#neither of them know the other is dead would be a worse fate though

[swimmingelectron]

I like to think neither of them died.Not just in the denial of the death of my favourite characters way, but technically. Sirius is beyond the veil. Regulus is now an inferi. They are both not of this world but hypothetically not dead either. Kinda like soul Voldemort?

Like Regulus is still in that cave, as one of the hands that pulls someone else in, his body still works, it's just eternally in pain, and his mind is gone. Sirius's entire body is beyond the veil, he cannot be dead because his body is still there, but it'snot present.

They are not quite dead, but dead regardless.

Sirius never thought he would die after regulus. He always thought that because he’s older he wouldn’t have to understand the pain of regulus death. He always felt guilty by this fact that one day he’d die and regulus would understand. Sirius never realized it was possible regulus could die before him until 1979 and he get a letter from his mom, the last letter he’ll ever get from her that only held three words,

Regulus is dead.

[captain039]

On the edge

Alpha Jayce x omega reader

Warnings: AOB, light swearing, feral alpha, intimacy, angst, Spoilers? Fated mates

Jayce returns changed from whatever he was in. Changed and feral with animalistic needs over glowing him

When a medical officer came to your door you were truely not prepared for what you saw. They had timidly ask you to follow them without any other explanation and you were confused and worried afraid one of your family members had been injured but seeing him, in a white room with a simple mattress on the floor and nothing else broke your heart. When Jayce disappeared you didn’t know what to do, his mother heart broken, Viktor gone, Mel gone half the council dead, Caitlyn turning into head enforcer, and you stuck sitting in a lab with neither Jayce or Viktor by your side. You were by Jayce’s side the whole time Viktor was in that strange case of whatever it was, the hextech fused into this giant healing bath almost. You didn’t know what to do watching the alpha loose part of his small close pack, his best friend and then he disappeared went into the hextech core room and never came back with either of his companions till now.

You stared at the alpha, his jaw so tense you were afraid he’d break teeth. His teeth were bared and he was panting heavily hands fisted by his side. You see his bracelet stone now fused into his skin, you see the wolf untamed hair on his head the beard he’d grown, what happened to him?

“We’ve been unable to reach him” the medical officer says beside you and you barely register their words eyes wide mouth slightly part as you stare at Jayce. The once clean golden boy, turned into this.

“We’ve tried everything. We did a mate test on him” you freeze at those words. You half figured it was Mel, but she’s gone too. A mate test was a pricey test you could get if you wish to find your fated, though most people left it down to chance but now it was harder and harder to find one so people gave up while scientists made a new way to find them.

“Mel?” You ask and they shake their making you frown.

“Who?” You ask frowning.

“You my lady” the medical officer says and you frown how the hell were you his mate? You’ve known him your whole life and nothing?

“That’s not possible” you whisper and the officer gives a small sad smile.

“I guess you want me to- go in there?” You ask gesturing to his white room.

“It would be dangerous. he cannot see us through the screen so we will turn it on so he can” the officer waves a hand to the security camera and the alphas body flinches staring at the now two way window. His eyes are the same but different somehow wild, untamed with hunger maybe. You don’t know what to do as he looks to the officer and growls like some wild beast and charges at the glass fists pounding against it making you flinch and step back. He doesn’t notice you too busy with this wild look at the officer.

“Few officers will be around him due to this behaviour I have chosen to stay but he doesn’t like that” the officer comments and you nod.

“Right” you mutter.

Nothing changed for a week, he never looks at you only whoever is beside you having some bad memory and rage towards them. You’re starting to think he doesn’t know who you are and your heart breaks. You’ve slowly come of your suppressors as the officers request, it took a few weeks to adjust but now you feel semi normal as you head back to the facility. You hate the looks you get seeing as natural born omegas are few to none around here in the upper city. You look at Jayce in his room he’s sitting on his bed staring at the ceiling a muscle twitching every now and then his knuckles are bruised and bloodied as always and he looks worse, hollow eyes with big dark eye bags. You hesitate at the door looking to the camera as the door buzzes and unlocks. You head inside seeing Jayce up instantly and snarling. The door seals behind you and you stand very still unsure how to approach or say him in this state. He eyes you and you eye him for what feels like forever before he begins to walk over your whole body tense as his eyes stay on yours intensely before he’s a foot away. You frown at his changed scent missing his old one.

“Jay-“ before you can even finish you’re pressed against the door the wind knocked out of you, your arms pinned above your head and hot breath on your neck. You’re frozen in fear never had him be this rough or physical before he always gave the best hugs but he wasn’t an overly touchy person. He’s panting harshly and he’s overly warm almost feverish as his hands grip your wrists tightly and his head rests by your neck. He’s too close but not close enough suddenly your omega senses already haywire from coming off suppressants. He lifts his head up eyes hard and narrowed as he stares at you before something flicks on them. Recognition? Realisation? You don’t know but his eyes soften his hands loosen and his shoulders drop as tears well in his eyes and he mutters your name. Relief floods you like tidal wave and you almost want to cry too as Jayce lets your wrists go wraps his arms around your waist and presses himself impossibly close. His face is buried in your neck and you wrap your arms around his neck crying silently. He breathes heavily as he cry’s his strong arms tight around your waist like he’s afraid to let go.

“You’re ok” you whisper taking a shaky breath, hand brushing against his neck and through his long hair. He shakes his head and you frown trying to pull back but he doesn’t let go holding you tighter instead.

“Jayce- I can’t breathe” you say and he relaxes his arms but doesn’t let go you take in a breath just running your fingers over the base of his skull and down his neck and back up. He twitches sometimes and it makes you worry but after a while he lets go wiped his eyes and looks at you. You watch though as something glazes in his eyes like a shade and he’s tense and on edge again jaw clenched and he glares and snarls storming away from you. You stare in confusion as the alpha sits down and stares at the ceiling again, the door buzzes and unlocks and you slip out still confused.

“What was that?” You ask the medical officer.

“Something happened to him, made him feral” she says.

“Feral?” You say shocked there’s hardly been any feral alphas in the upper city.

“This is the first time he’s been out of it” she comments tapping on her holotablet.

“How do we get him back?” You ask frowning.

“It’s a hard process, we can try the subtle way or the medical way” she comments.

“Subtle way?” You ask.

“We coax him out by doing daily things, normal things, trying to reteach him I guess you could say, you’d be our main candidate for him to see” she explains.

“And the medical way?” You whisper.

“We operate on him, send electrical currents to rewrite his brain” she says like it’s no big deal and you flinch but nod.

“Subtle way, has his mother been by?” You ask.

“Yes” she says simply and you figure you won’t get much more than that from her as you nod, thank her and leave the facility. You walk to Ms Talis home knock on the door you haven’t spoken to her in a while.

“Oh” she says as she opens the door seeing you saying your name before urging you inside. She makes you tea and you both sit down at the table.

“I saw Jayce today” you say quietly unsure of how to step. A deep sadness etched her features and she nods.

“How is he?” She asks.

“He recognised me” you whisper and she jolts and looks to you.

“I went into the room today, it was brief for five minutes he didn’t say anything though before he went back-“ you hate saying the word feral, such a barbaric term. You watch as Jayces mums eyes fill with tears and you give her hand a comforting squeeze.

“We’ll get your boy back Ms Talis” you whisper to her in promise.

Next Part ->

[maria-and-aguilars-codex-1492]

The Old Guard AU where the poly!141 are a group of immortals who seemingly cannot die so they travel around for centuries fighting battles, wars, and injustice.

John Price, the eldest of them all, the first known immortal. He cannot entirely remember how old he is or anything of his mortal life. There are memories that he carries of fighting against the Romans in what he believes is present day England. Eventually though everything began to bleed together and he almost gave up hope entirely until one fateful event.

The Battle of Culloden. It is where he meets Simon Riley and Johnny MacTavish.

Simon is a lieutenant for the King, a British red coat, different from the rest if only by the black bandana with the white paint of a skull covering his face. A man who Price encounters before his death. Something about him pulling the immortal to find him upon the battlefield. That is, of course by fate, where Price first meets Johnny MacTavish as well. A proud Scott fighting for independence. Face marked by warpaint, dirt, and blood as he kills Simon with a battle cry upon his lips. And in a moment that Price cannot comprehend being reality in its entirety or flashes of the new immortals being bound to him he witnesses this: Johnny kills Simon. Simon rises and kills Johnny. Over and over the two fight, killing each other and healing, until finally they pause. As if realizing that neither is truly dying they hold each other, both looking up to Price just standing over them. A calm silhouette against the backdrop of brutal battle.

Something telling them that he knows.

Of course, none of them understand that they are bound together until later that night when they dream of the other. Price. Simon. Johnny. Living and dying. Plagued by their personal inflictions and differences. Causing Price to have to hunt the two down. Explaining that they have to all be together. They have a job to do. A greater purpose that goes beyond Johnny not wanting to work with Brits and Simon not wanting to work with anyone. (Not that John would ever admit that in truth...he just didn't want to be alone anymore.)

And by the time they dream of a fourth, the consequences of Culloden is gone from them against the sounds of a world at war.

World War II is where they find Kyle "Gaz" Garrick. Dying from a gunshot wound after freeing a camp of POWs from the Germans. Price, Simon, and Johnny race across no mans land and trenches. Across borderlines and battlegrounds to find him. It takes nearly ten days across foot before they come across Gaz collapsed upon his knees drenched in blood. Surrounded by dead German soldiers. A sob shaking him as Price settles a hand across his shoulder. The three immortals explaining that everything would be alright. That Gaz wasn't alone anymore. He'd never be alone again.

And when that war ended well the wars never end. However, the 141 as Price names them certainly didn't expect to gain another member, but one night upon a cargo train within the middle of the desert, they suddenly gain you.

Your death awakens them from sleep far worse than if the train itself had crashed.

Price watches you die, sees the wound that kills you, the pain and fear flashing across your eyes. Johnny catches a glimpse of your name tag and the features of your face; his hands hazardously sketching you upon a notepad he had stuffed away. Gaz quickly tries describing your environment and clothing. Simon looks upon them all with darkened eyes, his hand grasping his throat, as he announces that he felt you die. A statement that has Price standing as he suddenly realizes where you must be and what had led you to your death.

No more words were needed for them to all agree to find you no matter what.

[steam-beasts]

I Love you, I Hate you

Tw; heavily implied verbal abuse

Neither Duncan or Douglas had the best start in their lives. One moment, they're in the workshop, the next; a military railway.

Douglas was the more optimistic of the two, albeit the fact he tended to be horribly anxious and a little bit jumpy. The reason for this was due to the time he spent on the Calshot RAF railway in Southampton, ranging from having to listen to gunshots from nearby practices, always getting yelled at by the sergeants left right and centre. He could never prepare for them, and it never helped that he was nearly completely blind due to not having a face like Duncan. Before he was sent to the railway, he was a confident, outgoing and chatty engine. Unlike his brother though, he's too nice for his own good and restrained on being mean. His kindness continued as he lived on the Talyllyn railway, but after his fateful visit to Sodor, he isn't as nice as before. Specifically towards Duncan.

Duncan, when he was first build, used to be easily annoyed, but didn't have such a bad temper and unfiltered rudeness until he began working on the railway. He was once fairly happy, cheeky, boastful and a little prideful. He was and still is not afraid to be blunt, he's a believer of plain speaking after all! He's seen dead people during his time on the railway and it sickened him greatly. We obviously know what happened when he went to the Skarloey Railway, so I'll say no more. But back on Calshot, he was so much worse than how he acts nowadays.

For their relationship, they were a bit like best friends...at first. Douglas absolutely adored Duncan, having a tendency to sometimes be immediately attached to anyone if he knew them long enough. Even though they were twins, Douglas looked up to Duncan as a "cool older brother" type engine and always chatted away to him, asking how he was, what he thought of other engines at the railway, etc. Duncan used to enjoy Douglas's presence as well, being a little bit more laid-back in conversations with him, and even helped him memorise his paths. Douglas still needed help getting around, even though he had a pinhole of vision.

Things started changing when the next month started. Duncan became more short-tempered, rowdy and rude. Douglas at first passed it off as him being stressed from the people, sounds and sights which he couldn't blame him for as he too was stressed and strained from the work and noises...and painful sensations.

The next month came, and Duncan became a bit distant, not even saying hello back to him. All Douglas got as a response was grunts of acknowledgement or telling him to fuck off or no acknowledgement at all, just silence.

Douglas assumed it was because of the stress again and tried to remain happy, albeit becoming more paranoid. Every night at the sheds, he'd still ask the same questions and Duncan would snap at him more and more, asking "How th' hell can ye be happy?! Are ye stupid?". After that, he'd be hit with a bunch of swears and insults. Douglas knew Duncan was simply angry, so he never actually meant those...right? He never apologized after, though. But that’s ok! Siblings argue all the time.

The words cut deep, but Douglas still tried to remain positive despite the agonizingly harsh noises and screams and insults that got tossed at him during work. It was even more hurtful when Duncan started hating him. He always kept being nice to Duncan, assuring his twin that he still loves him. But he couldn’t understand why Duncan was always cruel towards him. It never helped either that Douglas was the more discriminated one because of the lack of face. He was just an emotionless, dumb machine.

Despite everything during his time there, Douglas always strained himself to be positive. He did try being more mean one time, giving Duncan a taste of his own medicine. But it backfired awfully. Duncan's (back then) explosive temper resulted in him gaining a habit of often saying sorry when he talks.

After moving to Tywyn, Douglas struggled to accept that his brother hated him, repeatedly reminding himself that working on their old industrial railway was very stressful, even for himself. But alas, he had to eventually. It wasn't easy. It was after a small telepathic talk with Midlander that he had to accept the facts. Midlander is a good friend. Douglas slowly began gaining a little bit of resentment towards Duncan after the talk.

Learning that his brother became famous because of Awdry’s books felt like salt was getting rubbed into a wound that never properly healed, because that was EXACTLY what happened to him! It wasn’t fair! The way everyone loved him and only ever saw him when they looked at Douglas...he felt completely in . No one truly liked him and the others for the engines they are.

Hearing the Willie Rushton narration over Duncan’s stories, he noticed that Duncan seemed to have softened up a bit and is just grumpy nowadays, but he was still the same. The faceless twin still saw no end to Duncan’s negativity. There was no true happiness. Just hatred.

It’s been decades since they spoke. Nowadays, Duncan himself had begun looking back on how he treated Douglas. He could never understand how his brother was so happy, but his driver is suspecting that his positivity is a simple mask. Duncan hadn't thought once about his twin or his old railway in years, now he's wondering...

Was he truly wrong for how he behaved back then?

[dxxtruction]

I've said this once, and I'll say it again, framing Armand as 'wanting Louis and Claudia dead' or 'planning their murder' makes 0 sense with any context the show provides us.

This still means he's 100% complicit (!!!). In fact, the very idea he could've prevented it at all puts the onus on him pretty highly. Compounded also on the fact that, as his lover, he had special obligations to Louis that he neglects by doing this, and the matter of racist intent that's involved in this that everyone's obligated to stand against on principle. Not to mention this is murder. Suppose one could say the very conditions set by the coven make one easily groomed to complicit-ness, but this is simply yet another explanation for things there's never any real excuse for (Don't be like Armand and try). But, it also begins to highlight why it's not a very good read of his character to blanket this as his sole doing, and as his desire at all to do. As it would completely ignore Santiago's much greater role in perpetration (Being the leader in creating, with the other coven members, the context for the complicit-ness to occur), as well as not considering the role the Laws, and ultra-violent dynamic of the coven, played into what Armand decides on. It ignores the whole narrative.

The option presented to Armand surrounding the trail was never his own making. The choice to take part in it at all is actually a lack of choice, because it doesn't actually concern his own choice in it. (Basically, he wouldn't ever come to it himself or willingly. Making it not validly consensual). It's likely as well the only reason he's directing it is because he'd know how to. He hadn't chose that part either, and frankly never really had to begin with. This is all especially true under coercion, or threat of violence - yes, even if he could act against it. The point is whether a victim of it believes there is threat, or that there could possibly be one, not whether it actually ever posed a real one.

When it comes to choice between the Coven or Louis, they exist as more options towards opposing obligations than anything else, and neither outcome, as he sees them going, is what he would actually choose were he to have a choice in it. Which he doesn't. (No one can choose outcomes, only predict them.)

Except, Armand could've created a choice for himself, but didn't. He could've found a way to prevent it, but didn't. He chose his own choiceless-ness, over making the potential for something he'd always prefer - and so would be a real and consensual choice - but didn't, because he didn't feel he would be able to have it the way he wanted. Paradoxically trapping himself into doing something he doesn't want, because he can't have what he wants. He not only becomes choiceless then, but wantless. Total self effacement. Reinforcing an enslavement that is now false. Living in Mauvaise foi - bad faith. (The Sartre cameo was foreshadowing of this exact thing.)

Perhaps he does this because he's become incapable of letting himself have that level of self, or awareness. Letting others decide his fate for him is all he can accept, when this is the only kind of self he knows. And/Or because the far worse option was simply the only one he could have any greater certainty in the outcomes with. There is also still the threat posed by a united force of the coven as well. This all points to Armand already being very easy to coerce into it, fact, he'd already been heavily coerced when he was groomed repeatedly to all this centuries prior.

The thing to understand though is he was never going to actually come to the trail, let alone having ever wanted Louis' demise, when what he really wanted was Louis all along. Only because there's an opposing threat presented to him, does he actively work against himself as he doesn't see to any alternative. (And Claudia was always a footnote in all this to him, a literal footnote in history, so wouldn't have factored into his decision much... don't read into this also being a footnote. RIP Claudia, miss you dearly.)

Also in coming to this choice-less decision, he knows nothing can prevent the coven from turning their backs on what they've already set their hearts on doing. They'd mutinied to get this. And, he knows as well he can't force Louis to love him, or for this matter, love him forever.

In having to decide on something, he appeases the thing that threatens him the most, which is the coven. And with a mere feeling of a threat from Louis, his obligations to him are taken as only thereafter fleeting. Though this doesn't mean he'd stopped loving him. Simply stopped acting out the biggest obligation to someone you do love - which is keeping them safe, and alive, if you can help it. (He is in love; doesn't act in love). So no, this doesn't mean he wants or orchestrates what the coven is forcing him to do - this makes no sense. But that, within the dynamics of the coven, which have changed to be against him, and the laws they seek to uphold with this change, there is a high-controlling obligatory threat to violence he must also accept to eliminate all threat to himself. Real or not.

Now, how real that threat is with his decision, is granted not the most plausible in a physical sense. (and factor that he could've come to a plan with Louis and it would be doubly true.) - but if you consider Armand as someone who wouldn't know how to fair well without other people, or at least desperately not want that, there's a certain level of threat still to suddenly becoming very isolated. And more importantly totally alone. This is the main threat to him, really. If he had, let's say, made a plan to run off with Louis, and he were to then leave him down the line, this would be a threat to him in the same way as losing the coven would. The coven provides a security that Louis could not in this sense - but it's just that. A security.

It's very: siding with an abusive parent/guardian because at least they provide a sense of some protection, or dare I say mercy, on you. Even when they're completely opposed to your wants/needs/autonomy.(etc.) (Notable etc. - he'd been fucking them all for years, like the lack of metaphor is so striking.)

He does end up making choice for himself in the end though, and that is resurrecting Louis + not saying the truth to Louis. He chose this WAY too late, but it's probably when outcomes started to change from how he thought they would go that he realized the errors in his thinking. That, given this, he also would never have known if Louis would leave him. And so rescuing Louis from this was an option the whole time to avoiding threat, if he had just seen he could've had that. That he could've had what he wanted and just chose that for himself. Even up to the very moment.

He's tragic in this way, but you almost don't want to view him like this because he'd reaped all the rewards over choices he never made. Choices he would've made if he were (... well, Lestat), but really a more self-respecting person who actually understood the thing he wanted, [love], and the trust it takes to have that. Because Armand chooses to lie, or obscure truths, he sets this relationship up to always have inevitably broken on lack of trust.

He is a perpetuator of manipulation, and does do things which mimic the neglectful and highly-controlled kind of abuse the coven was offering him, and past abusers were inflicting on him as well. Once he's to himself, with only an obligation to himself and to Louis as a companion - as was his want and choice - he therefore takes full responsibility for those choices he makes. He can't just be complicit in those things. You might almost want to excuse (not forgive) what comes before it, because the choice wasn't of his autonomous consent, and he was highly susceptible to fall into it - and for Louis I think he does (technically it's only his right to do as well*) - but even Louis can not excuse for things Armand of his own volition chose to do.

Because Louis has some self respect, and does understand love requires trust, he had to end things there. The fact Armand still wanted to fight for it anyway says a lot about his own development throughout all this time, and how it's not moved very much forward from where it started. To end off, I would think this sets him up for a lot of growth in later seasons. He's literally hit a wall, and has to now redirect his life.

*When I say 'technically' it's Louis right for the purposes of respecting this is fictional media this right only naturally extends to the community Louis represents: [Black people, Black queer men, Black abuse survivors, etc.]. These people do not have to side with Louis excusing it, and that should be respected always more than Louis own excusing of it wrt the shows text. In other words, there's no excusing it except through Louis eyes. That's how that has to work.

[arthropodwithapen]

Just wanted to say that I love all your stories, specially Spaghetti and Red Wine, that I already read twice.

Aaaad I have a prompt: Peter develops an alcohol (or other substance) problem after his aunt May dies. Tony, having taken him in, finds out and tries to help him.

Thank u ❤️❤️❤️

Thank you so much for your kind words and for the prompt! Sincerest apologies that it took sooo long to get to, I've been so uninspired this year! Hope it's okay! :))))

Here it is!

Word count - 1724 words

***

Drowning was backwards, Peter decided.

It was all backwards. 

Day in and day out, his lungs burned and he gasped for air. It was unbearable. But as soon as he was drowning, he drew air into his lungs. The burn was quenched with the burn at the back of his throat. 

It was only when he wasn’t drowning that he felt most like he was suffocating. 

Backwards. 

Peter liked drowning. 

Spider-Man drowned too but no one knew it. It came with perks - the mask, the reputation, the rapport with the locals that made lying to them all the more easy.

With his mask he was Spider-Man, not Spider-Sixteen-year-old-kid. ‘Man’ as in, over twenty-one.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out how this would benefit him and Peter used to consider himself a genius. He wasn’t so sure now that he’d been consumed by the tides. A genius wouldn’t let this happen. 

Sixteen was pretty young to start drinking. Sixteen was pretty young for a lot of things. 

Sixteen was pretty young to have lost two parents. Four parents was simply excessive but Peter always had been something of an over achiever. Now he was nothing. He felt nothing under the waves. 

He drowned on rooftops. He drowned on top of moving trains, staring up at the clouds swirling over head. He drowned at every chance he could get and when he wasn’t drowning he was thinking of it - thinking how badly he needed it because not drowning was worse. Always worse. 

He did it alone. He kept it hidden - safe. Sacred. His dirty little secret.

The only issue with that was he’d never been great at keeping secrets from those he held close to him. But the more he drowned, the further he drifted from them and the easier it was to push them away, squeezing empty bottles in the growing space between himself and everyone else like he was building a wall of glass to hide behind. 

Drowning his sorrows - and he had no shortage of those - was a solitary activity. He wanted it to stay that way. People always tried to make him talk and think and do all the things he never wanted to do again. 

He didn’t want to think about it. About her. About any of them. About any of his dead. 

Tony Stark was perhaps an unfortunate oversight that caused the whole operation to crumble. The man hadn’t factored into the equation for quite some time and Peter barely registered him as a character in his story anymore. He wasn’t an issue.

Tony had been thrown in the deep end and had had a moody, bereaved teenager dumped on his doorstep simply because Peter had thought of no one else to call on the fateful night when the waves descended over him, pushing him so deep he couldn’t escape the current if he tried. 

They both stopped pretending either of them had any idea how to navigate the waters together pretty soon after. They skirted around each other to avoid difficult conversations neither of them wanted to have. They hardly ever saw each other anymore, even though Peter was now living with him. 

Gone were the days of easy lab sessions after school spent joking and laughing. Peter didn’t laugh anymore and Tony didn’t know what to do with that. So he didn’t do anything.

Tony never questioned his whereabouts. He never got close enough to smell the liquor on his breath. He never pried long enough to realise what he was doing.

Peter never once blamed him for it. It only made it easier to drown in peace.

It was destined to fall apart at some point, though. 

Spider-Man had been detrimental to his survival and he continued to be, though he spent less and less time actually active in the suit fighting crime like he had been doing for almost two years prior.

But he still tried now and then. Only, web swinging wasn’t the smartest idea when he was drowning and couldn’t remember the last time he bothered with the frivolities of food. 

He didn’t remember trying to swing to the Tower. He didn’t remember not making it to his room. He didn’t remember Tony finding him or how he got him down to the MedBay. He’d never forget the look on his face when he woke up, though. 

*** 

Peter had spent no shortage of time in the MedBay. When he was more active in the suit, he’d been injured on the regular and May and Tony would panic and rush him to the MedBay for Cho to stitch him up. He wondered how she’d try stitch this one up. 

Tony was there beside him, his hand covering his mouth. He didn’t look angry, like Peter had expected, but he was disappointed. Wasn’t that supposed to be worse? Peter just didn’t care. He had been caught and he didn’t care. His eyes told him he knew everything there was to know about him. There was no use hiding now. 

“You care to explain why your blood alcohol levels were through the roof?” Tony asked when he noticed Peter’s eyes were open.

“Probably the tequila.” 

Tony swore under his breath. “I swear to god, Parker, you have some serious explaining to do.”

Peter shrugged. 

Tony stood. “You know, I really thought you were better than this.” 

Peter stared at him. It was backwards. He was breathing easily but it felt like inhaling fire. 

“I just.. what were you thinking?” Tony’s hard stare pierced holes in his chest.

Peter shrugged. “Wasn’t.”

“Clearly! Do you even understand how reckless you’ve been? How stupid..” Tony seethed for minutes, pacing around, waving his finger and ranting about how much Peter had screwed up.

It was like the ferry but worse. But he didn’t tear up like he had then. He didn’t beg for the man’s understanding like he had then. He didn’t tell him he was sorry or that he wanted to be like him like he had then. He didn’t want to be anything. So he didn’t say anything.

Eventually, Tony sighed and brought his hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose, shaking his head. 

“Everyone always said - May always said” - Peter winced - “how alike we are. How much like me you are. And that.. and that always used to make me so proud.” Tony laughed humourlessly. “I’d have never thought that this is what they meant.” 

Peter kept watching him, blinking up at him while Tony worked through his anger and disappointment. It was all he could do.

Tony sighed. “Okay.” He nodded, as if steeling himself to say something unpleasant. “Right. I guess.. I guess it’s time.”

He didn’t speak for a long moment, he just stared down at the floor, deep in thought. 

Peter shifted uncomfortably. “Time?” He asked, his voice hoarse. 

“Yes, Peter. This was only supposed to be a temporary thing anyway.. and well, we all know I’m not qualified..” Tony rambled. And continued to ramble, talking around what Peter already understood. 

Tony was getting rid of him. It was simple. The ship was sinking and Tony was abandoning it to the merciless waves. Peter could drown peacefully now on his own, not worrying about dragging Tony under too. It was better this way.

“Peter?”

“Yeah?”

Tony spread his arms. “Well? Were you even listening?” 

Peter shrugged. “S’okay.” 

“What?”

“It’s okay. Wherever I go. It’s okay.”

“Okay? Is that all you have to say for yourself?”

Peter stared at the wall behind Tony, speaking expressionlessly. “What would you like me to say instead?” 

“I don’t.. I don’t know!” Tony ran a hand through his hair. “This is all just..” Tony waved his arms, looking for the right word. He couldn’t. 

“Backwards,” Peter said. 

Tony looked at him. Peter met his gaze head on. The man was silent, pursing his lips. His eyes were glassy. Tony’s shoulders sagged, he sighed and then slowly sank back into the chair. 

“Yeah. That’s.. Yeah. Backwards.”

They didn’t speak for a long time. It could have been hours, days, years. Peter aged an eternity in that silence. 

“I just.. Why?” Tony sounded broken.

Peter kept his mouth closed, worried that if he opened it, he’d start screaming and wouldn’t be able to stop. 

“Why won’t you talk to me? You know me. You know who I used to be.”

There was pain in his eyes. Peter wondered if it was like looking into a mirror for him - seeing all of his bad choices manifest in the mentee that was supposed to be better than he was.

“Say something.”

Peter had nothing to say. He had a million things to say. He never wanted to speak again. He wanted to dive into the salty depths of despair, sink down and swallow until his lungs stopped burning. 

“Peter, if there’s anyone that understands what you’re going through, it’s me. And I’m the last person that’s going to judge. I just want you to tell me.”

His lungs were filling up with water. He didn’t remember how to breathe.

"Just say it.”

“I’m drowning.”

Tony sucked in a breath. Peter waited for him to do something, say something - help him. Tony smiled a sad smile, relieved at the admission. 

“Go on,” Tony encouraged gently. Peter’s throat burned. His eyes did too. 

“I’m drowning and the only time I don’t feel like I’m drowning is when I drown  myself. It’s backwards.”

Tony reached forward and took Peter’s hand, covering it with his own. He didn’t remember the last time he’d touched another person. He looked at their hands. 

Tony’s was warm, Peter’s was freezing. Gradually, the warmth seeped into his and the places were their skin was touching reached equilibrium. Balance. Understanding. 

“I get it, Peter,” Tony said, so incredibly earnest that the burning overwhelmed him and a single tear spilled down his cheek. “I see you. I understand. It’s going to be okay. We’re going to get through this, okay?” He squeezed his hand. “Together.”

The urge to run and hide was there, to shy away into the dark depths of his mind and push everyone further back from himself. But Tony was a lifeboat. He had been drowning once too and maybe that meant he could be the one that helped him learn to swim. 

“Okay.” Relief. 

Backwards.

[mumms-the-word]

Dark Future, Dark Reality

Part 1

Characters: Solas x fem!Lavellan, Varric Tethras, Dorian Pavus, Leliana Summary: When Iren Lavellan is cast into the future via Alexius's spell, she wants to believe everything is just a temporary nightmare. But as she encounters and speaks with Solas, the details of the dark future become all too real to her and she struggles with how much the future has changed her friend. Solas is not the man she has grown to care for in their travels up to this point. Torn between longing for the man she left behind and the man she must leave behind soon, she fights her way through Redcliffe Castle, wrestling with guilt, fear, and a desire to save a man who refuses to be saved. A/N: Did you want Solavellan angst just a week before Veilguard comes out? of course you do. I'm zooming through my new inquisitor's game before the next game comes out but I couldn't let In Hushed Whispers go by without writing a bunch of pining and angst and so on. You know me. Part 2 is here, but the whole thing can be read on AO3 here!

Your spymaster, Leliana. She is here. As are your companions.

Where? Are they all still alive?

I do not know. But you must find them. If you can.

Fiona’s words repeated in Iren’s head as she stepped softly over the cracked flagstones of the Redcliffe Castle dungeons, peering through the gloom. The dungeons were more shadow and frigid water than stone and wood, illuminated only by weak, blue torch flames and the hazy glow of red lyrium. It was difficult to see much of anything, but even so she searched, looking through the bars of every cell she passed. She had to find them. Whether dead or alive, she had to know.

She had dragged Solas, Varric, and several Inquisition soldiers into this mess. Whatever their fates were, they were on her head.

If Dorian and Fiona were to be believed, Alexius’s spell had cast them an entire year into the future, into a world so bleak and broken it was difficult to make sense of. The evidence of catastrophe was all around them, in the red lyrium all over the place, in the way the air felt mutable and wrong, in the heavy, howling emptiness of these dungeons. As though every soul in Thedas had already perished. Each time they passed another cell without any signs of life, the feeling of her and Dorian being the last two people alive in the world increased, pressing down on Iren like a millstone around her neck.

Some cells were empty, their occupants long since dead and disposed of. In others, the dead remained, curled against the floor, their faces cast in darkness, or they stood as twisted, desiccated statues out of which red lyrium grew in abundance. Iren forced herself to study each body, dread churning in her gut, just in case it was someone she recognized. Thus far, Grand Enchanter Fiona and the young elven mage, Lysas, were the only living occupants. Neither were in any state to help. Both were more dead than alive.

She pressed on, stubbornly placing one foot in front of the other to keep searching. More empty cells. More darkness. More silence. Keep searching. Keep looking. Leave no space unchecked. You must find them.

But would she find them dead or alive? Which was worse, in this hellscape?

Keep searching.

She approached yet another room of cages, her cold hands stiff as she pushed the heavy door open. At first, she heard and saw nothing. But then something shifted in the far corner.

“Is someone there?”

Her heart leapt into her throat.

“Solas,” she breathed. She would recognize his mild tenor anywhere. She set a hand on Dorian’s arm as he tried to draw his staff, stopping him. “Wait. That’s Solas.”

“Who?”

But Iren didn’t answer. In the far right corner cell, a pale hand gripped one of the metal bars and then disappeared back into the gloom. She wanted to rush over, but cautious sense prevailed, and she crept forward quietly instead, glancing at the other cells to be sure. All empty.

But she had heard him. She had glimpsed him. There, in the last cell on the right. As she drew even with the bars of his cell, she saw him moving within, his pale form appearing ghostly in the darkness.

“Solas.”

He didn’t hear her. He paced and shifted restlessly in his cramped space, like an animal in a cramped cage. Huge shards of red lyrium grew out of the walls and pointed toward him like dull blades, a constant threat, but he moved around and through them without thought. Dipping a shoulder to pass beneath one large crystal that jutted out at neck level. Turning his head just before a sharp fragment would cut his cheek. Stepping around a cluster of crystals that grew out of the flagstones. Each motion a habit, a series of muscle memory movements that spoke of weeks, months of confinement in this one small space.

How long had he been here?

The heat from the red lyrium seemed to pulse as Iren drew nearer to the bars of the cell, the crystals the only source of warmth, twisted and unnatural, in this freezing cold dungeon. The red haze coming off the corrupted lyrium made the air swim as if she were in a dream, but he was no illusion. This was Solas, in the flesh.

What was left of him.

“Solas,” she said again, softly, taking hold of one of the bars. “Can you hear me?”

He turned at the far wall, dragging his gaze up from the floor, and then jolted to a halt, his eyes widening in shock. For a moment, he couldn’t speak, and then—

“Iren,” he breathed. He took a step closer, lifting an arm as if to take hold of the cell door again, and then halted once more, his arm dropping back to his side with a clenched fist. “You’re alive?”

She nodded, tightening her hold around the bar. His eyes glowed with a strange, sickly red light, but any other detail about him was lost amid the darkness and red lyrium miasma surrounding him. “I’m here, Solas.”

He shook his head in disbelief. “We saw you die.” His voice rang with a strange metallic echo, warped and wrong. “Yet you are no spirit. No illusion. How is this possible?”

“We traveled through time. I can’t explain it. I…”

“Allow me,” Dorian said, producing a key they had plucked off a Venatori jailer’s body. He unlocked the door and pulled it open, speaking as he worked. “In brief, no, we’re not dead. Not yet anyway. The spell Alexius cast displaced us in time. We just got here, so to speak, plucked directly from the throne room one year ago and dumped here. Simple, really.”

As Dorian explained, Solas emerged from the darkness, out into the blue light of the nearby torches. Iren stifled a gasp.

The red haze from the lyrium clung to his body, flickering around a frame that was dangerously thin. Already a slender yet lean man, now his wool shirt hung off him as though he were little more than bone, the knuckles of his hands like sharp peaks, his cheeks sunken in. Beneath his pale skin, turned bone white and ashen in the strange light of the dungeons, his veins stood out stark and bright red. Each beat of his heart sent a crimson glow webbing outward from his core, nearly in time with the pulsing of the red lyrium crystals around them. The blood vessels and pupils of his eyes shone with that same crimson light, and beneath his eyes, his skin had turned gray and black, bruised by exhaustion and months of torment.

He was a dead man walking. A corpse holding onto the barest thread of life.

But his focus was on Dorian. “Displaced in time,” he repeated, as if to himself. His focus sharpened, a sudden, almost frenzied urgency tinging his voice. “Can you reverse the process? You could return and obviate the events of the last year. It may not be too late.”

“That is the plan,” Dorian said. “You catch on quick. Good to know someone understands me around here.”

Solas frowned. “You would think such an understanding would stop me from making such terrible mistakes. You would be wrong.”

Iren was barely listening. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from him. His body bore the subtle signs and markings of a year’s worth of living as some madman’s prisoner, but the damage ran much deeper than the surface showed. The red lyrium haze, the glow that pulsed in his veins, that shone out from his eyes…it went far beyond any healing spell she knew, beyond any herbal remedy that she had memorized.

“Solas…what happened to you?” she asked quietly.

His ashen lips twisted in a grim, humorless smile. “Red lyrium. It kills, but slowly. I am dying.”

“Dying?”

She didn’t want to believe it, but she had never seen anything like this. He was…changed. Though he carried himself with the same somber gravity that he often adopted back at Haven, when all eyes were on him, he no longer stood as tall as before. The bend of his shoulders and the gauntness in his face spoke volumes. He was exhausted, worn down to nothing. All traces of his subtle humor and gentle kindness had been destroyed, replaced by cold detachment. His mind may be as sharp as ever, but physically, he was no more than a shadow of his former self.

It made her heart ache with a pain deeper and heavier than she dared name.

She reached out a hand to touch him. To do what, she didn’t know. Offer him comfort. Attempt a healing spell. See if he was even real. But he took a step back, out of her reach.

“Do not.” Though warped by the metallic tone, his words were firm and unyielding, almost sharp. “This is not something your healing magic can alter.”

“There must be something I can do. Or something I can try.”

“No. There is nothing. My death is inevitable. And there are more important things at stake.”

There was no room for argument in this tone. As if his death were no more than a minor, immutable fact. The evidence was carved into his body. Bruised deep into his skin. Radiating within his blood. He was dying.

But Iren pressed her lips together. “You’re not dead yet. Maybe I can—”

“No. I do not matter here. You do.”

A familiar exasperation rose up within her. “So there’s nothing I can do? Nothing at all?”

“No.” His jaw hardened and he clasped his hands behind his back, all sharp angles and steely silence. She clenched her hands at her sides, swallowing frustration that was little more than thinly veiled despair, and glared at him. For a moment, they merely gazed at each other, Solas’s usual grim sobriety weighed against her stubborn stare. Neither budged, until at last he sighed softly, relaxing a fraction.

“What you can do is this: return and make sure none of this ever occurs,” he said. “And if—when you succeed in returning to your own time, it’s best that you do not bring anything from this time back with you. This red lyrium is a slow poison without a cure. I cannot let it affect you, too.”

Her eyebrows drew together. “Can the effects of red lyrium spread so quickly? Just by touch?”

“Perhaps. It is better not to risk it.”

“So you don’t actually know.”

A flicker of irritation crossed his features, a ghost of the man she had befriended back in her timeline. It was good to see that that Solas still lived, buried deep within this new corrupted form. That somewhere beneath the unrecognizable frame he now bore, her friend was still within, with all his stubborn pride and ridiculous opinions.

It hurt as much as it comforted. This was no mere dream of the Fade. This was a new reality, a potential future. This Solas, with all his wounds and pain, was real. What he had lived through was real. All of this was real.

And in this timeline, she had abandoned him. He had every right to act coldly toward her.

It was her turn to relent. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. But Solas merely shook his head, silent.

“As charming as all this is,” Dorian interjected, glancing between them, “we should get back to the matter at hand. Alexius? Remember?”

“Alexius is not the one that need concern you,” Solas said. “He serves a master, the Elder One. He reigns now, unchallenged. After you stop Alexius, you must be prepared.”

“Prepared?” Iren asked. “For what?”

“To stop the Elder One.” He focused his glowing gaze on her, more serious than she had ever seen him. “I will tell you all I know. But remember this future, Iren. It may help you prevent it.”

—————

Solas spoke low as they moved through the remainder of the dungeons, checking for other survivors. He spoke of the Elder One assassinating Empress Celene and of the chaos that descended on Orlais. He spoke of an army of demons, pouring out of the rifts that only grew more numerous and more unstable without Iren there to close them. Even more gravely, he spoke of the Inquisition and Ferelden armies attempting assault after assault on Redcliffe Castle, always working separately, only for the Ferelden forces to retreat after three failed attempts. But not the Inquisition. In their final assault, only a few short months ago, they were overwhelmed by the demon armies of the Elder One and slaughtered, down to the last man.

“Even Cassandra?” Iren asked. “Cullen? Our friends?”

Solas shook his head. “I can only assume based on what I have heard, and what little I have seen. I have heard of no other survivors, other than myself, Varric, and Spymaster Leliana. Why they keep us alive now is a mystery. The Elder One has already won.”

“Don’t say that,” she said, sharp. “Anything can be stopped.”

Solas let out a short, rough laugh. “You would not say that if you had experienced these things firsthand. Any hope of stopping this Elder One died when the Veil was torn asunder.”

“You’re talking as if all of this is inevitable, even if I do make it back to my time,” she argued. “I can’t afford to think like that. I have to believe he can be defeated.”

“He can be defeated, but not by fools who ignore the dangers even when they are staring them in the face.”

Iren’s face flushed as her temper rose. “So I’m a fool now?”

“Yes, if you continue to treat this world like some dark fairy tale,” Solas snapped, anger flashing through his words. He stopped to face her. “In this world, the Elder One has already secured his victory, and the world has spiraled into chaos as a result. I am not telling you this to pass the time, Iren. These. Things. Happened.” He paused, searching her face, and then added firmly, “You cannot hope to defeat him if you close your ears to the truth now.”

She clenched her jaw, refusing to back down from his stare. But he was right. As was so often the case, he was right, even when she wanted to argue the finer points with him.

Pretending all of this was a dream would help no one. No matter how much she wished to convince herself that this could all be washed away, the evidence was all around her. Even if she did make it back to her timeline, she would have to carry these memories with her. The more tangibly they lingered in her mind, the better prepared she would be to predict the Elder One’s next moves. It made sense.

Much as she hated it.

Dorian, several paces ahead, turned to look back at the two of them. “I’ll just search the next room alone, then, shall I?”

They both ignored him. He shook his head and disappeared through another door, leaving them to their silent staring.

“All right,” she said quietly, after the silence had stretched on too long. “Then tell me everything. Starting with how I died.”

For the first time, a flicker of genuine pain crossed his face and he looked away. “No. Do not ask me that.”

“Solas, I’m not a child. There is no need to protect me.”

“You misunderstand. And it is of no benefit to you.”

She threw one hand into the air, exasperated. “According to who? You’ve talked of nothing but what has happened to everyone else, to this world—”

“Because it is the world that matters!”

“—but never once have you said how I died or what happened to you and Varric,” she continued, raising her voice over his. “How am I supposed to save you, or save myself, if I don’t know what I’m up against when I get back? How can I guarantee anything if I don’t know what I might face?”

“We do not matter so much as the world at large,” he said, his voice rough.

“You matter to me,” she snapped.

He shook his head again, turning his face away, and fixed his gaze on the far wall, his eyebrows lowered. Light and darkness cast his profile in stark relief, black and white, sharpening the planes and angles of his face. Pools of shadow gathered in the hollow of his cheek, of his throat, darkening the bruises beneath his eyes by contrast. In the flickering blue torchlight, the line of his jaw was honed to a knife’s edge. The only color came from the glow in his eyes, a scarlet shade the color of rage, a rage that was not his own but had been forced upon him, sinking into his blood, consuming him from the inside out.

For a moment, he looked lethal, a predator, ready to bear sharp fangs and lunge for the kill. And then the shadows shifted, and all she saw was the hollow death mask of a dying man running out of time.

This world had changed him. He was all shattered glass and ragged edges now. Sharp, brittle, trying to be strong and resolute but shredded raw by months spent in one small dungeon cell while corrupted lyrium slowly ate away at his body, his mind, his will. This whole time, whenever he spoke, his tone had been steely, almost cruel in its coldness. He was less patient here, more frenetic. No more the mentor or the teacher, the wisdom-giving friend, but a dread harbinger.

But the Solas she knew was still in there somewhere. She had seen him, a glimpse, flickering at the edge. And that faint specter of the man she had grown to care for was what kept her tethered here, grounding her in this reality, even as it wrung out her heart to see this world so horrifically twisted and empty. The Solas she knew would want her to equip herself with as much knowledge as possible to stop this Elder One. Even if it hurt. Perhaps especially if it hurt.

And whether this Solas or that Solas liked it or not, she would use that knowledge to save as many people as she could, starting with him.

She took a step closer to him. He flinched faintly and took a step away. Always keeping her just beyond arm’s reach.

“Please,” she whispered. “Tell me what happened the day I di—I disappeared.”

At first, he pretended not to hear her. But then he released a breath through his nose, glancing sidelong at her. It only took another second or two for him to cave. “Very well. I had forgotten how stubborn you were.”

She smiled slightly. “Indomitable focus, remember?”

A hint of a smile passed over his lips. The first real smile, however faint, she had seen in this dreadful world, other than Dorian’s cavalier smirks. His eyes softened. “I do.”

It was the hint of encouragement she needed. She took another small step closer, prompting him with a quiet, “So…?”

This time he didn’t step away. But his expression grew somber again as he lowered his gaze to the floor between them. It took him a moment to find his voice.

“The magic Alexius used to transport you to this time appeared to us as a tear in the fabric of reality. It ripped apart your body in seconds before sealing itself closed, leaving behind nothing more than scorch marks and silence. It was…” He swallowed, his throat bobbing. “Swift. Swift and unstoppable. There was nothing I—nothing we could do.”

Iren said nothing, letting the severity of the memory settle over her. She tried to imagine it from his perspective…and failed. He had painted the scene in so few brushstrokes…

A realization washed over her with a cold shiver. His hesitancy, the pain that had crossed his features the first time she had asked, his resistance…it all suddenly made sense. It wasn’t her he was trying to protect from the memory.

It was himself.

“With you gone,” he continued, not noticing her sudden chill, “Alexius unleashed his forces upon us, ensuring that none would escape. Varric and I fought to the point of exhaustion, down to the last crossbow bolt and wisp of magic. But Alexius’s forces were too numerous. They wasted no time chaining us to our cells. There, we have remained. Until now.”

“Solas…I…”

He passed a hand over his eyes as if shielding himself from seeing the past. “Forgive me,” he whispered. “If I had been stronger, more powerful…none of this would have happened.”

“Don’t talk like that,” she chided quietly. Creators, what she wouldn’t give to touch him, red lyrium or not. She felt so useless standing there an arm’s length away while he tore open old wounds to sate her foolish curiosity.

She shouldn’t have asked. She shouldn’t have pushed for answers. Wasn’t that how they ended up in this mess? In every mess? Because she couldn’t leave anything well enough alone? If the blame had to be laid at anyone’s feet for all the horrors of the last year, it should be at hers, not his.

She chanced another step closer. “None of this is your fault, Solas. You can’t blame yourself for what happened in this world.”

He dropped his hand with a mirthless laugh, shaking his head. “You say that with such conviction, but you have no idea what I have—” He cut himself off, turning his face away, his hands clenched at his sides. He took a deep breath. “What I have experienced. You know nothing of this world. It is far worse than you understand. To you, this will be nothing more than a terrible dream. But in this world, an entire year has passed, the people crushed beneath the whims of the Elder One and his armies. If you had seen what I have seen…endured what I have endured…”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, and then again, stronger this time, “Solas, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. I didn’t mean to cause you more pain.”

“No. There is nothing you can do or say to cause me any more pain than I have already endured.” And just like that, his vehemence cooled, leaving behind only weary acceptance. “And you are right. You must know what you are up against.”

He took a slow breath, meeting her gaze once more with careful detachment. She struggled to hide her disappointment and her guilt. Any ground she had gained moments ago was lost. He was back to grave business once again, the Solas she knew buried deep down where he could no longer be hurt.

“Now…I trust your curiosity is now satisfied?” he asked. Without waiting for her answer, he turned toward the door Dorian had disappeared through some time ago. “We must find Varric and a way to reach Alexius. That is all that matters here. We should waste no more time.”

Then he stepped through to the next corridor, leaving her alone in the cold darkness of the dungeon chamber.

She struggled with herself a moment, wrangling guilt and shame and embarrassment into something she could swallow. She was such a fool. Silent, she followed after him, heading past yet another row of cells trying to focus on the tasks ahead.

They found Varric shortly after, safe and sound. Or as safe and sound as one could be after a year spent in a dungeon cell surrounded by red lyrium. Like Solas, he looked gaunt and pale, a dying man’s husk for his normally stocky and well-built body, but he spoke with his usual casual levity. Though it seemed more forced and less vibrant than usual, he acted as though none of this horrific future had actually affected him.

But Varric had always been a very good liar.

“Solas told us everything,” Iren said. “The Elder One, all that he’s done…”

Varric nodded. “Yeah. To say it’s ‘bad’ out here is an understatement. The past year has been a damn nightmare.”

“Are you all right?” she asked. She heard Solas snort quietly behind her and winced. “Right, stupid question.”

But Varric just gave her a crooked grin. “I think I look pretty good for a dead man, honestly. Just saying, the not-dying version of this red lyrium stuff? Worse. Way worse.”

“Were you in there with the red lyrium this whole time?” she asked cautiously. She knew how much Varric hated it. How much it had cost him.

“The red lyrium came later,” Solas answered for him, his face carefully blank. “After the first few methods of torture proved insufficient to produce any new information about you.”

Torture. He said it in a tone so matter-of-fact, she nearly missed it. She stared, speechless with muted horror, but he was already moving on. Already gathering himself up and drawing away toward the door.

Varric grimaced. “Aw, Chuckles, you don’t have to scare her like that.”

“She wants to know,” was Solas’s distant answer.

“You were tortured?” Iren whispered, looking to Varric for an answer. But Varric just shrugged.

“These Venatori don’t appreciate a good story,” he muttered under his breath. Then he followed Solas toward the door.

Iren learned to stop asking questions after that.

—————

Iren caught a glimpse of the torture methods of the Venatori firsthand as they burst in to save Leliana. If anything, she looked worse than the others, her skin mottled and unnaturally gray, her blighted flesh hanging off her bones as though all the strength and vitality had been sucked from her body by some vampiric demon. She bore no traces of red lyrium corruption, but she was dying as surely as the others. Everyone was dying here.

Leliana had even less patience for rehashing the details of the past than Solas, though it was Dorian attempting to ask for details this time.

Enough! This is all pretend to you. Some future you hope will never exist. I suffered. The whole world suffered. It was real.

Iren’s eyes had been on the bloodied and rusted torture elements when Leliana spat those words out to Dorian. Though they lay inert now, all she could see were the brands blazing white hot, inching toward her friends’ bodies, the sharp pokers and tools with which they could cut, slice, stab, tear…

What marks did her friends bear that she couldn’t see? Scars healed by time, or possibly even magic, as Alexius forced them to stay alive in hopes that they would reveal some secret about her, even after she was supposedly dead.

Torture. Red lyrium. Demons. Death.

It was real.

Her words rang in Iren’s head as they made their way, stoic and silent, through the rest of the lower floors, creeping ever upward and forward toward the surface. She was only half-paying attention when Dorian opened the door leading out into the courtyard, only distantly aware of the green-tinted light spilling through the doorway. She heard Dorian swear in Tevene and dragged her gaze up to see what had alarmed him.

She stepped out into the courtyard with a gasp.

“The Breach! It’s…”

“Everywhere,” Dorian finished. He looked shaken for the first time in that dark future.

What had formerly been just one ugly, green-glowing wound in the heavens had spread, the very sky rippling and churning with sickly-looking clouds and ribbons of Fade light. Colossal columns of stone hung suspended in the air while whole chunks of buildings and ruined towers floated over their heads, as though bits of the Black City that hovered just out of sight in the Fade had been brought to bear down upon the mortal, living world. The grass at their feet bent not from the brush of a natural breeze but from hazy washes of magic that swept around them like filmy curtains, thin but tangible even to the naked eye. All around them, flakes of ash and small rocks floated skyward, drawn in by the pull of the Breach, by the gravity of a sky so shattered there was nothing solid left to rely on.

The overall effect was so disorienting, Iren nearly lost her footing simply standing just beyond the doorway. More than anything else she had seen so far, this nearly brought her to her knees. Her mind struggled to make sense of where the world ended and the Fade began, where the Veil was supposed to be, which parts were meant to be mutable Fade structures and which were the hand-hewn stones and walls of Redcliffe Castle. She stared up at the broken head of an Andraste statue, larger than any statue she’d ever seen for any Creator, god, or prophet, as it hung suspended and slowly rocking in the sky. No such carving existed near Redcliffe, of that she was certain.

The world was warped, shifting, neither Fade nor not-Fade but something in between that refused to make sense. The longer she gazed up at the sky, the more she felt as though she would fall into it, her feet lifting from the ground like the small stones around her, the whole world tilting as she was dragged upward into that sea of green and gray.

She staggered, catching herself with her staff, and forced her eyes onto something that wasn’t moving. The flagstones at her feet. “I don’t understand.”

“The Veil is shattered,” Solas said, joining her outside and staring up at the sky. He leaned more heavily on his staff now for support, the shadows beneath his eyes darkening in the eerie green light.  “There is no boundary now between the world and the Fade.”

Shattered. There was no Veil here. Nothing keeping the Fade from spilling over and twisting the world, rewriting the rules, and leaving only chaos in its wake. No more Thedas apart from the Fade. No more Fade apart from the world. It was all one and the same.

And it was hell.

She saw Solas’s jaw clench. “It is not supposed to be this way.”

“Understatement of the age, Chuckles,” Varric muttered, but Solas ignored him. He turned to Iren instead, red-glowing eyes intense in the fluid light of the broken sky.

“This world is an abomination,” he said, every word weighted. “It must never come to pass.”

She nodded. Something in his tone spoke of warning beyond the threat of the Elder One, but she couldn’t discern what. And with very little time on their side and the Elder One the most immediate threat, she elected not to ask.

“I’ll do everything I can to keep this from ever happening,” she said solemnly. “Ever again. I swear it.”

“Good,” he murmured.

“Let us put those words to the test, Herald,” Leliana said, drawing her bow and notching an arrow. Iren followed the point of the arrowhead over to the upper level of the courtyard, where several demons prowled, eager for something new to hunt and devour. “There are still many obstacles between us and the throne room where Alexius cowers and hides.”

Iren readied her staff with a nod. Even here, demons could be killed. First them, then Alexius, and eventually, one day, the Elder One. Simple.

For now.

[blues824]

For Historia/Christa MC it’s easy for me to see MC’s good girl facade slowly wavering after she released Belphie from the attic & Mammon, Asmo & Levi felt betrayed. Historia in AOT was looking for a heroic way to die which is why she joined the Survey Corps in the first place, & MC knew Belphie was lying since the beginning but went along, in truth she wasn’t trying win Lucifer’s respect. Post-Lesson 16 Belphie is horrified & feels more guilt after recalling how MC just calmly accepted her fate.

Female reader. Does this count as being suicidal? Imma put a warning anyway.

Warning: Suicidal? Reader, Hurt/No comfort, big sad

Lucifer

As he saw you in the grasp of his youngest brother, he wondered why you weren’t fighting back. You fought against Titans, but this is what gets you?? He needs you to fight back. You made him feel appreciated, and he grew to love you. He would not stand to lose you. That is, until he heard you say something.

“The only thing I’ve ever wanted was to die a noble death so that people remember me fondly.”

The one sentence just shattered Lucifer’s heart, and he didn’t even move when Belphegor finished the job and dropped you to the ground. This is what you had wanted. Everything you did up to this point wasn’t really for the livelihood of the Brothers, but rather so that you would be seen in a good light.

However, after the events, he realizes that he can’t do this without you. He begs Barbatos to use his power to bring you back, but it only makes the guilt worse. Every single time you bring him tea in his study, he’s reminded of what you said. So, he keeps a close eye on you to make sure you don’t do something like that again.

Mammon

He is yelling at you to fight back, and he’s yelling at Belphie to let you go. Unfortunately, you didn’t seem to even try to hear him, as you just let Belphie grasp you by the neck and lift you up. With your last breaths of air, you mustered up a sentence.

“I hope dying like this allows others to think of me with fondness”.

Mammon’s entire world came crashing down around him as he saw Belphegor drop you. He dove to catch your lifeless body, and held you in his arms as tears streamed down his face. You really wanted to leave him? The feeling of betrayal was almost too much to bear, especially while holding you.

Out of any of the brothers, he is the one most likely to respect your wish to be left dead. He argues against Lucifer’s decision to ask Barbatos to bring you back, and even offers to select a different exchange student. Every single time he sees you, all he can think of is how truly happy your eyes were as he held you on the day that you were killed.

Leviathan 

Along with Mammon, he’s screaming at you to fight back and screaming at Belphie to let you go, but neither of you followed his orders. You actually used your pacts with Beel, Mammon, and Asmo to have them restrain the others from helping you. He felt absolutely distraught.

“My only goal was to die a noble death, and I hope you all remember me.”

He was angry. Henry doesn’t betray the Lord of Shadows like that, and you weren’t supposed to either. Levi was angry at you, and Belphie, and Mammon, and everyone who never did anything to help you. But most importantly, he was angry at himself.

The Avatar of Envy was in support of bringing you back. As much as it pained him, he needed you. He wanted a do-over. This time, he would make sure that you knew he loved you. He would make sure to spend more time with you. He would change himself just for you to not leave him again.

Satan

He is sitting there in shock at what is happening. He already knew something was up, since you always were so kind even though everyone gave you shit in return. He was the closest to you, and felt as though he got to know the Historia behind the Krista (so to speak). But he never expected something like this, or what you’re about to say.

“All I ever wanted was for people to see me in a good way when I die, and I hope I’ve finally achieved that if nothing else.”

Satan remained frozen as his youngest brother dropped your dead body as though it were nothing. But, the freeze only lasted a few seconds, because he immediately attacked Belphie. He was in his demon form, yelling at the Avatar of Sloth while trying to actually kill him.

As angry and upset as he was, he was against bringing you back for fear of this repeating. He doesn’t know if he could handle the pain of 1) seeing you so happy while knowing what was really going on and 2) seeing the tears in your tear ducts as your body went cold for a second time.

Asmodeus 

Along with his 2nd and 3rd brothers, he is screaming at you and Belphie. He doesn’t care if it will ruin his vocal chords; for you, he would ruin his ethereal beauty. If it meant that there was even a small chance of you making it out of this unscathed, he would take it.

“This is all I’ve ever wanted: to die knowing I’ll be remembered for the good I’ve done.”

So… this was your plan all along. Mascara was running down his face as tears flowed. He felt betrayed, deceived… why didn’t you tell him anything? He could have helped you. Did your makeup and skincare sessions mean nothing to you? He poured his heart out to you, and you didn’t even bother to do the same.

He is in favor of bringing you back because you were the one person who loved him for him rather than just his physical appearance. Like the others, he feels like shit whenever he sees your smile because now he knows the real reason why you’re being so kind. He doesn’t want to even lay with you at night because he doesn’t want you to see him crying himself to sleep.

Beelzebub

You used your pact with him to make him restrain the others from helping you, so he has every right to feel angry and upset in general. He’s begging you to not do this, but you either don’t hear him or are choosing to not acknowledge him. So, he watched as Belphie asked you for your final words.

“I have but one life, and I want it to end knowing that everyone will think of me with a smile.”

The second he was released from your command was the second he raced to catch your corpse. He didn’t like how you were limp in his arms. He’s not angry, but he is in an excruciating amount of pain. He was torn because he loves both you and Belphegor.

He chooses not to vote in deciding if you should be brought back. Beel will miss you if you remain dead, but it was bound to happen at some point since you were human. However, he doesn’t know if it’s worse than the guilt and grief he would have to go through knowing the reasoning behind your kind acts.

Belphegor

He knew that you knew he was lying, but he was confused as to why you still helped him. It had him go through an entire internal conflict because of it. Besides, you were always so kind towards everyone and you didn’t show anyone any resentment, including him. So, he asked for your final words.

“My wish was to die in a way that had good memories associated with my name, and I hope my wish has been fulfilled.”

The deep breath you took before he finished you off was a happy one, and as he saw his brothers huddling around your lifeless body, he felt an entire tsunami of grief crash onto him. He really didn’t know what to do with himself, since he really never took the chance to get to know you.

When asked, he votes to bring you back, giving the final score of 4-2. But, as he saw your smile once again, his eyes went blurry with tears. He felt ashamed of his actions, but he also knew that he had no excuse for what he had done. But you were willing to forgive him; of course you were, but it’s not for the reason he wanted to be forgiven.

[honey-minded-hivemind]

Lesser know fact about Cain in the actual bible: after he killed Able, God had to place a special mark on him to keep others from killing him, as he commited what is believed to be the first murder and without protection, he would have been killed. (Being a born and raised Baptist means you learn the lesser known Bible stories, so feel free to ask for info on that front.)

So to adjust for Cain and Able Au: after both Logan and Victor tried to kill Reader, they gained a mark of unknown origin. They don't know what it means until they come to Earth looking for Reader. The humans (who we may or may not recognize) immediately spit at them and banish them from their lands. Some who don't fear punishment may actually try to kill them, as they know what the brothers did and view it as the worst sin.

Ah... That adds a fun adjustment to this AU~! Thank you, @sugar-soda, for telling me this!

The two brothers, after trying to murder their own child/nibling, gain a mark, which at first puzzles them, making them wonder what strange powers have branded them...

Until, upon visiting Earth, humans see it, and an almost primal fear wells up in them. Some run, shrieking and screaming, moving entire cities or empires just to escape their presence. Others try to fight them, even kill them, but the moment a blow lands, something worse happens to their opponent. And it seems wherever they go, nature quakes and turns a cold shoulder to them...

The other angels and fallen angels and winners and sinners help them look up information on the marks, but there search bears little fruit... Up until they find one of their oldest scrolls, preserved by ancient magic and power, that reveals the different signs of the universe and what they mean... and in its confines, there is a section on the mark the brothers bear, one labeled...

"Murderer/Attempted Murderer"...

They find it strange, why would they be branded as such? They've only done their duties, their purpose, have they not? Why mark them as something like that? Until word comes in that Reader, the very being who had been innocent of all but being their father's child, was slain... and their soul is nowhere to be found...

Wait...

What...?

Reader was...

Dead...

They weren't in the rings of Heck or the cities of Heaven, nor anywhere on Earth. No spells yielded where they were, nor could the other angels or demons tell them anything as to where they could have gone. It's as though they... they...

Ceased to exist...

And for once, since their feud began, they feel a deep, overwhelming panic.

Dead. Dead?! They, they can't be! Just- completely gone?! No soul left, no traces of their life or afterlife, they're just gone?! What... what the blazing voids does this mean?

Does that mean.... does that mean Reader met a fate WORSE than death? Worse than THEY ever had to suffer? Or anyone else? Because... if they aren't anywhere known... then are they... gone forever?

Neither one can stand the thought. And for once in their lives... they start to feel remorse...

(Go @sugar-soda! I can't wait to expand this AU! And Reader isn't dead forever! Just, well, about to be reborn! So... there is THAT fun detail, and the fun legends behind the First Wrongly Accused... And the creepy fluff! Ahhh... The joys of writing platonic yanderes~!)

[dragjunkie23]

Earth Angel

Request: Sam Winchester Fluff where an angel falls in love with him

Humans and angels have a complicated history. Some instances we were allies, while others, they turned their backs on us. Never in my centuries of living, though, have I witnessed an angel truly fall in love with a human, and never in my time did I think I would be one of them.

My brother Castiel fell for Dean Winchester, though he cannot bring himself to admit it. As for me, well, I was in love with the younger Winchester.

Sam.

I don’t know how it happened, but his soul and good heart is what drew me to him. Sure, he’s made some rather…interesting errors, but he did all of that in the name of love, whether it be for his brother or for humanity.

Our love wasn’t exactly forbidden, but it wasn’t encouraged either. We were at a weird point in time, though, so I don’t think the rules apply as much anymore.

_______________________

I healed up Sam’s right arm. His latest hunt caused him to get a giant cut thanks to a sword. He was lucky that it didn’t break off.

“You need to stop tempting fate,” I scolded, “You are a strong hunter…but you are still human.”

“I wasn’t expecting the sword when confronting the vengeful spirit,” he said, “So…not like I had much of a choice.”

“You’re lucky I got you and your brother out of there before it got worse.”

When the cut was finally healed, I laid down in bed with him, laying on his chest as he took me into his arms. “I worry about you, Sam. I wish you and your dear brother would take a step back and ask for help.”

“Help? Y/N…so many people want us dead…I don’t know who to trust anymore…”

“You trust me though, right?”

Sam took a pause for a second, almost like he was trying to figure out what to say next. “I do…it’s just…lately, I feel like you’ve given up so much and…you’re still an angel and I’m a human. I just…I’m worried about what they may do to you if you keep helping us.”

I gave a little smile, cupping his cheek with one hand. “If you think you’re a burden, I can tell you right now that is so far from the truth. You are not a burden. Neither is Dean, and I’m not just saying that because I love you. I’m saying it because this was bound to happen, with or without you and Dean. This fight among my brothers and sisters…it’s been cooking up for centuries. It was only a matter of time before it would explode.”

I shifted myself so I could lay my head on his chest, tracing his stomach with my fingers. “If anything, I would think myself and Castiel would’ve been the burden…this is our fight with our family, yet you and your brother get caught up in this nonsense.”

“That’s on your brother, Lucifer,” he said, “He dragged us through this and keeps pulling us back.”

I nodded. “So…don’t feel like you’re a burden. I love you, and I do not like seeing you beat yourself up over things that are not within any human’s control.”

Sam shifted a bit, kissing me on the head while getting himself comfortable. “I love you, too, my angel.”

[moreespressoformydepresso]

TreeMina as Chris and Clarisse from the Percy Jackson series because I love both of these ships and want neither of them to die.

Going with @ylvisruinedmylife’s theory here that movie Treech left Lamina to protect her, because refusing Coral would make him (and thus, if he stays with her, automatically Lamina) her primary target. Here, Treech genuinely believes in Coryo’s (Luke) cause and while he has his doubts about the Kronos part he trusts the older camper to know what he’s doing. I’ll add to this story that Treech is less mad about being passively rejected and left to rot in a horrid home life by his godly parent than he is about Ares favoring Lamina’s brothers over her for being a girl. He’s not an exceptional fighter but he’s great at sneaking and running away (Hermes kid who?) so Coryo sends him into the Labyrinth hoping he’ll avoid the horrors long enough to find Ariadne’s String and come bring it back for the invasion. It doesn’t go well.

See Coryo clocked Treech as a Hermes kid the second he came through the Cabin door (my Chris hc) despite Hermes never officially claiming him, so he was hoping Treech inherited their dad’s navigational powers. Now, that’s not untrue, Treech is a great navigator. The problem is that Treech also got the more psychopomp aspects of their dad and can thus hear the tormented souls of the dead in cursed or otherwise divinely lethal places. The closer the link to the demigod world, the clearer he can hear them if he wants to and the harder they become to block out when he doesn’t. So if things had gone according to Coryo’s plan, Treech would’ve definitely been the best guy for this mission. Send in one other person to make up for his lack of fighting prowess and he’ll be back with the string in a week tops.

What actually happens is that navigational skills don’t mean shit in a labyrinth made to not be navigable, Treech’s guard gets viciously torn apart in front of him and the souls of the dead lead him around the maze with their tormenting screams until he runs into Minos who drives him insane.

It’s okay though, because Lamina ends up finding him and brings him back to camp, caring for him until Dionysus cures his madness and she helps him regain his will to live, after which they become a cute couple. Yes, Lamina beats the shit out of Coryo at one point for sending Treech into the labyrinth unprepared and subjecting him to a fate worse than death.

Then she mouths off to Hermes about being a shit father and leaving his child to die unclaimed and alone.

[contrivedchaos]

So idea Sera and Emily fall and Sera who knows a bit about hell decides that two fallen angels would draw attention they don't need decide to start moving trying to find somewhere safe plus as proper angels not sinners they aren't immortal to everything but angelic steel if someone shots them with a normal gun it's over. She doesn't really know which fallen angels are still around baring Lucifer which if any would be willing to help instead of kill her on sight or even how to get to Lucifer. Meanwhile Carmilla hears about two fallen angels leaves the girls with Zestial and goes out looking for them unfortunately because Sera isn't staying put she can't find them and spends a while trying to find them. While that is happening the two are struggling they have no money shelter or food at at this point probably have some injuries most likely broken wings from the fall and random other things they realize running isn't doing any good so they need to find someway to support themselves or more accurately for Sera to support them. Sera eventually after looking around finds the overlord who filled Valentinos niche before he came along. (Somewhat off topic but how does hell technology work like is it tied to the real world was the Valentino of 600 years ago doing plays and selling woodprints) Sera is very a beautiful and an Angel she could easily be make him a lot of money after all the beautiful 10 ft tall angel would almost certainly be popular so they make a deal Sera will work for him and sell her soul in exchange for money shelter and promise that no one will harm Emily or ever buy her soul. Like the moment after the deal is signed Carmilla shows up realizes the fallen Angels where her ex from heaven and her sister and learns she is too late to stop the deal though Sera does tell Emily to go with Carmilla since she knows she'll be safer with her and accepts her fate. Carmilla doesn't she attacks proto Valentino and either keeps beating him until he undoes the deal or just kills him freeing Sera. Once that part is dealt with she takes the two tired, hurt and hungry angels home. She gets them cleaned up, fed, get someone to deal with the injuries (Sera is worse off she did her best to protect Emily and at points that meant standing in front of things blowing up or taking whatever hell threw at them) and lets them rest and recover. The two also get back together after all neither had gotten over the whole break up originally and after all that well Carmilla makes Sera feel safe and Sera is doing her best to make Carmilla feel loved.

I swear to not-God, you guys are not afraid to completely beat my heart to a bloody pulp with some of these AU ideas. 😭😭 I'm fine! I'm fine! (I'm not fine!)

Without knowing how making deals works in Hell, I guess I could see Sera get to a breaking point and do whatever she thought she needed to protect Emily. Then, not realizing the repercussions of the deal until it's too late, she's trapped. I assume Hell's society is also much more primitive at this time, like there's obviously no social media, shopping, television, or overall community of any kind. The denizens have to find entertainment somewhere, so her beauty would be something Sinners would gravitate to.

I like to think that once Carmilla realizes Sera sold her soul to proto-Valentino, she would not hesitate to just off the bugger right then and there. Like at this point the overlord alliance probably isn't that strong yet. The only other person she still trusts is Zestial, and some guy who puts on plays and makes woodprints isn't going to be a big enough player in Hell's economy that she'd be willing to risk Sera's soul. He'd just be double-dead from the word go.

She and Sera can reconcile, get back together, and start building back the great Hell empire from there. That's how I see it all playing out!

[mysticstarlightduck]

"Proud of" Tag

I was tagged by @pluttskutt, (here), for this one! I'm catching up with my tags after taking a bit of a break the past few weeks (due to health reasons, which I've now recovered from), so here we go!

Rules: Post a snippet you’ve written that you’re proud of and tag 5 people. This snippet can be from today, last week, last month, or five years ago, it doesn’t matter! Show us what you’re proud of 💗

[...] "What are you doing?" Teivel peeked through the bars of the cell, suspicion written in his features as he watched Lucian shakily fumble with a key bunch.

"Getting you out of here."

The young man answered with fierce determination, already moving to unlock the rusted lock. Teivel couldn't help but gasp, horror dawning on him at this recklessness - he reached through the gap, holding onto Lucian's wrist and stubbornly keeping him from turning the key.

"Oh. No, no, no." He shook his head, lowering his voice after his words echoed around the hallway "You're a fool, they'll catch us before we're even out of the dungeons and then we'll both be stuck here. Please, just go back, and we'll just pretend this never happened. It's not worth the risk, not for me."

Lucian looked up in disbelief but did not pull his wrist away from the other's grasp. Instead, he spoke with a reassuring smile.

"It is worth it because of you, not the other way around. We need to try. I'm not letting them kill you - I couldn't care less what my father thinks, and even if I end up tried for treason, at least that way I'll know I'll never be like him."

Teivel sighed, dejection and exasperation mixing in his voice. "We're going to regret this. Even if we escape this place, something will go wrong - that war out there kills everything in its path. I won't be able to keep you safe, and neither you me."

"What if I told you there's a way to stop that war? You know the old tales as well as I do - the curse out there isn't just that, it's a prophecy. 'The Dead God's heir will be flame that'll spark a new dawn', that scroll said." Lucian spoke, hurriedly, like an anxious scholar with too much to explain and not a lot of time. He looked over his shoulder and down the hall, checking if the guards hadn't come down for their usual patrol.

He took a deep breath before continuing. "My father's soldiers are seeking him, and he hates wasting troops. If they are making such an effort to find this guy, then it's because the prophecy is real - and if we find the prince before they do, we can change things, maybe even stop the war."

"So you're suggesting that we put our fates in the hands of your people's fairy tales, and hope we won't just get captured or worse?"

Teivel asked, nearly angry, though there was a glint of something else in his eyes - something that showed that he, as much as he feared to admit it, wanted to hope that maybe, just maybe, there was a sliver of a chance that things wouldn't end in bloodshed this time.

"No. What I'm saying is that we take this chance, we don't know when another will show up." Lucian gestured around, their bleak surroundings emphasizing his point. "Maybe the stories are true, maybe they aren't, but that doesn't matter - my point is, I'd rather put our fates on the uncertainty of what's out there, than on the certainties we have here, certainties like the executioner's blade that's waiting for you tomorrow morning."

Just as Lucian paused, a telltale creak echoed through the hallway - the iron door atop the stairs slowly swinging open. The guards must've realized the keys were missing, and they'd be here any minute. Lucian felt Teivel flinch, tightening his hold on his wrist for a second, before letting go.

Lucian turned the key, opening the door. "If we're going to do this, the time is now. What do you say?"

Teivel looked at him and then up the hallway, where the guards would inevitably appear in a blink. He shook his head, almost not believing what he was about to do, before stepping out of the cell. "You'd better have a spectacular plan." [...]

Tagging (gently): @little-peril-stories, @oh-no-another-idea, @clairelsonao3, @i-can-even-burn-salad and @starlit-hopes-and-dreams

[authortobenamedlater]

The Halo S2 trailer has me thinking that one of the many stories I haven’t written for Tom and Chyler yet is what they’re doing when Reach falls.

I’ve waffled between them being on Reach and getting evacuated/hastily deployed for air support, and one of them being on Reach and the other somewhere else.

Lasky’s Halo Alpha (I know Alphas can be iffy but you take what you can get when you live in in side character hell) says he was on Luna during the Battle for Earth, so he was probably there during Reach as well? So Chyler was on Reach and got off the surface before things really went to crap.

Do I want it to be sort of Circinius Redux or Circinius But Worse? If they’re separated, neither will know the other’s fate for a few days at least. Or. Well. Chyler would probably be pretty sure Tom is fine, since he isn’t near the action. Tom though wouldn’t know anything right away. He might even assume she died on the surface.

If I REALLY want to dial it up to 11, there’s a mix-up or last-minute change to Chyler’s ship assignment. The ship she would have been on gets destroyed and she was still listed on the crew manifest. So Tom THINKS she’s gone, and then finds out randomly that Chyler is fine and has been trying to reach him for two days and had no idea he thought she was dead.

I only meant to write one paragraph sheesh.

Also this would be TWO glassings Tom and Chyler have survived.

[scribblertown]

Fates of the Fateless Ch. 5: A Broken Mystery

Think of these camp interactions as filler as it takes me an eternity to write. But I still find them relevant to the story line so DON’T SKIP!

ao3

wattpad

Arthur nurses his morning cup of bitter brewed coffee. His lips pucker in distaste, he considers dumping the rest of it.

 Definitely not worth a whole extra quarter.

 Placing it to the side as he turns his attention to his book of memories, ramblings, and thoughts pondered but never spoken. Taking his worn, dull pencil into his hand and letting the words form themselves on the pages.

 Dutch has been scouting out the mine nearby. Place called Bingham. Never been much of a prospector for gold or any other valuable dirt these fools seem to think is worth dying over. No doubt he’s spun a tale to any who would listen to the ramblings of a man spouting promises and dreams. Though I suppose we all become believers if we have someone just as foolish to believe in something greater than ourselves.  

 I’m definitely one of them.

 He compliments the empty space with a drawing of the camp, emphasizing the Junipers as the center piece. Accidently smudging the corner with his thumb. Today’s been quiet, nothing really going on. Dutch off doing what he does best leaving the rest to await his next move. He can hear casual exchanges of the other camp members around him. His focus zoning into one in particular.

 “It’s alright miss, you’re safe now.” Bessie is speaking in a very hushed delicate manner. One he imagines a mother would use on a crying babe. He hears Tilly and Annabelle as well, uttering other words of comfort.

 “We’re here for you! You don’t have to go through this alone.” Annabelle tries to keep her voice chipper and her attitude confident. But it’s only met with silence. His eyes find the group of girls huddled around (y/n). Whom is hunched over, face covered with her hands and shoulders trembling. Bessie’s arms encircle her in an embrace, stroking the top of her head and humming a lullaby.

 They all sit in awkward silence before Tilly stands, “I’ll go get her a drink of water.” Arthur follows her to the barrel.

 “She alright?”

 Tilly’s face twists in discomfort. “I don’t know.” She clutches the now full cup of water in both her hands. “I don’t know what to do for her. She… She just seems so hopeless sometimes.”

 Arthur thinks back to the times he and the gang had taken in one another. Tilly being one of them. Lost, broken, hopeless.

 “We’ve all been there. It’s just a matter of keepin’ her goin’ till she’s got something to hope for again.”

 “Hm…” Tilly looks on at the group of women, (y/n) hasn’t lifted her head up once. Now curled up into a ball, attempting to shrink away from everything and everyone. “I suppose we just let her feel this way till she don’t feel it no more.” Tilly begins to walk away muttering one last remark under her breath that Arthur almost doesn’t hear. “I just hope it’s while she’s still alive…”

 The thought disturbs him more than it should. After all, he’s seen and even been the cause of death in many forms. But this leaves him with a sickness in his stomach.

 “It’s a sad sight.” Miss Grimshaw appears at his side, shaking her head and a look of pity on her face. Or maybe it’s disappointment. “Life ain’t been kind to us neither. But it’s best to move on quickly lest she wind up dead. Or worse. Stuck in this stupor for the rest of her miserable life.”

 Her words can be harsh at times, but Arthur’s knows she cares. Cares more than she would like to let on. “Well, she’s done a wonder at holding her own despite her circumstances.”

 “Hm, yes that reminds me.” Grimshaw lowers her voice a bit, “Dutch has been quite hesitant to include her in our dealings. But I simply can’t have her galivanting around camp without contributing to the camp’s funds forever. We ain’t a charity!”  

 In all honesty, Hosea was the one who thought to keep their little stowaway in the dark. At least for the time being.

 “She’s got enough to worry about. We don’t want to go scaring the poor girl.” Hosea had said. Most everyone else agreed.

 “She ain’t got family or kin, got no money, no trade, no skills. We don’t even know her surname.” Grimshaw huffs. “For all we know she plopped right out of the sky.”

 “Just… give her some time, ok?” Arthur gives her a pleading look. “And if you’re so worried about money, I’ll be sure to bring in some more.” Grimshaw’s once cold and stern face falls into one much softer.

 “No no, we’ve been quite alright money wise.” She’s quick to reassure Arthur. “She’s been a diligent student… and never shirks her work.” She lets out a huff and with it she lets go of some pride. “You be well Mr. Morgan.” She leaves just as quickly as she appeared.

 Tilly seems to of succeeded in convincing (y/n) to drink, the cup now in her hands and head held up for him to see her in all her woeful glory. Eyes puffy and swollen. Remnants of her tears clinging to her lashes and a distant look in her eyes. Looking right past him, as if he wasn’t even there.

 He watches for a moment longer, staring directly into those sad hollow eyes. And he wonders what lies behind those eyes.

[titsthedamnseason]

it’s probably a bit hasty for me to get right into posting my thoughts but alas i shall! it took a bit but i finally finished mistborn era one!!! 🥳💗

i rated the final empire 4.25/5 stars (looking back i actually think this book deserved 5 stars. i was a little harsh but the ending and overall story arc is perfect especially now having the context of the whole series. i think if i were to reread it i would appreciate it so much more)

i rated well of ascension 4.75/5 stars

and lastly, i gave hero of ages a 4/5 stars

ultimately i was quite satisfied with sazed’s ending and the way his character arc ended. i thought it culminated very expertly and if there was any character that should have become a god it was certainly him

vin’s ending i was more unsatisfied with but i maybe need more time to sit with it. i never necessarily saw that for her and thought it was so abstract that it lost some of its impact for me. maybe it was that the moment she took on the role of preservation it was obvious that “human” vin was dead no matter the fate of her mystical consciousness so the actual moment of her death had way less impact than a character like her deserved. i mean, she was literally the main character lol. and from a romantic standpoint her and elend’s final goodbye while they were both human in person was underwhelming. maybe on purpose since neither of them knew they would never see each other again but still im bitter about it. i’m happy they are reunited though

it might be too soon for me to really articulate my thoughts on elend’s death. i kind of hated it in the sense that it’s frustrating when a character has their moment of actualization and grows to their full potential only to die pages later, as if all that development was only for dramatic effect. but i think this one is too raw and i also might just not like it because im sad about it. objectively elend was a loyal ruler that wanted nothing but to protect his people and that is what he died doing with a smile on his face so in that sense i can acknowledge that it was in character and he would probably be content to know he died playing such a major role in saving the world

overall i really loved my introduction to brandon sanderson! his books are a rollercoaster and i hear it only gets crazier / worse / better / intenser from here so i am READY 🫡 my copy of arcanum unbounded is on the way