#this post is for that one anon who sent the previous ask

[ranbling]

Don't be cowards, send me hate with your usernames visible

[fullscoreshenanigans]

When do you think each of the fullscore trio realizes their feelings for each other?

Copying from this post but I generally hold these sentiments:

Sometimes I go back and forth on this with Emma realizing it earlier but keeping it to herself so the boys have more time to digest and put a name to their feelings so as not to pressure them. She has a very acute emotional awareness.

…except maybe when it comes to herself, lol. Feel like the comparative obliviousness on the matter is the final roadblock for most of her ships with her Type A personality. If she’s aware of it and knows it’s mutual, it’s so hard to see her not just going for it, especially with these two with how badly they can get stuck in their own heads.

As for when exactly it happens, Ray realizes Emma and Norman are special to him early on, though he doesn't conceptualize that love to the full extent it would eventually become. Again borrowing from earlier posts, but:

(Chapter 181.1 | Chapter 93 | S1 Episode 6)

He loved them more than he feared the consequences of revealing what he knew to Isabella. They comforted him when he'd have nightmares that left him screaming and crying in terror, even when they couldn’t understand what was upsetting their friend so badly and he couldn’t articulate to them what was wrong.

But he's also the last to act on his feelings after years of self-loathing and his firm commitment to ensuring Emma and Norman survive as a set.

(2020 Exhibition Interview)

One of the immutable truth's of his universe is the two of them belong together, and he would never do anything to jeopardize that, even if it meant remaining silent about how he felt.

Norman feelings for Emma are evident by his eleventh birthday in the fourth story of the first light novel, "A Gift from the 39th Girl."

He admires her deeply, and she inspires him to do better and strive for the seemingly impossible.

(Chapter 14)

With Ray, Norman always had someone he could show his more prideful and impish side to.

(S1 Episode 2 | Mystic Code Book Chapter 2)

I disagree on the wording a bit here because it's not that Norman doesn't show his true nature to Emma, but that the two of them are seeing different facets of a multifaceted person. Emma sees Norman caring for and helping their siblings all the time, and he's not disingenuous in those actions, even if in his pragmatism his mind immediately jumped to just him, Emma, and Ray escaping after being confronted with the truth. Ray was someone he valued and trusted enough to show aspects of himself that he didn't share with anyone else openly at this point in his life.

But it's after two weeks of hating Ray's guts that Norman discovers the true motivation behind Ray's plan at Grace Field:

I adore the way the anime adapts his realization of this, further discussed here:

(S1 Episode 5)

Norman reaching the same conclusion is one of humbling, relief, and grief. Since Krone first arrived at the house, he suspected Ray was the traitor. He hated himself for it, but that didn’t change the conclusion he drew, and he spent two weeks stewing around in those negative, vindictive thoughts. This is the only time I believe Norman ever truly hated Ray as a person. His being aloof and withdrawn might have been annoying and frustrating when they were younger, but he still accepted Ray as he was and didn’t hate him. This development, however, was infuriating. Norman would have been willing to sacrifice Ray, like Ray tells him he should have done, if he hadn’t talked to Emma in the flashback from the manga that instead plays out chronologically here. It isn’t stated by him directly how he aspires to be like her, but it does cause him to pause, reevaluate, and take a step back from adhering to his more rigid sense of morality. And then he realizes Ray’s true motivation and is humbled even further. In the final seconds of the song, the distorted crackling cuts out, and we’re left with the last rueful notes of the string instrument as the camera zooms in on a single child’s drawing, one that we know is Eugene’s based on the chapter 31 extra of the Grace Field House art gallery… …A good use of resources to convey to the viewer the same affirmation Ray had given to Norman: whatever his machinations might entail, his motivation has always, always been his two most precious friends. There’s relief in that realization: Ray isn’t out to maliciously harm them, but there’s also grief in how Ray doesn’t see himself as worth saving. A very humbling experience when just a few hours ago Norman had been so willing to throw him away, just like Ray wanted.

This settles something in Norman—that Ray is once again firmly in the "dear friend who must be saved and protected at all costs" category of his mind, reflected in his resolute stare in these two additional frames in episode 11 of season 1:

Ray intends to die. From what he said, he's doing it so you and I don't get killed. He didn't include himself in the numbers. He's not escaping. Ray has decided to die inside this house. He's going to set himself on fire to distract Mom in order to let us run away. That's his entire plan. But I won't allow him to do that. Not ever.

But it also leads him to begin reexamining what exactly that all entails, and he has over a year to pore over those thoughts in Lambda.

By the time he razes the facility to the ground, he recognizes that he cares for Ray in the same way he cares for Emma (@vinokurinner conveys it beautifully through this comic)

(Chapter 74 | Chapter 129 | Volume 18 Inner Cover | Chapter 145 | Chapter 153 | Chapter 181.4)

Emma's cherished the boys as her best friends her whole life at Grace Field. As they're inspired by her, she in turn is inspired by them.

(Chapter 5 | Chapter 88)

But when exactly she consciously puts a name to those feelings and recognizes them in their totality, I don't have as specific of period for because I like to play around with it.

(Chapter 123)

But there's the beat of pronounced, wide-eyed clarity when Ray mentions Norman's special to both of them.

(Chapter 153)

There's her bold declaration of "I'm never letting you go!" to Norman, firm in her conviction that she'll won't let him sacrifice himself or be separated from them again.

(Chapter 161)

There's the faith that now that she has both of them at her side again, they can achieve the impossible.

(Chapter 180)

And there's the visions she has of them in her dreams after they arrive separately in the human world and she's lost her memories, because not even a god can remove the place they hold in her heart.

[blueberrylovv]

pls read ik its long sorry but ćrę3p alert!!!

okay so basically these 4 acc are the same person, you might know them as the wàttpàd link person, they are going around rèpòrtìng people (if you got an anon 'reported' in your inbox that was them) especially if you side with me or høney or just criticise them or even engage with any of my responses to their asks (my bestie who literally only uses her acc to interact with me and doesn't post anything reblogged my answer to them yesterday and got anon 'rèpòrted' in her inbox like 3 minutes after that hmmmm i wonder who that was since she literally doesnt engage with anyone else but me and her acc is literally blank with just a few of my posts reblogged hmmm)

the list of the accounts I know of for easy copy and paste into search (just replace the first number in the name with the letter) if you cant search fro them there should be links to their posts in the comments, some ppl cant find them through search even tho they are not blóćkęd by them just heads up

l1ttlereader2024

m0lasseslasts

blu3b3rryl0v3sblgg3sttarg3t (used to be pr3ttyinpink2028 and then gymg0er4life and then 4ndanotherchange )

gr0tesquefreakkkk

they claim they are different ppl, they even 'talk' to each other in comments sections but some of the accounts are literally brand new and only follow/post about each other

the molasses one even has this rancid 'but I hate honey' line in the intro post, this is clearly just honey stälk1ng/hàr4ssmeņt account (honey got these two asks one after another)

it also seems that they are crosstagging across their blog? (on the reader acc) because some posts are tagged with the new jęlly tags but then others are tagged with i think the ręcóvry versions of the jęly tag? (not to mention they are also using hóneydet tag to promote their story)

I'm not telling you to bĺòck/rèpoŕt for me or honey (bc I'm pretty sure we got rèpòrtèd to he1l already lol I don't think there's any way to save our souls now) but literally bc they just jump people and spam repòrtŝ until the acc gets got - and just fyi we were cool until we rejected/ignored their fvckasś links - for someone who's so adamant about the fact that we are pro or whatever or just the satan himself you were quite persistent while begging us over and over again to make boards/dets/posts about the characters in your story so which one is it are we cool or are we the worst thing that happened to this side of the blr huh like you can't like us only when you need smth from us love you literally followed me like a stray dog here across all of my previous account you literally sent me the link to this acc back when it was still empty and intended as a bàckùp like

in conclusion this is stąłkęr behaviour, whenever me or honey błóck them suddenly a new acc that got made 10 minutes ago pops up and spams our inboxes and the only acc the new acc follows are these 4 i mentioned pls blóćk, pępórt and ręblóg so people can protect their blogs from this person whatever their end goal is

[skythealmighty]

gang ngl i miss object universe. i should rewatch it again and get way too emotionally attached to Ice Cream and Map

#rocket talk #i made fanart of them with a steven universe song once i'm unwell

(1 note)

🪟 im-not-electric Follow

why does gamey get to be on ii TWICE. who gave him permission

🪟 im-not-electric Follow

thanks for the suggestion @cabtube-truther

📟 knockoff-gameboy Follow

You don't hear PBSB complaining about this...

🪟 im-not-electric Follow

well they're in a show that's super popular

📟 knockoff-gameboy Follow

Yeah, and you're in one that got cancelled

🪟 im-not-electric Follow

shut up you didnt even finish season one

#just one more cameo mephone4 thats all i ask

(316 notes)

anonymous asked: not sure you're gonna want a cameo rn mephone is going Through it

🪟 im-not-electric Follow

hold on im not actually caught up lemme see

🪟 im-not-electric Follow

holy shit

#I TAKE IT BACK

(58 notes)

anonymous asked: omg fan pleaaaase marru me ill do anythinggg ❤❤❤🥵🥵🥵

💥 fans-fantastic-features Follow

hey @test-tubular just checking was i ever this weird

🧪 test-tubular Follow

Weird? Always. This weird? No.

💥 fans-fantastic-features Follow

COOL just checking anyway

no please stop sending me these

#fans fantastic asks #this is the least weird anon ask from i think this specific anon #ive blocked them but oh my god #NO!!!

(83 notes)

💥🔃 fans-fantastic-features Follow reblogged 4️⃣ four-therecord

2️⃣ hey-two Follow

Hello everyone!! 👋 Since I've gotten many an ask about my cheesecake recipe from previous TPOT episodes, I've decided to make a longpost and put it here for you all to use!! Feel free to use without credit but credit is still appreciated 😊

Keep reading

4️⃣ four-therecord Follow

i hate you

#so they ARE on here #followed both immediately #how did i not come across them earlier...

(2,613 notes)

💊 the-cringe-one Follow

Recovery across different universes, a scientific theory

(Full post below the cut)

((Thank you to @not-tally-hall for the testimony regarding the S*n!))

Keep reading

😎 the-chad-one Follow

boring 👎👎👎👎

💊 the-cringe-one Follow

Get off my post

⛳ bossy-bot Follow

This is incredibly fascinating and an enjoyable read! There are some points of debate I've brought up in DMs, but otherwise this is a very solid theory. Good job!

💊 the-cringe-one Follow

Thank you, that means a lot!!

#I follow your papers closely so hearing that coming from you is an honor #anyway back to my regularly scheduled nonsense

(13 notes)

🟧 julian-waiting Follow

Bonjour! J'ai découvert ce cite grâce à des vidéos amusantes

Je suis encore en train de m'habiteur à la société et je pense que c'est une bonne façon de me faire des amis! Enchanté de vous recontrer tous 😃

🥖 shut-up-about-boto Follow

bienvenue sur le site de l'enfer ! la plupart des gens ici ne parlent qu'anglais, vous pouvez donc m'envoyer un message si vous voulez parler à quelqu'un en français. je peux également vous montrer des endroits en ligne pour apprendre l'anglais

🟧 julian-waiting Follow

Cela signifierait beaucoup pour moi, merci

🥖 shut-up-about-boto Follow

bien sûr!

🍐 betterthanpearaib Follow

Baguette we all know you're not actually French you don't need to keep pretending 😒...

🥖 shut-up-about-boto Follow

K

(172 notes)

anonymous asked: your iconic quote from episode 10 has unfortunately become a vocal stim for me. please help, i'm suffering

🍿 stevecobseviltwin Follow

Hey? This is the funniest ask anyone's ever sent me. Can we make out behind a Denny's

#my condolences though oh my god 😭

(4 notes)

⚾️ take-me-out-to-theballgame Follow

Guys, this site is easy! Just watch

⚾️ take-me-out-to-theballgame Follow

Based ball? Based on what?

⚾️ take-me-out-to-theballgame Follow

#hey. are you doing okay

No

(42,526 notes)

🍐 betterthanpearaib Follow

Finally watched II! Good show. I want that twink OJ dead why is he like that

☝ i-date-iconic-posts Follow

Date of origin: November 2nd, 2020

🍐 betterthanpearaib Follow

I DIDNT MEAN IT I DIDNT MEAN IT I DIDNT MEAN JT I DIDNT

#😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

(26,942 notes)

🎒 liam-plecak Follow

Thanks everyone for the help so far! I'm not too much of a science nerd, unfortunately, @bossy-bot, so I didn't understand everything in the papers you sent me- but they still helped a ton! Especially the coding help. I was a telemarketer, not an IT person...

Now that I know what I'm doing, I have some free time. With some recommendations from @fans-fantastic-features:

If you have any other recommendations, just leave them in the comments. And please go and send help to @fire-cartoon-schtick while you're at it!

[yandere--stuck]

i know you didn't respond to my previous ask with ideas yet (and i wanna say pls no pressure!! i'm sure you must get a lot of asks!!) but man. especially after ur last post i was wondering if i could share some gore writing i wrote for bill? totally fine if not, have a nice day! (also, sorry he keeps possessing you </3 get well soon! :P) - that one anon who wrote zagreus gore a while ago

Just wanna say, first of all, so glad you're still around, anon!!! You're such a great writer and I'm still a huge fan of what you sent in to me! Hope you're doing well c:

And secondly 👀 Hopefully this will be a preview to a longer thing I plan to write

Warning for gore/suggestive stuff under the cut teehee :3

I can totally imagine Bill chaining the object of his affection down. On your knees, each wrist strapped in glowing blue metal cuffs above your head. All vulnerable and all for him.

Your flesh is so pretty and soft. He wants to drink you in completely. The only thing to ever dare grace his vision. But, what he's really interested in is what lies underneath.

The human body is hilarious! You know, if you really wanted to protect yourself from danger, your kind should have evolved some sort of exoskeleton to protect such a vulnerable spot from attacks. Oh, well! All the easier for him to slash into.

His eye crinkles with delight as you writhe against your restraints in agony. Tears pool from your eyes and screams rip from your throat. You make such beautiful noises for him, this has to be in his top five favorites!

He just watches for a while. Watches the blood pool out of your stomach, stares into the inside of your stomach. His hands itch. All those squishy little organs to play with…

You hang your head, breath coming out in stutters. Drool drips from your mouth, mind too fogged with pain to care.

Bill laughs when you flinch away from him, your eyes suddenly wide as the demon move closer. You thrash in a feeble attempt to get away, body taught and mind in a frenzied panic as he reaches in-

Bill coos at you when your entire body locks up. Your mouth wide open in a frozen scream as he plunges his hands inside your guts. He digs around, grasping and rubbing your inside for what he's looking for…

Aha!

He grips your intestines and pulls, your insides quickly becoming your outsides. You should be dead. You'd rather be dead than in such agony, but you know he'd never ever let you.

With reverence, Bill strokes and rubs and caresses your intestines, taking in the sounds of your suffering with glee. One day, you'll get used to the pain. And then, after that, he knows you'll start to like it. He can't wait for the day that you ask him to do this to you, for you to beg him for it. He can't wait for you to understand that this is how he shows his love.

Slowly, he lifts an intestinal rope to his eye. He forms his eyelids into lips to press a gentle kiss to it. From within his eye, a monstrous tongue comes put to lap at the blood that had been smeared onto his lids.

“Told you I loved you from the inside-out," he quipped. 

[occasionalsnippets]

hello author!

I’m a totally different, definitely not the anon who sent the previous post!

So…out of curiosity…if fd reader was filling in for robin ( I assume this is pre- red robin-or would reader act as a double for red as well?)

and they got sucked into another universe…

what kind of shenanigans would occur?

also while I am definitely not the previous anon, I’d like to mention that the fd series has a new film coming out next year it’s a little different!

A/n: sorry kinda messy because I got my wisdom teeth removed

Taglist: @dragondevinity, @lonely-star2044, @sheep-from-rad, @ilxandra, @thethingwiththefeathers, @star-wars-lycanwing-bat, @sackofsadstuff, @zonked-times, @paastaboi, @venfia, @fantasy-angelo, @linaisadream

---

Getting dropped through a portal and landing in the middle of a fight isn’t great. Fortunately, you're dressed for the occasion since you’re filling in as Robin. Unfortunately, your comms are dead. Fully dead. Dead enough that there isn't even a trace of static to be heard.

It could have been worse, you think as you help Nightwing (alternate universe? Probably alternate universe Nightwing, he doesn't seem to recognize you) clear out a group of goons. At least you're in Gotham and at least you didn't land directly in the path of the batmobile while someone was driving it or something.

Nightwing is wary of you and your supposed help, at least, until you get a moment a tell him the code for alternate universe situations because of course, there’s a code for everything.

(Code for time travel, code for alternate universes, code specifically for family, etc, etc. You leave all those codes up to Batman to decide.)

He doesn’t totally relax, obviously, but he’s willing to take down all the goons before focusing on you.

You're clearly bat-trained, have bat-gear and would look like a carbon copy of Robin if Tim was currently Robin and not Damian. It isn't difficult to believe you are a dimension traveller (you aren't the first and likely won't be the last either), especially with the obvious portal you hopped out of.

And well, things should be okay if you’ve got the family code tagged along with the standard code, right?

Either way, you and Nightwing end up going to the batcave. There’s some back and forth banter, you ask about who’s around and find out that it’s basically everyone you remember from the comics in their own role. Their universe is a bit ahead of yours it seems.

“D’s not allowed to be Robin until he’s more than 4 apples tall,” you tell Nightwing. By 4 apples tall, you mean 4 apples on the height chart you bought to mark Damian’s growth.

"4 apples tall," he mouths, delighted.

Dick had reacted the same way when you put the chart up. Damian had been livid.

The batcave is every bit as dark and cave-y as you remember it to be. Batman is there. So is Red Robin. And Spoiler. It's still early in the night so everyone else is probably still doing patrol.

Being interrogated (kind of) is interesting. It would be more effective if you hadn't seen similar songs and dances hundreds of times. Plus, Batman isn't being too harsh about it. It might be because you're Robin, because you're family.

The edges of your domino mask are peeling off. It always feels like you never put enough glue.

Well, you might as well reveal yourself. With the retrieval of the glue solvent, removal of the mask and a quick run of your hand through your hair, you could consider yourself off duty.

“Are you a girl???”

“Congrats on your top surgery.”

“Congrats on your bottom surgery.”

Hilarious. You laugh softly and ask, “Do you guys think I’m Tim?”

Something discordant ripples through everyone. You thought it was obvious you weren't Tim but well... You smile and hide your teeth.

"I'm (Y/n) Drake, nice to meet you."

You’re pretty sure that your universe will figure some way to get you back so you tell Batman that if you haven’t disappeared by the time 48 hours have passed, he should probably contact a magic user to get you back.

No one is going to bed apparently. It’s Sunday tomorrow. They’re not technically the family you know so you don’t say anything about pulling an all nighter.

There are some fascinating follow-up one-on-one conversations afterwards once they get past the "Tim's older sibling who doesn't exist".

Dick mentions it’s a bit odd to see you as Robin. You’re technically the oldest person to have ever been Robin as everyone grew out of it (died in it, got fired, etc) and got their own costume before they hit 18.

You point out it's not really your costume and that you only really fill in when you have to. He tells you you're still part of the legacy. You're still Robin. You... don't really know what to say to that.

When he asks you how you got involved, you shrug and say you just followed Tim. "He's my brother. What was I supposed to do? Leave him?"

Anyways, interesting conversations between two people who have been eldest daughter syndrome-d. Maybe things are better in your universe where you're there to ease the emotional load of the family but it shouldn't have been your responsibility. It shouldn't have been Dick's either.

You end up telling Jason that the Joker is dead in your universe. More specifically, that he "had gone missing a bit after Red Hood arrived in Gotham". You don't say exactly how it happened but he can probably infer that you had something to do with it.

The two of you probably bond a bit over your paper thin morals. After all, when you aren't playing at being Robin, you don't have to follow Bruce's moral code either.

Bruce is okay. The one here isn't horrendously terrible or anything but there were probably more bumps along the way. You straight up tell him to start seeing a therapist. His nest of birdies are his children first before they are his vigilante partners. He should make that clear before he makes another blunder, fails to apologize, and has to try to mend his relationships again.

He asks if you’re one of his children. You laugh until your ribs hurt.

Damian asks why you (and your Tim) are still Robin. You’re reasonably confused. Dick had informed him that your Damian is with the Waynes already yet has not been made Robin.

You aren’t exactly aware of how this Damian (or comic Damian for that matter) became Robin but you just tell him, “There’s no rush to pass on the mantle. Besides, we’re a couple years behind you guys.”

"You coddle him." "He's literally like, 9."

He'll figure it out someday once he gets past the being raising in an assassin cult thing. You ask what pets he has to derail him.

Things are easier with Cass, as they always have been. She takes one look at you and definitively declares "Family". You smile, ruffle her hair, the same as you would with your Cass, and she drags you away to talk to Steph.

Steph cracks a joke about your presence evening out the gender ratio in the household. She's also on the phone with Barbara so you say a quick hi before being swept into the next conversation.

You and Tim. Tim and you.

It’s been years since Jack and Janet Drake have died. Years upon years since Tim was a little boy waiting by the phone for his parents to call and tell him they’re coming home. He thinks some part of him still longs for them, despite it all.

And now, there is you. His sibling who never existed.

You remind him of his mother, of Janet. You’re as sharp as he remembers her being but you’re so terribly warm and patient and casually affectionate in ways he still isn't used to. Perhaps you're how Janet would've been like if she had loved him more.

You and Tim probably have the most to talk about out of everyone, especially about the early days from before he became Robin. Throughout it, he finds out just how much you've involved yourself in the other Tim's life. There's something sad in your expression when the two of you talk.

He hasn't needed someone to protect or raise him for a very long time but still, it must have been nice to have you, to have someone to trust and love him unconditionally.

For what it's worth, you tell him you're proud of him. Even if you don't exist in this universe, he's still your itty bitty tiny little brother.

Something bubbles in his chest. He thinks it might just be jealousy for the version of him that has your unconditional love. The version that has everything that you could give him.

Alfred brings down food for you to eat. Despite the fact that you don't belong, he insists on calling you "Master (Y/n)". Some things never change you suppose.

Everyone notes that it's very very strange to see you be so familiar with everyone when none of them know you. It's like they're all stumbling over a step in their life, fumbling in their interactions with you, uncertain about what to do.

Duke wanders into the Batcave in the morning and finds you at the batcomputer, still wearing your Robin costume. You get one look at him and go, "Ah they didn't tell you about me did they."

You give him a quick rundown ("I'm from an alternate universe, yeah I showed up last night, I'm Tim's older sibling, I'm only a placeholder Robin, no I don't really know you but I think I've seen you around in my universe before") before he leaves for day-patrol.

He's cool. You'll keep an eye out for him when you get back.

True to your expectation, less than a day after your arrival, a portal opens up beside you. Everyone's in the batcave and are able to see you off as Tim (your Tim) reaches out to bring you home.

You're wrapped up in hugs immediately upon return. So clingy, you think as you say, "I'm home."

Tim, who's buried by your side, mumbles, "Welcome home."

As for you filling in as Red Robin later on, it might be better to discuss it chronologically with Batman getting lost in the timestream and the no good very bad follow up conversation about who should wear the cowl that somehow ends up with you filling in as Nightwing.

[hunn1e-bunn1e]

My dearest lord of the burrow, I beseech you, please grace this mere peasant with another scrumptious Demiurge fic? You, my lord, are the only individual I have found in my travel on this desolate land known as Tumblr to create gender neutral or male reader Demi fics and one's that are not of a sexual nature.

If you would hear my plea, this one would be eternally grateful. You, my lord, may call me, 🥕Carrot.

Seraphim SB Part 2, Electric Boogaloo~

🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.

Greetings, noblest 🥕Carrot anon, one has heard of your quest for gender-neutral and male reader Demiurge content and sends you this small offering to hopefully quench your thirst... even if this is only slightly Demiurge related... sorry about that. This particular work is a gn reader one as pronouns aren't mentioned at all, and it is a continuation of a previously received ask since there were no specifications in the ask you sent. —Benny🐰

Original Post

                                                                                                   

🔆•♡•🔅•♡•🔆•♡•🔅•♡•🔆•♡•🔅•♡•🔆•♡•🔅

Presenting…! An short overview of Seraphim SB's general information!

It wasn't mentioned in the original ask, but Seraphim SB is the heteromorphic race ‘Angel’ and has gotten to the maximum evolution and level, reaching the class of ‘Seraph’. I thought of a passive trait of theirs being that they have a natural holy aura around them that purifies anything within a certain distance of them. And by anything, I mean, living and non-living things.

As mentioned in the previous ask their aura harms those of undead or demonic origin, steadily chipping away at the health of those who are at the same level or higher and hacking away at the health of those of lower levels. The effect of Seraphim SB's aura is so powerful that even Ainz has to step away from them after a while after seeing his health become three-quarters of what it was just an hour ago.

As said above, Seraphim SB is a Seraphim; in angelology, Seraphim represents light, ardor (enthusiasm & passion), and purity. This would mean, after a little while in the new world their overall demeanor would become incredibly positive, bright, and enthusiastic.

The positivity they hold never dissipates even in the most serious or depressing situations, as their mind no longer allows them to feel negative emotions; their racial qualities completely blacking them out. They'll also take on a strange sense of innocence that makes those around them feel an irrational need to protect them from certain things and people. Seraphim SB's positivity also affects those around them, driving being into an almost deranged happiness if they stick around too long.

Because of Seraphim SB's holy origin, most if not all of the spells, skills & abilities they use are also of holy origin. Their particular skill is somewhat similar to a command order, but it's strictly directed at other angels. This skill, ‘Buisine’, allows players of the seraphim class to issue irrevocable commands to those of the angel race that are ten levels or less below them. Not only that, but angels and other holy beings have a natural want to follow, serve, and protect seraphim as they are usually a sign that a God is nearby.

It's already been established that Seraphim SB is the law of Nazarick; they are the judge and sometimes the executioner. But, who's the jury? Seraphim SB has two NPCs who act as their jury, each one is of a race that can split themselves into multiple consciousnesses with a maximum of six. They give off the appearance that each part has its own thoughts on each case, but in reality, they all share the same thoughts, goals, and morals stem from Seraphim SB. So to be clear, the “jury” is also Seraphim SB. It was also mentioned in another ask I received, but they can summon a sort of instant domain in the form of a grand courtroom that can seat thousands.

Let's talk about Seraphim SB and their relationship with others in Nazarick!

As stated in the previous post, Seraphim SB pays the arch-devil no real mind. They usually ignore most of the people around in favor of having a constant internal celebration instead. What do they celebrate about, you ask? Anything. Back on topic– Because Seraphim SB is physically and mentally incapable of having negative thoughts and opinions anymore, they usually fail to see the wrong in anyone's words or actions.

Demiurge wants to take over the world in the name of Ainz and themself and also happens to be kidnapping humans and doing unspeakable things to them at the Happy Farm? Okay! Sounds great! Shaltear was brainwashed and is fighting Ainz? That's awesome, Seraphim SB is rooting for both of them! Albedo wants to hunt down and kill any other players she finds? Cool! They're wishing her luck! 

Seraphim SB is also incapable of reprimanding and forgiving others, they can't identify that any wrong has been committed and because of that, have no reason to punish or forgive them. That may make you wonder how they can accurately judge others when they commit a crime against Nazarick, but they trust that the book of laws that Ainz gave them is correct and they abide by it without fail. They also have Albedo, Demiurge, and their NPCs to point them in the right direction when it's needed.

Because they trust so readily and are easily manipulated by others, Demiurge, lucky for him, has been assigned to Seraphim SB as a sort of protector and a balance to their morals. 

🔆•♡•🔅•♡•🔆•♡•🔅•♡•🔆•♡•🔅•♡•🔆•♡•🔅

🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.•°•.🐇.

Reblogs are appreciated ~ 𔓘

Wanna see similar content? Check out my Masterlist!

[mykneeshurt]

Hi! I’ve read your post based anon’s request about “reader (female) has a tendency to be unintentionally lewd and radiates submissive energy” and the team couldn’t handle it anymore (somewhere along the lines).

It was super hot 🥵 👁️👄👁️ 🫣🫣🫣 👀

If that’s okay with you, can I request the same thing but with König & Keegan please? TYSM!! ☺️☺️☺️

P/s: shoutout to anon who sent the previous request! ☺️

Hopefully I’ve done these two justice! Keegan could have me anywhere anytime tbh. The P in Keegan P Russ stands for pussy destroyer.

Warnings - allusions to smut

Keegan 🗡️

Keegan P Russ. Your Sargent and superior, he was good looking sure, and you definitely had a crush on him. But you knew better than that. You took your role in the Ghost team seriously, you’d worked hard to get there and now it was time to reap your rewards.

What you didn’t notice was how your mere presence turned the normally stoic, professional silent man into a weeping mess. He first noticed his attraction to you when you were sniping together. He watched as you laid yourself out on the floor in a prone position, your ass pert standing to attention. He made a mental note of it for later.

The second time was when you were at the shooting range, he’d come in to mentor you but was ran late. All he could hear was your frustrated groans behind the partition due to your gun jamming. Even the most ferocious curse words sounded soft and fluffy on your tongue. His mind instantly went to the gutter.

The third and final time was when you were practicing close combat knife skills. You’d asked for some more practice, how could he say no to you? He was showing you a new move and gripped your wrist to guide the movement, to show how fluid it should be. Little did he know you were a fast learner, after showing you two times you cracked it. Tripping him up on his back, blade to his neck, you stared down at him, face determined and stern. Your breath fanned over his neck, he felt his cock grow instantly hard.

Your face softened and you shot him a warm smile, you stood up and extended your hand to help him up. But he had other ideas, grasping your hand he pulled you back on top of him. Needless to say Keegan showed you how quickly he could learn what you needed.

König 👑

You were the first friendly face König saw when he arrived at base. He was on loan from KorTac for a specific mission and the 141 boys instantly puffed up their chests.

König instantly felt relaxed around you, at ease.

He loved how expressive you were, you’d bite your lips, stick your tongue out when you were concentrating and when you were listening to him you’d lick your lips. The most innocent body language, but it caused his mind to flutter.

He watched you working on one of the jeeps, face covered in oil, mouth agape as you huffed. He could listen to you work all day, the little moans and groans that fell from your lips echoed in his head every minute of the day.

König then watched you in the gym, beating the shit out of the punching bag. Skin covered in sweat your tongue hung over your lips, biting them intermittently. How he longed for his cock to be in your mouth, feeling your tongue and teeth along his sensitive skin. That’s when he broke, he couldn’t take it anymore. He approached you cautiously, your eyes lighting up as you greeted him. He swiftly threw you over his shoulder ready to fuck that beautiful little mouth of yours.

[a-dragons-journal]

Not the previous anon, but your answer made me wonder what exactly defines something being alterhuman. I know it means an experience/identity that’s alternative to humanity, but I find that definition vague and uncommitted. Like, what does alternative to humanity mean exactly and who gets to define it? If it’s an experience that the vast majority of humanity doesn’t have, then that would definitely include archetropes and hearthomes, but it would also include stuff like being a master bassoon player because that’s something most people aren’t as well. I’m not asking this in bad faith, I’m just confused where the line is drawn, what is considered alterhuman, and what isn’t, and why, because it all seems kinda arbitrary.

This post, the final "coining post" (put in quotes because it was kind of a process of refining more than a single post, but this was the final definition essay) for AlterHuman Personal Identity/AHPI, which would rapidly turn into just alterhumanity, may be helpful to you.

As I said in my last post (which was sent before you sent this in, in your defense), it is ultimately subjective and up to interpretation a bit. There's a reason that there's debate on, say, whether plurality should be included in alterhumanity "by default". It is kind of arbitrary, because that's how a label as broad as alterhuman works. That being said, I would say that, to use your example, being a master bassoon player doesn't make you alterhuman because while that experience is rare, it's not one society considers outside the range of "normal human experience."

But there's also, admittedly, a cultural aspect to it. A lot of mainstream society considers being neurodivergent outside the range of "normalcy" - but few people will argue that neurodivergency in general should be considered alterhuman by default (although personally, if an individual feels their neurodivergency makes the word alterhuman fit them right, I feel that's up to them to decide). And yet, plurality, arguably just one form of neurodivergency, is often considered alterhuman by default, in large part because of cultural ties between the plural community and other alterhuman communities - plurality often comes with speciesqueer experiences, fictionfolk experiences, and other experiences that are shared with or similar to other alterhuman identities, and perhaps as a result of that, the communities have a history of interacting a lot. Similarly, a term that arose out of alterhuman spaces is a lot more likely to be considered alterhuman than one that arose elsewhere - because the fact that alterhumans felt that it needed to be created says that they probably feel it's divergent enough from "normal human experience" to "count" as alterhuman, and because its historic and cultural ties to the alterhuman community probably make it inherently connected to the idea of alterhumanity, if that makes any sense.

It is subjective and it is messy, and I know that's not as satisfying an answer as you'd probably like, but like I said, it's the nature of an ultra-broad umbrella term designed with inclusiveness as a high priority. It's not a clean line so much as a gradient - there's a wide swathe of gray area transitioning slowly from "definitely alterhuman* (ex. therianthropy)" -> "alterhuman by default, but relatively easy to see how someone might not consider it to be (ex. plurality)" -> "not necessarily alterhuman by default, but easily considered as such (ex. furry lifestyler)" -> "not alterhuman by default, a few may consider it to be (ex. furry)" -> "definitely not alterhuman (ex. bassoon player)".

*"definitely alterhuman" as in, by definition; individuals may of course choose to not use the term for themself. ex. therianthropy firmly fits under the alterhuman umbrella by definition, though not all therianthropes like or use that word.

Or at least that's my thoughts on it. Y'all's thoughts, @ the general alterhuman public?

[thevindicativevordan]

Hi, hope you are doing well. I am the anon who asked this question about the Maker (post/730144525324009472/im-conflicted-about-the-maker-as-a-character-on) and I wanted to know what are your thoughts on the Marvel Universe as remade by the Maker? I understand that most of it is a comentary/analogy to real life events, with technocompanies rulling the USA, the USA doing experiments in the Pacific with radiation, basically everything Midas stand for, etc. But, looking from the Maker point of view, how do you think it fits with what he wants? And what do you think he wants, in the end?

Perfect time to ask me this because after I got temp banned from the CBR Forums recently, I decided to read all of Ultimate Fantastic Four. I need to amend my earlier post regarding the Maker - he does actually feel like a believable evolution on the flaws that were always present in 1610 Reed:

Even before he became a homicidal maniac, 1610 Reed Richards was a dick. There was a mean streak and petulancy that I had forgotten about. A willingness to walk riiiiiiiight up to the moral divide that was present from the very beginning. Millar, Bendis, and Ellis all established Maker as having a darker side. Using torture against Doom was on the table, he flat out rejected the possibility that he had made a mistake, he did messed up science experiments for fun. The pieces were all there! Alas the execution sucked. I still stand by what I posted here regarding the Ultimate Doom trilogy:

Bendis' depiction of his "fall" was awful and incoherent. Under Bendis, Reed instantly becomes the type of guy willing to commit cold blooded murder against both his family and other heroes for no real reason. If Reed is pissed about the military controlling everything, why is he trying to kill Peter Parker? Shouldn't he be trying to kill Nick Fury and destroy SHIELD? That at least would make sense, Ultimate Nick Fury is a fucking awful person. Instead he murders his entire family instead of just his asshole dad because... I don't know, he's just evil now. A writer can't write someone smarter than them, and Bendis is just not the guy for tackling the world's smartest heroic mind descending into villainy. Reed's plan is dumb and paper thin.

Coldly murdering his mother and sister Enid - his sister whom he went through all the effort to save from Psycho-Man in one of the final UFF arcs! - reads even more egregiously out of character. Why did he kill those two and not just his asshole dad? No clue, Bendis never bothered to give us an explanation. Trying to kill all of SHIELD after the UFF fall apart makes perfect sense to me after reading Ultimate Power for the first time. 1610 Nick Fury is evil. Fury is a monster whom even Dick Cheney would have to kneel in awe before. Asshole deserves to die and SHIELD should be destroyed. Sending suicide bombers to murder Spider-Man and his other heroic peers on the other hand?

No Bendis, you need to actually explain WTF Maker was thinking there because that makes no sense AND it doesn't line up with his previous characterization! Maker didn't want to kill the zombie F4 despite them 1. Being undead and 2. Planning to infect and eat everyone on his Earth. He wasn't willing to kill Doom even after Ultimatum. Then suddenly off-screen he becomes the kind of guy who murders his sister who only ever looked up to and worshiped him, and his mother who tried to support him and showed him nothing but love? Terrible writing, and it makes me so mad because everything else is brilliant setup unintentional though it was.

Pages like this one floored me. You read this knowing they were not setting up Maker yet somehow it perfectly does just that. The other Baxter Building kids breaking off to form their own perfect society in a secret city tucked away from private eyes? Being sick of how they were forced to serve the military? Commitment to the idea to the point they're willing to kill the F4 and any military personnel sent after them? In-universe this, and other events like Psycho-Man's utopia, likely served as the foundation for where Maker came up with the idea of the City. Everything fits! It's a natural result of Maker having an enormous ego, having seen others make their own attempts at building utopias, tossing morality aside, and going "they failed but I'll succeed. I don't make mistakes like they do."

Begs the question OP asked: why did he make Earth 6160 into the way it is? Fantastic question especially considering that both as a hero, and during his initial fall to villainy, Maker hated the "corruption" of science into a force that only served the elite.

Yet the world of 6160 is exactly what he claimed to hate! America collapsed into a realm ruled by technocrats who abused science to enrich themselves. Freaking Midas is in the White House using cosmic energy as a power source for his war suit and the electric grid. What gives? Is it just Maker being a hypocrite? Maker offers two justifications in Ultimate Invasion. First, that he ran civilization models in the City and humanity cannot accept perfect peace. If you've ever watched the Matrix you know how that argument goes. We aren't built to live in paradise. Our human natures are too fallible, when offered the option we reject it. Given Maker's god complex it does suit him that he invokes the Biblical explanation for why evil exists - human nature demands it.

However, there's a second justification. Maker treats Earth 6160 as his playground, his laboratory. He's the Emperor of the World, and with that comes those who would covet his throne. Keeping the world full of conflicts and evils keeps people divided. They're so busy fighting each other that they can't unite against him. Hitler, Genghis Khan, Bismarck, Stalin, Mao, history is full of dictators who employed similar logic to maintain power. Yes it makes him a hypocrite but Maker is beyond caring about the "small minded" dreams he had back before he jumped off the slippery slope.

Regarding what he wants power for, there are two likely motives to parallel his two justifications. I believe he is trying to create the "Ultimate Earth", an Earth that lives up to what he wanted 1610 to be. Time travelling to the future indicates that he is at the very least invested in this Earth's well-being. He saved it from Galactus, he kept the Council from spiraling out of control as they now threaten to do in his absence. He supported scientific and technological advancements that did improve life for everyone. Howard mentions curing cancer. Maker's Ultimate Earth appears to be a technologically advanced society where the peoples lives are improved at the cost of their freedom. In a single word: Latveria. Fitting for a Reed who has gone the way of Doom.

Unsurprisingly Maker's other motive is much more selfish and narcissistic: he wants to screw with Earth 6160 Reed.

Mentioned this before somewhat in my previous post:

My theory is that it's because Maker is trying to take a Reed who is similar to 616 Reed and transform the guy into a monster like him. It's his middle finger to 616 Reed. Maker wants to prove that 616 Reed isn't better than him, if Mr. Fantastic had lost his family and been put through hell like Maker had, he would break too. That 6160 Reed is, so far, not a monster like Maker pisses Maker off. It's not logical to keep 6160 Reed around, and doing so leads to Maker's fall.

Additionally there's some clear self-hatred going on.

Note the callback to UFF with the "I don't make mistakes" line. People talk about Sue rejecting the marriage offer as being the big divergence point between the 616 and 1610 Reeds. I think it goes back even further. 616 Reed was the one who messed up his friends lives. 1610 Reed however was blameless. 1610 Doom, not Reed, was the one who caused the accident that gave the Four their powers. In Ultimate Power it was Doom's meddling which was revealed to have killed millions of people despite Maker initially being blamed. Maker never had to feel the guilt that Mr. Fantastic has to live with. Always when it seemed like he had screwed up, a reveal came to absolve him of any responsibility. Arguably his two greatest pre-Maker screw-ups were teleporting to the zombie Earth and creating the Cosmic Cube and guess what? Both of those were because of external agents in the forms of zombie Reed and Thanos meddling with his head.

So having done nothing wrong his whole life, never having screwed up with nobody to blame but himself, when Sue dumped him and his whole life fell apart because he put saving the world over his personal desires in Ultimatum? Knowing, thanks to zombie Reed, that there were Reeds out there who got married and had families and kept the Four together despite making mistakes? My headcanon is that's what broke him. Also that's why he made Doom's life hell. 6160 Reed was supposed to live the life 616 Reed got, the kind of life Maker wanted. Instead he lost everything. Why? Because from Maker's point of view, Doom doesn't deserve that kind of happiness. Why should Maker, a Reed who never made mistakes, be the one Reed denied that joy while all the Reeds who are responsible for transforming their friends get to have that?

So Maker took 6160 Reed and gave him the life he thinks Mr. Fantastic should've gotten. 6160 Reed made the mistake of not double checking his notes and lost everything. He ended up with the burnt face and Doom moniker because from Maker's point of view, that is what should have happened to 616 Reed. Maker should be the beloved hero with the fantastic family as befitting a Reed who never made mistakes, not the unworthy Reeds who are fallible. In Maker's mind, 616 Reed should be the one whose Sue rejected him and became a villain. His words in Ultimate Invasion about having thought about what he and 616 Reed would be like if they swapped lives support this.

There's a beautiful symmetry going on here between Maker and Doom. Dooms usually blame Reeds for ruining their lives by sabotaging Doom's experiments. Here is a Doom for whom that belief is valid, and his obsession with Maker completely justified. Except it's himself that he's obsessed with, just as Maker is clearly obsessed with Mr. Fantastic. A grand ouroboros of Reeds chasing after one another. Fitting, for Reeds have always been their own worse enemies.

[hbowardaily]

We are happy to announce, that @hbowardaily is once again hosting an online gift exchange for the holidays with a few small changes to previous years!  

This event is open to anyone and we will be accepting all characters from the three shows in any creative form! Gifsets, edits, graphics, moodboards, fanarts and fanfics are all welcomed! However in this event you can only participate on Tumblr, which means all creations should be posted to Tumblr, even the full texts of fanfictions!

Please use the tag #hbowarsanta23 for every creation so we can reblog them!

During this event everyone will give something and receive something. After the sign-ups are over we will reach out to everyone and send them their giftee’s url and preferences.

During the exchange, you have to send anonymous messages to your giftee to get to know about them and their likes/dislikes, the goal of the exchange is to get to know each other better! At least two anonymus messages should be sent during the event, one in November and one in December. This will be checked so please don't forget to send something!

Make sure you have your ask and anon feature enabled to participate!

You can make your gift anytime, but don’t post it before the posting starts!

Make sure you allow messages from those you don't follow or give our admin (@supervalcsi) a follow, so we can send out your giftee's information. This will be checked upon applying, and your application won't be accepted until you do the needful!

In case somebody is not able to finish the event, we are in need of pinch-hitters for those who wouldn’t get anything otherwise. Please if you would be able to make one more gift in this case, fill out the respective question on the sign-up form you can find below!

In the light of our last exchange event we are intorducing a new drop-out system. Those who drop-out after sending out information will be banned from our next exchange event, those who drop-out after posting has started will be banned for two years from all our exchange events. Dropping out before November won't have any consequencies.

Schedule:

Sign-ups: Oct 12. - Nov. 1.

Sending out information: Nov. 2 - Nov. 5

Creating: Nov. 6 - Dec. 23

Posting your creations: Dec. 24 - Dec. 27.

HERE you can find the sign-up form! Introducing a new option, from now on you are able to send your application to your email address, so you have your choices and answers later on.

If you have any question, don’t hesitate to contact us!

[eddiediazismyhusband]

lmao buck didnt ditch tommy last episode, he just made a pit stop before going to spend the night with tommy, like do you think he spent the whole night there? and yeah, this episode, if he does leave tommy to go help eddie, that's what friends do ?? like what do you expect him to do, just ignore his friends life completely falling apart? buck is an adult relationship and adults respect the fact that they arent always going to be no 1 first priority ALL of the time. tommy respects that, especially because eddie is actively in a spiral, and honestly it's really refreshing to see such a healthy depiction of the balance between romantic/platonic relationships. i mean how many times have other couples been interrupted by similar emergencies, this is literally the emergency show like. yeah obviously when there is an emergency, the characters are going to drop everything and go to it. I swear you people have never had adult relationships, romantic or platonic, because you see a normal healthy relationship and are incapable of enjoying it. "not anti bi buck, just anti tommy kinard" not anti bi buck, just anti any relationship buck has with a man that isn't eddie

wow what did i say?? that was quick!

if you think buck left eddie’s house after hearing eddie say the words “yeah me too” in reference to being worried about him, then you do not know buck at all.

also when have we seen tommy respecting anything with buck? you all live in these made up scenarios that lou blabs on cameo when in reality all we have seen is tommy constantly be dismissive towards buck unless buck is actively paying sole attention to him. that is not a perfect and healthy relationship.

tommy is constantly speaking down to buck, calling him “kid” and refusing to call buck by the name he chose for himself. that is not the sign of someone who cares about buck to me.

as for being against any relationship buck is in with s man…. give me a man who actually shows that he gives a flying fuck about buck. give me a man who isn’t constantly being condescending and rude. give me a man who’s whole backstory wasn’t as a tool to put hen and chimney through hell at the 118. if buck was dating literally any other guy i wouldn’t be anywhere near as fed up with this plotline; but the fact of the matter is we have BARELY seen anything between them that isn’t tommy being a dick to buck unless buck is kissing him. that doesn’t read as a positive and healthy relationship to me. you all claim to care about buck so much, but then actively defend everything tommy does that is rude and condescending to buck as if buck somehow deserves it.

i am capable of enjoying normal healthy adult relationships because i have watched this show for seven years. i have seen these characters drop things for emergencies. i have picked up on the patterns they have laid down in previous storylines. i have experience working in filmmaking and know how to read into things.

normally i look at these asks and laugh because i don’t like to give a platform to people like you who hide begind anon to try and make buddie shippers out to be monsters but the fact that that post hasn’t even been up for ten minutes and you already felt the need to type a whole anon ask about how wrong i am when none of what you’ve pointed out has any canonical evidence of living in the truth? i have to laugh.

the block button is free. filtering out the anti tags is free. if you’re one of my followers…. when have i ever posted anything that would make you think i was pro tommy in any way that got you to follow me in the first place?

since you sent the ask on anon and i have no way of doing it myself, i invite you to go to my page and press the block button… the anti tags exist for a reason and if you don’t wanna see anti tommy content, either filter out the tags or block my blog. simple as that.

[thetomorrowshow]

hi i’m the anon who asked to make more of the reverse au

i realised i’m actually pretty terrible at writing and am terrified of posting my work anywhere but i still have so many ideas. i thought i’d just share them here in case you or anyone else is interested (you don’t have to read them i just want to get them out of my head)

-scott and jimmy become pen pals and write to each more and more until it’s a daily occurrence. through the letters jimmy tells scott everything that was said in dissonant air (he can’t control his powers, he never meant to hurt anyone, the depressing thoughts, etc)

-they see each others real faces during a poorly timed letter delivery. scott had come to give jimmy his letter in his civilian get-up at the same time jimmy was leaving his apartment

-scott didn’t return to being a hero between the times he was kidnapped from his injuries and from his fear of seeing xornoth again. he stayed trapped in his house writing letters. his friends were more than happy to help him buy groceries and stuff every once in a while. nobody noticed when he got kidnapped except for jimmy, since the letters stopped coming. at first jimmy thought scott had come to his senses and stopped talking to him but still had a feeling something was wrong

-jimmy tried to tell the other hero’s something was wrong but they didn’t trust him. after days of constantly bothering them and insisting major was in danger they finally complied. jimmy told them about scott’s previous kidnapping and they got on the case

-the hero’s tried to find xornoths lair by themselves (they wouldn’t let jimmy help for obvious reasons) but gave in after months of failure and let poor jimmy help. he used what information he could find from all of the letters he was sent. it wasn’t a lot but it was enough to work with

wow this got long. sorry about that! there’s still other stuff i had in my head with this (like with what was going on with scott during all of this and how they get him out) but idk if you’d want to hear more. sorry if this was bad i’m not the best with writing and grammar

I never thought I would write anything else for this au of an au. But hey, here we are.

For clarity's sake, Jimmy is 'S' and Scott is 'M'.

---

Hey! Hope everything’s good. Sorry about your security camera :/ I think I broke it… But I just wanted to say thank you for not mentioning me to the police. Or the reporters. Yeah. Sorry. But I hope you’re getting to feeling better! Thanks again and sorry again

Thanks

S

~

Thank you for your help.

-M

~

Hey, just wanted to let you know I got your note! Glad I could help, really. I feel like I never do anything right, so it was nice to be able to help someone for once. On a related note, I think your groceries went bad. Sorry :( I should start pre-writing these so that I don’t stand on your doorstep for so long. But how does getting groceries delivered work? I’ve been wanting to try it for a while because supermarkets are a landmine. But I hope you’re well! I hope you’re eating enough. Sorry about the groceries.

Thanks!!

S

~

Please do not stand on my doorstep to write notes.

You visit the store’s website and click the delivery option.

-M

~

Thanks for the advice about the whole shopping thing! I haven’t done it yet because I dropped my phone into an incinerator the other day and I’m still trying to buy a new one but the power goes out every time I walk into an electronics store. I’ll try it out once I have a new one though!! And I’m so so sorry I know I shouldn’t stand on your doorstep because like anyone could pass by, which is why I’ve only been stopping by at night, but I think Pearl almost saw me the other night so I’ll be more careful.

Sorry again!!

S

P.S. Sorry I’m standing on your doorstep but I was just wondering why you haven’t done any interviews?? You’ve been back for while now and people are going to worry… just checking to make sure you’re okay! Getting kidnapped can kind of take it out of you for a while :/

~

Sorry you haven’t said anything I just wanted to let you know that I tried out the delivery thing!! It worked really well actually I didn’t have to sign for it or anything just came right up to my doorstep. A lot of the stuff wasn’t what I ordered and the jam I wanted had shattered but it worked and it was way less stressful than usual so you’re the best for telling me how to do it thanks so much!

S

P.S. sorry sorry sorry but you don’t have to write me back if you don’t want to, I just wanted to check that you’re doing okay! Have a good week :) 

~

If they sent you the wrong items, you should get a refund.

Thank you. I don’t plan on any public appearances until I don’t panic when I go outside for the time being. I am recovering well.

-M

~

Okay you didn’t say to stop writing but it was good to hear from you! I felt really bad that I couldn’t help you more that night so I just worry. I’ve been thinking lately though that you probably don’t want to hear from me though so I can stop.

I do need to say something first, though. I mentioned it when you were at my at that apartment with me, but I don’t know how much you remember from then or anything. But basically I’m so so sorry about everything. Like literally everything. I’ve never forgiven myself for Aeor and I don’t expect you to, either, but I just wanted to let you know that I’m sorry. If I could change everything I would. Believe me I would. I’ve hurt too many people. It would be better if I didn’t exist. I don’t deserve to I’ve hurt I should just start a new note at this point, haha. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I understand if you don’t want me to write any more notes. I’ll stop. I hope you’re doing well and you continue to recover!

S

P.S. last time I got kidnapped I was really scared of going back to my apartment so I moved and I felt better, so maybe you need a bit of time out of the city to help you get tip-top :)

~

Thank you for the apology.

And my therapist thinks that might be an unhealthy way of coping, as much as I might agree with you that getting away sounds nice. I’m working through it.

You don’t have to stop writing.

-M

~

I AM SO SORRY I DIDN’T KNOW YOU WERE AT MY DOOR BEFORE I WALKED OUT LET’S NEVER TALK ABOUT IT AGAIN

Anyways wow you have a therapist that’s good!! My advice isn’t really good haha sorry. I actually did therapy for a little when I was in school but then everything went really bad with my powers and but then things didn’t work out. I don’t know why I crossed that out. Basically I was in therapy to try and learn how to control my powers and well we know how that ended up.

Quick question maybe I haven’t paid enough attention to you on tv but are your eyes naturally that blue? Because it’s really blue.

S

~

This is my natural eye color.

I didn’t know that there was a therapy program for children who struggle to control their powers. You said it didn’t help, though. I’m glad that you were able to figure it out without professional help.

You were kidnapped before. Does it get any easier? I’m sorry to hear that.

-M

~

Oh so about the therapy thing yeah my powers came when I was like 15 and that’s usually a little old for that therapy but they made a special exception. But no it didn’t work. Actually my parents were planning to send me away to a specialist where I could get the help I needed but it never ended up happening. So I just never learned how to control them.

On a related note a giraffe ate my new phone but I tried out the delivery thing again before that! I kind of expect to get the wrong things because of my powers haha so I’m not going to complain about my ten bottles of ketchup. But my jam did shatter again so I have to decide if it’s worth the anxiety of going to the store.

The first time I got kidnapped, I was really scared. I didn’t know what was happening. They wanted information, I think? I was panicking really bad because they kept pointing guns at my head. I got out pretty quick but it was bad for a long time. I didn’t want to leave my apartment. I mean I never do, really, but it was even worse.

I don’t know when I moved on. I think my sink broke and I was forced to leave the house, but moving isn’t the same as moving on, you know? Like you can run anywhere but it’s usually just running away. You have to face it.

S

~

Thanks for the advice. I really liked that last thing you said.

I don’t want to face them, though. I know I have to, but what if they take me again?

I’m sorry. These are my problems, not yours.

-M

~

Oh gosh I didn’t mean you have to face Xornoth!! No that sounds bad! They literally kidnapped and tortured you for like a month dude! Honestly forget what I said about the whole running away thing, you should really try to get away from this situation if you can. You shouldn’t feel responsible for Xornoth when they hurt you like that, let someone else deal with that! There are tons of supers in the city, just tell one of your friends that you don’t want to be involved with Xornoth and they’ll take care of it!

S

~

I’m the Primary Protector, though. It’s my job to face the city’s greatest threats, and Xornoth is one of them. I should be able to handle them.

I don’t want my friends to see me any differently. They already give me weird looks. I honestly wasn’t very badly hurt—I was mostly malnourished. They don’t understand why I’m not back in the game yet. I don’t know how to tell them.

I wish I could leave.

-M

~

:(( it sounds like you’re really struggling. Do you think you might have PTSD? You don’t have to answer that. But you should take your time! If it was anyone else, I think they’d have moved very far away to get away from the danger which is smart. It’s actually really upsetting that you can’t. Maybe you can work out like a code with your friends so that they can come in and handle Xornoth if they show up while you’re working? Honestly just the fact that they were able to kidnap you once means that there should be extra protection for you. Heck maybe I can do something.

If you need anything though I’m here. I don’t get it exactly but I kind of know what it’s like. I mean yeah I’ve been kidnapped before a couple of times but I know what it’s like to not want to go outside in general. To be scared of what could happen. Well you have other friends but I’m here to help if I can. I don't make promises ever because they never work out for me but I'm here.

S

~

Thank you for the offer. I don’t think there’s anything you can do to help.

I have been diagnosed with PTSD, actually. I’m also readjusting to my antidepressants still, so my therapist thinks some of my anxieties come from the meds change and will even out in time.

I think I’ll do a public interview soon. I don’t want them to think that they’ve scared me away.

They’re dangerous. Please don’t endanger yourself. They experimented on me They might try to It isn’t worth the risk.

-M

~

The craziest fight happened downtown!

Okay so I was really just trying to get to the Planet Fitness to take a shower (I’m not homeless haha my shower is broken again) but Mythics was battling Pearl downtown and it was WILD. Like they were not pulling any punches, and I thought they were kind of friendly rivals but this was just crazy! But then the Oracle got involved? So the fight just kind of stopped when he touched them and then he left. I thought the Oracle was a villain but that was vigilante behavior if you ask me. I get it though, if I could’ve done that I would’ve. Like maybe he just needed to take a shower too.

Anyways my powers decided to make everything ten times worse like usual so a giant worm burst out of the ground. Maybe I should have let the Oracle touch me too so that I could join Mythics and Pearl on the ground crying. They’re fine btw some civilians dragged them out of the way of the worm. I was too busy trying to figure out a way to deal with the worm. I think Mythics woke up and magicked it into one of his portal things.

But anyways it was crazy. Well you probably already saw it on the news or something.

I hope the interview goes well!! How does that even work? Like does somebody come to your house or do you go to the news station or what? I'm assuming you've done a couple of interviews before idk.

S

~

I saw about the attack. You should look up ‘tired man throws phone at giant worm video’ if you haven't seen it.

For the interview, I reach out to a news outlet and set up an interview (or, more often, they reach out to me). Then we usually meet in a nice room in their office. I've done tons of interviews, you can find them on my twitter or on youtube.

I'm nervous about the interview. I tried to get a reporter I like but I just know that they'll ask me why I've been away. I don't want them to think I'm weak. It isn't your problem, anyways. I'll talk about it with my therapist.

Really though, you should watch that video.

-M

~

NOOO THAT'S SO BAD THAT SHOULD BE A CRIME

In my defense I was really tired and I just threw whatever was in my hand at the worm, I didn't realize it was my phone.

I've never given an interview before but man that sounds stressful. I hope it goes well! I'd appreciate it if you didn't mention me in it of course but you know that. Good luck and let me know how it goes!

Also if it helps at all taking time off definitely doesn't make you weak. Sometimes it's even stronger to admit you need a break than to keep powering through. Especially after being held captive and tortured for a month.

Good luck again!!

S

P.S. your cat is super cute but maybe she shouldn't be outside? It's really dangerous for cats to live outdoors and I don't want to accidentally hurt her :((

~

Thanks for the kind words.

I can send you the link to the interview if you tell me your phone number. Or I can dm it to you on twitter—is the verified account actually you? The one that mostly shares scam links and random ip addresses?

Also I'm working on leash training Elle, so that we can go on walks and she can be an inside cat.

-M

~

I've tried to write this note like fifty times but the paper keeps tearing so I'll keep it short. My phone number changes a lot and I currently don't have a phone (giraffe again) but I'll just look it up when I get one! And yep that's my twitter, I try to delete the old pictures of me it posts but I gave up on when it posts my location.

Good luck again!

S

~

Why don’t you delete twitter?

-M

~

I did :( 

S

~

Solidarity, your life kind of sucks.

-M

~

You’ve got no room to talk, mister.

S

~

So that’s what it is, isn’t it? We’re just two losers.

-M

P.S. but, for the record, your life is way worse than mine.

~

Okay I’ve got a new phone and I watched the interview! You did incredible, I think I would’ve run away like two seconds in. Like even when they asked that one question about why you weren’t back to work when you’re pretty much physically all right, you really kept it together. I was genuinely so impressed.

Also you’re looking good! I don’t know how to explain it haha, but you look a lot better than you did on my living room floor. How are you doing? Do you think it went well?

S

~

I’d look a lot better in your bed Thanks for watching. It was hard. It was really hard. But I think it helped. I feel kind of better about getting back into it all. Not yet, but maybe soon.

Do you ever wish you’d chosen a different path in life?

-M

~

I never really had a choice to make.

S

P.S. but if I wasn’t powered, I think I’d want to do something with my hands. I used to think subways were the coolest thing ever. I wouldn’t mind learning how to fix a subway car.

~

I studied to be an architect. I loved city architecture. I wanted to design skyscrapers.

I didn’t ever plan to be a hero full-time, but I do like it. I enjoy my job. I’m famous, I live comfortably, I do cool stuff on TV.

But what if I would’ve been happier as an architect?

Sorry, this isn’t your problem. I should talk to my therapist about it.

-M

P.S. Maybe you can take a community college mechanics course?

~

I really can’t, cars tend to break down around me. I don’t even take Ubers anymore (not related to the car breaking-down thing, but because last time the driver held me at gunpoint and stole my phone and wallet).

Honestly mate, if you want to be an architect I'd say go for it. Even if it's only something you can do on the side you know? There's tons of people who never got the chance to do what they love. You deserve a good life.

S

~

Thanks. I'm sorry that you never got to choose. You deserve a good life, too.

I can't let Xornoth win. If I run away, it's defeat. If I don't do anything about it, they might hurt someone else.

I need to take care of this myself.

-M

~

That sounds like a suicide note.

S

~

Wouldn't be the first time.

-M

~

You should ask your friends for help. You don't have to do this alone. You shouldn't face them alone.

S

~

I haven't really talked to anyone since I got back. I know it isn't healthy but I can't. They don't get it. They don't know what Xornoth did to me. I can't let it happen to anyone else. They're a danger to the city and it's my duty to take them down. Alone.

I'm sorry.

-M

~

You aren't alone, okay? If you have no one else, you have me.

S

~

Thank you.

-M

P.S. it means so much to me. I consider you a friend. You have me, too.

~

I saw you on the news fighting the Engineers. You looked good! The fight went really well. How do you feel about it? Is there anything I can do to like support you?

S

P.S. Elle won't stop begging me for belly rubs but each time I try she nips my fingers :(

~

Hey are you doing all right? I mean you took a little bit of a hit in that fight so it's okay if you can't make it to my apartment to drop off a note haha. You can email me if it's easier awsumwingback8@yahoo.com.

S

~

Major please just like let me know that you're okay.

S

~

I may have broken into Blossom’s house (I meant to just knock but the door fell down) and she kicked my butt but she hasn't seen you in a while, she said. Are you okay? I'll break into your house next haha.

S

~

I know you told me not to write notes while I'm on your doorstep but if you don't open the door by tomorrow night I'm breaking in. Elle keeps trying to get me to follow her inside. I'm going to watch your house until tomorrow night, okay? You don't have to write back, just open the door.

I'll come for you.

S

P.S. I didn't mean to sound weird or creepy I mean I have your back. I'll come save you if they got you. 

I promise.

[monstersandmaw]

Changing Tides - human prince 'cursed' into merfolk body (sfw)

Hello! This has been up on my Patreon for my $3 and $5 tiers to read for a week now. If you want to get early access to stuff, and to access my entire back catalogue, here's a link.

Disclaimer which I’m including in all my works after plagiarism and theft has taken place: I do not give my consent for my works to be used, copied, published, or posted anywhere. They are copyrighted and belong to me.

Anon sent me this message and I responded with almost 8000 words:

"human prince who got cursed and turned into a merman, and while his family and the royal court struggle to find a way to break the curse he finds he's actually happier as a merman"

It's 3rd person, sfw, and features an orca clan who adopts our frightened prince, and there's a hint of mlm romance for one of the orcas with a human in the future... Anyway, I hope you like something a little different. 

Content: some mild elements of body horror during the curse/turning scene, brief but not gory/too explicit mention of marine animal death, some implied trauma resulting from a transformation against his will/separation from family and previous existence at a young age, brief description of blood/injury from a harpoon to another character

Wordcount: 7965

Dusk gathered over the gentle swells of the open ocean, gilding the new yardarms and painting the perfectly crisp, white sails of the Royal Navy’s flagship with a pink and orange watercolour glow. The ship’s guests drank and laughed, and celebrated The Sea Rose’s maiden voyage, utterly unaware that they were enjoying their final few moments of life as they knew it.

Unremarkable in almost every way, a small porpoise had been playing in the bow wave, its small, dark body darting mere inches from the stem each time it plunged in and out of the spray and waves.

It didn’t hear the warning from the sea witch racing to catch up with it, and when the young porpoise’s concentration slipped and the black-painted stem of ‘The Sea Rose’ collided with its solid little body, no one on board noticed the tragedy of its passing. Even if the guests hadn’t been half drunk on the heady mix of wine and their own self-importance, there was no one on lookout in the crow’s nest that day; the new ship was flanked for her safety by two frigates a little way off, both crewed with the Navy’s finest and bristling to the gunwales with cannon and ammunition. There was no need to keep a watch this time.

There was, after all, no danger.

And yet, the animal’s accidental death would not go unmarked, unmourned, or unpunished.

Heedless of the vengeful danger rising swiftly from beneath the ship, the king himself strode along the main deck in his white and gold finery, leaving his guests for a moment as he spotted his thirteen year old son standing at the taffrail on the afterdeck and staring out at the ship’s trailing wake.

He slapped the skinny boy on his shoulders by way of a greeting, and nearly sent him toppling over into the sea from the force of his jovial blow. Hauling him upright again with a meaty fist at the scruff of his velvet doublet, the king laughed, cheeks red with drink and the bracing sea air, and he grinned down at his second eldest son.

“What’s got into you, lad?” he asked, his words a little thick and his green eyes a little glassy. “You’ve begged me for years to be allowed to go to sea, and now you’re here, you look like you’d rather be anywhere else! You’re not seasick, are you, lad? You’re going to be Admiral of the Fleet when your brother ascends the throne — can’t have you turning green at the slightest bit of swell!”

“It’s not that, father,” he said, mustering a smile for the king. “I’m sorry. I was just… thinking.”

Down below on the deck, the little prince’s older brother was talking with a few of the captains and admirals, and the boy felt suddenly every bit as young as he was. ‘King’ Eolan was a title that would suit his brother one day, with his regal bearing and his noble features, while the younger boy was gangly and too skinny to fill out the doublet he wore or the fine leather boots on his small feet.

He didn’t get the chance to observe the Crown Prince in action for much longer though, because a shudder ran the length of the new ship, and conversation sputtered and died.

The sails quivered and the rigging shook like spiderwebs before a coming storm. All the hands looked to their stations while the royal guests shifted uneasily and someone dropped a wine flute into the silence of the swelling sea. The Crown Prince scuttled up the stairs to the afterdeck and joined his father, tense and alert, though not before laying a hand on his little brother’s shoulder and offering a reassuring smile.

While the ship sailed past the stricken porpoise in a foaming, heedless rush, the creature bobbed past with its back broken, dead on impact, and the sea darkened around it and then began to boil and churn along the sides of the ship.

Finally, a shout went up and someone standing by the rail on the port side pointed and then reeled back in alarm. They were joined by more guests and sailors until half the ship’s company was hanging off the side and staring into the water that had turned an inky black around the corpse of the sea creature.

The thirteen year old prince followed his father to the railing of the high afterdeck and peered over in time to see a humanoid figure rise from the water. Her long, wet hair hung around her shoulders like a veil of moonlight, and her eyes flashed the colour of the ocean on a summer’s day. Her skin was freckled and oddly iridescent and the air around her seemed to shimmer like the road on a summer’s day. In her right hand she held a staff that was the silvery brown of old driftwood, wrapped around with seaweed like the leather on the grip of a quarterstaff, and her lower body appeared to be that of a leopard seal.

The prince’s breath caught and he stared, slack jawed down at her, forgetting to be afraid.

At the sight of her though, the guests recoiled and grabbed at the charms and holy pendants they wore around their necks, but it would do them no good. The witch raised her staff and let out a wordless scream of grief. As if whisked by a winter squall, the sea rose up around her at her call and a huge wave sloshed against the side of the ship, rocking it and sending a wall of spray and foam across the main deck.

Wherever the droplets of water touched, a flurry of white feathers appeared, and from the afterdeck, the king and the two princes watched a flock of startled seabirds flounder upwards into the sky. In their wake, the main deck lay completely deserted.

The king swore and unsheathed the steel sword at his hip but the young prince simply clung to the wooden railing and continued to stare down at the sea witch.

All his life, he’d heard tales of merfolk and of the magic they wielded, but he’d never dared dream they might be real. He’d spent hours begging the merchants who came to the castle for stories from the fish markets, since every sailor claimed to have fallen in love with a selkie or kissed a mermaid on one of their voyages, but he’d never truly believed that merfolk really did exist.

“What is the meaning of this?” the king bellowed down at her over the sound of the settling sea. “Return this ship’s crew and my guests to me at once, witch!”

“Never!” she snarled. “They’ve flown far away now, oh great king,” she added sarcastically, still sneering, “Your pretty birds won’t return to you now!”

“Why? What prompted such an act?” he barked. To his younger son, he suddenly gestured and added, “Come away from there!” With a desperate look over his shoulder, he hissed at the Crown Prince, “Eolan, protect your brother!”

The witch smiled and the younger prince saw tears tracking down around the corners of her smile as it turned from malice to grief. “Father…” he breathed, wanting to warn the king, but not knowing quite why or of what.

“Quiet!” the king hissed with a sharp motion of his hand. “Eolan, fetch a harpoon. I will have her hide on my wall!”

The Crown Prince snuck away down the stairs, out of sight of the sea witch, and then disappeared below decks. As he left, the younger boy finally let go of the railings and came to stand behind his father.

“Your ship,” the witch called above the wash of water against the sides of the vessel, “Is an abomination! You toss your refuse into the sea to choke the life from those who live there, tangle us in your nets, capture us… skin us!”

She paused and choked something raw and visceral and far beyond articulation. Drawing energy into the staff in a swirl of mist, she came to the real crux of her grievance.

“Your ship took my familiar from me and you didn’t even care to notice!”

“Your what?”

“Shadow!” she wailed, and that sorrow finally crystallised into rage. She pointed as the body of the dead porpoise floated over towards her and then with another heartbroken shriek, she raised the staff not at the king, but at his son. “I curse you!” she spat at him. “I curse you! May your son’s frail human legs fail him and may he know the plight of our people first hand! May the air choke him and the water you disdain be his only solace!”

A bolt of lightning seared down out of a clear sky and struck the deck of The Sea Rose behind the king in a spray of splinters. Ozone and singed wood filled the air as he turned around at the wheezing gulp that left his son’s throat. At the sight that greeted him, the gilt steel sword dropped from his fingers to clatter across the deck at his feet.

The boy’s legs had gone completely limp and he hit the deck hard, eyes wide with terror.

“Father,” he tried to choke in panic, but the sound lodged in his throat.

He brought one hand up instinctively to claw at his neck as he failed to breathe, suffocating in the ordinary sea air, and a moment later his fingers found the three slits of gills in his skin that had not been there before the lightning of the witch’s curse had struck him.

Before the true terror of his discovery could sink in, however, a blinding pain erupted in his chest and his hips, and his legs began to spasm.

The boy tore at the trousers which were suddenly constricting and strangling him, cutting into his legs, and he rolled on the deck as he ripped them off to reveal the distinctive opal-green and black pattern of a mackerel’s skin beginning at his hips. He clawed wildly at his skin in horror trying to halt the change, and his father dragged the fabric away just as the transformation ran its course, and his son arched his back and writhed on the deck like a landed catch, unable to breathe and blind with terror.

Footsteps on the stairs announced Eolan’s return and when he saw his brother lying on the deck with the barbed tail of a mackerel, he crashed to his knees beside them, the harpoon forgotten.

Not knowing what to do, the king knelt at his son’s side and stroked his curly, black hair out of his eyes which were bulging as he failed to breathe.

“Father,” he mouthed, chest spasming.

The skin of his remaining human body turned a grayish silver, like tarnished pewter, and between his fingers as they scrabbled at the deck the king could see a thin webbing stretching and flexing. Black, wickedly sharp claws raked the wood of the deck to splintered furrows as the boy twisted and panicked.

“What do we do?” Eolan whispered, tears filling his eyes. “Father? He’s dying… He can’t breathe!”

Acting on the most fragile of hopes, the king picked his son up in his arms and held him briefly, kissing his forehead. “I love you,” he said. “I will find a way to reverse this.”

Before the cursed prince could work out what was happening, he had been flung over the side of the ship and hit the water with a heavy smack.

The rush of cold seawater across his new gills was a relief beyond anything he’d ever felt. Instinctively, he drew in water through them and let his body start to sink.

Above, the shadow of a second ship, the frigate ‘Persistence’, announced itself with a volley of musket fire, and the sea witch dived out of sight, dragging the body of her slain familiar with her into the depths, the young prince forgotten entirely.

In all the commotion, the prince disappeared into the depths of the coastal waters, alone and afraid for the first time in his life.

__

The clan of orca-folk cautiously breached the surface and paused to watch the selkie on the shore light the driftwood pyre with the tip of her staff, and dipped their heads as one in respect. The creature at the heart of the kindling blaze was most likely her familiar, and they decided not to trouble the witch in her grief.

Leaving her, they swam in silence out of the cove and moved along the rocky shore, casting uneasy glances at each other. Magic was rare among the merfolk, but those who changed their shape at will, like the selkie folk and their distant, inland relatives, the kelpies, had it more strongly. There had been turmoil on the sea that day, and even now that the stars had blinked to life in the sky above, the waters still churned with unease.

A younger member of the clan swam on ahead, not quite understanding the wary reverence her relatives had for the sea witch, and, distracted by the passing of a very ordinary but still very quick seal, she raced off in a stream of bubbles to play with it. Yes, her kind hunted seals, but when they were being that obvious about their pursuit, the seal was in no danger.

She blasted around the rocky promontory but splayed her wide flippers to bring herself to an abrupt halt when she spotted a boy about her own age lying curled on the sandy bed of the next cove’s floor. He was hunched in on himself and seemed to be in some kind of distress, so she swam slowly over to him. He had the dizzying markings of a mackerel — black lines and opal shimmers like summer sunlight on the sea’s surface — and she wondered if perhaps he’d been left behind on the annual migration.

As she approached, he raised his head and his mouth opened in a soft ‘o’ of surprise, gills flaring.

“Hi,” she grinned. “I didn’t mean to startle you,” she said. “You alright?”

He shook his head.

“Pearl?” Her older brother’s voice sounded from close behind her, wary and warning, and she glanced back over her bare shoulder at him. “What is it?”

“I don’t know,” she said honestly. “I just found him.”

Hook swam past her, pushing her roughly to one side, and he loomed over the terrified stranger and bared all his sharp teeth at him. Hook was only a year older than Pearl, but he liked to play the grown up with her, and it irritated her no end. She grabbed the wide flat of his tail as it wafted past and yanked him sharply backwards. It wasn’t enough to move him much, but it brought his long, black and white hair drifting into his face and undermined his attempt at a tough persona a little.

The strange boy cringed away, hands above his head, and Hook relented when he saw he was no threat, and clearly terrified.

“You hurt?” he asked, though he could taste no blood in the water. “Where’s your shoal?”

In no time, they were joined by the whole orca-folk clan, and it was decided that the stranded boy would swim with them for the winter until his people returned to these waters to claim him. The boy didn’t speak, but he seemed able to understand them, and something told Pearl he’d been through something more awful even than being abandoned by his shoal.

Over the next few weeks, she first coaxed some tentative smiles from him, and then, when they had stopped to rest one night in another rocky cove further to the south, he laughed.

It happened when Hook got his finger clamped by a massive lobster and he swore and flung the thing away before washing it further from him with a great sweep of his tail, scowling. He was growing into his body and would one day outgrow even their father, and the motion sent the offending crustacean spiralling away on the temporary current.

When the wash of water in their ears had settled, they heard a quiet giggling and looked around to see him sitting near a bed of kelp, one hand over his mouth, and laughing softly. His eyes were the most beautiful brown, like a seal’s, and when Hook saw who was laughing, his indignation at the incident melted away like the ice in the spring, and his whole body softened.

Pearl watched as Hook swam over to the strange boy, the one they’d taken to calling Mackerel for the beautiful patterns on his tail, but the boy stopped laughing almost immediately. Hook’s shoulders dropped and he looked mortified when he saw unease and uncertainty in the boy’s eyes.

“It’s alright,” Hook said with a half-smile. “I deserved to get pinched the way I picked her up,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking. You want to see if we can find another one and I’ll show you the right way to do it?”

Tentatively, the boy nodded, and Pearl watched as the boy swam off at Hook’s side. He didn’t swim like normal merfolk, but more like a newborn still getting used to his tail. Sometimes he started to sink and panicked, and the first few times it had happened, Hook had actually had to lift him up to keep him from sinking completely. Unlike them, he was a piscine merfolk, meaning he could breathe water and not air, while they were mammalian and needed to surface. When Hook went up to gulp fresh air those first few times, Pearl would watch the boy and make sure he didn’t sink until Hook returned.

He seemed to grow in confidence though over the winter, and by the time of that first laugh, he was just a bit awkward in the water. He couldn’t hope to keep up with Hook, but her brother had a kind streak to him for all his brash bravado, and he kept pace with Mackerel. Slowly, the boy began to talk with them, but he never spoke of what had happened to him, and any time they asked him where his shoal was or where he’d grown up, he shut up tighter than a clam and refused to talk. Eventually, they stopped asking.

He did till them his name though, and they were surprised to learn it was a human name. Pearl had been named for the lightness of her irises — such a pale blue it was almost silver — and Hook had been named because the patch of white under his tall dorsal fin looked like one of the barbed devices that humans used to catch fish. Mackerel, however, turned out to be named Theo, and when asked why he had that name, he just shrugged and said his parents must have liked it. They stuck to calling him Mackerel, or Macks, and he didn’t object in the slightest, only smiling shyly the first time Hook used his new name.  

When spring came to the waters where Pearl’s clan hunted, no piscine merfolk came looking for Mackerel, so he simply stayed with the orca folk.

One year became two, became three, became five.

Hook grew into a monster of a merman, with muscles rippling over his body and a reputation for taking on anything he deemed a threat to his clan, from great white sharks to fishing boats. Mackerel grew as well. Gone was that awkward, faltering motion as he swam — he could out pace any of them in a race and he was lithe and graceful and elegant when he moved. He laughed a lot too.

Pearl noticed how he would watch her swim past and then look away, and when Hook caught him staring at her like that, he washed him playfully away with a wave of his massive tail and sent him spiralling off into the murky depths with a laugh and told him to come back when he could win against Pearl in arm-wrestling.

Then, one summer evening, Mackerel disappeared.

They’d been swimming nearer to the shore than was wise in the warmer months, when humans often gathered on the shore with their fires to dance and sing and make a strange music of their own. Hook and Pearl’s mother called the clan back from the shallows and led them away when they heard the strange notes of human song and saw the orange lights dancing on the shore like strange, swirling blooms of plankton that spat sparks into the sky, but when Hook turned to Pearl to ask her something, he tensed and looked around.

“What?”

“Where’s Macks?” he asked, his hold tightening on the driftwood spear he usually carried in his right hand. Its ghostly-white blade was made of honed whalebone, and it had gutted a great white from nose to tail only the week before. The colour had drained from Hook’s usually tanned face, and he looked around frantically in the gloom that night had cast on the sea.

“Maybe he didn’t hear mother calling?” Pearl whispered.

“Stay here. I’ll go back for him.”

“Careful!” Pearl hissed, but he was already sliding away like a shadow, consumed by the growing darkness.

Hook searched the cove where they’d been intending to rest until they’d discovered the humans too close for comfort, but found nothing. Panic began to rise as he looked further along the dark, jagged rocks of the shoreline.

Eventually he started to run out of air, and surfaced carefully, mindful of the massive dorsal fin that stuck up like a sail behind him now that he was full-grown. If the humans spotted it glinting in the dark, they’d hurl harpoons at him or try to snatch him for a trophy. Merfolk — both saltwater and freshwater — didn’t last long in captivity, and he had no intention of being taken.

Then, at the far end of the sweeping cove, he spotted the opalescent glimmer of Mackerel’s scales and saw his greyish body draped over a rock. He was leaning on it, staring at the humans. His black hair, which, in the water, was flat, had started to curl, and Hook couldn’t believe he was out of the water at all. He was going to asphyxiate if he stayed up there too long, but the orca kept watching him a little longer. He liked Mackerel’s body; how it was different from the powerful orca folk. He was built for speed and agility where Hook was built for a combination of wild bursts of power and slower endurance. He might have begun courting him, bringing him gifts of carved whalebone and rare trinkets from the seabed, if Mackerel hadn’t clearly been attracted only to his sister or her female friends. So, he’d kept his affection for him chaste, and now as he watched, he realised with a jolt that Mackerel was crying.

Slowly, he swam over to him, keeping in Mackerel’s line of sight, and when his best friend turned to look at him, Hook’s heart cracked and sheared apart at the look on his face.

“What?” Hook asked, pausing and bringing his hands up to speak in the Hunter’s Tongue they used with each other when they needed to be silent in the water. He’d taught Mackerel himself, and he’d soon picked it up like he’d been speaking it all his life.

Mackerel only shook his head though and then dipped his neck below the waterline to breathe before rising up and staring again at the humans.

Hook turned to watch, but didn’t he understand. Humans were fascinating, sure, but they weren’t beautiful enough to make grown merfolk cry, surely?

Strange structures had been erected on the soft, pale sand, which looked like they were made of the same material that humans used to catch the wind and drive their boats and ships. These though were coloured the same shade as the urchins and starfish that hunkered down in rock pools at high tide, and whatever they were made of glittered occasionally like the sun on the water. The humans were laughing and moving around in odd patterns around their fires.

“What is it?” Hook whispered when he was close enough to Mackerel that their bodies touched all along one side.

“I miss them,” Mackerel rasped back. His voice didn’t work very well above the water, needing the cool caress of the waves to make it audible.

“Miss who?”

“My family.”

Hook went still. Macks had never talked about his family in all the years he’d lived with Hook’s clan. He looked from Mackerel to the humans and back again. “What do you mean?”

Mackerel bit his lip. “These people…” he said. “I know them. Hook, I was —”

A shout went up and something lanced down out of the dark, piercing the water and glancing off Hook’s large, rounded flipper. He cried out in shock at the sting of it as blood blossomed in the dark water, and he yanked Mackerel down into the waves just as another spear flew into the waves like a diving bird.

This one landed in Hook’s flat tail, and it wasn’t a spear. It was a harpoon.

Thick and barbed, the weapon lodged itself in his tail and he found himself hauled up the beach by a small party of humans before he could even flounder or lash out. His own spear had been dropped when he’d reached for Mackerel and he only prayed that his friend had the sense to swim for the depths. Not that he was about to go down without a fight, he thought as he readied himself to lash out with his fists, and even his teeth if he had to.

Of course, Mackerel had the self-preservation instincts of a piece of seaweed in a Spring Tide, however, and he breached the water a second later with a screech of distress that made even Hook’s eardrums hurt. For an instant, the tearing pressure on his tail was relaxed and he heaved his body with all his might, knocking the shadowed figures aside and sending them tumbling into the sand.

Then he saw Mackerel hauling himself up the beach, and the men started to run for him too.

Panic set in to Hook until he heard Mackerel yelling at them. He was yelling a name. A human name.

The figure at the front of the group skidded to a halt in the wet sand and stood there in shock while a wave washed up the shore to him and sloshed over his boots. “Theo?”

“Eolan…” Mackerel wheezed. “Please… Let him go…”

The figure crashed to his knees in front of Mackerel and tilted his face up to look him in the eye.

Hook seized the opportunity and swung his tail again, scattering the last of the humans tugging fruitlessly on his line now that there were too few of them. The barb of the harpoon was right through the meat of his tail and it was bleeding everywhere, turning the sand a nasty dark hue.

“Let… him go… Eolan. For me.”

“Brother? Little brother?” the human choked, bowing over him.

“Yes. It’s me. Let. Him. Go.”

The human turned his face to look at Hook then, and Hook recoiled. He looked like Mackerel, just… older. And harder too.

“Get back into the water,” Hook growled at Mackerel. “You’ll choke up here.”

That made the human — his brother? — look sharply back at him, and when Mackerel nodded and his lungs started to seize, the human dragged him unceremoniously into the water himself by the tail.

Hook meanwhile clawed his own way back down the beach, dragging the harpoon with him. If it ripped out of his tail, he’d bleed to death, but if he didn’t get away from these humans, they’d hang him up like the sharks and the tuna they took great pride in catching, and they’d wait til he bled out or died from the stress of it.

He yanked at Mackerel’s tail and dragged him the last way into the water too, then half-swam and half-sank down into the safety of deeper water. Pearl was waiting for them with Hook’s spear in her hand and swam at him, crying out when she saw the harpoon in his tail.

“It’s bad, Hook. We have to take you to the sea witch,” she said. “Mackerel, what in the name of the Deep were you thinking?”

“I…” he croaked. Like a piece of flotsam caught in the grip of the tide, he didn’t know whether to return to the beach or follow them into the sea. Hook didn’t have time to wait though, and he let his clan bear him away, looking back over his shoulder at Mackerel in disbelief and confusion.

Pearl drew Mackerel after them, and he followed in mute shock.

The sea witch’s lair was somewhere most merfolk avoided, mostly because magic was as unnerving to them as human fire, and the sea witch was powerful. She had never been known to turn away anyone in distress however, and when she scented blood in the water and saw Hook being borne into the protective ring of rocks around her home by two of his kind, weak from blood-loss and pain, she darted over immediately and hissed a curse.

“Humans,” she said through gritted teeth as she instructed the orca folk where to leave Hook. He found himself drifting in and out of consciousness on a soft bed of woven kelp, and when he looked up she smiled at him. “Easy, sweetheart. We’ll get you taken care of. I’ll need you to be brave, and you might need to hold onto someone while I take it out. There’s no easy way to do it, but my magic will patch you up afterwards. It’ll scar, but at least you’ll have your tail, eh?”

He nodded. “M… Mack…” he moaned, but Mackerel didn’t appear. When he cracked his eyes open again, he saw Mackerel staring at the witch with abject terror in his big brown eyes.

“It’s alright, lad,” she laughed, waving him over. “Come. Your friend needs you now.”

But Mackerel didn’t move.

When he remained, drifting on the currents like a mindless jellyfish, the witch tutted and gestured more impatiently, until she went still and really looked at him. “You’re… You can’t be… By the Deep, you’re him, aren’t you?”

Slowly, he nodded.

When Hook let out a groan as the water drifted over his injury and moved the harpoon, the witch focused again and said, “No time for that now. Someone hold him while I heal him up.”

Mackerel did move then, and he swam right around her and came to hold Hook’s hand in a firm grip. “I’m sorry,” he said.

“Not your fault. Humans are awful. I hate them,” Hook spat. “I hate them all, I —” He cut off as the witch yanked the harpoon out and immediately began to heal it. Hook’s eyes rolled and he lost consciousness at last.

When he came to, he found Pearl at his side, curled up asleep the way she had done when they were really young. He stroked his hand over her hair and she stirred, blinking and rolling over.

“You’re alright?” she asked and he nodded.

Moving his tail experimentally up and down, he found that the pain had gone, and the wound had been mended to leave a silvery scar in the top and a pink one in the white of the flesh underneath. “Where’s Macks?” he asked and she swallowed and looked away. “Pearl?”

“He’s gone.”

“Gone?” Hook jerked upright and glared at her. “Gone where?”

“He talked with the sea witch for ages and she gave him something, and then… he just left.”

“Without saying where he was going?”

“He swam to the surface like he was one of us running out of air. I don’t know what happened.”

“Where is she? Where’s the witch? I want to ask —”

“I’m here,” came the witch’s harsh voice from nearby. “Don’t get your flippers in a flap,” she added, rolling her eyes. “And something tells me your boy will be back…”

“He’s not my boy,” Hook growled.

The witch just rolled her eyes. “Maybe not in the way you wish, but he’s not for you anyway. Your blood told me an interesting story when I drank half of it in by accident earlier. How are you feeling?”

She moved her seal’s lower body from side to side in a sinuous sweep and lifted up his enormous fluke, nodding with a satisfied grunt when she inspected the scar.

“I’m fine. Tell me what’s going on.”

“It’s not really my story to tell, if he’s not told you already,” she said carefully, “But I lashed out a long time ago when humans took my familiar from me, and I took it out on the wrong person. I wanted the humans to know what it was like to suffer at the hands of someone you feared, so I gave one of them a tail and gills in a fit of pique to make his father pay. I was so wrapped up in my grief at Shadow’s death that I clean forgot about the lad when the humans opened fire on me, and I’ve not thought about him from that day to this.”

“Mackerel…” Hook exhaled, his blue eyes wide. “He… He was human, once, wasn’t he?”

The witch nodded. “Pampered little princeling out on his father’s brand new ship. Shadow got too close and the ship hit my familiar. The shock of it broke something inside me that day, but I never should have taken it out on an innocent child.”

“Where is he now?”

“I gave him the means to return to his people. If he stays on land for longer than a single cycle of the sun and moon, he’ll stay there and never return. If he returns to the sea within that time, he’ll never be able to return to his human form again.”

“Why would you make him choose like that?” Hook demanded, face like a thunderhead.

“My magic isn’t infinite, boy,” she scoffed. “I can’t give him a shifters gift. He must choose, his family in the water or his family on land. By all accounts, the humans have scoured the land looking for a way to get their cursed prince back, but no witch has been willing or able to help them.”

Pearl shook her head. “Probably no one wanted to go against the Sea Witch…”

The witch blew a stream of bubbles from her mouth and shrugged. “If they had, I might have heard about the situation and remembered the poor boy I tossed into the ocean like a piece of discarded bait. Your clan shamed me with your honour in taking in the boy as your own.”

Hook swam out of the witch’s lair not long after that and made straight for the cove where the humans had been frolicking on the shore like spinner dolphins in the surf before they’d spotted him and Mackerel.

There, sitting close together on the beach by the dying embers of the fire, he saw his best friend and the human who’d called him ‘little brother’.

For a long time, he watched, transfixed.

Mackerel was wrapped in a piece of fabric that looked like a small, patterned sail, only it fell softly around him, and from under it, Hook could just see a pair of feet. His gaze snagged on them, and he wasn’t sure how long he stared. He wondered what it was like to have two limbs instead of one — perhaps it was like controlling his flippers and his tail separately…?

Suddenly, on the rocks above him and to his right, a male voice cleared his throat, and Hook jumped, lurching away with a snarl.

“Sorry,” the man said with an earthy chuckle. “Didn’t want to spook you, but I figured you should know I was here, and that you’d better not try anything either,” he warned.

Hook’s upper lip peeled back to show his row of sharp teeth. “If he wants to be there, I won’t stop him,” he growled. “Who are you?”

“Crown Prince’s bodyguard. You?”

“His friend.”

Hook eyed the man up and down and found he didn’t dislike him, physically. Like Hook, he was clearly a warrior, since he had what the humans called a ‘sword’ belted to his hip, and he carried a long spear in his right hand. His clothes looked like they’d been made of fish scales though, and Hook immediately wanted to touch. The fabric shimmered in the torch light and clinked softly, almost musically.

When he saw where Hook was staring, the man chuckled. “Yeah, mail’s a bit like fish skin, I suppose.”

“Mail?”

“This,” he said, plucking at the shirt that ended halfway down his thighs.

He crouched down, leaning on the spear for balance, and at the sight of the dark, soft fabric underneath the mail and covering his legs, Hook’s curiosity surged and he swam a little closer.

“Fuck,” the man breathed when he saw the way Hook moved.

“What?”

“Never been this close to one of your kind.”

“Without hurling a harpoon at us, you mean?” Hook growled, gripping the rock at the man’s boots and raising himself up out of the water enough to reveal his entire torso. Then, with one hand, he grabbed at the man’s mail shirt near his neck and hauled him close.

The spear dropped from his hand and clattered onto the rocks, but the human didn’t resist him.

“Holy shit,” he exhaled instead.

Hook snarled, lip rising again on one side, and he heard a shout of alarm from the beach.

Flinging the man aside so that he toppled and landed hard on his backside on the rock behind him, Hook looked over to find Mackerel standing shakily and staggering on the sand. The ‘sail cloth that wasn’t sail cloth’ fell to his waist and he grabbed at it, just as his brother lurched to his feet and helped to steady him.

Together they walked shakily around the cove and over to the rocks that jutted out into the sea like a dock, but the shore was too jagged for Mackerel’s bare, human feet, and besides, he was too unsteady on his unfamiliar legs.

He beckoned Hook over though, and Hook glanced back at the Crown Prince’s bodyguard, then sloshed into the water and drove himself at the shore with a few powerful sweeps of his tail. There, he half-beached himself, looking up at Macks.

Mackerel crouched, keeping the soft fabric around himself and half hiding his strange limbs from Hook’s view for some reason, and the older man stepped back when Mackerel nodded at him. “You’re human?” Hook croaked, looking up at him.

Mackerel made a little sideways motion with his head. “For now. I’m sorry I never told you what happened. I… I was afraid you’d… that you wouldn’t want me in your family anymore if you knew the truth. I know how you talk about humans…”

Shame twisted in his gut and he looked back at the man on the rocks who was standing up at the approach of Mackerel’s brother.

“You going to stay with them?” Hook asked.

“I’m not sure. I want to talk with my brother a bit longer. While I can. We’ve got a lot to catch up on.”

Hook nodded. “I understand.”

“Hook…?”

He met Hook’s blue eyes with his brown and reached for him. His skin was warm and soft in the firelight, and Hook found he missed the stony grey it had been before. Being human didn’t suit him, but he didn’t feel it was his place to say that, so he just swallowed and nodded. “Take your time. You know where we’ll be.”

“Hook, whatever I decide, you're family too. All of you. Pearl and you and the whole clan. You took me in and cared for me in a way my family on land never really did. They sheltered me and they loved me, but… not the way you did. I’ll always love you all for that. You know that, right?”

Hook nodded once and shoved his weight backwards in the sand, awkwardly carving a channel in the wet shoreline with his massive body. He glared as Mackerel’s older brother strode back across to join them, and he helped Mackerel to stand. His legs trembled and wobbled, and he laughed and leaned into his brother, and the two retreated up the beach to talk some more.

At the whispering of metal rings sliding like scales across one another, Hook glanced to his right and saw the guardsman approaching along the sand. He set down his spear and held up his hands, laughing softly. It was a warm, chuffing sound, and it stirred something in Hook’s gut that he’d thought only awakened for Mackerel.

“What do you want?” he asked, though it came out more petulant than threatening, and it only made the human warrior snort another little laugh. “You sound like a seal with a cold, making that noise.”

That made the man’s laughter grow and he shook his head. Hook saw that his hair was wavy and dark brown, and it looked impossibly soft. A shiver ran down his whole body and he felt a spark of arousal thrum through him. He was glad he was lying on his front, for one.

The two princes talked long into the night, and Hook stayed with the guardsman.

Slowly, he got over his hostility and started to ask questions about the humans’ world, and once he’d started, he couldn’t stop. The guardsman had plenty of his own questions too, and by the time the sun was well up into the sky and hammering down on them, Hook’s deep voice was hoarse and his golden-brown skin was dry and prickling.

“I should…” he rasped, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder at the water behind him. “I’m going to turn into one of your baked fish soon.”

“Shit, I’m sorry,” the guardsman said. His name was Kit, it turned out, which Hook thought was a very funny sounding name. “You need a hand getting back in the water?”

He didn’t, but the thought of having this human’s hands on him sounded suddenly and bizarrely appealing, so he shrugged. “You strong enough to actually help me, or are you just looking for an excuse to get your hands on a merman?” he said, raising an eyebrow.

Again, Kit laughed. It seemed so easy, so natural for him to laugh, but Hook felt a little flicker of pride all the same at having made him do it.

“With all that muscle you’re packing? Probably not,” Kit admitted. “Seemed polite to ask though.”

Hook snorted too, and shook his head. His hair had dried while they’d been talking and it was tickling his face. The guard surprised him by reaching out and tucking it behind his ear with a smile. “I’m glad I met you, Hook,” Kit said. “Maybe… no matter what His Highness decides, you’ll meet me here again some time?”

“His… Highness?”

“The one you call Mackerel. He’s a prince, you know?”

“He’s just… Macks,” Hook scowled.

“Yeah.”

Kit straightened with a grunt and dusted the sand off his legs, and Hook used his forearms to back himself back out into the surf, tail lifted so it didn’t drag like an anchor.

His back was burned, and the saltwater was agony to start with, but it had been worth it to spend so long in the company of the strange human. He ducked beneath the water without a word and vanished, deciding to wait out the rest of the time until Macks’ spell conditions were met in the solitude of a nearby kelp bed.

Occasionally he surfaced, but he didn’t go back to the shore, and finally, when the moon was starting to rise again, he breached the water one last time and looked to the beach. There was no sign of Macks this time, and he realised he’d probably made his choice.

Grief struck him a worse blow than even the harpoon, and he curled inwards with a grunt as saltwater leaked from his eyes and he realised he was crying. He doubled over and turned towards the open ocean. His scarred tail gave a throb of pain as he pushed himself to the limit and blew past his clan who had been waiting nervously out in the open water all day.

Pearl yelled after him but he ignored her. He wasn’t sure how far along the coast he swam but eventually he doubled back to familiar waters and located his clan.

And there, in the middle of all of them, was Mackerel.

Hook halted and stared, and the motion of his black and white tail attracted his best friend’s attention enough that he stopped mid-sentence and darted away from the girls, his body flashing like a minnow between the figures of orca merfolk. He shot out and blasted over to him at a pace even Hook hadn’t known he was capable of, and collided with him with the speed of a racing tuna fish. He gave a soft ‘oof’, a cloud of bubbles rising up to the surface in a foam as the air was knocked from his lungs and he started to cough. Mackerel tugged him up to the surface and made sure he got a good gulp of air before hugging him again.

“I know you don’t see me as your brother,” he said, “And I’m sorry I can’t give you what you wanted, but… I hope you’ll accept me back into the clan all the same.”

“I love you,” Hook said, “No matter what, or how. I can’t believe you stayed though. I thought… I thought…” He squeezed him tightly, using his flippers as well as his arms, and Mackerel laughed.

“Turns out I actually prefer being a merman,” Mackerel laughed. “I was always out of place on dry land, but here… I think I’m meant to be here.” He waited a beat and then said, “My brother’s guardsman seemed quite taken with you. Maybe you can keep flirting with him when I go and visit my brother?”

Hook shoved him away and then used his trademark tail-wipe to wash him even further away, and the two of them laughed.

“Race you?” Macks asked.

Mackerel did an easy back-flip in the water, rolling gracefully and then twisting like a strand of kelp in the current. When Hook thought back to how he’d been in those first few weeks — when, he now knew, he’d only just acquired a tail instead of legs — he realised how Mackerel had really grown into that pretty tail of his.

As pretty as it was though, it somehow wasn’t as appealing as Kit’s legs anymore, and Hook hid a secret smile as he let his slippery friend scoot away from him before setting the muscle of his tail to good use and powering after him like an incoming breaker.

Relations with the humans changed after that. The old king died some years later, though not before he got to see his lost son one last time, and over the course of the next year, trade and new laws governing fishing rights and shipping lanes were established for the safety and benefit of the merfolk.

And if Hook disappeared from the clan for extended periods of time, and if those periods happened to overlap with Kit’s time off duty, well, it was only a sign of better things for both worlds, surely?

__

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[eluxcastar]

As I opened my tumblr, just to check if there is new Arlecchino stuff to swallow... lo and behold, I saw your post with the Arlecchino simp tags. Shot me the moment I stepped into the door right there, hahaha! May I request an Arlecchino x reader, headcanon or anything you're comfortable coming up with. The reader is thousands of years old, who got disowned by the Tsaritsa because they declined their performance in greatness for someone else's benefit and saw no worth in her/them. Could be a sibling or a friend, the betrayal stung like a bee since she/they saw Tsaritsa as a mother figure or could literally be the mother (Got kunikuzushi'd in a way, minus the puppet part). So, here's the main part - How Arlecchino would handle that person, when they meet in hostile terms. An accidental encounter, had banters and fights and eventually found strange subtle solace from each other. Could be romantic, or just obsession on Arlecchino's part because we love deranged women pls step on me with your sharp heels - anyway, since Arlecchino is interpreted as someone who won't hesitant to betray the Fatui. On her own benefit, works with the reader to mess and interrupt Fatui operations. I won't include more or else you'd be dealing a whole thesis of it. Hahahah! Good day to you~!

One of Repetition

── ୨୧：arlecchino x reader

୨୧﹑synopsis :: in a strange decision nobody quite understood but could not contest, you were dismissed from your position by the tsaritsa herself but allowed to live. you wander for some time, lost and confused, and most notably unable to escape the fatui even when you are no longer associated with them, which means an unwanted letter and an even more unwanted visit from the knave.

୨୧﹑genre :: kinda angsty

୨୧﹑content :: fem reader, reader has a pyro vision, arlecchino has a cryo delusion, reader uses a bow, capitano is not human this time, he's just a plot device too, their previous relationship is implied but ambiguous, implied age difference, reader is most often called by the title brighella, writing this spiralled me into insanity, possibly bad writing, not proofread 

୨୧﹑words :: 13.6k

hehe, I know that Arlecchino simps flock to me once they learn my requests are open. I have no idea why. maybe they're just especially desperate for food, but they linger, and I have a little collection of anons.

don't worry about how much it'll take me, I honestly enjoy writing longer works. anyway, I received a request similar to this some time ago (was it you? I have encountered that before) but haven't gotten around to completing it, so I'll be partly combining the two

here's the other request:

it's gonna provide some stuff for me to follow, and I remember exactly when I got it, so I wanted to include it for the dear anon who sent it

why brighella you may ask well that's because brighella has been described before as essentially Arlecchino's smarter and more vindictive brother and they compliment each other well. I think Arlecchino may also work for Brighella in some versions?? either way it felt right even though they're not really based off of the character brighella, they do share a few traits with him but not fully it's just a fun little parallel

I really did not expect this to be so long that it literally lagged the writing program I was using to save it and I have been staring at this for so long I literally have no gauge on the quality anymore just that it's variable because it took me so long someone send help

Her words left you exasperated, literally at a loss for words, and you struggled to comprehend the reason for it. There was nothing you could think of, no instance that struck you as prominent. Yet, somehow as one of the Tsaritsa's children, you had become what any parent might refer to simply as a disappointment, their failure—the problem child who never quite ironed out their issues. You had always been faithful to her, hopelessly devoted to the archon and her will. News such as this came out of nowhere and struck you like a hammer to the chest.

Two of her most mighty children were near and dear to her, and now the other had turned against you as he remains loyal to her. The Jester, who you once held in high regard, has turned against you. It is a bitter pill to swallow, for you must now sever ties with the one man you believed was truly deserving of serving the Tsaritsa. Your mother— your world— turns against you with him, before him, leading the way for him. 

In vain, you draw your bow to strike an arrow between his eyes, prove your strength and power as above your position, above him, but it means nothing. Your strike is blocked, and the Tsarita's Damselette Columbina moves to detain you. You believe she would not be strong enough, but you don't itch to fight ten other Harbingers. You understand that even you have a limit, and fighting what are supposed to be the strongest people in the country is not a part of that. Your honour is on the line, an honour which would tarnish not only Brighella's name but also have a ripple effect on your soldiers, men and women who fought for you and did not deserve a punishment that would result from their actions.

"Think carefully, Brighella." Columbina's warning is not lost on you, "You could remain as a hero or fight, and I will lure the creature you brought from the abyss and gut him before your eyes."

You do not want that. That creature is not yet loyal to the Tsaritsa but to you, and she will convince him he can save you. He will fall into her trap and die.

You bite your lip, trying to think of a way to escape and capture him so that you can run off somewhere. He does not deserve to die, but you can't think of anything. Not when you know how thorough these people are. There is not a will, really. There is only a has. He has fallen into her trap and is at the mercy of the Damselette. "What if I am to obey?" You finally ask the question you did not want to, surrendering in a way, though the bite has not left your words.

"I'll leave him be." Her answer is swift. She expected that you would eventually give in and only needed to wait for it to happen.

You shake your head, dissatisfied with only that as your compensation. "Not enough."

The smile on her face does not waver, thin and deceitful as ever, eyes hidden and closed, unseen behind the band of lace. "Mm. I can't bargain anything else." 

"Have him take my place." You lay your condition out firmly. There is only one to meet, and not a hard one at that. It would be easy to sway him into it, using whatever they plan to do to you as motivation. His loyalty and affection for you would make him accept it.

She ponders the situation and proposal momentarily, powerless to make the executive decision but undoubtedly keen on the thought of it all. "He believes that you are about to fall in battle to a foe and that he is going to save you."

You grit your teeth, knowing that this is her trap. Lure him to a place. It was not what you had expected, but it is no less the Damselette's style of acting. There is always a damsel, but perhaps she recognised that she would not suffice this time. She needed a better damsel for him to save; for that to work, it needed to be you. 

She needs your name, reputation, your relationship with your subordinate, melding together with her lies to make for a tale of tragedy with him as the hero.

The thought of him rushing to his death under the guise of saving you spikes your blood cold, chilling you. You're aware of her cruelty and always have been, but to experience it is different than hearing about it from her perspective. You are experiencing it from the perspective of the victim. 

His death was another factor to hold over your head, your penance, the anchor to force your compliance. Your blood boils with anger, but you cannot fight. Despite your feelings of anger and frustration, you know that lashing out will only cause further harm and pain.

There is only one thing you can do. You know you must. It's simply that you don't want to. 

But...you must. 

You must for him, that poor creature you tried to give a home to and who would never be in such a position if not for you and your ambition. 

"Then I will fall, and you will use the honour I built into him to persuade him." 

It was an honour meant to humanise him in a way, a being only able to imitate humanity. He had a mentor and something to fight for. Now you're imploring that it be used against him to burden him, but he will do well in your position.

Columbina smiles, that thin mocking smile like she knows the secrets of this world and more. "Would he really believe that?"

The helmet. You should use the helmet to your advantage. Your subordinate's first exposure to humanity, being you, a woman in a metal helmet, seemed to last. He used to think that was what humans looked like, and he admitted as much to you as he had asked you to remove it. Your impression left an indelible mark on him that he treasures to this day. Even if he was to see you in the aftermath, he would not uncover the lie.

"He has never seen my face. He would not recognise me."

Columbina accepts that readily, and her eyes open, pools of black and white visible through the cracks in the lace over her eyes. You've seen them before, inky black sclera and inhuman patterns decorating the borders of her irises, but you can't help the unsettled feeling that makes a home for itself in the pit of your stomach. 

-

By the evening, you are stripped of your honours, titles and coat and dumped to the curb like a bag of rubbish somebody left out. There is no more fight, no more bargaining, no more arguing. Everyone has the things they want, for the most part, so you are all satisfied enough to remain amicable with each other. Without a fight, you allow the Jester to remove the fur-lined overcoat despite the cold that rushes over you once it is gone and discarded in a heap of fur and fabric on the floor with none of its previous value. 

After that comes the slow, deliberate removal of every trinket that denoted you as you. From your delusion, several gifts to your very insignia, the only thing left of you is a lone pyro vision and the clothes on your back. You've never been more thankful to not wear a standard-issue uniform lest you be made to undress and hand that over too.

That was it. Your everything.

With each piece of regalia taken, a part of yourself disappeared until you were left an empty husk of a person, your entire reason for being for hundreds of years snatched out from under you and spat on.

The Harbingers were supposed to be the children of the Tsaritsa, and this was your grand disowning. A show of power and influence over her closest children and, by extension, the ability to bring pain to her less-- to her followers. It was foolish of you to ever think you were special in her eyes for having been by her side since before the Archon War. What did it matter when she left you amongst the rest of them? The years you spent since you had hobbled into her life so tiny and cute were now reduced to a few personal belongings and a set of words that shattered your world to sharp and dangerous pieces that would only hurt you in your haste to reassemble them and string your life back together.

When you were young, your cuteness may have been your best asset: a small body with endearing quirks, the inability to walk long distances without tumbling. In this state, you required her for everything because you would only find danger in the harsh Snezhnayan winters. To even acquire your own food was unthinkable, so you were sheltered and provided with ample treats that you could nibble from the palm of her hand if that were what you wished. Anything to keep you happy and content.

Like a little trinket, she cradled you for as many years as it took you to grow, and once you were at an age you no longer needed to be cradled, she made you her loyal companion, or so you had believed. You thought her affection for you was unwavering. She was the only mother you had ever known; she is the only mother you will remember for all of eternity.

Although it may have been an exaggeration, watching the sun's gradual descent below the horizon, you could almost believe eternity would quickly prove to be a very real concept. You watch the sky darken in silence for a time. You roam aimlessly around the city, your presence still striking unease in the people from the threatening demeanour you learned to conduct yourself with as a Harbinger, even without your official attire. The only remnant of your former self is a helmet you consistently wore during every public appearance. 

You can't help your wandering mind. Did your imitation of the Tsaritsa's actions make you weak? Attempting to nurture someone in the same manner she nurtured you? You are not a god, only the former child of one. Maybe you cannot care for him and maintain your objectivity. It's possible that he has become your Achilles' heel, as you were forewarned when the Tsaritsa less than subtly suggested you eliminate him.

You cannot live like this.

No matter how many suns you watched set, you would never come to terms with it living like this. The world you once knew, which revolved around a singular governing entity and individual, has disappeared without a trace. Without a central axis to anchor it in place, your world spirals chaotically out of control, with each passing second feeling more frenzied than the last. Your head is too muddled, your brain too overwhelmed by your emotions to think objectively of the faults in your time as a Harbinger, years of your life spent that way, burying your thoughts beneath a heavy weight of despair.

You almost want to call them wasted, but that would be wrong. Without the Tsaritsa, you might've— no, would've died during the Archon War. Perhaps another god would take you in, but it is unlikely that they would have exhibited the same level of compassion and generosity as the Tsaritsa. They would not have coddled you into comfort the way she did. Then again, what if that had been your downfall? Did she ever genuinely want you to stay? Based on this...perhaps you took her kindness for granted and overstayed your welcome.

You had no right to make demands of her in your final moments as her child, acting like a spoiled brat throwing a temper tantrum. But can you be justified? Can the threat to your subordinate's life negate that? Surely a bit, but not entirely, not if her actions were in response to yours. 

Oh, even if you begged on your knees, she would not take you back now.

Why had you not done that before?

She must be disappointed that your attitude was born from her compassion, the epitome of her failures. You do not deserve to call her your mother. You took her generosity as a guarantee, thought yourself above her other children solely because you were her first, and believed you were her favourite for no reason besides your own arrogance.

You have failed the only being in Teyvat willing to show pity toward you.

-

The deepest heart of Snezhnayan forest welcomes you readily with open arms and the gnashing jaws of monsters starving for food. The forest seems to come alive with a vicious hunger for flesh. You have nothing but your vision and bow left to aid your defence. Your delusion is gone, and your subordinates are nowhere to be found to assist you. Despite this, marking your way with a trail of bodies is easy. It is just an inconvenience to have to always be on guard, but you are strangely used to it. 

The cold is numbing as the air hits your face, your fingers almost wholly without a sensation of touch and even a tingle in your toes.

You spent many missions that way, tensed and expecting violence at any moment, hardly allowing yourself to sleep, let alone relax. It feels like nothing has changed in that respect, but you know everything has. You cannot hear the large crackling bonfire or the pattering of footsteps in the snow as your subordinates come to join you, their laughter and chatter and their whispers to each other.

There is a stark silence that is deafening to your ears.

-

On the seventh night, you pass through a village on the outskirts of Snezhnaya, where you first catch wind of the news you had agreed on. The locals informed you that they had recently halted their work for half a day in your honour, believing that you had passed away. All of them are completely unaware that as they remark on the death of Brighella, they are speaking to the former Harbinger, who asks about the news under the guise of being a curious traveller. They also strongly advised you against venturing into the innermost heart of the nation. If anyone were to notice the helmet carefully secured around your waist, it might bring unwanted attention to your travels.

Though you were stripped of your insignia, you have your armour, which by some grace had been spared from confiscation. Though a seemingly trivial act of kindness, a sense of pride swelled within you as you gazed upon it. You are glad it is still yours. This armour had accompanied you through countless blood-soaked skirmishes, serving as a steadfast shield against all manner of danger. 

It is at that moment you decide to treat it as a trophy. Though there is no truth to it, you take responsibility for the Harbinger's slaying. Now, the armour which once protected you as a Harbinger will stand as a triumphant emblem of your hard-won victory over Brighella and the end of the Harbinger's tyrannical hold over the land. You know that you will keep it close, treasuring it always as a tangible reminder of the sacrifices you made to reach this pivotal moment. You slayed Brighella. You ended the Harbinger's tyranny.

If you didn't know better, you would think you were getting a little too far into it and starting to believe it yourself.

By the eleventh night, you find yourself situated in an inn, and the nights only carry on from there all the way up to the twenty-second night since your abrupt dismissal and, to the rest of the world, your supposed demise. Already, the whispers that once revolved around Brighella's defeat now shifted to speculations regarding her successor. The question was not necessarily who, but who could possibly? Her brutal reign as a Harbinger had instilled fear in the hearts of all who crossed her path and in the minds of the people, no one else could measure up to her sheer terror-inducing presence. Nobody knows what happened once they dared to fight Brighella until now. She was only the Fourth of the Tsaritsa's children, but she was the most combat-heavy, and no one wished to cross her, except for the rumoured contender for her throne, who was spoken of in hushed tones as nobody was eager to have their reverence for whoever was bold enough to reach the wrong ears.

Your achievements find their place amongst the rumours as people say that Brighella's killer stole her armour and wears it as her trophy.

Despite the slew of gossip that its patrons indulge in, you enjoy the quaintness of this bar made and run by travellers who use it like a pitstop to rest and recuperate. It is a home to them, along with adventurers and merchants who benefit from the atmosphere. The people are strangers, often reserved and eager to keep to themselves, but have immeasurable wealths of information that spill with a few drinks and a group of acquaintances who are, for only one night of pleasure and indulgence, their lifelong friends.

Among those friends buried in your own tankard of cheap ale, you laugh along with their jokes and entertain their questions like a test of your ability to lie and improvise in this tale you're making for yourself. If they have names, you don't know them. Brighella's death was a glorious battle but isolated to the hills where you were alone.

"Brighella was alone, and they were weakened by prior injury. I don't know what caused it." You mix a dash of the speculations in, downplaying your strength a tad as you're unwilling to expose too much of it. "I'm not one to miss an opportunity. When would it arise again?"

One of your new acquaintances scoffs, amused but no less aware of the dangers of doing such a thing. "And make an enemy of the Fatui?" He is a new graduate of the Sumeru Akademiya who's come to make his way through Snezhnaya for a job offer. Reminds you of someone else, minus the graduating.

"They will not miss her." You are quick to answer—too quick, arguably—as it draws a sliver of attention before dipping back under the radar as a product of your confidence. "Her 'head' makes too cute a decoration on my side to pass up stealing it."

"I wouldn't dare say such a thing. Fatuus comes here sometimes." They are the words of a Snezhnayan native raised to worship the Fatui, though he is somewhat disillusioned by their crimes and cruelty, as you've learned many are.

"Let them hear it!" Your laughter is boisterous and unabashed. "They'll see the armour anyway. They probably despise her like everyone else."

Another one of your new friends, a travelling merchant from Fontaine, interjects your ravings to add only a passing comment. It was as she had done all evening, her secrets locked up tight. "She did not make herself likeable."

"She was not meant to be likeable but a fearsome warrior." Again, the Snezhnayan man rebuttals the criticism against her as he had been doing all evening again.

"You don't have to get so far up her ass, Brighella's not gonna crawl out of her grave and thank you for it."

"You're so vulgar."

You plant your tankard firmly down on the table between the four of you, leaning over it to close the distance between you and the man. "I'm not meant to be likeable either."

Forget being only a little too into the role. You're revelling in the freedom of this new identity of yours.

Quick to disperse the tension, your graduate friend changes the topic without a hint of hesitance in his voice. "They left an underling people believe will take their place. It's a surprise to think Brighella had someone who followed them with such...devotion."

"It's strange, but not impossible." The merchant from Fontaine again, contributing nothing you weren't all already thinking.

"Could she have had a sentimental side?"

"Who cares if she had a sentimental side?"

"Upset the attention isn't on you anymore?"

Anger crosses your face, but you stifle it just as quickly as it appears. You wish their attention was off of you, really. The former you, maybe, but you nonetheless. You want to know about your subordinate. What happened to your second in command? You don't care to hear their speculation as to whether you were or were not particularly emotional with your underlings. You know the answers to all of those questions and more without their guessing games.

"Regardless of the reason, they say the underlying is much easier to swallow than she is, so maybe the position of Fourth Harbinger will change drastically if he takes it." 

"Would he really change its purpose if he was so loyal?"

"Unintentionally, perhaps."

God, these people are so dull. Just listening to them, you can tell they know nothing of the ways of the Fatui. Harbingers are not individual job positions with specific parameters. Each role is its own, and they are moulded by the person who assumes them like a character in a play, enchanting and unsettling in a horrific mix of theatrics and violence. It is what they stand for. One does not assume the role and become an actor with a script. They must improvise and act on a whim to the beat of the Tsaritsaʼs drum, their life no longer their own.

They are not whatever these ramblings and poor excuses for speculations make them out to be.

"Terribly misinformed, aren't they?" In your ear is the low voice of the Snezhnayan man holding in his laughter at the two as the scholar and the merchant go back and forth. 

You glance to your left, where he has leaned closer to you. "Repulsively," you respond curtly.

He has a faint glint of satisfaction in his eye as you seem to have confirmed something. "I thought you might've been from Snezhnaya." 

"So what if I am?"

"It was only an observation."

In the background, the main conversation continues, just as clumsy as it was before you had tuned it out in favour of drinking some more. "Does this mean he will also be named Brighella?"

Straightening back in his seat, the man swiftly interjected their back-and-forth responses to explain to them. "They receive a unique title upon their promotion, and nobody knows what it is until then." A simple enough concept to understand.

"In other words, anything but Brighella."

"It hasn't been long enough to know yet."

"It's strange. Nobody knows his name even now."

That would probably be because you never gave him one.

You considered it in the years you spent with him but couldn't find one you liked. His name was inhuman, not for your ears and not for your tongue, rendering it useless to you and every human who would hear it. The night you found him was spent crowded around a bonfire listing off every suggestion you and your subordinates could think of to no avail, as he only sat quietly by your side and said little about any of these choices, finding no familiarity in any of them. That's only natural, you suppose. 

You still haven't chosen a name for yourself that isn't Brighella, either. Your old one is well and truly forgotten, with the years eroding your memories. It had been centuries since you had been called anything else. Evidently, picking names is not your forte. 

"As far as I've heard, nobody knows what it is."

You find the mention of your subordinate has completely ruined your mood. You are grateful the creature is alive but worried the knowledge you're snooping around to find out when he will be promoted could land you in trouble. It's troubling enough to wonder if he has heard your tales through the grapevine about how you had supposedly 'killed' Brighella—his mistress and mentor—which he would not be happy about. Though you did not fear the creature before, now that you've personally trained him to understand human combat, you're not so sure you'd want to fight him. It would be a hassle. Unlike many, you do not fear the inhumanity of the Doctor or the stone wall that's called the Jester. Even the cunning Damselette struggles to do more than unsettle you, but you respect that creature's raw strength and understand that no matter what you do, it doesn't matter. You are confined to a human form, and he is not.

You lied when he said he wouldn't recognise you, however. You don't actually know if he would.

You don't know the extent to which his eyes can pick out the details in your appearance that aren't physical. Had he memorised your relative build? Your height? The way you carry yourself and your mannerisms? The thought unnerves you, but so does everything else about him.

"I'm turning in for the night." Without regard for the ongoing conversation, you declare your intentions and abruptly shut down whatever is being said at the time without much care for it. Whatever it is, it isn't important. Your unfinished drink is left behind as you make your way to your quarters.

In retrospect, you understand their eagerness to merely cover up the circumstances of your dismissal. For a Harbinger as feared as Brighella, it is easier to halt work for a mere half-day rather than attempt to contain the resulting fallout of admitting one of their own was inadequate while simultaneously preserving their tenuous hold on power.

-

Months pass before there is talk of the crowning of a new Harbinger, the people abuzz with the news and eager to know all they can, preferably before the aristocrats feel like sharing the night of the event. You considered attending the ceremony but ultimately decided against it. You may have the courage to do so, but you are certainly not stupid enough to wander into the waiting heart of the Fatui's clutches. You have waited patiently for this moment and can easily wait longer to hear the news.

No longer treating the inn like a home, you settled somewhere in the plains of another nation only a few weeks after you had first arrived there, sensing the barkeep was getting sick of you and the attention you were drawing to his otherwise obscure establishment. 

People settled there for a night, saw you were there, and word of mouth as they boasted of their encounters with you lured others who came to see you. While this influx of new customers certainly provided a boost to business, it also had the unintended consequence of driving away those who preferred to keep a low profile and valued its place as being for those 'in the know'. In other words, while you were great for a boom in business, you were bad for long-term business. 

The barkeep pushing the mora you tried to pay him to pay for another night was enough to send the message he wanted you gone, out by morning. The idea you were not to come back for quite some time was clear to you in the look he gave you.  

Liyue, on the other hand, is filled with mountains and teeming with visitors who have come to witness the highly anticipated Rite of Descension. Surprisingly, the influx of tourism only adds to the overall enjoyment of your experience. You would think that tourism would hinder your time there, but completely contrary it makes it better in a way. The locals are expecting an influx of outsiders to come to see the Geo Archon in person, and, as a result, they are not only willing to hire help for the time but also serve later at food stalls, and the place is livelier. 

People notice you less as you blend into a crowd of people who don't belong, and you slip under the radar.

You have no interest in the Rite of Descension nor the Geo Archon, and most of your time is spent outside the Harbour.

Wangshu Inn is still within Liyue but at a considerable distance from the Harbour, a mid-point between there and the border to Mondstadt. It is quieter, which is neither good nor bad, and home to some very understanding owners who ask so few questions it almost alarms you. Nonetheless, you crave respite from the chaos and theatrics you were revelling in as a reprieve from the stress you were under, wondering how you would live your life now. At one point, you relished being hailed as a hero by many, but it soon became overwhelming, and you found yourself trapped in the clutches of Brighella once again.

Whether by design or happenstance, your identity had begun to consume your life again, and if you wanted to have any hope of living outside of Brighella, then that had to stop. And so, you sought out a place to lay down your burdens and unwind, leading you to where you are now.

You arrive your old self, and despite clinging to it since your travels had begun, you remove every piece of your armour for what you intend to be a long time and leave it all neatly arranged for when you eventually return to it. You feel compelled to finally don the fresh outfit you acquired during your journey through Fontaine. Admittedly floor-length dresses and extravagance are not your style after years of being cooped up in a heavy suit of armour, but there's something alluring about trying out a new look, especially when it involves pants that don't weigh more than a third of your body weight. Besides, you always kind of liked them anyway, just...not yet. Now seems like a good time to dip your toes in.

You almost don't recognise yourself when you finally see yourself in the mirror. Perhaps you got too used to seeing a metal helmet staring back at you and a suit of armour for a body, but the fresh air against your skin and lighter clothes feels...good. 

For the first time in a while, you feel free.

The new outfit is making you giddy, too giddy for your taste. You don't recall having such an innate pep in your step, only one that felt deserved, but this different. While you typically associate a sense of satisfaction with having earned it through hard work or perseverance, this newfound exuberance seems to come from just existing in your new clothes. You are happy just because even if there is nothing to feel happy about. It's as if the simple act of wearing them has given you a boost, despite not having accomplished anything significant. It doesn't even seem like you made much progress toward becoming yourself when you lay it all out on paper. You bought clothes and wore them, that's it. 

Something about it feels so much like yourself. The freedom to stray from what you thought you were until now, something you hadn't dared to try before.

One thing you like about Wangshu Inn is how it serves even people who aren't staying there. The ground floor overlooking the water is designated as almost a kind of restaurant. People filter in and out to be served, stay for lunch, meet with friends, and take breaks from their missions. It is meant as a place for travelling merchants, but you find that is not all its patrons see in it.

You are not nearly as sociable as you were in the Snezhnayan bar you were at, but this seems more manageable anyway.

"If you've come looking for work, the Adventurer's Guild may have a place for you." A suggestion from a merchant who struck up an idle conversation with you for some reason sticks with you. You can't say why, but you imagine a product of boredom.

"They accept anyone?" Your surprise is evident in your tone, as you thought they might have tighter restrictions.

Just as in disbelief fact as you are, he shrugs, "As long as you've got enough power to back yourself, a friend of mine said they'll accept anyone."

That sounds far too good to be true, at least for your taste. "And it doesn't matter where you come from or where you go?"

"Adventurers are known to get restless in one place for too long."

"I see, and you can just go up a--"

"Excuse me, miss." You don't remember hearing that voice, but you recognise the attire when you turn your head just enough to be met with the sight of a cicin mage standing before you impatiently awaiting your attention. The top half of her face is concealed, as is customary, but there's no mistaking the unkind smile that tugs at the corners of her lips as you meet her gaze.

Has she come for retribution? 

Despite your fears of having to make a mess, the woman reveals a letter that is sealed with wax and extends it towards you, expecting you to receive it sooner rather than later as she waves it slightly as a form of incentive. "From the Damselette," she adds.

"What could the Damselette want with me?"

"Perhaps a warning." The words slip by, quiet but noticeable, immediately catching your attention. You raise an eyebrow at her. She's slowly unveiling her contempt at your presence; you're very aware of that fact. You are not familiar with her. It is unlikely that she ever worked under your command. However, it is possible that she might've held a certain level of regard, which has since turned to hostility as rumours of her arrogant killer run rampant. "I don't know. I'm not privy to those things."

Your eyes glance over her from head to toe in thought, scrutinising her for any indication of where her animosity came from. However, there is nothing that gives away her motives. You break your gaze away from her and glance down at the letter in your hand. "I suggest you get a better hold of your tongue. They don't like it when you're rude to their guests."

Her smile does not waver. "You are not a guest." She states that fact with glaringly false politeness.

"Everyone who recieves correspondence from a Harbinger is a guest."

You suppose you can't fault her disdain when all is said and done.

From somewhere tucked away in her clothing, she pulls what appears to be a knife from your peripheral vision and points it at you, but you look up to find it is only a blunt letter opener balanced in the palm of her hand, waiting to be picked up.

"I was ordered to stay until you had read the letter to deliver her your response."

Just as she believes you are a murderer, the letter addresses you as such. Your lies have reached her ears. Moreover, she is playing along with them.

You expected threats and unfair deals, but it is only an update on what is happening regarding your position, the reassurance that they have not violated the terms of the agreement made. A half-hearted apology and an excuse. Preparations set them back, supposedly.

While you imagine preparing not only a funeral but a ceremony to announce the next Harbinger does take time, it would not take this much time with how prepared they were to kill you off in the first place. It was a planned betrayal.

It just looks better if they don't appear so prepared.

For whatever reason, perhaps your consolation prize for enduring her shameless lies, she shares a secret with you. As you casually scan the letter with little care for its contents, your attention is immediately drawn to the heart of the matter. It's the very subject on everyone's minds and all that anyone speaks of. 

Il Capitano. His name is Il Capitano.

Personally, you would not have picked it, but that does not mean that you hate the name. Quite the opposite, in fact, as you have to admit that when you envision the name paired with his face, it suits him well. She ends the letter promising that she will 'take good care of him', though you know that your respective ideas of those words do not align or even coexist in the same universe. There is an unmistakable discrepancy between her intentions and your own, and you don't like it.

"Come back to us, Brighella. You can watch everything you wanted in person."

-

You won't go back. It's a trap.

Irritated, you find yourself back in the heart of the country where nobody lurks, haphazard in the way you fire your arrows at every creature that dares to disturb your sense of peace. It's hard to focus, and you don't bother trying. Liyue is not the same as Snezhnaya, with open plains broken up by rocky mountains. The creatures are mostly the same, and all die the same, hilichurls and geovishaps running rampant and shot down into piles of meat and rocks.

It doesn't matter how loudly you shout, as there's nobody around to hear it. You could scream, cry, and throw a tantrum all you want, and it won't matter. Even if you throw yourself at the ground and bang your head into the dirt, nobody will see it.

This is all pointless. You will never escape. It will never matter how far you roam or how fast you run.

Why did you think you could? Had your brain melted from your head?

There is no other side. There is no salvation. You are owned from the day you're brought in until the day you die, but why? Why did they want to bring you back to Snezhnaya? What was the point? You are out of the way now, hardly causing trouble for them. Despite this, everything seems to be running smoothly, even with the liberties you have taken in your new role. Was that it? The reason they wanted you to see?

It must be. There is no other reason to risk exposing the lie otherwise. Unless it was to tarnish the Fatui's reputation.

You refuse to believe it is something as innocent as wanting to see your request honoured. Nothing is innocent within the Fatui, not an action without hidden intentions or motives. Centuries of watching their misdeeds from the inside, which always go unpunished and unchallenged by anyone except the powerless commoners, have taught you that there is always an ulterior motive lurking behind their actions.

Not to mention it came from Columbina.

You must've spent three days out there before finally returning to Wangshu Inn, dirtied by the elements and craving something to eat, like a child's insatiable desire for sweets. The dead of night provides a cover for you to take a dip in the water beside the inn in an attempt to rinse the dirt and sweat off of you. It dawns on you that your new clothes would've been ruined if you hadn't had the foresight to change before venturing out again. In that moment, thoughts of the Fatui and the memories evoked by your armour flooded your mind, and you didn't want the same thing to happen to the clothes that had made you so happy from the moment you put them on.

It feels childish how you cling to these things.

A part of you just can't help it, torn between holding onto the memories that define who you believe yourself to be and starting anew with a clean slate. Neither can win. One is stuck on the past and what little you have of it, and the other wants to abandon all of that and start completely fresh.

The half-compromise you are trying desperately to make work by accepting that what's gone is gone while keeping your armour close to your heart is obviously not working. The thought of discarding it pains you too much to actually do it, plagued by the urge to melt it down to scrap metal while also being overwhelmed by the knowledge you will regret doing that as soon as you see the mess that would be left of it.

Your new clothes make you happy, so you need more new things to make you even happier, right? If new means you glean happiness, then more new is what will help you move past all of this deliberation in your head.

Clothes were a given, and...maybe a haircut? Yeah. You should try cutting your hair and decide on a name for yourself that isn't Brighella. Something you want, a name you like, that you can look at yourself and see that person reflected in a mirror. The person you think you are supposed to be when you look past the expectation that has been instilled in you.

That merchant you spoke to mentioned the Adventurer's Guild might have a place for you. What if you should be helping people instead of hurting them? What if you only did that to please the Tsaritsa?

In the background of your thoughts, you walk yourself back to your room at the Wangshu Inn and collapse onto your bed, thinking. Though you are exhausted, you cannot bring yourself to sleep for one reason or another. You make excuses for yourself just to ignore the glaring root of the problem you know is there but refuse to acknowledge. The problem isn't really how hot or cold the room is or the texture of your blankets and how much you dislike the humidity in the air. Something else entirely is keeping you from rest.

Your hair isn't the problem either, or your clothes. Even your lack of a proper name really doesn't bother you. They're only the illusion of change you're using to cover up how truly lost you have become now that you have to think for yourself.

How long have you been alive now? Centuries at least. You can't even live independently after that long? No. No, you can't.

You are so lonely, you are lost, you are confused. You need company, you need guidance, and you need purpose. How are you supposed to live? Where is the person who will tell you what to do every day? 

You have to make that choice yourself? You can't do that. You've never done that. 

The thought of even something so basic scaring you so severely brings you to a weakness you never realised you even possessed. Fear surges through the very depths of your being, an unfamiliar sensation that you find unsettling. You don't like it, but it's an impossible feeling to push down and ignore. Over the years, you had quietly collected your shortcomings into a neat little jar and pushed it aside, out of sight, away from your conscious thought, as if pretending you were invincible. 

What would you have done if you had gotten to Capitano? Make him decide?

He can't. He's not human. He doesn't know enough to decide. You've only made him just like you, a fearsome man until he's abandoned and vulnerable like you have become, and then he'll be pathetic and helpless too.

Nothing came out of any of your efforts, did it? It couldn't have possibly. Even with every attempt you made, it was always doomed to fail.

-

It turns out that the Adventurer's Guild was more than happy to take you in, in a way. They put you right to work. It helps to take your mind off of things if nothing else. It's mindless work, able to tune out everything in your brain and run on auto-pilot. You take to this life so well it scares you, completing your tasks with so little trouble you wonder how this isn't more popular, even if some are arguably unnecessary. If only you were good at proper cooking, you might get rich from the tens of requests for certain dishes. 

You're irresistibly drawn to the combat, right back to the heat of battle where you feel truly alive. In all you've had to question, your love for the thrill of fighting has never been up for debate. You're unsure whether it's the adrenaline or something else, but you don't care to know, either. You don't concern yourself with such questions. It's not important to you why, so long as you find comfort in it. It's the one thing you cannot be robbed of. 

A hard day's work is always rewarding.

"Make sure you be careful today." A fellow adventurer is quick to catch you before you can wander off for your next quest, smiling and unbothered despite his words. You've never met him, but he speaks as if you have.

Something about the bond of adventurers is so reminiscent of the Fatui.

You turn back to place your full attention on him rather than the grilled tiger fish you had acquired out of curiosity about the taste. "Why's that?" You're not too bothered, expecting him to tell you that it's dangerous out there, the Abyss Order existing and all.

"The Fatui are restless."

His words catch you off-guard, light in tone as they are. In outward appearances, he's mostly unbothered, while the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end.

You try to grasp your bearings just enough to speak. "They don't do that for fun." Something about it is just as shaky as you expected, unable to fully mask it, but you figure he'll blame it on nerves.

"Harbinger, apparently." He doesn't draw attention to your demeanour, so neither do you.

"Which one?"

"Dunno."

It's probably Columbina. Maybe you pissed her off when you shot the messenger. Yeah, she probably wouldn't appreciate that. When you did it in a fit of anger, you expected her to find it funny after coming to your senses.

"Hey. Something wrong?"

You startle as you realise he had been speaking that whole time, and you just weren't listening.

"Sorry?"

"I said it's weird that they'd be up and about so soon after the newest was officially promoted."

You deadpan a little, realising it wasn't something of actual value, just a misconception that the greatest powers that be in Snezhnaya aren't spiteful enough to hate each other just as much as they hate everyone else. "Not really. They're not particularly sentimental."

"They don't even care to go out drinking for their own?"

"They hardly know how to tolerate each other." You realise your slip of the tongue too late, seeming too familiar. That's a problem. He barely draws attention to it, only making a strange face.

"Well, whatever the reason, work doesn't stop for them."

In silence, you agree and continue your day as if you really believe that.

-

As you wrap up your work for the day, you feel a sense of pleasant exhaustion wash over you. It struck you as strange that nobody was out in the wild, even the usual fatuus you avoid. Something about it was uniquely eerie. It dawns on you why he came to the conclusion that the Fatui were 'restless'. They must have retreated into the city to prepare for the impending arrival of the Harbinger destined to disrupt the small peace you had found. The sudden influx of fatuus in Liyue would make it seem like they are increasing in numbers nationwide when in reality, they are just moving.

You're not going to let it bother you for now.

Somewhere in the back of your mind, you know you have promised yourself that repeatedly and have found it to be a lie, but you mean it this time. You're familiar enough with the workings of the Fatui to know that they don't like to leave sectors alone for too long, and Liyue had spent a fair time before your dismissal unchecked. 

Even at night, you remain unbothered when you wander Liyue for a time, looking for something to do and notice what he was talking about.

Many of them are fussing more than usual, meaning that chances are it's too late to inhibit the process of this Harbinger arriving. You could turn tail and run, scurry off to the other side of Teyvat and settle in Fontaine or even Natlan, but you like it here.

You sit in the heart of Liyue, listening to a speaker tell his stories. You know you shouldn't linger, but you tell yourself you can for just a little while longer. It reminds you of the past, filled with Liyue legends you remember hearing about as news at the time they took place. The fact these tales are now old enough to be suitable for a speaker's recitation as 'legends' is a grim reminder that maybe you're older than you realised. Your early life is now from the time of legends. You can push that feeling aside to focus on the nostalgia of hearing these stories.

Beside you, you hear the chair move but don't budge from looking to see who it is, assuming that all other chairs are taken or that it's an adventurer who got curious, possibly even the man you had spoken to earlier about all of the Fatui--

“Reminiscing, Brighella?”

You recognise both that voice and that name and go stiff, eyes finding her before your head can even turn in her direction.

In front of you—or rather, across from you—the Knave sits upon the other chair at your table as if she was always supposed to be there, seemingly at ease, but you know better than to assume her guard is down. Arlecchino has always had an icy composure, though she can be hot-headed at times and can lose her temper when provoked. It's not surprising that she was able to track you down, even without knowing what your face looks like.

She turns to you leisurely, unhurried. "I came to look for you since you missed the ceremony." It sounds like a greeting the way she speaks those words. You suppose it is one, really.

Ah, maybe you should've been worried after all.

You try to play off your emotions as if you're completely unfazed by her presence. It's the only way to maintain some semblance of control. "Did Columbina not like my gift?"

"Oh, she rather enjoyed it." Arlecchino maintains a similar composure, knowing approaching you in public means employing subtlety as much as it means she's less likely to be attacked. "She felt it was just the kind of gift you would give."

"I try my best not to disappoint." Your response is less enthusiastic than you might like, a hint of nervousness infesting your brain and refusing to budge.

Despite this, she doesn't notice, not outwardly. Really, that means nothing, as you are very aware of how good her poker face is. "Il Capitano hasn't stopped speaking about how much he'd like to kill you. You don't want to disappoint, do you?" When you were waiting for her to speak, those weren't the words you expected to hear, but somehow you're not fully surprised either.

"I see, so my lies reached even his ears." 

You thought as much.

"I think you'll be quite surprised when you see him." Her reply is so cocky that you almost scoff at her.

"Who said I would be seeing him?" You try to match the audacity she had to make such a remark.

She turns to you rather casually for the words she speaks, an odd tone you can't quite place, lacing her words half like mockery. "You miss him, don't you?"

It's that question that makes you snort and turn away as you realise that her negotiation and persuasion skills are abysmal for such a cunning and intelligent woman. "Not enough to become foolish enough to trust someone whose title denotes them as dishonest and untrustworthy." You always wondered about that, really. "A name like 'the Knave' really isn't subtle."

"Funny." She doesn't laugh or even smile. "I believe yours was something close to 'bother'."

You lean back in your chair, testing it slightly as you push the front legs off the floor as a means of entertaining yourself through this frankly dull conversation. "Then I suppose we're both living up to our names."

She remains silent for several seconds, pondering her next words. You can see her fingers rub against the wood of the chair as a distraction. 

"The others told me it was pointless to try to bring you back."

"They were right."

"You won't come back for any reason?"

"I know a trap when I see one."

"Of course."

Silence, again. You don't care to break it, either. You came to hear the stories, and you really would like to continue that rather than listening to her voice, but she's not making it easy.

"Is that all now?" Your voice shows your impatience more than you might like, but you realise it may work in your favour if she senses she's annoying you.

For the first time in a while, she smiles faintly to herself. "For now. Your answer is abundantly clear." She appears to concede, if only for a little while

You let the chair land back on all of its legs and lean your elbow on the table. 

"Are you going to get out of that chair?"

"No."

"And why is that?"

"It's comfortable."

The urge to roll your eyes brims in your mind, but you stop yourself. You don't want to give the Knave the satisfaction of knowing something she is already well aware of. Besides that, you don't want her to know that you really don't want her here in any capacity. Arlecchino's presence is never a good thing.

You let out a tentative breath as you consider your next words quite carefully. The wrong thing might have Arlecchino never leaving you, and the right one might drive her back to Snezhnaya if you're lucky. You shift your whole body to face her. "You just arrived from Snezhnaya, I take it. What do you want to eat?"

She eyes you suspiciously, scrutinising you for any sign of trying to fool her into consuming poison or making herself sick. "You're feeding me now?"

You pretend you don't notice her intensity. "Well, you're not leaving. It would look strange for me to order food for myself."

Again she smiles to herself, a light mockery that's cautious and testing, easing herself into accepting your offer. "I wasn't aware you cared so much."

"You could starve if you'd prefer." You turn away as you speak and don't look back, shifting yourself back in your seat to be front-facing.

There's a quietness between the two of you, both waiting for the answer to your proposal. You have an inkling Arlecchino will accept, but you don't know with her. She never seemed especially pleased by the times the Jester would convene you all over meals and such, ending up in fights and bickering. She never fought with you, however, so perhaps it's different. 

"Order whatever you like."

You find yourself looking intently at a list of the options on the menu. It's quite a lengthy list. "Mm..." Even though it's just a false invitation and you're doing it to be courteous, you can't say you aren't enjoying the thought of picking out a meal and sharing it with her. Despite your removal from the Fatui's affairs for some time, you'd be lying if you thought you weren't at least a little curious. "Jade Parcels...and maybe Jade Fruit Soup? But Dragon Beard Noodles sound good too..."

Becoming slightly irritated by your indecision, Arlecchino looks across the table to where you are sitting deep in thought. "Is it that complicated of a decision?"

You spare her only a glance before returning to looking for something she would enjoy. "I have to pick something you'll like, don't I?"

Soup is more challenging to share than noodles are.

With that, your decision is made, and you settle. Despite yourself, you are somewhat restless in thought. Arlecchino's lack of contribution is slightly frustrating, but it sounds like she'd be content with anything. You're not sure if your choice is the correct one, but you believe you picked something to the best of your abilities that is easy, even to a foreign tongue. As far as you know, Arlecchino is from Fontaine. You've never eaten like this with Arlecchino to know her tastes or dietary restrictions.

"Jade Parcels and Dragon Beard Noodles. Sound good?"

"It'll do."

"Good. I'll go order it, then."

Arlecchino must be surprised that you returned, as she doesn't seem too thrilled. She never really does, but there was a disappointed glint in her eye right up until you walked in front of her to get to your chair. 

It continues until you get the food, and Arlecchino finally stares at it with an overwhelming sense of dread, left with an intense feeling of apprehension regarding whether. You appear not to hesitate, though this arrangement isn't quite what she had expected. Arlecchino had thought you would order enough dishes that you wouldn't have to share, but you seemed to understand it in a way that meant you would be eating from the same bowl.

You notice her hesitation almost immediately, yet your vexation with her arrival makes you unwilling to acknowledge that you know the reason, a deliberate miscommunication on your part. "Mm. I didn't think this through." Your words seem to make her perk up as if you will free her from her awkwardness by asking for another bowl. "You probably aren't used to using chopsticks, are you? Not many dishes that need those back home."

She knows you're toying with her, that sweet smile from across the table hardly hiding your true intentions. Arlecchino waits, watching to see what you will do next, as she looks back at you with a scowl. 

Her eyes do not leave you as you wordlessly collect a Jade Parcel and present it to her like you are patronising her with this action. Your feigned kindness, this supposed benevolence of you offering to feed her like a child, no doubt hoping she'll back down and excuse herself completely. 

She won't let you do that and have the satisfaction of seeing her back down. She won't allow you to break her facade of acceptance.

Though you circle the food in front of her slowly, only a motion with your fingers trying to convince her or make her as uncomfortable as possible, Arlecchino continues to stare for several more moments. Eventually, she musters the courage to relinquish some of her pride.

Arlecchino leans in slightly, just enough to open her mouth and take a bite from the food you hold out for her. Despite the circumstances that led to this moment, she can't help but acknowledge your good taste. Arlecchino couldn't possibly eat another bite that way, though. Not being fed by the woman who is now her adversary just to avoid her 'winning' in the situation, but admitting she is willing to let you get under her skin is not an option either.

She must treat this situation differently, as if you are merely feeding her out of obligation to her rather than because you have your own motives.

It hardly stops her from enjoying her portion of the meal from the chopsticks you share with her. At some point, it finally occurs to her that you only hold one pair, leaving her set untouched despite feeding her. You had been feeding her with the same set you ate with the entire time, and while you were well aware of that, it hardly seemed to alarm you as much as it alarmed her.

Your biggest disappointment was being unable to get rid of her that whole time, watching her readily accept whatever you tried to use against her. Watching a Harbinger practically bow their head and obey you, however, fuels your consciousness. It's like eye candy to think back and realise you did that.

It's another one of your quiet defiances against the Tsaritsa. You wonder how far you can take it.

As you stand from your seat, you stretch your arms above your head until you hear a faint pop as all the tension in your back relaxes. "I don't imagine you'll be leaving anytime soon."

"No. I have plenty of business outside of you." It's not a lie. She's got a lot to do in Liyue even without your presence, but you're a priority. 

You lean back over your chair, a mischievous little look on your face. "Do tell."

"You know that I can't do that." She's not amused by the attempt, either.

You straighten back to your usual height and brush it off in moments. "Unfun. I thought your loyalty to the Tsaritsa could be won over easily." 

She scowls. "Not by you."

"I see. You have standards after all."

She chooses to ignore your comment. Up until now, you have had quick-fire conversations, sometimes interrupted by a silence that drags on. This is no exception.

"Capitano truly believes you are dead." Arlecchino realises when she has caught your attention, and that time is now. She notices how your head tilts towards her ever so slightly, and your head raises. "For a time, he grieved, but it didn't last long. He has become fixated on the idea of revenge ever since he heard that Brighella's killer was running around boasting about their achievements with the authentic armour to support their claims."

Suddenly it makes some small amount of sense in your mind why they would want you to come back exactly. Capitano won't stay put forever. If he's stuck on vengeance, he won't rest until he exacts it. You weren't thinking about how much your stories would piss him off at the time.

When you spend an extended period of time silent and seemingly disinclined to answer, Arlecchino continues. "I want to show you to him."

You have subjected him to human emotions he's not equipped to deal with. Rightfully, you feel horrible like more of your failures are being wrenched from your corner and dumped out into the open for all to see. It doesn't matter that you're in Liyue, where nobody knows the two of you. You don't want them to see either. 

"He wouldn't want to see me." You don't think she really wanted to hear those words when you finally speak. Her expression gives it away. "He should enjoy his position without my interference. I've ruined his life enough."

"You've given him power and status, he should be grateful for that--"

"No. He shouldn't." You don't even wait for her to finish. She hasn't even realised it yet. Not the way you've been forced to. That power is a detriment, not a blessing. Why should he want that? "I thought that way as well, but now I…I don't think my choice was the correct one."

Arlecchino was not expecting to evoke your vulnerability, shallow as it may be for now. "What choice?"

"To bring him back from the abyss." 

From a purely objective perspective, taking in Capitano was the cause of everything. Arlecchino presumably thinks of it in the way you don't want her to, that you regret taking him in because he ultimately ruined everything for you, causing your world to fall apart. You don't. You wish you hadn't dragged him down with you.

Now Capitano still dealing with the consequences of your choices. He was perfectly satisfied where he was and would've remained that way had he not been caught up in your plans. It was your arrogance that made you think Capitano would prefer to come with you. At no point in your first interaction had he indicated he was displeased in his circumstances, only hostile because humans were so close to him. It is an understandable thing, considering that humans were a foreign concept to him and potentially posed a threat.

"Because he overtook you?" 

There it is.

Despite her words, she appears to have dropped her irritated expression and the impatience in her words and actions. You are finally speaking, and she won't lose that opportunity to an avoidable break in her temper.

"No. No, nothing like that." You try to find the words to explain it, even knowing she likely wouldn't understand it in her current position. You doubt she could ever comprehend it with how she treats her loyalty. "It's more like… Off the record, though I was cherished for many years, even I eventually became disposable. I have left Capitano in the hands of the person who caused that, and now I have damned him to the same fate."

Arlecchino is silent in thought, mulling over your words with great care. The tone of the conversation shifted right under your noses, and with it, so did her demeanour. She became relaxed in a way, though you imagine no less guarded than she always is. "I fail to see how your performance declined. In fact, you are more necessary now than you have ever been."

"I see." In your head, that means she's on your side to a degree. "So you believe that my termination was a mistake?"

"A grave error at best." Her words only confirm the way you thought of it. "Even if you had declined in performance, the people have begun to question more than ever, which sabotages the political landscape of Snezhnaya for those who care about it, the same people who stood idly by while you were ousted. Those who oppose the Fatui are pushing the notion that we must be weaker than we appear, because if even Brighella could die, then what does that say for the rest of us."

Though you wish you could say that concept was inconceivable, the idea that those fighting for reform would seize upon your demise as a means to spur change. It's not shocking that everyone else has been called into question, either. Though it is easy to push the role of frontrunner onto the Director, his duty is mainly administrative, as is the case with many high-ranking positions. His wrath is quick and brutal, and sparse. Dottore is too busy with his disgusting hobbies, and Columbina must remain in the light as a figure they can cling to. That leaves the position of Fourth as the one who is publicly the most violent and ruthless, which used to fall to you.

"I see. Is that why they want me to come back?" You don't expect an honest answer as you ask that question, half anticipating another play at your heartstrings.

"No." 

Frustratingly, she doesn't elaborate.

"I'll only agree to return if Capitano is free to do as he wishes."

She scoffs, somewhat returning to her brash attitude. "Even if I could make that decision, we're well past the point where that's a possibility."

You know that she's correct in that.

Still, you can't stop the sight you let out. You knew the request was wonderful in theory but inconceivable in practice, but asking never hurt anyone. "Then what do you want from me? I take it that though I'm only a stagehand, my part in the theatre is not yet over."

"Is that how you see it?"

"Answer my question."

"Execution."

You pause at her answer.

"Execution?"

You're not even sure you heard her correctly. The execution of who? Brighella has already been put to death, and Capitano has barely warmed his seat among the Harbingers. Nobody left in this is worth killing, given the precarious nature of the Fatui's support in the aftermath of Brighella's murder. It was already unstable, and now things are just worse, with no better word to describe.

You doubt they made the decision lightly.

"Execution. Your execution for the murder of Brighella and crimes against the state."

Your nerves instantly spike again, and your guard is higher than ever. At any moment, you could need to draw your bow and fight her because even though you're unsure of how to treat this life, you're not ready to give it up. No foe has scared you before, and neither will the prospect of rebuilding from square one.

"I see, so you've come to extradite me."

"You read my intentions horribly. I'm impressed you managed to make it so far like that."

You furrow your brows in annoyance. "Then what?"

"The values of the Fatui no longer align with mine." The assertion draws your attention more than anything else. You have always been aware that she is unconcerned with the ideas of loyalty and honour, which you can't fault her for. Abiding by the code of honour the Tsaritsa instilled in you left you here.

You may be completely wrong, but she was so vague and doesn't seem to be waiting to say anything else. "Is this your way of telling me you're deserting the Fatui?"

"No."

"Then what?"

"You so happen to be someone I like." 

You're startled by that as well. As far as you were aware, the decision to do nothing in the face of your dismissal was unanimous. You thought Capitano was your only remaining ally. Even if she's the lowest ranking, that is not indicative of power in an objective sense but of authority. In a sense, she is the new 'you' of the Harbingers, as she always was to a degree. 

Blame for the disorder is shifting in your absence to her.

"Because I cleaned the messes you now manage?"

"Because you aren't cowardly and fixated on politics but inhibited by them. You are a model of what is right." You can't say you follow what she's saying but allow her to continue. "Pulcinella and even Pierro refuse to travel abroad, always making excuses to shirk their jobs when faced with danger in order to comfortably remain in luxury. From the day I joined, you stood out to me in that way."

You raise an eyebrow at her, unimpressed by whatever she's trying to do right now. "Are you trying to flatter me into coming back?"

"I was telling the truth." She doesn't look impressed, either.

You feel a little embarrassed by that, suddenly feeling as though you really had responded quite rudely to an innocent statement. "Hearing a person idolise me is strange," you admit.

"It's not idolising." Her correction is sharp.

"Sounded close enough."

Silence again, as with the pauses scattered around the rest of your conversation. You aren't catapulting the topic into something of great interest or progressing, and neither is Arlecchino. Her lips press into a thin line trying to hide any cracks and stifle any emotion that slips through.

"I admire you."

You did not realise such a thing was possible, really.

"I thought you may have remembered the times we shared and think fondly of it, but perhaps not. We fought once- maybe twice- before. We drank together. Nothing else."

To end that statement with 'nothing else' as if to reduce every conversation, interaction, hour and experience to ashes is thoughtless at best. You didn't remember either instance in which Arlecchino believes you fought and still don't, though you try to now that you have come to find it apparently happened. If it did, the chances of you actually remembering is slim to none with how your memory is. It's not that you forget things quickly, but that minor events slip through the cracks in your frankly chock-full memory.

"I don't remember them, I'm sorry."

"I didn't expect you to."

Despite her words, there is a faint bittersweetness to it, the realisation you are insignificant to the person you aspire toward being like. Somewhere, even if she is aware it was always not only a possibility but highly likely, it still feels like a letdown, the fragile hope you might remember her strength. You only remember her drunken and all too enamoured by you to think properly. It is foolish of her to feel that way because you have battled many foes, and expecting you to remember all of them, let alone your underling, is unreasonable.

"You still haven't answered my question." Changing the topic, you take the opportunity to try to direct her back to what you asked in the first place. "Why are you really here?"

"The Jester gave me permission to pursue you, believing I would attempt to convince you to return to Snezhnaya after Columbina failed." As Arlecchino begins to explain, it slowly begins to make sense as the pieces fall neatly into place. "However, I have no interest in appeasing the wants of dignitaries who care only for their comfort."

You don't want that either. It's just a repeat of Capitano. "Do you understand how dangerous what you're doing is?" It's an attempt to remind her, but Arlecchino's unwavering expression tells you that reminders are unnecessary and unwanted.

"Yes, you were removed for less." She only confirms it for you. "Dottore is of the opinion that you will be forgotten, as are several others-" you imagine singling him out has something to do with them fighting all the time- "but that is simply impossible."

"Times change. You would be surprised how many things we thought would never be forgotten that humans have completely lost all knowledge of."

To her, that concept may be harder to swallow. Arlecchino has never seen the centuries roll by as you have and isn't as familiar with what does and does not remain. Even the greatest gods fell in the Archon War, and most humans cannot name any but the seven Archons. It is natural to forget and progress. The past is meant to become speculation and theory.

"I won't allow that." Abruptly she stops, though her sudden words startle you somewhat with how intense they are. That kind of illogical thought process is natural, maybe. You can't really say. "They could remember."

You shake your head in response, a firm denial before she's even begun to try and sell you on the idea. "There's no need for them to remember."

"There is every need."

"People don't glean the same admiration you do for someone they see as a tyrant."

"Then evoke fear!"

"Enough." You did not expect to have to put your foot down so harshly but do not hesitate to. "I won't entertain this."

Arlecchino grits her teeth at how easily you let go. Even though you are obviously not acclimated to civilian life, you refuse her offer that would allow you to return to Snezhnaya in a potential position of power. It is yet another failed step in the many she expected to have to take to convince you.

"Then let me hide you until some time passes."

"I'm not a precious treasure." She ignores how you roll your eyes at her, completely withdrawing how emotionally available you had managed to be. She can't let her anger take control of her again. "I can handle myself thank you very much." 

You sense she will not be giving up easily.

Even if you could convince her to leave you to your devices and that you would be fine, you doubt she would accept that. However, you have a feeling she knows you intend to disappear after this conversation. You have no idea why else she would pour her heart out in an attempt to make you easier to keep hold of. If you leave, you hold the advantage.

"I cannot continue to defend your honour while you stand by and allow them to do as they please with your name."

That doesn't worry you too much when you've been contributing to it since leaving. "Then give up. Let my name be tarnished."

Arlecchno's anger finally begins to boil over despite her efforts to contain it, rage spilling from the cracks in her composure. "You cannot have forgotten everything we did together."

"Of course I have not forgotten that." Your words are more fuel than suffocation to the growing fire.

"Then accept my help and stop being so stubborn."

"There's no need to."

She grabs you by your arm before you can step away, and you can feel a chill in her hand seep into your skin, likely a byproduct of her delusion. It doesn't hurt, but it doesn't match well with how warm you are most of the time. "You would be willing to pretend you don't wish for normalcy to avoid confronting the Tsaritsa?"

"If I return to Snezhnaya, I will die." You lay it out as directly as possible, without an if, but or and. There's no room to debate this because the outcome will not change. Even if the two of you decide you're best friends, nobody else will see things that way, so it's pointless to pretend you don't see it as it has to be.

Arlecchino finally appears to consider your words more carefully, remaining silent again, but you do not interrupt her this time. You shift your focus to the icy hand still touching you and begin to channel what little you can of your vision without drawing your bow to warm her. You hope she doesn't notice it, not wanting her to find an ulterior motive in it.

"Then it is unavoidable."

You don't quite understand what she is saying until she removes her hand from you to place something on the table you shared.

Suspiciously, you eye the item as you wonder about the significance of abandoning it beyond the obvious, but you don't want to acknowledge that option. "You'll need your insignia if you wish to return." You needn't remind her of that, but it is a prompting statement.

Arlecchino shocks you with her next words.

"I'm remaining with you."

You stand in stunned silence for several seconds, replaying them over in your head. Remaining with you. She doesn't mean that, does she? This is another of her persuasion tactics, right? She cannot actually go through with this. "You're what?"

"I'm not going back to Snezhnaya."

That only confirms your fear, the chill of it rushing to the core of your being and lighting your nerves up with an icy cold. Maybe that's just the hand touching your cheek.

"You can't. You shouldn't. You should stay there."

She makes an odd face at you, half understanding of your plight and the other confused about why you care so much about what she does with her job. "In that place you curse yourself for leaving Capitano?"

"It's a comfortable position." You try to reason that way with her, pointing out the inarguable benefit.

"I don't care for comfort."

You scramble to find another reason, something else to make her give in and pick it back up. You have not gotten anything you attempted to get this night. Arlecchino didn't leave and is, in fact, intent on leaving the Fatui to continue that.

"I don't care to waste my time pandering to people who do not value what I provide for them, all the while relying on it."

That's not a reason you wish to say, but it is. It is a very real reason. You can see it in how the Fatui regards your circumstances that they have never found enough value in the mountain of work you took on. If they had, you wouldn't be having this conversation. She's right, you realise, she realised what you could not.

"Even if you do not allow it, I would be able to follow you." It's a strange thing to say, but maybe she was trying to convince you. Her arm falls back to her side.

You shake your head. "Humans tire."

"I won't be too slow."

It's different for her. Arlecchino doesn't hulk around a bulky suit of armour and a helmet to conceal her face. It is open and well-known. There will be places she can't ever travel to again. Her life will be this and nothing else, while yours will eventually become something else, as it was always supposed to. Even if you don't want to now, you will move on and find a new sense of self. She may never.

"There are grave consequences."

"I know."

"You may never know peace."

"I can live with that."

"You--" 

--will question everything you have ever known. That was what you were about to say. You again come to a realisation that clears things for you. It's different. Arlecchino has not spent her whole life dedicated to serving the Tsaritsa, only a few years at best. You spent centuries. It is no wonder that she could give it all up so easily. Arlecchino only had one foot in the door in the first place.

The realisation dawning on you this way is daunting.

"...Fine. I will accept that." Though you thought you would struggle more, you also understand that it is useless to do so.

"A good choice."

The act of conceding can bring about a sense of relief and comfort. Conceding feels nice, in a way. It is a respite from constantly controlling everything to be exactly as you wish. It allows you the freedom of simply acknowledging the reality of a situation and accept that it may not align with your ideals, even if you don't necessarily like it.

You don't want Arlecchino to accompany you for her sake, but accepting that she will not share your fate of being humiliated can bring about a sense of peace. She will live however she pleases, and that means she may not want for the same future you received. Having a free will allows her to leave.

Slowly, you try to recover from the shock of the situation. As you take in a deep, quivering breath, you begin to steady yourself and attemt to process all that is unfolding.

A single question comes to your mind, a relatively simple one but significant enough to matter greatly.

"What is your name?"

CROSSPOSTED ON AO3

[skzoologist]

HI HI HIIII! IS YOUR REQUEST STILL OPEN? (checked your profile but I had to ask again because what if u forgot to close it? 😭) ANYWWWWAY

Can I ask the reaction (crack or fluff just skz being proud of our bby bae) of skz to Bae dancing EXO's 'The Eve' or 'Artificial Love'?

TENCHUUU (づ￣ ³￣)づ

word count: ~1.2k

warnings: sensual dance (for the shy ones like me)

genre: crack

a/n: Hey-ho anon, don't you worry! I basically live on this hellsite, I'm here everyday, updating my blog. Now, onto your request. The way I just watched the videos so I knew what to write about like this: 😳🫣. What can I say, I get flustered easily too. Also I wasn't sure in what format you wanted the reactions, in a little drabble like this, or written down per member, so I'm sorry if this is not what you wanted (i'm still not versed in the ways of running a blog). I hope you'll enjoy this! (Also yes, I know the gif isn't matching, I just couldn't find one from this dance)

Please let me know if I left a warning or anything out, I will add it in! Reblogs, likes and feedback are greatly appreciated!

!I don't condone anyone stealing my work and posting it anywhere without my permission, or feeding it to AI!

!This is just fiction, my interpretation of Stray Kids. By no means is this how they are and how they behave in real life!

‧˚₊꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒦꒷‧₊˚⊹‧˚₊꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒦꒷‧₊˚⊹

‧˚₊꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒦꒷‧₊˚⊹‧˚₊꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒷꒦︶︶︶︶︶꒦꒷‧₊˚⊹

The band was on their 3rd Fanmeeting, the crowds overly ecstatic wherever they went. There was a certain buzz in the air, amplifying the cheering and shouting even more than usual.

And the boys were absolutely thriving on it, adrenaline coursing through their veins in dangerous amounts, pushing them to perform on those bright stages for endless hours with no problem.

Bae was no different, his stage persona flawless, the perfect and cold mask on his face never even wavering. Fans shouted his name with all their might amidst their performances to different songs, trying to grab his attention, even if it was only for a split second. It never worked, the male too focused on doing well and dancing with all his might, executing the moves with scary precision. The fans were used to it by now, never expecting the idol to actually smile at them with a finger heart or even a wink sent their way, those actions suiting the other members much more. The tall otter was way too shy to do that, especially amidst dancing. 

After the band performed the well-known and fan favourite dances that belonged to a few of their selected songs in Seoul, it was time for a little break and fanservice. Small chairs were brought up onto the stage, easily lifted and moved thanks to their light build. Everyone took their respective seats, Bae having his between Chan and Changbin. Not like it mattered anyway, the boys always kept switching up their seats and who they sat next to amidst the chaos.

And chaos, it was.

Bae knew what was going to happen, of course he did, having helped the others practise with the choreography, but it still didn’t take away the shock factor of seeing it live, right in front of him up on the stage.

It started with ‘Queencard’ by (G)I-DLE, the two males next to him standing up and walking to the centre of their little half-circle they had decided to sit in. Bae couldn’t help the smile that broke out on his face, seeing his bandmates perform so wonderfully, all those practices having paid off. But he also couldn’t help the way his eyes widened at certain moves, the skin on his ears undoubtedly already turning red. It only became worse once the song ended, Chan and Changbin going to sit back down and noticing his slightly flustered state.

He tried his best to ignore those giggles around him.

Focusing back in front of him, Bae suddenly wished he didn’t. The sight of Felix and Hyunjin dancing to ‘The Eve’ by EXO caught him off-guard, still not having fully recovered from the previous dance. Their moves were flawless, of course they were, being proud members of Danceracha, and the watching idol was extremely proud of them. He remembered which parts were tricky for who, both proudly skipping over to him when they had finally pulled them off.

But the moves were also sensual, way too much for the shy little otter. Yet, he couldn’t take his eyes off of them, gaze stuck in place and meeting with Hyunjin’s. The younger winked at him just as he performed the last hip roll, not knowing how much damage he had done to Bae’s brain.

By the end of the song Bae’s skin became several shades darker, the red extremely evident and vibrant on it. This naturally meant that everyone could see it easily, teasing him endlessly and with no mercy. It was a miracle in itself that he hadn’t exploded at all.

“Come on Bae hyung, why not dance it as well?” - Felix slyly added, wiggling his eyebrows. “N-no, I couldn’t–” - Bae tried to defend himself, only to have Hyunjin cut him off. “You’d basically learnt it with us, with how much you helped us. Come on Hyung, please?”

And who was he to say no to those eyes?

With a silent sigh, Bae closed his eyes and tried to cool himself down. Those boggled thoughts slowly detangled from each other, leaving his mind tidy and focused. The memories of each practice flashed before his closed eyelids, all in perfect order and great detail.

When he opened his eyes again he had already been standing in Felix and Hyunjin’s place, the attention of the crowd and his members all on him. A quiet breath left his lips, a hand carding through his hair as the song started up again, signalling that it was time.

Bae’s body moved in perfect rhythm, as if it was a well-oiled machine. Not a single step or flick of a hand was out of place, his mind on autopilot with only the thought of dancing floating in its entirety. He felt the tight leather pants constrict with each movement, the slit on the back of his shirt opening and flashing a bit of skin when he turned around.

As the song ended so did his focus, eyes blinking and seeing the cheering crowd as he was putting his hand down from his ending pose. Although somehow the ones next to him were much louder, something that should have been impossible to achieve.

“I TOLD YOU YOU COULD DO IT!” - Felix shouted, a smile on his lips so wide, Bae was afraid it would split his face in two. “Wah, I never knew our baby otter could dance like that!” - Chan said, all giggles and chuckles as he affectionately squeezed Bae’s shoulder. “I think you just killed a few people here, Dal hyung.” - Jeongin added in, Seungmin wholeheartedly agreeing.

At the head tilt of the flustered member, the puppy pointed at the remaining four members who laid on the floor, seemingly dead. Jisung kept glancing up occasionally, successfully catching Bae’s gaze.

“Yah, warn us before moving like that! Those hips are deadly, man.” - he accused, even pointing a finger at the poor man.

“I don’t think I can recover from this.” - agreed Hyunjin, dramatically draping an arm over his forehead.

“Guys, I think Binnie and Lino hyung actually died. They haven’t moved since then.” - Felix added in, sweatdropping at the situation.

The boy was right, as the two didn’t react even when Chan and Seungmin had shaken them. Only when Bae was nearby did they seemingly resurrect, latching onto his legs and gazing up at the blushing male with stars and adoration in their eyes.

“Marry me, jagi.” - the two said almost perfectly at the same time, even the petname they used matched.

Minho and Changbin glared at each other, all the while Bae became an absolute flustered mess, skin flushed all the way down to his neck and chest. The others enjoyed the show, maybe a bit too much, relishing in the fact that Bae had finally let up on stage for a bit. Most of them didn’t hesitate to join in and shower the tall idol with praises, only worsening his condition as he just stood there, hands covering his face so at least STAY wouldn’t see him.

He couldn’t let that happen, not in a million years. Let him have the remains of his dignity, if not anything else.