#soft for parental elwin

[thatrandomlemononyourcounter1]

AHAA

I FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY GOT ONE OF MY REQUESTS DONE EVERYONE BE PROUD OF ME

@synonymroll648 I think requested dadwin! So here's a 500(and like 47) word Drabble of how I think it would've gone if Keefe stayed with Elwin when he found out his mom was evil (it's very Keefe centric sooo :PP)

@myfairkatiecat this seems like something you'd like

Any time, kid, any time.

Keefe took a shuddery breath as the pile of tears on the marble floor grew. He had screwed up, once again. His judgement had been wrong, once again.

It was probably considered rude to cry on Elwin’s, who was letting him spend the night, floor and bedding. Elwin was being ridiculously, no, unreasonably nice. What kind of person just lets some random kid stay at his house? Especially someone who just found out his mother was a wanted criminal? 

Elwin apparently. 

Another shiver shot up his spine, and he wrapped his arms around himself to stop the trembling. 

He was an idiot. 

Stupid. 

Stupid. 

Stupid. 

How could he not have seen the signs? 

You couldn’t have known, Keefe. 

Sophie was wrong. He lived with the woman for elf’s sake. He was so caught up with avoiding his dad and thinking about his dad’s…tendencies that he didn’t even begin to consider his mom was the true villain. 

Great, so both of his parents were evil. 

Okay, so maybe his dad wasn’t evil per se, but…

He would’ve made the better villain. 

His father fit the role so well that Keefe hadn’t even flinched when Sophie had brought it up. 

It just made sense. 

But of course, since life hated him officially, it just had to throw him another curve ball. 

He grabbed one of the many many multicolored pillows on the guest bed and hugged it to his chest listening to his own shaky breathing and muffled sobs.

How embarrassing. Behave yourself, or I’ll give you a reason to cry.  

His mom was supposed to be the good parent. 

The one who was slightly better than the other. 

Not the one who was part of a cult who killed Kenric. Who tried to kidnap Silveny. Who put a tracker on his family crest. The one he had finally earned. 

She probably helped the others kidnap Sophie and Dex. In fact, she was probably the one who approved it. 

He drove his fist into the mattress, imagining how his face looked. If anyone saw him like this, he would be ridiculed in school for the rest of his life. 

If he even got to go back. 

That was a whole other can of worms that was yet to be opened. The Council knew about them helping the Black Swan. 

Who knew what would happen. He could end up in Exilium after all. Maybe he would even be exiled. 

You were right after all, daddio. 

He shuddered again. 

One, two, three knocks drew him out of his thoughts. 

“Uh, yeah?” Keefe hurriedly tried to wipe away some of the tears. He didn’t want Elwin to think he was some sort of baby. 

There was no response as the door cracked open and a plate of mallowmelt was slid inside. 

“Elwin?” Keefe called, hating the way his voice sounded raw. 

“You sounded like you needed this more than I did.” Elwin’s voice replied from the other side of the door, soft and comforting. 

Keefe sniffled. Elwin must really think he was pathetic if he was giving him desserts through the door. Although…mallowmelt didn’t sound terrible. 

“Keefe?” 

“Yeah?” 

“None of this was your fault, okay?” 

Keefe covered his mouth, and bit his tongue to keep from making any sound as another sob shook him to his core. It took a few deep breaths, but he finally managed a quiet: “Thank you.” 

“Any time kid, any time.”

[dreaming-of-the-end]

futures and dreams (and other non-fading scars): Bianuca

A/N: Hi @uni-seahorse-572, I'm your secret santa! Thanks @song-tam for hosting!

Summary: Biana looks at her again, and her eyes are tinted red from exhaustion and pain but still they carry with them the Vacker power. The one she's craved and hated for far too many years.

TW: mentions of blood/violence/wounds

Tags: @steppingonshatteredglass @sunset-telepath @stardustanddaffodils @turquoise-skyyyy @skylilac @wu-marcy @saintashes @rune-and-rising @lavender-and-rainy-days @confusedamphibian @hellomyfriends @callas-starkflower-stew @a-harmless-poison @professionalwhalewatcher @theogony @gay-otlc @confuzzled-fox @almostfullnerd @athenswrites @synonymroll648 @squishmallow36 @xanadaus @honey-the-dinosaur-ate-our-kid

Biana's lips part as she sleeps, in soft contrast to the rest of her twisted face. Maruca wants to trace a finger down her skin, soothe the wrinkle between her brows, let her eyes rest easy instead of pressed tight.

At least she's finally asleep.

The bandages wrapped across most bare skin make the idea of rest impossible: three hours ago, she was pinned down to keep from writhing, with teeth clenched so hard they ground audibly as Elwin and Livvy plucked shards of glass from her skin, then poured a disinfectant elixir over the jagged wounds. The numbing elixir barely eased the pain for her. Elwin said some of the glass had gone too deep.

Maruca wants to hold her hand, but even if she could do that without causing her pain, she isn't sure what it would mean. Years before, there wouldn't have been any sort of hesitation, only relief, comfort, familiarity.

The thing is, she knows the feeling of her hand so well that seeing those fingers twitch in her sleep is a phantom pain, an absence so familiar that feeling it is easier than it would be to feel the real thing.

Biana's mouth purses and her face screws up on itself for a moment before fading back into worried sleep.

(god, that mouth.)

Livvy had taken her aside, an hour ago, when the bandages had just been wrapped and the color had still been gone from her skin. "Elwin will tell them that the scars might fade. He will give her a possibility, maybe a hope."

"And you?" Maruca asked.

Livvy looked at her. "Maybe in a hundred years, there will be nothing remaining from this day on her skin. But the scars will still be there."

Maruca scrubs at her face with her hands.

She can hear Fitz in the next room talking to his parents, swoops of anger filling the area before he remembers to keep his voice down. Della's sobs punctuate the conversation. Alden's voice is lower than usual, pieces of his crisp accent lost in raspy worry.

Sometimes, it's like it only took a day for their family to fall apart. But then Maruca remembers it really took two, even though she wasn't around for either of them.

One: Alden's mind break. Two: Alvar's betrayal.

She wonders if this day will be the third. She knows it would have been if Fitz and Dex had taken any longer, or if Livvy hadn't been in Atlantis, or if they hadn't found her in time.

Still, all she knows is that there was the last day she was there: when Della was smiling, when Alvar was making his stupid jokes, when Alden could tease his children without worrying about the consequences, when Fitz still had that laugh that didn't turn dark halfway through. When Biana's breaths were even and balanced and calm.

And then there was every day after. When she'd see them in public, or in meetings, or in school, and suddenly the memory of the planting scattered its leaves through every long-lasting look, or there was a missing piece from their unified front.

If they hadn't found her in time.

The thought is more than a prickle or a pang. It's an explosion, a road to a future without her. A future she never imagined, never wanted to imagine.

All the future she'd imagined consisted of kisses in the dark and smiles across a bright room and fingers tracing arms and thumbs scraping across cheekbones and dark hair twisted carelessly around a knuckle and limbs slung over stomachs—

Goodbye does not have to go both ways.

It doesn't even have to go one way. Biana never said goodbye, but neither did she. They never made a promise not to grow apart, but Maruca doesn't think it would have mattered.

In the end, it wasn't a clean break.

It was a drawn-out pull, like a strand of yarn from a threadbare sweater. It unraveled so quickly and so suddenly that all of a sudden Maruca was left with threads the size of hairs and no way to weave them back together. It took several months of wondering when it would happen and then all of a sudden she was gone.

Gone.

"I'm scared of losing you," Biana had told her once upon a time. Back before the first time falling apart. Not the Vackers, but them.

Well, great job, Bee. 'Cause now she's fucking terrified.

Biana stirs. 

Fitz is there immediately, thanks to his sixth sense that tells him whenever a sibling is either dying or betraying him. He leans over the bed, hand hovering an inch above her cheek, her hair, the closest he can be.

Maruca was scared for him, of him when she'd arrived. Eyes bloodshot, voice breaking every other word. He'd let go of her hand and then his nails had almost gone through his skin from clenching his fist too hard. He'd tried to smile at her and she caught a glimpse of a wild animal prowling, barely hidden anymore.

Dex had rested a hand on his shoulder, and it calmed and provoked him, sending him pacing and tearing his hands through his hair and eventually, sitting by her bed with his mouth moving, whispering to her what she'd never be able to hear. Dex sat beside him for hours, even if he's gone now, mixing elixirs for the scars that will never truly fade.

Maruca sits on her other side, staring at the bandages and thinking that maybe she should go into healing if only so she'd have some idea of how to be useful.

"Biana," Fitz whispers. Her eyes crack open.

Maruca almost retreats, but she's never hidden before and she refuses to now. She crosses her arms over her knees and twists her fingers together.

"Did we win?" Biana asks, her voice gravelly from sleep and screaming.

Fitz hesitates.

"They saved the city," Maruca says. Biana's eyes widen, flicker over. Then they drink her in like there's no one else she'd rather see and there it is. The reason she fell for her in the first place. That power, that makes her feel like no one else in the world matters, like no one else could make her complete. Maruca clears her throat and refuses to look away. "Linh did. And Sophie, Keefe. They saved Atlantis. Gisela tried to flood it, but they blocked up the barrier, held back the ocean."

Biana tries to sit up, mouth pressing into a fine line as she feels all the bandages over her neck, cheek, arm, and side. Fitz helps her, eyebrows pressed into a worried line. Still, relief eases the tension in his neck, the stiffness in his shoulders.

"So, did we win?" Biana repeats.

"Some will say yes. The Council will say yes." Maruca shrugs. She sees the gray in Biana's skin and can't imagine how it can fit together with victory. "I don't know."

"Sophie's parents," Fitz says. "They're safe. Everyone is safe."

Something eases in Biana's face. "Some losses. Important wins."

"You could say that," Maruca says. Biana looks at her again, and her eyes are tinted red from exhaustion and pain but still they carry with them the Vacker power. The one she's craved and hated for far too many years.

She's absorbed, as everyone ends up some way or another where Biana Vacker is concerned. It's not that she thinks of nothing else, but it is that along with all those other things she's still there, lingering just behind as an echo. Maruca considers a question on her Universe worksheet and finds the stars reflected in teal eyes.

This is the Vacker effect. The pull, the gravity of it enough to harness the moon into orbit. The power leaks from them like tea drips from a teabag once it's turned the boiling water dark. You can sense it when they walk into a room. Any of them, but especially her.

At least, this is what Maruca assumes everyone else sees.

For a moment, the feeling disappears and a weight takes its place in a band around Maruca's throat. The feeling is missing her, and it's not that it abates but that it's overwhelmed by hating her.

In the end, she's the first to look away.

[synonymroll648]

no hummingbirds, no butterflies (just soft whirrs & peaceful daylight)

pairings/relationships: queerplatonic keefex, minor mentions of dex’s dynamics with his parents, + referenced dadwin (keefe & elwin as a parent-son duo of sorts)

tws: minor (autistic) overstimulation, anxiety, touch starvation, swearing, implied sexual humor (keefe’s here, what’d you expect), and i think that’s it - but please let me know if there’s more that should be added! 

summary: “I—okay, fine. You’re not patient with gadgets or alchemy or anything that’s a project,” Keefe laughs, and then his voice goes…gentle. Like midnight rain. “But you’re patient with people. You’re patient with me.”

You’re patient with me, Keefe says, and Dex thinks, What an interesting way to say ‘I love you’. 

-

OR: An exploration of what Keefe and Dex’s dynamic could’ve been if Keefe hadn’t run off to the forbidden cities.

additional notes: happy final day of @keefex-week 2023, even if this is for the day 1 prompt queerplatonic! i started this fic back in feburary as an ayyam-i-ha gift for the one and only wonderful @bookwyrminspiration​, but didn’t finish in time, and then i tried finishing it in time for its tumblr bday, and didn’t finish in time for that either. but at least i finished in time for this! i hope you enjoy the third draft of keefex being queerplatonic and neurodivergent (i wrote this with autistic!dex in the front of my mind. also, this entire fic was inspired by this keefex shitpost i made [and the really gay eckodon scene in book 4].) comments and constructive criticism are appreciated!

word count: 6.4k

ao3 link (recommended)

taglist: @gay-otlc @purplesoup-lad-le @when-wax-wings-melt @asexual-juliet @cowboypossume @xanadaus 

fic under the cut :)

Out of all the things that can surprise Dex Dizznee at 12:21am, getting hailed by Keefe Sencen isn’t one of them. 

The buzzing of his imparter laying on his bed cuts through the quiet ambiance of the noisemakers carefully placed in his room. The gadget Dex has mindlessly fidgeted with for minutes on end gets set down on his desk, and he carefully steps through the mess on his floor to pick up the hail. 

(After turning the volume down, because Keefe has accidentally woken up Dex’s parents from laughing too loud on more than one night like this.)

“Heeeey, Dexy,” Keefe deliriously croons across the line. 

Deliriously is the correct description, Dex knows, because Keefe only ever uses that tone when his guard is down—and after Loamnore, lowered guards only ever occur after a mental breakdown or from serious sleep deprivation. 

Or both.

“Hello to you too, at this totally reasonable hour for the two of us to be awake,” Dex sits down on the edge of his bed, tucking his feet up onto the mattress. 

A snicker. “Tooooootally.” 

Dex does a brief internal analysis of his face—he doesn’t have enough time to be thorough without being awkward, but no mental notes at all is bound to leave him floundering later on in the conversation. 

Dark circles → Keefe is probably at least halfway out of his mind.

Bedhead → Keefe is definitely at least halfway out of his mind.

Lots of blankets and pillows → Keefe is either content or in the middle of an existential crisis. 

Slightly more prominent freckles across the bridge of his nose than usual →  Congratulate Keefe on getting some sunshine. 

Keefe starts talking again, and Dex is glad that he doesn’t have to be the one to resume conversation. “What’d I interrupt?” 

“Me trying to get work done for the Black Swan or school but being too tired to think properly.” 

“I’m guessing you’re also too awake to go to sleep.” 

“Bingo,” Dull exasperation on Dex’s end. 

“Relatable.” Fatigue softens the ‘t’ so much that it’s only implied at best. Relatable is surrender wearing a humorous mask; Keefe’s favorite shield.

You need to say something. It’s the start to an all-too familiar chain reaction. He almost lists out all the ways You need to say something evolves into something much more panic-inducing, since lists usually help, but this is one of those few exceptions where listing it all out will screw him over. 

So Dex starts on the steps to prevent that, with an inhale quiet enough that Keefe hopefully doesn’t think he’s sighing. Next is grasping for something to contribute. Something silly, preferably. 

Dex is a second slower to reply than he’d like, but he finds something that works. His headspace relaxes once he asks, “Is the bingo card or the bingo pieces or the bingo itself relatable?” 

“Hmmmmm, good question…” Keefe tilts his gaze up to the ceiling of his starry bedroom at Splendor Plains. 

Dex takes his thoughtful pause as an opportunity to study Keefe further. He notes gulon pajamas, and eyelashes that are long and dark and confusingly nice to look at—which makes him think of the eckodon ride to Alluveterre, the first time he’d really noticed them—which makes heat begin to fester under his skin, because that was a lot of physical contact and—

—Keefe starts talking again, and it’s enough to get his brain to shut up. “Bingo pieces, probably. Sometimes I get put in situations where things work out, and sometimes I get put in situations where they don’t. Comes down to everyone else’s luck.” 

The Keefe is either content or in the middle of an existential crisis part of Dex’s mental notes from earlier resurfaces at the front of his mind, and he leans a little more towards preparing for helping Keefe through an existential crisis. 

Then Dex leans a few degrees back into the or part of the note, once Keefe cracks, “Kinda like all the backstories we came up with for Keebler elves.” 

Laughter, fast and loose and loud, threatens to explode out of Dex’s chest. He quickly covers his mouth, unable to help looking away and throwing his head back while he tries to not disturb the sleepy nighttime air that blankets Rimeshire. 

When Dex looks back down at Keefe, there’s a proud grin crinkling the corners of his eyes, smushed up against the cozy mess of his bedding. Keefe wrestles a hand out from under the blankets it was trapped under, and points directly at his imparter camera. “You thought it was funny, don’t deny it,” 

“I won’t,” Dex relents. A wistful sigh almost turns into snickers, since he’s apparently spent way too many nights talking with Keefe over the past few months. “That was probably the funnest reason for pulling an all-nighter.” 

A giggle. More than one giggle, actually. A whole stream of them, like a human song kids would get hooked on. (Giggles. Keefe is undoubtedly delirious, guaranteed to be more than halfway out of his mind. There’s no other explanation for him being so light and sunny at 12:26 in the morning.) “Best all-nighter eeee-ver! No school, just the silly.” 

Dex arcs an eyebrow like the sunrise that’s hours away. “The silly?” 

“The silly!” Beaming a childish grin, Keefe’s fist punches out of his heap of blankets and up into the air, almost as if he’s cheering for something. 

The force of it sends Keefe’s imparter—wherever it’s propped up on—toppling over. The view on Dex’s imparter shifts to close-up constellations behind glass. He hasn’t done well enough in his Universe class to be able to identify anything before Keefe cries, “Dex! Mrs. Stinkbottom! My dearest companions! Noooooooo!” 

This time, Dex has to gently bite down on his knuckles to keep himself from laughing too loud. 

(Dex has to stop himself from wondering too much about the depth behind My dearest companions too. Because he’s gone down far too many rabbit holes about whether or not he’s romantically attracted to Keefe and been left with a confusing answer of no, but also not being satisfied with the label platonic either. He just focuses on the joy of someone finding him valuable outside of his tech and alchemy skillsets.) 

There’s a smile on Dex’s face so wide it makes him feel dumb as he watches Keefe lean over his bed to try and grab at his imparter. Awkwardly angled footage goes a little fuzzy as Mrs. Stinkbottom gets pulled up before Dex. Well, not Dex, the imparter, since Dex is leaned back against his pillow and headboard and not collapsed on Keefe’s bedroom floor, but no one cares about technicalities like that other than Dex. 

Finally, Keefe’s hand presumably wraps around his imparter, and Dex’s screen is a blur as Keefe hauls ‘him’ up. “I got a little too silly for the world to handle,” he pouts. 

“The world? I don’t think me and Mrs. Stinkbottom count as the world. Pretty sure there’s a lot more to the world than that.” 

“Well, that’s the only part of the world I care about right now.” 

Don’t read into it, don’t read into it, don’t read into it— 

Dex doesn’t read into it. Because he’s a master at this seemingly mythical thing called self-restraint, if his friends are anything to go by. “I dunno, I’m pretty sure you care about your blankets and pillows right now,” 

Keefe’s lips thin into a disconcerted line. “...Yeah, I do. Caught me red-handed,” he mumbles, relaxing further into the comfortable disaster he’s wrapped himself in. “But that’s it.” 

You sure about that? he wants to ask, but takes the few seconds of silence to consider his options and turn the conversation towards something else instead. “How much have you slept?” 

Things That Would Replicate Keefe’s Hysterical Laughter at That Question When Mixed Together Properly:

Tea kettles when their contents are boiling. 

Monkeys screeching. 

Gasps from someone who almost drowned. Or ran a long distance at a high speed and finally got to stop. Or something like that. 

A recording of someone’s sobbing or laughing that could pass as both to unaware listeners.

It’s a little startling—startling enough that he jumps at the unexpected change in sound. Frantically, he turns down his imparter volume. And then Dex tries to climb under his covers as quietly as he can and curls up on his side, so he can fake being asleep if his mom pops in to check on him. (She’s a light sleeper, which she’s jokingly coined as her proof that she married into the Dizznee family instead of being born into it.) 

Keefe wipes at his eyes. “You gotta specify a time frame, Dex. Tonight? The last twenty four hours? The last week? Etcetera,” 

It takes a blip of time to remember what they’re talking about. “Last twenty four hours.” 

“I took a nap after lunch. Ro woke me up for dinner. After that, I painted until I spilled my water jar on accident. Cleaning up made me realize how tired I was, so I tried to sleep. Buuuuut…” Something about the way Keefe’s facial expression just barely shifts makes Dex suspect that he’s either gonna cough up a hard truth or lie to cover it up. “my brain wouldn’t shut off. And now we’re here.” 

Dex takes a shot in the dark—literally. The only thing lighting up his room is his open curtains. Moonlight washes the room in pale silvers and a whole scale of blues. “Was it that you couldn’t stop thinking period, or you couldn’t stop thinking about the wrong things?” 

The steady, easy rise and fall of Keefe’s form stills. It resumes when Keefe sighs and says, “Does anything get past you?” 

I’ve spent my whole life analyzing everything to the best of my ability, because I’ve spent my whole life out of the loop and fighting to get in it. It’s late at night, and your guard’s down. Of course nothing you do gets past me. Too serious, too blunt. Killjoy of a response. Dex condenses it into something lighter, but still truthful. “When it comes to you, no, not that I know of.” 

“I feel like that’s a sign that I’ve overshared on one too many nightly hails over the past few months,” Keefe tries to laugh it off, but Dex can sense the nervous undertone. 

“I mean, if it makes you uncomfortable, I can stop you next time you try to open up,” Dex offers. He hopes Keefe doesn’t take him up on it. 

Dread begins to stir in his stomach as Keefe pauses to consider. It dissipates when Keefe says, “Nahhh, I trust you to not take advantage of me being stupid. Also, like—actually, you know what? Can I ramble about something? The only way my brain can make points is through stories right now. But if you want me to shut up, that’s fine.” 

“Ramble away,” Dex says. It’s nice being your number one person to talk to, even if I’m sure it won’t last forever. 

“Okay, so, earlier today—well, technically yesterday now, but no one cares—anyways. Anyways.” Keefe clears his throat, fist in front of his mouth. Eyebrows downturn in a way that’s either ironically or unironically serious; Dex can’t tell. 

Dex poorly suppresses a smile. Turns up the volume again to hear him better, and resolves to just remind Keefe, No sudden noises please, if he gets too loud again. 

“So basically, after Ro woke me up, Elwin knocked on my doorway today and told me dinner was ready if I was hungry. It was in the usual spot he leaves it for me since being in the same room as people is hard and he’s cool about me eating alone, y’know? I feel like I told you about that already, but whatever.” (Keefe has indeed told Dex about this routine. On multiple occasions.) “I hear his footsteps walking away, and I open the door and I say ‘Elwin?’”

“Out loud, or using signs?”

“Out loud,” Keefe confirms.

It’s been a month or two since Keefe managed to start saying short phrases to people aloud again, but it’s still difficult enough—especially without preparation beforehand—that it’s always a surprise to hear him mention talking out loud face-to-face recently. Dex’s eyebrows nearly touch his hairline. He holds back the Wow, Keefe, incredible job—genuinely, ready to jump off the cliff’s edge of his tongue. Lets Keefe keep talking. 

“So he turns around and he tilts his head in this way that’s like, hey, keep going. My nerves started acting up, but I managed to ask if we could eat at the table together. I had to clear my throat and clarify—well, I was really just rambling, but whatever—that sitting, like, right next to him would be too much. And I’d probably have to sit on the opposite end of the table, but he told me that was totally fine. No disappointment or anything. And we—we actually had a conversation. Not just a few sentences. I could keep up with talking back and forth for longer than a few minutes. And there was this point where he said…” Keefe stops. “He said, um. Hang on.” 

Keefe flops his face into his pillow. Dex suppresses an instinctual smile at the unintelligible noises that come out of Keefe’s throat, because he doesn’t know if they’re positive or negative. Yet. 

So he asks. “Is this good or bad?” 

Keefe nods. Confusion forms in a crease between Dex’s eyebrows. Some absurd part of Dex suspects Keefe can sense it through the screen, because he turns his face towards his imparter and clarifies, “Good. I think. I’ve just forgotten how to handle affection in general. And I’ve never known how to handle it from parental figures.” 

Parental figures has delighted surprise lighting up Dex’s face for a split second before he smooths his expression out into something neutral again. Elwin’s always been a lot better than Cassius. Keefe maybe, just maybe, finding someone else to call ‘dad’ or something like it would be good for him. 

Dex hopes they get there. Eventually. 

Dex also doesn’t know if it’s too early to tell Keefe that, so he errs on the side of caution. “From what I’ve heard you tell me, I don’t think Elwin minds that you don’t really know what you’re doing. But what did Elwin say to you? You cut yourself off.”

Keefe blinks, a bit slow to respond. “Sorry, I was processing that first sentence. Uh. He said that he was really proud of me. For,” —Keefe’s laugh in between words is bittersweet— “being so brave about all of this. And I thought he was playing up how he felt to make me feel better, so I told him that he didn’t have to lie to me. Then he told me that he was being dead serious, and he was sorry he didn’t say it more often. And he tried complimenting me more, but, um, I—I told him to stop because I didn’t want to start crying, y’know? Especially since I couldn’t—can’t hug him. Or anything like that,” 

Dex doesn’t really know how this relates to whatever point(s?) Keefe was trying to make earlier about trusting Dex, but he’ll roll with the punches. “I’m not a professional on emotions or anything, but I think it’s okay to get overwhelmed by someone being nice to you when you’re used to literally nothing at best.” 

“That’s…” Keefe goes quiet. Dex wonders if he said the right or wrong thing. Hopefully it was right. It feels right, at least. “That’s good to hear. Thanks.” 

“No problem,” Dex says, and gives him a tired smile. Not because he’s tired of Keefe, but because it’s who knows what hour in the morning now and Dex has been on a losing streak with his sleep schedule for roughly a week now. 

Keefe sighs. “I wish I could hug you,” he whines. “You’re always so nice about putting up with my bullshit, and you’re cute when you’re tired, and I call you all the time but I still miss you because it’s not the same as when I could wrap my arm around you and say I’ve got you, Dexy, without physical consequences.” 

There are many, many things that Dex could think in response to that. There are many, many things that Dex does think in response to that. But the first thing that comes to mind is if this conversation had been a string of imparter texts, Keefe would have written something along the lines of “:(((“ at least once just now. 

Keefe bulldozes on. “Like, you’re so…patient,” 

And then Dex cuts him off with a snort. “You are the first person I have ever heard call me patient. Ever.” 

“I—okay, fine. You’re not patient with gadgets or alchemy or anything that’s a project,” Keefe laughs, and then his voice goes…gentle. Like midnight rain. “But you’re patient with people. You’re patient with me.”

You’re patient with me, Keefe says, and Dex thinks, What an interesting way to say ‘I love you’. 

It’s an observation. Not a revelation, because Dex has known for months now that his dynamic with Keefe is defined by oddities. They are misfits on the outskirts of everything they know. They are two boys that don’t fit neatly into any boxes—one with a genetically modified ability that’s drastically altered his life in ways no one knows how to fix, and the other the son of a bad match that’s become a regent at 15 and a Black Swan technopath even younger. They are more than that, too, and they see all of that more in each other. They see all the mundane more and the wild more and all the more in between that doesn’t fit into any box society likes. They’ve been seeing more of all the more in one another over these past few months, and scrapping their discoveries together like spare parts into something that’s probably confusing and worthless to the rest of the world, but it works for them.

Progressing without refining, coloring outside the lines—it’s not what mechanics or artists are supposed to do, but for this piece, for their style, for their invention, it works for them.

This weird version of love that they have, that seems to permanently float either between or outside platonic and romantic binaries (Dex is too sleepy to tell): it works for them.

It works for them.

“You make being patient worth it, Keefe. You always do, in the long run.”

Half-lidded eyes shoot wide, and Dex can’t tell if the glaze over icy irises is due to tears or lighting until Keefe’s turning away and whining, “Dex, what the fuck did I say about not wanting to cry?” 

Dex is glad that his words touched Keefe, since his hands can’t. Appreciation presents itself through amused exhales at the smile on Keefe’s face that won’t go away. “I thought you liked honesty, though?” he teases. 

Keefe rolls back over in his twist of bedding to glare at his imparter, but it looks more like a pout. “Yeah, but I also like not having a crisis over whether or not—I’m pretending I live in an ideal world that doesn’t hate me, by the way—I want to draw you a bajillion times or paint you a bajillion times or tickle fight you until you’re in hysterics because I like the way your laugh sounds or hug you for an eon normally or hug you for an eon the way we did on the eckodon or if I want to kiss you. And I know that last part’s probably overreacting, but also, I can’t tell if it’s wanting to, like, kiss you on the cheek? Or more than that? Or less? Which makes things harder and way more confusing,” 

Dex’s eyebrows aren’t practically touching his hairline, they are touching his hairline. (In spirit. Because eyebrow muscles don’t work like that in the real world. He thinks.) Dex adds You want a REPEAT of the eckodon ride? onto his mental list of conversation topics, then asks the slightly more pressing question he got from Keefe’s rambling: “You want to kiss me?” 

Because Keefe Sencen? Renowned heartthrob that had half the girls at Foxfire wrapped around his finger without even trying that hard? Wanting to kiss him? Him? Dex Dizznee? The sheer notion was fucking absurd. Bonkers. Ridiculous.

“I mean—like—listen—okay, just, just let me explain before your brain runs wild, I know how you are,” Keefe splutters.

Dex suppresses a grin at Keefe being the flustered one for once. “Oh, I’m definitely listening.” 

“Okay, so, first off, kissing was a brief idea that popped into my head when I thought, How do I show Dex how much I care about him? Kind of like an afterthought. And the original afterthought was, like, impulsively kissing your cheek. In a goofy way. Not full-on making out with you or anything.” Keefe pauses, and two things shift in the meantime: Keefe’s facial expression tipping off of panic into thoughtfulness, and Dex’s facial color gradually sliding from its pale base color to a blush that only gets more vivid as Keefe talks. “Though I probably wouldn’t complain if we made out, but it’s not something I’m yearning for every second of every day or anything. The possibility only just hit me, after all. I want it if you want it, I mean. But if you don’t, I’m all good. We’re all good.” 

Dex blinks. Throws all caution to the wind, and thinks about it. Thinks about whether or not he’d like that kind of kissing from Keefe. Keefe would most likely start slow, because that feels like a Keefe thing to do, so Dex imagines that. Imagines how he might feel if they were whispering to directly into each other’s ears instead of each other’s imparters, if Keefe pulled him in for a kiss instead of keeping his distance without compromising himself—

—and almost immediately thinks No thanks. Which is a little odd, since he likes the way Keefe looks and acts, but his stomach hollows out at the idea of another mouth moving over his, no matter how kind the intention. Mashing two mouths together is an overrated display of affection hyped up too much by mom’s romcoms and other romance enthusiasts is the explanation for it that pops up into Dex’s head. The lack of spark or pull that Dex feels towards kissing in general plus the weirdness of textures and germs interacting through mouth to mouth contact probably factors into his opinion too.

Overriding that kind of mind and body instinct feels wrong, so Dex offers up more honesty to Keefe. “I think I’ll pass on the kissing. Making-out kissing, at least. Kissing anyone makes me feel weird—a bad kind of weird, if you get what I mean.” 

“Sir yes sir!” Keefe barks out, giving him a cheesy salute, and Dex giggles. “Thank you for making it easier to make my brain shut up about kissing you. The identity crisis prevention is appreciated.” 

“Of course, of course,” Dex jests. “But for the record, I don’t think you potentially wanting to kiss boys in general is a bad thing. As long as they’re good for you, y’know?” 

Quiet overlays Keefe’s demeanor, and Dex can practically hear the gears in his brain turning. Processing. Then Keefe gives a small smile and says, “Thanks, Dex. I’ll keep it in mind. Buuuuuut,” Keefe claps his hands suddenly, and Dex nearly jumps out of his skin. “I’m not in the mood for heavy introspection right now! Soooo…maybe you could tell me about the things I said that you’d be okay and not okay with instead? For the sake of, like, boundaries and stuff.” 

“Ah, yes. Discussing boundaries when we’re both sleep deprived and not thinking straight. Incredibly intelligent move.” 

Dex apparently didn’t put enough lightheartedness into his deadpan, because Keefe scrambles to backtrack. “I mean, yeah, you have a point, we can do that sometime later in daylight, or later, or never. Whatever you feel like. No worries.” 

“I was joking. We can and probably should talk about it now, even if we’re not 100% functioning,” Dex reassures. 

“Okay. Um. Where do you want to start?” 

Dex references his mental conversation prep list, and plucks out a relevant item he hasn’t used yet. (He will use the sunshine comment before the end of this hail, or so help him.) “Can we talk about the whole ‘basically wanting a repeat of the eckodon ride’ thing? Because in the moment you seemed pretty eager to end that, and I’m simultaneously confused and curious at your…change of heart, so to speak.” 

A hypothesis Dex will never be able to test the accuracy of: If Keefe weren’t under the weak starlight of his bedroom walls and somewhere brighter in this moment, Dex would be able to see a flush crawling over Keefe’s ears. Perhaps even over his cheeks, too. The musing is based on evidence—the hand running through Keefe’s bedhead, the loaded exhale, the averted gaze, the upper teeth worrying his lower lip. 

Anxiously, Keefe chants strings of swears under his breath before composing himself a little. “First things first, just to know how much of my dignity I’m losing here at whatever time of night it is right now, can you tell me how often you think about the eckodon ride? And what you think of it, if you do think of it at all?” 

Oh god. Dex had not prepped for actually talking about that. At all. 

So much for not floundering later on in the conversation, he curses his past self. 

“Do you want me to start right now and then just pause and backtrack when I word things wrong, or do you want me to try and get things sorted out before I talk?” Clarification and a counterattack, a delay of the inevitable. 

“Take your time,” Keefe murmurs. 

Dex does. While Keefe breathes in a purposeful pattern he messes up every now and then, Dex rearranges the scramble of thoughts in his head until every piece is in the right place. And then he double checks to make sure it’s right. And when he thinks Maybe I should triple check, he forces the words out into a freefall and hopes that when they collide into the connection between him and Keefe, it won’t hurt. “Before I get into emotional vulnerability, I would like to say that I still stand by my opinion that your breath stunk. You need to invest in having carry-on breath mints at all times, dude.” 

Keefe bursts out laughing, and it’s everything from playful ocean waves curling and splashing at his lower legs on a shoreline walk to distant melodies whispered in the wind. “I’ll do that, next time I go out,” Keefe promises, and for now, only Dex will ever know how big it is to hear Keefe make plans for a more social future he said he’d given up on at the beginning of these nighttime hails. “But only if you do too. Because I swear, your breath rivaled gulon farts, my guy.” 

But only if you do too. My guy. It softens Dex like the glow of the stars outside his window. His smile is a crescent in the dark. “Fine, fine, I will. Maybe I’ll make my own and hail you so you can watch alchemy antics.” 

“Please do. But finish talking first.” 

Dex takes a deep breath. “Okay. Uh. Where was I?” 

“Emotional vulnerability, I think?” 

Exhale, trace back to which thought he left off on, and go. Hurtle out of comfort and into the brilliantly terrifying unknown. Speak before the end of the fall. “Right, emotional vulnerability time. I don’t think of the eckodon ride every second of every day or anything. But it pops up from time to time. More often when I’m talking to you, of course, but it’s not like I can hear whale songs or see Z-shaped objects without at least briefly thinking about it. As for what I think of the eckodon ride, I think…” Dex falters. Stumbles. His carefully constructed thoughts flutter just out of reach. 

What was I thinking earlier? What have I thought about it before? “I think it was nice. Confusingly nice, but nice. I felt—it felt—it was different. A lot more physical contact than I was used to. And I guess I liked looking at you close up more than I was willing to admit before. Noticing little details was interesting—like how long your eyelashes are, since I didn’t really have anywhere to look but your eyes and I usually try to look close to people’s eyes but not quite since I get distracted by their eyes when they talk if I make eye contact, but we weren’t talking, and I just got to look, and—ugh, I’m rambling. That sounds weird. My words aren’t, I dunno what the word is—wording? Right? That’s wrong, but whatever. My words aren’t wording. You get what I mean.” 

Dex drags his hands down his face, and grimaces at the light layer of sweat that’s built up there in such a small amount of time. Has the freefall ended yet? Will his stomach please stop hollowing out? 

The freefall crashes to an end, and Dex slips out of the wind into into safe waters when Keefe asks, “So you didn’t mind how close we were the whole time?” 

With only the moon as a witness, the timidness in Keefe’s voice is clear. With only the moon as a witness, all the air empties out of Dex’s lungs when he says “I didn’t really mind, but I thought you did,” into what feels like six feet underneath the sky. 

Thuds pulse loudly in his veins and ears in the real silence. Every gentle slide of fabric moving with the crests and troughs of Dex’s breathing feels like the edge of too much, but Dex doesn’t know which side of the edge it falls onto. Staring at his imparter is too much now, too, so he turns his face into his pillow and swipes his thumb back and forth across his sheets as a nearly futile distraction from his frazzled senses. 

Keefe reels him out of it, out of the increasingly weird stimulation levels and the imaginary water. “I didn’t really mind either, and I didn’t know what to do with that, so I shoved you away and jumped to something that I understood. And then I tried not to think about it. Which worked for a while, but then Loamnore happened, and now it’s really hard to not think about how much I miss being close to people, which makes it extra hard to not think about the eckodon ride when I’m around you, and now we’re here.”

A hum vibrates in Dex’s throat; it resonates with all the gadgets scattered around his room on sleep mode. “So originally, you didn’t want to fully process the eckodon ride, but now that you have, you miss that kind of proximity?” 

“Yes,” Keefe breathes out a syllable and longing. 

“That makes sense,” Dex nods to himself. 

Contemplation lulls talking from either end of the line to sleep for a little while, but not Dex. Yet. At some point, Dex’s imparter slipped so that he couldn’t see Keefe and Keefe couldn’t see him. Not focusing on the changes in his expressions and environment, when it’s so late and quiet and Dex woke up at 2am yesterday and hasn’t slept since, makes it a little difficult to stay awake. 

“So if I end up being able to handle touching people at some point in the future,” Keefe starts, and Dex starts at the sudden verbalism and the hope in his voice that they both thought he’d lost, “kissing you is a no, but hugs are a yes?” 

“Hugs are a yes,” Dex agrees. 

“What about, um—” Keefe stops short. 

Laziness compels Dex to flick his imparter upright with telekinesis instead of just reaching over and grabbing it. He raises an eyebrow at Keefe. “What about what?” 

Dex is the furthest thing the elvin world knows to an empath, and yet. And yet. He can feel Keefe’s embarrassment through the countless miles separating Rimeshire and Splendor Plains. Keefe’s almost completely buried beneath blankets, pressed deep enough into his pillow that only some messy blond tufts are visible. 

“This is so stupid,” Keefe grumbles into fabric. 

“I think this is rather funny, actually. Hilarious, even,” Keefe can’t see Dex’s shit-eating grin. “Share with the class, Keefe. How were you gonna finish that sentence? Be honest,” 

(Dex turns down his imparter volume to the lowest setting. Just in case a certain froster is wandering around the halls with those silent mom feet of hers and walks in at the worst time possible.) 

Dex thinks he hears Keefe mumble holding hands, but that seems far too innocent to be correct, so he asks, “What?” 

Keefe pops up out of his cocoon. He looks like he wants to shrivel up and disappear to somewhere that’s anywhere but near his imparter. “Holding hands. That’s how I was going to end the sentence.” 

Suspicion narrows Dex’s eyes. “Considering the kind of jokes you like to make, I feel like it takes more than the idea of holding hands to get you flustered,” 

“Not anymore,” 

Dex can’t tell if Keefe is whining or scraping the surface of loneliness that he’s shoved aside for tonight, and decides it’s a good idea to pull him away from that. He can lament his losses when the sun’s there to smatter more freckles along the bridge of his nose. “Getting back to the point—you wanted to know how I felt about you wanting to hold my hand?” 

Slowly, Keefe nods. 

“I don’t see why it’d be anything to get flustered about. We used to hold hands for light leaping all the time. Extending that doesn’t seem like a huge deal, in this hypothetical.” 

“How the fuck are you so chill about this but I’m not,” Keefe says, and yeah, he’s definitely whining now. 

Dex laughs. “My serious answer is because 1) I’m not touch starved and 2) we’re talking theoreticals, and my emotions kind of take a backseat during conversations like these so my critical thinking skills can take the wheel, since it feels like there’s no stakes since it’s all, as I said, theoretical. My joking answer, on the other hand, is because I’m cooler than you.” 

Keefe cracks a smile. “True, true,” 

“Anything else you wanted to talk about?” 

“Is there anything else I said earlier that you’re not cool with?” Keefe returns. 

“List it off again?” 

“Uhhhh…” What some humans would call Keefe’s ‘Adam’s apple’ bobs as he tips his head back and thinks. He raises one hand and flips up a finger for each item he rattles off. “Stuff we haven’t talked about yet: Me wanting to draw you a bajillion times, me wanting to paint you a bajillion times, me wanting to get into a tickle fight with you just because I like how your laugh sounds, and teeeechnically cuddling?” 

This is the kind of thing that Dex should probably have to mull over for a while, but answers come to him oddly easily. “All of those are fine, but I will warn you that I might kick you on instinct if you tickle me too much. Which isn’t that hard. My dad makes fun of me all the time for still being ticklish. He said that Dizznees usually have built up immunity to tickles by my age.” 

Keefe blinks. Numerous times. Exaggeratedly. “Normally I’d be losing my mind at you being cool with me using you as a pillow for no reason, but I’m way too stuck on tickle immunity being a thing you can build up.” 

Dex forgets to be quiet with his wheezing. “Dude, I have so many whack stories about things me and my family have done that have to do with tickling. Like, my dad said that when he was a level two he’d make elixirs specifically to give him vampire fangs so he could bite his siblings harder when they tried to tickle him,” 

The tea kettle monkey screeching hysterical laughter from before comes back with a vengeance, and Dex is very glad his imparter is as quiet as it can be without deafening Keefe out entirely. “I need the full story now,” he gasps out. 

“You’re in for a ride,” Dex says, settling into a more comfortable position on his bed. But then he remembers one thing he swore he’d say before this hail ended, and makes sure to look the camera head on when he comments, “Oh, by the way, before I don’t shut up for another three hours, good job getting some sunshine. The freckles look nice on you.” 

Horror rounds Keefe’s eyes comically. He frantically runs his fingers along his cheeks as if his aforementioned freckles were braille spelling out some awful message on his face. “You can see them?” 

“How else would I know they look nice on you?” 

Keefe groans and curls up like the roly poly bugs Dex loved to pick up as a kid. Keefe’s imparter falls forward, and the imparter screen thumps into fuzzy blackness. “I chase Bullhorn around the property so Elwin can have a break for a day one time, and this is how the world rewards me,” 

“As I basically told you already: I think it’s a great reward. Anyway. Wanna hear about just how petty my family gets or not?” 

“I’m 100% down, Dexy. Hit me with good old storytime.” 

Storytelling hasn’t ever really been Dex’s thing, but Keefe doesn’t seem to have high standards, which is nice. (The other explanation is that Dex is better at storytelling than he thinks, which he refuses to believe because he hates being wrong about anything ever.) He laughs more than Dex expected, and insists on getting his sketchbook at one point to draw out certain parts, and then they both giggle so hard they can’t breathe. They gesture and talk and talk and talk until Keefe says his throat and ribs hurt, and Dex agrees on that last part. 

Dex’s last thought before his breathing slows and evens out is some hazy musing of how nice it is that he can be Keefe’s person without having to feel hummingbirds or butterflies to get there. 

Both of their imparters are on when they fall asleep to soft whirrs and wake up to peaceful daylight.

[stingslikeabee]

For the If They Had A Kid meme, because I am so incredibly curious --

Melissa and Miles!

send me a pair name and I’ll tell you what I think it would be like if they had a child . accepting

Name: Delilah Drysdell (she could go by 'Rosfield' instead, but it all comes down to how comfortable Miles is to reclaim his identity as Elwin). Gender: Female. General appearance: There is a remarkable contrast between Delilah and her siblings - she lacks the physical strength of Clive, being smaller and more fragile-looking; but she also appears healthier and less sickly than Joshua, particularly because of the absence of any dominant gifts. Delilah has the darker hair of her parents, but inherited Miles' deep blue eyes and the fair skin of her mother. The girl has a very sweet and melodic voice and she speaks quietly, almost as if afraid to disturb those surrounding her. However, this can change significantly under certain circumstances - see below. Personality: Sweet, kind-hearted, loving, affectionate - the good qualities about Delilah are never-ending. She sounds and acts soft because she doesn't need to be tough or harsh: Delilah was born in a world that allowed her to be kind and rewarded such behavior, and as such she has a gentleness about her that is very soothing - particularly for Miles. A notable change, however, comes with injustice, unfairness and prejudice - Delilah is surprisingly vocal and grows to be agitated/loud when she sees another human suffering; her drive to be a morally upstanding citizen is a Rosfield legacy she actively seeks to protect. Special talents: Delilah excels at most domestic chores - splendid cooker, gifted gardener, a perfect little seamstress. The girl's caretaker nature is very strong - particularly because of how emphatic she is and how much she feels for the hard lives her parents were subjected to before she was born. There is an open admiration related to the heroic tales of her half-brothers and Jill, but to her, these are akin to fairytales and incredibly removed from her own reality. Delilah feels at ease offering support to others and building a better world away from the public eye. Who they like better: Miles, but only by a bit! The fact that Elwin only had male heirs and that they were both destined to grandiose but ultimately heartbreaking fates had him react differently to Delilah - for once, a child he can love without guilt or knowing that their future would cost their happiness. As such, Delilah definitely feels that love and adoration from her father, only to return it fiercely. Delilah does like Melissa, though! Her mother is a role model of sorts given her flexibility to adapt, survive and ultimately rescue others, and her bolder/fiery temper (when it is out - which is not often) is very similar to Melissa's when the former courtesan allowed herself to be dominated by emotion. Who they take after more: For those who haven't met Miles during his time as Elwin, it feels like she is more of a Melissa copy - with the right grace and manners but hiding a temper that is always ready to emerge if necessary (like anyone who carries the firebird in their hearts) and nurturing to a fault. However, the way injustice and lack of tolerance impact Delilah is very reminiscent of Elwin and his own struggles to bring about change to Rosaria. In many ways, she has adopted his most important fights and carries on in her own way. Personal Headcanon: Delilah has learned sign language - particularly because of her father. Given how severely injured Miles was on the night he almost died and the repercussions to his voice tone / ability to speak, Delilah was always very keen on ensuring communication at all times but in a manner that did not put an undue strain in Miles. That has been helpful in a number of different situations, too - trauma sometimes render people unable to talk, but signing remained as an option. She will gladly assist as an interpreter to anyone who needs help establishing communication. Faceclaim: Thomasin McKenzie.

[uridestiny]

The Warrior of the Moon Chapter 17: A white lie

Previous chapter:

https://www.tumblr.com/uridestiny/744327346981650432/the-warrior-of-the-moon?source=share

I was carrying some bags with me as I walked back home; after having helped Elwin return safely to Gridania, we went our separate ways and I took the opportunity to take the fast route to go to the markets like the last time I visited them. I bought some ingredients, at first I wasn't sure what I could prepare, not to mention that I still had to consider what ingredients my brother has in his cabin; But I still decided to bring a couple of necessary things, then more ingredients wouldn't hurt and maybe would help my brother consider more dishes to cook.

To my surprise and fortune, the cabin is in sight and I saw Adrien inside it, turning on some lights inside the cabin to provide illumination.

Seeing him from the window made me feel great relief to see him again, I sighed and tightly took the bags with me with the ingredients, after the dinner, a part of me really wished I could sleep better tonight.

¨I'm home!¨ I announced when I arrived at the cabin and opened the door.

Adrien raised his head when he was turning on the oven at home.

"Hi sister" He said, and blew into the wood that was burning inside.

¨I thought you would be back later, how was your day brother?¨ I asked.

Then I saw Adrien get up with a serious expression, he wasn't looking at me, his eyes focused on the burning flames sent by the wood he had placed inside the metal oven.

¨Adrien?¨ I asked, his silence was unusual for him.

He sighed; he really seemed upset about something. Adrien turned around and looked at me in the eyes, in them I noticed that he was worried.

“We'll talk after dinner and making the cookies” He said, trying to force a smile, but I really didn't like him doing that.

During the preparation of dinner, we remained silent, I was excited to cook with him, because I had brought ingredients to prepare one of my favorite dinners that I used to prepare with my parents, Meat Miq'abob.

Before his letter to Sharlayan arrived saying that he wouldn’t be attending the dinner, I admit that I felt a little sad and upset; especially because my intention was to prepare dinner myself, in a traditional dish that after a while I learned to prepare thanks to several weeks of practice.

But now... I felt like my fears had returned, as if a great wave full of anguish was emerging in my heart. I tried to concentrate and not think about the worst, so I simply prepared the meat and put it in the oven to cook it; While I was watching the meat I saw how my brother took out the ingredients to start preparing the cookies.

When the meat was ready, I took the skewers out of the oven and cleaned the area a little to receive the cookies in a while. I approached Adrien and helped him beat the dough while he prepared the table to place the cookie dough, with a rolling pin we spread the dough and I took out figurine molds from a bag.

Adrien laughed as he took a star mold and started making star shapes.

"I bet Aaron will give us forgiveness points if we give him some in the form of stars."

I smiled to myself, remembering how Aaron has a soft spot for the things Adrien and I do together, especially when it comes to the subject of stars. With that in mind, I looked for another mold and found one in the shape of a pine tree, I showed it to Adrien and then brought his head closer to mine, trying to show affection.

Any shape similar to trees have always been Adrien's favorites, because he has always appreciated life in nature and its beauty.

When Adrien finished using the star-shaped mold, he took out two more molds, one in the shape of a heart and the other in the shape of a circle.

I raised an eyebrow when I saw the two shapes, it wasn't usual for us to use the heart shape to make cookies, I looked at Adrien confused.

"The heart is to say how much we love each other as a family," Adrien said and then smiled to show me the circular one, pointing a finger at me.

"And these are for you, since you like the moon so much." Adrien showed a real smile.

I laughed a little at his unusual way of looking at the circle-shaped cookie on a moon. “Are you going to make it look realistic?” I joked.

"Aren't I the king of the kitchen in our family? I consider myself skilled enough to decorate cookies too, and I will give you the brightest moons just for you. " Adrien boasted of his talent in the kitchen.

I laughed again, couldn’t deny his good skill in the kitchen, but sometimes that boast bothered Aaron a lot that he even constantly questioned him if he used the recipe exactly as the book said, since he didn’t usually keep his eyes on the book with the instructions, but Adrien always defended himself by saying that "He learned well from someone else."

When I was thinking this... That I realized that Mr. Leveilleur was right, cooking these cookies together had calmed my heart and it was as if nothing bad had happened.

Once we prepared the tray to put the cookies to cook, my brother and I had dinner to eat the juicy meat on the skewer, and I felt nostalgic when I remembered that my father used to prepare them and he and I ate this together quite a bit.

I looked at my brother over the food, I saw how his eyes focused on the cookies.

¨Do you think we should save some for ourselves?¨ He asked distractedly. "I don't think Aaron would mind, after all he's not very interested in eating sugar."

I smiled at his comment.

"Believe me, he would eat a whole jar full of cookies, especially when he's so anxious, sometimes when it's too much he eats sweets to try to distract himself."

Adrien's eyes widened, truly surprised at this new information.

"He's never going to admit it, but don't tell him I told you that."

We both burst out laughing.

After dinner and cooking the cookies, the two of us dedicated ourselves to decorating the cookies with icing and sugar. To my surprise, Adrien managed to give a good design to the moon-shaped cookies that he prepared for me, I decorated the stars and some pine trees, at some point Adrien also offered to help me with half of the pine trees cookies.

When we finished, I decided to tell Adrien everything that happened that day, from my meeting with Elwin, as well as the treasure we found together after fighting some beasts.

¨Can you show me how you are raising the bow?¨ Adrien said, standing up and heading to the door.

¨Right now? Shouldn't you go to sleep soon?¨ I asked, but I followed him anyway.

"I'm fine, besides, there's still time, the night is young, let's take advantage of it." He said and motioned for me to follow him out of the cabin. I quickly grabbed my bow and arrows to follow him outside.

Adrien asked me to show him my stance and I obeyed.

"I see what the problem is" He said and then took my hand with which I was supporting the metal tip of the arrow. "The angle of your hand is inadequate, you’re shaking a lot, that's why your aim at the critical point was failing."

I looked at him again and felt him raise my hand slightly and hold it for a couple of seconds to help me not shake, then he pointed to a wooden training dummy.

"Calm down and concentrate, shoot while maintaining that angle." I heard his voice when I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. When I opened them, I focused on the doll and shot, the arrow hit what is supposed to be a person's throat.

¨Although there is a critical point, it’s always advisable to aim at the chest, the head and neck of an enemy will always be more difficult to target while you are moving.¨ Adrien said walking from one side to the other as he spoke.

¨You haven't done it wrong but you need practice¨ He concluded.

¨There are not many places to practice archery in Sharlayan brother.¨ I responded, puffing out my cheeks, it had been a long time since I used my bow and arrows in Sharyalan. Not to mention that I was rarely able to practice with my current lifestyle.

¨If you go along the shore of the island there are good places to practice, I think... It would be a good idea if you could access them now¨ Adrien said and I tilted my head a little in confusion.

He smiled and said in a cheerful tone.

"When mom and dad raised us on Sharlayan, I used to sneak out to practice using the bow and arrows in various corners of the island, and to avoid worrying them, I always used to return home early." Adrien motioned again for us to enter the cabin and then he entered to his room looking for something.

When he came out, he had a scroll in his hand and after moving some plates and cups, he spread it out on the wooden surface. It’s a map of Sharlayan with several circles drawn in ink.

"The points made here are good to practice, besides, I doubt that the students who are in the reconnaissance and espionage department will tell you anything if you go there" Adrien said. "They already know me and if you tell them that you are going to explore those areas on my behalf, they will not say anything to the Forum about your presence outside the safe zone."

I was really surprised, I had heard before from Aaron that Adrien always used to act carefree and was always anywhere but where he had to be. At first I thought it was something about character and preferences between the two, but now it had been revealed to me that my own brother had done more than just be carefree, he was very serious about what he focused on and went after it no matter what the cost.

"I didn't know you liked being a rebel, dear brother" I said, sounding sarcastic and showing a smile.

He shrugged.

¨When I was little I always really liked to explore, especially when we first arrived at Sharlayan, while my brother, as you know, has always had a great attachment to rules and obedience, I considered myself a free spirit. I really liked exploring the hidden routes of the island, because I found many ways to cross the island without being seen.¨

Adrien put the map back and handed it to me.

¨Aaron always scolded me for doing it, always saying it was dangerous and irresponsible. But I was always careful, in my own way obviously¨ Adrien winked at me and I laughed.

¨Maybe I'll tell you the story about how I reached an agreement with the intelligence and espionage reconnaissance department to wander wherever I wanted, but that will be a story for another day.¨ Adrien said smiling.

Being in Adrien's company made me feel better, it had been a long time since he and I had spent time like this, like we used to do in Sharlayan, I found it entertaining to listen to his antics and that he taught me to be stronger.

I remember looking at the time out of the corner of my eye on a clock that hangs next to the window, and wondering why Adrien hadn’t yet proceeded to clean and put everything away to go to sleep.

“Brother, are you okay?” I asked, noting how unusual it was for him to stay up late at night.

¨I'm perfectly fine... ¨ But then he yawned and ran a hand over his eyelids.

¨Adrien...¨ I crossed my arms with the map still in my hands. ¨ What's the matter?¨

He sighed defeatedly, and ran a hand through his hair before looking into my eyes, somewhat sad.

¨I received another letter from Aaron, this time I decided to read it¨ He said and then shifted his eyes to his jacket resting on the couch. ¨In the letter... He asked me to take you to Limsa Lominsa for you to take a boat back, there is even a ticket in the letter envelope.¨

I looked at Adrien perplexed, I couldn't believe that Aaron had quickly managed to get a new ticket to go straight to Sharlayan.

¨I wanted... I wanted to spend more time with you, but I don't think it's possible now...¨

This was wrong, I wasn't upset that Aaron had gotten a ticket to send me straight home, but that Adrien had given in so easily I couldn't believe it. He's never been the type of person to give in easily to his own brother's demands, and he proved that to me yesterday... What had changed?

¨Adrien...¨ I tried to formulate some words, but I couldn't find a way to express what I felt, the anger, the confusion and the sadness of leaving as soon as the sun came out.

¨I'm very sorry Destiny, but it's already decided...¨ He still didn't look at me as he spoke ¨I'll take you to Caroline Canopy early in the morning so you can take the first flight on the airship to Limsa Lominsa.¨​

¨It doesn't make sense!¨ I screamed.

Adrien was surprised by my outburst, but quickly regained his composure.

¨Destiny...¨ Adrien started but I interrupted him.

¨Let me read the letter! What did Aaron tell you that made you so easily agree to listen to him?¨ I shouted again, slammed the table leaving the map there, and clenched my fists tightly, waiting for answers.

Adrien continued to remain silent and frowned.

¨Why don't you say anything?...¨ My anger began to fade at Adrien's silence, and I felt a great wave of sadness.

¨...It's a decision that Aaron and I made together, I already sent him a response, I wrote that I agreed to take you back home.¨ Heextended a hand and placed it on my shoulder. ¨If the circumstances were different, I would fight over and over again for you to stay here with me, but that's not the case... All Aaron and I want is to take care of you...¨

¨I DON'T NEED TO BE TREATED LIKE A CHILD!¨ I screamed again, pushing his hand off my shoulder.

Without saying a single word, I walked at a fast pace angrily away from him and locked myself in his room.

I remember it was a difficult night, I lay down on Adrien's soft bed and wrapped myself in his sheets, they had a very peculiar woody smell, almost the smell of an oak tree; My tears fell as I let myself be enveloped by the softness of the fabric on the bed... I was too upset, not because of their decision... But for lying to me.

Adrien wasn't telling me something and Aaron seemed to have exposed him and made him feel vulnerable... That might be the only explanation...

My tears fell silently because of the anger I felt, they were few, but enough to leave small wet circles on the sheet, I closed my eyes and slowly fell asleep.

I don't remember how much time had passed while I was immersed in my dreams, but when I opened my eyes again, I saw myself again surrounded by those metal walls, with children surrounding me trembling with fear... Just like that day on Garlemald 's airship that transported us to Ala Mhigo... To then be enslaved.

¨ We are under attack!¨ The voice of a soldier was heard again.

The airship shook violently as we all struggled to stay in place, but there was something strange... The sound was different.

The shaking became stronger and the sound became louder, as if we were closer than we had been, the metal walls began to contract and space collapsed on us...

[ruiination]

@phoenix-flamed (x)

Her gaze hardens. She knew that Elwin was too soft. He was incapable of understanding what it truly meant to rule. Perhaps the lowborn could love their children foolishly and completely, but the burden upon those of higher station was toward the future. It was not to have pride in a child for his first words or steps. They were above that. Elwin consistently showed little understanding in regards to the true nature of bloodlines.

Mayhap to a lowborn, a child simply walking or talking was notable. But to nobles, there had to be more. Words had to be perfect, speech eloquent, movements graceful. These were traits passed down in the blood of the worthy. If a child fell short, parents had to correct them. If the child was not able to be corrected, then they were better off dead.

Their firstborn had caused her unimaginable agony during pregnancy and birth. The only thing that could have redeemed him was being the Phoenix. The one worthy of becoming the Archduke. The sole reason she and Elwin had been made to marry. And yet, he had fallen short. Clive was utterly worthless. He struggled with his temperament. He did not consider his station. Clive might as well have been born a lowborn. The fact that her blood flowed in his veins drove her mad. She wished only to see the very blood in his body, to see why he had been so flawed. Was she to blame? Was it Elwin? Perhaps there was something fundamentally wrong with Clive himself. Neither of her children were perfect, and it enraged her. Though, with care, Joshua would flourish. If he did as she said, he would be perfect. If his health stayed the way it was, she would be a faithful advisor to him.

"The archdukes does not need to go into other territories just to bring stray animals back with him." Of course, she speaks of the newest addition to their household. The girl from the north. He expects her to care for her as if she is her own child? The daughter of savages and criminals. As if one disgusting dog under her roof wasn't enough.

"He is not worthy of the Rosfield name." She states. Her own emotions boiled within her, but Anabella had always been taught that women only show emotions when it suited them. Unlike the men that were so often slaves to it.

"He may be blood, but he is not my son. My son would not have been rejected by the Phoenix. My son would be better with his lessons. He wouldn't spend all day playing with wooden swords getting filthy. He would not be helping those in the stables tend to the Chocobos like some kind of commoner." She had given birth to him, but she could not consider him her son. There was no maternal feelings that warmed her heart upon seeing him.

"So he is to be rewarded for his tendency to shrug off lessons and play knight?" She lets out a bitter chuckle. "Promise with a sword? He may as well be a lowborn nobody. Perhaps he can stay at the barracks and keep from darkening our home and exposing our dear son to his filth."

[flamesofrebirths]

@creatrix-mea said: i wasn't expecting this from you ( from mom in her resurrection verse :3 ) PROMPTS FOR PEOPLE WHO AREN'T USED TO KINDNESS | ACCEPTING

Well, the truth is that Clive and Joshua argued a bit about this. After all that Anabella had done, Joshua truly couldn't let her die. He saw both of his parents dying right in front of him, and he's stronger now, and he knows how to use his powers properly. Maybe there was nothing he could do to save Elwin, but he decided to heal Anabella, to give her a chance to redeem herself. Because she's not as bad as what she seemed in the past years. Joshua just knew it.

And maybe using his powers slowly kill him, but he has Ultima inside his chest, too. And he fears the effects of Ultima much more than the ones of Phoenix powers.

He shakes his head, then offers Anabella a soft smile. "Mother. I could not let you die." He understands why it maybe surprises her, to know that he chose to save her. But he doesn't regret it at all. "... I missed you, and I had just gotten you back."

[fire-branded]

Slowly, Miles's arms unfolded. One hand raised to rest beneath his chin in thought as he listened to his younger son. I can see why Cidolfus and he were such good friends, he wanted to agree -- but perhaps that too sentimental, and too presumptuous. Which is to say that he refrained.

Another soft, lighthearted laugh arose from him, and he did nod. "He is one of the best. You should speak with him sometime -- and if you ever find free time to spare, he can always use another helping hand, or point you in the direction of someone who does."

Of course, Joshua was by no means obligated to help around Hideaway. But his father figured it might give him something different to set his mind upon for a time; a change of pace, so to speak. And, on a more selfish note... it would keep Joshua here just a little bit longer, that the two might have more opportunities to speak like this.

Not that Elwin was opposed to visiting Joshua.

The question did catch him off-guard, enough so that it elicited a gasp. His brows rose, head raised, and for a scant few moments, he stared not at the other, but through him. It was a subject he hadn't put too much thought into, and no one had ever asked about his preferences before now. Probably because, understandably, it had never mattered. His course had already been set the moment he had been born, as the first child of the Archduke; no matter how loving his parents may have been towards him and Byron, it didn't change the fact that his purpose in life had been to sire the next Dominant of Phoenix.

Once more his brows did furrow, but this time, the smile held a sadder tone to it, even as he reached out to lightly bump his fist against Joshua's chest.

"I ..." The hesitation in answering was not because he was laying bare something so deeply personal to another person, but because it meant admitting it to himself. A deep breath was sucked in. The hand withdrew back to his side, only for his arms to once again be folded across his chest, where fingers ran back and forth along his forearms. "... I like men and women, but ... my preference has always been men, yes." A nervous shuffle, and another averting of his gaze. "However, my preference is, above all else, just... to be loved."

Joshua nodded slowly. Strange as the conversation might have felt, there was something decidedly natural and human about it. Two people discussing someone that one of them loved. Wasn't that the core of most human conversations? Wasn't it normal to want to open up and talk about the person you loved to someone else you cared about?

He couldn't recall conversations like this growing up. Not that he ever expected or wanted either parent to talk about their newest crush, but... even about one another. Never was there a word said about their love for each other, just the duties that they needed to perform.

"I've seen how he cares about the Hideaway and everyone in it. He seems like a good man." Joshua himself had never really interacted with him much. It always felt like he would be overstepping himself; working with Otto was for Clive or Jill, for the two who had been with the Hideaway for years now. Joshua was still the outsider, the tag-along little brother, the one who would eventually vanish once his purpose with them was done.

But he did have another question. He knew that people could easily love both men and women; that was him, after all. But he had never suspected his father would as well. "With mother... I mean... was it just because of... you had to, or... is Otto what you... prefer?"

[stellarune]

ok but

we all love human aus

and high school aus

so i raise you

elwin, who is the school nurse, and his husband, huz, who is the school therapist

keefe, who has been coming in more and more often over the weeks to see elwin

he isnt injured, or sick, he just. comes in, grab and blanket and sleep on one of the cots

or sometimes on the floor, even though there are free cots

and obviously, elwin is worried, because this 16 years old kid, who he sees everyday because he says hello and goodbye, and sometimes needs a place to hide or an alibi after a prank just. doesnt do that anymore. bot really

he looks exhausted, and elwin has tried to talk to him about it to know if hes sleeping ok, if hes not working himself too hard, but he never got an answer jeefe just flashing him a smile and coming up with some excuse

he wants to help, but hes afraid that if hes just straightforward with him keefe would lose the safespace that is the infirmary and he doesnt want to take that away from him.

one day, keefe walks in, not saying hello, just looking particularily rough, deep bags under his eyes, blotchy skin like hed been crying.

he falls face first into the cot, and elwin can see he isnt sleeping, still.

and he wants to do as he said he would to let h come at his own pace, and all that, but fuck he looks like he really needs a hug

elwin sits down on the cot, and keefe pushes himself up to sit besides him.

"do you want a hug ?" keefe nods and buries his face in elwins chest, who holds him tight for as long as he needs to.

keefe doesnt talk about why this is happening, but from then on, he just goes straight to hug elwin if he needs it (and elwin isnt like,helping someone) (if he is, keefe just crashes on the bed, and elwin comes to see if he needs like, cuddles or something as soon as hes done)

(just. parental elwin ok)

if he needs to be with someone, because on a whim, elwin gave him a key to the infirmary

he hopes keefe doesnt have to use it outside of school, but sometimes you gotta be prepared for the worst, and he still doesnt know exactly what is going on

keefe doesnt talk much about anything when hes in the infirmary, just dozes off so

anyways, he meets lord and lady sencen during the aprent teacher thing, and everything clicks

he runs into them in a hall, while theyre talking about just how bad keefe did that year, only "scraping a 97 in some classes" and he doesnt know exactly what these people have been telling keefe but hes this close to punching them right then and there

he makes a point of letting keefe know just how smart his teachers knew him to be, and that most of them didnt mind him not being in class if he was bored, as long as he did the tests and turned in his assignments, which he did

also how all the pranks that had been pulled on alina had become a running joke amongst them. how she was the only one who didnt know it was keefe pulling the pranks, but everyone else found them hillarious

fintan, bronte tiergan prentice come in sometimes as well

fintan is deseperatly trying to get keefe back on his play, prentice finds keefe to be the only one worthy to talk with him about art, and bronte and tiergan are just here by proxy

(and to keep their husband/brother in check)

(they went to school with keefes parents, and honestly theyre all this close to coming beat thel up in their sleep, but fintan and prentice are just a bit closer to actually dping it)

one day, what elwin really didnt want to hapen happened. keefe was already ther when he opened the infirmary

he could have just come in eatly or whatever, but he was wearing the exact same clothes as the day before

and he knew keefe had friends that would take him in if he asked them to, but he also knew keefe probably didnt want them to know somethi g had hapened

"do you want to caome stay with me ?" he asks when keefe blinks awake.

he didnt really mind keefe sleeping in the infirmary, even though it was proably forbidden by the school or whatever, but the cots were kinda uncomfortable

hes surprised keefe agrees

he drives them to the sencens first, so keefe can grab clothes, phone, laptop, and anything else he needs, then to his place

thankfulky he has a guest bedroom

keefe seriously cannot stop thanking him and he really doesnt need to elwin tells him, he offered after all, and he wouldnt have done so if he didnt want keefe to be there

what was probably supposed to be a few days turns into a month, then two, and honestly elwin doesnt mind (at all)

just, lzt this boy heal in peace

gisela wants to get him back, though, after a while

and she would have the upper land, both legally and emotionally if keefe sisnt just straight up refuse to see her

and she knows she doesnt have that many chances to win a lawsuit if keefe hadnt been home in 2 months and is testifying againt them

so yeah, elwin just recieves a bunch of death threats, but he can deal with that, and he has cameras installed that send a live feed to his friend tinker wjo lives a few states away so he feels pretty safe knowing they wouldnt be able to destroy the tapes

keefe doesnt come in to the infirmary nearly as much these days, and he looks less tired as well

he joins the school play, and prentice reports that hes been using the art room a bunch as well

fintan helps him prank alina again

bonus :

the first time keefe calls elwin dad was as a joke

"okayo daddy-o"

neither of them aknowledge it , but they bith know it happe.ed and honestly they arent mad about it

the moment it really starts to be a Thing for them though, is the next year, at the parent teacher conference, when keefe gives him the invite.

"you know, since.... youre basically my dad now."

"ill be there son"

keefe sends him a 10 hour loop of the "you are my dad" vine for fathers day

they dont really bother with guardianship, because keefe will be 18 the year after, and his "parents" havent tried anything in months

even the threats stopped

elwin definitely walks keefe dosn the aisle

[cogaytes]

Family Remedy

here it is: my secret santa for @ahyesitsshmeegus :D thank you to @song-tam for organizing!

my prompt was to let keefe be happy for once, so here’s a little drabble for an au where elwin and keefe are half siblings. they’re brothers your honor :]

--

Elwin is too young to bear the weight of the world—the weight of his father's expectations—but he does so anyway. The Sencen name holds a certain weight to it, he's been assured, and his actions must reflect that. He mustn't be too loud, too foolish, too stupid. But he holds his head high, like his father, and he shows no weakness, and he gets through the day however he has to.

Elwin is still far too young when he rushes home from the Silver Tower to find his mother on her deathbed. He's by her side, too, when she succumbs three days later. It was a rare illness, the physician tells him, something whose cure was beyond the reach of even the best of elven medicine. Elwin decides from that moment that he will change this. Flashing—the last gift she gave him—makes him especially suited for being a physician, lending itself well to this personal quest. Leaping straight to Foxfire after her planting, he throws himself into the biological studies; he graduates from the elite levels with the promise of an internship under the best of elven physicians. It takes him ten years, but he does manage to find a cure for her illness. No more elven children will lose a parent.

What he does not manage to find a cure for, however, is his father's grief. It changes him. He's sharper, now. More quick to anger. He marries again within six years—a tall woman with a haughty tilt to her chin. The new stepmother, Lady Gisela, doesn't particularly care for Elwin. He doesn't particularly care for her either, and as glares from his father turn into screaming matches and broken vases, he gives up on tolerating either of them. The new house he builds for himself is called Splendor Plains, and it's strange in the most perfect, most Elwin way imaginable. His father will never visit him there.

***

Eighteen years later, Elwin sets foot in Candleshade for the first time in a decade. He takes a moment to adjust his appearance: his hair, tied back in a neat ponytail at the nape of his neck. His tunic, the only one he owns without some sort of animal pattern, carefully selected to best adhere to his father's selective standards of grooming. This is not the time for starting a fight…not if he wants to meet his baby brother.

Keefe is a scrap of a thing, lanky for two years old, with a wide grin plastered across his face and limbs that always seem to end up in places he hadn't meant them to. His energy is boundless, and Elwin feels more than sees his father's frown as the two of them watch him bounce around the room. He doesn't let that stop him from dropping to one knee and meeting Keefe's eyes across the room. 

"Hey," he murmurs. Keefe seems suspicious of him, eyeing him warily as Elwin tries for a smile. "I'm Elwin. Your brother." Though Keefe shrinks away slightly as Elwin brings his arm out from behind his back, his eyes widen at the stuffed gulon. He toddles over and reaches for it. Elwin chuckles. "Like her?" Keefe's toothy smile is more than enough answer. He gently lifts the gulon from Elwin's outstretched hands and runs his stubby fingers over the soft plush. "You want to name her, then?"

Keefe pauses to consider. A wicked smirk slowly grows across his face, and he proclaims, "Mrs. Stinkbottom!" Elwin can't help but laugh, both at Keefe's self-assured declaration and the twin looks of horror on his father and Lady Gisela's faces.

"Absolutely not," Lord Cassius snarls. "Give me that." 

Elwin manages to intercept his father before he gets to Keefe. "Here, Keefe. Let me keep her safe for you." It's a struggle to keep tugging the newly christened Mrs. Stinkbottom from Keefe's grasp as his little brother's eyes fill with tears.

"No!" he yells, "I want her! Give her back!"

Elwin gives him the closest thing to a comforting smile he can manage. He feels a swell of rage rising in his stomach, and it's all he can do to tie it in a knot and shove it back down. Anger won't do him any good. Not in front of Keefe. Not right now.

"I'll take care of her for you," he says instead, "I promise." Keefe shoots him a glare full of spite and suffering. He storms from the room, and Elwin can hear his stomps echo as he unleashes the full force of his fury on every single stair in the place. For a moment, he and his father and his stepmother only stare at each other.

"What were you thinking? Bringing him foolish crap like that?" growls Lord Cassius at last.

Elwin takes another deep breath, and when he speaks again, it’s in the mildest tone he can muster. "Stuffed animals aren't foolish. I still carry mine around."

"And you shouldn't; it's improper—"

"Honestly, do you let the kid have any sort of—"

"Elwin Sencen," his father thunders.

When Elwin smiles, it's cold as ice. "It's Heslege now, actually."

Cassius Sencen is speechless. For once in his life. "What—since when?"

"Since I moved out." It's hard to keep satisfaction from bleeding through in the edges of his voice, so he gives in to the urges to gloat. "Now, it's been wonderful catching up with you, but I really must be off. I've been appointed Physician at Foxfire, you see, and it comes with all sorts of important duties. Gisela, you're a royal pain as always." With all the dignity he can muster, he sweeps from the room.

***

Elwin doesn't see Keefe again until he's a Level One. He barely recognizes his little brother when he bounds into the Healing Center, all wheeling arms and legs and self-assured smirks. But his energy slows to a dull murmur when he locks eyes with Elwin. 

"Oh," he mutters, staring at the ground, "it's you."

Elwin can't help but smile, despite the teen's sullen attitude. "Hey, Keefe." Keefe doesn't look up, so Elwin busies himself studying his brother's form for any sign of whatever injury's brought him here. He also can't help but check for bruises. Just in case. "So, what happened?"

"What?" Keefe finally raises his head, but still refuses to meet Elwin's gaze.

"To bring you here. You're injured, right?"

"Oh. That." Keefe shuffles his feet. "My Elven History session was really boring and I didn't want to go." And Elwin would hear the lie in his voice without noticing the way he hid his left hand behind his back.

"Show me." Keefe produces the offending hand grudgingly. Elwin whistles at the long, deep cut slicing across his palm. "How'd you manage that one?"

"Universe." Keefe's grunted answer is all Elwin needs; he's treated more than enough mishaps from that particular class. Bustling between shelves and cabinets, Elwin searches the racks for the particular ointment he likes to use for cuts from broken glass.  He stops to give Bullhorn a scratch under the chin before he returns to his patient.

"Oh, have you met Bullhorn?" he adds, hoping to distract Keefe as he applies the gooey purple paste to Keefe's cut. It's not enough, though, to prevent Keefe's subtle wince at the initial sting of the ointment. 

"Bullhorn?" asks Keefe, and the banshee yawns at the sound of his name. "Whoa, you've got a pet banshee? That's awesome!" And this, this is the bright Keefe Elwin knows and loves.

Elwin grins. "Right?"

"How long've you had him?" He reaches for Bullhorn, and to Elwin's shock, Bullhorn lets him pat his head.

"'Bout a year. He likes you, you know. Doesn't usually let anyone but me touch him."

Keefe rips his hand away as if he's been burned. "Oh."

"Say, Keefe, how're you—"

But Keefe is already getting up and backing towards the door. "Thanks for the stuff for my hand. See you." He turns and sprints from the room before he's even made it over the threshold.

***

Keefe doesn't come back to the Healing Center for the rest of the year, and all of Level Two. It's not till the beginning of Level Three that he comes in dragging Sophie Foster. Keefe with Sophie is the most comfortable Elwin's ever seen him in his own skin, and Elwin is grateful for her—both for that, and for bringing Keefe back into his life with her frequent Healing Center trips.

Midterms brings a more unpleasant family member back into his life: Cassius Sencen. He's just passing through the hallways when he overhears the elf. He's yelling—of course he's yelling—at Keefe, who stares at his shoes with hunched shoulders. He's not quite cowering, but he's not quite standing tall and defiant either. Gisela stands next to him, and Elwin can catch her murmuring something about "A 92 isn't so—" and "Let the boy be."

It's not even a conscious decision he makes to intervene. With three long strides, he's planted himself in between his father and his little brother. He's several inches shorter, but he'll be damned if he can't manage a threatening glare nonetheless. "Well, Father dearest. What's going on here, exactly?"

"These are Sencen matters," Cassius spits, and it's obviously meant to be some sort of great, crushing blow. Elwin brushes it off like nothing.

"You're screaming at my brother in the middle of the hallway." Elwin cocks his head, an unspoken challenge lingering in the air. "I'd like you to stop, please."

Cassius recoils at that last word, barbed as it was meant to be. "I can speak to my son any way I like."

Elwin keeps his voice soft. Dangerously so. "Allow me to rephrase that: Fuck. Off. You treat Keefe like shit, and you don’t deserve to breathe the same air as him, let alone speak to him that way. He will not be burdened by your presence any longer, as he and I are leaving. Goodbye." And before he can talk himself out of it, he grabs Keefe's arm and marches him off to the Healing Center, leaving Cassius and Gisela sputtering in their wake.

He knows he's done the right thing, though, when Keefe flips his parents the bird as they hurry away.

***

"Are you okay?" is the first question Elwin asks Keefe when they arrive at the Healing Center.

"Yeah," Keefe breathes, as if he can't believe what he just saw happen. "That was amazing."

Elwin chuckles. "It certainly felt good."

"The looks on their faces," Keefe crows, punching the air with both fists. He flops backwards onto a cot, staring dreamily at the ceiling.

"What was he so mad about?"

"Eh, my midterm grades. Got a 92 in Elven History."

Elwin shakes his head, burying his face in his hands. "That's an excellent grade."

"Not enough for Daddy dearest," Keefe mutters darkly. He tosses a pillow at the wall. Elwin catches it as it bounces off.

"Believe me, I know," he says gently. "I grew up with him, same as you." Keefe looks away. "I'm sorry, Keefe. I should have been there."

"Doesn't matter. He would've kicked you out anyway even if you'd tried to visit." But the hunch to his shoulders tells a different story. Elwin reaches for him.

"I should have been there anyway." Keefe freezes at his touch—doesn't pull away, but doesn't lean into it either. "I'd like to be there starting now, though, if that's okay."

His little brother lets out a breath, and then shifts on the cot, letting Elwin's hug take his weight for him. "Okay," he breathes, and wraps his arms around Elwin.

They sit there, for a moment, just enjoying getting to hug one another for the first time. Then Elwin gets up. "I have something for you."

"Is it a tunic that says Lord Awesomeness? Or a stink bomb? Or a—" His guesses are cut off by the sight of the green, sparkly gulon plushie Elwin pulls out of the cabinet. "No way—" he breathes.

"Remember Mrs. Stinkbottom?" 

Keefe reaches for her, and Elwin's heart warms watching his brother trace his fingers over her the way he had that first night. "You kept her?"

Elwin's mouth opens to reply, but the hot tears suddenly filling his eyes nearly prevent the words from getting out. "Of course. She's yours, now. Always was, always will be."

"Dad won't let me have her," Keefe mumbles.

"Keefe, you think I'm letting you go back there?" 

The other boy gapes at him. "He'll be mad, and—"

"I just told him to fuck off; he's already mad enough." Keefe manages a laugh at that reminder. "But it doesn't matter, Keefe. I don't want you in his home anymore." His brother mumbles something. "Sorry?"

"Haven't got anywhere else to go," Keefe repeats, louder this time, and Elwin's heart just about breaks.

"Move in with me," he begs fiercely, "come live with me at Splendor Plains. You and Mrs. Stinkbottom both." 

Keefe raises his eyes to meet Elwin's, filled with a fragile sort of hope. "Really?"

"Of course." Elwin pulls him into another hug and Keefe melts into the touch, resting his head on his brother's shoulder despite being the taller of the two, and after a moment Elwin feels tears soaking through his tunic. Mrs. Stinkbottom is still clutched tightly in Keefe's right hand. And Elwin holds him, content just to have his brother in his arms.

After a moment, Keefe giggles softly.

"What?" Elwin asks. 

A wicked grin spreads across Keefe’s face. "Let me be there when you tell Dad."

Elwin tries for a wry smile. "I can try to make that happen." Meeting Keefe's eyes, he ruffles his hair, and his brother yelps in mock-indignation.

"Hey, Elwin?" he asks after a second.

"Yeah?"

"Love you."

His smile is wet, but Elwin still manages, "Love you, too."

[keeper-of-the-lost-dadwin]

The pain of remembering is worth the danger of forgetting

@creetchure I was your secret Santa

Elwin was forgetful. He had been since he was born and would continue to be until his wanderling had sprouted. He could forget just about anything.

He would forget whether or not he had grabbed his schoolbooks. He could misplace things resting in his hand. He would repeat actions over and over again, caught in an endless cycle. He had tried to overcome it; little scribbled notes had once surrounded him. Alas, they weren’t much help when he ended up putting off and consequently forgetting to write down his reminders.

So, he went on being as forgetful as ever, gradually adjusting to it. He resolved to look on the bright side, there was no harm in double checking after all. He had an eternity to live, five minutes searching for a tunic was merely a blink of an eye.

When moving to splendor plains, it was easier to manage. His official doctor stuff was organized throughout the manor. His personal belongings were kept in a separated, homier wing. This meant nothing traveled too far.

One thing he still forgot about was food. He forgot to eat most nights, usually spent refining some remedy or other. This habit was quite enabled by the arrival of one Sophie foster. Even if he ate three meals a day, his food would spoil long before he had reached the end of it.

Food wasn’t sold to be eaten occasionally by questionably healthy bachelors. It was sold to be eaten by families with many stomachs to fill. So he let it rot, only getting rid of it once the odor became unbearable. As neglected as anything else in his home.

Then came a certain Keefe Sencen. He was just a kid, no more than a baby really. His seventeen years were nothing compared to Elwin’s centuries. Yet those 17 years had been filled with so much pain.

None of which he deserved. He was a great kid, as full of mischief as he was. He was kind and smart, despite what his parents had told him. He deserved the world, but Elwin couldn’t give him that, despite how much he wanted to. What Elwin could give him was a gentle, loving home.

And so he did. A home filled with soft words of praise, filled with love and safety. A home where Keefe wouldn’t need to worry about being good enough, where he could just be himself.

Part of that included giving him good food. Fresh fruits and pastries that would fill him up. There would be no more days of forgetting to eat, not with a kid to take care of.

He had come home early one evening, not having to tempt bullhorn from anyone that day. It was the least stressed he’d felt in a while, without the looming threat of death hanging over one of his kids.

He passed keefe getting a snack as he went to his room to change. He glanced at his plate and immediately knew something was off. He ignored it, thinking it was nothing urgent.

He took off his work clothes and put on comfy pajamas. He had no expectation of going to bed anytime soon but getting comfortable a bit early never hurt anyone.

He went to the kitchen to make himself a snack, willing to put off making dinner that much longer. He sat down with his food and greeted his son.

He took a better look at what he was eating. There were bits of mold on the edges of his food. Keefe wasn’t eating with his eyes closed, so he had to have known it was there.

Elwin felt queasy. How long had keefe been eating rotten food? How much had he eaten? Even if he hadn’t gotten sick didn’t mean there wasn’t a risk now. How horrible of a parent did he have to be not to notice it? Why would Keefe be eating rotten food even after Elwin had made sure there was always fresh food in the house?

He realized he had zoned out for too long. He shook himself out of his stupor to actually fix the problem. Worrying wouldn’t help Keefe, wouldn’t make him stop.

“There’s mold on that, darling,” Keefe finally looked up from his plate, startled by the sudden breaking of the comfortable silence. 

“You’ll get sick if you eat that”

He looked like a cornered animal, a guilty expression painted on his face. “I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to eat the rest of the food in the pantry. The kind that wasn’t rotten. I thought you would get mad,”. He looked sheepish, as if this was in any way his fault.

Elwin couldn’t believe it. Keefe thought that Elwin would get mad at him for eating. Eating the food Elwin had specifically gotten for him. How could Keefe believe that? Who had made him believe that taking care of himself was something bad? 

He knew the answer to that of course. He knew all too well how Keefe’s “parents” had treated him. It sickened him to even think of anyone willing to do that, especially to their own son. 

“Did Cassius and Gisela make you eat spoiled food?” He spat out the names, as if that would fix all that they’d done. 

“Yes,” Keefe whispered, as if to keep Elwin from hearing. He curled in on himself, as if trying to hide himself from Elwin’s fury. That only made him angrier, how could Keefe believe he was the one Elwin was mad at? As if Elwin could ever actually be mad at him.

“My dad made it clear that whenever I was grounded, I wasn’t allowed to take food from the pantry. I would keep a small stash of food hidden under my bed. I didn’t know if you would be okay with me taking your food, I figured you wouldn’t care about what you couldn’t eat.” 

Elwin was horrified. “Your parents let you starve?”

“Well, not really. I was smart enough to learn how to get food anyways. Besides, I was only ever grounded for a couple weeks at a time.” He blurted it out so quickly he almost tripped over his words. Whether he wanted to explain it to defend his parents, or just to make Elwin less angry, he didn’t know.

“That’s not okay honey, no matter how easily you were able to actually get food. Your parents can’t starve you. They can’t just not let you have food.”

Keefe nodded, apparently finally understanding. "I’m sorry for worrying you”. 

And back to square one. 

“You have nothing to be sorry about. I should have made it clear that you were welcome to everything in my house, what’s mine is yours.”

Elwin invited Keefe to join him on the couch to watch a cheesy human movie and eat some popcorn. Once the movie finished, they went to bed, having forgotten what had transpired just a few hours earlier. 

That was the end of their food struggles, they managed to fix one of the kinks that came with building your own family. And if Elwin made sure to throw out any food that had gone bad from then on, well, it never hurt anyone to be on the safe side.

@song-tam

[ofengineers]

It has surprised Mid when she was informed that Anabella wanted to see her. They don't have a bad relationship even if they had a rocky start, but she still wouldn't have thought Anabella would request to see her. She would have thought that the brief moments they spend together were enough. But it makes Mid happy. Anabella is Joshua's mother, so of course, the engineer wants to have a great relationship with the other woman. And the truth is that Mid doesn't even have her parents anymore, so she's somehow projecting, even if she's not sure of what Anabella would think of that.

"I am! Thank you, Lady Anabella. I hope you are well, too!" she exclaims, a warm smile on her lips. The pause that follows is maybe a bit awkward, but Mid keeps her smile on her lips. After all, she has to wait patiently because the older woman is the one who asked to see her in the first place.

Mid raises an eyebrow, tilting her head just a bit as she listens to Anabella's words. Yes, she knows of that tradition, and she also knows of Elwin's bracelets for his sons. Her eyes become huge when she realizes where Anabella is heading with that. Did she commission something for her ? She blinks a few times, smiling again before she lets a soft chuckle escape her mouth.

"You... You... For me !?" she asks, not very good at voicing her own thoughts. She shakes her head, hesitating a bit. "You... You didn't have to, Lady Anabella. I'm... I'm... not even coming of age." Well, that's not what she really wanted to say, though. She takes a deep breath and approaches the chest. Breaking our traditions. That's quite what Mid and Joshua are doing, too, for being together even if she's not a noble at all. When she opens and sees the hammer, her eyes quickly come back on Anabella. She doesn't even take it for now, almost scared of doing it. "You... commissioned a hammer for me ?"

@creatrix-mea

𝐀𝐖𝐀𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐖𝐎𝐌𝐀𝐍'𝐒 𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐈𝐕𝐀𝐋, Anabella found herself pacing a few steps through the room and then back again, just to turn around and follow her own steps to the other spot for a second time. Without a doubt, she would have continued to dig a trench into the flooring by pacing back and forth, if a knock at the door, followed by a servant's voice, who announced Lady Midadol. " She may come in, " the former Duchess responded, and waited for the young woman to enter. " Midadol. I hope you are well. " She inclined her head in a formal greeting.

A pause followed; a pause she herself would have described as uncomfortable, of sorts. Despite having spent hours upon hours together in conversation as well as training, she was still uncertain how to properly talk with the woman, who had become a daughter to her. She lowered her shoulders. Maybe in mild defeat over the situation.

" Joshua has surely told you about an old family tradition of gifting our children a personalised gift upon coming of age. Elwin commissioned a matching set of bracelets for our sons, and my mother gifted me a dagger when I reached adulthood. " Which had been, Anabella had to admit, an odd gift for a young lady if one did not know the meaning behind the gesture. She turned around and gestured toward her desk, upon which a small chest had been placed.

" I never had the chance to commission anything for my daughter. As you know, I never had one. You are neither my daughter nor a born Rosfield. But I allowed myself to break our traditions. Just this time. "

Inside the chest, resting on a red cushion, lay the commissioned hammer for Midadol.

@ofengineers

[gay-otlc]

Queer Elder Elwin

Sophie comes out to Elwin as nonbinary and Elwin is wonderful. Surprisingly not angst but warning for trich mentions and dysphoria and internalized transphobia... so I guess it is angst just not anywhere near my usual amount.

@synonymroll648 hey look I wrote it! And since this is largely based on what I have been screaming about with them @dawns-faevor and @countingthestarsaboveourheads

Word count: 452 it is not a long fic but enjoy <3

"I have a question about elf medicine."

Elwin adjusted xyr glasses, hoping Sophie was aware of the long-winded ramble that could accompany that question. "Ask away."

Xe frowned as Sophie pulled out an eyelash, and another. "Well, I know how there are elixirs here that can change appearance or whatever for a few hours, but I was wondering if there was anything that would be more... permanent. Something that could like, make someone taller or give them a different face shape, or... like... a flatter chest, or something."

"That is possible, yeah. Is that something you would be interested in?"

The answer was so soft xe could barely hear it. "...maybe?"

"Okay."

"Is that weird? That I would want to change how I look like that?" Sophie's voice got louder as the questions gained more confidence, or maybe desperation. "Is there something wrong with me? Why does my body make me sick sometimes and why does being a girl make me miserable, what's wrong with me?!"

Elwin wrapped Sophie in a hug, effectively cutting off the spiral. "There's nothing wrong with you, Sophie. Sometimes people just aren't the gender the world told them they should be, and that's okay. If you think you'd be happier with a different gender or different pronouns or a different body, that would be awesome."

In a whisper, Sophie said "Could I maybe use they pronouns?"

"You don't need my permission."

They pulled back from the hug and wiped at their eyes. "I think I want to use they/them pronouns."

"That's fantastic! Do you want a pronoun pin? I've got an extensive collection." Sophie nodded, and xe showed them the box of all different colors and designs and pronouns. Sophie eventually settled on a they/them pin with alicorns in the background. "Good choice," Elwin said as Sophie pinned it to their shirt with shaky fingers.

"I feel like I'm letting everyone down by being nonbinary," they mumbled, going back to their eyelashes. Xe caught their hand to stop them.

"You aren't letting anyone down. And if you are, that's their problem. The people who really care about you, your parents and your friends and me, we don't want you to make yourself miserable trying to live as someone you aren't. We want you to be happy, Sophie, so do what makes you happy. Unless almost dying makes you happy somehow, please continue avoiding that. But being nonbinary doesn't make you a disappointment. It makes you yourself, and yourself is great. Okay?"

Xe waited for them to nod. "Okay," they said finally. "Thanks, Elwin."

"No problem. I'm here any time you need to talk." Xe reached out and adjusted their pin. "I'm proud of you, Sophie."

[bookwyrminspiration]

im still thinking about healer tam, so im just gonna....put all that here...if you dont mind...

specifically ive been really obsessed with the idea of him being like. the elvin equivalent of a pediatrician (or just. have him be a new elwin except their personalities are totally different) bc i feel like hed channel his anger at his own terrible childhood into making sure the lives of children in the present are better than his, if that makes sense? and i feel like he'd sympathize a lot with the angry ones specifically (obviously) and that hed be able to help them put a name to what theyre feeling, etc? it just...tam has always felt like a very sincere and genuine person and i feel like he would absolutely go and try to make peoples childhoods not as terrible as his own. i just. i love him. and i bet hed be like elwin- he cant help but adopt whatever kid he comes across and is in need of a parent figure. thats just his nature.

and this isnt related but is set in the same au- for some reason i really like the idea of him no longer having silver hair? NOT as a "oh hes mellowed out now" way but more in a "the problems people face today are not the same ones as the problems faced before, and clinging on to the past (that is no longer fully relevant) will stop me from doing good in the future" way- he still always wears silver on him as a reminder of what he's been fighting for this entire time, but its not the central part of him anymore, he is still fighting, yes, but its a different fight, and he wants to reflect that. (however, i still think linh would have her dyed hair since she dyed it to remind herself to keep control, and i dont think shed necessarily want to get rid of that message?) tell me if im not making sense here but. yeah.

- pyro

oo i love healer tam!! this was almost exactly the kind of vibe i got from him when you brought him up the first time--you nailed it right on the head. like he has all this anger and lingering resentment and doesn't know where to direct it so he channels it into making the world a better place so no kids end up like him

i'm fascinated by this concept. like. think about it. kids are some of if not the most vulnerable people in a society--they're young and their parents have legal power over them, they haven't learned the full concept of right and wrong, they're small and can't advocate for themselves the same way an adult can. they don't have authority. so tam, this healer who looks intimidating, stepping into that role and saying it's going to be okay and speaking for them and helping them way more than just patching their wounds. it's so good i love it so much. i have a soft spot for characters who are fiercely protective of children because they didn't have the childhood they deserved either

tam just seems like such a kind person, just not in the way you'd think a kind person would be. he hates the way things work right now, so why wouldn't he try and comfort the people experiencing it? if there's kids out there who are furious and hate the world and want to shun their elvin ways--well he was that kid. this kid comes into his office/healing center place just stubborn and expecting Tam to try and get them to calm down and take another chance with the system and say it's not as bad as you think it is and then. tam just agrees with them. and it's like oh you understand. this is a safe space. you're just like me.

also you're idea of him getting rid of the hair is so cool--i love the meaning behind it! his silver bangs have so much pain and anger mixed in with them, i can't even imagine how freeing it would be to cut them off. that message that he's not holding on to that past in the same way, that while he's been affected by his parents and societies actions for life, he's not going to hold that as a part of himself--sure, it'll motive him at times, that lingering pain--and he's going to learn from it and be better. I've seen headcanons that tam cuts his silver hair off and Linh dyes her whole head, which kinda reminds me of that you're saying. I agree that Linh would keep hers, because it wasn't a message to anyone but herself and her own mistakes.

i wonder--do you think Tam would have one specific piece of silver that he'd wear, like a necklace or bracelet he never takes off, or would he swap it out from time to time?

i don't know if i said everything I wanted to but healer tam is so special to me an holds a place in my heart permanently. just the whole idea of taking your anger and refusing to let it overcome you and give up on the world, this firm determination to keep going because there are people, children, who are going to need you there to fight for them

[author-luna]

Villain!Sokeefe/Ruewen family AU

Hi there everyone! A little while ago, a friend and I were talking about Sokeefe and what might happen in book 9, and then I had this idea for an AU where Sokeefe as well as the Ruewen family (Gardy, Edaline, Sophie and alive!Jolie) have been villains all along.

The idea couldn’t leave my mind so here I am.

Word count: 2.9k

Trigger/ Content warnings: mentions of nightmares

Please don’t hesitate to message me / tell me in the comments in case I should add any warnings!

My idea for it was that during Keefe’s time with the Neverseen, they were able to get him on their side

They make him work as a double agent, while thinking he is loyal to them

His joining is fueled by the fact that he feels like the Black Swan isn’t doing anything to help them nor are the utilizing them how they should

He knows that they could defeat the Neverseen in the bat of an eye, if only the Black Swan helped them reach their full potential by not sheltering them

But Keefe has his own agenda, which involves shattering both the Black Swan and the Neverseen

In his opinion, both organizations are hopeless and the best way to actually achieve what they want is a different approach

His plan is to get both the Neverseen and the Black Swan to destroy each other as well as the council, leaving the elvin world exposed

Then, in mits of all chaos, a new organization should take the position of power and work to redefine the elvin values and society

He has thought quite far ahead, but a lot of stuff is still up for debate and he doesn’t really mind because he knows he’ll come up with something in time

After he comes back, he finds it harder to play pretend than he originally thought it would

He can’t bring himself to think about the betrayal everyone would feel after they find out

Even worse, how Sophie would take it all in

After all they’ve been through and how she still trusted him, he can’t take any risks

One day though, when he and Sophie are both hanging out together and the topic of the Neverseen comes up, he can’t take it anymore

It slips out of him before he can even think about it

and suddenly it’s quite, too quiet and yet so unnervingly loud because the blood is rushing in his ears and the air is swirling and Sophie is just shocked

he scrambles to explain what he meant, cover up or anything

but then Sophie just starts shaking and oh god he really messed up didn’t he-

he is convinced that she hates him now but then the shaking turns into faint giggles and the giggling turns into soft laughter which then erupts into a laughing fit and he just wants to call Elwin so he can check on her

after a little while Sophie calms down and sits down, her hands in her lap and her eyes looking at him expectantly

at first our boy is just confused but the she tells him to sit down and explain

when he looks at her like she went insane she tells him that she knows him, he would never do that if he didn’t find value in it

so, he sits down and tells her all about it

from the very start, how he spend his stay to how they recruited him and about why he joined and his own plans

Keefe talks for a while, and when it all come to end, he is surprised by how much better he feels, almost like a weight has been lifted off him and he could finally breathe

Sophie stays quiet for a while, her eyes looking into the distance

Keefe stars fidgeting and pulling loose gras out of the ground because the silence is heavy and he thinks that she definitely hates him now

when Sophie finally looks at him, she is smiling, s m i l i n g and he thinks she finally went crazy

she seems to have read what he thought on his face because now shes pouting and she hit his arm in a playful manner, which leads Keefe to throw a handful of grass on her and suddenly they’re rolling around, chasing each other and laughing like normal people

when they finally stop to catch their breath and they find themselves under Calla’s tree which is ironic, Keefe thinks

the silence now isn’t heavy, it’s comfortable like they've came to a silent agreement

when Sophie speaks up, Keefe can’t help but feel nervous

he is expecting a lecture, a list of things he already knows, maybe even a screaming match because that’s what he deserves

instead, Sophie just whispers a single phrase

‘I trust you’

and it’s enough to bring tears to his eyes because she still trusts him, she isn’t going anywhere and she is still his friend

and then they talk for hours

it’s about everything and nothing in particular

they exchange stories and jokes, laughter echoes through the air followed by a light hearted silence and for the first time in ages Keefe feels like everything might turn out good and he dares to hold on that bit of hope he usually tries to suffocate

Sophie herself feels the same

she thought about yelling at him or scolding him, but deep down she knows that it doesn’t matter

and when she said she trust him, she meant it with each fiber of her body

a little voice in her head tells her that she’s laughing with the enemy and that she’s foolish for trusting him, that she’s a traitor herself for doing it but she snaps back saying that maybe she wants to be a traitor and that she doesn’t care, and the voice shuts up

for the next few days, the voice keeps whispering that she is the enemy as well because she’s trusting Leefe, but whenever she says that maybe she wants to be the enemy, the voice shuts up and that makes her think

Keefe made good points, his plan could use some improvement but the point still stands

her thoughts are constantly running and circling back to the same question ‘Where do I stand? What can I do?’

and at night, the overthinking gets to her

her dreams are haunted by what if’s, but one dream stand out to her

that night, she dreamt of her friends, her family, Keefe and herself in a future where there is no Neverseen

in her dreams, her friends and her were at the beach in San Diego, Linh is playing with the water and everyone is just having fun

when she turns around, she sees Grady and Edaline laughing with her human parents and she hears her human dad’s barking laugh echo as he retells a story from her childhood

she feels a hand on her shoulder and when she looks up, Keefe is standing besides her, looking fondly at the scene

he notices her staring at him and he looks down to her,a soft smile on his face as he whispers ‘We did it Foster’

she jerks up from sleep and she could swear that she can still hear the laughter, smell the water and feel the lingering touch of Keefe’s hand on her shoulder

that night she realizes that this is the future she wants, one where she doesn’t need to hide her human self

she lays awake for hours, and the next morning she finally makes a decision

in the night, when she lays awake, she mentally reaches out to Keefe, and when he opens his mind to hers, he is confused

but with an unbelievable determination she tells him that she is joining him

there is a lot of arguing from his side, but Sophie expected as much

she tells him that if he doesn’t want her to work with him she’ll join the Neverseen on her own so he gives up for now and tells her he will make arrangements for her to meet the others

after the meeting, they take Sophie in as part of them

obviously they don’t trust her from the start and she has to work very hard to earn their trust

they give a lot of assignments that involve morally questionable things that Sophie at first refuses to do but gives in

wherever she goes to these type of missions, she mentally seeks out the comfort of Keefe’s mind, who gladly will distract her, comfort her and talk to her until she feels better

it isn’t a pleasant thing for her to lie to her friends so openly, and she often struggles with hiding it, but Keefe is always right there to help her

they keep talking at night, just basking in the security of each other’s mental presence

because sometimes, things don’t seem that bad when you have a friend by your side

Sophie’s telepathy gets even stronger with the help of Gethen, who teaches her how to hide things securely from Fitz and Mr.Forkle

‘Gethen is okay I suppose’ Sophie begrudgingly admits one night during their nightly hangouts, after Keefe asked her about their training session

he teases her and laughs at her when she threatens to mentally slam a pillow at his head, but secretly she find that his laugh is quite adorable

after the Nightfall fiasco, Vespera and Gisela finally start trusting Sophie more because she kept up the facade so well

they call a meeting with her to ‘formally introduce her’ and during the meeting, she’s a bit nervous

of course, she has been kinda member all this time, but now being officially part of them was making her giddy with nerves

they do the protocol of introducing her to everyone, making her swear herself in, talk about her position yada yada, but the only thing she can focus on is Keefe's hand that intertwined itself with hers under the table and three familiar hooded people in the back

at some point during the meeting he had grabbed her hand to stop her from tugging on her eyelashes and to keep her grounded and steady, and to be fair, the soft circles his thumb kept tracing over her knuckles and the menatlly reassuring things he said to her were soothing and kept her from freaking out

but as much as she wanted to focus on the meeting, her attention kept going up to the three hooded figures in the back

she couldn’t help but feel like she had seen them before, their posture and presence so familiar

she was so distracted she barely noticed how everyone left the room, leaving only Gisela, Vespera, the hooded figures, Keefe and her in the room

when Keefe squeezed her hand, her attention snapped back to the room and she noticed that the figures came closer

Gisela suddenly asked her and Keefe to keep calm since they would now let them into the identities of three of their members

once the hooded figures let down the hoods, Sophie might have yelped in surprise and Keefe might have pulled her closer,just to put his arm around her and there is a tiny chance that Sophie buried herself deeper into his comforting side hug

in front her stood her parents, her elvin parents and with them their daughter she saw them mourn

it didn’t make sense to her how Edaline smiled at her and how Grady sheepishly scratched his neck and especially not how Jolie, the Jolie form the pictures and Prentice mind, shyley waved at her

Gisela and Vespra left them alone and told them to explain and sort it out

the moment they left, Keefe and Sophie started bombarding them with questions

finally, Grady and Edaline explained that Jolie had joined the Neverseen a while before she joined the Black Swan and how she recruited them

her death and all the mourning was just an act to keep everyone from questioning them when they try to get information or when they try to spy on the council

Jolie told her about how she was able to make herself a new identity under the name Trix

upon asking how she could be Trix if his ability was being a Guster and Jolie being a Conjurer jolie answered that she kept gusts of wind stored in the void that she could use and redirect to her liking

they tell them about their positions and how they actually always assisted them in some way, and Sophie feels abit betrayed for not knowing earlier

her and Jolie talk for a bit, getting to know each other and Sophie decides that Jolie is quite amazing

Edaline notes that they should go before someone notices their absence and Sophie takes her home crystal, leaping her and Keefe back to Havenfield

for a second they stand in the living room, hands intertwined and faces close

and before they could speak, they hear someone clear their throat and Sophie lets go of Keefe’s hand in embarrassment

Keefe is a bit upset, he already missed the way Sophie’s hand had fit into his own and the comforting feeling of rubbing his thumb against her knuckles

with a glare, Grady sends him home

after Gardy leaves him alone, he smirks to himself and makes it his mission to hold Sophie’s hand often

now time skip to Unlocked

at first, Keefe didn’t plan on telling Sophe where he’s going because he still was convinced that he is a danger for her

but 2 nights away from the lost cities and he suddenly found Sophie towering over him, hand on her hips and a glare so deadly he probably would have been 6 feet under

sheepishly, he asked her what she was doing here and she just punched his arm

cue an hour of lecturing about how they were in this together and he shouldn't have left without telling her

that’s when it dawned on him

why was she here, and if she was here with him, who was in the lost cities

she sat down besides him, setting down a backpack and saying that she was also a runaway

for the next month or so, they wandered around the world

with her teleporting, their birthfounds and Keefe’s new abilities, they had no problem at all with traveling and staying undercover

in the lost cities, Grady and Edaline helped keep the suspicions at bay

they covered for them and made sure no one found them

cue another showdown between the Neverseen and the Black Swan

this time, it’s a full force one and everyone instinctively knows that this battle is the last

all the intelligent species hold their breath as the war rages, gnomes and elves fighting on each side with all they’ve got

there are losses of course, but the biggest one is when Sophie and Keefe suddenly appear in the middle of everything

their friends stop and look at them with bewilderment, and it soons turns into shock when Keefe takes out a microphone like thing and tells everyone to freeze

as the battle stops, Sophie whistles a tune and Silveny descents from the sky

she lands in front of them and gently, Keefe helps her up and sits behind her

their friends would love to follow them with their eyes, but their gaze is fixed into the distance, and so, they don’t notice how Silveny flies them up to the middle and how Sophie starts expanding her mental grip on everyone

when she finally has everyone listening to her, she takes turns with Keefe to tell them about the future, how both the Neverseen and the Black Swan can’t guarantee a good life for them and the council even less

they end their little speech with them asking their friends to trust them, and Keefe sends everyone but Fitz,Biana,Linh,Tam,Dex,Marella,Wylie,Stina,Bronte Grady and Edaline to sleep

they land and talk with their friends, telling them everything that has happened, from them joining the Neverseen to their time in the human world

and as they stand there, all the stories told and feeling laid bare, they hold each others hands

they know that there is a high possibility of their friends not forgiving them or even not wanting them back

they also know that they might have to leave the elvin world behind forever

that's why they hold each other, because they know that as long as they have each other, the world can throw anything at them and they will get around it

because when Sophie lovingly whispered ‘As long as we have each other, we’re invincible’ after Keefe woke up from a nightmare, it was a promise

and as Keefe whispered a ‘It’s us against the world’ back, it was a mutual understanding,a promise and a reassurance that tells the world ‘We belong with each other, each a heart and a soul that is stronger together’

so when Biana breaks out into a sprint to hug them and everyone joins, hugs exchanged, laughter echoed and stories told, they don’t let go

the future might be uncertain, but it’s a bit better if you have friends with you to stand against the uncertainty

[swordofazrael1992]

autistic sophie headcanons

she masked constantly in the forbidden cities and never allowed herself to show her autistic traits

she wasn’t actually diagnosed before she left the forbidden cities because many of her traits were brushed off as her being a “weird kid too smart for her own good”

her parents, along with calling her soybean, would joke about how she was an “absent professor” referring to how she was incredibly intelligent but distant from social situations 

(elwin diagnoses her at the first checkup at everglen, recognizing some of his own traits in her)

but then when she gets to the lost cities she sees these traits the she has always tried so hard to suppress be completely accepted and she’s like “oh. i can do that? i can be myself?”

(when bronte becomes more of an ally, he tries to help her understand her autism and autistic traits as an important part of her self as well as accommodates her the way he wishes his biological parents had helped him with his own autism)

she doesn’t truly start unmasking for a long time, however once she does she realizes how much happier she becomes

she infodumps about astronomy to grady and edaline over breakfast, rocks back and forth on the balls of her feet during morning orientation at foxfire, taps her fingers on her desk while she takes notes, flaps her hands and does butterfly taps on her shoulders to calm herself down when the foxfire lunchroom has run out of her normal order, runs her fingers over ella’s still-soft body while she sits and reads, and unashamedly asks people to clarify their meanings when she would’ve spent too much mental energy puzzling it out before

meltdowns don’t happen often for her, and instead she will have sensory overloads and go nonspeaking

during sensory overloads she goes into her room at the first possible opportunity, changes into her softest clothes, turns off the light, and listens to music from her iPod (she chooses soft classical music or heavy metal, nothing in between)

her nonspeaking episodes will last from either a few hours or several days, with varying levels of communication that she is able to use. sometimes, she can transmit to others in words, sometimes she has to use pictures, if she can’t gather the mental energy to transmit, she usually ends up writing everything down or even uses sign language (when she first attempted to use sign language to communicate, grady and edaline snuck off to a forbidden cities to get books on sign language, and sophie’s entire circle of people learned it as well)

while the keeper crew was living in alluveterre, calla noticed sophie wrapping her arms around herself, wearing multiple heavy layers, and pressure stimming in other ways and makes her a weighted blanket. she can’t sleep without it now, and it still smells slightly like the reveriebells hung in her room

also, she actually like capes, because they give an extra bit of weight 

she hates dresses because the swishing fabric feels so wrong on her legs, especially when there are extra ruffles

her special interests are astronomy, history, and avatar: the last airbender

(after dex realizes she’s upset because she can’t watch atla anymore, he reconfigures a few imparters to make one, big screen. everyone comes over for a sleepover and avatar watch party)

sophie has days where she struggles and days where she succeeds, and while there are negative aspects, she’s learning to see it as a part of herself that is important and shouldn’t be forced down until she can pretend it isn’t there

(minor detail in bronte’s backstory is inspired by the Pyren Bros AU by @bronte-deserves-better)