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ellekhen · 1 year ago

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Hand, Hearth, and Home

Chapter 1 - A Warding Bond

Summary

“I… envy you,” Astarion admits. “In your short life, you already seem to have had your share of… experiences,” he smirks at him suggestively for a fleeting moment. “And much of it seems to have been… enjoyable. Willing.” He flourishes a hand. “You know what I mean.”

Church smiles wistfully. “I try my best, but it hasn’t all been perfect. I’ve had my share of… mistakes.” His mouth twists a little.

“I certainly hope I’m not one of them,” Astarion half-heartedly jokes.

Church looks at him earnestly.

“No,” he says softly. “You’re not.”

Astarion flounders for a moment at that.

When Church loves, he loves with the intensity of the sun. His childhood friends know this well. But, when it comes to his lovers, the warlock tends to wield a much lighter, cautious touch… that is, until he begins to fall hard for a certain vampire spawn. In their respective, wary calculations every encounter, Astarion and Church know they very well could be the death of each other. But as the trust between them grows, Church learns to let go of the past that holds him back from embracing the future — no matter how uncertain it may be here at the vampire spawn’s side.

Pairing(s): Astarion x Male Tav (Main); Past OC x Male Tav Rating: Explicit

@lumienyx tagged me in a “why/how did your Tav fall?” prompt, and whoops, it turned into a fic!

Excerpt below:

The rogue and warlock are searching through one of the infirmaries when the tiefling lets out a small, intrigued gasp.

“Oh!” Church murmurs. “It’s the other half of that pair of rings. Remember? We found one on that justiciar’s skeleton.” He pulls out the ring in question from his pouch, comparing the two side by side before passing them both over to Astarion. The rogue examines them as the warlock gingerly retrieves the journal from the withered skeleton’s grasp.

As he begins to read it, his mouth twists. “Oh…” he repeats, albeit softer and more troubled.

Astarion peers over his shoulder. “What is it?”

“The husband’s journal,” Church murmurs. “It tells… a much different story.” He sighs, handing it over to the rogue as well. “Poor bastard.”

Astarion skims through it. Poor bastard indeed — blissfully blinded by love when all the justiciar was doing was using him as a shield. He has to admire that it was clever of the justiciar to deceive the fool into such an arrangement. Although, by the sound of the sorry sod’s journal entries, if his dark bride had simply asked, he may very well have entered the arrangement willingly — warding bond be damned.

At first Astarion scoffs — he simply doesn’t understand people who would thanklessly sacrifice themselves just that.

…but then he thinks — just for a moment.

Does he understand? Just a little?

The more he dwells upon it, the rings’ magic as described between the two texts is certainly fascinating as a concept…

“What’s on your mind?” Church asks him, crouching down to tug a disintegrating blanket over the skeleton, for some reason.

“Well, you know,” Astarion hesitates even as he offers. Why he even offers is a mystery. “Remember… just this morning? Those… things by the river?”

The warlock’s hand flies reflexively up to his neck. “Meazels,” he grimaces.

“…meazels,” Astarion nods, gesturing emphatically. “Anyways. Since you have, hm, a tendency to take hits fairly heavily… why don’t we… you know…” he makes a gesture that would have been lewd under any other circumstances, if not for his sincere expression. “That way, even when you’re far off, I can still protect you? Take a couple hits?”

Astarion never fathomed he would ever offer such a thing to anyone. He had offered to take punishment on behalf of a sibling only once, and Godey and Cazador both made sure that he regretted it more than anything else in the moment. Violet never bothered to return the favor anyways.

But Church…

…misty-stepped right in front of the wretched creature, blasting it away before its claws could reach Astarion. Damn it, the rogue scolded himself, he had gotten sloppy. Then again, none of them expected to be ambushed by such vicious creatures, especially ones that would go straight after their casters to —

He heard a strangled gasp. A meazel leapt out from the shadows, his wire whipping over Church’s neck. Astarion only had a split-second for their eyes to connect before both the struggling meazel and tiefling went hurtling over the edge of the building…

In the present, the elf gives the tiefling a meaningful look. If Astarion has to haul the warlock’s lifeless body from the ground one more time…

“No.” Church says firmly, waving him away.

“Oh, well,” Astarion says, somewhat relieved if a little miffed by how quickly the tiefling rejected the idea. “At least consider the practicality…”

“I am not going to let you be hurt because of my own carelessness,” Church snaps. “You read that journal. It’s a curse, not a blessing.”

“There’s no need for that tone,” Astarion retorts, taken aback by its harshness. “Don’t pretend you wouldn’t do the same for me.”

Church’s mouth twists and he sighs.

“…fine. You’re right — I would. But I don’t want to use these at all. I think we’ve been doing a pretty good job at covering each other’s backs lately, don’t you?” He smiles wanly at his lover. “We’ve been doing this… right, I think.”

Astarion regards him with amusement as he pockets the rings. “Doing this ‘right?’ I suppose if one of us has any idea of what that even means, it’s you.”

Church’s smile is gentle as he shrugs at him. “I’m hardly an expert, Astarion. I just do the same for you as I would for any friend, just with… you know, more…”

Astarion steps close to him, smirking as he tips the tiefling’s chin up in a kiss. Church hums softly, stumbling into him in his enthusiasm.

…it’s followed by a dry crunch.

The warlock startles, gingerly stepping off of the poor bastard in his bedroll. “Shit, sorry,” he mutters unnecessarily.

Astarion watches him, fondly.

“To be honest, I admire how easy it is for you to define what is ‘right’ in an arrangement such as ours. It’s…” he wheedles, “…admittedly not my area of expertise.”

“I…” Church frowns. “We’ve talked about this. I just don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do. It’s not that hard.”

“You’re sweet,” Astarion smirks. “But it’s not that straightforward for all of us.” He sighs, reluctantly stepping away from the warmth of him. “Although with you — perplexing as you often are — sometimes it is that simple. It’s… refreshing.”

Church glances away a little self-consciously, a little worriedly as the elf continues to study him.

Church smiles wistfully. “I try my best, but it hasn’t all been perfect. I’ve had my share of… mistakes.” His mouth twists a little.

“I certainly hope I’m not one of them,” Astarion half-heartedly jokes.

Church looks at him earnestly.

“No,” he says softly. “You’re not.”

Astarion flounders for a moment at that.

“Well,” he says with a flustered laugh. “That at least is a relief.” He leers conspiratorially at the tiefling. “Why don’t we brighten this place up? Tell me about the good ones.”

Church frowns at him. “Honestly, I’m not sure how I feel about—?”

“—Oh, come on!” Astarion waves him away. “It’s fine. I’m bored. Humor me.”

Church studies him for a moment longer, before chuckling nervously. “Well… I snuck into a castle one time to visit a duke’s son…”

“I bet Wyll wishes that were him,” Astarion remarks, and the tiefling blushes purple beneath his dusky skin.

“Oh shush,” he laughs. “I had to run out of there for my life, clad only in a chaperon.”

He thinks for a moment.

“There was a half-elf bard in Baldur’s Gate — D’vana, if you’ve ever heard of her during your… nights out? Green skin, white poof of hair?”

Astarion shrugs. He’s not much in the habit of paying attention to the entertainment of his hunting grounds.

“Anyways, I used to visit her whenever I stopped by the city,” Church continues fondly. “We’d…”

“…make music together?” Astarion finishes for him suggestively. The tiefling huffs a laugh.

“We tried once or twice, but as you saw with Alfira, I’m hopeless with a lute,” he says with a sheepish grin. “No sense of rhythm… oh, wait.” He flushes. “That’s… not what you meant, was it?”

“Were you one of those adventurers who had a lover in every city?” Astarion asks in amusement.

“Lovers?” Church laughs. “No, nothing of the sort. Just… moments. Flights of fancy. Good friends,” he concedes, “but nothing more.”

“Well, those all sound like incredibly delicious moments with those friends of yours,” Astarion says lightly.

He waffles for a bit. “So are we… is this the first time you’ve done… something… like… this?” He waves his hand. “Whatever the hells this is.”

Something unreadable flashes across Church’s face as he glances away for a moment. The levity drains from his face even as he smiles softly back at the elf. “Do you mean something recurring? Exclusive?”

“I suppose,” Astarion drawls.

Church looks down, fiddling with the strap to his pouch.

“There were… a few,” he says softly, but then he blinks and straightens up, shrugging. “But nothing ever ended well.”

“Hm, well that doesn’t exactly bode well for us,” Astarion quips. The last word rings in the stale air for a moment.

“Us.” What a concept.

“I…” Church laughs nervously. “I don’t want to think like that,” he murmurs. He looks around to make sure they’re alone before reaching and grasping hold of Astarion’s hand, covering it with his other. He looks up into the elf’s eyes. “If anything, the past has just taught me to treasure each moment I can get with you,” he murmurs. “I… want to make each one last in my mind. I want to make sure…”

He trails off, and laughs a little, nervously.

“We should keep moving, shouldn’t we?” he says. “This… this is hardly the place to let our guard down.”

Astarion catches him before he can move away. The elf peers into the tiefling’s starry, yellow eyes, which struggle to hold his gaze as he stares back at him. Church’s lip quivers for just a moment, and Astarion pulls him into a soft, lingering kiss.

“Don’t tell me I’m the optimist in this arrangement,” he japes quietly. “I… like this, Church. No matter how it ends.”

Read more on Ao3!

#baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #bg3 oc #churchstarion #bg3 fanfiction #bg3 astarion #baldur's gate iii #baldur’s gate fanfiction #astarion #baldurs gate astarion #fanfiction #fanfic #bg3 fan fic #bg3 tiefling #tiefling #bg3 warlock #oc x astarion #tav x astarion #hand hearth and home

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usa-manors-library · 2 years ago

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The Mystery Visitor

Breathlessness. I'm not even sure if it could be considered an emotion, but... It felt like one. It felt like one crushing me as I stood in front of the manor. The manor that looked almost unrecognizable after so many years.

It was nighttime. Not a single light illuminated the world, except for the silver rays of the moon, partly obscured by passing clouds.

The sounds the soft wind caused were all I heard other than my heart pounding. They were welcoming noises. The tree branches swaying and the grass rustling reminded me that this was real. That this wasn't a dream.

It almost felt like one. The scene was idealistic enough to be a painting displayed only in establishments as distinguished as the Louvre.

I stared at the house in complete silence.

I promised myself that I wouldn't tear up. Reminding myself of that, I wiped the trembling back of my hand against my watery eyes and took a single deep, shaky breath. I couldn't fathom what I was about to do...

But I knew I had to get moving before dawn and... well, I was already here. It would be a waste to not follow through with it. With another deep breath, I went forward on my journey.

As stealthy as a hunted mouse, I circled around the house. Anyone and everyone inside the building should be fast asleep by now, but I didn't want to take that chance...

I couldn't quite find what I was looking for. All the windows and doors were locked... It seemed like my mission had run into a wall.

Quite literally, I thought to myself as my gaze traced up the unfamiliar structure. Shaking away my doubts, I began my ascent to the top.

A small smile bloomed on my face as I climbed over the stone garden walls. The rumors were true. New Jersey grew up to love gardening, that much was obvious by the condition of the walled-in paradise. I could see it was cherished dearly, almost as if my little brother dedicated himself to making it the sequel of the Garden of Eden.

After sliding my legs over the top, I dropped down in the soft dirt below quietly, fulfilling my goal to miss the nearby flower bed. The dirt smelled damp and fresh, most likely watered the previous evening.

I took in the sight for a moment more before creeping my way to the main garden path.

It wasn't long before the kitchen door stood before me. I softly wiped the dirt off my shoes as I reached for the handle.

I abruptly paused as my breath hitched.

It was left unlocked.

After all these years, the family still hasn't quite mastered the art of remembering to lock the kitchen door.

A wave of nostalgia washed over me as I processed the fact. It was such a tiny detail, but... it was enough to make me want to tear up again.

I stood in the open doorway, staring into the dark kitchen. My legs were trembling.

I hovered in the doorway for a moment more as I tried to gather my thoughts, my emotions... Myself, essentially.

Swallowing my bitter doubts, I shakily stepped into my old home. Suddenly, the song of the wind outside wasn't enough to convince me that this wasn't a dream.

Feeling as if I were in a trance, I drifted across the floor mutely.

Despite the renovated appearance of the kitchen, everything felt the same. The scratches Virginia's old cat left on the sides of the door of the kitchen were still there, now joined by some new ones. I wondered how many more she owned after the one I knew passed.

Everything was a blur. The rooms, the thoughts, the memories, my eyes... I vaguely realized in hindsight of the ordeal that the blur might of been tears.

Before long, I was in the dining room. I didn't even know that I walked away from the kitchen until I stood by a chair.

His chair. It was in the center of everything.

I felt my hand trace over the chair and the scratches on it. It was the same one he sat on when he placed me on his knee when I was small. The same one he prayed a blessing over the food from before every family meal. The same one he lectured us about food fights from.

The old portrait of Britain and the even older portrait of England still sat on either side of the dining room's fireplace, although they've since been vandalized. Most likely at a post-Revolutionary War party, considering the messages scrawled on the paintings.

I looked down at the long table. Yet again; it was the same, despite the two new ones joining it looking like they were made more recently. At least more recently than the 1600s.

I pulled Dad's chair out slightly and crouched down. I crawled under the table and looked up at the bottom of it.

Names. So many carvings of names. Familiar and unfamiliar.

I laid on my back and looked up at them. There was my name, right where I left it... There were carvings of flowers around it this time. That was new.

All the new names checked out with the family members that have been added since my departure. Even one that was mostly scratched out read 'Dixie.'

I crawled out from under the table and stood once more.

I don't exactly remember how I got there, but soon I was in Dad's study.

It was the same as always; bookshelves and paintings lining the walls, a nice carpet laying over the wood floor, and two seats facing Dad's dark oak desk, illuminated in the moon's glow by a large window behind his desk chair.

As always, the desk was disheveled. I remembered he always tried his best to keep it neat, but he had trouble with that when he was working.

Folders were scattered, three empty mugs were collecting dust, crumpled notes were tossed to the side...

The only thing that seemed to be in order were the two framed pictures.

One seemed to be a recent family photo taken on the front steps of the manor, including everyone from the territories to West— Ehm, regular Germany. Getting everyone to pose for that picture must of been quite a feat.

The second was a smaller pencil drawing of all his other children who never had the chance to get in the family photo. Popham, Saybrook, West Jersey, and... You get the idea.

The room smelled faintly of vanilla and smoke. I had no idea if it was recent or not... I wondered if he ever quit smoking.

Quickly and quietly, I tidied up his office for him. I told myself going into this that I wouldn't touch anything, just look, but... I couldn't leave without showing him I still cared, even if he would have no idea that I was the one to clean up.

Softly closing the study's door as I left, there was only one last room I wanted to see before bolting; my own.

I was almost certain they turned it into something new. I couldn't help but be curious on what it might be now.

It was a stressful trip to get there. It was right in the middle of a hallway where some of my siblings' rooms were located, and I had no way of knowing who was there or not. My heart was pounding like a drum as I crept through the dangerous zone. A single noisy floorboard would be this situation's equivalent of a land mine.

Miraculously, I made it without having a heart attack. Resisting the urge to breath a sigh of relief, I turned the handle and entered the room, quietly shutting the door behind me.

I turned around and faced my small, old room. I felt my heart freeze.

I was expecting it to be storage, a sitting room, possibly a guest bedroom...

But nothing could've prepared me for it to look exactly like it did when I left it.

My wardrobe. My bed. My books.

The sight I saw before me was the same sight I saw before running away to save my family's reputation...

Unmoved. Undisturbed. Untouched.

Almost untouched, at least. There was a fresh vase of roses left on my desk... Someone's been in here recently.

In addition to that, a piece of paper was peaking out of one of the drawers.

Curiosity overtook me and I went over to the desk, feeling like I was floating in a hazy dream instead of walking in a very real room. I opened the drawer and felt a lump in my throat as I realized what was inside. A smell of paper filled the room.

Dad's written me letters. Hundreds of them.

'Dearest Haven.'

'Good Morning, New Haven.'

'Happy First Independence Day, Haven.'

I stumbled back ever so slightly, unable to control my surprise.

'The Country Is Split, Haven.'

'God End Me Now, Haven.'

'The World War's Over, Haven.'

I sat at my bed, eyes darting from one random title I saw to another.

'Prohibition Sucks, Haven.'

'Haven You Would Not BELIEVE Which War's Getting a Sequel.'

'You'd Laugh At Me If You Saw Where I Was Now, Haven.'

It was the same thing he did with Poppy... With Saybrook...

'Haven, Pardon My French But Soviet's a Little B**ch.'

'AYYY! HE'S DEAD, HAVEN! :D"

'Happy Birthday, Haven (2022).'

The letters started to blur and swirl together as a heavy feeling of guilt and bitterness overwhelmed me.

He missed me. Gosh, he missed me so much.

I knew he did something similar after Popham and Saybrook died. He must of did the same thing for West Jersey and I.

It was his way of coping. Whenever Dad needed to clear his mind, I would see him writing letters to his deceased kids. He'd write them advice, updates, stories... as if they were still with him.

I felt terrible. I didn't deserve this. I didn't deserve any of this mourning. I wasn't dead. I was only hiding...

I used to be the embarrassment of my family, when I lived with them. A colony without even a mere charter. Easily pushed around by Connecticut's larger forces.

I was ashamed of myself. I hated that I embarrassed my own family's reputation, so I ran.

After a couple of decades and some desperate searching... They finally assumed me dead.

I didn't show my face to anyone until my colors changed, when I could finally pass myself off as a new person; Connecticut's city of New Haven.

I've been living a lie for years now. The only relative I've seen since is Connecticut, who thankfully can't seem to see past my newly made appearance and mannerisms.

I was a coward. I was a filthy coward, and it resulted in me giving my father extra pain to burden over the years.

I thought he would've been relieved to get rid of the family's weakest link... What now?

I stared at the drawer filled to the brim with letters as dozens of ideas and scenarios rushed through my head.

I could tell the truth. I could go back to my family... My home, which I've longed for since leaving.

But... would they even let me back in?

I've hurt them... My Dad, at the very least. I gave them all this pointless grief. They'd be angry if I came back now, especially when I take back my role of being the family disappointment... Everyone else would be states, territories, federal districts... And what am I? Another random city of my brother's? One that isn't even the biggest?

I can never face my family now. My return would cause more harm than good.

I love them, though... I love them to the point that it hurts. Watching them grow and flourish on the sidelines has been difficult for me, but I don't want to be selfish and go with the alternative.

I stood from my old bed, eyes locked on the letters. I was itching to take them. At least a single one. I wanted to hear what my Dad would've told me if I was around. It was the closest thing to talking to him in person I'd ever achieve now.

I felt a stab in my heart as I realized I couldn't. He might look back on his letters. One shouldn't be missing or crinkled.

I looked at them longingly as they disappeared into the desk once more as I shut the drawer.

I smelled a single whiff of the flowers (roses; Dad's favorite) before backing out of the room. Yet again; the hallway was barren of other life.

I noiselessly rushed back through the house, pushing down the memories this time. It didn't take long for me to get back to the kitchen door.

I couldn't help it. I started running.

I slammed the door behind me as I practically jumped over the garden wall. I slid off the stones this time. It seems like the clouds covering the moon before had finally started a storm.

The second I was back on my feet, I bolted. Away from the house, away from the memories, away from my family. The ground was slick, but I didn't know if I kept slipping because of the weather conditions or if the night had stressed and exhausted me to the point of my knees giving out.

I raced out the large, unlocked front gate. I raced down the road. I raced and raced until I found my car where I left it; hidden behind some bushes.

I immediately got in, started it, and sped off. The storm raged outside as I took some deep breaths to calm down. I shakily turned on the radio as I drove home.

I had a hard time finding a song that wouldn't make me break down immediately. Fed up with all the lyrics, I switched to a piano station. The slow version of New Home by Austin Farwell filled the car. Not exactly cheery, but... I guess it

With a sigh, I shook my head and drove off into the night.

──────── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ────────

Connecticut had no idea who that shadow of a man was, or what he wanted... But he didn't seem to hurt anything. It was probably just one of his brothers, collecting something he left at the manor after a visit.

Despite agreeing with this conclusion, Connecticut lingered at the window for a while more. For whatever reason, he felt the need to... follow it... As if something precious was escaping him...

He didn't move an inch. He stayed at the window until the mystery visitor disappeared into the rain.

#countryhumans #statehumans #cityhumans #colonyhumans #?#USAManor! New Haven #USAManor! Connecticut #USAManor! America

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fromthemouthofkings · 1 year ago

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Nanowrimo 2023

aka: let me ramble to you about my nonbinary lesbian polyam mermaid story

Summary:

When misanthropic marine biologist Belle Fischer moves into the cozy seaside town of Hidden Coves, she is reluctantly amused by the town's kitchy charm...and the town's baker, one very charming butch named SJ Ortiz. However, mysterious forces are moving in the deep, and Belle soon finds herself torn between the land and the sea.

The cast of characters:

Belle Fischer: a pretty, punk marine biologist who loves the ocean almost as much as she is afraid of people

SJ Ortiz: a charming, soft butch cupcake shop owner and overachiever, fun aunt, and smooth talker extrairdinaire

Aen: them that the ocean whispers to when it has bad dreams, priest of the old god speedrunning their religious trauma, an actual real life mermaid

excerpt below the cut

Unfortunately, the cozy little seaside town of Hidden Coves was the only fucking place in the world where the endangered Scarlet Bellied Sea Turtle laid its eggs. Not down the coast in sunny Los Angeles, where the UCLA campus could provide easy access to lab space, equipment, and punk shows. Not up in San Francisco, which at least had a subculture, even if it was kind of a tourist trap. No, the Scarlet Bellied Sea Turtle was a picky motherfucker that insisted on laying its eggs in the kitchiest town on the coast of California.

Belle glowered at the faded sign announcing Come find us Fathoms Below at Fathoms Below Deepsea Adventure Park! One spindly, weatherbeaten wooden roller coaster rose uncertainly above the sandy beach, which Belle immediately vowed never to get on. She could bet that the summer tourists were just great for the sea turtles. Noisy, annoying, disrespectful–they came with their giant SUVs and their litter and their dollar signs for the “local economy” and dug and kicked and poked at endangered wildlife and its precarious habitat.

She was not looking forward to getting to know her new neighbors.

She drove on down Oceanfront Drive, keeping an eye out for the conservation center that was to be her home for the next six or seven months. The main street was lined with cute little shops–an antique shop, an ice cream parlor, a little restaurant with a large, smiling taco above the door–the town even had its own cupcake shop.

Continuing on down the road, she came at last to a sign that read Coves Ocean Conservation and Research Center and took a hard right. A curving drive took her to a small, square building set beside the water on a small cove, with a walkway heading down to a stretch of sandy beach. She parked the U-Haul in front of the door and climbed out, surveying her new home.

She didn't hate it. The beach looked quiet and the water sparkled invitingly. It was a bright turquoise in the bay, dropping off to a dark blue further out. She straightened her shoulders and anchored her combat boots underneath her.

“Time to take names and kick ass,” she muttered to herself under her breath, “time to take names and kick ass–” she stomped up the steps to the front door– “time to take names–”

For just a moment before she pushed open the door, she thought she caught a glimpse of something in the water. It was gone in a moment–was it the flash of a fin? The tip of a tail? She hesitated for a moment, straining her eyes. There shouldn’t be anything that big in the bay–could a shark or a dolphin have gotten caught in the shallow waters? Or was it just a trick of the light?

#my writing #hidden coves #nano 2023

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cartoonfun2890 · 1 year ago

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Marcy Wu The Little Mermaid part 1- "♪ Fathoms Below ♪"/Main Titles Prince Jon the human and his friend Sci-Twi traveling the the high seas looking for Prince Jon's true love

Once upon a time, in the enchanting kingdom of Atlantica, there lived a young mermaid named Marcy Wu. She had long, flowing hair as black as the night sky and eyes that sparkled like the ocean's waves. Marcy was known for her adventurous spirit and her love for exploring the vast depths of the sea.

One sunny morning, as Marcy swam through the coral reefs, she heard a beautiful melody carried by the currents. Mesmerized by the enchanting voice, she followed the sound until she reached a ship sailing above her. Curiosity filled her heart as she peeked above the water's surface.

On the ship, Prince Jon, a handsome and kind-hearted human, stood at the helm, accompanied by his loyal friend, Sci-Twi. They were on a quest to find Prince Jon's true love, as he had been dreaming of a mysterious voice that called out to him every night.

As Marcy watched from below, she couldn't help but feel a connection to Prince Jon. She had always been fascinated by the human world and longed to explore it. Determined to meet him, she swam closer to the ship, her tail glimmering in the sunlight.

Suddenly, a storm brewed in the distance, darkening the sky and churning the sea. Marcy's heart raced as she realized the danger that lay ahead. She knew she had to warn Prince Jon and Sci-Twi about the impending tempest.

With a

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arickaandherfictionalothers · 1 year ago

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Little merman AU: mysterious fathoms below-!

(Aricka x Billy)

(Little Mermaid au! Aricka is a princess, Billy is a merman. The story is the same but different.)

It was a beautiful day in the ocean near Westerly Kingdom. Seagulls swarmed overhead, dolphins jumped to and fro, and out of the fog, a glorious ship emerged- Liberty’s Reign, owned by the fair princess, Aricka Munson. She was as beautiful as the sunrise, gentle as a whisper; and as fierce as a hurricane. She longed for adventure in open waters, to explore what might lay beyond the boundaries of her kingdom.

But more than that: she longed for someone who would adventure with her. Oh, her brothers and friends were fine company, but she wanted love. True Love. Like her mother and father shared.

She looked on the deck below, and smiled as she heard the thrumming music of the sailors and her dearest companions, walking down to join them.

“I'll tell you a tale of the bottomless blue-!” She cries; and the sailors join in,

“An' it's hey to the starboard, heave ho!

Brave sailor, beware, 'cause a big 'uns a-brewin'

Mysterious fathoms below!

Heave ho!”

Aricka’s dearest friend, Steve, a merchant by trade and a sailor by heart, walks over and joins her,

“I'll sing you a song of the king of the sea-!” And two of their closest friends- Robin, a servant in Aricka’s court; and Dori, the royal musician- join them,

“An' it's hey to the starboard, heave ho!” Eddie swings in on a rope, landing gracefully by his sister, bowing low as he takes his solo,

“The ruler of all of the oceans is he-!”

And the friends move to their respective tasks, singing as they went,

“In mysterious fathoms below!

Fathoms below, below!

From whence wayward westerlies blow!

Where Triton is king

And his merpeople sing

In mysterious fathoms below!” Aricka’s younger brother, Mike, was not accustomed to the sea life; and was currently leaned over the side, in a most uncomfortable predicament- he was seasick.

“Isn’t this perfection Mikey? Out on the open sea, surrounded by nothing but water?” Aricka asks. Trying to cheer him up.

The boy- well; hardly a boy anymore, at eighteen years her brother was well on his way to being a man- gives her a dry look. “Oh, yes, it’s simply...delightful...” before leaning back over and expelling more of the contents of his stomach.

Aricka runs to the bow of the ship, climbing up the bow-spirit and clinging to a rope as she sings out,

“The salt on your skin

And the wind in your hair

And the waves as they ebb and they flow!

We’re miles from the shore

And guess what – I don’t care!” From the starboard part of the ship, Mike grumbles,

“As for me, I’m about to heave ho!”

“Back to work!” Robin orders, all the sailors heeding her command.

Dori, Steve and Robin lead the next part; Eddie grabbing his sister’s hands as they swing around the main deck,

“I’ll sing you a song of the king of the sea

An’ it’s hey to the starboard, heave ho!

The ruler of all of the oceans is he

In mysterious fathoms below!”

Mike scoffs, “King of the sea? Why, that’s nautical nonsense – nothing but a superstition!” Robin waggles a finger, cautioning,

“The king of the ocean gets angry

An’ when he gets angry, beware!

I’m tellin’ ya, lad, when King Triton is mad

How the waves’ll buck, rock to and fro!” Dori and Steve join her,

“Hold on, good luck, as down you go!” Aricka cuts them off as she hears something- a beautiful, haunting melody, seeming to be heard only by her,

“What is that? Do you hear something?” Mike rolls his eyes,

“Sister, please. Enough sea-faring! You’ve got to get back to court – to honor our mother’s wishes and take up her crown!” Aricka and Eddie share a Look and roll their eyes.

“That’s not the life for me, Mike—There it is again!” She clings to the starboard side, leaning over as far as she could. Steve and Dori exchange a worried look.

“We ought to head back to shore, your majesty.” Steve proposes.

“Indeed, we should!” Mike agreed. Aricka scoffs,

“Not while I’m captain. Now follow that voice! To the ends of the earth if we have to!” Robin and Eddie share a grin before the former replies,

“Aye-aye, Captain!” And the sailers resume their work as the finish their song,

“There’s mermaids out there in the bottomless blue

An’ it’s hey to the starboard, heave ho!

Watch out for ‘em, lad, or you’ll go to your ruin

Mysterious fathoms below!”

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

@astralshipper @rosieshipper @hyperionshipping @yeehawselfshipping @letsgofoletsgo @tsundere-selfship @callsign-revenge

#little merman au #Aricka x Billy #Spotify

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salsa-and-light · 1 year ago

Text

"See, this is EXACTLY what I knew would happen when I saw that “Read More” break at the bottom of a post with nothing below it. And this is why I was VERY careful in what I said and what words I used:"

Well I figure if that were true then he would have blocked me before I reminded him how buttons were used.

He blocked me so this is just for me and the audience.

I am sorry for how this variety of Christian acts, I'm tired of it too.

I'm going to add another page break here because not everyone has the patience to read this or scroll through all this, and I'm polite.

Not that it particularly matters when people add collages of photos and walls of text with no break but I try.

"I obviously know what a read more break is"

Oh REally>

Consider this enrichment.

Those definitely aren't the words of someone trying to cover their ass or anything.

I certainly block people when they do what I expect and not when I'm caught in a massive assholish blunder.

"(not to mention that I’ve probably been using the internet longer than this SJW has been alive)."

Ohhh, are you oooold?

What 30? 32?

Truly I am but a babe before you and the wisdom of the ages.

How old do you think I am?

"When they can’t beat the facts, they try to get away by claiming that they had some brilliant point that their opponent either didn’t understand or didn’t address because of a technical issue or some kind of cheating."

Listen, I'm more than willing to take the compliment; if you think I did all that research on Mister Gagnon and checked your sources and added pages of text in the two hours between my first and second post(can't see his post I'm blocked) well then go ahead, think I'm a brilliant speed demon all you want.

Why I would do that instead of just waiting two more hours to respond to an already old post is mystery to me but this imaginary version of me is clearly working on levels that I can't fathom, so who could say.

"And no, it isn’t “courtesy” to use read more breaks. It’s actualy super annoying, because it forces a person out of their own blog and dashboard to instead visit the other person’s blog to find out what they said"

Well I'm very sorry that it takes a second or two of inconvenience for you before you settle in to read a long post but the rest of the userbase still exists and they don't want to see pictures of the same uninspired book for six pages.

I don't know where you get the self importance to call me rude for not wanting to subject people to this when you yourself decided to move to a second blog that you made for arguments, presumably so that it wouldn't clog up your main argument blog.

Unless "argument side blog" is some ironic artistic choice, in which case.. far out man

"Suddenly there is something after the read more break, in the exact location which was empty when I checked it before. Funny that."

Yep I did all that work just for your tootsie pop, I dropped everything in the early afternoon just to write all that.

Maybe this is a cultural difference or maybe I'm just ~crazy~ but I don't actually care what you think of me. I'm on the internet to have fun.

"Since my arguments don’t need to rely on speculation, lies and petty insults"

Awww, someone thinks that because their insults are subtler they're more academically valid, so precious.

People were supposedly getting in fist-fights at the Council of Nicea, scholars have never been impartial, there is almost no correlation to being right and being nice.

I'm here to have fun, so if you want a polite discourse be polite and we can have a good time.

And if you want to dish it out, learn to take it.

I'm very fair😉.

Kisses

"I won’t hyper analyze how this happened."

-Negative self-awareness-

"“Monolignual American” = Assumption"

It was a hypothetical.

"...low-key racism"

Against whom?

Monolingual Americans‽

That's not a race.

It's a condition, a curable one at that. Get a duolingo, hire a rosetta stone, kiss the Blarney Stone if you're desperate.

Is it also "racism" to be biased against medical advice from people with no experience in medicine‽

Even then, I'm no going to trust a podiatrist over a cardiologist when it comes to heart health.

"& Ad hominem insult."

It was a warning darling, I don't trust people who don't know about what they're talking about, in this case translation and linguistics, if you chose to take that personally that's a reflection on you and sources you choose to believe.

"Firstly, it’s an admission of guilt that he has already made an a priori judgment"

Yeah, just like you made an "a priori" judgment that a lack of sources was uncompelling to you.

I was being nice by telling you the standards that would convince me, which I didn't have to do and perhaps shouldn't have.

Since you got'yer panties in a wad over it.

But if you can't meet the standard of expertise that I require then I don't know why you bothered anyways.

"and will refuse to be swayed by any argument, no matter how well researched or authoritative,"

Notice how I was specifically saying that I would only be convinced by arguments that were well-researched and authoritative. But way to admit that your standard for authoritative is so much lower than mine.

"This guy is using my status as an “American” against me,"

Oh yeah, the most oppressed minority, Anglophone Americans.

I didn't know you were an American, although it's a hardly surprising.

This particular brand of Christianity tends to only survive where people have limited contact with people with different religious ideas.

Everyone's a evil heretic except for you, or so you can convince yourself if you leave every church you disagree with and never talk about God with anyone you actually have to live with.

"as though he can simply dismiss all arguments from Americans on the basis of their place of birth,"

I learned linguistics in America, and some of the best universities for linguistics in the world are in Pennsylvania, notably a place in America. Some of the most renowned Linguists were American, Noam Chomsky, both Sapir & Whorf.

Cool it with the victim mentality, your sources were just bad.

"while simultaneously ignoring the fact that I actually have formal education"

You'd have to tell me that for me to ignore it, unless your "formal" education was supposed to be you reading books from your library.

"I’m citing the works of other well-respected experts"

Respect is useless currency when it comes to the truth.

People thought that Germ theory was crazy.

I warned you off the most blatantly wrong "experts"(people with limited linguistics training or knowledge) and that didn't seem to work so I'm not sure how I should explain to that I also want the research to be good.

Opinion pieces are not valid evidence.

"Insulting the design of a website rather than responding to the actual content of the site."

Yes, but you see, I'm here to have fun. So I'm going to share my personal opinion too.

It's one of the perks of being able to write whatever I want😘

I'm not positing his bad website design as the fundamental flaw of his argument.

I'm saying that It's an ugly website.

It's not that deep.

"Also, his objection to the “content” in this context simply reeks of the fact that he has already a priori eliminated any"

Blaah blabla.

I didn't even object to the content, though I would be within in my right to(my blog- doing this for fun remember) but I think we can all appreciate how unsurprising people are, the homophobe thinks that God has instituted complementarian gender ideals. What a non-shock that is.

Never mind that he also says that be believes in "gender stratification" but who needs to dwell on that little horror when the rest of him is exactly the same.

If you didn't want me to comment on his views or be amused that this is exactly what I expected then you really shouldn't have put the man in front of me and implicitly asked me to take him seriously.

Even you did the same thing as me with your "On brand so far!" because yes, Mister Gagnon is on-brand too; and I think that's funny.

It's about the only funny thing, but you know, I have to entertain myself somehow.

"It’s also worth noting that “homophobe” is a completely vapid and empty insult of no real weight."

Yeahhh.. kind of like calling the KKK racist.

It's True- yes, but it's a bit redundant

But hey, I was adding a dramatic flair.

Some Queer people are dramatic,

It's been known to happen.

"SJWs like this “part homosexual” use it at every possible opportunity to mindlessly slander anyone who even..."

It's called a read honey,

Like how you gonna dress like a gay man and be homophobic.

It's hilarious to me.

It'd be like if Miss Piggy were homophobic

I'm having fun, you sound miserable.

"quoting his comments would become redundant and needlessly stressful due to his bizarre formatting choices."

I like to call them artistic choice but I was actually pleasantly surprised by how much we're alike in our formatting: indented quotes.. elipses to switch topics between paragraphs..

All the hits, makes it a bit easier to sift through the silt.

You're a bit overzealous with the CAPS and the Bolds and the ITalics, but we all have flaws.

"he found a partial copy of Gsgnon’s book in PDF format, didn’t object to the obvious intellectual property theft issues"

Yeah, that doesn't sound like someone who "formally studied" much of anything; do you know how much textbooks cost‽

I, in fact, do not have any objection to pirating, of all things, the table of contents for a treatise on bigotry.

Take the whole book if you can stand to read it. I've read all those same ideas from the YouTube comment sections for free.

"and proceeds to hurl various additional ad hominem insults at sporadic areas of the book"

✨Correct✨.

I think complaining about the tribulations of being a homophobe is whiny, comparing that to coming out of the closet is gross and I think that trying to use scripture to justify sexism is shameful.

Bad behavior and bad ideas deserve criticism, and if I'm the one to dole it out today.. then baby hand me another tomato.

"The author isn’t wrong just because you were personally offended by what he had to say."

Bolds again, tsk tsk.

But I'd have to be surprised to be offended honey🚬

"I am not an arbitrary internet user, because: My blog is actually dedicated to discussing religious topics..."

Showing that you have a vested interest.

Some might say that you're too close to the issue, sunk cost fallacy being what it is.

Tell me, when was the last time you changed your mind on something more serious than your favorite flavor of ice cream?

Do you remember? If you can't it's probably been too long.

But in any case, your still just some guy, on the internet, you could be a Russian bisexual transvestite hooker for all anyone knows.

"This is the second such blog I’ve operated here on tumblr over the last decade."

Oh so you're Re-aLly invested, Okay "Dude" whatever.

"I’ve addressed this exact argument many times before."

And so have I, what of it Viceroy, do you think that repetition gives us legitimacy? -because I don't.

"I responded to and was involved in the original post back when it was first made in 2019."

Yeah, just another rando to me bud, just because you have the dates memorized doesn't mean that I care more.

"I have an actual Master’s Degree in this topic, therefore giving me legitimate credibility to discuss the topic."

And I also have a Master's what a super~crazy coincidence.

You're really building this up aren't you, it's kinda cute.

"I’m citing authoritative sources from other experts."

That's very good, that's very good sweetie.

I don't care, you're still just some guy, just like I'm just some guy.

And as I've made abundantly clear, I think your experts are speculating at best.

"And on top of all that, I provided actual arguments"

Ooh they're arguments, not good, not new, not based in the linguistic evidence that's relevant to translation,

But they're arguments

"...instead of just engaging in diversionary rhetoric and hurling insults at my opponents."

And what a good boy you are Jack Horner.

But the problem is that you're very impolite, and you arguments are bad and rage-fueled.

I don't owe a serious reply to bad ideas just because someone created a discipline out of discussing bigotry.

🎶A communist- with tenure is still just a communist🎶

And you don't get civility when you offer none

"who clearly does not have even rudimentary knowledge of the subject material"

That's very funny,

"and is running a generic blog of no particular theme,"

By Jove!, you're right.

Oh my gosh what can I be without a theme, does my whole life need a theme too‽

"opinion on a post he necromancered out of 2019."

You know for someone who's supposedly old enough to have been on the internet longer than I've been alive you seem to be wholly unfamiliar with the concept of things coming back.

Skinny jeans are back FYI.

Sorry that I'm late💎✨, if you wanted me sooner you could have tagged me back when you first tried to criticize me.

Besides, the color of the Sky post is from 2012, if it's still on tumblr, safe to assume it could pop back up.

Also the word is "necromanced", "necromancer" is a person who necromances. And why you're referencing a old website filled with socio-political caricatures I have no idea.

"This commentary is quite amusing to me, because I can just envision this SJW putting on his rainbow flag pins and heading out into the woods to get his hoe-down on with the Duck Dynasty characters. Yeah, that would pan out great, I’m sure."

I find this funny for two reasons, one because it's a tacit admission that Queer people are in far more danger than homophobic professors and two because he clearly doesn't understand how being in the closet works and imagines Queer people as something closer to a cartoon than real life.

I'm an expert with a bulldozer and I know how to build a chicken coop, I'm also Queer.

It happens,

Any illusions that you had about being far away from Queer people are a myth, they're there, if you don't know it's probably because your untrustworthy, or perhaps just unpleasant.

"tumblr users would refer to as a “weird flex.” Particularly when he immediately follows it up by trying to inflate his own association with intellectual society."

Hell yeah it's a flex.

Do you know how few people where I'm from even make it to College? Sorry if this is too complex for you but I can be happy about my achievements while also recognizing the power of class privilege to buoy unremarkable academics.

"Last time I checked, theological seminaries weren’t counted among the ranks of “Ivy League” schools. Of course, this really just means that this SJW has no idea what “Ivy League” means and uses these kinds of snappy comments with no knowledge of what he is implying."

Well apparently I'm the only one who does any research before I open my mouth.

Mister Gagnon works at Houston Christian University and so he has a faculty page detailing his education as is customary for universities. Predictably there was nothing in the study of ancient languages or linguistics but last I checked Dartmouth, Harvard and Princeton were all Ivy League schools.

Didn't you say this man was your favorite author? Has he never mentioned his education? I'd find that odd; he seems the type.

Unless of course he's lying about being educated in Ivy League schools, which I highly doubt, but wouldn't it be funny?

A gal can dream can't she?

"Yeah, I bet! You all got together at those “Ivy League” schools to swap stories about how much you developed your racist hatred of “Monolingual Americans” during your “poor” upbringing in the “backwoods!”"

This is bad enough I don't think I need to say much, but just for the viewer they have these things called "conferences" where people in a given field come together to share ideas and the like.

Given how Mister Gagnon works in Texas and I've been to the rather informal affair of a theological conference in Texas before, I imagine that he was probably nearby.

But hey, maybe the expert theologian never attends theological conferences, who am I to say what he does in his semi-personal life.

In fairness I wouldn't invite him more than once if I were an event organizer.

Though I also appreciate that this man acknowledges the classism that's latent in academic circles.

"Every SJW always denies being an SJW, while in the same breath expressing the most far-left political views possible."

Let's just say that if the most far-left positions in America are being anti-communist and pro-gun that we're living in a very different world than I thought.

"Conceding one of the points of my argument. Good job."

I often do that when people are right.

I'm glad that you could experience it.

"The examples he cites are still between one man and multiple women,"

Yes, which is not "1 man + 1 woman".

Which means you were wrong, that's not a rule; tell me where I'm losing you.

"The claim that people can have multiple wives is a very commonly asked about issue in scripture and there are many readily available sources that explain why marriage is limited to one man and one woman in spite of the limited Old Testament examples of men taking more than one wife."

I mean I could give a nuanced breakdown of the arguments made by this opinion piece article.. but I think it would be wasted effort, (if someone else has a question LMK) but for our purposes here I'll simply say that a lot of the claim are editorializing at best and it doesn't matter regardless.

Even if you were able to prove that marriages that aren't heterosexual, monogamous and outside the household of the patriarch are inferior in some capacity it doesn't change the fact that scripture still calls them marriages.

Which means that scripture does not also claim that non-monogamous marriages can't exist.

"He also makes the error of proof texting in this argument."

And yet.. you try to imply that the Bible does say that non-monogamous marriages can't exist.

Tell me what context was missing from the verses explicitly stating that these people were married to multiple people

Was there some super secret verse right after that said "just kidding"?

Making abstract accusations of being "out of context" for verses whose meanings don't change in context is bottom of the barrel snottiness; pre-teens at Wednesday church do that.

" “Nowhere in the Bible does it say [sex outside of marriage is a sin]” Yes, it does. Many times. Over and over and over."

Not one of those passages ever mentions pre-marital sex, we've been over this.

Proverbs 6:32

This passage is talking about adultery, not premarital sex.

Matthew 15:19, Acts 15:20, 1 Corinthians 5:1, 1 Corinthians 6:13, 1 Corinthians 6:18, 1 Corinthians 10:8, 2 Corinthians 12:21, Galatians 5:19, Ephesians 5:3, Colossians 3:5, 1 Thessalonians 4:3, Jude 1:7(this one alludes to attempted rape), Revelation 21:8

These passages are talking about sexual immorality, not premarital sex.

Hebrews 13:4

This passage is just talking about how marriage should be respected.

1 Corinthians 7:2

This passage is explicitly telling already married couples that they should have sex, they incorrectly believed that sex was dirty. Imagine that.

Romans 1:29

This passage doesn't mention sex or marriage at all.

Song of Solomon 4

This passage is used as evidence that God likes sex "as long as it's in marriage", even though this passage is about a man(Solomon) who has hundreds of wives and hundreds of concubines and we actually have no idea if he and this woman are married. The ESV translation that the site links to uses the word "Bride" but they could be married, engaged, betrothed or it could be poetic language just like is used in the rest of the chapter.

Needless to say though it's highly unlikely that this was his first wife.

It's also worth mentioning that these blogs(mostly the first link) repeat verses multiple times to give the impression that there's more evidence than there is and that they know what they're talking about.

I've done it too, I needed to hit those page counts on those academic papers, but it's a little sleazy when you're doing it to convince people to make major life decisions.

....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... ....... .......

Now the viewer might have noticed that most of the verses mention sexual immorality but don't mention premarital sex, the blogger foresaw that rather glaring issue and adds this line:

"Sex before marriage, or premarital sex, is not addressed in that exact term, but it does fall within the scope of sexual immorality."

What is immoral about pre-marital sex⸮ Why is pre-marital sex in the category of sexual immorality at all⸮

Because they say so.

And isn't that just rich.. rich and morally repulsive.

It's like saying "👆🤓 actually the Bible never said you had to share your stuff with me but the Bible said not to be greedy and not giving your stuff to me is greedy"

It's quite stunning the boldness that people have to just say things knowing that there's no proof.

"he then goes into an angry rant about the “purity movement” and how it has “fallen apart” as if this is proof of anything."

I'm sorry that you don't think it's important that Christian doctrine works in application and not just in theory.

Meanwhile the damage is done and people like you seem to content to ignore and repeat it.

But for those interested there is a fantastic documentary which follows Joshua Harris the Author of I Kissed Dating Goodbye(one of the most popular Purity Culture advocacy books) where he follows up to see what damage his book, and by extension the purity movement has done. He diplomatically rejects the ideas of his previous book and the culture it fostered.

Quite admirable given the circumstances really.

"this is another example of him using the bandwagon fallacy by appealing to what the majority of secular society believes"

No.

I was talking about the Purity Movement, and almost entirely Christian movement which decades later has been revealed to be a damaging social liability that gives adults permission to control the clothing and behavior of women, demonize the human body and poison gender relations.

Unsurprisingly, sexual ethics were the vehicle for enhanced social control and a culture of shame and degradation.

I don't personally find that trivial.

But where have I seen that before.

It's not as if people's "moral objection to homosexuality" has ever been used as premise to punish anything else right?

Oh wait, it's always been used for that.

Men can't have sex with other men and suddenly Susan and Sally can't hold hands.

He can't walk like that, she can't have that haircut, they can't play that music, he'll never be taken seriously with that voice, she shouldn't stand that way, men shouldn't dress like that, women shouldn't live alone and on and on it goes.

It's never been just about the sex, it's always been about a whole host of other issues, sexual ethics is just the prelued to justify their pre-existing prejudices so that people don't realize how it looks to say "oh this man is too pretty" and "this woman wearing shorts looks like a man".

"And since I proved that the premises in question are accurate, he effectively concedes another of my major bullet points."

Do you want a cookie for understanding a hypothetical?

It's like watching a rat in a maze be satisfied by imagining the cheese at the end.

"He then follows this up with some more angry ranting about how I’m being mean to “queer” people. I’m going to classify that as a very feeble appeal to emotion fallacy, not worthy of further response."

Oh.. you would say that darling.

The angry ranting in Question:

"But way to reduce Queer people to sex, that’s real cute of you."

Yeah I seem pretty incensed, just boiling really. That's not a casual comment at all.

In any case I that was a footnote, and he spent longer talking about how ridiculous it was than the actual statement.

The oversexualization of Queer people is a real issue, I didn't expect this person to care about that. I expected him to ignore it, not blow it out into some unjust crusade that I'm inflicting upon him.

I'm being dramatic on purpose; but him, I don't know what his deal is.

It's probably because, even if the previous hypothetical were correct it doesn't even remotely touch Queer Love, Queer relationships or any non-sexual form of physical affection.

"Lie. I provided sources that explain in detail how the statements of Jesus and his citation of the Genesis narrative are in opposition to homosexuality."

Ehh, writer's privilege, I'm ignoring that.

To quote myself, because I'm brilliant and fun at parties:

"As I have said previously, the idea that Genesis 2:24 and its requotes are “definitions” contradicts scripture.

But even so affirming heterosexual marriage does not condemn all other relationships or statuses."

"His only rebuttal against my sources and Gagnon’s arguments is to engage in shallow and meaningless insults against our character,"

Not in that section. Though I'm sure your character merits it.

But if you wanna' kvetch I'm not your friend, find someone else.

"Another lie. Once again, I provided ample sources which validate the translation as condemning homosexuality beyond any doubt."

And yet I remain here chancellor, with plenty of doubt. I don't suppose any of your "ample sources" address why the English translations of Leviticus 18:22 translated the noun "מִשְׁכְּבֵ֣י" as a verb?

I thought not.

"He brings up some variant of this claim several times during his rant,"

No, no darling.

You're ranting, I'm stirring the pot.

I usually know that people who archive their arguments aren't that willing to hear any new opinions.

I'll admit that you're incensed beyond what I expected but I don't usually aspire to lay my sorrows at the feet of prickly personalities anyways.

I'll admit there are some things that a person could say to hurt my feelings, I'm only human after all, but I don't think I'd trust any criticism coming from you about my appearance so better luck next time.

"For example, I addressed this type of argument on my old blog as Ignorant SJW Arguments #1, #14, #23 and several others,"

I think it's fun that you've spent so much time arguing on the internet that you have to catalogue it. Like a hidden library of obscure sorrows..

Or obscene sorrows, take your pick.

You know most people aren't as gracious as me, most people aren't receptive to new ideas and they don't take an attitude sparingly.

You're just lucky that I find the attempts to insult me funny otherwise I might have blocked you first.

Aww, we could have done a little couple thing, "block me, no you block me, block me first XXOO😋"

I did poke around on your defunct little archive though, some of your links were broken but I managed to find a few of the people you got into spats with.

Includding a horse blog.

What did the ponies ever do to you John?

I follow them now.

But I did find this old line

"Now normally, I wouldn’t resort to a “call out” post like this, except..."

different times eh.

Oh well.

"You can also find simple explanations on mainstream Christian websites and apologetics sites."

Yeah sure, only trust the good Christians that believe what we believe, don't want to check in with the bad Christians, what we believe is objectively true so you shouldn't check in with any other viewpoints otherwise you might not believe what is objectively true because objective truth can't be found anywhere else.

Anyways, I encourage everyone to check a variety of viewpoints, I don't care if you've never set foot in a church, the priest, the preacher and the pastor are all just some guy(including the women) just be curious and critical, the culty ones tend to tell on themselves.

This man moved cross-country to escape people he disagreed with, that's usually a red flag: not playing well with others.

There are Christians all over the world who live in majority non-Christian spaces, many in more hostile places than "secular America".

"To briefly summarize, there is a difference between ceremonial laws given explicitly to the nation of Israel (such as Orthodox Jewish practices of not cutting their sideburns) and moral laws (such as the prohibition against sexual immorality) that still applies to us today."

Does the Bible say anything about this?

No it's doesn't this is arbitrary distinction so that people can ignore some parts and enforce others.

The blogs you linked says as much

"The division of the Jewish law into different categories is a human construct designed to better understand the nature of God and define which laws church-age Christians are still required to follow. Many believe the ceremonial law is not applicable, but we are bound by the Ten Commandments."

Meanwhile the actual scriptures say this:

"Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed. So the law was our guardian until Christ came that we might be justified by faith. Now that this faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian." - Galatians 3:28

"For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it." - James 2:10

So it appears that you're breaking the Law too. Shame.

But then again, we're not bound by the law, so it doesn't seem to matter.

And of course:

“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” - Matthew 22:36–40

Love God, Love one another, I can manage that, doesn't that just put things in perspective?

Isn't that better?

Looks like I'm done worrying about ethics, at least at this level of bad-faith minutiae.

And considering the quite literally millions dead from Christian homophobic propaganda and violence over the past several decades.. Let's just say that if being Queer were a sin Christians are still in a far worse state.

And I'm not willing to follow that trend -thank you very-much.

"So wrong again, SJW."

Does that term bring you joy?

Does it spark Joy?

I hope so, I imagine that being homophobic isn't getting any easier so I hope you can find some joy.

Maybe a healthier hobby too.

I liked therapy but I wouldn't call it a hobby🤔

-though I definitely recommend it if you're on the fence

You've implied that you're like.. ~totally ancient~ so.. maybe golf?

Put-put is the better type for the environment and urban planning..

I knew this one guy who was just- insanely good at ping-pong, you'd surprised how easy it is to make friends when you have a good bit.

I steal most of my bits from drag queens on the internet so I don't think that's your thing but.. hey, I'm not a miracle worker. Someone you're age can think of a good bit if you redirect your efforts.

One of my favorites is to go up behind someone when I'm about to start drinking something and I say in a lackadasical voice:

"I don't think there's anything wrong with having a cool-refreshing-drink after a long-hard-day"

The earlier in the morning you can say it the better.

"Not even going to let him finish that sentence, because he is about to tell another lie that has been denbunked for a long time. Gagnon specifically refutes this argument in detail on his website and in his book. I have also refuted the argument in the past."

I like how he writes like we're speaking in real time or if he's playing some recording of me talking, it's not quite camp but it may be picnic,

Remember how I said I've heard most of his arguments before, that's true, I've actually read this exact article before, bad formatting and all; but boy when I tell you that it hits every time,, uy/

"not only that but attempted same-sex sexual intercourse that dishonors the visitors by treating their maleness as if it were femaleness? After all, Jones has already acknowledged that the Levitical prohibitions have as their implicit motive clause the putting of a male in the position of a female sexually."

The man-

kggghhh

The man thinks that certain sexual positions are demeaning-

Ahhh, talk about being a product of the fifties.

A pallete cleanser, isn't he cute, and well-cared for judging by the look of is eyes.

"I’ll give him some minor credit"

"that this is a variant of the argument I haven’t heard before, but it’s also incredibly stupid,"

Oh well, can’t win’em all.

"The rapists in Sodom didn’t know the angles had supernatural powers. They were asking for “the strangers” who they assumed were just ordinary men from another town"

Okay..

Well Gagnon certainly rejects the notion that appearance carries an affect on gender, I assume he thinks that there's some nebulous transcendant quality of gender that belies appearance.

If you think anything remotely similar it's hard to argue that the appearance is all that relavant.

In any case it's clear that if the rape attempt had been successful it wouldn't be gay.

But props for understanding the basics of gender performativity theory 👍🏻.

"If the Sodomites had even remotely suspected the “men” were actually supernatural beings with no gender, then they obviously wouldn’t have been trying to rape them in the first place."

You don't know that, you don't know what they're into🫦-

"If the Jews who wrote the bible and other associated religious scriptures considered homosexuality a sin, then that obviously supports the conclusion that their scriptures would be correctly interpreted to confirm their opposition to homosexuality."

That would true if A) homosexuality was an extant concept and B) these anti-gay sentiments were contemporaneous to the period where the passages were actually written.

Neither of which we can confirm, so we're dealing entirely in the realm of speculation.

There's a reason I put “the period” in quotes, because the reference point for this claim(made without source) was "before Paul" which very much sounds like in the period immediately preceding Paul's use of the term. I don't usual to refer to something as "Before 9/11" and then talk about the Medieval period.

But despite the lack of source I already knew that 1st century Jews were anti-gay, a rarity for the period, but I can also do math and happen to know that 1st century Jews were not contemporaries of the Levitical writings. In fact the most recent piece of scripture accepted by Protestant Cannon was written in the 5th century BC.

With Leviticus and the rest of the Pentateuch being written a Thousand Years before That.

So congratulations, yes; I understand and acknowledge that Jews of the first century were homophobic but I also understand that 16th century Christians believed that the Bible supported racial hierarchy.

I don't consider the opinions of people a millennia and a half after a text was written to be authoritative, so pardon me if I don't give a damn.

"Secondly, he claims that the Jewish authors of scripture don’t have “authority”"

Well random Jews a millennium later don't have any authority, you're damn right I said that and I'll say it again.

No person outside of the living memory of a work's author has any special claim to understanding their text, and even then.. eugf who knows who to trust besides the author.

Poor Ray Bradbury has been fighting with people about the meaning of his own book for decades so people are very stubborn.

"One of the most important rules of hermeneutics is to understand the culture and intent of the original authors of scripture"

No, there are no hermeneutical rules, there are only hermeneutical norms, I don't even disagree with them most of the time but they're still not rules.

Regardless what you're trying to talk about is semantics, because you(like me) value the authorial intent of the writers.

Meanwhile you don't seem to consider any distinction between Jews of the first century and their ancestors a millennium and a half prior.

Which is rather important context-

"Again, this amazingly ignorant argument is just further proof that this guy knows nothing about Christianity, the bible or how to interpret scripture."

Just wait it's about to get Good.

"I won’t bother to quote individual points from this section, because he totally fails to address the fact that I already debunked this: Because “Arsenokoitai” is a combination of two HEBREW words,"

Oh boy, oh boy!

Christmas came early, this is delicious.

You remember This Page you linked when you were arguing about the etymology of "Arsenokoitai"?

Quote: "‘Arsenokoitai’ is a combination of the words ‘ársenos’ and ‘koitōn’ to form a word that the audience would clearly understand"

First of all, how would the Greeks understand a Hebrew word and second of did you even Look at that page‽

I would have figured that Mr. “Formally educated” and “Master’s degree in 'Christian Apologetics'” would be able to recognize Greek lettering.

And if that wasn't clear the URL has "greek" written right in it.

If that's not enough, feel free to look at the Wiktionary pages for "arsen" and "koiten" the word roots.

An while you're at it look up what the Septuagint is.

It's Greek, this should be the easiest part of this discussion but you've turned into some epic battle of truth and lies.

It's comically tired.

"this explains why it doesn’t follow normal rules of Greek “gendered” language."

Gendered languages adopt words from non-gendered languages all the time, often it is impossible to incorporate them into the language without gendering them.

I used the word "kleenex" as an example. It's a word from English, a language without gramatical gender, but in Spanish it has a gramatical gender so when the word "kleenex" was incorporated, it gained a grammatical gender(it's masculine if you care).

But I'm not even sure you understand the concept of gramatical gender soo.. eh unless you wanna' suck up your pride and read Wikipedia to figure out what a noun class is, you're just gonna' have to trust me.

" “have you ignored every other scholar who disagrees?” The problem with the other so-called “scholars” who support the pro-homosexual agenda is that they use the exact arguments we are seeing here in this debate. They lie, they obfuscate, they..."

So yes, you do ignore them, because you don't like their methods and their conclusions. Similar to how I also disregard shoddy evidence from bad scholars and academics.

But if I were to say that all the experts agreed, then I'd be lying; you see how that works

Just like you were lying when you repeatedly claimed that there was universal agreement.

"Again, I cite the fact that Gagnon and myself are both legitimately educated experts on this topic,"

Says the person who doesn't recognize Greek and doesn't understand the concept of a loan word.

Your claims of expertise were shoddy to begin with, but now your credibility is a pile of dust.

Dust honey,

~hhweewh~ gone. Gone gone.

Showcasing, in real time, why linguistics is basic to understanding language and translation.

That's such a basic and self-obvious statement that I never would have believed I'd have to say it, but here we are.

"we have read the “literature” on the other side of the debate"

Have you?

Or did you just sample them to argue with.

Apologetics is not usually interested in alternative views just destroying them.

The knowledge to conserve an animal is far more complex and nuanced than the limited knowledge required to hunt it.

And what?

"...and we have debunked all of those shallow arguments.."

Goodness you do love the word "debunked"

Does it inspire similar feelings as "vanquished" or "conquered"?

If you're arguing this much there must be something in it for you.

I'm getting the impression that "debunking" the "SJW" is kind of like "slaying" the "dragon" for you.

But I suppose we all have to tell ourselves some sort of narrative about ourselves.

"how Paul supposedly didn’t mean what his words obviously say"

I don't think that anyone has ever seriously argued that Paul didn't mean what he meant; just that we(in particular you) don't know what he meant.

"Obvious" is one of those words babe, like "clear" or "self-evident", you can't ever really use them during a disagreement.

Because if it really were "obvious", if it were really "self-evident" then no one would be arguing.

Chalk it up to a lack of empathy or depth of thought.

"or that Sodom was some some of allegory about bad hospitality."

Such passion, such rage or should I say such such rage?

But no, I think the rape was a pretty significant part, you would misrepresent the situation though.

"But to once again repeat the obvious, the SJW is lying and I provided sources which debunk his claims. What more can I be expected to say here?"

"Obvious", "SJW", "lying", "debunk"- maybe what should be expected is for you to say less not more; or at least be a bit more choosy.

Although I've already said what I expect, linguistic evidence, not the opinion pieces of monolingual theologians with a pedigree.

I know that I'm asking a lot, considering how someone doesn't even know what Greek looks like but what can I say?

Crazy claims require crazy evidence, and life's not always fair.

One of the many lessons you learn as a Queer person.

"Again, I’ve already addressed this. Claiming the bible was translated wrong and/or that the word “homosexual” was translated incorrectly is a common SJW talking point"'

That's the whole conversation buddy, welcome back.

"I’ve cited the sources and provided rational fact-based arguments."

This kind of person loooves being rationalll.

be rational harder daddy

"The SJW has lied and insulted everyone in sight."

Oh darling, not everybody just the people who desserve it

Do you think you've been polite‽

Although, while we're on the subject I would like to rescind one minor criticism I made of Gagnon, he is married, presumably to a real human woman.

So I would like to change my previous criticism of his ignorance of sexuality to the much worse crime of being a sexist man married to a wife.

I hope and pray she's doing okay, in fact I'd love it if God could give all the women married to sexist men a break.

"Gagnon IS an expert in the linguistics of biblical scripture specifically."

The only time language is mentioned in the first link is in the Wikipedia language options. I don't know why you would cite things that don't support your claims. Citation inflation? Citation kink? Inflation kink? I think I've heard of that one.

I am well aware of the fact that some theology courses have a rudimentary curriculum on ancient language, but I'm also aware that I have more linguistics education than he does, if by no other evidence than his casual disregard for connotative semantics.

It takes ~44 weeks of continuous full-time study to even gain basic reading and speaking proficiency for Modern Greek, let alone Ancient Greek, let alone ancient Hebrew a semitic language with no relationship to English.

These people are not becoming fluent in two ancient languages in the course of 2-4 years. Let alone learning words that have been lost to the historical record.

Learning words from a dictionary is different than learning words from context.

There is no dictionary for untranslated terms, you have to figure it out the old fashioned way.

"But the guy who doesn’t even know what “Ivy League” means wants to question that? No thanks."

Says the guy who didn't research the man he's defending and doesn't know what Greek looks like?

"And remember that picture I posted earlier of my bookshelf? That Interlinear Bible with Greek and Hebrew language isn’t just there for show."

It's not there for show but you can't tell the difference between Hebrew and Greek..

Why not?

I've always wanted to visit the state of delusion, I hear it has nice weather.

"This is called a “New Knowledge” argument. Already debunked. Nice try."

It's not "New Knowledge" it's a new concept that is anachronistic to the period.

Paul did not have a concept of atoms, of germs or of homosexuality, these were all ideas which either were created long after him or which have entirely different meanings from their historical counterparts.

Yes obviously Paul's statements might have implications for atoms, but it would be a lie to say he addressed them, this is relevant if you care about authorial intent.

"You have repeated all the same sorry arguments that leftist homosexual activists have been using for years, pretty much verbatim with only a few variances."

Hmm, lots of people from different groups and with different backgrounds coming to the same conclusion.. hmm..

"But these arguments have all been debunked by the actual facts and authoritative sources."

Goodness you love that word, how many times have you used it?

That's too many, you're mother and I are worried about you.

"And you did a worse job of presenting the homosexual agenda than most have done in the past,"

What can I say?

I'm bad, I'm a bad bad girl.

"since you immediately degraded to childish insults"

But baby, you started it, I thought you liked it dirty

"In between your petty insults and fallacies"

Boy, it's really gettin' to you huh

Sorry if your feelings are hurt, I don't owe people who peddle the work of sexist homophobes a calm and serious response.

Clowns might be good for teachable moments but you don't have a serious wrestling match with one either, you put a banana cream pie in his face.

"In between your petty insults and fallacies, you even managed to concede that the majority of my arguments are factually accurate."

I don't think you know what "majority" means. Or concede.

"All you really did was angrily rail against the fact that my position and the position of the experts was too “homophobic”"

I mean that's a problem but I've spoken to a rare few reasonable homophobes in my time. You're just not one of them.

"Also, before I conclude this debate by blocking you,"

Ahhh, there it is, this makes me think of the time I had a very nice date with this beautiful male model with hair like a Digimon character, we had a great time, he was a good kisser, I had him wrapped around my finger.

Then I didn't hear from him.

About four months later I find out from the guy I was dating at the time that the model was his Ex's Ex. and at the time of our date they had been together for two years.

Although they did break up less than two weeks after our date, so I take credit for that.

And like this situation, by the time an explanation has rolled around, it doesn't really make a difference.

Boo hoo, oh well.

"let me also point out that you failed to address my arguments in my earlier response to this post or when I tagged you on the Anti-Catholic Master Post."

Yeah, didn't feel like it.

I like to be involved, but eh, this wasn't that intriguing to me. You don't believe I'm a country boy, you don't believe I'm a Christian, You don't believe I'm not an SJW, is it really anything more than wasted air to say I'm not a Catholic either?

Besides, this is a fun little treat, but it's a bit like sugar, the time commitment is too much to bury yourself in it.

"So you effectively concede those points in the debate as well. Good job."

That's how it works, Silence is agreement.

That is sarcasm, which you seem to hate so I'll also say that actually silence is not agreement and in your normal life you should get explicit consent.

Although if you support Gagnon's views of "gender strttification" maybe you should just stay away from women altogether.

"I’m not asking you to agree with my morality, follow my religion or worship my God."

Yeah you are, you're falling into something called

🌈The Narcissism of Small Differences☁️⭐

You'd rather me be some pagan druid than be a Christian who doesn't agree with you.

Because you want to be in charge of your own special little camp.

You want the backing of millions of anonymous drones who you can use as source of validation and authority for whatever other wacky thing you wanna' say next; but dissenting voices shatter the illusion.

Guess what daisy-do a lot of people want the uncompromised backing of entire religious institutions, there's a reason the church is pushed into the crossfire of every political divide,

You're pretending to be gracious but what you're really saying is that you want to excommunicate me from the community of believers so that you can maintain ideological purity.

But I'm sorry to say, that there never was nor will there ever be ideological singularity in the church, barring divine intervention.

But from what Romans 14 says I get the impression that God's not overly fussy with the details.

"(In fact, talking to you really makes me feel a lot like Jonah when he was asked to preach to the Ninevites. Not that you will have any idea what that means.)"

Oh so it issss a holier-than-thou, crusader mentality thing.

I'm the big bad dragon, and your the little prince, come-to-tell-me how big and evil I am. You selfless soul, driving the dagger into the heart of evil.

Heyyy-

no judgment self-aware fantasy can be a healthy method to deal with unprocessed emotions, and I do mean that sincerely.

Though if I'm being sincere I don't think that you're self-aware enough for this to be healthy.

Like I said, I'm a much better because of therapy, and I highly recommend it, maybe the kids should go to therapy too, I can say from experience that homeschoolers usually need a little help after being isolated.

Especially if their parents are radical fundamentalists, the real world can be a shock so it's good to prep them for the emotional toll.

"But I am unequivocally not going to stand by and allow people to blatantly LIE about what the bible clearly says."

Well, you can sit down if you like- I'm not here to police anyone's body.

"If you don’t like what the bible says, go find some other religion that will put up with your sexual perversion."

You make it sound so much more provocative than it really is. Sex is just sex.

Of course, I'm more of a "whore in theory but not in practice" type of person.

I'm not sure if you've heard about the whole "written by a man", "written by a child" comments that are floating around on Tik-Tok but I think my life is written by a teenage girl who's a little too into Yaoi but still has a shaky grasp on what gay sex is.

But listen to me going on about myself.

"But don’t lie about my religion or what my God teaches in His scriptures."

Oh no bestie, Our religion😁🫶

...

This has been fun but we shouldn't do this again, I don't know if it's ethically responsible to try reasoning with someone who has "Anon hate encouraged, but be specific!" in their bio.

So I'm cutting you off, get help.

Arsenokoitai isn’t a mysterious word

“Arsenokoitai” is the Greek word Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:10 to describe men who have sex with men. Anyone who maintains homosexuality isn’t a sin would tell you that this is a word that is difficult to know Paul’s intention in writing it. Except it’s pretty easy to know exactly what he meant.

This word is a word coined by Paul, that much is true, but it is made up of two words that already exist in Paul’s Greek Old Testament. Paul wants this word to act basically as a hyperlink to Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13. He achieves this by essentially quoting those passages. Here’s a handy guide I put together:

‘Arsenokoitai’ is a combination of the words ‘ársenos’ and ‘koitōn’ which are literally placed next to each other in 20:13.

It’s that easy, folks.

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mcrmaidscales · 6 years ago

Text

sent meme || based on this song || @imbicilite

The sea had been so suffocating. She’d given up her life as a princess, daughter, and sister to find a life that had been denied her by an overprotective father. Of course, she missed them with everything in her heart, but this was the life that she had wished to have since her youth.

“My father built the castle in Atlantica for my mother and us. It’s a city of gold and shell and it’s so pretty when the sunlight peers upon it through the waves,” she told to the man beside her as her eyes settled upon the small village that seemed to be the most beautiful city she had ever laid eyes upon, “But towers of gold are still too little. These hands could have held the world in Atlantica, but it would never be enough,” a smile played upon her lips as she turned to the human, “I can’t believe I’m finally here.”

#imbicilite #the mysterious fathoms below || main ||

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viscountessevie · 2 years ago

Note

What are your fav pre S2 fics and post S2 fics?

Sanji's Bridgerton Fic Recs

Am I allowed to plug myself? 😂😂 I just never end up on fic rec lists so you know what Imma be shameless and link my masterlist:

I'm really proud of my Kathony one shots (My 10 Things AU is a vibe but I've abandoned it sorry yall 😭) and I think my NB!Sophie fic deserves more love so please if you're interested have a read and let me know what you think 💞

As for the other recs - I'll be honest, I don't read as much fics as I should especially when I have so many amazing writer friends I really feel bad I haven't read or commented enough on their fics! That being said here's all my fave fic writers (literally mainly my friends shsjjsjs cos they're the only ones I trust to get the characters right):

@newtonsheffield aka Molly! She is first fandom friend I ever made in this fandom and the reason I ended up making this blog. I always saw her in the main tag and got really curious about her fics. Then I fell into the rabbit hole that is BSCU which I still need to finish 💀💀. I would rec all of her works tbh she has written something for everyone but my personal faves are the following:

1) Mysterious Fathoms Below - A Little Mermaid Kathony AU that's very soft and hella intimate. I was SUPER hyped for this one and Molly really delivered

2) Through The Wire - This was an intense and angsty AU where Anthony gets amnesia after an accident a little while after dumping Kate when they were getting too serious. It was brilliantly written and I honestly think this is her best work. It's so annoying that the puritans of the fandom gave her so much shit for some of her chapters, they can fuck right off this was my absolute fave fic of hers ever!

3) Royals - Hello we ALL LOVE a Princess Diaries 2 AU! This was such a fun read honestly it's been so long I need to go back and reread. Also watching the movie right after hits different and gives you all the feels

[Ik she has other faves she'd hype up more but I haven't read those yet jshdjjd so I can't really comment on them but oh! Honourable Mention because she's mentioned she loves this AU but it's very underrated and I still need to read it: Post Traumatic. It's a Jurassic Park AU AND Kate is a fight pilot it's iconic]

I would also recommend going through the tags of those fics because she always has fun snippets, edits and playlists for them! It really drums up the hype while you're waiting for it to be updated.

Next up we have Lil aka @sharmasandcorgis whose writing I absolutely adore and I think she's hella underrated so please go give her some love on her AO3

1) Leap Year - If you haven't already guessed I go feral for movie AUs I think its a film writer thing lmao. Based on the movie of the same name, it's enemies to lovers EXCELLENCE, with a side of fake marriage we love to see it!!

2) Mornings - It's pregnancy Kathony fic and is so so soft and comforting. I was literally Agnes reading it: IT'S SO FLUFFY I'M GOING TO DIE!!

3) So I need to catch up on her other fics but she's so brilliant I couldn't pick a 3rd I'm just reccing her entire AO3 works!!

Zaira aka @jeanvanjer who needs to write more fics for us because her writing is AMAZING, currently only has The Ghost of You up at the moment. Very soft but angsty and sad, get tissues ready before reading.

Look out for her Sugar Daddy Professor Anthony AU at some point down the line.

Triv aka @hptriviachamp is my fave Regency fic writer because she's very good with the language of the time, does thorough research for every fic and as a Poli-Sci major, always has a political touch in her fics it sets her writing apart from the rest of the writers and makes her stories so unique!

1) Suddenly A Smile, Shyly Obscene - Johncesca's first meeting fully fleshed out. I watched this fic come to life in our GC whenever we had writing sprints and let me say I'M OBSESSED! She really understands Johncesca and the way she writes John makes me go feral, her John is now Canon John imo.

2) The Courtship of Charlotte Bridgerton - IT'S *THE* NEXT GEN FIC! Charlotte and Clairmont are super compelling especially with how it progresses and no spoilers but there's a suprise on Clairmont's part 👀. It's a really refreshing take on a certain kind of relationship and the characters are just so fun to read about.

3) A Very Bridgerton Diwali - The very first fic of hers I've read. It made my heart sing because it reminded me so much of how my family and I are during Deepavali so it hit close to home in a very soft way.

Author's Pick: Do Not Go Gentle Into That Senior Year (Just Rage) - A Kathony HS AU with all the tropes of a HS au and beats of their story in one fic.

Honourable Mention: I'm Your National Anthem - A very spicy politically charged Kathony Politics AU but it's on the back burner as a WIP and hasn't been posted 😭😭 if it ever comes out please go read it!

Belle aka @sophiamariabeckett !! My fandom wife 😍😍. Heads up, we're moving into Benophie territory.

1) Bridgertons' Anatomy - IT'S A GREYS AU!! I was really surprised to hear her tell me this wasn't hyped up more like don't yall love Greys?? AND OFC THE BRIDGERTONS WOULD BE A HIGH POWERED DOCTOR DYNASTY FAMILY!

Of course it's Benophie centric and Ben/Sophie (Baek!! She's Korean yall) are super cute in it but my fave chapter is Nepotism Babies where Anthony and Simon meet for the first time 🥺🥺🥺

Soo gooo read it - Belle also made a lot of edits for it, go give it some love!

2) Fallen Through Time - Outlander AU nuff said, very angsty and just iconic I mean when Jamie and Claire are the blueprint and you apply to Benophie it's just chef's kiss!

3) Author's Pick: Dusk Til Dawn - Violet Bridgerton II's Birth! Another fic that was born in our GC and it is so so soft. Okay but like the way I initially wrote From Dusk Til Dawn til I realised that's a video game 💀💀

Last but certainly not least, Michaela aka @minim236 is literally our fandom's Bob the Builder fix-it fic writer. Canon broke it? Michaela can fix it, yes she can!

Her AUs are unmatched! Lots of fun rarepairs but she makes them work and you can see why they fit together. My personal favourite fic is tied between these two so I'll put them in the order I read it:

1) The Marina/Simon Series - An AU where Simon and Marina strike a deal to enter into a marriage of convenience so she won't be ruined and Simon can say Fuck you to his dad by not having any biological kids to take the Dukedom. Also these two deserve better than being ending up with r*pists (Ik Show Phillip didn't since they won't need to consummate their marriage and she doesn't seem to have PPD but still Book Philip can go die.)

I think this was the first ever fic I read from her?? So definitely has a special place in my heart!

2) [Also Author's Pick:] A Papa Sharma & Mary Love Story. My soft spot is Kate and Edwina's parents I WANNA KNOW EVERYTHING and this fic series fulfilled that!! Their love story was so so sweet and we had baby Kate and Mary moments I was sobbing! We also had a moment where Vi was being a ignorant white lady lmaoo it was funny and I lowkey wish she had been called out for it within the narrative hshshs.

Bonus Sequel: Letters Sent & Read

Sorry M I gotta admit I haven't read this one yet but I will soon! The premise is promising and I'm excited to read it 🤗🤗

3) Ruin

He would not ruin her. How could he ruin such beauty? Benedict is an artist without a muse or motivation. Until he is introduced to Sophie Beckett, a guarded ballet dancer who lacks passion and does not want to be his muse. The attraction between them is confusing, especially to her.

I need to read this but it's a monster of a fic and I love that! Hopefully it will be finished by the time I can start it and I'll be able to binge it ehehhe. I will say I always see edits for it and they are amazing!!! So please go give them some love 💞

Also anon I know you asked for Pre-S2 and Post-S2 fics, but I can't recommend any good fics that are canon compliant with S2. I've given up on trying to find good ones without a Kathani jumpscare and I have talked about it on my blog a couple of times (recently talked about it in the comments here) but I hate HATE the trend of Abusive!Sharmas and White Saviour Kathony saving Kate from her 'oh so horrible' family, it's fucked up. Please go read TVWLM and come back with better characterisations of the Sharma Family Unit thanks, we don't claim the dysfunction on the show.

Thanks again for the ask anon and everyone goooo read my friends' work, just absolutely brilliant writers!

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project-feive · 2 years ago

Text

Ranking my versions of my Five based off of her levels of unhinge-ness.

Read more below just because there could be some stuff considered spoilers?

1: NL!Callista Glover. “The Red Soldier” (my own personal AU) This bitch crazy and traumatized. Lived in Red Scorpion Base and was basically a test subject and didn’t meet Team Abel until S9. Do not turn your back on her ever. She will kill with no remorse. Feels everything and nothing all at the same time. Girly is in her Reputation Era and doesn’t plan on getting out of it any time soon.

2. ZR!Callista Glover. “Runner 5” (main series) She isn’t in her Reputation Era just yet but she’s close. Her mind is literally breaking and she’s been traumatized ten times over and her marriage fell apart in front of her eyes. Like girl needs therapy, meds, a vacation, the whole works. She’s approximately two seconds away from snapping and killing everyone.

3: Ista-Glow. “Rookie” (Dystopia Rising) She is a mercenary. What would you expect? Also major parental issues. Has died before and in Dystopia Lore coming back is a horribly kind breaking thing so def has baggage from that.

4. Evangeline Freeman. “Walker” (The Walk) Has mental health issues at the beginning but isn’t really unhinged at the beginning of her story. Slowly becomes more unhinged as the story goes on. Will definitely need therapy.

5. Callista ‘Cal’ Glover. “Rider” (Dragon Flight) This version of Callista is 14. Do you know how unhinged 14-year-olds are? I don’t think I need to say any more.

6. Glass Woman “Five” (Endless Sea add-on story) Poor girl loses her memory and has black glass armor. Doesn’t talk to the aliens on the planet she resides on much and doesn’t let them ever see her in the forest where she lives. If unhinged because she is very casual about breaking and entering into the literal castle of the alien royalty and bossing the king and queen around and getting them to do what she wants. Isn’t super high on the list just because she doesn’t ask for much or anything drastic.

7. Callista Elizabeth ‘Eliza’ Glover. “Apprentice Five” (Abel’s Buccaneers). Literally became Dr. Samuel’s apprentice because her sister abandoned her on the streets of a place she’d never been in because she flew off the rails after her fiancé died. Fell in love with Dr. Samuel because he gave her the tiniest bit of affection. Girly needs therapy. Not unhinged as the others but as some issues she needs to work on.

8. Callista Glover. “Specialist Five” (Venus Rising). Goes on a mission while dying so she can spend more time with her secret bf. When secret bf does she blames the Captain for not doing anything and plots to kill her even while running for her life. Ends up doing so after the last mission of the series. Ironically becomes the last one surviving when she is dying of a terminal disease. Although that last part doesn’t make her unhinged. Everything else though…

9. Callie Morse. “Stoker Five” (Mystery at 4000 Fathoms). Slightly unhinged due to grief. Literally loses it when she can’t find her locket with her late husband’s picture in the beginning. But she does start the healing process at the end of the new adventure.

10. Celeste. “Bellhop” (Hotel Hijinks). Not really unhinged, but does whatever unhinged stuff she’s told to do, like getting into a dumbwaiter to spy on others. This is especially unhinged for Celeste because she’s hard of hearing/mostly deaf so she’d have to peak through and read lips.

11. Quinn (Rule Britannia series). Not really unhinged, although we could say she’s crazy for dealing with so much bullshit for as long as she has. But for the most part is very level headed and isn’t completely murderous.

12. Detective Glover. “Runner 13” (The 13th Runner). The most level headed of them all. Has a brain cells and actually uses them. No inning was unless we consider how the story could end which can go which her going to most unhinged or remaining least unhinged. But during the mission she is not unhinged and is super prepared. Is a bit of a workaholic though.

@catsoutofthebags

#zr ocs #callista glover #runner five callista #zr #my runner five #zombies run #zr new adventures #never left au #zr Rule Britannia #zr the thirteenth runner #zr dystopia rising #zr Venus rising #zr Abel’s buccaneers #the walk #the walk app #zr hotel hijinks #zr Dragon flight #zr mystery at 4000 fathoms #zr spoilers

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lananiscorner · 11 months ago

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I am also slowly making my way through these. XD Thoughts below the cut.

You know it's a bad sign when you're happy about your side losing, even though the game wants you to think you're the hero (I mean, you can pull that off in a compelling way, like in Spec Ops: The Line, but those writers were light years ahead of 3 Hopes' lol).

"I also can’t fathom why you wouldn’t just send some of your army. Like why all of them? Claude is an idiot for this." - Maybe Claude is genre-confused and thinks he's in a horror game instead of a musou.

I also liked Holst better when he was a meme mystery character.

RIP Claude for constantly getting the recycled routes.

"dodo bird" Edel lol. I am tempted to just refer to her as that from now on.

Not surprised Leonie also eats the weeds--she's the kind of person who wouldn't want to waste anything. She's got that Faerghus hardiness, even though she's from Leicester.

Why does this Leonie & Hilda B support read like a setup for a sapphic omegaverse AU?

Man, Marianne's prayers to the goddess must be WILD in GW. "Dear Goddess, please hear my prayer and protect us as we march to kill the archbishop of your church."

Sapphic omegaverse vibes continue.

"I spent hours fighting side battles and preparing units to basically have Dorothea’s and Manuela’s paralogue joke story end up the main battle. Wow." - Wow. I think that's the part where I would have tapped out.

Golden Wildfire Ch 13

I am slowly making my way through these.

STORY

Guys, not going to lie. This backtracking is boring as fuck. But at least Claude keeps taking Ls.

I also can't fathom why you wouldn't just send some of your army. Like why all of them? Claude is an idiot for this.

But we all knew he was after his oh so potent counter argument vs Sylvain lamo.

Yeah, it's the same TWSITD stuff Edelgard backtracked for. How dull.

Haha, Shez can say she thinks it's the Knights of Serios and Claude's like "they're not that low." So then why are you so desperate to murder all of them?

They're nicer to Shez than the Black Eagles were though, where he practically got treated like a guilty enemy and threatened and interrogated. Still think AG is by far the best route for Shez, but I'm not biased at all lamo.

MAP/SIDE BATTLES

I don't think Linhardt wants to be here lol.

I liked Holst better when he was a meme mystery character. What they did with him is so dreadfully dull.

It's pretty rich to hear them judge people for attacking villages when they just did the exact same thing.

Cool to see Lysithea's past be relevant again.

This is the exact same thing as SB. I swear Claude always just gets railroaded into someone else's plot.

At least Claude realizes this happened because of the war instead of dodo bird Edelgard who thinks TWSITD doesn't want the Empire to unify everyone (which, they do so . . .)

SHEZ & HOLST A

Holst goofed up. Shez lecture him. They split up and head back.

Holst falls asleep waiting for Shez to get back.

Nothing interesting happens.

MARIANNE & LEONIE B

Leonie failed to catch something and runs into Marianne heading into the stables.

Guys, Leonie also eats the weeds.

They talk about a flower they both like that Leonie also picked just because she liked it. Marianne gets poetic about it.

Leonie gives it to Marianne, who wants to share it with everyone.

Leonie doesn't take Marianne literally when she claims the birds told her something.

LEONIE & HILDA B

Leonie tried perfume and Hilda's happy. It's one Hilda made herself.

If I hear "Eau de Leonie" one more time, I'll have heard it twice more than I want too.

Leonie rejects it. It's not for her. Hilda's not offended. Hilda just wanted Leonie to have something special.

Leonie compromises and says she'll just wear it on special occasions.

Hilda wants them to wear different scents that smell better when mixed together. They both talk about how weird that sounds, but Leonie's still game to try because she's a trooper.

HILDA & MARIANNE A

Really weird to see a support talk about how religious Marianne is in GW. Where she doesn't blink twice at the idea that Rhea is all that's wrong in the world and must die.

Marianne asks why Hilda's always so nice and brings up the first support. Which mentions Judith so ... awkward. My bad playing skills strike lamo.

Hilda thinks having Marianne around makes her life easier andis just "the best." Marihilda fans eating good.

Marianne always emotionally supports Hilda without even knowing it and makes Hilda feel warm inside.

It's a pretty sweet support all things told.

FINAL BATTLE

Okaaay, so this starts with them wanting to go see an opera. That's . . . . not how I thought this would start. Well, they're fighting the bandits. And their fans are playing soldier to fight bandits.

Is this . . . really what the main battle is about this chapter? Golden Wildfire really doesn't have anything to do, does it?

I spent hours fighting side battles and preparing units to basically have Dorothea's and Manuela's paralogue joke story end up the main battle. Wow.

They were really like, oh shit, GW has one less chapter. Oh, I know, let's have them fight bandits to protect opera singers and their delulu fans. Like, why.

Well, at the end it has some semblance of relevance by having TWSITD show up. But yeah . . .

No one got any answers (Shez and Lysithea, specifically)

Now Arval and Shez are in that weird space dimension.

Edelgard is requesting reinforcements at the school. Rhea might be there.

xxx

#Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes #FE WTH #Golden Trashfire

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kyberphilosopher · 4 years ago

Text

ᴛʜᴇ ᴊᴇʀᴇᴍɪᴀᴅ

“Anakin knew he had to set her free, this beautiful Sith of a woman.”

word count: 2731

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

jer·e·mi·ad/ˌjerəˈmīəd/ jeremiad

a long, mournful complaint or lamentation; a list of woes."the jeremiads of puritan preachers warning of moral decay"

Anakin couldn’t remember when he first started loving you. He only knew that he had seen you at some point, and at some point became so infatuated, he kept an eye out for you at every turn. If you happened to be passing by while he was speaking to Obi-Wan, Anakin’s eyes were trained on you. If you fought together in battle, he would look to see you on the other side. Curiously enough, when he would get glimpses of you, you were always twirling your lightsaber after a kill.

Anakin felt an enormous amount of guilt about this. He had been entangled with Padme for some time now, and had even married her after the Battle of Geonosis. He would’ve been foolish not to. Padme was beautiful and kind and diligent, and she would sometimes appear to Anakin in dreams like an angel. He felt an enormous wave of relief wash over him when he would meet his wife at the end of a long mission.

But he didn’t love her. Not really. He loved you. He wanted to be with you, to snake his hands around your waist in the night. He always made an attempt to spar with you in the temple, or ask about any mission you might’ve been on. Anakin felt like a magnet around you, even though you hadn’t shown much of a mutual pattern in return. Anakin didn’t mind that much though- you were a busy person, he understood. If anything, it only made his desire for you stronger. A woman of few words, Anakin only further imagined what your moans would sound like in place.

Eventually, however, you were gone.

As clear and distant as the rising sun, and as quiet and hushed as the moon, you disappeared from the temple and the Jedi alike. There were no more glances to steal at you, no more glimpses of your elegant training to behold. The corner of the archives Anakin often saw you in now seemed empty and incomplete with your form. Even the Jedi council seemed like it was missing something, even though you had refused to be a part of it some years before.

There were whispers, but none that Anakin ever got the opportunity to fully hear. Part of him knew that if he did hear them, he probably wouldn’t have accepted them. In truth, he refused to think that you were even dead, even though it was the far more likely answer to his questions. Anakin believed that you had suffered from some injury in your endeavors and had most likely become immobilized, instead. He didn’t want to know the truth.

But did he have some semblance of it? Yes. He was the most powerful, in tune Jedi in the galaxy- he would’ve felt what had happened to you. He just refused to believe it.

◇─◇──◇─────◇──◇─◇

Sometimes, you would appear in Anakin’s dreams.

Your two blue lightsabers would be at the ready in your cunning hands. Your most trusted trooper- Commander Nyx- would be at your side, awaiting instructions. Your dark Jedi robes would stand in contrast to the scene ahead of you, which consisted of crystalline buildings falling and gunships falling with green streaks.

In dreams, Anakin would suddenly get confidence he could never muster in real life. He didn’t know it, but this was out of desperation. He wanted so badly to see you, to feel you if he could, that he wouldn’t mind risking how he appeared to you anymore. He just wanted you to turn around and face him.

Tentatively, Anakin’s gloved, mechanical fingers would reach out to you. “Y/N?” he’d call out. You would give no reply. Your robes would stay swaying slowly in the wind, offering only a view of your back. Not even Commander Nyx would answer Anakin’s prayer of a whisper. But when the sky of the scene would darken when he drew closer to you, he had received a sort of response. Anakin didn’t care enough to acknowledge it. “Y/N...”

This prompted you to turn to him. Like poetry, he caught your eyes. Even in sleep, he still felt weak and woozy in his stomach (in the best way, of course) and he couldn’t help but get lost in your orbs like a maze.

You were still just as beautiful as he remembered, but different. Something was oozing, sinking, blackening your veins like tar and poison. Anakin could see this in the way you held your sabers. He wasn’t sure how, but your fingers seemed more hungry. Your lips were chapped and slightly paler, but no less attractive than he’d always thought. Jaw sharp, skin glowing faintly- your eyes were the main piece. They were so much brighter and more intelligent than he’d thought, although not in a good way.

You were always a powerful Jedi, and this was common knowledge. You had specialized in the seventh and most deadly form of combat, taken your time to study ancient texts, and had gone head to head with several enemy forces during the War. Anakin could even recall a report of you surviving an encounter with General Grievous and emerging unscathed. But this was different. This was pure and untamed energy, an ultimate corruption as sweet as fine wine.

In this dream, Anakin was too stunned to say anything. He could only stare in a mix of awe and disbelief. You, however, did not take too long to react. Your hand shoots out. Anakin trips forward, gasping at his own throat as he watches your lightsaber come closer and closer to him.

And then he wakes up.

◇─◇──◇─────◇──◇─◇

The day of Kamino’s attack takes everyone by surprise. It had already happened recently, and nobody had fathomed the possibility of the Separatists forming such a similar attack so soon. Anakin, Ahsoka, Obi-Wan, and trusted Captain Rex all rushed to the scene in a gunship, with anxiety drumming in their hearts.

Anakin’s hand tightened around the rope above. His grip became a hot, white, vice as he stared at the crashing waves below. The storm overhead was unending and surreal, but it did nothing to calm the warning in his heart.

He hadn’t dreamed about you in a month by this point. He thought about you often, however. Even more so when he was laying by Padme who had her hand placed directly over his heart. He wondered if you were still out there in the galaxy, fighting monsters and exercising a patience he could only imagine. On good days, he could trick himself into believing that you were taking a long term holiday on some distant world.

But now, it didn’t feel like you were on a distant world. It felt like you were on this one. You felt so impossibly close. Like the universe was shrinking up around the two of you and making his chest feel closed up.

“Are you alright, Anakin?” Obi-Wan spoke out. His free hand came to rest on Anakin’s shoulder comfortingly, like he was about to pull Anakin out of something.

“Yes Master,” Anakin promised in return, even though it was a blatant lie. Still, he managed to keep his voice steady, and that had impressed him enough. “I just worry what Commander Nyx will tell us when we meet him.”

Anakin knew Obi-Wan was unconvinced. He could feel it in the air and see it in the older man’s eyes. Regardless, Obi-Wan removed his palm from Anakin’s form and opened his mouth to spit the normal analytical nonsense. “Nyx and his men are already inside the main structure. They’re searching for our intruder while clearing a way.”

“I thought you said Grievous had already been seen,” Ahsoka questioned.

“I did,” said Obi-Wan. “But that does nothing to help confirmed reports of a second party present.”

Anakin squinted at the water. Determination filled him up like it always did before a battle, but there was also an unquenchable need to make sure you weren’t this ‘second party’. He knew it would’ve been ridiculous to even consider that possibility- you were off on holiday! But something inside of him just wanted see it. It was probably just that witch, Ventress again. She did have the hobby of inconveniencing Anakin’s life more than you ever had.

◇─◇──◇─────◇──◇─◇

Anakin was wrong.

He rounded the corner with his lightsaber in his hand. His breathing came out evenly, just as he had trained it to do. Raising his right wrist to his mouth, he said the magic words. “Obi-Wan, I’m locking in on the targets location. No signs of Nyx anywhere.”

After a high pitched beep, blaster fire could be heard in the background of Obi-Wan’s scene. “Be ready, Anakin.”

With that, Anakin doubled down his speed and spurred himself forward. His brown eyebrows furrowed together, his fingers clutching the hilt of his weapon selfishly. There were people counting on him- the Clones and snips and Obi-Wan, even Padme. But more than anyone, he felt that you were counting on him. He just wanted to silence the anguish he was feeling. It was eating him alive.

Anakin stumbled into a dark, circular room. It was empty, except for the bodies in white armor that littered the floor. He could sense other things too- two presences in the middle. He didn’t need to be so gifted in the ways of the force to know that, though. He could hear the little whimpers from the center in a voice he had heard thousands of times. It was identical to that of Rex and Cody and Bly, and that scared him somewhat.

“Y-you can’t!” the voice pleaded. Anakin would’ve surged forward and saved the clone, if not for the silencing of him all together. With the swiftest of movements, the figure pulled both of their arms to their sides, and something heavy dropped to the floor. The Crimson color of the blades answered a few of the Jedi’s questions. The face of the mystery killer, however, created more.

It was you, in all of your glory. Your eyes piercing and calm, your features were striking. You, as always, were immensely beautiful to Anakin. You were like something that he would never see again if he looked away, and the fact that it was all too true was saddening. Although your skin had paled somewhat, you were entirely recognizable. The thing that had changed the most about you was your lightsabers, which had of course transitioned from pale blue to blood red.

Anakin’s eyes widened as he looked at you. You. What kind of sick, twisted joke was the Maker bestowing upon him? This was the thing he had wished against more than anything else. It was terrible enough imagining himself fighting Obi-Wan, but this wasn’t Obi-Wan. This was the woman he had watched from afar, silently admiring and memorizing. And now the woman was a Sith- the thing he had sworn to fight against.

“Master Skywalker,” you said coolly. You twirled one of the sabers in your palms just as Obi-Wan and other Jedi had done to loosen up their grips. It felt distant. “I had hoped you’d be the one to execute me.”

Anakin swallowed, but it didn’t help the feeling in his throat. “Y/N?” he asked hoarsely, almost like a beg. He wished so badly that you were Ventress, or even Count Dooku for that matter.

You didn’t give him a straight answer, you were never known for that. “If you want me to be.” You looked the man up and down, taking him in. You could recall seeing him around the temple, fighting along side him. You couldn’t place any real conversations or formal meetings, although you would be damned before letting yourself forget the name Anakin Skywalker. He always had been the most fascinating specimen. “Shall we fight, then?”

You poised yourselves on your toes. Your prey could never see when you did this, which gave you the element of surprise in combat. You knew that you were better than many of the Jedi in the Order. You had bested Luminara Unduli on multiple occasions, along with that Kenobi and Kit Fisto. You were never one to flash this, however, instead choosing to mask your growing contempt further and further. But Anakin Skywalker was not any of those Jedi. He was the most powerful force user alive. You were not entirely sure you could beat him.

“What are you doing here?” Anakin asked. His question partially caught you off guard, but you were polite.

“I’d like to think that defeats the point,” you quipped.

Anakin opens and closes his mouth multiple times. Like a glitch, he can’t seem to find or form the words. “We- you were a peacekeeper! And now look at you!”

Your eyes narrowed at him. Anakin noticed this, but you were too much of a demanding sight to ruin his current view of you. He didn’t want to fight you. What if he killed you? What if you killed him?

“Look at yourself,” you challenged. Anakin’s heart broke in his chest. You could see his eyes widen, and immediately a pang ran through you. It was the most of any emotion you had felt in a while- years, maybe. You didn’t know what it was, because it seemed to be a mix of guilt and anguish and longing.

Slowly, like a scared child, Anakin presses the switch on his emitter and takes his fighting stance. His blue streak of light roars to life softly. The shade reminds you of your own weapons, before you had made them bleed and turned them red. The shade reminds you of many other things, however, like Anakin’s brilliant eyes and all the neon planets you had traveled to.

Anakin doesn’t want to fight you. He doesn’t know if you can tell, because your demeanor is just as cold as always. His insides feel unnecessarily hot, and the hair on his arms stand on end with electricity. He’s only felt this way when he’s becoming intimate with Padme, but never like this. This is unsettling, uncomfortable, and he would even dare to describe it as traumatic.

“I’d always hoped you’d be the one to come here,” you said. In that moment, Anakin jabbed his blade forward cleanly. The sky blue glow extended across the room, even shadowing itself onto your face and created purple against the red. You positioned yourself back on instinct, waiting for the weapon to enter through your chest cleanly.

But it didn’t.

Anakin tried to keep his face stern and angry, but he couldn’t. It kept falling short and returning to one of heartbreak. This made your eyes features fall. Anakin wasn’t going to kill you, and you weren’t going to kill him. You had never wanted to.

“I have to take you into...” Anakin’s breath fell short. You had the opportunity to kill him right then, and you were doing nothing. How incredibly foolish of you.

You pressed the switch on your blades. Both of them came to a close, leaving both of you drowned in the blue light and the blue light only. There was no competition anymore. You truly weren’t going to kill Anakin.

Anakin lowered his own weapon as he looked at your face. You looked so much softer now. He memorized everything he could about you again, like he was seeing you for the first time, whenever that may have been.

You took a single step backwards. Anakin did nothing. Another step followed. You had been ordered to kill both Anakin and Kenobi, should you stumble across them. Instead, you would cover for the man. You would tell Dooku and the other Separatists you had not encountered Skywalker.

Similarly, Anakin did not follow you in your steps. He did not chase you as you turned and left the room. He only watched your form, wondering if he was truly going to let you go again. The answer, of course, was that he would. He would tell Obi-Wan he had no conception of this hidden enemy, and that by the time he had located Commander Nyx’s squad, they had already been dead.

Still, the both of you dissipated into your respective nights, knowing your debt was settled, and wondering if it would ever return.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

Taglist: @omg-we-really-doo

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lailoken · 4 years ago

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The Coblynau

“Under the general title of Coblynau I class the fairies which haunt the mines, quarries and under- ground regions of Wales, corresponding to the cabalistic Gnomes. The word coblyn has the double meaning of knocker or thumper and sprite or fiend; and may it not be the original of goblin? It is applied by Welsh miners to pigmy fairies which dwell in the mines, and point out, by a peculiar knocking or rapping, rich veins of ore. The faith is extended, in some parts, so as to cover the indication of subterranean treasures generally, in caves and secret places of the mountains. The coblynau are described as being about half a yard in height and very ugly to look upon, but extremely good- natured, and warm friends of the miner. Their dress is a grotesque imitation of the miner's garb, and they carry tiny hammers, picks and lamps.

They work busily, loading ore in buckets, flitting about the shafts, turning tiny windlasses, and pounding away like madmen, but really accomplishing nothing whatever. throw stones at the miners, when enraged at being lightly spoken of; but the stones are harmless. Nevertheless, all miners of a proper spirit refrain from provoking them, because their presence brings good luck. They have been known to

Miners are possibly no more superstitious than other men of equal intelligence; I have heard some of their number repel indignantly the idea that they are superstitious at all; but this would simply be to raise them above the level of our common humanity. There is testimony enough, besides, to support my own conclusions, which accredit a liberal share of credulity to the mining class. The Oswestry Advertiser, a short time ago, recorded the fact that, at Cefn, 'a woman is employed as messenger at one of the collieries, and as she commences her duty early each morning she meets great numbers of colliers going to their work. Some of them, we are gravely assured, consider it a bad omen to meet a woman first thing in the morning; and not having succeeded in deterring her from her work by other means, they waited upon the manager and declared that they should remain at home unless the woman was dismissed.' This was in 1874. In June, 1878, the South Wales Daily News recorded a superstition of the quarrymen at Penrhyn, where some thousands of men refused to work on Ascension Day. This refusal did not arise out of any reverential feeling, but from an old and wide-spread superstition, which has lingered in that district for years, that if work is continued on Ascension Day an accident will certainly follow. A few years ago the agents persuaded the men to break through the superstition, and there were accidents each year-a not unlikely occurrence, seeing the extent of works carried on, and the dangerous nature of the occupation of the men. This year, however, the men, one and all, refused to work.' dealing with considerable numbers of the mining class, and are quoted in this instance as being more significant than individual cases would be. Of these last I have encountered many. Yet I should be sorry if any reader were to conclude from all this that Welsh miners are not in the main intelligent, church-going, newspaper-reading men. so, I think, even beyond the common. Their superstitions, therefore, like those of the rest of us, must be judged as 'a thing apart,' not to be reconciled with intelligence and education, but co-existing with them. Absolute freedom from superstition can come only with a degree of scientific culture not yet reached by mortal man.

It can hardly be cause for wonder that the miner should be superstitious. His life is passed in a dark and gloomy region, fathoms below the earth's green surface, surrounded by walls on which dim lamps shed a fitful light. It is not surprising that imagination (and the Welsh imagination is peculiarly vivid) should conjure up the faces and forms of gnomes and coblynau, of phantoms and fairy men. When they hear the mysterious thumping which they know is not produced by any human being, and when in examining the place where the noise was heard they find there are really valuable indications of ore, the sturdiest incredulity must sometimes be shaken. Science points out that the noise may be produced by the action of water upon the loose stones in fissures and pot-holes of the mountain limestone, and does actually suggest the presence of metals.

In the days before a Priestley had caught and bottled that demon which exists in the shape of carbonic acid gas, when the miner was smitten dead by an invisible foe in the deep bowels of the earth it was natural his awe-struck companions should ascribe the mysterious blow to a supernatural enemy. When the workman was assailed suddenly by what we now call fire-damp, which hurled him and his companions right and left upon the dark rocks, scorching, burning, and killing, those who survived were not likely to question the existence of the mine fiend. Hence arose the superstition—now probably quite extinct—of basilisks in the mines, which destroyed with their terrible gaze. When the explanation came, that the thing which killed the miner was what he breathed, not what he saw; and when chemistry took the fire-damp from the domain of faerie, the basilisk and the fire fiend had not a leg to stand on. The explanation of the Knockers is more recent, and less palpable and convincing.

The Coblynau are always given the form of dwarfs, in the popular fancy; wherever seen or heard, they are believed to have escaped from the mines or the secret regions of the mountains. Their homes are hidden from mortal vision. When encountered, either in the mines or on the mountains, they have strayed from their special abodes, which are as spectral as themselves. There is at least one account extant of their secret territory having been revealed to mortal eyes. I find it in a quaint volume (of which I shall have more to say), printed at Newport, Monmouthshire, in 1813. It relates that one William Evans, of Hafodafel, while crossing the Beacon Mountain very early in the morning, passed a fairy coal mine, where fairies were busily at work. Some were cutting the coal, some carrying it to fill the sacks, some raising the loads upon the horses' backs, and so on; but all in the completest silence. He thought this 'a wonderful extra natural thing,' and was considerably impressed by it, for well he knew that there really was no coal mine at that place. He was a person of undoubted veracity,' and what is more, 'a great man in the world-above telling an untruth.'

That the Coblynau sometimes wandered far from home, the same chronicler testifies; but on these occasions they were taking a holiday. Egbert Williams, 'a pious young gentleman of Denbigh- shire, then at school,' was one day playing in a field called Cae Caled, in the parish of Bodfari, with three girls, one of whom was his sister. Near the stile beyond Lanelwyd House they saw a company of fifteen or sixteen coblynau engaged in dancing madly. They were in the middle of the field, about seventy yards from the spectators, and they danced something after the manner of Morris-dancers, but with a wildness and swiftness in their motions. They were clothed in red like British soldiers, and wore red handkerchiefs spotted with yellow wound round their heads. And a strange circumstance about them was that although they were almost as big as ordinary men, yet they had unmistakably the appearance of dwarfs, and one could call them nothing but dwarfs. Presently one of them left the company and ran towards the group near the stile, who were direfully scared thereby, and scrambled in great fright to go over the stile. Barbara Jones got over first, then her sister, and as Egbert Williams was helping his sister over they saw the coblyn close upon them, and barely got over when his hairy hand was laid on the stile. He stood leaning on it, gazing after them as they ran, with a grim copper-coloured countenance and a fierce look. The young people ran to Lanelwyd House and called the elders out, but though they hurried quickly to the field the dwarfs had already disappeared.

The counterparts of the Coblynau are found in most mining countries. In Germany, the Wichtlein (little Wights) are little old long-bearded men, about three-quarters of an ell high, which haunt the mines of the southern land. The Bohemians call the Wichtlein by the name of Haus-schmiedlein, little House-smiths, from their sometimes making a noise as if labouring hard at the anvil. They are not so popular as in Wales, however, as they predict misfortune or death. They announce the doom of a miner by knocking three times distinctly, and when any lesser evil is about to befall him they are heard digging, pounding, and imitating other kinds of work. In Germany also the kobolds are rather troublesome than otherwise, to the miners, taking pleasure in frustrating their objects, and rendering their toil unfruitful. Sometimes they are down- right malignant, especially if neglected or insulted, but sometimes also they are indulgent to individuals whom they take under their protection. ‘When a miner therefore hit upon a rich vein of ore, the inference commonly was not that he possessed more skill, industry, or even luck than his fellow-workmen, but that the spirits of the mine had directed him to the treasure.'

The intimate connection between mine fairies and the whole race of dwarfs is constantly met through- out the fairy mythology; and the connection of the dwarfs with the mountains is equally universal. God,' says the preface to the Heldenbuch, 'gave the dwarfs being, because the land and the mountains were altogether waste and uncultivated, and there was much store of silver and gold and precious stones and pearls still in the mountains.' From the most ancient times, and in the oldest countries, down to our own time and the new world of America, the traditions are the same. The old Norse belief which made the dwarfs the current machinery of the northern Sagas is echoed in the Catskill Mountains with the rolling of the thunder among the crags where Hendrik Hudson's dwarfs are playing ninepins.”

British Goblins

Wirt Sikes, 1880

#the fae #faerie folk #faerie faith #faerie #coblynau #british goblins #wirt sikes #welsh folklore

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stxrrywildflower · 4 years ago

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WONDER || ONE

from germany to france to the states, it was always in the stars for you and tara

MASTERLIST -> PLOT EXPLANATION

meeting tara was something out of luck, though it felt like the universe was secretly rooting for you.

if one thing had changed, even something as small as your dad being late for army training one day, you would never have lived the life you were living.

it was such a strange sequence of events that it felt like if you were pinched, you would wake up, almost as if it was too good to be true.

you and tara held each other together, less like glue but more as yin and yang.

it was a balance, seeing each other in both your worst and best moments. without her, you couldn’t even fathom where you would be. she was your rock, and the same the other way around.

you would lay your life down for her if it came to it, and it did; only once and it was a close call, but you didn’t regret it for a second. tara always joked about being in ‘internal debt’ to you but you brushed it off.

did you love her? absolutely. though you weren’t quite sure if it was more platonic or in fact romantic.

that wasn’t something you realized during your teenage years when you were still young and naive. it carried into your adulthood; you often found yourself longing for the intoxicating presence tara had when she was around you.

any chance of a relationship had crumbled away as you grew apart. besides, you never really knew how tara felt either.

it was a blessing to have tara in your life, she was truly something special. if miracles did exist, tara certainly was one.

︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽︽

virginia, 1982

you were less then happy when your dad broke the news to you that you would be moving.

4,228 miles, that’s how far you would have to travel.

your dad got relocated to germany of all places. in just days you would be leaving your rural home in virginia and traveling to what you were told was an urban apartment right in the heart of berling.

moving away from home, flying eight hours, and leaving your friends for the forseable future felt like hell.

you wouldn’t know where to go, you wouldn’t know the language, and you wouldn’t even know anyone. you were six, almost seven, and barely knew anything past your basic education.

a week notice was given for you and your dad to pack up everything you would need for the move, your house and selling it would be taken care of by some agent assigned to you.

you got to say goodbye to your friends, childhood home, and virginia as a whole before you left for the airport. it did thankfully bring you some comfort.

germany was scary to say the least, it was full of unfamiliar people from both the airport and just those on the streets. sure most seemed friendly enough, but an eight hour flight you barely slept on wasn’t helping.

everything just felt wrong.

places were either too hot or too cold. the buildings in the city towered over you and everywhere you went, there was barely as much as a houseplant. the tallest thing you had to deal with in virginia was a telephone pole.

the usual serene sounds of your former home were replaced by a multitude of things; street vendors, conversations between groups of people, and cars. public transportation was big in the city, you had never been on so much as a bus.

your townhouse was even more different. three stories, four bedrooms, and even a slanted roof you could climb out of a window to sit on.

your room was even more simple. white walls, a full sized bed, and huge windows to view the streets below. your dad quickly reassured you that you could decorate it once you settled in.

but something was missing. it didn’t feel like home.

“i don’t like it here,” you admitted one day while unpacking with your dad.

your dad kneeled down to match your height. his hands moved up to rest on your shoulder. his mannerisms meant one thing, you were about to have a deep talk.

“i know you don’t y/n but trust me, you’re going to love it. you’re going to make a lot of new friends at your school and i’m sure of it. plus, there’s a few other military families here. we’re actually going to meet with one tonight,” your dad spoke. “do you remember me talking about mr. lewis back home?”

you nodded along, mind slowly rolling back to the stories your dad would tell you about his ‘companions’ as he worked with them during training. mr. lewis was always one of them.

you had never met the man, but from what you were told you gathered that him and your dad were close.

“well him and his family moved here as well, they live just down the block and have invited us over. can you do me a favor and go get ready?” you dad asked.

you headed to your room after that, picking out one of your favorite outfits from your half-unpacked suitcase. it sat in the corner of the room by itself, you weren’t ready to unpack it yet. unpacking meant the move was solidified.

despite your age, you were fairly self-sufficient; growing up with it being only you and your dad did that to you.

once dressed, you met your dad back in the main living room.

“y/n,” your dad greeted. “are you ready to go?”

“yes dad.”

as your dad adjusted his tie in one of the mirrors, you took a seat on the couch. the last thing you wanted to do right now was go out. meeting a mystery family in an unfamiliar state was one of the last things you wanted to do.

“i know you don’t want to be here y/n but i promise, this will be good for us,” your dad offered. “i still don’t like it,” you informed him. “and i’m not asking you to right away. just please try and be nice during dinner. that’s all i ask.”

you nodded at that, it was the least you could do.

“now come on, the lewis’ have invited us for dinner. and i know they have a daughter your age.”

#criminal minds #tara lewis #tara lewis x reader

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snowbellewells · 4 years ago

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Captain Swan Movie Marathon: “Carolina Moon”

Here is my second submission to the @captainswanmoviemarathon event!! This one is a modern au of the Nora Roberts tv movie (adapted from one of her novels) Carolina Moon. The main female character in the movie is psychic/clairvoyant (I’ll admit, I’m not too sure on the distinction between the two) and I thought her visions and what she goes through in connection to them made a nice real world parallel to Emma’s magic. (There’s also a scene in here where the male lead says something that I could so perfectly see Killian saying to Emma… I just cannot wait to get to that point!)

Anyway, I hope you will enjoy this romantic thriller with some murder mystery elements. There are some instances of abuse and violence in here though - which I feel like I should mention, since that’s a little darker than my typical style. Most of them are in flashbacks of Emma’s past, or in visions she has of victims, more than in the actual present day plot, still I wanted to make people aware before we got too far.

Please enjoy! (I’d love to hear what you think.)

Chapter One

July 1993

The water at their hideaway always feels so good. She could sink into it until her head slips below the surface and never, ever want to come up for air. It’s cooler, more luxurious than even the rich, satiny sheets on the trundle bed those rare nights she gets to sleep over at Rose’s. Emma Swan’s gangly, 13-year-old limbs slice through the murky water as if the constant humidity and sultry air of Storybrooke, South Carolina can’t penetrate here in their little haven. She knows, of course, logically, that the real world isn’t all that far away. The shaded pond she and Rose discovered two summers ago is just a short trek into the woods at the furthest edge of Rose’s family’s boundless acres. Still, it feels removed enough to bring Emma a sense of peace and contentment she gains nowhere else.

Looking over her shoulder to the large, smooth boulder jutting up out of the pond at the bank where they left their flip flops and cutoff denim shorts, she can see her best friend stretched out with her new book where they had spread their towels on the rock’s surface, just in the wash of warming sunlight that streams through the tree branches overhead. Her friend’s flawlessly creamy pale skin is prone to burning, but at the moment Rose seems willing to take the risk for the benefit of lazing cozily to read as she dries in the sun after taking a quick dip. Shaking her head, Emma plunges back under, happy to stay in the chilly water a bit longer herself. She knew as soon as they’d met outside Rose’s house that afternoon and Rose had held the newest entry in her favorite mystery series in her hand that she wouldn’t be able to resist burrowing into those pages for long.

It’s funny, Emma supposes, but that’s exactly what bonded she and Rose in the first place. They might seem different on the surface, but in the end, neither of them quite fit with everyone else, and so they gravitate to each other, and have ever since Emma first arrived in Storybrooke as an eight-year-old orphan. They’re willing to give each other at least one other person who takes them as they are and with whom they won’t have to pretend. Emma doesn’t care if Rose wants to read quietly and tell her about the stories she’s already finished instead of picking out dresses for the next cotillion class or preening in front of the mirror to practice batting her eyelashes to charm boys or bragging to Emma about which ones she intends to kiss. Her sister Ruby, who shares the same thickly shining, burnished mahogany hair and pretty pink lips but little of her fraternal twin’s calming, gentle personality, does enough of that for the both of them. Their mother, a former debutante and southern belle, delights in the one daughter’s traditional coquettishness, and despairs of the other’s shyness, a true throwback to another time who wants nothing more than to see both daughters marry well and retain their places atop the social ladder. In turn, Rose doesn’t mock Emma for her thick, dark-framed glasses or secondhand clothes, nor does she cringe away from the “fits” that sometimes take hold of her friend, making strange, disturbing scenes Emma can’t understand flash across her mind with such intensity they sometimes knock her off her feet. Emma knows Rose’s mother and sister find her an unsuitable and embarrassing companion for Rose, but she is eternally grateful her friend seems able to see the best in anyone - even a lost girl nobody else wants - and so blithely acts as though she has no idea of the rest of her family’s opinions.

Cringing even while still submerged in the pond’s depths and practically invisible, Emma tries not to think of her unwanted visions. Her strict, hypocritical, and more than a bit deranged foster father claims she’s possessed - and more than once has taken her episodes out on her hide. The man swears he’s beating the devil out of her and putting the fear of God in Satan’s place when he takes the thick leather strap to her shoulders, back and legs until she bleeds, but Emma has already lived long enough in a cruel and unfair world to know that his violence and “discipline” have less to do with parenting and concern for her soul, and more to show for his own twisted mind and overindulgence in the bottle. She wants to hide her spells from him, but when they come on her so abruptly and with such power, they are impossible to miss. She can’t fathom how a person like him was deemed fit to take in and care for a child, but it seems to be her lot, and so she simply grits her teeth and survives.

It’s different when the spells happen around Rose; the slight brunette merely rests a cool, steadying hand on Emma’s forehead or her arm until it passes, helps Emma stand until she feels in control again, listens as she attempts to make sense of whatever she’s seen, and most importantly… believes her. If only she could stay in the huge house Rose’s family calls home. She’d cook, clean, do chores, and stay in the servant’s quarters, Emma isn’t picky. It would still be a far sight safer than the situation she had in the rundown shack with the monster who’d been deemed her caretaker. Barring that, she would honestly rather live wild in these woods and survive off the land. She knew which plants and berries were safe to eat, Graham, her friend and a fellow orphan now happily adopted, had taught her how to fish; it wouldn’t be easy, but she’d get by, and at least no one would lay a hand on her again.

This afternoon, those eerie images she sometimes had seem far away as she splashes up out of the water, trying to arc playfully like a mermaid as she breaks the surface. Drawing in a big gulp of air after staying underwater so long, Emma startles at the sound of teasing laughter, and whirls to see three figures on the bank where she and Rose left their shoes and shorts.

“Well, look here,” calls out a taunting voice that never fails to set Emma’s nerves on edge. “It’s the baby beached librarian and her drowned rat friend!” none other than Emma’s nemesis Killian Jones crows from his vantage point on dry land.

Rose sits up ramrod straight, book still in hand and annoyed scowl on her face at the quiet of their sanctuary being interrupted. She isn’t genuinely angry, though; for all that she and her sister shared little in common, she and her two years older brother are affectionately close. “Shut up, Killy!” she shoots back, throwing in the childhood nickname they all know he hates. “Who asked you to come looking anyway?”

The boy standing next to Killian speaks up next, making Emma scowl just as playfully as Rose had moments before. Graham Hunter might as well be her big brother; he’s the closest thing she’d had to family since her parents were lost in a car crash and she was thrown into the foster care system. Be that as it may, he and Killian Jones are thick as thieves, and he’ll give her a hard time for all he’s worth in while in the presence of his buddy. “We just wanted to swim,” he calls across the water to the two girls, smirking at Emma, now standing in the water with one hip jutting out and hands planted on her waist. “How were we supposed to know you two were infesting it?”

“Ha!” Emma jeers back, the affront plain in her voice; despite the fact that the entire routine is like a practiced girls-versus-boys exchange they’ve all engaged in countless times. There isn’t much else to do for entertainment in their sleepy little one-horse town. “You idiots know this is Rose and I’s hideaway, fair and square!”

“Well, Rose’s anyway,” a third voice cuts in snidely.

The cruel jab reminds Emma once more that she is just a charity case, quite possibly only included in anything at all because of her friend’s kind heart, and causes her gaze to cut sharply to the third member of the boys’ little crew, hanging back slightly in the shadows behind Killian and Graham as he always does. Her green eyes narrow to slits in genuine dislike and suspicion. Where before her animosity was largely for show, when they land on Walsh Ozman it is all too real.

She has never understood why the other two boys - jokers and annoyances though they may be, but good guys when it comes right down to it - hang out with Walsh at all. Where Graham and Killian are much more cut from the same cloth - athletic, outgoing, well-liked and pleasant - Walsh is a splindy, sniveling character, complaining and whining whatever their little trio gets up to. He lives not far from Emma’s foster father’s cabin with his single mother - a bushy-haired redhead who seems strangely overprotective and attached to her only child. Most people give the property a wide berth, except when high schoolers teepee it the whole month of October, and the general town consensus is that Zelena Ozman might be a witch and to steer clear. Still, beyond all of that, Emma might have been able to look past the boy’s circumstances and see him for himself - she of all people knew the gift it was not to be judged by where a person came from - if Walsh hadn’t simply given her “the willies”. Even standing too close to him made the fine hairs at the nape of her neck stand on end - and not in the way that nearness to Killian sometimes did; an altogether much more pleasant tingle, even if she was just as unable to explain one as the other.

“We could just take their things,” Walsh suggests, holding up the threadbare, faded jeans Emma had left on the bank. “Make them walk back in their skivvies.” The wicked smile on his face makes Emma’s stomach turn over sickly.

Something sharp flashes in Jones’ eyes, his nostrils flaring slightly and his head giving a subtle shake of dissent that Emma can see even at the distance she stands away from him. Protectiveness, chivalry, or maybe the honor of a southern gentleman passed down to him through generations of his impressive family line, whatever it is, it sparks to life in his eyes at that moment as he quashes Walsh’s mean-spirited suggestion in no uncertain terms. “That’s my little sister you’re talking about Oz,” he growls, smacking the worn material from the smaller’s boy’s hands, even if the article of clothing isn’t Rose’s at all.

Emma feels her breath rush back into her lungs, though she continues to watch the guys warily for whatever they might do or say next. Before long, they grow bored of standing around and move on, hollering out age old taunts of “Bye, losers” and “Hey, smell ya later” to Emma’s derisive snort and Rose completely ignoring them to flip open her book again.

However, even with the intruders gone, it seems as if the perfect comfort of their retreat has been shattered by the unsettling interruption. Soon, Emma wades to the shore and Rose clambers down from her perch, to dress once more and return to the world outside. For a moment, as she refastens her jeans around her skinny waist, Emma feels a strange prickling along the fine hairs on her arms… like they’re being watched. She jerks around, searching the surrounding trees and brush, but can’t see or hear a thing.

Rose’s small hand takes hers, snapping Emma out of the moment. “What is it?” she whispers, only true caring in her voice. “Did you sense something?”

Emma nods, but can’t give her suspicions voice. Usually her vision are clearer than that - this had just been heavy breathing and like looking at herself and Rose through another person’s eyes, outside her own body.

Rose stooped to grab the little canvas bag she’d bought along with water bottles, towels, and a second book in it. “Hey, don’t worry, okay?” she offers, hopeful and kind as always. “You’ll figure it out. Wanna meet back out here tonight? Secret Sister bonfire?” she winks mischeivously. “I have to get to dinner now. You know how Mama hates it if I’m not washed up and properly attired for the evening meal - or a second late. But we can talk some more then, maybe you’ll remember more and it will be clearer.”

Emma nods gamely. “The stars’ll be beautiful by midnight,” she suggests. “And we’ll definitely have the place all to ourselves.”

“Since we were so rudely interrupted,” Rose chimes in with a giggle and roll of her eyes.

“Shake on it, pinkie swear,” they say together in practiced unison, executing a complex handshake that ends with their pinkies hooked together and wide, matching grins on both their faces.

“Thanks Rose,” Emma whispers sincerely, trying to speak around the lump in her throat as if it’s no big deal. “I’ll be out here as soon as I can sneak away.”

Rose, for her part, wraps her taller, golden-haired friend into a tight, momentary hug. “Hey, we’re Secret Sisters! You can count on me. I’ll see you then!”

They part ways at the edge of the forest, Emma heading to the rundown cabin that serves as her nightmarish version of a home and Rose to the pristine, Jones mansion standing tall over all the surrounding land. Rose looks back over her shoulder with a smile and wave that bolsters Emma, and the memory fades back into the haze of the past…

Eighteen years later….

September 2011

The blaring of the horn as a sports car whizzed by, barely missing the nose of Emma’s beat-up yellow VW where it had begun to edge out into the country intersection jarred her back to the present with a gasp and painful jolt to her chest. Panting for a moment as she gripped the steering wheel, Emma tried to clear her head and calm the pounding of her heart at the near-miss.

‘Get it together,’ she berated herself. It might have seemed like only yesterday as she remembered that sunny afternoon at the swimming hole, but that day had been nearly two decades ago. She was a grown woman, had made a way for herself, fighting tooth and nail for every step forward, and she answered to no one. She had learned to stand up for herself, to control her visions and use them for good, and was a special consultant for the NYPD. But, more than all of that, she had come back to this place to find peace, to lay to rest the ghosts that followed her everywhere else she’d gone in the years between, once and for all. If she expected other to leave the past in the past, she’d first have to manage it herself.

She’d had no way to know as she and Rose parted that afternoon with promises and plans for later that it would be the last time she would ever see her friend. Emma had harbored the pain and the guilt and the unanswered questions ever since. Finally, it was time to meet the gazes of all of those who’d stared at her in suspicion before she’d been packed up and moved away once more, and it was time she found answers. She wasn’t the scared, whipped, mistreated adolescent she had been at 13. What she had lived through then wasn’t her fault, nor was what had happened to Rose that muggy July midnight.

And if she had to return to Storybrooke, South Carolina to lay that burden down… well, it was long past time she did.

Tagging: @captainswanmoviemarathon @teamhook @revanmeetra87 @lassluna @kmomof4 @searchingwardrobes @jennjenn615 @hollyethecurious @stahlop @winterbaby89 @lfh1226-linda @therooksshiningknight @thejollyroger-writer @artistic-writer @resident-of-storybrooke @darkcolinodonorgasm @tiganasummertree @xsajax @spartanguard @laschatzi

#captain swan movie marathon #cs ff #cs au #carolina moon #chapter one #cs mc

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