#we are mice in the midst of things

[woundgallery]

Mary Jo Bang

[transboyswitchytales]

Blood In The Water (NSFW) - Part 2

Claire DeBella x Reader x Maya Mason -🔪 DARK FIC - DEAD DOVE🔪

WARNINGS: Sexual Assault / Manipulation / Stockholm Syndrome / Mommy Kink / Imprisionment / Kidnapping / Absuse / Knives and sharp object warning / Blood / Starvation Techniques / Sexual Humiliatino / Reward System is fucked / Grey Maya / Dead Dove Don't Eat / Claire is rich and crazy / Past Trauma Helps Claire Manipulate R / Fisting / Squirting / Mastubration Humiliation / Kink Shaming Kink / Mean Claire Kink / UNRELIABLE NARRATOR / Fetish Sexual Slavery / Claire is Smart Don't Forget it / Reader is in the midst of Stockholm Syndrome next chapter she fights more /Time is an Illustion Reader / VICTIM BLAMING NOT SANE

Part 1 (catch up on how we got captured)

Request by Anon:Reader is also smart so how about using the only tool she has, herself. Maybe Reader is trying to dismantle the alliance between Claire and Maya. Reader takes advantage of her moments alone with Maya to 'show' her affection and SLOWLY insinuate that it would be better if it was just the two of them (Maya and Reader). Knowing Maya's personality and the temptation of having Reader for herself; Reader convinces Maya to escape. Maya can arrange everything so that they flee without raising suspicions and go far away.

First, we must sink my friends.

I been trying not to go off the deep end I don't think you wanna give me a reason

To understand the ease in which you fell into Stockholm Syndrome, you must first understand the cage. 

Your cage was that of a five-million-dollar mansion somewhere in Connecticut. 

Doesn’t sound like a bad life, some might say.

You had a library fit for any Pintrest bitches vision board, the mansion was set with fourteen rooms, a four car garage, the master had a rain shower and a jet tub, fixed with a walk in closet bigger than any apartment you’d ever lived in. The oak floors were heated, and every appliance was smarter than a fifth grader.

The second floor theater room housed a thirty thousand dollar projector and surround sound, the game room homed a pool table, two offices had mahogany bar’s in the corners. These walls, if the could talk, could indict a politician and make the catholic church release a statement of apology. 

It was a velvet cage really. 

You had a fourty foot, heated pool with gorgeous lights, and a hot tub that should be used to shoot porn in. 

The backyard was a designers wet dream, outdoor fireplace, an outside TV, fully stocked bar, and kitchen. 

This big of a house of course had staff, as rich people tend to acquire. 

Money and power seemed to get you things, things everyday people didn’t think possible. 

It also bought silence, but more on that later. 

They came in every Tuesday between two pm and left before seven. 

They were like good little workers, the mice in Cinderella is an accurate way to describe this team. 

The house was cleaned pristine in that time, and food was restocked in the fridge. Pool didn’t have a single leaf, snacks stocked in Theater room. 

Not a spec of dust on any surface, books re-organized. 

Creepy really…

Anyone would love the sound of this house. 

But this was not a house, this was not your home.

This was your cage. 

Now, you are a smart person, both street smart and book smart. 

You had a high IQ. 

You had a fancy job in L.A, you made movies…at least you used to. 

You used to….well, do a lot of things. Like have big parties, a mansion, a fucking retirement plan and a life. 

That was before, all of that was before. 

Your grandmother had a bird when you went to boarding school, you stayed with her for a month before you left. And that damn bird never shut up, it clanged against it’s cage like it was insane. Life inside the cage was worse than anything out of it. 

The author of Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury, once said;

“Insanity is relative. It depends on who has who locked in what cage.”

You understood now why that bird broke his neck on the bars of the cage. 

And you understood that you were smarter than that fucking bird. 

You had reached a new level of insanity, and it was maddening. 

But you were locked in.

The house was a cage, and you were fucking insane. 

Claire put cameras in every inch of the house. 

She put you in the basement for the first month. 

You screamed day and night for the first two days. You think it was two days, time was getting strange quickly.

You heard them cleaning upstairs, and they never even checked to what the sound of that poor bitch downstairs was. 

Money and power made the common people scared. 

Maya was instructed by Claire to not speak to you, and she listened for the first three weeks. 

Which was crazy, you’d never seen Maya be quiet. 

But she brought you food, and she locked the door. 

You threw things, you smashed mirrors and tried to make weapons. You tried to break the small window only to find it had bars on the outside. 

A large man with shades came in with Maya. 

He had a very rude electric friend. 

You learned from pain and violence what Maya and Claire wanted. 

Because Mr. Men in Black used a cattle prod to electrocute you into submission. 

You had a mean streak it turned out, and you tried to ignore the voltages running through your body. 

But as the first month came to a close. 

You fucking missed conversation. 

You hated to fucking admitt it. 

But you wanted to go upstairs so badly. 

And you started to look forward to seeing Maya bringing you food. 

They must have done their research on Stockhome Syndrome. 

Because you were having a hard time fighting now, a month and no one came for you. No police or FBI?  How was that possible? 

Your basement had a bed, a bathroom (with a broken mirror), one window that was now fixed and clouded over, and that was it. 

And you were so fucking bored. 

You’d thoguht they would come in and sexually assault you every day. 

You thought you’d get to bite and punch and fight. 

But Claire DeBella was smart, and she did exactly what she’d promised in the car that day. 

She was breaking you. 

You missed the conversation more than you thought possible. 

They’d given you no TV, nothing to write with, no books, nothing for stimulation. 

So it was on a regular boring ass day of you laying on the bed and staring at the ceiling that a click of the door made you jump. 

This wasn’t Maya’s normal time at all. 

And the giant guy with shades didn’t walk in. 

Governor Claire DeBella did, in her heels and nice dress pants and dress shirt. 

She smiled at you, and you thought about trying to hurt her. 

But you stopped, and that pissed you off so much. However, you’d learned through pain, through a caddle prod to the stomach and limbs over and over, that fighting would not work. 

So you needed to be a smarter bird. 

“Hi.” Your voice cracked, you’d only yelled at Maya and begged, pleaded, and cried. 

Conversation was new for you.

Claire stopped at the bottom of the stairs and eyed you curiously before she gestured to the spot at the end of your bed. 

You nodded and scooted to crisscross your legs on the mattress. Claire kicked off her heels under your bed and then sat on the mattress next to you.

You didn’t let your eyes travel down to the heels, you knew they could be used as a weapon, but you also knew you didn’t want to be alone another minute. 

Perhaps you were insane, now. 

This was Stockholm syndrome, and it only took a month, strange.

“You seem to be in good spirits today.” Claire mused at you not attacking her and not yelling. 

“You haven’t come to see me yet.” You decide on that instead. You wondered if they’d defanged you now. 

Claire smiles sadly for a second and then looks around your basement. 

“Would you have wanted me to?”

“I..I don’t know.” You can’t believe those words came out of your mouth. Claire thinks about your phrase, and she seems to be debating something. 

“Do you know where you are?” She says, and it doesn’t sound condescending like you thought it might. 

“Connecticut, your home?”

“That’s right,” Claire says, and she looks towards the stairs. “You know how long you’ve been in here?”

“A month.” You say, and you wonder if she’s doing some kind of cognitive test on you, to see if you are still with it. Claire shakes her head. 

“No, Honey, you’ve been in here for two months now.”

You try not to panic at that fact, and you wonder if she’s lying to freak you out. But you can’t figure out if a month or two months in here really matter in the grand scheme of things. You weren’t getting out, and no one was looking for you. So, what did time really matter now?

“Claire?” You ask and she waits for you. “Why am I down here?”

“I wanted you to get out all of your anger in here. But when you decided to accept your new life, I was going to start giving you things again.”

“Things?” You say, and it sounds more excited than you want it to, and Claire notices. 

“Yeah, sweetheart, if you can behave, no more mirror knives, escape attempts, and throwing food. We won’t need the cattle prod and quarantine. I’ll give you full use of the house, and you can swim and read. You can watch movies again.” Claire says, and her tone is gentle, and you perk up at the idea of movies. 

You think Claire and Maya must have spoken, she just hit your currency. You’d get to watch movies again. You looked down at your lap. 

“What would I need to do…to get those things?” You feel like a traitor to yourself, but you were ready to do anything to get some kind of mental stimulation. 

Claire turns her hand over and waits, but the message is clear: she wanted you to reach out to her. She wanted you to decide to touch her, and if you didn’t, you didn’t know what would happen. But you had bruises that made your guess of pain pretty clear. 

However, it was interesting that Claire was making you decide, like she wanted your surrender. 

And you hated her. 

And you hated yourself. 

Because you reached out slowly and put your hand in hers. Claire softly moved your palm up in her own and used her left hand to trace the new scars from the first week. From the broken glass and mirror in your hand. 

Her eyes were fixated on the scars, and you wondered what your monster was thinking. 

“If you can prove that you can be a good girl,” Claire says and you shiver, and her mouth twitches in enjoyment at your response. You don’t know why you shiver, but your body does it anyway. 

“How?” You press and you don’t know why Claire’s touch is so good. 

But you haven’t been touched in…two months was it? Was this you being touch starved?

What was happening?

“As of Today, I’ll start allowing you more things, and if you can follow the rules. If you can behave, I’ll give you more. Mommy wants you to succeed.” Claire says, and she guages you reaction. 

The memory of that night at the penthouse comes back in flashes now. 

“Mommy no!!” You bit your lip to stop the feeling of your pussy being a super soaker. But Claire found your cervix and used it like Rocky. It hurt, god it hurt, and you can’t stop cumming.

 Until she slows her movement and you are wheezing, you need your inhaler, almost that fucking type of wheezing. 

Your eyes glaze and you are in shock. But your mouth opens as Claire grabs your face hard. 

“What did you just call me? Oh this is perfect. You slut, did you say Mommy? You are fucked up. Is that what you said? You want me to be your Mama? Is that it? Wanna suck on my tits too? You needed this, you don’t want to make decisions anymore. You need Mommy to do it for you then? Oh sweetheart, you are precious.”

You want to pull your hand away now. 

But you don’t, you need to know what it will take to go upstairs. 

“I’ll be good.” You say even as your mouth feels dry and acidic. 

________________

It started that week, you didn’t see Maya. 

Claire brought her work to the mansion you figured. Because she spent so much time with you. It started in the basement, Claire started small she brought you a book. 

You thanked her, until you saw what it was. 

She’d brought you a smutty romance book with stockholm syndrome, and a domme who spanks and sexually humilates the younger woman. 

You didn’t care, you just wanted to read. It felt good to read. So Claire sat with you in the basement. 

She ate meals with you. 

It was another two days later and she brought you a newspaper and you read that thing five times that day. It was just nice to know what was happening. 

But Claire DeBella fucking knew what she was doing. She was making you trust her, need her. She was the hand that fed you, and she could take all of it away. 

But you were careful with your words, you spoke to Claire and answered all her questions, but you made sure not to let your temper ever show. 

At the start of the second week Claire walked downstairs in her big plush robe and a cup of coffe and you all but drooled at the smell of the coffee. 

“Maya didn’t give you coffee huh baby?” Claire smirks at your face, it borderlines aroused at the drink. 

“Never, I used to get these Cinnamon Dolce Lattes.” 

You didn’t mean to tell her that, but you noticed that was happening more recently. You were hungry for conversation, and your captor was the only one here. 

“Hmm, you do have a sweet tooth. I’m more of an almond milk latte girl. Though I do love a shaken espresso. Before I was a politician, I’d have an espresso martini at a bar.” Claire mused, and you realized….she wanted to talk to you. What the fuck was this. 

“Do you have an espresso machine?” You bit your tongue, angry at yourself for asking. 

“I do, it’s upstairs. Would you like to try it?” Claire lays down the offer and waits, taking a sip of her drink. 

Like a person puts a mouse trap, she laid the cheese, and you, you stupid fucking rat. You walked right into it. 

You nodded, and Claire turned around and walked up the stairs, and you slowly stalked  behind her until you got to the steps and you stopped. 

You’d been shocked once for crowding Maya by the door, and now you were nervous for the possability of pain. Claire looks behind her like she was listening for your footsteps to stop.

“Darling, I’m inviting you upstairs. You don’t need to be afraid.” Governor tells you, and you wonder if she hears how hilarious that is. But you step up the stairs slowly and she keeps the basement door open for you. 

You were in shock for the first few hours of being upstairs. 

But you saw the cameras and you saw the giant fence outside, it had to be at least twelve feet along the property. And you even saw a man in the far distance, he had a machine gun strapped to his chest and a big vest. 

You weren’t free, just in a more plush cage. 

Claire came up behind you, and you froze, but she didn’t touch you. 

“How’s the coffee?” Claire says, and you wonder if what she’s really saying is: ‘do you see them? Do you see the guards? You wanna run? You want to go back down to the basement?’ 

Be smart prey damn it. 

“Really good, thank you, Claire.” You say and Claire humms like you’ve chosen right. You try not to let your hands shake as you bring the hot liquid up to your mouth. 

The next two weeks Claire would make you sleep downstairs, but bring you up to spend the day and the evening upstairs. 

Until the third week when you were in the theater room, your favorite room of Claire’s. 

She’d let you choose the movie, which was interesting. You didn’t know psychologically if she just wanted to ease you in, make you forget that you were being held prisoner. 

But sometimes you noticed you weren’t afraid of Claire. 

That was wrong, that was stupid of you.

Stupid prey. 

But it happened, and you had to admit it to yourself at least. 

It wasn’t until you had picked Beauty and the Beast that you realized. 

You’d picked a story that had Stockholm syndrome in it. You picked it, not Claire, and she didn’t even say anything as you watched it. 

But Claire watched you, and you yawned and closed your eyes.

When you woke up, things changed. 

You don’t know how you ended up lying against Claire’s chest as she played with your hair. But you thought for a second you were sleeping on Maya, and you were back at your house in L.A. That was wrong, this was wrong, the perfume was different, and the feeling was different. 

And your eyes shot open and Claire was rolling her ankles on the sofa. She’d put on CNN now and you were snoozing against her body. 

You couldn’t breathe. 

This was wrong.

Run away, hide, fucking fight asshole.  

You were being fucking domestic. 

You were getting fucking domesticated by your abuser!

You jumped off of Claire in horror. 

And Claire didn’t even seem offended. 

“Oh sweetheart, you were doing so well too. You melted into me.”

“You are a fucking monster.”

Claire laughed and then mutted the TV, like this was way better than politics on the evening news. 

“Baby girl, you get to decide how this goes. Not me and not Daddy. So if you want to ruin tonight, that’s fine. But eventually, that little voice that tells you to hate me, you won’t hear it anymore.” The Governor’s voice was so condescending. 

You eyed the door and jumped over the sofa and threw it open and ran up the stairs. You ran up two floors until you got to where you’d remembered the front door. Your mind told you to stop, but the fight in you demanded this. 

Just as you got to the foyer. 

Mr. Cattle Prod came into view. Her was sitting on a chair with a long sub sandwich about to take a bite. 

“No! NO! NO! NO!” You shout louder and louder when you see him, he sighs like he doesn’t like this either. 

You spent the next two days downstairs, alone, no Claire, no Maya, no movies, no upstairs, no dirty book. 

You cried and cried and cried. You didn’t get food, and you didn’t really care about that. You missed Claire, and that was what made you so fucking angry. 

On the third day of being alone, around the afternoon Claire came back downstairs.

She was in home clothes, jeans and a button down white loose shirt, and she walked down slowly until she found you laying on the food. 

“Shall we try again? Do you think you can behave today for Mommy?” Claire asked and you nodded and wiped at your tears. Claire nodded towards the bed and you scrambled to sit on it. 

“What would you like to do today?” Claire asks and you bite your lip wondering if she’s being mean. 

But Claire hadn’t been unkind yet, in fact, she’d been downright gentle with you. The beatings only ever came from the man with his shades. Claire always granted you things. 

“Can….Can I have coffee?” You ask, having suffered a caffeine headache from the lack of coffee for the past two days. “And breakfast?”

“Those are two very easy things I can do. And I will, but think bigger baby.” Claire said and she cocked her head to the side. 

“Can I go…outside? To um..to swim?” You scrambled, you hadn’t been outside in so long. 

“You may, but you have to do something for me first.” Claire said and you didn’t even care what it was, you thought. 

So you waited for her to say it. 

“Take off your shirt honey.” Claire said and you hesitate and she smiles, and it’s dangerous. 

But you don’t want to be alone today. 

So you take off your baggy white t shirt. You didn’t get bra’s. You figured a long time ago it was because of the wire, aka a weapon. 

Claire eyed your breasts but didn’t touch, didn’t say anything. 

“Now the pants.” Claire said in an even tone, leaving no emotions for you to latch onto. 

You stand off the bed and drop your jeans and she eyes the underwear and arches an eyebrow. 

You take them off without her asking and she seems to like that. 

“Now let’s go upstairs baby.”

You spend the day naked, and you find you don’t fucking care like you thought you would. Like you once would have. Claire let’s you eat seconds and thirds of breakfast, and she opens the slider, and you get your first breath of fresh air in forever. 

Claire lays by the poolside and sits on her phone, with her designer sunglasses pulled on. 

And you swim, and you forget for a minute who she is and where you are. It feels so good to swim, you don’t care that you are naked. No one is around but Claire. 

The ring of her phone cuts through your gentle mind fog, and she answers it. 

And you think to yourself ‘scream and yell, tell them you are being held captive.’ But you remember your quarantine, your solitude, and you bite your lip. 

You keep quiet.

Silent for Mommy.  

You hate yourself for this. 

But you know Claire is watching you, fascinated, entertained even by your submission. You can’t see her eyes, but you feel them on you. 

You try to remember who you are. 

Who you were.

And that you were not on a holiday at the pool.

You were a prisoner.

You sink to the bottom of the pool and scream, knowing no one will hear you. 

_______________________________________________

You aren’t sure how long Claire keeps this up…Time is strange.. but you get to swim in the afternoon sun. She makes you big salads for lunch. 

You watch movies after dinner.

You go back to the basement for bed. 

You wake up in the morning to coffee agan. 

But now, you do all of this, very, very naked.

It is like you must give up something to earn a place at Claire’s table. 

And you don’t care about the clothes, so it doesn’t feel bad. 

But one day you are watching a movie and Claire is reading a book, and she reaches out and touches your head. 

You freeze, wondering if you are about to be hurt or abused further. 

But she plays your hair, scratches your scalp, and reads, like you are her house pet. 

You wonder if you are her pet now. 

That’s how it starts, months into captivity, Claire gently plays with your hair. 

And you get used to it quickly. 

You come to expect it even. 

One day you sit on the sofa and grab the remote to flick through her extensive movie collection and she doesn’t touch you.

You drop your arm with the remote and turn to Claire. Who is reading, or pretending to, you aren’t sure. 

“Claire?” You ask and she puts her finger on the page to mark where she was reading but looks up with her glasses and makes an acknowledging noise in her throat. 

“Did I break a rule?”

Claire looks confused, or she acts well, and she shuts the book now, you have her attention. You just can’t figure her out. 

“I don’t know, Honey, did you?” Claire challenges like she’s speaking to a wayward little thing. And you look around, no cattle prod, no clothes, still upstairs, what was wrong? Something is missing. 

“Did I do something wrong, or behave badly?” You ask and you feel strange, like your mind isn’t working like it used to. 

“Baby, what is wrong?” Claire tries again, and you wonder if she’s planned this, but you can’t stop mid-play, the show must go on. And you weren’t sure what part you were playing anymore. 

“You aren’t…” You realize now why you feel strange. 

Claire wasn’t touching you. 

How long had you been leaning into her touch? How long had she been doing this?

Now that you thought of it, it wasn’t just the TV times she’d touch you. No she combed your hair in the morning while you drank coffee. And she..she rubbed your back as she helped you climb into the basement at night. She tucked you into the covers…oh fuck she kissed your forehead as you fell asleep. 

When had this started? You thought it was just the sofa thing…But Claire went as far as hugging you as she wrapped the towel around you after the pool.

You hadn’t even said anything.

Where was your fight? 

You blinked at her now, feeling dumb. 

“Can you ask for what you need baby?” Claire said and you realized, you were in the ring with someone far more sophisticated than you’d given credit for. 

“No, I um..I think I don’t feel good.” You grip your stomach and lie, Claire takes a moment, a moment to silently communicate with you. She doesn’t buy it, but she waits a second, lets you sweat. Before she pretends with you. 

“Oh baby, you swam for a long time. All that time in the sun.” 

You remember her putting the sunblock on your skin now, she rubbed you everywhere to get it in. You didn’t even fight her. 

“Can I..I mean can I go lay down?” 

You need to hide. 

“Sure.” Claire nods and stands and you follow her, but she doesn’t turn towards the hall that leads to the basement. She turns instead to go up the stairs, and you are super confused but you follow. 

Claire leads you up multiple floors and then down another hall to the master bedroom.

You stop as she opens the door. 

It was beige and whites and looked like it was an expensive spa, weekend getaway, plush bedroom. 

This was Claire’s master bedroom.

Probably the one she’d shared with Devon, ya know, her dead husband. The one she killed. This god damn monster, a preditor. 

You stop before entering and Claire walks in like she has a zillion other times.

The governor goes to the bed and pulls back the plush comforter; she’s got a bunch of giant soft pillows, and the sheets probably cost more than you made in every job through college. 

You hold your breath as she makes a show of pulling back the side of the bed for you. 

You realize, she’s put you on the other side. Devon's side, actually if we wanted to bring up that guilt. The dead husband's guilt you carried, because this maniac killed people for you. 

Claire lets you stand there and decide how your night will go. 

She clicks the remote by her bedside and the shades drop. 

Now the room is completely dark. 

You wonder if this is how it feels to be prey in the woods at night, everything is cold, everything is still, and in the dark your nightmare waits. 

“Did you still want to lay down?” Claire asks and you do now. Because your knees feel like they may give. 

You pad over to the side of the bed she’s holding the blankets to. 

You crawl in and she doesn’t kiss your head, and you don’t know why that worries you. 

You figure this must happen in abusive situations. You fear the lack of kiss just like you’d fear the hit. But you also want the kiss, you want to know you are safe. That you won’t be electrocuted and thrown in solitude again. 

Claire walks around the bed and you are not sure this is real, she’s going to leave you alone in her room?

“Have a good sleep Sweetheart,” Claire says and closes the door, you wait to hear a lock click, and it doesn’t. 

What a beautiful trap she’s laid out. 

But you won’t fall into it. 

Now, when the bed feels cool, the sheets are so soft, and the pillow so inviting. 

You close your eyes and drift into dreams.

You visit your old life in dreams, a dream with Maya and the beach.  

_____________________________

When you wake you hear typing, and you open your eyes to see Claire with her hair up in a clip as she types on her laptop.

You blink a few times and Claire must have some strange link to you, because she notices immediately. 

“Morning sleepy head.”

“What time is it?” You yawn and stretch and feel more rested than you have in forever. 

“A little after two, you slept the morning away,” Claire says like you two are on vacation and she let her lover have a lie in. 

“You working?” You ask and you don’t know why but Claire doesn’t flinch at your comment at all. When had you been allowed to ask her things?

“Yeah, I’m trying to get people to listen to this new legislation, but your generation won’t even read it. Wanna help Mommy?” Claire offers and your eyes grow wide at the idea of a problem to solve. You get excited, and Claire easily gives you notes on her speech. 

After a while you feel like you are working again, it’s so nice. 

“Seems a little stiff.” You say as she hands you her coffee and you drink it. You don’t notice how it has cinnamon, your favorite in it now. 

“Should Mommy be offended?” Claire teases with a grin and you laugh. 

Claire can’t stop her surprise now, you actually laughed. You hadn’t done that in front of her since before she took you. 

But you laugh and it feels so fucking good. 

“Sorry, no, you shouldn’t. You should however, be using Twitter, or whatever they call it now. Because, as you blamed my generation for not listening, you should be making the effort to get my generation to listen to you. When I saw you on CNN, you were cut throat, that’s why I wanted you to be elected in the first place. Young women want to hear your opinion, but they don’t always want to find it. You have to make it more readily available.” You ramble and then sip the coffee, satisfied with the taste. 

Claire stares at you for a moment. 

You wonder if you are being too comfortable in her presence now, perhaps you should stop. Oh shit you were going to be in trouble again. 

Stupid little prey. 

“I pay my staff a great deal of money, and no one has even mentioned this to me. You may have just upped my ratings.” Claire gives you the compliment and it makes your insides shine; you feel it all over. “And don’t do that,” Claire sternly adds and your smile drops and you are confused again. 

“I’m sorry what did-”

“No, don’t apologize for your ideas. Don’t apologize for laughing or having fun. You don’t need to apologize here.” Claire isn’t looking at you and she slips her glasses back on and opens up her email to talk to her so called ‘media team.’ 

You sit amazed that Claire is feeling so…much like a….partner, or even a friend?

Stockholm Syndrome, you remind yourself. 

Not your fault, it’s not your fault, it’s not our fault. 

But after that day, you sleep next to Claire. 

In fact you hadn’t been down in the basement in a while now. 

You walk around the house freely, you are still terrified of the man with the shades but he nods his version of ‘good morning’ to you. And you do the same. 

Claire works with her laptop, and you stop thinking about how to steal it to get a message out. 

You don’t notice the cameras that follow your every movement as you walk the mansion to get to the library alone. You just grab a book and head back to Claire’s office to sit on her chair. 

You don’t remember the last time you wore clothes and you don’t remember caring. 

It feels….normal now?

So one night you get into bed and fall asleep as Claire reads, and you easily fall asleep. Just like so many nights now beside her. 

And you dream;

You dream of the night. With Miles Bron on a rooftop. 

Except this time it’s different. 

You are in the bedroom this time, and Claire touches your face. 

“You want to cum for Mommy baby?” Claire asks and you nodd and she pulls you down onto her strap on. And you moan and beg her. 

“Please Mommy, I need it so bad. Mommy please, Claire fuck I need you inside of me.” You pant and beg. 

You wake up with a jolt. 

Claire turns on the side lamp, and she grabs your arms to help calm you. 

“Honey?” She asks, confused at how you are losing your mind. 

“I had a dream..I-I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.” You panic even more now.

Unsure what is worse, the dream, or your reality.  

“It’s ok, I heard you calling my name. You sure you are ok?” Claire asks, and she pushes your hair out of your face and you lean into her now. You put your head on her shoulder and you rest it there and she rubs the back of your arms up and down lightly. Not moving for more, and not moving for less. 

“Why don’t you touch me?” You ask, and you don’t know if you are still dreaming. Why are you doing this? Why are you shaking?

“I’m touching you right now pudd’n what do you mean?” Claire says and her voice is deep with sleep and it sounds like when she was aroused and fisting you. 

You pull back, and you feel frustration clear through your whole body. 

“You said that day in the car…You said..” You felt tears falling and Claire’s face changed. 

She looked dangerous now. Different than before by so much. 

“Say it, what did Mommy say that day in the car, can you remember?” Claire brushed your tears away from your face. 

“You said…You said you’d fuck that independent streak out of me…”

Claire nodded and it was such a weird contrast to the sweet woman she’d been to you. 

“What else did Mommy say? Can you remember for me?”

Claire acts like you are stupid. 

You sob now and hiccup and you remember. But you can’t say it and you shake your head. Claire cups your face and brushes stray tears away like it’s her job. 

“I told you i’d give you a good dose of Stockholm Syndrome for your system. You worked so hard, you fought so hard in the beginning. But it weighs on you, that kind of loneliness. I know, because you did that to me. You did all of this. You made me do this baby. So you needed to be punished, you were alone, but Mommy was watching from those cameras. I waited, and I was so patient. But you needed me to be patient, and I will be. But that’s all before, what happened tonight. You broke your streak, baby girl, tell Mama why?”

Claire looks excited, like she used to look on the news before she told some stupid Republican they were wrong. 

You look down at your lap and you feel no fear at her words. It was just the truth, so why weren’t you mad. 

“Focus baby, answer my question. You were thrashing back and forth in your sleep. You said my name, can you remember what your dream was honey?” Claire asked and your face turned beat red. 

You were moaning Claire..You were moaning ‘Mommy.’ Claire seemed to be satisfied that you figured it out, because she’d been watching the whole thing, she knew. 

God she was really something else, the manipulation on top of manipulation. You couldn’t figure her out, not even for a second. 

“You made a little mess on my sheets huh, sweetie, you’ve been here six months now. Just like I guessed it, huh? And you haven’t touched yourself once. That’s a long time to ignore the need, isn’t it?” Claire’s voice was doing things to you, and you nodded and licked your lips. 

This was so fucked up.

Fight, run, fucking hide! 

“You were moaning Claire and Mommy. You say it so pretty baby. You were surprised when I didn’t fuck you. But I played the long game, see I don’t want you as some sex toy in my basement. I want you as a wife. I want you to stand on the podium next to me. And the only way that’s gonna happen, is if Mommy is patient.”

Claire lays out the first part of her plan like she’s talking to some lower life form, like you are stupid and she is the teacher. 

You gasp and hiccup and cry like a dumb child. A child who stuck their hand in the aquarium and got bit, and then all the adults thought the kid was stupid. You were being so stupid. Your instincts told you to stop, but your mind was no longer your own. Claire had tattooed your skull with her initials, and now you were no longer in control. 

“Claire, this is wrong.” You whimper and her thumb brushes against your cheekbone and you lean further into it. Her hold is everything to you. 

“I know you say that, but your body likes this. You practically purr when I touch you now. And even in your dreams, you want this. So why don’t you ask? Have I not been fair, have I not given you choices?” The Governor starts to get a little heated. Like you were the problem. 

You were prey, you were shark food. You were the dumb bird, fuck FUCK! 

Be smarter than this. You begged yourself to be smarter than this. 

“Claire this is wrong, I can’t do this.” You say, but your voice sounds sad and Claire sighs and releases you.

Like you ruined it, like you ruined her fun. 

“Ok.” She looks disappointed but releases you. 

“Ok?” You say completely confused and she moves to the light and flicks it off. 

“Then let’s get some sleep.” Claire says and you lay back down and she does the same. Not touching you at all. 

You sit there in the silence, and your thighs press together and you wonder how the fuck you got here. 

How did you get here?

If there was a god, did she hate you?

Your body wouldn’t let you sleep now, you had to cum. You needed to masturbate. But Claire would for sure feel the bed move, and you knew you were never quiet when you came. 

You shifted until you lay on your stomach. 

You bit your lip to not moan at the feeling of your clit throbbing as you pressed yourself tighter. 

Claire’s voice slices through the night, like the fear you have in your bones. 

“I’ve found that lying on my stomach never helped settle the ache, is it the same for you dear?” Claire asked, and you whimper at her words. 

Her mothering, comanding, powerful voice shatters your resolve to not lightly hump the bed. 

Something about her stupid voice just turned you on. Call it your shitty upbringing or your need for older women to be cruel to you. You’d begged Maya to slap you in bed. You taught your women how you liked to be demeaned humiliated. 

Claire didn’t need you to teach her, and that was horrible. 

 And you just remembered the rooftop with her fist and you were so empty now. 

“Claire, I need to…can I…” You knew she wouldn’t let you run to the bathroom and fix this, and you weren’t sure what to ask for. 

“You need to masturbate, is that it?” Claire’s voice was mocking. 

“Yes please.” You whisper like you are trying to get one over on yourself, maybe you won’t hear it. 

“Then do it.” Claire says, and you can’t believe it, but you don’t ask questions. 

In the dark of her white room, your hands go under your body and you put your face in the pillow and moan as your fingers meet wetness. You grind down on your fingers for a few minutes in the silence.

Except the sound of the wet noises, they fill the air. 

“Claire…” You whimper after a few moments, realizing you can’t cum like this. 

“Say it.” Claire's voice is venomou,s and you should be afraid but you aren’t. 

“Mommy….can I have your help?” You say, and Claire turns and flicks on the light and throws the blanket back. She sits on her heels now. 

“Lay back, open your legs nice and wide,” Claire tells you and you flip onto your butt now and put your legs open for her to watch. 

Like she’s the director and you are the porn star. 

“Small circles, we aren’t in a rush. It’s just you and me gorgeous.” Claire tells you and you start slower, as if you’ve never touched yourself before. Like this body Claire knew, and you didn’t. Because she was playing you like an instrument and you were tone deaf it seemed. 

Claire watched your face and body move like she was starving for every moment of it. 

“You got this wet from a dream, baby? That’s so embarrassing. Your pussy is so wet, so swollen from the dream. You needy little thing.” It’s not even as mean as she’s been. But you get wetter anyway. 

You whimper and nod, but you need more. And Claire knows that. 

“You liked me being sweet these last few months don’t you?

You nodd and rub your clit harder and Claire tut’s you and you slow. 

“But you don’t like nice in bed do you?”

The silent voice is louder now, Claire’s not safe, Claire’s not consensual, Claire’s not sane. This is not a place for your fetishes and desires to be knowkn. Claire is poision and you could not do this. 

You shake your head, no you don’t. 

Claire tilts her head to the side and some of her hair falls. 

She’s a goddess. 

“You like it mean, just like Mommy.” The white of your captor’s eyes shine in the dark room. She’s crazy. You were insane for playing with her. 

“I do, just like Mommy.” You moan at the end as you give her back the nickname. The secret kink you didn’t want to share. 

“So, how mean do you need me tonight? You want that fake sweet governor? You want the domestic cunt who sits and plays with your hair?”

Her face doesn’t emote. 

You think Claire must be a psychopath; she must be, to have such different reactions. Looks and moods you could never track, no matter how you tried. 

But you’d give this woman all she wanted, if you could just cum. 

You shake your head, you don’t want nice or sweet. 

“No, thats right you need the woman who assaulted you on the rooftop don’t you? It’s been so freaky for you, seeing me so nice. And you were waiting for me to make good on my promise. You were waiting for me to fuck you this whole tme.” 

Claire’s voice is dark, deep, but steady. Like she could say the worst most deprived thing to you and not blink, blush, or feel any sort of shame.

Claire was sick.

She could play whatever part and role she wanted. And you were powerless to figure her out, to say the right thing, to do the right things. 

You were just along for your Governor’s ride.  

You nod and whimper as you touch yourself. Your pussy is desperate and you are too wet to get the right traction.

Your abuser's voice got darker, a little richer in her anger.   

“And you are wet and needy, your slick is ruining my fucking sheets. And I’m not even touching you. I haven’t fucking touched you, do you realize that? And ths is how you act. Like a fucked bitch in heat in front of me.  You know I used to masturbate to you lying there in that basement, and now here you are masturbating in my bed. The big, bad, scary kidnapper, the one who stole you from your perfect little life. The one who killed for you. And you are a whimpering mess for me.”

You humped your hand trying to chase your orgasm. 

You can barely see her face in the night lamp glow illuminating her from behind, but she’s having fun. You blink a few times to focus on her face, try to see Claire.  

She’s sick, she’s getting pleasure from you breaking. 

“Stick your tongue out. Do you remember when I spit on you? You fucking liked it. You liked my fist. Do you remember my fist? Of course you do, because your hole is gaping open for me, trying to get anything. But I still haven’t touched you. Do you realize how mine you are, if you do this you have to give up this facade that you don’t want me. That you don’t need Mama’s touch.”

Each word hits your skin like a million little needles. 

You hate how you moan and chase each word like it’s a drug, and you need a high.  

You sob and stick your tongue out, and try to finger yourself but Claire stops you. 

“No, that’s not for you to touch. Now I want you to tell me the truth. That sex tape, why did you like it?”

You were worried about this, this was something you had hoped she wouldn’t bring up. 

“Please, Claire…..no.” 

You didn’t have a safe word, and it seemed she liked you saying ‘no.’ If only for a moment.  

“It’s just you and me, and perhaps my own video footage of this moment for Maya. But Daddy already knows, I want you to say it to Mommy. Because you are gonna be Mommy's girl, not Daddy’s, after all.”

You hope Maya isn’t watching, but the idea that she is makes you gasp and your hips pick up. 

You secretly missed Maya. You were so angry at her for doing this. But you missed how she fucked you, how she humiliated you. You missed date nights and talking about work. Fuck that woman. But Maya knew this secret, and you wondered if she’d told Claire. Or if Claire could just sniff out secrets. Perhaps that’s why she was such a good politician. 

“I can’t. Please don’t make me say it.” You whimper lamely. 

Claire sighs loudly, like you are getting on her nerves. Perhaps she didn’t like a brat after all.  

“You don’t say it, you don’t get to cum. And it’s been so long hasn’t it?”

Fuck it, you were already dead. No one was coming to save you. You were here to bargain with the devil herself. What was the harm anymore?

So you let it go:

“I liked it because I didn’t have a say. I liked the horrible things they called me. It made me wet. I don’t want control.” You shout it into the night, into the millionaire's, well billionaires' (after getting Miles' money) bedroom.  

Claire laughs at you and you hate how much you like being made fun of. You ache for more. 

“That's my sweet girl. That's why you belong to Mommy. Why I picked you. You don’t want control. You don’t even know how long you’ve stayed here anymore. You crawled into my bed like a little kitten. Now you are fucking yourself in front of me like a good girl.” 

You moan louder and Claire smiles.

Something about her owning you made you feel safe. How wrong was that? That you felt like nothing bad could happen as long as Claire held you. You tried to remember that you weren’t her lover. You were her prisoner.

DeBella’s canines shine in the light.

She keeps speaking, like she’s enchanting you, like she’s a snake tamer. And you don’t know why, but you can’t fight it.   

“You love that, you love being a good girl. Well if you were a good girl. You would admit it to me now.”

You feel a game coming on, a new one for Claire. You understand now, and you say it. Your nails dig into your soft, intimate flesh. It hurts, it all hurts.  

“I want you to be mean to me.” You admit it, your voice is raw and cracks. 

Claire doesn’t seem satisfied anymore. So she continues.  

“You like this life. The one I made for you.” She challenges. 

“I like this life.” You don’t know who is speaking inside of you, but it comes out your mouth. 

“You like being mine.” Claire doesn’t blink. 

“I do.” You gasp, and you aren’t sure if it’s from masturbating. 

You wonder if this is what hypnosis was like. 

“You don’t even notice you are naked in a dirty politicians bed, begging to be fucked like a fucking whore. You missed me, baby.” Claire tells you these things like facts. And your clit pulses at her voice. You have no self respect.   

“I did MAMA PLEASE LET ME CUM!” You shout and angrily hump your hand for no release. 

“Slap your cunt, hard,” Claire says like she’s telling someone how she wants her coffee, no interest in her voice. It makes you scream out.  

You move your hand away from your cunt, and you slap it hard. The sound echoes in her bedroom. 

“What do you need, your fingers not doing it for baby?” Claire taunts and you almost wonder if she’s done something to your body. Or your mind? Why can’t you make yourself cum. 

You knew. 

You needed Mommy. 

“I NEED YOUR FINGERS!”” You scream, and Claire thinks about it for a minute. And you think she’s bluffing, but she isn’t. 

“Not yet,” Claire says, keeping her hands to her sides. Not touching you, not helping you. And you go mad with need. You start to babble like you have no sense of self anymore. 

“Please, please, please. I’M A WHORE! I’m your whore and I want you to hurt me. I want you to make it hurt, I want you to ruin me. I want to be bruised and fucked every second. Please, I’m yours I’ll make your babies and I’ll wear what you want. I’ll go where you want and do whatever you want! Just fuck me!”

Clarie likes that and she licks her bottom lip watching your body writhe in the bed. 

“You are a fucking slut. Turn to your right, and smile. You are on video baby. I’m live streaming this.” Claire said, and you came just like Claire knew you would. 

That’s how you lost your mind. 

___

You begged for the next four days for Clarie to touch you. And she refused to touch your pussy. 

She made you do all kinds of things. 

You only walked around on your hands and knees for an entire day. 

She spoon fed you her leftovers and put her feet on your naked back as she typed on her computer. 

Claire was breaking you beyond belief. 

She made you sit on the bathroom floor as she used her own vibrator in the shower and came. But you couldn’t see her, and you couldn’t do anything. 

Claire even made you hump your own hand while she took business calls. 

You were a sex fiend you were gone.

No mind left, no sense of pride.  

And finally you were on your hands and knees with your fingers on your clit and she was sitting in her bedroom on her armchair drinking a scotch and watching the show. You weren’t allowed to ever fuck your hole, Claire made sure you never touched there. 

You screamed into the bed and sobbed. 

You cried for a really long time, and you felt like you were being tortured worse than in the basement. 

You wanted Claire, you don’t remember what healthy love was. 

But you knew you wanted nothing more than Claire.

You thought to the penthouse with desire now.  

Your mind was sick. 

And your vagina was raw from trying to mastrubate and nothing working. 

“PLEASE MAMA I NEED YOU! I LOVE YOU DON’T IGNORE ME ANYMORE!” You scream and the sound of Claire’s drink hitting the side table was so loud and you didn’t even notice as you cried into the bed with your ass in the air. 

But Claire gently flipped you onto your back. Like the broken little thing you were.  

“What did you say baby?” She asked and her face looked completely stunned and you didn’t know why. You wiped your nose with the back of your hand.

Your body so sore.  

“I..I need you?”

“No sweetie, not that, after that. What did you tell me?”

“Don’t ignore me?” You tried again, and Claire chuckled at that demand but she continued. 

She seemed so soft now. 

“Before that, right inbetween those two.” 

“I love you?” You say, and the words feel strange in your mouth but you blink at Claire through wet lashes. “I love you.” You say more confidently now and Claire’s smile is so big you think it must hurt. 

She grabs your knees and pulls you flat and her mouth goes right to your pussy. 

You cum in two seconds from her mouth, and then she doesn’t stop for two hours. And you are sobbing and writing under her telling her how much you love Claire DeBella. 

That’s how you fell in love with your monster. 

How you begged for her fist, her mouth, her kisses, her cruel words. 

Unsure how long it has been. How long life has looked this way…But after you had taken a fist and two fingers.. you were laughing and naked at the kitchen island and Claire was laughing with you. It was romantic and sweet and you were so happy. She was spoon feeding you yogurt and you were telling her about a L.A nightmare press thing. And you were breaking an NDA like it was nothing. Telling secrets like you were telling teenage girl rumors. And Claire was paying attention, and somewhere inside you knew she’d use this. 

But you were Claire’s weapon now. You were her partner, her lover, her’s to control. And you found your mind didn’t hurt anymore. 

But it ended, like all things must. 

The front door opened and then slammed close and you jumped and Claire groaned, irritated. She knew what was happening, it seemed. 

 Maya walked in with her heels clicking on the floor. Her three suitcases being carted in behind her with Mr. Shades. Who looked at his boss like he was not sure who to be more afraid of, Maya or Claire.  

“This looks cozy.” Maya snarls with a wicked look in her eyes at Claire. 

You don’t know why they are glaring at each other. But you feel like you want to crawl back into the bedroom and hide.  

“Maya?” You ask confused, and she looks at you now. She gazes at you like one does a lover they accidentally bump into after the breakup.  

“Mason, we agreed you would wait until I told you you could come.” Claire’s tone wasn’t kind. 

“Right, but see you aren’t my boss, so that’s not how this works. You keep me from her again and I’ll out you to the press so fast your head will spin bitch. You aren’t the only one with connections and blackmail.” Maya snarls and you look at Claire, fear evident on your face. 

Claire drops the yogurt dramatically into the sink. Some of it gets on her button-down sleep shirt; she’s wearing that and a thong.  

“Let me get dressed, and then we can talk about this in my study,” Claire said, wiping her hands on a kitchen towel. 

The Governor walks away from you and you feel completely lost. No longer having a tether to your insanity. 

You turn to Maya, who stares at you like you are the freaky one here. 

“Maya, how long have you been gone?” Your voice is shaky. Maya steps forward to come to you and you flinch. So she stops and looks back to Shades as if to say ‘get lost.’ He drops the bags and walks back out of the house. 

Maya has so much fear on her face. 

“Two months, two fucking long months. She hasn’t let me in this house yet, last time I saw you was in the fucking town car! I tried to get here but we’ve been arguing this whole time. Plus Matt is a shitty replacement and then Vegas and the shrooms. It’s been a mess without you. I’m trying to convince Governor Gaudy over there to let you work again. What the fuck are you doing?” She whispers, yells the last sentence like she’s on your side. 

“What do you mean?” You ask and you feel yourself cracking. 

“What do you mean, what do I mean? You are naked in the kitchen? You are practically her sex slave in here. I saw the footage, what the fuck?” Maya tries to walk forward and you back off to the corner of the kitchen like you don’t want to be around her for a second. 

Maya seems to fear that too. 

You panic and looked around, not sure what’s happening. 

“Two months? No that’s not possible, she said six months at least.” You repeated and Maya shook her head. 

“She’s fucking lying. Kinda like she lied and told me I could bring you back to work. Kinda like how she told me I could spend time with you. Fuck baby what is going on? Did she….I mean..are you?” Maya put her hands up and down to direct to your person. 

And you felt like you were going to have a panic attack. 

“Maya what the fuck!” YOu scream and go to the kitchen and grab a knife. 

You put your back to the fridge. 

“Woah! Put the weapon down!” Maya says but she’s not as freaked out as you thought she’d be. Obviously used to L.A. girls with sharp objects pointed at others. 

“Stay away from me!”

“Hey, listen to me! I’m trying to get you out of here. But if you pull this again, she’ll put you down in that basement! I can’t help you there! Ok I’m trying to get you out. You gotta keep your shit together.” Maya yells at you but she turns to see if Claire is watching. 

“You are lying, you…fuck you helped her steal me. Oh my god I loved you. Oh my god I told Clare I love her. What is wrong with me?” You yell and look at the blade. Maya watches your gaze, and she starts to walk forward. 

“Yeah, that hurt by the way. You told me I was the first person you ever told you loved. And then you fucking tell her, that was fucked. Ok, let’s not hold the blade so close to your body, huh sweetness?” Maya knows you better than you do, you bring the blade closer to yourself, and she lunges forward and you both fight on the floor but Maya is stronger and she hits your hands against the marble top and the knife flies out of your hands.

Claire comes back in and she’s pissed. 

“MAYA THIS IS WHY I TOLD YOU TO FUCKING STAY AWAY! What the fuck did you do?” Claire shouts, and you are fighting Maya as hard as you can, and then a shot goes in the back of your neck, and you see Mr. Shades before you pass out. 

Part 3 coming soon...

AO3

MasterList

Series MasterList

'Great, look, now the lion woke up You eying my shit, inquiring shit'

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Where Will All The Martyrs Go [Chapter 2: I’m The Son Of Rage And Love]

Series summary: In the midst of the zombie apocalypse, both you and Aemond (and your respective travel companions) find yourselves headed for the West Coast. It’s the 2024 version of the Oregon Trail, but with less dysentery and more undead antagonists. Watch out for snakes! 😉🐍

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, med school Aemond, character deaths, nature, drinking, smoking, drugs, Adventures With Aegon, pregnancy and childbirth, the U.S. Navy, road trip vibes, Jace is here unfortunately.

Series title is a lyric from: “Letterbomb” by Green Day.

Chapter title is a lyric from: “Jesus Of Suburbia” by Green Day.

Word count: 6.2k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist 🥰

On the shores of the Susquehanna River, just north of Harrisburg, you find a Wawa with no gas: bags on all the pumps, cars with their fuel caps unscrewed and dangling. This is a common courtesy adopted en masse, like rationing during the World Wars or flying American flags after 9/11. It signals that a car has already been siphoned, no gasoline to be found here, no transparent flammable gold made of eons-past decomposition. You wonder if in a few million years, some unfathomable new apex species will be drilling your liquefied remains from the lightless layers of the earth to power their spaceships.

“Then we got sent to Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling,” Rio continues, gnawing on a piece of beef jerky, Jack Link’s in a red bag, teriyaki. Mercifully, whoever took the gas left some of the food. You are sitting in the parking lot, a quaint zombie apocalypse picnic, trail mix and Rice Krispies Treats, Herr’s potato chips and Tastykakes, warm soda sipped from plastic bottles. Luke and Rhaena are on the roof of the Tahoe. Jace is tearing the convenience store apart; he is convinced the employees must have kept a gun somewhere in case of robberies. You know he’s fine. You can hear him banging around and swearing in there.

“Then we built some schools and a hospital in Djibouti,” you say.

Aegon is baffled yet intrigued. “Djibouti…?”

“It’s on the Horn of Africa, near Ethiopia and Somalia.”

Luke snorts. “It’s nice of you to assume he knows where Africa is.”

“Huh.” Aegon tosses a green M&M into his mouth. “Djibouti is horny.”

Rio says: “And after that we spent like six months in Key West, and then we got shipped to Corpus Christi, where Chips very narrowly avoided getting impregnated by, marrying, and inevitably acrimoniously divorcing a Marine.”

Everyone laughs except Aemond, who gives you a teasing smirk. “Did you really?”

“Uh, no. He asked me out, I ghosted him, that’s as far as it went.”

“Why’d you ghost him?” Baela says, crunching on Utz Cheese Balls.

Aegon turns to Rio. “You want a Honey Bun?”

“You’re my Honey Bun,” Rio replies. Aegon smiles, his sunburn flushing darker.

You shrug, eat a handful of candied almonds, tell a half-truth. “I just didn’t like him enough.”

Rhaena yelps and points: a snake, black and maybe five feet long, is slithering across the parking lot. It passes beneath the shade of the Tahoe and then continues towards the bushes. A moderate amount of panic erupts.

Helaena glances up from her notebook. “Rat snake. Not venomous.”

Rhaena shudders. “Well, I still don’t like it.”

“Where were you stationed next?” Daeron asks Rio.

“Chinhae, South Korea. Wicked cool place. The people love Americans, the food is incredible. We were there to rebuild a pier that got wrecked in a typhoon. They have these cute dolphin-looking things, they’d swim right up to the edge of the water with fish in their mouths to try to give to us. Like cats bringing home mice for their owners.”

“Finless porpoises,” you say.

“Yeah, those. And after Korea, it was Diego Garcia.”

“Diego…what?” Rhaena says.

Aegon turns to Luke. “Try to act like I’m stupid for not knowing where that is.”

“Diego Garcia is a tiny little island in the middle of the Indian Ocean,” you say, a bit wistfully. “It’s technically owned by the British, but we share a base there, we use it for airfields and to refuel submarines, things like that. We were renovating the housing facilities for Camp Thunder Cove. At night we’d go to the beach, have a few beers, look out into the ocean and it was just…nothing. Wide open dark nothingness for as far as you could imagine.”

“That’s what we need now,” Helaena murmurs as she makes elegant cursive annotations in her notebook, the cover picturing different species of spiders, a pinktoe tarantula, a green lynx spider, a black widow. “Someplace to go where no one will find us.”

“So you’ve known each other since basic training.” Aemond’s remaining blue eye shifts between you and Rio, like he’s still trying to puzzle it out. There’s really no mystery. You’re friends, and you’ve always been friends, and you’ve never been more than friends, despite many of your fellow seamen’s jokes to the contrary.

You tear open a Slim Jim. Aemond rebandaged your hands this morning, though they barely hurt anymore; he touches you with a clinical, focused restraint. “Not quite that long. Rio enlisted a few months before I did, so we weren’t at Great Lakes together, and then carpenters do technical school in Gulfport, Mississippi near Biloxi, and electricians train at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas. We met after we were both assigned to Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 1.”

“The First and The Finest,” Rio quotes the motto, grinning. “The original Seabees, founded during World War II. People called our battalion the Pioneers, which…is kind of ironic now.”

Aegon says, munching noisily on trail mix: “It’ll be so appropriate when you end up dying of a broken leg or the flu or in some other totally preventable way.”

“It’s so crazy, people died of anything back then,” Luke marvels gravely. “Tuberculosis, pneumonia, infections, starving, freezing, poisoning, getting kicked by a horse, giving birth…”

Rhaena shoots him a fearsome look and Luke shuts up, but of course he can’t take it back. There is a long uncomfortable silence punctuated only by birdsong and Jace’s muffled outbursts from inside the Wawa. Everyone looks at Baela, concerned, pitying, entirely unable to do anything to improve her situation. She is still eating Cheese Balls with one orange-stained hand, but the other rests on her belly.

“Clearly, the timing is less than ideal,” Baela says after a while, and if she’s terrified she doesn’t sound like it. “It wasn’t planned to begin with, but I was determined to make the best of things. I figured that I could still finish up my master’s degree with a baby, and Rhaena and our parents could help, and Jace would be done with law school soon, and it might be stressful for a while but we’d all get through it. And now…” She shrugs wryly. “Now all those plans are gone. Just gone.”

“You’re going to be okay,” Aemond says; a fierce low determination, a promise, a vow.

Baela smiles at Rio. “How old is your baby?”

He is caught off-guard, clears his throat, averts his gaze. Aegon looks over at him, alarmed. “Oh, he, uh…he’s little. Really little. He…” And Rio, so rarely at a loss for words, can’t continue. He eats his beef jerky instead.

You explain for him. “Sophie’s due date was right around the time the phones and internet went down. The last we heard, she was headed to Odessa to stay with Rio’s parents.” Aemond and his companions nod and don’t say what they’re thinking, but it’s swimming in their eyes: Sophie could have died, the baby could have died, they both could have died, you and Rio might be risking your lives to cross the continental United States for nothing. “Rio’s parents live in this…well, I joke around and call it a doomsday prepper cult, but that’s not really what it is, it’s just a farming community out in the middle of nowhere. People who have their own chickens and gardens, churn their own butter, don’t wear deodorant, make medicine out of tree bark…and a lot of them have kind of a survivalist mentality, they stock pantries and collect guns. So we figure we can reunite Rio with his family and then carve out lives for ourselves in relative peace.”

Rio reaches over to bump his fist against your shoulder. He is grateful. You punch him back, fairly forcefully; it’s like hitting a brick wall. Rio is as tall as Aemond but probably outweighs him by a hundred pounds.

You ask Aemond: “What’s in the Bay Area?”

“Our parents have a beach house. It’s up on a cliff by itself, pretty isolated, and surrounded by state parks. That’s where they were when everything shut down. I assume they’re still there.”

“Beach house?” Rio raises his eyebrows. “On a cliff?”

Rich kids. REALLY rich kids. “Your parents couldn’t just fly you to California in a private jet or something?” you say.

“Our pilots stole the jets,” Aemond replies, not realizing you were joking.

“Oh.”

“Jace and Luke’s parents were home in London, so getting there isn’t really an option, and then Baela and Rhaena…”

“Mum and Dad were on a business trip to Moscow,” Baela says. “I’d like to think they weren’t eaten, but…they were probably eaten.”

“I am so sorry,” you manage awkwardly.

A single zombie goes shuffling past the Wawa on the main street, a woman in a floral church dress, hair falling out of its curls, one pink high heel that clicks on the pavement, blood all over her mouth and chin. She notices the nine of you and begins to hiss, lurching closer. Daeron shoots her down and then trots over to retrieve his arrows, yanking them out of her cheek and eye socket. Rhaena winces. Aemond, distracted, bites into a Nature Valley granola bar. Aegon opens a can of Pringles, pizza-flavored.

Luke is peering through his binoculars, looking south towards Harrisburg. Faintly, you can see sunlight glinting off the gilded statue of a woman—the Spirit of the Commonwealth—that tops the green clay tile dome of the state capitol building. “What is that?”

“The sculpture?” you say.

“No. Farther away. Those big concrete towers, right on the water.”

Now you know exactly what he means…and you’d forgotten all about it. It’s an oversight you hope doesn’t cost too much. “That’s Three Mile Island. And we should leave so we can put more space between it and us.”

“Oh, fuck me…” Rio mutters.

Now everyone else is squinting to see the facility, barely visible from the Wawa. “Why?” Aemond asks you.

“Because it’s a nuclear power plant. And since the electricity is out everywhere, as soon as its backup generators fail, it will melt down and the whole area around it will become radioactive.”

Aegon puts two Pringles into his mouth so they look like a duck bill. “How do you know?”

“Did no one else go through a Chernobyl obsession phase in high school?”

“The professor mentioned it in one of my chemistry classes,” Aemond says, but he sounds doubtful; this must have been years ago, when he was consumed by med school prerequisites and had no space left in his brain for mere curiosity.

“Okay, listen up.” Rio knows the key points; he’s had to study different sources of electrical power. He demonstrates with dramatic hand gestures. “You have super radioactive reactor fuel, usually uranium or plutonium. You have a pool of water around it that circulates continuously. The heat of the fuel evaporates the water, which makes steam, which spins turbines, thus creating power. But if the external electricity fails, the water stops circulating, and the heat vaporizes all of it, and when there’s no more water the reactor fuel overheats and melts through the floor and poisons the earth, air, and groundwater. Any questions?”

There is a chorus of distressed chattering as people swiftly rise to their feet, clutching armfuls of snacks for the road. Jace comes trudging out of the Wawa, conspicuously not in possession of a firearm.

“No luck?” Daeron asks.

“Obviously not.” Then Jace snaps at Aemond: “Why were you stomping around all pissed off in the medicine aisle earlier? What were you looking for?”

“Nothing,” Aemond says quickly.

“Seriously, dude, what was it?”

“Nothing!”

“Damn, Plankton, calm down.” Jace shields his face from the sun, following Luke’s nervous eyeline towards the concrete cooling towers to the south. “What’s that?”

“Three Mile Island,” you say. “And we’re leaving now.”

Aegon yawns loudly. “I’m so full! Rio, can you carry me to the car?” And before anyone can tell Aegon to shut up, Rio has crouched down to let him scramble onto his back. Aegon cackles and waves his can of Pringles around as Rio sprints to the Tahoe. Now there are a few more zombies stumbling up the street, but you don’t waste arrows or bullets on them. Baela runs them down as she swerves out of the parking lot and drives northwest, heading towards Clarks Ferry Bridge where you will cross the Susquehanna River in a less populated area and commence the long slog to the Ohio border. She turns up the volume on the CD player: London Bridge by Fergie. Immediately, Rio, Aegon, Daeron, Rhaena, and Luke are singing along.

Baela checks the fuel gauge and looks at Aemond in the rearview mirror. “We have half a tank left.”

“We’ll find gas somewhere.”

“Aemond, it’ll be alright. Don’t worry about me.”

“You’re not going to be able to walk to California.”

Baela can’t think of a response. He’s right. Outside, the miles roll by in a blur of radiant, reptilian, early-summer green.

~~~~~~~~~~

Each time the interstate is blocked by a snarl of crashed vehicles or a backup too thick to navigate through—both common occurrences—Aegon digs the folded map out of his shorts and charts a new course for Baela to follow. This particular divergence might prove fortunate. The Tahoe has rolled into Distant, Pennsylvania, an Appalachian speck of a town, churches, coal mines, dilapidated old sheds. On the outskirts, perched on a hill and surrounded by oak trees, you find a small single-story brick house with a myriad of banners on the flagpole: an American flag, a Confederate flag, a black POW/MIA flag, Don’t Tread On Me, Trump 2024.

“Yeah,” Aegon says, scratching his scruffy chin as he peers up through the windshield. “I feel like they probably owned guns.”

“How do we know they’re not still home?” Baela asks warily.

“No car in the driveway,” Aemond observes. “No windows boarded up. They probably ran into trouble while they were out somewhere and never made it back.” Then he waits, the question upspoken. Are we going to risk it?

“We’re down,” Rio says after exchanging a glance with you.

Aemond turns to Jace. Jace—curly dark hair down to his shoulders, eyes on the house, chewing his full bottom lip apprehensively—doesn’t reply at first.

“You said you wanted a gun, Jace. All the Walmarts are cleaned out. This is what shopping looks like now.”

“Fine. Okay. Let’s go.”

Baela parks the Tahoe in the gravel driveway and tells Rhaena and Luke to stay inside with Helaena until the property has been cleared. The rest of you climb out, afternoon sun and mountain wind, dandelions crushed under your shoes. There’s a barn behind the house, you see now, gaps between the wooden boards and flaking red paint.

Luke is standing up through the open sunroof, inspecting the scene with his binoculars. “No movement.”

“We’ll take the house, if you want,” Rio tells Aemond. You’re clutching your borrowed baseball bat with bandaged hands, though it still feels unnatural; your M9 is in its holster in case of emergencies. Jace, Baela, and Daeron start plodding across the yard towards the barn. The grass is tall and mostly shaded, the oak trees decades old, massive, weaving a patchwork canopy of leaves.

Aegon trots over and slaps Aemond on his left shoulder, his blind side. Aemond says without looking at him: “I’ll go with them. You wait out here.”

Aegon drives an imaginary ball with his golf club. “I’m very sensitive to rejection, you know.”

“You’ll survive.” Then Aemond follows you and Rio to the house.

Rio tries the knob, locked. He doesn’t waste a bullet by trying to shoot the lock off the door, something that is far less reliable than movies would have you believe. He kicks it open instead, three tries and then the screws that secure the latch give way and the door swings ajar. You wait, counting seconds in your head, listening for growls or footsteps. There are no sounds except the breeze sighing through the trees, the warbles and wing flaps of birds. You steal a glimpse of the barn. Jace, Baela, and Daeron have unhooked the rusted iron latch and are venturing inside, Daeron last and glancing around watchfully, his compound bow already drawn. Rio steps into the house.

It’s hot, stifling, all the windows shut. But this has its advantages. You inhale deeply: no trace of decomposition, no black swampy nauseating rot, just dust and lemon Pledge and old-people staleness.

“Smells fine,” Rio says. And then, loudly: “Anyone home? We’re just looking for supplies. We don’t want to hurt you. If anybody is here, just let us know and we’d be happy to leave. And, uh, sorry about the door.”

You stay close to Rio as he sweeps through the living room—floral couch, television turned off, crosses on the walls—and then the kitchen, where bananas are turning black on the counter. Aemond is to your right; he’s placed you on his blind side. He trusts me, you think. When did that happen? You haven’t heard anything from Aegon or the barn. That must be going well.

In the bedroom, Aemond pulls the curtains open to let some light in. You search the drawers, the closet, under the bed. No weapons. The bathroom has 1950s-style pink porcelain, the dining room table is set for a meal that never happened. There is a deer head mounted on the wall, ten points, not bad.

“I can’t believe these fuckers didn’t have guns,” Rio says. “But where the hell are they?!”

You have always watched more than you’ve spoken. That’s why you’re good at shooting things, and why you’re still alive. Rio talks and you listen; Rio acts and you reflect. “Wait.” You turn to Aemond. “Did you see a cellar outside?”

“A what?” He is perplexed. “Like…a wine cellar…?”

“No. A regular cellar.” You walk back into the midday heat and circle the house, Aemond and Rio hurrying to keep up. Over by the barn, everyone else is stretched out across the grass, joking, relaxing, Baela with her hammer on the ground and her hands laced over her belly, Helaena cradling a praying mantis in her palms and showing it to Rhaena. Aegon is teaching Luke how to smoke with a pack of Marlboro Golds he found at the Wawa. Luke, game yet somewhat anxious, takes a puff and then immediately coughs until he starts retching.

“I want to try too,” Daeron says.

Aegon shakes his head, taking a nonchalant drag off his own cigarette. “Nope. Not for you. Illegal. You’re under eighteen.”

“I want to try!”

“Shut up, you can’t even vote.”

“Nobody can vote, the government has collapsed!”

You find it at the back of the house: a pair of large metal doors leading down into the underground cellar. The weeds have begun to encroach on them, wild violets and black nightshade.

“Awesome!” Rio says, lifting the doors open one at a time, the hinges shrieking. They’re heavy, but they cause him no trouble. Underneath is a staircase and a room dark with shadows; you can see a light switch that won’t work, the electricity long gone. Rio unclips the flashlight from his  belt—taken from Saratoga Springs, waterproof with a 90-degree head so it doesn’t roll, known as a Moonbeam—and ducks down into the cellar. It’s a small room, easy to clear, and then you can start inventorying your findings. Rio is laughing, ecstatic. There is a workbench, a coil of thick rope, an array of tools—screwdrivers, wrenches, hammers, saws—some homemade leather wallets and holsters, cans of Brillo color spray…and then a treasure trove of weapons mounted on the walls.

You scan the collection. “We got Marlin .22s, we got Ruger Magnums, we got Remington 12 gauges, we got hunting knives…and one Glock 20.”

“A lot of ammo under here, Chips,” Rio says, yanking boxes out from beneath the workbench and stacking them on the floor, organized by caliber.

“No scopes?”

“Not that I’ve seen yet.”

You lift one of the Remingtons off its hooks and examine it: dusty, unloaded, vines of rust on the receiver. “We’ll have to go through and sight all of them. I don’t think they’ve been used in a while.”

“That’ll be a lot of noise. But here’s the place to do it, I guess. Low population, and we’re not staying.”

“Exactly.”

“Sight them for close range, like ten yards?”

“Yeah, that should work.”

Aemond says, eyebrow raised: “I didn’t know the Navy used shotguns.”

“Everyone hunts where I’m from.” You put the Remington down on the workbench then pick up the Glock, a box of 10mm ammo, and a can of Brillo. “Come on. Grab one of those hammers. I’ll show you how to shoot.”

You bound up the cellar steps and out into the shade of the oak trees, not stopping until you are at the edge of the property. Across the backyard where he lounges on the grass, Aegon gestures to the barn and asks Luke: “What’s in there anyway?”

“Nothing. Saddles and a few dead horses.”

“Oh, dynamite, I gotta see the dead horses.”

Jace says: “Aegon, man, what is your diagnosis?”

You use the can of Brillo to spray a large chocolate-colored circle onto a tree trunk, then make another two feet above that. You count your steps as you walk back towards Aemond: approximately ten yards. You load a single bullet in the Glock, aim for the bottom circle, and fire. A hole appears at the very edge of the circle. You take the hammer from Aemond and give the rear sight a few knocks. “This isn’t recommended, but it usually works.”

Aemond is smiling. “Okay.”

You load the full magazine and try again. The bullet hits closer to the middle this time. “Here. Both hands.”

Aemond takes the Glock but hesitates. “Is…my eye…?”

“It shouldn’t be a problem. A lot of people close one eye anyway when they’re aiming. I always do.”

He is relieved. “Oh. Good.”

You tap the underside of the Glock. Aemond obediently lifts it. “The line of sight is slightly higher than the barrel, so you have to account for that. And then gravity will pull the bullet lower, and the longer the range of the shot, the more it will drop. So when you fire, the barrel should be angled upwards just the tiniest bit, not horizontal.”

“Like throwing a football.”

“Yeah, exactly. It’s an arc, not a straight line. At first it’ll feel like you’re trying to do all these calculations in your head, and it will be overwhelming, but then it becomes muscle memory and you don’t even have to think about it.” Jace, Baela, and Daeron are now eagerly crossing the yard to help Rio carry the guns out of the cellar and receive their own lessons. “Alright, we’re going to start with a really terrifying enemy. I want you to shoot that tree.”

“What a formidable tree.”

“Aim for the top circle. And if you hit it, then you can practice on Jace.”

Aemond laughs, butter-yellow sunlight filtering down through the trees, the shadows of leaves flickering over his skin, a mosaic of flesh and earth. You ghost your open hand down the length of his arm as if adjusting the angle. Really, you just want to touch him, to feel his warmth and his stillness, the tension of his muscles, the rhythm of his pulse. He’s watching you, lips parted, goosebumps rising beneath your fingertips. Birds are chirping, sparrows and blue jays. High above, squirrels leap and scrabble through the branches. You pull your hand away.

“Look through the sights. The rear sight at the back of the barrel is shaped like a U, and the one at the front is an I. Is the I in the middle of the U?”

“I have no idea.” A pause as he reconsiders. “Yes.”

“Right, it is, and the bullet should go exactly where you want it to because I already sighted that Glock. I’ll show you how to do it later. Now shoot the tree.”

Aemond aims but doesn’t pull the trigger. He’s nervous; he doesn’t want to seem incompetent, pathetic. You imagine it is rare that he isn’t the one with the solutions.

“Hey,” you say softly, and he looks over at you. “You don’t judge me for not knowing how to cure people. I won’t judge you for not knowing how to kill them. Deal?”

Now he’s smiling again. “Deal.” He returns his attention to the tree, lets a few more seconds tick by, and fires. He hits one of the branches. “Oh, that is…embarrassing.”

“It’s not that bad. You hit something. Try again.”

More seconds, more birdsong, more wind through the grass and the leaves. Aemond’s second bullet pierces the trunk about six inches above the top circle. “Yes!” he cheers, boyish triumph on his scarred face.

You resist touching him. It is startlingly difficult. “That was really good.”

He lowers the Glock, and you click the safety on for him. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure,” you say.

“Why’d you ghost that Marine at Corpus Christi?”

“I told you. I didn’t like him enough.”

“Okay, sure, but actually. What was wrong with him?”

“I’ve known you for like twenty-four hours. You think you’ve earned all my secrets?”

“Well, not all of them,” Aemond says, grinning. Rio is showing Jace, Baela, and Daeron how to load the .22s. Aegon is swinging his golf club in circles as he follows Luke into the barn. Helaena and Rhaena are giggling as butterflies land on their outstretched fingers. “But our time together could be very finite. It seems unwise to waste it by trying to preserve some amount of mystery.”

“You’ve convinced me.” You want to be known by him, you want to be understood. That is a frightening thing to realize. It’s like handing a stranger the keys to your home. Will they visit graciously, or will they rob you, ruin you, burn you down? “I haven’t seen many examples of love working out for people. I’ve seen couples who hated each other, and couples who split up, and a lot of women having to raise kids all on their own and turning into these…bitter, exhausted, hollowed-out versions of themselves. I never wanted that to be me. And for as long as I can remember, I’ve felt like that was just one wrong choice away from becoming my life. I don’t want men to disappoint me. So I don’t give them the chance.”

You think Aemond is going to say something cheap, flirtatious, awful: Give me a chance, baby. I won’t disappoint you. Instead he says: “I haven’t known many happy couples either. I mean…Luke and Rhaena would be the closest, I guess. But they’re so young. I’m not sure if they count.”

“Rio and Sophie seem happy. But they’ve also barely seen each other in five years.”

“It does things to you, when you start to believe love might be doomed to end or tear you apart or turn to hatred. If it’s just an evolutionary mirage to trick us into reproducing, what’s the point of giving someone that power over you?”

“Exactly.”

“I feel like one of us should be trying to talk the other out of being so fatalistically cynical.”

“Yeah, totally. Okay. You talk me out of it.”

He chuckles. “No, I don’t think I can. You talk me out of it.”

You’re watching Aemond, realizing you like everything about him—his smirk, his height, his hands, the clear direct blue of his eye—and wondering what the hell you’re going to do about it. Then there is a scream from the barn.

What?? Who??

“Luke!” Aemond shouts, and takes off across the yard. Now you’re all running, even Rhaena and Helaena who don’t have anything to fight with. Everyone is yelling, their lungs heaving in wild June air, their shoes pounding against the earth.

Inside the barn, on a wooden floor strewn with hay, Luke is shrieking as he tries to push a zombie off of him with his bare hands. She’s an older woman, grey hair in rollers, yellow nightgown stained with gore. Something has happened to her feet. Both of her legs end in exposed tibias and flapping strips of purplish, rotting skin. Aegon is beating her with his golf club, but he can’t get a good shot at her head. If he accidentally hits Luke, he could make it worse, he could stun him or even knock him out, and he’ll be bitten in the few seconds it takes anyone to remove his undead assailant. Rio lunges to grab the zombie. She snaps at him with bared teeth and he retreats, drawing his M9.

“Don’t shoot!” Jace is saying. The air is putrid: dead horses, dead people. “You’ll hit Luke!”

Your own M9 is suddenly in your hands, the safety clicked off, one eye closed. “Luke, don’t move.”

“Kill it, kill it!” he pleads hysterically, pushing the zombie as far from him as he can, his palms sinking into the decomposing bruise-colored tissue of her chest and throat.

“Don’t shoot!” Jace orders, but you ignore him. He fades into the background with all the other frenzied voices. Your finger on the trigger, a boom like thunder, bits of bone and brains against the wall. Luke shoves the corpse away, trembling, sobbing. Rhaena flies to him.

Aegon spots the fresh blood on Luke’s right hand and panics. “Is that a bite?!”

Luke notices the wound for the first time. “I don’t know!”

“What do you mean you don’t know?!”

“I don’t know!” Luke wails, tears flooding down his pink face.

“I thought you cleared the barn!” Aemond roars at Aegon.

“It fell out of the loft, we didn’t think anything was up there!”

Luke is blubbering: “I hit my hand against one of the stalls, I think that’s how I cut myself, I was just…I was pushing it away…I didn’t think it bit me…oh my God, I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t want to die…”

“It only takes once, kid,” Rio says grimly, fidgeting with his M9, looking at Aemond as if for permission.

“Don’t touch him!” Jace hisses, stepping in front of his brother and clutching his bat. “No one is going to hurt him, it’s not a bite, you can’t prove it’s a bite!”

You reach for Luke’s bleeding hand. “Can I see—?”

“Get away from him!” Jace swings his bat. The tip of it connects with your skull, just a graze fortunately, but still enough to rattle you. Rio charges Jace, tackles him to the floor, starts throwing punches. Baela has apparently forgotten she’s heavily pregnant and is trying to pull them apart. You join her.

He’s going to demolish Jace. He’s going to break his nose or jaw or something. “Rio stop, I’m fine, stop!”

There is another gunshot, a cataclysmic earth-shaking explosion that makes the pain in your head surge from a ripple to a wave. Aemond is aiming his Glock skywards; a hole has appeared in the roof of the barn. “Stand up!” he commands. Rio and Jace reluctantly comply. You help Baela to her feet.

“Aemond,” Jace says. “You have to stop them, they’re going to kill Luke—”

“No one is killing anybody.” Aemond lowers his Glock. “Maybe he’s been bitten. Maybe he hasn’t been. And even if we knew for sure that he was going to turn, we don’t just execute people like this, threatening them when they’re terrified. We have humanity. We have compassion.”

There is a silence that strikes you as heavy, laden, holding meaning that escapes you. Aegon points at Luke. “So what the fuck are we going to do about him?”

“We’ll tie him up,” Aemond decides.

“What?!” Luke exclaims.

“There’s rope in the cellar. We’ll tie his arms and legs so he can’t do anything and keep him like that for a few days until either his hand heals up or he turns into a zombie. Someone will always have to be with him to help him eat and take a piss and also…you know. Deal with it if he turns.”

“I’ll stay with him,” Rhaena says immediately.

Aemond’s voice is now gentle, sympathetic. “I don’t think you want this.”

“If Luke has to die, I should be the person with him.”

“You’ve never had to put someone down before.” And in this statement lives another: Aemond knows what that feels like. Aemond has had to kill someone when they turned.

“I’ll stay with him,” Rhaena says again, this frail harmless doe-eyed girl, and you see a steeliness in her that you hadn’t thought existed.

“Okay,” Aemond relents. “When you’re asleep, Jace or I will take over.”

“It’s not a bite,” Jace murmurs, like he’s trying to convince himself.

“We’ll all find out soon enough,” Rio says, casting him a glare, then goes to fetch the coil of rope from the cellar.

Aemond cleans and bandages the wound on Luke’s hand. Then the weapons, ammo, and newly immobilized Luke are loaded into the Tahoe. Aemond asks you once everyone else is inside: “How’s your head?”

“Fine, I think.”

“Hurts?”

“Just a little.”

“Dizzy? Double vision?”

“No, nothing like that.”

He takes a quick look, parting your hair with his fingertips, feeling gingerly for blood and swelling. And this is becoming a serious problem: every time he touches you, you want more.

“Aemond…who did you have to kill?”

He doesn’t answer. For another moment his hand lingers by your temple, then Aemond turns away and climbs into the Tahoe. This time, no one sings along to the next song on the mixtape. Heads rest on windows, eyes are vacant and misty. Baela steers the Tahoe westbound on Route 1004, the Chainsmokers drifting through the speakers: All We Know.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Pick a card, any card,” Aegon says when he’s done shuffling. He fans out the entire Uno deck face-down and offers it to Rio, Aemond, and Jace. They each select a card, then Aegon picks one for himself. Finally, he holds out the deck to Luke, who stares up incredulously from where he’s still bound with rope and sitting on a curb in the parking lot of a Burger King just outside of Yarnell, Pennsylvania.

“Are you serious?”

“You’re an adult male, aren’t you? You think being in the middle of transforming into an undead murder machine exempts you from gasoline siphoning duty?”

“I’m fine!” Luke insists.

“Great. Then pick a card.”

“I can’t move my hands, you idiot.”

“Pick it with your mouth.”

“I hate you.” Luke bites his card of choice and waits with it clasped between his teeth, glowering.

“I want to pick a card,” Daeron says cheerfully.

Aegon refuses. “No. Too young. A baby.”

“Aegon, I’m seventeen!”

“Can’t enlist, can’t do jury duty, can’t buy lottery tickets, can’t sign up to drink gasoline. Okay, everybody show their cards.”

“I got a three,” Jace says, then yanks Luke’s card out of his mouth and reads it. “He got a skip.”

Aemond’s card is a nine, Rio’s a five, Aegon’s a reverse. “That means you lose, Jace,” Aegon announces, admittedly rather gleeful. “You had the lowest number.”

“This is bullshit, I had to siphon last time!”

“Then stop picking bad cards.”

“Jace, I can do it,” Aemond says.

“And get to be the martyr, as usual? No thanks. Give me the damn hose.”

Aegon roots around under the Tahoe seats and produces a long, semitransparent siphoning hose. “All the ones with the little pump attachments were sold out everywhere by the time we thought that might be useful,” he explains to you and Rio.

“That sucks, Jace,” Rio says. “I mean, literally, it sucks.”

“Next time we cross a bridge, I’m pushing you off it.” Jace takes the hose from Aegon, pops open the gas cap of the Dodge Ram 3500 you’ve found, and threads the hose down into the tank. He sucks on the other end and then shoves it into the Tahoe once the gasoline starts flowing. The fuel gauge was hovering just above E. Hopefully you can get at least a few gallons out of the Ram, another fifty or a hundred miles, maybe even two hundred, enough to get you across the Ohio border.

Jace is bent over and vomiting gasoline onto the pavement. Rhaena and Baela sit with Luke as Aemond feels his forehead and peers into his eyes. Daeron accompanies Helaena as she goes to scavenge inside the Burger King, her burlap messenger bag slung over one shoulder. Rio is now holding the siphoning hose and watching the liquid gold pour into the Tahoe, his smile growing with each passing second. Your eyes fall on Aemond and stay there, his careful hands, his brow knitted with concentration.

A whisper from behind you: “We could fake date to make him jealous.”

You whirl to see Aegon, mischievous smirk, neon green plastic sunglasses. “That is a super generous offer and I appreciate the thought you put into it, but no.”

“Why not?”

“It’s dishonest. It’s manipulative. If something is going to happen with Aemond, I want it to be real.”

Aegon sighs. “No, you’re right, it was a dumb idea. I just figured I have a lot of experience.”

“Experience with what?”

“People pretending to love me.” He flashes a strange, sad smile, then follows Daeron and Helaena into the Burger King.

[loveerran]

The Power of a Good Friend

In November of 1960, 6-year old Ruby Bridges was escorted by US federal marshalls into William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans - 6 years after the US Supreme Court's Brown v Board of Education overturned its own previous "separate but equal" ruling from Plessy v Fergusson.

The state had tried closing schools rather than integrate them, the legislature had passed dozens of laws to keep schools segregated (in defiance of the courts), and school boards had implemented egregious barriers to integration, including 'intelligence' and other testing for prospective black students. White parents withdrew their children from school in protest. Ruby was eventually the only student in her class. Crowds of adults outside the school screamed death threats and hurled racial slurs.

In the midst of all this turmoil, Ruby's white teacher, Barbara Henry, became her friend and ally. Ruby would later say "Despite all the hate that was going on outside, inside that room it was filled with love". While other teachers resigned their jobs in protest over integration, Ms. Henry committed herself to supporting Ruby. "I would not have gotten through that if it had not been for my teacher," Ruby later recalled. "She filled my day with things to do. She made school fun. I enjoyed learning. Even though the crowd was outside yelling, she would go and close the window, and she'd say 'We're going to have music today,' just to drown out everything." Initially, Ruby had lunch alone in the classroom, while Ms. Henry ate with other teachers, but Ruby stopped eating. She hid her sandwiches in a storage cabinet until mice and roaches started showing interest. Ruby later said Ms. Brown "was just sorry there were so many days when I hadn't eaten. After that, she usually ate with me so I wouldn't be lonely".

Ruby recently wrote a book, titled Ruby Bridges: A Talk with My Teacher, described as a love letter to teachers who hold the power to change lives. The value and impact of even one true friend on someone's life is impossible to measure.

Ruby went on to graduate from a desegregated high school, marry, have four children, and start the Ruby Bridges foundation to promote "the values of tolerance, respect, and appreciation of all differences". I love the story of her meeting President Barack Obama in the White House when Norman Rockwell's painting The Problem We All Live With, was placed on display. When President Obama came into the room, he gave her a hug and whispered "I cannot begin to tell you what an honor it is to welcome you into this White House under this administration... I think it's fair to say that if it hadn't been for you guys, I might not be here and we wouldn't be looking at this together."

When asked what advice she would give to herself as a child today, Ruby replied "It would be the same advice that the federal marshalls gave me. They said, 'Ruby, walk straight ahead and don't look back.' That's what they told me at 6 years old, and I've tried really, really hard to do that. I think that would be my advice to all of us who were on this path and want to see a better world for our children."

[welcome-to-ratterrock]

You've mentioned that the comic takes place off the heels of ww1. I'm sure there's a real life history of how rodents were effected by the war, or even used in the war. How does this reflect the world of ratterock? Did the rats and mice have a tiny war at the same time?

Oooooh, what a wonderful question.

When we began this story, both Baji and I were big into Peaky Blinders - we both have Irish heritage, and how the Shelby’s handled and adapted their lives and “business” in the midst of the prejudice and persecution of Irish people from the government was a big draw for us. One of the key themes of that story was how WW1 destroyed and damaged so many people, in particular the Irish. Fighting for a country that didn’t even protect them in the first place, forced into trenches and tunnels like rats…

This has certainly influenced the world of Ratterrock, and Baji and I have both talked about which characters served during the war, how it played out for them. One of the overarching themes of the webcomic is trauma, generational and internalized, and the trauma of WW1 is definitely a part of that theme.

Our rule of thumb is that rodentdom society is a reflection of human society, not an exact mirror. More to the point, rodents are by and large dependent on humans. So if food becomes scarce and rationed for human households, the same happens for the rodent household beneath their floorboards. If the men of the community are moving off to the front or enlisting, male rodents are also doing so. Because their humans are essential to them, and the rodents have the loyalty of desperation - they need their humans alive so they can stay alive.

Going off of that and addressing your question if there was a tiny war happening between the rodents of different countries, yes and no. I imagine that the rodents of their respective countries were focused on helping their humans and keeping their food sources safe. I think there was a lot of covert operations and tunneling done to infiltrate the enemy armies to gnaw at vital wires and weapons, snatch up scraps of very important codes and messages that they would then leave for their army to uncover. But of course, the rodents of the other country were doing the same thing…

Mace definitely served in the war, and made Sage promise to look after Camilla and their children if anything happened to him. Sage was able to be excused from active duty because a number of high ranking officials declared him too important to lose over on a foreign shore.

As for the rats on the Rock…Baji and I have talked about that, and that’s all I can say about that. But…rest assured, by and large, rats got the worst of the war. Once again, a government that didn’t even protect them in the first place was forcing its people to fight for it…

[ethereance]

In the mood for some secret relationship allurance.

When they get together after some intervention from the mice—the tiniest wingmen you ever did see—they don’t even mean to keep it secret, they just. Don’t make a big deal about it. Because this is a them thing, and they’re content with that. They’re not even very secret about it and it’s a wonder no one catches them kissing in the castle halls. But Lance is his normal enamoured-with-Allura self, dating her has not changed that, and they’ve been subtly gravitating towards each other since long before they made things official. So them continuously opting to sit next to each other, hands intertwining beneath the table, slipping into each other’s room at night for face masks, it all goes unnoticed. Except by Coran because Lance let it slip when he came to him asking about ideas for a meaningful ‘month-aversary’ gift. It had taken a moment for protective father mode to disengage, and a few words from Allura, but Coran is pretty supportive (and Coran maaay have a soft spot for Lance out of all of the paladins, not that he’s picking favourites or anything).

So here they are. At some fancy ball-like event to improve diplomatic relations, each of the paladins dressed in whatever altean formalwear Coran and Allura could pull up out of the castle ship’s storage. Even with several washes, the outfits are still a bit musty smelling, but are otherwise in pretty good condition for 10,000 decaphoeb old clothes (both the material, and the airtight storage helping with that). And Allura is starting to believe this was a terrible, terrible, terrible idea, oh so incredibly distracted by Lance in altean formalwear. Maybe he doesn’t have the ears, but it suits him well, blue quite simply his colour. In fact, she’s starting to wonder what she even found hideous about his ears when first they met.

“You look beautiful,” he whispers to her, something shy in his smile. He looks at her with the utmost adoration, such an open expression that sends a cosy wave of warmth through her heart. Allura never wants to lose this feeling, never wants to lose him.

She hopes, this once, the universe will be kind.

“So do you,” she whispers back, watching as red begins to lightly dust his cheeks, his eyes widening.

“You think I—” He grins, boyish and giddy. “Holy crow. Sweet. Think I can keep the suit when this is all over?”

Again, a terrible, terrible, terrible idea. And yet. “Well I hardly see this being our last event.”

They spend the vast majority of the night away from each other, never far, but always caught up in conversation with the people of Cobraqua—their reptilian-skinned hosts for this evening—many curious about the exploits of Voltron, and some, more well versed in diplomacy, wanting to know what being a part of the coalition would mean for their home. Though he clearly hasn’t had the thousands of lessons of etiquette that have been drilled into Allura’s brain through the castle’s somewhat violent projections, Lance has always been good with people. An event like this brings that out in him.

So good, in fact, that the Cobraquelien Prince Bokar decides to make an announcement in the midst of the festivities.

“Father,” he says, directed at the planet’s king. “I believe it is in our best interest to accept their offer and join the coalition.”

And for that, Allura is thankful. The next part, less so.

“And you, paladins. Allow me to thank you for protecting our planet with the most prestigious gift my people can offer. If I may.”

He motions to one of the service staff who presses a small, black box into his hand. The prince clicks it open, revealing what from this distance appears to be some kind of ornamental trinket, a blue sapphire sitting at its centre.

“Blue paladin, I extend my hand to you, and ask that we bind our lives together with a romantic union.”

Now, it’s not like Allura is unfamiliar with being proposed to, once a princess of a planet of diplomats. A future throne to a planet with that much influence was enticing to many, despite it being common knowledge those of her lineage often found partnership with other alteans, and so it wasn’t unknown for nobles to nudge suitors her way during visits with her father. Often, she was left unimpressed, none of them matching up to the prince—or princess—her inner romantic heart had envisioned, captivated by the idea of a love so true, so magical, she’d fall for them the moment they met eyes.

But, just like her mother, she had fallen for someone who wasn’t a prince at all. Not even close.

No love at first sight.

Just Lance being Lance, growing into a person she can trust with her life, who’s so genuine with his faith in her that she knows he feels the same.

And somehow, despite such grandeur fantasies of love, what her and Lance have rests so dearly in her chest she would never have it any other way.

(One quintant, she thinks. One quintant she’ll be the one doing the proposing, when the war is won, and their future assured.

And maybe this can end better than any dream).

So, no. It’s not that Allura is unfamiliar with being proposed to, back then and even now, still, with Lotor having tried talking her into a union of them both.

But this other prince springs this upon her so suddenly, no lead up, that it comes as a shock, putting a dent in her diplomatic persona for just enough time that Lance reacts first, coming to stand defensively at her side like a paladin in shining armour. A very jealous paladin in shining armour.

As if he has anything to worry about.

“Woah, woah! Nu-uh buddy. You can’t marry Allura!”

Off to the side, she hears Pidge snickering. “Oh here we go again.”

“Seconded!” declares Coran, popping up out of absolutely nowhere to stand next to Lance. “As the Princess’ primary guardian, I object! I object I say! … Not that I mean any disrespect to you, Prince Bokar, but I can’t hand Allura over to someone without any notarised certificates of commendation,” Coran pauses, and looks at the prince with renewed interest. “Actually, as a prince, do you have any certificates?”

“Coran,” says Allura in time with a similar protest from Lance.

“Yes, right! Sorry. I just thought it was worth an ask.” And to the prince, Coran says, “Not that it would matter if you did, of course. I cannot in good conscience approve when the princess is already being courted.”

“She is?” asks Shiro. He turns to her. “Is this true, Princess?”

“Yes that’s… correct,” Allura says, realising that this is the first time the matter of her and Lance’s relationship has been brought up in front of the other paladins. “I apologise, Prince Bokar, but I will have to decline your proposal.”

“I knew it!” she hears Hunk say to Pidge, “Her and Lotor really are a thing!”

Allura inwardly winces at the name. She knows they must keep a working relationship with Prince Lotor, but they’ll never become anything more than that. There’s something about the way he speaks, almost as if it’s exactly what you want to hear, charmed words a distraction from his real goal. She may have had a passing attraction, but was all there was to it.

“That’s not…” she tries, only to catch sight of Lance and his pouting face. Allura stifles a laugh.

“I believe there has been a misunderstanding,” says Bokar, this baffled look on his face as he stares Lance up and down. “You’re in blue. Are you not the blue paladin?”

Oh?

Oh?

Lance blinks, his face going blank. He opens his mouth as if to speak, and leaves it like that, speechless, as if trying to catch a Jartulio fly in there, only nothing is caught, and nothing is said. After some pause, he tries again to find his voice, managing a pitchy, “Huh?”

“Hold on, hold on,” says Hunk, stepping forwards from the buffet table in which he and Pidge had been snacking from, their eyes darting back and forth as if watching a live dramatisation of a play. There’s this amused sparkle in his eyes, like he’d full on guffaw if this weren’t a professional setting. “So what you're saying is you want to marry Lance?”

“Yes, I find his company to be delightful. Even if he’s not the blue paladin, red is such dashing colour for a dashing man,” says the prince, taking Lance’s hand in his own to press a kiss to it. If it had been Allura preforming the action, she knows Lance would be a flustered red mess right now. As it is, he isn’t, though there does in fact seem to be a slight trace of red on his cheeks. “Please, paladin Lance, consider my offer.”

“As generous as your offer is, he cannot accept,” says Allura with as much professionalism as she can muster. She’s glad others are able to recognise Lance’s good qualities as she has, but it’s best they shoot down this man’s attempts as courting Lance as soon as.

“Yeah,” agrees Pidge wholeheartedly. “You’re really not his type. I’ve only ever seen him try and flirt with girls before and—”

“Uh, Pidge…” says Hunk, elbowing her in the side. She casts him a quizzical look and Hunk starts whispering in her ear. Nothing that Allura can pick up, even with heightened hearing. A crowded room like this is full of all sorts of muttering.

“Look, I’m really flattered, okay? I am,” says Lance, scratching his neck. He gives the prince an oddly bashful—yet endearing—smile. “It’s not everyday a prince gets charmed by my… me. But I’m going to have to say no. Sorry. And it’s nothing to do with you being a guy or anything, I mean, that’s fine. But I’ve already promised myself to this incredible woman and I really, really want this to work between us. Soooo… we’re cool right? This won’t affect the alliance… will it?”

Two rejections in a row has the prince looking out of sorts. There’s something to his smile, tight, pinched, that makes Allura believe that was less of a proposal and more of a demand.

“You could take us both,” insists Bokar, trying once more. Unsuccessfully, of course, as Lance uncomfortably shifts on his feet, looking like he’d rather be anywhere but here right now.

“Yeah, uh, we’re good.”

“No, I insist,” presses the prince, forgoing any pleasantries. The crowd around them starts muttering even louder, noises of disapproval directed at Bokar. “You can’t refuse a proposal from a prince! I’m me!”

“He said no,” says Allura, sharp, her glare even sharper. She notices Coran is giving him a similar expression, a rare sight indeed.

“But—”

“Enough Bokar,” comes a booming voice, sending an invisible tremor throughout the people in the crowd, guests jumping in their skin. “You cannot treat our guests this way.”

“But father, you said I could have anything I wanted,” protests Bokar, now less charming, more whiny brat. “And I want a lion! He’ll give me his lion.”

The way Lance deflates at that has Allura making mental note to shower him with love and appreciation once this is all done. Right now, she has half the mind to fling this spoiled prince across with room, consequences to the coalition be damned.

“No way man,” says Lance. “I’ve been here before and it involves being tied to a tree.”

Oh how could they forget.

“Your majesty,” says Shiro, addressing the king. “If this is the condition for joining the coalition, we won’t be able to accept. This isn’t right.”

“Hmm, yes. I apologise for my son,” says the king, another glare directed at Bokar. “Worry not, I have every intention to join the coalition. As for Bokar, he has a little more growing up to do before I marry him off, so it seems.”

***

“Eugh. What a jerk,” says Pidge over the lions’ comms. “He could not take no for an answer.”

“Indeed,” agrees Allura. She has absolutely no time for people like that.

“Yeah! I mean, he basically forced Lance into making up a girlfriend to get him to back off,” says Hunk. He narrows his eyes. “… You did make up a girlfriend right? I would know if my best friend was dating someone, wouldn’t I? Are you dating someone? Is it that alien from that planet of mermaids? Did she give you her number?”

A guilty wince. “Well…” Lance says, trailing off.

“No way,” says Pidge, no lack of disbelief.

“Oh my gosh! Lance, Lance,” says Hunk, a flurry of delight. “You’ve gotta spill the beans. First Allura, now you? When did this even happen? I mean, there’s just so much to tell Keith now! Usually all our blade phone calls are like ‘I found some new spices that don’t melt your insides’. And ‘we fought more galra.’ But now this. I mean, talk about a coincidence.”

“Err, about that,” Lance tries again. “See, there’s a reason for that. I was talking about Allura. We’re dating each other. Surprise?”

And with a flourish of his hands, the secret is out.

How this manages to be so exhaustingly dramatic an experience, yet simultaneously underwhelming, Allura doesn’t know.

“Oh!” says Shiro, an amused twitch to his smile. “Congratulations, the both of you.”

Hunk’s eyes are wide, impossibly so. “… Huh?”

“Sorry for not telling you before. It just… never came up.”

”No—it’s just. Wow. Didn’t see that one coming.”

“Me neither. Huh, weird. I didn’t think Allura would… yeah,” says Pidge, a strange expression on her face Allura can’t quite distinguish.

“He’s right, Pidge,” Allura admits, looking fondly at Lance on the screen. He returns the look easily.

“Gross,” says Pidge, that expression disappearing like it was never there at all. Pidge rolls her eyes. “Get a lion, guys.”

Lance just laughs, a sound that has Allura wondering just how they managed to hide this relationship at all.

It is truly a beautiful sound.

[extraordinaryhistories]

#22 - 'Far Physician's Son' (non-album track, 2001)

Somewhere early in his career, Sufjan Stevens discovered something incredible: acoustic guitars could be strummed. Before this point, Sufjan did one of two things on the acoustic. He would fingerpick, which made up the bulk of his nascent folk material, and it sounded great (just as it would later in his career, when he became iconic for this sound.) Or he would bash. The sound he gets out of his guitar on a song like ‘A Winner Needs a Wand’ isn’t a strum, it’s an attack, ugly chords getting hammered out of his guitar. There was rarely an in-between. If you want a soft song, you pick; if you want a loud song, you bash. Such was the binary along which he operated for a while.

Then something changed. There was a realisation. There was no need for all this abuse; just sit with it and strum. Listen to the word escaping from the guitar – strum. Listen to all the beautiful resonances. Listen to the syllables as they play across the strings. Listen – really listen – to how the sound fills the space. Listen to six notes interacting as they choose. And then: out of it let music pour.

When Sufjan finally lent himself over to this most traditional of folk guitar styles, he created some really gorgeous work. His feel for writing chord progressions was developing rapidly, and that’s essential for strummed guitar, one of the more direct ways of conveying complex harmonic movement. Suddenly he was evolving out of elementary uses of the instrument, like those we see on ‘Happy Birthday’; the melodies were now being supported with a harmonic framing that served as the yin to their yang, a complementary – but slightly distinct – source of light and colour. A less immediately evident source of the refinement of Sufjan’s music, but one that’s present nearly everywhere, if you care to look for it.

Find it, if you will, in ‘Far Physician’s Son’. This song’s provenance is typically obscure: it was released with three other Sufjan songs on 8.21: A Blue Bunny Compilation, and if you haven’t heard of it, it’s because just about nobody has. On it you will find ‘Woman at the Well’, an early version of ‘Year of the Ox’, and then this, sandwiched between a tinny slacker rock song and a long slab of musique concrète. Listening to it in sequence is quite striking. Sufjan spent about fifteen years of his career (up until Carrie and Lowell) relishing in the fact that he was sort of uncool, an oddball English major writing knowingly kitschy songs based on musical tropes that were very much not in vogue, certainly not in the indie sphere. 8.21: A Blue Bunny Compilation is the perfect microcosm of what Sufjan was becoming as an artist. In the midst of all this wild laissez-faire experimentation comes this, a precious, beautifully-performed folk ode to Jesus. Not quite the recipe to win the alternative glitterati over, is it?

So yes, like ‘Joy! Joy! Joy!’, like ‘Woman at the Well’, like ‘God’ll Ne’er Let You Down’ and a host of others, ‘Far Physician’s Son’ is orthodox in just about every sense. The one daring element here is the time signature. It is our second-ever Sufjan song to feature 5/4 metre, and he continues to demonstrate here his natural gift for making non-standard timing sound like nothing out of the ordinary. This is one of those uncommon songs in five that sounds as effortless as the flowing of a stream – it might take several listens (around five, in my case) before you pick up on any strangeness at all.

We can attribute that effortlessness to the guitar playing. There’s that word – strum ­– wide, yearning chords, played at a confident pace, that fill up both channels with their close-miced honey. The assuredness of the rhythm draws the ear away from the metric oddities perfectly, make it sound orthodox despite being anything but. This is the first time an acoustic guitar has sounded this rich on a Sufjan song, and thankfully by no means the last – but songs like these are the origin point of so much of Sufjan’s later sophistication. The arrangement here is otherwise remarkably tasteful. Some flutes here, some vibraphone there, all following the vocal melody, nothing feeling garish or out-of-place. ‘Far Physician’s Son’ is not a song designed to challenge you. Sometimes, orthodoxy can be undervalued.

Thus we are encouraged to focus on the symbiosis that underpins all the finest Sufjan songs: the slow-dance between lyrics and melody. Predictably for this man’s early work, ‘Far Physician’s Son’ is a song about Jesus. (As an aside, I have at times theorised that Sufjan was considering a full-blown career pivot to Christian contemporary music around the turn of the millennium, given how nearly every vocal track written between A Sun Came and Michigan is explicitly religious. Religion as a thematic focus came back in a big way on Seven Swans, of course, but there it is treated with more complexity and metaphor than ever before. Early throwaways like ‘Far Physician’s Son’ accept the premise of God’s fundamental goodness without question. Simplistic? Yes, but then again, so many beautiful things are.)

‘Far Physician’s Son’ is a mostly straightforward song that references a passage in Luke 4, where Jesus goes to the synagogue of Nazareth (‘Went to Galilee / With the scroll again’) and announces himself as a saviour – the man who will save humanity from the ills that befall them (‘Heal the poor and stung / Steal the hurt and hung’.) The song emphasises Jesus’ fundamental humanity, and thus his staggering glory; he is ‘Joseph’s son’, child of a common man but saviour of the wider world. Again, there’s not much to this one, but there doesn’t need to be. Jesus’ goodness – his ‘is’-ness – is self-evident. It is written that the person who speaks to God in a few honest words is blessed over the person who speaks to God with ego and articulation. No more words are really required in a song like this than the repeated refrain, the ideological core of the song that inhabits its latter half: ‘he will arise, he will arise’.

It's that phrase, and the melody attached to it, that always beguiles me when I listen to ‘Far Physician’s Son’. This is a feathery song, with lighter-than-air melodies and effete instrumentation – and yet we find this great counterweight at the end of the song, ‘he will arise’, repeated ad infinitum, with its doggedly deep and flat melody. It takes me out of the song sometimes. And yet there is a keen reason to it. ‘He will arise’ is the final truth of the New Testament, the promise and end state of Christianity, the thing above all things. Of course it has to sound weighty. Of course it has to read like a mantra in the context of the song, Sufjan singing it over, and over, and over. It’s only logic. It’s only everything.

Addendum: literally mere weeks before I wrote this, a Sufjan show from the year 2000 was unearthed, and a rendition of ‘Far Physician’s Son’ was in it. A pretty standard version, but a version nonetheless. Massive news for annoying people.

[fairytales-and-folklore]

In Terms Of Curiosity

Sleepy Hollow » Ichabbie

Title: In Terms Of Curiosity

Author: fairytalesandfolklore

Fandom: Sleepy Hollow (Masterlist)

Relationship: Abbie Mills x Ichabod Crane

AO3 Rating: Teen & Up (a complete collection of author's notes, inspiration credits, content warnings and tags can be found on AO3)

Summary: Abbie had thought that she'd filled her quota on embarrassing moments the day Crane had happened upon a box of tampons hiding underneath her bathroom sink, and proceeded to call them her "little cotton mice." But that doesn't even come close to the day Crane accidentally discovers one of Abbie's vibrators.

"Is it a telephone?" he asks, pressing it up against his left cheek in an attempt to listen for the sound of a speaker, and Abbie nearly dies of embarrassment. "Not very practical in shape, if it is," he amends, frowning. "No, Crane, it's definitely not a phone. Would you please stop playing with it?" Abbie asks, exasperated. "Why? Is it a remote control? Does it work the television?" he asks, rolling it in between his palms until he finds the small, circular protrusion located at the base. With a quick flick of his thumb, he's pressed the button, and the toy comes buzzing to life. Crane jumps like he's seen a ghost, but quickly recovers, keeping a firm grip on the trembling toy and fixing Abbie with a curious expression. "Why does it quiver?" he asks, head tilted to the side in confusion.

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Abbie had thought that she'd filled her quota on most horrifically embarrassing moment ever the day that Crane had happened upon an open box of tampons hiding underneath her bathroom sink, and had proceeded to call them her little cotton mice until she'd been forced to correct him…only to be swiftly replaced by the time that Crane had accidentally brought up a porn site on her laptop and had actually had the audacity to ask her why scantily-clad women with low, throaty voices and pouted lips were asking him to take his clothes off…but none of that even came close to the night that Ichabod accidentally discovered one of Abbie's vibrators. (Abbie forever files that night under conversations dead and buried, and if Crane wants to keep his head, among other things, intact, he'll do well to remember that.)

They're all snuggled up on Abbie's couch for the evening, in the midst of a movie marathon after a long, tiring day at the station, spent poring over endless scriptures and ancient tablets. It was an absolute travesty, in Abbie's opinion, for anyone alive in this century to have never watched The Princess Bride, and Abbie was determined to remedy that. Surprisingly, Crane had only complained twice about historical inaccuracies (it's a comedy, Crane, they're not actually trying for accuracy, here…yes, it's supposed to be ridiculous) and had, overall, quite like the film, if his quiet bouts of laughter were anything to go by. As the credits roll across the screen, Ichabod shifts in his seat, trading the slumped position he'd sunk into during the movie for his usual, ramrod straight posture.

"Admittedly, that was rather enjoyable," he says, offering Abbie a small smile.

"Told you so," Abbie quips, pulling her feet up onto the couch cushions and curling her arms around her shins. The moment she does, her stomach gives an ill-timed, impatient rumble, and she turns to look at Crane.

"Hey, how much popcorn do we have left?" she asks. "Pass me the bowl?"

"I'm afraid I might've eaten the last—" Crane starts, reaching over for the plastic container and then stopping mid-stretch, a peculiar expression etched into his features.

"You okay, Crane?" Abbie asks, concerned.

"There…erm…there appears to be something hard poking into my backside," he says, shifting uncomfortably on the couch cushions, before dipping a hand in between them, rummaging about for a few seconds, and then extracting a long, narrow object with a slightly curved tip. There's a bright flash of hot pink as Ichabod waves it about in the air, and Abbie freezes, eyes growing wide as she stares back and forth between the sex toy she'd accidentally left out from the night before, and Crane's curious expression.

"That's an odd-looking sort of apparatus you've got buried in your couch cushions…whatever is it for?" Ichabod asks, and all of the blood in Abbie's entire body rushes to her cheeks, flooding them with heat.

"Um, it's noth—" Abbie attempts, leaning forward and all but lunging for Crane's hands, only to be met with a childishly indignant expression as Crane lifts his arms out of her reach (which, admittedly, doesn't take too much effort on his part) and she very nearly goes tumbling, face-first, into his lap.

"Nothing. It's nothing. Really. Don't worry about it," she says, making another quick grab for it, which only serves to make Crane hold it up even higher.

"Oh come now, Lieutenant," he says, scoffing playfully. "You can tell me. After all, I am meant to be learning the ins and outs of this century's customs…you swore that you would answer my every question, and I—"

"Remember how I said that there were some things you wouldn't want to know? Some things that are better left unsaid? Need I remind you of the tampon incident?" Abbie warns, cheeks flushing impossibly hotter as she blatantly ignores the way Crane's lips curve around the phrase ins and outs.

"Need I remind you, Lieutenant, that it was your rule to never bring it up again?" he asks, arching his eyebrows. "But seeing as you have now…there's no shame in admitting that while I might've been a touch…erm…surprised by the concept at first, I assure you that I have moved past it and am now quite at peace with the whole ordeal."

"That's great and all, Crane, but I really don't think—"

"Besides which, you and I have faced all manner of demonic monsters, both literal and figurative, together, and have come out relatively unscathed. I highly doubt that there is anything you could say that would put me off."

"Mmm…I can think of a couple things," Abbie murmurs, absentmindedly biting her lower lip. Crane furrows his eyebrows in concentration, and then, horror of all horrors, begins twirling the little pink device in between his fingertips, tugging at the taut silicone with the pads of his thumbs. Abbie suffers a full-body shiver and cringes so hard she nearly pulls a muscle. (At the very least, Abbie muses, she hadn't opted for the life-like model. The shape of it is ambiguous enough that Crane wouldn't be able to tell what it is at first glance. Which means he's not going to let up until he gets a proper answer out of her. Why is this her life?) Crane's nose scrunches up in perplexity as he scrutinizes the toy with an overzealous fascination, and then, struck with a sudden thought, he looks up at Abbie and purses his lips, poised on a series of inquiries.

"Is it a telephone?" he asks, pressing it up against his left cheek in an attempt to listen for the sound of a speaker, and Abbie nearly dies of embarrassment. 

"Not very practical in shape, if it is," he amends, frowning.

"No, Crane, it's definitely not a phone. Could you just—"

"Is it a baking apparatus, then? A whisk of some sort?"

"No, but—"

"Does it play music, like that pod thing you've got?"

"Crane, would you please stop playing with it?" Abbie asks, exasperated.

"Why? Is it a remote control? Does it work the television?" he asks, rolling it in between his palms until he finds the small, circular protrusion located at the base. With a quick flick of his thumb, he's pressed the button, and the toy comes buzzing to life. Crane jumps like he's seen a ghost, but quickly recovers, keeping a firm grip on the trembling toy and fixing Abbie with a curious expression.

"Why does it quiver?" he asks, head tilted to the side in confusion.

Oh, for fuck's sake.

"Because it's a vibrator, Crane," Abbie sighs in frustration, finally caving in.

"Well, I can clearly see that it vibrates, Miss Mills," he huffs, rolling his eyes for good measure. "But what is it for?"

"It's, um… it's like a muscle relaxer," she says, wincing at her own terrible phrasing.

"Is it used for massage?" Crane asks, intrigued.

"You're getting warmer," she says, sinking lower and lower into the couch cushions in the hope that they'll just swallow her whole.

"I don't understand why we must play these guessing games, Lieutenant. Can you not just tell me what it is? Would that not be simpler?" Crane asks, clearly irritated now.

"Fine," she spits, vexed. "Fine, whatever, if it'll get you to shut up about it."

Crane waits, eyebrows arched and lips jutted out in expectation. Abbie heaves a long-suffering sigh.

"It's…a toy…for adults," she says slowly, feeding him small, seemingly innocent, overly emphasized words, bit by bit, in the hope that he'll eventually catch on and she won't have to continue subjecting herself to this mortifying torture. 

He doesn't, though. He merely blinks at her and (im)patiently waits for her to finish.

"Oh my god, okay, fine…it's a sex toy, okay? It's used to…um," she trails off, sucking in her lower lip and pointedly avoiding Crane's penetrating stare.

"Bring about orgasm?" he offers, his voice suddenly quiet and reserved, with just the barest hint of a strangled groan underneath that final word. Abbie tries her damnedest to ignore the sudden heat pooling low in her belly.

"Um…yeah, that," she says, eyes still averted. "Can I have it back now?"

Without a word, Crane hands it back to her, fingertips lightly brushing against the palm of her hand, and Abbie chances a quick glance at him. His bright blue eyes are wide, more in wonder than in alarm, mouth rounded in a surprised oh as he stares off into the distance, submerged in deep contemplation. The moment it's back in her hand, Abbie bolts off the couch and slips into her bedroom, burying the offending toy under a pile of silken, lace-embellished underwear in her top dresser drawer. 

When she comes back out into the living room, Crane is already standing by the kitchen door, shrugging on his ancient, tattered jacket and lacing up his boots. Slowly, carefully, like he'd planned it just so, Crane lifts his lashes and locks his eyes onto hers, fixing her with a small smile that lingers, not with an air of embarrassment, but with one of smug satisfaction. Abbie is torn between wanting to smack it clean off his face and kiss it into submission. Instead, she takes a hesitant step toward him, and crosses her arms across her chest, leveling him with a look of pure intimidation.

"We are never speaking of this again," she says, careful not to touch him as she all but ushers him out into the corridor. Crane pauses for a few moments, seemingly collecting his thoughts, before turning toward her with a cheeky grin. He makes a sudden, but nonetheless elegant, sweep, bending his posture into a proper gentleman's bow, and says, with the slightest hint of salacity, "As you wish, Lieutenant."

Before Abbie even has the chance to respond, Crane has already strolled across the corridor, bounded down the stairwell, and let himself out of the apartment complex, none the wiser of Abbie's stare burning holes into the back of his jacket as he walks the length of the parking lot. After a few moments, Crane turns on his heel and tilts his chin up toward her window, smiling softly at the way Abbie's startled expression disappears from view with a quick sway of billowing curtains.

[jeremy-ken-anderson]

The Nature of the Death

It's interesting to me, thinking about the latest in A Savage Proposal, and the way that I want the current scene to play out.

What I want is for Liene to beg one last mercy of Lord Tiwakan: A fearless death for Lafitte.

I want her to let him die like Lennie in Of Mice and Men: caught in the midst of reverie. To kneel in front of him and reminisce of the days when they were children running through the fields on her father's estate, the sun warm in their hair, the wind bringing the scent of wheat and wildflowers, and as he closes his eyes to recall those moments she nods to Tiwakan and her face - because it is so close to Lafitte's at the time - is spattered with his life's blood.

It would be hard for her. But it is the last kindness Lafitte can receive after what he's done, and one I think Liene would want for him even still. He's clearly gone mad, lost in delusions, and there's no way out of an execution after what he's already done. So let the delusions themselves be his last comfort.

This isn't quite the same as the firebug in Samurai Executioner, though it certainly brings it to mind. The story there is that a woman has a pyrophilia psychosis, and she's to be executed for starting fires that have claimed lives and ruined homes. But it's clear that she doesn't consciously know what she's done. "The firebug" is a personality separate from the one that is present for most of the day. There's a moral and honor dilemma as they consider how to treat a woman who's at once innocent and a threat to her community, and in the end the titular Executioner performs the execution while she stares into a flame, so that 1) the guilty party - the firebug - is present to be executed, but also 2) so the innocent woman is absent, and doesn't have to deal with the fear of imminent death.

I don't think Liene has the steel in her spine to ask this kind of thing, sadly. I want it, but I don't think we get that from her just yet. I kind of expect this scene to play out with her a lot more passive and Lord Tiwakan just doing his thing, or perhaps some outside force moving the plot along and sparing Lafitte Kleinfelter a third time when frankly he probably should have died the first. The story overall is much more about the romance between Liene and Tiwakan, and trust or mistrust between them (and of course their mutual attraction, and how that jumps into the middle of questions of trust).

[connorsui]

This has to be one of the most cutest and most fantasy driven fics of aemond I have ever read 🩷…my author my beloved I don't know how I can make my words sound as pretty and you have written down but …hey…it's as expected …you can never copy a beautiful and whimsical poetry when you can only read it with your own eyes

You gotta experience it to luv it ✨️

THOOO MAKING AEMOND A LITTLE DOLL!? THAT WAS PROBABLY THE ONE THING THAT HAD ME GIGGLING ALL THE WAY 😭😭😭🩷🩷 — but its the little details that u add in the midst of it all that makes it even more beautiful and yet – most questionable ..like Luke deliberately and not wanting to – destroys aemonds eye by accident ..but in real aspect ..true aemond has his eye gone ..so then the whole debacle comes in …was it real …or we tripping?

Did we get so drunk that we started seeing little mice fighting other bby mice?? Or did Aemond really have a tiny sapphire eye ?? 💀

ALL HONESTLY THOO U WOULDNT CARE ✨️ LIKE IMAGINE HAVING A TINY KINGDOM WITH A TINY PRINCE AND A MAGICAL DRESS??? –. . . 🧍🏻‍♀️🩷.. .

I would keep dousing myself in melatonin gummies to pass out – each adventure gonna be comatose moments inside a hospital

Dance of the Sugarplum Prince

Nutcracker!Aemond x Clara!Reader

Word Count: 2.3k

Warnings: violence, character death, smut, tiddy sucking, oral (f-receiving), uncle-niece incest, unprotected sex, piv sex, breeding kink, possessive Aemond, obsessed Aemond

A/N: I may not be the first nor the last to do a nutcracker au, but I’m doin it anyways! Merry Christmas to those who celebrate!

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. All rights go to HBO and George RR Martin

The snow falls heavy and thick outside the window. You watch the snowflakes dance to the ground while your family makes a ruckus behind you. The adults Gossip amongst themselves while your brothers laugh and joke amongst themselves. You love your family, but you’ve grown tired of your overbearing aunties trying to set you up with “nice boys” they know.

You notice a figure making their way towards the front door, making your own way towards it to greet them. Right after the doorbell rings, you open the door, smiling at the woman on the other side.

“Aunt Alys,” you smile and embrace the older woman.

“Forgive me for my tardiness, but it’s nearly impossible to make one’s way through that,” she replies, indicating to the storm outside. Other family members come to greet Alys, so you move to the side and let them. She pulls a large case out from under her coat. She reveals several beautifully made dolls, winding them up and letting them dance across the carpet. Your family is in awe. While they’re distracted, Alys approaches you.

“I have a special gift for you,” Alys says. She opens her bag, gingerly pulling out a final doll. He was a beautiful man with long silver hair and black armor accentuated with gold.

“This,” you aunt explains, “is no ordinary knight. He is a prince of a faraway land.”

“Oh Alys, she’s too old for dolls!” your mother calls from across the room.

“Oh, but he’s so beautiful!” you rebut. “Couldn’t I just put on on my shelf and admire him?”

“You can put these dirty dishes in the kitchen,” your mother tells you. You sigh, setting your doll on the windowsill. Alys follows you into the kitchen.

“Perhaps you should’ve brought me a real prince. That would’ve made mother happy,” you laugh. Alys simply smiles at that.

Suddenly, a loud crash sounds from the sitting room, followed by your mother shouting “Luke!” You rush into the room. Your doll is lying on the floor at your brother’s feet.

“It was an accident!” Luke explains. “I only wanted to get a closer look!”

You rush over, picking your doll up off the ground. One of his eyes is broken. Luke apologizes profusely while you carefully extract the broken pieces. Alys approaches.

“I couldn’t find a spare eye, but this should fit,” she says, handing you a small sapphire. You slip it into his empty socket; it fits perfectly. She provides a small strip of black fabric that you use as a makeshift eyepatch.

“Thank you, Alys,” you say, giving the older woman a hug. You don’t notice the worried look she gives your doll.

BONG

BONG

BONG

Was it midnight already? You must have nodded off at some point. You look down at your prince, admiring his handsome face. Perhaps it’s the dim light, but it looks as though his mouth twitches.

You’re about to go to bed when something moves at the edge of your vision. A small man walks out from under your Christmas tree! For a moment, you think it’s your prince. However, this man has two eyes and looks older. He wears a crown that looks like it’s made of wood. He’s looking around, clearly searching for something. You stay as still as possible, hoping he doesn’t notice you. Theres a possibility you’re still dreaming, but you’re not willing to take that risk.

“Looking for someone, Daemon?” a voice calls out. Both your heads snap to the corner where it came from. Your mouth falls open. It’s your prince! But he’s alive! He approaches the man, sword drawn.

“Aemond,” Daemon greets. “It appears you’ve suffered a horrible accident. Shame. I was hoping for a fair fight.”

“And you’ll get one,” Aemond snaps. At that moment, more figures storm into view. You recognize them as your brothers’ toy soldiers.

“Alright. Two can play at that game,” Daemon raises a hand, and several mice scurry out from nowhere. You clap a hand over your mouth, trying not to scream. Daemon and Aemond draw their swords, circling one another. Daemon strikes first, but Aemond is quick to block. The mice and toys launch at each other. You’re enthralled. Though bloodless, the battle is intense.

Suddenly, Daemon strikes Aemond’s blind side. He’s sent flying to the floor, his sword clattering away. Daemon smiles viciously, standing over his nephew. He raises his sword to strike the killing blow and—

WHAM!

A giant slipper knocks him off his feet. Aemond glances at you, noting you are now missing a slipper. He grins, then springs into action. He draws a dagger, races to his uncle, and plunges the blade into his neck. Daemon never had time to regain his senses before he bleeds out, choking and clasping at his throat. The battle stops. The now leaderless mice scurry off, and the toy soldiers return to where your brothers left them originally. Aemond walks over to you. As he does, he grows until he’s the height of a normal man. You stare up at him, lips parted. He’s tall, and even more handsome as a man.

“You saved me,” he states, kneeling at your side.

“I-it was nothing,” you stammer, blushing. “I didn’t want him to…kill you.”

Aemond’s lips curl into a smirk. “Such a sweet thing you are,” he muses. He reaches out, winding a lock on your hair around his finger. “It’s not every day a man can say he was saved by someone so beautiful or kind.”

Your blush deepens. “You’re too kind,” you whisper.

“You must come back to the castle with me. My family will want to meet the girl who helped defeat my wicked uncle and his wretched mouse army,” he stands, extending a hand to you. You look around the empty sitting room, wondering what to do.

“It’s only for tonight. I promise to have you back by morning,” he assures you. You bite your lip, not noticing the way his gaze darkens. Then, you smile and take his hand. When you stand, you notice how much taller he is. you look down shyly, but he tucks a finger under your chin and tilts your face up to his. For a moment, you think he’s going to kiss you. But then he says, “let’s be off then,” and leads you to the Christmas tree. With each step, you shrink until you can easily walk under the branches.

You spot a castle in the distance. A beautiful red fortress perched on the edge of a cliff, overlooking a sprawling city. The faint ringing of bells can be heard.

“It seems word of our victory has spread,” Aemond observes. “I imagine the celebration is well underway.

“Oh, but I’m not dressed!” you realize.

“Look down, little one,” Aemond replies. You do, and you gasp. Your simple nightgown had been replaced with a beautiful white dress, tied by a large red ribbon. The skirt floats in light layers down to your calves. Your feet are covered by red slippers with ribbons wrapped around your legs.

“How…?” you start to ask, the question dying on your lips when you look up and see Aemond had changed as well. He’s wearing a black and red jacket adorned with golden epaulettes, and also matching breeches and shiny black boots. His hair is loose, and the swath of ribbon covering his eye is replaced with a proper eyepatch.

“Come,” he requests, extending his hand. “We don’t want to miss out on the festivities.”

The walk to the castle is filled with merriment as the small folk throw flowers over your heads and dance and cheer. Inside the castle is even more merry as ball is in full swing. You spy the king and queen at the end of the hall, their matching silver hair catching the light.

Aemond leads you to the middle of the dance floor and leads you in a waltz. The night passes in a series of twirls and lifts, until a hush falls over the crowd.

The king leads his queen off the dais into the center of the crowd. Everyone pushes back, forming a wide berth around them as they lead a solitary waltz. You feel a large hand on the small of your back.

“Come with me,” Aemond whispers. His breath tickles your ear.

He leads you out of the room. The two of you race down the halls. You haven’t felt this exhilarated since you were a child chasing your brothers outdoors.

You’re lead into a bedroom that you presume is his. You don’t have time to take in the decor, as he grabs your face and kisses you hungrily. You kiss him back, hands tangling in his soft hair.

He deftly undoes the bow on your back. He tries to untie the laces, but he gets impatient and just tears your dress open. You gasp as your dress falls from your body.

Aemond scoops you up and lays you on the bed. He looks over you like a lion about to devour his kill.

“Have you ever been with a man before little one?”

“N-no,” you stutter, causing him to chuckle.

“Well,” he starts, “allow me to show you.”

He tears the rest of your underthings off, leaving you bare before him. Without breaking eye contact, he takes one of your nipples into his mouth. Your head rolls back as he sucks on the sensitive flesh, kneading your other side.

“So beautiful,” he gasps, switching to the other tit.

“So perfect.” He trails kisses down your torso. He fingers swipe through your folds. He brings them to his lips and sucks them clean; his eyes roll back and he groans.

“I knew you’d taste sweet,” he purrs. He lowers his head to your mound and drags his tongue through your folds. You gasp and instinctually shy away, but he pins you with this hands on your hips. You can only moan as he relentlessly devours your cunt.

“M-my prince…”

“Aemond. Call me Aemond,” he breathes, sending a shiver through you. You feel your peak approaching, closer and closer. It’s just about to wash over you when he pulls away. You whine at the loss of stimulation.

“The first time I make you come, it will be on my cock,” Aemond states, once again leaning over you. He sheds his clothing with ease. He’s truly one of the most beautiful men you’ve ever seen. His cock is long and thick, and already leaking. He strokes himself as he gets into position.

“What if it doesn’t fit?” You ask innocently.

“It will fit.” He replies. “I’ll make it fit.”

He angles his cock and enters you with one sure thrust. You gasp loudly, clinging to his shoulders.

“Gods you’re tight,” he whispers. He begins to rock in and out of you, setting a steady pace.

“So wet, and I’ve barely touched you. Such a needy little thing. Absolutely begging to be fucked.”

You babble incoherently in response. Aemond chuckles and starts playing with your pearl.

“Already cockdumb are we?”

He pinches your pearl.

“I could keep you here you know. Fuck you—breed you— day and night, until your belly swells with my child. You’d like that wouldn’t you? My perfect little princess. My broodmare. Mine.”

You’re a little frightened by his declaration, but you’re to overwhelmed by pleasure to do anything about it. You can only lay there as you climax, the pleasure melting your bones and heating your blood.

“That’s my girl. That’s my good girl,” he groans, and you feel his cock pulse followed by a sense of warmth. He keeps his cock plugged inside until he starts to soften, then he pulls out. You feel a mixture of your fluid and his seed leak out. He hold your legs open, admiring the sight. Then, he lays down, pulling you into his arms.

“You’ll want for nothing. I’ll make sure of it,” he whispers, pressing a kiss to your hair.

You lay against his chest, and it isn’t long before sleep claims you.

“Sweetheart, wake up!” you hear your mother call. You reluctantly open your eyes. You’re in your own bed, in your own room.

“I don’t mean to rush you, but we have some surprise guests waiting downstairs,” she pulls open the curtains, and you wince at the sudden brightness.

“Get dressed quickly! I need to get back downstairs!” she rushes out of your room, closing the door behind you.

At first, you don’t move. There was a heaviness in your chest. It had all been a dream. Of course it had been a dream. Mice soldiers, living dolls, and princes could only be the product of dreams. This is the real world, and there are guests waiting for you.

As you get dressed, you realize your prince doll is nowhere to be found. You must have left him downstairs.

Voices could be heard in the sitting room as you make your way downstairs. Unfamiliar voices. You round the corner and freeze. Sitting around the room are three very familiar faces.

“Darling, these are my half-siblings.” She leads you to the Sugarplum King. “This is Aegon,” then to the Queen, who smiles sweetly at you, “Helaena,” then finally to the most familiar of them all, “and this is Aemond.”

He takes your hand in his, planting a kiss on your knuckles. You stare up at him with wide eyes. He’s wearing an eyepatch. Over the same eye your brother broke. Was he hiding a sapphire under there?

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” you breathe.

“Please, the pleasure is all mine, niece,” he purrs, looking at you in a way an uncle should never look at a niece.

“What happened to your eye?” Luke asked abruptly. Jace whacks him on the shoulder, admonishing him.

“Ow!”

“It’s alright. It was an accident long ago,” Aemond replies.

“Oh, let’s not dwell on unhappy memories,” your mother says, turning to Helaena. “How is Alicent? It’s been too long since I’ve heard from her.”

The conversation carries on, but you’ve stopped paying attention. You’re not looking at him, but you feel his gaze on you. Just as intense as it had been when he made love to you in your dream.

A dream.

It had only been a dream.

Right?

[fordecree7]

THE BIBLE BOOK OF GOD

Isaiah 66

The Humble and Contrite in Spirit

66 Thus says the Lord: “Heaven is my throne,     and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me,     and what is the place of my rest? 2 All these things my hand has made,     and so all these things came to be, declares the Lord. But this is the one to whom I will look:     he who is humble and contrite in spirit     and trembles at my word.

3 “He who slaughters an ox is like one who kills a man;     he who sacrifices a lamb, like one who breaks a dog's neck; he who presents a grain offering, like one who offers pig's blood;     he who makes a memorial offering of frankincense, like one who blesses an idol. These have chosen their own ways,     and their soul delights in their abominations; 4 I also will choose harsh treatment for them     and bring their fears upon them, because when I called, no one answered,     when I spoke, they did not listen; but they did what was evil in my eyes     and chose that in which I did not delight.”

5 Hear the word of the Lord,     you who tremble at his word: “Your brothers who hate you     and cast you out for my name's sake have said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified,     that we may see your joy’;     but it is they who shall be put to shame.

6 “The sound of an uproar from the city!     A sound from the temple! The sound of the Lord,     rendering recompense to his enemies!

Rejoice with Jerusalem

7 “Before she was in labor     she gave birth; before her pain came upon her     she delivered a son. 8 Who has heard such a thing?     Who has seen such things? Shall a land be born in one day?     Shall a nation be brought forth in one moment? For as soon as Zion was in labor     she brought forth her children. 9 Shall I bring to the point of birth and not cause to bring forth?”     says the Lord; “shall I, who cause to bring forth, shut the womb?”     says your God.

10 “Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad for her,     all you who love her; rejoice with her in joy,     all you who mourn over her; 11 that you may nurse and be satisfied     from her consoling breast; that you may drink deeply with delight     from her glorious abundance.”

12 For thus says the Lord: “Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river,     and the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream; and you shall nurse, you shall be carried upon her hip,     and bounced upon her knees. 13 As one whom his mother comforts,     so I will comfort you;     you shall be comforted in Jerusalem. 14 You shall see, and your heart shall rejoice;     your bones shall flourish like the grass; and the hand of the Lord shall be known to his servants,     and he shall show his indignation against his enemies.

Final Judgment and Glory of the Lord

15 “For behold, the Lord will come in fire,     and his chariots like the whirlwind, to render his anger in fury,     and his rebuke with flames of fire. 16 For by fire will the Lord enter into judgment,     and by his sword, with all flesh;     and those slain by the Lord shall be many.

17 “Those who sanctify and purify themselves to go into the gardens, following one in the midst, eating pig's flesh and the abomination and mice, shall come to an end together, declares the Lord.

18 “For I know their works and their thoughts, and the time is coming to gather all nations and tongues. And they shall come and shall see my glory, 19 and I will set a sign among them. And from them I will send survivors to the nations, to Tarshish, Pul, and Lud, who draw the bow, to Tubal and Javan, to the coastlands far away, that have not heard my fame or seen my glory. And they shall declare my glory among the nations. 20 And they shall bring all your brothers from all the nations as an offering to the Lord, on horses and in chariots and in litters and on mules and on dromedaries, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, says the Lord, just as the Israelites bring their grain offering in a clean vessel to the house of the Lord. 21 And some of them also I will take for priests and for Levites, says the Lord.

22 “For as the new heavens and the new earth     that I make shall remain before me, says the Lord,     so shall your offspring and your name remain. 23 From new moon to new moon,     and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all flesh shall come to worship before me, declares the Lord.

24 “And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh.”

Isaiah 66

Diane Beauford

[solarpunkpresentspodcast]

Some Sights From Lutherstadt Wittenberg and the Elbe River

In the thick of the family trauma that was going on at my in-laws’ over Christmas, I tried to escape once a day to go on a long walk with the dog. I wouldn’t have survived it otherwise. But it was also amazing, because for the first time in years, the Elbe River began to flood. (Of course, the downside of that was the ceaseless rain that was causing the waters to rise.)

The day we arrived at my in-laws’ (Dec 20th), things were still relatively normal. It was still possible to walk the mile over the flood meadow to the river in its normal channel. The river was running a bit higher than normal, but not unreasonably so.

By the 23rd of December, it had risen high enough to cover the groins that jut out from the shore of the Elbe to slow down its flow near the riverbanks, accumulate passing sand, and in general prevent the erosion of the banks.

By the 25th, the water had marched the entire mile across the flood meadow to start lap at the base of the dike. From there, the water level kept going up. It was… exciting! (At least because here, unlike in other areas of Germany, the flood never reached the point where it was a problem. Here it remained well within the confines of the flood meadows and the dikes.)

I just wanted to share some of the pictures and videos with you, because it was so impressive.

Here’s what things looked like on the 23rd:

By the morning of the 25th, the situation had notably escalated:

By the 27th, the water had reached the dikes all over and was rising slightly and falling slightly depending on how many hours it had been since the last deluge.

I was in the midst of wondering about all the poor mice and earthworms—all drowned?—and all the deer—wandered off to… where?—when I got interrupted by a feral nutria swimming through the water then nonchalantly hauling out on a log and giving itself a good scratch.

In the 1950s and 1960s, people here—like Spouse’s grandmother—used to raise them for their pelts to make a bit of extra money. When it quickly became clear that this was not a lucrative endeavor, however, they then either slaughtered all the nutria or, presumably, set them free. They’re quite a pest all over Europe and normally local councils set traps and then euthanize them. But this is not the first nutria I’ve seen in this general area! They seem to be surviving here just fine.

Here’s a beautiful submerged tree from the 28th of Dec:

Later on the 28th, Spouse and I had to head into town to get a large photo of FIL printed and framed for display at his funeral. Seeing FIL’s healthy, joyous face in the picture hit Spouse like a sledgehammer. After dropping the picture off at the mortuary (because they’re organizing the funeral), we numbly followed our feet down the cobblestone streets, braving the frigid wind, paying no attention to where we were going. Suddenly, we found ourselves standing in front of the church where Martin Luther tacked up the theses just over 500 years ago. I mean, it’s not so surprising. It’s a small town and a big church. But with all the stress and trauma of his dad’s Alzheimer’s, we hadn’t had the freedom to while away time in town, and so we hadn’t seen it in years. And the tower was open!

How could we not climb all the stairs to have a look around at the flood from above?!

Here are some “highlights” of our long tromp up the stairs.

And then lastly, and far more interestingly, here’s a video of a trip around the circumference of the tower.

[woundgallery]

Mary Jo Bang from The Last Two Seconds

[memelleity]

hocus pocus sentence starters

❝ oh, look. another glorious morning. it makes me sick! ❞

❝ wake up, darling. ❞

❝ you’re right, i’m wrong. ❞

❝ stop that! i need to concentrate! ❞

❝ i smell a child. ❞

❝ open up your mouth. ❞

❝ get away from my potion! ❞

❝ there are not enough children in the world to make you young and beautiful! ❞

❝ dazzle me, my darling. ❞

❝ witches? there be no witches here, sir! ❞

❝ this is terribly uncomfortable. ❞

❝ we seem to have a skeptic in our midst. ❞

❝ would you care to share your california, laid-back, tie-dyed point of view? ❞

❝ everyone knows that halloween was invented by the candy companies. ❞

❝ it’s the one night of the year where the spirits of the dead can return to earth. ❞

❝ well, in case jimi hendrix shows up tonight, here’s my number. ❞

❝ look, i’m sorry. i didn’t mean to embarrass you in class. ❞

❝ what am i supposed to do with my afternoon? ❞

❝ hey, how was school? ❞

❝ don’t be such a crab! ❞

❝ it’s a full moon outside! the weirdos are out! ❞

❝ couldn’t you forget about being a cool teenager just for one night? ❞

❝ we used to have so much fun together trick-or-treating. remember? ❞

❝ the old days are dead. ❞

❝ hurry up! the bewitching hour is about to begin! ❞

❝ can we go home now? ❞

❝ you should’ve punched him. ❞

❝ this is your home now, so get used to it. ❞

❝ give me one more chance? ❞

❝ whoa. check that out— something just few across the moon! ❞

❝ i love your costume. ❞

❝ well, come on, make a believer out of me. ❞

❝ look, just do this one thing for me, and i’ll do anything you say. ❞

❝ oh, come on. it’s just a bunch of hocus pocus. ❞

❝ how time fies when you’re dead! ❞

❝ it’s been great fun, but i— i guess i’d better be going. ❞

❝ you leave my brother alone! ❞

❝ she poisoned him and sewed his mouth shut with a dull needle, so he couldn’t tell her secrets even in death. ❞

❝ ____ always was the jealous type. ❞

❝ i hate halloween. ❞

❝ you explained it beautifully. ❞

❝ you will fail to save your friends, just as you failed to save your sister! ❞

❝ are you okay? ❞

❝ relax. i’ve hunted mice down here for years. ❞

❝ think soothing thoughts. ❞

❝ i need one of those instant ice packs. you girls are giving me a fever! yeow! ❞

❝ anybody ever tell you you’re very easy on the eyes? ❞

❝ i told you, i can’t die. ❞

❝ what would mother say if she could see us like this? ❞

❝ what kind of costumes are these? ❞

❝ haven’t seen you for centuries. ❞

❝ what the heck, why don’t you come in?  ❞

❝ they thought i was a real cop. ❞

❝ aren’t you a little old to be trick-or-treating? ❞

❝ get out of my house! ❞

❝ something terrible happened. ❞

❝ how much candy have you had, honey? ❞

❝ don’t you see how crazy this sounds? ❞

❝ your kids are in danger! ❞

❝ i’m serious! it’s not a joke! ❞

❝ thank you, ____, for that marvelous introduction. ❞

❝ i put a spell on you, and now you’re mine. ❞

❝ i have an idea. ❞

❝ what is this place? ❞

❝ read any good spellbooks lately? ❞

❝ you can’t keep blaming yourself for that. that happened so long ago. ❞

❝ take good care of ____. you’ll never know how precious she is until you lose her.❞

❝ you’re a ____ now, buddy. one of us. ❞

❝ you wanna smash some pumpkins? ❞

❝ i don’t feel so good. ❞

❝ why was i cursed with such idiot sisters? ❞

❝ i remember it like it was yesterday… ❞

❝ my parents are gonna kill me. ❞

❝ i wish you could stay. ❞

❝ what harm could it do? ❞

❝ do you wanna hit me? would that cheer you up? ❞

❝ we are doomed. i feel the icy breath of death upon my neck. ❞

❝ take me to the window. i wish to say good-bye. ❞

❝ good-bye, cruel world. ❞

❝ nothing good can come from this book. you got it? ❞

❝ something’s not right. ❞

❝ don’t listen to her! ❞

❝ we need a miracle. ❞

❝ it doesn’t matter how young or old you are! you sold your soul! you’re the ugliest thing that’s ever lived, and you know it! ❞

❝ she bit me! ❞

❝ prepare to die! ❞

❝ there’s one thing that i know that you don’t! ❞

❝ oh, don’t say it. don’t even say it. ❞

❝ she really hurt my feelings. ❞

❝ i killed you once! i shall kill you again, you maggoty malfeasance! ❞

❝ you’ll be safe in here. ❞

❝ i’ve had enough of you. ❞

❝ i’m going to teach you a lesson you’ll never forget! ❞

❝ are you okay? ❞

❝ you saved my life. ❞

❝ i love you, jerkface. ❞

❝ come on. please don’t be sad for me. ❞

[a-mel0n]

it’s such a weird scene because it feels like most of what matters in that scene was cut, but also it was extended in the weirdest places?

like. the reason tommy breaks up with buck at the end of the episode… doesn’t have anything to do with like, any part of the miceli’s scene at the start? it honestly seems like the writers worked backwards from the breakup scene to the miceli’s scene. except… it still doesn’t make sense

tommy is, at most, kinda weirded out that he and buck both dated abby, but he isn’t like… digusted by it? not to the point if breaking up with buck. it’s very much a “man, that’s wild.” so you could completely cut the abby reveal and nothing of importance would change. good. it’s a bad reveal and doesn’t tell us anything about tommy or abby aside from “tommy did bad things while closeted,” which we already knew. it’s said like three separate times in season 7, after all.

(the josh speech would be different. that’s fine, it kinda… didn’t make sense either way? both buck and tommy came out in a “post-glee” world. i guess the intent there is that tommy knew he was gay in a pre-glee world? but the phrasing of the speech is just. eugh. if you want to keep it, keep tommy being engaged to a woman, that’s fine. it’s whatever. MOVING ON—)

then you’ve got the “i’m not your last, i’m your first” which COULD be connected to buck not telling that girl at the start of the episode “hey i’m on a date with my boyfriend of SIX MONTHS could you ask someone else?” ignoring the fact that buck should’ve 1000% caught that she was flirting with him, this still doesn’t make any sense in the context of the breakup.

tommy’s acting like he’s the first person buck has ever dated. he obviously isn’t, the plotline of the fucking episode revolves around buck’s first adult relationship continuing to haunt the narrative 7 seasons in.

so then the implication here is that tommy is just the first man that buck’s dated. which would be eugh, whatever. IF THAT WAS SHOWN TO US.

so far, buck has only shown attraction to tommy. sure, we know that he “occasionally checks out a hot guy’s ass” but it’s different with tommy. he’s not just attracted to tommy’s masculinity (“he’d got a cleft”), he’s attracted to tommy, he finds him interesting. he likes his confidence.

so if the breakup needs to be about buck starting to “explore his attraction to men,” something needs to kickstart that. and OH LOOK AT THAT—

someone in this episode is cast as a “Hot Waiter!” i’m sure this will be a plot relevant and important character to the ending of buck and tommy’s relationship in order for him to get that title—

THE HOT WAITER DOESN’T EVEN FUCKING MATTER.

he shows up for five seconds (at most) and leaves.

WHY??

THAT could have been the thing that ends buck and tommy’s relationship. buck’s continued reluctance to acknowledge his attraction to men. it would’ve been a weak reason, considering that’s buck’s plotline in 7x05, but it STILL would have been a reason that’s set up at the start of the episode, not something that comes out of left field during the breakup.

it feels like they needed to break up buck and tommy so that buck could be in the midst of the torment nexus for the next few episodes, so they stole the “tommy and abby are exes” theory from the fandom, and then didn’t even incorporate it into the series properly.

then once they realized they HAD to organically add the abby connection, they just plucked a cut version of the miceli’s first date from 7x05 and just cut some lines and added some other ones to lead into the abby reveal.

god confessions fucking sucks. and that’s not even touching on the absolute TRAGEDY that was the handling of eddie’s storyline in 8x06.

Got mad because of that damn restaurant scene again

[scroll-of-thought]

Curse Week - They’ll be expecting you

I’ve given it some thought and I think one of the most important things we can start curse week off with is what to expect in terms of resistance and how to not get messed up in the process.

If your targets look anything like my targets, or have a lot of enemies, there’s a good chance they’re under layers of protection. People like this (politicians and corporate heads especially) are probably more superstitious than us witches, and it’s a pretty open secret that many of them employ protection from a plethora of spiritual practitioners and services. This might be a fellow witch, a spiritual leader of their religion, occult specialist, and they probably pray to someone or something for protection from exactly the likes of us.

If you’re going to curse a high value target you have to expect them to be protected and possibly dangerous to curse. Here we’re going to discuss what kinds of defenses they might have and ways to get around them.

Return to sender spells - When you curse someone who has a return to sender spell on them, the curse does just that. It comes back and curses you instead.

Ways around - Knowing this is a popular method of protection, you can build the spell around the idea of it being returned. Include an envelope with the targets address (often totally legal and easy to obtain) in both the address and return address locations as an ingredient of the spell could be enough to confuse the logic of a return to sender spell. This would at very least keep it hovering around them until the other defenses get taken down.

Decoys - Decoys are a great way to trick a curse into attacking the wrong target. It’s a fake target, often a vessel filled with a taglock and something to either trap the curse inside, or  even harm the caster.

Ways around - Specify the target in time. When crafting the spell, your taglock needs to be chronologically more recent than the decoy was made, and the spell needs to specifically target that. So, say the decoy was made with old hair from a year ago. That version of the target is a constant, but the target in this moment isn’t that person anymore. Use a picture taken this week, find their twitter or whatever. Specify with laser accuracy exactly who and what the curse is meant to target.

Negative energy collection - They take your curse and use it to fuel a different spell. Often times that other spell will be to power their own defenses, or achieve the goal your trying to stop, and don’t put it past them use these like charged return to senders.

Ways around - My first thoughts are to be very specific with the conditions of your curse, so the energy can only be used in the way you specify. But then I got a random thought. Has anyone tried making a malware/virus spell to get past one of these? The concept is that you make the spell with a condition expecting it to possibly get absorbed by one of these energy collection spells or objects, where once inside you can redirect the energy to your goal of cursing the target. Just some food for thought, and maybe something to be developed more later.

Barriers and wards - Literally just walls you have to get through or around. The challenge is in the simplicity.

Ways around - You could try breaking them, but it’s likely they’ll have thought of that. You could make a spell specifically to sneak in though any crack they can, or even hitch a ride on any mundane thing crossing the barrier (insects, mice, other critters), or wait for them to be in a place where you think they’ll be away from their barriers. Mid day most people are in transit, and you can ward your car, but warding spaces between parking and the front door is a lot less common. Construct your spell like a pathogen and the second they let their guard down they’ll be in it’s midst.

Deities, spirits, etc - A lot of us work with these, and a lot of them do too.

Ways around - You’ve got a couple ways. If you’ve got your own god, familiar, or spirit, ask for their help. I’m sure many of your ancestors would want you to succeed and may have fought for causes like this in their time, so ask their help if you work with them. Additionally, you could try appealing to their gods. It’s not unreasonable to imagine some of their deities are not happy with their actions, and won’t grant or will revoke protection if asked respectfully. Many spirits aren’t senseless in who they protect and you might be able to reach a deal or agreement. Be warned, you never know who the target is dealing with, so if you always hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

I was also thinking a potential way around a few of these would be a Reverse Scapegoat, but considering how many people are probably cursing these assholes daily right now, I don’t think it would be smart to accidentally attract any of that.

There are definitely more defensive methods, but I’m finishing writing this at 4am and I’m not going to have time to add more by tomorrow. Start by thinking of your own protections and how you’d get through them. Add some thoughts and ideas in the comments and reblogs, browse the comments and reblogs. I don’t expect these posts to blow up or anything, but someone always has something interesting or clever to add, so take a second and look or add your own for others. If people are serious about cursing a high value target than they need to prepare and we need to pull knowledge and resources.

Additionally in all situations where you’re cursing a high value target, you should have a bunch of your own defenses set up and ready to protect yourself. Do you expect someone who knowingly voted to kill women and is excited to take away more rights isn’t going to retaliate against you? I’d assume when they hired that black book occultist to protect them they paid extra to ruin you in the process.

If anyone has any questions, topics I should cover, ideas or whatever, asks are always on so let me know. I’ll try to answer everything and make many more posts throughout the week whenever I have a minute here or there.