#the devastation of knowing you were always going to outlive the love of your life vs. losing him many decades before you should have

[serpentinegraphite]

Challenge: make a poll of your five fave characters of all time, then tag five people to do the same

Tagged by @sazandorable so I'm tagging uhhhhhh @delcat177 @oak-and-rowan @emrknght2 @slinkyinky and anyone else who wants to do it, just tag me, I want to vote on your blorbos.

[prettyboykatsuki]

»» — { ♡ } —— { ♡ } —— { ♡ } — ««

one lifetime | d. kaminari 

➳ tags ;; fluff, insecurity, existentialism (?), falling in love, fem!reader, like.. no dialogue, a singular mention of sex, alchohol ment/partying habits. implied player denki

➳ wc ;; 1.4k (literally what) 

➳ a/n ;; this was just supposed to be like a short little thing. idk how or why its this long. 

➳ plot ;; denki falls in love and re-evaluates his life as it is. 

»» — { ♡ } —— { ♡ } —— { ♡ } — ««

Denki Kaminari likes to say the same phrase when he’s living his life out. 

“We’re gonna live forever!” 

And he says it with his chest, a warm grin spread across his face. Cheeks aching and red from the night wind, brushing across it like knuckles. It’s a half-lie, half-truth, half cheeky statement in regards to his dangerous job and even more dangerous lifestyle. He knows that all those things don’t make a whole, 3 halves - but that phrase is just as overzealous. 

The point is that he likes to say it whenever he’s having fun. Whether that be at his 21st birthday, sparklers flying out of his cake or in the middle of a drunken night - head stuck out of the window. He’s not sure why exactly. 

But he assumes he enjoys dancing with the implication that it’s possible. That, by living like this, there isn’t anything finite about existence and the he could, indeed, live as long as he wanted. Somehow, he’ll be broadly immortalized by his partying habits and missed connections and videos of him dancing with strangers at clubs. That these things will live on even farther than the legacy he was supposed to have by heroism. 

Denki Kaminari likes to think the idea of living forever is really just a way for him to say that he doesn’t have to think about the life he’s already living. The fact that he’s not unhappy but he’s not exactly where he likes to be. This hollowing incompleteness that rests on the apples of his cheeks and weighs down his smile. It doesn’t matter - this loneliness or sorrow. None of it matters if we have infinity. 

We’re gonna live forever right? So why try and think about the unimportant. There are bigger fish to fry. Bigger things to worry about. 

He isn’t.. sad. And he knows he shouldn’t be lonely. He has friends who care for him, and all the girls he could ever want, and he’s doing good! On the hero rankings, he broke 10 last week for the first time. He’s something of a bigshot now. He has media coverage. He has fans. He has the life he always dreamed of as a teenager - experiences all the cool shit he ever wanted. 

But he is, anyways. Lonely, that is. If he were more honest with himself than that’s really the only word to describe it. It’s a deep, unsettling loneliness. 

And he swore to himself that he was above most things. He would live out his dreams for the rest of his life and it would be awesome. Life would be so good He didn’t need to fall in love. Or if he did, it would be with some hot supermodel or whatever else. 

Lately, Denki finds that he really doesn’t want to live forever. 

The funny thing about love is that it brings you feelings that you didn’t even know existed. Like one day you’re completely fine but the next - you love someone so much life without them seems miserable. And there’s that weird, never ending fear that they might die. Then it’s 2am and you’re crying because you love them. Love them so much that you don’t really want to live forever but that you just don’t want them to die before you. That would make you so sad. 

And you’re not really the type of person Denki imagined himself with. You used to just be the lady on his patrol who sold Taiyaki on the corner with a pretty bandana on your head and a lovely smile. You sold other things, but he likes the Taiyaki the best. And despite how much shit you’ve seen on the corner, you never seem to leave it. You say you’re too attached to ever go, you’ve been there for four years of college and you’ll be devastated when you leave someday. 

And it’s funny because he’s not sure the two of you could be more different. You’re the type of person who others love - you have that tenderness to you. Soft hands and warm eyes. Everything about you is beautiful in the same way that renaissance paintings are. That kind, dreaminess that makes his stomach feel tight. 

He really didn’t mean to fall in love with you. It just sorta happened on his part. One late patrol became many, became talking to you for hours and hours on mundane days, became asking about your life. Where do you go to school? What do you do? Hows your relationship with your parents? Do you like coffee or tea or maybe neither? And hey, are you seeing anyone lately? 

Would you like too?

Denki Kaminari didn’t really ever intend to be a settled man.

But then he met you and the the idea of you having kids or marrying anyone other than him was so upsetting - he cries over it drunk. He met you and suddenly, he thinks that you might like some flowers he bought. He daydreams about holding your pinky and walking with you. Pictures living with you in an apartment - somewhere in the city. He’d take you out on the town to eat pizza and play at the arcade and then you could make out in the park.

You always listen to him. He didn’t know he wasn’t being heard until he met you. And you sat there and listened to him talk about his favorite video games for hours and hours - the classics, the lore, the fan-theories. You kissed him when he apologized for talking so much, promised you didn’t mind. These days, if he goes off on a tangent - your smile makes your eyes crinkle in the corner and your lips turn up in a smile. You encourage him to talk as much as he likes, hold his hand and squeeze it whenever he thinks he’s being too much. 

Denki didn’t know he spent so much of his life hiding. It’s scary, he has to admit. He thinks maybe you’re the only person who’s ever seen him. Not as the funny guy, or the partier, or the hero, or the side-character - he’s just Denki. You don’t lose interested in him when people like Kirishima and Bakugou are around. When someone asks who you’re dating - you hold his arm and say his name. 

Not Chargebolt but “oh! this is my boyfriend, Denki”. You smile and nudge his side. And no matter how much he hates himself somedays - you love him, always. With open arms and an unlocked door to your apartment - where you’re cooking dinner in the kitchen wearing cute socks. You’re the girlfriend he dreamed of in highschool - the one that wears anime merch and joins him in new things and holds onto him when she’s scared. 

The one he didn’t think he could have, no matter how much he wanted it. You’re a dream that he’s living. A living, breathing dream. 

The first Denki laid in bed with you - he didn’t remember much about the sex other than the fact it was good. It was so good he cried afterwards. He sobbed into your arms and you stroked his back, ran your hands over your shoulders and kisses his head. He doesn’t remember the sex itself, not really - but he remember the way the sunlight hit your skin when morning came. He spent the whole night looking at you, would you believe it? And it was nice. It was good. 

It’s so good being loved by you that Deki no longer wants to live forever. Needs too. 

Which is funny right - because you’d think the alternative would be for the two of you to be together forever. Instead of just him, you could spend eternity together latched to each others sides. 

It sounds nice in theory. It’d be nice if the two of you could stay together until time ends, and even if you left - he’s sure he’d spend eternity chasing you again. 

But he loves you so much that he doesn’t want to live forever. There would be so much he’d miss if that were the case. He wouldn’t be able to grow old with you like he wants, and if you had kids - what if they passed before you. Or even if you didn’t, you’d outlive all your friends. You would be able to see the whole world but then you’d run out of things together. 

Infinity is better in theory than in practice. He doesn’t want to live for forever because he knows he can’t. He doesn’t need to do something so.. impractical to be happy. 

Being with you, just for one lifetime, is enough to make him happier than he could ever dream. 

When Denki wakes up with you in his bed tomorrow morning - he knows in that moment that this is all he could ever need. 

»» — { ♡ } —— { ♡ } —— { ♡ } — ««

[danses-with-dogmeat]

Romanced companions (fo4) react to a distressed female soul telling them she found out she's turning into a ghoul (she's known it for a while but she's been too afraid to tell them, worrying about how they'd react)

Romanced! FO4 Companions React to F!Sole Turning into a Ghoul

Thank you so much for the ask anon! (and for your patience, I know you sent this one in forever ago 😅)

I always kind of wondered how the companions would react to this if it was a function of the game 🤔 So I'm glad I got to explore it a bit! I hope you enjoy!

Cait:

No. Not her. Not her Sole. Cait thought, unable to grasp the news Sole had just revealed to her. Her partner was too strong, she was too careful. She was from before the bombs, before the radiation! How could this have happened?

In her mind, it would have made a lot more sense for Cait to turn into a ghoul long before Sole. Her arse actually deserved the pain of watching her physical self peel away day by day, but not Sole. Her companion, her partner, the one damn person she actually loved... No, Sole was too good for this. But the two of them, they could beat it, they could reverse it somehow. One of those vaults could hold the answer, like it did for her, even after she had thought it was too late.

Cait didn't want to stop the change because she had anything against ghouls, really, because she doesn't. But she couldn't stand the sight of her luv's face when, at the light brush of her fingers through her once silky locks, she felt them fall to the ground in webbed clumps, Cait couldn't stand the pain in Sole's expression as her skin began to shrivel and peel off, she couldn’t witness one more instance of Sole glancing in a mirror with such immense sadness in her eyes. And Cait became very troubled when she realized that Sole would be here long after she was dead. Cait couldn't stand to face reality without her partner after all that she's done for her, and now Sole was staring that reality in the face. The poor lass had already outlived everyone she's known and loved once, and now she had to do it all over again, who knows how many times? It just wasn't fuckin' fair.

Well, once Cait had accepted Sole's change as permanent, she would do everything in her power to ensure the pair made the most of their years together, giving absolutely no fucks about Sole's new appearance. And should anyone else decide to look at her the wrong way, or, God forbid, say something to her about it, Cait's fist would be unholstered and swinging before the offensive words could even leave their worthless lips.

Curie:

She would feel sorry for Sole, and constantly be there for her as a source of support. When her love had told her what was happening, Curie had been shocked. Sure, she had noticed a few changes in her partner’s body, but she had hoped it wouldn’t be anything too serious. Still, this wasn't the worst that could happen, Curie would know, after all of the diseases and viruses she had worked with in the vault. Yet... the synth still found her chest throbbing at the thought of watching her love deteriorate before her eyes.

Throughout Sole’s change, Curie would do what she could to lessen the symptoms. There was no “cure” for being a ghoul, but Curie would feel awful if she didn’t at least try.

As Sole’s condition became more and more obvious, she would do everything in her power to make sure her partner knew that she still loved her. Curie had been a reprogrammed Miss Nanny when Sole had found her, she'd been nothing more than a metal machine when Sole had selflessly saved her, and yet, she had found a way to love her for who she was, despite what she was, and she had been there every step of the way as she made the change to her synth body. Curie would be happy to return the favor tenfold.

Also, throughout the process of Sole's change, if anyone was rude to her love, about anything, Curie would be at them with harsh words and a firm teacher’s voice as she gave the ill-mannered stranger a quick ghouls-101 education session.

Danse (Post BB):

Oh… Oh God. Not this. Not her, not his beautiful Sole. The ex-paladin’s stomach would drop as she quietly forced out her confession, refusing to meet his wide, despairing gaze.

He didn’t know what to do. Danse was horrified. Not for the first time in his life, he felt like his world was crashing down all around him. Everything good in his life seemed to revolve around the person in front of him, but all of his love, his devotion, all of the effort he put into protecting this one person he had left, that he valued above all else in his life, it was all in vain. Because now… she was turning into something that he had always feared. Something that he had been taught and trained to despise, to think of as vermin that needed to be extinguished. It was the way he felt about himself when he found out what he truly was. He never wanted to feel that way towards her, never thought he would have been able to, and even now… he found that he couldn’t.

It didn’t matter what she was turning into, what she’d become, she was still Sole. And he was committed to her, he was loyal to her. Godammit, he loved her for Christ's sake. He wasn’t about to let this calamitous development change any of that. She certainly hadn’t when it had been him in her place.

Danse would still often have trouble with his internalized prejudices left over from his time with the Brotherhood, but he would try his heart out for her. Every passing day brought more changes to the woman he loved, each one serving as a reminder to what the end result would be, and witnessing it would break his heart into pieces.

It was strange though, it wasn’t as devastating as he had thought it would be, in the beginning. Sole was still herself, even underneath all of the physical changes, she was still here beside him, and in the end, that’s all Danse really needed.

Deacon:

For once, Deacon remained silent. His brows furrowed low beneath his sunglasses and his hand came up to rub at his mouth, as though he were trying to physically pull out a response. He cleared his throat, and his hand went up to remove his glasses so he could look Sole in the eye. A rare sight, one that made her pulse quicken further as the apprehension of her confession really set in.

Deacon had already known, or… suspected, rather, but he hadn’t wanted to believe it. It wouldn’t be the first time the Railroad agent's experienced this kind of dread. When he had found out his wife was a synth, he had felt this same crippling pressure in his chest. But he didn’t say that, Sole didn’t need to hear about his problems, no, not again. Now she needed him to help with hers.

So, the spy would nod at her, and ask her what she needed from him. He's a knowledgeable guy, everyone knows that, Sole most of all, so if she needed anything as far as information on what she was about to go through, he would be able to provide it. Better yet, he could bring her to quite a few folks he knew who had gone through the same sorta hell themselves.

Beyond that, not much else would change. Deacon isn't one to put much stock in a person's physicality, what kinda daft and inconsiderate hypocrite would he be if he did? Hell, he may even speak to a surgeon about altering his appearance to become more ghoul-like if that was something Sole cared about. But honestly? He just would want his partner to know that it didn't matter to him.

"Thought you could get rid of lil old me just by going ghoul? Heh, sorry, cuddle muffin, but it looks like you're still stuck with me."

Sole had been able to forgive him for everything he's done, she hadn't judged or ridiculed him for being a bigoted assface for the first half of his life, and she'd accepted him for the compulsive liar and emotion-dodging, sarcastic smart-ass that he was now; sooooooo, yeah. This whole ghoul thing? Not a problem. Just another glorious and compelling chapter in this wacky book called life.

Hancock:

Hancock becomes the literal epitome of empathy. He knows what this shit's like, he's gone through the motions. He remembers the nightmarish sight of his flesh falling from his body in shriveled tatters, he recalls his once silken voice dissolving to his current raspy timbre, he knows what it's like to see the bright vibrance of his irises vanish over the course of a couple weeks, slowly dissolving to the blackness that he now saw the world through.

But with Hancock, it had been his choice. Okay, so he didn't know for certain that he'd become a ghoul, but he had been ready for it, had known it was at least a possibility. With Sole though, she didn't sign up for this shit. She didn't deserve to go through the same kinda hell he did. He wanted to go through hell, felt like he deserved it. But his gorgeous sunshine? The light of his life, the kindest, most selfless person he'd ever met? Nah. She didn't deserve to watch herself develop the likeness of a certain sorta dehydrated fruit.

Hancock would be sure to tell her every day just how incredible she was, how brave, and strong, and how she was still beautiful beyond belief, no matter what. He would show her how he felt. Showering her in gifts and affection, taking her out to prove to her that he could never even think to be embarrassed by her in any capacity whatsoever. He loved this woman, he cherished her. Every irradiated bit of her.

And now… now the best part. Hancock would try not to seem too overexcited, knowing that this whole process was traumatic and painful for his love, but now he could spend the rest of their lives making her see just how much one person-- one ghoul-- could love another. He'd been terrified out of his mind when he thought he would outlive Sole, by who knows how long. But now… now they had an eternity to spend together, or, however long it is ghouls live for. Whatever, no matter how much time they had, Hancock would never be convinced it would be enough. He just supposes the rest of their long lives will simply have to do.

MacCready:

He'd try not to give away his heartbreak as he gazed back at her, his face draining of all it's color as those fateful words escaped her with a sob. This was a nightmare of MacCready's. He hadn't ever told Sole what he saw that night he had woken up screaming, he had told her he couldn't remember the dream, and she had said "maybe that was for the best." If only he'd been telling the truth. In reality, what he saw was the immensely frightening sight of Sole taking his late wife's place in that horrific memory that was forever burned into his brain. Her body engulfed by a throng of writhing ferals as she shrieked out his name. As with all of his dreams like this, MacCready was rooted to the place he stood, forever imprisoned as a bystander to the brutality taking place before him. The agony only ceased when the pack of feral ghouls dispersed, revealing Sole, now as one of them. She had raced towards him, hunger and madness glinting in the opaque depths of her dark, iris-less eyes. The mercenary couldn't get the image out of his head as he watched the color in Sole's eyes fade away over time, her skin losing its divine smoothness, her soft hair drifting to the ground in wisps of somber defeat.

The couple had cried a lot in those weeks of her change. The process was heart wrenching for the both of them to witness; but MacCready stuck by her side. He could be stronger than his nightmares, than his fears, when it came to Sole.

When the day finally did come when she was referred to as a ghoul by a perfect stranger, MacCready had almost been surprised. It had taken time for her to look this way, to sound this way, and he had hardly noticed the extent to which his partner changed until looking at old renderings and pictures of her from before the bombs. This was just who she was now.

She wasn't a monster, a ravenous zombie that he feared and despised. She was Sole. She still acted like his love, her voice still resembled that of his partner's, her eyes had lightened to a blue that outshone his own, which he was clearly not bitter about, and she still was just utterly his Sole. The same woman he had fallen for in the first place, the one he thought he'd never be lucky enough to be loved by in return. But now, even behind all the changes, he could still see her there, and he could certainly still love her.

The nightmares became much less common after her transformation, oddly enough. And when he finally introduced Sole to Duncan, he was terribly worried that the boy would hate her, that he would remember that traumatic night when the pair had lost a mother and a wife, and that he would be afraid of her. But his son hardly seemed to notice Sole's condition, as he shook her hand and introduced himself with enthusiastic giddiness. Later, Duncan might voice some questions to her about being a ghoul, but they were always out of genuine curiosity.

MacCready couldn't have been more proud of his child than he was then, or more touched than when Duncan expressed his relief at Sole having a skin condition like this, and yet, she was still able to be loved by someone as great as his dad. The boy himself remembered the way people would look at him before he had been cured of his blue boils, and he didn't wish that on anybody, he'd assured both Sole and MacCready of that one day.

No, MacCready couldn't have been more proud. Of his son, sometimes even of himself as he learned to outgrow his fears, how to muscle through his trauma and be the best father and partner he could possibly be; and certainly, he couldn't have been prouder of Sole.

Nick:

Nick would be remarkably sympathetic, taking Sole's hand in his good one comfortingly as she struggled to get out the confession, and having not even a glimpse of a negative reaction in response to her heart-wrenching words.

“Oh, doll… I’m so sorry.” His fingers would stroke over her hand in an effort to comfort her. He had been surprised by the news, but it wouldn’t change anything. He’d assure her of that. No matter what physical changes Sole underwent; the memories of a certain synth, all metal, and fiberglass, and plastic, and the damn near perfect woman who somehow fell for him would fill his mind, and he wouldn’t be able to keep from telling her just how much she meant to him every single day.

Life would go on, they would go out on cases together, and help the people of the commonwealth as they have nearly since the day they met, but if anyone decided to utter a comment as to Sole’s physical state, they would certainly be faced with a stern talking to from one sassy synth.

He tried to not mention it too early on, but Nick wouldn't be unable to keep the thought buried forever. One day, when Sole was feeling especially despondent about her current state, he’d remind her that he’d always be there for her. Always. Now he didn’t have to worry so much about that dreadful and inevitable fast-approaching day that he would have to bid Sole goodbye as she passed away from her old age, leaving him alone on this ruined earth. He’d just have to hope that she would be as comforted by the thought as he was.

Piper:

The news would be hard to grasp at first, and even after she understood what Sole was telling her, she wouldn't know what to do. How can you fix something like this? This was her Blue they were talking about! She could do anything, she'd survived the bombs, had found the Institute, she had found her son after so many years, had done all of that, just to now have to go through this too? Hasn't Sole been through enough?!

Piper would be angry, and she'd feel horrible watching Sole go through the changes, as she was forced to witness her love's physical form deteriorate before her in just a couple short months. Piper would try to tell Sole to keep her chin up, remind her who she was, of everything she's been through, how much she's overcome; and if anyone wanted to bug her partner about being a ghoul, Piper would tear them to shreds with her words, not caring if she made a scene as she made the stranger realize what horrible mistake they had made speaking to Sole like that. She'd rip ‘em a new one for sure, and spend a good portion of the day making sure her love was alright after the ordeal. The reporter knew how much words could hurt.

She would be utterly supportive, and even, if Sole was comfortable with it, might see if she’s interested in being a sort of poster child for a campaign to allow ghouls back into Diamond City (and God help anyone who tries to keep Sole out of the city before Piper has a chance to change the law officially.)

Preston:

Preston tried to swallow through the lump in his throat, but to no avail. The Minuteman didn’t cry often, or, he hadn’t since meeting Sole. But this… He couldn’t stop the tears from spilling as he drew her into his embrace. His voice surely would have failed him if he had tried to comfort her with his words, so his arms wrapped tightly around her, her head pressed firmly to his chest. That would have to do for the time being.

“Sole, I can’t tell you how sorry I am.” He managed to whisper to her as his hand came up to stroke gently at her soft hair, trying desperately not to imagine the way it would fall from her head soon enough. He took a deep breath.

“But… I want you to know something. Something really important.” Preston pulled away so he could look into her eyes, hands coming to rest on either of her tear-stained cheeks “This won’t change anything between us. No matter what, you’re still my General, and… and I love you so much. What’s happening to you won’t ever change the way I feel about you.” They’d both be sniveling messes through the night.

But each morning that passed in the coming days, each change Sole underwent, they would take as it came. Preston is a bit of a workaholic, he knows this, and so does Sole, but he’d take a day off if ever her symptoms became unbearable enough. The Minutemen were stronger now than they had been in years, because of her, and so he would try not to feel so guilty about stepping away from his duties to help her.

But he would keep his promise, and, through everything, Sole would remain the General of the Minutemen, with everyone still paying her the respect that the title was due. She would remain the love of his life, he would tell her every day the way that he admired her, tell her how gorgeous he found her, no matter how much her physicality changed, he would remind her of her boundless strength. He just hoped it’d be enough to make her happy, to save her back, in the way she had saved him.

X6-88:

When Sole hesitantly told him about what was happening to her, it had only been after he asked. It was clear to the synth that something was wrong with his partner, but waiting for her to explain on her own had him only becoming more impatient. When she did tell him, he was furious. Certainly not at her, and not necessarily at the Institute’s inability to prevent it from happening, but at the Commonwealth, at the world for doing this to the one he loved. X6 couldn't stand the thought of it, the pain she had to go through. A part of him blamed himself for it. He was meant to protect her, from anything that could possibly harm her, and he had failed. Her changing appearance would be a testament to that failure every day of his life.

In an effort to make it up to her, X6 offered everything he possibly could to his partner, walking her though each and every symptom that came with her change, and ensuring she was utilizing every resource the Institute had at its disposal. Treatments, and skin creams, and supplements, and enough radaway to douse the glowing sea were used in an effort to slow the process of ghoulification, or perhaps even to halt it.

When it inevitably didn’t work, X6 would feel useless, like he had failed in his mission to keep his beloved safe all over again. However, something strange happened to the courser when the one he loves began to physically fall apart in response to the radiation. He didn’t want to leave her. He could stand to look at her, to still love her in the way that he never thought he would be able to, even when she was human. Despite what she had become, she was still his Sole.

After he came to this realization, X6 would take it as a personal mission for himself to ensure that anyone who made Sole feel bad for the way she looked or the way she now spoke would pay dearly for the carelessness of their commentary. X6 would work endlessly to guard his love from insults and dangers alike, from outsiders as well as those within the Institute. That was what he could do for her, what he had to do, if he ever wanted to make it up to Sole. The way he had carelessly let this happen to her... He would never forgive himself, and wonder every day how Sole could, but he will make it up to her. Mark his words.

[clouds-rambles]

Im not even gonna go anonymous anymore. Arghh asking for another request makes me feel guilty knowing you have an essay due so i'll just present you a little prompt!

Being immortal and outliving people you love, you know the drill. It must be sad and lonely. But you know what i feel like would be devastating? Just imagine Teyvat in a time loop. Meeting your friends for the first time, getting know them, hearing their plans and ambitions, sticking with them through dark times, falling in love... Reader just happens to be the one to witness all of it over and over and over again.

Don’t worry about it! I’m horrifically avoiding it right now. I’ll probably have some lunch and do some more of it after lunch. I’m talking about things I enjoy so hopefully it wont take up too much of my brain and we’re going to ignore the graphic novel I have to create in 2 weeks too lmao I’m a professional procrastinator

I have a bit of an idea with this so I hope you don’t mind it being platonic and with the Mondstat guys either. I’m going to reference a previous set of headcanons where you’re the leader of the winds. The two writings aren’t related relationship wise though.

Pairings; (Platonic) people of Mondstat x reader

Warning(s); angst

Keep reading under the cut!

You had done this cycle millions of times before. Before you even became the leader of the winds, when you were just a small spirit. Much like your friend Barbatos.

And while the archon of this land could sleep for thousands of years at a time you had elected to protect his people from the dangers that the god of freedom was too asleep to do anything about. And in fairness you can understand why Barbatos has been asleep many a time to avoid his brain contaminating with similar ideals to Decrabain. You can’t blame him really...

But you’re so horrifically lonely. And it’s not like you’re surrounded by an absence of people. In reality you often find yourself over compensating for your loneliness. Nights are often spent in the tavern conversing with mortals that you can’t quite understand.

You half wish you could ascend to Celestia, at least there you can be merry with fellow immortals and not have the constant threat of losing a friend dear.

You have known the Ragnvindr family for many generations. It’s not like they are hard to notice. Bright red hair and, more often than not, a sweet, bubbly personality. Not many of the Ragnvindr’s have been blessed with visions, but they all make their way through life the best way possible. And while they seem to show similar thought processes to the previous anemo archon, especially considering the fact they basically own the alcohol industry in Mondstat, and more recently Teyvat in her entirety. But when you see the family treating their employee’s so well and with a great wage you can’t help but think maybe humanity can move past the age of dictators. Or at least the humans of Mondstat.

The newest Ragnvindr, Diluc had always caught your eye. You had helped babysit both him and his brother while you weren’t busy reminiscing in memories of old mondstat and slaying monsters of your home. The air of change hangs heavy on the air when you’re around them, it seems like the winds you lead are trying to tell you something that you can’t yet decipher.

Until the day comes when you can. Seeing a broken, sobbing Diluc shut you out of his home not only made you sad. But, it infact reminded you that you shouldn’t get too close to mortals. For, like your friend Crepus’, mortal life is fleeting. 

You’ve seen many stories over the years, but there’s only so many times you can hear the same story before they all meld together.

Take Amber for instance, decided to become an Outrider because of her Grandfather. How many times had you heard that story? Someones grandfather joined the knights and inspired them? Too many to count. And as much as you want to remember Ambers story, you already know, like all the others, her memory will meld with the others. 

Kaeya’s story isn’t one you’ll forget quickly, especially when the deeds of  Khaenri'ah weigh heavy on your mind. Though you have seen a small handful of changing of alliance stories in your lifetime his is probably the one that’ll stick the most. Especially when the memory of him crying in your arms after the man he considered a father died. 

There’s this one young girl you remember from centuries ago. She reminds you of Barbara a lot. Carefree, loves the people she works for. Just this girl was born a few millennia too early. She was apart of the Windblume resistance alongside the bard Barbatos fashioned himself after. You had attempted to smuggle the girl out the fortress many a time yet she always wanted to help. 

Sometimes when you watch Barbara sing you can’t help but cry over a girl you considered your first friend after becoming leader of the winds. Barbara is under the impression that you hate her because of how you avoid the girl. But being constantly reminded of someone you couldn’t save in the end makes you so sad. You’re not sure how Barbatos copes with donning the face of a friend when you can barely look at the face of someone who reminds you of a lost friend.

Razor sits fondly on your mind. He reminds you of the people you did actually save in old Mondstat. You remember checking in on a handful of refugees that you had to hide in old caves and how easily they had climatized to foraging for food. Whenever you see Razor you’re reminded of another young boy who went missing millennia ago who was later found to have been raised by bears. 

Through the centuries you’ve become good at pairing up couples. You seem to be able to point out people who will later enter a marriage. You’re not sure if soulmates and reincarnation exists, but that’s your only explanation being able to point to couples so easily.

You wonder for an immortal like yourself would be blessed with a soulmate. Especially considering you weren’t originally in a humanoid form. Maybe there’s some thousand wind out there for you that you’ll never be able to meet and fall for because of this form.

Your mind stretches to Barbatos whenever you think this but you never let yourself linger on it for too long. Lord Barbatos doesn’t like commitment, and you’re very much content with that, yes sir. 

Your eyes often linger on Rosaria as you often ponder if she thinks she’s the only nun to have strayed from typical nun doings. You remember telling a small Rosaria tales of Decrabains nuns and how they helped with the resistance against the tyrant. You wonder if that’s what gave her the idea to stray from typical nunnery. 

You smile upon Lisa fondly, a bright young woman with aspirations as high as the stars. Much like Rosaria you remember telling a young Lisa about alchemy and sorcery. She had such a knack for it, and seeing the woman return after only two years of study was a little disheartening. But you’re sure there will be people after her who will have similar aspirations with better outcomes. It’s not unlike you’ve seen people scurry their lives away in the pursuit of knowledge. You can understand her want for a different life.

As much as it hurts you in the end most, if not all, the people of Mondstat have buried themselves in your heart. And like you have done countless times before you’ll have to move on from them once you’re dead, no matter how much it hurts. Your mind ponders to Adeptus Xiao of Liyue. He’s under a similar curse to you. The curse of being alone while being surrounded by people. You wonder if that’s why Xiao has distanced himself from mortals.

And as much as you feel like you should take a page out of his book, you find yourself falling in love with Mondstat’s citizens over and over again.

[immergladsss]

Day 2- Memoriam

Maria sniffled. She felt her throat seize. Her eyes stung. She tried to hold back her tears. She wanted to appear strong. Her family was watching.

She cleared her throat and began the eulogy she had spent all night writing in between tears.  “You were my first friend when I first came to Moonacre.” She said with a small chuckle.

“Without judgement, you heard me, you consoled me. You were with me at all times. Whether it was through the difficult times of breaking Moonacre’s curse or enjoying our afternoon tea out in the sun and eating your favorite biscuits. your eyes spoke volumes to me and you always seemed to know the answer.” Maria’s heart throbbed at the memories. She placed a flower over the makeshift-headstone, quickly engraved on wood. There just hadn’t been enough time to prepare a real headstone, but one would be arriving soon. Robin had commissioned it for her, she just could not bring herself to do it. A tear finally won and trailed down her cheeks as she struggled to continue her speech. “To my dear friend, how I admired your strength and resilience. How I admired your tenacity and intelligence.  Even in the face of death you fought and came out triumphant. You lived a long life, and I am incredibly grateful to have spent it in your company. Though I’ll always wish we had more time.” She clenched a fist over her heart and fell on to her knees. “You sweet, sweet, girl. Your time with us wasn’t long enough. How lucky of heaven to have you for an angel.” Her tears were now freely flowing. “How I miss you so, my dear Serena. I hope I will one day see you again,” Maria cried with pain in her voice.

Robin crouched beside her and placed an arm over her shoulders. He brought her close to him and she began sobbing. One by one, her family came up to the freshly dug grave and dropped a white flower to join hers. She buried her face into Robin’s chest and sobbed for what seemed like hours until only she and Robin were left.

It wasn’t until her eyes were too dry to cry, and her heart was numbed from the pain, that she finally raised her head. Her swollen red eyes met his. “You must think I’m so silly.” She croaked with a forced smile.

“Not at all, Princess,” He said sweetly as he kissed her temple. “After all, it was all thanks to Serena that we first met. I will be forever indebted to her.” His warm lips brushed against hers, sending a jab of warmth into her heart to counter-act the cold numbness she felt.

“Thank you, love. It means so much for you to be here with me.”  

“No need to thank me.” He stood up and pulled Maria by her hand. “Let us go home.” With an arm around her back, they walked quietly together. It pained Robin so much to see the heartbreak on her beautiful face.

It was last week that Serena first began to behave abnormally. Knowing she had far outlived the typical lifespan of a Moonacre Hare, and recognizing the signs of death, Robin expected the worst. He tried to warn Maria, but she denied this. Instead, she concocted a plan to research all that she could on rabbits, hares, and remedies for them. Each day, she and Loveday spent every waking hour preparing and feeding Serena all sorts of concoctions, but with each day Serena grew more and more lethargic. Then two nights ago, she went to sleep in a basket, cradled in Maria’s arms, but never woke up. Maria was devastated. She wept for hours, and continuously checked for a pulse. Until finally her body grew cold and Maria accepted her companion’s death.  

Robin sighed and brought her close to kiss her temple once more. How he wished he could put a smile on her face.

Then a memory jogged his mind. It was a memory of an old joke he used to say when he first became friends with Maria. He would say it anytime he found the hare in her arms or accompanying Maria for some tea. It was a risk, and it could backfire, but he needed to try. Perhaps it was more for his sake than hers, and even selfish of him to think she needed to smile, but when was he ever known for his selflessness?

He glanced at her from the corner of his eye, and said, “It’s a shame we buried Serena. I still think she would have made a beautiful pelt.”

Maria smacked his stomach so hard the wind was knocked out of him. He doubled over and struggled to catch his breath.

Maria kept walking ahead of him. “Too soon you oaf!” She said with a glance over her shoulder, but he didn’t miss the hint of a smile in her tear-stained cheeks.

“Worth it,” Robin grinned and ran up to catch up to her.

[morganaspendragonss]

quédate un segundo más (1/8)

@911lonestarangstweek day 8 - t is for...tumour, terminal, treatment

title from voy a quedarme by blas cantó, translates roughly to 'stay a second more'

thanks to @halsteadmarchs and @tarlos-spain for the beta!

as shown above, this will be eight chapters if all goes to plan, and i hope to finish it before season 3 begins. much of what is written both in this chapter and in future ones is ripped directly from life and i am only writing from my own perspective and experiences of losing a loved one to cancer.

ao3 | 1.6k | angst, hurt tk, cancer, terminal illness, more warnings to come in future chapters

A rare genetic mutation.

That’s what the doctors tell him when the results come back.

A rare genetic mutation that has rendered his cancer practically undetectable until its latest stages, until all that’s left to do is wait to die.

TK’s hands shake as various leaflets on Managing Your Diagnosis and What To Expect and Looking After Someone With Cancer are placed in them. He feels two steps to the side of himself, his entire world halting in its tracks the moment those words had left the doctor’s lips.

“I’m afraid it’s not good news,” he’d said, eyes wide and empathetic. “Your scans and blood results have come back showing evidence of a tumour on your pancreas. There are treatment options which we can and will—with your consent—pursue, however I have to inform you that your cancer is entering stage IV. It has begun to spread to your bladder and liver. I’m sorry to say that, at this point, treatment is more focused on managing your pain and making you as comfortable as possible; we do not anticipate recovery.”

It’s just… TK’s fine. He feels fine. Like, sure, he’s been a little more tired recently and he’s been getting these weird pains, but they always fade after a while, and he’s fine.

But he couldn’t deny the blood spotting his pee, the last straw which had finally sent him to the doctor’s office.

Too late, apparently.

A touch on his knee brings him back to reality with a start. TK looks up to meet the doctor’s kind gaze, and he wants to cry.

“I understand this is a lot to take in,” he’s saying. “If you have any questions, please ask.”

“I…” TK shakes his head, swallowing a couple of times before dropping his eyes to his knees, the words on the pamphlets blurred through his tears. “How long?”

The doctor hesitates a moment, then sighs regretfully. “I can’t say for certain. People frequently outlive their projected timeframes; equally, it could be less. However, given the way your tumour looks and the rate it appears to be spreading at, I would estimate around six months.”

Six months.

Six—six months.

“Oh,” TK says, and it feels wildly insufficient but it’s all he has. What even is there to say? He’s dying, and that’s...that’s that.

“Do you have a support system in place?” the doctor asks. “This is going to be a difficult process, and you are going to need other people to help you through it.”

TK nods slowly, not looking up. “M-My husband. Carlos. He was supposed to come with me today but he was called into work last minute. He’s a detective, so he couldn’t exactly refuse—not that that stopped him from trying.” He laughs wetly, remembering how he’d insisted that everything would be fine when Carlos had stalled leaving this morning. “And there’s my dad, and my team—my family. I’m a paramedic and I work in a fire station, so we’re all pretty close. I… Shit, I’m sorry. You don’t need to know all this.”

“It’s okay.” The doctor is still smiling, still so understanding, and TK wonders—just how many times has he had to do this? “I’m glad to hear you have solid support behind you; that’s going to be incredibly important for the coming months. I’ve also given you a few leaflets about support groups you can access, that your family can access, and, of course, your treatment team will be there every step of the way.

“Now,” he continues, returning to a semi-professional aspect, “I want to see you later this week to iron out how we’re going to proceed. For now, why don’t you go home and rest, allow yourself to process this? Does Friday at 10.30 work for your next appointment?”

TK nods absently, clutching the pamphlets tight enough to crease them. “That’s fine,” he whispers.

“Okay,” the doctor says, just as quiet. “Are you going to be okay to get home?”

“Yeah.”

But he doesn’t move. He can’t. In this room, he’s separated from the rest of the world—TK doesn’t want to go back into it, where he’ll have to tell everyone he loves that he’s… That he…

“TK.”

TK’s head snaps up at the doctor’s voice and he flushes a little at seeing his pointed look. “Sorry,” he mutters, scrambling to stand up.

The doctor stands too, much more gracefully than TK, and gets the door for him. “It’s okay. I’ll see you on Friday, TK, alright?”

He mumbles an affirmative then steps out of the office, taken aback for a moment by the bustle and noise in the corridor. It’s strange to witness it now, to see all these people who don’t know him from Adam going about their lives, while his has, in the span of thirty minutes, completely crumbled.

TK takes a deep breath (and how many of those does he have left?) and joins the flow.

*

He’s home.

That’s… He doesn’t remember it. He must have unlocked the front door because the keys are in his hand and he’s standing in the entryway, but TK has no idea how he managed to get from the doctor’s office to here.

He made good time though, judging by the clock on the wall.

Small victories.

With heavy steps, TK walks to the sofa, easing himself down and tipping his head back to stare at the ceiling. It still doesn’t feel real that there's this—this thing inside him, growing and mutating and killing him. He’s not sure when it finally will.

Maybe in a few months, when his skin is sagging off his bones and his hair is gone and even the very act of breathing is a challenge.

Or maybe in a few hours, when Carlos comes home and TK has to break the news. TK can picture his face now, the way his ever-present smile will crack and break, the shock and hurt and grief that will take its place.

He thinks he understands his dad now.

TK closes his eyes and tries to clear his mind, just for a moment, of everything that’s happened today.

Which, as it turns out, is a mistake, because that’s when he remembers the letter that came for them yesterday and the phone call they’re going to make after dinner.

The phone call they were going to make after dinner.

TK wants to scream at the unfairness of it all. They’ve been waiting for that moment for so long, the moment in which they found out they were finally cleared to adopt a kid. And now…

Gone.

Carlos is going to be crushed.

As if the universe is reacting to that last thought, the door suddenly swings open, marking Carlos’s return from his impromptu shift. For a moment, TK panics. He’s not ready, dammit, he needs more time to plan and to figure it all out, how he feels and what he’s going to say, but—

But, in the end, it doesn’t matter. He could have had the most detailed and well-thought out plan in the world and it wouldn’t have mattered.

Because all it takes is one look at Carlos’s smile for TK to fall apart.

Carlos is by his side in an instant, gathering him in his arms and sliding to the floor with him when TK can no longer support himself on the couch. TK fists his hands in his husband’s shirt and cries into his neck, all the emotion that’s been slowly building all day exploding from him all at once.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Carlos shushes, which only makes TK cry harder, because how is he supposed to tell him that it’s not?

He shakes his head and clings onto him tighter, feeling Carlos do the same to him in return. TK’s always felt safe in his arms and it’s no different now; he thinks that, if he can just stay here forever, maybe things will turn out okay after all.

But the moment ends, as they tend to do. When TK’s sobs have run dry, Carlos carefully pulls back from him, his hands rising to cup his face and wipe the tears from his cheeks.

“Babe, what’s wrong?” he asks softly, so much worry in those damn eyes that it hurts. “Is it… Did the doctor say something? Are you okay?”

TK opens his mouth, but the words refuse to come out. All he manages is a wordless shake of the head, and even that turns Carlos’s expression into the picture of devastation. He can’t bear to look at it, so he wraps his arms around Carlos’s waist and leans into him again, resting his head on his chest.

Carlos holds him and presses a kiss to the top of his head. “We’ll get through it,” he promises. “Whatever it takes.”

And it turns out that he does have a few more tears left in him; TK squeezes his eyes shut and breathes out shakily as a couple of lone drops fall down his cheeks. “We can’t,” he whispers hoarsely. Carlos stiffens and shifts as if to look TK in the eyes, but TK doesn’t let him. If he has to look at Carlos, he doesn’t think he’ll have the courage to say it. He hesitates a moment longer, a huge lump forming in his throat, but eventually he manages it.

“It’s cancer,” he chokes out. “Stage IV. Incurable. They think… I’ve got six months.”

It’s like time stops.

They’re both motionless on the floor of their front room, neither saying anything, barely breathing as the weight of it settles between them.

TK doesn’t know how long it lasts for, but suddenly Carlos sobs and grips onto him with a bruising strength. Carlos’s body heaves and shakes with the force of his cries, and it’s TK’s turn to hold him as tears drip down Carlos’s cheeks into his hair.

And, in that moment, it becomes real.

[angst-fairygodmother]

We all know that Leon probably dies not much longer after Honey. Probably a few months. Enough time to make sure everyone's going to be alright (Trick situation: the kids were always going to be alright without their parents).

Selina is angry/jealous that her brother and daughter can see her parents at will. She ignores that they have to kill themselves to do it. Sure he can conjure them, but she's conflicted about that too.

Sunny becomes obsessed with visiting Honey at least until Leon dies. He uses the guise of Klaus. He wants to keep her for himself. Sometimes he presents himself as a little boy or a teenager to make up for all the grief he put her through with his addictions and disappearing for two years.

Nikolai takes their deaths harder than anyone expected. ESPECIALLY Leon which takes Selina by complete surprise. He finds it hard to communicate what it is that is causing him so much grief, but it's really because Leon's been his dad longer than Sergei ever was. Leon always told Nik that he was very easy to love.

Luther is also devastated. Leon and Honey were his first friends outside of the academies. Actually they were Sloane's first friends too. And it was reciprocated, Honey did not have actually confidantes outside her sister and Leon until she met Sloane. They were both worried the other would judge them on their pasts.

Funny enough, I suppose this is the same situation for Diego and Lila too?

Irina and Lev and JT are the most ok with everything. Their period of grieving is far shorter than their parents and uncle and great uncles/aunts.

Leon's heaven is just a dingy flat in White Chapel above a Greek restaurant and Gracie with the flowers in her hair.

Now your turn: Jess and Ollie and their family's reactions 🥹😮‍💨

😭 I love this, but also hate it. Why would you do this to me?

Jess and Ollie have a similar timeline actually.

They live well into their eighties, or maybe even nineties (probably nineties. I like the word nonagenarian better). Time to not only meet but really have relationships with grandchildren and great grandchildren.

Jess dies first. Of something slow enough that she has time to say goodbye, but not painful. Just age?

Of the next generation, I think the three that take it worst are her middle daughter, her and Ollie’s son, and Sean (after all, she was something of a mentor figure for him for most of his life, and their similar interests kept them close. Although actually I think he takes the years leading up to her death, where age has stopped her from being able to take pictures anymore harder.)

Her eldest daughter is very stiff upper lip about it, and feels like it’s her job now to take care of the others, and she only cries after she’s sure her siblings, cousins, and their kids are all okay.

Cormac probably handles it best out of them, both because he met her later in life which gives them a unique relationship, and because of his scientific approach to things. (Plus if he’s anything like his father, he has the chance to talk to her again.)

I have no idea on the grandkids and great grandkids. Some are devastated, others take it better.

Ollie dies within a year. Suddenly in his sleep.

His official cause of death is a heart attack, but everyone in the family knows that it was actually a broken heart, it just took a while. 

The family is equally saddened, but are able to take comfort that they’ll be reunited.

This is the one that gets their eldest and youngest daughters, the latter probably at some point begs any/all of the folks in the family that can to bring him back, so they can have one more conversation, one more hour with him.

(I tried to think of how Selina and Nikolai would feel, if they outlived their other halves, but I think that is too much pain. 

[abluescarfonwaston]

Did someone ask for a quick and angsty immortal jaskier prompt? "It was supposed to be the music," he whispered, voice breaking. Heart breaking. "The songs. I wanted my songs to be remembered forever. I never wanted this."

Why would you do this to me anon. i’m already crying over the fact dandelion outlives everyone he loves. Major Character Death Warning. Obviously. Literally everyone dies. Uuuh also this kinda turns into Lambert/Jaskier at the end but like. They’re both Centuries old so nothing Happens.

When the wasting sickness swept through Lettenhove it killed his Mother and his Father and his Sisters and left him untouched. 

He was ten and the world was over. Except he kept waking up in the morning.

At thirteen a girl at Oxenfurt, Essi Daven, played her Lute in the commons and sang and had the most beautiful cornflower blue eyes. And for the first time in years he sang a duet with her and suddenly he was a bard and he had a little sister again. 

Maybe the world hadn’t ended. Maybe it finally restart.

At seventeen he met a man with white hair and seemly as many scars on his body as his heart and fell in love. Because Bards fell in love easily and he was impossibly easy to love.

The witcher plead for his life. Plead for them to let the bard go.

“No. Both of us or neither.” He was done outliving those he loved. At seventeen he was already done with that. “You kill him and let me go and i’ll destroy your mountain. Kill every last one of you in revenge.”

He’d leave behind a song. The one he’d written as a child and had swept the town more devastating than even the scarlet fever had been. It would live on past him. He would be remembered. The people he loved would be too. Toss a coin to your Witcher. The people he loved immortalized in song.

It wasn’t supposed to make him immortal.

“Give it a rest Jaskier.” Danity snapped. “It’s not you that has to be afraid of anything. No one ever touches a troubadour. For unfathomable reasons you’re inviolable.”

He’d still feared then. Chappelle could have had him killed. He was pretty sure he could die. Mostly he feared the pain. Or dying alone.

“When an old woman gets tired of life she walks into the woods without a weapon. The results are guaranteed.” He’d told Geralt when he’d moaned about how the world was changing and -more importantly- that he had no work.

Remember how I don’t even carry a knife when I follow you out on an adventure? No weapons at all. Ever. Just me and my lute.

He’d brushed death. A thousand times he’d almost met her. He followed Geralt- who was prophesied to always have death follow after him. You’d think at some point they’d meet.

Essi and Geralt fell in love on the coast. He wrote a ballad for them. About how their love was so powerful not even death could come between them.

He never played it. Not to anyone. He didn’t think it was actually about Essi and Geralt.

When rash appeared on Essi’s face in Vizima during the quarantine his hands shook.

“Not her.” He’d screamed at the gods. They didn’t exist of course. If they had then they’d abandoned them all long ago. “Not her.”

“Jaskier?” She shivered violently. “I don’t want to be burned.”

“You won’t be. You’re going to be fine.” He promised. Clutching her hand. “Promise Poppet. You’re going to be fine.”

The cremation fires blazed outside.

“I want to be buried in the woods. With my lute and-” She hurled mostly into the bucket. “My necklace. Please Jaskier.”

“Course Poppet. When you’re old and grey I will bury you out in the forest.”

“Thank you.” She clutched the little pearl. “For giving me him. I love him.”

“I never saw him happier than when he was with you Poppet.”

“What about when he was with you?”

“Oh come now.” He shifted her in his arms and moved the bucket a little further away. “You know me. I’m insufferable.”

“I love you Jaskier.” She cried as she shivered with less and less energy.

“I love you too Poppet.”

He carried her from the city. Into the forest. Her heart stopped beating before they arrived. He dug her grave and buried her with her lute and her pearl necklace.

With the pearl he’d given to her as a birthday gift. From him and Geralt.

When Regis passed it felt absurd. Humans weren’t supposed to outlive goddamn vampires in their fifth fucking century.

And then there was Geralt. Died in Yennefer’s arms along with her.

“It was supposed to be me.” He told no one as Ciri led their bodies out to the lake. “I was supposed to die with him.” Love so great not even death can part us.

But the story was never really about him was it?

Nenneke had a garden full of plants that grew under a crystal skylight. They didn’t grow anywhere else in the world anymore.

He’d asked Geralt about it. She’d said something about the sun and how it was changing. Apparently Geralt had asked why they all didn’t live under crystal skylights then, if it was so deadly.

“It’s already too late for us.” She’d said.

She talked liked the world was ending but the world ended all the time. And he still woke up in the morning.

Zoltan’s beard turned grey. He supposed he should have been thankful that Zoltan got to turn grey. It was better than most of the people he’d loved.

“How’s your fucking hair still Gold. You’re supposed to be getting old too!”

“I dye it.” He lied with a roll of the eyes. He’d stopped dying it years ago.

That winter he buried Zoltan too.

Golden eyes stared at him in confusion. “You look just like.” He started. His thin hair was grey. His wolf medallion gleamed in the sunlight that streaked into the bar.

“You’re one of the last Witchers i think.” He told him as the waves crashed outside. “Might even be the last.”

“Fucking hope so.” He sat down across from him and stole his beer. “Shitty job and a shitty life.” He squinted at him- which Jaskier knew was entirely unnecessary. He just forgotten to adjust his eyes. “What’s your name bard?”

“Dandelion.” He answered. It had been for the last century. “Yours?”

“Lambert.” He downed the drink. “You really think i’m the last? That worth a song? One of my brothers had a lot of songs.”

“Yes I suppose he did.” He waved for another drink. “And look what it got him.”

“Died surrounded by people who loved him.”

“Are you sure you know what a pogrom is?”

That got him a sharp toothy grin.

“I could write you a song but-” He was tired of burying people he loved.

“But?”

“I’m cursed you see.” It was definitely a curse these days. “I’ll live until the last of my songs is forgotten. I really don’t need anymore material.”

Lambert leaned forward curiously. “Doesn’t sound like a curse.”

“You don’t think it sounds like a curse?” He sneered. Lambert’s face faltered. “To outlive everyone you love?”

Lambert paused. Thinking. “Write me a song then. Play it just for me. So if my song’s the last we’ll go together.”

“And what’s my payment for this song?”

“Company.” Lambert’s grey eyes glittered. “You look like you need it.”

“Not as much as you. I bet you talk to your horse.”

“Well i know you do pretty boy. Heard you in the stable.”

He leaned back on the bench. “So what’s a Witcher do in a world without monsters?”

He shrugged. “Fish mostly.”

“I can do that. Once almost snagged a catfish the size of you. Got a djinn instead. Very bad deal honestly.”

“You expect me to believe that? I know about Bards and Ballads and how you’re all rotten liars.”

“Don’t forget about fisherman and their tales.”

The boat leaked worse than an old drunkard but it was small enough and the lake calm enough that it didn’t make him sick.

“I could just kill you. Curse probably can’t fix decapitation.” Lambert offered with his stick in the water. He claimed were bombs they could use instead if they got desperate. Or bored.

He smiled and shook his head. “Give it a try.”

Lambert raised an eyebrow but pulled a silver blade from it’s sheath.

His pole reeled and the boat tilted to the side, plunging him and the sword into the water.

He laughed as the attempted to drag the monstrous fish to the boat. Lambert cursed and climbed in. Yanking at the rod until the line snapped and they fell back into the boat in a painful pile. Laughing.

He didn’t remember the last time he’d laughed.

“Sing me a song bard.” Lambert would request from under his floppy sun brimmed hat. “No else up here but me.”

“There’s an entire stone keep on the hill.”

“No ones lived there in centuries. No one can hear you up here but me.”

He frowned at the ruins on the hill. Lambert kicked him.

He grinned and for the first time in decades - sang.

Maybe. Maybe the world hadn’t ended. Maybe it had finally restart.

“What was this place called?” He asked as they wandered through the crumbled ruin, covered in moss and ivy.

“Kaer Morhen.” He said like the words hurt him.

They hurt him too. He laughed.

He laughed some more.

He couldn’t stop laughing until Lambert smacked him hard enough to see stars.

“I never got to come here. Geralt.” He caught the flinch but moved past it. “Never trusted me enough to even let me know which country it was in.”

“So you were his bard.”

He nodded as Lambert kicked a stone apart. “He was right not to tell me of course. But.” It still hurt that his best friend hadn’t trusted him with his home. He’d taken Yennefer here. But not him. Never him.

He didn’t deserve Geralt’s trust. A thief, a liar, a spy, a bard. It still hurt.

“Well a wolf finally took you here. Is it everything you fucking dreamed?”

He took it in. “Nah. It’s rubbish.”

Lambert smirked. “Yeah. At least that hasn’t changed.”

“You’re hairs getting grey bard.”

“What?” He nearly leaped into the water in his haste to look.

Grey strands streaked his beard.

“Thank you.” He cried. “Thank you.”

“Still owe me that song Dandy.”

He wrote Lambert a lot of songs. Performed for an audience of one.

“Are you really okay with the fact no one will ever hear them? I mean what’s the point in being immortalized in song if-”

“Yeah. Didn’t give a shit about the songs.”

“Hey!” He protested. Kicking him where he lounged in front of the fire. “They’re good songs!”

He grunted in fake pain. Wiggled out of range. “Did Geralt ever tell you why he liked having you around?”

“My charming personality I assume.”

Lambert snorted.

He sat down on the floor and poke him. “Don’t fall asleep. Tell me why you think he did.”

“No one tells Witchers bedtime stories.”

“Oh.” Lambert was halfway to sleep already. “Would you like one?”

“Yeah.”

“What you think happens after?” They were huddled together. Old and grey as a storm raged outside. “We die.”

“I gave up on gods when i was a child.”

“So did i.”

“Then.” He paused. Listened to the howl. “Whatever’s next at least neither of us is going alone.”

Lambert squeezed his bony hand. “What’s the chance we see them again?”

“Hm.” He pretended to consider. “Well we’re definitely going to hell so-”

“Like anyone we gave a shit about wouldn’t be.”

“Point.”

He closed his golden eyes. “Hey Dandy.”

“Yeah?”

“Sing me out.”

“It’d be my pleasure.”

And quite singing filled the drafty cabin until the song stopped.

The world ended.

And at long last no one woke up in the morning.

[mercuryislove]

6 for Anwei, 10 for Yixing, and 30 for Ciaran and Sihla please 😊

once again I feel like I have said a whole lot of words with actually answering any of the questions at hand... please forgive me ._.

6. Do they like being reminded of home?

If by “home” you mean the past or like her childhood home then... only sometimes. Very rarely? It's complicated. Anwei pretends not to be sentimental about what life was like before, but deep down she still longs for that familiarity. She wasn't nearly as close to her mom as Ciaran was (and neither of them were close to their dad because he was um. largely absent), and looking back she still beats herself up about not cherishing the time with her they had. And sometimes in casual conversation, Ciaran will bring things up like “oh, this is just like the time when we were kids when Mom did xyz” or “Mom used to say things like that all the time” or “Mom would have loved this [completely mundane thing lol]” and some part of her gets like... resentful, maybe? She's jealous in a way that he doesn't feel the ache for the old times like he does. She's jealous that he remembers all those little details about their old life, while she only remembers stupid shit written in the margins of her college textbooks or some song on the internet that went viral when she was thirteen or the mnemonic devices she used to learn all the bones and muscles in the human body. She doesn't care about those parts. She wishes she could remember more important things. Like her mom's favorite color or the way their childhood home smelled after a summer vacation or the name of her favorite restaurant down the street. So like. to not answer the question at all, no lol. It mostly just makes her sad to think about home and how she can never go back again :(

--

10. Are they very sentimental, or perhaps just selectively?

Yixing has nothing to be sentimental about in his life. Well, he does have a few things, but he doesn't think so, and all of the things he would get sentimental about are tarnished by the abuse he's suffered at the hands of others. When he hears other people talk about their nostalgic feelings about childhood, he's just like “Hm. Can't relate. In fact, I wish I could erase every memory of my childhood from my brain!” Much like Anwei, he just gets fucking sad about shit instead of ever getting sentimental. Wait, would it be called sentimentality if you're like. mourning for the things in life you never got to have growing up? Like a well-adjusted family and fond memories of your youth? Because if that counts, then he absolutely is sentimental about everything ever. Sometimes he sees fathers with their young sons and sees how much they care for each other and has to like. hold back tears (or go sit on his horse for a minute lol) because that is what his life was supposed to be like. He was supposed to have someone who loved him and taught him right from wrong and protected him from the evils of the world and supported him and nurtured him and showed him how to be a good person, and... well. His father didn't do any of that. If anything he did the exact opposite. And sometimes Yixing gets really bitter about it because he didn't deserve that, and leaving when he did was the best thing he could have done, but still. He likes to imagine what it could have been like.

(Seriously though, the only things he ever truly thinks fondly of when looking back is how on nights when it was cool outside, he would sneak out of the house and go hang out with the horses in the barn and read by candlelight.)

--

30. How do they feel about the passage of time? Do they feel old too soon? Are they content to let days go past without recognition?

I've talked before about how the passage of time makes me personally feel insane and yes I do project all that onto my little fictional gay people because how else am I supposed to cope with the ever shifting sands of time?!

A long time ago, it didn't bother Ciaran. There was a glossy sheen to the realization of “oh fuck I'm going to live forever” and years and eventually decades passed, and it never bothered him to watch the first and second generations of survivors of the actual end of the world grow old in what felt like the blink of an eye to him. He was so distant from people back then anyway. Then the years continued to fly by and immortality had lost its shine, and he had the grim realization that he couldn't keep people at arm's length forever. They needed him and Anwei, whether he liked it or not! So he slooooowly started to warm up to the idea of letting people get close again, and eventually opened himself up to like. loving and caring for people (and letting people love him) in the short time they had to know him. (And as we know, that works out very well for him and everything is hunky-dory for a long time until he starts to care for people a little too much and then he meets a certain someone that really throws a fucking wrench in the works, and everything kind of goes downhill from there lmao) And if you go WAY back to when he like. mortal or whatever, he absolutely led a very yolo kind of life. Like. Oh fuck I will only be young and beautiful and relevant for so long so I might as well fuck up my body while my liver can still handle it!! And god he was insufferable for it. Some of that still comes through but he isn't (usually) as reckless/self-destructive about it.

MEANWHILE Sihla does not even consider time. She used to. She used to be anxious like Ciaran about how she would outlive everyone she ever loved, but then she met Anwei and was like “nevermind lol fuck everyone else I only need her,” which was, well... an interesting outlook on life. And when that ended horribly because [redacted], she got to enjoy the luxury of being trapped alone to die every day for a couple of centuries, and that's when she quit caring about, uh, anything really. (omg she did like spongebob and cleared her mind of everything except fine dining and breathing) Except maybe exacting revenge on the two people that put her there (gee I wonder who that could be). And before this all happened back when she was just a regular person, she was high strung and SCARED of the passage of time. The world as it was before wasn't particularly great, and there were always growing anxieties about the devastating effects of war and climate change and complete apathy from gods who were very real (and who could definitely put a stop to the suffering with the wave of a hand), and she was just an elementary school teacher trying to like. come to terms with the fact that many of her students could hardly afford food and clothing. And she and her wife had their own woes with trying to raise a young child in a world that could barely sustain them. Every day was a fucking struggle but it was also a gift, and she tried her hardest to make the important things count.

[shotsbyshae]

Angel on Fire

Warnings: Language, Murder, Little Fluff, Smidge of Smut   

Words: 4.2k

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Fem!Reader, Bucky Barnes x Fem!Reader

Summary: You literally fell for Bucky Barnes in 1944, Steve was there when it happened. How is it possible that you’re sitting across from him now in 2012 looking exactly the same?

Song: Angel on Fire by Halsey

A/N: Please do not hold me accountable for any of this lore. 

I’m standing in the ashes of who I used to be.

1944

It was a celebration.

A small gathering to acknowledge everything The Howling Commando’s had accomplished thus far in sabotaging Hydra’s operations. There was only one reason you were here – him. Steve Rogers, America’s golden boy. You had to admit the newspaper clippings did not do him justice. He looked so young and innocent in his service uniform that night.

Guilt. It echoed through the very depths of your soul.

You had traveled this far though, so you finished your glass of wine, a little liquid courage, and ran your hands along the front of the emerald green chiffon material of your dress to smooth it out. You inhaled deeply, trying to calm your nerves before you left the bar and waltzed across the room towards him with sheer confidence. The moment he saw you, his blue eyes widened, and he shifted on his feet. Chest out. Shoulders back. You kept your eyes on him, the corner of your lips turning up in a smirk at how utterly distracted he was by you – it was adorable.

An unseen force slammed into your shoulder, knocked you off balance, and strange hands grabbed at your waist and arm as you fell. The man had managed to catch you in time and pulled you back to your feet. His hand slipped from your waist to lower back as he steadied you against his strong frame.

“Dammit Dugan,” the man who was pushed into you hissed as you instinctively clutched his arm for support.

“Oh shit,” a large, burly man in a bowler hat and red moustache gave you a look of embarrassment as he tipped his hat. “Sorry ma’am.”

“Sorry about that,” the stranger’s hand was still on your lower back and heat radiated from his palm. Your skin prickled where his fingers gripped you ever so slightly through the dress, his hand felt as if it encompassed you wholly. For a moment you were terrified the fire that pulsed through your veins might consume you both. Dark hair and eyes that were blue as the ocean only emphasized the boyish grin on his face. “They’re idiots.”

This feeling was unlike anything you’d ever felt before. Lust? Love? One thing was certain, for the first time in a long time you felt safe. You smiled at him because his charm was infectious, “It’s okay.”

“I’m James,” he offered his hand as an introduction and you took it carefully. “My friend’s call me Bucky.”

You had given him your name and as he brushed his lips across your knuckles you knew things would never be the same. Sergeant James Barnes stole your heart that night and saved you from yourself without knowing. He wasn’t who you had come for, but sometimes fate has other plans.

The two of you fell in love hard and fast. The kind of love that absorbs two people so fully that nothing else exists in the entire world except each other. He was your first real love – first real mistake – being in love with Bucky had meant bringing his best friend into your life.

The photo Bucky had carried with him of he and Steve showed the person Rogers was before the war, the shield, the serum – a rail-thin kid from Brooklyn. Bucky had told you stories about having to save him from fights he’d get into and how awkward he was with girls. He’d also tell you how proud he was that Steve had volunteered for that experiment. Bucky wanted you like Steve, because that was important to him – Steve was important to him.

You tried not to like Steve Rogers, you really had. After all, you knew where that road would lead. There was no escaping it though, because Bucky was a brother to him. They were a packaged deal. You didn’t get one without the other. So, Steve had befriended you, against your better judgement.

“Watch out for each other,” you told them.

“Always,” Bucky placed a chaste kiss against your lips before he turned to join Dugan and Morita.

“Will do,” Steve gave a small smile, warm and assuring.

They were just young men – boys – fighting the monsters of the world. Not exactly the same types of monsters you were accustomed to, but monsters nonetheless.

One year felt like forever.

In the middle of a war, you had snuck around to places to you shouldn’t have been, just to spend a few moments with the guy you loved and the one you shouldn’t have met.

It was amazing.

Until it wasn’t.

People die. It’s the curse of being human. That’s one reason you’d never let your guard down before. Bucky Barnes had been worth the momentary lapse in judgement though, Steve too, even though you hated to admit it – he was a good friend.

When you lost them both, you had been devastated, but in your life, you knew you would outlive people.

Lose those you love.

That didn’t make it any easier.

However, with Steve Rogers gone you had nothing left to lose – literally.  

2012

You had seen the news – The Avengers had saved New York.  

At first you thought it was someone imitating him, just a cheap knock off behind the mask. So, you had come to see for yourself, after all, it’s been over sixty years.

They said he was frozen in the ice.

What is your excuse going to be?

You watch as he sits across the patio from you, a half dozen empty tables between you, sketching away in his notebook. Steve used to do the same thing, all those years ago, always drawing in his spare time. Against your better judgement, you pull your sunglasses lower on your nose, peering over the rim of them to get a better look.

It’s him – it’s really him.

The same golden boy you remember, he’s not aged at all. Your mind is racing and for a moment you just stare at him as a flood of memories wash over you. Your heart stops as his eyes flick up from his drawing and immediately focus on you.

He recognizes you instantly. You’re still as beautiful as the last time he saw you, but that was over sixty years ago. Steve blinks, afraid his eyes are deceiving him. His mind is telling him there’s no way it’s you, but his heart is reminding him that in a world full of aliens and gods – maybe – just maybe the universe could give him this.

A piece of home.

He’s been stumbling through a world that’s not his own. Everything has changed. At least when he puts on the suit, he has a job to do, responsibilities as Captain America.

He’s a hero.

A damn national treasure.

Take away the red, white, and blue, and he’s just Steve Rogers, a man who doesn’t belong here.

This isn’t his time – it isn’t either of your time.

Why are you both here?

The recognition is evident on his features and you quickly push your sunglasses back up on your face as you carefully stand, trying not to draw attention to yourself. It’s too late though, because he’s on his feet, notepad forgotten on the table.

He’s halfway across the patio as you head for the sidewalk, calling out behind you, “Hey.” You don’t stop, but he’s persistent as he chases after you. “Excuse me, miss?”

You pick up the pace, but he doesn’t relent. Images of your smiling face flash through his mind. Bucky’s arms wrapped tightly around your waist, his chin on your shoulder, the wide smile on his face crinkled the corners of his eyes. He had been happy for his friend, even if there was a tinge of jealousy there. Steve had saw you first that night, but after everything Hydra had done to Bucky – he was the one who needed you.

Rogers has to jog to catch up with you and gently places his hand on your shoulder to stop your escape. For a moment you forget to breath, his touch familiar – yet foreign. You close your eyes as he circles around to get a better look at you. An almost silent whisper falling from his lips, “It is you.” You look up at him slowly, staring into his curious blue eyes as he continues, “How – how are you here?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” you remark.    

“Long story.”

“Mine’s longer.”

***

Steve tells you about everything, the fight with Schmidt, the tesseract, and crashing the Valkyrie, then about Loki and the battle of New York. You can see a happiness in his eyes when he looks at you, as if no time has passed.

It has though and so much has changed.

“How?” his brows furrow. “How are you here?”

You don’t want him to know the whole truth – not yet. You’ve lost a lot since he’s been away and having him here brings back feelings you’d long since forgotten.

You didn’t think it was possible anymore.

“It’s complicated,” you say before taking a sip of your coffee.

Steve knows you’re holding something back and his hand finds yours on the small patio table between you and he gives it a gentle squeeze, “Tell me.”

He had developed this uncanny ability to ready you like a book during that time together in the war.

Maybe it was from being a third wheel in your relationship with Bucky.

Maybe it was something else.

It had been wrong, and you knew it, but fate be damned. There had been something very pure about Steve Rogers – innocent. In a world full of monsters and demons, he was good and kind, and oblivious to it all.

“I can’t die,” you say simply as if that sums up everything he needs to know, “technically.” He stares at you for a moment, waiting for you to elaborate, but you take another sip of your coffee instead.

Steve raises his eyebrows after a few moments of silence, “I’m going to need more than that.”

“I’m not human,” you finally say, your fingernail anxiously scraping at the chipped paint on the table. “I’m what they call a Phoenix.”

His blue eyes are inquisitive, and you can see the flurry of questions waiting there, “Like the mythical bird?” You nod and he continues with boy like curiosity, “Do you breathe fire?”

“No,” you shake your head with a smirk and hold your hand up, wiggling your fingers. “That comes from these.”

He gives a slow nod as he contemplates another question, “Can you fly?” You give him another shake of your head and he takes a deep breath as he leans back in his chair. “Okay.”

“Okay?” it’s your turn to look surprised. “I just told you I’m not human and you’re just going to roll with it?”

“I fought aliens two months ago,” he gives you a half-smile, “alongside an Asgardian. Weird isn’t so weird anymore.”

Truth be told, as long as you aren’t Loki, he could care less what you are. You’re here. That’s all that matters. Seeing your face brings back the good memories of the war, those small moments in time, which he’d forgotten about.

“You know what we should do,” Steve says suddenly, as a thought crosses his mind. “Let’s go see a movie.” Your brows furrow together in confusion at him, the large smile on his face making him look like a teenager. “Remember? Me, you, and Buck, we used to talk about when the war was over and we got back home, we were going to spend all day at the theater just watching whatever was playing. Eating popcorn.”

“With butter,” you do remember those discussions.

“Loads of butter,” his eyes widen with excitement. “What do you say?”

You just got him back, you’re not ready to let him go just yet, even though you know you should. It’s selfish, and you know that, but you agree, “Deal.”

The two of you spend the rest of the day watching movies and binging on theater popcorn and snacks while reminiscing about the past and how much things have changed. When Steve talks about how everything is different now, you can see a glimpse of that rail-thin kid Bucky had always protected.

You know what it feels like to be lost, and even though you had told yourself you wouldn’t stay – you can’t leave him like this.

He was Bucky’s best friend – your friend.

2013

Just a few months, until he’s more adjusted.

That was the phrase you had started telling yourself in the beginning. Steve had no one and you couldn’t leave him. He needed you and the fact your friendship was able to pick up right where the two of you had left it in 1945 made it easy to stay.

But you shouldn’t be here.

You know it.

Yet, here you are, assisting Captain America and the Avengers in taking down another Hydra facility, this time in D.C. of all places. The fighting, the violence, it’s too much. Fueling the flame inside of you, making you irrational sometimes, but you can’t tell him that. Then you would have to explain everything, and you can’t do that either.

The mission is going according to plan until two Hydra agents get the drop on Barton and you’re the only one to see it. You react without thinking and your right arm juts out towards the two agents, hand igniting in a beautiful combination of red and orange flares. The action immediately causing the two men to burst into flames. Their screams of agony are short-lived as your manipulate the blaze with your hand. It only takes a few moments until nothing is left of the men but a pile of ashes.

Clint raises an eyebrow in concern because you’ve never used your powers like that, then gives you small nod of appreciation for saving his life.

“What the hell was that?” Steve says from behind you, ignoring Tony’s ‘Language Cap’ over the comms.

“Sorry,” your tone almost flippant.

“We’ve talked about that,” he reprimands you, making you feel like a child, which only pisses you off. “Incapacitate only. Killing is a last resort. We don’t do that.”

“You don’t kill people,” the cold look in your eyes is one he’s seen before.

“Neither do you,” Steve voice is still firm, calmer.

Shaking your head, you glare at him, “You don’t fucking know me. There’s a whole world of bad out there Steve. It can’t all be contained. Some of it has to be killed.”

You know you’ve said too much and you storm off. You’re going to have to tell him, but you’re too angry at him right now. You died too many times during the sixty years Steve was frozen in the ice. It’s taken a toll and you know he’s seen it, his blue eyes filling with concern and uncertainty at some of your actions. You aren’t the same carefree soul you were when he and Bucky met you, in fact, you know there’s not much of your soul left at this point.

That was part of being a Phoenix.

You and Steve have talked some on the subject of Phoenixes. He knows you’re a rare species who can control fire with your hands, although he’s not a fan of that. You haven’t mentioned the issue with your soul though, or how he plays a part in your story. There’s no easy way to tell him and you know it will be easier to leave – disappear.

Steve approaches the quinjet seeing everyone on the team except you and glances to Tony his eyes questioning your whereabouts without him saying anything.

“Hey Firestarter,” Tony says over the comms, even though you hate that nickname. “You still inside?”

“Yea,” you respond.

No one expects the explosion that originates from somewhere inside the warehouse and rocks the quinjet, but Steve’s eyes go wide in horror. Tony has to grab him to stop him from running into the flames. Metal arms cling to him tightly, as his world goes up in bright orange and red waves.

You told Steve you couldn’t die – technically. He never asked what technically meant because he was afraid to.

He searches the warehouse himself after the firetrucks leave. Tony and Natasha help, but there’s nothing left.

This is technically.

Later that night, you wake up in the rubble of the warehouse – naked and cold.

You know you’ve stayed too long. You can barely feel any of yourself left inside and it scares you. Feeling completely empty, void of any emotion or empathy. That is a fate worse than death.

It’s time to let him go. He’ll be okay without you. He has Tony and Romanoff now. You should leave while you can, but Steve Rogers is the only friend you’ve ever really had – which in itself is a cruel fucking joke.

***

You rap your knuckles against the wooden door in a rhythmic beat. The hem of the oversized bright yellow t-shirt you’d stolen from the construction worker’s truck brushes against the middle of your thighs, and it reminds you just how numb your body feels from the cold. It had been a long walk from the warehouse to here.

Steve opens the door to the apartment, red-rimmed eyes staring at you in shock. Your face has smudges of ash, sprinkles of it are in your hair, and you smell like the thick smoke of a campfire.

“Have you been crying?” Your tone edging on derisive as you enter the apartment.

“I thought you died,” he replies slowly, before closing the door hard behind you.

“And?” You can’t help the cockiness in your voice, chalk it up to being almost soulless, and you turn to him. “I told you, I couldn’t –”

His mouth is on yours, shutting you up as he pushes you back against the wall. One hand grips your waist firmly while the other tangles in the hair at the nape of your neck. Your mind races because this isn’t supposed to happen – it can’t. You shouldn’t be here.

The muscles in his shoulders flex under your fingers as he tightens his hold on you, pinning you to the wall with his body. Steve’s kiss is punishing and as his tongue slides past your lips, your body arches into him instinctively, overriding your thoughts. His assertiveness makes you forget the reason behind your visit, the warm, wet sensation between your thighs quickly becoming your new motivation.  

He presses his forehead against yours as he breaks the kiss for a moment, whispering against your lips, “I thought I lost you.” He has never looked at you like this before, with such longing and desire, and you feel it.

Really feel it.

The small part of you that is left is suddenly overcome with a surge of emotions and feelings.

Joy. Fear. Sympathy. Confusion. Love. All colliding together, twisting and spiraling inside of you like a whirlwind. Making you question yourself, ‘When did I fall in love with him?’

This need you’re feeling.

This ache.

You’ve forgotten what tears feel like as they prick the corners of your eyes and you cup his face gently with your hands, staring up at him. Your golden boy, “I’m here – I’m right here, Steve.”

It would be easier if he fucked you. Cold and hard against the wall of his apartment or with reckless desperation in the shower as water streams around the two of you, but he doesn’t. Steve Rogers makes love to you that night. Forcing you to melt as rough hands trace every curve and line of your body with feather like strokes and tender touches. His mouth both insatiable and intimate with kisses, expressing his feelings for you without words.

It’s raw, intense, and passionate.

You shouldn’t have come back, it’s not fair to him.

But you’re thankful you did.

Because you’ve never felt more alive – the irony of that is not lost on you.

***

The next morning you’re sitting at the kitchen table when Steve comes out of the bedroom and he can immediately see the look on your face. He notices the duffel bag by the door, and it makes his heart stop.

“We need to talk,” you say ominously, and the man slowly moves to sit across from you at the table.

“I don’t like how this looks,” there’s a noticeable tick in his jaw as he keeps his eyes focused on you.

“I didn’t tell you everything – about what I am,” you begin to explain, wrapping your hands around the coffee mug in front of you nervously. “Everytime a Phoenix dies and is reborn, or rises, a part of our soul burns off. It’s an incentive really, to keep you from dying. The more you die, the sooner you become a soulless monster, not caring about anything or anyone. Killing others becomes a second nature to us then, at least while we have a soul, we can keep that part of us in check.” You watch him closely as you speak, making sure he’s understanding everything as you say it.

“So, the two men at the warehouse?”

“Yea,” you nod shamefully. “Phoenixes are immortal, but we are destined to be killed eventually. A final death, one which we don’t rise from. When a Phoenix rises for the first time, there’s a name you’re given. The name of the person who will ultimately be the one to kill you – bring about your final death. Usually a hunter, or someone along those lines. Sometimes, that person may not enter your life for hundreds or thousands of years.” You glance out the window thoughtfully, “You have no idea what it’s like to know the name of the person who will kill you. Live with that for years, but you can’t run from fate.”

Steve sits across from you solemnly as he processes the information you’re sharing, “Can you change it?”

You shake your head. “I wanted to though. I wanted to change my destiny, kill the person whose name I was given before he had a chance to kill me. I found him too, but fate had other plans,” you glance away from him. “She’s cruel that way – fate – destiny or whatever it is that’s written in the stars. None of it would have ever happened if I’d not been trying to change it.”

“Whose name were you given?” he asks quietly.

“Yours,” you say, looking back over to him. “Steve Rogers.”

It looks as if you’ve punched him in the gut. That night, all those years ago, when he saw the prettiest girl at the party walking his way, it was because you had planned on killing him. Because eventually he was supposed to kill you.

“I never wanted to be your friend Steve,” you let the words slip out quietly. “Then Bucky happened, and I let my guard down. That wasn’t fair to you and I’m sorry.”

His mouth goes dry as he shakes his head, “But I wouldn’t –”

“You won’t have a choice Steve,” you reply. “When my soul is gone, that’s it.”

There’s a moment of silence between the two of you as he shakes his head in frustration. “How much is left?” he questions you, his brows furrowing together. “Of your soul?”

“Not enough.”

“There has to be a way we can fix this,” he tries to reason with you.

“No, we can’t,” you look at him hopelessly. “This is it. We both know what’s coming and I need you to promise me, when it happens, you’ll take care it.”

“I can’t do that,” the pain on his face is enough to break your heart.

“You have too. When there’s nothing left of me, I’ll just be a shell. The person you love won’t be here anymore, I’ll be a monster,” you can see the wretched expression on his face as you stand up from the table. “Promise me.” Steve looks out the window as he starts to chew on his bottom lip. You reach down, placing your hand on top of his, squeezing it gently, “Please.”

He glances up at you with glossy blue eyes. He’s broken because of you and you’ll never forgive yourself for this. You shouldn’t have come back.

“I promise,” his words are barely audible.

“I should go,” you say before leaning down to kiss his cheek gently. “I do love you.” The words come out as a whisper against his skin before you stand back up. You make it halfway to the door when you hear the chair scraping across the hardwood floor roughly. Steve is on you by the time you turn around, his hand flying to the side of you neck roughly, pulling you back to him. His lips crash into yours hard and desperate as tears slowly stream down your face.

Sometimes your soulmate isn’t the person you fall madly in love with, sometimes it’s the person you least expect.

A beautiful disaster.

Steve Rogers is your soulmate.

He’s also the man who will have to kill you one day when your soul no longer exists.

The thought of it shatters your heart and you’d give anything if you could take that burden away from him, but fate is cruel.

“I’ll see you around Steve,” you state quietly as you move to grab your duffel bag.  

He watches as you open the door to his apartment, his face full of sadness as he says the words firmly, “I hope not.”

[dragonrajafanfiction]

Oral Tradition

It was a little past midnight as the weary-eyed students picked up their luggage from the jet. The entire back of the plane had lifted up and a conveyor belt rolled out the attack aircraft they would be using  for the mission. It was like the big Beluga whale plane was giving birth to a killer barracuda.

The jet was outfitted with high powered explosives. The outer shell was made of a material that would shatter and turn into thousands of razor blades, just like the Storm Torpedo had shattered Norton. Huge turrets were armed not with bullets but with thousands of needle-like projectiles like how the sky weapon had devastated Herzog. It was as if the Gear Department had taken all the technology that had been used against the dragons in recent years and put it all in one airborne package.

Brian stood, his duffle bag over one shoulder, watching Ru’Yi collect her things. She seemed sleepy but still bright and happy. He didn’t try to say hi. Their last encounter was humiliating enough. 

It has always understood that through training and learning, even the least of the Hybrids could excel in all sorts of missions in regards to dragonslaying. From the beginning, Brian had distinguished himself in that regard. But at the same time, it was understood that pedigree and bloodline could close the gap between lack of education and training.

He was sure she didn’t mean anything by it personally. She just laid out the facts to him. Ru’Yi’s father and her mother were confirmed slayers of Dragon Kings. She had a better pedigree than even the Executive Department head. Bloodline wasn’t everything, but it was one of the ways you were evaluated. Even though she was not nearly as skilled as the rest, the crowd around her couldn’t help but part now that she had so clearly conveyed to them who exactly she was. She wasn’t even aware of their reverence. She just smiled and nodded in surprise assuming they were being chivalrous when they offered to carry her bags.

He should have taken the hint from his friend Aaron but she definitely put him in his place in her own way. He had no right object any longer.

Aaron stayed next to him, grinning ear to ear.  He raised his face to the warm sea breeze and sighed. “You look like a kicked dog. Cheer up will you?”

He tilted his head to him. “Sure.”

A uniformed woman, tall, with turtle shell glasses, stepped in front of them all. A small smile graced her lips. Her skin was an exceptionally dark and silky ebony. “I’ll be taking you to your accommodations. Please follow me.” Without waiting for confirmation, she turned and started to lead them down a narrow staircase to a passageway below deck.

“Welcome to the Aido-Hwedo. For the unfamiliar, she is a Yorktown-class Aircraft carrier, staffed with 1,273 persons, not including yourselves. We sail for months at a time patrolling for any sign of dragon activity. We are currently carrying 76 aircraft: 10 Seahawk helicopters, 35 Hornets and 31 Super Hornets. Your fighter the Javelin will be making the entry into the weather anomaly but we are here to support you in any way possible. The goal of this mission will be maximum air superiority.”

Despite the age of the vessel, everything was new and state of the art. The halls were spacious enough for them to walk unobstructed even as it was bustling with people. “My name is Lieutenant Summer Hart and I’m going to be your main point of contact.” She turned on her heel to face them. “This cooperation is based on the association with Mr. Baldwin as well as on the goodwill furnished by Principal Anjou. You are representatives and ambassadors here. So don’t do anything to make Anjou sigh in heaven.” She paused a moment and then smiled. “Oh… who am I kidding, we all know he’s in Hell.”

A ripple of soft laughter came from the group. They all had no experience with Anjou in real life, but his reputation for ruthlessness outlived any other trait he had.

Lieutenant Hart continued walking down the hall. “Because you are guests here, we won’t hold you to the full responsibilities of a sailor, however, we are expecting you to be on your best behavior and to follow the schedule of the ship. You are to report at 6 am for roll call. Breakfast is at 8 am. Lunch at 12 noon and dinner at 5 pm. If you are in need of anything we do have a shopping area here on board. As a guest, you are not expected to pay but please…” She glanced behind her. “Do not abuse the privilege.”

“Part of your responsibilities will be keeping your living area clean and tidy. We do not have maid staff on this voyage. At 9 am, your sleeping area will be thoroughly checked for cleanliness and infractions will be reported. Any contraband will be confiscated.” 

The hallway came to an end and she swiped her card. The wall panel suddenly slid open and they were led to what appeared to be something almost like a hospital ward with white walls lined with art and fluorescent lighting.. “This is where you’ll be sleeping. It’s cramped I know but you won’t be here for very long. I know you’re tired from the journey.”

She suddenly turned to Ru’Yi. “Sleeping areas are strictly separated by gender so I’ll show you to the women’s quarters.” She gave the others a fierce glare. “No men are allowed in the women’s area. If you are seen there you will be thrown into the brig. The area is clearly marked.”

Ru’Yi gave a shy little wince. “I guess I have a room to myself?”

“Not really. We weren’t …” Lieutenant Hart paused, rethinking finishing that sentence. Then her smile returned. “We can discuss that later.” She raised her eyes to the rest of the group. “Do you have any questions?”

Shimoda Masato raised his hand. “This is my first time working with the West Africa Branch. Can you tell me a little about your history?”

Liutenant Hart gave a curt nod. “Hybrids have always existed in Africa. While Mesopotamia is traditionally held as the ‘cradle of civilization’, it was the African plains and low forests that birthed humanity itself. We have the oldest relationship and conflict with dragons and their kind.”

She continued. “Our oral history cannot be fully explained by your traditions of the Dark King and the Light King. Our Creation Traditions do have dual gods, Mawu and Lisa. They are Brother and Sister as well as Husband and Wife.  Mawu is Female and Lisa is Male.”

Ru’Yi rubbed her chin.  “Mawu and Lisa are the same Dark King and the Light King?”

Summer Hart shook her head. “We cannot make that assumption. There are too many differences that cannot be explained by Cassell’s traditional knowledge.”

Aaron had an eager expression, pushing to the front of the group.  “Can you give us a brief run down?”

Summer looked a bit tired but couldn’t resist such an enthusiastic and curious audience. . “It was Mawu who created the earth while riding the Rainbow serpent, Aido-Hwedo, sliding across the ground and creating the hills and mountains. After the creation was finished, Mawu felt that the Earth would sink under its own weight, so she tasked Aido-Hwedo to support the earth in its strong coils under the sea.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “In Cassell tradition, there are two Dragon Gods over all dragons, the Dark King Nidhogg and the Light King Izanami. However, in our tradition, the creator duality itself has a parent: Minona. Our traditions are passed down from her, the Mother of the Earth’s creators. She taught us to use the palm tree to tell the future, that is… Alchemy. Minona herself is a twin, sister to the god Legba, which is consistent with draconic relationships and lore. Legba is the one who gave us our Soul Skills.”

The students were whispering and murmuring among themselves after receiving so much new information.

“So, what you’re saying is there are more than two dragon gods? Then how come we don’t read about them in other histories?” Aaron asked, with a puzzled frown.

Summer Hart gave him a kind but pointed look. “Because our traditions are oral, my dear friend. We did not write them down. There are no temples to explore, no ruins, no clay tablet to find.”

Aaron sighed mournfully. “I’m sure Anjou was really curious about it too. It’s a shame he didn’t get to know any of this. I would have loved to have taken a class.”

Summer didn’t respond to that. She simply turned back to the group. “Any other questions?”

Brian lifted his hand. “What sort of kit is on this ship besides the planes?

“The ship is equipped with 8 Mark 12 5"/38 caliber guns, 45 Bofor antiaircraft guns, 32 Oerlikon cannons. All are modified to deal with dragon targets rather than fighter jets. We’re running heavy with alchemy rounds.”

Aaron blinked in shock. He didn’t expect so much artillery. “From the gear department?” 

She shook her head. “We have our own engineers and alchemists to take care of our needs. But please do not be concerned. We pride ourselves on our alchemical prowess and we have a long history of dragon slaying.”

Aaron raised his hand again. “By any chance we could maybe learn more about your type of Alchemy and Soul skills?”

“I will have to ask the brass but… highly unlikely.” She checked her watch. “I will have to take our lone lady to her sleeping quarters. I suggest you get as much rest as you can.”

[krizaland]

If you’re up for writing some angst could you do a one shot about zim finding out irkens live much longer than humans and now he has to face the fact that his favorite human y/n is not going to be around forever? If you want to write a good ending you could have zim find away to grow a irken body for y/n to upload herself into when the time comes, whatever you want to do. Thank you and have a good day.

Oooh! Interesting! I think I can do that!

NOTE: I made myself cry so sorry if this seems rushed.

Long, long, ago, a large star emerged from the depths of the universe.  The star remained whole for centuries. Until the day, a meteorite smashed into the star, splitting it into two.

One half of the star remained in place while the other was sent spiraling into the never ending sea of countless galaxies.

Ever since that fateful day, each star piece vowed to search the multiverse for their missing half no matter the cost.

The star pieces soon died out and were reborn into their next lives.

With each new life, the star pieces always crossed paths. However, their reunion would always be cut short by the cold hands of death.

Nevertheless the star pieces always managed to find each other.  

A thousand years had passed and the star pieces had been reborn as two young Irkens, You and Zim.

As you set foot in The Academy, you smiled brightly and chirped,

“I’m so excited to be in class with you guys! I know we’re all gonna be the best of friends!”

The moment those words left your lips, Zim felt his PAK spark.

The longer you and Zim trained together the closer the two of you became.

Soon you two were so close it felt like nothing could separate you.

Nothing except the cruel judgement of the Control Brains.

The Control Brains took notice of how emotional you were becoming and decided that was enough reason to delete you.

Zim was devastated and vowed to avenge your memory by becoming the greatest Invader The Irken Empire had ever known!

It wasn’t long before Zim was sent to Urth to continue a ‘secret mission’.

Everyday Zim schemed and schemed. He was ready to enact his latest plan when he heard it.

“Hi, my name’s Y/N.”

Zim let out a gasp as his head jerked up

That voice….It couldn’t be.

“I’m so excited to be in class with you guys! I know we’re all gonna be the best of friends!”

You then flashed the bright smile that Zim remembered so fondly.

Zim clutched at his chest as he felt his PAK spark.

It really was you!

Sure you had a human body, but that cheerful look in your eyes remained the same.

You took your seat next to Zim, and turned to greet him.

The moment your eyes met his you felt a spark of your own, deep within your heart.

Zim was a mess of nerves! How could he be in love with the enemy?! This was all so wrong!

With a loud scream, Zim bolted out of the classroom and straight to his base.

After a long chat with Minimoose, Zim decided it was best to indulge in his feelings.

After all, he had missed you terribly! Just because you had a human body didn’t change who you were right?

The next day Zim cleared his throat and approached you at lunch.

“Y/N, I’d like to apologize for my outburst yesterday, I simply uh, had…explosive diarrhea! Yeah! It was so bad I had to run home screaming!”

“Oh man! Are you ok now?” You asked sympathetically.

“Of course I am! Zim is always ok! I just needed to go home and you know…” Zim chuckled as he rubbed the back of his head.

“Oh I totally get it,”

“Anyhow, I know this is gonna sound pretty sudden but….” Zim swallowed thickly as his PAK sparked.

“But what?”

“Y/N I have chosen to give you the highest honor of being MY LOVE PIG!” Zim sang dramatically.

You nearly choked on your lunch before staring at Zim in shock.

“Are you?! Are you asking me out?”

“Yes. So what do you say?” Zim asked casually.

“Wow! This is definitely sudden..”

You let out a nervous laugh but something about the look in Zim’s eyes beckoned you to say yes.

“Sure! I don’t see why not!”

“Wait really? I mean! Excellent! I shall now sit with you!” Zim announced dramatically.

You giggled again as Zim plopped down next to you.

You and Zim spent the rest of lunch talking and laughing together.  

Despite just meeting, you felt as if you were talking to an old friend you haven’t seen in ages.

Zim held back the urge to cry tears of joy as he spoke to you. Oh how long he had longed to see you again!

From that day forth, you and Zim were inseparable! It was as if time had picked up right where it left off!

Not even Zim revealing his true alien self to you was enough to tear you two apart.

Time passed by and you and Zim had graduated Hi Skool and were headed off to the same College.

Things seemed to be going well until one fateful night.

You and Zim were cuddling under the stars.  

The cool grass tickled your back as you turned to face Zim.

“Hey Zim, how old would you say you were?”

“Eh? I’m about 169 years old.” Zim replied casually.

“Damn! You’re an old fart!” You teased playfully.

“Well I mean, I’m technically 19 in human years!” Zim scoffed as his face turned a darker shade of green.

“Well still! How long do Irkens live anyway?”

“Well we can live up to one thousand years. How long do humans live?” Zim asked as he sat up a bit.

You opened your mouth to speak but you were overcome by a wave of sadness.

“Humans can only live up to 98 years. Maybe 100 if we’re really lucky.” You confessed somberly.

Zim let out a hum before he realized why you sounded so sad.

He was going to outlive you.

“WHAT?! THAT CAN’T BE IT JUST CANT!” Zim blubbered as he pulled you close.

“Well, I mean we’ll still be together for a while so-”

“No! I don’t want to live without you! Not even for a second! I can’t let you die before me!” Zim interjected as he clung to you for dear life.

“Zim it’s gonna be alright we still have-”

“Wait! That’s it! Technology! If I can build you a PAK of your own, it can increase your lifespan!” Zim cheered as he sprung to his feet.

“What? I didn’t say anything about that-”

“Do not question me being ingenious! Now, I apologize but I must get to work at once!”

Zim gave you a kiss on the cheek before running off to his base.

You scoffed as you playfully shook your head.

“What am I gonna do with him?”

A few weeks later, Zim eagerly rushed up to you holding up a PAK just your size!

“The PAK is done! I’ve designed it with your DNA in mind and it’s water proof!” Zim sang cheerfully.

“Woah! That’s amazing, Zim! But are you sure it’s safe?” You asked skeptically.

“Of course it is…Probably! Come with me! I shall attach it to you in the safety of my lab!”

You wanted to protest but you were very intrigued by the idea of having a PAK so you decided to go along with it.

After arriving at Zim’s lab, Zim changed into a white lab coat and green lab goggles.

“Alright, Y/N, now I’m going to attach the PAK to your back. You may feel a slight sting but other than that, you should be fine.” Zim explained as you laid on your stomach.

You held your breath as Zim slipped the PAK under your shirt.

FWIP!

You felt a slight prick as the PAK latched into your back.

“It is done! Now! How do you feel?” Zim’s voice quivered as he spoke.

You blinked as you slowly sat up.

“Well….My back hurts a bit but other than that…I don’t really feel much different.” You admitted as you stretched a bit.

“Excellent! Don’t worry! Your back pain will subside soon! Let me know if there are any other complications!” Zim instructed as he helped you up.

“Will do! You know, this is actually pretty cool! So can my PAK do all the same stuff yours can do?”

“Probably! Wanna find out?”

“Sure!”

And with that, Zim taught you everything you needed to know about your PAK. From learning how to use your PAK legs, to seeing how many things you could stuff inside, you were having the time of your life.

Having a PAK was a bit strange but you loved it nonetheless.

Most importantly, you took comfort in knowing that you would never be separated from Zim ever again…

[msbluebell]

In the captured!AU, let‘s pretend for a moment that Jeralt didn’t die. He wouldn’t just be protective-dad, he‘d be livid-almost blind with fury-dad. Then upon being reunited with his kid he would be nothing short of a supportive father helping his child through a horrible trauma.

Ooooooooooooooooooh ho ho. You. You keep talking Anon, because this prompt is as delicious as Mac and Cheese.

Jeralt has always been silently protective of Byleth. He once set a building on fire, faked his death, and ran off for twenty years just to protect Byleth from Rhea. Byleth is his ONLY child, one of the last things he has of his wife, and many people in game remark how openly proud of his child he is and how much he very obviously loves them. Jeralt may not be the most emotional parent, but he’s a loving, reasonably protective, good father.

So if he survived Monica’s assassination attempt (which I’m going to say still happened, but he survived because Monica’s aim went off when Byleth tried to interfere and she only wounded him) and made it to the war he’d be...destroyed for lack of a better term. 

I find it funny that English doesn’t have a word for parents that outlive their children. We have one for a child that outlives their parent, and a spouse that outlives their spouse, but we don’t have one for a parent that outlives their child. I think we need one, because I can’t imagine something so painful. You can move on from a spouse, but moving on from your child’s death? That’s the kind of bitter, stinging, empty pain that I think would be so difficult that for some it would be impossible. Yeah, we should have a word for that. The Germans have a word, Verwaiste Eltern,because of course they do, they have a word for everything. I once saw a Duke article that argued we should use the word Vilomah, because we use the term widow, which is Sanskirt.

Either way, I think the pain of a parent losing their child is so devastating that it deserves it’s own word. Or...maybe...the reasons we don’t have a word is because, for a loving parent, the pain is so great that they can’t even bare to imagine a word for it.

Jeralt is probably one of those parents that never even considered outliving his child.

In the game he repeatedly mentions his own death, and makes plans and takes steps for if HE dies. But he never once brings up Byleth’s possible death. I think, in his mind, while he OBJECTIVELY knows it’s a possibility, he never once registered it as something that could legitimately happen. For him, Byleth’s death is a far off thing that’s going to happen LONG after he’s gone. He’s taking steps to ensure Byleth has a long and happy life. He’s giving them his wife’s wedding ring, the only other memento he has of her, so they can start finding their own happiness and setting up their own life. These aren’t the actions of a man ready to lose his child at all.

So when the war happens, and Byleth is lost, he’s devastated. 

He’s probably not worried at first, because it’s a battle and Byleth is strong and they’ve probably just been delayed in their escape. They’ll be here soon. The safe spot is good for days.

Then a week passes.

Then two.

It’s not safe to stay in this spot anymore, and Byleth still isn’t here, and there’s a pit forming in his stomach, and his men are starting to think it’s maybe time to tell their bass that there MIGHT be a possibility that maybe, if it’s been this long, their kid ain’t coming back. But no one wants to outright SAY it because, well, how do you tell a man his only child might have been killed?

They’re forced to flee, after a while, because with Imperials marching everywhere and looking for enemies it’s just not safe to stay in one spot for too long. So they run.

As time goes by, Jeralt is starting to think his kid may not be coming back.

Jeralt isn’t an emotional man. He’s always had trouble expressing his feelings. He’s not the type to burst into tears, or plan a wedding the moment someone he knows starts liking someone else. Jeralt is made of quite things, quite moments. He’s the warm hand on your head, the cup of morning coffee that gets you through the day, the small and proud smile when you win, and the shoulder to cry on when you lose. He’s a quite parent that’s quietly supportive and honest when you need him to be.

But when he realizes Byleth isn’t coming back, he cries. It’s not loud sobbing, but a stream of quite, steady, tears that roll down his face. He doesn’t do it in front of his men, he waits until he’s alone, sitting on a rock and facing away from their direction, and he whips them away before he goes back to them. 

(He didn’t need to. His eyes are red. They know. But they’re gracious enough not to comment)

He goes back to try and find the body, when it’s safe, but he never does. And it’s that just cruel? First life takes his kid and now he can’t even bury them. He at least got to bury his wife.

Jeralt decides that, if he can’t even bury the body, than he might as well try to do something Byleth would want him to do, since they’re not here anymore. He’s lived twenty years protecting Byleth, he can spend the rest of his years fighting for the life they’d have lived. The only thing he can think of is protecting those students of theirs, so he heads towards Faerghus.

What he finds is a damn mess.

The King Regent has been assassinated, and now Cornelia is in charge, and Dimitri was supposedly killed. Half the country is sworn to the Empire and the other half is putting up a resistance. Jeralt sighs heavily and points his men toward the resistance, where he thinks Byleth’s students would be set up. He’s pretty sure the two lords in charge of it are parents of her students.

He’s welcomed by Rodrigue with a sad smile. Rodrigue knows what it’s like to lose a child (and, oh, what pain that causes. It swallows you whole. And nothing makes it better. You can tell yourself they died for something good, that they died right, but that only makes your other child hate you), and he’s very sympathetic. He wouldn’t have said no to the extra forces even if Jeralt wasn’t there, but his heart is soft for another parent that’s known such loss.

Jeralt serves as both a tactical adviser and a captain for his forces. He also helps Rodrigue and Gustav try to track Dimitri (Byelth had really liked that kid, he remembers. Byleth had mentioned him a few times, anyway, which was a lot for them, so Jeralt figures there must have been a lot of fondness there. He doesn’t have the whole story, and now he kinda wishes he did so he’d have something to say, but he’ll have to contend with trying to find the kid), but the kid is slippery as and eel and good at staying hidden. Jeralt is honestly impressed that the kid is so good at surviving when the entire Empire is hunting him down. Even HE can’t find the kid and he’s good at his job.

He tries to take care of the other students in the meantime. He tries to visit them when he can, check up on them, make sure they’re healthy. It’s what Byleth would want. And, to be honest, he’s growing quite fond of them himself. Annette is a sweet girl, and so is Mercedes. And Ashe is a good kid that he can see going far. Felix is intense, but Jeralt knows deep down he cares a lot, maybe too much, and he’s just guarding his heart. Sylvain he keeps out of trouble too, because he seems to find it a lot. And, really, they don’t fill the hole Byleth left behind, but they numb it for a bit and that’s the best he can ask for.

He never gets over Byleth’s death, and the lack of funeral, but he’s able to at least live a meaningful life for them. That’s not enough, but it’s something.

Then, one day, Rodrigue comes to him with a letter from the Alliance.

Byleth is alive.

Byleth is ALIVE.

His child is alive.

Claude wrote out all the details from his “reliable source I have in Enbarr”. Byleth was captured in the battle five years ago after falling off a cliff and being knocked unconscious. They’ve been held in solitary confinement in the top of a tower in Enbarr for the last five years. The reasons no announcement from the Empire has been made is because Edelgard is keeping them as her personal prisoner and not a political one, and the reason his spies haven’t found out about this sooner is because Byleth is confined to that single room with no access to the outside world, no windows to spy through, and no one but the most trusted staff allowed within a tower full of traps and mazes. Apparently, according to Claude, only Edelgard’s inner circle are even allowed to deliver meals.

Jeralt is...livid to say the least.

Rodrigue is barely a third of the way through the letter, reading it to a horrified council, when Jeralt slams his hands on the table and throws himself up, knocking back his chair. He’s marching out the room in moments. When Rodrigue asks where he’s going he just gruffly and furiously spits out, “Enbarr.”

It takes all of Rodrigues power to stop him, furiously chasing after the enraged man and trying to talk reasons and sense into him. Telling him that he can’t go alone or he’ll die, and that they need to increase their army, and that Gustav found another lead on Dimitri so give them time to get him, and the Alliance and they could combine forces, and they’ve gotten into contact with Seteth recently so they could gather the remaining Knights of Seiros. The’ll rescue Byleth, that will be a top priority, but they need TIME and FORCES.

Jeralt is not having it. He argues back. That’s his KID in there, trapped like some sort of...of...of PET. They’ve been stuck there for YEARS while he’s been wasting time. And you wouldn’t be so calm if that were GLENN.

A silence falls over them, and Jeralt realizes he’s made a terrible mistake.

He sighs, rubbing his forehead. He knows that was uncalled for. That was massively uncalled for. He says that, and he apologies. But Rodrigue shakes his head, saying he’s right, if that were Glenn he’d be acting like this too, and there’s no need to apologize, and he’s heard worse from Felix anyway (and Jeralt should really get those two to actually sit down and TALK sometime before it’s too late). Jeralt says that there is, because Rodrigue is right, he can’t get Byleth out on his own. It’s just...that’s his KID. That’s his kid and he thought they were DEAD and now they’re ALIVE and they’re being kept as a PET away from them and he can’t stand it.

Rodrigue puts his hands on Jeralt’s shoulders and promises that they’re going to get Byleth back. That it will be one of the first things they do. He swears his life on it.

Jeralt nods and says the same about Dimitri.

Turns out, Rodrigue was right to stop him, because a few weeks later they’re at Garreg Mach, and both Byleth AND Dimitri are there, showing up together like ghosts returning from the dead.

And, shit, both kids have had a rough time of it. Dimitri is half mad and feral from being hunted in the woods for five years, and some clearly unresolved issues have only made him worse than ever. And he’s glad that Rodrigue is still holding up the front in Faerghus because he doesn’t want him to see his kid like this.

Byleth isn’t much better. They’re not half mad like Dimitri, but captivity wasn’t a good look on them. They’re wearing Empire Red silks and they’re pale as a ghost. They can’t stand outside too long without turning pink as a big, but they can’t stand to stay inside either. They won’t even sleep in their room anymore, taking up a spot in the chapel. And Dimitri is always standing by them too, half mad but ready to skewer people at a moment’s notice if Byleth asks it. 

It’s...hard for him to see his kid like that.

He can’t huge his kid for too long anymore, because they don’t like feeling trapped. So even though he wants to hold them tight and never let go, he has to let go quickly or they’ll start to panic, and that will set Dimitri off, and he’s like a guard dog as it is.

Most nights Jeralt sleeps in the chapel with Dimitri and Byleth (though he has yet to see Dimitri actually sleep. It’s more like he just stands there, looming over everything. It’s unnerving, downright disturbing, and Jeralt is legitimately worried that Dimitri may have trained himself to sleep standing up or something. Or worse, not sleep at all. It explains why he’s gone mad for damn sure, and he makes a not to try and pump Chamomile in that kid and try to get him a nap because maybe that’ll help calm him down. It helps Byleth get to sleep these days. Lavender and Chamomile. And him being there). Byleth doesn’t really wake up screaming from nightmares, but when they do wake up they always end up panicking for a moment before looking around, making sure there’s sunlight and a place to escape. It breaks his damn heart.

He has to help Byelth get used to sunlight again. They need limited time, even though all they seem to want to do most days is lay in the grass. He has to herd them back in though, before they’re burned. But every day they get a little more time. It’s slow going, but he thinks it helps. 

Still, he can’t help but hate Edelgard. He has his kid back, but Goddess above, look at them. Dimitri and Byleth are both a wreck at best, and he and the others have to take care of them and get them back on their feet for the battles ahead (which is hard, because Dimitri only listens to Byleth, and sometimes even that isn’t reliable if he gets too lost on the battlefield. Still, it looks like for the most part Byleth has got Dimitri’s recovery in their hands, and Jeralt has Byleth’s so it’s FINE).

When the day comes, he’ll kill that Edelgard woman himself if she even looks at Byleth wrong. He’s going to destroy that tower and scatter it’s stone across the seas. 

He’s going to help these kids get better, and rub it in the world’s face. He’ll look every god in the eye and spit in their face before he lets anything bad happen to them ever again.

[tae-cup]

A Sad Announcement

I am absolutely devastated. No words can describe the grief that consumes me right now. My guinea pig, Rocky, fell ill recently. We tried to keep him going, but he’s old, probably around 95 in guinea pig years. He’s outlived his brother by two years and lived a long and happy life. I have had him and his brother since I was eight years old. They were my first pets and my first loves. I remember insisting on feeding and cleaning them and I always took over whenever my mom was gone. With great sadness, Magellan, Rocky’s brother, got very very sick and we kept him sustained for about three weeks before we made the decision to put him to sleep. 

A few days ago, Rocky began slowing down. He stopped eating and drinking so my mom and dad tried to feed and water him, which he happily accepted. He was just so exhausted. He was an old pig. After our New Years celebration today, my parents went back downstairs to check up on him. I’m kicking myself because I had this gut feeling hours ago to check on him, to make sure he was alright, but I didn’t go downstairs. We found Rocky had died in his little soft baggy that my parents had put him in to keep him warm. I’m completely devastated and in a state of shock. Everything happened so fast compared to the slow and awful way Magellan passed away. I will be releasing the next chapters of Calcu-LATER that are already planned and I might write a few oneshots, but I will need some time to process everything. 

I know grief affects people differently and the way people react is different. In the past, I have found my way of coping is pretending everything is fine. Everything is not fine. I repeat, everything is not fine. I’m only writing this now before I get the sense to go on with life as if nothing has happened and it’s an awful trait of mine. Thank you for your patience in the coming weeks.

[ourimpavidheroine]

First of all, I've been reading all of your fic over the past week and it's just so GOOD. Where have you been all my life? Secondly, I wanted to ask about Naoki. Will she always live in the Fire Nation? Will things get better for her? She's my favorite of all your OCs (which are all great btw). Thanks for everything!

I’ve been right here! I’ve been writing fic for the past 5.5 years! :D

Seriously, though, thank you so much for taking the time to come and let me know you’ve been enjoying it. I’m always grateful and appreciative when readers take the time to do that.

So about Naoki... She will live in the Fire Nation, yes. She does have her bending school in Republic City at the old Sato Estate; she will end up building another school outside of the caldera in the Fire Nation capitol island with Juziya’s approval and silent assistance. (The property belongs to the crown and Juziya gifts it to her.) Both schools are meant to educate benders who cannot otherwise get training due to their financial situation (thinking of her father and uncle) or because they were born a bender into a family that doesn’t have other benders of their type (thinking of herself). I imagine as more people in the United Republic of Nations intermarry that families like Mako and Bolin’s, where there are kids of differing bending abilities, will be more common. Who is training these benders? (Her schools will focus on earth, water and firebending - airbenders take care of their own at this point.) Her school in the Fire Nation will mostly take on boarding students as most firebenders in the Fire Nation don’t have difficulties getting training. 

She and Lozan will visit her parents very frequently in Republic City and of course the Firelord’s vacation home is just down the road from Wu’s on Ember Island and it will be very common for the families to holiday together.

There will always be people in the Fire Nation court who will disapprove of her. She purposefully keeps her hair cropped short, which is a bit of a slap in the face to the culture there, which prizes the topknot and associates it with honor. Naoki doesn’t want anyone to forget where she comes from, which is just how she is, and there will be people who take offense at that. She’s got a Republic City/Noble Earth Kingdom accent which she point blank refuses to modify (and which will flavor Lozan’s speech no matter how his tutors try to smooth it out). She is granted special permission to wear both her flaming butterfly badge as well as her Hou-Ting badge and that pisses off a lot of people as well. (Juziya, who is a brilliant politician, is smart enough to pick her battles when it comes to Naoki. She’s also been known to use Naoki as a weapon when Naoki isn’t necessarily isn’t aware of it, something which Sozui does recognize and keeps well out of.)

Things will get better for her. She will try to have another baby but it never works out for them; she’s 36 when Lozan is born so she lets it go by the time he is 10 or so and is okay with it. She and Sozui will fight a fair amount but that’s just their dynamic and it doesn’t make her unhappy. She loves her son very, very much and his firebending will, one day, rival her own. She will eventually dote on her grandchildren, who will adore her in turn. She and Juziya will, after a shaky beginning, become allies and eventually the best of friends. (They are not dissimilar, something which Sozui prudently does NOT point out.)

She does not ever officially find out who her parents were, although Ursa will, as an old woman, tell her what she suspects. Naoki, being Naoki, accepts this but it changes nothing for her. She knows who her real parents are.

Mako’s passing will devastate her and she will never be quite the same after it. She will live to be a very old woman, outliving Sozui by only six months or so. She’s ready to go when she goes and is at peace with it. She will be buried next to him in the royal shrine but she does ask her son to take some of her ashes to be buried with her grandparents, parents and brother in Republic City. She is their butterfly that flew away but she loves her family very much and will, despite the distance, always be a part of their lives.

[imaginesbymk]

Jerome being in denial that you’re dead would include...

— Requested by anonymous!

He wasn’t there to see you die so of course he was gonna laugh and wave the person off for telling him you were dead

Jerome thought it was hilarious that something that bizarre came out as serious news to him

He always thought you were immortal and smart to not get yourself killed

Days and weeks pass and Jerome hasn’t seen you in a hot minute

He’d assume you’re busy at work or school so he’d come into your house (he has his way of breaking in)

He realizes no ones home, you were no where to be found

“Mr. Valeska. Take in consideration what I said,” Jervis Tetch cautiously tells him. “Beloved Y/n is dead.”

“No she’s not!” Jerome says, waving him off.

He makes himself at home on your couch

But over time it slowly consumes him knowing you were nowhere to be seen and he’d rather lose again and again than not see your face or hear your voice

Usually he wouldn’t even care if someone he worked with died, in fact he’d forget about them. But with you, it was so different.

He’d fake a smile though

But making sure, Jerome asks Jonathan Crane: “So! Are you two bozos just gonna stare at me or are you gonna tell me how she...”

Crane and Tetch both stayed silent, not wanting to answer to avoid angering him.

It angered him anyway and takes it out on everyone

Jerome eventually figures it out on his own, finding out how you died.

Your death was devastating. It didn’t mean for it to happen to you but you truly deserved better. Not even the GCPD could save you, and Jerome couldn’t save you either.

But Jerome was stubborn and thinking that if he died once and got resurrected, so could you

After invading the Gotham concert festival with kidnapping the Gotham council, waiting for his brother Jeremiah and Bruce Wayne, he was also waiting for you to make a surprising comeback like how he did

Jim Gordon arrives at the scene and demands to let the hostages go and volunteers himself to go up there

This enrages Jerome.

“I don’t want you, Jim. I want my brother and I want Bruce. And I want Y/n to be here to see it all happen. She loves it when I’m in the spotlight. I want them now.”

“Jerome—” Jim says.

“No no no! Don’t even start,” Jerome now had his finger on the switch that ignites the explosives. “She’s not dead. She’s just a little late.”

“Y/n is dead, Jerome.” Jim hated Jerome, but he understood why he was behaving this way. He knew exactly why, as he would act the same if it were Lee. “I’m sorry. I know you loved her but she won’t come. Now let me get these people outta here, I’ll come up there—“

“YOU’RE NOT LISTENING TO ME!”

Everything backfires and Jerome was now gripping onto the bar sticking out the edge of the building as he is clinging on to his life. Accepting his fate, he knew this would happen and there’s always someone else to carry on his legacy.

“It’s a long way down, you sure you’ll outlive me?” Jim asks, his hand being extended out to reach for him to grab.

“Oh I’m sure. Maybe I physically won’t be, but at least Y/n would.”

“I’ll say it again, Jerome. She won’t be. She’s—“

“Dead,” Jerome finishes for him. “She’s dead... I know... but I’ll be seeing her soon.” He reassures him. “She has a lot of explaining to do, and you’ll be seeing me soon.” His fingers were like butter as he slips off the bar, laughing manically as he falls to his death on top of the roof of a car. “Au revoir!”