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maryellencarter · 2 years ago

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Memed from @thisbluespirit : "Share ten different favorite characters from ten different pieces of media, in no particular order, then tag ten people."

Do I even have ten blorbos? Surely I must. I don't have handy gifs of most of them, I don't think. How far back in my fannish history am I going to wind up going here?

1: Jigen Daisuke, from Lupin III. I've told this story in a few different places, but about six or seven years ago -- I think it must have been 2015 because some of the promotional material from Part 4 looks awfully familiar -- VirusQ was reblogging an assortment of Lupin stuff. Now, VQ and I have *extremely* similar taste in sharpshooters. I saw about a five-second clip from Jigen's Gravestone, the bit where Jigen is explaining to Lupin why he lost the first quick-draw duel in that movie (I'm pretty sure it was the Japanese subbed version but it could have been English with dubtitles, I know the audio was written down because like fuck would I have remembered Jigen's name six years later if it wasn't), and I said to myself, "If I see *any* more of this man I am going to have a new hyperfixation, and I do not have the spoons for that right now," and I blocked the Lupin III tag on Tumblr for the next six years.

Then, late last year, Leia asked me "hey would you buy me an action figure for Christmas if I asked", and she linked me a figure of one Goemon Ishikawa XIII, whom I had never heard of in my life. But I clicked through to the Amazon listing, and you know how those have the long stringy search-engine titles, so it was something like "Banpresto Goemon Ishikawa XIII Lupin III", and I was like "I know that name, Lupin III" and I had a feeling as of impending fate. (Not to be melodramatic, but I really did. I have a habit of putting off many visual medias until the stars align, and sometimes they actually do align and it's a very particular feeling.) And then I scrolled down to "other people also bought" and went I KNOW THAT SKRUNKLY ASS MOTHERFUCKER ^_^ and then I very cautiously made noises (not to get Leia's hopes up too far) indicating that I would be amenable to being shown the thing, and then she did, and now I've seen 95% of it and we're in the middle of publishing a 50k novel about it :D

(Also I've dragged at least two other people into it after me. The First is one *hell* of a gateway drug. XD)

2: Wes Janson, from about ten seconds of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, and also four tie-in novels by Aaron Allston from the '90s. If you've seen ESB, you presumably remember the scene on Hoth where they use the snowspeeder tow cables to wrap around the AT-AT's legs and knock it down. Wes is the gunner who actually makes the shot that anchors the tow cable to the AT-AT's foot. This is his entire existence on film. However, because Star Wars, his personality and backstory was greatly expanded in the tie-in novels (and some comics which I read much later and so only regard when they happen to add important details like the existence of socks in the GFFA). He became Rogue Squadron's class clown with some underlying survivor's guilt and PTSD that presents *really* similarly to mine, plus the ability as a trainer to turn a ragtag band of misfit pilots into a found family -- an ability which his friend and boss Wedge Antilles weaponizes as the premise of the Wraith Squadron trilogy, because Wedge never saw a character trait he didn't think tactically about.

I first read the tie-in novels in 2007 or thereabouts, while being extremely isolated and struggling with undiagnosed PTSD, ongoing emotional abuse, and an assortment of other mental health bullshit, and latched onto Wes *hard*. I've wandered in and out of the fandom several times over the years; I originally wanted to grow up to be Wes but didn't think that was possible. When it occurs to me to think about it, I'm still quite thoroughly confused that I've not only grown up to be him but have also managed to acquire my very own Hobbie Klivian. (That's the guy in the background of Princess Leia's briefing scene on Hoth who says "Two fighters against a Star Destroyer?" In the comics and at least one of the novels, he's Wes's BFF, wingmate, and partner in crime. He's laconic, sarcastic, pessimistic, and has up to three prosthetic limbs and possibly a prosthetic dick, depending on which parts of canon you accept and which ones you think are an editing error, a stupid throwaway line, etc. Star Wars! *jazz hands* Hobbie is a massive troll, but quiet enough that people usually notice the much more flamboyant Wes first.)

Did I mention Wes is also a sharpshooter? For some reason, I have a *type*, and very little about it is physical appearance -- I think "sharpshooter with a soft spot for people who need help, probably has PTSD, also a knack for unexpectedly wise insights possibly delivered in a rusty baritone" is probably gonna be at least half the guys on this list.

3: Zaeed Massani. Case in point. Zaeed is a DLC character from Mass Effect 2, voiced by the late and greatly lamented Robin Sachs, who was an absolutely amazing voice actor (possibly better known as the recurring chaos sorcerer Ethan Rayne in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the main villain whose name is escaping me in GalaxyQuest, although there's something wrong with the mike setup or the ADR in GalaxyQuest so you don't really get the full effect of his amazing vocal range). Uh. Where was I? Right. Zaeed is yet another sharpshooter, a merc in his forties or fifties -- Mass Effect continuity being what it is, he has at least two wildly contradictory backstory timelines. Point is, twenty-odd years ago as of ME2, he founded a mercenary group which became very large and successful, and his co-founder double-crossed him and shot him in the face at point-blank range. Being made primarily of steel wool and hatred, Zaeed survived this with only the loss of an eye, which you'd think would be a problem for a sharpshooter, but nope, he's still one of the best there is at what he does.

As of ME2, Zaeed has been trying for twenty years to find and get revenge on the man who double-crossed him. Being a DLC character, he has a nice compact little story where you can either help him get his revenge -- having to let a factory's worth of trapped workers burn to death in order to do so, because video games -- or save the trapped workers but let the enemy get away. When I first played ME2 on a severely underclocked computer, I had planned to take the "Paragon" route where you save the workers (me being me, I had read a walkthrough of the mission beforehand), but there's a puzzle minigame you have to solve to open the door to that route, and my computer lagged too much to get through the minigame, so I had to take the "Renegade" route where you take a quicker path through the burning factory, help Zaeed get his revenge, but have to listen to the distant screams of the dying factory workers the whole time.

I've since played both routes, but Robin Sachs absolutely *nailed* the voice acting, the script was fantastic as well ("Don't you call that a goddamn grudge!" hits me really hard for personal reasons), and I always wind up going Renegade because... well. Depictions of PTSD mostly have a tendency to trigger my own PTSD (it's complicated), but some of them land just right. Plus, listening to him tell the story about Jessie, his first gun that ge finally had to retire a couple of years before ME2... god, he absolutely breaks my damn heart every time.

Actually, I should probably tell the story about Jessie, too. It's this weird recursive piece of causality. So, okay, when I was very first getting into Mass Effect 3 multiplayer, this would have been in early 2013. There used to be these weekend challenges where you competed to get a certain number of points with certain weapons, or killing certain enemies, or whatever. I hadn't played any of the singleplayer games yet, didn't know any of the characters, I was just messing around in what is still objectively the best co-op shooter multiplayer ever created. Early March 2013, it was announced that one of the voice actors had just died and there was going to be a memorial weekend challenge, so many kill points with this specific gun and so many with this specific power. Well, I didn't have any kit with the required power (it took me literally another year to finally unlock one), but I had the gun because it's one of the five starter guns you unlock on your first multiplayer login. So I'm always down for a memorial event like that, so I did what I could. Didn't get very far that weekend, but I did find that I liked the gun -- a basic shooter game assault rifle, very "spray and pray" style (which was about all I could do on this extremely laggy underpowered computer), kind of a peashooter as far as damage per bullet but with a really big clip and easy to aim.

So then I carried this gun as my default for quite a long time, and of course anytime people were talking about their favorite guns in the game they just had nothing good to say about it (because, gamers being gamers, there are like two or three guns that are really best suited to the highest difficulty level, and this gun really is only suited to the lowest difficulty but that's what I played). So then when I finally got around to playing singleplayer, and I got to Mass Effect 2... even before you do Zaeed's DLC mission, as soon as you recruit him, you can go and talk to him about various items scattered around his room, get some war stories and characterization out of him. And one of those items was his first gun, which he named Jessie, which was this same model of starter assault rifle. He spoke so fondly about it that a big part of why I initially latched onto him is that I'd finally found someone else (even though a fictional character) who appreciated this gun. Which, of course, I only appreciated so much because of the memorial weekend challenge for Robin Sachs, where we had to use Zaeed's gun.

Damn, now I want to play Mass Effect again. I take Zaeed everywhere in ME2, every mission that you get to choose a squadmate on (there are some where you can only take required squadmates). Because squadmates don't have bullet/power travel time but the player character does, and because my computer was so laggy, telling Zaeed to shoot a particular enemy off me was often the only way I stayed alive.

Am I gonna be able to fit ten blorbos in a single tumblr post at this rate? Fuck if I know.

4: Wolverine / Logan, from the X-Men (comics and various assorted animated shows, I've never gotten into the live action X-Men stuff). Not a sharpshooter, for once. ^_^ So back in 2004, Spider-Man 2 (the Tobey Maguire one with Alfred Molina as Doc Ock) came out, and somebody recommended it to my mother, who became absolutely obsessed with all things Spidey. So a friend of hers was taping the '90s Spider-Man animated TV show off cable at the time, and I wound up getting assigned the rather drudging work of cutting the commercials out of said show using some video editing software we had for reasons, so we could burn it to DVD-R without having to sit through a bunch of ads. I still owned that set of homemade DVDs until I lost all my most treasured stuff a few years back, actually, but it's on Disney+ now, so there's that.

Point is, the '90s Spider-Man cartoon did a crossover two-parter with the '90s X-Men cartoon, and I *really* have a thing for those growly baritones, okay? So I wound up finding the bulk black-and-white "Essential X-Men" reprints of Chris Claremont's run at the library -- they had volumes two and three, which turned out to be the perfect introduction for me, covering most of John Byrne's run as artist (including the classic Dark Phoenix Saga, which literally every X-Men adaptation apparently has to cover at some point) and all of Dave Cockrum's second run, and more to the point, covering the most pivotal part of Wolverine's character development from a feral hypothetically-teenage asshole with no known name to something pretty much approximating his "standard" characterization in the years since. As an autistic tortellini dealing with constant forced overstimulation and unpredictable meltdowns, I really latched onto the portrayal of Logan's struggle to control his "berserker rage" meltdowns caused by his enhanced senses.

Of course, Herself was always terrified of anything that she feared might get me in touch with my violent side, and for good damn reason -- both my parents strongly deserved to have me snap and kill them, and I'm convinced that she at least knew it. (I have not, for the record, killed anyone irl. Yet. You never know.) She forbade me to read X-Men comics, I attempted to set An Boundary on my eighteenth birthday by telling her I would respect her rules and not bring them into her house but I was an adult who needed to make my own moral decisions and I would continue to read them at the library, and she very conveniently started the Remodel of Doom a few months later which kept me 100% isolated and under her control for the next five years as well as permanently ruining my health... but also forced me to spend most of my waking hours at the library because the house where I was living didn't have running water or, uh, installed toilets for a lot of that timeframe, which meant I found a compilation of "40 Years of X-Men" on CD-ROM at the library and read *the entire fucking thing*.

With that kind of isolation and that kind of input, I wound up developing a headmate version of Logan, who helped me massively with surviving and getting out of that whole situation. He very, very rarely shows up anymore, which is a really good sign, because it means I haven't been in that kind of a survival situation in... several years at least. I still think of him as my big brother, though (which is from a whole other situation I may have mentioned where my sisters and I had this incredibly complicated multi-crossover found family storyline going on... it says a lot about our general situation that the one who insisted no abuse was happening and I couldn't even use the term "a bad situation" about my experiences, was also the most heavily involved in creating a world where none of us had any interaction with our RL bio-parents.)

(My name in that storyline was Estel, which is Sindarin for "hope". On the nose much? ^_^ Logan still calls me Essie, which nobody else who's still in my life does. I've tried on a royal fuckton of names over the years. If I was going to change my legal name again, I'd probably take the last name Logan. Unless I made it my middle name and chose something that's not a first name for my last name -- my current legal name consists of three names that can all be first names, and the confusion it causes at doctor's offices is a pain in the ass.)

... that's only four blorbos, but I am out of spoons. I'm pretty sure the other six would fit the pattern as well. Let's see if I can at least make the rest of the list, if not say anything about them.

5: Adam Cartwright, from Bonanza. The original reason I wanted a hat, before Logan even entered the scene. Another sharpshooter, soft-spoken, mechanically minded (I have been known to say that my type is guys you'd want around to help you rebuild after an apocalypse, specifically a lot of them have engineering and/or childcare skills), and -- man, I don't know if it holds up, I don't even know where the hell I'd watch it since my VHS tapes are long gone, but I loved the hell out of early Bonanza back in the day. It hit the same kind of "eye-opening social justice for an extraordinarily sheltered tortellini" buttons as Howard Pease's 1930s YA mystery novels. The very first episode I ever saw was about the ways USian society treats felons after their jail sentences are up -- I can still hear the guest star saying bitterly, "They say you do your time and you pay your price, but don't you believe it!"

6: Richard Dean Anderson as MacGyver and Jack O'Neill, which are two very different characters but I'll put that down as a twofer.

7: Gandalf, because he is a delightful bitchy-ass troll. We read The Hobbit and LOTR out loud as a family when I was ten, which was possibly the best thing that ever happened to me as a kid, and I was hooked right from "Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I like it or not, or that you feel good this morning, or that it is a morning to be good on?" (I am still *insanely* proud that, with no other spoilers than the fact that the blurb for ROTK in the back of The Hobbit mentioned Gandalf, I recognized him on his return as Gandalf the White at the same moment Aragorn does and for the same reason -- his "laughing long and softly" there is distinctive, he does it in that first conversation with Bilbo in The Hobbit as well (at least I think it's the first conversation, I have my one-volume of LOTR but I don't own The Hobbit currently).

8: Does Marvel count as one fandom? Seems like it's supposed to, these days, but I'm gonna put down Venom as well. I named my hat after him. Well, *I* didn't, exactly -- my sister had a brown cowboy hat of which the brand name was Eddy, so when I got my black cowboy hat, he was promptly named Venom. I didn't mind, because in the '90s Spider-Man cartoon, Venom is voiced by Hank Azaria nomming on all the available scenery and then some, and I do love me some good scenery-chewing. Also Eddie Brock is just kind of a dork in any incarnation, and depending on your version and timeframe, he's also very much the Catholic guilt superhero, which you can see why that grabbed me.

Anyway, then Herself decided my hat was in fact a symbiote and wouldn't sit next to him in church (another reason I wanted a hat was for taking it off in church purposes, because when that's about the only way you can express masculinity as a very suppressed trans tortoise, you do what you can). Well, she always said she didn't actually believe he was a symbiote, but in a defensive sort of way, and she really wouldn't sit next to him. So that's why my hat has pronouns. That and the fact that he was basically my only remotely physical companion during the Remodel of Doom. Have you ever had to figure out the logistics of crying on a hat's shoulder? I have. Much of my hat-wearing experience lends itself well to writing Jigen, but I'm not so sure about that bit.

(Technically I retired Venom-the-hat earlier this year, he has a spot on the closet shelf now, but the new hat seems to be inheriting the pronouns. Nearly twenty years of habit doesn't go away easy. The new one doesn't seem to have a name for now, presumably because I have other friends.)

9: Merryweather from Sleeping Beauty? Man, I am either running out of blorbos or not thinking of some. Merryweather was partly a color coding thing -- my birth name was a variant of Mary and my next sister's was a variant of Rose, so whenever there were things like toothbrushes to divvy up, I got the blue one and she got the red or pink one. Suited me just fine, not being the pink-coded one after she came along. Anyway, so in Sleeping Beauty, obviously Flora was "her" fairy and Merryweather was mine, but Merryweather is also very relatable -- the most aggressive of the three fairies, the one who it's implied does all the chores for the sixteen years Aurora is growing up, and also she's just a little cutie.

10: Dr McCoy, from Star Trek: The Original Series. My space doctor. *The* space doctor by whom all others are measured. I could do a whole essay if I wasn't so tired. Best space doctor.

#meme

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mnmovdoom · 3 years ago

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Okay I can’t not request one of the touch prompts XD “Falling asleep on the other’s shoulder” with my beloveds Zam and Jango please? 🥰

Them falling asleep around each other is canon, now XD

Jango was the most boring man Zam had ever met. Except when things got action-y, because then he was a joy to be around. He’d start his jetpack and fly around and shoot his blasters and mini-rockets and he’d punch sentients left and right and kick them and-

She was staring.

He was staring back, looking thoroughly unimpressed. Right, the job. Surveillance. Wait for the guards to exit the warehouse, go in, retrieve the crate, leave - preferably, without the guards returning from their round.

If Zam had it her way, she’d blow a hole in the wall, Jango would fly in with his jetpack, toss some grenades, fly up to the ceiling to avoid the blasts, get the crate, and then they’d leave. Peak team-work. And if Zam had it her way, once they were safe inside the Slave I and well into hyperspace, Jango would jump on her and reveal that he had feelings for her.

A girl could dream.

“You were saying?” she asked, clearly remembering she had zoned out to the land of merry dreams and home-made serotonin the moment Jango had pulled up a diagram with something that could be easily solved by blowing it up.

“I was saying we’ll have approximately one hour to wait for the guards,” he said, putting his helmet back on. No! How was Zam supposed to admire him with that bucket on him? Not that the bucket was bad, Zam quite liked that shiny armour…

“You mean one hour to sit out here in the cold?” Crossing her arms over her chest, Zam swung her legs off the ledge and began to swing them back and forth. But Jango, in a demonstration of lower body strength, remained at a crouch.

The karker had nice thighs. The stupid flight suit did nothing to hide the fact. Truly, why must the galaxy torture Zam with a hot friend who’ll never let her out of the friendzone?

“We could just blast our way in, you know?” she grumbled.

“We could, if we wanted to draw attention and pick a fight. Which we do not want.”

“I didn’t vote for you to be the boss.”

“My gig, my rules.”

Whatever. One hour went by awfully slowly. Just sitting there was boring, tiring.

Out of the corner of his eye, Jango noticed Zam yawn. First, that was unprofessional. Second, why was she tired? Wasn’t she getting enough sleep? Jango figured he should sit next to her, close, just to make it easier to grab her if she did fall asleep and slumped forwards.

Of course, the moment he sat next to her, she smirked and nudged him. Jango had no idea what that was supposed to mean, so he changed his attention back to the warehouse.

Some time later, he felt a weight pressed to his side, something on his shoulder. He whipped his head to find Zam leaning on him. This was either a prank, or she had actually fallen asleep. Unprofessional! With one hand, Jango pulled out his helmet, and with his other hand, he reached under Zam’s chin and tipped her head up a little, just to confirm she had fallen asleep.

Carefully, Jango arranged her head on his shoulder, so that she’d be more comfortable. He knew he had to look back to the warehouse, he knew he had to keep watch, he knew he should lean Zam against the wall behind them - or better, wake her up because she was being very unprofessional.

Instead, he kept looking at her, realising he hadn’t actually let go of her chin. Despite his gloves, Jango was convinced her skin was very smooth to the touch. A luxury he couldn’t afford, for their sake - for his son’s sake.

But in a moment of weakness, Jango turned his head to keep watch on the warehouse while resting his cheek to Zam’s head. His hand let go of her chin, and Jango carefully snaked his arm around her waist to keep her close, secured.

He could almost pretend this wasn’t a job, that he had simply asked Zam out and they were stargazing when she fell asleep. He could almost pretend today was going to be the night he told her how he felt, but since she had fallen asleep in the meantime, he’d need to ask her out again, another time.

Jango was a good pretender, and he nuzzled at Zam’s head, gently.

#I was asked something #my writing #Jango Fett #Zam Wesell #Star Wars

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zu-is-here · 3 years ago

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Hi Zu!!

Yess! That was one of my proudest achievements!

Oh I see, I know how you feel, I do have some of those kind of things, like a certificate for coming 3rd place in a pancake race during year one! It's the sentimental value in things like this!

Oh yes! He did alot. See as a kid, I was undiagnosed as neuro typical, so I was often treated as a basket case.

Though he didn't, and if it wasn't for him I don't know where I would have ended up. Oh wow! That a huge one!! That sounds really cool.

Well in the very few times it had snowed I made one with my class, as I mentioned yesterday. And a few years ago I made a really small depressed one XD.

But my best snow memory was sledging! You've done this right?

I really had a great time that day, though I was freezing by the end of it.

Yess! My unicorn is terrifing, but I love it! What's the best thing you ever sewd?

. Ah! The classic!

Oh you like Turkish delight! What flavour do you like?

Well I've never really been a huge donut eater. I much rather things like cookies! But I used to love these fresh cream frozen donuts that you could buy from Iceland! That really where really good.

I've also always had a soft spot for hot dog donuts! Do you like these?

What's the best donut you ever had? Yesss! I wanna draw it so bad!

Oh I always loved sour sweets when I ate them! I remember that pain you get in your tongue.

Have you ever tried tounge painter's Zu? Yessssss! I agree! It's been really good to bonce stuff off of yuri! I must draw me some Kross!

How has your day been today Zu?

[back]

Hii Gayfish!

Oh wow— what was the pancake race about? (*'▽'*)

I'm so sorry you were treated like that, you didn't deserve it at all. So that was so nice of him! <3

A smol snowman (๑˃̵ᴗ˂̵) Awww sledging is a classic, sometimes we didn't even need sleds cause the snow on the hill was so frozen it turned into ice ☆

Ooff hope you didn't get cold! Cause I did and now am enjoying a chill xd Please, take care (ówò)

No matter how terrifying they are, handmade toys are priceless <3 I remember sewing a plush bunny with buttons eyes, looks awfully cute (≧∀≦)

Do they have flavors? :0 Guess I don't even distinguish them with colors XD And yours?

Oh they def are *^* Chocolate chip cookies tho!.. <3 But a hot dog donut?? Is it like a hamburger or? Wanna try it!~ The best donut I've ever eaten is a mint one ♡ What about you? Noo I haven't tried tongue painted *0* Is it like chupa chups?

I'll be looking forward to this! (๑>◡<๑)☆

The day was reeeally lazy but very good, thanks <3 How was yours? *^*

UPD:

I can imagine it XD Sounds like lots of fun indeed!

Oh that's another matter! Cause there snow here is usually crispy and good for sculpting *^*

Not for long heheh *hugs*

Aw that would be really sweet! <3

Ohhh I got it *^* That donut was very refreshing, especially when taken with tea xd yet so sweet! Oh chupa chups are small lollipops ☆

Awww did you invite them? That's so cool! <3 I'm so glad to hear you had a good time together╰(*´︶`*)╯

I love board- and card games, it's always fun to play Alias, Monopoly or Jenga– what's your favorite? *^* As for cards, knowing how to play Durak is kind of a must among russians XD And for you?

Same here!! Can't wait to see others works ♡

Oh what are these songs? *^*

By the way— you don't have to answer every thing and write a lot of you don't feel like that, feel free here! <3

Oh nono, it's okay! Same here <3 I just thought about it cause anfie warned me she can't write big asks now, that's why you don't have to, still, thank you! (ówò)

That's good to hear it (*´꒳`*) Ah sure– have a good night! ☆ It's my pleasure <3

#updated #ask #zu is happy

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sophi-s · 4 years ago

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Cost of Kindness

Chapter IV: Complications

By: sophi-s

Fandom: Darksiders video games

Words: 6,656

Characters: Raphael, Original Female Character (OC), Fury

Warnings: Blood and Injury, Swearing (a lot of it XD)

Summary:

After far too many close calls and an adventure that will last her a lifetime, Nicola and Raphael finally make their way towards Haven. Unfortunately, not everything goes as smoothly as it could.

--------------------------------------------------

Many, many centuries ago taking off to the grand skies has become one of humanity's greatest dreams. They always wished to be able to fly, envying birds their wings and wishing to join them in their aerial conquest. It took many more ages to even try to think of it seriously and even longer for the humans to create the first working airplane and fulfill their dreams as the gravity kept thwarting all their plans. But once this seemingly impossible goal was accomplished, this event has been recorded on the pages of history as one of the most remarkable inventions of the human race.

When she was little, Nicola dreamed of flying on her own as well. She loved watching birds, tracking the planes soaring through the sky, so far away they looked like ants, and thinking about how it would be to have her own wings. Her dreams eventually were abandoned as she grew older, more serious and more reasonable. But honestly, if a week ago someone asked her if she would choose to have wings if she could, Nicola without hesitation would reply "a huge YES". Now however, she realised something she didn't really take into consideration before. While humans wished to rule the skies, they absolutely were not created for this. They have been made flightless, earth-ridden creatures and for a good reason. Her very apparent fear of heights made it awfully clear to her.

These thoughts were all Nicola could hear aside from the rustling of feathers on the wind as she desperately held onto her angel friend, her heart hammering in her chest, eyes wide and stomach making somersaults while everything was spinning around like a carousel. At a certain height the human body just starts to give up and refuse cooperation. For those who are afraid of heights the gap is even smaller and the symptoms more severe. All that was keeping her from fainting or throwing up there and then was the fact that she refused to look down to see how high they actually were but imagining the small buildings below her wasn't making it much better. If she survives this, she will never ask any angel for a fly again and - if it will ever be possible after the apocalypse - stay the heck away from any sort of working plane. Ground was where she belonged. Flying was not her cup of tea and no one will ever convince her otherwise.

Raphael seemed oblivious to the silent prayers spilling past her lips and just kept flying, fully focused on his destination, as she was absolutely certain she's going to die. Her muscles were completely stiff, as though she looked Medusa in the eye. She couldn't even see anything with how her face was buried in the rumpled fabric of Raphael's clothes but she assumed they were getting closer and closer. Focus on anything else than the height. Anything! She kept telling herself when her jaw started to hurt from how she was clenching her teeth. Easier said than done. Nicola knew that Raphael wasn't going to drop her. He promised her and lately she learned to trust him but the pull of gravity beckoning her down into the abyss and to a long plummet ending in a painful impact and certain death… The last time she was this panicked was when the Fallen jumped her out of nowhere. Speaking of which… God, please, let this be a smooth flight. No demons, I'm begging you..

Encounter with stray demons was the last thing they needed now. She didn't doubt Raphael's ability to defend both her and himself but if a flying demon was to attack them from surprise… Not a single part of her already malfunctioning brain could produce a scenario that wouldn't end in either of them dying or at least suffering grave injuries. In short words, any sort of aerial confrontation would mean serious trouble. And trouble wasn't something Nicola missed. Especially after the last night..

Seems like her prayers have been answered. So far nothing noticed an angel and a human passing overhead. And those demons which did apparently decided not to bother them since it didn't seem worth it or had no way of giving them trouble from where they were standing. Nicola stopped counting seconds of their journey long ago and the only indication of the passing time was the wind rushing through her hair slowing down as Raphael started to try and spare as much energy as he could, gliding whenever possible on his wings simply stretched out on both sides and flapping them only to keep the right height, out of range of any demons that could be sulking below when he began to grow weary. His stamina wasn't probably in the best condition after the time he spent in hiding and most likely not moving much.

When she gets back to Haven, Nicola is going to first, eat a solid lunch since her stomach was displeased again - though now she couldn't really feel it twisted in panic like that - second, go the fuck to sleep for the rest of the day. Even though she spent the last night sleeping like a dead woman, she didn't feel that well rested. The amount of stress she had to endure exhausted her and a few hours of rest weren't enough to regenerate her full strength. High on her bucket list was also taking care of Raphael, to at least make him look decent and dress any wounds he carried. Elanya could do that too but Nicola couldn't imagine that Raphael would let a maker he doesn't know do anything to him. She remembered how distrustful he was in the beginning. And after she gets back, no more escapades if not necessary. At least two weeks long break. Ulthane is going to make sure she stays there anyway so she might as well spend her time on sleeping and some light activities.

Speaking of Ulthane… Nicola wasn't actually sure what she'd say to him once she suddenly showed up in Haven after all that time with a traumatized, crazy angel at her side. To say it will be awkward as heck, would be a severe understatement. It's not even about Raphael. How is she going to explain herself to the overbearing maker who is standing on his head to save the last survivors of her kind while, by nearly killing herself three times already, she acted nothing if not ungrateful? And honestly, she wasn't in shape to wonder about it now because her mind refused to focus on anything else than this one thought of the lethal distance between her and the ground. Damn it all.. Why does she have to be afraid of heights and find out this very unpleasant way? Really, if someone tried to take her from Raphael before he landed or too short time after, they'd probably need a crowbar to pry her off him.

While Nicola thought that the flight itself was awful, the moment her stomach seemed to move up into her gullet as Raphael dipped towards the ground she unwittingly shrilly cried out in fear. And that was a mistake. The angel, startled by the quiet human he'd been holding this entire time suddenly screaming bloody murder for no apparent reason, tried to halt his descent to figure out what's wrong but it was already too late for that. As a result the landing was rather rough. Nicola closed her eyes and so she didn't see how Raphael clumsily hit the ground and barely kept himself propped up not to land on top of her as she slipped out of his grasp and lost her grip on his robes. The expectations of a long fall made her throat tighten and trap her voice inside. All the bigger relief once after barely an inch or two, her back connected with the surface, drawing a soft and strained "oof" from her.

Still scared, disoriented and confused, Nicola opened her eyes to see wide-eyed Raphael hunched over her, hands on either side of her head - with the staff to her left - and gawking at her with a slight panic on his face. Goodness, he was way too close. Pulling her arms close to her body in a helpless attempt to regain her personal space, she smiled awkwardly.

"H-hi there!"

The moment he saw that nothing was wrong and her face regained some of its color, Raphael breathed with relief and got off her, once again offering his hand to help her up. Once back on her feet, Nicola nearly cried out when she felt the solid ground under the soles of her boots. Blessed earth, she could literally kiss it right now. But the fact that they were not in Haven yet disconcerted her a little. Looking around, she noticed they're in an empty street in the middle of nowhere. Casting a questioning glance at Raphael she didn't even need to ask. The way his wings were slumped against his back, his breath heavier than before said it all. Plain and simple, Raphael was tired. Too tired to keep going. Still, he was eyeing her cautiously.

"Why… why were you screaming?"

Still feeling the nausea and the shaking of her knees, Nicola scratched the back of her neck and turned her eyes away ashamed.

"Ahuh… I'm not-... I'm not used to flying, that dip scared me a little. Sorry about this.."

Raphael said nothing to this, simply nodded, and lowered himself to the dusted road to have a seat by one of the decrepit stores. Nicola decided to let him have his five minutes to rest before going any further. Store. She suddenly realised. And not just any. A grocery store. At the mere thought her stomach rumbled. Not only could she have something for herself but also gather some stuff for others! If anything there is still edible that is. It wouldn't hurt to check. Every bit of food is precious.

"Raphael, can you wait here for a bit? I'll be back in a jiffy."

Out of the corner of her eye she already saw him shift in apprehension and almost begin to stand up. Probably because she ran once already and in his mind could do it again. She proceeded to calm him down immediately by pointing at the building she intended to search.

"I'll just go in there to look for stuff, don't worry. I will come back."

Staring at her for a couple of intense seconds, Raphael eyed her from head to toe twice before his concerned gaze softened a bit.

"Promise me…?"

Nicola smiled reassuringly and nodded. There weren't many options for her if she did want to run off. Besides, she wasn't quite sure where she was just yet. Her orientation in terrain was… less than decent as of late.

"I promise."

She offered and once Raphael sat somewhat comfortably back down, she took her backpack and shotgun - just in case - and stepped in through a broken window. The inside of the store was in utter disarray and even that was putting it lightly. Most of the shelves were toppled over, some even in pieces. Glinting shards of glass littered the floor, crunching under Nicola's feet every time she made a step. Unsurprisingly, nothing was working. No lights, no freezers, no ventilation. No time to waste. Nicola began her search immediately.

Approaching the fruit stand greeted her with bitter disappointment. Apples, oranges, pears and many other fruits were already rotten and sometimes even coated in white specks of mould. Definitely not good. With vegetables it was exactly the same. The only carrot that looked acceptable at first, turned out to have been completely wilted. Tossing it aside, Nicola moved on. She didn't even bother looking for meat. The stench hit her the moment she came inside and were it not for the smell of decomposing corpses that drifted around the sewers when she was there, she probably would've thrown up where she stood. Instead, she just covered her mouth and nose with her bandana.

Any dairy products were off the table too. Without working freezers every single one of them has surely gone sour by now. A diarrhea was not something she wanted to have in Haven and most likely neither did the makers. Nicola didn't dare to so much as touch any eggs that still were somehow intact. Bad idea. A smelly one as well. There's no way some of them haven't gone bad yet. The risk wasn’t worth it. Passing by one of the mostly whole shelves, she absent mindedly grabbed a bag of dry cat food and stuffed it into her backpack. It was highly probable that most of the survivors would be feeding the kitten with any leftovers but.. just to make sure the poor thing doesn't starve to death.

Most of the jars have broken during initial earthquakes but two small jars of pickles seemed to be mostly alright. Without giving it much thought, she placed them in her backpack. Four bags of freeze-dried fruits quickly found their way into her pockets once she got a hold of them. Under a broken shelf, Nicola spotted an edge of some packet. Assuming it was just crackers or something, she reached into the rubble for it but once she pulled it out… she immediately regretted her decision. It was, in fact, not a bag of crackers. It was a whole, torn bag of soured cabbage coated in some strange growth - probably mould - she didn't get a chance to really look at because her attention was caught by something inside the bag. Probably squeezed in through the tear and got stuck, a small, bloated body of a gigantic, hellish critter. Instinctively, Nicola yelped quietly and without giving it much thought she lobbed the thing across the whole store before wiping her hand on the nearest piece of rag that wasn't her clothes. She didn't even get any of the spilling juices on her but… gross. Just gross. Ew ew ew! Ignoring the wet splat the bag made when it hit the floor wasn't an easy task. Still shaking off the disgust, she continued her search, noting to herself never to touch something she isn't sure what it is.

From there it thankfully was starting to go much smoother. Two packets of crispbread, some dark chocolate and a box of tea were found and collected. Nicola nearly cheered out loud when she spotted a few Snickers on a shelf. One she immediately opened and eagerly ate while the rest landed safely in her backpack. It might be mostly sugar with a bit of peanuts but it was a good snack that could deceive the brain for quite some time. To be frank, Nicola lived half of the high school on those whenever her lessons lasted too long for her breakfast to keep her sated. Besides, she couldn't imagine others would mind her bringing a bunch. Especially Marie. Jacob will most likely strangle Nicola if his daughter eats too much sweets but in the end it'll be worth it. Anything would be worth putting a smile on that sad little face.

Somewhere on the floor, Nicola even found a box of vitamins which luckily was not out of date yet. With a deficit of fruits and vegetables, those could be lifesavers. Especially for Leslie. She needs the most of it. Unfortunately, the space in her backpack was very much limited and soon she couldn't put anything more in there. Rearranging the contents of it, she put in one bottle of water, careful not to crush the crispbread and chocolate. At least she found something. Her escapade wasn't all for nothing when it comes to supplies. But even without those, she wouldn't say she regrets it. Against all the odds, she lived. And most importantly, she gained an otherworldly friend. And in times like these, a friend is something to be treasured.

Slinging her now much heavier backpack on her shoulders, she picked up her gun and headed towards the broken window she used as an entrance before. Peeking out from the store, she saw Raphael where she'd left him and a very much awake cat playfully attacking the longest quill of his left wing. His head perked up when she dropped onto the sidewalk beneath the window and she could've sworn she'd seen the corner of his mouth twitch upwards for a second there. Smiling, she unfolded her hands and shrugged.

"See? I keep my promises."

The angel hummed quietly before leaning his head against the wall behind him and closing his eyes. Nicola was about to ask if he's good to go but let the thought perish when she noticed his eyebrows furrow and his chapped lips twist into a slight grimace. Soon after, his right hand wandered up to his chest as he took a couple of quick and shallow breaths through his clenched teeth. If Nicola didn't know any better, she'd have said Raphael was having a heart attack. Can an angel even have an infarct? She honestly had no idea. In fact, she didn't even know how old he is. She couldn't tell. All the angels she'd met so far had white hair so that's not a hint to go by and his face didn't necessarily look old or young. He seemed as ageless as the time itself. Still, she didn't want to take any chances.

"Raphael? What's wrong?!"

She asked as she crouched beside him and laid a hand on his shoulder to steady him if needed. Raphael simply slowly shook his head and turned to look at her tiredly. And in his blank eyes she saw the already familiar pain and a spark of a silent plea.

"Just a little longer.. Let me rest a while…"

It took everything Nicola had in her to stop the sigh of relief. It didn't sit right with her that Raphael was still suffering and she could do absolutely nothing about it but hearing he's mostly fine, with only the usual ailing him, made her feel a tad easier. When his breathing grew slower and calmer, she even let herself slip down to the floor beside him.

"Sure. We have time, I guess.."

It was still relatively early, barely an hour or two after noon and Nicola wasn't that eager to return into the sky so soon. Only thinking about it made her feel a little sick. Hopefully, it wasn't too far to Haven from here. Even though Nicola really wanted to finally get home, she decided to be patient with her companion. He was wounded and most likely ill but he still tried his best to help her, even though he hadn't known her that long. He deserves a moment. Nicola too needed to sit down for a second as her thigh was still a bloody nuisance. Just a few more minutes. It wouldn't do harm to have a little break now, would it?

Yes. Yes it would. Nicola suddenly realised when she saw the kitten arc its back and puff its tail out. It hisses loudly before scurrying away into the store she just left and soon enough Nicola realised why once she looked into an alley ahead of her. The sight of a massive, winged shape made it painfully obvious. Her heart nearly ceased and Raphael beside her tensed at the sight of an enormous demon with curved horns and teeth, each the size of her palm, resembling a set of barbed knives made specifically to cut meat. The edges of long healed wounds that left behind terrible scars on her abdomen began to itch as she gawked at the familiar monster that nearly took her life. Flapping of gigantic wings that covered the sky with its expanse… Razor sharp claws curling around her body… the same talons tearing into her flesh as Ulthane attempted to free her from its grasp. And this shriek… oh God, this shriek…

Despite the apparent pain and exhaustion, Raphael slowly - not to agitate the demon - got up to his feet and raised his wings threateningly as he stepped in front of aghast Nicola. The fact that due to its bulkiness this thing seems almost twice as large as he is doesn't make an impression on him. Or maybe it does but he doesn't show it. The Fallen stared at Raphael with its small red eyes as a pair of Phantom Guards rounded a corner and joined the beast. Each carried a jagged blade that could easily tear through angelic armor. Nicola had seen it happen. Following them was another bloody Goreclaw. But these three she barely even noticed. Her wide eyes were focused on the larger demon. She felt her muscles refuse cooperation and seize. She couldn't move, couldn't speak. Her mind repeatedly screamed No nono no NO! Not like this!!

With excited roars, the lesser demons charged towards the angel standing between them and the weak, pathetic and helpless human as the Fallen spread its wings and took off into the air. Even as Nicola kept stone still, Raphael remained sharp and ready to act as always. One spell spilled past his lips and the flying demon instantly went rigid before plummeting back onto the ground and crashing into a broken car, setting its annoying alarm off. It didn't discourage the other three but it let Nicola find will to move and clutch her gun tighter. Ever since she'd met Raphael, he'd been doing nothing but getting her arse out of trouble. Taking a shaky breath she decided to start repaying favors.

Though, once again she didn't really have a chance to do anything as she was dumbstruck by the following scene playing out before her. As the hellish monsters charged, Raphael took his staff in both hands and held it before himself, closing his eyes and muttering an incantation in his melodious language. The moment the first demon stepped a tad too close, Raphael's eyes snapped open, burning like two white suns and a sleek ethereal blade materialized from the tip of what Nicola previously thought just an ornament or a walking cane. It glowed like the purest light ever to exist. Another assumption Nicola made about Raphael turned out to have been false. The last thing she can say about him is unarmed. He carried no blade, no gun or anything but who needs a weapon as lame as those when in addition to powerful sorcery you have a freaking lightsaber?

Everything lasted less than a second as the angel led a wide, sweeping slash of his spectral sword… spear thing… and promptly relieved the Phantom Guard of its horned head, before stopping the pouncing Goreclaw with a flick of his free hand, suspending it in the air growling and hissing. The other Phantom Guard had no chance to either attack the vulnerable angel or retreat, when Raphael was busy cutting down the quadrupedal demon, as Nicola came back to her senses and, instead of running like she always has, jumped forward and fired her shotgun. The resounding bang travelled through the entire city, bouncing off the walls and drifting far into the desolate town but it had the effect Nicola counted on.

The Phantom Guard staggered backwards with a chest full of buckshot, wheezed a couple times and tripped over onto its back never to get up again. With adrenaline still pumping through her veins, Nicola stared at the either dead or dying demon in wonderment, her brain trying to process what just happened, before releasing a breathless laugh of triumph. She killed one. She actually killed one! Raphael too seemed rather surprised but not unpleasantly so as he let the blade fade away.

"I got it! Did you see that?!"

"That indeed, I have.."

He said as he eyed her carefully, probably just to check if she's fine. Aside from a little fresh blood on his boots and hands, Raphael didn't seem to have gotten hurt in any way. Well… more than he'd already been at least. Nicola beamed up at him nearly bursting with pride at her actual first kill on a demon larger than her shin. And he seemed happy for her, if the soft smile he regarded her with could be an indication. But this victory didn't last long. Her own smile faded when she saw the Fallen stiffly getting up from where it slammed onto the ground, pure rage on its monstrous face. Her pulse began to race again but this time she refused to let the panic get a hold of her just yet.

"Watch out!!"

She cried too late, just a sliver of a second too late. Raphael whipped around to face the attacker and all he managed to do was raise his hand before the charging demon swung its head to the left. And with the force of a truck driving at the speed of fifty miles per hour, slammed it into the angel, making a formula of a spell die on his lips as he was sent flying through the air and crashing against a nearby building. The force of the impact caved in the wall and the kind, mad angel disappeared in a cloud of dust. All that was left were a couple of white feathers slowly falling to the ground.

"NO!"

Nicola didn't pay any mind to how her voice broke and squeaked pitifully when her heart leaped up into her throat. She could only stare at the place where Raphael vanished with a rumbling crash as the enraged demon growled in the same direction. Not a single part of her being agreed with what she'd just witnessed. A second before he was standing right there, like nothing was about to happen, distracted by her gushing over her first serious kill. Nothing should have happened, why did the demon unravel Raphael's magic just like that? Even a Shadowcaster didn't manage to do that! Why would this one? And why… Tears welled up in her eyes as her lower lip trembled… why did it have to… end the way it did…?

To make matters worse, the Fallen was still before her, still furious and thirsting for blood. Not wasting more time, Nicola pulled out a handful of new bullets and tried to reload her weapon but it proved almost impossible with how much her hands were shaking. Thank Christ, the demon was taking its sweet time as it faced her and began to lumber towards her on all fours, huffing out breaths stinking of rotting meat. Faster, faster, damn it! Nicola cursed inwardly when she dropped a couple of shells before she finally managed to place the ammunition where it should be. But when she looked up, the Fallen was on top of her already. Parting its jaws wide, ready to swallow her whole.

The scream of anguish that felt so tempting in the back of her throat never came to be. In a second, Nicola thought about all the horrors she'd lived through. All demons she'd met, all shambling corpses of former humans brought back by vile sorcery. All friends she'd made and lost.. Raphael, do just one thing for me. She gritted her teeth as her knuckles turned white from how she was gripping her weapon. Despair started to turn into rage. Burning bright and white hot inside of her, the flame Raphael had helped her see. Please, be alive when I come for you… The demon lunged forward to sever the string of her measly life by biting her in half. But Nicola wasn't going to let it get her so easily. Her fear was forgotten as she stuck the barrel of her shotgun into the monster's opened maw. She didn't want to die. Not now, not like this. For once she wanted to have a say over her own fate. Over the date of her demise. She is still young, she had a whole life ahead of her. And all those demonic dickheads with the Destroyer leading the charge decided to ruin everything and not only for her, but for every human who lives still and who has perished. And those who are yet to be born. She refused. She will not die. Not here. Not killed by that thing.

"FUCKOFF!!!"

And she fired. Partially, the sound was muffled by the demon's mouth snapping shut just barely missing Nicola's arms as she let go of her gun. The Fallen recoiled and began to shriek in pain, spitting out its own blood onto the concrete at its feet. Nicola didn't have delusions she could kill it but it gave her the precious seconds she needed. She ran for the closest hiding place available, which was the store she just left. Nicola leaped in through the broken window and quickly made it to the opposite wall to put as much distance between herself and the writhing monstrosity as possible. And it was a good choice. A loud roar from the street made her heart fall into her heels as the injured demon finally gathered its bearings.

Nicola looked at the Fallen that was coming her way with murder in its eyes. The unexpected bout of courage has long faded and the petrifying fear once again had Nicola in its chilling grasp. Even with the mouthful of bullets, the Fallen did not intend to give up on its prey. And here she hoped it would piss off if she fed it with lead… Snarling and panting, the demon approached the broken window with its own blood pouring from between its sharp fangs. It only added to the menacing image of the beast that had Nicola trembling and frozen.

Think, Nicola, THINK! What can she do against an opponent far bigger, stronger and more dangerous than a single human without a weapon? The Fallen was trying to fit through the window, reaching out with its clawed paw to try and get her. Nicola looks around in panic, looking for anything that could save her. In a grocery store. Good luck. Eventually, she says "fuck it" and grabs a most likely rancid egg. The laughably small projectile splatters over the face of the demon with a squelch and even from far away Nicola is sure this egg was definitely rotten. Even the Fallen stops for a second to shake the disgusting goop off of its head but before it's done, another egg flies through the air and cracks on its head, just as stinky as the previous one.

"How'd ya, like that, asshole?! Wanna have some more?!"

Nicola yells at the demon, holding yet another egg, fully prepared to just chuck it at the monster. Unfortunately, all she managed to do was piss it off even further as its efforts in reaching her doubled. Pieces of plaster and bricks were coming loose as the demon tried to wriggle into the shop to finally kill that annoying pest lobbing small, smelly things at it. As a result, an egg once again hit the demon while Nicola kept shouting out profanities that probably made her poor mother toss and turn in her grave. She's not going down without a fight, even if the said fight is done by throwing eggs and all the gross shit she found on the floor. But she knew she isn’t getting out of this one.

And so, this is it. Nicola couldn't believe she would die by the claws of the same creature that nearly killed her once before. Was Ulthane rescuing her only delaying the inevitable? What a sick joke… Why does fate insist on being cruel? There was so much she wanted to say, so many apologies she had to give… so little time… There was nothing she could do. At least… she will see Nicholas again.. her parents and every friend she'd lost in this cursed apocalypse. A miracle would've been nice. A tiny one. Just this once. Please?

And boy, did she get her wish. A sudden force violently tearing the Fallen out of the shop nearly startled her out of her dirty and tattered jeans. Hardly believing her eyes, she watched as her would-be killer screeched in rage and surprise when it was wrenched free from the ruined window and was gone from her vision. A sudden tremor shook the whole building, sending small bits of debris raining down on her head as a mighty roar reverberated through her very bones. But it wasn't the Fallen. It was something meaner. Something… Nicola swallowed thickly at the thought… bigger. Or at least as large as this fucker. Then came clacking of metal, ungodly screeching of the demon. A second later Nicola saw as it was flung through the air like a sack of potatoes and crashed against a block of flats. Instant karma. She thinks with bitter satisfaction when she remembers what that faggot did to Raphael. I need to somehow get to him. Honestly though, she doesn't really want to know what managed to just YEET a Fallen like a skipping rock.

Unfortunately, she finds out and finds out quite soon. From her hideout, she sees an enormous creature, nearly as big as the demon that threatened her, charging towards the stunned monster still bleeding from its mouth. If Nicola had been terrified of the Fallen, then she was on the verge of having a straight out SCA after seeing this chunk of a behemoth. Whatever this thing was, it was the size of an average tree. Its armored hide was burning with red and white flames which were enveloping twin jagged, metal whips it held in its hands. Vestigial wings were trembling with wrath as it turned its radiant white eyes at the battered demon. Between a pair of sweeping horns that crowned its head was a flickering blaze that flared with each step the monstrosity took towards its quarry. Right.. What's the best way to get rid of a monster? Sic a stronger monster on it. The Fallen shrugged off and growled at its new assailant, challenging it to a fight.

While the two beasts were circling one another, battling she couldn't even guess what for, Nicola braced for what was to come. This is a horrible idea. Breath in and breath out. In and out. And when the Fallen pounced at its attacker, she bolted. Not stopping, she ran. Through the street the demons were fighting on, past them - so close she could feel the heat radiating off of the newcomer - and into the building Raphael disappeared in. Nicola hoped she was ready for what she was about to find. She really did. Jumping in through the punched in wall however, she soon found out she was, in fact, not ready. The moment she entered, she immediately caught the sight that made something squeeze inside of her.

On a pile of rubble from the destroyed wall was Raphael coated in dust. Still. Not moving, his mesmerising white eyes shut. Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh God, oh NO! Not thinking, all fear and uncertainty she ever felt in his presence was long cast away, Nicola rushed over to him pleading, begging everything that would listen for him to be alive. Don't leave me here like this… Dropping at his side into the rubble, Nicola lays her ear on the top of his chest and doesn't let herself relax until she hears a heartbeat and a shallow breath within. Words cannot describe how much she deflated once she did. He's still alive.. but he doesn’t look good.

"Raphael! Please say something! Can you hear me?!"

Thankfully, angel's eyes lolled open as she spoke to him, hinting that he indeed can hear her. Trying his best to keep his unfocused gaze on her face, Raphael furrowed his eyebrows and lifted his upper lip in a pained sneer as his hand wandered up to clutch at his side where the demon's heat struck him.

"Nnn… Nnii… co…"

He weakly attempted to speak but without much success. No joke, he must've hit his head really hard and she dreaded to think about the state of his ribcage.. But hey! At least he hears and understands what Nicola is saying. And it's a good sign.. right…? Wasting no more time, Nicola helped him sit up, keeping her hand on his forehead to steady him as his own palm rested over hers. Even squinting in pain, Raphael kept looking at her, as though she was the only point of focus he could think of.

"Hang in there, okay?! Please, Phel.. We'll be fine…"

Liar. Something snaps at her. They're pretty much defenseless and vulnerable with a very livid demon still threatening them. One or the other will come out victorious. And to the victor go the spoils… Raphael tried to say something but still couldn't formulate words properly due to the splitting headache pulsing through his entire skull. Though even through ringing in his head and pain in his chest that somehow rivaled the one he constantly felt, he found something in this human's words that baffled him. In her panic, Nicola doesn't catch a puzzled look he sends her way.

Phel?

A choked up cry of a dying demon made them both jump a little and look out through the hole Raphael made when the demon gored him. Just in time to see the flaming beast standing on top of the Fallen and strangling it with its whips. Then, the creature of… quite blatantly feminine curves gave one sharp tug and the demon's head was brutally severed from the rest of its body. And everything fell silent.

Instinctively, Nicola halted her breath and ceased any movement, watching the winner (Nicola felt fully comfortable with calling it per "she" now) shoot a glance towards her and Raphael who by this point tiredly laid his head on her shoulder, heaving in attempts to draw a proper breath. The creature approached slowly, keeping Nicola frozen in place and desperately holding onto her injured friend. When the demon was at the wall, only her massive legs were visible. Seconds ticked by as a set of claws rested above the opening to the house, and a monstrous head loomed through the hole.

That would be more than enough to make Nicola pass right the Hell out but.. Something about this creature intrigued her. It didn't have a snarling, toothy maw but an almost featureless face with the curve of a nose and a pair of bright and ferocious, intelligent eyes. It stared at her with more understanding than any demon Nicola had ever seen. Whatever it was, it didn't seem aggressive for some weird reason. At least not yet.. Then, unexpectedly, the creature was enveloped in red flames as its humongous form began to shrink and reshape into something much smaller but still a good two heads taller than an average human.

From the hot light emerged a very humanlike woman in intricate metal armor. Black tattoos marked her stern face around her luminous, white eyes and on her forehead, right below the line of incredibly dense magenta colored hair which floated freely around her head, defying gravity like it's the most natural thing in the world. Whoever it was, even with an intimidating aura of strength and resolve, her close resemblance to a human calmed Nicola somewhat. Plus, she had to admit that this woman had the looks. Men would probably be killing one another for her. Honestly, Nicola felt kind of jealous.. But considering she was still pretty much helpless with a half-conscious angel leaned against her, it didn't put her fully at ease. At least until the stranger spoke in plain English. Then Nicola finally released the breath she was holding. Crossing her arms, the tall lady sneered slightly at the human and angel before her.

"Well, would you look at that. Guess it's your lucky day today."

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It's finally done, my goodness! This one was hard to get right but I made it. Don’t ask me how i managed to finish it with two pictures, I have no clue :I

Fury makes an appearance! Badass as always. :D

Also, can I get an F for Raphael's poor ribs?

#darksiders #darksiders 3 #darksiders fury #darksiders raphael #raphael #fury #darksiders OC #human survivor oc #CoK #cost of kindness #chapter IV

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carewyncromwell · 4 years ago

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The next Cinderella AU part is here...and I am so thrilled about this part, because not only do we get a new character (who I’m quite sure you can identify from the sketch above -- only my second time drawing him ever, and I’m actually pretty happy with it!), but we’ll also get a nice serving of drama! Goodie!!

Robin Hood as a legendary figure first originated through the oral tradition, so its history is a little hard to plot out, but his first reference in writing is a ballad from the 15th century. Although our modern image of Robin Hood is that of a chaotic good heroic figure, his original incarnation was decidedly less saintly -- he was a bandit, and although he did refrain from stealing from women, he was rather violent, reckless, and hot-tempered, as well as flagrantly against both clerics and all nobility. Robin Hood’s backstory of being a disgraced nobleman who turned outlaw after losing his title and land and who remains loyal to the “good king” Richard while opposing the unlawful regent Prince John was added later, presumably to make him a bit more “approachable” to an Elizabethan audience who was more accustomed to hearing tales about nobility (just look at a lot of Shakespeare’s plays from that period -- many of them center around royalty or the upper class). Plays about or referencing Robin Hood then increased in popularity on the British Isles throughout the 16th and early 17th century, until the rise of Puritanism in the 1640′s put a halt to theatrical productions. (Bloody kill-joys.) For more information on the history of Robin Hood’s development, I strongly recommend this analysis done by Overly Sarcastic Productions (...actually, just watch everything on their channel, it’s all great XD).

Previous part is here -- whole tag is here -- Katriona “KC” Cassiopeia belongs to @kc-needs-coffee -- and I hope you enjoy!

x~x~x~x

Carewyn had a lot of trouble returning to her daily routine at the palace the following morning. Getting so close to the border with Orion and hearing about how much scarier it was likely to get on the battlefield made her all the more worried for Jacob’s well-being. Even if the spell Charles Cromwell had paid for nine years ago made it so that Jacob would stay alive as long as he willed it, Carewyn dreaded the thought of what harm, physical and emotional, that Jacob might face. If she only had some idea which battalion he was a part of and where on the front he’d be, then she could always just try to send a letter his way...maybe even ask Orion to drop it off to the camp for her, since his father was an officer. But Carewyn had combed every military roster she could get her hands on, but hadn’t been able to find a single record of Jacob anywhere.

‘He must be under another name,’ Carewyn told herself.

It wouldn’t be too unreasonable that Charles wouldn’t want Jacob to advance in the ranks on the back of their family name. And really, Carewyn knew full well how displeased her grandfather would be if he found out she was trying to reach out to her brother without his approval -- he could’ve even forced Jacob to take on another name, just to try to make it that bit harder for Carewyn to contact him without his approval...

Carewyn’s friends noticed a rather abrupt shift in her mood. She was singing as always, but her choices were a bit less upbeat and her voice sounded oddly distracted and nostalgic. At one point, Andre mentioned offhandedly that he’d been designing themed outfits for his friends to wear to his mother’s New Year Eve’s Masque Ball, but Carewyn had trouble putting much attention on it.

“I’ve already finished some ‘owl wings’ on a cape for KC and a fur-trimmed wolf mask and gown for Erika...I was thinking perhaps a stag for Bill, a dragon for Charlie, and a lioness for Ginny? I considered a horse at first, but I think a pale gold would make her just glow, don’t you think? Yours I’m most excited for, though...I’m hoping to actually make your newest pair of shoes with fabric on the inside for comfort and diamond on the outside for sturdiness, if I can manage it!”

“Mm...that sounds great,” said Carewyn absently.

Her gaze was drawn out the nearest window, as far out as she could.

“...Andre,” she said slowly, “I realize this is very last minute, but...may I have this afternoon off, to go see my family?”

Andre blinked. “Is something the matter?”

“Oh no, no,” Carewyn lied with as pretty and reassuring of a smile as she could. “It’s just...well, it’s nearly Tristan’s birthday. My uncle keeps him very close to home, compared to my other cousins...I merely thought I might stop by and bake him a little something, as a surprise.”

Andre frowned slightly. “You...get along better with your uncle and his son than with Iris, then?”

“No, but Tristan is only a boy. It’s hard to hold any bad behavior against him. And well, maybe if he and the others don’t know I made it, he’ll enjoy it better.”

Carewyn could see Andre still looked confused and a little dismayed, so she quickly added, “I’ll be back by tomorrow morning, in time for my rounds. I won’t allow it to interrupt my duties.”

Andre offered a hesitant smile. “Well, all right...if it really means that much to you.”

Carewyn’s eyes softened. “Thank you, Andre -- I really appreciate it.”

Fortunately for Carewyn, Andre wasn’t the best at picking up on other people’s pretenses. Unfortunately for Carewyn, two of his most regular confidantes were his cousin KC and fencing instructor Erika, and they did pick up on Carewyn’s odd behavior.

“She said she wanted to surprise her cousin with something for his birthday?” asked KC, frowning deeply.

“Well, yeah,” said Andre. “I admit, it seemed a little weird to do something so nice without even wanting credit, but Carewyn is an awfully selfless sort. From the way she made it sound, she just wanted to do something nice for him.”

“And you believed her?” said Erika rather coldly.

She whacked Andre’s practice sword out of his hand with her own, making the Crown Prince hiss in pain.

“I’ve told you before, Prince Henri -- you all may think Carewyn Cromwell’s nothing like her family, but that’s absolute bunk. She might be more pleasant than them, but she’s not stupid and she’s not honest. Or did you not notice that that weird guy she hangs out with keeps calling her ‘his lady,’ as if she weren’t the penniless orphan of a deadbeat merchant?”

Erika picked up Andre’s sword and tossed it back to him with ease.

“Then of course that guy himself is shady as all get out.”

Andre frowned. “You mean Orion? Come on, Erika, he isn’t that bad -- I thought he seemed quite amiable, myself. Don’t you agree, KC?”

“He is,” said KC fairly. “But Erika isn’t completely off-base. There is a lot about Orion that we don’t know -- that even Carewyn herself doesn’t know. She admitted as much to me, after I first met him. That being said,” she raised her own sword and got into position to attack Andre, “I don’t think Orion’s a threat. You would think anyone with the ability to sneak over the palace walls not once but twice would’ve tried to make some move to attack you by now, but he’s only ever come looking for Carewyn. And although I don’t completely understand the reason behind why she’s acting like a lady around him,” she shot Erika a faintly reproachful look as she and Andre traded blows, “I’m pretty sure it has more to do with her own insecurities than because she’s a terrible person -- ow! Damn it!”

Andre had successfully disarmed KC.

“Insecurities?” he said, his eyebrows furrowing in concern. “What is there for her to be insecure about? I mean, yes, she has no dowry, and taking Orion’s wardrobe into account, I’d suppose he has to come from a family with modest wealth -- but Orion seemed to enjoy the Weasleys’ company quite well, and their family is poor. I think they’d make a lovely match, really,” he added with a rather smug grin. “They even matched at the Festival, without realizing it.”

KC massaged her wrist, frowning a bit sourly. “Yes...but Carewyn is solely under Lord Cromwell’s charge. He’s the one who sent her here. He’s the only guardian she really has. And I think it’s quite clear how much influence he has over his family -- even his daughters who married into other esteemed families still live at his estate with their husbands and children, rather than moving out onto their own estates. And in Carewyn’s case, she doesn’t even have a parent to help shield her from Lord Cromwell’s will. She doesn’t have a penny to her name. So that means, in effect, she’s chained to him, and in those circumstances...well...”

She hesitated.

"Well what?” Andre prompted her.

KC looked incredibly uncomfortable.

“I didn’t want to say anything before without knowing for sure...but I think someone’s been looking at our military ledgers, documenting troop placements. Everything’s neatly put away the way they should be, but there are more fingerprints on them than before. And usually I’m the only one who has much use to look those up, whenever I’m ready to suggest a new war strategy...”

Erika’s eyes narrowed very sharply and she got right up into KC’s space. “And you’re only just saying this now?! That information could be critical to Royaume’s enemies! What if that guy Orion sneaked in not just to see Cromwell, but to get his hands on those? Or what if it was Cromwell herself, working in collusion with him?”

“Impossible,” Andre said forcefully. “Carewyn would never be a spy for the enemy -- it’s not in her character.”

“And I don’t think Orion would know where those documents would be, even if he did sneak in,” said KC.

Erika, however, looked unconvinced as she made for the door. “You can coddle those two all you want, but I plan to tell the King and Queen -- they’ll want to interrogate Cromwell and this ‘Orion Freeman’...”

“Erika, belay that!” Andre said in a suddenly much sharper and more authoritative voice. “That’s an order.”

Once Erika had stopped walking and turned back around, the Crown Prince exhaled heavily and crossed his arms in a business-like manner.

“I’ll get to the bottom of this,” he said firmly. “If Carewyn is heading to the Cromwell estate, she’ll have to take the road through town, correct? I’ll simply take a horse and follow the road after her.”

Erika and KC looked startled.

“Uh, Andre,” said KC, “you haven’t forgotten that you’re not allowed to leave the palace, have you?”

Andre smirked. “No. I’m just sneaking out.”

Before Erika and KC could articulate an argument, he added in a much sassier voice, “Look, I’m doing it whether you come with me or not. I’d appreciate the company if you want to come along -- all I expect is that you’ll dress appropriately. I hear linens and cottons are fashionable for those who don’t wish to attract attention.”

And so Andre, KC, and Erika made preparations to follow Carewyn...completely unaware that a half-hour earlier, Bill and Charlie Weasley had -- after having a similar, but much more concerned conversation with Badeea Ali about Carewyn clearly lying to Andre’s face -- decided to take their horses and tail their friend themselves. And sure enough, the two eldest Weasleys soon enough found themselves following Carewyn on the road heading northeast, avoiding the Cromwell estate all together.

At the very same time, in Florence, Orion had finalized his plan. Today was the day he was going to request a formal audience with Prince Henri, as Prince Cosimo VII. As Carewyn had said, he’d need to act fast if he was going to stop his father from finding a way to complete his own ruthless strategy -- the battlefield itself would be a difficult place for Orion to make his case, with so many distractions, but he knew a more balanced, peaceful setting wouldn’t be. And so he wrote a long letter to the King, explaining everything that he had learned from Royaume and its people as well as Florence’s own, so as to make a case for peace. He then had the court magician Severus Snape deliver it to the Florentine camp in his stead, while he dressed in his finest and prepared to leave for Royaume.

When he made as if to take his own horse, however, Orion found Skye and McNully waiting for him, a black coach already prepared.

“If you’re planning on going to meet Prince Henri, you really should arrive in style,” said McNully with a wry smile. “A good first impression to the King and Queen would help your case by a good 45%.”

“And you have to know there’s no way in Hell we’re going to let you go out and expose your true identity to the enemy without back-up,” Skye added, her arms crossed over her chest. “

Orion’s black eyes softened. “...Thank you.”

As he climbed into the carriage, both McNully and Skye’s faces nonetheless betrayed some hesitation.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” McNully asked. “There’s a 74% chance they’ll respond badly to it -- I reckon there’s a 39.5% chance they’ll try to arrest you on the spot and hold you as a prisoner of war...”

“I carry no weapons with me, and I come with the explicit purpose of diplomacy,” said Orion levelly. “Therefore I’m not an enemy combatant. As long as I follow their direction while under their roof, then any harm they might do me would be violating the conventions of war...and the Royaumanians, for all of their flaws, do have honor.”

“One could make a case for you having been involved in espionage, though,” McNully pointed out, but Orion ignored him and settled down in the carriage, crossing his legs offhandedly.

“What about Lady Cromwell?” said Skye, her voice a bit lower and more concerned. “She’ll find out you’re a Florentine. And not just any Florentine, the Prince of Florence.”

Something sad flickered through Orion’s confident, unflappable expression.

“She was going to learn the truth sooner or later,” he murmured. “If our time together has come to an end...then at least I may have the memories to hold onto...and the knowledge that by ending this War peacefully, I may have spared her of more heartache.”

He closed his eyes and began to meditate, clearly having said his piece on the matter. Skye and McNully, however, couldn’t help but exchange a look that was both anxious and very sad.

As long as they’d known Orion, he’d always been a little reckless, but he was also passive and avoided direct confrontation. This plan to directly appeal to Royaume’s royal family, however, required a lot of guts -- far more than either of them had thought Orion possessed. And they knew such courage could only have been encouraged by one person...the very same person who Orion loved so much that he would choose to follow her example and protect what she loved, even if it meant destroying their relationship forever.

Orion meditated during most of the journey to the Royaumanian palace. It was merely fortunate that, as they approached, McNully broke him out of his trance by tapping him on the shoulder and pointing out the window. If he hadn’t, then Orion would not have seen a rather familiar trio of riders on horseback, riding through town past them -- a short, stocky lady with dark red hair and freckles; a very tall blonde with a square jaw and sharp eyes; and a very handsome dark-skinned man dressed in a purple tunic, emerald green pants, and gold-buckled black boots.

“Stop the carriage!” said Orion, his soft, level voice nonetheless very firm despite not rising in volume.

He barely waited for the carriage to completely stop before slamming the door open and jumping out.

“Andre! KC!”

Andre, KC, and Erika all stopped their horses in an abrupt halt and turned around as Orion dashed up to them.

“Orion?” said Andre, startled.

KC looked from the rather finely dressed Orion to the expensive-looking black coach behind him and back. Erika’s eyes narrowed critically upon Orion as he came to a stop in front of them, his hands clasping in front of him.

“I...had not expected to see you out and about,” said Orion, trying to put on his most pleasant, calm expression.

Andre glanced over his shoulder up the road, frowning deeply. “Yes, well...some business has come up.”

“Orion, have you seen Carewyn?” KC asked him, her face very serious.

Orion blinked.

“Not since last night,” he said. He could feel his heart starting to beat faster. “Why? Is something wrong?”

“Never you mind,” barked Erika, as she turned back to the road. “Come on, we don’t want to lose the trail -- ”

“Erika,” reproached Andre, before he turned back to Orion, his face visibly concerned. “...Carewyn asked for the afternoon off to go see her family, but it was very last minute, which isn’t like her. And according to what we’ve heard in town, there’s been no traffic down the road toward the Cromwell estate in the last four hours...”

“So Carewyn had to have been lying about where she was going,” finished KC, her face much more stoic but her voice no less tense. “We need to find her and figure out why.”

Orion’s eyebrows had furrowed over his widening black eyes. His heartbeat was slamming in his ears as the memory of Carewyn in the woods returned to him -- looking northward, toward the army camps, as if longing to run toward them --

“I know where she’s gone,” he said at once.

He rushed back to the coach, grabbing onto the window frame and standing on the boot of the carriage.

“To the northern border,” he urged Skye, who sat in the driver’s seat. “Quickly!”

“The border?” repeated Skye as a sharp whisper. “But Orion, your meeting with the Prince -- ”

“Can come later,” Orion told her very firmly under his breath. “Both he and I must get to the war front.”

He shot a significant look over his shoulder in Andre’s direction. McNully, putting two-and-two together, nodded and inched himself up to the window of the carriage.

“If you tie one or more of your horses to the carriage, we should decrease our travel time by a good 21% per horse,” he told Erika, KC, and Andre. “If Carewyn left an hour ago, then with one horse, we should be able to overtake her within an half-hour -- two, within twenty minutes, and three, within ten. Though with Orion on the boot, there’s a 12% chance he’ll fall off if we ride at full speed, so we might have to go at 95% instead -- ”

KC fixed the blond-haired man with an incredulous look as she leapt off her horse.

“Are you really calculating all that on the fly,” she asked, looking as if she wasn’t sure whether to be impressed or amused, “or are you just pulling those numbers out of fat air?”

McNully couldn’t help but grin. “Excellent! Now I can officially say that I’ve been asked that question over a hundred times before.”

Still looking faintly bewildered, KC moved to help Andre, who’d quickly started attaching his, Erika’s, and her horse’s to the front of the carriage with the two black ones already pulling it, ignoring Erika’s incredibly sour and distrustful expression. There was no time to lose.

From the boot of the carriage, Orion directed Skye down the same road he’d taken with Carewyn the previous night, Andre, Erika, and KC riding with McNully inside the coach. Once they’d reached the forest, Orion caught sight of a familiar-looking golden eagle with a bandaged wing -- at the sight of the Florentine prince, the eagle gave a loud shriek and flew down into the trees, and Orion urged Skye to pursue him into the woods. The road took them deep into the trees, until at last the eagle landed on a branch over the heads of two familiar-looking ginger-haired men, who were bound with thick rope to a tree.

Bill and Charlie were stunned at the sight of such an elegant coach, but were absolutely beside themselves with relief at the sight of Andre, KC, and Erika. Erika immediately yanked a knife out of her ankle boot and set about sawing off their bindings -- once she’d cut Charlie free, he immediately rushed forward and grabbed Andre’s shoulders.

“We’ve got to hurry!” he said anxiously. “They’ve got Carey!”

“‘They?’” said Andre, very startled. “They who?”

“This band of Florentine bandits,” said Bill, his voice very low and urgent. He kept maneuvering his bindings as Erika cut them to try to sever them faster. “They cornered us so they could try to rob us -- they were willing to let Carey go since she was a lady, but she bartered with the leader, saying that they could take her so long as they left us alone. Claimed that they could probably get more money from holding her hostage than us, given her family...”

Both Skye and McNully glanced at Orion. The Prince’s face had lost most of its color -- he’d turned his face away and closed his eyes, breathing in and out slowly as he tried to stabilize his emotions.

“The bandits in these woods are Florentines, so I doubt they will harm you,” Baroness McGonagall’s words returned to his mind, “but I cannot be sure how they would respond to a Royaumanian, especially one related to one of their wealthiest noblemen.”

“They took all three of our horses and tied us to the tree so that we wouldn’t follow them,” growled Charlie. “They left us a knife so that we’d be able to cut ourselves free, but it’s so dull I reckon it would’ve taken us hours to do it ourselves...”

Bill succeeded in snapping the weakened ropes in half and leapt back to his feet, massaging his wrists.

“They must have taken her to a camp of theirs,” said KC, her dark blue eyes narrowing. “Even bandits need some base of operation.”

McNully nodded, resting his arms on the edge of the coach’s window. “The lady is right. Given where we are, I’d say the odds are fairer that it’s southeast of here.”

“Closer to the Florentine side of the border, you mean,” presumed KC, and McNully nodded again.

“They were heading south through the woods,” said Bill. “But we won’t want to bring the coach. They stopped us because they wanted money -- if they have any reason to think any of you have it, they’ll no doubt want to imprison you too...”

“On the contrary,” said Orion in a very low voice, “this carriage may be just the thing we need, to ensure that they don’t imprison us.”

Everyone looked at Orion, their faces all a mixture of incredulity and revulsion, but he seemed disinterested in explaining himself.

“We must be quick, McNully,” said Orion, and although his voice and face were as level and unreadable as ever, they both betrayed a slight edge. “Time is not on our side.”

With Bill now sitting with the driver’s seat next to Skye and Charlie hanging off the boot with Orion, the black coach set off again. Overhead Orion caught sight of the wounded eagle again, which shrieked at them warningly -- the Prince thought it must mean they were close, but did not respond fast enough to the trap set out in front of them.

The coach rode right through a certain cluster of vines, and within seconds, they had magically sprung to life, lashing themselves around the limbs of the five horses pulling the coach. The steeds reared back, panicked -- Skye immediately yanked out a sword from her belt and began hacking away at them, and Erika and Andre both leapt from the carriage with their own swords to help, but it was no use. The vines only lashed onto them, binding all three of them fast and making it impossible for them to move. And when things seemed like they couldn’t be any worse, without warning, a group of green-dressed men and women had swung down from more vines attached to the nearby trees, surrounding them in a tight noose-like circle and pointing their arrow-decked bows at them.

They were trapped.

“Well, well,” said a voice from the trees above, “we don’t often see coaches that ritzy out here.”

The voice’s owner leapt down to the ground. Unlike his companions, his hooded tunic was yellow instead of green. When he lifted his head enough that they could see his face, it was the host of a mischievous smirk.

“Especially ones crafted in Florence,” the dark-haired and eyed bandit said breezily.

Andre, KC, Erika, and the Weasleys all stiffened.

“Florence?” breathed Bill.

They all as a unit whirled on Orion. His face was remarkably calm and solemn as he stepped off the coach and in front of the others and faced the bandits’ leader, his hands clasped in front of him.

“We do not come seeking trouble,” he said. “We merely come to retrieve a lady who surrendered herself to you. Frame like a robin’s. Hair the color of a red sunset. Eyes the color of the sky.”

The bandit’s leader raised his eyebrows curiously. “The maid called Cromwell?”

“That is her.”

“And what reason would you desire her in your custody?” challenged one of the green-dressed bandits with a cocked eyebrow, a dashing man with tanned skin and dark brown hair.

“Wants to ransom her off himself, no doubt,” sneered another woman with messy brown hair and cold magenta eyes. “He probably works for Lord Malfoy -- we all know he’s the sort to make money off illicit enterprises and keep it all to himself, rather than give it to anyone who actually needs it...”

Two of the other bandits -- a pair of women with long red and short pink hair, respectively -- exchanged a sour look.

“We have nothing to do with Lord Malfoy,” spat Skye, vainly tugging against the vines binding her. “We wouldn’t collaborate with that rat if you paid us -- !”

“Skye,” said Orion in a quelling voice.

The last bandit, a very strong-looking man with dark red hair and emerald green eyes, frowned deeply at the leader, who considered Orion carefully.

“I know your face,” he murmured.

Orion inclined his head, his black eyes boring into the other man’s face. “I’m sure you do.”

The leader’s thin-lidded eyes narrowed critically -- then they widened, realizing.

“Bring out Lady Cromwell at once,” he said abruptly.

The others all whirled on him.

“What?!” cried all three women and the dashing man.

“Jae, are you mad?!” said the woman with the magenta eyes.

“Do it,” said the leader called Jae firmly, without flinching.

The strong bandit -- the only one who hadn’t questioned the leader’s direction -- grabbed a vine, which immediately retracted back up above them.

Jae glanced at the magenta-eyed woman. “Merula, have the vines set them loose.”

Merula looked rather scandalized. “What? Oh come on, you know how much of a pain it is, to have to recast a spell after it’s broken -- ”

“Better that we do it now than wait around for the spell to expire on its own,” Jae said dryly.

Still looking very reluctant, Merula nonetheless did as she was told, holding up her hand, which glowed with light green.

“The terms are now invalid,” she muttered sourly at the plants.

The plants sparkled with a similar green flare before falling limply off of the horses, Andre, Erika, and Skye. KC and Bill moved to detangle the now harmless plants from their companions and around the horses’ legs, and Charlie moved to soothe the frightened steeds.

Within a minute, the strong bandit was back, holding onto the vine easily with one hand and holding Carewyn under his opposite arm. She had her ginger hair tied back in a loose bun and was dressed in the green peasant dress she’d worn to the Festival and her slightly oversized brown shoes -- no doubt because it was the most comfortable dress for travel she had. Orion was also beyond relieved to see that she was perfectly unharmed -- not a single cut or bruise.

“CAREWYN!” cried KC, Andre, Bill and Charlie in relief.

All three of the men immediately dashed right over to her and threw their arms around her in a group hug.

“It’s all right,” Carewyn reassured them with a small smile. “I’m all right.”

“They didn’t hurt you?” Bill interrogated her.

“You must have been terrified -- ” said Andre.

“Where are the horses?” asked Charlie.

“Tied up in a makeshift stable over there,” said the pink-haired bandit with a wry grin and a vague hand gesture.

“A bit tricky to lug them up into treehouses,” added the red-haired one cheekily. “And no, for the record, we did not hurt Carewyn Cromwell. She may be a stick in the mud, but she’s a decent sort.”

“And brave too!” said the muscled man, beaming. “She wasn’t scared at all, not even when Merula stuck a knife in her face!”

“I was only getting fed up with her smart remarks,” huffed the magenta-eyed bandit called Merula. “You’d think she was the Queen of Sheba, with how she acts...”

“She is a proper lady, to be sure,” said the dashing bandit, shooting Carewyn a rather Casanova-like smile.

Carewyn tried to stifle a snort of laughter behind her hand as Jae approached her.

“Seems you’ll have an escort after all, Carewyn,” he said, lowering his bow with a slightly more serious look. “I don’t think I can convince you to reconsider, but under the circumstances...well, just make sure you’re careful. I’d hate to hear of Royaume losing one of its only honorable citizens due to their own stupidity.”

Carewyn inclined her head to him, her blue eyes very solemn. “I’m far from Royaume’s most honorable citizen, Jae, nor from any other country, I daresay. But thank you.”

Jae nodded. He then looked up at Orion.

“By your leave then, your Highness,” he said with an abbreviated bow.

He then nodded to the other bandits, and one by one, they all disappeared back up into the trees.

None of the people on the ground, however, gave them much mind. All of them had turned back around to face Orion -- Carewyn felt like her heart had stopped still as she stared, taking in his neat ponytail and finely tailored black doublet and hose and boots.

“...‘Your Highness?’ ” repeated Charlie, shocked.

Andre’s eyes widened. “Then...then you’re...?”

Orion swallowed, but somehow managed to keep his composure as he nodded. His eyes were locked on Carewyn’s face, never shifting and as turbulent as a black ocean.

“King Cosimo’s new heir,” KC breathed, her face flooding with fresh understanding around her amazement. “Cosimo VII.”

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leapyearkisses · 3 years ago

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Director’s Cut Commentary - Orbs Are Bad News Part 2

Second part of me blathering my thoughts all over this old story per the request of a very nice anon! I am still sleep-deprived, so yay~ Sorry, this commentary is probably way less interesting, since this part is just the sexy stuff, but if you have any particular questions, please send me another ask!

Happy to do any of my stories or just answer asks, whatever. I clearly enjoy reading myself talk XD

Comments in bold below the cut! This part is NSFW. Well, it’s all kinky but there’s also sex.

I forgot to mention this in Part 1, but the title of this story is because the homebrew campaign I ran for my friends involved magical evil crystal orbs. Hence they are bad news.

"Are you ever going to stop sneezing?" Remembrance asked. At the same time, Cordes said, "One thousand blessings, Llewellyn, one for each." The two of them were several yards ahead on the road, and only Cordes was looking back over his shoulder. Right now, the four party members were the only travelers on this particular stretch, although as they got closer to civilization, they'd started to pass the odd wanderer, farmers with wagons, even a merchant or two. The woods here were broken up periodically by stretches of arable land, clear-cut several decades ago and now waving with wheat, flax, or various vegetable leaves. The fields were golden in the late sun. Their shadows stretched behind them like taffy, rippling on the cobblestones. The day was vanishing quickly, and Gerrit could sense his companions' impatience to move on even as he stopped again himself, drawing out his handkerchief in a now very familiar motion.

Stick your people in a world. That’s my advice. Don’t have them just floating around in a no man’s land of generic scenery. (Also why I like period/historical snzarios and fantasy stuff, because reading about plain people in an apartment somewhere is boring to me.)

Llewellyn, for his part, could not answer them, face buried in his elbow as he ducked with another reluctant outburst. "Hahktschiu! Hahh- happtsch!"

"Bless," said Gerrit, and he stepped in front of the elf to shield him marginally from view. He laid one warm hand on the back of Llewellyn's neck and lifted the handkerchief with the other, capturing the next sneeze in the flannel folds. He settled his fingers firmly around Llewellyn's nose.

This was an arrangement that had been born out of necessity three days ago when the party had raided a bandit camp's plundered stores. Along with a good stash of gold and gems, they'd found a blue crystal orb, cursed perhaps, that had summarily become attached to both of Llewellyn's hands, rendering the sorcerer unable to do most anything... including take care of his cold on his own.

On the last episode of Orbs Are Bad News...

Llewellyn blew his nose into the handkerchief, wetting the cloth and dampening Gerrit's fingers through it. Originally quite opposed to such a display outside of the most private circumstances, the elf had been forced to put his pride aside and let Gerrit help him. His fever had abated the previous day, but the frequency of his sneezing had increased, as if his body was insistent now on ridding itself of whatever illness remained. It was a horrific prospect to Llewellyn to catch the resulting mess every time in the sleeve of his robes... so he suffered Gerrit to hold the handkerchief, even though they were walking along the road where any might see them.

Despite some initial teasing, Remembrance and Cordes had quickly grown accustomed to the practice and now cared not at all, except to complain. "We're going to have to camp again," grumbled Remembrance. "Five miles from Veigh and we're going to be stuck without a bath!"

Is five miles a realistic figure here? No fucking clue! I frequently engage in excessive and specific research for my stories, but I didn’t look up how long one might hike for in D&D. Oh well.

"Is there anything I could do for you?" Cordes asked, somewhat exasperated. The priest had made several herbal concoctions for Llewellyn over the past few days, but none had helped the elf's nose much. Cordes's specialty was unfortunately not the curing of disease but the mending of bones and flesh.

I will take any opportunity to make up an excuse as to why the snz cannot be contained. You’re welcome lol

"Ndo," Llewellyn growled, as fed up as the rest of them. "I'm beyond heh- help. Hngtschiu!"

"Bless you, arimelda," said Gerrit, trying to keep his voice even. He shifted the handkerchief so that Llewellyn could have a drier spot, trying to ignore a glimpse of slickness on the elf's face. "Remembrance, Cordes, why don't the two of you go on ahead? Find an inn, get a room, take a bath, whatever you want. It might be prudent also to send a message ahead to the Mages Guild about the orb. Will you do that? Llewellyn and I will join you when we arrive."

An elvish word appears! I researched this but not walking.

Cordes nodded. "Yes, I'll draft a letter as soon as- Hey!" Remembrance had grabbed his arm and was rushing ahead already.

"Let's go, man!" she said. "Everyone loves a damn priest; you're my ticket to a good room, so may your god help you if you dawdle." Her pointed tail swished as she practically jogged down the road. Cordes spluttered but could no more stand up to her as to a tornado, so off they went. It was a remarkably short time before the two of them were out of earshot, disappearing around a bend.

And again, removed so that the main characters can bang, lol.

Gerrit sighed but turned his attention back to Llewellyn, who was blowing his nose again. The handkerchief was running out of clean corners this late in the day, but the elf leaned back this time when he was finished. "All set?" Gerrit asked.

"Yes." Llewellyn rubbed his eyes on his upper arm, wiping away a spare tear from the effort. "...My apologies." He cleared his throat, refusing to meet Gerrit's gaze. "We may arrive after dark."

"You're ill," said Gerrit, trying to fold the flannel in a way as to avoid his pocket getting wet. "We'd move faster if you let me carry y-"

"No."

"Then I don't mind taking a more leisurely pace." Gerrit smiled. Even after everything, Llewellyn was stubborn. Honestly, since they weren't really in a rush, he didn't really care when they reached Veigh; they'd only detoured here to try and remove the orb. If Llewellyn, the most inconvenienced, didn't want to give up his pride and piggyback on... well, Gerrit found his noble hauteur inexplicably cute.

Me too, buddy. Don’t worry, you can carry your elf later.

He also wasn't in a particular hurry because it was awfully uncomfortable to make any sort of time with his arousal pressed flush to his thigh.

A reminder that sex is usually going to be involved in my stories. The snz is not enough by itself.

Llewellyn coughed into his elbow and then started walking again. Gerrit had pulled back his hood for him in the morning and braided his hair, and the crown of plaits caught the afternoon sunlight like an obsidian. Gerrit tried not to let his eyes linger on the sorcerer's pale nape. Or any other part of him. He and Llewellyn had been travelling together for close to three years, working for their current patron in the capital, and in that time Gerrit had felt himself growing closer to the elf. Wanting to be closer, anyway.

Llewellyn shot a glance at him and caught him looking. Gerrit flushed and turned his gaze back ahead to the road.

"You've been very accommodating during all of this," the elf said, tone carefully neutral.

Gerrit shrugged. "It doesn't bear mentioning. We're comrades."

"Comrades," Llewellyn repeated, an edge to his voice that Gerrit couldn't quite place. "Is that all it is?" He kicked a stick that had fallen to the cobblestones, sending it into the brush. Somewhere to the right, bumblebees droned over a meadow.

Llewellyn is kind of a asshole and not super great at communicating with any level of affection, although he does get better.

Gerrit swallowed. "Yes? You and I, we've helped each other before. I consider you to be a steadfast companion." Eyes on the road. Eyes on the dappled play of shadowed leaves and light on the ground. "Why do you ask?"

"So shy," Llewellyn exclaimed, a tad mockingly. "You've never been shy about taking me to bed, Gerrit." Despite his short height, the elf seemed to find it easy to look down his nose at the much taller fighter. "Has something changed?"

Height difference is also personally sacred to me.

"Changed?" Eyes on the road.

Llewellyn stopped walking. "You called me 'arimelda.' 'Dearest.' Did you think I wouldn't hear you over my sneezing?" He couldn't cross his arms with his hands trapped by the orb, but the set of his jaw was determined and his firm brows were arched. "I wasn't so distracted then as you seem to have thought."

Gerrit shoved his hands in his pockets. He stopped walking but didn't turn. "Apparently not," he muttered. "Look, we can set it aside. Doesn't have to mean anything – doesn't have to change anything. I know a highborn elf like you wouldn't consider an official relationship with a half-elven bastard, and I've known that from the start. For my whole life. So... I care about you. But it can just be as comrades, or whatever you want it to be." Llewellyn was quiet, and after a long minute, Gerrit did turn on his heel, desperate to know what kind of reaction he'd provoked.

The angst of the half-elven existence! Gerrit is a very typical half-elf in terms of D&D characterization, lol. Despite that, I do find these different-lifestyle pairings interesting, so they keep happening, cliche or not. There is a definite pathos in the elf/human relationship because of the different lifespans, of course - most famously depicted through Arwen and Aragorn, probably, although he’s not the exactly typical human. Anyway, it kind of varies how people like to determine elven and half-elven lifespans in D&D depending on the PHB and your DM’s weary forbearance lol, but Gerrit and Llewellyn will expect to live similar lengths because I’m a sap.

He saw Llewellyn standing with his eyes closed and head titled back, lips parted. The elf's nostrils flared as he gasped.

"Are you going to sneeze again??" Gerrit asked. He threw up his hands, then went for his handkerchief once more. They did have an arrangement.

He strode back over to Llewellyn's side and tucked the cloth around his nose again, thumb and forefinger just resting on the elf's nostrils. He started to rub Llewellyn's back. "You have the worst timing, you know? Here I am, spilling my heart to you and everything."

I laughed writing this part, too. You can’t always let things just be angst.

"Sh-hhuh-t up, I jh- just nih-" Llewellyn gasped again and gave in; he had no other choice. "Hahktscht!" He moaned and pressed closer into the handkerchief, thick congestion only aggravating the itch that remained inside. "Hkktschtt! Hngtscht! Hahh- ah-- ankcxttschiu!"

That sure is a bunch of letters crammed together!

"Easy... it's okay." Gerrit massaged Llewellyn’s nose, tried to soothe the irritation. He guided Llewellyn to the side of the road, and, in a moment of calm, settled him to sit on the grassy bank. He followed, kneeling at the elf's side. Llewellyn was tearing up again and his nose was twitching against the pads of Gerrit's fingers. Gerrit felt electric all over. He found himself wishing the handkerchief was gone so that he might touch the soft, heated skin of Llewellyn's septum, coax the elf to relax and loose his tension, sneeze into Gerrit's palm. The mess didn't bother him; none of it bothered him. He was supremely unbothered. His cock was almost painfully hard.

It took several more minutes punctuated with more urgent expulsions before Llewellyn seemed to trust himself to speak. His eyes were wet with unshed tears, eyelids tender and reddened. His nose was brightly ruddy, running to chapped. He had to take a shaky breath, collecting his thoughts. "Gerrit."

I’m a very visual writer. This kink is extremely visually-based for me. I wish I could draw as well as I want to so I could depict these scenes how I imagine them, but eh.

"Yes?" Gerrit lowered the handkerchief, gently pinching as he did to clear any lingering moisture. He wasn't ready to hear a rejection, nor did he feel particularly ready for a lecture or a tirade or even a logical exploration of why a relationship was a bad idea. He wanted, if possible, to keep walking to Veigh, side by side, listening to the bees and dragonflies and songbirds settling in for the evening, feeling the light breeze on his face, replete with the scents of summer.

"Kiss me."

Gerrit blinked, mental caravan bunching to a halt. "What?"

i am so funny omg

Llewellyn nudged him in the chest with the orb. "Kiss me. You're all worked up." He cleared his throat. "And judging by the state of you, you're not put off by my cold. So?" He tilted his head to the side, gently, closed his eyes. "I want you to kiss me."

An example of the B character not really forcing the admitting of the fetish but just kind of not caring. That is also okay, and I think it’s normal. People don’t just admit to all their kinks immediately upon entering a relationship.

Baffled, but feeling as though maybe all was not lost, Gerrit obliged, pressing their lips together. His own eyes slid closed and he cupped Llewellyn's cheek, deepening the kiss, touching their tongues together, trying to convey how he felt. Whatever had changed. The kiss lasted for too short a time; Llewellyn broke away to breathe, eyes half-lidded, but he didn't lean away.

I’ve never kissed anyone, but I consume media. I feel like I am pretty good at depicting things regardless of experience.

"I'm not going to dismiss you out of hand," he said. "You or your feelings. But I would ask for some time to think." He looked up through his lashes. "Are you feeling better?"

Another thing I like in romance, even in kink short stories like this, is a more realistic portrayal of the confession than just “It was obviously meant to be~”

Gerrit could feel his pulse in every extremity. "Not really," he managed, and he kissed Llewellyn again, this time sliding one hand under the elf's head and one at his hip and pressing him back to lay in the grass. He moaned in his throat as Llewellyn kissed back, and when they had to break for breath, he started to kiss at Llewellyn's forehead, jaw, throat, wherever he could touch skin. His hands roamed over the elf's body, smoothing over hip and thigh and belly until he could start to undo the buttons on Llewellyn's close-cut robes.

"Gerrit," gasped Llewellyn. He moved the orb between them, jamming it into Gerrit's sternum. "You are not going to sleep with me on the side of the damn road! Get ahold of yourself!"

He has standards!

Gerrit growled at the quick pain in his chest, then shook his head and leaned back. He flushed deeply and pulled his hands away. "Oh. Oh, fuck, sorry. I-"

"Pick me up." Llewellyn lifted his arms.

"What??" Gerrit's brain was having a hard time keeping up at the moment, all of his blood being elsewhere.

"There was a thicker copse of trees back about thirty feet, on the left." Llewellyn waved the orb at him. "Pick me up. We can lay down there."

His standards are NOT that high! But he does have them!

So. So Gerrit ducked his head into the circle of Llewellyn’s arms and picked him up, holding him securely and setting off down the road again, back the way they’d come. The elf was right; there, about twenty feet back from the bank, was a thick copse of pines, all grown together with wild geranium and maidenhead ferns. Gerrit pushed through, shoulder first. Despite its proximity to the thoroughfare, the inside of the stand was quiet and shielded completely from view. This would do nicely.

Told you you’d get to carry him soon.

He set Llewellyn back on his feet and made short work of undressing him, first freeing the sorcerer from his pouches and bags, then undoing the silver buttons on his robe from his collarbone to his crotch. The rich fabric fell open appealingly. Next, Gerrit freed the elf from his boots and leggings. A long white shirt, woven from the finest of elven angora, still covered him, but Gerrit pushed the fabric up over Llewellyn’s belly, leaning in to kiss the elf again and touching him intimately.

Llewellyn moaned and nudged Gerrit’s hip with the orb. “Now you,” he said. “I want to see your body.”

Gerrit complied, making quick time shedding his cloak, pack, leather armor, breeches, boots. Two daggers, two short swords, caltrops, a bow and quiver, a glaive, and a spiked whip followed. He pushed them to the side as Llewellyn rolled his eyes.

This is another funny trope lol, like when a hero or assassin or someone has to go through airport security and the metal detector keeps beeping because they’re carrying 18 knives on their person. Fighters are proficient in every weapon, so why not have one of everything?

"You can't possibly have a use for all of those," the elf said, and then Gerrit captured his mouth again.

He laid Llewellyn down on the soft carpet of pine needles, using his cloak to cover the ground and double as a makeshift pillow. The elf was beautiful in the shifting shade, skin flawless. He had the orb resting on his chest and it glowed intermittently in the inconstant sunlight. The gold chain netting that encapsulated both the orb and Llewellyn's fine-boned hands glimmered. "You know," said Gerrit, smoothing a hand down Llewellyn's bare thigh. "You'd look pretty good bound up in gold chain."

"This isn't enough for you?" He scoffed.

Gerrit laughed. "It would be fun to tease you. I love it when you fuss at me. So cute." He dodged Llewellyn's elbow and settled down on his stomach, hooked one of Llewellyn's legs over his shoulder, and nuzzled the base of the elf's cock. "Ready, arimelda?" His own cock was under him, pressed to his stomach in the confines of his shirt. He could feel his pulse in the head of it, quickening with the scent of his lover.

"Yes, you prick," sighed the elf, and he moaned when Gerrit started to kiss him and lave his skin. His fingers flexed on the orb, longing to wind into Gerrit's hair.

Licking is kind of thing, and I love writing about fellatio so. Yay~

Gerrit took Llewellyn into his mouth eagerly, fingers curled over the elf's thighs, fingertips pressing at the sensitive inner surface as he sucked and teased and swallowed. Like this, he could focus on Llewellyn's pleasure. The noises the usually stoic and prideful sorcerer was making were enough to make Gerrit moan, mouth full, and rock his hips. Nothing pleased Gerrit more than seeing Llewellyn undone, seeing the elf flushed and open and undone for him. And he shivered, all over, when he heard the elf's breath catch and his tone go wavery. He thought he could come from this, listening to Llewellyn sneeze while pleasuring him implacably with a heated, well-placed tongue.

This is also VERY IMPORTANT. Caretaking to the point of like, partner worship idk. It’s good!!

"Aa, aa, ahh- ih- Gerrit, I-" Llewellyn drew his knee up, curling, heel drawing along Gerrit's back. "I nih- need to snih- hh-"

Gerrit drew his head back, let Llewellyn's cock free for a moment. He didn't loosen his grip on the elf's legs, though, wound up and desirous. "Okay by me, melda, it's okay. Feel all right? Want me to stop?" He was breathless himself, had to force the words past the distraction of his arousal, but he would abide.

Consent is the sexiest thing.

"No, don't stop," Llewellyn groaned, then turned his head to the side. "Hpptscht! Hah- Haktschiu!"

"Bless, bless." Gerrit kissed Llewellyn's thigh tenderly, then nipped it, drew his tongue over the hurt, sucked a bruise to mark its place. He swallowed Llewellyn down again as the elf cried out in pleasure and then bent with another helpless burst. Gerrit wondered if he could make Llewellyn come simultaneously with a sneeze and what that might feel like. The fantasy set him alight. His abdomen was tight, his cock like a brand on his stomach. He redoubled his efforts.

Gerrit felt it first, when Llewellyn came, in the tightening of the elf's thighs and stomach, then tasted the salt of his release. His world narrowed down to taking it in, swallowing, milking with his mouth while Llewellyn cried out, going until the elf was pushing him away, keening, oversensitive. He didn't wait to lift Llewellyn then into his lap, cradling him with one arm and stroking himself with the other hand, desperate to come as well. Llewellyn pressed his face to the junction of Gerrit's neck and shoulder, tightly gripping the cloth of Gerrit's shirt as they rocked together. The elf's nose was gently wet and he was panting, sniffling. Gerrit came with a shout, holding him close, shaking with an overabundance of pleasure. He let go of his cock and embraced Llewellyn fully. He had enough presence of mind not to confess to anything, but he couldn't stop himself from murmuring how beautiful, how soft.

okay. o__o There’s only so much I can say about writing the porn lol. I write what I want to read.

Gradually the world came back. Birdsong, first, and the bees, the sounds of the trees swaying in the light breeze. The lingering heat of the day, dampened by the shade and the growing dusk. The musty smell of pine needles and the sharper hint of sap, the scents of sex, the pressure of Llewellyn astride his lap, the bite of uneven ground against his knees. Llewellyn was touching his cheek, trying to say something sweet, failing because of his cold again.

I tried to write this part so that it would not be immediately obvious to the reader, as it is not to the characters, that the orb is gone.

"Ah- hh- Ttschgktst!"

Wetness against his neck. Gerrit wound his fingers with Llewellyn's and kissed his jaw. "Bless you," he said. "I'll find you a healer in Veigh. We'll get you well again. Right after we free you from the orb." He laid his cheek against the back of Llewellyn's hand tenderly. Then he paused. "Wait." Straightening, he brought his hands between them. The right was laced with Llewellyn's left. "The orb is gone."

Llewellyn straightened also, looking down at his hands. His hands with no orb. He lifted them both, amazed. And then wiped his nose on his wrist, sighing in pleasure. Gerrit tried not to blush despite everything.

Me too, buddy.

"Where did it go?" he asked, looking past the elf's shoulder. "Why did it come off?"

"Who even cares at this point??" Llewellyn had let go of him and was stretching, running his palms over his body, touching his own arms and face and cock, finally able to move and feel again after three days of magical bondage. He wiggled his fingers and then clapped his palms together, raising a small flame with their parting. "I have my freedom back. I can cast spells again. I can-" He smiled brilliantly. "I can touch you, too." He dropped his hands suddenly to Gerrit's lap, nimbly taking Gerrit's cock between them.

Gerrit lost track of the orb immediately.

Me too, buddy.

---

It was dark indeed when the two of them made it to the inn in Veigh, but both were in high spirits. Gerrit had relinquished handkerchief duty back to Llewellyn with a great internal mourning, but he could always fantasize about this again in the future (he did, frequently), and he knew that Llewellyn, despite his best efforts, would catch more colds on the road (he did, more frequently than he would like).

I would love to play a fetish-friendly D&D campaign, but it would be way too embarrassing, probably. My current PC has allergies, but I have never mentioned them in-game and probably never will lol. God help me if my DM ever remembers that I wrote them into my character sheet.

Remembrance and Cordes had only been able to secure one room, it seemed, with two beds. Gerrit resigned himself, going up the stairs, to sleeping on the floor. But... it was apparent upon entering the small space that... well, their priest and thief had ended up taking up only one of the beds, together. Gerrit and Llewellyn traded glances.

"I don't think I want to ask," said Llewellyn, going for the free bed.

"Sounds like a plan to me," Gerrit replied, joining him.

The untold story, lol

In the morning, Cordes, with great dignity sprung from embarrassment (the cause of which he did not volunteer) informed them that a letter had not been sent to the Mages Guild yet. He was immensely relieved to find that one was no longer needed and quick to congratulate Llewellyn on his newly regained freedom. Remembrance just chuckled from the bed and took her time buckling her armor back on.

Already in Veigh, the party spent some time stocking up on medicines and liquefying some of the heavier treasures they'd liberated from the bandit camp. Gerrit sent a message on to their patron to expect them back in the capital in a couple of weeks, barring disaster. They purchased horses and set out, ready for the next adventure.

---

The orb lay still in the pine thicket, nestled like an egg among the ferns, waiting for the next hapless traveler.

Faust’s Orb of Rope Bondage. Make a Will saving throw [DC 15] upon touching the orb with any body part, wearing clothes or not. Upon a failure, the orb will find its way to adhere to the hand of the hapless adventurer. If both hands touch the orb, they will both be stuck. If two people fail the save, one of each of their hands will be stuck. The spell can be broken only if each attached party has an orgasm.

I GUESS

#lyk writes #snz #llewellyn mistwalker #gerrit truestride #gerwellyn #director's cut commentary exercise

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cruddyborderlandstheories · 4 years ago

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heyeyey current anointment system SUCK

endgame content is awfully balanced unless u have perfect anointments (AS choice barely matter so long as u have 150% rad anoint and low health) and due to that i believe they completely overcompensated with the legendary drop rate so grinding for anointments would be easier

i still think anoints should’ve had the rarity of pearls and given at most a 20% damage buff if they NEEDED to give damage (they didn’t...) but actually what i wanna talk about is anointment ideas AKA what could have been extremely borderlands-themed if anointments rates stay as they are

i wanna add to the chaos gear causes with anointments (especially in multiplayer) instead of just shoving damage down our throats... sort of like a bonus part but with wayyy more chaos than just parts can do. like a special legendary effect but with the chance for it to spawn on any rarity

so step 1 is to remove all straight damage buff anointments because those are not fun. Instead, fix the VHs and buff their skills to suit endgame content ALA Guardian Takedown so they can deal damage without anointments. stuff like the shield break AS start/end anoint is fine, same with a lot of the nova anoints, grenade regen anoints or Moze’s IB grenade spawn on taking damage is all good.

step 2 is cause chaos without directly affecting damage done and also synergizing with different VH builds

examples for:

Guns:

25% of critical hits made with this weapon ricochet (all non-jakobs weapons have a chance to spawn with this anointment)

every other shot fired from this weapon gains __ element and creates an elemental puddle under the enemy shot

kills with this weapon cause the dead to explode into homing darts

shots fired from this weapon bounce once if they miss their target

reload speed is decreased by 50%, but all bullets in the magazine are fired at once

reloading with this weapon creates a bubble that protects the user from kinetic damage for the duration of the reload

melee attacks done with this weapon allow the user to dash towards the enemy in their crosshairs

attacks with this weapon have a 10% chance to make non-boss enemies ragdoll

when reloaded, the weapon has a 50% chance to jump down and run around for 15s, spawning a loaded copy in your hands (all non-tediore weapons have a chance to spawn with this anointment)

kills with this weapon increase the user’s movement speed by 4% (stacks 5 times and lasts until swapped out or entering FFYL/respawn)

enemies shot by this weapon release a large __ element nova whenever they are melee’d

elemental DoTs applied by this weapon spread to other enemies nearby (non-radiation, non-cryo elemental weapons only)

critical hits have a 15% chance to chain ___ element to nearby enemies

reloading deploys a huge shock nova and increases accuracy by 200% for 10s

FFYL time is increased by 50% for all teammates when holding this weapon

Action Skill duration is extended by 3s for every kill while holding this weapon (Alt: cooldown is shortened by 1s for every kill)

this weapon’s flavor of elemental damage is changed on every reload (elemental weapons only)

cryo efficiency for all teammates while holding this weapon is increased by 50% (cryo weapons only)

players shot with this weapon are revived, but the user is downed instead at 50% duration

kills with this weapon have a 50% chance to restore shield capacity by 10%

enemies critically killed with this weapon have a 15% chance to spawn a beacon, doubling fire rate and reload speed for all allies near it for 20s

enemies killed with this weapon have a 10% chance to spawn a mine, launching the first enemy to touch it into the air (like the whispering ice)

this weapon gains more elements as its mag empties

melee attacks with this weapon taunt all nearby enemies, but increase health regeneration by 5% for 10s

ETC ETC

Shields:

when depleted, this shield releases a nova that forces nearby enemies to reload

while shields are active, regenerate your current weapon’s ammo at 10% of its magazine size per second

elemental damage taken while shields are active is stored and released upon shield break in a large nova (maximum 300% base level nova damage)

while shields are active, enemies that melee the player are slowed until frozen

while shields are not at maximum capacity, gain 3% max health regeneration per second

Gain 20% movement and reload speed while in combat

enemies near the player take __ elemental damage per second

bullets have a 15% additional chance to ricochet off this shield while active

meleeing while shields are active cause melee attacks to explode, damaging nearby enemies

when damaged by bullets, this shield has a 5% chance to release a booster that increases bullet reflection rate by 30% for 10s

when damaged, this shield has a 10% chance to release a booster that increases projectiles per shot by 100% for 5s

on shield break, release a _ nova that damages enemies and heals teammates close to you for _ damage

while sprinting or sliding, leave a trail of _ element that damages enemies

sliding recharges this shield by 10% per second, and slide speed + duration is increased by 30%

sprinting releasing homing balls of _ element, which seek out enemies

while crouching or sliding, creates a temporary bubble shield with _ health that explodes when broken

ETC ETC

Grenades:

allies hit with this grenade are revived from FFYL

this grenade has a 10% chance to bypass shields when thrown

30% chance to double the amount of grenades thrown when thrown

this grenade gains _ more child grenades when it detonates

this grenade will not explode until it touches an enemy

enemies hit by this grenade have a 15% chance to ragdoll

this grenade will bounce _ more times when thrown

this grenade will heal allies caught in the explosion

killing an enemy with this grenade creates a healing circle for 10s

ETC ETC

and that isn’t even Vault Hunter specific stuff (which, oh my god, why does amara have 40% bonus rad damage when the default is 100%??? wtf??)

I’m a lil Zane main so here are some examples I came up for Zane specific anointments:

this shield gives Zane’s barrier 30% bullet absorb/reflect

this shield has Zane’s barrier fire homing _ elemental darts at enemies that shot it

this shield gives Zane and his clone/drone _ element shots (adds chance for certain elemental effect (DoT or slowed) to apply to the enemy)

after teleporting, Zane and his clone gain 30% bullet absorption/reflection chance

when commanding his drone, Zane’s shield has a 30% chance to fire a free grenade at the target with a 10s cooldown

every third shot by Zane’s canon causes a singularity, drawing enemies to the location it fired at

changes Zane’s canon element to ___ and creates a large nova of that element when hitting an enemy

Zane’s canon will fire a grenade every 5th shot

when reloading, Zane’s clone has a 20% chance to activate his shield’s fill/deplete effect

when targeting an enemy, Zane’s drone has a 30% chance to release a shock nova that restores Zane’s shields by 20% of damage dealt

Similar stuff for other Vault Hunters, I’m just not experienced enough with them to give something in-depth XD

LET ANOINTMENTS BE FUN INSTEAD OF JUST SUPPLEMENTAL DAMAGE SO THE CHARACTERS AND GEAR WILL BE WELL BALANCED WITHOUT THEM AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

#borderlands #borderlands 3 #anointments are so bad right now #woooow i get bonus damage for using my action skill... wow #damage i should already have enough of by using my action skill...#but i dont cuz the VHs all rely on anoints for damage output #and the guns #and the grenades #hhhhhhhh

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silvysartfulness · 4 years ago

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Tagged by @yumingyesfairy - thanks! I suck at these, but I love being tagged in things, so... Let’s try. XD

rules: answer 30 questions and tag however many blogs you want!

name: Silvy

gender: afab, though gender expression’s never been very important to me

star sign: Cancer

height: 5’5”/169cm

time: noon

birthday: July 19

favourite bands: I suck at keeping track of names and as often as not go for covers... But Poets of the Fall are good. Some Depeche Mode? Probably others, but I literally couldn’t say. My memory’s pathologically bad, literally.

favourite solo artists: That’s even harder! I don’t know! *sobs* I vibe with songs, not artists!

last movie: Soul.

last show: The Untamed, probably.

when did i create this blog: 2011, I think?

what i post: The Untamed, more Untamed, my own art, stuff for my 100k+ Untamed fanfic, meta, gifs, fun stuff that comes up on my dash and that I reblog, the occasional social justice stuff. Cats and ocean stuff and some history.

last thing i googled: Obscure stuff for my fic, no doubt... No wait, it was pictures of lotus leaves to use as refs for this week’s chapter illustration!

other blogs: @silvysbettaboys which is awfully neglected lately. Pictures of my betta fish. XD

do i get asks: I do, and I love them, and I’m a sloth at replying on low-spoon days, but I try to get around to it! Just... slowly. Sorry. Please talk to me! I love it!

why i chose my url: My usual handle, “Silvestris”, was already taken by the time I joined tumblr. Silvy started out as my online nickname, but it’s been my legal name as well for over 10 years now. The ‘artfulness’ is a pun referring both to the amount of original art I make, as well as me being a sneaky tricksy fucker at times. ♥

following: 114

followers: 1356

instruments: None. These hands are for drawing, not playing music, alas.

what i am wearing: A long black turtleneck tunic, black sweater pants and sick purple slippers with leopard print. Also a rust-red cardigan because it’s cold.

dream job(s): I thought it was to be an illustrator, and then I became one. (Turns out you have to deal with entitled people who treat you like a soulless art machine, and it sucks.) Can I just draw my own stuff and write fanfic full time?

dream trip: I want to go back to Bali so bad. Dreaming about it has kept me a given value of sane during the pandemic. I truly hope I’ll have a chance to visit again, it may just be the most beautiful place I’ve ever been in the world. But I’d also love to go to the US and meet up with friends!

favourite foods: varies from day to day, but Chinese is always a safe bet. Home made pizza with chèvre. Ice cream, that counts as food, right?

nationality: Swedish

favourite song: Varies often, but I keep coming back to Show Must Go On (either Queen’s original or various covers) and In Your Room (Depeche Mode) for multiple fandoms. Lately it’s been Saints by Echos, since the mood fits the current chapters of my fic so well (thanks for the tip, @lepetiterik!)

last book i read: I very rarely read actual books these days, I’m that stereotypical “used to read all the time, now I can’t focus” adhd poster child, apparently. It may have been something by Terry Pratchett, those books I will always love. Last fic I read was Blood In Your Mouth by @veliseraptor last night, since it’s so friggin good and I go back to read bits and pieces repeatedly. ♥

top 3 fictional universes: The Untamed, my own original storyverse Pangaea and. Uh. I don’t know. There are others I like, but none that I’m super-invested in lately. MCU, Discworld, KH-verse etc are places I have lived, but don’t really do anymore.

I tag: anyone who wants to do it? I’m really bad at this part. @veliseraptor @ameliarating @chigrima @soawen @orodrethsgeek if you guys feel like it? :)

#long post #ramblings in the moment

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ahkaraii · 4 years ago

Text

Belatedly answered ask responses

Thank you for anyone who has sent me stuff!! I LOVE reading them and I’m so sorry I’m awful at replying, but know that I love each and every one. Here’s my attempt to answer a whole lot :D

@doki-dream Thank you so much for enjoying my DBZ comics!! DBZ was my earliest “fandom”, as it were, from over twenty years ago, and it was so, so special to me as a wee child. I think it’s obvious how heavily I project onto Gohan, haha! But now that I’m an adult, it’s really fun to weave in all these ideas I had as a kiddo into a more seamless interpretation that works with the existing canon. I hope you continue to enjoy my interpretations <3

@half-devil-in-red-leather Thank you so much for sticking around with me for so long!! :D :D DMC still has a very dear place in my heart, and always will. As for Trunks and Gohan -- they were my favourite characters, too!! Gohan moreso than Trunks in my case, but I’m awfully fond of all iterations of my purple-haired boy, and someday I’ll get around to drawing all of my Mirai!Trunks headcanons :) Trunks and Goten are fascinating to me as well, because they’re a Unit, yanno? In canon they were rarely seen without the other, and so their development as people is undoubtedly tied together, too. The differences between Mirai!Trunks and main-timeline!Trunks is FASCINATING, and speaks a lot to what are “core” characteristics of Trunks and what are things he’s adapted from his close peers over the years. Anyway, I love Trunks and Goten and Gotenks and rest assured I’ll be posting a lot more about them in the future.

@vejigante Unfortunately I still haven’t watched Dragon Ball Super beyond the two movies (Battle of Gods and Broly) so I’m preeetty much out of the loop as to who these guys are. Maybe someday :0

@katerchip :D :D :D =happy=

@yusuke96universe I don’t exactly take suggestions, mostly because I kinda draw whatever I feel like in any given moment, and drawing something based on someone else’s idea or suggestion is almost always stressful (”what if they don’t like my take” “what if I drew something they find gross” “what if what if what if” etc), but I can safely say I, uhhh, actually don’t know much about Tien??? I’ve skim read the original Dragon Ball manga, but I never watched the original Dragon Ball anime, so Tien is one of those side characters I don’t have a very good grasp on, or, frankly, much interest in. Maybe someday!

@shika-boom Fugaku and Shikaku were not friends, per say, but they were always peripherally aware of each other. They’re both clan heirs, for one, so you gotta know who’s who. Shikaku has always been a nosy nin who collects secrets, while Fugaku’s shameful secrets have always been painfully on display, so it’s not like they didn’t butt heads now and again growing up. I talk a little more about the topic here (x).

@darkblades75 Thank you!! You can read the manga online here (x).

@hydrabellwolf Raditz is an interesting character I’m still getting a handle of, in my own interpretation, but I think he essentially has little to no attachment to his birth family and as a kid he probably thought Goku was pampered trash because Gine kept his pod at home. I don’t think Raditz ever made the connection that Gine sent Goku out to save him from the massacre, so I don’t think Raditz realized Gine “spared” Goku and didn’t think about him (Raditz).

Afterward, he only ever remembers Goku might still exist when he realizes he needs someone he can ally with against Nappa and Vegeta (after establishing he’s Alpha Dog, hence him stealing Gohan and talk-posturing at Goku instead of properly fighting from the start), so it’s not so much familial piety as it is convenience because he’s outnumbered and outgunned and outbullied by the only couple other Saiyan survivors.

@wardstoneus That’s a story for another day, and details I probably won’t get super into because I’ve learned my lesson about delving into unnecessarily dark themes in an ambiguously exploitative way. But, yeah, I have lots of Thoughts about Raditz’s distinctive hairline and how that looks more like Vegeta than it does Bardock, and how exactly that could’ve gone about.

It was not a consensual thing :/ Gine had a rough life, and not just because she was weak and also not very Saiyan like. Bardock married her to protect her after she was pregnant, and he got demoted to low class because of it. (That’s how I explain to myself how Bardock was apparently super fucking strong and yet inexplicably deemed low class).

@loyaltykask Tbh the only other Sakumo ship I find mildly interesting is Sakumo/Tsunade (you can kinda tell why I drew them together in the Five comic in the first place xDD), but, naturally, my take on Sakumo and the Sakumo that gets shipped with Orochimaru in fandom are very different characters with very different pasts that made them that way :’D So if I separate my take and just take fanon Sakumo as it is, there’s lots of interesting fics with him and Orochimaru and such. I don’t tend to read them though, because Orochomaru is never in character (as I interpret him, anyway), and that can be tiring XD

@pretty-rage-machine Thank you!!! I’m sorry (not sorry) that I jump around fandoms so much, my creative brain is stupid and it latches onto new things every 2-6 months without control and I’ve learned to just go with the flow, it allows me to create faster and better works if I let myself explore whatever topic has captured my interest at any given moment instead of forcing it to stick to one thing. Luckily, I am not a professional artist; if you are, don’t do this xDDD Maintaining discipline and motivation beyond personal whim is important in any job!!

That being said, yay!! I’m glad you like my stuff regardless of how much knowledge you have of the canon I’m messing with. Hearing my characterizations are grounded and relatable makes me happy <3<3

@poly-hebdo Thank you!!! :D :D Once again, I apologize for jumping fandoms like the attention deficit fella I am, but I’m glad you’re still digging my works regardless of the fandom!

@jkl-fff Ahh thank you, friend!! (Side note reply: I watched DBZ:A yeeears ago, and I have to rewatch it again STAT because I actually have gotten mentioned by MasakoX (voice of gohan and goku in DBZA) a couple of times now, once in one of his videos and twice on his twitter feed, so I’m like HOLY SHIIIIT!!!! because that’s some Senpai-Noticed-Me shit and eeeeeeek).

It may be obvious by now but I HEAVILY project onto Gohan, he was basically my mental self-insert as a wee lad, so my characterization of him is heavily tinged by that selfish nostalgia; part of the reason I’ve been drawing these comics is to seamlessly integrate that mental image of Gohan I have living in my brain to the actual existing canon, to make him a plausible version of Gohan that can exist between the pages. From that, a fascinating little narrative has been born and I’ve been having fun detailing out the characters that exist around the Gohan I’ve created :D Thank you for enjoying my hot take on it!!

And YES LAWD I am all for bisexual Gohan, he and Dende were totally a cute first romance thing as teenagers, though naturally it had to come to an end as they moved on with their lives -- Dende to proper ascetic Godhood, and Gohan to a more normal human highschool life. Maybe someday I’ll get into the nuanced complexities of that, though I probably won’t post it to twitter, where the audience there seems to crave more canon straight stuff than any wistful doomed gay sideplots (that seems more a Tumblr thing). Ahhhh so many ideas, so little time XDD

#ask responses

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eleanor-devil · 4 years ago

Photo

So I thought a lot about this before I started drawing, at first it was just a random sketch of Naraku's incarnations as humans but then it actually developed into a modern AU story (which most likely I will never write but we will see XD), this means that this is the first picture of others I will eventually work on with the remaining Inuyasha characters.

Characters (c) Rumiko Takahashi

DO NOT REPOST, TRACE, EDIT OR USE!

More IY - Modern AU

Taishō Family

Higurashi Family

Now a bit about the characters and plot surrounding them:

Makai Hakudōshi

The eldest son of Makai Onigumo, thus making him the heir of the Makai Company. He is 11 years old and despite his young age, he is extremely intelligent and calculating. Mostly a quiet child, outside classes he practices kendo and equestrianism.

Despite not openly showing it, Hakudōshi actually despises his father and was actually the one who pulled the strings behind the exposition of Onigumo's dark schemes despite the initial popular belief that it had been the Taishō Family doing so. His plan was to overthrow his father and thus take his place as the new head of the Makai Company, although due to his young age, he can't perform most actions without the permission of his uncle until he turns 18 years old.Out of the two Makai brothers, Hakudōshi is the only one who remembers the face of his mother who suddenly went missing when he was 9 years old. It is unknown at the moment if Hakudōshi's actions were to either be able to search for his mother without any interference or rather if he just wanted to gain more power.

Fūjin Kanna

The adopted daughter of the Fūjin Family, Kanna is 12 years old and is at the first year of Junior High School. She was orphaned at a rather young age and brought to a local orphanage until she was eventually adopted by the Fūjin family where she gained two loving parents and an elder sister; but life didn't turn out easy and eventually Kanna also lost her adoptive parents in a car accident. Her elder sister, Kagura, was able to keep Kanna's guardianship due to already being of age but had to drop out of her studies in order to work and be able to pay for the expenses as well Kanna's own studies.

All this contributed to Kanna being a very quiet girl who barely speaks (some even think she is actually mute), she is however a very hard working girl so to not let down her elder sister and also to not throw her efforts considering she gave up her dream to be able to raise Kanna.Kanna only met Hakudōshi once in her life, when her elder sister was forced to bring the boy to their house after his studies had ended, all on a whim of his father.At some point she is hired as the babysitter of the youngest of the Makai brothers, Akago.

Fūjin Kagura

The eldest daughter of the Fūjin Family, she is currently 25 years old and is a teacher of Traditional Japanese Dance. Kagura is the foster sister and guardian of Kanna after the sudden passing of their parents in a car accident. In order to take care of her sister, Kagura dropped out of her studies and even gave up her dream of becoming a dancer, to sustain their expenses and also Kanna's studies Kagura began to work as an assistant at the Makai Company. Her life at the company was not easy, she would often be threatened to be fired if she didn't do everything she was asked for, sometimes it would even be things that weren't related to her work as an assistant like watching over Makai Onigumo's sons, Hakudōshi and Akago. Kagura never met personally the mother of the two boys but one day, while eavesdropping on a conversation between her boss and a female voice (whom she assumed was the boys' mother) made Kagura start suspecting that something far darker was being hidden within the Makai household.

At some point, Kagura began passing on information about the Makai Company and Onigumo himself to their rival company, the Taishō Company, in hopes that it would bring the corrupted Onigumo to justice. This was how she met the eldest of the Taishō brothers, Sesshōmaru, for whom she eventually developed a romantic interest.

She was surprised when she learned that Onigumo's fall wasn't done by the Taishō Family but rather by Onigumo's eldest son, she never fully understood the reason behind the actions of the boy but choose to not get any further involved after Hakudōshi relieved her of her duties as an assistant and gave her a good amount of money as a compensation, enough for Kagura to finish her duties and even open her own school of traditional japanese dance, as well to keep paying for her sister's studies.Kagura never figured out if the boy had given her that enormous amount of money to keep her silence about the things she knew about the Makai Family or if he had actually pitied her struggles to try and give herself and Kanna a rather normal life. Either way, Kagura decided she didn't want to be involved anymore with the Makai Family, therefor she was very concerned when Kanna began working as a part-time babysitter of the youngest Makai son.

Makai Akago (*)

The youngest son of Makai Onigumo, he is just a three year old toddler during the main storyline. Before the downfall of their father, Akago was not able to spend much time with his older brother due to their father constantly taking away Hakudōshi for his "heir lessons" as he liked to call it. He also doesn't remember his mother's face as he was just one year old when something happened that caused her sudden disappearance.

Once their father was out of the picture as well, Akago was put under the care of his estranged uncle, Mugen Byakuya, along with his brother. At some point, Akago gets a new babysitter, Fūjin Kanna.Akago is actually the only person that is capable of bringing out a (rather small but still) genuine smile from his brother.

(*) I'm aware that "Akago" isn't a name but the japanese word for "Infant" which is how this character is called in the canon series, but since he had no other name I'll use it xD

Mugen (Makai) Byakuya

The estranged younger brother by four years of Makai Onigumo. He was just 16 years old when he was kicked out by his brother due to his life choices, he wished to pursue a rather normal, basic, life instead of entering the family's business. After this, Byakuya took his mother's maiden name (Mugen) as he wasn't allowed to use the Makai name anymore (which he didn't care).

At the time he left the Makai household, he was already an uncle to Hakudōshi who had been born when his brother was just 17 years old (much to Byakuya's surprise, who had never seen his brother as the father type). Byakuya always tried to stay away from his brother's suspicious life even when he was still part of the Makai Family but found rather suspicious how his brother had suddenly fathered a child and more at such a young age, especially when he had never seen Onigumo date anyone.

When he was 22 years old, Byakuya, now a teacher at the Junior High School, learned of his brother's demise and was informed that, until his eldest nephew was of age, he was the official guardian of the two Makai brothers as well held part of the Makai Company's actions, much to his discomfort.

Even so, Byakuya took his new life seriously and despite continuing to teach at the Junior High School, he began attending important meetings along with Hakudōshi, given that the boy was not allowed to make every decision on his own. At some point, Byakuya discovers that the awfully quiet student in his extracurricular Calligraphy class, Fūjin Kanna, is actually good with children and proposes her to be a part-time babysitter of his youngest nephew, Akago.

Despite his playful and polite personality, Byakuya tends to clash sometimes with his nephew and doesn't really mind to scold the boy or pull his ears as a punishment whenever Hakudōshi attempts to outsmart or even berate him for his "normal" status in life. Even so, Byakuya takes seriously the mission given to him by the boy which is to find the whereabouts of his nephews' mother, although he does question if it's safe to find her, for he doesn't know what are his eldest nephew's intentions when he finds her.

#inuyasha #hakudoshi #kanna #kagura #akago #byakuya #hakudoushi #kanna (inuyasha)#kagura (inuyasha)#infant #the infant #mugen no byakuya #byakuya of illusions #eleanor devil #inuyasha art

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