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childrenofcain-if · 3 months ago

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How would the RO's change MC died after they were romanced?

C LACROIX

C wasn’t made for grief.

they were made for insulting words and cutting smiles, for elegant lines and perfected exteriors. loss was not something they wore well; it settled wrong, like a coat several sizes too heavy, dragging them down. they didn’t know how to process it, not when they first heard the news, not when they saw your body, not even in the quiet moments afterward when the world felt like it had slipped out from under them and left them hollow.

it was a plane crash. nothing grand or cinematic, just a routine flight that went horribly wrong, the kind of accident that everyone reads about but never imagines happening to someone they love. one second, you had been flying back from a conference, and the next, you were gone. just like that. no warning, no chance to say goodbye.

C had stared at the TV when the news broke, their face frozen in something close to disbelief, their hand still clutching his phone like maybe, just maybe, you would call and say it was all a mistake. it was supposed to be a big fucking joke, wasn’t it? it had to be. you were too alive to just disappear. you were too vivid, too present, too… everything.

when the silence settled, after the news anchor had moved on to some other tragedy, C let their phone fall from their hand. the sound of it hitting the floor was distant, a hollow echo that meant nothing. everything meant nothing.

they never cried. not at the funeral, not during the long, agonizing weeks that followed. people expected them to, C could tell. they waited for the breakdown, the outpouring of emotion, the proof that C.A. Lacroix was, in fact, human. but it never came. instead, they stood by your grave, their hands in the pockets of their coat, their eyes as dry as the winter air around them.

“i always thought i’d be the one to leave first,” they said quietly, their voice almost drowned out by the wind. it was a bitter truth. C had lived their life like they were invincible, like nothing could touch them. and now, standing there in front of the cold stone with your name etched into it, they realized how utterly foolish that had been.

one night, weeks after the funeral, C found themself in your apartment that you’d rented after graduation, sitting on the edge of your bed. the door had been left unlocked for them by the landlord, who had given them a look of pity before leaving them alone with the memories.

the apartment was the same as it had always been. same stupid art that C had painted on the walls. same worn leather couch. same lingering scent of lavender in the air—so faint now it was barely there, but enough to make their throat tighten. they walked through the space like a sleepwalker, their fingers brushing absentmindedly over the coffee table, the kitchen counter, the handle of your favorite mug.

this is it, they thought. this is all that’s left of you.

they then proceeded to walk to your bedroom. it was untouched, as if you might walk in at any moment. they picked up one of your books from the bedside table, thumbed through the pages without really seeing the words. it was a tattered old paperback you’d read a dozen times. they flipped through the pages, stopping at the footnotes you’d scribbled in the margins, half-formed thoughts, sarcastic remarks, things you’d meant to tell them but never got the chance to.

their fingers traced the words as if that action would bring you back to them.

“you were always smarter than you’d think,” C murmured to the empty room, their voice rough, broken at the edges.

but there was no answer. there never would be.

the door creaked slightly, and C’s heart leapt for a fraction of a second before reality crashed back down. It wasn’t you. it would never be you again. they closed their eyes, trying to will the ache away, but it only spread deeper, gnawing at the hollow space you had left behind.

***

for a long time, they did nothing. they went through the motions of life—work, social engagements, even the occasional meaningless flirtation—but it was all mechanical. they weren’t there, not really. they were somewhere else, trapped in the memory of what you two had, of all the things they never said to you when they had the chance. the words that stuck in their throat now were the ones they’d dismissed as unimportant then.

because they thought you still had time.

“come back,” C would whisper into the dark of their empty apartment one night, drunk and foolish. “you’re supposed to be here, damn it.”

C hated how small their voice sounded. they hated the vulnerability that seeped in when no one was watching, when the mask they wore for the world slipped just enough for the cracks to show. they didn’t want to be vulnerable. not to anyone. especially not to a ghost.

***

years passed like water through cupped hands, but it didn’t heal the way it was supposed to. instead, it twisted the wound, making it fester in the quiet moments. C became colder, more rough. people commented on it behind their back, how they’d changed, how they’d become more distant. as if they hadn’t always been distant. they avoided relationships like a plague, finding them tiresome, pointless.

they took to spending more time alone. alone felt safe. alone meant no one could disappoint them. alone was all they had now.

***

C never married. they never loved anyone after you, not in the way that mattered. there were flings, of course—fleeting, shallow things that never stuck. they didn’t want them to stick. they’d feel sick everytime afterwards; it was a subconscious way to punish themself.

when C died, at the age of 74, it was in a quiet, sterile hospital room, their body finally betraying them to some nameless illness they didn’t care enough to fight. no one was at their bedside. no family, no lovers, no friends. just them, alone, the way they had spent the last decades of their life.

the nurse who came to check on them found a small silver bracelet on their wrist, the only piece of jewelry they ever wore. it had been there for as long as anyone could remember, though no one ever asked them about it. but rumours are fickle, and there were many. they believed it belonged to the only soul C had ever loved; they’d be right.

alas, there was no confirmation. C never talked about their past, never spoke of the person who had owned their heart so completely all those years ago. but the bracelet stayed with them until the very end, a quiet reminder of the love that had once been, the love that had shaped them in ways no one could see.

and so C.A. Lacroix left the world as they had lived in it—cold, distant, and untouchable. they were buried next to an heir who died young, a fortune to their name which C had inherited and then donated to several charities around the globe.

V NÆSHOLM

V would’ve never imagined that their life could unravel so completely in the span of a single, terrible moment. they’d spent so much time wrapped up in their faith, in the steady rhythm of prayer and the familiar weight of their cross resting against their chest, that the thought of losing you seemed almost impossible, even when they whispered it in the quietest corners of their mind.

but now, you were gone, and all V could do was stand there in the hospital room, staring at the empty bed, their mind slow to catch up with the horrifying finality of it all.

it had been a car accident. quick, brutal, unexpected. you had been walking home, your usual route through the city, nothing unusual. just a random, terrible twist of fate—a driver who wasn’t paying attention, a red light ignored. and then the call. V had gotten the call, their heart dropping into their stomach the moment they heard the voice on the other end, calm but clipped, like they were just delivering bad news in a routine, detached way.

at first, V had held out hope. they’ll be fine, they told themself, clutching the metal cross around their neck so tightly the edges dug into their palm. they’re strong. they’ll be fine.

but you weren’t fine. you didn’t wake up. you didn’t squeeze V’s hand back or open your eyes when V whispered their name. the machines hummed, the doctors muttered their apologies, and in the end, it was just… over.

***

in the days that followed, V couldn’t seem to find solid ground. the world tilted around them, spinning out of control, but they kept moving as if through thick, suffocating fog. people spoke to them—friends, family, even strangers at the funeral—but none of it registered. the condolences, the words of comfort, they slid off V like rain on glass, unable to penetrate the haze of disbelief and sorrow that wrapped around their heart.

they spent hours alone in the small church near their apartment, staring at the flickering candles that lined the altar. the scent of incense hung heavy in the air, but it didn’t soothe them the way it used to. nothing did. not the prayers, not the hymns, not even the familiar rhythm of the rosary beads sliding through their fingers. they prayed, but the words felt empty now. they didn’t know what they were asking for anymore. forgiveness? strength? understanding? none of those things seemed to matter when you were gone.

one evening, weeks after the funeral, V found themself at the spot where it happened. it wasn’t a conscious decision; they had just been walking, trying to escape the suffocating quiet of their apartment, and their feet had carried them there. the street was busy, cars rushing past, people laughing as they walked by, utterly unaware of the history beneath their feet. V stared at the pavement, at the place where you had fallen, and something inside them broke.

“i should’ve been there,” V whispered, their voice swallowed by the noise of the city. “i should’ve… i should’ve done something”

they didn’t know how they could’ve stopped it, but the guilt was there, gnawing at their insides like a slow, relentless tide. they wrapped their arms around themself, clutching at their cross like it was the only thing holding them together. but the truth was, they weren’t holding together. not really.

“i don’t understand,” they murmured, their voice trembling. “i don’t understand why god took you. you didn’t—” their voice broke, and they pressed a hand to their mouth, the tears coming faster now, hot and relentless. “it wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

V stood there for what felt like hours, the world blurring around them as their tears blurred their vision. they had no answers, no solace. only the terrible, aching silence of a world without you in it.

***

in the months that followed, V’s faith began to falter. they went through the motions, attending church, praying before bed, but it all felt distant, disconnected. the questions swirled in their mind, louder and more insistent with each passing day. why would god take someone so good, so full of life? what kind of plan was this? V had always believed in a higher purpose, in the idea that everything happened for a reason, but now? now, nothing made sense.

V stopped wearing their cross. they couldn’t pinpoint exactly when it happened—one day, they just forgot to put it on, and then the next day, and the next. eventually, it stayed in the drawer by their bed, tucked away like a relic of a life that no longer made sense. their prayers, once a source of comfort, felt like words spoken into a void. and V, for the first time in their life, felt truly alone.

***

time passed, but the ache never really went away. V learned to live with it, the way one learns to live with an old wound that never quite heals. they moved on, or at least that’s what everyone said. they got a new job, met new people, filled their days with distractions. but every time they walked past the spot where you had died, they felt that same hollow ache in their chest, the same weight of regret pressing down on them.

V never got married. they didn’t believe in soulmates anymore, not in the way some people did, but they knew deep down that they’d never love anyone the way they’d loved you. they carried that love with them, quiet and steady, like a flame that never went out, even as the years blurred together and their hair turned gray.

when V died—peacefully, in their sleep, at the age of 83—they were found with an old, worn photo of you tucked under their pillow. the photo was crumpled and faded, but V’s fingers had held onto it until the very end. they were buried with it, and when the priest spoke at the funeral, he didn’t know the story behind the photo. he didn’t know how V had spent a lifetime missing someone they’d lost too soon, someone they’d never stopped loving.

but that love? it stayed with V, even in death.

W OSTENDORF

W had never been good at letting go. of anything. not of people, not of feelings. so when you died, it was like losing gravity, like the world had unmoored itself from beneath their feet and left them floating, untethered, in an endless, cold space.

for a while, they had you. they had you in all the small ways that mattered—the quiet moments in the morning when you would drink coffee together, the long, easy silences that wrapped around you like a second skin, the unspoken understanding that nothing could break them.

until something did.

it had been an illness, terminal and insidious. at first, W thought it was just exhaustion—long nights of work catching up with you, a bout of stress, nothing that couldn’t be fixed. but then the doctor’s visits turned into hospital stays, and the vague reassurances became grim warnings.

you got weaker, thinner, your voice a little quieter every day until W couldn’t ignore the gnawing dread that curled in their stomach every time they looked at you. you tried to be brave about it, for them, for everyone, but W could see it in your eyes—the fear, the acceptance.

“i’m not scared of dying,” you had told them one night, your hand trembling as you reached for them. “i’m scared of leaving you.”

W had kissed the top of your head, their lips pressed hard enough against your hair to hide the fact that they were shaking too.

“you’re not going anywhere,” they’d whispered, because the alternative was impossible. they couldn’t lose you. not you. not again

***

but you did go. slowly, painfully, slipping away in a way that left W feeling raw and powerless. they were there, at the end, holding your hand, their voice cracking as they begged you to stay. but you didn’t.

and W broke.

it wasn’t a loud break, not at first. it was quiet, a silent shattering of everything they had built around themself, a slow unraveling of the person who had once known how to smile, how to laugh, how to love. they went through the motions at the funeral, shaking hands, offering nods of thanks to the people who said they were sorry. they were all sorry, but what did it matter? sorry didn’t bring you back. sorry didn’t fill the gaping void that swallowed them whole every time they closed their eyes and saw the empty space beside them where you should’ve been.

***

in the weeks that followed, W became a shadow of themself. they stopped going out, stopped answering calls. their apartment was too big, too empty, every corner of it a reminder of the life they’d lost. the couch where you used to sit together. the kitchen where you would make fun of their terrible cooking. the bed—god, the bed—where your absence felt like a punch to the gut every night when they lay down and realized they’d never feel your warmth beside them again.

they didn’t cry, not really. not like they thought they would. the grief was too big for tears, too vast and strangling. instead, it weighed them down, pressed against their chest until it hurt to breathe. every morning, they woke up and went through their routine—shower, coffee, sit at their desk—but it was all mechanical, all pointless.

emerson tried to reach them, worried out of their mind. their aunt asked if they were okay. but W couldn’t answer them. they didn’t know how to explain that the person they had known, the person they used to be, had died the same day you did.

***

time passed, but it didn’t heal. W didn’t move on. they didn’t want to. moving on felt like a betrayal, like erasing the only part of them that still felt real. they didn’t go on dates, didn’t flirt or laugh or even think about love. they couldn’t. not without thinking of you, not without comparing everyone to you and finding them all lacking.

sometimes, late at night, W would pull out the old letters you had written them. small notes, tucked into books or left on the counter, filled with inside jokes and quiet declarations of love. they’d read them over and over until the words blurred, their vision clouding with tears they never let fall.

“i miss you,” they whispered one night, the paper crinkling in their trembling hands. “god, i miss you so much.”

the apartment echoed back in silence.

***

W never married, of course. people talked about it sometimes, behind their back, wondering why someone like them—successful, good-looking, with their whole life ahead of them—never found anyone else. they didn’t understand. they didn’t know what it was like to have your heart buried with someone else.

they grew older, their hair turning silver, their body slowing down in ways they hadn’t expected. but they kept going, day after day, carrying the weight of their grief with them like an old companion. it wasn’t sharp anymore, not like it had been, but it was always there, lingering at the edges of their mind, a dull, constant ache.

when W died, quietly in their sleep at the age of 79, they found them in their armchair, a book in their lap and a small silver band on their ring finger. it was worn, the inscription inside barely legible after all the years. but if you looked closely enough, you could still make out the initials: three letters which belonged to a young heir of a massive fortune who died a long time ago.

W hadn’t spoken about you in decades. they hadn’t needed to. you were always with them, in the silence of their apartment, in the spaces between their thoughts, in the worn pages of the notes they had never thrown away.

D DIACONU

D—rook, as many would know them—had always been too good at running. they knew how to leave feelings behind, how to laugh things off, how to keep people at arm’s length so nothing ever hurt.

“flighty little wolf,” mihail, their older brother, would laugh when they were younger. the sentiment didn’t lose itself even as D grew older.

it was easy, life was easy, until you. and suddenly, nothing was easy anymore. they were flirty by nature, playful, keeping everything light, but you were the exception to every rule D had lived by. the one person they couldn’t outrun.

but even then, D didn’t want to acknowledge it—not completely. love was an unwelcome thing, something that made people weak, made them care too much. so, they danced around it, avoided the word, kept things just close enough but never fully admitted it.

they were still D, still flirty, still detached on the surface. yet, whenever you were around, something about them softened in ways they’d never allowed before. in those moments, they were scared shitless. because what if one day you weren’t there? what if you disappeared like everything else D had been too afraid to love?

***

and then it happened. suddenly. the kind of thing that’s supposed to happen to other people, in distant stories, not to you. you were in an accident—an unforgiving, tragic turn of events that left D shattered. they were at the scene. D could still remember the way the sky looked, overcast and thick with grey, how the sirens sounded distant, like they were underwater. it wasn’t real. it couldn’t be real. they stood there, frozen, heart in their throat, staring at the wreckage that used to be a car, and everything in their world stopped moving.

D didn’t say a word, not to the paramedics, not to the people around them. they couldn’t. there was nothing to say. nothing mattered anymore. you were gone.

***

“you’d laugh if you knew,” D muttered under their breath one night, sitting alone in the corner of some dingy bar. they stared down at the half-empty glass in front of them, spinning it slowly between their fingers. “all this time, you thought i didn’t care. that i didn’t... feel. but here i am. utterly wrecked by you.”

they chuckled, but it was hollow. the kind of laugh that only came out when the truth was too heavy to hold in. because you had gotten under D’s skin in a way that no one else had. even after all those times D had told themself not to fall, not to let you get too close, it had happened anyway. and now, D was stuck with all these feelings they didn’t know how to handle.

so they write and write. songs after songs, pages after pages filled with their long-gone eternal muse. the band’s popularity skyrocketed, the producers milked it for as long as they could.

D could not bring themself to give a shit.

***

months passed, and D became a ghost in their own life. they showed up, sure, but it was like they weren’t really there. they’d skate through the days with the same careless swagger, but something was missing. people started to avoid them. it was too hard to be around someone who looked alive but was dead inside. it seemed like the only people who tried to be there for them at that point were their bandmates and C.

they would laugh it off when their friends asked if they were okay. “me? i’m fine. never better. just living, you know?” and they’d wink, flash that charming smile that always got them out of trouble.

but the world became smaller, dimmer. D moved from one party to the next, one high to the next, chasing something they couldn’t name, something they had lost with a bright-eyed heir with an evergreen heart. nights blurred into mornings, and nothing felt real anymore. nothing except the ache, the emptiness that had been left behind.

on some nights, after too many drinks and too many bad decisions, D would find themself sitting in a bathroom, staring at their reflection in the mirror. their pale face would be gaunt, their gray eyes hollow. they would look like a stranger.

rook didn’t know who they were anymore.

***

D died young. too young. it was late one night, after another wild party, and they had pushed things just a little too far. the drugs had been an easy fix—an easy way to drown out the feelings they didn’t want to face. but this time, their body couldn’t handle it. the paramedics found them slumped on the floor of a room at chelsea hotel, empty pill bottles scattered around like confetti from a life that had spiraled out of control.

but what was strange—what the paramedics couldn’t quite understand—was the look on D’s face. even in death, behind the glazed-over eyes and the pale, lifeless skin, there was a smile. a soft, almost peaceful smile, like D had finally found what they’d been searching for all along.

in the end, D had stopped running.

M WHITLOCK-SINGH

the news of your death came to M as a whisper, traveling through the rigid, polished halls of their life before it reached their ears. at first, it didn’t make sense. death, for someone like you, felt improbable, impossible even.

you had been everything untamed in M’s world, everything wild and unpredictable, a force of nature that couldn’t just stop. yet, the world had stilled. all the reckless plans you had made—the fleeting escapes, the late-night laughter—had ended in a way too final for M to comprehend.

M grieved in silence. royals were trained for composure, for duty above all else, and M had mastered that lesson too well. there were no public displays of despair, no headlines that suggested the depth of the loss they felt. even when they stood at your graveside, surrounded by others who wept openly, M stood perfectly still, a model of grace and solemnity. inside, though, their chest felt hollow, as if someone had reached inside them, twisted through the maze of their ribs and snatched their heart away.

after the funeral, M’s life became a carefully curated performance. they married—someone of equal status, someone safe and suitable—but it was all a façade, a slow march into an existence they hadn’t chosen. the marriage was a duty, a requirement. it lacked everything you had ever been. The late-night conversations that made the world feel infinite, the reckless plans that filled the air with electric energy—all of it was buried with you, and M was left with nothing but a name and a title they never cared for.

they’d close their eyes at night and still hear your voice, soft at first, then louder, like a song they couldn’t forget but could never play again. the world, once vibrant with you, felt drained of color. the laughter that used to spill from M’s lips was replaced by brittle smiles, the kind that didn’t touch their umber brown eyes.

they never spoke of you—not to their spouse, not to anyone. it was as though speaking their name aloud would unravel M’s delicate grip on sanity, on the life they were barely holding together.

***

a few years passed. M became more distant, more remote, even within the walls of the palace. their marriage grew cold, each day more formal and lifeless than the last. they were trapped, locked in a gilded cage with no way out. your memory remained, a quiet presence that lingered at the edges of M’s mind, haunting them with the life they could’ve had, the person they should’ve been.

there were whispers, of course. rumors about M’s detachment, their coldness, their increasing absence from royal duties. but no one knew why. no one could have guessed that their heart had been buried in the grave of a lover they couldn’t even publicly acknowledge.

***

a scandal. a disappearance.

the royal family awoke to find M gone, their accounts drained, their titles stripped of meaning. no one knew where they had gone, or why. the official story was vague—an extended sabbatical, perhaps—but there were no answers. their spouse, barely more than a stranger, said nothing. the media speculated for weeks, but no trace of M was found.

***

years later, in a small village (zaanse schans) in the netherlands, a farmer passed away in their sleep. they had been quiet, unremarkable, living in a modest cottage on the outskirts of the village. they kept to themself, never married, and was mostly known for their collection of british royal memorabilia. it wasn’t until after their death, when the local authorities came to settle their estate, that they discovered who they truly were.

a runaway royal. third-in-line after their mother and older sister.

the village was stunned. for all the years they had lived among them, no one had guessed their identity. but as they sorted through their belongings, the truth became undeniable. among the memorabilia were photographs—of you, smiling beside M in moments no one else had ever seen. there were letters, too, carefully folded and kept in a box, written in a hand that only M could recognize. letters that had never been sent, but that held all the words M had never been able to say.

the villagers spoke of them with quiet reverence, a kind and humble individual who had always paid their bills on time and helped their neighbors when they could. they didn’t know about the wealth that had quietly flowed into anonymous accounts over the years. they didn’t know about the palace, the titles, the life of privilege M had left behind. all they knew was that they had lived simply and that they had loved someone fiercely until the day they died.

***

and that was how they were remembered. not as a royal, not as someone of wealth or power, but as someone who had once loved deeply and had chosen, in the end, to live for that love, even if it meant leaving everything else behind.

M’s name would never appear in the official histories, but in that quiet village in the netherlands, they were remembered for who they truly were—someone who, despite it all, had found a way to keep you with them until the very end.

#was thinking this will be spoilers but i also got many asks for this so take this AU hehe #did not proofread #ro: c lacroix #ro: v næsholm #ro: w ostendorf #ro: d diaconu #ro: m whitlock singh #if: the ballad of the young gods #interactive fiction #interactive novel #twine wip #interactive story #tw: drugs

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