air and crash into the ground, so getting it to do that with any precision would be a challenge, but where’s the fun in life without a little challenge?”

  Alcor shook Charlie’s head slightly. “That sounds like it would likely generate more attention then we would want.”

  “You’re probably right - but consider - I would get to hack and crash a rocket for the greater good.”

  “Do whatever you think is best, and have your fun, just make sure it works. I don’t want another molasses incident here.”

  “In my defense,” the Alcor Virus said, “the molasses incident was hilarious.”

  “No one is questioning the hilarity of the incident,” Alcor clarified. “I’m just pointing out that it didn’t accomplish what we wanted in the slightest.”

  “Which did sort of make the whole thing even more funny.”

  “That may be true,” Alcor said with a smile. “But we really can’t afford that sort of mishap right now. Charlie’s life is very much on the line, and if people get through on that road, Vin and Renee are in danger as well.”

  “I suppose I could find a different reason to crash a rocket…”

  “Do you really need a reason?”

  “It’s more funny that way.”

  “Well let me know when you’ve blocked that road off, alright?” Alcor said. “I should bring Renee back into the loop.”

  “Will do,” the virus said. “It will probably be a little, there’s nothing very close that I can infect.”

  “I take it your friend didn’t get the ritual diagram,” Renee said, gently wrapping a bandage around Charlie’s hand.

  “No,” Alcor sighed. “They destroyed the digital data before he could. He’s located a backup but will need to get someone to cooperate with him in order to get it.”

  “And I’m sure he’s just great at getting people to cooperate with him.”

  “It really will depend on what sort of person has backup. If it’s the same person that decided that the correct solution for a data breach was to set a server on fire, he’s going to have to be careful. If it’s a more reasonable person… well, he has a lot he can offer a reasonable person.”

  “And in the meantime you’re suggesting we go back,” Renee stated.

  “We need Charlie’s skin,” Alcor said. “The facility is going to be a better place to do a ritual than anywhere else in this woods. There also might be physical documentation on the ritual they used that my friend couldn’t access. The place is empty right now, and my friend is going to block the road ensuring it stays that way, so it should be safe.”

  “I’m not going to say you’re wrong, but I don’t like it.” Renee hugged her arms tightly to her chest. “I never want to go back to that awful place.”

  “You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Alcor pointed out. “I can probably manage on my own at this point.”

  “I don’t want to abandon Charlie,” Renee said resolutely. “And if there are people still there, you’ll need my illusions.”

  “I still have my fire.”

  “How much more fire can you produce without further aggravating Charlie's condition?” Renee asked. “Especially after that stunt you just pulled?”

  Alcor didn’t respond, thinking about how loose the bond between him and Charlie felt. Any fire at all was probably a bad idea.

  “If there is anyone left, you’ll need my illusions,” she said firmly.

  “I’m certainly not going to argue against help,” Alcor said. “I just don’t want you to feel pressured into doing something you don’t want to do.”

  She picked up Vin again. “My anxiety will eat me alive if I stay back while you two go ahead. I’ll feel better doing something, even if it’s largely unnecessary, than I will if I do nothing. Even if that means going back.”

  “Alright then,” Alcor said. “Let’s get on with it. We should see if there’s a way up the cliffs. They probably have some kind of vehicle that we could use, or at least tracks we could follow.”

  They walked along the cliff face, looking for a path.

  “In case I missed saying it before, thank you for earlier,” Alcor said.

  “For what?”

  “For stopping me.” Alcor paused before continuing. “If I had been left to my own devices… I’m not sure Charlie would have survived.”

  “It was nothing,” Renee said, avoiding Alcor’s gaze.

  “It was extraordinary. You were terrified, I was putting on what was likely the single greatest demonstration of destructive power you had ever seen, you had no idea how I would react, and you drew attention to yourself to call me out anyway.”

  “Someone had to do something, and I didn’t think the either the dead woman or the two unconscious people were like going to seize the initiative.”

  “Speaking of which, what happened to Vin anyway?”

  Renee’s gaze dropped. “He’ll be fine in an hour or two. He tried to find a way out and ended up looking too far forward. It’s my fault; I shouldn’t have pushed him after he said that he didn’t have any intuition on what to do next. I knew that this is what happens when he tries to control his abilities and I told him to do it anyway. I guess I thought that if the situation was dire enough adrenaline might get him through it? Or more likely I wasn’t thinking about what the consequences would be for him at all, only about what I wanted.”

  “What you wanted was for all of us to get out alive,” Alcor said gently. “You didn’t know I was capable of doing what I did. There was a chance that Vin could have been the straw to tip the scales in our favor, and you acted on that chance. If the only options you know about are to risk putting Vin through this or to die, risking this is the right choice.”

  “But was it really my choice to make?” Renee asked. “I’m not the one who got hurt.”

  “He was presumably also aware of what happens when he pushes himself and tried it anyway. He made just as much of a choice as you did.”

  “I don’t think he was actually trying to look into the future, though.” Renee was slithering slowly. “He was being really flippant about it, and he seemed genuinely surprised when his third eye opened.”

  “It is possible that he only did it because of you. That doesn’t mean you made a bad choice.”

  “He seemed so content,” Renee said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so relaxed and peaceful as he was when he was sure that he was going to die.”

  “Renee,” Alcor said. “Vin’s severely depressed. His relationship with death is badly skewed.”

  “Is it really our place to say that it’s a bad end for him, though?” Renee said quietly. “It’s what he wants. It feel selfish to say that he has to live because I want him to.”

  Alcor took a deep breath before speaking. “Look, I know you feel like a shitty person who selfishly hurt her friend, but a) you’re not and b) even if you were that doesn’t mean that you’re wrong about everything. Yes, Vin wants to die. Vin also wants to be eating chocolate at all times. If you feel comfortable denying his desire to constantly consume confectionaries you should feel fine denying his desire to die. He’s sick, and unless things worked very differently at the facility than I’m assuming they did, he’s completely untreated and spent most of his life in a triggering situation. I’m not going to say that death is never a solution - there is a reason assisted suicide is a thing - but death is a very final solution. It’s what you do when nothing else works, when you’ve expended all your options, the pain is unbearable and can’t be stopped. It’s not what you do when you haven’t even tried a single method of treatment.”

  “But he’s not going to be able to get treated!” Renee cried. “We can’t even go to a farm in the middle of the night without disguising our faces; we’re not going to be able to walk into a psychiatrist’s office, assuming we could even find someone who does in-person visitations.”

  “Sure you will. Remember we aren’t alone anymore; I brought someone else into it. This could go very public if we want it to. Or we could shut it down quietly and blackmail them into leaving you alone. Either way, you’re not going to spend the rest of your life hiding in the woods. Unless you want to, of course, in which case I’m not going to stop you. Live the dream.”

  “You’re saying we can put this whole ordeal behind us, just like that?” Renee said.

  “You don’t sound especially excited about the prospect.”

  She shifted her grip on Vin. “On top of the fact that I don’t think I can say with any degree of sincerity that I believe you, it feels wrong. It’s too easy; there’s too many places for it to go astray.”

  “There are probably considerably fewer moving parts than you’re assuming.” He smiled. “I can pretty much guarantee that if we get through this alive I’ll be able to clean your records.”

  “At what cost?” Renee asked. “What organization would be pulling these strings and what guarantee do we have that they aren’t going to want to hold this favor over us?”

  Alcor laughed. “There isn’t a nefarious organization. There’s really just the two of us, and you’re already up to your ears in my crap already.”

  Renee cocked an eyebrow. “There’s just two of you and you’re confident that you can both make this go public and give us our lives back?”

  “Well,” Alcor said, “it’s mostly just him, if I’m being entirely honest. But he’s pulled much bigger stunts than this before.”

  Renee frowned. “Unless your friend is like the Alcor Virus or -”

  “Wow,” Alcor interrupted. “That was a really good guess.”

  “What?”

  Alcor was grinning widely. “I didn’t think you’d figure that out until you two were talking.”

  “What‽” Renee was looking around, as if she could find a more sensical universe hiding behind a tree.

  “But you got it nigh instantaneously.”

  She focused on him with a disbelieving stare. “Are you trying to tell me you are friends with the Alcor Virus?”

  “You were the one who suggested it in the first place.”

  “I was being facetious!” she cried. “Wait a minute, yesterday you said - did you program the Alcor Virus ???”

  Alcor just grinned.

  “Just to be clear,” she said, “we are referring to the program that took over the entire world's nuclear arsenal and threatened to use them if a series of increasingly asinine demands weren’t met?”

  “Yeah,” Alcor said dreamily. “That was a good time. We managed to get global nuclear disarmament in under a day.”

  “You’re telling me the goal of the Tretalelin Incident was disarmament?”

  Alcor waggled Charlie’s good hand. “About eighty percent of it was about disarmament, twenty percent was just about fucking with the global powers.”

  “Well, that worked out great in the long run.”

  “We had a good two centuries of zero active nuclear arsenals. I would say that’s pretty decent for a day’s work.”

  Renee shook her head. “So our lives are now in the metaphorical hands of one of the most infamously unpredictable and trollish entities ever. How far we’ve come.”

  “Oh he won’t do anything to seriously fuck with you if I ask him not to.”

  She glared. “Are you actually planning on asking him not to, though?”

  Alcor put up a finger. “That’s a very good question.”

  “That is not an answer.”

  Alcor put Charlie’s palms up. “Where’s the fun in life if you don’t have a surprise every once in awhile?”

  “I’m starting to get the feeling that we have very different ideas about what fun is.”

  “I bet Vin would agree with me,” Alcor said. “He has a sense of humor.”

  “Vin doesn’t take the future seriously because he doesn’t believe he’ll live to see it. Having him on your side here isn’t doing you any favors.”

  “You’re just jealous that it’s two to one.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I bet Charlie would be on my side.”

  “Well, that’s just because Charlie’s a square.”

  “I have no idea what that means.”

  “That’s because you’re also a square.” Alcor stopped and pointed at a bit of the cliff. “Oh, hey, this looks pretty trampled. Wanna try ascending here?”

  The trampled path was at a gentler incline than the cliff around it. It was still pretty steep, certainly steeper than Renee would like to scale while carrying Vin, but it looked manageable enough.

  Renee nodded.

  As they climbed Renee turned to Alcor. “I can’t think of anything that can rip out the soul of a living, non-consenting person.”

  “I normally wouldn’t be able to. But I’ve done practically nothing these past few days but gather my energy up. I could do a lot right now, or at least I could before I went and did the thing.”

  “Just how much energy are you absorbing?” Renee asked, looking at Alcor like he was some kind of large wild carnivore. “The amount of energy it would take to do that is absurd.”

  “Do you know how much energy it takes to burn through the dreamscape of something with the cognitive strength of a selkie? It’s not a small number.”

  “I suppose not.”

  “It’s actually sort of lucky that I ended up wrecking zir hand,” Alcor said. “It takes a lot more energy to achieve a physical effect than it does to do things in the mindscape. If I hadn’t had so much of the energy I was channeling through zir push through zir physical body...  Things could have been very bad.”

  “Well, that sure is something.”

  They picked their way up the cliff side.

  “So,” Renee said. “If I’m to believe the words of our former captors, you’ve killed enough to gain a reputation for it.”

  “I’m not sure why you would trust anything those people have said, but yes, I have,” Alcor said. “What about it?”

  “Do you,” she paused. “Do you feel guilty about that?”

  “Sometimes.”

  Alcor reached the cliff’s top and extended Charlie’s uninjured hand down to Renee.

  “Sometimes?” she said, taking it.

  “Sometimes,” he repeated, helping her up. “Sometimes I’m not really in a place where I can feel guilt. Sometimes I feel fully justified in my actions. Sometimes the weight of everything I’ve done is completely immobilizing.”

“Do you feel guilty about it currently?”

  “Some of it,” he said. “Most of it. Some of it feels pretty justified, though.”

  “Like the magi just now?”

  “Yes. That was definitely an unusual occurrence, but I’m not going to lose any metaphorical sleep over killing someone who was prepared to murder kids to use me as a science project,” Alcor said. “And although the circumstance surrounding the encounter was obviously unique, and the ending was rather extraordinary, there wasn’t anything too special about her, really.

  “The way my existence works…” Alcor continued. “I see the worst side of people. I see a lot of the worst side of people. And even though I also deal with perfectly decent people, when you constantly see the extent of what horrors people are capable of… It’s a fight to keep believing that people are worth grieving over. That I should feel guilty at all. And sometimes, it’s a losing battle. And sometimes, it’s too hard and I just isolate myself.”

  “So why do you care, then? Why bother fighting just so you can feel bad about what you’ve done?”

  “Because,” Alcor said slowly, “I like people. Admittedly, not always in a healthy way, or a way that’s good for the people involved, but I pretty much always like people. The world would be awfully boring without them. And I want to be liked back, to deserve to be liked.”

  “At least, sometimes you do?”

  “Yeah. Sometimes I really don���t care what anyone else thinks of me. But I kind of hate that part of me.” He laughed without any humor whatsoever. “Of course, I also hate that I hate that, hate that I feel the need to get validation from others, hate how weak and pathetic that is. And then I hate that I feel that way and... I’m a bit of a mess, honestly.”

  “Have you ever considered therapy?” Renee asked. “You sound like you could really use it.”

  “Hah! Yeah that would go great. ‘Yes, hello, you can call me Tyrone, I’m a hundred times your age, good with kids, and I’ve almost certainly killed more people than you’ve ever met’.” He sighed. “Actually I have tried therapy before. It didn’t go great. There’s too much that I just can’t tell someone I don’t know that well, and at the end of the day, therapy is about changing what you can and accepting what’s left and I can’t do that. I can’t change what I am. I want to - god do I want to - but it’s too much a part of me.  And I don’t want to accept it - I don’t want to be okay with doing terrible things because that’s when I do even worse things.”

  “Just how many people have you killed here?”

  “I haven’t exactly been running a tally. It’s not a small number though, I can tell you that much.” He paused. “Most of it was an accident though, for what little that’s worth.”

  “How do you accidentally kill more people than you can count? Are you secretly a politician or something?”

  “No, I didn’t poison a water supply or whatever. I was a dumb angry kid and I threw a hissy fit with more collateral damage than I realized was possible. I didn’t know my own strength at that point, and a whole lot of innocent people paid the price.”

  “That sounds terrible. I’m sorry,” she said, unsure how else to respond.

  “It was,” Alcor said, pointedly ignoring the part of him that found it hilarious.

  The silence that settled over the two was like an especially itchy blanket on a hot summer night.

  Renee focused on picking her way through the underbrush.  The path was well trampled, making it much easier to traverse than the path leading to the encounter had been. She kind of wished it was harder, that it would demand more of her attention. As it was, it left her with little to do mentally other than contemplate everything she just learned, and she wasn’t sure she was ready to do that just yet. She just wished she had some sort of distraction.

  As if on a cue, Alcor stopped in front of her.

  “Well, this isn’t what I had in mind, but it will probably do,” he said.

  Renee lifted herself up a little to see over Charlie’s frame. Ahead of them, scattered around the area’s sparse trees, was a pack of parked motorcycles. They looked relatively new, despite the layer of dirt that coated them. That was about all Renee could assess from them, as she knew about as much about motorcycles as she did how to feel about Tyrone, which was an almost impressive amount of ignorance to have about a relatively common object.

  Renee slithered about the area, getting a more solid idea about what was there. The motorcycles were the only things she could see that were left behind. There was nothing she could see that could practically transport something her size.

  “They really weren’t planning on taking Vin and me back, were they?” she asked.

  “Doesn’t look like it, no.”

  “He was right,” she said. “They were planning on killing us.”

  “Probably. I could have told you some very dangerous things by now.”

  Alcor walked up to one of the motorcycles. It was still on: apparently they didn’t expect the encounter to last very long. Which, Alcor supposed, wasn’t technically an inaccurate assumption.

  Experimentally, he got on one. It was a little large for Charlie’s body, but not unworkably so.

  "Think you can get on one of these?"

  "You want me to ride a motorcycle," Renee said. "What with my zero legs and four meters of torso."

  "I was more wondering if you would be physically capable of mounting one. I might be able to tow you," Alcor said. "I want to get back to the facility quickly; getting me out of Charlie as soon as possible is more important than ever."

  "Can you even tow a motorcycle with another motorcycle?"

  "I don't see why not," Alcor said.

  "You can, so long as you have a towline," the Alcor Virus said in Alcor’s ear. "There should be one in the repair kit in the storage area under the seat."

  Alcor shuffled through the storage area’s contents. It seemed to be mostly standardized stuff, but there was a small jar that contained a dead dragonfly and a centipede. The repair kit was easy to find; it was a neatly labeled box that took up a majority of the space.

  "Is this it?" Alcor asked, pulling a strap out of the kit.

  "You realize that you left the only camera for miles with the Magi, right? You could have just pulled out an irate alpaca and I wouldn't know so long as it was very quiet."

  "Right. It's a thick strap with a Y shaped fork at about one third of its length, around 5 meters long."

  "That's it. You're going to want to tie each end of the Y to your footpegs, and lead it around the handlebars and have Renee hold it with her left hand. She's going to be your breaks, which is fun because she’s only going to be able to use the handbrake."

  "I think I understand how this works." Alcor started to tie the towline to the footpegs."You willing to try getting on one?"

  "Sure. Why not. Have the naga ride a motorcycle," Renee said. "It’s hardly the most absurd thing to happen today."

  She slithered up to the nearest bike, pushed her upper torso over the seat, and wrapped her lower torso around it. Her torso drooped along the sides of the bike, with her weight resting on the fenders, pushing them close to the tires. Vin rested somewhat awkwardly between her and the handlebar. She had never been more grateful her friend was so small.

  “So how are we going to take this out of park without instantly tipping over?”

  “There are stabilizers for low speed maneuvering,” the Alcor Virus said. “I can easily activate them.”

  Alcor relayed the virus’ message as he hooked the strap around the front of the bike and looped it around the left handlebar a couple times.

  “The handle on the right is your brake,” Alcor said, handing her a helmet. “If we’re going faster than you would like, feel free to use it. You want to keep the towline taunt if possible.”

  “Shouldn’t there be two breaks?”

  “The other one’s a foot brake.” Alcor mounted his bike. “We’ll go slowly, though; I’m sure we’ll only need the one.”

  “This is absolutely going to end with us crashing into a tree, isn’t it?”

  “Eh, there’s like, ten bikes here.” Alcor put a helmet on Charlie’s head and prepared to go. “We’ll get it eventually.”

Happy TAUniversery everyone! 

The next (and final!) chapter only has ~3000 words written so far, and I’m thinking it’s going to be a longer chapter, so it’ll be awhile. Hopefully not too long though. 

Previous Chapter - Next Chapter

[orionredstarr]

SPARRABETH CHRONICLES #32

We are a club of die-hard Sparrabeth fan fiction readers and authors who simply love this fandom. Every other week we will continue to present our selection of vintage, Sparrabeth fanfiction. We each have our own style, taste, and various interpretations—but one thread we all have in common is that we love Jack Sparrow and Elizabeth Swann as a dynamic team! So far, we have made it through THIRTY-TWO weeks and going strong! So, we hope you are enjoying the tales we select, and having a great time discovering a new story every other week….as much as we love bringing them to you! Feel free to let us know how we are doing, of if you have any suggestions! Also, if you would like to join us, please drop anyone of us a line here at Tumblr! @apirateslifeforme123​, @princesspenelopenerfherder, @colorblindly, or me @orionredstarr. The ONLY prerequisite is that you love Sparrabeth―that is it!

THIS WEEK OF February 1, 2017 We would like to present to you:

TITLE: 14 short fics/vignettes - starting with: Desiderata – What’s Past Is Prologue

AUTHOR: Djarum99 (on LJ) or here at Tumbler @thesandreckoner

PAIRING: Jack Sparrow/Elizabeth Swann

GENRE: M-F

Author’s RATING:  N-17 (each segment rated)

LOCATION: LIVE JOURNAL (navigating chapters click on WHAT COMES AFTER for next page)

LINK:  http://djarum99.livejournal.com/3803.html#cutid1/

Chapters: 14 vignettes/fics interrelated/standalone Author’s DISCLAIMER: owned by the mouse in the concrete jungle, but they live in our hearts

A/N: Post-AWE erotica, set after the events of Fiat Lux (posted at my journal) but reads as a stand-alone, Jack’s POV. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ CRITIQUE on "Desiderata – What’s Past is Prologue": WHY I selected this piece:

I have read just about everything Djarum99 / @thesandreckoner has ever written on Sparrabeth! Naturally, I admit to being prejudiced because I admire her skill and love her stories! I am positive that her chronicles will be exciting and contagious for you too! There is a raw genius to her craft; translated through spot-on characterizations, exclusive literary style and structure, and her intriguing plots. I love the sensuality too, the chemistry and spice which Jack and Elizabeth’s portrayals are so tangible, they become very real people in every sense.

I admire Djarum99’s pacing as well. Even the pictographic palate of each story is amazing. For instance, this series or block of ‘fics’ can be read as standalone literary pieces—or strung together as chapters within one longer fiction. I loved that concept instantly! Not only because it was unique and imaginative, but each vignette, chapter or story, has its own ‘flavor’ or ‘hue’. They are all immensely lyrical, and quite often the ornamentation of written passages morph into beautiful poetry! I am not sure if that was done intentionally, or if that was one of muse’s mysterious gifts which came naturally to Djarum99/ @thesandreckoner for being a truly talented artist! I must ask her! These scenes are painted so lavishly that you can vividly ‘see’ them. Superb dexterity in writing skill and magical story telling…delightful fun

Here in this instance, no matter your perception of length with these “stories” or “vignettes”—some people may view these as individual short stories, or one long Fanfiction. It makes no difference what your preference is, because each chapter is condensed; chock-full of different nuances so they will read quickly. As you become drawn in and vested, a bizarre quirk takes place….you are compelled to devour them all to the point of wanting more! So, no matter your choice—read a few or read all, they are ingeniously fashioned so that you come out a winner either way!

Whichever way you tackle these chapters/vignettes, I grant you this; all are teaming with sentiment, emotion, and all the Sparrabeth ‘feels’ we love and crave! These are shrewd anecdotes woven together for boundless entertainment and presented with panache! And as always, Djarum99/ @thesandreckoner is an author who has a flair for sensual script that is just outright enchanting, provocative and robust! Each segment is rated for content, and not recommended for the faint hearted or very young. Please keep that fact in mind before proceeding! 

A short tease or EXCERPT FROM Desiderata – What’s Past Is Prologue

He watches her in sleep, a guilty pastime made an irony in light of what they do together in waking hours. Midnight gives her silver, touching the curves of her face and the joy of her body with moth’s wings. Dawn gives her gold, outlining his love with the spare delicacy of a monk’s illuminating hand. He breathes her in, the scent she has brought to his bed, wanting to draw her spirit into his lungs, hold it for a moment, release his own to her.

Jack Sparrow has a mandate, an obligation, the word a foreign taste on his tongue and a sound like giddy angel’s song in his ears. He wants this woman to experience life as he knows it, draw her into its swirling sea of sensation and discovery. Wants her to defy reality as convention paints it, see beyond the surface, walk with him into new worlds. Wants to know what she sees there, what new doors she can reveal to him. He wants to be her guide, follow where she leads, know who he will be, with her.

He remembers the first time she put her hands on him. No longer a sheltered girl’s porcelain, but a woman’s strong brown instruments, playing over his skin and making something new of the runes life has drawn there. Remembers the first taste of her on his fingers, sea salt and sweet sunlight, remembers his mouth at her breast seeking redemption. The strength of her surrounding him, magic heat and the promise of creating a mystery that was the sum of them both, and more than that. She had laughed, holding him in those hands, circling him, stroking, teasing him with her own anticipation and delight. Elizabeth, his Lizzie, pirate empress, his equal and novitiate. The weeks since she had spoken her choice, come to his bed, had been a revelation of both her naiveté and her boldness. Somewhere in between lay trust of him, of what they were together, a treasure he’d never thought to hold. He was not yet certain he deserved it.

To be continued………

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I have listed them all separately below in sequence, just in case the Live Journal website format is too daunting to navigate. It can be a challenge due to its diary-type layout.

14 Short fics, set in the post-AWE AU universe of Fiat Lux and A Priori

LINKS to ENTIRE LISTING OF individual FICs / Chapters (hope all ‘took’)

Desiderata

Chiaroscuro

Practical Magic

Elegy

Vexed

Bordello

Vector

Archangel

Coda

Rain

Dance

Madeira

The Sand Reckoner

Memento Mori

So, there you have them—above are links to all 14 fics in the series! I do hope you will enjoy them as much as I have.

ORS

And do not forget @bybyeblackbird incomparable SPARRABETH FANFICTION ARCHIVE, a website created to organize all your Sparrabeth Fanfic needs in one place!

[icyada]

Chapter 3- Potions, Obliviations, and Bonds, Oh My!

Echos across Time and Space Book One: "Something Wicked this way Comes"

AN: Done editing this chapter for tumblr format! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAY! Enjoy!

Disclaimer: As much as I hate admitting it, I don’t own Harry Potter. I do think Mrs. Rowling should rewrite the series though, it’s got so much she can add to it.

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Harry and Hermione,

Bad luck mates, with Ron running off like that. Yeah; if we live to see him again, we'll ream him out for you. If you haven’t done it for yourselves that is. Anyways, onto more serious matters.

We read the whole book (not just the marked section), and bloody hell mates, you have a lot on your plates huh? Harry, in all seriousness, we always thought you and Hermione would end up together. Yeah, Fred and I were talking about it and we think at least Mum and Ronald slipped you two a mickey so to speak. That is to say, slipped some love potion into your drinks. Further research found that it’s most likely Amortentia, the most powerful love potion ever. And some of its side effects match both of your worsening moods since your 5th year (for Harry) and last year (for Hermione). Others include:

-Appearing sickly and pale (no offence mates, but you two did seem rather pale last year and the year before);

-Becoming obsessed with the object of their affections (Hermione, don’t deny you were feeling jealous when the prat was dating Lavender, and Harry, we know you kissed Ginny last year);

-And most importantly, becoming excited or dangerously unstable towards others (No offense you two, but we heard about Harry chasing down Snape to curse him after Dumbledore died, and Hermione, we heard you blew up a few times at Won-Won because of his relationship with Lavender. Even attacking him with a conjured flock of birds).

What’s more, our theory about the love potion could be proven right by two passages in the book you sent us.

Passage 1: "Your mother confessed," sneered Riddle-Harry, (Disturbing by the way) while Riddle-Hermione (Again, disturbing) jeered "that she would have preferred me as a son, would be glad to exchange..." [R1]

Passage 2: "...I Disapparated and arrived here in these woods........" [R2]

Obviously, George and I would be delighted to have you two as brother and sister for real, but we both know it will never happen. However, Mum has confessed to at the very least making, if not using, a love potion before. [R3] The love potions that are on our shelves at the shop are one-day use only, and we make sure to control the sales of them so they're only used in jest (as all love potions should be). Harry, what Riddle will say to Ron is true; Mom did admit to wishing you were her son, rather than Ron. And Hermione, it’s obvious Ron has feelings for you. In fact, we'd say the ONLY way you specifically would fall for little Ronnikins would be through a love potion.

As for the 2nd passage, that’s suspicious too. Why would Ron spend time looking for you two when he can come straight home? We still have the Ghoul in the attic disguised as a Spattergroit-infected Ron parading around the house, so it wouldn’t be too hard to slip inside Disillusioned and switch places with it....... Unless he's under orders from mother to keep you two dosed to high heaven, as we doubt the prat has enough of a guilty conscience to feel bad about leaving you. Points to him for the good act though! As for Miss Ginevra, we're unclear about her involvement. We can only hope she is unknowing of these love potions, and that she would be disapproving if she ever found out. We'd really hate to have to hate our little spitfire because of her own bad decisions.

Anyways, we could go on and on about our suspicions. We just wanted to give you some food for thought. Two more things: A) Among all our notes that we provided, there should be letters to Dad and us in the past; we'd really appreciate it if you could see to it that they get them somehow. B) No matter what happens from here on out you two, know that Gred and Forge Weasley will always support Mr. Lightning and Miss Flare.

TTFN you two, Gred Forge

P.S.: Mr. Moony let us know before the first Potterwatch broadcast of the new Mauraders. We're undertaking the prestigious honor of joining them. Toodles.

P.S.S: This is a last minute thing: if Fred and I are right about Ron and Mum, then you might want to check all your items for tracking charms. We don't buy that bull honkey about Ron using the De-luminator to find you.

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

Harry chuckled as he read the twin's letter. It had been a week since he and Hermione had sent out letters requesting help from some of their allies. Since then, he and Hermione had come up with a tentative plan and had relayed it to Godric via the charmed parchment, and were waiting on a response.

In the meantime, they had already started on the plan. Hermione had gone (under disguise) to Diagon Alley, and bought 2 multi-compartment trunks like Alastor Moody's. Since returning with them, Hermione had been examining the magic of the trunks to see if more magic could be added, being that she was the Ancient Runes and Arithmancy expert (She had said, and Harry quite agreed, that an untrained person shouldn’t be creating and experimenting with spells and potions).

Harry, on the other hand, had been the one to start looking through the abundance of notes the twins had sent, marking down the ideas and topics that looked useful. It was a few days later that he spotted a folded parchment on the floor, something he noticed as he was headed over see if Hermione made any progress.

For an hour each night before bed, they had also been practicing Occlumency. After talking it over, Hermione had convinced him to try it again, despite his misgivings about the whole practice. Her logic? He should do so if for nothing else but to keep Voldemort’s anger-induced visions away. Thankfully, the twins had sent a few books on Occlumency; they had written on the inside of one of the covers that they did have a mental link between them, but hearing each other's thoughts ALL the time had gotten rather annoying. As a result, they had asked their parents during their fourth birthday if there was a way to block each other out. Dumbledore had been there, had overheard them, and was enthusiastic about taking them on as Occlumency apprentices.

"Well, that explains why he wouldn’t teach me in Snape's place," Harry had said when they read that. "He already had apprentices."

Hermione looked over at him from the trunks, his sudden chuckle disrupting the monotone silence of the tent which they had lived in for months. Harry handed over the letter to her, a smile on his face.

"Well, the good news is that the twins are definitely trustworthy. Take a look for yourself," he said, before handing her the parchment.

Taking the parchment, she started reading it, just as a soft chime signaled Hedwig incoming with more letters and possible research notes. Harry went over to her as she flashed onto the table, before untying the packages from her legs and giving her a treat.

"Thanks girl, is this everyone?" he said, stroking her head gently.

Hedwig trilled and nodded, spreading her wings a bit before pointing to the charmed parchment laying on the table next to her with one of her wings. Harry blinked before his eyes lit up.

"Hermione!" he call excitedly, as he watched words forming on the parchment. "Godric is writing back to us!"

Hermione came rushing over, and they both sat down, watching the parchment as a lengthy letter appeared on it.

Harry and Hermione,

I am unfortunately not Godric. I am Myrddin Emrys. I am the one writing you currently because on our journey back home, Godric was bitten by a Runespoor. The poor dear thought he was trying to steal her eggs from her nest. Do not fear for Godric; I was able to pull the poison out in time to save his life. He is currently sleeping comfortably. He was, however, overjoyed to see that you had written back to him so quickly, and even more ecstatic to learn that you agreed to help him, despite the risks you place on yourselves in messing with time. 

He has asked me to pose a question to you. He would like to know what you want your younger selves to do about various people around you. In particular, he wants to know about Hagrid with his natural inclination to follow Mister Dumbledore blindly, while Ms. Minerva and Madam Poppy quite possibly might need to be obliviated. Severus (as you might know) made an oath, most likely to Albus Dumbledore in order to protect Harry. I do not know why, but Lady Fate has pointed out to me to tell you that there is also Molly and Ron Weasley to consider. She said you would know what I mean.

She also pointed out to me that it might be prudent to write a few letters to those who you will summon. Godric wishes you were here already; he's getting a bit jittery because he wants to get started. Honestly, that man can never stay patient for very long.

Anywho, that’s all I was told to speak with you of. Myrddin Emrys

The duo was silent for a few minutes as they pondered the information. Then Harry looked at Hermione quizzically, a question quickly forming in his mind.

"How far are you with that trunk?"

"Oh, I've actually got a good list of modified spells that will work with the enchantments already on there," she said airily. "The problem is...well, to be quite honest, I don’t have the right amount of power to cast the more powerful ones..."

Harry blinked in surprise, before replying.

"Ok, what can I do to help?".

"Well," Hermione began. "Since you're able to block...You-Know-Who now, maybe you can draw pure magical energy from him and use that to perform these spells."

Harry looked thoughtful, then shook his head before replying mildly.

"I've got a better idea. Why don’t we go to Stonehenge like Godric and Merlin did? I've been reading about it, and apparently the nearby abandoned wizarding village has a structure there that’s sentient like Hogwarts and the sorting hat. It’s been feeding magic to Stonehenge ever since the Druids who lived there abandoned the place."

"Ok," Hermione agreed making a face. "But how does that help me with my lack of power for our spells?"

"Well, and now this is just an idea 'Mione," Harry hedged watching her carefully 

"Why don't we use some basic magic strengthening rituals on you?"

"On us you mean," Hermione interrupted, looking thoughtful as she spoke. "Although, you're pretty powerful as is, Harry. Sirius told me you were unusually powerful as a baby, to the point that your mum and dad had to place magical blocks on you so you wouldn’t hurt yourself or expose your family to the Mundane. It should have been removed when you were starting your magical training, meaning just before first year started, though. I don’t remember you saying they had been removed though, and with the things we've been discovering about Dumbledore, I wouldn’t be surprised if he kept them on you to keep you magically weakened. Do you want me to scan for and remove them?"

Harry had smiled when she had said Mundane; they had had a talk about non-magicals in general, and had both agreed that the word muggle was a derogatory term, much like the word "Mudblood" is; made up by purebloods to marginalize non-magicals.  Harry shook himself out of his thoughts and nodded at Hermione, before beginning to reply.

"Yes, please. If Dumbledore is up to his old tricks, then I want to know."

Hermione took out her wand and waved it over him, muttering "Magicae invenire ruinas” [T1].

Harry felt like a warm blanket had brushed over him and blinked a bit, watching as Hermione nodded a bit before starting to speak her results.

"Definitely there are quite a few on you...actually, I’m surprised you still have magic. Let’s see if I can identify them," she said, waving her wand again. "Revela magicis cuneos [T2]".

"Hmm, some of these are old," she muttered, while seemingly watching something just above his head "Let’s see…one definitely from when you were nearly a year old. Looks professionally done, most likely by a healer your parents hired to perform the blocks. Another at age five..."

Harry was shocked into silence. He remembered the bout of accidental magic when he was five; he had been bored with the class, as he had already studied the content being talked about (he was, after all, bright as a child; he would just get punished for being better then Dudley), and so to liven up his boring day, he had begun to imagine the teacher's wig was blue. The next thing he knew, all the strands of hair on her wig had begun to turn blue [R4]. 'The color change charm,' he thought idly. He and the class had had a good laugh but then...a blank in his memory, until he found himself at home in his cupboard. 'A possible Obliviation?' his mind's voice provided gently.  

Oblivious to his thoughts Hermione had continued speaking. 

"Another at age eight..."

Again Harry's mind went to when he was eight, and he remembered the shrinking sweater incident [R5] ('Yuck, really! What was Aunt Petunia thinking? Brown with orange puffballs, indeed!' he again thought idly to himself). He had accidently used a shrinking charm that time. But again, he had a small gap in his memory. That very same day at school, he had gone outside for their hour lunch break, but the next thing he remembered he was walking back into school after lunch. 'Another possible obliviation?'

"Huh, another block placed the very next day. This one is specialized, unlike the others...to block Metamorphmagus abilities," Hermione said screwing up her face in concentration.

Harry remembered that incident too. Both of them had occurred around his school's picture day, and Aunt Petunia had apparently made it her personal mission to try and get him to look decent for his turn (not that either attempt had worked anyways). Yet again there was another gap in his memory, this one of about two hours.

"And there were four more, well actually, the third one looks like a leech from your scar; that one’s got to be the horcrux..." she shook her head, shaking off the thought for the moment. "Number four you broke with the ah...training that Moony gave us. That one was placed on you at the same time as the Metamorphmagus one. Number five was several months later at school, the September after you turned nine, this one is specialized too. To block a natural apparition ability." [R6.1]

Harry nodded, that one had to be his second favorite bout of accidental magic. Of course, it was marred by the terror that Dudley and the gang had been 'Harry Hunting' at the time. [R6.2]

"The last one, number six," she said in a more furious voice. "Was placed on you the evening of June 23rd just a month and a few days before you turned Eleven." [R7.1]

"Dudley's birthday," Harry muttered for the first time in several minutes, remembering the incident well. 

He coughed as she watched him curiously before replying, "We were at the zoo, and he and his friend pushed me to the ground to get a better look at the boa constrictor I had been talking to. I guess one of them saw it responding to me.  Er, well, I was upset and a little bit bruised from hitting the ground so hard, so I, unknowingly at the time, cast the vanishing charm on the pane of glass between them and the snake. Dudley had actually been leaning on the glass so he actually fell into the enclosure, and when he went to try to get out after the snake had slithered out he found the glass had returned. I guess I unconsciously willed it back into existence." [7.2]

Harry was blushing furiously when he finished, knowing he was rambling out of embarrassment. Hermione smiled a bit indulgently at him and Harry blushed more, this time for a completely different reason. 'How have I not noticed before how nice Hermione looks when she smiles,' he thought. 'You weren't trying to step on little Ronikin's toes,' the little voice in his head whispered, sounding oddly like both Fred and George. 'But now that he's gone and you don’t plan on letting him find you just so he can drug you both again, you're able to appreciate her without worry.'

Harry quite agreed with the voice, but made his mind focus back to the present. 

"A-Anyway, you said I have blocks, and they all coincide with gaps in my memory. Isn’t that the usual sign of an Obliviation?"  At this, Hermione looked troubled and nodded. 

"Yes, um, let me think," she said, falling silent for a few minutes before speaking up once more, only slowly. "Er, well, I think it’s a safe bet that if we try to remove them all at once, it will cause a magical explosion, killing you and-depending on how powerful-anyone within several hundred miles of you. So if we remove them one by one, slowly and carefully to allow your body to get used to the amount of power you have, then you should be ok. The magical backlash should also eradicate the obliviations on you. As for the leech, its most likely Voldemort's horcrux feeding magic from you to him. If we look hard enough, we might be able to find something to pull it out of you without killing you."

Harry nodded, thinking over what he was told before replying "Let’s take the oldest block off me and go from there."

Hermione simply waved her wand over him and said in a clear voice "Longe antiquissimum scandalum [T3]".

Harry felt unbelievable pain, but tried to focus his breathing through it. 'This is nothing like one of Voldemort's Crucios,' he thought with humor. 'It doesn’t come anywhere close to that.' Noticing that Hermione was watching him worriedly, he reached over and stroked the back of her hand gently.

"I'm ok 'Mione, this is nothing like one of You-Know-Who's Crucios. It’s really miniscule compared to that," he said with an encouraging smile.

The next second however, he felt a stabbing headache forming. Thankfully, it had nothing to do with his scar this time. As he had slowly built up his Occlumency walls, he made absolutely sure to block off the mental connection to Voldemort. He hadn't had a nightmare nor felt any of Voldemort's feelings since he had done so, back when both he and Hermione had started practicing Occlumency. 

This particular headache came from the broken obliviation that had went with the block on him. He took a moment to focus, before closing his eyes and starting to sort the new memories. But the more he sorted, the angrier he got. 'Dumble-arse' was lucky he was already dead or Harry would have applauded Severus and joined him in killing the old bastard.

Harry was so wrapped up in his memories that he didn’t notice what was going on around him.  It wasn’t until he felt a pair of arms wrap around him and heard Hermione's voice in his ear that he noticed the whirlwind of power echoing around him.

  "Harry, calm down. Please?"

Relaxing slowly, he re-opened his eyes and blinked sheepishly. All around him, the papers he had been studying were scattered, while there were deep gouges in the table in front of him as if a huge bird had been clawing at the table. Hedwig had positioned herself on his lap and was nuzzling him, trilling softly with her feathers sticking up slightly, but appeared otherwise unharmed.

"Harry, what’s wrong?" Hermione asked from behind him.

He tried to turn his head to look at her, but she kept her face out of his line of sight. Letting it go for the moment, he focused on her question before replying.

"Dumbledore, the old coot! That obliviation was done by him right after the attack on my parent's house," he said rubbing his head. "He purposely obliviated any memories of my parents. I only remembered how they died because he made sure to leave those intact in my mind."

Hermione hugged him tighter before replying, her voice quiet.

"We won’t let that happen again to your younger self. We'll let Godric and Merlin know about it and they'll definitely make sure that your younger self has all his memories by the time they return for first year."

Harry nodded a bit and sighed, relaxing into her embrace before replying.

"I also was supposed to have an eidetic memory. But since I didn’t have a chance to develop it, it’s an ability lost to me as an adult. [See AN at the bottom]."  

"Again, won’t happen," Hermione mumbled while nuzzling his back.

Harry slowly got control of his emotions, before his nose picked up the metallic scent of blood. Blinking and gulping, he couldn’t help but feel upset over what the implications were. He had hurt her.

"Hermione, I'm sorry. I hurt you," he mumbled miserably.

"Relax Harry, It’s only a thin scratch," she mumbled. "Episkey. Anyways, we've still got a lot to do. I'll help you research tonight, and in the morning we can set off for Stonehenge. Er, we'll actually have to be traveling since I've never been there before."

"You mean Hermione Granger, the great explorer of the world, has never been to Stonehenge?" Harry said teasingly.

Hermione smiled and tapped his shoulder playfully.

"Oh, quiet you. Let’s get started."

They both pulled a few books over and started looking through them.

-------------- References: [R1] Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 19: The Silver Doe, Page: 377 

[R2] Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 19: The Silver Doe, Page: 385

[R3] Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Chapter 5: The Dementor,Page: 69-70

[R4] I did not find a reference in the first book where its said to be. Can anyone tell me where it is if they find it?

[R5] Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Chapter 2: The Vanishing Glass, Page: 24-25

[R6.1, 6.2] Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Chapter 2: The Vanishing Glass, Page: 25

[R 7.1, 7.2] Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Chapter 2: The Vanishing Glass, Page: 26-28 (And some of the movie mixed it)

Translation (According to google's English to Latin translator):

[T1] Find the magical blocks

[T2] Reveal the magical blocks

[T3] Remove the oldest block

AN: This chapter felt like a hurtle and took long to type because I gave myself lots of breaks and did it small sections at a time. Anyways, Eidetic memory, I read from its Wiki says "It occurs in a small number of children and generally is not found in adults". 

Beware, SPOILER AHOY!!!!!

However, since we're dealing with magic here it allows me to twist that a bit. If Harry had been allowed to develop his Eidetic memory then he would most likely be able to retain it as an adult.

Spoiler end

Ok, so after deliberation I've decided to split what would have originally been 1 long chapter up into 2. So this fic will be 4 chapters long. So yes next chapter. R&R