#the rift that tore the world in two....in the company of......through your door.....

[tora-the-cat]

Naruto should've gotten to interact with the other jinchurikis by the way. I love you white-room-jinchiriki naruto fanfiction. you understand me. We should bring those back.

[crue-sixx]

I’ll Always Be Here For You (Steve Rogers/Captain America Imagine)

Summary: You try to hold it together after the passing of your brother, but it all becomes too much. Steve is there to help.

Warning: Panic attack.

There are major Avengers: Endgame spoilers in this.

You sat on the couch with your niece and sister-in-law, Morgan and Pepper, as the holographic video of your older brother played before you. It was almost as if Tony were really there, but he wasn’t. He was gone and you still couldn’t believe it. You were in shock over the whole thing and in complete denial. He couldn’t be gone. He was Tony Stark...Iron Man. Nothing could defeat Iron Man.

You and Tony had been very close. He had raised you when the untimely passing of your parents occurred. He had always been there for you and made sure that you were well taken care of. You looked up to your older brother so much. You grew up and decided to follow in his foot steps by working for his company then by becoming an Avenger, much to his dismay. He was worried about you and your safety, which caused a bit of a rift between you two. He eventually accepted it, however. You two were an amazing team together. You had your ups and downs, but you were family. He was the only family you had left and he was gone. Morgan and Pepper were your family of course, but you and Tony had been through so much together.

You and the rest of the team had suffered two major losses during this battle. Natasha was the first one to sacrifice herself. It came as a complete shock. You were absolutely devastated. Natasha was your best friend and she was just gone. You didn’t think it could get any worse, but then the battle against Thanos and his minions occurred. Tony was the next one to sacrifice himself.

You held Morgan’s little hand in yours as you all watched Tony. Your fiancée, Steve, was stood right behind you. His hand was on your shoulder and he squeezed it in a comforting manner.

“I love you, 3000,” Tony spoke before he signed off. His Iron Man helmet stopped playing the hologram and you all sat there quietly for a bit.

“I love you, 3000, daddy,” Morgan said, which tore at your heart strings.

You looked down at her as she moved closer into Pepper’s side. Pepper wrapped her arm around her and kissed her head before she looked over at you. You gave her a small smile to try to comfort her. You had been trying to stay strong for Pepper and Morgan. They needed you and you were going to make sure you were strong for them. You’d cried on the battlefield when you watched your brother take his last breath as he looked at you and Pepper. You vowed to stay strong after that.

“Are you ready, Y/N?” Pepper asked you and you nodded at her.

You took one of Morgan’s hands as Pepper took her other. Happy handed Pepper the wreath that was made for his memorial, which was why everyone was together. The wreath had his arc reactor on it that Pepper gifted him that read, “Proof that Tony Stark has a heart.”

Everyone started gathering outside. You, Morgan, and Pepper all walked out to the ramp of the lake hand-in-hand. Steve stayed close behind you. He had been there for you through the whole thing, never leaving your side. He was worried about you, especially since you didn’t seem to be letting yourself grieve properly. He could tell you were holding it all in and knew how dangerous that could be. He let you do your thing, however, and made sure he was there in case you needed him.

You, Morgan, and Pepper all bent down, placing the wreath into the lake together. You watched it float away as you squeezed Morgan’s hand in yours before she wrapped both of her arms around Pepper. It was like watching that arc reactor float away made it sink in fully. Your brother was gone. He wasn’t there for you to talk to anymore. He wasn’t there to give you advice anymore. He wasn’t there for you to annoy each other. He was really gone.

As some time passed, you felt your chest tightening up as you watched the wreath float in the water. You tried to make the feeling pass, but it only became stronger as if it were damanding to be noticed. You stood from your spot on the ramp and tried to keep your breathing steady.

“I-I’ll be back,” you spoke shakily to Pepper before you quickly turned and started walking away.

You started passing by everyone. Happy watched you walk away with a worried look and Peter Parker looked at you sadly as if he knew what was happening. He also knew that you had been holding in your grief. The boy was close to you and your brother both, but especially to your brother.

You finally made it into the house and ran up the stairs quickly. You made it into the guest room, where you and Steve had been staying, and shut the door behind you before you leaned back against it. You couldn’t hold it back any longer so you let it out. You began sobbing uncontrollably as your chest tightened up. It felt like something heavy was on it and really there was. Your grief was weighing heavily on you and could no longer be ignored. It demanded to be recognized.

You tried breathing as you sobbed, but found it hard to. You knew that you were dealing with a panic attack at this point. It was something that you and your brother both suffered from. You would usually help each other in these situations, but he was no longer there to do that.

There was a knock on the door and you put your hand to your mouth to try to keep your sobs down.

“Y/N,” Steve spoke from behind the door. “Can I come in, doll?”

“Steve,” you sobbed out as you pushed yourself off of the door and opened it.

Steve looked at you and came into the room quickly when he saw the state you were in. He shut the door behind him before he gathered you into his arms and held you against him.

“St-Steve, he’s g-gone,” you sobbed out. “M-my b-brother’s gone!”

“I’m sorry,” he sighed out sadly as he rubbed your back and placed his lips on top of your head.

“I-I can’t br-breathe,” you choked out.

Steve picked you up and carried you over to the bed. He sat down on it and placed you in his lap before he pulled away a bit so that he could look at you. His hands came up and held your face as your own hands held tightly to his wrists.

“Y/N, doll, look at me,” he told you. “Look at me, sweetheart. Just focus those pretty eyes on me.”

You were looking around in a panic, but your eyes eventually landed on his and he nodded.

“That’s good,” he said as he wiped away the never ending tears. “Just focus on me, okay?” He moved one of his hands and took one of yours, placing it on his chest where his heart was. “Focus on the beating of my heart and my breathing and try to follow it.”

You felt the beating of his heart beneath your hand, steady and strong. You could also feel his chest rise and fall with each breath he took. He took some deep breaths and let them out slowly to show you how to breathe. You tried to put all of your attention on him. You closed your eyes so you could focus more and began trying to take some calming breaths.

“That’s right, sweetheart,” he said, encouraging you. “You’re doing so good. Just keep doing that for me.”

You did as he told you. You matched your breathing with his and found yourself starting to calm down. The tears still came, but the panicky feeling was starting to evaporate from you. It took some time, but you eventually calmed down enough to breathe properly again.

“There you go,” Steve said and squeezed your hand in his before he brought it to his lips and kissed it.

You finally opened your eyes and looked at Steve, who was looking right back at you. He looked worried, but was keeping his cool for you.

“I should’ve been there for him, Steve,” you told him.

“You were there for him, doll.”

“No, I-I mean I should’ve been there to stop him,” you told him. “To save him! I should’ve been the one to use the stones!”

Steve’s face fell at that and he shook his head quickly. “Y/N...no. Don’t say that.”

“It’s true!” You told him. “Tony’s always been there for me and I should’ve been there for him! He finally had everything he wanted and deserved...Pepper and Morgan. They need him. Morgan needs her father and Pepper needs her husband, Steve. It should’ve been me!”

“Y/N, you know good and well that Tony would’ve done everything he could to keep you from sacrificing yourself,” he told you. “You’re his sister and he loved you so much. There’s absolutely nothing you could’ve done to stop him so don’t blame yourself for any of this. He wouldn’t want you to. He did what he did for his family...for you. He was important, but you’re important too. I love you, Y/N, and I need you. Your loved by so many. The world needs Y/N Stark so don’t ever say that it should’ve been you.”

You knew Steve was right about your brother not letting you sacrifice yourself. Tony would’ve chose the same path to keep you all safe. It just hurt you too much. Why did it all have to play out like this? Why did Natasha and Tony have to sacrifice themselves? They didn’t deserve it. You all should be together. They did what they had to to save the world, but they deserved so much better.

Steve kissed your forehead before he pulled you close. You buried your face in his chest as you continued crying. You were probably making a mess of his shirt, but neither of you cared. He rubbed your back as you let it all out, whispering comforting words to you.

“Tony’s not going to be here to watch us get married or to walk me down the aisle,” you said aloud after a while. It hurt to think about, but it weighed heavy on you. “Natasha won’t be here either.”

“He’ll be there, doll,” Steve said and kissed your head. “He may not be there physically, but I know he’ll be there in spirit. He’ll probably be glaring daggers into me because I’m marrying his baby sister. Natasha will be there too.”

You smiled a little at that as you raised up to look at Steve. His eyes were watering as if he were holding back his own tears, but one fell. He wiped your tears away again and pecked your lips before you wiped his tear away in return.

“I love you so much, Y/N,” he told you and rest his forehead on yours.

“I love you too, Steve,” you told him. “Thank you for being here for me.”

“I’ll always be here for you, doll,” he told you.

[coreshorts]

Stars

It was long-in-coming, she had thought. They had put so much work toward this goal, this answer. The door that stood for millennia at the farthest northern reaches of Eorzea had been the goal of O’byahta Odah’s most recent venture, and it was Hali’s first self-given trial as a Blue Mage. It would also be her last.

So much, she thought, had been given in the pursuit of that goal. Lives, time, sanity, blood, all given in the name of what she thought, at first, was coin. There had always been others there, doing much the same: searching, fighting, possibly even dying. But, in the end, it was she and those she followed who triumphed. Rather, it would have been, if “triumph” was even the word. Was it? She couldn’t be sure. It certainly didn’t feel that way at all. It felt hollow.

It had started simply enough: a call to arms by the Outriders, by Byahta, for those same people who went to slay a creature they had called the Nucklavee, a task thought impossible in the wake of horrible curses and impossible odds. Just fresh out of the Games of Glory as its Champion, Hali was eager to prove herself as a capable adventurer. She didn’t know just the depth of what she’d just entered... but on she went, ignorantly and happily throwing pretence aside in the name of... she didn’t even know. Was it pride that drove her, or just an overwhelming need to prove herself to herself?

Whatever the case, a long ride north had them setting up camp in a stretch of ruins, interspersed throughout the land, overshadowed by a great door the likes of which she had never seen before. The shadow it cast was long, but the darkness that lay beyond was something she’d never expected.

Night after night, morning after morning, dusk and dawn alike tore at her mind. The world, the very fabric of reality screamed, and it hurt like nothing she’d ever felt. Even the pain of the Immortals’ trials paled in comparison. At times, she lost herself, giggling madly as some sick prank played by her mind, others devolving into a crying heap of aethersick convulsions. She weathered it, at times for weeks straight in the name of guarding their rented aetheryte.

Their investigations were long and arduous. Ruins after ruins, each of which had their own story to tell, as night after night, after the mind-shattering aetheric “event”, as Byahta had begun to call it, the dusk would bring scenes as if from a play, the same each night, that drew out scores of soldiers and their commanders to war. Knights and commanders and armies wearing the opposed mantles of Day and Night, their clashes titanic in power. The very aether given off made Hali’s skin crawl as she watched.

As time went on, they understood more, and at the same time, so much less. They encountered an Examplar of Night, with whom they attempted to parley, only to be locked in fierce combat - a fight they lost, their lives only saved by the grace of the night’s fall ending the strange rift in time. 

Another had them speaking peacefully with a pair of brothers faced with an impossible decision: one or the other must die for a decision to be made and peace to be had. If peace could not be reached between the two armies, they had found, the Allagans would surely wipe them out. A coinflip decided the ancient decision, and time and time again it had failed due to assassins, which the company was forced, eventually, to face in order to make the decision last. At the end, a relic stood unbroken which empowered the door, they believed. They marked it as progress.

They met an ancient dragoon who, though at first determined to stop them, to end the threat they posed to everything for which he was sworn, became an ally, if only even briefly, after a long and deep conversation about choices and taking one’s fate into one’s own hands. Let your people die in agony, or be cursed, but live on? Both sides had made their choice, and it was a heavy burden borne by each side. Hali had not been there, of course. Looking back, she wished she was, rather than lamenting her own faults and downfalls to a beastman with no understanding of such complex things. But she, like the soldiers, had a duty, and it was to the runes she had practised, nearly perfected, so that the others could always return safely. At the end, the others had escorted a palanquin back to a designated spot where the next relic was restored. They marked it, too, as progress.

They had investigated a fort next, which had, they had discovered, sunk beneath the waves in a desperate battle with the Allagan Empire thousands of years before. Once again, they met a commander of Dusk when the event shifted time, and they witnessed as the fortress quaked and rattled, shades of Allagan soldiers attacking and cutting down Night and Day alike in their wake. They fought hard, but by that point, the strain it had all put on Hali had begun weakening her. The aether events, the attempts at Blue Magic that she barely understood, she felt something in her dying, and it scared her. A knife tore her open from the back, and she lost consciousness, until she awoke to one of the group, carrying her, a potion bringing her back around. They fought Allagan constructs, and watched as the Door, so far in the distance, blazed, prompting questions that had no time to be answered as they continued to pursue the Knight who seemed to know all too well where he was going...

When at last they met, it was a pained discussion, very nearly a heated debate, over whether it was better to let his people die or to keep them trapped in a repeating nightmare, dying time and time again, going through the same thing every night. Most of them forgot. The Knight always remembered. A thing like would drive a person mad, Hali thought, and even though his insistence on perpetuating the nightmare enraged her, her experience with madness, with despair, with such fear... she felt it all in him. He threatened her with meaning. In a mission of shapes and noise, she wanted to cry as she watched blood seep from his armour as he desperately tried to hold back the tide of destruction, the Locus, his source of power and, ironically, one for the door he had once hoped to destroy to save his people, fuelling a last ditch attempt, just like every night, to stop the collapse until the scene played its course and night fell true. When it did, Byahta posited that they search the ruins beneath the waves, and, surely enough, they found the Locus: a broken, long-forgotten blade with barely a spark of aether left to it. It was progress, once more, but what was about to happen was almost beyond comprehension.

Like a woman possessed, Byahta had rushed for the Door that stood so tall above all else in that vast stretch of land. The linkshell went mad as the woman left to guard the crystal called out in concern... and then fled when she had heard of Byahta’s mad dash. As the Locus completed its ritual and the Door began to open, Byahta was held back by an otherworldly force like a massive dark hand plucking her from the ground and restraining her.

“Gyuhuhuhu...” a dark voice cackled to her, “You do not get to make this journey.”

Standing before the door, then, after so many had come and gone were Hali, the Outriders’ leader Naomi Kett, the monk T’rahven, swordscale Ryuka Yumitori, the Protector Kazukata Go, and the Dark Lancer Shadow Shouvome. As it began to close, it was Hali who had begun running first, her strength failing, but her sheer determination to have this finally done and finished forcing her forward. It had to end. She would find out how to make it end.

On the other side of the door was another world to its own, a mirror of their own. It was silent, empty, hollow, and before them stood a single figure. Battered, beaten, but not yet truly broken, the old and weathered blade of a soldier of Night clutched in his hand. Before him lay several similar weapons, all driven into the ground like grave markers. Words were exchanged. They made Hali want to scream, to cry, to yell in anger. The Outriders wanted so badly for him to join them in their fight against the voidsent monstrosity who, they believed, had set it all in motion, but it was over. It had long been over. The Door was a weapon as much as it was an escape, and everything behind them, with its closing, was not only closed off to them, but blasted in to what they thought may well have been oblivion.

The words continued, but the Exemplar, called Lun, had been trapped with naught but ghosts, time, and a vast stretch of emptiness until, as he had said, “even their dust [was] dust.” It pained her. To be chained to something so hopeless, so meaningless, for so long tore at her. She felt things she never wanted to feel, never could comprehend, and yet still felt, and it made her want to scream, even as she struggled to stay standing. She took a step forward and offered herself, first. He wanted a fight. He was doomed anyway, with the opening of the door, and so he would go out in accordance with his duty. He would fight and be slain, but he would fight.

It was no glorious battle. It was a struggle for one man, one dying knight against six weary adventurers, brought to and beyond the precipice of oblivion through time and despair alone, to make one final stand against something that was so clearly meaningless. All he knew was gone. There was never any hope, never a chance, and so he fought. He fought, despite it all. He attacked and was attacked. He fell, meeting the earth of the mirror-world time and time again, but each time, rose with another wound leaking sand, as if that was all time had left of him, in some cruel joke. At the last of it, he staggered for the weapons that, during the course of the desperate final stand, had begun to glow.

Hali felt nothing. She hadn’t the strength to feel. The pain of her own failing body, her writhing, agonised soul, and her mind, wrung into complete dissociation by the trauma of trying to relate to such a torturous fate, trying to understand such a desperate struggle, for all of them, it all became nothing for a brief moment, and she joined Kazukata in a final rush to run him through before he could finish them, Ryuka blocking his path and keeping him from proceeding further.

At the end, he was nothing but armour and dust, fading into obscurity as the door opened once more, no longer bound by the single man tethered to it in a desperate bid to do anything he could against the tide of inevitability that awaited him. There was nothing. It was no victory. It was hollow. It hurt. It had brought the would-be Blue Mage to her limits, and then pushed her over. She felt as though she would die. She expected to. She did not.

When they returned to the base camp, their whole path littered with the suddenly-returned ruins of a long-dead civilisation, the ground, stone, mountains, and more scorched from the Door’s power, they found Byahta and S’seri Loh. The two green-haired miqo’te, paired with their strange dolls, awaited the company of adventurers, the latter having been tasked for some weeks with guarding their precious aetheryte, much to her own dismay. Byahta was battered and broken, looking not only concussed but entirely uncharacteristic. She spoke in an old dialect, where she was normally mute, turning some heads, before they all went their own ways, Byahta and Naomi using the aerthyte to return home, and the rest packing up camp to make the long ride back on their own.

It felt so much longer than the ride there, and even that had taken days. Most of the time, Hali remained either asleep or despondent, staring silently forward along the long path. She had nothing to say. There was nothing she wanted to say. There was nothing she could say without crying, without screaming, or without simply failing to find the words she needed. The nights were especially harsh, seeming darker, almost less hospitable to her. She wondered why. Had it been because of what they had unknowingly completed? Were they all so scorned? It hurt to think about, and so she didn’t, attributing it only to her weakness. 

Kel’s offer to train her in the arts of the shinobi were a sure thing for her. She couldn’t continue on this path. The Immortals were no more interested in teaching her than they were in trying to kill one another for reasons she barely understood. The magic was killing her, slowly, she felt. This venture made her realise that. It had to end. She would be better on her own. This would be the start... but first, she had to recover. She had so much to think about, so much crying to do, and just so very much to take in.

It would take time before she could truly come to terms with her Memories of Stars.

(( This short serves as a personal recounting of @obyahta-odah‘s fantastic Memories of Stars storyline from the perspective, of course, of my character, Hali Naras. I can’t possibly do it justice with a single short, but here we are. It was an absolute treat and I’m glad to have been part of it. ))