#the silent beat after that is two stones in the river

[veunho]

I love love love drawing but I cannot draw poses in any circumstances

[fallenclan]

Buzzardcry Fic

By Dragon Anon

Buzzard couldn't help but feel a pang of annoyance as Kestrel practically glued herself to his side, shorter pelt ruffling his own. Still, Buzzard chose not to comment on it, knowing his sister was only seeking some form of comfort, since Vulture didn't seem keen to offer any.

"Where are we even going?" Buzzard demanded, hating the way his voice took on an almost whine-like quality. 

"The mountains."

Buzzard blinked in surprise. This was the first real answer Vulture had given them in days. "Why?"

" . . . " 

Buzzard sighed. Evidently, his mother was returning to her silent brooding. "What are mountains like?" Kestrel whispered, her muzzle brushing against Buzzard's cheek.

"I don't know. Tall?" Kestrel frowned. Hating the saddened look in his sister's eye, Buzzard hurriedly continued, "But it'll be a new sort of adventure for us to find out."

"Really?" Kestrel's gaze brightened. She loved stories about adventures. Vulture used to tell all kinds of stories, before Falcon had died.

"Yeah. Don't you worry, Kes. It'll be fun."

"Okay." Kestrel smiled, vacant gaze becoming more focused. "I like adventures."

"I know, Kes. I know."

***

"We have to cross this?" Buzzard hissed, gawking at the river Vulture had pointed out. Its waters were moving at relatively slow pace, but the way they sloshed against the stepping stones Vulture had instructed them to use made Buzzard's stomach flip. 

"Don't complain. Watch what I do, and copy me," Vulture replied briskly. With allowing further room for debate, Vulture leapt forward, pouncing from stone to stone with the skill of a mink hopping through the snow. 

Buzzard remained rooted to his spot on the river's bank opposite of Vulture. "Don't worry, Buzz," Kestrel chirped. "See how easy Mama made it look? We can do this!"

"I don't-" Before Buzzard could finish, Kestrel had already begun to leap from stone to stone. She had almost made it when---

SPLASH. She had mis-stepped, flailing wildly for a few moments before landing in the river with a tiny shriek. "Kestrel!" Buzzard yowled, racing along the riverbank. "Kestrel?!"

After several moments of wild searching, Kestrel's head resurfaced. Buzzard dove towards his sister, paddling fiercely against the river's current. His limbs seemed to howl in protest, struggling to move in the direction he wanted them to, until finally, finally...

Buzzard latched on to Kestrel's scruff, swimming the rest of the way across the river and collapsing against the far riverbank. Kestrel was trembling violently and coughing. Buzzard was silent, inhaling and exhaling deeply through his nose.

Vulture watched with wide eyes from a few paces away.

She hadn't even moved a paw since Kestrel had fallen.

***

"Mama?! Mama, get up!" Buzzard hissed, heart beating wildly against his chest. It wasn't fair, she couldn't leave them now, they had almost made it to the mountain!

Vulture wheezed, throat torn open after a vicious tussle with a vixen. The fox had tried to take off with Kestrel, and before Buzzard could even react, Vulture had flown after the vixen. 

Kestrel's nape was bleeding badly and her eyes were wide like two pale moons. "Go--" Vulture gasped, legs spasming as she fought to get up. "--the mountain. She said---she said she would come here if--" 

"What are you talking about? Mama?" Buzzard demanded, blinking furiously to try and force back the sob threatening to escape his chest. 

"Find Cedar---she---" Vulture let out a final, wretched gasp, and fell still.

All that was left was the scent of blood, and the ragged breathing of her kits.

***

Buzzard lay still. He had no energy left to move, or to call for help. They had made it to the mountain, and for what? Kestrel was gone, unable to fight off the infection that grew within her bite wound. 

Now Buzzard was alone.

He didn't know how long he had been laying there when a soft, frantic voice spoke: "Stars above! Little one, are you all right?" A spotted black cat with a distinctly white chest was peering down at him. Vaguely, her pelt reminded Buzzard of a magpie.

"Don't worry, I'm going to bring you somewhere safe and get you all healed up, okay? Stars, you're skinny... I'll get you some prey to eat, too."

Buzzard didn't respond, glaring at the unknown cat. Leave me alone, he wanted to screech. He remained quiet, even as her felt her teeth sink into his scruff, lifting him up as if he were a kit and she his mother. 

He had stopped being a kit a long time ago.

***

"It's a good thing Eris found you when xe did. You're lucky to be alive," Shrewscratch murmured, brows furrowed deeply. "You said your name was Buzzard?"

"Yeah." Buzzard flattened his ears. It appeared as though every cat in FallenClan had something to say to him. 

"Well, she and Cedarberry have offered to look after you for now. You're too young to be on your own. Once you're old enough, you can decide if you want to stay or not."

Buzzard scowled for a few moments before freezing. "Cedarberry?"

"Do you... know her?" Shrewscratch tilted her head.

"Not really." After that, Buzzard stopped speaking, not wanting to entertain conversation any longer. 

***

"Did you know a cat named Vulture?" Cedarberry's eyes widened at Buzzard's question, her mouth opening slightly in shock.

"I--yes, I did, once upon a time. Why, d'you know her?"

"She was my mama. She told me to find you." Buzzard eyed Cedarberry accusingly. Who was this cat, that Vulture had trusted so deeply?

Cedarberry sighed, glancing at Eris, who was listening with a placid expression. "Vulture an' I were friends a long time ago. We, uh, made a promise to look after each other, if anythin' ever went wrong. I used to dream about livin' in these mountains. Talked her ear off about it, actually. I didn't think she was actually listenin' to what I was sayin."

"Why did she never mention you until--" Buzzard winced. "Until right before she died?"

"Things didn't end well between us," Cedarberry replied wistfully. "She was a strong cat, but a stubborn one too. I'm sorry to hear 'bout her passin'."

" . . . " Buzzard glared at his paws.

Clearing her throat, Eris mrrowed, "Why don't we go set up a nest in the nursery? Ain't many cats in there right now. We can use any sort of bedding you like, okay?"

" . . . okay."

***

"Please please please please please?" Palekit was practically jumping up and down, little paws batting at Buzzardcry's side. "It isn't fair! You know tons of battle moves! Can't you just teach us one?"

"Yeah!" Darkkit whined. "We wanna be strong like you!"

"You'll be apprentices in a moon." Buzzardcry gently shook Palekit off of himself. "You can learn all the battle moves you want then."

"Noooooo," Palekit collapsed dramatically, acting as though he'd struck her.

"Boo!" Darkkit stuck out his tongue as well. Nearby, Eris and Cedarberry were both chuckling. 

Buzzardcry shook his head. Kestrel had always been so timid, so gentle. Nothing at all like Palekit and Darkkit, who always seemed to be yowling about this or that and running whirlwinds around camp. 

"Don't be botherin' your big brother too much, kiddos. He's got adult cat stuff to do, too," Cedarberry rumbled, amusement radiating from her whole body,

Unbidden, Buzzardcry felt a tiny smile sneak its way onto his features. "Actually, I think I have time to show you one battle move..."

"Yes!"

"...if both of you agree to help clean out the elders' den later. I'm sure Cliffpaw and Inkypaw would be greatly appreciative."

"What!" Palekit exclaimed, eyes widening in disbelief. "But only apprentices clean out the elders' den!"

"Only apprentices learn battle moves, too," Eris piped up, chuckling.

As Palekit begin to squabble with Eris about what constitued as "apprentice duties," Buzzardcry could only purr contentedly.

Somewhere, he hoped Kestrel was watching. Buzzardcry had been given a second chance to be a big brother, and he wasn't going to squander it for anything in the world.

-🐉

(dedicated to the several individuals who agreed that a buzzardcry fic would be interesting! i'm sure buzzardcry will continue to have fun sibling times with paledawn and darkpaw and that nothing bad will happen ever... smiling in an evil and autistic way)

(beetle note: ok this one made me lose my mind a little. i was at work when i read it and i just KNEW i had to use it as inspiration for today's warmup. big brother buzzard :(((( side note i especially love the "pouncing from stone to stone with the skill of a mink hopping through the snow" line, it envokes such vivid imagery)

[graylinesspam]

The force was so quiet for so long. So many living beings cut down, their communication and the waves that it caused in the force were just gone. So quickly. So suddenly.

And then for the first few years after, the movement continued to decline. Slowly it grew impossibly quieter. Until the force was so still. So silent.

It still flowed. So long as life existed the force would flow through it's natural paths. But where it had once been a river crashing over stones. Colliding with so many force sensitive beings it had become a slow still creek. Whose water remained glassy reflective and seemingly unmoving from the surface.

Ahsoka knew that the ones she had loved were in there somewhere, returned to the force flowing through all life. But not as themselves. Not as the living thinking beings she'd known before. They were passive now. Part of the will of life with no feelings or motivations of their own.

Until...there was movement again.

Subtle and nothing like anyone she'd known before. The gentlest ripple, like a turtles beak breaking through the surface. It was an old presence. or it felt that way. Like someone who was and had been a part of the force for some time. But who had managed to maintain...not a physical form but something wholly personal within the all consuming sameness of the force.

It was a fleeting visit. Like an animals eye cast in her direction to asses the threat she may pose only to disappear below the surface once more. It came and went always barely a flicker of movement on the edge of her senses.

When there were two, Ahsoka thought she understood what it was. As the observing presence surfaced once more, feather light ripples washing over her heightened senses, she felt something else as well.

Someone else.

Familiar enough in the pattern of ripples that, like echo location, Ahsoka swore she could make out a shape.

"Obi-wan?" She whispered hopefully. relishing in the way the force swayed between them like water beaten in gentle waves by two moving objects.

Once her former grand master entered the force he must have gone to work. Because while her first visitor had only become perceivable in proximity to her location, There was a distinct change to the flow of the force when Obi-wan entered it. Like the introduction of a new species changes the landscape, he changed the flow of the force. A fish making waves as it swam endlessly, never sleeping.

The dakside users stomped into the flow, kicking up stones and splashing but never catching the slippery target.

New ripples were forming like children reaching in for the first time. letting their fingers play along the surface. A new generation dipping their toes into still waters.

And then Yoda came. He changed the landscape once more. Not by making waves but by breaking them. By sitting his whole presence down in the force like a rock in a stream. Splitting the flow and breaking apart the ripples rings. The first stone for the flow to beat it's self against.

The waters were becoming alive again. Teeming with newness and oldness all the same. She was able to put a name to the little turtle beak. Ancient and observant despite their years, was Qui-gon.

Ahsoka was not afraid anymore of dangling her feet in the water. Where before she had crossed over stones to keep from rippling the surface, now she splashed through the water as recklessly as the sith did. calling attention to herself, but letting the ripples break along Yoda's back before they could be traced back to her.

She wasn't sure how they managed to preserve themselves in the force in such a way. And she doubted she'd learn to do the same. So she may as well make as much movement as she can now.

Then....there was Anakin. She'd become spiritually acquainted with every version of him. She knew the shape of his soul, light and dark. And when he passed into the force it was like the gates of a damn being opened. The rush of the force was strong again. Not raging like a river but moving enough that you could see the shapes bending along the surface. The various plant life bending with the flow.

And Ahsoka dipped into the flow like a child being baptized.

The force is alive again. Not just a by product of life, but full of it. Of the souls of the past mingling with the will of the living.

For so long she'd endured the still, now she'd bathe in the flow. whatever it brought. Wild waters meant hot spots and cold depths. Slippery algea and jagged stones. But come what may, it was the waters of life. And she'd been sitting on the banks for too long. So she'd endure all of it.

[darkfireumbreon]

Can we talk about Magma’s (Dr. Stone anime) redemption? Cause I recently rewatched those season 1 episodes and I realized how well done it is. Like, it’s not huge, rather subtle in it’s entirety which comes off as out of nowhere to some but is perfect for him in my opinion. Yes he was an ass, power hungry and pretty ruthless, however, that was during a time where all he knew was get girls and power. He’s a big buff guy in a small village where physical power is authority. So it’s no surprise that he gets taken down by team science, which changes everything. Very suddenly the goal, their world, is bigger than they ever could have imagined, which I think massively humbled Magma. There are bigger threats out there (Hyoga, Tsukasa). We can see with Hyoga’s attack that Magma does care about the safety of the village. He willingly fights alongside Senku and the others to defend the village, even if he was reckless and charged in himself. He never put up a fuss after losing the tournament and just integrates into the kingdom of science rather silently, which is where the subtle part of his redemption comes into play. We as viewers don’t see anything from Magma other than snippets of him enjoying some of the new inventions or helping out labor wise, leading up to the cave exploration where he is selected as the 3rd party member alongside Senku and Chrome. And yet still he doesn’t put up much of a fuss. Of course he’s a little pouty as he’s now on a team with the guy who stole the position of chief from him and the guy who beat him in a fight by setting him on fire and pushing him into the river, but it’s little more than an annoyed huff. Of course the trip itself is where most of the redemption comes forth, as we learn of Magma’s assumption that the “smart twigs” control the big brawny people. Senku of course proves otherwise, that the two types work together to cover weaknesses, emphasizing why they need him on this journey. But the part I particularly want to highlight is when Magma saves Senku by pushing him out of the way only for Senku to try to save him. Chrome assumes Magma was trying to attack Senku and really, just about everyone had been saying similar before they had even left, assuming that Magma would take the opportunity to kill Senku. And it’s the look that they highlight on Magma, while he’s hanging in Senku’s grasp just before he starts spouting the act that fits all those assumptions. He knows what people think of him, he knows how he acted, and I think he genuinely wanted to change all of it. He puts on the act that everyone expects from him, “admitting” that he was going to attack them in hopes that Senku would just let him go and save himself, which I’m sure Senku saw right through.

Looking back on it all, it is blatantly apparent just how much Magma had changed in such short time, mostly due to his worldview completely changing, probably a little bit due to humility from losing the tournament, but also, as is said, because he has seen the great things science can make and he wants to see more. He wants to be a part of it, and that is huge for a guy who had such extremely selfish goals when we first met him. This is highlighted when Kohaku’s father mentions that he had never seen Magma help out before, and now he’s willingly offering his strength to help out wherever he can. Of course let’s not also forget that Magma keeps the promise to Gen to get them all back safe and on time in order to celebrate Senku’s birthday, something he never would have cared about had he not changed.

I’m sure there’s some out there who think Magma shouldn’t have been redeemed or that his redemption came out of nowhere (he was planning on letting Ruri die so he could have the seat of chief to himself). But I would argue that it was perfectly done. Nothing over the top, he didn’t need a whole arc, it was just enough. And I think he became a very successful character who values his strength in a way that helps others rather than just for his own gain. At his core he is still someone who likes to show off his strength, but to go from someone who thought the only way to do that was by taking over the whole village and becoming chief to someone who shows off his strength by helping improve the village is massive character growth.

And now he’s a big competitive himbo with a willingness to learn, which I find very enjoyable.

[storm-and-starlight]

Break the Surface

tw for (very brief) suicidal ideation and implied torture (it's pre-canon Astarion fic, what were you expecting?)

There's not much left from the days before he died, but still Astarion remembers the river.

It might have been the Chionthar, in its sunny eastern reaches before it flows into Baldur's gate and a population of several hundred thousand starts using it as an all-purpose garbage dump -- it might not have been. He can't tell. There are willows on the bank, and river-weeds, and the small bright darting shapes of kingfishers flicking about in the corners of his vision, with the sunlight glinting as it skips off the water. It's a river painted in a storybook, the kind with swooning fair maidens and princes charming with blesséd stakes and vampire lords that monologue dramatically about how they'll never be deafeated before the noble paladin sticks a two-foot bar of yew through their chest and they explode into ash and mist and everyone else lives happily ever after, so of course his only memory of the place is that time he almost drowned.

He'd been young and clumsy, walking on the narrow edge of a log sprawled out into the deeper current, and like any worried parent could have warned him he'd slipped and fallen and tumbled straight down into the churn. He remembers the blaze of the sunlight, the blue flash of a kingfisher diving, and then the water swallowed him whole.

It was silent, in the river. So cold the water ran silver instead of blue and so fast that it dragged the air from his lungs, and silent. Enough to hear his heart as it slowed, and slowed, and stopped.

This is, of course, when Astarion always wakes up.

He must have survived somehow -- pulled out by his parents or a poor-but-virtuous fisherman or even just flung up on the bank like so much flotsam -- but no matter how hard he tries to find what happened after, that's where it ends. There's a vague blurry haze of being in bed with hot soup and warming stones and a chill hand on his cheek, but that might as easily have been a common childhood fever as the aftermath of drowning, and beyond that it all fades into the same greyish blur as the rest of his life before Cazador.

It's not the kind of memory he'd choose to recall, if he had the choice -- what color his damn eyes used to be would be nice -- but for some reason it keeps showing up anyways, welling up to the surface when he trances and jolting him awake when his heart stops.

Two hundred years and he still hasn't gotten used to the silence in his chest.

Honestly, he could have done without having any memory at all. Thirty seconds of remembered sunlight isn't worth the bother when it can't possibly be a replacement for the real thing, and the drowning is really just excessive. One traumatic death is more than enough for a lifetime, thank you.

Astarion breathes, a sharp flush of air through useless lungs, and it's so loud in the confines of the spawn dormitory that it might as well echo. All seven spawn are here, sleeping away the hours when the sun is highest, and it is, quite literally, quiet as the grave. The loudest sound -- the only sound -- is the tick of the clock in the private bedroom, muffled through the walls.

He leans his head back against the pile of ex-blanket that serves for his pillow and listens to the beat like it's a replacement for a heart.

---

Baldur's Gate isn't the kind of city where peace is easy to find. The harbor is full of gulls, the river is full of geese, the high streets home to flocks of starlings and the alleys mobbed with crows, and every last bird in the city just so happens to hate you personally and has elected to be extremely loud about it. There's always someone singing or shouting or fucking or doing all three at the same time, and someone else hollering for them to put a sock in it from the next house over, and on top of that both of them are trying to out-yell the bells of three dozen temples. The taverns are packed, the streets equally so, and right around the time that the drunkards are staggering home the bakers are starting up their ovens for the morning market rush. You could be standing in the middle of the street at midnight in a blizzard and someone would yell at you to get out of the bloody road, arsewipe, and stop holding up traffic. The only places with some semblance of peace -- and peace is rather an overstatement, because walking through a magically-induced wall of silence feels quite a bit like falling into the Chionthar from the full height of the cliffs might -- are the temple graveyards, that the dead might not be disturbed by the follies of the living.

Cazador's house, for all its inhabitants are unburied, is the same.

Nothing breaks the silence within those walls. Nothing. Astarion has watched the full force of Dalyria's voice break and crumble against the uncaring marble; has seen a thousand sobbing innocents falter and go silent as Cazador confirms their fate; has heard his own screams soar and shatter on the vaulted ceilings and fade away into nothingness, unheard. The palace is as much a dead thing as any vampire, and, as everyone knows, the dead cannot speak.

---

It's a tenday past midwinter, just long enough for most of the remaining Deadwinter decorations to have fallen down and been frozen into the mud puddles, in the middle of a truly brutal cold snap, and Astarion is out on the hunt.

Cazador's orders, of course: a vampire's thirst can never be slaked, and his master's grown accustomed to feasting every night -- though clearly not this night, because right now it's cold enough that the bloody Chionthar's started to freeze, a thin skin of ice and... various other things lying slick and black along the banks, and if the Chionthar's frozen then it's cold enough that anyone on the streets who isn't already undead is, well... dead. Even Ilmater's lot haven't been out to offer succor to the shivering -- or perhaps he's simply bad at picking their bodies apart from the beggars. At this point, they're all just a lot of lumps of ice.

Right now, anyone with a lick of sense is tucked away at home, buried underneath every quilt they've got and most likely with every last member of their household tucked away with them, and anyone without that much died two nights ago in the squall that whipped up off the harbor and coated half the city in a finger's-width of ice. Every tavern is locked and shuttered, every flophouse sealed tight with rags. He could certainly charm his way into them, but back out onto the streets? With someone else? No chance in any of the hells he's bringing someone back to Cazador this night.

It's left him leaning alone on the cliffside rail, watching the river flow sluggishly on.

He's got all night, if he wants -- my apologies, Master, I looked until dawn but there was nothing to find -- and he's already doomed to the kennels the moment he returns home empty-handed, so what's a few more hours spent lingering in the rest of the city, watching the river run? He's been cold for a century; a winter's night won't make much difference. Even if it is cold enough to freeze a frost giant's balls off.

He sighs, idly noting the way his breath refuses to cloud, and looks up at the sky. The stars are clearer than usual in the razor-sharp air, a wandering river of light, and so impossibly bright the void between them is blue instead of black. The moon is winter-brilliant, no smoke in the air to tinge it red or golden, and the edges are so sharp it almost seems he could reach up and cut himself on the radiant inner curve. Even Selune's Tears are visible in their entirety, a massive halo caught in a neverending dance. The moonlight runs sparkling off the surface of the river like a road leading off to nowhere, fading away around the bend into the darkness beyond the hills and the wilder reaches of the Chionthar where the willows grow and the kingfishers flirt and flicker in the sunlight, beckoning him. Like he could follow it all the way to freedom.

A certain kind of freedom, anyways. For all that it can only dubiously be called either flowing or water, the Chionthar is still a river running, and thus deadly to all creatures of his... particular persuasion. He couldn't cross it if he tried, much less follow the reflection of the moon out anywhere at all; he'd turn to ash and be swept away in an instant.

He almost considers it.

He does consider it, for what would be a heartbeat if he still had one, and the thrall sinks bloody claws into the gaps in his spine and drags him gasping away from the rail.

Thou shalt know that thou art mine.

He retches around an empty stomach, the stink of the kennels rising in his nose, the pain already slicing through him. Cazador has made it very clear what he thinks of that avenue of escape, to all his spawn but, of course, to Astarion in particular. I'll not see you waste the gift I've given you so... carelessly. He'd been pinioned for that one, left to linger in the kennels under Godey's watch while the thrall sank sickly-sweet and heavy into his bones and told him that he could not die.

Astarion hisses through his teeth, sharp and striking in the utter flat silence of the winter city, and heaves himself back up to his feet. The ice coating on the rail cracks under his grip, powdering off like diamond dust, and he smacks it off on his doublet in a glittering spray. The rime on the cobblestones crunches underneath his heel as he stalks away from the river and deeper into the city, with the cold gleam of moonlight catching the spires of Cazador's palace as they strike above the horizon.

---

Astarion is silent.

Astarion is-- Astarion-- He is--

He is silent.

He can hear Godey sharpening his tools at his workbench, the flat scrape of whetstone over silver and tuneless humming that buzzes between skeletal teeth, and he can hear the steady hissing gasp of his own breath -- pathetic, boy, a century and more and you still can't control yourself -- but he is silent. There's no point in being otherwise: Godey doesn't care for his screams like Cazador does, and the house will swallow the rest of the sound. No one knows what goes on inside these walls, not even the gods.

Not that the gods would care, if they knew.

Godey's humming stops, and the whetstone is set down with a click. Astarion forces his chest to stillness, presses flat palms and bare skin against the floor -- the marble is cold and stained and sticky -- curls in on himself in instinctive, uncontrollable fear. Godey tsks. The knife glints in the greenish witchlight.

The clank of the cage door opening does not echo, even though it should. The rattle of the chains does not fill the room, though by rights he would expect it to. And when Astarion finally breaks under the edge of the knife, his voice goes unheard.

---

He half-thinks he's dreaming, when the sunlight breaks over him -- freedom from the shadows? From Cazador? It can't possibly be real -- except Astarion's dreams have never once been this kind.

The river runs steady and silver in front of him, whispering to itself as it passes between the stones of the ford in smooth braided ripples. It's a storybook sort of river, weeds and willows and the wing-bright flicker of flighted things in the branches and reeds. The ford is druid-made, heavy boulders set in the middle of the flow that make a dry place to step, and there's no slippery log, no water flooding his lungs, no icy silence throbbing up through his chest -- there's the sun on his back and the water laughing over gravel a step away from him and a small blue bird staring down at him as though it, too, can't quite believe he's real.

Astarion stops a pace from the bank -- he'd rather not test the tadpole's limits by actually getting disintegrated, thank you-- and just stares back at it, biting back the-- the bitterness that's swelling in the back of his throat. Two hundred years, and the only reason he's not still in the kennels is a damn mind flayer--

"Is that a kingfisher?" Karlach says, right behind him, and both he and the bird in question jump. Astarion turns the movement into a smooth step forward to give her space, but the bird shrieks and flashes away, disappearing into the trees. "Aww, I scared it off."

"I'm sure it'll be back," Wyll says, stepping up on Astarion's opposite side and forcing him another step closer to the river's edge. "There's likely a nest nearby -- these banks are perfect for it."

"Perfect for what?" Gale asks, stepping into the gap between Wyll and Karlach and effectively cutting off Astarion's last escape route. "Though if you're simply stating that this river is perfect in its own right, I find I cannot disagree."

"Kingfishers!" Karlach says, splashing out into the water in her enthusiasm and making it seethe and boil around her feet. Astarion flinches back from the splash, wincing at the sticky seep of mud around his boots -- he's getting too close to the water.There are too many people pressing in around him, and he's too close to the water.

"Ah, Accedo atthis," Gale says, fully in wizarding prodigy mode, "the common kingfisher. Perfect conditions for them here, Wyll, you're certainly right."

"I wonder if we'll see more," Wyll says, already squinting at the trees across the river like he's about to stop and birdwatch. Some monster hunter he makes, if he hasn't noticed the vampire sleeping across the fire from him every night and he'll let his hunt go cold because he saw a pretty bird.

Astarion, at least, is saved from having to intervene himself by Lae'zel bulling straight through their little group like an armored green battering ram (and giving him a perfect opening to stumble past Gale out onto the safety -- and space -- of the path and pretend that she shoved him). "We do not have time to look at birds."

Shadowheart, hanging back from the river as though even the thought of kingfishers is beneath her, gives Astarion her customary dismissive look. He returns an empty, lovely smile and flicks imaginary mud off his breeches, and she turns away with a scoff -- let her think him the fine Baldurian dandy afraid of ruining his clothes, and maybe she won't think too much on how he refuses to touch running water and start wondering.

"If you are so insistent on finding this Halsin," Lae'zel continues, leaping up onto the ford with that frankly enviable Githyanki ease of hers, "then we cannot delay. The goblins are unlikely to let him live for long."

The group is extremely quiet after that.

"Well!" Astarion says, just to break the silence, "far be it from me to argue with the murderous Gith," and gestures, quite gallantly, for Shadowheart to precede him across the ford. "After you, my dear."

She glares at him, suspicious as ever, but goes.

Wyll and Gale follow her, Wyll with a graceful flourish and Gale with a grunt of effort to get up on the rock in the first place and then with his arms held out for balance like he's worried about falling in. The cloud of steam that Karlach has turned into sets out across the river with a collection of splashing noises and one truly nasty curse in Infernal that Astarion quietly tucks away for later. He lets the lot of them clear the first stone before stepping carefully up -- the water runs barely a hand's-width below the level of the stone, and he has no idea how far the tadpole's protection extends. There's no force holding him back, true, but-- better not to risk it. He has no intention of dying before he gets his revenge, and running water is a nasty way to go.

Still, he crosses the first stepping-stone with ease and hops neatly across the first gap, landing on the worn surface of the next rock and watching the water run deep and clear and cold just past his feet. Him, Astarion, standing in the middle of a river. He might as well not even be a vampire at all! -- if not for the deafening silence in his chest.

"What was that about not arguing with the Githyanki?" Shadowheart calls, and he looks over to see that the rest of their little party has already made it safely to the other side and are lolling about waiting for him. "Have you never forded a river before?"

No, actually, or at least not one that he can remember, but he can't very well tell her that, now can he? Either they figure out his little secret and he gets staked in his trance the next night, or they leave him behind as a useless city fop, and either one would be. Well. Lets just say he needs their little group at his back, because bitter as it is to admit it he cannot kill Cazador alone.

"Come on, mate, you can do it!" Karlach calls, still gently steaming, and he turns back to say... something, offer up some kind of apology, excuse -- when something flashes fast and dark and deadly past his cheek.

Arrow.

He twists, looking for the archer, for any signs of a goblin ambush further upstream, and steps back. His heel comes down on empty air instead of stone, the world tips backwards around him in a single outstretched moment of oh shit, and down to the river he goes.

The sun's reflection flares mirror-bright as he crashes through the surface, and then the world goes cold and silver and silent.

Running water. The true and final death to vampires. He can feel it, sliding up through his ribs and fingers and throat, the cold creeping down in through his skin, the shimmer of the current over his skin as it starts to strip him apart.

Will it linger, this death? Will the river shred him slowly, moment by moment, or will he simply scatter into ash and be carried out to sea? Will his companions know? Will they care?

Will he feel it, when he dies?

It tugs at him, the surface a silver mirror above him, wings backlit against the light before it fades. The air leaves his lungs, cold water flooding in, silence spilling out of that dead place in his chest until there's nothing but the river pulling him apart, the current slipping between his fingers even as he tries and fails to cling to it -- gods, a week of freedom after two hundred years and that's it, he didn't even get to so much as spit in Cazador's face, but-- but he saw the sunrise again before he died and that at least was--

was--

Hold on.

He still has fingers.

Is he... not dead?

Running water, to hear Cazador tell it, kills as quickly as the current runs, stripping away everything that makes a vampire a vampire until only dust remains. By all rights, Astarion should have disintegrated by now, gone to wherever it is his soul is bound when he finally shuffles off this mortal coil.

Astarion opens his eyes to light.

It slants through the water in long impossible beams, dusty gold in the clear upper reaches and faded to a soft and murky jade in the depths where the river-weed grows, catching on the bright-scales backs of little darting fish, and washes over him. Sun and shadow, the bright points where ripples collide and the long lingering trails where willow branches drift on the water and the sweep of darkness as wings pass by, and the river sets him gently on its bed.

He's not dead.

Astarion breathes, and it comes out as a stream of bubbles, swirling up towards the surface -- he catches one, watches it break apart around his fingers. Even here, the river isn't quiet, murmuring to itself in a chorus of whispers that swirl around him, like they can fill up the silence inside. The riverbed is sure and steady beneath his feet when he pushes himself back up  and the mirrored surface shatters into light and sound and life, wind and voices and a kingfisher's screech and he has come up from the river and lived--

--and his lungs abruptly remind him that undead or not they are not supposed to be filled with river water, and it all comes back up in a single lurching heave.

Astarion hacks, chokes, doubles over, and vomits up what feels like fully half his body weight in water, and then a little more as his sinuses -- how much went in? -- start to drain by any available pathway. It tastes disgusting -- well, anything other than blood tastes disgusting, but this is really something special -- and his stomach decides to join in on the fun too with a clench that threatens to bring up whatever remains of that fox from last night.

It takes forever to get it all out, and even when the coughing eases he can still feel the liquid sloshing around inside his chest -- but eventually he can straighten without dry heaving, throat burning, and he drags himself up to his full height against the pressure of the current and pulls in as much clear air as he can. The water laps cheerfully at the bottom of his ribs, barely more than waist-deep.

"-starion!"

Shit, right, ambush; he scrambles to find the rest of his party, see how badly they're overwhelmed and what might be coming for him -- except they're all just standing flat-footed on the bank of the river staring at him. Wyll has his boots off, for some godforsaken reason.

"Yes?" he says, wincing at the rasp in his voice.

Karlach drops her head back and lets out an enormous smoky sigh, shoulders sagging. "Fuck me, mate, when you didn't come back up..."

"...what?" Do they know? Were they just... waiting for him to get killed by his own incompetence, rather than have their precious consciousnesses stained by just up and staking him without warning -- but if so, why do they all look so-- relieved he's not yet dead?

"You were down for nearly two minutes," Wyll says, looking heroically concerned -- godsdamned gallant Blade of Frontiers that he is. "We were worried you'd drowned."

"After a display like that, I'm not so sure he didn't," Gale says, and leans forward, speaking louder than strictly necessary. "Astarion, are you having any pain in the lungs? Trouble breathing?"

"...no?" Astarion says, blinking, and swallows back another cough. The river chuckles at him, tugging at the buckles of his new armor, splashing around the edges of the ford-stones and holding a lilting conversation with the wind in the willows, which rustles back at it companionably before sighing off to make the pinetops bend and creak. In the branches, the kingfishers squeak and shrill at one another before clattering away in a flurry of wings and furious little heartbeats, while the softer, steadier double-drums of his companions keep counterpoint on the bank, and all around him the river runs, crystal-clear and shining in the incredible, impossible sunlight. He could go anywhere, if he wanted, cross any threshold, any stream -- brave the brightest, most relentless reaches of the sunlit world the way that no other vampire living can -- the river cannot touch him, and neither can Cazador.

"No, I'm-- perfectly alright," Astarion says, and laughs for the sheer shocking delight of it, for being free.

It goes soaring up away from him, not stifled in his throat or swallowed by the stone but filling the air until it rings -- all the silence, broken.

[idiotwithanipad]

Actions and Words

(A young boy finally learns how to talk from the ghost of the tribe's past)

"Boy not learn to make speak yet. He be silent for longer and he never survive hunt. If he can't tell others when deer get closer, how he let them know? "

"He not start speak soon, Wise Elder will kill boy herself..."

Wila bit her lip tightly as she couldn't help but hear the condescending and grizzly whispers ripple through the tribe. She knew her responsibility and it's tremendous importance; children, the boys especially, had to talk. She knew her small son wouldn't be able to get through his life by using his hands and fingers to sign. He'd have to learn the tribe's tongue one day. But teaching him never seemed to make it any clearer.

It was a huge problem. The Wise Elder would watch from afar, regarding the boy with a stoic and heavy expression, as though the mere existence of the boy was destined to be a lost cause.

He was quite content sitting by the river bank and throwing pebbles to see how far away they'd fly, and if he could grow stronger enough to beat his record each time. Sketching shapes and symbols into the earth with sticks. He was a happy boy. But just being happy and full of life wasn't enough.

Many members of the tribe had lost their limbs, eyes, skin and faces by being too happy. Happiness can lead to distractions, and distractions lead to carnage, especially within a tribe surrounded by potential threats. A member of the tribe, a few generations back, had become a warning, a cautionary tale about letting distractions fill your head. He'd been killed. But not by another man, or an animal or coughing and sneezing.

No trace of blood or injury to be seen on him anywhere, yet he still died. Moonah chose to set reminders to how life worked.

'Don't be like the happy man'

Wila pretended not to notice two men eye her and her son as she walked past them, carrying the tiny boy in a leather sack strapped to her back, his pudgy cheeks nesting against her hair. Ahead, the Wise Elder rose her spear and gave an exhausted yet triumph sigh.

The motherland, at last.

Far back in their past, back when the tribe still walked on all fours and ate meat straight from the bones, the Moonah Stones were placed here. The tribe took shelter here rather than in caves. The stones were enough to protect them, that's what they believed. All they needed was fire, and their precious stones.

The sacred site the tribe visited every full Moonah. A place of worship and serenity, the tribe finding the time to gather and tell stories of their ancestors and about their future. Celebrating the prosperity of their tribe and giving thanks to their almight sky mother, Moonah.

Some gave delighted cheers, others let out relieved sighs and slowed down to take breaths, letting the leather satchels and sacks on their shoulders slip off and bangle limp in their hands now that rest could come after such a strenuous hike. Small children who'd been here before took off running past the Wise Elder to get first dibs on which stone was 'theirs'.

Mothers and soon-to-be mothers took their seats underneath the rotten and fungus laced tree that stood a short distance away from the stones. Two warriors placed grass and branches at the center of the ring of upright, hefty stones and started to light a roaring fire.

Wila woke her son, still nestled against her back and pulled him from within the trusty carrier, and instant relief for her upper spine. She set the half asleep and yawning boy down onto the due speckled grass and walked him, hand in hand, towards the stones.

The fire finally caught and took to blaze as they passed into the circle, triumphant chuckles and shoulder pats all around. Andother successful trip with no accidents or run ins with rival tribes of packs of wolves.

Wila sat in the grass, her back propped up against one of the mighty stones, her tiny son held in her lap underneath a blanket of wolf fur. The tribe eventually got over their excitement and puddle water drinking and gathered around to hear some old tales from each member.

The tiny boy, Velu by name, turned in his sleep and slowly awoke, everyone was gathered around, leaning closer to the fire and speaking softly, holding their hands above the flames and gesticulating whimsically to aid their flowing stories. Somebody kept walking from beyond the circle. Velu could see them. From the waist down, the upper portion of the person's body was obscured by darkness, the light from the fire only lit them partially, hidden also behind the broad shoulders and nodding head's of the tribe.

Yet they still circled. Occasionally stopping behind someone and leaning closer, listening. A walk. A pause. A walk. A pause. A lean. A pause. A walk. A back track. A lean. A pause. A walk. Over and over again. Soon, the figure walked away, out of sight into the blackness beyond the reach of the fire's light. Sleep soon took Velu away yet again.

"Time wait for no one, Wila. When little Velu learn words?" A voice called quietly from past the fire. Velu's father sat, curious and concerned eyes flicking down to the boy. Wila stroked her palm, like a gentle feather, over the boys soft hair.

"He talk soon. I make sure he talk soon" She whispered back, giving a slight nod.

The rest of the circle didn't seem too convinced as they glanced amongst each other and shook their heads.

"He must learn. He not talk, he lose focus. End up like-"

The father was cut off by a less than gentle hand reaching over and pressing harshly against his mouth.

"Don't say name. Speak bad of dead and they get big mad" The man warned, looking about as though making sure he wasn't speaking loud enough to be heard by anyone outside of the circle.

Some faces nodded in realisation and turned to look through the darkness behind them, shuffling closer into the small ring of light. Other's, who had aged and wrinkled faces with greying hair and beards, looked almost sorrowful and bowed their heads.

Wila knew why they hung their heads, and she knew why they were frightened. But that was a long time ago, back when her mother and father were still small. Moonah is merciful, she doesn't cut people down anymore.

One of the older ladies held up hand to her chest and spoke.

"Was not an angry man. Never was an angry man. Always happy, take care of babies and friends. Not get mad by-"

She was rudely cut off by the younger man, who's hand was still pressed against Velu's father mouth.

"He alive then. He dead now. Death change people. Make them sharp like spear and bitter like red berries. Bitter 'bout being dead. Speak bad and they make us dead too"

The older woman let her dead roll down into a heavy shake, unwilling to argue and indulge his paranoid superstitions anymore. She knew the truth about the happy man. She was his friend when he was alive.

In a defeated huff and a paranoid stupor, the man pushed himself from the soil and plucked his spear from the grass before taking a few companions and heading into the woods, leaving Velu's father and the ladies alone.

Wila stared down into the flames, contemplating, before the old woman's boney hand landed on her shoulder. A gentle and encouraging smile spread on her hollow cheeks.

"Not fear. Your boy will talk, me know it" She smiled. Wila gave a smile back and nodded, but her smile quickly fell, turning her eyes back to the woman.

"I not sure. I not sure what to do no more. If son not speak, then-"

"Then ask the happy man to help" The old woman suggested, her grin never faltering. Wila stared at her, watching as the old woman drew her hand from her shoulder and focused her gaze back to the fire to warm her hands.

In a silent moment of self reflection, Wila glanced off to her right, to the empty space between the two stones beside her, yet the space still felt as though it had an occupant. Quietly, without looking away, Wila pressed her hands together discreetly in her lap boyond her sleeping son's back, palms and fingertips pressed softly together and trembling. A single tear forming in her eye, hoping that Moonah, or the happy man would hear her mind beg for help and assist her son.

The fire had dwindled to a bronze glow, the tribe slept soundly in their spots and the owls preened in the trees not too far away. Velu had awoken, his dry throat begging for water. Rubbing at his eyes, Velu looked around and noticed the rest of the tribe slept also, including his mother. He turned in her Lap and went to carefully set his foot down into the grass at his mother's side, but stopped.

One member of the tribe was still away, and was watching him. He sat, cross-legged by himself between two of the mighty stones to the right. He looked no different from the rest of the tribe, but his face was unfamiliar. Rival tribes never wore furs, so the chances of this being an intruder was probably very slim.

Velu stepped up from Wila's lap, without waking her, and gave a careful wave to the silent and watchful stranger. The man's eyes seemed to gleam with curiosity and suspense, as though he couldn't believe what he was seeing. He cautiously waved back.

Velu kept his eyes on the stranger as he stood waiting for him to say something. But the stranger said nothing and kept staring, expecting Velu to try something else. The man leaned forward.

"Hello...?"

Velu waved again, this time with a smile.

The man's eyes widened and his mouth opened into a grin before pushing himself up off of the grass.

"You see? You see Rogh?"

Velu nodded.

The man's two hands slapped hard against his hairy temples as he broke into a round of laughter, loud laughter. So loud that some nearby babies swaddled in their mother's arms turned in their sleep. Velu found the laughter infectious and began to grin.

"Been long time. Big long time since anyone talk to Rogh" The man admitted, finally calming down from his laughter, yet he still vibrated with an inquisitive excitement that seemed to buzz around his aura like lightning.

Velu could only watch the man do all the talking, his troublesome little lips not yet able to form any words of his own. A dark cloud above rolled away, letting a pale light shine from above, catching both of their attention.

"Moonah!" The man beamed, reaching his hands up as though trying to catch the rays in his fingers. Velu copied him and let out a breathy giggle. The man looked back down to Velu and crouched down.

"You say thank to Moonah yet? Not want her to get big mad"

Velu shook his head.

"You not say thank to Moonah?" The man repeated, perplexed, and tilted his head, his matted and scraggly hair hanging at his shoulders.

"Why?"

Velu shook his head and released a hushed series of tiny grunts and bables. The man seemed to retreat from his excitement and confusion and dealve into a demeanour far more complex and contemplating.

"You slow speaker?" The man questioned, yet he seemed sympathetic. Velu only nodded. The man hummed to himself before he looked back up at the shining moon above. He stood and began walking away from the stones, out into the expanse of damp grass before turning his head and glancing over his shoulder at Velu.

"Come on, follow Rogh. He show you".

The man walked further away into the darkness before Velu glanced as his sleeping mother. She would be so happy if he could talk, at last. It would be a big surprise. She could be happy again. Other boys wouldn't pick on him anymore. Moonah would like him. Tribe would be proud.

Velu followed the man.

"Bakou! Bakou! Our son talk!" Wila beamed, tears brimming in her eyes as she held the small boy in one arm whilst harshly jabbing into the man's shoulder with the other. He awoke with a start and snorted, his eyes darting about as though someone had clapped two rock together right in front of him.

"Wha-? Wha-?" He groan, delirous, and sat up straight. Wila sobbed through her laughter and turned to look at her son in her arms who also smiled.

"Velu say word at last!"

Bakou, and others awoken from Wila's cries, watched in scepticism as the boy flapped his arm in excitement. Yet, soon, all scepticism had burned away once the boy shaped his first word and articulated it perfectly.

"Moonah!"

The tribe were awestruck and thrilled, especially Wila and her small family. Over by the old, rotten and dead tree, the old woman stood, her calloused fingers stroking gently against the bark, her warm smile drifted from the circle to the empty space beside her.

"Thank be to Moonah. And thank be to you, old friend"

[hopetorun]

behind the scenes for wait a year (which i just reread and continue to be delighted by)

okay this is technically a little less than half of this scene but the full scene is almost 4k (it's by far the longest scene in this story, almost a quarter of the story is this scene) but here's some commentary on the part before they start actively having sex, lol

The most surreal thing that happens in Prague is that they win, [truly this is one of the most improbable and self-indulgent things i've ever put into a hockey fic. tho the original outline of this story had them winning gold at the 2026 olympics together and then i realized i'd lose my mind writing two different fics in two different versions of 2026, and that i'd have to fill three and a half whole years of story in] an overtime goal shoveled in on a rebound by a kid named Ryan Chesley that Luke played with in Michigan [i thought this was a real guy for some reason but the only ryan chesley i can find plays for the university of minnesota ... who knows] and who spent the first week of the tournament sitting next to Quinn at every meal to ask him questions about the NHL. Quinn’s on the ice with him when the puck goes in, the horn goes, the arena full of Czech fans goes suddenly silent except for the screaming directly in Quinn’s ear. [my sincere apologies to the czech men's national ice hockey team and also their faithful fans attending the game. i do feel bad but they had to beat someone]

It still feels great to be slammed into the boards by the weight of his whole team, and as the cheers on the ice start to die down Quinn can hear a few from the crowd, too. And it’s still a win, a gold medal that’ll be draped around all their necks, another item for the list of things he and Brady have done together.

Quinn stands next to Brady when they line up for the anthem, Brady’s arm draped over his shoulder and Brady’s voice loud in his ear. Quinn leans in closer, unable to resist the pull of him, and Brady tightens his arm around Quinn’s shoulders as the final notes of the anthem play, and it’s like something out of a dream. [brady is SO physically affectionate and i spent a lot of time really carefully threading this needle of making him even more obviously so than usual and still keeping quinn unaware of brady amping it up] A weird hybrid of present and memory that comes together as feeling entirely outside of reality.

After—after the medal ceremony, after the champagne and beer in the locker room, after the team shuffles through a series of bars, after Quinn tries more Czech beers than he thought existed—after all that, Brady catches his eye and grins and Quinn follows him out onto the street without a second thought. [i didn't want quinn to seem like a pushover in this story, or like he isn't an active participant in this relationship or friendship because he very much is, but he is willing to let brady be in charge of things pretty often, and brady also knows him very well and makes sure things are the way quinn would want them. because he's in love] He doesn’t even know what Brady has in mind. The smell is wearing on Quinn, the walls and wooden seats oozing smoke even though no one inside is smoking, and the air outside is crisp and clear. [i learned many facts about prague for this fic and one of them was that smoking in restaurants was only banned there pretty recently]

Prague is pretty cool, with red-roofed buildings and old, winding streets and stone bridges arching over the river. [google search pictures of prague] Quinn wouldn’t mind actually getting to explore instead of being shuffled from the hotel to the arena to the practice facility.

Brady knocks his shoulder against Quinn’s, startling him out of his thoughts. “I think I’m just about done for the night,” he says. “I can’t keep up with those kids anymore.” [this is a lie. brady can keep up with the kids. he's just more interested in having sex with quinn. or going for a walk with quinn. really whatever as long as quinn is there]

He doesn’t seem particularly drunk, to be honest. Quinn’s seen him drunker, Quinn’s seen him puking in bushes and falling asleep in strangers’ beds. Right now he’s a little pink in the face, but he isn’t slurring or stumbling or even rambling. It is late, though, and they played a hard game today, 12 minutes of overtime before the goal horn sounded. And Quinn’s had a lot of beer, even if he isn’t really feeling it either. Maybe in the tips of his fingers, but maybe that’s just Brady’s proximity and the way Quinn wants to reach for him. [quinn ... you're so in love]

There’s no one around who would even notice if he did.

“Me neither,” he says. “You gonna head back to the hotel?”

Brady nods. “I think we could walk,” he says. “I don’t think it’s far.”

It’s a clear night, stars sprinkled through the sky and a crescent moon overhead. According to Google Maps on Brady’s phone, the walk back to the hotel will take 20 minutes and take them across one of the bridges. The night air feels nice after so many hours of sweaty teammates and cramped, hot bars and beer breath. [this is very Rule of Romantic, i feel like a cab would be much more plausible but a tipsy nighttime stroll in the moonlight ... so good for being in love]

Halfway across the bridge, Brady nudges Quinn’s shoulder again, and then he catches Quinn’s hand in his own. [this scene, and the one shortly after where they go out to dinner, are both very much meant to feel like what the relationship progression would've been if they started dating in high school, going for walks together and tentatively holding hands etc] He’s never done that before. Quinn refuses to read anything into it. It’s just Brady doing that thing where he doesn’t know how to be casual.

On the other side of the bridge, half a block down an empty cobblestone street, Brady presses him against a wall and kisses him. It’s not really a surprise, not after last summer, but it feels completely different. This isn’t part of Quinn’s life. He might never come back to this city, and even if he does come back here, probably for some other IIHF tournament at some point, he might never walk down this street again. He isn’t going to walk past this spot and think about the time Brady kissed him here, the way Brady’s mouth moved against his and the warmth of Brady’s hand on his side, distracting even through the material of Quinn’s shirt. [is this a good thing or a bad thing? quinn's not sure yet]

Quinn kisses him back, of course, slides his mouth across Brady’s and his hand along Brady’s side. The stone is cool against his back, and Brady’s mouth is forceful against his. Not rough, not biting, but Quinn would have to push him away to break the kiss.

He doesn’t want to push Brady away, and when Brady does pull away, Quinn chases his mouth. Brady indulges him with another kiss, shorter and softer, and then kisses his cheek instead. [brady ... this boyfriend behavior ...]

“Wanted to do that since you set Chesser up with that saucer in OT,” Brady says, and his breath is hot against Quinn’s cheek. [a fun fact about me is that i cannot use sauce in the slang sense of pass in any way with a straight face and i did in fact grimace as i wrote this line but. these dumb boys do say these things] The problem, the one that Quinn’s been trying to ignore since the first moment that Brady laughingly suggested kissing him, is the one that Quinn always knew was simmering under the surface: the moment Brady became someone he might be able to have, he stopped wanting anyone else. [oh i was so proud of this line. i am proud of it tbh! obviously it's not consciously in quinn's internal monologue throughout the story but i hope the idea was kind of infused in so it doesn't come totally out of left field]

Quinn tangles his hand in Brady’s hair as best he can, and yanks Brady’s mouth back to his. Brady lurches forward, and the medal hanging around his neck hits Quinn’s chest before it settles, dangling between them. [is this how physics works? i sure hope so] Quinn doesn’t like the space there, and he arches off the wall to feel Brady’s chest against his own instead.

He kissed Brady so much last summer, but he’s still not used to kissing someone that much taller than him, the way he has to tilt his head up, how much longer Brady’s limbs are than his own. He’s not used to it, but he does like the way Brady towers over him, corners him against the wall, presses forward until Quinn’s entirely surrounded by him. [tying back to brady right after the game, draped all over quinn, always touching him :))))] He’s not used to it but part of him wants to be, wants to get to do this until it starts to feel normal.

Now’s not the time to think about that. Now’s the time to kiss Brady until his lips are sore, until they’re both panting, and then to slide his hand down to Brady’s ass and squeeze hard enough that he understands what Quinn wants out of this.

It also makes Brady’s hips hitch forward against his, rough friction for a few breaths, and Quinn doesn’t even bother trying to hide the way it makes him gasp. It’s not like Brady doesn’t know what he likes.

Brady bites Quinn’s earlobe before he pulls away, and then scrapes his teeth down the side of Quinn’s neck. Quinn didn’t used to like having this much biting involved in sex, but it’s Brady. So far, he hasn’t found anything he doesn’t like when it’s with Brady. [quinn ... buddy ... more broadly i really enjoy poking at concepts like the things people do because the person they love wants them, someone else being so into something that you enjoy it even if it's not your thing, etc etc. not a lot of detail on it in this story but it was def on my mind]

“You wanna head back to the hotel?” Brady asks. His voice is rough. Quinn squeezes his ass again. Watches Brady’s eyes fall shut for a moment. “Jesus,” he says. [quinn does really enjoy getting to throw brady a little off balance]

“Yeah, I wanna go back to the hotel,” Quinn says. He doesn’t sound any better than Brady.

“Thank God,” Brady says. And then he kisses Quinn again, stepping somehow closer so that Quinn is more thoroughly pinned but also so that they’re pressed together, almost hip to hip. Quinn rolls his hips a couple of times to feel the drag of his cock on the inside of his pants. Not what he wants but better than nothing at all, and it’s pretty satisfying when it makes Brady swear under his breath, too.

“Fuck,” Brady mumbles. “I gotta—”

He fumbles for his phone in his back pocket.

Matthew was still at the bar when they left, and Brady must be texting him to find somewhere else to crash. Maybe in the morning they’ll regret giving him that kind of ammunition, [matthew's inclusion in this story is partially just a function of it being a gift for becky, though also partially as a brothers counterpoint to jack, but i did amuse myself imagining what a nightmare he'd be to brady about this] but right now Quinn just wants to get his hands on Brady’s skin, his mouth on the muscles of Brady’s stomach, the thin skin of his hips and collarbone, the tender spots on his neck. He spent the whole season trying not to remember how well he learned Brady’s body last summer, but it’s all rushing back now. Brady’s hand is already curled around his hip, fingers pushing under the waistband of Quinn’s pants, nails scraping a tender spot above his hip where he would leave marks with his mouth and then push his thumb into them until Quinn hissed. [being familiar with someone's body ... good]

“Come on,” Quinn says, pushing Brady away from him. There are things Quinn wants to do to him—with him—that he’s not going to do on a side street in Old Town Prague, even after midnight when there’s no one around. He does not want to have to call his parents, or worse, Matthew, to explain that they got arrested for public indecency in Czechia. [this would be a nightmare for them but very funny for me]

“Right,” Brady says. He’s distracted, his hand sliding from Quinn’s hip to his ass, fully under his pants now.

“Brady,” Quinn hisses. “Hotel. We can be naked in a hotel.”

That does get a pleased noise out of Brady, and then a transparent leer.

“You know, you’re hotter now than you were when I said I’d marry you,” Brady says. [i don't think of brady as a particularly self-aware guy, which tangentially is why i find his pov really hard to write, and to some extent he isn't entirely aware of what he's going with quinn in this fic. he gets there quicker, and he's fully willing to go with the flow of stumbling into a relationship, but he is very much in the middle before he realizes he's begun, as it were. but the pin drops for him like ... on their romantic prague vacation] Quinn absolutely cannot think about this. He cannot think about marrying Brady, the stupid deadline that creeps closer every year, and then go to a hotel in Prague and beg Brady to fuck him. [oh but you very much can, quintin] “Good taste from me, I think,” Brady continues. “Got in there before anyone else did.”

[politetim]

Aurgin and Aileen Chapter 7

This is the first "new" chapter! I wanted to try a little something more with horror, so we shall see how that went. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Onward Towards Ankirat

“Perhaps it was unwise to allow you two such unrestricted access to the alcohol.”

Aileen opened her eyes and shut them just as quickly. The barest threads of light stung her headache and the beat of her heart made her sea sick. Groggy and lost, she grasped for divine power and shivered with relief as it washed her clean of her hangover. With a lurch she rolled over, out from the covers, and got to her knees. Aurgin and I slept…?

The voice that woke her was Maker’s, who stood looking on with crossed arms. Aileen heaved a sigh. “No, it was unwise of me to allow myself any comfort. Shame, really.”

“I heard it again, in the night.”

Aileen froze. She fruitlessly tried to remember the night before, but all she could was what had been right in front of her. “When? How close? Did your little guy see anything?”

“Late. Far. No.”

Aurgin stirred, then grimaced and groaned in pain. Aileen stole her pain with a quick pat on the head. “Get up, it came back last night.”

“You sure that wasn’t us?”

“Not a joke Aurgin! Get up! I can’t believe I let you talk me into drinking, we could’ve died!”

Aurgin sat up, blinking bleary eyes. “You talked yourself into it, actually. I think. Anyway, When did you hear it? How cl–”

“Late. Far. No.” Maker’s voice, though toneless, carried enough snap to show their impatience.

“Well then we are fine. We didn’t die. And now we can walk further in and leave it behind.”

Aileen paused in the middle of pulling her dirty armor on. “Unless there are more out there.”

Aurgin did not hesitate as she stood and stretched. “Not a problem to think about now! That is a wedding for another season. For now let’s just get breakfast going.”

“I think we have wasted enough time–” Maker began, but it was Aurgin’s turn to interrupt.

“Shu-shu, you don’t eat, you don’t get to tell us when and when not to eat.” And with that, she pulled on the rest of her clothes and shouldered her way past Maker into the sunlight of the camp. Aileen stuffed her feet into her boots and hurried after her, apologizing to Maker as she passed the Sentenate. 

Breakfast was a quick affair. Though she presented a carefree face, Aurgin kept her eyes on the treeline outside camp even as she cooked. Aileen did too, not bothering to pretend she wasn’t on edge. Maker kept their distance, posture aloof. After Aurgin and Aileen finished their meal, the three repacked their bags and shouldered them. Then, taking a careful route to the road so as to avoid seeing the remains of the bandits, they set off towards the rising sun.

After the morning’s chilly start, the afternoon was silently hot. The only speaking they did to one another was to ask for a pause to take off a warm layer or for lunch. Despite the residual ill feelings, lunch was a delicious affair. Aileen felt a deep regret for spending so long away from Mathuni cooking, and not for the last time. 

The road wound on, deeper into the peninsula. At the peak of a hill they came to an overlook. From here they saw a river crossed by a mossy, stone bridge. Aileen could not help but break the silence by voicing her curiosity.

“Who built this? Dwarves? Men? Mathuni? How long has it been here? Why haven’t we seen any other markers of their living? In fact, who even bothered to build or maintain this road?”

Aurgin shrugged. Maker had a more educated admission of ignorance. “A long time ago, the land and seas looked very different. Some years ago, I came across the remains of a fort that I remember from before… my lapse. It was heavily weathered, its walls crumbling and its roads slowly being buried by grass and dirt and bushes. It was still there, however. How it is that the road has remained clean, or usable, I do not know. But I know that this road could be older than any nation you know.”

Aileen nodded slowly, allowing some wondering about the exact age of the Sentenate to sink in. Aurgin cut the moment short by pointing to something further on the horizon. “There is your first clue.”

Following her finger Aileen and Maker saw a rotting windmill that was barely discernible from the ceaseless foliage of the peninsula. At such a distance they could not see any details beyond the silhouette, so the racial and cultural origin of the structure was a mystery. Each shared a look as the mood changed for the better.

“At very least it could be a ceiling between us and the sky, walls between us and the wind,” Aurgin said. “At best it could give us clues on what to expect.”

“What do you mean?” Aileen asked.

“My father liked to talk about this all the time even though we were bored out of our skulls. Baerkavar, one of the seven, knew every star for every season. He was the one who determined where in Kyranta they were. Then, he used his studious knowledge to determine that, from the language and architecture of Paen’eta that it came from a culture that predated but influenced every human culture we know now.”

“It was how they unravelled the mysteries of the Kings Land. Just knowing the basic patterns in their cultures led him to this. Later, my father would use a similar knowledge to determine the real Author of the Sacrezin Pages, tying them to a half-elf from Sarazin who grew up in Caelumnar.” Aurgin grinned at the memory. “His pen name included a silent ‘is’, which can be found in both Caelish and Lantier culture, but only Caelumnar includes it in the center of a name!”

Maker interjected. “That is well and good, but we should keep moving. I would prefer to have as many miles between us and the screaming hills, as they are called. Besides, it will be a day or two at least before we make it to the windmill. Let us keep our guesses as to its origin to ourselves until then.”

Aurgin deflated in such a way that Aileen could not help but feel pity. “How small minded of you to dismiss her wisdom out of hand! If you truly are a newcomer to this world then you could do well to shut your own metal clacker and let her help us! Endless above!”

With that she kept marching, not bothering to see the reactions of her companions. Unfortunately, she also tripped over a loose stone, and rolled the rest of the way down the hill. At very least the road was, as Maker remarked, still maintained. She spent the rest of their march dizzy and leaning on the arm of Aurgin, who was more than happy to show compassion to her defender. Maker remained apart from them.

The bridge rose into the air with a magnificent arch. On either side was a parapet to stop travelers from falling into the river below, which surged between the bridge’s pillars with a white foam. All three Folk were curious enough for a peak over the up-stream edge. The chill of the wind that raced across the top of the water and carried its spray up and above the stone of the bridge. 

Aileen took it in, mesmerized. The silent war between every Folkish dam and weir and the river it impeded was often a gentle one, but here it built into a furious roar. The beauty of the scenery and the dedication each member of the froth had to its task; standing or running, so far away from where anyone could see it and hear it and know it. The unyielding march of time and motion was still at work.

It was also a solemn reminder that the three of them were where no other Folk had tread for dozens if not hundreds of years. The road had been comfortably smooth so far, with few juts, overgrowths, or loose stones, but on the other side of the spray-soaked, lichen-crusted bridge was the wild. Where a paving stone showed itself it was cracked and powdered by the roots of the grass, the bushes, and the trees.

Just walking to the precipice was difficult, as the lichen was slick and slippery. Standing, arms out-stretched for balance, they considered the far shore. After her days of traveling; assaulting an ambush, defending against a drake, running from the scream, no step forward had caused her this much dread. From the look on her face, Aurgin felt the same fear.

“We die out there, no one will find our bones for a thousand years,” she said, staring off into the undergrowth.

“If only us three were chosen to venture out here, then we will be enough,” Aileen said to comfort herself. “Tain is no fool, and Mialoth devious. They wouldn’t have sent us if they thought we weren’t enough.”

The three stood together. The sun began to set far behind them. Their shadows crept forward into the forest. The river ran and the birds sang sweet songs at the sundown. But still they stood, none willing to put a foot over the edge of the bridge. Even the stoic Maker refused to move forward. It was only after the light began to dim that Aileen felt she could take no more.

“If we keep just standing here we might as well invite anyone with a bow to come shoot us, or a monster to rush us down. We must keep moving, and if it takes summoning a light to see by then so be it!” With that she did just as she said, channeling divine power into a small glowing dot of light. Concentrating, she changed it so as to keep the light from shining back at them, both revealing and blinding them. Then with a suppressed shiver she stepped forward into the dark. Aurgin trailed after her, but Maker held out just a moment longer.

“That light will give us away in the dark.” But even they were secretly glad for it. To see green grass and leaves instead of shadowy shapes kept the dread at bay.

The afternoon’s heat had long gone, and the wind that swept over the peninsula carried the cold of the tops of the Sku Koroth mountains from the south. They made many stops for many reasons, to put on warmer clothes, to check something on their kit, to get pebbles out of their boots. Each step they took forward they huddled closer and closer, eyes scanning the darkness for any sign of movement.

When the wind first began to pick up it nearly stopped Aurgin’s heart. The sound of leaves rustling in the wind had her whirling, hands white-knuckle tight on her maul. Maker and Aileen’s hearts were firmer, but only just. Their fear began to paralyze their progression until they barely picked their way through the roots and bushes. No obvious campground had provided itself, and none of them were willing to stop and sleep in the cramped forest, so on they went.

Soon the wind was perpetual, and the chill began to bite. They gathered around to discuss their options. Maker insisted they head back to the bridge and camped there, so they could make better progress in the morning.

“But we are so exposed there! Besides, we are hours past the bridge,” insisted Aileen.

“Hours spent at a snail’s pace,” Maker said.

“I think that I am very tired and very hungry and my feet hurt and I am ready to sleep,” Aurgin stated to no one in particular.

“What, here?” Aileen asked. “There isn’t even an Aurgin-sized patch on the ground free of rocks or roots.”

“But we aren’t going anywhere very quickly,” Aurgin whined, “and who knows when we will find a spot that is ‘good enough’? I’m exhausted. I carried you through half our run the other night, I will remind you.”

“You seemed to have enough energy last night,” Aileen said with a smirk.

Out in the forest there came the sound of a snap. Not a twig snapping, but a full branch buckling under the constant blowing of the wind. It slammed into its neighbors with a crash, its leaves shaking free in a shower of movement. It rolled over side and fell to the ground, where it snapped some more before coming to rest.

Before it had a chance to strike its first neighbor the three Folk were off into the night at a dead sprint. Roots that reached to trip them were instead squashed underfoot. Twigs that snarled were torn free of their branches. The three ran in silence, their breath frozen and blood cold. Except Maker, who had neither, and instead was simply and extremely afraid.

If the road still did exist under the brush and the grass then the party left it behind. Their path was erratic until they came to a dip in the landscape. They rushed into the comfort of a rocky wall that jutted from the fallen leaves and stout trunks. Aileen’s light had long since winked out, so they stood panting in the darkness. The sound of rushing leaves had not faded, so their hearts had no respite.

“Why didn’t we hear its call?” Aileen asked, eyes wild.

“Maybe this is a new thing?”

Maker was unconvinced. “Safer to assume it followed it, waiting for a moment to strike!”

“We need shelter,” Aileen said, “check for spaces between rocks and roots!”

“Endless above, grant within me the courage of my father,” Aurgin muttered, facing away.

Maker and Aileen turned to see what had terrified her. In the rock of the hill was a gate. The gate itself had long since rotted away, but the robust stone reliefs that made its trim held strong around a pure black void where the gate used to be. The darkness of that portal seemed to radiate outward, darker than the night around it. The fear of their phantom follower hammered at Aileen, demanded she move and prepare. Looking into that void ignited a new kind of fear that stiffened her body to wood, petrifying her to the spot. She couldn’t take her eyes off of it for fear of what would dart out without a sound. She couldn’t bear to look in case some monstrous shape unfolded itself from the inside. A fumbling found her holy symbol, and another her mace, but it did nothing to empower her.

“Under no circumstance can we rest here,” Maker said. With only a slight stumble, they began to back away. Aileen and Aurgin followed suit, allowing only a few glances backwards to steady themselves. When they had managed fifty paces, they felt they could regather.

“It is clearly important that we find out what is in there, but certainly not tonight.” Aurgin said at last. The other two nodded sincerely.

“Not tonight.” Aileen agreed.

“We must wait until dawn.” Maker amended.

They stood like that, all in ecstatic agreement, until the moment wore off. The adrenaline ran its course and when it was gone their muscles began to shake. The cold redoubled its efforts, though the hillside blocked much of the wind. With no small amount of uncertainty, Aurgin and Aileen settled down to sleep. Maker promised to keep watch. It was a kind gesture, though unnecessary, as neither Aurgin nor Aileen got any sleep that night. Three sets of eyes fixed firmly on the door into the dark. It was that way until morning.

[alieneye]

Lovesickness, like budding rust in the grim grey woods, is not the cruel gust that cuts the shore, nor the fierce flame that feasts on all in sight. No, it is the quiet, clinging earth after autumn rain, where roots reach out yet never meet, where air thickens with a faint, forgotten scent. It is the lingering gaze, not in fire’s fury, but in the slow, veiled glance of a lost green.

Lovesickness, like a lone cloud crossing endless skies, casts its shade not by will, not by right, but floats forlorn, because it knows no rest. It is the tree we near but never touch, the stone that’s steadfast but stays cold. As rivers run to the unfeeling sea, love aches in the shade of silent days, trailing softly behind, like a drifting cloud fading far across the grey horizon.

Lovesickness, like an echoing, endless song, a voice lost in vastness, is a field barren, a shore swept clean. Not the rushing crescendo nor the calm of quiet, but a breath that circles, unanswered, in hollow rooms. It is the hidden pulse of an untuned melody, the murmur of chords unstruck, unsung, each glance a shadowed sigh, each touch withheld, unclaimed, and beneath all the winds of the world, two hearts beat apart, lost in the same ceaseless, soundless, refrain.

lovesick

adjective /ˈlʌv.sɪk/ /ˈləvˌsik/

in love, or missing the person one loves, so much that one is unable to act normally

unhappy because of love; feeling weak, foolish, or unhappy because someone you love does not love you

related words & phrases: a long face, abjection, adoring, affectionate, amatory, amorous, angsty, be ardent, be down in the mouth, be in a funk, cut up, devoted, dismayed, displeased, dissatisfied, distraught, distressed, doting, enamored, fervent, fond, forgiving, frustrated, impassioned, infatuated, lachrymose, languishing, lonely, lonesome, longing, love-struck, lovelorn, mushy, passionate, pining, romantic, sappy, sentimental, tender, tenderhearted, woe, woe is me, woebegone, yearning

antonyms & near antonyms: aloof, antisocial, callous, cold, cold-blooded, cold-eyed, cool, detached, disaffected, distant, dry, frigid, frosty, hard-hearted, heartless, indifferent, offish, pitiless, remote, reserved, ruthless, soulless, standoffish, unbending, uncaring, unconcerned, unfeeling, unfriendly, uninvolved, unloving, unromantic, unsentimental

“The folly of all follies is to be love sick for a shadow.” — Alfred Lord Tennyson

“I guess I have a lot of emotion stored up. But it's nothing bad. It's love. It's just love rotting up inside of me...That's it...I have too much love, I think, and nobody to give it to.” — Ottessa Moshfegh

"Come o'er the eastern hills, and let our winds Kiss thy perfumed garments; let us taste Thy morn and evening breath; scatter thy pearls Upon our love-sick land that mourns for thee." — William Blake

"The piano may do for love-sick girls who lace themselves to skeletons, and lunch on chalk, pickles and slate pencils." — Mark Twain

Sources: 1 2 3

[someonestolemygrilledcheese]

Warriors: Call of the spirits

I’m pretty sure the only people reading this are bots so🦅

Chapter four

Pebble woke up to a cooling droplet of water splitting down the two sides of his muzzle, him looking up to the grey sky, the dark clouds fighting to keep hold onto the rain water with its moist grasp.

He shook out his sodden fur from the dampened moss and stood up. His pure white and light grey fur greyed by soot. He turned to the still sleeping pile of black, grey and white pile of fur.

He trotted over to his brother, prodding a paw into his matted flank.

He grumbled, curling his tail over his flank with annoyance.

Pebble continued to prod, Gravel opening his eye, half-listening. “Gravel, we’re not in the den anymore! Wake up you lazy pebble-brain!” He hissed.

“Fine..”Gravel sighed tiredly, slowly blinking as he stood up, yawning and licking his chest tuft. Pebble eyed Gravel’s paw as they walked, he still limped on it, and you could tell it was starting to swell. Light only grew more pale as they were shaded by the oak trees, soon turning to large pines , their dark green crowns thrashing violently in the wind. As lightning broke the horizon, thunder cracked in the distance, signaling for the rain to follow after it, starting to pound down on the piney undergrowth. The steady beating of rain on the lush leaves easing the two brothers as thunder continued to crack and twirl in the sky.

As they steered deeper into the forest, the scent of the strange cats tinted the forest floor, giving it the camouflaging arid smell of soot, squirrel, and the sweet scent of tree sap. The small streams and puddles carrying its sweet scent back towards the river.

The mud began to squelch and rise up through the breakage in the dark ginger pine leaves, Pebble’s paws becoming matted as the mud dried into his fur.

As they trailed back to the old cabin, Pebble started to realize the oaks were now completely overgrown by pines, the dark clouds and bright cracks of thunder the only light reaching beyond its protective layer of stick like leaves.

The strange cat scent was also overgrown, the smell of rain and piney soot clogging Pebble’s nose. The starving mud escaped from the undergrowth, almost entrapping Pebble’s paws.

He twitched his ear in annoyance, looking around for a solution, he glanced to his right, seeing Gravel had tripped on a stray branch and landed in the mud, his underbelly darkened by the unforgiving mud, it spiking and dragging above the ground, his claws unsheathing into the non solid earth.

Beyond him, the pines covering the ground were dense and sturdy, it would be wise to follow that path.

“ the mud is less dense over here, follow me.” Pebble mewled to his brother, trying to keep his steps light as he skimmed over the mud.

Gravel followed closely behind, scowling to himself at his ruined fur. The sturdy growth under paw kept the mud from rising too high, making it easier for them to move through the forest. Pebble couldn’t smell anything but wet pine leaves, ears flattening in irritation. Rain droplets landed on his long fur, running down his downed ears, regaining itself at the ends of his ears and tips of his fur before landing silently onto the crisp pines below. Winds curling around the two from the clouds, twisting through every patch of fur and seeping into his skin, chilling him to the bone.

He began to shiver, the cool air and refreshing rain going through his fur like stones being thrown into a lake.

He couldn’t wait be back home in his den, sleeping in a soft nest of feathers and moss with his brother.

They hadn’t eaten in forever, his old memories of the past awaking his belly, growling like a starving wolf to a plump rabbit.

He sighed, just wanting to collapse and go back to sleep.

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” Gravel worried, attempting to groom his underbelly before jerking away from the earthy, oily taste, sticking his tongue out in disgust.

Pebble blinked up at the lightless sky thoughtfully before replying, “Maybe we should stop until the storm passes, I can’t scent anything in this weather.”

Gravel nodded hesitantly, still pouting about his ruined pelt.

Pebble redirected his gaze to the gutting roots of an old pine, just enough space to fit under it for two small cats.

Pebble inspected it, his eyes disappointed when he found the small dip flooded with muddy water. “Lets keep going, there’s bound to be something.”

As they walked, another close strike of lightning echoed through the air like a warning , making Pebble’s fur rise on his back.

He soon spotted a large bush in the bracken with a reasonable space beneath its dense branches of leaves, with a swish of his tail, he beckoned his brother into it. Gravel trotted into it, the two brothers catching their breath inside.

The rain only grew more intense, pattering down furiously as it echoed through the forest. Pebble sighed in relief, licking his soaked fur and resisting the earthy tang of mud as it slowly left his fur, leaving only a dull brownish stain onto his fur. It’ll take many suns to return it to his former snowy color.

Behind the bush was a soaked earthy clearing, Pebble crouched to the earth as he glanced at a grazing doe, peacefully eating, even through the relentless pounding of rain.

Pebble admired the freedom of the deer, the gentleness of its pricking from the grass reminding him of how his mother groomed him when he played too rough with his brother and got his pelt dusty. Remembering her words,

“Your pelts too long to play rough with your brother; your pelt mingles with the dust and it takes forever to take it out!” She exclaimed, frustrated but her voice containing a hidden tone of affection for her smaller son.

He snapped back to reality when a crack of thunder flashed, yowling as if it was a yowling cat, The doe twitching it’s ear and looking up at the sky, wind rippling her fur onto her back. She took a step back, her smooth black eyes carrying an expression of fear.

Pebble flattened his ears in horror as a wolves grey and cream fur erupted from the other side of the clearing, skidding on the muddy ground to the left of the doe, it bellowing and kicking its front legs in the air before attempting to canter away. The large wolf effortlessly pushed its legs after the doe, leaping its front paws onto the lower back of the deer, it bellowing in pain before the wolf bit into its spine, making it hard for the deer to stand as the wolf slowly dragged it to the ground, taking it by the neck and dispatching it in front of the bush where the brothers hid.

Pebble flinched as its amber gaze landing on him with a growl, revealing its blood stained fangs.

“What is it now?” Gravel said, turning as Pebble took a step back into him.

Gravel looked up, eyes widening as he looked up at the furious wolf in front of them, eyes narrowed with blood lust.

“Run.” Pebble whispered to Gravel, voice filled with fear.

//Longest chapter I’ve made and my phones about to die

[too-many-blorbos]

Part two of the Prisoner's Dilemma fiction

Pearl.

Father called me that in his most tender moments. I was an unexpected boon, a pearl in an oyster. The greatest treasure in his life. I took comfort in that often. People didn’t look kindly on a child without a mother, much less one who traveled with mercenaries. If I was never dear to anyone else, I was at least dear to him. 

I clung to that sentiment when we fled the mob. I was certain he’d catch up to us as promised–I was too precious for him to abandon. Even as days became weeks, I kept telling Gerrain that we’d rendezvous soon. I pestered him to visit our favorite towns and check with every courier we saw for a letter, certain that Father would send news any moment. Gerrain humored me grudgingly, always silent. He knew better, of course. He was too wise to believe my father had survived. Every confident assertion from my young, hopeful self was a dagger in the heart to him, a reminder that his brother-in-arms was gone forever. I wish I’d been wiser back then; we could have at least grieved together. Instead, Gerrain suffered by himself… and by the time my hope faded enough to see the truth, he was already beyond saving.

He lasted five years raising me alone. It wore him down, like a river beating stones into sand. Towards the end, he stayed in bed and did nothing but drink. He died in that bed. Heart failure, the undertaker said… that's one way to describe a broken heart. I wondered often if I could have prevented his fading. I doubt it; I couldn't even heal my own broken heart. And now I faced the world on my own for the first time in my short life. My guardians didn't leave me with nothing; I had no material riches, but I knew their trade and I knew their mastery of the wilderness. It was an inheritance that could sustain me my whole life if I used it well. 

But I was young. I was hurting. And that combination rarely breeds good decisions. 

Splinters dug into my feet as I climbed the shoddy stairs. My skin prickled and stung under the sun's relentless shine. It didn't matter. I wouldn't live long enough to burn. My unfortunate peers– other prisoners, their crimes ranging from manslaughter to poaching deer– were noisy as they waited their turn. Some cried. Some prayed. Some cursed. I should have been doing the same; any normal person would be emotional in the face of death. But I felt nothing. Even looking at the wagon piled with limp corpses, waiting for the rest of us to be loaded in for disposal, I couldn't muster any feeling. My own execution felt as bland to me as a bowl of gruel.

The noose pulled snug around my neck. It was damp with sweat, its fibers coarse and irritating. Funny how I was more annoyed with the mild discomfort than the prospect of death. 

"Any last words?" The recorder asked in a monotone.

"Screw off."

"Noted." He wrote the phrase down with a hint of disappointment. Perhaps he'd been hoping for something poetic. People sometimes expected eloquence from me when they heard my name, with its exotic syllables. They were usually disappointed.

The executioner crossed to the lever. Her weather-worn hand gripped the mechanism, but didn't pull yet. She met my eye, briefly. I stared back, unspeaking, unblinking. I don't know why she hesitated to end my life. She'd shown no such squeamishness with the other prisoners. I broke her gaze, choosing instead to stare at my feet and the platform beneath them. The wood displayed an impressive collection of stains from its years of use. It was almost like a painting. An abstract painting, made with pain for pigment and cruelty for a brush. A fitting place for my end, after a life shaped by cruelty and pain. 

I heard the lever creak as it was finally pulled forward. Then the sound was overshadowed by the sudden blast of a horn, and the thunder of approaching horses. 

"Stop! Stop the executions!!!"

My head snapped up of its own accord. I caught a glimpse of silver and violet, of a colonel's shining crest--a high-ranking entourage from the national army.

And then the wood gave way beneath me and I fell. Plunging to my death. 

[whatgaviiformes]

Ficlet: unnamed.

A/N: apparently I can't get this out of my head. So I am sorry for writing this. I hate that I wrote this.

Warnings for whump, angst, drowning (yes again), and temporary character death. There be no medical accuracy here.

Ficlet

They are men of action, so Virgil hadn't thought twice about jumping into the rapids after the little boy, and Gordon hadn't thought twice about going in after his brother. He tracked them from shore because he'd been in a pod. Lucky for them because he could keep up with the speedy river currents and make a plan. 

It involved getting ahead of them, a rocky area he could grasp onto, and a little bit of prayer. 

A lot of prayer. He had to help the boy first because that's what they did. The grasp was weak, shaky, but he was conscious, and Gordon brought him to the riverbank. One life.

The boy coughed, looked up at his hero with wide eyes, but Gordon was looking away, back towards the river where he'd seen Virgil's form bob over the surface and slide back under. There had been no fight. 

He didn't have time. 

"Gonna be okay, kid?" He asked, kindly, his voice a pitch higher than usual, but the kid didnt know that. Virgil needed him. 

The kid nodded. 

Back in the water to make two lives saved today.

Stroke after stroke to race the river, dodging and pushing off of slippery rocks, until finally he found purchase on a green baldric, attached to a limp, waterlogged version of his older brother. 

On shore, he was still, blood near his hair line. 

Gordon sprung to action, calling for help through his comm, checking his airway, feeling for a pulse on the cold skin. He pounded on his brother's chest in counted cycles and placing his mouth over his blue lips to force air in, precious air that would only help if he could get the water out, and his lungs working, his heart beating. 

Again again again.  Two breaths 

Again again again. 

How long was he under? 5 min? 8? 

How far into the trek had he hit his head?

How long since he pulled him out?

He didn't know. Time drained in the resuscitation rhythm, again again again. Breathe. 

A rib cracked. 

He kept going. 

It felt heavier now, harder to press his weight into Virg's heart through his stacked hands as they shook. 

How long? 

He'd stolen his toast just that morning. Shining eyes and a deep baritone of a laugh. So full of life, happy and whole. Gordon had thrown a piece of egg in his hair. 

Again. Again. … again. 

Breathe. 

Too long, way way too long. He found the wrist. 

No.

Nononononono

Where was that help? 

Virgil. It keened out of him as he sat back on his knees, his body vibrating. Hoarse where he'd been calling for him and the counts interspersed with pleas, his voice cracked and his cries fell silent. 

His brother. Virgil always had warm hands, even in the cold of winter his hands could be counted on for warmth, his body a furnace and his hug a blanket. 

He loved popcorn and plants, and art, and -Oh, god, the music.

All of it slipped through his fingers. 

Gordon's grasp fell slack, and the wrist dropped like a stone to the ground. His heart stuttered with the sadness so intense, so deep, that he let the dark shudder through him. 

And then Virgil coughed.

~.~.~

It's Virg himself that climbed out of the dark. A cough, so light, then another and another and another. He remembered none of it. Consciousness was fleeting, his body too battered. 

But when Scott arrived with help, Virgil was breathing, Gordon looking over him with wet haunted eyes, his entire body vibrating. 

He pried Virgil's wrist out of Gordon's hands, and nodded to the paramedics when they could move closer. Scott maneuvered himself between them, between Gordon and the work of the people behind them, and brought him close to his chest. 

Gordon clutched at his arm with inhuman strength,  the strength of the frightened, of those who have seen horror.

"You did it, Gordon," he said. "It'll be okay."

Gordon said nothing. 

He shook. It was different being in Scott's arms. He wanted Virgil's.

But Gordon had given up. He didn't do anything. Virgil had been fighting his way back, and Gordon, for just a moment, was about to call it. He's not sure he deserves Virgil's hugs or his laughter or his music ever again. And so he retreats, goes numb in Scott's arms, and loses himself in his grief.

[venelona]

“I love you.”

Dazai couldn't help but flinch when those gentle words reached him. He turned to Atsushi, who chuckled at his comically wide eyes, his own gaze holding nothing but warm and sincerity.

They’ve been standing by this river for some time, enough for the evening sun to lower enough that it was hidden behind Yokohama skyscrapers. Dazai, filled with nervousness unusual for him, has spent this time gathering himself to speak, carefully arranging sentences in his head, the pattern of every word.

He had asked Atsushi to come here, the place they first met around two years ago, to have a serious conversation, but the weretiger had beaten him to it. Of course he did.

“A…” Finally, Dazai had found his voice. “Atsushi-kun, why would you say that? Did you want to steal my thunder?” He couldn't even uphold a whining front, smiling uncontrollably as a lighthearted laugh escaped him. He never felt this light before.

“Dazai-san was staring at the water so intently I was afraid he'd jump, and I don't feel like walking home completely drenched.” Nakajima muttered, making the brunet giggle even more, but soon his face softened again. “But it was something I wanted to tell you for a while.”

Osamu felt his heart flutter.

They never officiated whatever was happening between them - the way they grew closer to each other was so simple and yet felt so incredibly right they didn't question it, not even when it clearly grew beyond a simple friendship.

They just let it happen.

“Well, this wasn't quite what I wanted to talk about.” It was, tangentially, but it wasn't how he expected the conversation to start out. His gaze slid back to look at the water running beneath them, one hand squeezing the bridge railing as he gathered himself to finally say it. To commit to it. “I brought you here to say that I… I decided that I no longer will make any suicide attempts.” Even now the river was calling to him, but he only shook his head. “Not because I don't want to anymore. I don't think that will ever go away. But… after meeting you, seeing you persevere through everything...” He finally forced himself to face Atsushi, smiling. “Atsushi-kun made me want to live.”

The silver-haired detective looked as surprised as Dazai did at his confession, making Osamu want to reach out and touch him. Atsushi had beat him up to it, again, embracing the laughing brunet close.

“Really?”

“Really.”

“You promise?”

Dazai nuzzled his tiger. Such a childish request, but…

“I promise.”

Osamu indulged him, and he meant it.

Back then, he let himself hope. Let himself forget that life has always pried everything he cherished out of his hands. Atsushi was so beautiful, full of so much life and will to live…

Dazai never expected him to die before him.

He never felt this empty, when he heard the news. He refused to believe it. Atsushi couldn't be gone. No matter what Kunikida said. No matter how remorseful but sure Ranpo looked. No matter how much Kyouka cried.

Dazai refused to believe it.

He never stopped searching, even after the rest of the Agency did. Not even after the funeral, which he didn't come to - Atsushi wasn't dead, there was no body to be buried, he had to still be out there.

Dazai used everything he had, exhausted his every connection, pulled on all the strings until they completely unraveled, and yet-

Atsushi remained gone.

Dazai refused to believe it. He didn't, he didn't believe it, but… he started to visit Atsushi's grave anyway. Sometimes he didn't even enter the cemetery premises - he stood outside of the gates, staring at the tombstone from afar. Sometimes he'd enter, but turn back halfway to the grave, not lifting his head until he was at the bar. Sometimes he'd come in and stare at Atsushi's name carved in the stone and look at the flowers left at the grave, guessing which Agency member left them. Sometimes he spent days at the cemetery, silent, his back pressed against the cold tombstone as he fell into sleep with empty dreams.

He dropped by Oda's grave as well - they were buried at the different cemeteries. If Dazai participated in preparations for Atsushi's funeral, maybe he'd have him buried here, too. He didn't. Now he has two places to visit, a reminder that no matter where he was - the Port Mafia, the Armed Detective Agency, anywhere - he'll only bring misfortune to the people he cares about.

“Do you know whose grave this is?”

“Was it someone you were in love with?”

“If it was a woman I loved, I'd have died with her.”

Dazai let out an empty chuckle. Life was a joke.

Atsushi was gone, after Dazai has promised him to live.

And Dazai tried. Carried on living. The days grew ordinary, boring - usually, those kinds of days would blend into each other, fly by in a blink of an eye, but Osamu felt each one, piercing his skin like needles. Atsushi fought so hard for this, for peace, but Dazai felt the weight of each passing day get more excruciating.

Standing on the roof, Dazai gazed down. Atsushi wanted him to live, but… would he really want him to live like this? A mere husk of a human being? Would he?...

Osamu stepped away. No. Of course Atsushi would. Atsushi never wanted anything from him - even the reciprocation of his feelings - except for one thing.

He wanted Dazai to live.

“I promised him…” He mumbled in a hoarse voice, sitting in front of Oda's gravestone. “But it's so hard, Odasaku… I promised you to live in the light too, but this…” He shook his head. “I don't know how much longer I can keep going…”

Maybe he should stop giving promises to the dead.

Dazai tried. He really, really did. Even though the days kept going, it felt like Dazai was standing still. The darkness, the light, nothing mattered anymore, it never did. The gravestone felt colder and colder every time he came by. Did Atsushi ever meet Oda, out there? Were those two watching him now? Would they really be happy to see Dazai exist like this?

He didn't know.

Two years, three months and twenty four days. Dazai didn't want to count the days since he last saw Atsushi, but he couldn't help it.

“I'm sorry…” Dazai whispered to the wind. Atsushi loved him. Atsushi would forgive him for breaking his promise.

He stood at the bridge, back at that river where their paths had crossed for the first time. The arrangements for after his death were completed since he was fourteen. Nothing really changed, aside from a couple more letters to some people. The Agency will move on, like they moved on from Atsushi’s death. Akutagawa will finally have no choice but to seek something more in life. Chuuya will forever be mad at him, but Dazai knew he'd understand one day.

Watching the sunset for the last time, on the other side of the railing, Dazai only thought of one person.

“I hope you forgive me, Atsushi-kun. I love you.”

Dazai let go, and the cold water swept him into nothingness.

***

Atsushi didn't know how many days had passed. He used to count, but he stopped after a year.

He knew it's been more than one by this point - the room he's been chained down in has no windows, but the tiger inside of him would stir every full moon, so he was vaguely aware of how many months have passed since he's been kidnapped.

He didn't know who took him - they never talked to him, not even one word in months he's been locked away - but he was pretty sure on why. Experiments.

And Atsushi thought that Shibusawa was cruel. He had nothing on these people.

Even transforming into the tiger didn't stop the pain he was subjected to. He wasn't allowed to leave this room, and the silence in his ears was ringing louder than the desperate roars inside.

First few months, Atsushi was trying to escape. After that failed, he waited in hopes that the Armed Detective Agency would rescue him. He believed that they would find him. He believed that Dazai would find him. After a year, Atsushi just hoped that the pain would stop.

After two, he wished he could die. It would be better than this.

“Would it?” Dazai asked him, a hallucination so vivid Atsushi should've been worried, but it was also his only solace in this prison. He wasn't sure when he had started to see Dazai, but it was the only reason the weretiger was still holding on to hope.

It hurt so much. But Dazai was here. Not here- out there. He was searching, he was waiting, and Atsushi couldn't give up.

He persevered. After what felt like forever, a person who was responsible for shakling him back to the wall slipped up, just a little, only a second - but it's a chance Atsushi was praying for.

It took all the strength he had left in him, everything the tiger could offer him, so, so much blood- but finally, Atsushi has escaped.

He'd never forget the faces of his coworkers at the Agency when he walked into the office after missing for two and a half years. Just like he'd never forget how he felt when he glimpsed two flowers.

One on his desk, and one on Dazai's.

“They told me you never stopped searching.” Atsushi said, standing over a small grave, his voice strangely distant even to himself. As if it wasn't him who was talking. As if he wasn't there anymore, just like Dazai. “I couldn't stop thinking about you, too. I was so scared of dying…” The tears that started streaming down his cheeks also felt as if they belonged to someone else. “But I was scared that I won't get to see you again even more… I'm sorry, Osamu.” Atsushi fell to his knees. “I'm sorry I wasn't fast enough.”

He knew that if Dazai was here, he would've forgiven him. But he wasn't, so Atsushi was forever at fault.

“I forgive you.”

He lifted his head, staring at Dazai crouching before him.

A hallucination.

“Go away.” Atsushi sobbed. “He's dead.”

“You tried your best.”

“He's dead, he's dead, he's dead- go AWAY!” He curled into himself, shaking. This version of Dazai his brain has invented to survive, the last crumb he had held on to when he was locked away and falling to pieces, his guiding light-

He wasn't real. Just a mockery of a man who had already left Atsushi behind.

“I would never leave you behind.”

But you did. Atsushi whimpered on the ground. Dazai did.

His guiding light burned out.

Even considering his upbringing - bullied, abused, locked away - after the experimentations he went through, going back to normal life seemed impossible. Atsushi could hardly speak, still flinched when a person came near him, trembled in phantom pain and went to bed every night dreading to wake up back in that tiny room, only to scream every morning because he didn’t know where he was.

His friends promised that he would be fine, that it would get better. Dazai had made him a promise once, too. One he had failed to keep.

“If it was a woman I loved, I'd have died with her.”

Dazai wasn't joking back then, it seems. He really did follow his love to the grave. Would he want Atsushi to do the same, he wondered?

When that question left his mouth at the Agency, he had gotten a slap from Yosano and a long lecture from Kunikida.

They told him that Dazai would never want him to end his own life. That Dazai believed that he was alive even when all of them had lost hope. That Dazai had tried very hard to keep living, even after he lost all hope that Atsushi would come back.

Atsushi stood at the bridge, staring at the river below. His legs had carried him here, even though he wasn't sure where he wanted to go. The hands that held the railing looked like his, but at the same time it was as if he was looking at the hands of a stranger. The brief reflection he could glimpse in the water showed a person he used to know, a person that used to look back at him when he looked at the mirror.

That person was gone now.

“Don't do it, Atsushi-kun.” Dazai’s voice said somewhere behind his back. The silver-haired man turned, looking at the man he loved.

“I can't remember how your face looks anymore.”

Dazai smiled. Was it how he used to smile? Atsushi couldn't tell. He couldn't remember. He would never see it again.

“You should live, Atsushi-kun.”

“I know.” He looked up at the sky, at the clouds passing over Yokohama. “I can't bring myself to end it all, anyway. But I can't continue living, either.”

I died the moment the light went out.

And in the darkness, only the tiger remained.

Atsushi hasn't used his ability for three months - he couldn't bring himself to activate it after those experiments - but he had let himself shift into a white tiger, his consciousness slowly drifting to the background as animal instincts took over.

He took one last look at the river and ran away.

***

“I saw Atsushi today.”

Everyone who was at the agency office turned their heads towards Kyouka - even though she's been working here for ten years now, her voice still remained quiet and soft.

“Was he at Dazai-san's grave again?” Tanizaki asked - he was the last to see him there, perhaps a year ago.

“No. He was by the river.” The woman's blue eyes dimmed. “I don't think he recognizes me anymore.”

Yosano approached her, quickly pulling the girl into a hug, while the rest of the Agency remained silent.

Atsushi has remained as a white tiger for years now. At first he'd come to the Agency pretty often, even assisting as a muscle on an occasional job. Sometimes agency members would find him curled in their dorm, or see him leave Dazai's. When he wasn't around the Agency, he was wandering the outskirts of Yokohama.

Then, he started to show up less and less. If the detectives saw him, it was usually at Dazai's grave, but after years he could be barely glimpsed even there 

“What if I bring him here?” Kyouka’s hands clenched Yosano’s shirt. “Maybe we can have him live here again, maybe he could transform back-”

“That won't happen.”

At the other corner of the office, Ranpo stood up.

“Atsushi-kun will never shift into a human again.” The detective’s voice was even, but his face betrayed sadness and guilt. If only he had found Atsushi back then. “He has always used his special ability as a means of survival. The tiger has always protected his life. If Atsushi becomes human now…” His green eyes swept the two desks. “He'll kill himself. The tiger is keeping his intelligence blocked as a means of protecting his life. Atsushi-kun is never coming back.”

Everyone knew what he meant by that.

Atsushi was already as good as dead.

Kyouka weeped, and the rest of the detectives didn't feel any better than her. They had their friend return only to watch him die again.

There was a legend in Yokohama, of a white beast that wandered the city in the shadows. A tortured soul locked within, waiting to one day reunite with his loved one.

A stray.

I was talking earlier about angst and Dazai committing suicide as part of that. And the following little drabble-thing was spawned from there. (So you can blame @the-port-mafia if this makes you sad. 😁)

I'm throwing this up here because I'm not planning to write a full fic for it, so if you're feeling particularly inspired by this, feel free to do so yourself. I'd love to be tagged in anything that comes out of it!

(there's angst and mention of suicide, so skip this if those bother you.)

"You know, it could be much heavier angst to have Dazai not kill himself." -me, before breakfast this morning.

On the surface, Dazai not killing himself is the opposite of angst. And yet, one could have both. To have Dazai make a promise to Atsushi that he would not try to kill himself anymore. To have to fight against both his baseline desire for death and the added desire to do so after a tragedy strikes, after Atsushi dies. To try to figure out how to live to honor his promise. Living, for Dazai, would be the ultimate agony.

You can also make it worse.

Because Dazai is only human after all. No matter what the name of his ability might imply. One day even he would lose the struggle to keep his promise. Is it days? Weeks? Months? Even years? It doesn't really matter. Everyone had accepted that Atsushi was gone, was dead. Everyone knew he wouldn't be coming back. Even Dazai accepts it eventually. Just one more grave he visits. Oda and now Atsushi. (Would he have them buried near each other? Would he want to be buried there himself?)

But what if Atsushi wasn't dead? Wasn't gone? What if his death had been staged so he could be taken captive, hidden away, experimented on, tortured and abused? What if Atsushi breaks himself free all that time later, only to find that he's too late. That Dazai is gone.

There's something to be said for the poeticism of Atsushi killing himself here. But that's not really in his character, to me. Atsushi wouldn't be the kind of person to commit suicide himself.

So instead, maybe he loses control. Loses the will to control his ability any longer. Lets himself be overtaken by a wild beast entirely. Gives up on living for himself. Atsushi has lost everything he wanted to keep in his life - his freedom many times over, his sanity, maybe even his humanity under experimentation, and now the one person he had come to view as truly safe, as his.

And so he gives in. He lets the tiger have free reign over his body. Lets it have a chance of its own to live.

There's something poetic that even when Atsushi would want to die himself, he can't bring himself to do it. He would instead live on, mind locked away behind the facade of a mindless beast. To live so that his ability can also stay alive. It isn't even a conscious choice he makes - it is all just instinct.

[kairakeiji]

tropes

didn’t know what to title this lmaoo but i’m giving haikyuu characters tropes

characters: atsumu, iwaizumi, sakusa, osamu & kuroo

a/n: ima just get on my knees for reblogs cries 

— atsumu miya: only one bed

the boy was all talk, the two of you brushing off the little mistake from the hotel management like it was no big deal. he claimed it would be ok and that he doesn't mind sleeping in the same bed as you, even if it was quite small to fit you both. but in reality, he couldn't stop thinking about it. despite you going out and spending the day with him, his mind couldn't leave the what-ifs of the upcoming evening. and so he caved, offering to sleep on the floor. but you couldn't allow that, not because you had feelings for him too, but because you knew he needed proper rest for his game tomorrow (or at least that's what you told yourself to calm your nerves). it took a while for both of your heartbeats to slow down, sleep not coming easily whatsoever. the two rest of you on opposite sides of the bed, sleeping on your sides trying not to bother the other. it's not until you hear atsumu shuffle on the other side that you inch just a bit closer and closer, and closer until you felt his hand on the small of your back, pulling you in a tiny bit more, almost asking you without words if this was ok, a silent question you answered as you turned towards him, a small smile on your face as you finally felt those butterflies from earlier finally go away.

— hajime iwaizumi: coworkers to lovers

working for the japan national team was quite a hard task. not only did you have to run paperwork and do administrative tasks (something you found rather boring) but you had to manage a group of men in their twenties. it wasn't like the team was a burden or a bother. in fact, as the team's manager, you spent your fair share of time working with them and going over plays. it was just that whenever a certain trainer by the name of hajime iwaizumi walked by, you were always greeted with smirks from the national team. they knew about your "tiny" crush on iwaizumi and have been pushing you to talk to him and maybe ask him out for yourself. but every time you tried you ended up chickening out, opting to ask about different team members or how his day was going. it was rather dry and the whole volleyball team was kicking and teasing you for it. it felt like you were all in high school again, a group of friends pushing someone to talk to their crush. in fact, you kind of enjoyed this little childish game you were playing, despite the fact that you never really asked him out. but all of that changed when a certain trainer decided to finally beat you to the punch.

— kiyoomi sakusa: fake relationship

he needed a date for a party, you needed a way to get back at your ex. while it was out of convenience, you had never thought you'd end up making fake relationship arrangements with your neighbor. you barely knew him despite living a block down from him. but this arrangement you both had for your fake relationship was just what you needed to get back at that lowly two time cheat you cried rivers for. and so, you both went out together, walked home together after school and spent more time with each other that you could've ever anticipated. despite him being more on the quiet and reserved side, he was sweet, caring, it was something you picked up on rather quickly as you both ran into your ex during the party. even under the stone cold gaze you always managed to spot a hint of warmth, of softness, of love. you had both promised that this would be a quick thing from the beginning. all you both wanted was to complete your side of the bargain and then leave. but neither of you wanted to end whatever you had so soon, because even if it was all fake, something about it just felt so incredibly real.

— osamu miya: childhood friends to lovers

you had been neighbors forever, the perfect addition to the miya twin duo. you spent your summer days with them, playing in the park and running through the streets of your neighborhood, quiet sidewalks growing louder at the sound of your laughter. but while you loved and appreciated atsumu, you always found yourself gravitating towards osamu. he was more like you than the other twin, a little more on the quiet side and always willing to tease atsumu. you tended to spend more time with him as you grew older while making sure not to neglect the now blonde twin. despite your constant insistence of only seeing him as a friend to those around you, your heart kept tugging at you to say otherwise as you entered high school. after all, he was sweet, supportive and one of your closest confidants. you'd be an idiot to say you never even felt something for him. heck, you'd be a fool to say that you didn't see osamu with you for the rest of your life. you had wanted to confess for ages, but you just never found the right moment, nerves always stopping you as the boy rather obliviously always mentioned how you were just a friend too. but when you finally gained the courage to say those three little words, osamu was incredibly quick to say that he loved you too.

— tetsuro kuroo: idiots to lovers

you were both smart, there was no doubt about it. both of you were top of the class, almost perfect grades, if anyone had any kind of tutoring needs or questions that needed answering, you both were the first people who came to mind. but despite being intelligent in your studies, you and kuroo were complete idiots when it came to love and it was driving everyone mad. your friends never shut up about the stolen glances, missed chances, and unforgiving mentions of how you were both just friends, despite the feelings they knew you both had. the volleyball team was just about ready to lock you both in the storage closet, hoping that you two would finally come to your senses and realize the other liked you too. but, if they were thinking honestly, you'd both just find another way out of the closet that didn't involve your confessions. you were both so smart, so intelligent, everyone and their mother knew that. so why couldn't either of you figure out that the feelings you both harbored were mutual?

[buttermynutter]

The Name They Gave Us | Silco x Reader

A one shot inspired by Richard Siken! Does not follow canon timeline. Warnings: Mentions of alcohol and smoking Word count: 3.5K

━━━━━━━━

It was cold outside when he had no pride to wear. 

It was colder under the streetlamp by the river, his reflection illuminated in the macabre puddle of equal parts of blood and water that he lay in. 

The little bit of strength leftover from heaving himself out of the channel seeped away as quickly as his reflection did through the cracks of the cobblestone road. A pattering against the rocks rang through his head as he lost consciousness, his last thoughts wondering if it was incoming rain. 

"Silco, you bastard," you had chided, only yourself and the empty warehouse to hear. The words echoed like your footsteps had against the stone when you spotted him, though the singular thing you heard in the moment was your heart beating between your ears. 

You had carried him to the closest abandoned building nearby, not difficult to find in Zaun. He was heavy, but you were never sure whether it was because of the water soaking his clothes or the weight of betrayal. 

He woke while your hand was still pressed against the side of his face, breaking your silent thanks that he wasn't conscious to suffer from the painful disinfectant of the rag you were holding, the last few years teaching you how he could tolerate countless black eyes but never the sting of chemicals.

Silco had swatted your arm away before realizing who it was before him, his movements still lethargic - though the look in his eye was anything but unwary. 

Once he caught sight of you, he had sighed, the only noise he made a slight croaking. There was a moment of confusion before you realized it was because he was unable to speak, and you delicately shushed him before continuing your cleaning, his hand coming to rest on your wrist. 

Only one of his eyes was visible, but in it was enough helplessness to drown oceans. The two of you had sat in silence, the night bustling and chaos of Zaun peculiarly dead.

Silco couldn't feel his tears among the water dripping from his hair. 

"I'll kill them all."

He had said the words like someone would say they were hungry, a simple afterthought. You glanced at him, noticing the swelling of his face had already gone down within the week from the night the pair of you left unspoken.

"You could," you mused, running a pair of scissors through the deep red fabric that was to become a coat. 

"High collar," Silco had said earlier, his slender fingers pressed together. "Very high." And although he hadn't said any more, the both of you knew it was to hide the side of his face. 

A sharp snip at the end of the cloth caused him to flinch slightly, his brooding demeanor broken.

"You could," you repeated, turning to face him. "Or, you could prove them right. One seems much crueler."

Silco's eyebrows raised, further defining their sharp angles. Abruptly, he scowled, swiping at the hair that came to drape like curtains around his face. "I won't be doing anything at all with this in the way," he snapped, gesturing vaguely at the bangs sticking to his exposed wound. "At this rate, the skin will grow over my hair."

You looked down at the shears in your lap, tracing its curves with a finger.

"I have an idea."

Silco's lighter flicked open, its flames chasing after the end of his cigar. His hands were shaking, and you thought to yourself that his left eye looked more red than usual. You were afraid he would burn into ashes with the tobacco. 

His plans were now running smoothly, but he seemed drastically on edge. You watched the smoke circle around his head - even smog avoided him. 

"I am a baron," he had snarled, tapping anxiously on his desk, the firm knocking reminding you of your feet against the cobblestone so long ago. What was it now? A year? Two years? With how Silco was behaving lately, it felt as if it had never happened. 

"Yet, people still feel the need to swap petty gossip concerning me," he continued, his gaze swinging every way in the room but yours. "Can you believe it?"

You were paying more attention to a cut on your forearm that you hadn't noticed until now, Silco's rants like radio noise to you more and more each time. 

"They're saying we are a couple." He sneered, the leery smile positively dripping with contempt. Still, you caught his eyes flitting towards you, the red iris identical to the ring of fire outlining his cigar tip. Though you acknowledged it was the first time he had looked at you since you had sat down, you didn't care for what reason. You didn't remember him ever being this blatantly spiteful, the malice he had spoken with squeezing your heart like he was juicing an orange. 

You wanted to do nothing but pull him towards you by the collar, the regal outfit he donned looking more like a costume than anything. You wanted to scream at him, about how you picked up after him and his dirty work, about how you saved his life, about...

Your thought tripped, tumbling over the folds of your mind before it hit a wall, in each brick scrawled a different moment leading to your realization: the way his back would arch when leaning against his desk, the low growl that accompanied his subtle praises for you, the small shudder of his body after his shimmer injection, still rejecting the chemical sting after all this time.

About how you loved him. About how you hated yourself for it.  

You remember having dashed out of the office, leaving nothing but a rattling chair, its revolving seat tilting to and fro. 

Silco's calls pursued you like smoke.

You had slammed the card down on the crate, your cries of hubris only encouraged as those gathered behind you cheered, Sevika's shout barely heard over the clamor.

"Another pint for the victor!"

Despite her loss, she was smiling, nimble fingers sliding the card back towards her to shuffle into the deck for yet another round. 

Vander banged the beer glass on the makeshift table, stray drops of foam soaking into the wood.

"At this rate, we'll be going from 'The Last Drop' to none at all!" 

You had grinned up at him, the split second of eye contact conveying a stream of words that could never be said, a silent betrayal concerning every party involved. You would never ask him of his fight with Silco, as he wouldn't yours. 

The mug of beer was quickly emptied, the cheers of the accumulated crowd only growing.

A flare of orange caught your eye, the cigarette clamped between Sevika's teeth swiftly lit. Your heartstrings tightened, coiling with the thought of the man you had left behind. It had already been several weeks, but even a vague reminder of Silco stirred your mind back into a sad, solitary puddle. 

But, the night went on, and several pints later - not to be unaccompanied by a brawl or two - you made your way home. 

A headache quickly clambored over your heartache the next morning, the searing pain amplifying as three firm knocks reverberated through the abandoned submarine you called home. The metal clangs sounded distant as you made your way to the door. 

You had cursed yourself as you tried to turn open the hatch, your strength impared both by the hangover and morning grogginess. 

Because of the combination, you weren't quite sure whether you were hallucinating or not once the door swung open, though that hadn't stopped your mind from descending into a sudden frenzy. 

For what seemed like eternities, you and Silco stared at each other. The repressed emotions brewed in you by the gallon; you didn't let yourself even blink, afraid that when you opened your eyes, he would be gone again. 

"I'm sorry."

And the gallons bubbled over. 

He was the first to step forward, falling into you as your mind shot through dozens of possibilities, all which made your heartbeat quicken a little more; but you remembered you had bottled them up for a reason. 

"Why are you here?"

So, he had told you, the hours and hours on end he had spent searching for you on foot, the discovery that the shimmer medication made him more aggressive with each injection, the blood and bourbon spilled that only stained his loss, never concealed it.  

Of course, you couldn't forgive him. Not now, at least. You trusted the person in front of you, not because of him, but because of the untidy, spontaneous boy that you would walk the wires of Zaun with, that you shared warmth with when the only other alternative was setting a building on fire - not that either of you wouldn't have done so for each other. The boy that Vander still respected, so you would too. 

Months flew, as did your spirits, Silco and you back to business partners; though he proved himself to be much more. His initial apologies were accompanied by a cigar or a small collection of flowers - always half wilted from the pollution of the Undercity, but that didn't stop you from thinking they were perfect. You could never admit to him that you didn't share his affinity for cigars, so in a few weeks you would return it under the guise as a gift of your own, sometimes wondering if it would find its way back to you once more. 

Naturally, he would have his subtle moments.  He asked you into his office for the most trivial of reasons, one time even to help him find a pen which - you realized after leaving the room - he had never dropped.

Each interaction flustered you a little more, each knotting of his tie, the nimble fingers ducking in and out of its folds, not to mention whenever he asked you to do it for him. With each flicking of his lighter, it felt as if it was to set your heart on fire.  

Soon, you grew accustomed to being in his office at all times, the two of you working side by side once again, both figuratively and literally, the oil of his lamp sometimes burning out in the middle of the night as you worked. 

The first time it happened, Silco had even laughed. 

The same laugh followed you through the markets of Zaun, Silco's arm around your shoulder. 

"Only for safety," he had told you. "These people are all scum, I couldn't stand being lost among them." You had simply raised an eyebrow at him, trying your best to conceal a dubious smile.

The smile returned especially now as the street you were on was nearly empty, your companion's cologne rubbing shoulders with Noxian spices and the sweet incense masking inevitably sinister businesses, Silco no doubt owning a portion of them. 

He had stopped abruptly, nearly causing you to trip over a pothole. You were just about to berate him before he hissed, "Did you hear the shopkeeper that we just walked by? Saying to their customer what lovebirds we were?"

"Calm down," you hummed, pulling him forward by the waist, surprised he made no objection to your contact - though, the feeling that woke within you as you were reminded of the last time he had made such a comment was much more bleak. "I'm sure they say that about everyone." 

Silco's hand left your shoulder, and you had felt a glimpse of sadness before he grabbed onto your hip and pulled you into the nearest alleyway, interrupting two crows' fight over a crust of bread, their caws fading with the street noise.

He had pressed you to the wall with one hand, the other leaving your hip to rest beside your head, sighing so heavily that you were surprised you weren't blown over.

"What if I wish they didn't?"

You could only cough awkwardly, the position you were situated in preventing you from thinking properly. 

Silco pressed his lips in a thin line, a single finger tapping the brick by your head before elaborating, "What if I wish they didn't say that about everyone?"

Your mouth opened instinctively, but you couldn't say anything - it wasn't that you had nothing to say - rather, the opposite. You wanted to ask why now, why at all, if this was what you thought it meant, if you would have to walk out all over again.

His tone had been rigid but the stability seemed forced, and you could swear that if you listened hard enough, his voice would be pleading. "I will never forgive myself, and some part of me wants to tell you to turn away, to remember what I did that forsaken day."

Your rational thinking slowly regained its footing as you weighed his actions, though your heart never stopped screaming that he had redeemed himself from the moment he began to speak.

"The other part of me loves you."

The footing was lost, yet you ascended, all the speculation and late nights suddenly endowed with a new meaning. You had given Silco a small grin, trying not to give away how truly elated you were. His expression was hopeful, and his lips almost trembled as he bit the bottom one, Adam's apple noticeably bobbing as he swallowed. 

"Every part of me loves you."

He had lit up instantly at your response, and you sealed his smile with yours, your dreams pressed between your hands, its scars shifting under your fingers with the movement of his mouth; Silco left your lips wet and your body warm.

You thought back to what he had said, that you should turn away - you knew it was about more than the past. Your future was bound to be tarnished now, but you didn't care, as long as it was intertwined with his.

You might as well have already been marked once you had helped him to his feet in that crowded market long ago, a stolen fruit concealed within one of his hands, a dagger in the other. It was the first time you laid eyes on him, but you somehow knew it wouldn't be the last. 

With a relationship, you'd be just as good as tacked with a red pin; but if you knew Silco at all, you knew that in spite of either choice, he would do anything and everything in his power to protect you. 

He had handed you a knife, but you took it by the blade. 

You were proven right only a month later, sat down in Silco's office chair with a syringe of poison lodged in your shoulder, the injury fortunately minor, as the tip of the needle had broken, causing none of the liquid to be injected - the perpetrator had been quite clumsy for an attacker. Nonetheless, Silco was in ruins, delicately removing the weapon before crushing it beneath his heal, shouting at nobody in particular only to abruptly kneel in front of you. 

After a dozen promises to murder the assailant and yet a dozen more apologies, he fell silent, his head buried in your lap. His outburst worried you more than the attack itself had, highly uncharacteristic of his usual placid and calculating self. Silco's hair was unkempt from the number of times he had stressfully ran his hands through it, so you pushed the strands away from his forehead, his heavy breaths warm against your thighs. 

He had looked up at you, the look in his eyes tying your stomach into knots. The dim light emitting from the desk lamp was just enough to catch the tears welling in them, a red ring swimming through the black sea of his eye. 

"Stay with me," he had whispered. You lifted your hands to wipe away the liquid, leaving mirroring damp trails from the corners of his eyes.

"Where else would I go?"

Silco had stood looking out the window twirling a vial of shimmer between his fingers. You looked up to admire him, the records you were sorting through sprawled around you on the carpet. He was trimmed as ever - albeit except the lack of the typical waistcoat, his shirt unbuttoned halfway down his chest. 

Despite only another handful of years passing by, his hair had begun to grey. 

You huffed and leaned back, letting the papers you were holding fall to the ground. 

He turned around with his usual elegance, his pose mirroring a sovereign painting. You swore the sun set because this man brought it to its knees each night. 

After a moment of consideration, Silco sat down next to you, giving it another bit of thought before deciding to lay down as well, the papers crinkling pleasantly. 

"Do we seem like sweethearts to you?"

You glanced at him, amused but bewildered. "Sweethearts?"

He gave an affirmative grunt, saying, "I've heard people call us that. It seems a bit sickly among the others. Sweethearts, lovers, tyrants, freaks... evil."

He had listed the terms like they were lines of a poem, each with their own potent connotation. 

"For someone who looks down on others for their obsession over things like this, you've certainly made it a hobby of your own." 

Silco rolled on top of you, cornering your head between his elbows as he lay his chin on one hand, the other tracing your jaw. The sensation tickled slightly, and you closed your eyes as he responded, "Ultimately, I don't care what labels they give - as long as it's me and you."

You don't remember ever getting up from the carpet, only his breath imprinted on your face. 

The days blazed by, an assassin for every other month, a bribed Enforcer for the next. You dug yourself deeper in the pit of danger, trying to convince yourself it was simply wider. Either way, Silco was by your side - a tie you embroidered around his neck, a lock of his hair inexplicably straying from the rest. 

Nothing else mattered when he would tip his head onto your shoulder, when he would inspect your wounds with as much fragility as one would when picking a flower, when you woke up covered with a coat you knew hadn't been there the previous night. 

The foyer of your memory was pristine, recollections framed and hung at a perfect angle. But the hallway was strewn with heavy furniture of heavier words, mismatched but ever-present, the wallpaper a myriad of conflict, some without their resolution, some of it torn from other people - the shiniest frames and the fullest drawers always belonged to Silco.

Your mind opened the door to the living room. 

And here you are.

Only knee-deep in water, yet still drowning, wondering if you left a latern lit by the door, if you forgot the key in the gate, if the children of the Enforcer could hear him scream from the pier. 

Silco's heavy coat weighing on your shoulders does a better job of keeping the cold inside you rather than the night air out. 

You hear his voice, but it feels more like you're reading his lips than anything, the words barely tangible above the officers' yells and rattling weapons.

"It's okay, darling. I was rebirthed in this water."

He tilts your head upwards, the slightest of tremors in his hand.

You glance up to the night sky, and a star winks at you like it has a secret to tell, like it has some way to whisk you away from this predicament. 

"There won't be a birth this time, Silco," you say, suddenly aware that your throat is dry. You consider having a drink of the river; as if that would be normal, as if any of this is normal. 

The side of his face is ironically mangled, this time by an Enforcer's baton. Water creeps up your legs, begging to pull you down and swallow you before anything else can. His hand is in yours, though you're not sure whose fingers are whose, intertwining like the branches of mingling veins, like the pool of combined blood dripping into your palms. 

Your heart folds together with the endless skies, a fleeting thought jumping through your head pondering which of Silco's eyes looks more like a star. 

He speaks up again, this time his voice hollow, an empty frame, remorse still clinging to its edges. "I think death forgot about us." Clutching your hand a bit tighter, he whispers, "As much as you're one to be remembered, I truly wish its memory was good enough for only me."

His voice cracks during the last line, the scars of his face deepening as the Enforcers' flashlights move closer. How grotesquely amusing, you think, that if you looked down from the sky, the ring of officers wading through the river would look almost like the iris of an eye, its pupil a couple. Couple? Lovebirds? Freaks? 

Maybe sweethearts wasn't too bad after all.

"You really are fate's fool," you murmur as his chapped lips press to your forehead, the action so deliberate and heartfelt you swear it would leave a mark. 

"No," he utters. "Just yours."

There you stand, trapped in a snowglobe of acid seas and blood skies. Or, would blood seas and acid skies be more fitting?   

You wish you had time to debate such trivial matters with yourself, but you focus on only Silco, trying desperately to memorize the pattern of the blood slicking his neck, the adoring gleam in his eye, the position of every last strand of hair, foolishly considering if you could cut it one final time. 

The only movement you're aware of is of his lips, each word falling from them like glass that you couldn't be more eager to catch and save from shattering.

"I'm sorry about the blood on your hands, dear. I only wish it was mine."

He pauses, as does the world.

"I love you."

The Enforcers sound a thousand miles away, though you notice there's a sudden bout of yelling to which you only make out a few words. The shouts carousel through your head, each statement of theirs that you assume seeming less likely than the last. Did the captain tell them to close in? To make an arrest?

"I love you too." 

A sudden heat blossoms in your abdomen. 

Ah, you think to yourself.

Open fire. 

Somewhere, a star burned out. 

[alrikhart]

"Place me first in line for a demonstration when you do, friend." Time. A fair request but when Alrik thought about the boon of time he silently thought of shackles as well. His life had felt long already, he couldn't imagine what it would be to live past a century, for two, or for three. One painful decade would roll into another, maybe he'd find bliss, but with years like that, it was inevitable to see that happiness ripped away. If time were a river then Alrik was happy to close his eyes and drift. "Another drink." It was a cheap answer and he felt that, so after the momentary smirk, his mouth faltered.

"Then a hint, as is fair." Alrik took a beat, it wasn't in his nature to divulge anything that might make him vulnerable in any way, but the displacement had left him with an air of absolute certainty. He was a violent creature, he knew this, and he was hardly fair toward those who trusted him most. Alessia among them. "I don't know, yet I'm not without options. The world is happening around me and I-" Alrik paused for a moment as he chipped away at a piece of the bar, earning a scowl from the wench before he ceased his fidgeting. "I don't see my place in it. I want to go home, but there's a barrier between me and Iskaldrik. The druids once traveled through the mist, I'm hoping to find my solution among their old stones." Another beat passed, "Home," Alrik added, "that's what I'd buy."

"Not yet." Maybe having a tail would be cool? Alrik's next question made him think, but not for long since he already had the answer, he just didn't think it was a good one. It was his nonetheless. "Time." As a Genasi he had time to spare for himself, but often did others worry about that, so he'd give it to those who needed it. If he had the chance back then, he'd have given it to his adoptive parents and to his siblings, and they'd still be around; it was a lonely life that of a Druid, he knew it through the arches, and it was even lonelier the life of a Genasi, tempered by the Dark One's power. "How about you?" He offered his best smile.

Zephyr shrugged. "Definitely none," And the many he'd met throughout life could attest to that, one thing that really made him rethink his disguise more than once before. "But haven't we established we're good friends already?" He teased back, stretching and crosing his legs shin to calf under the table. "I'm sure I will be needing your services in the near future, so I certainly will send a message when the time comes." There were many things he wished to know yet.