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ateliersss · 18 days

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Oh, take me back to The Night we met

Pairing: Yautja x Fem!Reader Summary: 1936, eighty-eight years ago, you met him, the creature that changed your life in a way that goes beyond human imagination. Cross-posted on AO3: here Warnings: Attempted Rape, SA, Murder, English isn't my first language Word Count: 10.162 After the Blooming Family series

⇨ Surprise! I hope you are surprised because I was starting to doubt myself. I actually believed I wouldn't even finish it this year. Anyways, I wrote the finishing 6.800 words in the last seven hours and my brain is mush. I hope it didn't affect the pace or logic of the plot. If so, I will edit it in a few days. Comments are always appreciated.

⇨ Also, if you tell me I wrote an unrealistic reaction to seeing a Yautja's face for the first time, let me tell you, you and I wouldn't be here if I hadn't reacted the same.

⇨ Want to join the tag list?

1936, Earth

“Thank you, ma’am.” The soldier in front of you returned your identity card, the national animal printed on it facing you.

You returned his bright smile with a tight one. You were already used to identifying yourself to patrolling soldiers after work. It was for “safety measures”, according to the government.

While you were busy putting away your identity card, the boy looked nervously over his shoulder to his comrade who nodded back to him, encouraging him to finally man up and just tell you what he had rehearsed a dozen times already to eventually make a move on you and ask you out.

“A-And thank you for your service, ma’am!” He blurted out, louder than he intended to, with a soft blush covering his cheeks.

You closed your purse and looked up at him in confusion.

The boy, you now noticed, had to be at least five years younger, probably around the same age as your younger brother, Emil. And you recognized him now, too. He was patrolling around this area two to three times a week.

At your confused face, he gestured a little awkwardly to your uniform, the white dress and blue-grey blouse underneath it. “D-Doctors and nurses are in desperate need in times like these a-and saving lives is a remarkable job!”

“Oh.” You looked down at yourself before you pulled your coat tighter around your body and smiled softly at him. “If that‘s all I‘ll take my leave now. Have a good night, gentlemen.”

He visibly deflated at your words and mumbled a quick “Have a nice evening, ma‘am.” but you barely got half of it when you turned around to continue your way back home. The second your back was facing them your smile dropped.

You hated it, hated this, this so-called life you and everyone around you had to live. Horrible and disgusting things were happening, but no one dared to speak up. You were all trapped, too scared to act, too afraid to do something.

And the people could feel it, the tension that was stretched so tautly that was just waiting to snap. The whole world was holding its breath, deferring that one moment when the match would ignite and reduce everything and everyone to rubble and ash.

Meanwhile, your brother was beaming with pride as he was now considered old enough to join the army and could finally fight for his country. On the other hand, your father, the only other family you still had in this world, was far more reluctant when it came to the plans of the government and his son’s naive blindness of patriotism.

No one was talking about the horrifying wrongs your home country was doing for years now, but everybody knew, everybody saw. And if someone even dared to utter a word about it, they disappeared.

That didn’t stop your father from ranting about it behind the closed doors of your home. He did so, of course, in Emil’s absence. He was family, yes, but nowadays blind obedience could manipulate even a brother and son to go against his own kin.

You loved your brother dearly. He was a good guy and he only held a very strong pride for his home, his people, and his culture. But sadly that was the only thing he acknowledged around others. He denied the “rumors” of a genocide going on and overlooked unintentionally the more sinister motives of others in the world of politics and the military. He was truly and utterly blind, but you couldn’t condemn him for that. Not really.

The Great War ended when Emil was three years old and you remembered him crying when your father told him he couldn’t participate in it anymore. Ignorant of the horrors that happened at the Front, he and a few boys from around the neighborhood would play war and were disappointed when they were told it was over. The worst part was the elder men sitting on benches near their battlefield, telling them their people were the superior power since they had been able to hold their own against three opposing countries in the end.

You sighed and started to fumble around in your purse for your keys as you reached your destination. After a quick look into the mailbox — the usual evening newspaper and another flyer that encouraged men between the ages of twenty and forty-five to sign up for the military — you made your way up to the first floor and poked around in the lock with the key, a little distracted by the newspaper as you were searching the headlines for anything concerning. There was another report about a skinned man found hanging upside down from a church tower. Unbelievable. At times like this and there was a maniac running around, killing people in the most grotesque way for fun.

“I’m home!” You called into the dimly lit hallway, knowing your father was sitting in his usual spot in the living room.

After dropping your purse next to the wardrobe, toeing out of the white pumps, shrugging off the coat, and hanging it on the coat rack, you walked through the corridor and past five doors. The ones leading to the bathroom and the kitchen were open as always, just like the door of Emil’s bedroom. Although it hadn’t been inhabited for a few months now, you would always leave it open after cleaning. It was false reassurance, but that way it seemed as if he was still home.

“How was your day?” Your father asked gruffly from his spot on the wing chair, the morning newspaper still in his hand before it got replaced by the evening issue you handed to him with a kiss to his temple.

“It was…”

Screams.

Blood.

Wails of a newborn.

A cold body.

“…long.”

“Mhm.” Your father hummed, his eyes scanning the front page before turning it. “Hah! Sightings of another black cloud of smoke and the authorities tell the public another farmhouse burned down. Do they think we are stupid? Unbelievable these people! Think they will get away with it, hiding it from the public eye, and no one would notice!”

You weren’t entirely sure if he had even listened to you, but you didn’t care. You weren’t very eager to start a conversation with him anyway.

“I’m in my room. Call me if you need anything, okay?”

Though you didn’t expect a response, you waited a few seconds — maybe today he would ask if his son had finally sent a letter — before you turned around to retreat to your room.

Since your father had lost his legs in a bomb attack at a munitions factory where he had worked during the Great War, he had changed. A lot. Before he was quite a gentle and jovial man who worked hard and never shied away to show how much he loved his family. Nowadays he was resentful and bitter towards everything happening around him.

It was exhausting, not only listening to his complaints day in and day out but also being nothing more than a maid and caregiver to him. You were the sole breadwinner in this house. You worked yourself to the bone in a business that was equally about life and death but gave you more grief than joy. At least it made the medical care of your father a little easier. The surgery, the medicine, and the wheelchair would have cost you a fortune.

When you would get off work, more would await you at home. Taking care of the household was your responsibility for nine years now since your father wasn’t capable of doing it anymore. After the first week of dusting and sweeping, washing the dirty laundry and ironing the clean ones, going grocery shopping and cooking as well as taking care of your father like washing him, helping him get to the toilet and such, you cried yourself to sleep with the thought of quitting and running away.

But you didn’t.

You were miserable, yes, but you stayed. You stayed with the hope of a better life in the future. Maybe you will be married to a nice man in a few years like your girlfriends already were. You had experience with men, sure, but none of them you would consider fit to be your husband.

In your bedroom, you quickly got rid of your uniform until you were only in your undergarments, a baby-blue silk panty that flowed around your mid-thighs and an uplift brassiere of the same fabric and color, both with a lacy hemstitched design. You were about to throw the white and grey-blue dress to your other dirty clothes when you noticed red speckles on the left sleeve.

Yes, the day had been long, too long for your taste, and when your shift did end, you felt hollow once more. You could still see her in that bed, screaming and crying.

Watching her, you had wondered if you would ever end up like her.

You shifted in your place, second-guessing, before you finally turned and looked at your reflection in the mirror that occupied one corner of your bedroom. You hesitantly lifted your hands and placed them on your belly.

No. Your job showed you women struggle and in pain every day. You would never do that to yourself. Being a mother was not worth the probability of taking your last breath during labor, giving your own life while granting another to your child.

Today was another reminder of that.

The girl in the delivery room, Johanna, was sweet and lively. You met her occasionally on a monthly check-up when you assisted the doctor who took her into his care. She would tell you about her and her husband trying for this baby for years and how excited she was.

You bit the inside of your cheek when tears once again started to well up in your eyes when you thought of how helpless you had felt when you stood in that room. Your colleague, an older and more experienced woman, was holding the crying newborn in her arms. The doctor was doing his all to save the unsavable while Johanna’s body got colder as the dark red spot grew bigger on the white linen of the bed.

Today had shown you once again that you would never let something like that happen to you.

“You have to incise into her abdomen.”

Not ever.

“No!”

Not in a million years.

“No, Mi’ytiar… you have to, you have to.”

You would never put someone else’s life before yours, not even the one of your never-going-to-happen baby.

“Save our baby. Forget me… ju-just save our son… please.”

Sighing, you got ready for bed. You were far too tired this evening to get anything done. The laundry had to wait until tomorrow and your father probably already had eaten, so there was no need to get to the store. For now, you needed to stop thinking.

A whole week passed and you had followed your everyday routine like every other day. Occasionally, when you walked past the room where Johanna had delivered her baby and made her husband a widower, you paused and stared. Instead of the freshly made bed and the stark white linen, you saw her, dying as she bled out. You saw the doctor, yourself by his side and the nurse holding the baby at the foot of the bed.

You jumped when you felt a hand on your shoulder and you turned to see said nurse smiling pitiful at you.

“You are still there, right?” She asked softly, her eyes scanning your face.

You swallowed and nodded. “It’s like that every time I come here. I don’t know why. She’s not the first I watched dying during childbirth.”

The elderly woman patted your cheek and guided you away from the delivery room by the crook of your arm, pulling you away from the sorrowful abyss before you could drown any deeper in it.

“You liked her, that’s why.” She started, “I had a Johanna, too. A long, long time ago. Although she was a lot younger, she was just as excited to be a mother. Poor thing died just like her baby.”

You gasped and now it was you who looked with pity at her. “Why?”

“The baby was stuck.” The older nurse sighed, “She pushed and pushed and tore. By the time the doctor started to cut her open, she died of internal bleeding.” She had to clear her throat before she continued, “The baby died with her. A little boy. He got himself tangled up in the umbilical cord.”

You turned your gaze from her face down to the ground and watched your feet walk an unknown route. Swallowing down your tears, you forced yourself to concentrate on not stumbling over your own feet.

You did like Johanna. You had empathized with her, even though children would never be part of your life. She had just wanted a baby, a part of her and the man she loved united in one body, and all that she got was death. She hadn’t deserved it. At least the thought that she might be together with her baby in heaven now thanks to her belief in God soothed your heart a little.

“Go home, (Y/N).” The elderly nurse interrupted your train of thought.

Looking up, you saw her holding up your purse and coat. Apparently, she had led you to the lounge where the doctors and nurses spent their lunchtime.

“But I still have six hours to go.” You tried to argue, but bit down your lower lip when she shook her head.

“If someone should ask for you, I will tell them you didn’t feel well and that I sent you home. There are certain benefits as head nurse.” She winked at you, pushed your belongings into your hands, and shooed you in the direction of the exit.

“I promise I will feel better tomorrow.” You called over your shoulder and waved at her, giving her one last smile before you shrugged on your coat and left.

Thirty-two minutes later, you got off the bus and turned around the corner into your street, your purse dangling back and forth on your wrist. With your extra five hours, maybe you could finally start that book on your bedside table if your dad wouldn’t find any reason to turn your attention to him.

Feeling slightly more cheerful, you walked a little faster, already searching for the key. Like always, you checked the mailbox — nothing again — before you hopped up the one flight of stairs to your apartment, the sound of your heels on the wood filling the otherwise silent staircase.

The noise seemed to attract the woman living across from you because you barely reached the top of the stairs when she ripped her door open and stared at you with wide eyes.

You paused and looked at her in concern. “Mrs. Walter? Is everything okay?” You asked and carefully inched closer to her.

For several moments, you didn’t get an answer. Only when you opened your mouth to ask her again, she slowly lifted her trembling arm and pointed past you at something you could not see.

Strange. The only thing back there was your apartment door, so…

The slamming of Mrs. Walter's door barely reached your ears when you turned around. All you could hear was eerie silence, not Mrs. Walter quickly putting her distance between her and the door, not the dog barking from above you that got awakened by the slamming door, not the traffic noises outside.

The door that you diligently locked every morning before you got to work and unlocked every evening when you returned home hung on its hinges. In quick strides, you reached it and ripped off the note that was nailed into the wood under the peephole. Your eyes scanned over the words as you pushed the door open and entered the apartment.

A search was carried out here due to a tip-off of a conspiracy against the country and its people. All residents are requested to report immediately...

Tears clouded your view and made it impossible to make out the rest of the words. But there was no need to. You already knew what you needed to know. Your father was dead, no questions asked, no evidence to prove that he was innocent or guilty, no interference by the judiciary. He had dug his own grave since he started to badmouth and criticize the current sins committed by the government.

You slowly navigated your way through your destroyed home, your hands supporting yourself against the wall, careful to not get caught in something with your pumps. You had to duck under the big shelf close to the entrance of the living room. It was tilted to the side so that the upper part was now leaning against the other side of the wall. Everything that had ever been placed onto it — pictures, plants, certificates, and other little knick-knacks — was now scattered on the floor.

It got even worse in the living room. Everything had been turned upside down. Your father’s chair was thrown to the side just like the couch and the coffee table. The books from the huge bookshelf that covered the length of the smallest wall in here were pulled out and tossed on the floor, pages ripped out and strewn on the floor. Pictures were taken from the walls and the glass crunched as you stepped over them. Dirt was covering the floor as if someone had been digging in the soil of the potted plants. The carpet was overturned, partly thrown onto the couch, and revealed the wooden floor it usually covered.

Your living room had been thoroughly searched and you doubted the rest of your home looked any different.

In a daze, you carelessly let your purse drop to the floor and shuffled to your bedroom. Opening the door, you were greeted with a view you had expected — your bed was tilted to the side, clothes from your closet were now scattered on the floor, and your mirror was lying face down on the floor.

When you saw the pictures of you and your family carelessly thrown into the corner, you couldn’t hold the sob in any longer. You sank to your knees, curled into a ball, and cried to your heart’s content with your eyes squeezed shut.

You lost your mother at a young age, lost your father for the first time after his accident, lost your brother to the country, and now lost your father for the second and final time. Now you were wholly and utterly alone. Not for long, though. If you didn’t come forward and turned yourself in to a possible fair trial in the next sixteen hours, you would be taken just like your father and die the same way he did.

Your breakdown had been apparently so nerve-wracking and tiring that when you opened your eyes, it was dark inside your room and outside your window. Groggily, you propped yourself up and looked around, disappointedly ascertain that you hadn’t been dreaming at all. Your eyes scanned your room, still a little out of it, until you spotted your clock on the wall, surprisingly intact. 9:24 PM. Now you had less than ten hours left.

How would you spend your last ten hours in freedom? You didn’t know, but you for sure wouldn’t do it in here. You needed to leave.

As quick as you could you switched your nurse uniform to a skirt and your favorite blouse, fixed your make-up and your hair to look less like a mess and more like the respectable woman you usually were, and left the apartment after putting on your shoes, coat and grabbed your purse. At first, you strolled around with no real destination in mind, but the darker it got the higher the risk of being stopped by a patrolling soldier.

You had enough money with you to occupy yourself with a few drinks, so why not enjoy yourself, let a little loose. You never really got the chance to try it out. Your job unironically prevented you from unnecessarily damaging your liver and you had the responsibility to take care of your family. Your girlfriends always invited you on girl’s night, but sadly you had to decline almost every time, be it your father or another night shift forced upon you. They had another planned on the weekend in a few days, the first one in a very long time you would have had time for. Not anymore. When they would sit around a table and share the newest gossip, you had already started to rot away in a mass grave.

You entered the first, non-shady-looking bar and plopped down on one of the bar stools on the right. When the bartender finally took notice of you, all he needed to do was to take in your gloomy figure pitifully slumped in your seat to grab a glass and fill it with a brown liquid. No words were spoken — you didn’t feel like it and he noticed that — as you grabbed the glass, tossed the liquor back, and placed the now empty glass back down. The alcohol, whatever it was, burned like hell and you couldn’t help but cough, tears forming in the corner of your eyes. The bartender meanwhile had wordlessly filled your glass again and without any hesitation, you emptied that one too.

You spend almost four hours like that. Losing count after your sixth shot, your head started to feel funny, like the world around you was spinning too fast. You mused what your life would have been like if your mother hadn’t died when you were just nine years old, if your father hadn’t lost his legs when you were seventeen, if your brother had chosen a normal job at your current age. You could have grown up like any normal girl, could have joined your friends more often to hang out, could have started going on dates again after your last boyfriend dumped you for neglecting him.

And what about your future? What about the man you wanted to marry in a few years? Every day you daydreamed of someone who would just sweep you away in his arms and take you far, far away from here. There had to be a place somewhere where you could live your life in peace without a brewing war and the constant fear of death. You waited for someone who would make your life easier than it currently was, who would take the weight from your shoulders and not add some more on them every single day. Someone who loved you passionately and would spoil you after nine years of labor where you worked yourself to the bone. Someone who would take charge and let you rest when you needed it. Someone who was the other half of your soul that hopelessly awaited to be rejoined with its counterpart.

When you reached out to your glass for the nth time, a hand softly clasped your wrist. Looking up, you saw the bartender giving you the same pitiful look you had received for God knows how often today, from your colleague at the hospital to some of the other patrons who entered and left the bar during the last few hours.

“I think you should get home.” He said firmly and pulled his hand away.

No longer being hindered, you lifted the glass up to your lips and emptied it in one go. “I no longer have a home.” You dully answered, your speech a little slurred.

“We close in a few minutes.” He tried another route, anything to get you to stop drinking.

He may not be interested in what personal business you have to drink yourself under the table, but even he wouldn’t let a young woman like you do that to herself.

“Fine.” You mumbled, grabbed your purse, and searched for the money that was stored somewhere in there. You hummed when you finally found it and without looking at it, you dropped it down on the counter. “Here.”

You held onto the sleek surface of the bar to lift yourself up and from your seat, supporting your whole weight with one hand while you needed several attempts to grab your coat. Not bothering to put it on, you turned to leave and even you were surprised that you could still walk in a (more or less) straight line.

“Hey, you paid too much!” The bartender called from behind you.

Not bothering to stop or turn around, you simply proclaimed, “Keep it. Where I go I won't need it.” and pushed the entrance door open.

Outside, you tilted your head up, closed your eyes, and took a deep breath of the cool night air. It instantly freshened you up and cleared your mind a little. Looking left and right along the sidewalk, you decided to take the left and began strolling wherever it was taking you, once again with no actual destination in mind. You had no idea what time it was, but you guessed you had around five or six hours left. If you’re lucky and didn’t get held up by some patrols, you could visit the park one last time where your parents, Emil and you would hold a picnic every summer when you were younger. It would only take you ten minutes on foot. It wouldn’t hurt to visit the place that held so many good childhood memories and bask in them in your final hours.

You were walking for mere two minutes when you heard a whistle from your right. Halting your steps, you turned your head to the side and looked over to the source. There, on the other side of the street, were two men sitting on a bench and two standing around them. One was holding a beer bottle while the others were smoking their cigarettes.

“Hey, pretty lady.” The one with the beer bottle called over to you and lifted it to toast to you.

You quickly snapped your head back forward and continued on your way, your strides bigger and faster to create as much distance between you and them as possible.

When you thought you were safe, you felt a hand clasping your wrist whose owner pulled you back and against his strong chest.

“Hey, hey, hey.” The voice of the man with the beer bottle breathed against your ear, sending an uncomfortable shiver down your spine. “Don’t be shy. We were just celebrating my friend’s promotion.” To your horror, he put his hands on your hips and turned you both to his three companions who had seemingly followed him, all of them wearing leering grins. “Why don’t you join us, hm? We could need a little entertainment.” He murmured against your neck, his breath reeking of alcohol.

Before he could place his lips anywhere close to your skin, you struggled out of his grip and stumbled a few steps away from him. “I-I’m sorry, but I need to go home. I’m already late.”

The man who seemed to be the leader of the bunch stepped closer to you, smirking when you accidentally walked right into one of his friends. The guy immediately held you against him, keeping you in place.

“I think you could spare a couple of minutes.” The leader said firmly and reached for your blouse.

Fear seemed to be a great way to quickly sober one up because the next thing you did was stomp down on the foot of the man that was holding you, your heel hitting his toe perfectly, causing him to let you go with a cry in pain and a curse. Next, you rammed your knee into the crotch of the man in front of you and when his body doubled over, you pushed him to the side and bolted down the sidewalk.

Not daring to look back, you sprinted as fast as you could, but the alcohol made it hard to keep balance, not to mention the nausea that bubbled up in your stomach. But you ignored it and tried to keep it down when you heard their calls from behind you, coming closer and closer.

This was not how you wanted to spend your last night, this was not how you imagined it. Tears clouded your view and you narrowly escaped the grabby hand of whatever guy that was closest to you when you ducked down and sharply took a left turn into an alley.

Unbeknownst to you, you were being watched.

The next thing you felt was hard concrete as you fell forward when a heavy weight collided with your back. You cried out in pain when you hit your head, then hysterically screamed in panic when you felt hands on your skirt and you started kicking around, not caring if you hit something or not. You heard a grunt when your heel finally made contact with the shoulder of one of them, but you had barely time to bask in your little victory when a punch to your face almost knocked you out cold. Your body went instantly slack, a long-winded groan leaving your mouth.

“Move your ass and hold her down.” The voice of the leader sounded from somewhere above you. “And turn her around. I like to watch their face when they give up.”

Hands turned you on your back as your screams and cries accompanied your attempts to fight their hands off.

“No… please no.” You begged as your wrists were pinned above your head by a pair of rough hands. “No!” You screamed louder, in a high-pitched, panicking voice when your blouse was ripped open, your brassiere following suit, and your chest got groped by a calloused hand.

You squeezed your eyes shut when you felt an eager mouth around your nipple, harshly sucking on it, while your breasts were still in a painfully hard grasp. You tried to gather your last strength, the drinks earlier and then the hit to your head from the fall tempted you to just fall unconscious, but you bucked your body up in hopes you could throw whoever was above you off of you.

Only you couldn’t move. Someone was straddling your thighs, hindering you from moving.

You finally forced yourself to open your eyes and the blurry image of the leader pushing up your skirt presented itself in front of you.

“Stop, please! Help!” You started screaming again, causing the leader to sigh in annoyance.

“Could you please shut her up, for fuck’s sake? I’m trying to enjoy myself here.” He growled at the guy who was holding your hands down, his patience growing thinner with every passing moment he wasn’t able to force himself inside you. “When I’m done with her, you get what’s left of her.”

“No, no, no, no...” You wailed when you heard the clinking of his belt and a zipper being opened, but you soon got silenced when a palm pressed down on your mouth.

Rather than keep watching him, you closed your eyes in defeat, now only feeling how he moved closer to your crotch, his fingers pushing your underwear aside, and positioned himself against your entrance.

A dull thud behind your attackers stilled them for a moment, but a raging roar got them to whip around. You kept your eyes squeezed shut, not wanting to see whatever feral animal was going to maul you and those men.

A scream, something wet splashing on you and something, someone, heavy landing on top of you got you to finally open your eyes again. You stared right into a gaping hole where the head of a person normally should be. Maybe it was the shock of almost ending up left on the ground in this alley, covered in bruises, blood and bodily fluids after they were done with you, that kept you from screaming.

In a daze, you pushed the corpse off of you, and looked down at your body. It was covered in blood, parts of a splattered brain, and white fragments that had been the skull of the leader of the group. His head had bursted into pieces. No animal could have done that and no human either. There was no weapon on earth with that much destructive power, so what…

With slow eyes, you looked up from your soiled legs. The guy now lying dead next to you had been obscuring the view of a large creature standing no more than three meters across from you.

Whatever it was, it seemed livid. Its body was heaving with wrathful breaths and its long fingers were twitching, clenching into fists before relaxing them again. The massive form of it was hidden by darkness and you could barely make out its silhouette.

It felt like an eternity with you just staring at the creature and it (probably) staring right back. The other assaulters, two of whom had fallen to the ground in shock with the sudden attack on their leader, hadn’t dared to move a muscle. Maybe they were in a trance just as you were, not for the same reason of course.

“H-Hey!” The fourth guy squeaked, breaking the tension that seemed to suffocate the whole alley. “Wha-“

In a practiced, seemingly effortless movement, the creature whipped out its arm, and something silvery shot out of the darkness. It wrapped around the throat of the man, choking him and sending him to his knees. He was clawing his neck and tried to remove what seemed to be a whip made out of sleek silver and grey material.

You watched him as he desperately tried to free himself and blood started to flow from where the whip was wrapped around his neck down to his shirt, turning the light blue fabric deep red. Your eyes then traveled along the bladed chain, you now noticed, to the other end of it, and found the large creature moving towards you.

If you would have been able to make a sound, you would have, but you were still too out of it that no noise escaped your bloody lips when you were finally able to distinguish your savior.

It was indeed huge, a massive body that was dwarfing any human being you could think of. Its appearance was bizarre. Its feet and calves up to its knees were in unusual boots, made out of metal instead of leather and an interesting design. You wondered if it was the skin of the creature, or if it was wearing a net-like cloth that was visible on every body part that wasn’t hidden beneath armor like the chest plate that bleed over into a full sleeve of its arm. It was covering the left side of its chest, but not enough to conceal a rather fit upper body. You found yourself staring a lot longer at the well-defined, almost sculpted abs of it. It was no doubt a male.

As you were eyeing the creature up, he yanked on the whip. You were only aware of a dull thud when the bladed chain cut off the head of the man who had been in its hold.

You didn’t register when more blood sprinkled on you as you were too busy trying to imagine a face underneath that strange mask. With his green, brownish, and beige reptilian skin, the long black tendrils sprouting from the head, the long claws, and the animalistic posture, he was without a doubt not human.

An arm wrapping around your throat from behind, preventing you from breathing evenly, brought you back to reality. You immediately put up a fight, scratching it and pulling on the arm in hopes he would let go.

It was one of the attackers that had fallen to the ground when the creature had appeared. He must have scrambled over to you when his last companion was foolishly enough to run up to the murderous beast, trying to do something quite laughable, only to be impaled by a spear and was now hanging on the wall to the right like he was a portrait above a chimney, the spear rammed through the brick of the apartment building.

The idiot behind you thought the creature would let him go if he was holding you hostage as if he wasn’t going to kill the both of you just like his buddies. So foolish, you internally sighed.

“S-S-Stop! I‘m warning you!” He screamed at the towering figure which was closing in on you. “I will… I will kill her!”

The creature stopped a few steps away from you and reached behind his back. Quicker than your eyes could keep up, his hand shot forward and he threw something of the size of an orange at the man.

Yelling, the man loosened his grip, his instincts kicking in to fight against whatever was sticking to his forehead. In his struggle, he fell on his back and started rolling around on the floor when the little device made a strange wiring noise. His body went stock still when he was engulfed in a net, restraining him. Then the man screamed bloody murder when the wiring noise grew louder and the device pulled the net tighter around him.

You turned to him, only to see the strings cutting into his skin, drawing blood, until only pieces of his body were left of him, leaving him unidentifiable to whoever would find him and his friends.

Now it was only you in that alley. You, the beast that saved you and the bloody massacre turning the place into an image of horror.

You were going to get sick if you stared at what had been a living and breathing human once any longer. Rather than wanting to face the creature when it was going to kill you, you turned back around and then startled back. Said beast was crouching in front of you, the head cocked to the side.

He reached out a clawed hand and you closed your eyes, preparing yourself for whatever gruesome death he had planned for you. You thought back to everything you had achieved in your life, every person that was still dear to you, said goodbye to every place you loved to visit, to the movie you had wanted to watch in a week with a friend, to the unread book on your bedside table and every dream you had wanted fulfill — you had actually planned to do that in a few hours. At least he was going to give you a quick death and not whatever the authorities had done to your father.

Something poked your cheek.

Your eyes snapped open and you were met with a closer view of the strange mask covering the creature‘s face. His hand was outstretched and a finger was prodding your skin. A strange noise was coming from behind the mask, something you could only describe as a rumbling purr.

You stayed still, afraid if you would only move a muscle it would set the creature off, and let him drag his clawed finger up to your temple where a trail of blood had started to run from the wound you got from the fall. You hissed in pain when the pad of his thumb stroked — probably unintentionally hard — over your lower lip, the rough skin touching where it was busted. He pulled its thumb away only to replace it with the back of his pointer and middle finger to caress your jaw and down to your throat. The touch caused you to swallow which he most likely could feel. Only when you felt the scaly sensation on your skin dip too deep, too far beneath the ripped remains of your blouse, you gripped his wrist.

The creature’s head snapped up where it had followed his exploration. You flinched back at the sudden movement and quickly loosened your hold on his wrist, pulling it away like you had burnt yourself.

“I’m sorry.” You whispered, your voice hoarse.

What if you had just signed your death? What if you touching him like that had triggered him? What if he thought you were a threat now? What if he thought of it as highly offensive? What if he was going to kill you now? What if-

A low thump caused you to flinch when he hit the left side of his chest with his right fist. With parted lips, you looked from his fist up to his masked face and then back again, confused, both at the gesture and the lack of aggression towards you. Almost as if he could understand the look on your face, he repeated the action with a little more determination after he inched closer to you. You were more focused on his sudden closeness, daring not to move back, but you hastily turned your gaze down to his fist. It was a little hard to concentrate on what he was trying to tell you after the vast change of demeanor — from murdering in cold blood to trying to… communicate with you?

“You?” You tried hesitantly.

It really was your best guess on what he could mean.

A soft growl reached your ears from underneath his mask, making you tense up but relaxed in relief the second his attention turned to his forearm. You watched in curiosity as his clawed pointer finger ghosted over the armor-like wristband that started flashing in a bright red and made strange beeping noises like when a caller on the other line hung up before you could. Your mouth opened without you even noticing. You had never seen something like it, probably no one ever had. How was it functioning without cables like your telephone and radio did?

“Are you telling me you are married?”

You jumped back a little when a male voice chimed from his wristband.

“To a cup of tea, I will never say no.”

“I can’t believe you put the jar in the oven!”

You looked at him in astonishment as more voices sounded from his forearm. Human voices.

He kept repeating the same three sentences, but they seemed to get shorter with every replay.

“-telling me you are… telling me… me.”

“-a cup of tea… tea.”

“-you put the jar in the… you put the jar… the jar… jar.”

He seemed to be satisfied as he let out a deep, low-pitched chirp before he played the cut and put together word snippets to you, his head facing you now.

“Me-tea-jar.” He hit his chest once again before playing the word again. “Me-tea-jar.”

“Meetja?” You tried the word, tried how it felt on your tongue.

He let out a deep grumble before he played the same word again and leaned even closer to you.

“Me-tea-jar.”

“M-Meetiar. Mi’ytiar.”

With his head slightly cocked to the side, he tilted it forward in a one-movement nod as if to say, “Now you got it.” and his fist hit his chest one last time.

“You. Mi’ytiar. T-That’s your name?” You asked and hoped you put the puzzle pieces together correctly.

Another nod before he pointed at you.

“Oh.” You softly said, shifted slightly your hips, and nervously placed a hand on your own chest. “(Y/N). I’m (Y/N).”

“(Y/N).” Your voice sounded from his forearm when he touched his wristband. “(Y/N).”

You couldn’t help the small smile and you nodded. “Yes. (Y/N).”

The creature — Mi’ytiar — lowly grumbled in appreciation and you breathed out the air you had been holding in your lungs in a laugh. You couldn’t believe you talked, more or less, to something that undoubtedly didn’t belong on earth while you were surrounded by death after being spared from something that would have scarred you for life just because you had been out drinking to have one last night in freedom until you would follow your father in an early grave. Your life really had taken a strange turn in just a few hours.

“What are you?” You asked him and tilted your head to the side.

“Hunter.” He communicated with the help of his wristband.

“Where do you come from?”

“Sky.”

“Sky.” You repeated the child’s voice and looked up.

So he came from the sky. You wondered if he meant the clouds, or maybe the moon. It could be the stars for all you knew. Was he the only one living there, or were there more? Maybe one like him lived on each star the night sky had to offer.

As you were looking up in thought, Mi’ytiar took his time to admire you. You were, what you humans would use, adorable. He didn’t hunt humans very often as they weren’t much of a challenge, but sometimes he would visit earth out of curiosity. Your kind was interesting and his ancestors had been quite fond of them when they used them to breed their prey centuries ago. Humans have made a continuous development from then to now, so it was fascinating to watch.

Like he watched you now. He admired your wide eyes, the curve of your nose, and your rosy cheeks that displayed the dried tear streaks of panic and fear. He admired the shape of your lips and the cut that had caused you pain when he touched it. He admired your shiny hair that had once been pulled up in a neat bun but was now hanging loosely and messily around your face, framing it like it was a piece of art. He admired your small, shaking hands that were desperately holding the ripped-open blouse together, protecting your modesty, and the naked skin of your trembling shoulders when the fabric had slipped down to your biceps. You had been so incredibly warm and soft when he had touched what you were hiding now.

A quiet hiss got you to look back at him and you watched with uncertainty as his fingers first pulled on the one tube that was connected to his mask and then the other before he removed it anxiously slow. You mentally prepared yourself for the most horrific sight of your life, but when the top half of his face was laid bare, you sucked in a breath. It wasn’t the foreign shape of his head, the texture of his skin, or the spiky triangle-shaped bumps that circled the sides and the back of his head like a crown, clearly dividing where the roots of his hair ended and his face started. It was his eyes, though an abnormal orange, that were salient and captivating you. They didn’t look like what your wildest fantasies had to offer, but somewhat seemed almost human — a black pupil surrounded by an orange iris. And not just any orange. It was the kind of orange that stretched across the sky at every sunrise and sunset. The only difference you spotted from your own eyes was that he had a black sclera instead of a white one.

You would have gotten lost in them if he hadn’t removed the mask fully so his lower face was showing too. You wouldn’t exactly describe it as terrifying, but the sight of his mouth was, to say it simply, unnerving. It was hidden behind four tusks that represented his mandibles. You were fascinated when he suddenly made a clicking noise but were taken aback when he extended the fleshy texture to reveal two rows of teeth. It was like he had two jaws, one when the mandibles were retracted to his face and one when they were extended and showed his actual mouth. His upper jaw held three teeth with two larger fangs on each side, his lower jaw held the same amount only were they a little thinner, so his fangs wouldn’t hinder his mouth from closing.

Even after the initial shock subsided, you wouldn’t exactly use the word pretty, but there was something about him. Thrilling and particular, astounding and intriguing, but also alluring.

The longer you looked at him, at Mi’ytiar, the more accustomed you got to his appearance.

Another clicking sound reached your ears and you stopped mapping his features with your eyes, only now realizing how he looked down at you with his head tilted to the side. When you mumbled his name, almost as if it took all your courage, he straightened up and his eyes snapped to your hand that had loosened its grip on your blouse. He followed the movement of it getting closer to his face and when you turned your hand so your palm was facing him, his own hand reacted fast and grabbed your delicate wrist.

Bad idea, real bad idea, you thought. He wasn’t exactly hurting you, but his grip wasn’t exactly soft.

Instead of tugging against his hold in an attempt to free yourself that would obliviously fail, you let your arm go slack. Instead of panicking, you remained calm. Instead of screaming at him to let you go, you kept your mouth shut and waited for his next move. If you triggered him in any way, he would surely kill you.

Mi’ytiar, on the other hand, was amazed with you, in awe. He wouldn’t be the first Yautja to be enthralled with a human in this kind of way, sure, but he hadn’t expected to be one of them one day. You were extraordinary in the way you looked at him, didn’t mind the proximity he had put you in, and apparently seemed to seek for it.

Contrary to what you believed, he pulled your hand closer to his face by the wrist, causing you to move from your side-sit on the floor to get on your knees. Your lips parted in surprise when he pulled his mandibles in and he himself brought your hand up to his cheek.

The sensation underneath your touch was unusual and new. His cheek wasn’t like that of a human when you would press the fat until you could feel the jaw bone. It was springy, considering it was only a fleshy layer that covered his mouth. You moved your hand down to his outer jaw which consisted of his mandible and followed the length of it with your palm. You could feel the firm muscle and bone and gave it a gentle, experimental squeeze. Almost automatically he made a soft purring noise like that one of a cat and you blushed at the possibility that he was enjoying the caress.

You, of course, had no idea that you were touching a highly sensitive part of his anatomy and would be alive to tell the tale afterward.

Just as you were curious about him, he was eager to explore you as well. Carefully, he reached out and through the ripped-open front of your blouse. Seconds later his palm made contact with your stomach and he could feel how you tensed up. He looked up into your eyes, but when he found nothing that indicated that you despised his touch, his hand ran along to your waist and down to your hip, his thumb absentmindedly stroking your belly. It was strange how you could feel his thumb near your navel and at the same time his other fingers on your lower back, taking the width of your hip like it was nothing.

The both of you were too busy in your explorations that you had grown ignorant to your surroundings, so when a scream filled the previously quiet alley, you grabbed his extended arm, not to push it away but to hold onto it in panic, while Mi’ytiar whirled his head around to the two outlines standing near the street at the end of the alley. Your body was hidden by his massive one, so it looked like a monster was kneeling among his freshly killed victims, basking in the glory of his crime.

Mi’ytiar’s mandibles flared and the guttural roar that left his lungs made you cling to him in fear. Not of him, but the consequences that you would have to face if those who had stumbled upon this scene without context would call for the patrolling soldiers. You heard more screams and hastily retreating footsteps as the couple ran as if their lives depended on it.

Large hands grabbed you by the waist and hoisted you up on his shoulder, causing you to squeal in surprise, and you had barely time to hold onto him before he started climbing up the metal scaffolding of the balconies of the apartment building, jumping up and landing on the roof. With an arm secure around your waist, he jumped and ran further and further away.

And you let him.

2024, Yautja Prime

“What you smiling for?”

And all of a sudden, those purred words were taking you from your past life to your current one. You hadn’t even noticed you had stopped drawing random figures and forms on Mi’tyiar’s naked chest. At some point, you had started daydreaming with that far-away look in your eyes and a smile slowly making its way on your lips as you were lying on him, between his legs.

“Just thought of the night we met.” You drawled lazily and rubbed your cheek against his reptilian-like skin. “My hero in shining alien amour.”

“My amour does not shine.”

Now you had to laugh. Sometimes you couldn’t help yourself when he was so bluntly clueless. Humans and their analogies were oh so confusing.

“It’s a human saying, my love.” You explained as you crossed your arms on his wide chest and rested your chin on them. “A male who saves a female from danger. A male who would sacrifice himself so the female can get away without harm.”

Mi’ytiar reached towards your face and cupped your cheek, his thumb stroking your cheek before he dragged it over your lower lip. You were dreamingly looking up at him, basking in his loving touch. You were placing your hand on his and turned your head to the side so you could pepper his palm with light kisses.

He couldn’t help his body’s reaction, he just couldn’t. He was starved of your touch.

You suddenly stopped your sweet kisses when you felt something big poking your stomach. You looked down, although you could only see how your breasts were pressed against him before you looked back up at him with a raised eyebrow.

“You are insatiable.” You smirked and hoisted yourself up after placing one last kiss between his pecs.

You straddled his midriff but left enough space between you and him so you could reach underneath your body and grab his semi-hard cock. Even at this size, you had a little trouble to fully embrace it and getting your fingertips to touch.

You hissed when you felt the familiar sting of his sharp mandibles and teeth digging into your skin. You tilted your head to the side and offered him more access. Mi’ytiar let out a feral growl when your blood finally hit his tongue. He relished in it, tasting so sweet, just like the rest of you.

Grasping your hips with both of his hands, his claws scratching your delicate skin, he pushed them down to his crotch.

He needed you again, needed to be so deep inside you, so he could see the bulge of his cock forming in your tummy. Just the thought of it made his hips snap up, barely missing your entrance, and dragging his cock through your sopping wet folds that were covered with your combined releases from your last mating moments ago. It elicited a whiny moan and a wiggle of your hips.

“Stop teasing, tanhì. Put it in.” You groaned and started rubbing yourself up and down his rock-hard cock, coating it with your mixed cum that was still leaking from your hole.

Mi’ytiar wrapped a large arm around you and started to get up, his other arm supporting himself, to manhandle you on your back to be on top. The second your hazy mind registered what he was doing, you placed both of your hands on his chest and pushed him back down. You preened when his body immediately went slack, allowing you to do as you pleased with him.

He was staring up at you with flashing eyes. You didn’t take the lead very often, preferring it to be dominated by your mate, but when you did, he was gladly giving you the power you wanted.

The first time you had tried to be on top, it had gone from steamy to ugly pretty quickly. You had been on your back when you tried to push him and switch your position, but since he had been unmovable like a rock, you had untangled yourself from him and told him to lie back. You were straddling his hips, humping his hardening cock for exactly thirty seconds before he flipped you over and on your back again. You had then mewled and tried to push him back once more, causing him to growl. For your attitude he bit roughly into your throat, hoping it would keep you submissive. You let out a cry and hit his chest with both of your fists. This time Mi’ytiar had shown you his displeasure more vocal when he slammed his flat hands next to both sides of your head and roared right into your face. Safe to say, it scared the living daylights out of you and caused you to escape his caging arms. He, of course, followed you quickly and tried to amend his outburst rather with purrs and snuggles than words.

The next time you were on top, he vehemently focused on staying seated on the edge of your nest with you on his lap as you rode him with his helping hands on your hips. His eyes strayed from the spot where his cock was disappearing inside of you, to the bulge in your stomach that grew and shrunk with every movement, to your bouncing breasts, to your pleasure-contorted face.

After that, he couldn’t get enough of you being on top.

The same was the case now as you slowly inserted his throbbing cock into your-

A wail broke the sensual atmosphere, causing the both of you to jerk your heads to the doorway connecting the room to the rest of your home. With your maternal instincts kicking in, you practically jumped up from your mate, his half-inside cock slipping from your tight heat, and run to the room where the sound was coming from.

Mi’ytiar slumped back with a displeased grunt. He loved his pup dearly, truly he did, but he hadn’t been able to mate with you for an eternity — five months, double the time the healer had advised you to keep from being intimate with each other after the pregnancy because a certain someone had been overly cautious with you — and his cock throbbed painfully at that sorrowful thought.

He got up from the nest and followed the direction you had run off to. Your five-month-old pup was sleeping alone in his room for only a short part of his life. Before that, his crib had been standing next to the nest in your room, quickly accessible and in reach should he need any sort of attention. Now he was sleeping in his big brother’s former nursery you had lovingly prepared when you had been pregnant with Akail, your first pup.

Mi’ytiar watched you standing in front of the crib in the middle of the room, your back to him, as you rocked the whiny pup in your arms. The wholesome thoughts of his beautiful mate taking such good care of his youngling quickly turned into an animalistic need to breed you once more when his eyes trailed over your curves that had gotten bigger after bearing his second son. They fixed on your legs where trails of semen were running down your skin from between your inner thighs.

He was faster by your side than you would expect from a being of his size. He pressed his bare body against your own, hands on your hips pulling you closer, his cock digging into your back. Mi’ytiar bent down to snuggle his face into the crook of your neck, purring lowly.

“He was just hungry.” You whispered as you watched your pup falling back to sleep.

Bending over, you placed your little one back into his crib, careful not to disturb him. You had to bite your lip when you felt Mi’ytiar pull you back against his crotch to rub himself against your ass. All you needed to do was push your ass back into him for him to grab you, throw you over his shoulder and turn to leave your son’s nursery.

Giggling, you looked back to the pup’s crib and whispered, “Dream of the stars, my little Toyah.” before you got carried back to your nest.

Masterlist: here

Tag List

@rorrika, @lialiwasneverseen, @lil-lilacwitch, @purplekitten30, @eternalmoonshineofahopelessfan,

@ladygrimmx, @blurpleuni-squid

#predator #predator x reader #predator x you #yautja x reader #yautja x you #fanfic

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throwaway-yandere · 2 years

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I Got Reincarnated As A Server NPC In An Otome Game But A Capture Target Won’t Leave Me Alone (Yandere!Diluc Ragnvindr/Reader)

a/n: fasghadsa this is my thank-you fic for @poptartsthings for supporting my fics for the past year!!! thank you for the tips huhuhuhu ;;;—;;; hence, I wrote this diluc fic for *clears throat* "mommy milkers". Enjoy this self-aware yandere otome game!duke diluc ragnvindr!!!

unreliable synopsis: what if you got isekai-d in your favorite otome game and one of the Love Interests found out they aren’t a real person? (or, ya know, whatever the title said lmao)

"Bottoms up, Duke Ragnvindr!"

"No matter how enthusiastic you are, I remain inclined to think that this is a horrible idea, (Y/n)..."

Reluctantly swirling a small amount of fire-water while wearing gloves, the duke saw how the alcohol hardly made a wave. Unsatisfied, he diverted his attention and observed the NPC pour their drink.

"In all honesty, your grape juice is worth more than this, (Y/n)–"

"Shush!" With a flamboyant and dismissive wave, the generic common mob silenced one of the Main Characters. "Don't ruin the mood, now. I had to pull a few strings to get this bad boy right here. It’s such a shame that Mister “Best Boy” Albedo can't come, so we have to make sure I get my money’s worth off of these bottles. It’d be such a waste of francs."

"Wasted like the thousand francs wine you clumsily spilled last year?"

"Don't bring that up again, please."

"Why not?" He chuckled. "If you hadn't, I wouldn't have met you."

"If I hadn't, I would've been drinking with Villager B..." They muttered as they grabbed another glass from the cupboard.

He pretended not to have heard it.

They are both aware that their destinies follow different paths. No matter how hard one of them tries to walk next to the other, this cruel fate will separate them with a penalty that is even more agonizing than the last. All because (Y/n) was a real person, and Diluc was not.

Duke Diluc Ragnvindr is this game’s easiest route: the typical childhood friend who falls for the heroine– Princess Lumine– first. In this genre, he falls into the category of those love interests who are incredibly austere with themselves that they were unable to enjoy the small things in life outside work. Ultimately, he follows the cliche of protecting the heroine from harm until she remembers that they used to play together as children in the palace gardens. Which, in itself, is quite a feat since the duke was not a man many could befriend. Unless you count Chief Justice Ajax as his greatest comrade, then perhaps he could finally add item number 11 to his list of trusted people.

The “Duke of the South” only favored audiences for those he was willing to invest in— after all, he’s famously known for having a “good signature.” It may seem like a compliment for uneducated nouveau rich men, but those with an eye for Gaciean politics knew how much power he has as the head of the Department of Military Affairs. Tales about his on-and-off disputes with the Chief Ajax circled as frequently as Teyvat Time’s popular Paimon-The-Friendly-Fae’s comic strips. Some loved his obsession with national security whilst some were quick to call him a pampered weapon hoarder, but if there’s one thing everyone can agree it’s that they fear the southern duke.

Now, after introducing a political figure with crimson locks of hair and domineering combat prowess, it’s certainly a tough sell to introduce the last person left inside: (Y/n) (L/n).

Unremarkably, they’re merely an NPC from Xiangling’s Seaside Restaurant. They’ve “reincarnated” into this world fumbling about like a newborn until the chef offered a job. Fortunately, they were not completely helpless in the kitchen. They had shown off their managerial skills from their old job since day one. Since then, Xiangling had hoped to train them as the new manager, but (Y/n) preferred to take on some responsibilities gradually. After a few days had passed, they abruptly realized that they were "Server C," an NPC with only a character sprite and a scarcely distinguishable name. The red ribbon-theme outfit from their restaurant was the only thing that distinguished them from the other faceless workers. According to what they can recall, one of their tasks is to give the princess's order of candies while she flees from her overprotective retainer, Dainsleif. It was a tense moment in that common route since all three of the princess’ potential suitors were customers from different ends of the restaurant, which were Dainsleif, Kamisato Ayato, and, of course, Duke Ragnvindr.

… Unable to snap out of their initial shock after recognizing that this was one of the game’s CGs and seeing three attractive men inside the restaurant they work at, (Y/n) accidentally broke the script by spilling the wine on Duke Ragnvindr’s coat.

Since then, (Y/n) had trailed and followed the characters whenever they could for their amusement– often helping their favorite love interest, Albedo, set up the scene so they can view his "CGs" in real life. Due to their apparent lack of stalking skills, they had another off-script encounter with the duke whilst doing so. Instead of heading straight to North Gaciea as he had done in the game, he was delayed seven hours after he weeded (Y/n)’s hair out of the bushes they were hiding in. Their first meeting was horrid, and their second almost went in a similar direction. Almost.

Since (Y/n)’s lies were as visible as their head peeking out of their hiding spot, Diluc had them drink a truth potion to uncover why they were stalking the chief alchemist, however…

… Does the phrase “the truth is stranger than fiction” apply in this case when both the earth and the sky are nothing but lies?

Diluc put on a convincing poker face when they babbled about the game they live in, demonstrating both their objectives and, more critically, their in-game omniscience. Albedo is the only love interest who changes into a feral (and subjectively "hot") monster toward the end of the novel, thus (Y/n) was adamant that he be Princess Lumine's ultimate endgame—but going any further in their explanations would be deemed a "spoiler." Additionally, Albedo’s route could only be unlocked once you finished another character’s route first… and that character happened to be Diluc Ragnvindr himself.

———

“In layman’s terms… We are living in a complex romance novel-esque system, correct? And I am the ‘book’ people often recommend to start the series with first before moving on to the sequel?”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“… and I am just a stepping stone for a happier ending? A pawn? A mere puppet for someone chasing a momentary cure for loneliness?”

“Well, it felt real to me when I played your route—”

“Perhaps, but feelings do not change what is real and what isn’t.” Diluc sighed, unsheathing his dagger to break off the ropes that held the server down.

(Y/n) traced their wrists, appreciating now how gentle he had been when he could’ve gone rougher.

“Diluc…”

He bit his lip. It pained him to hear the server call his name as if they knew him.

They spoke as if they were friends the whole time right after they just revealed that his life is a self-fulfilled prophecy of unrequited romance.

And it was insulting.

———

The two have come a long way since then. He lost his faux feelings for Lumine. After gaining self-awareness, Diluc had begun avoiding what occurs in the game’s plot under the NPC’s guidance. To improve Lumine's chances of acquiring Albedo's route, (Y/n) was more than happy to assist him, so they started exchanging chats that ranged from oblique threats to routine discussions only friends could have.

Even so, (Y/n)’s attempts were futile when Albedo revealed to both of them that he knew he’s also just a character since the day he was “created”, and that “I would greatly appreciate it if you stopped attempting to produce an inorganic chemistry between the protagonist and me.”

…The chief alchemist was a smart one for sure and his confrontation had sobered (Y/n) fully. Although Albedo will never be the princess’ endgame nor will he turn into an apocalyptic dragon, (Y/n) had earned his friendship and started treating the rest of the cast as people and not just characters.

Diluc gazed out the window.

It was late into the night and rain was falling. There was not a single domestic sound emanating from nearby homes, which was a wise choice since annoying harpies would have gathered at the sound of human noises. Birds accosted the drying trees and roofs as fog swept through the streets. With the exception of this seaside restaurant, most stores were noticeably closed. The downpour buried the sound of crashing waves just a few meters outside, so no one would have known that this was close to the beach.

"Huh," (Y/n) stared in the same direction. "Didn’t expect it to rain tonight. Guess you can't escape this cheap alcohol-tasting session, huh?"

In the course of his outdoor nightly training, the head of the Department of Military Affairs grew incredibly resilient against mere storms. "I don’t need an umbrella."

"Fair," they laughed, distinctly human compared to the usual polite chuckles he would hear from leeching nobles. "But oh, dear Duke, if you don't need an umbrella then why are you still here? Is it because you wanted to see me– w-wait hold on—I'm kidding— sit down!"

…

They reached for his arm, but try as they might—

their hand only passed through.

The two stiffened.

Diluc’s breath hitched.

That was proof.

Because of this scripted fate, a commoner like them can't even grasp his hand, let alone touch it. Not when the system outright denies the friendship they have.

An NPC like (Y/n) can’t remain friends with a main character like Diluc once they have fulfilled their role in their story.

Diluc was untouchable.

He closed his eyes. Just acknowledging this pains him.

They both sat back down.

Much like how Diluc had pretended not to hear their comment earlier, (Y/n) also pretended that nothing unreal occurred seconds ago.

"S... So, is there anything else you want with that?" They pointed at his glass. "We have a crap ton of limes and cranberry juice! Oh, but I'm not sure if it would taste that good if we mix it, haha."

He could practically hear them force that laughter right out of their throat. Diluc hurriedly swallowed the fire-water they offered him since neither could stand the awkward tension. Diluc cringed.

"Oh, sorry, was it too strong?" Many nobles who detained the duke with platitudes were met with sarcastic comments, but he never hated (Y/n)’s idea of small talk.

"It's fine." He spoke huskily.

"Does it need lime or any add ons–"

"It's fine."

"... Okay."

The silence was painfully awkward... Perhaps Diluc shouldn't have threatened Albedo to sit this one out. He wanted an opportunity to be alone with (Y/n), and this is far from what he had hoped would turn out. Diluc's forehead creased as he held back what could've been a long somber sigh.

"How's work?" He asked.

"Oh, it's been alright."

That doesn't sound promising. This was a trick up his sleeves to snap them back to a cheery mood. Usually, they’d start rambling about their regulars and watch how endearingly entertaining they are. There should’ve been a quip about Itto’s TCG losing streak or how Kunikuzushi and Kazuha were arguing again over where they should place their tent for their next travels. This time, (Y/n) barely uttered a phrase.

They continued, "I don't suppose I could ask you the same, given that most of your work is confidential–"

"The Holy Kingdom’s crown prince visited North Gaciea today."

"Oh?"

Finally, he could see them smile for just a bit. Of course, they’d be interested to hear about Zhongli since he was the poster boy for the game’s sequel. Fortunately for Diluc, (Y/n) never got to play the game.

"That's wonderful! I was waiting for an English Localization of the sequel for soooo long! Was he hot? I bet he’s gorgeous as fu–"

"No."

"No...?"

"I mean." Diluc cleared his throat. It's barely even a shot of fire-water and he's already getting impulsive. "I meant that I cannot discuss the matter further. I am not like Kaeya. This is confidential, like what you had said."

"Ah..." Their eyebrows furrowed "I see…"

Why did they sound so disappointed?

Is (Y/n)… bored of him?

Diluc digressed, "how's Dainsleif?"

"Dain?" Their nose scrunched. "I haven't seen that poor guy for weeks now. He’s probably escorting Princess Lumine to Justice Ajax’s territory like in the game. Why?"

"Kamisato Ayato?"

"Ah, he ordered a crate of Dango milk yesterday," they laughed softly. "I'm amazed at how that man is barely affected by the script. I mean, I guess that’s to be expected when your route can only be unlocked by choosing three unsuspecting dialogue options. I don't think he talked to the protagonist at all these past two years. You’d think Lumine would’ve raised her wits stat high enough to attract his attention, but alas, Lord Ayato’s still lounging around East Gaciea doing Venti-knows-what."

He wasn’t paying attention to their ramblings. All their names sound bitter in Diluc's mouth. Unlike Albedo and Diluc, the rest of the Love Interests are free to interact with them as an extra. Server C had also performed their last scripted interaction with them, hence, (Y/n) can never touch Albedo and Diluc again.

Retainer Dainsleif of the West, Lord Kamisato Ayato of the East, Chief Justice “Childe” Ajax of the North, Chief Alchemist Albedo of Who-Knows-Where, and Duke Diluc Ragnvindr of the South… Princess Lumine certainly had fine options.

The Duke just wished the otome game scriptwriters would’ve let him have his own choice in the matter as well.

(Y/n) rested their elbows down on the table as they gazed into Diluc's distant eyes.

"Why did you ask?"

Diluc frowned, He admits it— (Y/n)’s eyes are nothing to write home about. When compared to an ephemeral beauty like Princess Lumine, their ordinary (e/c) eyes and visage hardly qualify as "distinctive traits." Their vibrant red ribbon is the only thing separating them from the street's grey residents. Yet he can still tell it's them no matter how big the crowd is. No matter how much they look like an “NPC”, to him at least it was a face worth seeing. Even if they mesh into a blob of slime, he can sense their essence through and through.

Although he can now barely make out the features on their face, nothing on this false earth can convince him that he wasn’t talking to the love of his life.

"I..." Diluc loosened his collar, suddenly growing hot at the intensity of their stare. "I simply wished to learn how the two other Love Interests are doing. I’ve had a chat with Ajax, and he still acts like a quote-on-quote “yandere” as you had explained before."

“Is that all?”

Diluc nodded.

"Ah," They shrugged. "Got my hopes up there– I thought there are other “Wasureta: No More” CGs I haven't seen yet."

Diluc smiled and took a drink.

"Ahh..." He exhaled, his eyelids fluttering shut in the process.

"You okay there pal?" They asked. "I know I said we shouldn't let any of this go to waste but you know I can just store them back home right? Oh, you can have some too but I don't think you'd like so–"

"I'll take a bottle."

(Y/n)’s eyes widened.

"Y-You..." They stuttered, "You sure?"

"Yeah," Diluc mumbled, lying to himself. "It tastes okay."

They grinned. The sight makes his decision all the more worth it.

"Haha, great!" They fist-bumped the air "See? Told ya cheap fire-water tastes good!"

Don’t get him wrong, he's not taking one home because of its taste. He's taking one home because it might be the last memento he'll have of (Y/n).

"Hold on, let me get a ribbon." They opened their palms to stop him from leaving. "Can't give the great Duke of the South something that looks barely presentable now would I?"

They left him with a skip in their steps. Diluc smiled.

Now that he's left alone, he silently wondered:

Just how long can he last before he tells the NPC that he wants to ruin their friendship?

———

Along with the sounds of gutted flesh reverberating through the tunnel's dark passageways, a man's hysterical laughter echoed. It was mostly silence in the caves, and there is a strong sense of loneliness upon entering the vicinity. Humans and animals alike would feel as though there is no life inside those walls, but the joyous yet hollow laughter came from the end of the tunnel.

And on the other side, you'll find a red-haired man at his wit's end.

"Tell me..." His words dragged out in a low growl as he grabbed a fistful of the bloody and tattered blonde's greasy hair. The man whimpered from his touch. "Was it fun? Laughing at my misery this entire time? Were you laughing along with them? Lumine, Dainsleif, and all the rest?! Did I put up quite the show there?!"

Crown Prince Aether trembled.

Duke Ragnvindr had everything figured out.

———

“There’s one regret I have now that I’ve isekai-d in this game.”

“What was it?”

“It’s just that,” (Y/n) sighed. “I never really got this game to a 100% completion.”

Diluc raised an eyebrow, unimpressed by their obsession with Wasureta, “and why is that important?”

“Hey! It’s pretty damn important!” (Y/n) grumbled. "Tsk, if only I finished your bad endings… The guides say once you do that, you’ll be able to unlock a secret route.”

“A secret route?”

“Yeah,” they shrugged.

“I’ve read some spoilers from Otomekitten's blog and get this— the last route reveals where Lumine’s brother had been hiding all this time.”

———

The nerves on the back of Diluc's palms were more noticeable as he pulled the poor man closer. Simply put, their faces did not resemble what mankind should look like; rather, they were an animalistic representation of a predator and prey. Hitherto it had disturbed Prince Aether in his rests, but it was too late when he finally acknowledged that something unhinged lay dormant inside the duke.

"P-please..." He coughed. Blood started drooling down the edge of his lips. He assumes that a few of his teeth are likely knocked in, and he can feel his canines prodding inside his throat. "H-have merc–"

With alarming ease, Diluc threw him in the direction of the shelves. The blonde fell and gasped violently when the splintered wood struck his shoulder. The gaping wound on his hips gushed out once more, bleeding onto his carpet and scattered notes. The duke was a monster. He intentionally missed striking his vital organs to prolong his suffering. More blood gushed from his mouth and the prince noisily wheezed out wet coughs.

His Highness has (Y/n) to blame for the hints they gave the duke.

If they hadn't had that conversation, Diluc wouldn’t have figured out that Aether created this “game” world out of grief for his dead sister.

———

“I’ve been alive here for a year or so but I can’t get used to how the harpies in this world look so tame.”

“Hmm? What else were you expecting?”

“Nothing much, it’s just that they look so different in the game’s beta.”

They shrugged. “Fun fact: did you know that “Wasureta: No More” was a fantasy-horror game before the scriptwriters decided to rewrite everything?”

———

"Tsk." Diluc spat and wiped his mouth with his last dirty palm as if there was a major difference. Both are equally soiled with oil and Aether’s blood; it wouldn’t have mattered.

The duke snarled aloud into a burst of savage laughter, "what's wrong, My Creator? Can't even muster up the courage to face your retribution?"

"F-Friend..." Aether called out, hoping to garner sympathy for the Diluc who once looked after both him and his sister at the royal gardens. Hoping to remind him that he was placed number 1 on the list of people the head of Military Affairs had trusted.

"Don't call me that," Diluc's grip on his claymore grew tighter until his knuckles paled.

"Du-Duke..." The blonde looked up. "I can't just... Rewrite this story again..."

"You can," Diluc spoke in a somewhat broken voice. His sanity may be waning, but he cannot deny that Aether was included in the list of the people the duke trusted. "We’re just characters you’ve written. You've done that before. You've done that to Lumine."

"And I r-regretted it!" He sputtered out, accidentally stronger than intended. The blonde scurried to lean against the wall as he feared Diluc would attack him for his offensive tone. "I regretted it. I thought I could revive my sister... I thought that would bring Lumine back into this new world. I thought it would bring her happiness if– if I gave her m-more options–"

"Forced options," Diluc grumbled, rightfully angry at the blonde's interferences. Based on his inference, three of the five suitors wouldn't have been whisked away by Lumine's whims if it weren't for her brother’s influence. And judging by his pained reaction, Diluc would be right.

"But she’s not my real sister.” Aether sobbed. “She never will be— she’s just an image I had of her. And I-I still ended up making this false Lumine more miserable."

"No shit." Diluc snickered with narrow eyes. "You made her miserable—"

The duke just wished he knew where Aether was from the very beginning. He would've had Prince Aether's head before this whole damn game even started.

"And you made me so fucking miserable, Crown Prince," Diluc muttered.

“I just wanted to be with (Y/n).” He breathed in shakily, “is that so much to ask for?”

"P-Please, listen to me." Aether wept. "Ch-Changing someone's fate brings more harm than good!"

THUD.

Aether shook as a claymore thrust through the concrete just a hair beside his ear. He gulped under the towering gaze of those piercing red eyes. They glowered over him, and they were far from pleased. Aether was too terrified to look away as he saw how Diluc's eyes spiraled into the abyss. The air was thick with heat emanating from Diluc’s pyro-abilities. The sound of the metal rang in the prince’s ears like a warning, thus, the strength in his shoulders weakened and his muscles have gone mushed as he cowered down.

Changing fate brings more harm than good? What a joke. By the looks of it, letting fate run its course only puts the prince in greater turmoil.

Maybe Diluc should offer his head to Her Highness. It doesn't matter whether he lived or died, does it not? If she's so desperate to find the missing prince again, it wouldn't even matter what state his casket is in.

"Di–"

Aether couldn’t breathe.

"Don't struggle."

Diluc effortlessly slid the prince's entire body up the wall after grabbing his throat. Aether's feet curled up as he struggled to steal a breath. He tried to kick and claw Diluc's arms away, but the man stood his ground. Ruby eyes continued to pursue him with an icy rage that Aether was all too familiar with.

The fact that they both placed a lot of faith in one another was a mistake.

Aether's eyes started to tear up involuntarily. Diluc spoke those words as if they weren't threatening remarks, but a merciful command. Yet it doesn't change the fact that he intended to assassinate the prince with his bare hands. Aether began balling up his fists and striking him, but it was ineffective.

"..."

Diluc coldly watched his stomach bleed out like a student dissecting a frog.

Aether's vision clouded. As he flailed his limbs like a wild animal, dark blotches started to appear in his line of sight. His fingers are unwittingly clawing at everything as the adrenaline starts to kick in. Aether never wished to harm a soul, but at that moment he was aiming for Diluc's eyes.

His survival instincts kicked in.

He can't die.

Not like this.

"Si–..."

Lumine. Sister.

Aether needed to apologize to his sister.

He still hoped to say sorry— sorry for leaving her to run a kingdom alone— sorry for not being able to save her in the original timeline—

sorry for resetting and rewriting the game just to see her alive and happy again.

Aether had so much unfinished business piled up. So many discoveries he has yet to pen down. He can't die here. He mustn’t.

He grabbed something. A fleeting crimson near his assailant's collarbone.

Was it Diluc's hair?

He pulled harder. All his strength was wasted on that sliver of red hope. Anything that would get his assailant to stop.

And Diluc did. His grip on Aether's throat loosened as the prince fell back on the floor. Aether wheezed, his vision slowly returning to him. His bated breathing echoed inside the room as his eyesight returned to him. When the prince's eyes finally focused sharply, he saw silk.

This wasn't Diluc's hair, it was–

"(Y/n)’s ribbon."

Diluc used the very same ribbon (Y/n) to decorate a bottle of fire-water with to tie up his hair.

Aether shivered.

"It seems like you wanted to choose your death."

Oh fuck, oh fuck.

Aether looked up. He shouldn't have looked up.

Duke Diluc Ragnvindr's face was red with a grin uncannily reaching his ears to a degree that shouldn't be possible. His expression was akin to a lovesick young adult twisted to its extremities. He appeared to look excited. To think that he burns up by just a mention of this person’s name makes Aether sick to his stomach.

"Allow me to heed your last wish, Your Highness."

The prince felt his whole body tense up as Diluc wrapped the ribbon around his neck.

Diluc did not give him any more room to breathe as if his body was moving automatically.

This wasn’t Diluc Ragnvindr anymore.

His eyes were empty.

This was a man possessed.

"Ch...de..." Aether forced out his last words as the ribbon quickly wrung around him.

"S..ve... my... s....ter"

———

Diluc only pulled out of his trance after he started washing the blood off his hands. Elzer subsequently informed him that the duke had entered the manor bloodied and unkempt with no recollection of how he got there and that he had strolled carelessly to the restroom like a corpse. There was a commotion across the entire Ragnvindr manor and rumors that he had lost an unpleasant duel quickly circulated. Better that than the truth, he supposed. Even his memory of what transpired in Aether's basement is hazy. Diluc only had their red ribbon and the idea of winning in his mind. He refused to let things continue as they are.

It wasn't until he started drying himself with a towel that he realized that the crown prince perished by his hands.

To think that Diluc used to be so terrified of offending royalties– of accidentally slipping a lese-majeste out of his lips– but now he let a royal's soul slip out of his wrists.

It's invigorating.

Diluc not only tied his fate with theirs, but he successfully managed to cut their ties with those disgusting vermin they call their “regulars.” They can't have them anymore, and they won't even intend to reach out. No one remembers who Server C is. They are now alone together with him. He’s the only person they can depend on. Diluc's breathing heaved lower. Just thinking about their inevitable dependence excites him.

He quietly closed the door behind him.

"Good evening, Server C." He smiled. "Or, should I say, my beloved?"

Just the two of them.

They won't look at anyone else. They can't. The whole world will now feel what he felt when he was unable to touch (Y/n). Only HE has the privilege to hold them now.

It's just the two of them in this world left. After all, there is no statute of limitations once you learn how to play Creator.

Diluc Ragnvindr had successfully rewritten this game’s script.

He no longer carries any in-game responsibilities, much like how there is no Lord Kamisato, Justice Ajax, Retainer Dainsleif, and Chief Albedo that exists in this “script.rpy” file.

It’s just him and his beloved server, alone.

Diluc wiped his mouth. He's practically dro– no, his mouth is literally watering at the thought. Diluc's heart is pounding, almost threatening to break free from his ribs.

"I’m all you have now, (Y/n)." Diluc's gaze softens. "Isn't that wonderful?"

His hands reluctantly traveled under their blanket where their hands should be, scared that when he reaches out, he'll feel nothing there.

He felt their warmth.

Diluc grinned tearfully. He can finally touch them again. He felt their fingers crossed miraculously against his own.

"You’re so warm..."

He gently rubbed their calloused hand against his cheek.

No matter how overworked or ragged these hands were from washing the dishes, for him, they were silk to touch. So soft. So vulnerable.

Diluc swallowed his saliva with great difficulty. God. They’re so vulnerable right now. So peaceful. So fragile. His breathing increased in volume. He could just take them right here–

His bottom lip started to bleed. He was doing everything in his power not to cave in but his throat was starting to get parched. He breathed in deeply.

Not now. Please, not right now. Not when they probably don’t remember who he is.

Diluc wanted to see the look on their face as he finally kisses them. What expressions will they make? It's not fair to both of them to steal such a moment when they’re asleep. That's not what he had been waiting for. Not what he's been craving.

"My beloved, you're a beauty from afar, but you're even more flawless in my arms," Diluc muttered over their ear.

"And I'll do everything in my power to let it stay that way. Fate and the entire world be damned."

-----------

A/n: want to read more of this in a visual novel form? It's here :)

Edit: HERE'S THS IMPROVED SPRITES AND OVERALL UPDATED GAME!!!

#yandere diluc #yandere diluc x reader #yandere genshin #yandere genshin impact #yandere genshin x reader #yandere genshin impact x reader #yandere genshin imagines #yandere diluc ragnvindr #diluc #diluc ragnvindr #tag: otome game au #yandere male #tw yandere #male yandere #yandere #genshin impact #x reader #ansy-writes

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himezoro · 7 months

Note

Can you do head canons of how the straw hats would cheer you up if they noticed you were sad?

— thank you so much for requesting, and being my first request ! ୨୧ i mainly focused on the monster trio, i'll be happy to do a part 2 with other straw hats if you want to (tbh i was so excited to write after work that i could not wait lmao). i hope you'll enjoy it as much as i liked writing it for you ⋆˙⟡♡ i didn't know if it was meant to be their s/o, so i went for both hypothesis.

— ʜᴇᴀᴅᴄᴀɴᴏɴꜱ : how would the monster trio cheer you up if they noticed you were sad ?

wc : 1400+

warning! : mention of gender (female) in sanji's part !

sailing with the strawhats has always been pure magic and ectic each day. watching the sun sets in the most beautiful places, feeling the breeze tickling your nose, discovering nature in all its glory, dancing to the rythm of the waves. but traveling the seas had its tough times. who could have thought that your inner demons would catch up, when the thousands sunny would go so many ways ?

during these tempestuous times, with a forced smile on your face, the light in your eyes dimmed, and when you thought (or, your inner demons so declared), no one noticed, or that no one cared...

monkey d luffy

[ if you were his friend ]

luffy brings light with each blink of his round, bright eyes. he is the life of the party, hell, he is the party.

and even though he is used to having some more quiet souls around him, like zoro or robin, he sure can notice when someone is feeling sad, especially a crewmate. a friend.

when he noticed your absence during the time the ship decked on a beautiful beach, luffy asked for you, as he would for any of his comrades.

when he heard you stayed on the ship "to get some rest", he nodded and kept on having fun with usopp and chopper.

but the time flied, and you did not show up.

luffy would scream for you at the top of his lungs for you to come out and look at him pull pranks and build a really fun castle. he would do anything to make you laugh. even if it meant getting dugged in the sand by his friends or used as a kite for kite-surfing.

if his screams didn't make you come out (or, get him killed by nami), he would run to the ship and offer you a present : seashells he collected.

he would offer his biggest smile and tell you that he will be back soon with a giant fish for everyone to eat.

needless to say, he ended up drowning and that, made you laugh.

[ if you were his s/o ]

again, luffy may look a little over the moon, but he can make the difference between introversion and sadness.

if he would do anything to make you laugh as a friend, as a partner, luffy would tend to be more quiet.

luffy immediatly feels your sadness, even from miles away. it clenches his heart. he hates it when he knows his antics are not enough to make you smile. he feels like he failed in some way.

luffy's love language is physical touch. be prepared for a lot of cuddling sessions where he would not.let.you.breathe.

he hopes to bring warmth to your heart. he would not kiss you, but trap you with his elastic arms for as long as you want, or until he has to eat.

if you say you need space and alone time, luffy would respect that. instead, he would put his hat on your head and patiently wait until you're ready to be welcomed in his arms.

he's a sweetheart overall i want to squish him

roronoa zoro

[ if you were his friend ]

roronoa zoro is a quiet animal, a man of a few words. he respects boundaries more than anyone on the ship, which is why you liked having him around, especially during these dark times.

but just because zoro is quiet doesn't mean he does not notice. boy, does he notice. that man is always on watch, his guard on, he can feel the switch in the air the second he saw you sitting in a secluded space of the ship.

he knows he's not skillfull with words, and he knows he does not like prying. so, he does not ask questions. he just acknowledges your current state, and leaves you space.

when other crew members would ask for you, he would lie and say you're asleep in your quarters and do not want to be disturbed. he would make sure no one gets close to the place you're currently hiding, knowing that if you were there, it meant not wanting to be seen dealing with these emotions.

he would yell at luffy for being too loud and pretend it disturbs his own peace.

when he sees you come out looking sad again and cross his path, he would not talk or say anything. instead, he would give you a small, silent, yet, eloquent nod.

in other words : zoro would be the greatest gardian

[ if you were his s/o ]

zoro often felt like he was not a great partner. he's not energetic like luffy, romantic and eloquent like sanji... he feels like a brute.

but if there's one thing zoro is confident in for sure, in his relationship with you, it's his ability to protect you, to shield you from harm.

as a friend, he always feels protective of his crewmates, but when it comes to his s/o, this boy would build a whole planet just for them to be safe and sound. at peace.

so he immediatly notices you were sad with the way you bid "goodnight" after dinner.

he left you alone for a couple of minutes, just so you would not feel oppressed. again, this man knows boundaries.

yet, he is unable to stay away from you and leaving you alone in such state. his duty is to protect you from even the smallest ant. even if he has a lot of trust in your strength, he cannot help but to come into your room and sit, lay by you. he would not ask you to talk, but he will. after placing a kiss on your wet temple and a hand on your shivering shoulder, he would quietly state, with determination and pure adoration : "i'll be waiting by your side, if you need anything."

he would probably fall asleep, but he kept his promise, and his hand remained on your shoulder the entire time.

vinsmoke sanji

[ if you were his friend ]

sanji cares about the well-being of his crewmates like no other. after all, he is the chef, he is responsible for your health, and you know what they say : le bonheur est dans l'assiette (translation, happiness lies in the plate).

so when sanji notices you have not finished your meal last night, he figures that you just didn't like its taste.

so the next day for lunch, he tried to improve his recipe and served the meal once again, but to no avail. you did not eat a bite and quickly left.

sanji then understood the meal was not the issue here (he's a great chef after all, i cannot see him fail a recipe), but it was something else. you were sad. and this man cannot let a pretty lady in such dismay (or a friend in general).

sanji would bake your favorite cookies and, if you're a female, bring them over to you on a silver tray with the most marvelous bouquet to make you feel like a princess. it would be difficult for him to hide his excitement when he sees you, but he would understand your need to be left alone if this would please you.

but if you needed someone to talk, female or not, this man would pour down a cup of wonderful tea and listen to you for minutes, hours, hell, even for days, and provide a lot of advices and support.

he would not eat the treats he made for you, claiming they were yours and he "feeds off your growing happiness".

[ if you were his s/o ]

he would do everything he would do for a friend. after all, sanji is known to be kindhearted, thoughtful and attentive.

but when it comes to his s/o being sad ? he would feel it right away, like lightning.

before checking on you and reacting, sanji would think. this boy is sensitive, filled with empathy. so he would question himself and wonder if he is the cause of your sadness. is he too cliché ? is he too pushy ? does he not compliment you enough ? is the attention he gives to other ladies problematic ? he would think a lot about his own actions to make sure he can comfort you the right way.

so even though he notices your sadness really early on, he takes a while to react.

but when he does, expect your favorite treats along with a wonderful handwritten note under the plate where this boy tells you everything he wants you to know, "so you can cherish these words forever and hold them to your heart when feeling sorrow"

he would not give you the plate in person if you asked to be left alone, instead, he would silently leave it by your window and wait until you open it to offer you a sweet, loving kiss, on top of your forehead. like la cerise sur le gâteau (translation, the cherry on top of the cake).

2024 © himezoro - do not repost or translate my work. likes, reblogs, and comments are welcome

#one piece x reader #one piece headcanons #one piece x you #zoro x reader #luffy x reader #sanji x reader #roronoa zoro #monkey d luffy #vinsmoke sanji #one piece headcanon #one piece imagine #op #op x reader

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halcyone-of-the-sea · 1 year

Note

Hello! May I request a reader x Keegan drabble where the reader is an artist in secret?

Sure, they roam the wake of no mans land in a ravaging war, but in the moments they are not on missions they capture the scenery around them. Wether it be on rooftops, surrounding woods or abandoned shelters, the reader revels in the few moments of silence they have before another bombardment of bloodshed is thrown their way to remember places or things around them before they eventually move again

How would Keegan react, let alone if he caught reader sketching him?

Thank you for your time, have a good day :D

—Paint The Dawn; Paint My Eyes

⇢ ˗ˏˋ 5k Drabble Masterlist ࿐ྂ

╰┈➤ ❝ [In the midst of war and death, there's little time for pleasure. All you had was a ripped-up sketchbook to call your own, its contents littered with the rough face of your comrade.] ❞

The camp is quiet, and you are tired.

Looking out along the wreckage of this wasted world, there seems to be no end to the broken valleys or the craters of rock—this desolation remains as if an angry God had thrown a tantrum, and smashed the earth to bits. Trees grew sideways, wreckage that could be bits of houses or even remnants of bone breed in the little spaces under moss and bush; where the rest died, nature took back what was hers. Thus, the cycle continued.

What breathes, dies, and with that firm and undisputable reality, you find beauty in moments like these.

You blink down at what still breathes of the patchwork lungs of No Man’s Land, pencil in your hand still for but a moment of red-eyed concentration. The deer was down in the dip below the Ghosts’ quiet camp for the steadily growing night—white where it should be a tawny-blonde shade. Barely breathing, you watch with half of its albino form sketched out in short bursts of graphite on your sun-bleached possession.

A sketchbook, old, and worn to the very binding of its pages, and yet to you a more prized possession had never been held in your grip.

So focused on the deer and its white shadow; its lithe body as it grazes along the forest floor amidst a soft rustling of leaves, you don’t notice the man behind you—a man supposed to be sleeping.

It’s a minute of looking at your awe-filled face before Keegan clears his throat, speaking in a low grumble. “Not every day you see that, huh?”

You startle back so quickly that your pencil slips out of your hand, bouncing off your thighs before clattering to the flat rock that serves as your lookout platform. A clink of metal on stone is all it takes, the pencil falling down into the lower land and striking through greenery as you gasp and snap your eyes away. The flighty heart of the deer all at once sparked in a puff of air from its nostrils and a flair of a raised tail.

It disappears into the bushes and its white flash is seen until the thick foliage swallows it again. You look back just in time to grace your eyes with one last glimpse.

A deep disappointment blooms and you level out a sigh as Keegan clicks his tongue, guiltily rubbing a hand on the back of his neck.

“Shit, Sweetheart,” he hums, “didn’t mean to…” Keegan tapers off with a low groan. “I’ll, uh, get you a new pencil when we’re back, yeah?”

You stare at the forest a moment longer before huffing out and shifting—you turn and glance at the Sergeant before grumbling out, “You have a nasty habit of sneaking up on people, Russ. I don’t like it when it’s me.”

Blue eyes meet yours, his body still in gear and armed just like yours. Even sleeping, Ghosts bore the fangs of the living. Keegan’s face is down a mask, though, so you’re privy to see his built jaw and strong features in the moonlight. Black hair like a void.

He sighs.

“Again, didn’t mean to. Thought you knew I was there.” Your eyes roll, but a small smirk snaps your lip.

“Of course you did.” Huffing and shaking his head, the man comes to lean against your rock.

“What ya workin’ on anyways? Seen you scribblin’ in that thing every chance you get. Got curious enough tonight to ask when I saw you up during Ajax’s watch.” He blinks at you, swirling with curiosity and dim intrigue. “You take over for him?”

You smile, shrugging. “Maybe.” Keegan stares and raises a dark brow as your form leans closer, presenting your object of patience and smudged graphite. “You gonna wake him up?”

The man takes the object and studies your half-finished work with an acute eye, taking in the lines and erased bits that indent the paper. He tilts his head at it and a moment later he grunts an answer, lost in thought.

“Depends.” Blue meets your vision in a slow sweep. “You tired?”

Face burning, you clear your throat and begin to stutter a negative before the worst moment of your life takes place.

Keegan grabs one page of your sketchbook and starts flipping. Heart lurching and eyes wrenching open to the size of dinner plates, your hand snatches at the old cover—but not before the damage is done.

The dead-gazed Sergeant locks onto a perfect image of his own sleeping body from hours earlier. Drawn face soft and calm in the gray of blended material that you’d had to use your finger to achieve, and limbs loose; he almost seemed to come off the page in an intensive display of detail.

Keegan pauses and feels his jaw slightly slacken, eyes going that bit wider before his brows lift in shocked pleasure. Your hand latches onto the top of your book and rips it from the man’s grasp easily.

“Did anyone ever tell you it’s rude to go through people’s things?!” Your heart is racing, palms going clammy. At your chest, you hold your belonging with a tight scoff of embarrassment.

Keegan’s lids move up and down three times in quick succession before he replies. A tease is so deep in his words you cringe with a burning face.

“Anyone tell you it’s rude to watch people sleep, Sweetheart?” Glaring, you have to look away.

It wasn’t exactly common knowledge to others that you liked the gruff man, but if anyone took one look into your sketchbook they’d know the truth. Pages were dedicated to finding the perfect slant of his eyes—that structure of his jaw and his broken-one-to-many-times nose.

His lips and how his skin looked when he smirked.

Shame tightens your face and you stare hard at the trees a few feet away; the sleeping forms of your comrades. Until a smooth chuckle leaves you breathless.

A puff of air spreads over your cheek but you don’t dare turn your head.

Keegan whispers to you slowly, that gravel in his tone and his lips brushing against your ear as he leans closer to you—arms crossed in front of him.

“If you wanted me to pose there, Doll, all you had to do was ask me. No use watchin’ from a distance…I’ll give you the full tour.”

He walks off back to his mat of leaves and grass and you’re left gaping and choking on your own thoughts; honied vision dripping shock.

Keegan calls easily over his shoulder as if his comment hadn’t made your pulse pound, “I’m waking up Ajax—go back to bed. Scenery’ll be the same come morning.”

You breathe in his sly quip, “trust me.”

TAGS:

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entishramblings · 2 months

Text

The Innocence of Brutality Pt. 9 [Legolas/Reader]

A.N: I want to especially thank @tiny-and-witchy for giving me such motivation to write this chapter. Your messages of encouragement were so helpful. Also, this chapter is very....interesting. I wanted to focus on character development and the development of learning behavior in a new world. Additionally, as this story follows the events of the lotr films, I didn't want it to be entirely too repetitive. We have all seen the movies and I personally find myself getting irked when I read and re-read the same scene over and over...hence why I wrote certain scenes certain ways. but fret not, there are plenty of things that I included in this chapter that are not a part of the films heh!

Request: none

Pairing: Legolas X Fem!Reader

Summary: The Reader is Rámaitë Mahtar, a warrior spirit race, and she meets the fellowship on their quest to destroy the ring.

Disclaimer: Any mythology relating to the Rámaitë Mahtar is not canon as I made up Rámaitë Mahtar. Also, all elvish was translated from a translator site—it may not be accurate.

Word Count: 5.6k

Warnings: mentions of war, mentions of torture, violence, fluff, hurt/comfort, blood, injuries, gore, nudity, things get spicy, discussion of sex 🌶️

MASTERLIST | AO3 | WATTPAD | The Innocence of Brutality Masterlist | HERE for OC format

(Y/N) sat still upon a large rock, her eyes fixated on Boromir’s motionless form, as Aragorn and Gimli prepared his funeral boat. Her wings, once radiating power, were now punctured and bloody, Legolas tending to them with care. Still, the pain that rippled among each feather was nothing compared to the suffering and hopelessness in her heart.

The silence among the four was profound, each absorbed in their own grief. Aragorn's face was painted with stoic sorrow, his hands moving with gentle precision as he placed flowers around Boromir's body. Gimli, usually gruff and unyielding, worked the same task with a rare tenderness, his eyes showcasing the break of his heart. With each blossom they laid upon Boromir's chest, a silent tear slipped from (Y/N)’s eyes, running down her cheek and falling to the earth as she once had. The forest, who bore witness to Boromir’s bravery, seemed to mourn beside them—for the trees rustled peacefully, creating a soft song for the Gondorian.

“It is time,” Aragorn spoke softly.

Slowly, (Y/N) stood, her injured wings slipping from Legolas’ healing hands. She approached the boat that now cradled her companion. The Rámaite Mahtar reached for his cold hand. With immense care, she gently unfolded his fingers, confirming that her opal rested inside his loose grip. Blinking back tears, as little rainbows reflected upon the pale skin of his palm, she closed his fist once more.

“Goodbye,” she whispered.

With a solemn unity, the group pushed the boat into the water, their hearts heavy with grief and reverence. They watched it float away, carrying their fallen comrade to the halls of the gods, praising his bravery and sacrifice.

In that profound moment, they forged an unbreakable resolve to save Merry and Pippin. They would not let their friends perish to the evil of the Uruk-hai. Therefore, with fierce determination, they embarked on a relentless race across Arda.

As their feet pounded into the soil across the plains, (Y/N) tried to conceal her struggle. Her punctured wings, open and unable to fly and resistant to motion, held her back. The relentless wind battered against them, intensifying her pain and forcing her to push harder than the others, stealing her energy. It seemed to howl in laughter at her suffering. It mocked her. No longer would she let the wind's whispers taunt her. Therefore, despite her injuries, she folded her wings into her form, leaving no feather upon her back, only smooth skin.

Legolas sent her a look of concern as they ran but she only shook her head and said two words: “The wind.”

He seemed to understand, but kept a careful eye on her as they sprinted.

Despite this concern, it appeared to be a good thing that she hid away her wings because, only hours after, the group was standing in a circle of men who were high upon their horses with spears drawn and aimed. Legolas assumed that, if they saw her wings, those spears would be through their bodies, for often men fear what they don’t understand.

The elf was quick to push the Rámaite Mahtar behind him, into the center of the tight, small circle Aragorn, Gimli, and himself formed.

The leader, seemingly so, approached them. “What business does an elf, man, dwarf, and woman have in the Riddermark? Speak quickly.”

Gimli was the one to snip back a snarky reply, “Give me your name, horsemaster, and I shall give you mine.”

The man dismounted, a sneer upon his face as he moved closer towards the dwarf. “I would cut off your head dwarf, if it stood but a little higher from the ground.”

Drawing his bow Legolas replied forcefully, “You would die before your first stroke fell.”

Aragorn was quick to push down his arm, interrupting the interaction. “I am Aragorn, son of Arathorn, this is Gimli son of Gloin, and Legolas son of Thranduil.”

The man contemplated the Ranger’s words for a moment, before he dipped his head towards the final member in their group who had not been introduced. “And the woman?”

The Rámaite Mahtar stood straight, confident, and strong.

“(Y/N),” she replied simply.

He inched closer, a frown upon his brow. “Do you choose to be in the company of these men, Miss, or is it under force?”

She tilted her head, not understanding what he was trying to imply. Her subtle anxiety, slipping her hand into Legolas’, did not go unnoticed by the Rider.

With her action, he seemed to relax. Nodding towards their folded hands he spoke again. “I apologize, Lady, I did not realize you were the wife of the elf.”

(Y/N)’s brows crinkled in confusion, not entirely sure of the meaning behind the word “wife.” The other three hunters did not dare try to correct the Rider’s assumption for it could initiate a conversation of (Y/N)’s origins—which is something they knew shouldn't be shared.

Aragorn cleared his throat. “We are friends of Rohan and Théoden, your king.”

“Théoden no longer recognizes friend from foe,” he gruffed in reply. Taking off his helmet, the spears of his men retreating, he spoke again. “Not even his own kin. Saruman has poisoned the mind of the king and claimed lordship over his lands.

(Y/N)’s lips parted as a small whisper of recognition left her lips, no other besides Legolas noticing. “The Man of Saru.”

The rider continued. “My company are those loyal to Rohan and, for that, we were banished.” He then stepped forward, his demeanor changing, showcasing pent up anger and hidden fear. “The white wizard is cunning. He walks here and there, they say. There’s an old man, hooded and cloaked. And everywhere his spies slip past our nets.”

“We are no spies,” Aragorn interjected. “We track a party of Urk-hai westward through the plain. They have taken two of our friends captive.”

“The Urks are destroyed,” he replied. “We slaughtered them during the night.”

Gimli, his voice wavering, spilled out anxious words, “There were two hobbits! Did ya see two hobbits with ‘em?”

“They would be small, only children to your eyes,” Aragorn added, almost desperately.

The man paused, solemn. “We left none alive. We piled the carcasses and burned them. I am sorry.”

The air then changed, transforming the once-refreshing breeze into a suffocating, oppressive force. Thick and heavy it felt, marked by grief and confusion. No longer did it hold hope or whispers of encouragement, only despair.

(Y/N) glanced between her friends and the horsemen as she processed what the rider’s words meant. She watched as her fellow companions’ faces contorted and twisted, unsureness and shock upon them.

The Rámaite Mahtar’s lips quivered as she blinked back tears. With a breaking voice she spoke again. “No, b-but no. N-not again.” A sob escaped her throat as she desperately whipped her head around to look at her friends for a different answer. “N-not the hobbits.”

“(Y/N),” Legolas said.

Another loud sob reverberated through her chest, echoing among the air.

“(Y/N),” the Elven Prince repeated, his voice tinged with urgency as he grabbed her and pulled her into his body. Her form practically slammed into his with such a force of sadness, almost knocking the breath out of him. She immediately buried her head in his chest, inhaling deeply as the familiar scent of pine and honey filled her nostrils. Desperately, she clung to him, trying to find solace in the comforting aroma as she struggled to breathe through her heartbreak.

Seeing this desperate sorrow, the Rider whistled, bringing two horses forward. “May these horses bear you a better fortune than their former masters.” Mounting his steed, he added to his statement, “Look for your friends, but do not trust a hope. It is forsaken in these lands.” He then turned to his men, calling out an order. “We ride north!”

With that, the four hunters stood, numb and confused, allowing the feelings to sink in further.

Eventually, they pulled away from each other. Their bodies moved through motions their minds did not command with urgency, resigned to the belief that their friends were dead and they were only going to retrieve their bodies.

As if in a trance, they mounted their new steeds and took off toward the pile of carcasses, dread gnawing at their hearts as they anticipated the remnants of the flames—and their friends. Each hoofbeat echoed their apprehension, the stench of charred, decaying flesh growing stronger with every step. The eerie atmosphere was marked by the distant crackling of dying embers, reminding them of the devastation they were about to face.

It was then a haze of despair, hope, promise, and relief—an internal turmoil of change.

As they found the hobbits’ small belts, (Y/N)’s throat turned raw from her cries of despair.

As they found the little ones’ tracks, (Y/N)’s lips quivered and her hands shook with hope.

As they found the wizard in the flesh, new and whole, (Y/N)’s heart skipped with promise.

As they found the knowledge of the peace and prosperity of their friends, (Y/N)’s breath steadied and relief ran through her veins.

There then was direction—purpose—as they rode to Rohan.

….

The remaining members of the fellowship, reborn and filled with renewed hope, rode through the town of Rohan. Despite the wind, the air felt stale and eerie, as if it were sick and diseased. The townspeople fared no better; they appeared worn and weary, their gazes filled with suspicion as they watched the group trot by. Their eyes lingered on the group’s strangeness, noting the many races and the woman with piercing eyes.

“Why do they stare?” (Y/N) asked.

Legolas, one hand on the reins and the other around the waist of the Rámaite Mahtar seated in front of him, replied softly, “They have lived in misery for too long, never seeing anyone but each other.

“You’d find more cheer in a graveyard,” Gimli gruffed out, earning a look from Aragorn.

When they approached the halls of Théoden, they dismounted and were greeted with that same suspicion. “We cannot allow you before King Théoden so armed, Gandalf Greyham, by order of Grima Wormtounge,” the soldier stated.

Reluctantly, the men began to disarm, (Y/N)’s curious gaze filtering over this action. As her friends handed over their weapons—having to take extra time to disarm Gimli, for the dwarf had hidden quite a few—the men of Rohan’s lingering eyes filtered over the Rámaite Mahtar’s still form.

“And the woman?” the soldier stated.

(Y/N) frowned, tilting her head.

It was Aragorn that spoke. “You believe this woman holds weapons?”

The fellowships’ eyes shifted. She was the weapon.

“I apologize,” he stated, clearing his throat. “I was ordered to confirm every member of your party was disarmed.”

He then turned to Gandalf, “Your staff.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t deprive an old man from his walking stick, would you?” he retorted innocently.

At this, (Y/N) raised a brow.

The man huffed, but stepped aside, leading them through the vast doors.

As they stepped upon the stone, Legolas sent a side eyed look at (Y/N). “Don’t kill anyone,” he whispered. “Only incapacitate them.”

(Y/N) frowned.

While Gandalf addressed Théoden, a pale and slimy man, Grima, whispered into the King’s ear—likely spilling lies and manipulation. The men of Rohan cautiously crept around the fellowship as they approached; Grima confronted them in the center of the room. It took only a brief exchange between the ghastly man and Gandalf before Grima ordered his men to swarm the fellowship; however, they defended themselves swiftly. One soldier went to (Y/N) directly, likely thinking to take her hostage in his arms and use her as leverage; but, oh, how wrong he was to assume he could. (Y/N) grabbed his bicep and, with a quick motion, flipped him hard onto the ground. Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli immobilized the others, allowing Gandalf the opportunity to pull the poison from King Théoden’s mind.

All watched in stillness and nervous anticipation as Théoden spoke, his voice carrying the tone of another. Gandalf, his face etched with determination, used his staff to push the King’s body backward and pull Saruman’s poison from Théoden’s mind. Though it took only moments, it felt like hours until they saw the years melt away from Théoden's face, the lines of age and weariness vanishing. It was as if new life was being breathed back into him, Saruman's evil influence violently yanked from his very soul.

A young woman, her face pale with worry but her cheeks burning with renewed hope, rushed to his side to provide aid and comfort. Her hands trembled slightly as she reached out to touch the newly revived king’s cheeks.

“I know your face. Éowyn.”

A large smile blossomed upon her lips as she wrapped her arms around her uncle.

Those around them appeared visibly relieved as well, for the King of Rohan, now revitalized, was eager to restore glory and prosperity to his halls.

….

(Y/N) stood in a large bedroom in Rohan. Sunlight flooded through the open windows, casting a warm, golden glow across the room. The gentle breeze coaxed the cream-colored curtains into a graceful dance, while the scent of fresh grass, wildflowers, and the faint aroma of earthy soil and distant smoke wafted in, enveloping the room in a comforting embrace. Yet, to (Y/N), it still felt empty.

"But why?" she asked Éowyn again. "Why can I not be with the others?"

"Lady (Y/N), it is not proper for a woman to stay in a room full of men during the hours of night," Éowyn explained.

“But why?” (Y/N) persisted.

The Lady of Rohan sighed, retrieving an elegant dress from a large cupboard on the far wall and draping it over a vast wood-carved mirror. "That's simply not our way of life here. I understand it may differ from where you come from." She paused, then inquired, "Where exactly is that?"

(Y/N) simply shrugged. “Far.”

“I see,” Éowyn responded, sensing (Y/N)'s reluctance to share further. Changing the subject, she continued, “Let’s get you out of those travel clothes, shall we? A bath, perhaps? Then this lovely dress and some food. I do make quite a good stew.”

The Rámaite Mahtar huffed but followed the woman into the adjoining bathing room. At the sight of the steaming basin, (Y/N)’s face lit up, for she seemed to take joy in the comforts of water. She quickly pulled off her leather breastplate, followed by her tunic, indifferent to Éowyn's presence. Quite frankly, she still was not accustomed to Arda's perception of nakedness.

Éowyn started to avert her gaze but halted when (Y/N)’s back came into view.

The Lady of Rohan gasped, horror written across her face. “(Y/N)! You’re back–it’s–it’s entirely bruised!” She rushed forward, her gentle hands extending along the woman’s spine. “This–this could be internal bleeding,” she whispered, more so to herself, with worry.

With that, she rushed towards the hall, hollering for a healer, before returning to (Y/N). “Come, come sit,” she ushered, guiding (Y/N) towards the edge of the bed and pulling a folded blanket up to cover the woman’s chest. “A healer will be here in just a moment. Don’t you worry. You will be taken care of. You will be just fine.”

The Rámaite Mahtar frowned, standing up despite Éowyn‘s fretting. She walked towards the mirror, taking the blanket with her. She twisted and turned until the bruising came to her sight. Her lips parted, for she wasn't expecting such a thing.

It was at that moment that the healer arrived.

“By Eru—” he whispered, seeing (Y/N)’s back.

Quickly placing his bag on the bed, he approached her. Extending his hand, he was met with a fierce snarl from (Y/N), causing him to immediately withdraw.

“Lady,” he began cautiously, “I understand you must be in pain, but please know that I am here to help you.” The healer reached out again.

She snapped at him. “Do not touch me!”

“Lady,” he insisted, his fingers extending once more.

(Y/N) spun towards him, one hand clutching the blanket to her chest, the other reaching toward his throat. Her fingers closed around his neck, lifting him up.

Éowyn shrieked in alarm, taken aback by (Y/N)'s sudden aggression.

“(Y/N)!” a deep voice called from the doorway.

She turned at the familiar voice of Aragorn.

“Release the healer,” he commanded firmly.

Her intense gaze met his sincere gray eyes, and she immediately complied, trusting his judgment in this unfamiliar world.

Aragorn nodded at her, a silent understanding passing between them. He then addressed the servants who had gathered, “Please, get the elf,” he stated. One of them ran off at his word.

He approached (Y/N) with no unease. The trust they held as travel companions was evident to Éowyn. “May I take a look, (Y/N)?”

She nodded, turning her back towards him.

Gently, he examined the bruising upon her form. Tracing her spine lightly, he spoke, “Does this hurt?”

She shook her head. “No,”

He continued to run his hand further up her back. She remained stoic until he gently grazed the spot between her spine and shoulder blades—where her wings would normally have protruded. Only then did she wince.

At that moment, Legolas appeared in the doorway. “It’s her wings,” he stated plainly.

(Y/N) and the elf locked eyes in the mirror.

He approached her, taking Aragorn’s place. “(Y/N),” he said with a nod, indicating to her that it was safe to extend her wings.

With that, she slowly began to unfurl her wings from her back, each movement causing her to wince as they stretched out. Dried blood and greenish goo clung to each circular wound where arrows had mercilessly pierced her moments before Boromir’s death. As she extended them fully, her wings spanned at least half the length of the room, their impressive size and the remnants of battle obvious.

Gasps were heard from those in the room who knew not what or who she was.

Unfazed, Legolas moved to examine her wings. “The wounds must have become infected when you folded them in.”

“They were getting in the way,” she retorted.

“I know, Starlight. I am not blaming you,” he reassured softly. “I can treat the infection, but they must remain free while they heal.”

“Alright,” she agreed.

The Prince of Greenwood then took to the healer’s bag, not bothering to ask the man gaping at the Rámaite Mahtar. He was quick to sort through the herbs and other supplies to obtain what he needed. He dipped his head towards (Y/N) before motioning to the bed.

She obliged to his nonverbal request and sat upon it, her injured and infected wings stretching wide.

Legolas began gently cleaning the wounds.

Aragorn, on the other hand, moved towards the healer. “Your assistance is no longer required.” With a nod towards the door, he ushered the healer and the curious eyes of the servants out of the room.

He then turned to Eowyn, who was still fixated on the Rámaite Mahtar. Her soft lips were parted and her eyes were wide with curiosity. Unwavering they were...until she sensed his gaze.

“I apologize, Lady of Rohan, but you too must leave,” Aragorn stated gently.

Éowyn nodded in understanding, gracefully making her way towards the door. Just as she was about to slip through, she glanced back at Aragorn. “What is she?”

Aragorn inhaled through his nose before responding with two simple words. “Rámaite Mahtar.”

With that, he closed the wooden door, its hinges creaking softly. Leaning against the wall, he watched as Legolas tended to (Y/N)’s wounds. He stood guard at the door, for he knew that news of the winged woman they had brought into King Théoden’s walls would soon spread.

….

The following morning, a small group convened in the mess hall to discuss the future and the whispers of the 'disturbance' echoing through the halls. Present were King Théoden, his guards, Éowyn, Gandalf, Aragorn, Gimli, Legolas, and (Y/N).

(Y/N) was keen on wandering along the room, her partially wrapped wings dragging lightly upon the floor.

In a hushed whisper, mostly laced with curiosity and concern, Théoden spoke, “But what is she?”

With arms crossed, Aragorn replied, “She is a Rámaite Mahtar. 'Winged Warrior' in the common tongue. The Valar created them to cleanse the land that came before us.”

The King of Rohan’s brows furrowed. “So, she is not human, nor elvish.”

Aragorn nodded in confirmation.

“Is she—“ Éowyn started, “Is she dangerous?”

Aragorn’s eyes shifted, unsure what to say.

It was Gandalf who answered. “Yes, probably the second most dangerous force currently existing on our plane.”

“And the first?” She asked.

“Sauron,” Gandalf replied, his tone laced with trepidation.

“By Eru,” Gimli gruffed. “Ya make it sound like the lassie is gonna be the next thing to get us! Fret not, Lady, lover boy here—“ The dwarf smacked Legolas’ ass, causing the elf to jump. “—has taught the girl well.” He paused, before clarifying. “She’s on our side.”

“I see,” Théoden stated, suspicion still evident in his tone.

It was then that (Y/N) called out. “Legolas, what do these images mean? The ones made of little colorful stones?”

The King raised his eyebrows, caught off guard by her question.

“Tis a mosaic,” Legolas replied. “It tells the story of the men of Rohan.”

She turned to look at him. “What is the story?” she asked.

Surprisingly, Éowyn stepped forward and spoke. “It tells the tale of how we claimed and cultivated our lands. I can share it with you, if you’d like.”

(Y/N)’s face lit up. “Yes, I would like to hear the story.”

Cautiously, Éowyn approached the Rámaite Mahtar and began recounting the narrative depicted in the artwork along the walls.

“A curious creature then,” Théoden stated, simply.

“Oh, you have no idea,” Aragorn replied, rolling his eyes.

The King cleared his throat. “It will be best to keep her indoors while she heals. I do not want her to frighten my people. They are already scared enough.”

“Understood,” the Ranger replied.

The group dispersed, some settling down to eat breakfast, others going about their own duties. Éowyn sat with Aragorn and Gimli, while (Y/N) practically drug Legolas by the hand to re-explain the story Eowyn told her.

In a hushed tone, Éowyn spoke. “She doesn’t seem so dangerous.”

“I wouldn’t take you for one to underestimate a woman,” Aragorn said, sipping from his cup.

“I wouldn’t, but the way you all described her—as if she was a vile beast.”

“Oi, Lassie, she is,” Gimli stated. “(Y/N) over there could cut ya and half ya men down within a second.”

Éowyn ‘s gaze shifted. “And the elf? Could she cut him down too?”

Gimli nodded in confirmation. “She could cut us all down.”

“Yet he still loves her?” she asked with parted lips.

“Hopelessly,” Gimli grumbled. “Entirely hopelessly.”

Éowyn turned her head toward the pair. She watched as the Rámaite Mahtar smiled up at Legolas in pure delight, and he returned the affectionate gaze.

How in a time of war, they could find such love?

……

A couple of weeks had passed since their arrival in Rohan. (Y/N)’s wings had fully healed and were now neatly folded back into her form. She spent her days with her friends listening in on conversations and debates of war—not that she truly understood. In addition to her time with the others, she found herself assisting Éowyn with various tasks within Rohan’s walls. She learned to bake bread and prepare other provisions in the kitchen. (Y/N) also helped select sturdy fabrics for the men preparing for war. She even assisted in organizing Rohan’s swords and spears—though, admittedly, she only slowed the process for she asked many questions.

Currently, it was late in the night as (Y/N) wandered through the echoing halls of Rohan. Tomorrow morning, they would depart for Helm's Deep to seek refuge. She was determined to absorb as much as possible about this place before moving on to the next. Aware that war loomed on the horizon, she craved a brief taste of freedom.

For nearly an hour, she had roamed the silent halls, peering into open doors and descending stairs. It was only when she heard unfamiliar sounds that her brow furrowed in concern. The faint echoes of hushed moans and muffled groans drew her curiosity, prompting her to cautiously follow the source.

She followed the noises until she came upon a small, long, narrow window that was covered in intricate bars. Peering in, she saw a vast room adorned in fabrics of pink and red. Soft cushions and beds were scattered about, where men and women laid together in various pairs, two or three people at most. They were bare, their bodies intertwined in intimate embraces, eliciting sounds of pleasure and the music of skin upon skin.

(Y/N) squinted as she watched, unsure of what she was seeing.

Though as her gaze lingered on their bodies moving together, she felt desire. She bit her bottom lip as warmth began to build between her legs and her limbs twitched with eagerness.

“Lady (Y/N), what are you doing down these halls?!” A female voice chided in a hushed tone. "I've been searching for you since a servant informed me that you never returned to your chambers."

(Y/N) turned to see Éowyn, then returned her gaze to the window. “What are they doing?” She asked.

Éowyn frowned. “You do not know?”

(Y/N) shook her head. “Never have I seen people do such a thing.”

“Haven’t you been around for eons?” she asked, confused.

“Well, yes, but my people did not do this—this…what is this?”

Éowyn awkwardly cleared her throat. "We may go to war in a couple of days. These men, these soldiers, are seeking their last pleasure before they march to their deaths."

(Y/N) frowned. “I don’t understand.”

The Lady of Rohan pressed her lips together awkwardly. It appeared that she would have to be quite blunt with the Rámaite Mahtar. “They are having sex. This is a brothel. It is where men go to pay women for such things.”

“Why?”

“I have been told that it feels good,” she explained with embarrassment.

“You have never—?”

Éowyn interrupted her. “By the Eru—no, of course not. Those men in there are perverting an act of love. Sex is an act meant to be between two people who love each other dearly and are wed. Often, it is done in hopes to create a child. I am a Lady of Rohan. I must keep my honor until I am married and fulfill my duty to produce an heir.”

“This is how babies come to be then,” (Y/N) clarified.

Éowyn nodded. “Yes, sometimes.”

“My kind have never needed to have children. We were all made as we are. Made to kill,” (Y/N) remarked, glancing at Éowyn. “I was told that having babies is why we women bleed.”

Éowyn nodded, trying to understand. “Yes, yes it is. I—I am surprised no one has told how such a thing comes to be.”

(Y/N) shrugged. “Legolas, Aragorn, and the others…they haven’t talked of this sex before.”

Éowyn shook her head, her tone taking on a low level of disdain. “Men. You have only been traveling with men. Of course, they haven’t told you of such a thing.” She inhaled, taking a moment to recenter herself. “Such conversations are between a mother and daughter.” She paused, before awkwardly glancing into the brothel. “Come, Lady (Y/N). This place is not for us.”

With that, the Lady of Rohan gently tugged the Rámaite Mahtar away from this window; however, (Y/N)’s eyes were reluctant to leave for she was a curious creature indeed—eager to understand the ways of this new world.

Éowyn sensing (Y/N)'s lingering fascination and being rather uncomfortable with it, swiftly ushered her back into the quiet stillness of her chambers.

The air was heavy with the weight of impending war, yet (Y/N)'s mind was filled with questions. She lay on her bed, unable to find sleep, her thoughts consumed by the scenes she had witnessed at the brothel window. Curiosity gnawed at her, yearning to understand the allure of this intimacy that men sought before their deaths. What made it so compelling? Was it truly their last wish—their last desire?

Her thoughts then shifted. Eowyn had said it was to be done with someone you care for with your deepest heart. She bit her lip. Legolas.

With that, (Y/N) cast her covers aside, the white fabric tumbled and rumbled carelessly. Her bare feet were cold on the stone floor as she silently slipped out of her wooden door once more—ignoring the previous persistence Éowyn had held in her tone when she had told her to stay put before she left. Stealthily, (Y/N) made her way towards the chamber where the others in the fellowship slept. She peered in, careful not to wake them. Immediately, she spotted Legolas sitting upright with his back against the cool stone wall.

Sensing a presence, he opened his eyes. “(Y/N)?” he whispered. “What are you doing here? What is wrong?”

“Nothing is wrong,” she replied as he stood rather quickly. “Come with me.”

Curious, he stood and his feet led him towards her. Pausing in the doorway, he gazed down at her, trying to read her expression.

She grinned up at him, desire burning. “Come,” she whispered again, taking his hand and leading him towards her room.

As soon as she turned the knob and closed the door behind them, she pressed her body against Legolas'. Her lips eagerly met his, savoring the familiar taste of pine and honey that always lingered on him. He responded with gentle caution, lifting his hands to cup her face, unsure where this insistent passion of hers was coming from, nor what it would lead to.

“(Y/N),” he mumbled against her lips.

She playfully nipped at him, pulling him towards the bed. With a swift motion, she pushed him onto it and climbed up herself, straddling him.

“(Y/N),” he began again, “What are you—“ but her lips silenced him once more.

She settled onto his lap, weaving her fingers into his hair and matching her mouth to his. She then started to mimic the movements of the women’s hips that she had seen in the brothel, rolling them in a slow deep motion. It felt good.

“(Y/N),” Legolas moaned in pleasure, trying and failing to pull away.

She pushed him down, his head falling into the pillows. The Rámaite Mahtar eagerly pulled at his tunic, desperate to get it off, as she continued to grinded on him, feeling a hardness form in his pants. Oh, how she enjoyed the feeling it caused between her legs.

“(Y/N),” Legolas forced out, his lips parting, followed by a couple breathless elvish curses.

At the sound of her name upon his lips, her wings snapped open—a reflex—tearing through the white fabric that cloaked her.

“(Y/N),” Legolas practically growled, grabbing her hips and pulling himself upwards, his mouth only inches away from hers. Gently, he spoke, “Stop. Please, stop.”

She halted her motions. “Does it not feel good to you?” she asked.

He closed his eyes, his chest falling and rising quickly as he tried to regulate his breath. “It does, Valar, believe me, it does feel good. But we shouldn’t—we shouldn’t do this. How-how do you even know of this?”

She frowned. “Sex?”

He opened his gaze, staring intently into hers. “Yes. How do you know of sex?”

“I found a place. Éowyn called it a brothel. She told me of sex. She said they did it because it felt good and they knew they were going to die.” She paused, “Éowyn said that you’re supposed to do it with someone you love. I love you.”

Legolas leaned his forehead against hers, still trying to calm his heart rate. “I love you too, (Y/N). But this—we can’t do this right now.”

“You do not want to?” She asked genuinely, pulling her head from his ever so slightly.

“Oh, gods, (Y/N). Of course, I do.” he paused, closing his eyes for just a moment, as he felt her hot breath on his lips. “But you and I are not yet wed.”

“Éowyn said that the people in the brothel were not married,” she breathed out, her mouth just barely grazing his.

A light chuckle rumbled in his chest. “No, no they were not. That is prostitution. Men pay for sex. In a brothel, they treat it as a service, not as love.” He gently cupped one side of her face, making eye-contact with her. “I was taught that sex is not wrong in any means when it comes from love. You and I, (Y/N)—we do have that love. But, in my culture, elves do not have sex without being wed. And I am a Prince. I have rules I must follow. And you, you are not yet accustomed to this world. I will not take advantage of you.”

“It is not taking advantage of me if I want it too,” she replied.

He gently rubbed his thumb upon her cheek. “I know, my starlight, I know. I just do not believe this is the right time.”

She breathed in and nodded slowly—thinking. “Okay. If you want to wait, then we will wait.”

“Is that alright with you?”

She dipped her head up and down once again. “Yes,” she replied definitely.

He smiled gently at her before pressing a soft kiss to her lips then pulling her into a tight embrace.

“I love you with every ounce of my being, (Y/N). Never forget that.”

She buried her head into his neck and wrapped her wings around his form, as if she were shielding them both from the outside world. “I love you too, Legolas.”

Like that they stayed, feeling safe in the comfort of each other’s arms.

….

Everything Tag: @lea----b @aredhel-of-gondolin @princecami @the-fandoms-georgie @jazziwritestolkienprimary @swimming-in-stardust @elvish-sky @red-riding @hey-its-nonny @mirclealignr @laneynoir @straysugzhpe @runningfeather @awarwithinitself @finallyforgotten @kaiawrites @commanderawkward @xxbluestrifexx @slytherinambitious @redbirdbluebird333-blog @haylee-e @atokirina-tsuki @misshale21 @calypso888-blog @merlinbtch @lovelybaka @rilezra @sotwk

Legolas tag: @mylittle-escapingdreams @abandoncloud9 @aphroditesmoon @carojasmin2204 @phoenix666 @phoenix666stuff @high-sea-husbands @aheadfullofsteverogers @rippleinthestars @tiny-and-witchy

The Innocence of Brutality: @carojasmin2204 @therealscarletpumpernickel @noodlenerd101 @acupnoodle @altheanightingale @altheanightingale @casedoina @goosy-goose @hitherethea

Add yourself to my taglist(s)

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historicity-was-already-taken · 5 months

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pixeljade: #it IS very much a complex issue and I feel like saying that has been pissing off a lot of folks on both sides #one fact i would add to the table is that the current actions against palestine DO constitute a genocide by definition #its a word i hear pro-Israel people get very upset by because they think it is inherently comparing this to the holocaust #but its not. some people DO and thats its own discussion. but calling it a “genocide” is simply accurate and undeniable

Speaking as someone who was that pro-Israel person in her teens and very early 20s, the reactions you're describing are 800% cognitive dissonance freak outs. Most of these people, like me, received either directly or indirectly from their Elders in the Jewish community a very trauma-induced and deeply emotional information about the history of this situation, which boils down to: "They tried to kill us all once and they didn't now we finally have returned to the Promised Land, the only place we have to shield ourselves against It Happening Again. Israel's detractors hate that Jews can defend themselves now, and if any of them, including the Palestinians, were to have their way, they'd see us all dead. We must defend ourselves at all costs, and not let anyone ever put us in existential danger as a people ever again."

And then to have some rando 19 year old who knows jack shit about your or your community or your community's trauma to get up in your face and start screaming at you about genocide? It's only going to trigger that intergenerational trauma, and cause the party being screamed at to dig deeper into their defensive, cognitive-dissonance fueled response. Which, if we were to boil that response down to a thought process, looks like "This person hates me and all Jews. They think we're a hive mind who don't deserve to live. Thank G-d for Israel."

What's complex, is that not everything in that trauma response is wrong, and not everything the dumbass 19 yo who has no interest in unpacking their own learned anti-Semitism was wrong.

Israel's actions towards Palestinian Arabs since 1948 does fit several definitions of genocide and/or ethnic cleansing. And many of the Westerners who scream about it the loudest are fairly openly anti-Semitic.

Now, as someone with big Holocaust intergenerational trauma in her family, I am sympathetic to the Jewish kid in this scenario. But cognitive dissonance is just that: the domain of a child. Adults understand that cognitive dissonance is a little voice in our head telling us "Hey comrade our discomfort with this is a little much. Maybe this is a learning opportunity?"

I mean, that's what I did. But it's difficult. Its uncomfortable, and that scares people. It's much easier to believe that "They call it the Naqba because they hate us and think our survival and access to national self-determination is a disaster,"* than it is to understand that "They call it the Naqba because it was the near total dispossession and ethnic cleansing of Palestinian Arab populations from their generational homes and properties."

And again, everything I'm saying here is a result of my journey from a hardcore Zionist-in-the-contemporary-sense child (though always left in terms of domestic US Politics), to a grown Holocaust historian who understands that Israel is no better and no worse than all the other nation states (for new readers, I understand the nation-state as a political entity, the logical end point of which is genocide and/or ethnic cleansing), and openly criticizes it on those grounds.

*A rabbi in a youth group I belonged to told me this almost verbatim when I was 15. And when you're 15 and somebody tells you they love you you're gonna believe them.

#this post is clunky but i have a fever so w/e #i have great love and compassion for my community as an american jewish woman #so much of how american jewry remembers the history of israel is shaped by our collective trauma #sometimes in ways that we ourselves don't understand #i'm not here to shit on them #but i am here to compassionately call them in #and the only groups who i don't expect that compassion from #are actual palestinians

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jeankirsteinsgrlfrnd · 6 months

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I read your post on the insanely pretty cadet joining the training corps and I was wondering if you could do the boys’ reaction to her getting hit on or talking to someone they don’t want her talking to.

Love your work a lot and I’m sorry if I disturbed you! Have a good day :D

🇳🇬➕🌲🟰🇳🇫

a/n: thank you, you didn’t disturb me!

eren jaeger isn’t afraid to fight what he wants. so conveniently, every time you talk to somebody else, he allows randomly appears. the guy that’s hitting on you gets sick and tired of him always showing up when he’s making a move. he gives eren some snide comment and it’s over. eren beats the shit out of him in the dining hall.

armin arlert’s pretty confident in his chances with you. sure, he gets a little annoyed when he sees some meathead trying to compare hand sizes with you but he’s not so insecure to keep you away from him. with words of encouragement from mikasa, he musters up the nerve to make his move directly in front of the other guy. of course, he stuttered a bit.

jean kirstein’s quick to tell you that you shouldn’t waste your time talking to that other guy. he gives you about ten over-confidently reasons on why he’s no good for you. he says something like, “i just don’t think he’s your type, that’s all.”

connie springer flirts shamelessly with you all the time but it never stops any of the other cadets from approaching you. realizing most people don’t see him as a threat, he just decides to weird them out in any way he can to get them to stay away from you two.

reiner braun is pretty good at scaring unwanted men off. the people who aren’t his friends are terrified of him, mainly because of how tall and strong he is. he’s like your personal body guard. but really, he’s all bark and no bite. he pouts after he scares them away from you.

bertholdt hoover watches silently when all the guys swoon over you. he’s so jealous but he’ll never admit it. his friends tease him about not doing anything about it but he’s never been the violent type. he doesn’t want to control you. but he replays beating them up over and over again in his head.

levi ackerman totally makes whoever hits you on run until sunset or takes away meal privileges. he’s abusing his power when it comes to you but he doesn’t bat an eye. you’re too important to him. he can’t stand those other lowlifes trying to taint you.

erwin smith always calls you into his office after he sees you getting too close with another comrade. he questions about the nature of your interactions and reminds you that you shouldn’t be focusing on romance, instead the world at hand. he knows you can’t help how good you look but damn, it pisses him off.

this is the link for my slowburn enemies-friends-lovers jean fic

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chubsonthemoon · 2 years

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Last Binderary book is DONE!!!! This is the incredible Maybe sprout wings, by @moorishflower.

This post is going to be a doozy, so gonna just skip straight to the cut!

INTERIOR

INTRODUCTION

I really wanted to model this bind after my own copy of the Odyssey, (which is all highlighted and bookmarked and annotated to hell from my Great Text courses in undergrad ehe, so this bind was such a fun trip down memory lane!). But beyond just the cover/general aesthetic, I also wanted to give the book a similar feel to these kinds of editions of classics--there's usually an introduction, translation notes, and other supplementary materials, right? Like, a physical manifestation of the work of many, many people, all having conversations with one another across time and space.

So that's what I did! I wrote a short introduction (I will also probably post it to my AO3/my blog as well, in the name of preservation etc. etc.) and began reaching out to folks in the fandom who I knew had created art and meta for the fic. The result? 18k words of analysis, comments, and meta, and nearly twenty pages of art!

And this is what I love most about this bind, I think! This book is the work of several people--truly a collaborative work by the fandom--all of whom I will now be shamelessly calling out below :D

CHAPTER HEADER ART

First and foremost, this book would not be what it is without the gorgeous header art by @fancy-rock-dove! Thank you so much Dove for letting include your work, and for being so supportive and kind these past few weeks about this bind <3 You in particular have contributed so much to this book (which I will be getting more into in the next section ehe), and I'm so psyched I get to hold your art and words, too!

NOTES ON THE TEXT

This section was divided into four parts: Asks and Answers, Meta, Selected Comments, and Chapter Heading Art: Process

For Asks and Answers, I trawled Heather's blog for meta she had written in response to questions and other meta about the fic. Asks came from @fancy-rock-dove, @quillingwords, @kulapti, and myself! (I THINK I got all of them--tumblr's search function is finnicky even on its best days, so so sorry if I missed something T_T) I first got hooked into reading this fic because of one of these asks, so I'm very fond of this section in particular :D

For Meta, I included two wonderful essays written by @pastrypuppy (also known as @kulapti) about Hob as an author figure and the Disrupted Fisher King narrative in MSW. Her analyses were so fascinating and I just had to include them in the book! (And thank you as well for your permission, friend!) (also hello fellow Renegade comrade 🫡)

For Selected Comments, I owe everything to (once again :3) @fancy-rock-dove, whose insights are the epitome of transformative fandom at work. I'd look for their comments after I read every chapter to see what their takes were on this or that element of the story, and every single time I would go "!!!!! I didn't even realize!!!" or "OOOOOOOH I hadn't thought of that!!" It was like being in a lecture hall and always whipping your head around when one of your classmates raised their hand, because you knew they were going to say something fascinating that you hadn't considered before.

Aside from one of my own comments, Dove's comments make up the entirety of this section (for which I owe you my life--your long-form responses to fics are a gift to this world) but GOSH was it also so much fun going through the comments section while typesetting and seeing all the keyboard smashing, yelling, and crying from the other commenters. Communal nature of storytelling and ongoing meaning-making of fanfiction, babey!

And finally for Chapter Heading Art: Process: once again Dove coming in clutch with some wonderful insights into the design of each of the chapter heading art pieces! This kind of stuff is honestly my favorite: meta about art for a fic which is, in turn, a transformation of an existing story (not even to mention that The Sandman is its own kind of fanfiction of existing mythologies and histories)--I just!! Think it's all really, really neat :'D (for more coherent/polished thoughts on this pls see my introduction asjdfkls)

ART

The art gallery!!! A million thanks to @fishfingersandscarves, @honeyseller, @jazzpsych, @doctor-rainbowfoxey, and (HI AGAIN DOVE) @fancy-rock-dove for granting me permission to include all of your beautiful pieces!

As usual for artworks in my binds, I printed each piece out on specialty photo paper to really make the colors pop, then sewed each page separately to the text block! Behold, everyone's beautiful beautiful pieces!

The art gallery also satisfies the certain "oooh shiny" part of my brain that always activates when I see pictures in a book, so am also very fond of this section :3

CONSTRUCTION

And now on to the nitty gritty stuff! I used the German Bradel binding technique again, my second time using it. Even though it's more complicated than the case bind, I really love how it gives you the full board space for the cover designs (~it's free real estate~). Keep it a secret but I kiiiiiiind of made a small goof in the last few steps (I did the turn-ins a step too early and so had to paste an extra sheet of cardstock to secure the spine to the boards, whoopsie), but it's a pretty small difference, aesthetically speaking, so it wasn't the end of the world XD

Edges are once again fake gilded, but this time I tried something new with the colors! I did two layers of acrylic paint--one watered down shade of red for the base, then one metallic gold on top of that. I really like the red/gold effect! I'll have to keep experimenting with this kind of layering:

ALSO. Y'ALL! I think I'm finally getting the hang of endbands!!! Many thanks to the folks at Renegade who hosted all the endband workshops last month--I'm still working through them, but even the few sessions I've seen have been TREMENDOUSLY helpful. I learned that tension is Very Important, as well as thread thickness, so I tried doubling my thread and keeping a Very Close Eye on how I was holding the threads while doing the beads. And behold! I still have a ways to go (and one day I would LOVE to do the fancier designs), but I'm v happy with the progress I've made so far!

And finally the covers!! ARCHIVAL MOD PODGE MY BELOVED. I printed on the same matte presentation paper that I used for the art, then did several coats of archival matte mod podge + a pass of gloss mod podge over the title strip to make it ~shiny~. Then once those had dried and I'd adhered them to the boards, I sprayed two layers of matte clear acrylic sealer (also mod podge!) to finish it off. I had some issues with the paper tearing when I handled it before it was fully dry, but luckily the blemishes were small enough that it was easy to do spot corrections with my black acrylic paint. And now I know to be more patient next time LOL

(some non-photoshoot shots that show the shine a little better!)

FINAL THOUGHTS

I had a lot of thoughts while I was binding this book--about Sandman fandom, about Dreamling fandom, about the Odyssey, about storytelling, about fanbinding, about Binderary, about Renegade, about my friends--but really what came to mind the most was gratitude!

Simply put, I'm so grateful to everyone I've met both in this fandom and throughout the years I've been active online--this is SO fun, y'all. It's so much fun to love stories together--to talk about them, to write them, and of course to bind them! I hope I've adequately conveyed that gratitude.

But of course, this book would not exist without the wonderful words of @moorishflower. Heather, thank you so, SO much for sharing your stories, thoughts, and time with us--it is always a happier, better day when I get an email notif from you and when I see you on my dash. I love your work so much, and I'm so happy I finally get to put it on my shelf! So thank you so much again, for everything <3

and OKAY THAT'S IT FROM ME FOLKS!!!!! Binderary 2023 is officially a wrap! I had SUCH a blast--will probably write up a reflection post on it uhhhh after I take a very long nap ajslkdfjslk _(:3」∠)_

all my love! <3

#the sandman #dreamling #Moorishflower #Maybe sprout wings #binderary2023 #bookbinding #fanbinding #ficbinding #not my fic

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mysteryshoptls · 7 months

Text

SSR Idia Shroud - Platinum Jacket Vignette

"Happy 100th Anniversary"

[Land of Dawning – National Museum of Art]

Idia: Look at all these dynamic brushstrokes that can only truly be appreciated because they're from a real painting… Fheehee! This is the real thrill of seeing one live!

Idia: ―Ah! Th-Th-Th-This is…! A PAINTING OF THE LORD OF THE UNDERWORLD ON HIS CHARIOT!!!

Idia: It hits so hard～ In order to rescue a captured comrade, the king himself rushes to the front lines… Oooowee～ Doesn't that just get your heart pumpin'?

???: Indeed… However, is it appropriate for a dutiful commander to leave his base and head to the front lines?

Idia: Eeek!!! Silver-shi!? D-Don't just cut in when I'm talking to myself like that. This is why I can't deal with extroverts…

Silver: My apologies for startling you. I found your comment to be interesting, so I could not help but chime in.

Idia: E-Even if you think it's interesting, don't you think your impression of him was pretty shallow just from this one anecdote...?

Silver: Meaning?

Idia: I-If he was just a minister or something, he coulda just split after setting up the strategy, leaving it to his subordinates to execute everything.

Idia: But he still went to such a dangerous place to stir up morale, because that mission would be the linchpin of the whole battle. So, basically…

Idia: That means his responsibility meter is through the roof!! Wheeew, he's a totally different breed than any naïve and useless politician who just hoists their title around.

Silver: So you're saying that he himself went out there because it was a crucial situation. I would say that he does have an overwhelming sense of responsibility, indeed.

Silver: Hearing your opinion on the matter has allowed me to delve deeper into understanding this painting and its story. You are quite wise.

Idia: S-Sure, yeah～! You should follow my example and study up on things a little better, Silver-shi!

Silver: I will do just that. …However, it feels as though what you said about how other leaders may act had some weight behind it.

Silver: I had heard that you took up the title of Housewarden after being recommended by the previous Housewarden...

Silver: Was that because you had had previous experience as a leader, and were thus therefore chosen for the position?

Idia: Huh!? N-No, nuh-uh, wut are you even talking about? No way, no way… 'Sides, I'm more of a solo player even in my online games, y'know?

Idia: I mean, sometimes I've taken the lead of a party when I absolutely had to for a raid, or something…

Silver: As I expected, you do have experience in leadership.

Idia: It's not that big a deal… I mean, I got a reliable battle buddy who tanks and usually takes the lead.

Idia: Generally, I go for healing or DPS roles. Or more like, I just stack as many buffs as I can to increase firepower.

Idia: But it's not like our schedules always line up, so whenever he's not around, I take the lead… Because I have to!

Idia: It's usually the high-level players with great skills that take on the leader role. And in that case, I've basically maxed out all my stats in every position, so…

Idia: And I can grasp what the scenarios call for, see? And I can also play the tank roles to take charge on the front lines, right???

Idia: "Thanks to you, I was able to clear this high-level quest! I'm so thankful to have joined this party!"

Idia: …THEY SAY, ELECTING ME MVP OVER AND OVER AGAIN!

Idia: And I was just taking on the leader role because I had to. I'm just way too good…

Silver: So, those who fought alongside you showered you with gratitude. That just proves even further your leadership capabilities.

Idia: I-I wouldn't go that far― …Or maybe, just a little bit further? H-Hee Fheeheeheehee!

Idia: But also, I don't want to deal with failing a quest because some loser was placed in charge, so.

Idia: So I guess next time I have to put together a party, if my friend isn't available, I'll just have to lead them all again!

Idia: Wheeew, it's hard being so awesome～!

[Land of Dawning – National Museum of Art]

Silver: This is a painting of a lion, warthog, and a meerkat, I see. The three of them are singing a song and seem to get along well.

Idia: Ain't they waaay too upbeat, to be able to sing while walking like that? Like, this painting shows the lion crown prince that was forced to leave his own country…

Idia: It's showing him singing along with some friends he ended up making, while he tries to ignore that pain, right?

Idia: Lucky him, that they chose to glorify his hiatus from his royal duties like this. Tch!

Silver: I've heard that singing can raise one's spirits. Perhaps they all wanted to brighten their own moods.

Idia: Speaking of singing to take your mind off stuff, there was this one time when I was a kid when my little brother was too scared to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night…

Idia: So we would go there while singing the theme song of our favorite anime together.

Idia: Eh, anyway, whatever their reason for singing, having that moon in the background composition like that's super moving. Kinda like what you'd see in an MV.

Silver: Em-vee…?

Idia: Eh… Y-You don't know what a music video is? It's a video recording that goes along with music and lyrics…

Silver: Ah, so you call those MVs. I understand.

Idia: I-If you feel like checking out some MVs sometime, I'd recommend the idol group "Precipice Moirai."

Idia: Premo's MVs are so awesome that you could watch them 100 times and never tire of them…!

Silver: 100 times… That's quite a lot. Is that generally something you'd watch so often?

Idia: A true fan would absolutely! More like, it's way too insolent to think that you could truly appreciate their MV with only one watch!

Idia: The first watch is all about enjoying the song and video in its entirety. The next three times the focus is shifted to checking out each of the three members' dance moves and expressions one by one.

Idia: Next, there's the actual composition of the MV, and digging deep into the actual message of the video… At a minimum, it should be watched ten times.

Idia: On top of all that, Premo's super casual MVs can put even a film director to shame!

Idia: There's no way to fully comprehend their art with only a couple viewings. That's why it needs to be viewed hundreds of times.

Silver: I had no idea their work was that deep… It may prove useful in training me better in emotional expressions, and perhaps could even be incorporated into the academy's music courses.

Idia: N-No, I mean, you don't gotta go that far… But it's great that you know just how awesome they are.

Idia: Even between us Premo fans, there's always those who still don't understand their art at all…

Idia: Every time a new MV comes out, there's always people saying stuff like, "She got the most screen time," or "She's definitely the manager's favorite," and the like…

Idia: But does that have anything to do with the quality of their work? It doesn't, right? They don't care about understanding the heart or essence of the songs.

Silver: I see… I feel as though I have learned a lot from you, Idia-senpai.

Silver: When we return to campus, I will look into, hm… Premo? Yes, Premo's music videos.

Idia: Eh, no way!? S-S-Seriously!? They have all their latest MVs on their official Magicam account!

Idia: P-PLEASE WATCH THEM! YOU WON'T REGRET IT!

[Land of Dawning – National Museum of Art]

Idia: Ooh, here's the Sea Witch floating in the darkness… She's got a nice, bewitching smile going, too.

Silver: This is a painting depicting the scene of when the Sea Witch drew up a contract.

Silver: If I recall, it was said that the contract was so unbreakable that even a powerful spear couldn't rip through it.

Idia: I mean, you'd think that just having a contract that doesn't tear apart or bleed ink in water is strong enough...

Silver: Perhaps the contents of the contract was dire enough she did not wish it broken.

Idia: Who cares about the contents, the material of the contract is way more interesting. How high of a defense stat did it even have to not get ripped up by a spear?

Idia: But I totally get it, everyone wants to make invincible things every so often.

Silver: I cannot say I understand, but… What sort of thing would you make, Idia-senpai?

Idia: Like a "game console power cord that can never be taken away," or something like that… A-Actually, I tried to make something like that when I was a kid.

Idia: Whenever I'd play video games all day and into night, my mother would end up hiding all my cords.

Idia: If all she did was hide them, I could just make myself a new one, but she'd hide the cord materials as well. Totally overboard!

Idia: So I had a thought. I had to do something so she couldn't hide it!

Silver: I can only imagine your mother was concerned for your health… Did you never consider quitting your games?

Idia: Why would I? Ahh, but I really did burn the midnight oil like a little worker bee back then.

Idia: Like, I'd put a motion sensor on it, so that the cord could automatically run away from whoever was holding it...

Idia: Or I'd make the cord transparent so it couldn’t be found, or attach a homing function to it so it'd come back on its own…

Idia: And finally, after many failed attempts… I finally did it…!

Idia: I MADE A TRANSPARENT POWER CORD THAT ONLY RECOGNIZES THE AUTHORIZED USER!!

Silver: I do not really comprehend what that is, but… It is amazing that you invented something with your own two hands.

Idia: Nope, not at all.

Idia: My family also has a real stubborn genius, and every time I came up with some tech, it'd quickly get shot down by some kind of countermeasure...

Idia: And it took me a few months of that game of cat and mouse before I realized I should just convert my game console to wireless.

Idia: Hmph… But the peace and quiet that came from switching to wireless didn't last long at all...

Idia: Soon after, the Final Boss appeared: a device capable of disabling all wireless tech within a 10-meter radius!

Idia: Well, all the experience I got developing the motion sensing and automatic functions helped when I was putting Ortho together…

Idia: So I guess all that trial and error wasn't for nothing.

Silver: Even if you can picture your ideal outcome, it is rather difficult to actually put into action.

Silver: However, you have made real many of your thoughts. I can respect that.

Idia: Wai― What're you trying to say all a sudden? Getting complimented to my face randomly like that is a little scary… W-Wait, is this all a plot to beguile me!?

Silver: A plot? ...Hm, I see it has gotten late. I have kept you for some time. My apologies.

Silver: I am grateful to have heard such wonderful stories from you. Well then, I shall be on my way.

Idia: Whew… I'm exhausted having to actually talk to people for the first time in a while… Ah, this is…

Idia: It's the hero from that one myth. Look at his sparkling expression… He looks like he totally believes the future ahead of his is bright.

Idia: Life doesn't always go as swimmingly as you hope, though… Hope he doesn't get too excited that he gets carried away by the river of the underworld!

Requested by Anonymous.

#twisted wonderland #twst #idia shroud #silver #twst idia #twst silver #twst translation #twst birthday #mention: ortho

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