#suns snake polls

[sundere1181]

ROUND 2 POLL 2

San Fransico garter snake AND Blue Malayan coral snake VS Barbados threadsnake

[thirdlotusprince3]

[amayikes]

in case anyone worries that I just said I've discussed walrus fairy with my partner for two hours, it's not a fight discussion, we're just two autism-bained academia suckasses and we LOVE getting into long profound discussions, and right now is "how the fairy/walrus dichotomy of humans reflects their stances on religion (my argument, I vote walrus) and ultimately proves how dangerous thought patterns lead to the prevalence of scams (his argument, he votes fairy)

[cold-kitty]

Todays poll winner was... Yandere Naga! I love Nagas, really anything with a tail. I know that there's different Nagas, but this Naga is Centaur style: human from the hips up and a snake tail from hips down.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Little backstory: Nagas are a rare species in this world, which puts a high price on them. They're shoved into zoos or killed for their tails and scales, some celebrities even own a few. This Naga, however, is determined not to let that happen to him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Contains: Mentions of murder, non-human yandere, kidnapping, yandere doesn't know his own strength and harms darling

Yan!Naga who hates people, genuinely hates them. he hates them so much to the point that if someone so much as steps into his forest he kills them on the spot, he won't put himself in danger.

Yan!Naga who isn't a hateful person, he's just scared if we're being honest. people are scared of what they can't control or predict, and fear turns into hate.

Yan!Naga who always feels guilty after killing someone, especially regretting it if that person was innocent. he's definitely taught himself to differentiate threat from innocent though, so he doesn't kill as many people now.

Yan!Naga who keeps a close eye on you when you wander around his forest, trying to determine if you're a threat or not.

Yan!Naga who finds out you're not a threat, and continues on his way. he silently slips through the trees, his incredibly long tail holding onto branches for balance.

Yan!Naga who really, really doesn't like it when you lay down on his special rock, it was his after all. it was big and flat, big enough for him to coil his whole tail on (which means it's absolutely massive because his tail is like 25 feet long). it collected heat from the sun and warmed up anything that touched it, so he could understand the appeal.

Yan!Naga who definitely prepared to remove you from it. he reaches out to grab you, but abruptly stops when he sees your sleeping face. his hands starts shaking slightly and it balls into a fist.

Yan!Naga who definitely knows that he likes you, human or not, and he wants you to be his.

Yan!Naga who cozies up next to you on the rock, wrapping his arms around your shoulders and pulling you close. warm...

Yan!Naga who coils his tail around you, one of the greatest shows of affection for his people.

Yan!Naga who loves your warmth, even more than the warmth his rock provided.

Yan!Naga who gets scared when you start to stir awake. no no no no no no no! shit, he's gonna see me, he's gonna hate me!

Yan!Naga who watches your eyes widen and your mouth open in a scream. he immediately slams a hand over your mouth, his own eyes wide and his body shaking with yours.

Yan!Naga who feels you trying to squirm away, but he doesn't let you. he squeezes his tail tighter and tighter around your torso and legs to keep you in place, and he hears a gut-wrenching crunch.

Yan!Naga who immediately lets go of you as you let out a bloodcurdling scream into his hand, tears dotting in his eyes. oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck fuck fuck! i hurt him!

Yan!Naga who watches you roll onto your side, sobbing. he rolls you gently onto your back again, softly pressing his fingers into the side you're holding. he stops as you cry out, but he definitely felt something. a broken rib.

Yan!Naga who carefully picks you up, careful not to hurt you anymore. he starts carrying you to an abandoned cabin in the middle of the woods, where he stays at night.

Yan!Naga who slowly sets you down in his 'nest', a large pile of blankets and other soft cloths with a him-sized debt in the middle, AKA a huge crater.

Yan!Naga who wraps your side with a soft cloth from the pile, tying it tight enough to hurt but would help heal the fracture.

Yan!Naga who curls up against you again, holding you so loosely that it feels like he's not even there.

Yan!Naga who will provide for you, now until forever, hurt or not.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I hope your easter was great!

~🐈‍⬛

[xxotothedeathx]

Introducing....

LOSER-SUB!CHRIS STURNIOLO X DOM!READER

warnings: smut, edging kink, masturbation, sub male, slight degradition kink, losing NNN, overstimulation, oral sex (male recieving), use of y/n, little to no plot, pet names, NOT PROOF READ

details: DOM!READER will be using SHE/HER pronouns. chris lives with his girlfriend, y/n, who works at the local pet store. one day, she comes home early to find chris in a very compromising situation.

a/n: hi lovelies!! thank you for voting on my poll. as you can see, this story won! if you would still like to see the matt story, let me know!! this is my first time writing in MONTHS, so excuse me if it's bad... ENJOY!!

You walked into your apartment, noticing all the lights out. You know Chris is home, You saw his car outside, and it's only 6:00.

You slide your shoes off and walk deeper into the familiar darkness, placing your purse and jacket on the couch.

You stumble towards the hallway, tripping slightly on a cord. You come to a halt outside of yours and Chris's shared room.

You reach for the handle, turning it to open the door slightly. You stop in your tracks, the door not even halfway open when you hear a quiet whimper.

You peek your head around the door and into the room, seeing Chris lying on the bed. One arm is draped over his face, his head thrown back into the pillows. The other hand is rather low, stroking a quite intimate area very rapidly.

You step into the room fully, slightly mesmerized at the sight. You couldn't help but giggle quietly, which Chris hears.

His arm shoots off his head, grabbing the blanket and throwing it over himself as he sits up. His eyes glued to you.

"Babe, your home early..."

He speaks awkwardly, shying away under the blanket.

"That I am. What were you doing?"

You speak teasingly, walking towards the bed slowly. You know what he was doing, and he knows you know

"Nothing babe."

"Oh, so jerking yourself is nothing?"

"Shut up.."

"Weren't you bragging to Nate about how your gonna win NNN?"

"And I will. Its No NUT November, doesnt mean I can't touch myself."

"Hmm, I think I could make you lose."

You say, sitting down next to him, your hand snaking under the blanket and resting on his thigh.

"As if. I have more self control then that."

Chris speaks in a tone of courage, but the shudder his body gives and the quiet gasp he lets out says otherwise.

"Is that...a challenge?"

You speak, gently lifting the blanket off of him and crawling over him, hovering.

"Maybe."

As soon as the word left his mouth, you wasted no time. Your lips fly down, attacking his, as your hand snakes down his body to his most intimate member.

You wrap your finger around his cock, gently, causing him to gasp into the kiss. When his lips part, your tounge subconsciously shoots into his mouth, exploring it.

You begin to move your hand up and down, slowly. Your long nails, which he had paid for, adding extra sensation.

You slowly pull your lips off his, before moving them down to his neck. Leaving little bruises all over it, being sure to bite his most sensitive spot.

"Y/n.."

He gasps out your name, his hips bucking involuntarily up into your hand.

"Shh, be quiet for me.."

You mumble against his neck.

Your stroking gets faster, and his whimpers get louder.

"Y/n, Im gonna cum!"

Chris cries out, and you immediately stop the movement.

He lets out a whine and looks down at you, giving a questioning look.

You pull away from his neck, looking up at him.

"Wouldnt wanna lose, now would you?"

You smirk, crawling back up and kissing him.

This kiss is long and passionate, as he cups your cheek. Your tounges danced together in a loving fight. The heat between your bodies matching the flame of the sun.

Your hand moves back down, starting the stroking slowly. Teasing the tip of his cock, before speeding up slightly.

You pull away from the kiss, staring down at him. Watching as his eyebrows furrow, and his head tilts back slightly.

His lips pressed into a thin line, a slight sweat on the edges of his mouth. His eyes squeezed shut.

You begin moving your hand faster.

His mouth falls open, groans falling out one after another, and his head jerks back further.

You can tell hes close. So,

You stop your hand movmemt, earning a whine from him. You give him a sharp look, shutting him up before he has a chance to protest.

You climb off the bed, getting on your knees at the edge. You open your mouth to give commands, but before you can Chris is already positioned infront of you, sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Little slut."

You mumble, before kissing the tip of his length. He lets out a quiet whimper, before responding. Or atleast, attempting to respond.

"Im not a slu- ahh!"

His words cut off, and blend into a moan as your wrap your lips around his tip. Your tounge flicks the very top as you move your mouth lower.

He throws his head back, a stream of curses, moans, and grunts leave his mouth as your work your magic.

You push your mouth as far down and deep you can go. Taking almost all his length in your mouth. What you cant take, your hand is tightly wrapped around it and twisting.

This throws him over the edge, his head falls back as he attempts to pull away from you.

"Please, im gonna.."

Before he can finish his sentence, you feel a string of warmth fly into your mouth and down your throat. It was a salty taste, but you swallowed it all nonetheless.

You dont pull your mouth way however. You keep going.

Sucking, and bobbing your head up and down.

"To much, to much"

Chris cries out, but his hand that has found its way to your hair eggs you on, pushing your face towards him as his hips buck up into your mouth.

Whimpers upon whimpers leave his mouth, and even faster then the first time he releases in your mouth once again.

You pull away, after swallowing it of course, and look up at him.

"Loser."

"Shut the fuck up."

hope you enjoyed it ! its not the best and kinda short, but its what i got ! let me know if you have any requests !!!

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Where Will All The Martyrs Go [Chapter 6: I'm The Resident Leader Of The Lost And Found]

A/N: Be sure to vote in the poll pinned to the top of my blog AFTER you finish reading! It will be available for 1 week 🥰

Series summary: In the midst of the zombie apocalypse, both you and Aemond (and your respective travel companions) find yourselves headed for the West Coast. It’s the 2024 version of the Oregon Trail, but with less dysentery and more undead antagonists. Watch out for snakes! 😉🐍

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, med school Aemond, character deaths, nature, drinking, smoking, drugs, Adventures With Aegon™️, pregnancy and childbirth, the U.S. Navy, road trip vibes, RIP Jace...unless...??

Series title is a lyric from: “Letterbomb” by Green Day.

Chapter title is a lyric from: “St. Jimmy” by Green Day.

Word count: 8.2k (she's a little chonky)

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist 🥰

What happens to the people who turn? You know because you saw it back at Saratoga Springs, an EO from Oklahoma named Greg Flurry—Equipment Operator, he spent his days driving a forklift, everyone called him Snowflake—who returned from weekend liberty with a bite on his left wrist that he said was a gift from some drunk girl who attacked him outside of a 7-Eleven. You had all laughed and taken turns poking at the wound, making him wince: a ring of tiny bruises, not deep at all, the skin only punctured in a few spots, corporeal gemstones of trapped-blood amethysts and sapphires and rubies. Snowflake rubbed it down with a splash of Grey Goose vodka—the same kind your Mama always drank—and didn’t think of it again for the rest of the day.

On Tuesday, he felt fine; but the bite mark, paradoxically, was not healing. On the contrary, it was turning dark and angry, maroon trails along the paths of veins that shuttle blood back to the heart. Snowflake got a shot of antibiotics at the med clinic and was back in the driver’s seat of his forklift before lunch.

On Wednesday, he had a headache and nausea that wouldn’t go away. Snowflake attributed this to particularly questionable chicken fried steak from the chow hall. At night he tossed and turned in his bunk, and when Rio went to check on him, Snowflake was burning up with fever, sweating through his sheets, staring blankly through pupils like pinpricks. You, Rio, and Parker carried him to the med clinic.

On Thursday, in the early hours of the morning, Snowflake began to decompose. But he was still alive. His skin turned grey and sloughed off, his body purged itself: vomit from his throat, diarrhea from his intestines, blood beading out of his pores like sweat. His corneas went cloudy. His lungs flooded with decay-dark mucus. Snowflake sobbed and shrieked as you and Rio sat with him and held his disintegrating hands, as the corpsmen phoned every hospital they could to try to get him transported. All the ambulances were unavailable. All the hospitals were already overwhelmed. They gave the corpsmen peculiar guidance: Palliative care. Prepare to restrain him if he becomes a danger to others. The virus appears to be transmitted via bite wounds.

“Virus?” Rio had said, dropping Snowflake’s hand. “What the fuck kind of virus does this to someone?”

The corpsmen had shaken their heads—We don’t know—and attempted to administer narcotics intravenously. Snowflake received no relief. His blood vessels were collapsing, dissolving, turning to a noxious soup beneath what was left of his skin. Becoming a zombie is not unlike radiation sickness. It rots you from the inside out, and you can feel everything.

As the sun was rising, Snowflake died. And by then you were glad; it was the most merciful outcome. The corpsmen covered him with a sheet and called around for a morgue. They were full too. As you all stood in an exam room trying to understand what had just happened to Snowflake here, what was going on in the world outside Saratoga Springs, the fresh corpse sat up on the table. You had screamed and clutched for Rio; he shoved you behind him. The corpse, still covered with the sheet stained with black and brown and red, followed the noise of your voice and staggered towards you, snarling and groaning, arms outstretched, teeth clicking as they gnashed beneath the sheet. The corpsmen tried to grab him, then shrank away when the ghoul clawed at them, putrefied fingers peeking out from beneath the linen. The zombie lurched closer, and Rio struck out: colossal knuckles to a soft skull, the monster sent hurtling headfirst into a wall. The body plunged to the floor and, enveloped by a puddle of its own bodily fluids, died for the second time.

And Rio had glanced down at where Snowflake had been bitten—now indecipherable on his black, gangrenous wrist that jutted out from beneath the sheet—then turned to you and said: I guess it only takes once.

~~~~~~~~~~

You doze against Aemond’s shoulder as Baela drives the Honda Odessey across Indiana, goldenrods and dogwood trees, green weeds growing tall and wild, red bloodstains on pavement. Visions of the past come to you in spider-thread thin fragments of dreams.

Building dams of sticks and pebbles in the swamp-colored creek that runs along Kentucky State Route 1087. Balancing atop rusted railroad lines that once connected coal mines like ligaments link bones, bare feet, box turtles and milk snakes, autum leaves falling into your hair. Scratching black-ink battleships into the pages of your fifty-cent Walmart notebook as teachers drone on about things that mean nothing to you, things that will not take you away from here, Shakespeare, the Krebs cycle, the Tet Offensive, Spanish words for colors and animals. Mama glancing up at you as she scrubs dishes in a sink nearly overflowing with bubbles, too nonchalant to intend to be cruel: You’re lucky you ain’t too beautiful. Do you know what happens to beautiful women? Marilyn Monroe, Jackie Kennedy, Natalie Wood, Anna Nicole Smith? Horrible, horrible things. And then they die.

Once in a while you pass a car or truck or SUV coasting east as you roll west, strangers who wave and give you nods of grim, transient greeting. Good luck. I’m sorry you’ve lost people. I hope you live. At a Speedway outside of Kokomo, Aemond, Aegon, Rio, and Luke draw Uno cards to see who will attempt to siphon gas from the three vehicles you find there with closed fuel caps. Aegon loses with a blue four. The Kia and Toyota are empty; there’s almost a full tank left in the Ford. You refuel the Honda Odessey and scrounge through the convenience store for supplies. Helaena seems to have developed a sort of fixation with pain pills, hoarding Advil and Tylenol. Aegon finds a few more packs of Marlboro Golds. He puffs on them, windows down and breeze blowing, neon green plastic sunglasses shielding his eyes, as Baela skirts around Indianapolis. Even from fifteen miles away, you can see the billowing smoke from the fires, hear the manmade thunder of explosions.

“Bet people are having a great time there,” Aegon murmurs as he takes a drag, embers glowing and blonde hair thrashing in the wind.

Baela follows the course he plotted, swinging just south of Peoria, Illinois to avoid the nuclear power plants between there and Chicago. You cross the Mississippi River and into the southern tip of Iowa over the Fort Madison Bridge, the toll booth occupied only by a carcass that buzzards are pecking apart, a zombie that someone else already put a bullet in…or perhaps the man did it to himself. Maybe he didn’t see a point in sticking around to watch the dead inherit the earth. You cannot agree. Each day you find more reasons to stay alive in this treacherous new world. It’s like when you were back in Soft Shell, Kentucky. You can’t give up, you can’t surrender. The only way out is through.

The black Honda Odessey—a good soldier, having taken you six hundred miles and into the vast flat vacancy of the Midwest—at last runs out of gas as you are approaching Bonaparte, founded in the 1830s as a lumber mill on the banks of the Des Moines River. You unload the minivan and trek into town; you will find somewhere to spend the night and then in the morning head south to Route 2, which you will follow all the way across Iowa to the Nebraska border.

The first house you try is at the edge of town, eggshell-colored vinyl siding and an empty gravel driveway. Rio tries the front door—locked—then tells everyone to back up. He kicks it once, no dice, gets ready to try again. Then the door opens. A woman with wide fearful eyes stands there with two boys cowering behind her, maybe ten and twelve.

“Please don’t break the lock,” the woman says softly. “We need it. Sometimes they try to get in.”

“Oh hey, lady, I’m sorry about that. We didn’t know anyone was home. You okay in there?”

Her voice is so quiet you can barely hear her. “Please leave us alone.”

Aemond climbs the steps of the front porch, taps Rio’s shoulder to tell him to back up, and kneels in the doorway so he isn’t so tall. He asks the woman: “Do you need supplies? Food, medicine?”

“Please leave us alone,” she says again.

“My name is Aemond, and those two are my brothers Aegon and Daeron, and that’s my sister Helaena, my cousin Luke, and then Rhaena and Baela. The big guy is Rio, and the girl over there…” He smiles as he gestures to you. “We like to call her Chips. Everyone is healthy, and everyone is here by choice. We’re going to the West Coast, Oregon and California. Do you want to come with us?”

But the woman shakes her head almost violently. “We’re safe in the house. We have to stay. My husband is a long-haul trucker, but he’s on his way back to us.”

“How do you know he’s still alive?”

“Go away. Please just go away. Before they see you.”

The woman shuts the door and you hear her throw the deadbolt. You leave like she asks you to; but not before Aemond collects an armful of supplies you can spare and places them in a pile on the porch for them to take inside once you’ve vanished.

The sun is sinking into the west as Helaena lights candles in Bonaparte Baptist Church and Rhaena shakes out dusty, mothball-smelling tablecloths to use as blankets. Luke finds gallons of grape juice and bags full of tiny flat bread wafers in the cabinets of the kitchenette, once used for sinless communions. It’s Daeron’s turn to stay awake for first watch. If Jace was still alive, it would be his too; instead, Aemond takes his place and refuses all offers of relief. You lie down on a pew with thin violet cushions and are thinking that you’ll never get comfortable enough to fall asleep when you are abruptly swallowed by omnipotent, black nothingness.

You jolt awake sometime in the middle of the night, a bad dream you don’t remember and don’t want to. Daeron is perched on the altar and using a hunting knife from the cellar back in Distant, Pennsylvania to sharpen the sticks he’s gathered into arrows. Baela is sitting with Aemond, their backs against the wall and voices hushed so as not to wake the others. Aemond is telling her that everything is going to be okay, that he’s still here, that Jace is gone but he’s not going anywhere, and candlelight is flickering across his scarred face, and he’s afraid but he doesn’t show it. He can’t. Too many people need him.

Oh, you realize; and it doesn’t feel awful at all, doomed or apocalyptic, a curse or a plague. It feels better than anything you knew existed. I might fall in love with him after all.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Aemond, take a look at this,” Luke says, offering him the binoculars. You have walked several miles on Iowa State Route 2, an asphalt atoll in an ocean of emerald green flora, buffalograss and prairie roses, ash trees growing over defunct power lines.

Aemond peers through the binoculars. It’s a small farmhouse about a quarter mile off the road, rugged and weatherworn, besieged by a flock of zombies. There is something large and rectangular flapping in the wind like a white flag of surrender. “Hm,” Aemond hums sympathetically. “It’s a shame. Poor guy.”

“What do you see?” you ask, and he gives you the binoculars. The zombies, approximately thirty of them, do not appear to have breached the interior; they shuffle through the yard and up and down the steps of the porch, smack their palms against the wood siding, leave stains of gore on the boarded-up windows. None appear to be aware of you yet. The bedsheet that hangs from the attic window has a message painted on it in something dark and viscous, perhaps motor oil:

One alive inside

I can hunt, fish, and fix things

Please help me

God bless you!!!

“We should be able to get to Cantril before dark, it’s about twelve more miles,” Aegon mutters, pondering his map. “Boner-party. Who names a town something like that?”

Aemond stares at him. “Bonaparte. Like Napoleon.”

“Who?”

You pass Rio the binoculars, then say to Aemond: “We’re going to help him, right?”

“We sure as hell aren’t,” Rio replies as he studies the farmhouse. “You want to risk our lives killing all those bastards? I don’t.”

You turn to Aemond, incredulous, but he concurs with Rio. “It’s too dangerous.”

“What’s going on?” Baela says testily from where she’s sprawled on the pavement sipping a half-full plastic gallon of bruise-colored grape juice. She’s already exhausted, but you have no way of transporting her.

Rio points across the field. “There’s a sign saying someone’s trapped inside that house. Tough fucking luck, ain’t it?”

Baela stares at the farmhouse uneasily, her brow furrowed. Rhaena fans her with a paperback copy of Catching Fire. Daeron has wandered off the road to collect more sticks to sharpen and fill his quiver; Helaena is with him picking wildflowers.

“That was us,” you tell Rio. “We were stranded on that transmission tower and we would have died if we’d been left there. But we weren’t. Someone saved us.”

“Things were different then,” Aemond says, unemotional, uncompromising. “We had the Tahoe. Now we’re on foot, and we’d have to kill each of them individually. And there’s no way to make a fast escape if something goes wrong.”

“So we’re just going to leave him?” Aegon says doubtfully, his large ocean-blue eyes flicking between you and Aemond. He stuffs his map back into his shorts pocket and scratches at the tattoo on his forearm: It’s not over ‘til you’re underground.

Rio groans. “Come on, man, we don’t even know if anyone’s still alive in there! What if he’s dead already? What if he got bit or starved to death or fell down the steps and snapped his neck or something?”

“What if he’s not a good guy?” Aemond adds.

“There’s a Trump 2024 sign in the front yard,” Luke says. He has the binoculars again. Aemond opens his hands, an I told you so sort of gesture. Luke amends: “Not that anyone deserves to get eaten alive or transformed into a walking corpse. But, you know. I figured I’d mention it.”

You are not swayed. Had you stayed in Soft Shell, Kentucky, you might have believed the same things. “People deserve to have the chance to start over.”

Aemond’s eye is on you, narrow and seeking, desperate to understand. “Why are you so fixated on this stranger?”

“He hunts, he fishes. What are we going to do when we get out into Wyoming and Nevada where towns are fifty miles apart and there’s hardly anywhere to scavenge for food? What are we going to eat when the beef jerky and Skittles run out?”

“You said everyone hunts where you’re from.”

“Not literally everyone. I don’t hunt.”

“You can shoot.”

“Yeah, but I don’t know how to track animals. And even if I killed a deer, I wouldn’t know how to dress it.”

Aegon blinks at you. “To what?”

“To remove the skin and organs and everything.”

“Oh. Okay. That makes more sense.”

“It’s too dangerous,” Aemond repeats. Rio is nodding in agreement. Baela’s lips are pressed into a thin, thoughtful, rigid line. Daeron and Helaena have returned to the road to see how the discussion unfolds.

“There are about thirty zombies out there,” you say. “I can take fifteen. I just need you guys to do the rest.”

“Everyone here is my responsibility.” Aemond is severe, but he isn’t angry.

“Then you’re responsible for their humanity as well.”

“I can’t justify risking our lives for this.”

“I’ve killed people, living people, and I didn’t like how that felt. Make no mistake, this is killing too, just by omission instead of with bullets. We’ll all have to carry that weight. The man in that farmhouse hasn’t threatened us. He’s helpless, and he’s trapped, and if we don’t save him, who else is going to do it? What if it was you in there? What if it was me?”

Aemond, frowning, contemplates the house that has become a prison. Rio looks at you, one eyebrow raised. You gaze stoically back. He sighs. “Okay, what the hell, let’s rock,” Rio says.

Baela holds up her Ruger in one hand, slips her hammer out of a belt loop of her shorts with the other. “I’m on board.”

“You shouldn’t be on anything except bedrest,” Aemond tells her.

“I can take fifteen of the zombies myself,” you say again. “I have two M9s, thirty bullets total. I won’t need more than that.”

“I can take ten,” Daeron says.

“Shut up,” Aegon replies, though his tone is gentle. “You can’t even donate blood.”

“I can take ten,” Daeron insists, clutching his compound bow. “At least ten.”

Aegon swings his golf club around. “I can take…like…probably approximately three.”

Rio grabs his face and squeezes his sunburned cheeks as Aegon giggles and slaps at him. “You won’t get the opportunity, Honey Bun. Stay in the kitchen and bake apple pies until Daddy comes home from work.”

“You really think this is the right thing to do?” Aemond asks you. It’s not a challenge, only a question. He’s at war with himself, you can tell. He’s trying very hard to treat you like someone he’s not terrified to lose.

“Yes. Absolutely.”

He pulls his Glock out of its holster. “The gunfire will attract more of them.”

“Then we’ll have to move quickly.”

Aemond turns to Baela, still wilted on the pavement. “You, Rhaena, and Helaena will follow behind us with Luke and finish off any zombies we missed.”

Baela gives him a weak, acquiescent thumbs up, breathing heavily. “Got it.”

“Helaena, you still have your Ruger, right?”

“I won’t need it,” she murmurs, wildflowers tucked into her long blonde hair, watching a ladybug skitter across her knuckles. Aemond is exasperated.

“I’ll make sure she’s okay,” Luke promises. He’s using his binoculars to scout for any threats on the horizon, additional zombies or approaching strangers. Evidently, there are none.

“The grass,” Helaena says. “It makes it hard to see the snakes. Watch your step.”

Aemond replies distractedly: “I think we have bigger worries at the moment, babe.” As Rio pumps his Remington and Luke fumbles nervously with his Marlin .22 to make sure it’s fully loaded, Aemond walks a few yards away from the others and gestures for you to follow him. Aemond’s voice is low, the blue of his eye river-clear and blade-sharp. “I want you to stay near Rio.”

You give him a small, teasing smile. “So you won’t worry about me?”

“So I’ll worry slightly less.” He brushes a piece of buffalograss from your hair, his fingers lingering there longer than they need to. “Rio’s the biggest, he’s the best fighter. And if one of those things catches you by surprise, he’ll be able to crack its skull no problem. So keep close.”

“I’ll try, but sometimes it’s more complicated than that.”

“Please work with me. I’m giving you what you want.”

To be useful, to be merciful. “Thank you, Aemond.”

“Thank me by not letting anything bite you. Not today, not ever.”

“Well, except you of course.”

He laughs, the tension in his face breaking; he skates his thumbprint over your cheek and kisses your forehead, swift like a reflex, unthinking, instinctive.

“Good to go?” Rio asks with a grin, holding his Remington with both hands.

Aegon’s golf club is resting across his shoulders, and you have a sudden vision of Jace doing the same thing with a baseball bat, a vengeful ghost peering out from beneath his curls with cunning dark eyes and a smirk. “Yeah, Chipotle, you’re leading the charge here.”

“No she’s not,” Aemond says, striding to the edge of the road. Across the field is the farmhouse, the white bedsheet S.O.S. still whipping in the wind. “I’m in front. Everyone else is behind me.”

“Oh yeah? Then who’s gonna watch your blind side, huh?” Aegon jogs over and whacks Aemond’s left shoulder with an open palm, beaming up at him. “Don’t worry. You’ll still get to be the hero. I was born talentless.”

“You have talents, Aegon,” you say. “You can sing.”

“Not relevant in a zombie-riddled apocalyptic hellscape, Cow Chip.” He and Aemond start across the field, then you and Rio, then Daeron, darting around in your peripheral vision, nocking sharpened sticks like arrows. Luke, Baela, Rhaena, and Helaena trail at a distance.

You have closed half of the gap between the road and the farmhouse—and Daeron has already felled several zombies—before the beasts begin to turn around and notice you. They do not understand danger; they only understand hunger, and they lurch towards you with teeth gnashing and claws outstretched, strips of decaying flesh hanging like sleeves from their arms. You hate the way they move, like they’re trying to imitate life, like they are receiving some sinister transmission that reverberates inside them, like they are soulless vessels to be used in the darkest ways.

You stop, plant your feet in the earth, and raise one of your Beretta M9s. Your eyes find the sights; your finger settles on the trigger. You are rusty at first: a miss, a bullet in a rotting shoulder instead of a skull. Then you click into a rhythm and the zombies drop as they stumble towards you, infected dark blood spewing, brains pouring out onto the soil. When your clip is empty, you shove the first M9 back into its holster and pull out the other.

Daeron is putting his makeshift arrows through eye sockets, Aemond is firing his Glock, Rio is erasing entire heads with the grotesque power of his Remington. Aegon is swinging his golf club around wildly. His Marlin .22 hangs from its strap across his back, but he’s hopeless with it; his aim quite literally could not be worse. You hear other gunshots too, maybe Luke. A stranger appears from the front door of the farmhouse: red flannel shirt, roomy jeans, tan work boots, long messy russet hair pulled back in a man bun, almost as big as Rio. He is carrying an axe and begins helping to cut down the remaining zombies. Rio realizes you’re no longer with him and turns around to find you.

“I’m good!” you shout, waving him forward. “Go, go!” Rio nods and takes off again towards the farmhouse, blasting his Remington 12 gauge like a cannon.

Your ankle snags on something, a gnarled root, an old piece of farm machinery. You fall hard, hitting the ground and knocking the air out of your lungs. Your M9 is flung from your grasp. You roll onto your back and sit up to see what you’re caught on. It’s the grasping hand of a zombie, an old man, long white hair and dead milky eyes, only a torso, nothing below the ribcage except a tangle of dirt-coated intestines. It is scrambling towards your legs, jaws rattling, teeth covered in the blood of the other people it has eaten.

You shriek and try to kick it away. You reach for the empty M9, rip it out of its holster, and hold it by the barrel so you can use the grip, the heaviest part of a pistol, to bash the zombie’s skull in. But you aren’t Rio; when you strike the zombie’s head, it keeps hissing and scrabbling towards your flesh that sings to it like a siren, irresistible, divine.

I can’t let it bite me, I can’t let it bite me—

There is a boom and the zombie drops face-down to the earth. You are saved; you are free. You turn to see Rhaena standing beside you, clutching her tiny Ruger in trembling hands…but her eyes are closed. Slowly, petrified, they come open, one after the other.

You gape up at her. “Did you aim?!”

Rhaena shrugs guiltily. “I don’t remember how.”

“Jesus Christ. Well thanks, I guess. Glad you missed my pelvis.”

She laughs shakily. “Yeah. Me too.” Rhaena holsters her Ruger and helps you to your feet. By now, everyone else has realized you’re in trouble and are sprinting over, including the new guy.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” you say, holding up your arms and skimming your palms down your bare legs to show them you haven’t been bitten. “No need to despair. Rhaena rescued me.”

Aemond gets to you first. “Can I see?” he asks breathlessly. You give him your hands and with his fingertips, he reads you like Braille: palms, forearms, throat, jaw, gingerly turning your face away from him and then back again. He exhales, relieved. “Good job, Rhaena,” Aemond says, and she smiles. Baela uses her hammer to smash the skull of a zombie that’s still squirming. Aegon yanks a snarling toddler to its feet—Pokémon t-shirt, left leg missing, wearing one of those child leashes—and swings his golf club so hard its whole head pops off and rolls away into the buffalograss with sick wet thumps.

“I thought you couldn’t kill the kids,” you say.

Aegon spits on the corpse’s collapsed, headless body. “It’s different now. These monsters ate Jace. Fuck ‘em all.”

“I can’t thank y’all enough,” the axe-wielding stranger says. “I was sure I was going to die in there like a rat in a trap. There’s a hog farm on the property behind mine, and I think the…you know…all the meat attracts zombies. A pack of them saw me in the yard and followed me to the house, and when they’re in a group like that, they seem…well, I just couldn’t get rid of them. Alone they wander wherever, but a hoard has structure, it has a mission, and they were waiting me out. I didn’t have my guns, I didn’t have my truck…”

“What happened to them?” Rio asks.

“I got robbed, that’s what happened.”

“No!” Baela says. “Really?”

“A week ago, five men I’d never seen before broke in while I was sleeping. They must have drugged my dog, who knows with what—she slept for twenty hours, have you ever heard of something like that?—and locked me in my bedroom. By the time I kicked the door down they were gone, and so were quite a few of my earthly possessions. It was nice of them not to murder us, I guess. I have a couple boxes of ammo left, but that’s all. Mostly 9mm.”

“That’s exactly what I need,” you say.

The stranger gives you a curious, appraising glance. “I’m very glad to be able to assist you, ma’am.” Then he finally gets a good look at Aemond, who is glaring at him. “Lord almighty, what the hell happened to your face?”

“A piece of sheet metal fell on me.”

“He stitched it up himself,” Luke says. “I watched. It was wild.”

The man is impressed. “You’re a doctor?”

“No, no, no,” Aemond amends. “Just an intern.”

“He’s basically a doctor,” Baela says.

“Well, you’ll be useful to have around, I expect.” The stranger offers his hand and Aemond, somewhat unenthusiastically, shakes it. “I’m Cregan Stark.”

“Aemond Targaryen.”

“Targaryen?! That’s a heck of a name, sir.”

“It’s Greek,” Aegon says.

“Where are y’all headed? Not all the way back to Greece, I hope. That’d be a hike. And a swim too, I guess.”

Aemond smiles tightly, polite but guarded. “Not that far away. We’re on our way to the West Coast, California and Oregon.”

“And you’re on foot?! You need horses.”

“We haven’t come across any that are still alive.”

“Do you want to travel with us, Cregan?” Luke asks amiably.

“I reckon I would, for now at least. I got nowhere else to be and no one to care for.” Cregan looks to Aemond. “That alright with you, doc?”

“Sure,” Aemond replies ungenerously.

“My folks got a trailer over towards Cantril, and a truck parked out back too if nobody’s stolen it yet. We can stay the night there if you want and then drive west in the morning.”

“Cantril! That’s on our route!” Aegon exclaims, he of the map and the gel pens.

Aemond narrows his eye at Cregan, suspicious. “If your parents are so close, why aren’t you staying with them? Why didn’t they swing by to check on you and see you were in trouble here?”

“Well, ‘cause they’re dead,” Cregan says, and Aemond is abruptly remorseful. “When all this started, I went over to get them and they were out in the front yard, just bones. All the flesh was chewed right off. But I found their wedding rings in the grass, and Mama’s pearl necklace that her Grammie gave her when she got married, Mama never took it off as long as she lived. It looked like a string of rubies.”

Aemond swallows noisily. “I’m sorry.”

“Ain’t nothing I can do about it now,” Cregan says, staring out over the field and biting his lips so they don’t quiver.

“Did your parents have guns?” Rio asks hopefully.

Cregan chuckles and shakes his head. “No, that’d be swell, wouldn’t it? Daddy got all his guns taken away when I was in high school.”

“Taken away…?” Baela echoes.

“Yeah,” Cregan says casually. “After the methamphetamine conviction.��� He whistles, and a dog comes loping out of the front door of the farmhouse. It’s huge and mean-looking, fur the color of ashes or smoke. It goes directly to Cregan and noses his hands; you are reminded of how Aemond searched you fearfully for injuries. “She’s half-German Shepherd, half-grey wolf. Her name’s Ice.”

“Does she bite?” Aemond asks tentatively.

“My little princess?! Hell no! I wish she did, then maybe those robbers wouldn’t have gotten what they wanted. But she knows when those things are around.”

Aegon pats her angular, steel-colored head. Ice puts back her pointy ears and closes her eyes, basking in the attention. “Hey, fuzzball. I’m going to call you Blue Raspberry Icee.”

“You can call her whatever you want to as long as she’s allowed to come with us.”

“She’s welcome if she sniffs out zombies,��� Aemond says.

Baela is struck by a thought. “Cregan, what kind of truck did your parents have? I hope it’s big. We’re a lot of people.” She’s resting her hands on her belly. And we’re about to add one more.

“A Chevy Tahoe,” Cregan says. You all begin chattering excitedly, then have to explain why.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Y’all like fishing?” Cregan asks. He’s cooking dinner for everyone with his dead parents’ Coleman butane camping stove, only one burner, each course prepared individually. You are all seated around him on the living room floor, sipping cans of Coke and Sprite—what Cregan calls “pop”—and eating turkey-flavored instant stuffing that came out of a cardboard box. Now Cregan is working on Hungry Jack mashed potatoes, tiny white flakes like snow that puff up in boiling water. Rhaena is staring at the pot with horror. Baela scarfs down her stuffing like she’s been starving to death. Flashlights illuminate the room in dim ocher like a setting sun, the roof vents open to let in cool night air. The trailer smells like cigarette smoke and dust and mildew. Piled haphazardly in corners are old newspapers, mounds of unfolded clothes, empty boxes and plastic bags, VHS tapes—Star Wars, 80s rock concerts, Clint Eastwood movies—and unwashed cups.

Aemond chuckles like it’s preposterous. “No.”

“Garth Brooks?”

“No.”

“NASCAR?”

“Who watches NASCAR?!” Aegon says.

You smile. “Everyone’s got a driver where I’m from.”

Cregan, vindicated, thumps a closed fist against his chest. “I was a Jeff Gordon guy. His car reminded me of a box of Froot Loops or something.”

“My brother Denver covered the inside of the garage with Dale Earnhardt Jr. stuff. I got obsessed with Juan Pablo Montoya for a while, he was cute.”

“So you chase the dark-haired fellas,” Cregan says, grinning, still stirring the potatoes. Everyone else’s wide, perplexed gazes fly between you and Cregan as they eat their Stove Top stuffing from Styrofoam bowls.

You titter nervously. “I don’t usually chase anyone.”

Aegon notices a taxidermied largemouth bass mounted on the wall, approximately fifteen pounds. “What the fuck,” he whispers, dismayed.

“WWE?” Cregan asks you.

“Oh, Rey Mysterio, no question. He was cute too.”

Cregan snorts. “He literally never took off his mask!”

“He was cute underneath it. I could tell, I have a sense for these things.”

“I’ll let you live in delusion.”

“I thought wrestling was real back then. When he’d get beat up and covered in fake blood, I’d start crying because I figured he’d die. Who was your favorite?”

“John Cena.” Cregan waves an open hand back and forth in front of his face. “You can’t see me!” You both burst out laughing. No one else gets it.

“It’s John Cena’s signature move,” you explain.

“Hm,” Aemond says, but he’s watching you and Cregan with deep grooves in his forehead and a solemnness in his lone blue eye, tapping his chin restlessly.

“Now, we might not have any butter…” Cregan picks up one of the containers scattered around him, a plastic jug of Great Value powdered coffee creamer. “But this makes for the best potatoes on the planet.” The others watch, stunned, appalled, as he adds several heaping spoonfuls to the pot.

You smile wistfully. How is it possible to be so nostalgic for a place you once believed was killing you, wringing you dry until all your blood dripped onto the floor and you were left a husk, a ghost, a myth? “My Mama always did that. She put it in mac and cheese too.”

Cregan serves you first, taking your empty stuffing bowl and returning it nearly overflowing with Hungry Jack instant potatoes. “Here’s a taste of home.”

And he’s right; you take a bite—hot enough to burn your tongue, smooth, rich, soupy in texture—and it’s just like being five or ten or fifteen again, when this was your idea of luxury, a good day, lounging on a sagging couch torn to hell by the cats and watching The Simpsons or Malcolm In The Middle with your brothers. Cregan scoops Hungry Jack into all the bowls. Baela digs in enthusiastically. The others, following your lead, take cautious tastes, shrug, and decide it’s tolerable for one night. Cregan grabs a new pot and dumps a box of Rice-A-Roni into it, along with the packet of seasoning, a bottle of water, and a single spoonful of coffee creamer for good measure. As the rice cooks, he distributes one can of barbeque-flavored Vienna sausages to each guest. Rhaena pops hers open and immediately begins retching. Aegon feeds his to Ice.

After dinner, Cregan compiles all the extra blankets and pillows he can find, then supplements with bath towels and bedsheets from the closet in the hallway. The trailer is small, only one bedroom; you all agree Baela should get it. She will share with Rhaena and Luke, as she always does now. She doesn’t like sleeping alone. Cregan offers to take first watch, a gift in return for being rescued from a slow death by deprivation. Aemond agrees, but only because Rio—with a wink and a knowing smirk—volunteers to stay up too. Rio will keep tabs on this almost-stranger; Rio is the only one big enough to knock Cregan around if such an occasion ever arose. Aemond tells them to wake him up halfway through the night so he can take over and let them rest. You say you want to do the second watch too, and this time Aemond doesn’t argue.

Helaena gets the couch and Daeron curls up on the olive green carpet beside her, Aegon claims the tattered old recliner, you arrange your pillow and blanket—thin, scratchy, a weak blue mottled with dark stains you can’t identify—against the wall on the other side of the living room. Rio is teaching Cregan how to play Uno on the small plastic folding table by the kitchen, only spacious enough for two. Ice is stretched out beneath the table with her grey muzzle resting on her paws. At the moment, Aemond is supervising; he’s still trying to decide how much he can trust Cregan.

Aegon wanders over to you then bends down, his hands on his knees. “This place is revolting,” he whispers.

“It’s alright.”

“Where did you grow up? Alcatraz?” You laugh, and Aegon gives you his pink CD player, Ava still written across the top in rhinestones. “Just in case you need to get away for a while. It’s wasted on me. I’m going to be unconscious about two seconds after my head hits the pillow.”

“I’ll take good care of it.”

“If you see any meth lying around, you let me know. I’m always in the market for new ways to shorten my life expectancy.”

“I’ll keep any such discoveries to myself. I enjoy you too much.”

Aegon recoils, lets that sink in, then beams as he saunters back to his creaking recliner.

“Hey, Chips?” Luke says, approaching you shyly. He’s holding his Marlin .22. “I’m really sorry to bother you, but my rifle was shooting way to the left today, and I don’t think my aim’s that awful.”

“No problem.” You take it and remove the remaining bullets so there’s no chance the gun will accidentally fire, then examine the sights. “Can you get me Baela’s hammer?”

“Sure.” Luke dashes off and then returns with it moments later.

“You said it was skewed to the left?”

“Yeah, exactly.”

You take the hammer and tap the rear sight a few times. Luke watches you, fascinated, troubled. When he speaks, his voice is soft and miserable.

“I’m sorry I’m so bad at everything.”

“You know, this is the only possible scenario in which someone like you is worth less than me.” You give him an encouraging smile. “I didn’t go to a fancy school. I work with my hands.”

“But you’re smart, Chips. You could have gone to college if you wanted to.”

How would I have paid for application fees, or to take the SAT? How would I have gotten Mama to fill out the FAFSA? What school would have given me a scholarship with my mediocre grades in standard-level classes? Who would have driven me to school and helped me move in? How would I have bought books, shampoo, tampons, a laptop? Where would I have gone if I had trouble finding a job after graduation? What if the people there saw through me? What if they shrank away from the frayed threads I’m built of? There is no point in saying these things. The gulf between you is too great; it will only confuse Luke and hurt you. “I wouldn’t have known where to start.” You reload the Marlin .22 and pass both the gun and the hammer back to him. “I think it’ll work better now.”

“I bet you wish Jace was here instead of me,” Luke says, and it shocks you. “Everyone does, except maybe Rhaena.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Jace was a good fighter, and he was smart, and brave, and capable, and I’m just this…this weak scared loser who only knows how to write screenplays. And what goddamn use is that? Hollywood doesn’t even exist anymore! Scraps of Tom Cruise are probably stuck in some zombie’s teeth right now!”

“Luke, I’m glad you’re here.”

“I shouldn’t have left Jace,” he whispers, distraught. “I betrayed him. He was always protecting me and I couldn’t even save him once.”

“We did everything we could. And we all left Jace, not just you. It was me and Rio who said it first. You haven’t earned the blame.” If Jace’s ghost comes knocking, it won’t be your door he opens, Luke.

“Okay,” Luke replies softly.

“Baela is very, very grateful to still have you and Rhaena, Luke. She told me.”

Luke stares at you, doubtful, hopeful, wanting to believe. “Really?”

“I swear she did. I think you two are keeping her sane. The world, the baby, Jace…sometimes what’s most valuable to people are simple things, kindness, gentleness, compassion, support. I can kill zombies, sure, but I’ve never been good at knowing the right thing to say. You are.”

“Okay,” Luke says again, but he seems more at peace now; perhaps even the tiniest bit proud. “I guess I should go make sure Baela has everything she needs before I go to sleep.”

“That sounds like a good plan.”

Luke walks a few steps, then turns back towards you, smiling. “I think you know the right thing to say once in a while.”

“Maybe.”

“Definitely,” Luke insists, then disappears down the shadowy hallway and into the bedroom.

Aemond arrives at last with his blanket and pillow, arranges them beside yours, then joins you where you sit cross-legged on the floor. “You didn’t stay with Rio today when we rescued Cregan,” he says; not an accusation, a statement, a surrender of sorts.

“No. I didn’t.”

You must be visibly preoccupied. Aemond asks: “What are you thinking about?”

You decide to tell the truth. “How you were never supposed to meet me.”

“What do you mean?”

You point to him. “Rich boy with a beach house on a cliff.” Then you tap your own heart. “Poor girl who grew up playing with sticks and box turtles.”

“And that’s why you like Cregan so much.”

“It’s nice to have someone around who speaks the same language, sure. It’s nice to not have to explain things or think up lies so I can fit into other people’s idea of what the world is. But I don’t like Cregan more than I like you. Not even close.”

Aemond smiles, a warm glow like fire from under his scarred skin. “I’m glad I met you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Even if it wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“I’m sorry I’m not…” Someone sophisticated, seductive, experienced, bewitching. “I’m sorry I don’t already know how to do everything.”

“I don’t care. I would have liked you however you were when I found you.”

You look up at him skeptically. “Really?”

“Yes. Zero boyfriends or ten or twenty, I would want you the same way I do now.”

It hits you so suddenly you can’t stop the tremor in your voice, the shimmering tears in your eyes. “Aemond, please don’t die.”

“I’ll do my best.” He lifts the CD player from your lap and offers you an earbud. You accept it and slip it into your right ear as he puts the other into his left, then clicks the play button on Aegon’s pink Sony Walkman. What you hear are the opening ukelele plucks of Riptide, and you are spirited back to 2013: middle school, oversized hoodies and ripped jeans, hair you have no idea what to do with, the librarian letting you browse music videos on YouTube during lunch because you never cause any trouble, taking bites of your sandwich—one piece of Wonder Bread folded in half, a glob of Skippy peanut butter—and chewing slowly to make it last longer.

Aemond lies down and you rest your head on his chest as he covers you both with his blanket, circles his arms around you and pulls you in closer; and through the music you hear him mutter: “I wish this disgusting Hoarders trailer had two bedrooms.”

You laugh, burrow deeper into him, let his warmth and the drumming of his heartbeat lull you into darkness, still and serene, a place that exists beyond the world and the fear that it is ending.

When you open your eyes again, Aemond is up and speaking in hushed voices with Cregan and Rio in the kitchen, but he hasn’t tried to rouse you yet. I shouldn’t be awake, why am I awake?

Because someone is shining a flashlight directly into your face. You blink and swat at the blinding yellow-white gleam, your eyes aching, your vision hazy and distorted.

“He must check below the racks,” Helaena says. She is on her hands and knees and peering down at you like a bird of prey, like a goddess on Mount Olympus.

“What…?”

“He’s tall, so he won’t look, but that’s where it is. Below the racks. He must see it. Promise me you’ll make him see it.”

“Who’s tall…?” Aemond, Rio, Cregan?

“Promise me!” she hisses fiercely.

“Okay, Helaena! Okay. I promise.”

She crawls away without another word, climbs onto the couch, clicks off the flashlight, and tumbles back into the abyss of sleep with her back to you.

~~~~~~~~~~

The Chevy Tahoe—2001 instead of 2023, a dull rusty red instead of glossy dark blue—barrels down Route 2 past fields of soybeans ravaged by deer and rabbits, high feral weeds, tree branches entombing power lines and houses and barns, leaves freckled with cicadas and caterpillars, hay bales and archaic churches, life in shades of peridot and malachite and bloodstone and jade. Baela is driving, Ice has her big shaggy head hanging out of an open window, Cregan is examining Aegon’s map…and meanwhile, Aegon and Rio are singing along to the Enrique Iglesias song blasting through the speakers as one of the mixtapes spins in the Tahoe’s CD player, pretending to serenade and propose marriage to each other.

“Bailamos, let the rhythm take you over, bailamos

Te quiero amor mío, bailamos

Gonna live this night forever, bailamos

Te quiero amor mío, te quiero!”

Up ahead there is something in the middle of the road. No, not something; someone, parked across the double yellow lines on a small black motorcycle. As you approach, this person—made blurry by the distance—removes their helmet and seems to wait for you.

“What’s up with that?” Baela asks apprehensively, slowing down from her previously brisk eighty miles per hour.

Aemond frowns at the figure and then scans the fields on either side of the road. “I don’t know. Luke?”

Luke stands up through the sunroof to get a better look with his binoculars. “Oh my God, it’s…it’s…”

“Jace!” Baela screams, and slams on the brakes. She bolts out of the Tahoe before remembering to put it in park; the SUV rolls along sluggishly until Rhaena yanks the gear lever into the proper position. Now everyone is pouring out of the doors and rushing to him. Jace is laughing; he embraces Baela as she crashes into him and sobs into the curve of his neck. Jace is wearing jeans and a leather jacket despite the heat, safety precautions for the motorcycle. If he were to fall off, he’d keep most of his skin.

“I was hoping I’d run into you guys. I didn’t know if I was too far ahead or falling behind.”

Aegon gawks at him, sputtering. “How did…? How are you…?”

“You showed me your map, idiot,” Jace says; but he sounds relieved. “Route 2 all the way across Iowa, that part was pretty easy to remember. I figured if I could get here, I might be able to find you. If not, I’d just surprise you in California.” He grins, huge and teasing, ecstatic tears glittering in his eyes.

“The river,” Luke says, thunderstruck. “We thought you were dead…we left you…Jace, I’m…I’m so sorry we left you…”

“Hey, I get it. The bridge situation was fucked, there was no way you guys could fish me out. The river washed me miles downstream, way too fast for the zombies to keep up. I eventually got dumped on the shore near where some people had set up camp for the night. They were living out of a school bus, about fifteen of them. They heard me coughing and moaning, hunted me down, and dragged me back to the bus. Super nice, right? I told them about the zombies, and we relocated in a hurry. They were headed for a town up near Chicago, Rockville or something, so they took me with them and then one guy gave me his bike and taught me to ride it so I could go west. It’s a Honda Rebel 300. It can get 70 miles to the gallon. I’ve barely had to siphon any gas! And the siphoning hose my new friends gave me is the kind with a pump. No more Uno roulette, bitches!”

“I can’t believe you’re okay,” Baela whispers, tears flooding down her face.

“Don’t cry, I’m here, I’m back, everything’s the way it should be again. Now how’s my baby doing…?”

You, Aemond, and Rio exchange astonished glances. Luke snaps out of his shock and runs to hug Jace and Baela, and Rhaena follows him. Daeron searches the horizon for movement, for danger. Helaena rips the pristine white petals off a bloodroot blossom one by one.

For the first time, Jace notices Cregan. Ice stands beside the flannel-wearing Iowan on the pavement, wagging her long grey tail. She barks at Jace uncertainly. “Who the fuck is that?”

“Oh yeah, that’s Cregan Man Bun Stark,” Aegon says. “And his anti-zombie wolf Blue Raspberry Icee.”

[enby-jellyfish]

All Coiled Up

Male!Naga X GN!Reader (POC friendly)

Pronouns: You/Your

Summary: Cuddling with a naga.

Warnings: Tooth rotting fluff, me attempting to be poetic, (probably?) inaccurate homesteading and snake biology, reader gets licked/smelled and (gently) bitten

Word Count: 775

A/N: Based on this poll <3

It is a hot spring evening. The first of the year, you note as you trudge up to your cozy little home on the hill. It is the kind of home you dreamed of when you were a little kid. The perfect size and shape, with plenty of windows, filled to the brim with all of your trinkets and a shit ton of plants.

Right beside your home is the farm you spent the whole day working. It has everything you need to be self-sufficient, a big vegetable garden, chickens, sheep, cattle and a beehive.

It has been a busy day, a calf got stuck in a fence and you had to plant plenty of new seasonal crops and do weed control.

Naturally, you are exhausted. You feel your body ache as you rub your neck to try and release some tension. You remind yourself your hard work will be worth it.

Finally you enter your home and lean against the door, closing it and taking a deep breath, your eyes shut. You stay like that for a moment before you hear something, or rather someone, and open your eyes to be greeted with the sight of your beloved naga.

His face is relaxed, eyes closed. His body is coiled up near one of the many windows, bathing in the sunlight of the setting sun. It is something he has been doing since the first warm sunbeams of the year.

You smile to yourself and just drink in the view. He looks so beautiful. The sunbeams kissing his face like they are long lost lovers, now reunited. The beautiful orange and yellow of his scales highlighted by the golden light. It is truly a combination meant to be, serpent and sun. Seeing him so comfortable is truly a sight for sore eyes, capable of warming even the coldest of hearts.

Your naga has a hard time adjusting to the switching of the seasons. A battle between his simultaneously cold- and warmblooded body you suppose.

It has been a few years now since you first found him that one winter night. You had heard a noise coming from your farm and found him half starved in the chicken pen, looking for food and shelter from the snow. You took him in, fed him and helped make him a mock burrow in the shed.

After his brumation period he offered to keep the predators away from your farm in return for your kindness. He never left you after that. You slowly found yourself growing to like him. This later turned to love, which was reciprocated with open arms and a warm smile that made his eyes twinkle like stars.

You remind yourself that you have been staring unashamedly for quite a bit now and walk into the room. Disturbed by the noise of your footsteps on the wooden floors he lifts his head and blinks lazily at you, first with his brille and then with his eyelids.

"Finally, I was getting worried you'd keep working until the sun had long set. Come" He extends an arm to you.

"Let me clean up first, I smell."

"I don't mind..." He raises his eyebrows flirtatiously and stares at you through his eyelashes. He changes his position to face you, chin on crossed arms on his coils.

You sigh, knowing you can't resist that gorgeous face.

His face lights up as you walk over. He opens his arms and loosens his coils just enough for you to get in.

"Just for a minute." You say, knowing it won't be for just a minute.

"Of course, my love." He purrs smugly, also knowing it won't be for just a minute.

You lay on his coils, your back against his chest. As you get comfortable he wraps himself around you. The whole experience feels tight but not suffocating, his scales are smooth and have a cooling effect on your skin. It feels safe and comforting, like being wrapped up in a giant weighted blanket.

You close your eyes, slowly relaxing into his embrace as he gently rubs your arms. You feel yourself being soothed to sleep by the soft lullaby of his breathing.

Your journey to dreamland is suddenly interrupted by the feeling of a forked tongue darting out to taste your shoulder.

You smile at the ticklish feeling. "Pervert." You mutter, not opening your eyes.

He chuckles lowly. "Nothing perverted about enjoying your mate's scent. Especially when mine smells as good as you do." He playfully bites at your shoulder.

You scoff and let out a laugh at his animalistic antics. He laughs with you, slightly tightening his grip on you.

Masterlist

Thank you for reading <3

[cambion-companion]

Frozen Contract

I had to deliver on the poll I recently made. This is a drabble, being forced to share body heat with a cambion as you're stranded in a frozen wasteland.

"You have the freedom to choose the only option you have left."

Raphael x reader | drabble

You curled in on yourself, the coldness of hard-packed snow beneath you seeping through your thin bedroll straight to your bones.

Your shivering was becoming so violent you could just about feel your brain rattling within your skull.

“Dear, dear, you are in quite a state.”  Raphael sat quite unbothered upon his own pristine bedroll, golden eyes of licking flame as they watched you. “A frozen mouse quite fit for a snake’s meal.”

“Do you ever get tired of your metaphors?”  You could barely speak through the chatter of your teeth.

Raphael tilted his horned head, his breath creating puffs of steam with each exhale. “Does a nightingale get tired of singing the sun to sleep?”

You rolled your eyes.

“It’s self-evident you have life left in you yet, little one.”  Raphael noticed your annoyed expression, raising his eyebrow in return and flipping a page in the book he lazily read. His tail swept idly around in front of him, clearing a bit of snow and shoving it onto your blankets. “While we yet travel together, desist irking me with your trifling mortal troubles.”

“Such as freezing to death?” You bit back, your patience long gone.

Raphael smirked, holding out a large hand and catching several of the large flakes of snow that had begun falling from the dark sky. “Indeed.  I can hear the rattling of your bones from here.”

You glared at him for a moment, then squeezed your eyes tight shut.  

Raphael returned his attention to you, then snapped his book shut with a sharpness that made you jump.  He regarded you with a familiar haughty air. “I would admire your stalwart nature were it not so mulish.”

“I am not asking you for help.”

Raphael didn’t respond for a moment, his expression calculating. “I am quite accustomed to biding my time.”

You turned away, pulling the blanket tighter around yourself and attempted to sleep once more.

It was the shivering that awoke you, your body trying desperately to warm itself.  You couldn’t feel your hands or feet for the numbness, could barely lift your eyelids to check for signs of the dawn.

A heavy hand pressed upon your hip; you could feel the warmth of Raphael’s skin through the fabric over you. His breath was as the breath of life, hot against your neck and cheek. “Say ‘yes’.”

“Yes.”  You gasped out and the cambion responded immediately.

Raphael curled his large fiendish body around your much smaller frame, his fingers undoing the clasps of your clothing. He took hold of your wrists as you moved weakly to protest. “The ice will melt and leave you soaking, and I will not tolerate such a mess.”

You let him shed you of your clothing, his wing quickly covering you and his arm wrapping around your bare torso to tug your body flush against his own.

With two long fingers, Raphael tilted your face to look at him. His eyes flitted between your own, then down to your mouth. “Your lips are a charming shade of blue.”

“I can’t feel them.”  You mumbled; your thoughts hazy from the warmth seeping from his body into yours.

Raphael bent his head to you, his free hand cupping the back of your head, sending a thrill of heat through you. You closed your eyes, feeling his tongue trace liquid fire across your lips, then the soft press of a kiss that deepened to something more primal.

You felt the thick coil of his long tail slide and wind its way up your leg, warming you in a much different way.

Raphael took your chin between thumb and forefinger, forcing you to focus on him. “Say my name, pet.”

You hesitated only a moment.  Giving into a brief defiance before accepting defeat. Your lips trembled, but no longer from the cold. “Raphael.”

[robespapier]

I've read another disappointing French Revolution novel (not the worst by any rate, you can tell the author tried, more on that later), I've rolled my eyes a lot but also found it quite entertaining at times. Pick something from said novel (it's Jaques Ravenne's La Chute, published in 2020). I'm intentionally leaving out the infuriating, fucked up and depressing stuff and only putting the funny or good things in the poll:

[sundere1181]

ROUND 1 POLL 8

[jev-urisk]

OOPS, I dropped my laptop and Kazimier X Reader smut fell out! 😮 🌶 

Fang Kink | Monster X Human | World of 🌐7 Circles🌐

I sure hope the two people who voted for this on my poll don't find it~

And I don't know what I would do if @monstersflashlight knew they inspired me to post my smut directly on Tumblrrr....~

Notice: 18+ interacts only. Explicit sex, Ungendered reader insert, alcohol consumption, references to blood, author unable to resist worldbuilding

[Part 1/2]

You’ve been keeping a secret for a couple months now.

As a human, you’re not allowed into the monster empire, you’re supposed to live your measly life outside its borders in the Outlands. If you ever were to venture into the dark claws of Du’Preve, the closest monster district to your human settlement, you would be executed or worse if they discovered you weren’t one of them.

So you’ve taken extra care not to be discovered.

You could never pass as a vampire, with their red eyes and sharp teeth- nevermind a gorgon or gargoyle. But Liches… those looked just like humans until they put too many magic runes on themselves. A little black paint, and some inspiration from a Lich warning poster in your area, and viola, TOTALLY not a human.

Thus far, you’ve hopped the border just to look around for a little while. Du’Preve has some kind of strange curse over it that dims the sun, even at high noon it seems like late evening. You LOVED it. Something about it made you feel alive- you always did have more energy at night and it was a wonder to experience it at 2pm.

You would walk the dirty streets, trying not to stare as you passed people with hissing hair, barking owners of strange market stands, and old rune-riddled liches mumbling incoherently in the gutters.

You also tried very hard not to squint, to act like you weren’t used to the perpetual darkness. You’d overheard monsters spit that word onto the pavement, ‘Squints.’ ‘Damn Squints,’ ‘Filch-beggin’ no good fuckin’ Squints.’

It has the same other-ness that ‘Fang-Banger’ has back home, a term that’s spat at anyone who gets cozy with a monster, even when it’s not the person’s fault.

You might get called that just for visiting Du’Preve, honestly.

But no one back home knows about your adventures, just as no monster knows what you really are. It’s been working so well that on today’s trip into darkness, you decide to do something a little different.

Du’Preve was known to host all kinds of escapism- drugs, whores, alcohol, you name it. But the most interesting to you were the parties and the clubs that hosted them. Last time you were here you overheard talk of one club in particular, The Club Lascivia, where patrons are generally safe from gang involvement and getting drinks spiked by malicious strangers.

You had gone through what few Du’Preve-looking outfits you had, needing something to wear to a club- eventually settling for something skimpier than you’d usually wear in your excitement to dance the night- or the day, away. You slip through your settlement in an old cloak which you leave at the border, soon arriving at your destination- by all appearances just another monster looking to party.

The scene was electric, with colored lights and dirty music that hummed beneath your skin. You moved between the dance floor, enjoying yourself with your heart racing at how close you were to the monstrous patrons, and simply watching the crowd from the safety of a booth, seeing for the first time how human these monsters really were.

In the booth next to you were two gargoyles, their stone-colored wings slightly unfolded to give a sense of privacy as they gossiped about a third gargoyle between flustered giggles.

You see a male gorgon leaning too close to a disinterested woman at the bar and after a few heated words she throws her drink in his face, causing his snakes to curl back with a hiss.

On the dancefloor you watch a little lich flirting with a stunning vampire, dancing so close, rubbing against one another. The vampire brushes closed lips against the lich’s throat in a dangerous tease and you shiver unexpectedly, drawn to the tantalizing threat.

Hot.

Wait- ‘hot’? What are you thinking?! Are you.. a fang-banger? No but you haven’t-

Before you can really parse out your thoughts, you notice a man approaching your booth with a couple of drinks.

He’s in a leather jacket that he hasn’t bothered to zip up over his fishnet shirt, allowing you to see the shape of his hips and the toned ‘v’ of his pelvis peaking up over a studded belt and artfully ripped jeans.

He stops a pace or so away from you, looking at you through tinted glasses as the lights of the club backlight his mane of curly black hair. Something about the way he looks at you makes you flush. He smiles, as if he knows what you’re feeling, and you see fangs glinting in his smirk.

“Mind if I join ya?" He asks in this brassy yet silken voice.

“Yes.” you find yourself saying, “-You can join me, that is.”

“ ‘Preciate it.” he says, and as he sits a strange thrill buzzes through your skull. “Here, for your hospitality.”

He sets a tall drink garnished with a twist of orange in front of you and your voice of reason momentarily returns. Was this safe to drink? You didn’t see the drink made, so it’s possible this was a sexy trap to lure you into a surprise kidney removal or something, right? You rotate the glass, as if somehow that would help you tell if it was spiked.

As you’re grappling with how to politely refuse the cocktail, his hand and its many rings brushes against yours and he plucks your glass off the table to take a deep drink, smiling as he catches the look on your face.

He sets it back in front of you with about a third less liquid in it and leans back, his arms draping across the top of the plush seating. “You’re smart not to trust a stranger, but I don’t get my kicks at this club from unwilling participants.” he teases, not unkind, but with a hint of what those kicks may be, “Go on then.” he urges, looking at you, not the drink. “If you want it.. It’s here for you.”

You had never been propositioned quite like this. His air was pushy, dominant, forceful even. But in his words and relaxed posture he invited you to walk away. What if you did? He might chuckle as you excuse yourself with a scarlet blush.. but you don’t think he’d follow.

What if you didn’t?

In a streak of boldness you look him in the eye and pick up your drink, draining it entirely as you stare him down. You were a human with enough gall to sneak into monster territory, after all.

“Moxie.” he praises with a quirk of his brow. It crosses your mind that you’re impressing a monster with your bravery and you feel tipsy off that alone. He licks one of his fangs and you can’t take your eyes off him. You think to the vampire on the dance floor and wonder what it feels like to have those sharp teeth on your skin.. on your lips..

“Now that you're done with your drink, you wanna taste of somethin’ else?” He asks, and you blush at his ability to seemingly read your thoughts.

What.. What should you say? Obviously you were getting hot and bothered here but to do anything physical with a person from Du'Preve, to willingly walk into his grasp, that was a much much bigger taboo than taking yourself on a little adventure across the border now and again.

You feel a light touch on your wrist, the man has moved in the semicircular booth to sit beside you. “Hey now..” the man soothes, his fingers barely resting on your skin. “You can be nervous, moxie, or anythin’ between. If we do somethin’ I just need you to want it.”

Your voice comes out as a whisper, anxious and daring all at once. “I want it.”

[PART 2]

7C taglist:

@gioiaalbanoart @biblicallyaccuratefruitbat @katenewmanwrites @pencilpusher1000 @lychhiker-writes @autism-purgatory @wyked-ao3 @cowboybrunch @zackprincebooks @smellyrottentrees @fortunatetragedy @aalinaaaaaa @the-golden-comet @urbiggestfan-01 @quillswriting @nbkuhn @ddgraywrites (hmu to be =/- to the list)

[indigenous-character-tournament]

Indigenous Character Tournament

Round 1

The bracket was randomly generated with minor tweaking to balance it out since there are so many characters. Ties are allowed only when there is an exact 50/50 and in that case, the characters will move on as a team. Propaganda is allowed and encouraged! The polls of each bracket will last one week! Below are the match-ups in case it is hard to read the bracket! :)

Voting will start Monday, May 8th at 6:00 P.M. EST! The polls will be released in waves.

Bracket A

Eliza Maza (Gargoyles) vs Willie Jack (Reservation Dogs)

Sokka (Avatar: The Last Airbender) vs Kamakiri (One Piece)

Joseph (Blood Quantum) vs Fuzzy Mac (Grace Beside Me)

John Redcorn (King of the Hill) vs Clinton Skye (FBI: Most Wanted)

Travis Manawa (Fear the Walking Dead) vs Jessica Keynes (Miraculous Ladybug)

Artemy Burakh (Pathologic) vs Nakamura Kotan (Yuusha Dan)

Delsin Rowe (Infamous: Second Son) vs Moana (Moana)

Pike Dexter (Big Eden) vs Naru (Predator)

Victor Joseph (Smoke Signals) vs Volo (Pokemon Legends: Arceus)

Prince Ashitaka (Princess Mononoke) vs Kurapika Kurta (Hunter x Hunter)

Naranpa (Black Sun) vs Kirikou (Kirikou and the Sorceress)

Fredzilla (Big Hero 6) vs Margaret Kohere (Apex Legends)

Wyper (One Piece) vs Jenna Begay (Echo Project)

Kronk (The Emperor's New Groove) vs Rock (Nanbaka)

Ka'kwet (Anne with an E) vs Akita (Ninjago)

Tanis (Letterkenny) vs Caitlin (Mohawk Girls)

Bracket B

Asirpa (Golden Kamuy) vs Asterix (Asterix the Gaul)

Little Strongheart (My Little Pony) vs Atticus O'Sullivan (The Iron Druid)

Makoa Gibraltar (Apex Legends) vs Joss (Blood Quantum)

Kenai (Brother Bear) vs Ratonhnhaké:ton (Assassin’s Creed III)

Miyax/Julie (Julie of the Wolves) vs Massai (Fortnite)

Anna (Mohawk Girls) vs Princess Maya (Maya and the Three)

Izel (Onyx Equinox) vs Mercy Thompson (Mercy Thompson)

Charles Smith (Red Dead Redemption 2) vs Dr. Joshua "Strongbear" Sweet (Atlantis: The Lost Empire)

Lady Silence/Silna (The Terror) vs Dedue (Fire Emblem: Three Houses)

Koen West (Cleverman) vs Hau (Pokémon Sun and Moon)

Elora Danan Postoak (Reservation Dogs) vs Iduna (Frozen)

Zia (Mysterious Cities of Gold) vs Knuckles Thrash/Harley (Sleepless Domain)

Carlos Oliveira (Resident Evil series) vs Nainoa Flores (Sharks in the Time of Saviors)

Katara (Avatar: The Last Airbender) vs Little Creek (Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron)

Asta Twelvetrees (Resident Alien) vs Hototo (Appare-Ranman!)

Bracket C

Nate Kinski (Neighbours) vs Usui Horokeu/Horohoro (Shaman King)

Reki Kyan (SK8 the Infinity) vs Waruu West (Cleverman)

Mugen (Samurai Champloo) vs Sitka (Brother Bear)

Samantha Black Crow (American Gods) vs Sasappis (Ghosts CBS)

Nina Aroyo (A Snake Falls to Earth) vs Malakai Mitchell (Heartbreak High)

Echo Reverie (Friends at the Table) vs Nuna (Kisima Inŋitchuŋa)

Margu (Klaus) vs Raúl Cocolotl (Wendell & Wild)

Huā Chéng (Heaven Official's Blessing) vs Leilani (Indivisible)

Elatsoe Bride (Elatsoe) vs Tao (Mysterious Cities of Gold)

Scar (Fullmetal Alchemist) vs Jesse Cosay (Infinity Train)

Kalgara (One Piece) vs Molly Mabray (Molly of Denali)

Miko Kalani (Barbie) vs Tom Evans (Captain Canuck)

Nani Pelekai (Lilo & Stitch) vs Gideon Nav (The Locked Tomb)

Thomas Builds-the-Fire (Smoke Signals) vs Fiza (Daevabad Trilogy)

Tikal the Echidna (Sonic the Hedgehog) vs Greiger (Yu-Gi-Oh!)

Maya Lopez/Echo (Marvel comics) vs Bear Smallhill (Reservation Dogs)

Bracket D

Chakotay (Star Trek: Voyager) vs Piper McLean (Heroes of Olympus)

Emperor Kuzco (The Emperor's New Groove) vs Denahi (Brother Bear)

Ricky Baker (Hunt for the Wilderpeople) vs Kristoff (Frozen)

Serapio (Black Sun) vs Boy (Boy - 2010 film)

Inkarmat (Golden Kamuy) vs Geronimo Jr. (Cyborg 009)

Tanigaki Genjirō (Golden Kamuy) vs Betty (Infamous: Second Son)

Pacha (The Emperor's New Groove) vs JJ Jacobs (DImension 20)

Kaya'aton'my (American Girl) vs Danielle Moonstar/Mirage (Marvel comics)

Knuckles the Echidna (Sonic the Hedgehog) vs Sacagawea (Night at the Museum)

Débora (Cidade Invisível) vs Matthew Carver (Kagagi)

Papa-Capim (Turma da Mônica) vs Professor Kukui (Pokémon Sun and Moon)

Tainá (Tainá uma aventura na Amazônia) vs Nuna (Indivisible)

Ken Hotate (Parks and Recreation) vs Nizhoni (Race to the Sun)

Revali (The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild) vs Daunis Fontaine (Firekeeper's Daughter)

Korra (The Legend of Korra) vs Ch'ah Toh Almehen/Namor the Submariner (Black Panther: Wakanda Forever)

Tye Longshadow (Young Justice) vs Lilo Pelekai (Lilo & Stitch)

[xaharadesert]

MC’s Familiar Having a Crush on LI’s Familiar - Headcanon

Arcana Characters (Main 6 + Familiars)

A/N: another poll winner! The request for this one specifically asked for the reactions of the LIs and their familiars, so it doesn’t really fall into “x MC” territory :) also, I’m leaving the species of MC’s familiar purposefully vague, but with the assumption that it’s not the same species as LI’s! Please let me know if there are any spelling or grammar mistakes!

TW: swearing in Lucio’s section

❤️Julian❤️

As a man of science, he has many questions

Are relationships between different species common in the magical world? Does a “crush” indicate that familiars have a similar level of sentience to humans? Is this an innate trait, or something that manifests as a result of magic?

The temptation to launch a scientific investigation is strong in this situation, but he restrains himself

It feels immoral to toy around with love, even if he doesn’t really understand it

However, that means that he’ll be supporting this crush from both the standpoint of a friend and a scientist

🌑Malak🌑

He had never really thought about romance before

Most of his time was spent bothering people and collecting shiny things, and he was content with that life

So finding out that another creature had a crush on him was an odd experience, to say the least

Not to mention that it was someone he already knew, and shared a strong connection with

He thinks he might give it a try. He won’t be sharing his collection of shiny things, though

🧡Portia🧡

Immediately thinks it’s the cutest thing to ever happen

100% supportive, no matter the species difference

Gives your familiar the shovel talk (Pepi is her baby, after all)

Makes all the classic parent jokes about keeping the door open

After making that joke, she sits in silence and contemplates the reality of the relationship, and now also has many questions

Will not be asking them though; might ask Julian about it later

🐈Pepi🐈

Embarrassed by her mother, which is difficult to achieve, given that she is a cat and feels no shame

When she finds out about the crush, she just kind of shrugs it off

It makes sense, after all; she is a cat, and cats are perfect

If the crush seems serious, then she’s willing to reciprocate

Probably would not be the best partner— she prefers to spend her time napping in the sun, so if your familiar is high energy then it might not work out

💛Lucio💛

What the fuck

Like, genuinely, what the fuck

I mean, he’s not really one to judge, given his own weird tastes

But, like, really? How the fuck does that happen?

Thinks his dog(s) can do better than your familiar, and makes this well-known

🐾Mercedes OR Melchior🐾

Makes perfect sense to him— he would fall in love with himself too

Not really interested in reciprocating though: he is a very busy boy

Many squirrels to chase and bones to chew

May pursue a more dedicated friendship, though

And if he’s feeling generous, then he may share one of his toys with your familiar

💚Muriel💚

A bit hesitant at first

He’s a very reserved kind of man, and he really only has Inanna by his side all the time

So he doesn’t know how he feels about losing her to any degree

But if it makes her happy, then he’ll support it

After all, it’s your familiar, and he trusts you

🐺Inanna🐺

Really did not expect that

Immediately rejects the crush, partly out of panic, because she really doesn’t want anything to change

But over time, she realizes she might like something more with your familiar

Eventually, the crush is returned

Mostly, she truly feels comfortable with it when she realizes she will always have Muriel’s support

💙Asra💙

Makes perfect sense to him; he’s loved you for years, so it’s only natural that Faust would form a bond with your familiar as well

He thinks it’s really cute, and encourages them to spend time together

Sometimes jokes with Faust about her “snake charm”

As a bonus, your familiars spending time together means that the two of you can spend more time together as well

Most definitely plans double dates (platonic or romantic)

🐍Faust🐍

Faust had a crush on your familiar before they had a crush on her

So she’s delighted to see it’s returned!

Very enthusiastic about having a partner

If your familiar is larger, then she’s hitching a ride whenever they hang out

Very cuddly for a snake, especially if your familiar gives off body heat

💜Nadia💜

Keeps her thoughts to herself while she tries to understand how exactly your familiar can have a crush on hers

She doesn’t want to judge what she doesn’t understand, so she asks you a few questions about it

Once she gets the gist of it, she’s very supportive, and finds it rather cute

Keeps an eye on Chandra though, since she knows her familiar likes her personal space, and helps to enforce boundaries

Overall thinks it’s harmless fun

🦉Chandra🦉

Eh

She’s not into romance, and let’s your familiar down as easily as she can

Still wants to be friends, but needs her own space

She’s a very solitary creature, and she has no desire to change

Will still occasionally be more affectionate to your familiar when she sees that they’re feeling down

[skiddlecat]

you know what im making a poll for this.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Where Will All The Martyrs Go [Chapter 7: Tell Me That I Won't Feel A Thing]

A/N: Hello besties! Thank you for voting in the poll for Chapter 7. Below are your predictions...let's see how you did! 🥰

Series summary: In the midst of the zombie apocalypse, both you and Aemond (and your respective travel companions) find yourselves headed for the West Coast. It’s the 2024 version of the Oregon Trail, but with less dysentery and more undead antagonists. Watch out for snakes! 😉🐍

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, med school Aemond, character deaths, nature, drinking, smoking, drugs, Adventures With Aegon™️, pregnancy and childbirth, the U.S. Navy, road trip vibes, Jace is back yay!!!

Series title is a lyric from: “Letterbomb” by Green Day.

Chapter title is a lyric from: “Give Me Novacaine” by Green Day.

Word count: 9.6k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist 🥰

Billboards ask you as the Tahoe flies across the flat emerald sea of Iowa: Have you heard the good news? Have you been saved? Where will you spend eternity? Are you struggling with same-sex attraction? Do you regret your abortion? Do you fear the Lord? Do you want to end up in Hell?

Aegon snickers, gnawing on a Slim Jim. The sun glare turns his wild hair to gold, etches crinkles into the ruddy skin around his eyes, murky like deep water, oceans you recognize from other corners of the world. “I thought I was already there.”

Jace’s Honda Rebel 300 is left on the shoulder of the highway with its fuel tank uncapped, drained to feed the Tahoe, prehistoric combustion, bottomless mechanical hunger. Rhaena takes over driving so Baela can sit with Jace, touch him, inhale him, convince herself he’s real. Aegon climbs into the passenger’s seat and skips songs on the CD player until he finds the one he wants: In Da Club by 50 Cent. The miles roll by so soft and so infinite that you can’t imagine ever feeling trapped again, warm July air unfurling down the darkest corridors of your lungs, hawks on lifeless power lines and fields dappled with white-tailed deer. And you think: Everything will be better now.

You cross the Missouri River and into Nebraska at Plattsmouth, which—according to a plaque mounted on the outskirts of town—the Lewis and Clark Expedition passed through over two centuries ago. Rhaena follows Aegon’s directions to cut between Lincoln and Omaha, avoiding the roiling wastelands of the cities and keeping well north of Cooper Nuclear Station, where in the absence of a successful manual or computerized shutdown before the power grid collapsed, rods of uranium are melting down and irradiating the surrounding area, anemia, cancer, heart disease, radiation sickness, an affliction that eats you alive.

Rhaena takes Nebraska State Route 66 north and then Route 92 due west, lush fields of corn and soybeans and sorghum planted before the dead began to walk, bones of devoured livestock. You stop for the night in a town called Broken Bow, the sky turning the colors of fire and rust and blood, the Tahoe exsanguinated like a man with a slit throat. Every vehicle you pass already has its fuel cap unscrewed; the farther west you go—the scarcer the resources, the longer it’s been since the world began to end—the less the earth will yield to you: less guns, less gasoline, less food, less human settlements scattered across what was once called the frontier. You commandeer a two-story house: white wood, wraparound porch, a long gravel driveway that winds like a snake. There is a small cornfield and a barn, both of which you sweep for zombies before making yourselves at home. You try not to think about what happened to the family that used to live here.

Helaena lights candles, Luke and Rhaena distribute bowls and silverware, Aemond and Rio gather kindling for the woodstove, Daeron keeps watch on the porch, Aegon picks all the Twizzlers out of a mixed bag of Hershey’s candy for Jace. There is a 12-pack of Ramen noodles in the pantry, gallons of water in the cellar, and a pot large enough to cook it all in one batch. Cregan takes Ice and disappears into the cornfield for half an hour at dusk—something none of the rest of you would ever consider—and reappears with an opossum that he’s nearly decapitated with his axe. He butchers it and you brown cubes of meat in a sauté pan placed directly on the glowing embers. The others are horrified and won’t eat a single bite until you do. It’s the first real food you’ve had since you left Saratoga Springs, and you feel satiated in a way you had forgotten existed.

In honor of Jace’s resurrection, some revelry is in order. There are bottles of Grey Goose vodka in a kitchen cabinet, and Aemond allows a two drink maximum for anyone eligible to participate: Baela is too pregnant, Daeron is too young, Aemond himself is too vigilant, too self-sacrificial, too indoctrinated into the religion of his own martyrdom.

“Daddy loved his screwdrivers,” Cregan says. “I remember being five or six and taking a big gulp of one thinking it was Sunny D or Tang or something. Lord almighty, was that a shock!” He guffaws, then inspects the pantry, scratching at the dark stubble on his cheeks. “We ain’t got nothing like orange juice though.”

“Mama made hers with Hawaiian Punch.” You point: there are several jugs of it on the floor between boxes of Pop-Tarts and Welch’s Fruit Snacks and Cheddar Whales, red like crushed blackberries or fresh blood.

Cregan grins at you over his brawny shoulder. “That’ll work, Miss Chips.”

Luke and Rhaena have first watch, Rio and Aegon will take the second. You are blessedly unburdened tonight. This house is big enough for you to get your own room; you climb the staircase with Grey Goose vodka burning in your throat, your head warm and dizzy, a sensation like freefalling as you lie down on the bed.

I left them, you think, the walls spinning around you, echoes of Mama’s voice through the phone as Rio stood there nodding, encouraging you to hang up. I left them and I never looked back. Can someone commit such an act of ancestral betrayal without incurring a curse?

You are still considering this when you feel Aemond’s weight on the mattress and fold into him, the world going dark and hushed and harmless.

~~~~~~~~~~

“I think it’s safe,” you tell Aemond between sighs, his lips on your throat, his hand between your thighs. Late-morning sunlight slants in through the bedroom windows; goldfinches and blue jays flap by chirping blithely. The dead pillage the misfortunate beasts of the earth, but creatures of the air and water are spared. You can hear geese honking from a distance, and the breeze through the cornfield, and calm indistinct voices beneath the floorboards. You can smell pancakes turning from white to gold in a pan sizzling with Crisco. Cregan must be cooking breakfast in the woodstove.

“How sure are you?” Aemond murmurs, his breath warm on your neck, those small teeth he’s always hiding nipping playfully, and if he leaves marks like stains of ballpoint ink you don’t care. He’s whisked every scrap of your clothing away. Beneath him you are bare and helpless and needing more.

“Like…eighty percent sure.”

“I’ll pull out.”

“Like Jace did?”

He laughs and kisses your mouth, not just ravenous but wild like a storm, and all the rest of the world goes quiet. Your ankles are linked around him, his hips rocking with yours. He is wearing only his boxers, black plaid from a looted Walmart, apocalypse chic. “Hopefully better than that.”

“Just try your best. I trust you. I’m willing to risk it.”

“Yeah?”

“It’s worth it to me.” I could be dead in nine months, he could be dead in nine months. I’m not wasting the time we have left.

“It’s your decision. You would be most affected by the consequences.” He draws away and glances down. “I want to look at you.”

“Ohhh.” You stall. “I’ve been trimming with scissors by candlelight. It’s a hack job.”

“I won’t mind.” He grins. “You don’t mind my hack job of a face.”

“I love your face,” you say as you skim your fingerprints down the length of his scar. And then, when he raises an eyebrow roguishly: “I didn’t break any rules. I didn’t say I love you, just your face. I’m totally using you for your face. Your personality is terrible.”

He snickers, kisses you goodbye, retreats to your hips and pushes your thighs apart as you cover your face and whimper, nervous, exhilarated. And then his lips are on you and the trepidation melts away, puddles pooling and then evaporating, and you have a vision of being home again, shivering and dripping in front of the crackling flames of the woodstove after playing outside in the snow and waiting for the fire to take the cold away. Now the fire is growing over you like ivy, tendrils snaking through veins and leaves opening in your lungs, bones vanishing, muscles turning pliant and weightless. You can feel Aemond’s fingers pushing into you, a fleeting second of tension and discomfort, and then a fullness that is delectable, irresistible, maddening.

“Come back,” you plead, and when he does you clasp his face with both hands, kissing him deeply as his fingers remain inside you, thrusting and bathed in your wetness. You’re finally ready for him, you have to be, you need him so badly: like you’re dying of thirst, like you’re running out of air. “Now, Aemond, please. I want all of you.”

And he wants it too. His boxers are gone and he’s positioning himself between your legs, his tongue in your mouth, one hand cradling your jaw as the other guides his cock to where you are slick and aching and aware of an emptiness that has never felt so dire.

He’s so big…

But you are determined to take all of him. You don’t care if there’s pain, if there’s fear. You want to feel what it’s like to be with him before it’s too late.

Aemond presses himself against you, rolls his hips cautiously…and nothing happens. He is a bit more forceful. There is immense pressure, then the beginning of a stretching that is sharp, searing, dreadful, unfamiliar in a way that is completely disorienting. You gasp before you can stop yourself; a wince ripples across your face too quickly to camouflage. Aemond shakes his head and climbs off you, settling beside you on the bed.

“Fuck,” you exhale in frustration, slapping a palm down on the mattress. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand why…why I’m like this…”

“Shh,” Aemond soothes, kissing you. “It’s okay, it’s fine. I’ll help you finish and then we can try again later.”

“Why isn’t this easier?”

“You’re just nervous,” he says gently, smoothing your hair back from your face, like it’s no big deal, like he’s pointing out a bird or a rabbit or the shape of a cloud.

“I don’t feel nervous.”

“It’s not always conscious, sometimes the body reacts without the mind even being aware of it. You tense up and things become…more challenging. But fortunately for us, the treatment is very enjoyable. We just keep messing around and working up to it until one day you’re so aroused and so relaxed that I can glide in without any discomfort whatsoever, and then your body adjusts to this glorious new experience and you aren’t so nervous anymore.”

“Can’t you just…you know…sorry, this isn’t very romantic, but like…shove it in?”

“I could, sure,” Aemond says. “If I was a horrible person. And then you’d learn to associate sex with pain, which would just exacerbate the situation.”

“The problem, you mean.”

He smiles patiently. “You aren’t a problem. We’ll figure it out, we have time.”

Do we? You stare morosely up at the ceiling, shadows of clouds, shades of wings. “I should have hooked up with that Marine at Corpus Christi. Then I’d have practice. I was so afraid of giving a man the power to hurt me or get me pregnant or otherwise ruin my life, but I didn’t know I’d meet you one day. And now I just want everything to be easy for us, and it isn’t.”

“Hey.” Aemond turns your face towards his. “For me, you are…” He struggles to decide on the words, his eye drifting to the window, sunlight turning the blue of his iris to a shallow, glass-clear river. “You’re like an island, and everything else is a sea of poison, and violence, and catastrophically fucked up situations, and when we’re alone together it all goes away for a little while. The world gets quiet. It’s never been like that for me before. I don’t mind if it takes time for us to figure this out. I just want to be with you.”

“What happens when we get to Nevada, and you’re supposed to turn south for the Bay Area while I go north to Oregon?”

Aemond shrugs, but his expression is contemplative. “I’ve been thinking about that. Maybe we’ll all stay together and go to one place, then the other. If Odessa is safe, I can bring my parents, Criston, and Grandfather there. If it isn’t, we can bring Rio’s family south and live in California in that beach house on the cliff.”

“I never thought I’d set foot in a mansion.”

“I never thought I’d eat opossum.”

You laugh and curl up against him, resting your head and a palm on his chest. “How was it?”

“Not too bad, actually. Kind of like dark meat chicken. A little gamey, but I like lamb and venison, so that’s fine with me.”

“Just wait until you try bear.”

“Bear?!”

There is a knock at the bedroom door. Luke’s bashful voice is muted through the wood. “Aemond?”

“Yeah?” Aemond replies impatiently.

This was not an invitation, but Luke doesn’t seem to know that. He opens the door, and as he does Aemond throws the blanket over you so you’re covered, leaving himself completely exposed.

Luke begins: “I’m really sorry, I didn’t want to bother you, but…” His eyes go wide. “Oh, you’re like, all the way naked.” He turns and stares at the wall to be polite. “If it’s a bad time, I could come back in five minutes. Do you need more than five minutes? Wait, that was rude, I didn’t mean it like that, I’m sure you can last way longer than five minutes…um…”

Aemond sighs. “What’s wrong, Luke?”

“Jace is sick.”

“Sick?” Aemond sits up straighter, his eye narrowing. “Sick how?”

“He’s been puking since he woke up.”

You and Aemond exchange a startled glance as you clutch the edges of a blanket patterned with wild horses. Illness, virus, plague, curse.

“He hasn’t been bitten or anything,” Luke says quickly. “So it can’t be…you know…that. And he and Baela don’t seem that worried. But you should probably take a look at him.”

Aemond nods, less alarmed now. “I agree. Can I get those five minutes first?”

Luke smiles. “Yeah. See you downstairs.” He leaves and shuts the door behind him.

You look to Aemond. “Why—?”

He yanks the blanket away and drags you towards him. “I said I was going to help you finish,” he says, grinning, a hand slipping between your thighs.

You bite at his lips when he kisses you and tease: “I don’t need your help.”

“No, I’m sure you don’t. But it’s better when I’m here.”

And he’s right; it is.

~~~~~~~~~~

Daeron is out on the front porch sharpening sticks into arrows and using goose feathers for fletching, attaching them to the wood with a tube of Gorilla Glue that Helaena found for him. Helaena herself is presently floating through the house—soundlessly, ethereally, traceless like a ghost—and partaking in what you all call “apocalypse shopping,” pilfering the clothes and accessories of the former occupants. She seems to know everyone’s sizes without needing to ask. Aegon, Rio, and Cregan are sitting in the living room and eating pancakes off paper plates, carelessly spilling Mrs. Butterworth’s syrup on hideous 1970s couches ornamented with scenes of pheasants and autumn leaves. Down on the Turkish-style area rug, Ice is merrily chomping her way through a stack of burnt pancakes.

“So Cregan,” Rio says, his bare feet propped on the coffee table. “What did you do before the whole zombie situation?”

“I was a lumberjack.”

“No way!”

“Yes sir. I cut down trees for the power company.”

“What a coincidence,” Rio says around a mouthful of pancakes. “I was an electrician!”

“Well how about that? We oughta go into business together once the world straightens itself out. Where’d you work?”

“All over. Wherever the Navy sent us.”

Cregan sets his fork down on his plate. “You were enlisted?”

“Yeah, me and Chips both. That’s how we met.”

Cregan, much to Rio’s surprise, seizes his hand and shakes it soberly. “Thank you very kindly for your service.”

“No problem,” Rio replies, then turns to Aegon. “No gratitude from you, huh?”

“I showed my gratitude when I let you have the last pancake, you ogre…”

In the only bedroom on the first floor, down a hallway and towards the back of the house, Jace looks worse than you expected. He is heaving into a reusable plastic popcorn bucket, gluey ropes of saliva dangling from his lips; his skin is pale and bloodless, his dark curls damp with sweat. Baela is perched beside him on the bed and holding a wet washcloth to the back of his neck. Rhaena and Luke are loitering anxiously in the doorway, watching Aemond to determine if they should panic.

Jace casts you a bitter glance. “You poisoned me with your poor people food.”

“There’s nothing wrong with eating opossum,” you say, somewhat defensively.

Aemond feels his forehead. “That wouldn’t give you a fever. And everyone else is fine.”

“Maybe I’m extra sensitive. My digestive system has higher standards. I’m built different.” Jace resumes retching into the bucket.

Baela tells Aemond: “He can’t keep anything down. There’s nothing left in him, but he’s still so sick…it has to be a stomach flu, right?”

“Who would he have caught it from?” Luke asks, and Baela doesn’t have an answer.

“Stand up,” Aemond orders Jace when his wave of nausea abates. “Strip down.”

“Aemond, he wasn’t bitten,” Baela says. “I saw his whole body last night. He doesn’t have any scratches or bruises or anything.”

“Fine. But I want to see for myself.”

Jace stumbles out of the bed, pushing away Baela’s hands as she tries to stop him. “Okay, Nick Fury. If you wish to gaze upon the goods, I won’t deny you. I’m not shy.” Aemond rolls his eye. You turn around to give Jace privacy. “What’s the matter, Chips? The only dick you’re interested in belongs to Mike Wazowski over there?”

“Jace,” Baela says, but she’s chuckling. Amused, you stare at a picture on the wall—a haloed Jesus guiding a flock of lambs—as Jace sheds his clothing and follows Aemond’s instructions: lift your arm, turn around, show me the bottoms of your feet.

“No bites,” Aemond confirms, deep in thought. “But the symptoms…”

“It’s not that, Aemond, I’m telling you,” Jace insists, rasping breaths between each clause. “Listen, I got sick when I was alone, before I found you guys again. My stomach, my head. Maybe it’s the same thing now. It didn’t last long, and I thought I was over it, but I guess not.”

“People don’t get better and then worse again after they’ve been bitten,” Rhaena observes softly. “They just get worse.”

Jace lies back down on the bed, his face crumbling with pain. Baela uses the wet washcloth to cool his cheeks and neck. “My head hurts so fucking bad…”

“Because you’re dehydrated,” Aemond says.

“Helaena brought pills, but every time I try to take one I throw it up before it can start working.” There is a gurgling sound in his guts, and then a horrified expression. “Baela, I gotta get outside again.” She and Luke immediately swoop in, grab one arm each, and usher him out of the bedroom, through the back door of the farmhouse, and into the cornfield to allow him some semblance of dignity.

Rhaena gives you and Aemond an awkward smirk. “Helaena found Jace a 24-pack of Angel Soft toilet paper in the basement. So there’s some good news.”

“He needs electrolytes,” Aemond says. “We can’t let him get so dehydrated that his kidneys shut down. IV fluids aren’t an option. Pedialyte would be the next best thing, Gatorade or Powerade if that’s all we can find.”

“We passed a pharmacy on our way here,” Rhaena recalls. “It’s only a mile back, I think.”

Aemond nods. “Then that’s where I’m going,” he says, and walks out of the room.

You say as you follow him: “I want to go with you.”

“No.” Aemond points to Rio, who is now playing Uno with Aegon on the coffee table in the living room. “You and I are going to a pharmacy to get Pedialyte for Jace so he doesn’t die.”

“Cool,” Rio says, standing and fetching his Remington shotgun from where he propped it against the wall. “What’s wrong with him?”

“We don’t know. Maybe food poisoning.”

Aegon says, a hand pressed to his heart: “Personally, I loved the opossum.”

You stare defiantly up at Aemond. “If Rio is going, I have to go too.”

“Aww, so you can protect me?” Rio teases fondly, patting your back with one monstrous palm, an unintentional battering.

“Yeah. Exactly.”

Rio looks at Aemond. Aemond looks at you, touching his chin agitatedly. “You are stressing me out.”

“I’m the best shot. I want to be there in case anything happens.”

“Fine, okay, whatever you want. Just stay near Rio.”

“That’s the idea.”

“A pharmacy?” Aegon asks excitedly. “Can I go?”

“No,” Aemond snaps, and continues out onto the porch. In the gravel driveway, Cregan and Daeron are kneeling by the Tahoe and inspecting the front tire on the driver’s side. “What’s wrong now?” Aemond asks, exasperated.

“Got a flat,” Cregan says. “The little fella here noticed it.”

Daeron is mortified. “Please don’t call me that.”

Aemond peers around mistrustfully, out at the road, into the cornfield. “Someone sabotaged us?”

Cregan shakes his head and taps the tire. “Naw, we just ran over a nail yesterday. You can see it right here. A big one too, a masonry nail, I suspect.”

“Can you fix it?” Rio asks.

“I think so. I saw a jack and a lug wrench hanging up on the wall in the barn, now I just need a new tire, a real one. A spare wouldn’t do us much good, not with all the weight we’re carrying. It’d pop in twenty miles.” Cregan gestures to the main road, but westward, the opposite direction from the pharmacy. “Don’t remember seeing a tire place on our way in. Figured I’d try the other direction. I’ll walk ‘til I find a shop or a truck with the right kind of tires to steal from, whichever comes first. Can’t change a tire on gravel, though. I’ll have to drive the Tahoe out to the road and fix it there. I’m gonna need Rhaena’s keys.”

There is an uneasy lull as Aemond studies him. You, Rio, Daeron, and Aegon—who is lingering on the front porch, not yet ready to admit defeat—glance between them apprehensively. Ice is rolling around in the gravel, coating her grey fur with dust. “How do I know you won’t take off without us?”

Cregan’s face goes dark. His brow, heavy and furrowed, settles low over his eyes. “Look buddy, I’ve done a lot of things for you and your people that I didn’t have to. And now I’m fixing the Tahoe so it can take you west, someplace you decided we’re going. If you don’t trust me, do it yourself. Kill your own opossum. Change your own flat tire. But you can’t, can you? Just like I can’t shoot a zombie straight through the eye or tell you how to cure that sick boy in there. We’ve all got jobs here. Let me do mine.”

Aemond glowers at Cregan, knowing he’s right. Daeron averts his eyes; Rio, grinning, eats a handful of Cheddar Whales from a pocket of his cargo shorts. You lay a palm on Aemond’s forearm. “Aemond…he’s trying to help.”

“Sure,” Aemond replies crossly.

“You want collateral?” Cregan says. “Take my dog.” He whistles, and Ice scampers to his side. He points to you. “Go on, princess.” Ice obediently trots over to stand with you, shaggy ash-colored fur, bestial amber eyes like a rattlesnake’s. “She’ll look after you on your way to the pharmacy and back. And if the Tahoe and I have mysteriously vanished upon your return, you can eat her for dinner.”

“You don’t want a warning if you’re about to run into zombies?” Rio asks.

Cregan chuckles as he picks up his axe off the gravel. “Don’t you worry about me. We haven’t heard a peep since we got into town, and I’m just going a little ways up the road. Any less than ten of those abominations, and I can take care of myself.” He gives you and Rio a parting salute and strides into the farmhouse to collect the Tahoe keys from Rhaena.

Aemond turns to Daeron. “Stay here, keep watch. We’ll be back as soon as we can.”

Daeron nods, glancing to where his compound bow rests on the front porch. “Got it.”

“Aegon will help you.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Aegon says. “I want to go to the pharmacy too.”

Aemond is losing what remains of his patience. “No.”

“Please?”

“No!”

“Then can you at least bring me something back?”

Rio is confounded. “What do you need?”

“You know…” Aegon gestures vaguely. “Percocet, Vicodin, Oxy, maybe some of that cough syrup with the codeine in it—”

“Grow the fuck up,” Aemond flares, and Aegon falls silent. “You’re thirty years old. Take some goddamn responsibility for something, for anything. I have to go to the pharmacy, Cregan has to fix the Tahoe, someone has to stay here with Daeron to help protect Jace and Baela, and Luke and Rhaena, and Helaena too. Just shut up and do the right thing. You have to start acting like an adult. Who do you think is in charge if I get killed? I’ve never for a single day of my life had the luxury of making selfish choices, and now I feel like I’m not even allowed to die. Leaving everyone else with you would be like leaving them with nobody.”

Aegon gazes up at him, not offended but childishly, mortally wounded. His oceanic eyes are huge and glistening. “But you’re not going to die before me.”

“That’s not the point,” Aemond pitches back, cutting, caustic. Then he starts down the long gravel driveway towards the road. You give Aegon a small, apologetic half-smile and then follow after his younger brother, Ice loping alongside you.

Rio thumps Aegon encouragingly on one shoulder. “See you soon, Honey Bun.” And Aegon watches the three of you disappear, standing in the dazzling midday light with his arms folded over his chest and his hair in hie face, kicking at the gravel with the Sperry Bahama sneakers he once wore on yachts and golf courses.

“Please try to be nice to him,” you tell Aemond when you’re far enough away to be out of earshot. Rio is humming a song you don’t immediately recognize—probably Enrique Iglesias—and acting like he’s not listening. “You don’t know how much longer any of us have. And if that was the last thing you ever said to him, you’d feel awful about it.”

“You have no idea what it was like being his brother. Since I was born all I’ve done is try to plug the holes he blasts into ships. But there’s always water on the floor, I’m never done bailing it out. He needs to learn how to do things for himself.”

“Yes, he does. But he loves you, and he wants you to be happy. He would never intentionally take anything from you. He’ll grow into his purpose, whatever that is.”

“He needs to do it faster,” Aemond says harshly, and you walk the rest of the way without speaking, listening for snarling or lurching footsteps, hearing nothing but birdsong and wind whispering through leaves.

The pharmacy—a diminutive family-owned business, not a chain—has been ravaged. The glass of the large bay window has been broken out and the shelves looted, empty containers and wrappers littering the floor, crystalline shards threatening to gash, stab, infect.

“Stay out here with the dog,” Aemond tells you. Ice is panting calmly, her ears relaxed, her strange yellowish eyes taking in the scenery without any concern. “If she gets her paws sliced up, Cregan will have yet another accusation to levy against me.”

“You’re going to have to get used to him.”

“Not much of an adjustment for you, it seems,” Aemond says, then steps through the shattered window, glass crunching beneath his shoes. Rio gives you a wink and goes after him. They rummage through the remaining merchandise, strewn about randomly and interspersed among trash. Aemond peeks behind the counter where pharmacists once filled prescriptions and climbs over it, searching for any bottles or boxes that were left behind.

“Sorry guys, no condoms,” Rio announces, then laughs at his own joke.

“Be careful,” you urge from outside. “Look underneath, check the bottom racks. Rio? Rio, down low, check them!”

“Relax, ain’t nothing going on in here. It’s silent as the grave.” He laughs again. “Get it? As the grave.”

“Aemond?”

“I’m fine,” he tells you as he squints to read medicine bottles.

“Okay, okay,” Rio says, squatting to examine the shelves closest to the cluttered floor. “I’m checking all the racks. There’s nothing scary under the racks. Happy now?”

“Very. Helaena said something that freaked me out.”

“She can be a bit of an enigma,” Aemond admits. He is taking a tiny box from a drawer to keep.

“Oh, we got Pedialyte!” Rio says, yanking a jug of pink fluid from a pile of debris. “You think Jace likes strawberry?”

Aemond hurries over to help him hunt for more. “Yeah. It’s like a Twizzler, right?”

Ice noses your hand and whimpers softly. You look down at her. “What?”

She whirls and canters around the side of the pharmacy, then returns to make sure you’re keeping up. You go after her, slow and wary, a hand on one of your Beretta M9s. There’s nothing of note to be found in the narrow, shadowy alleyway other than an overflowing dumpster and two skeletons stripped of every shred of fabric and flesh; even the bones were licked clean.

You turn to Ice. “Did I need to see this?” She whines and shifts her weight from foot to foot, ears perked up. Something else? You look down the alleyway. Far behind the pharmacy and the shops that surround it is a church on a jade green slope, old-fashioned, white wood and a belltower. There is a cemetery beside it, and amidst the small grey blurs of headstones are… “Oh,” you breathe. “So that’s where the rest of the town is.”

The graveyard is full of limp, swaying figures that can only be zombies. You are far away and draped in shadows; you retreat back to the pharmacy without any indication that you’ve been spotted, Ice trailing close behind. Aemond and Rio are climbing out of the window just as you arrive. They are each carrying three jugs of Pedialyte in various flavors.

“Where the hell’d you go?” Aemond says; but he sounds more relieved than irritated.

“There’s a church about an eight of a mile away. And there are a lot of zombies in the cemetery.”

Rio sets his Pedialyte down on the sidewalk and reaches for the Remington 12 gauge hanging over his shoulder by its leather strap. “Okay, let’s go clear them out.”

“No, I mean a lot. Like a hundred.”

He freezes. “Oh.”

“We should leave town,” you say.

“While Jace is puking and shitting everywhere? You want to be stuck in a car with that?”

Aemond is thinking, toying with the little box you saw him pick up earlier. “We’ll leave as soon as we can.”

“What’s that?” you ask him.

He shows you the label. “Injectable morphine. All the pills were gone, but I found one vial of this, and I have syringes in my medical kit. It doesn’t need to be refrigerated. It should still be useable.”

“For Baela?” For when she delivers the baby?

“Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. Just in case.” Then he looks at both you and Rio meaningfully. “Don’t tell Aegon I have this.”

“We won’t,” Rio promises. And Ice begins trotting back towards the farmhouse, as if trying to rush you along.

~~~~~~~~~~

The Tahoe is at the mouth of the long gravel driveway, still up on a hand-cranked scissor jack. The tire appears to be new, but the lug nuts haven’t been tightened, and the wrench is nowhere to be found.

“Cregan?” Rio says uncertainly, peeking through the cornstalks as they bend in the wind. “Hey, Cregan? Aemond’s sorry he was a bitch to you earlier. He wants you to return ASAP and do manual labor for him.” Aemond grimaces; Rio beams in reply. But Cregan does not appear.

You can hear them long before you reach the farmhouse, muffled chaotic chattering, raised voices and rushing footsteps. As you ascend the steps of the front porch, Rhaena bursts through the door.

“Thank God you’re back,” she says; there is blood on her hands. “It’s Jace, he…he…come look at him. Aemond, you have to do something. He’s sick, he’s really sick. He’s bleeding.”

“From where?” Aemond asks, urgent, bewildered.

“From everywhere,” Rhaena replies, and beckons for him to follow.

The bedsheets Jace is swathed in are blooming with crimson, flowers of doomed gore. Blood drips from his nostrils and his eyes; when he retches into the popcorn bucket, clots of pink and red spew out. Everyone is gathered around him and speaking at the same time, except Helaena. She is crouched on the floor of the hallway just outside his room, her arms wrapped around her bent knees and her face stricken. Ice curls up beside her.

Above the other voices, Baela screams at Aemond, a desperate horrified moan: “What’s wrong with him?!”

Aemond pushes by the others and feels Jace’s forehead, then grabs his wrist to measure his pulse. As Aemond’s fingers tighten, Jace’s skin rips beneath them, the top layer sliding off and leaving only glistening, raw pink. Jace howls, tears of blood streaming down his cheeks. “I don’t know,” Aemond says, his voice unsteady.

“What the fuck do you mean you don’t know?!” Baela shouts back. “You’re a doctor! Fix him!”

“It hurts, Aemond,” Jace gasps, fresh blood on his teeth. When Baela touches his hair, locks of it fall out into her hand.

“He’s turning, right?” Rio says to you. “This is what happened to Snowflake, the blood and the skin and everything—?”

“He wasn’t bitten!” Luke insists, positioned in front of Jace’s bed as if he’s guarding it.

“I don’t care if we can’t find a bite mark, he’s decomposing for Christ’s sake, what the fuck else could it be?!”

Daeron returns with more blankets and towels. Aegon grabs a strawberry Pedialyte out of Rio’s grasp and tries to help Jace drink it. Cregan is muttering: “I ain’t never seen anything like this…”

Decomposing, you think dizzily. He wasn’t bitten, but he’s falling apart…what else does that to a person?

Baela cleans blood from his lips, a towel turning from snow to rubies. “Jace, baby, it’s going to be okay, we’re going to help you…”

“Could it be rat poison or something?” Cregan is saying. “Rabies? Mad cow disease? Ebola?”

“How the fuck do you think he got Ebola?!” Aemond exclaims. “You think he took a jet to sub-Saharan Africa when he was on his own? Use your brain.”

“I’m just trying to come up with ideas here, doc, and I don’t see you with any bright ones!”

He’s decomposing. He’s decomposing.

And then you remember. You kneel down beside the bed so you can look into his face, so you can make him pay attention. “Jace, listen to me.”

“I’m listening,” he replies faintly. He coughs, wet and gurgling. Fresh blood paints his lips. There are blisters beginning to form up and down his arms, you see now, the skin bubbling and separating.

“Jace, do you remember Three Mile Island?”

“What the fuck.” He is baffled, dismissive. “Three Mile what? Huh? What are you talking about…?”

“You’re upsetting him,” Baela says fiercely, tears glittering in her eyes.

But you are determined. “Outside of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, after we left Fort Indiantown Gap. There were these huge concrete cooling towers. We saw them from the Wawa parking lot.” But he wasn’t there when we talked about radiation. He was still inside searching for guns. “Remember, Jace? Do you remember?”

Now Aemond and Rio are looking at you, petrified, realizing what you must be thinking. No one else understands yet. After a long pause, Jace nods feebly. “Yeah. I remember the towers.”

“Good,” you say, smiling to encourage him. “Okay, this is important. After we lost you at the river, before you found us again, did you see anywhere that looked like Three Mile Island?”

“Yeah,” Jace murmurs as he stares back at you with glazed, bloody eyes; and Rio sighs and shakes his head. “I drove right by it on the Honda. The sign said Byron.”

And it’s been over for him since that moment.

“Alright, Jace.” You want to touch him, to embrace him or cup his cheek. You know it will only make his suffering worse. “Thank you. That’s all I wanted to ask.” He begins to gag again, and Baela hurries to place the popcorn bucket so it can catch his liquefying organs. You turn around and walk through the doorway.

“What’s happening?” Aegon asks you, hushed voice, frantic eyes. He has followed you to the living room, along with Aemond, Rio, and Cregan. You nod to Aemond. He knows.

“It’s radiation sickness,” Aemond says, low and bleak.

“What?!” Aegon gapes at him. “I mean, are you sure…?”

“It fits all the symptoms. He was in close proximity to a nuclear power plant, something the rest of us have intentionally avoided. If there was a meltdown, there are miles and miles that are poisoned with radiation. Passing by on a motorcycle could definitely result in a lethal dose.”

“Poor guy,” Rio says. “Not a good way to go.”

“No,” you agree. It isn’t.

“So how do you treat something like that?” Cregan asks Aemond.

“It can’t be treated,” Aemond replies tersely. “Not here, not by me, not by anyone. Not even if the world was normal again.”

“What do you mean it can’t be treated?! Everything can be treated nowadays! Cancer, heart attacks, diabetes, hell, my cousin got testicular cancer and he was fine a month later, he even got to keep one of his balls!”

“Radiation sickness can’t be treated. He’s going to die.”

“But how is that possible when—?!”

“I need you to try to not be stupid for five minutes,” Aemond snaps.

You say quietly: “He’s not stupid, Aemond. He just doesn’t know about this.”

“You are always defending him.”

“Because not going to med school isn’t a character flaw.”

Cregan asks mildly, looking at Aemond: “Could you explain it to me?”

“It’s pennies in a jar, man,” Rio says. “Radiation stacks up and at a certain point it kills you. It destroys your DNA and your body falls apart. You can get it just by going near someplace contaminated, and you might not even feel it happen. And there’s no way to undo the damage. The pennies never leave the jar.”

Cregan raises an eyebrow at Aemond. “Was that so difficult?”

Aemond ignores him. “We have to tell Jace,” he says instead.

Back in the bedroom—a mineral stench in the air, coppery blood and the salt of sweat—Aegon sits on the edge of the bed and takes one of Jace’s swelling, blistering hands carefully in his own.

“Don’t hold my hand, you loser.” Jace mumbles, and Aegon respectfully releases him.

“Jace,” Aegon begins. “We think you have radiation sickness.”

Jace blinks up at him, wincing and disoriented. “Which means…?”

“Which means, um, it’s going to be…not great.”

“Why are you the person explaining this?”

“You’re right, I really shouldn’t be explaining it. Can someone else explain it…?” Aegon glances around hopefully.

“Jace,” Aemond says. “Those cooling towers you drove by were part of a nuclear power plant that melted down when the power grid collapsed. You received a fatal dose of radiation. It’s the only thing that explains what’s happening to you.”

“Fatal…?” Daeron ventures.

Rhaena gasps and reaches for Luke. Baela’s face is a mask of numb shock. Jace stares up at Aemond for a long time before he speaks. “Aemond, fix me.”

Aemond’s words are brittle and fracturing. “I can’t. I’m sorry.”

“Stop fucking around, man, you’re a doctor. You can fix me. I know you can. You’re a genius. You’re a total freak but you’re the smartest person I’ve ever met. Give me the pills, give me the shots. Cut me open if you have to. I won’t scream, I promise. Fix me. I trust you.”

“Jace, I can’t do anything. No one can.”

“I have to meet the baby, Aemond,” Jace whispers, scarlet tears bleeding down his cheeks. “I have to be here for Baela and Luke. Fix me, man. I’ll do anything you tell me to.”

“Jace,” Aemond says, his voice breaking. “I’m so sorry. I can’t help you.”

Jace looks to Baela, Luke, Rhaena, and at last back to Aemond. “How long?”

“Not very. A few days, maybe.”

“Days?” he echoes, dazed. “What happens?”

Aemond shakes his head. You don’t want to know.

“Yeah I do. Tell me.”

Aemond can’t respond; clear silent tears snake down the right side of his face. Rio answers for him. “You continue to bleed out of every orifice and the rest of your skin falls off. And eventually you die.”

Jace breaks down in sobs. “I was trying to find you guys.”

Suddenly, Baela turns to you and Rio and Aemond, wrathful, hissing. “This is your fault.”

Aemond pleads: “Baela, please don’t—”

“You made me leave him at the river. I knew he was still alive, but you forced me to leave him. If he’d been with us, this never would have happened. But he was alone, and it was because of you. You did this to him. You stole him from me.”

Rhaena tries to console her. “Baela, no one meant to—”

“I just got him back!” she screams, and then shelters Jace in her arms as he clings to her, the skin of his fingers and palms flaking at the pressure, holding onto her anyway. No one knows what to say; everyone has tears burning in their eyes and embers in their throats. “Get out,” Baela demands. “Leave us alone. This is the last time I’ll ever have with him and it’s your fucking fault. So get out.”

And you leave them to their final moments, failing flesh in a dying world.

~~~~~~~~~~

Only Luke and Rhaena flit in and out of the bedroom, carrying soiled linens and the plastic popcorn bucket to be periodically emptied. The rest of you are engrossed in a grim, thunderstruck deathwatch in the living room. You discuss the inevitable in hushed murmurs. It is cruel to let Jace suffer; it is unspeakably horrible to let Baela witness it. Ice alternates between receiving scratches from Cregan, Helaena, and Aegon, never trying to enter Jace’s room. You can hear Jace and Baela talking in there, his retching and groaning, her sobs.

It is not until dusk that Rhaena summons Aemond. Luke is weeping as he paces back and forth in the bedroom. Baela is still sitting on the bed with Jace, resigned now. She does not apologize, but she doesn’t have any more venom to spit either. The rest of you watch from the hallway, keeping a respectful distance. Ice nudges your hand with her nose, but you ignore her. Jace’s bloody eyes roll to Aemond.

“I’m keeping you here, aren’t I?”

“Yes,” Aemond replies. There’s no point in lying.

“And I don’t need to feel myself melting like this for days. I get the idea.” Jace looks at Aemond for a while. His voice is anemic but calm; there are fresh blisters on his face and neck. “What can you give me?”

Aemond opens his medical kit and shows Jace the vial of morphine. “I found this at the pharmacy today. It would be painless, like going to sleep and never waking up.”

“Why do you have that?”

“I was thinking a small amount might help Baela during labor.”

“Is it the only morphine in your kit?”

“Yes.”

Jace nods. “Save it for Baela.” His gaze drops to the Glock in the holster at Aemond’s waist. “Can I borrow that?”

Rhaena stifles a dismayed yelp. Baela closes her eyes, but does not protest. Aemond says: “I don’t think you want to do this.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, Cyclops,” Jace says, smiling. “I’ll be quick, I promise.”

“It’s heavy,” Aemond warns. He clicks off the safety and gives the Glock to Jace. “Are you able to use it by yourself?”

“It’s a very simple two-step process. Barrel to skull, finger on the trigger. I think I’ll manage.”

Again, Ice bumps her nose against your knuckles; again, you barely notice. Baela kisses Jace on the mouth, her lips coming away bloody. Rhaena says goodbye to him, then Luke, whispered parting words you don’t try to listen to. Before Aemond exits, Jace grasps his hand.

“Take care of my family, Aemond.”

“I will.”

“Don’t let the zombies eat me afterwards.”

And then it becomes real. Aemond’s composure falters. “Jace…I’m so sorry…”

“Go,” Jace urges him. Then there is a coughing fit, fresh blood and pieces of stomach and lungs. “Right now. Before I lose my nerve.”

Baela is the last one to leave the bedroom; she shuts the door behind her. Almost immediately afterwards is a deafening bang. Baela sinks to the floor and wails, one hand on her belly, the other embracing Rhaena and Luke when they rush to her. Ice is whining and pawing at the floor, her nails screeching on the hardwood. Aemond alone returns to Jace’s bedroom and reappears with his Glock. He places it back in his holster, his scarred face vacant. There’s blood on his fingers, you see. Jace’s blood, the last he’ll ever shed. Aemond hasn’t noticed yet.

You reach for Aemond’s hand; he flinches away. You ask him, pained: “Do you think if you don’t touch me, it won’t hurt you when I die?”

“Please don’t say that,” Aemond responds in a hoarse, splintering whisper.

Ice yowls, and Cregan is abruptly aware of her. “Oh shit, the Tahoe is still up on the jack. I’ll go get it.” He opens the front door. Under the moonlight, there are upwards of a hundred zombies stumbling down the long gravel driveway. Everyone begins screaming. Cregan slams the door shut and shoves one of the couches in front of it. “What now?!”

“We go through the cornfield,” Aemond says as you are all frantically gathering your sparse possessions. “It will be more difficult for them to see us. We kill as many as we can and we make our way to the Tahoe. Cregan, how long will it take you to get it ready to drive?”

“Maybe a minute. But I’ll need someone to spot me while I tighten the lug nuts.”

“Sounds like my kind of job opportunity,” Rio says, pumping his Remington. Helaena gives you a flashlight. Cregan secures the lug wrench under his belt and picks up his axe. Rhaena has her Ruger out and is telling Baela to breathe, to stay focused, to let her and Luke lead the way.

Aemond comes to you and leans in close so the others can’t hear. “How many bullets do you have left?”

“Not enough. Maybe fifty.”

“Do what you can. Stay near Rio.”

“I’ll try.”

Now there are zombies at the front windows, beating their spongy swamp-colored palms against the glass. Baela, Rhaena, and Luke are leaving through the back door with Daeron; you can hear the whizzing of his arrows and the sick soft sound they make when they pierce rotting meat. Under the weight of so many hands, one of the living room windows pops from its frame and clatters against the floor. You open fire, bullets exploding skulls and spraying brains, corpses jolting and then diving to the ground. You shoot until both M9s are empty, then pause to reload, boxes of bullets that Cregan gave you back in Iowa.

“Let them in,” Helaena says.

“Are you out of your fucking mind?!” Aegon shouts at her. He’s firing his Marlin .22 beside you, quite poorly; Rio and Aemond are in the backyard killing any zombies that find their way towards the cornfield. “We’re not letting them get through the house!”

“Not through,” Helaena says placidly. “In.”

“Oh.” Aegon understands. “Oh! I get it! Trap them inside!” He races to the kitchen and tears the remaining bottles of Grey Goose vodka out of the cabinet, then begins spilling them onto the wood floor. “Helaena, give me a lighter.”

She places one in his outstretched palm and then leaves with Cregan as he escorts her away, leading her by her fragile hand. They vanish together into the cornfield, Ice on their heels.

“Time to go, Chips!” Rio booms; he can’t be far behind Cregan.

“We’re on our way!”

Zombies are pouring through the front of the house; another window has given way. You pull the trigger over and over again as you move with Aegon towards the backyard, his clear river of vodka drawing a path from one end of the house to the other. You hit the grass before he does, then wait for him by the edge of the cornfield. Aemond and Rio are shouting for Aegon to hurry up. He crosses through the threshold, flicks the lighter to life, and throws it into the house. His plan works—the farmhouse is abruptly aflame, cooking zombies like long-spoiled hams—but he neglected to realize that in his haste, he had also accidentally doused his own left leg and Sperry Bahama sneaker. The fire licks up over Aegon’s skin and blazes there radiantly. He shrieks and falls to the ground. Rio yanks his own shirt off and uses it to smother the inferno, then throws Aegon over one shoulder to carry him.

“Go to Cregan!” Rio tells Aemond, shoving him in the direction of the Tahoe. Rio will be slower now, but no one else could still run with Aegon’s added weight. “You and Daeron spot him until I get there!” When Aemond is gone, Rio glances back at you.

“I’m fine,” you say, felling zombies as they round the house. “Get Aegon to the car!” And Rio listens to you like he always does, vanishing with Aegon through the cornfield.

You weave through the leafy stalks, investigating each growl and rustling with the beam of your flashlight. Grotesque, fetid faces plunge through the greenery, and you demolish them. You’re in the rhythm now, wheeling for a target and locking in, squeezing the trigger and watching ghoulish faces disappear. And then you spy a zombie lurching towards you from fifteen feet away, a twenty-something in a red Nebraska Cornhuskers t-shirt making her way down the dirt aisle between two rows of corn; and when you pull the trigger, there is only a dry click in reply. Your other M9 is already empty. You’ve used all the ammo Cregan gave you.

“I’m out of bullets,” you say, but no one hears you; you are alone. Aemond always told you to stay near Rio and you never did. Too late, you realize what an oversight that has been. “Rio? Aemond?!”

There are human voices and gunshots, but reverberating from a distance. Far closer are snarls and groans of the dead. You click off your flashlight, drop to the earth, and crawl until you are as far under a row of corn as you can be, long leaves tickling the back of your neck and damp soil in your nostrils. Clumsy, lumbering footsteps trod by you. From the road, you hear the Tahoe’s engine start with a rumble.

They’re leaving.

You shake your head, here with no one to see you in the dark. Still, the thought persists.

They’re leaving. I left my family and now my family is leaving me.

“Chips, stay where you are!” Rio shouts. “We’re coming back, we’ll find you!”

You wait until they are within ten feet of you, Rio cracking skulls with his Remington—he must be out of bullets too—and Aemond firing his Glock. “I’m here, I’m here!” you cry, and they are lifting you up from the dirt and dragging you towards Tahoe, and Aemond puts his pistol in your hand knowing you can do more good with it. You fire ten rounds before the Glock is empty, and you think with terror: Do any of us have bullets left?

Then you are being helped into the Tahoe, and the second all the doors are shut Rhaena floors the gas pedal, heading west on State Route 92.

~~~~~~~~~~

“I got my drugs after all,” Aegon rasps as Aemond injects him with morphine on the floor of a laundromat on the edge of Merna, Nebraska, far enough to escape the zombies, not so far that the Tahoe risks running out of gas before you reach the next town. His left leg is burned from the knee down, and burned badly: skin, fat, muscle, blood-red scorched ruin. Even through the modest dose of morphine—Aemond is terrified of accidentally killing him—Aegon can still feel what has happened to him. He knows it’s bad. He knows it could be the last mistake he ever makes. “I’m so thirsty…”

“I got you, Honey Bun,” Rio says, and then uses the butt of his Remington to bust open the vending machines and bring him bottles of Powerade. Baela is sobbing in the corner with Luke and Rhaena. Helaena is shining a flashlight on Aegon’s leg so Aemond can see. Daeron and Cregan are keeping watch by the entrance. You don’t even know why. All the bullets and arrows are gone, Aegon can’t walk, the Tahoe’s gas tank is nearly drained. If you are descended upon now, what will you do?

Aegon sobs and clutches for you, links his arms around your waist, rests his head in your lap. You hold him and comb your fingers through his unruly hair over and over again, like a compulsion, like a ritual. You are so afraid to let go of him. You are terrified he’ll disappear.

I wish I knew what to say. I never know what to say.

He’s shaking uncontrollably as Aemond cleans his leg: peeling away dead skin, wiping down the raw flesh with disinfectant. Aegon’s eyes are wide and glassy. There is blood on the white tile floor, pinkish lymph fluid, bits of charred skin. Ice is whimpering, her muzzle propped on her paws and her eyes darting around the room. Aegon manages through the pain, a reedy, gasping whisper: “Tell me about all those places you went when you were in the Navy.”

You can see it like the miles-deep blue of his eyes: the Indian Ocean, the jewel-tone equatorial sky. “On Diego Garcia, they have these birds called red-footed boobies—”

Aegon barks out a weak laugh. “They do not. You’re making that up.”

“No, really, I swear! They’re like seagulls, but they have blue on their face and bright red feet, hence the name. They’re extremely stupid, and one night a few of us were hanging out drinking Guinness and playing pool, and a booby flew in through an open window. We panicked, it panicked, and then it was flying in circles and couldn’t get out. We opened all the doors and windows, and the booby still just flew around banging into the walls. And of course the whole time it was shitting and bleeding and getting feathers everywhere, we knew it was going to take hours to clean up. After thirty minutes of chasing this idiot bird around, Rio snapped, took off his boot, and smacked the booby with it. He was trying to fling it out the window, like hitting a tennis ball with a racket, but he accidentally hit the bird too hard and murdered it. Its beak literally separated from its body and flew across the room. None of us could believe it, we didn’t even know that was possible. Rio felt so bad he started crying. We took the booby—and its beak, of course—out to the beach for a Viking funeral. We made it a little raft of coconut tree leaves, set it on fire with a lighter, and pushed it out into the waves.”

Aegon is cackling. “Bryan Osorio, terrorizer of the homicidal undead and boobies!”

“What else?” Baela says, and you look over at her, startled. The flashlight incandescence turns you all to ghosts, phantoms, half-shadows. At first you don’t know what she means. “What else did they have on Diego Garcia?”

“Oh, tell them about the coconut crabs,” Rio prompts you. He’s settled down beside Aegon and is resting one broad hand on his trembling shoulder.

“Coconut crabs?” Rhaena asks you, wiping tears from her cheeks with her delicate, small-boned fingers.

You are abruptly aware that you have an audience. You can feel yourself shrinking beneath their gazes. “Rio should tell the story. I’m not good at it.”

“Sure you are,” Rio says, smiling kindly beneath dark, wet eyes. “Go on. Tell them.”

So you do.

[simlit]

Chosen of the Sun | | forest // fifty-six

| @rollingsim | @maladi777

POLL RESULTS | A 67% majority votes to apologize.

next / previous / beginning

ASTER: Ahem. Well, I made a good decision bringing the Necromancer along, after all. I’ll, uh, leave things to you from here on out, then? KYRIE: Don’t you dare! ASTER: Ack! KYRIE: You got us into this mess! ASTER: What am I supposed to do about? You’re the ones with the magic! KYRIE: And I’m just supposed to let you drop this in our laps because of it? Either get creative or go down with the ship. I’m not dying here for nothing. ASTER: You seemed perfectly happy to do it for those other guys! KYRIE: Aster! ASTER: What?! What do you want from me? An apology? KYRIE: coughing ASTER: Oh for the love of light… Alright fine! Listen here you overgrown—I mean, uh, very handsome… giant… snake. I know you’re probably quite hungry, what with there being a smorgasbord of veritable nothing for you to gorge upon when there aren’t tasty little fools stumbling into your lair. ASTER: Aha… ha… I see I’ve gotten your attention. Yes, ah, likely because I am one said tasty little fool… But listen, I’ve had some time to reflect on the mistakes of my past, seen the error of my ways, you could say! I’ve even returned your abominable— I mean, lovely cursed skull back to its rightful place. I really do think that should count for something! Like perhaps, disqualifying me— KYRIE: coughs ASTER: Me and my comrades, from your lunch menu? [basilisk growls] ASTER: Mm, yes well, see, I would offer some free entertainment— a live performance— as payment, but seems your boney friend over there has done a number on me. Instead, perhaps I could regale you with a wonderful tale about a farmer. SARAYN: The beast is distracted. KYRIE: whispers Wait! Let him talk. SARAYN: Being devoured isn’t high on my to do list. You forget not all of us here have a death wish. KYRIE: Yes, yes, Lord Tev’us, I’m well aware of your voraciouswill to live. SARAYN: You say that like it’s a bad thing. Certainly you could use some. KYRIE: We only make it out of this one way. Believe me. I’m doing you a favor. ASTER: There once was a man who owned a hundred duck-sized horses. Or was it one horse-sized duck…? [basilisk roars] ASTER: Okay! Okay! Look, I’m really sorry about the stealing business, but I’m desperate here! I’ve got nothing else but music! I would have done anything— even port halfway across the world and beg a gargantuan python to hear me out! If there’s any bloody gods at all, you’ll see I’m trying! What did you even choose me for?! Haven’t I suffered enough hell on this earth already? By all the gold and silver in this damned world, I don’t wanna die like this! At least let me sing about it! That’s the only love I’ve ever known. I just wanted it back! KYRIE: Aster… SARAYN: It’s going? ASTER: That’s that, I suppose. Let’s not waste any time, lest the old beast changes its mind. The portal is just through there. KYRIE: But your curse— ASTER: I said come on.