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orthodoxydaily · 2 years ago

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Saints&Reading: Monday, June 26, 2023

june 26_ June 13

VENERABLE ALEXANDRA, FOUNDRESS OF DIVEYEVO MONASTERY (1789)

Around 1760, a wealthy landlady (with landholdings in the Yaroslavl, Vladimir, and Ryazan Provinces) and a widow, Agatha Semenovna Melgunova, arrived with her 3-year-old daughter in Kyiv. She owned 700 peasants, a sizable capital, and large homesteads. It is known that Simeon and Paraskevi were her parent’s names. Father Vasily Dertev, a Diveyevo priest whose property Melgunova resided at, kept an account of her life’s events. Sisters from her community and Protopresbyter Vassily Sadovsky also preserved stories about her. These accounts of her life are fragmentary since Mother Alexandra meekly refrained from sharing stories about herself.

She took monastic vows at St. Florus Ascension Monastery named Alexandra. Her life in asceticism did not last too long at the St. Florus monastery. “It is reliably known,” as priests Dertev and Sarovsky, together with N.A.Motovilov, confirmed “that Mother Alexandra was once, either after a long prayer vigil or in a light dream, or even in a broad daylight, deemed worthy to have a vision of the Mother of God. She heard from Her the following: “It is Me, your Sovereign Lady, to whom you direct your prayers. I came to announce My will for you. I do not wish for you to end your days here. Just as I sent my servant Anthony away from My lot at the Holy Mountain of Athos to have My new lot at the Kyiv-Caves Lavra established here, thus I declare: go forth and travel to the land I am about to show you. Travel towards the north of Russia and visit all the holy monasteries dedicated in my honor. I will show the place where you will end your earthly God-pleasing life. In that new place of residence, I will glorify My name by founding a great monastery. Go forth then, My servant, and may the grace of God, My strength, My grace, and My mercy and riches always be with you.”

Even if she marveled in spirit, Mother Alexandra took some time to accept in faith what she had just heard and saw. Keeping the Mother of God’s message deep in her heart, she told her father's confessor about the vision. Later, she confided in other great and God-inspired fathers of the Kyiv Caves Lavra and older nuns, who strived in spirit together with her in Kyiv. Mother Alexandra sought their advice and reasoning about the kind of vision she had the honor to see and whether she had dreamed or imagined it or fallen into temptation. However, the elders and nun elders, taking time to pray and reflect, unanimously decided that the vision of the Queen of Heaven was genuine. Mother Alexandra was considered a blessed and ever-blessed one since she was bestowed and chosen as the founder of the fourth abode of the Mother of God in the whole creation.

Records about the timeline and places of Mother Alexandra’s wanderings were lost over time and are not mentioned anywhere in the written accounts. Some old-timers used to say that she traveled to Sarov monastery from Murom in 1760. Twelve versts before the sanctuary, mother Alexandra stopped to get some rest by the village of Diveyevo. She stopped by a lawn near the west wall of a small wooden church and sat down on a pile of wooden logs. As she fell asleep, she was deemed worthy of seeing the Mother of God in a light dream, Who told her: “Here is the place I commanded you to seek in the north of Russia,” the Most Holy Theotokos told Mother Alexandra. “Here is the lot set aside for you by the Divine Providence. Reside here and do God-pleasing work till the end of your days, and I will always be with you and visit you. I will found a monastery unequal to anything before or afterward in the world: it is my fourth domain in the whole creation. As many as there are stars in heaven or sands in the sea, shall I increase the number of those who serve the Lord Our God and Me, the Ever-Virgin Mother of Light, and who glorify My Son Jesus Christ. May the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God and the abundance of all earthly and heavenly treasures, obtained without a sweat, never grow scarce at this beloved place of Mine!”

Greatly rejoicing, Mother Alexandra went on to the Sarov monastery. Since the monastery was well known at the time for the holiness of its tremendous and wondrous ascetics, they could assist her with their advice and counsel. Having met them, Agatha Semenovna opened her heart to them and sought their guidance and instruction on acting given such extraordinary circumstances. The elders of Sarov confirmed what she heard and understood from the monks in the Kyiv Caves, asking her to wholly surrender to the will of God and abide by the Queen of Heaven’s instructions. Soon afterward, her nine or ten-year-old daughter died. In the death of her only daughter, mother Alexandra saw another sign of fulfillment of God’s will for her and confirmation of what she heard from the Queen of Heaven.

Agatha Semenovna, duly blessed by the elders of Sarov, decided to resign her property. She relieved some of her peasants from serfdom for a small fee and sold others, who declined to be freed, to decent landowners for a reasonable price. It freed her from any earthly cares. She contributed some of her funds to the monasteries and churches in memory of her parents, daughter, and family members. She reached out and assisted wherever such financial help was sorely needed. Her contemporaries named twelve churches that Agatha Semenovna either built or restored. Among them was Sarov, where a significant contribution allowed the monastery to finish the construction of its Dormition Cathedral.

When she returned to Diveyevo, Agatha Semenovna built a cell for herself on the property owned by the priest Vasily Dertev, where she stayed for the next twenty years, completely abandoning her noble origins and tender upbringing. In her humility, she toiled away in the most labor-intensive and messy jobs: mucking out Father Vasily’s barn, tending his livestock, and washing linen. Besides, Mother Alexandra would sneak into the peasant field plots to help sheave for the most vulnerable. At harvest time, she would quietly assist the peasant women, who spent long days in the fields, with housework. She would stoke the fire in their ovens, knead their dough, cook dinners, or wash the peasant kids while changing them into clean clothing just before their worn-out mothers returned from the fields. She used to do it discreetly when nobody saw it. Regardless of her attempts to do it secretly, the local peasants gradually grew to acknowledge their benefactress. Children would point at Mother Alexandra while she would look on in amazement if they came with gratitude, shunning their praise or credits.

Mother Alexandra’s cell woman, Eudoxia Martynovna, describes her appearance: “Agatha Semenovna wore well-worn, plain and simple clothing without changing it, from winter to summer; her head was adorned by a tightly woven black rounded small hat, trimmed with rabbit fur for she suffered from headaches. Her kerchiefs were made of cotton. She used to put on bast shoes if out in the fields and only changed to wear leather booties upon reaching advanced age. Matushka Agatha Semenovna wore sackcloth. She was of middle height and jovial appearance, with a rounded white face, grey eyes, a button nose, and a delicate mouth. Her hair was light auburn in her youth.”

At the beginning of the 1770s, Mother Alexandra began the construction of a stone church in honor of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God at the location the Queen of Heaven had appeared to her in Diveyevo and as a replacement for the old wooden church. When the Kazan church was consecrated, the landowner Zhdanova donated a small parcel of land to the north of the church. This is where matushka the head superior, built the first three cells for herself, four of her novices, and pilgrims traveling to the Sarov monastery. The interior of the cells matched the laborious and plaintive lifestyle of this great lady chosen by the Queen of Heaven. There were two larger and two tiny rooms in her house. One of the tiny rooms had a chimney stove and a stove ledge made of bricks. It had just enough standing space for the visiting Abbot Pachomius and Hierodeacon Seraphim to receive her deathbed wish to care for her Diveyevo sisters. There was also an entrance to a dark, windowless room, a tiny chapel, with just enough space for matushka to stand before the great crucifix lit by a hanging oil lamp. Her prayerful contemplation before the crucifix sealed the lives of the forthcoming generations of nuns with the spirit of prayer. Praying internally before a crucifix and yearning for the Crucified Christ is one of the deepest kinds of prayer. These were the kind of prayerful deeds from which blessed Diveyevo was born.

For twelve years, on feast days and on Sundays, Agatha Semenovna would not go home after the Divine Liturgy without first stopping at a village square, teaching peasants about their duties as Christians and giving due reverence to the church festal days and Sundays. Long after her death, the local Diveyevo parishioners would remember these spiritual conversations with gratitude. Not only local peasants flocked to her, but also the high-ranking locals, merchants, and even clergy would come to receive her counsel, a blessing, a piece of advice, or even just a greeting. The locals considered her a righteous judge in family affairs, arguments, and disputes and implicitly obeyed her decisions. She privately shared alms, serving everyone with anything she could or could help them. Her various deeds soothed her heart and were so pleasing to God that she was bestowed with tears.

This is how Mother Alexandra spent her days before they expired, living the life of a God-pleaser, full of selfless labor, hardships, and prayer. She closely abided by the harsh typikon of Sarov, getting counsel from Abbot Pachomius in every affair. She and the sisters sewed overcoats, knitted stockings, and cared for every single need in handiwork for the brothers in Sarov. Father Pachomius, in his turn, would dispatch a once-a-day food delivery to the sisters from the Sarov refectory. The community of Mother Alexandra was Sarov’s through and through. The lives of Mother Alexandra and her sisters fully embodied Sarov's ideas of living in poverty and laboring to cover their needs for sustenance.

In June of 1788, upon receiving advanced knowledge of her own death, Mother Alexandra took her vows into the Great Schema. She asked the ascetic fathers, for the love of Christ, not to forsake or leave her inexperienced novices without their care and to provide for her community, which the Queen of Heaven had pledged to her. Upon hearing this, Father Pachomius answered: “Matushka! I do not renege on my commitment to care for your novices and serve you best as I can in your pledge to the Queen of Heaven. I will pray for you till my death and our monastery will pray for you, as we will never forget the blessings you bestowed upon us. However, I do not pledge my word, for I am old and weak, and I have no right to promise what I will likely not live to see fulfilled. How about Hyerodeacon Seraphim, whose saintly life is known to you? He is young and will live to see it happen. Do entrust this matter of great concern into his hands.” Matushka Agatha Semenovna asked Father Seraphim not to abandon her community and told him the Queen of Heaven Herself would be pleased to counsel him.

The blessed elder Agatha Semenovna died on June 13, the feast of the holy martyr Aquilina. At the hour of her death, matushka asked her cell woman: “When I am nearing my end, you, sweet Eudoxia, take the Kazan icon of the Mother of God and place it on my chest so that the Queen of Heaven is by me as I expire, and light a candle before the icon.”

“She was a saint! I still kiss her feet myself!” Venerable Seraphim used to say about the Diveyevo’s foundress. He had a revelation that Venerable Alexandra’s relics would rest in Diveyevo.

Source: Diveyevo Monastery

ROMANS 9:18-33

18 Therefore, He has mercy on whom He wills, and whom He wills He hardens. 19 You will then tell me, "Why does He still find fault? For who has resisted His will?" 20 But indeed, O man, who will you reply against God? Will the thing form tell him who created it, "Why have you made me like this?" 21 Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor? 22 What if God, wanting to show His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, 23 and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had prepared beforehand for glory, 24 even us whom He called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? 25 As He also says in Hosea: "I will call them My people, who were not My people, And her beloved, who was not beloved." 26 And it shall come to pass in the place where it was said to them, 'You are not My people,' There they shall be called sons of the living God." 27 Isaiah also cries out concerning Israel:"Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, The remnant will be saved. 28 For He will finish the work and cut it short in righteousness Because the LORD will make a short work upon the earth." 29 And as Isaiah said before: "Unless the LORD of Sabaoth had left us a seed, We would have become like Sodom, And we would have been made like Gomorrah." 30 What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness of faith; 31 but Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not achieved the law of righteousness. 32 Why? Because they did not seek it by faith but, as it were, by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone. 33 As it is written: "Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, And whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame."

MATTHEW 11:2-15

2 And when John had heard in prison about the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples 3 and said to Him, "Are You the Coming One, or do we look for another?" 4 Jesus answered and said to them, "Go and tell John the things which you hear and see: 5 The blind see and the lame walk; the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear; the dead are raised up and the poor have the gospel preached to them. 6 And blessed is he who is not offended because of Me. 7 As they departed, Jesus began to ask the multitudes about John: "What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? 8 But what did you go out to see? A man clothed in soft garments? Indeed, those who wear soft clothing are in kings' houses. 9 But what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I say to you, and more than a prophet. 10 For this is he of whom it is written: 'Behold, I send My messenger before Your face, Who will prepare Your way before You.' 11 Assuredly, I say to you, among those born of women, there has not risen one greater than John the Baptist; but he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. 12 And from the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force. 13 For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John. 14 And if you are willing to receive it, Elijah is to come. 15 He who has ears to hear, let him hear!

#orthodoxy #orthodoxchristianity #easternorthodoxchurch #originofchristianity spirituality holyscriptures bible gospel wisdom

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aristidetwain · 5 years ago

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Who on Earth is Rasputin?

If you answered “the Fourth Doctor using a Chameleon Arch”, you have seen the 1971 biopic Nicholas and Alexandra and you have the sort of spirit we’re looking for. We love you, Tom Baker, we love you.

Nevertheless, while it is clearly canonical that every other part played by a given Dr Who actor represents that actor’s Doctor under a Chameleon Arch, (/s), let’s dig a little deeper, because it’s fun and we have cause to do so, into the life and history of Grigori Rasputin in the Doctor Who Universe.

(Lengthy development under the cut.)

The PETER HARNESS Story

For those who haven’t been keeping up with the flood of great content springing from the Doctor Who: Lockdown event like slightly wobbly ambrosia from the Cornucopia, Peter Harness has released a synopsis for one of the most improbable missed opportunities of the Welsh Series: a Capaldi one-parter entitled How The Monk Got His Habit.

This story would have seen the return of the Time Meddler himself, or, as you may know him, the Monk—a positively delightful antagonist from the 1960′s who got overshadowed by the more enduring and more malevolent Master, and whose gimmick was that he was an amoral hedonist who changed history for fun and profit with no care for the consequences. In his televised appearances in the William Hartnell era, the Time Meddler was played by Peter Butterworth; first encountered posing as a monk in an 11th-century monastery, he was subsequently remembered as “the Monk”, wearing that costume, and known thereafter as “the Monk” or “the Meddling Monk” in fandom and in subsequent appearances.

Harness decided to feature an early incarnation of the character colliding out-of-sync with the Twelfth Doctor, giving nothing less than the origin story of the Meddling Monk, both the “meddling” and “monk” parts, and just from the original pitch email he dug up, it is a thing of beauty.

(Source)

Further enjoyment is to be gleaned from the fully-written-out opening scene of a hypothetical novelisation of the unmade story, which can be found here and establishes the incarnation of the Time Meddler at the start of that story (currently going by “Roger”) as being his fifth.

This is mildly interesting in that in true Doctor Who fashion, it manages to contradict one of the very few already-existing stories that had tried to make sense of the Monk’s timeline. I refer of course to John Peel’s The Mutation of Time, which took time off to establish that the already-meddling, already-monasterial Peter Butterworth incarnation seen in The Time Meddler and The Daleks’ Master Plan was the Monk’s first incarnation. But never mind that.

Note that the historical Rasputin died at the tail end of 1916. I could construct elaborate theories of how and why Rasputin turning insane in 1917 could affect the Russian Revolution and the rest of human history, but I’ll spare you and myself the additional headache, and assume this was simply a typo.

The BOOK OF THE WAR Story

Where it gets complicated, as is often the case, is when you factor in the Time War. See, The Book of the War, in one of its most entertaining side-stories, establishes that Grigori Rasputin actually did not die in December 1916. Instead, Faction Paradox, those lackadaisical jackanapes, thought it would be funny to spirit him away to their hideout a few days before his death, leaving a barely-sentient clone to act out Rasputin’s real death.

Unaware of this, the Celestis (a faction of Time Lords who turned themselves into incorporeal demons to escape the Time War) had decided to recruit Rasputin in their usual faustian way, offering him a form of immortality in exchange of his accepting to be Marked by them, becoming a slave to their will. Because the Rasputin clone’s basic programming included “Do whatever freaky time travelling sorcerers are telling you to do”, the thing blithely accepted the Celestis Mark and was on its way.

And then, unaware of what the Celestis had done, but having caught wind of the Faction Paradox cultists’ plan to bring Rasputin to their homebase, the actual Gallifrey-based Time Lords decided to duplicate Rasputin themselves, leaving a “trapped” Grigori for the Faction to find, one who was secretly loyal to them, the Great Houses. And so they showed up one day before Rasputin’s death to perform the switcheroo, being under the impression that if the Faction were to whisk Rasputin away, they would do so mere instants before he was supposed to die.

(Maybe the Time Lords thought that because that’s how they would do it. For more information, see S09E12, Hell Bent.)

Hence, come the fateful day, the Time Lords’ doctored duplicate of the Faction’s doctored duplicate of Rasputin, now secretly immortal thanks to, and under the control of the Celestis, (are you still following this?)… not only does it take forever to die because duh, it’s a badly-made golem, not a human being… but once it does find it within itself to die, it is instantly resurrected by the Celestis, who activate their Mark, ordering it to do their shadowy bidding.

At this point, the misbegotten triple-zombie experiences an existential crisis too big for its artificial brain to handle, as what passes for its soul has now been conditioned to faithfully serve the interest of three different factions who are at war with each other. Not-Rasputin goes instantly mad with confusion and goes drown itself in the nearest river.

Meanwhile, in the members-only Faction Paradox treehouse, the original Rasputin whom the cultists replaced with the first golem is properly inducted into the Faction, where he is widely observed to turn into just as crazy a Grandfather Paradox zealot as he was a devout Orthodox and mystic. He proceeds to use his newfound authority as Father Dyavol of Faction Paradox to advise his fellow Faction member Princess Anastasia to secede from the Eleven-Day Empire and bugger off to Moscow.

After Anastasia and Dyavol’s revolution crashes and burns, his corpse is found in the river again, appearing to once more have been mutilated in more ways than it would take to kill a normal human being. The Book’s ambiguous in-universe authors are themselves unsure of quite what happened.

The OTHER STUFF

Those two are the “big ones”, but I would be remiss if I did not mention other Doctor Who takes on the historical Grigori Rasputin.

Big Finish’s Companion Chronicle The Wanderer has the First Doctor, Susan, Ian and Barbara coming across the younger, wandering-pilgrim Rasputin in 1903. He briefly becomes a genuine prophet due to having come into contact with an alien artefact which grants him knowledge of future human history, but this is undone at the end of the story and so doesn’t amount to very much.

I am told that this is because the story was originally written with Nostradamus in mind, which makes a lot of sense. What is of interest to us is that Rasputin is here depicted as a basically good, sane man, once you set the grandiose prophetic visions aside.

Dave McIntee’s The Wages of Sin, on the other hand, is also constructed around Rasputin’s death in December 1916, but it posits that Rasputin was a non-supernatural and non-crazy monk, totally undeserving of his ghoulish and supernatural post-mortem reputation. Rather problematically, it gives us a direct insight into Rasputin’s thought processes as he dies, with no thought of being a triple-zombie with conflicting allegiances to be gleaned:

The THEORY

What this tells us is that Rasputin’s death is not strictly a bootstrap paradox — the original historical death that the Faction fetishized to the point of wanting to get their own ritualistic mitts on Rasputin, the one the Monk accidentally averts, a few months before it’s supposed to happen, in a way that threatens to change all of human history, is not the farcical catastrophe described in The Book of the War. There was an original, untampered-with timeline that got thrown out of whack by too many different Time Lords trying to meddle with it.

You could, I suppose, posit that there are three different timelines: the Monk and the various Wartime factions both split off in different directions from the baseline Wages of Sin timeline where the human Rasputin died in the river. But that is no fun at all, is it? And furthermore, it does not account for the fact that the definitely human Rasputin of The Wanderer and The Wages of Sin is a good man unfairly maligned, whereas the Rasputin who becomes Father Dyavol is a rebellious lunatic. So let’s assume instead that the Book of the War story’s time meddling is building onto what happened (or, you know, would have happened) in How The Monk Got His Habit.

If we assume that the “the Monk drives the real Rasputin insane” incident happened a few months prior to December 1916, and it is on the day when he was driven mad that the real Rasputin is taken out of time by the Twelfth Doctor and replaced by the regenerated Monk, then this finally makes sense of the difference in characterization between pre- and post-1916 Rasputin. The sane, misunderstood Rasputin was the real human being, whereas the ranting madman Rasputin is the persona put on by the repentant Monk. Remember, per Harness’s outline, the Monk has a checklist of what Rasputin is supposed to do historically speaking, but I don’t see him having any real way of knowing how Rasputin is supposed to act. Most of his involvement with the man took place on the day that he drove him irreparably kookoo, after all.

So we end up with the following story:

The original Grigori Rasputin, who meets the First Doctor in 1903, is a mostly-sane and wholly-non-evil man. He has a traumatic experience with visions of future history, which the Doctor is forced to telepathically lock away, Donna-style. (The Wanderer) In the original timeline witnessed by the Third Doctor, Rasputin lives out his days largely as he had begun. He is assassinated in largely-mundane circumstances; Jo’s attempt to avert this by switching out the poisoned cakes for normal ones gives rise to a legend that Rasputin was unusually hard to kill, and causes the event to go down in history. (The Wages of Sin) The Earth band Boney M write a song about Rasputin which inspires the Fifth Monk to go back in time and make Rasputin listen to it. This drives him irreparably bananas, likely because of his having already had one barely-contained traumatic experience with future knowledge given to him by aliens, back in 1903.This screws with time to the extent that when he realizes he is out of his depth and calls for help, the Fifth Monk actually reaches the post-War Twelfth Doctor. After a lot of shenanigans, the Doctor leaves the Monk in 1916 with instructions to regenerate into a Sixth Monk physically identical to Rasputin, and then act out the part Rasputin was supposed to play in history to a T. (How The Monk Got His Habit) The Sixth Monk’s Rasputin cosplay leaves a lot to be desired, since he mostly bases his performance on the damn Boney M song and on the bananas, post-listening-to-the-song Rasputin. Nevertheless, it’s enough to fool Faction Paradox into abducting him a few days before he was supposed to fake his death and go back to business as usual. The improbable series of coincidences which follows, with the triply-brainwashed duplicate, might represent Time trying to adjust so that the myth of Rasputin’s outlandish death, which started this entire series of events, still goes down in History somehow. Once in the Eleven-Day Empire, the Sixth Monk realizes pretty quickly that his being there at all, in the middle of the Time War, is a perfectly irregular breach of all the Protocols of Linearity. Hoping to avoid detection, he continues hamming it up as Mad Prophet Rasputin until he figures out a plan. To his surprise, he manages to fool Anastasia, and so he manipulates her into giving him a free ticket out of the Faction, namely the whole Thirteen-Day Republic thing. (The Book of the War) But wait. What happened to the real Rasputin who went crazy? I reckon the Twelfth Doctor took him to some place of caring or other. What’s more, I reckon he voiced his intention to do so while the Fifth Monk was still with him. (How The Monk Got His Habit) And so the final grisly piece of the puzzle comes into place. Desperate to escape back to his own place in Gallifreyan history, where it’s safe and black-and-white, when he sees the Valentine’s Day Battle approaching, the Sixth Monk commits his first truly evil act by hopping back into his timeship unseen, bringing the real Rasputin back to the Thirteen-Day Republic, and murdering him in a way which he hopes will look like the original timeline reasserting itself. To further avoid detection in case he should be intercepted on the way out, the Sixth Monk regenerates himself into a clean-shaven Seventh Monk right there and then, probably hiding in a closet. (The Book of the War) As far as any of the Wartime powers know, “Father Dyavol” is dead, and so the now-inconspicuous Seventh Monk is free to slink away back to his TARDIS. Knowing the Doctor is found on Earth in almost all of their incarnations, the Monk hovers close to Earth’s timeline, hoping to find the “right” Doctor again and rejoin Linearity by latching onto him. When they finally bump into each other in 1066 Northumbria, there’s still a 50-year difference between them, but the Monk thinks “eh, close enough” and reenters normal time for good, now with much-loosened moral standards. After all, act or no act, he spent quite a lot of time working with Faction Paradox — besides which he has seen that everything the Time Lords of his day stand for is torn down eventually by the War, so why bother with any of those Laws of Time he know will eventually be suspended? (The Time Meddler, The Daleks’ Master Plan)

…oh!

And if you want the real Rasputin’s story to have a happy ending, maybe the Faction, once they rifle through the possessions found on the corpse of Father Dyavol, find a fobwatch and open it… reviving the Fourth Doctor, who offers the befuddled coroner-Cousin a jelly baby, shrugs that this particular attempt to throw off the Black Guardian clearly didn’t work, and returns to his own era.

The jelly baby in question was then placed, with religious deference, on a velvet cushion inside the Catalogue.

#Canon-Welding #Doctor Who #Doctor Who Fandom Shenanigans #Faction Paradox

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kendrixtermina · 5 years ago

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The Abyss NPC are such a trove of gold for additional worldbuilding tbh

Everything about the Pagan Lady who I assume is Dagdan breaks my heart

That poor NPC whose family was somehow massacred by nobles “People with crests do whatever they like no one stops them least of all the church”

Mr. Backup died during the timeskip :( But Abysskeeper ends up marrying his older sister in VW and SS

Rodrigue paid for reestablishing the monastery town, even giving money to the ppl in abyss & generally seems to. I guess you see where Dimitri gets that charitable mindset from. Yuri also notes that he’s remarkably uncorruptible.

Abysskeeper is originally from Derdriu. It#s fun how a lot of his CF and AM dialogue is exactly the same but in different context XD - apart from of course the rodrigue line, and the time Hubert sends a soldier to do some mission there

When you go save Fhirdiad Constance is pretty glad to save the ppl from the school of sorcery and is glad to find them mostly unharmed

Yuri goes into some detail of events right preceding Byleth’s return in AM where the villages near the fronts weren’t sure wether to think of the guy massacring random imperial soldiers as a serial killer or a folk hero

Balthus apparently had a friendly brawl with Dimitri at some point (I guess continuing the tedency of the recruitees in aM to mention having personally interacted with him, at the very least Leonie and Caspar also get lines like that)

Apparently Yuri’s mom got sick sometime during the timeskip (at least in the AM timeline) so he couldn’t evacuate her from Faerghus.

Constance like Ferdinand, Lorenz & Lysithea is one of those ppl who remember Edelgard in a semi-positive light after her defeat. Kudos to you!

Balthus suspects where Claude ran off to. Well, he was kinda sent there to snoop on him to begin with XD

He never had any hope for the Parlay

Apparently Yuri does have a habit of praying, he’s not like a strooong believer and can’t recite the scriptures much but it’s a habit he picked up from his mom, I guess he would be one of those ‘culturally religious’ people

I just love how Yuri had additional observations on nearly everything like... nothing gets past him.

Meanwhile in the CF timeline, Balthus apparently thinks Edelgard is hot (which earns him a death glare from Byleth) and thinks the whole Black Eagle strike force should go have a beer to celebrate Byleth’s return since they’re all old enough now and Byleth’s no longer supposed to babysit them

I love how Hubert just flat out takes over Abyss and integrates poor overworked Yuri into his spy networkXD . Hence why Hapi feels he deserves a definite article. Well, Hubert appreciates how good he is. The mission was to try & convince the Alliance lords to fold so like El & co were actively attempting diplomacy until the end

On CF you see a very omnious NPC who suddenly dissapears if talked to (probably Agarthan) who complains about “that prince being no good” - Did they offer Dimitri their support when they noticed they were definitely losing control of Edelgard? If so he seems to have rebuffed em. It’s a very cryptic line and I can’t rly make heads or tails of it, but, if he wouldn’t sell Rhea out to Edelgard he probably wouldn’t do it for someone even worse no matter what they promised him.

Apparently in the VW timeline Hapi is a big fan of Judith

Balthus is proud that little Hilda has become an A list schemer

Hearing Claude’s plan makes constance a bit self-conscious about her own being more past-focussed, she’s been out-bolded

Hapi doesn’t know much about Almyra but reflects on how there are many marginalized minority groups in Fodlan including ppl from Isolated communities like her own

Yuri finds the plan a bit lofty & idealistic for his tastes, and also reckless, but he realizes that he’s got no leg to stand on when it comes to being more noble than he lets on, and that maybe a lil bit of recklessness are what these times need

Oh, once the secret’s out Hapi concludes that there probably would have been war one way or another with the slitherers having everything infiltrated, edelgard or no edelgard

Balthus mentions that Holst wasn’t at Shambhalla because he was “working out things with the Almyrans” and suggest that they warn him about the slitherers lest they sabotage the diplomacy

Apparently Hapi meditates! This comes up cause she trying not to freak out about Nemesis

“People sait it was the church who kept order but actually Yuri’s the one keeping us from complete chaos”

Apparently it was Hapi who kept the surface bandit population from flattening Abyss

Apparently in VW it’s Judith who gave supplies to Abyss (In Rodrigue’s place)

Seems like despite Hapi’s worries they kinda fare best on CF though (”Things have been pretty ok” vs “We lost some ppl”)

Abyss Resident: “I used to be an important person in the church but Im exiled for embezzling. It wasn’t out of greed tho my hometown was pillaged and the church wasn’t putting in enough to rebuild” Tell me again that Rhea cares about the little guy

One of the random rogues from Abyss is from the kingdom, claims to be a distant descendant of Fraldarius the Elite and finds “poetic justice” in taking down the empire under Claude.

Another reaaaaly juicy tidbit is that rogue with another message from Hubert, telling Byleth to bring Rhea with them when they go to Shambhalla. Ensuing that Rhea and Thales would destroy each other. And reaaaly adds to my conviction that Edelgard and Hubert basically did everyone a huge solid and no one noticed. Well, actually in Verdant wind they Do notice eventually; Its the left hand fighting the right cause everyone has triust issues galore

I didn’t think my love of Hubert could increase further

I always wondered, hm, were they expecting Rhea to self-destruct? Did Claude deliberately plan for it? But I never had enough evidence. especially for team Empire. But I mean Edelgard started this whole war cause Rhea is a danger so, while I get keeping her alive cause the slitherers want her for experiments, why not slit her throat as soon as the imperial palace is surrounded? Why have Hubert return her alive, to win the other faction’s trust? Not their style.

Though the random rogue also says that “Rhea was kept alive as insurance” against the slitherers.

So it WAS part of the plan. I always did have that feeling, but, I never knew how to articulate it logically and not just intuitively.

Of course if Byleth went and told Claude about this, Claude’s decision is also clear because he’s not dumb enough to think the empire would care for Rhea’s wellbeing out of the goodness of their heart

Though ultimately she insists on coming along for her own reasons anyways wether Claude is there or not, for plain ol’ revenge.

Also while reading through the scrpits I realize that I never clicked the “Do you hope [Rhea] is dead?” option when Claude explains his plan. That actually nets you support points and he’s like... “Daangerous question friend”. Really Claude is not “the chill/nice one” he’s so much more interesting than that and I love him

Also I love how the NPCs get different outfits depending on the route! I wish there had been more route-specific aesthetic touches

#fe3h #fire emblem: three houses #fire emblem three houses #cindered shadows #ashen wolves

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questionsonislam · 5 years ago

Note

God Almighty declares in the surah At-Tahrím (Holding (Something) to be Forbidden) in the eighth verse: O ye who believe! Turn to Allah with sincere repentance: in the hope that your Lord will remove from you your evil deeds and admit you to Gardens beneath which Rivers flow. What is the meaning of sincere repentance in the verse?

Nasuh is the exaggeration mode of the word nush. It means to give advice a lot. The repentance is described as something giving advice a lot. That is to say, it recommends its holder to leave his sin, removes him from the evil deeds, and tells him to turn to Allah with sincere repentance. Thus, sincere repentance is: Leaving the sin; Remorse over the sins committed; Resolving never to return to sins; If it is related to the rights of another person, then, returning the rights or property one took.

Our prophet defines the sincere repentance as: feeling remorse, seeking an absolute refuge in Allah and not returning to it again just as there is no return for the milk into the udder. (Ahmad b. Hanbal, Musnad, 1/446)

Ghazali described repentance as follows: Those asking Allah His forgiveness with sincere repentance are the ones showing persistence in their vows until they are dead. They make up their mistakes in the past and never think of repeating the same sin, except for lapses and slips. It is the resolution in repentance. They are the people whose sins are turned to virtues by Allah, and who compete for good deeds.

2.The conditions for the repentance being accepted:

That Allah acclaims those turning to Him in repentance (the Quran, Repentance (At-Tawbah) 9/112) and says He likes the people knocking the gates to repentance is a proof that repentances are to be accepted by Him. (the Quran, the Heifer (Al-Baqarah 2/222)

The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) tells how Allah becomes joyful when His servants seeks his forgiveness with the following analogy,: 'When a servant of Allah returns to Him and repents, Allah becomes happier than a traveler who loses his mount which has all his belongings and provisions on and then resorts to the shade of tree after losing all hope only to wake up and find his mount staring in his face, and then out of joy and happiness erroneously says: 'OAllah! You are my servant and I am your Lord.' (Bukhari, Muslim) (Bukhari, Daawat 4; Muslim, Tawbah 3). As it is emphasized above, Allah’s joy is more than that of a man losing his camel and then finding it again when His servants turn to Him.

There are some requirements for repentance to be accepted by Allah. However, those requirements show differences depending on the type of wrongdoing committed. It is very important to know against whom it is committed at the time of seeking forgiveness of Allah. Therefore, we can divide it into two:

A. The sins involving God’s due: there are three stipulations in order to repent of the sins relating to His rights.

1) Remorse over having committed the sin; there occurs a sense of uneasiness and penitence within the conscience of man when it is come to a decision that the sin committed is a misdeed and harms the relations between Allah and His servant.

The servant transgressing will stand before the gate of repentance in a state jerking out of the perturbation and lurching with penitence and having a prudent heart and soul. The perturbation mentioned is an element encouraging man to repent.

Penitence is the first condition of repentance. As a matter of fact, our prophet said that repentance is feeling remorse in order to emphasize it. (Ibn Majah, Zuhd 30; Ahmad b. Hanbal, Musnad, 1/376, 423). To feel remorse is repentance itself. Repentance is impossible without having deep regretful feelings.

2) Abandoning the sin that is repented: Penitence cannot only be confined to the heart and neither is it a creep, recoil nor is a spiritual repentance in the form of weeping. That is to say, it is not only composed of some sorts of inner feelings. Rather, it is a process during which some actions are constructed on internal sensations. For instance, the person seeking repentance must give up the wrongdoing, live up to Allah’s orders as far as he can, and should not continue the sin that is repented. Should he happen to keep committing the sin even though he has repented, he will fall into a contradiction with himself. Such a manner is not going to comply with the repentance and the vow not to repeat that sin. On the other hand, abandoning the sin immediately is going to be an indication of his repentance and decisiveness not to go back to the same sin again.

3) Resolve not to repeat the sin that is repented: The person who has turned to Allah with repentance because of his past sins should be strong-willed not to commit the same sin again so that he will repent truly. Repentance and decisiveness for not repeating the same sin will be known with their true meaning merely by Allah as they are related to the heart. Therefore, it will not be known by people about who truthfully has repented. The person should promise Allah not to commit the same sin again so that it will have the true essence of penitence.

b- The sins that involve the rights of other men: there are four conditions for making tawbah for the sins involving other people’s rights. The fourth stipulation, apart from the three conditions stated above, is that it is compulsory that the rights be restored to the people and he has to ask for forgiveness from the person whose right is violated. If those rights are in the form of property, then he may encounter the following possibilities:

1. The grabbed possessions should be given back if they are still available and their true owner is known. 14. At this point it is not sufficient to conceal the sin and repent only.

2. If the stolen belongings are at the hands of the thief and yet their true possessor is not known, then those belongings should be given out as alms and he should not keep them any more.

3. If a man wronged the others in the past years and their true holders are not known, then he should give the equal amount of money to charity.

4. If the possessions the wrongdoer has are not fungible goods and if their value can be estimated and if he has enough money, he should give its equivalent to their owner. If he cannot pay for them, he should intend to give them back when he has enough money. We can expect of Allah’s forgiveness for the person that tries to restore the properties to their true owners as far as he can even if he finally fails.

5. A man who is not sure how much of his own material goods is mixed with what is forbidden picks a quantity of sum in accordance with his own assumption and gives alms intending getting rid of the rights of other people.

If the sinner seeks the pardon of his Lord and carries out those conditions, Allah will accept his repentance and will be ashamed to punish the repentant.

3. Time factor in penitence:

The sins are hurdles in the path going to Allah. The sinner is similar to a person who has got poisoned. Just as it is so perilous to waste time for a poisoned person, so too is it very risky for a man committing sins to delay his repentance.

A believer who has just sinned will be very irritated out of his sin as a result of his trust in God and will seek out ways to be removed from that sin. There is concurrence of opinion about the fact that it is fard to ask for Allah’s forgiveness just following the sin committed. In addition, those holding their penitence in delay get sins due to delaying it.

According to Ghazali, once the man realizes what he has done is a sin, he is to feel remorse and cleanse its effect with a good deed. Otherwise, the wrongdoings will dwell in his heart and their removal is going to be impossible.

Thus, in a hadith, it is said, “when the servant commits a sin, a black spot appears on his heart, and if he seeks forgiveness, that black spot is removed, and if he returns to sin, the black spot grows…..”(Ibn Majah, Zuhd 29)

The following hadith illuminates us about the last time for penitence: “Allah, the Lord of honor and glory, will accept the repentance of His servant till his death-rattle begins.” (Tirmidhi, Daawat 100; Ibn Majah Zuhd 30). When the death comes and the death-rattle begins, the penitence will not be accepted.

The reasons why tawbah is not accepted at the parting breath are that the man is in the state of hopelessness at that moment. However, the penitence should be sought at a situation when the servant is still hopeful of life. At the parting breath, the proposal is cancelled from servants. The deeds committed at that time cannot be regarded as good or bad. However, penitence is of the worldly deeds and should be done before the proposal is over. In the hereafter, everybody is going to be regretful and yet their states are not going to be evaluated as repentance. It is because the moment when the sinners feel remorse is a moment when the proposal is concluded. The last minute repentance is not accepted and it is like nothing and as a result, it means nothing. The person seeking repentance at the time of his parting breath is regarded like a man who has never repented throughout his lifetime.

As a conclusion, we can draw a timeline with regard to repentance: the time for penitence starts just after the moment a sin is committed, continues in the following days with no regard to any time limit and ends when the death signs appear. That is to say, the last time is when hope of life expires, the death marks become visible and the person lives his last moments.

4. The place factor in repentance:

Though some certain places for prayer and Hajj (Pilgrimage) are obligatory and virtuous, there is no any such a condition for penitence. Since tawbah (penitence) is multi-dimensional remorse, it does not start and end at a definite place.

Therefore, being in the mosque, dervish lodge or in a small Islamic monastery is not a must for asking for the pardon of Allah. On the other hand, it is not obligatory to come together with congregation in order to make tawbah in the form of chorus in groups.

A person who has committed a sin can make his repentance in any place. Any place for a person thinking about his past sins and coming into a decision to get rid of his sins is a place for repentance. That is to say, a worker can decide to start for making tawbah at his work, a farmer at his land, those being at home can make their repentance at their abodes.

After all, Hazrat Yunus (Peace be upon him) was in the stomach of the fish and in the darkness of the sea and said “"There is no god but Thou: glory to Thee: I was indeed wrong!" (the Quran: 21-The Prophets (Al-Anbiya, 21/ 87) and asked for Allah His forgiveness just because he did what was virtuous though he could have done the most virtuous. And Allah pardoned him.

And as it is known, eating the forbidden apple in the heaven, Hazrat Adam and Eve disobeyed Allah’s order. Having been expelled from Paradise and walking in the world for a long time, they turned to Allah in repentance because of their mistake at Arafat arena at the top of a mountain called “Mountain of Mercy”. And they said: "Our Lord! We have wronged our own souls: If Thou forgive us not and bestow not upon us Thy Mercy, we shall certainly be lost." The Quran: -The Heights (Al-Araf), 7/23). They asked the pardon of God and God Almighty granted His forgiveness upon them.

The process for tawbah begins when the heart decisively comes into a decision to get rid of sins. At every place where this decision is taken, the repentance is sincere. Confining the penitence to a place, laying down a sacred place condition for it stems from not knowing the essence of tawbah and failing to work out the message of Islam for the issue.

Conclusion:

God Almighty created man in a nature apt to being able to do both good and evil deeds. Tawbah is the solution for being cleansed out of sins and mistakes committed, and spiritual dirt. Through repentance, the servant is removed from his sins and faults and becomes as if he has never sinned. It is an undisputable fact that every man is in need of penitence.

Tawbah can be made just following the sin or until prior to the death rattle and signs for death come out. Since the appointed time is not definite, a person should repent without wasting any time.

A man needs no means for making tawbah nor a certain place or time for asking God in repentance.

For a true penitence, a person should feel remorse over having committed sins, and leave the place where he sins together with a resolution not to go back to the same sin. Giving the rights of their true holders back is the most crucial element of tawbah.

The suspicion whether he is cleansed out of his sins after his penitence is something baseless, Allah keeps His tawbah door open for people committing every type of sin. The point about which people should be cautious is if repentance is done with sincerity or not.

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ncfan-1 · 5 years ago

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Things I want to write for Three Houses (and may not actually wind up writing), a (most likely) incomplete list:

- Pre-canon fic with Petra, Edelgard, and Hubert. Gen.

- Fic for my headcanon of Edelgard’s stepmother, the Empress Berengaria. We know that this Empress must have existed, for Edelgard references her father having already married for political purposes by the time he met Patricia, but we know nothing about her. My headcanon of her is that she is by birth a member of House Nuvelle, that she was a supporter of Ionius’s attempts to consolidate his power, possessed a minor Crest of Cethleann, and that neither of her two children by Ionius numbered among the few (only three, in my headcanon) royal children who possessed any Crest at all. The fact that Edelgard was one of only three royal children with a Crest made her much more dynastically relevant than she otherwise would have been, and when Patricia was exiled, Berengaria took one look at baby/toddler Edelgard, said something to the effect of “It’s free real estate”, and snatched that kid right up before one of the consorts could get to her. Berengaria pushed hard for Edelgard’s candidacy as the next Emperor; she knew she’d never get anywhere promoting her own children (kid with a Crest wins over a kid without any day of the week), and installing a child she’d raised as the next Emperor was the best chance she had of ensuring that her and her own children’s would be preserved during the reign of the next emperor. She did care for Edelgard—and Edelgard definitely thinks of Berengaria before she thinks of Patricia when she thinks of ‘Mother’—though it’s less clear whether she loved Edelgard. Berengaria locked horns with Lord Arundel often over Edelgard’s custody. Just before the Insurrection of the Seven, Berengaria was assassinated via poison, and most assume it was Lord Arundel who killed her. The fic will be gen, obviously.

- I want to finish In This Valley of Dying Stars. Fic’s Dimileth, though it’s pre-ship, given its space in the timeline and the fact that neither Dimitri nor Melusine are in a good place mentally while it takes place.

- Want to write the sequel to In This Valley of Dying Stars, aka “Melusine finds out exactly what’s up about her and she takes it really poorly.” Dimileth, takes place just post the S-support, though the ship isn’t really the main focus of the fic. Melusine’s existential crisis kicking into overdrive is the main focus of the fic.

- A couple of oneshots set in the same ‘verse as In This Valley of Dying Stars and the as of yet untitled sequel. One of them focuses on Melusine, Flayn, Seteth, and Manuela, after Melusine overexerts herself using Divine Pulse and is unconscious for roughly a day and a half as a result. The second is the search for Rhea in Enbarr after the final battle. Enbarr’s the biggest city on the continent, and without Hubert’s letter, finding her… Yeah, that takes a while, and it’s taking even longer considering that there’s still fighting throughout the city even after Edelgard’s death and Dimitri is in no state to fight after taking a dagger to the shoulder. Both are gen; the first is entirely gen, and the second one mostly gen (In that there’s Dimileth simmering in the background, but it’s not the main focus of the fic).

- A fic set during the timeskip of Azure Moon, in which the explanation for why Mercedes is wearing a cap and veil post timeskip that looks a lot like the headgear worn by the nuns around Garreg Mach is that she took religious orders during the timeskip. Partly because she wants to become a nun, and partly because, while nuns don’t have to take vows of chastity in this universe, anyone who takes religious vows, even if they’re remaining a part of the secular world, is protected by law from being forced into marriage against their will. Even if the Empire has taken over Fhirdiad, where Mercedes lives, the prevailing culture is still very pro-Church, and thus, the men her adoptive father brings around the house take one look at her headdress, only have to hear her say, “No, I’m afraid I don’t particularly want to marry you :)” and are out the door, usually shooting dirty looks at her adoptive father in the process. Said adoptive father is too chickenshit to make her take off the headdress—especially considering she had four separate copies made up of the official document commemorating her taking religious orders, and three of them have been sent off to people who would not be at all inclined to give them to him to burn.

- Timeskip fic of Marianne’s evolving relationship with Margrave Edmund.

- A multi-chapter AU where Dimitri turns into a Demonic Beast during the timeskip, and the only way for him to turn back into a man is for him to let go of his rage and hatred of Edelgard enough that it isn’t consuming him anymore. This one’s… Yeah, it’s gonna be rough. And at least somewhat gruesome (Maybe more than somewhat). Main characters are: Dimitri, Melusine, Felix, Marianne, and when they show up, Rodrigue and Dedue. Gen. The only ship is Marianne x Linhardt, it’s mostly in the background, and it’s here primarily because it’s thematically appropriate and I love them. The violence and themes might be enough to make it M-rated. I’ve been mulling this one over for a while: here’s a snippet. The tag for this one will be ‘Demonic Beast AU.’

- Ingrid and Leonie get a support chain. Basically, it’s Leonie wondering “why is this noble girl asking me to show her how to make candles out of leftover cooking grease?” and finding out exactly why. Gen.

- Seteth comes to the monastery and deals with people reacting to the unvetted, unqualified stranger being promoted to a position of high authority over them. Gen, here’s the post I made speculating about it.

- Rhea and Seteth in the monastery, just being siblings at each other. Gen.

- Silver Snow Seteth having a reckoning over the damage wrought by the Crest System, and over everything he’s been complicit in since coming to live and work in the monastery. Basically a “That moment when you realize that the system you’ve been complicit in upholding has fucked over everyone you care about whose names aren’t Rhea and Flayn, and now everyone you care about may well die thanks to the secrets you and Rhea have been keeping,” to bridge the gap between what we see of him in the game and what we hear of him in his unpaired ending. Gen.

- Ingrid’s relationship with her mother, which I imagine as being at least somewhat fraught. Gen.

- The Sacred and Profane (titled such because I am so very original), centered around Rhea’s first couple of attempts at making a vessel for Sothis out of the children she created from her blood. Gen. The only fic idea I haven’t written yet that actually has a title.

- A fic centering around Lysithea and Ferdinand’s relationship if the game had fleshed it out more. Because I love their interactions in their paralogue, and I would have liked for them to have a support chain. Will probably be set in Azure Moon or Silver Snow. Could be gen, could be fucked-up shippiness. Anything is possible.

- An AU where Rhea learns to see Melusine’s mother as a person in her own right rather than simply a failed vessel, and thus treats Melusine like a person as well. So she handles things a bit differently after Melusine is born, and thus, Jeralt never leaves the monastery with her. And yet, things manage to go almost as poorly as they do in canon. Gen. Will be tagged ‘Grandmother AU.’

- An AU where after Edelgard resurfaces after having been experimented on and successfully implanted with the Crest of Flames, Rhea snatches her up and declares her a ward of the Church because those kids were descendants of someone she gave her blood to, dammit. Things… do not go well. Gen.

- Post-canon in Crimson Flower, Edelgard and Lysithea have a tense conversation just before Lysithea undergoes a procedure to have her Crests removed. Gen.

- Shapeshifter Marianne AU. Not sure if it will be gen or have ships in it.

- A fairy tale AU where Melusine is a lot more like her namesake. Probably Dimileth, and probably the least likely thing on this list to actually get written.

#Fire Emblem Three Houses #Fe16 #Fanfic #Fic ideas #Demonic Beast AU #Grandmother AU

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bitterparamour · 5 years ago

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( Herman Tommeraas, cis male, he/him, fire emblem: three houses ) * &. i know it must be scary for you, sylvain jose gautier, after surviving the takeover. to turn into someone like sylvain valter, a twenty five year-old bartender at the saturnalia, right here in castle town. just remember that you are as easygoing as you are promiscuous, and to be wary, be safe, be true to who you are : heroic through and through. ( liv heehee )

fuckboy season (fe3h spoilers) (tw for war, death, child abuse, murder)

BEFORE CASTLE TOWN.

Sylvain was the second son of Margrave Gautier, and the only child to be born with a Crest. Because of this his older brother Miklan was disinherited, as it is required for the family head to bear a crest. This resulted in a rough childhood, with Miklan’s jealousy growing so strong that he attempted to kill Sylvain on multiple occasions.

He considered his Crest to be a curse - his brother hated him, his family had high expectations of him, and people outside of his house regarded him highly despite not knowing anything about him.

Women, in particular, would throw themselves at him for his Crest, hoping for a husband that could help produce a Crest-bearing child. This made him a bit of a skirt-chaser, flitting about from woman to woman without forming any deep connection with them, knowing that none of them really want him for who he was.

He wasn’t completely alone though, as he grew up with his childhood friends; Ingrid, Felix, and Dimitri. They might have been his only true friends growing up, who knew him for who he was.

While not a direct victim of the Tragedy of Duscur, it deeply pained him to see his three friends suffer as much as they did; he tried, as much as he could, to do anything to make it easier for them, and could only hope that it helped.

He enrolled in Garreg Mach Monastery Officers Academy and joined the Blue Lions alongside his childhood friends, though he eventually switched to join the Black Eagles. During his time there he had no choice but to kill Miklan after the latter had stolen the Lance of Ruin, their house’s relic weapon.

He sided with the Empire after Edelgard declared war against the Church, in hopes of seeing a future where Crests were no longer held in such high regard.

IN CASTLE TOWN.

He remembers everything, and sees so many familiar faces in this town - some without any memories of their past lives at all, some whose memories match his, some who seemed to come from entirely different timelines - and it’s. it’s a lot for him.

and he also can’t seem to escape his problems from his previous life - because while Crests aren’t known here at all (thank god) he was still born into a well off family, and combined with his flirtatious habits he still has girls trying to get to him for superficial reasons.

but hey! no one’s being disowned this time! ha HA

he works at the Saturnalia because the music slaps, it’s fun to play around with drinks, the crowds are fun and it’s even more fun to piss his family off for working as a bartender when he could be doing Business Things bc 1) “i’m an adult and i can do what i want” 2) “UR NOT EVEN MY REAL FAMILY!! AND THEY WERE JUST AS SHITTY”

personality wise not much has changed. still has a bitter, pessimistic outlook, still sociable but almost never willing to open his heart up in full, still a fuckboy! but still incredibly protective of the people he does genuinely love and care for, always willing to get hurt if it means keeping them safe.

finally, he has felix’s sword with him, which was left on his doorstep in their past lives. it means a lot that it’s with him, as it serves as a reminder that none of his memories are fake, and that he still has people here that he cares for and can confide in.

there will come a day where i will play both inigo and sylvain while they’re both in the same room, and it is a day everyone should fear

#castletown.intro #war tw #death tw #child abuse tw #murder tw #yeah i love him. what about it

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yukiwrites · 5 years ago

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Unexpected Growth and Secrets

Thank you so much for the support as always, @breeachuu ! Things are starting to get hotter!

Summary: Wolfram had only been in Fódlan for less than three months and so much had already happened. He could barely keep up with each new discovery he made, even more so ones that related directly to his own mission -- Byleth gaining a new power and feeling more like a manakete every day but not being one turned the poor boy’s head into a knot.

Commission info HERE and HERE!

______________________________

Raindrops pierced Wolfram's body as though they were a volley of spears, the deafening sound of the wetting ground muting all others. He didn't realize he had reached the ground, the mud clinging onto his clothes, intent on pulling him ever downwards.

At a distance, blurred by the storm that formed, lay Jeralt, rocked into Byleth's arms as she wailed a silent cry. Dimitri's blur ran by Wolfram towards the Professor so, so far ahead, forcing the half manakete to watch, but not process what was happening.

He had been sent to that world for such a short amount of time. He barely managed to scramble on his feet after taking the first life with his own hands and now- someone he knew, someone's... Someone else's father simply... ebbed his life away, painting the mud in red.

Wolfram could hear his own heartbeat thundering by his ears; so loudly it made him cover them with both hands, wanting the sound to stop. He barely could discern what everyone was saying all around him, the voices so far and undistinguished it felt like he was hearing through a thick glass.

Seeing Jeralt fall so- so easily like that terrified Wolfie out of his skin. But not for his own sake, no.

He remembered the stories of the destroyed future whence Meliodas and Cynthia came -- the doomed timeline into which both of his eldest siblings watched their parents die.

Nidra. Henry.

Both lying dead on the ground, during such a hazy time the two children weren't even able to hold a proper funeral. To Wolfram, that all had seemed such a distant, impossible thing to happen -- after all, no one's stronger than his mother, Nidra! She's the second oldest manakete the Ylisseans had heard of, one that's witnessed the birth and death of entire civilizations!

No man was stronger than Henry, whose research allowed him to extend his usually short lifespan to match that one of his immortal wife -- no dark magic was trickier, no potential was larger...

And yet, dead they lay in that pool of muddied blood, as Byleth rocked them while Dimitri did his best to stay by her side.

"No-" Wolfie stammered, not noticing the tears streaming down his face with the rain. "No- it's not them-"

"Buddy, you okay? Heeey there!" Caspar loud voice and heavy slap on the back sucked Wolfram back to reality. "You're gonna trip at the entrance- Whoa there!"

Caspar had tried to warn Wolfie about the step right outside the Monastery, but the half manakete started mumbling to himself instead, making the noble frown and call out to him in response. As expected, Wolfram tripped at the stone, forcing Caspar to hold the taller boy's arm lest he fell facefirst.

Still rather out of it, Wolfram looked around them. "When did we come back-" His voice was hoarse from crying, though he barely uttered a sound during his quiet sniffles.

"Man, your face's a mess." Caspar pulled Wolfie to the side after someone bumped into them, using his own sleeve to dry the half manakete's cheeks. "You've been crying since we left, yeah? Get it together! If you've got time to cry, then we gotta train to get back at those- those- ggrah! Jeralt was a legend! For him to just- drop dead like that- it makes me BOIL!"

Caspar's burst of emotion managed to make Wolfram focus on him more rather than drift back into sorrow. The boy grasped onto the shorter one's shoulder so as to place himself in reality. "What- what happened after-?" He stuttered, his voice still shaky.

His small body still trembling with rage, Caspar briskly took Wolfram's hand from himself before slamming his own head at the nearby wall. The loud, cracking sound startled Wolfie into thinking his friend had broken his skull for a split second -- before seeing that the stone wall was the one that cracked. "Hahhh," Caspar groaned loudly, shaking his head. "There, guess that's better. Anyway," he turned back to Wolfie as though nothing had happened, ignoring or not noticing the flabbergasted expression the taller boy wore, "the Professor got it together so fast it was like nothing had happened, man. She got up with Jeralt in her arms and told the Knights to escort us students back. Dimitri stayed behind with her as far as I know, though." He scratched the red spot in the middle of his forehead, amusing Wolfram into wondering if that didn't hurt as much as it looked.

Still, as entertaining as it was to talk with Caspar, the sour mood had settled deeply into the half manakete's heart. "... I-I see." He fidgeted, twiddling his thumbs. "I wonder what's gonna happen next. It's not like we can just go back to classes like usual, right?"

Caspar frowned deeply. "No? Why not? I mean, I get that it's her Dad and stuff, but if she doesn't come back to train us, we'll never be able to get back at those punks!" He slammed one fist into his open palm, cracking his neck afterwards. "We'll get 'em, Wolf. We'll get 'em GOOD. But the Professor's gotta come back to train us -- I don't wanna go back to my old class after training under her! She's the best!"

The half manakete lowered his gaze, downcast. "Mhm..."

"You went back to being depressed for a second there, man. Do you wanna go somewhere else? Oh yeah, your wyvern's following us from the sky since you just kinda walked all the way here; don't you wanna settle him back and stuff?"

Wolfram shot his head up. "Oh no! Aquilo! Boy, I'm so sorry for leaving you!" He gasped loudly, reaching for his whistle.

"Hey- you gonna run just like that? Wait for mee!" Caspar shadowed Wolfram closely, going up the stairs three steps at a time to make up for his shorter legs.

Running and feeling his blood rush made Wolfram's eyes burn up again, as though the action of being alive was enough to set him off. Aquilo obediently landed close to his own spot at the stables, the gust of wind his large wings blowed raising dust all around them. "I-I'm sorry for leaving so suddenly, boy." He hugged the wyvern's snout, pressing his forehead between Aquilo's eyes.

The wyvern nudged his master's face, covering him with his own large wing. Wolfram could understand what his friend and mount was saying -- word by word, just like Henry taught him as a child. Wolfie was being comforted by Aquilo, the only one who knew everything about the half manakete's condition.

"I'm gonna see them again, right?" He sniffled, hugging Aquilo's long neck. The wyvern purred in response, using his other wing to cover Wolfie entirely.

Caspar scratched his cheek, watching it all from the sidelines. He kind of wanted to hug Wolfram as well, but even he could tell when someone needed to be alone (or with their wyvern), so he simply sat there by the door to Aquilo's cot, intent on waiting it all out; he crossed both arms and legs, leaning on the wooden gate as though guarding it.

An unknown amount of time later, Wolfram managed to considerably calm himself down after being comforted by his partner. The moment he got out of the reach of Aquilo's wings, he felt someone tackle him from behind.

"Gotcha! Man, I've been wanting to do this since FOREVER! Waiting really ain't my style." Caspar laughed as he squeezed the life out of Wolfram's ribs, crushing them in his over-the-top embrace.

"C-Caspar- grah- you're killing me-" Wolfram gasped for air, patting the shorter boy's shoulder, saying uncle.

"Haha!" He tightened the hug a bit more before letting go altogether. "There! Feeling better? If not, I'm all for round two." He rolled his shoulder.

Wobbling, Wolfram struggled to even catch his breath. "H-huff... N-no, spare me! I'm feeling better now, thanks. More like I think you just squeezed it all out of me just now... ouch."

"Plan's worked, then!" He loudly slapped Wolfie's back, who almost tripped in response. "Now let's grab something to eat 'cause I dunno about you, but I'm starving! I bet all that crying made you hungry, too, right?"

Still panting, Wolfram surprised himself with how easily a smile sprouted on his face after quite literally drowning in tears just a few moments ago. "Mhm, that I am." He slid his hand to Caspar's, silently asking for the shorter boy to lead the way.

Said boy simply grinned, pulling Wolfram along. "C'mon, before all the good food gets hogged!"

Being with Caspar truly helped Wolfram settle down emotionally -- sure, talking with Aquilo was always a treat, but he wasn't exactly verbose, let alone someone who could hold on a true conversation for more than a few minutes.

Wolfram allowed himself to be led to the dining hall, though he barely touched his food once it was in front of him. He WAS feeling better, but it wasn't as though all the grief would suddenly disappear. "Can I sleep over in your room tonight?" He asked out of nowhere, fiddling with his food.

"Sure, man." Caspar replied without hesitation, snaffling down some meat like it was nothing.

"Thanks." The half manakete smiled shyly, resting his head on one hand, unwilling to eat any more than he already nibbled. "I'm kinda scared to sleep alone tonight." He justified, despite receiving no such inquiry from his friend.

"It's cool. Do you wanna be roomies? The rooms around here are big enough for two people and stuff."

"Would you mind if I stayed for a few days? Not too long, I promise." Wolfie risked, feeling all tingling inside. It was so heartwarming to be so readily accepted like that -- and to be able to just ask without wondering if he'd be intruding or worrying about his ears. Caspar looked like a heavy sleeper, after all; it shouldn't be too hard to hide them from him.

"Knock yourself out!" Caspar grinned after slurping his juice. "You're not gonna eat? I'm trying to eat as much as I can to build muscle like Raphael so I'm not saying to eat like I do but- this is so little! Eat more, you gotta get more meat in your bones, Wolf!"

Once again Wolfie felt the warmth, finally able to flash a heartfelt smile. "Thanks, Caspar. I wasn't that hungry before, but now I think I can eat a bit more."

"Uh... sure." Caspar raised one eyebrow slightly, wondering what the deal was with his brain that made him want to stare at Wolf eat rather than finish his own plate. "Pah, whatever! Gotta gobble this up!"

After dinner, the pair went by Wolfie's room to pick up a few clothes and his own sleeping bag (hauling the school mattress around would be too conspicuous and a pain in the ass) before setting out to the dormitory's second floor.

As they headed to the stairs, Wolfie kept his attention on Byleth's room, so close to his own, feeling the Professor's presence there, but knowing it wasn't a good time to simply knock and ask her how she was doing.

What she needed most was time, and Wolfram was going to give it to her.

Since this month's mission was done in advance, they actually had a few days left before the weekend, though an announcement was posted at the Notice Board right by their dormitory and classroom informing them of the upcoming week off in lights of Byleth's loss. Their classes would resume on the 5th of the Guardian Moon.

"It's been only three days, after all..." Wolfram put one hand under his chin in thought, frowning slightly. Dimitri himself had informed the Blue Lions' students of the posting, so either he had been in constant contact with Byleth during that time, or he was simply making use of his position as House Leader to always be informed of the direction their classes would go, though Wolfram was certain that the latter was more probable.

The greater part of the students already had a training routine set, so apart from lacking the much needed feedback from their Professor, they strived to keep themselves in shape during her grieving. Caspar was one of such students, taking a constant place at the training ground alongside Raphael and Felix.

Wolfram had a training regimen Byleth herself had instructed him to do, but he didn't feel ready to come back to training just yet, so he allowed himself to make a visit to Aquilo before noon.

However, on his way there, he felt Byleth's presence edging further from the dorms, towards the market. Raising one eyebrow, the boy followed quietly, watching her from beside the front door. Her entire demeanor seemed different; her back was hunched and her expression, sorrowful. It was as though she was another person entirely.

"Wolfram? What are you doing, hiding behind the door like that?" A voice from behind startled the half manakete out of his soul, making him squeak.

"Eeek- D-Dimitri? D-don't sneak up on me like that! I almost died, there." He huffed, patting his own chest.

"Haha, forgive me." The prince bobbed his head. "We were just coming back from our classroom, see." He shuffled a stack of papers he carried, tilting his chin to Dedue by his side, who also carried a similar stack. "The Professor put up a notice at the classroom's board, instructing each student to pick up a few handouts and work on them throughout the week; she also included personal notes for each one of them..." He puffed his chest with pride, though sagged his shoulders in grief. "She needn't go through such trouble, honestly... It is her grieving time."

"Your Highness," Dedue touched Dimitri's shoulder, pointing with his chin towards the gates leading out of the market. "That's our Professor going out, is it not?"

"Oh?" Dimitri followed his friend's gaze, spotting Byleth immediately. He frowned right away, his heart tightening. "It is her, however... Something is not right. She would not simply go out like this without informing me- ah, ahem, without asking for official permission. I can guarantee that Lady Rhea would not give it, at least not during this time of grief."

Wolfie looked from the Professor who disappeared out of the gates to the concerned prince.

"Could it be...?" Dedue frowned deeply. "These handouts will surely take more than a week to finish-"

Dimitri lost the air in his lungs, the paper he carried crumpling easily in his hands. "She- she couldn't-" He went pale, his blood rushing. "No. She very much well could be thinking that. By the goddess, do not allow her to throw her life away like that!" He stuttered, ready to sprint after her. A moment of clarity lightened his mind, however. "Wolfram! Please, take your wyvern and follow the Professor from above-- me and Dedue will round up whoever we can find to follow. We do not know where the Professor is going, but I have a terrible feeling deep down. We must go prepared!"

"T-throw her life away?" Wolfram mumbled, surprised. He clenched his fist before nodding. "Alright! I'll follow her and keep you informed on the route she's taking!" He ran out of the door, taking a left towards the stables.

"I'm counting on you!" Dimitri huffed, running in the opposite direction, Dedue in tow.

Truth was that Wolfie would be able to track Byleth down even by foot, by sensing her presence, but it wasn't as though he could come out and say that, so on Aquilo's back he went. Byleth took a direct route southwards, going down the mountain through a steep path, making the task of following her by horse a difficult one. Wolfram relayed as much to Dimitri and the others, who had grabbed mounts in attempts to reach her faster.

"If she's going to the village down there, we can take a detour," Dimitri huffed, pulling the horse's reins toward the opposite side. "Keep us informed, Wolfram! You're our eyes up there."

"Got it!" Wolfie saluted, guiding Aquilo towards Byleth's presence. He could barely see her from up there, especially since she was hidden by so many trees, but he could still sense her, so it was fine.

She did the hike down towards the village as Dimitri predicted, though she pressed on without resting, even though the sun started to set. She marched towards the mountains all the way into the horizon, her pace so quick Wolfram could see how she widened the gap between her and the pursuing students.

Still, they kept on their pursuit, galloping through uneven terrain, taking detours and being generally guided by Wolfram. "Is she going towards the Red Canyon?" Dimitri inquired after the second day of marching.

Byleth had done well in eluding them thus far -- she kept by the woods so it would be (technically) impossible for Wolfram to follow or even land his wyvern there, while also choosing routes better taken by foot rather than with a mount or a convoy in tow.

It was only at the dawn of the third day that her pace finally slowed down as she entered ruins of some kind. From above, Wolfram frowned, finding the scenery familiar, somehow.

Beaten-down walls, craters of unspeakable proportions; old suspension bridges and a blood-red soil right by the edge of the mountain.

The Red Canyon, Zanado.

"Oh!" Wolfram blinked, a rush of memories blinking through his mind. "I-I saw this place before! Naga showed it to me in that vision, one year ago..." He huffed, somehow excited.

He remembered hearing Naga tell him about a tragedy, children and guidance. Perhaps he'd find the answers down there? Maybe if he landed-

Wolfram felt it before he heard it. An animal instinct deep inside of his gut, telling him to run.

Then, a bloodcurdling roar shook the earth so visibly Wolfie could see the trees trembling, their leaves dancing with the wind. "W-what was that-" he gasped, looking down. "A- a demonic beast!"

"Fly to her, Wolfram!!" Dimitri yelled desperately from somewhere under him, the trees hiding him and muffling his voice. "Go to the Professor! Protect her until we can arrive!!" He almost begged, his voice ragged, his mind entirely focused on Byleth.

"No need to ask me twice!" Wolfram whipped Aquilo's reins. "C'mon, boy!"

It wasn't hard to spot Byleth -- she was sitting ducks in the middle of three giant wolves just a few yards ahead. Wolfram jumped out of Aquilo's back as the wyvern rammed into one of them, throwing it at the bedrock.

"I'm gonna stay by you, Byleth!" The boy roared, his eyes shining slightly.

"Wolfram!" Byleth widened her eyes in surprise, though didn't allow it to take her for long. "Watch out for the woods -- I'm sure there are more from where these three came from."

"Roger that!"

Byleth danced with the Sword of the Creator in hand, its long reach and malleable blade allowing her to strike even faraway enemies while Wolfram zapped them from afar with his unique magic. It didn't take long for the others to catch up, Dimitri leading them.

Once they were all united, there was nothing that could keep them from winning -- soon all monsters and beasts were eliminated, finally allowing the prince and the Professor to meet.

"P-Professor! I was- we were so worried! I beg you, do not do anything foolish... Had we not followed you, you would be-" He choked on the words, hovering around her as though searching for wounds.

Byleth took his hand in hers, closing her eyes in a silent thank-you. "So you were the ones following me. Don't worry, Dimitri. I won't rest until I bring justice to the one who murdered my Dad, but I still had to come here to... confirm something."

Still rather worked up, but visibly relieved, Dimitri clutched Byleth's hand in his, smiling nervously. "I will not pry into what it is that you needed to confirm, though I must ask you to inform someone before leaving like that in the future... I- we were worried sick!"

"I did leave handouts for the entire week I'd be out, but- thanks again for coming, Dimitri; everyone." She looked behind Dimitri's back to the audience, smiling softly.

The prince blushed deeply as he realized he still held Byleth's hand -- in front of the entire class, no less! -- quickly taking a step back and clearing his throat.

Wolfram watched the scene unfold with amusement, though something twinged at the edges of his consciousness. It was as though Byleth's presence had strengthened itself, somehow. Raising one eyebrow, the half-manakete took it upon himself to digest that information slowly during the flight back home.

They took a day longer to return than they did to arrive, seeing that their mounts were exhausted from the little rest they had during the pursuit. Once they were back, Dimitri said that he and Byleth had been thoroughly scolded by both Seteth and Rhea, despite the Professor claiming that she had taken the class for an extracurricular activity.

Perhaps it was because of that incident that the movement of the Knights of Seiros all around the academy went unreported to Byleth. Well, not that they had to report to her in the first place, but Shamir, Catherine and Alois sometimes trained under Byleth's guidance, so they had a somewhat give-and-take relationship.

Not during the following weeks, however.

The Knights moved as though lurking in the shadows, their numbers diminishing daily as they spread themselves out in search of... something.

It was only after Dimitri's intervention (by carefully asking Ashe and Petra to shadow a few Knights) that the Archbishop herself disclosed the plans they had to wipe out the people who had arranged for Jeralt's death without informing Byleth.

However, now that they've found where the enemy was posted, the Knights were already spread too thin to be able to deliver judgment to them, falling on Byleth's class to do it.

Which she would, gladly.

Byleth's expression was somber as she assigned each student a position in the upcoming battle, instructing them to carefully pack since they were due to not only a hike, but a pursuit as well.

The Knights' reports weren't very clear, but once Byleth caught the trail of the enemy, she followed it as though she were a trained hound. She guided them through the Sealed Forest with mastery, avoiding monsters and traps until they were finally face to face to the woman who had stabbed Jeralt in the back: Monica, also known as Kronya.

The assassin revealed herself to be one who enjoyed murdering people for sport, laughing as she spoke of how Jeralt fell to his death so easily like that.

This time, Byleth's sword didn't miss. The Professor struck the assassin over and over from afar in a blind rage. She dived deep into the enemy's lines, forcing the students to cover for her as they engaged the monsters and miscreants under Kronya's command.

At some point, realizing she had lost the battle, Kronya retreated to the woods, but that wouldn't stop the Ashen Demon from going after her without so much as batting an eye.

Never taking his focus away from Byleth while engaging this or that monster, Wolfram was the first one to realize she started drifting away from the front. "Professor Byleth! Wait-" He snapped a powerful magic before turning Aquilo towards the path Byleth took. "Dimitri! Byleth ran after Kronya into the woods! I'm going after her!"

"We all should, Wolfram!" Dimitri dealt the finishing blow to the beast Wolfie had struck moments before. "We cleaned up here; let us hurry to give the Professor our support!" He huffed, wasting no time in following Byleth's tracks.

Just a bit up ahead, they reached the ruins of a construction of sorts -- something bleeding with Old Energy, though it felt rather unnatural, as though it were... fabricated. Wolfram couldn't explain it very well, but the moment Byleth stepped into the stone, the energy started pulsating.

Solon laughed as he gouged Kronya's heart out with his bare hands, making Wolfram's stomach turn. "Wh-what is UP with these guys? Everything they do is so revolting and disgusting-" He huffed, urging Aquilo to fly closer to stay beside Byleth, however, a beam of darkness enveloped the entire altar, pushing wyvern and rider away. "Whoa!"

"What madness is this?!" Dimitri exclaimed as he, too, witnessed Byleth being thrown into darkness. "Professor! Professor Byleth!!" He yelled atop of his lungs, the swirling dark wind sucking his hair and clothes before stopping altogether, leaving only a high-pitched, deafening sound behind.

Aquilo's reins fell from Wolfram's hands. "Byleth...?" He murmured, focusing his entire being into searching for the Professor's presence, to no avail.

She had disappeared.

She was completely gone, as though she had never existed!

"No, this can't be! Byleth! I didn't come all this way for this- I swore I'd stay by your side!" He panicked, making Aquilo fly around the altar in a vain search for something he couldn't even feel. "Byleth!!" His heart thumped loudly in his ears. "I can't lose you, too-" he stammered, clenching both fists so hard his entire body trembled. "Y-you gotta be-"

Wolfram's classmates cursed Solon from their spot, each and every one of them believing that Byleth would return; the bond they shared giving them confidence. Wolfie's frown flinched, his heart wavering. Trust.

He should trust Byleth's abilities, not panic. He wasn't there to be her guardian, after all. He was there to help her!

And the only thing he could do at the moment was to believe she would be alright.

Still nervous, but clinging into this newfound, frail, hope, Wolfram guided Aquilo towards his classmates, landing there to make the stand against Solon. The villain's words were barely out of his lips when something shook the very foundations of their reality -- the air distorted around the spot Byleth had disappeared in, as though something could come out of it at any moment.

"A portal?!" Wolfram blurted out, gasping the moment the tip of a sword cut through the veil that separated this world from the other, a blinding light crashing down from within, forcing all that watched to close their eyes.

Byleth stepped out of the portal, swinging her Hero's Relic to put it back into the shape of a sword, the crack behind her mending itself as though a fast healing wound. Her entire body shone with a divine light, the presence she exuded enough to make Wolfram lose his breath -- it felt akin to what Naga made him feel the day she delivered his mission, though only for a brief moment.

Once the light faded, a draft picked up, lifting Byleth's bright green hair off of her shoulders. She had the same hair that the other shape-shifters in this world shared! Did she turn into one out of nowhere? "No... her ears are still round." Wolfram huffed, struggling to regain his breath. Still, there was no doubt that whatever had happened had made Byleth many, many times stronger than she already was. Wolfram could almost see the power overflowing through her skin, noticing how now it shone with the characteristic manakete glow.

"You'd consume even the eternal darkness, Fell Star?!" Solon vociferated, lifting his hands so as to summon reinforcements.

Before he could even finish the incantation, however, with but a swing of her Sword of the Creator Byleth ended Solon's life, separating his head from his body.

The air stilled, then somehow filled itself with miniature explosions, as though reality was still adjusting itself from the rend it suffered moments ago. Particles of dust popped, radiating light and energy all around them -- concentrating themselves around Byleth, who simply looked up in grief.

She looked at her students for a moment, smiling before crumpling to the ground.

"Professor!" Dimitri ran to her, "are you unwell? What's happened- a-are you... asleep?"

"Asleep?" Wolfram trotted behind, clutching his chest. "She- she really is just sleeping... Pheeew..." he, too, fell on the ground, his legs giving out after experiencing so much tension.

Dimitri let out a nervous laugh, carefully picking Byleth up in his arms. His expression softened the moment he felt her warmth on his, stealing a smile out of Wolfram's lips. "This is no place to stay. Let us return to our camp!" He raised his voice to the approaching classmates. "We will have Annette, Mercedes and Dorothea examine the Professor once we settle her back in her tent. I'm counting on you three."

Still too tense to properly respond in their usual cheerfulness, the trio simply complied, sticking to one another as Dimitri led the way to their camp.

Byleth only woke up the following evening, yawning so loudly it made the three healers giggle before throwing themselves onto their professor.

Later that night, Byleth explained that she had received the blessing of the goddess of that world, which allowed her to escape the darkness, perpetually changing her hair to the color akin to the goddess'.

That intrigued Wolfram to no end -- could their goddess also open a portal to a different world, like Naga did? Wolfram could barely hear Naga's voice from Fódlan -- it was so, so far away Wolfie could barely hear it as a whisper during the quietest of nights -- but it still made him wonder if She could also transform a human into a manakete-looking person.

There were so many questions. Did the goddess herself make Byleth that way? What was Rhea, then, if that was the case? She was a shape-shifter who carried a presence almost as powerful as Byleth, a non-shape-shifter. Somehow, Wolfie could still tell that although Byleth carried the Blood within her, she didn't possess an inner beast. So what could the relation be between the two of them and this goddess?

Naga helped the manaketes because she was quite literally the Mother of them all, almost on par with being a goddess herself, though she denied being so when asked about it. Was this the case in Fódlan where their goddess helped the humans instead? So many questions!

It all ate Wolfram away slowly, over the course of the next few days. He would often sneak out of Caspar's room at night to stretch his wings and clear his thoughts, even though every single time he returned, he would do so with more questions instead of answers. Should he reveal himself to Byleth and ask her straight ahead? That started to seem the most reasonable approach…

Distracted, Wolfram perched himself atop the Goddess Tower, a frown deep in his brow. “But then what happens if I DO say it and Byleth still doesn’t have the answers I’m looking for? Grahh, it would’ve been much easier if only I could hear Naga properly! Last time I asked, I could only make out ‘power in the heart’ and ‘terrible past’, but that doesn’t answer anything! Though I did managed to see the place of that ‘terrible past’ with my own eyes earlier last month.” He mused, flying back to the dormitories, intent on landing in front of the greenhouse.

He wasn’t thinking of his surroundings, too absorbed in his own musings to realize that someone had been watching him ever since he flew over the Goddess Tower.

“Wolfram?” A familiar voice snapped the half manakete out of his deviations, while he was still holding his own dragonstone to pull his wings back.

A chill ran down Wolfie’s stomach, making his entire body freeze. He had been seen!

His wings! His dragonstone! His ears! His tail! His secret!

“Um, I can explain, Dimitri.”

#fire emblem three houses #dimitri alexandre blaiddyd #fe 3h #byleth #dimitri fire emblem #caspar fire emblem #my writings #fodlansona #yuki's commissions #soft dimileth for the soul but really subtle......... for the most part

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fillianore-moved · 6 years ago

Text

this is just a very long and unfortunate list of incorrect quotes i’ve compiled for the fe3h squad + my oc (aka cassia montal, who’s the assistant teacher at the monastery and is romancing jeritza)! i just needed a way to develop her and all the relationships there more, and this is the result, so it’s completely self-indulgent, lazy and frankly pretty silly, but still i had fun and developed her and her relationships a lot during this process! @highoverseer and @koroleyva i’m tagging you two because idk anyone else who’d care at all for this flaming pile of trash packed into a fe3h package uwu 🌷🌼🌸

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byleth: how long have you been sleeping with cassia?

jeritza: that’s disgusting. and wrong. i don’t even get… why would... i…i’ve never had sex with anyone, anywhere. it’s none of your… you have… the nerve, the audacity… cassia is my colleague, technically. and she is terrible, face-wise. and how… how... do i know, frankly, that you’re not sleeping with her? maybe you are. maybe you’re trying to throw me off? hmm? check and mate.

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cassia dies.

annette is sobbing

dimitri is heartbroken

edelgard is trying to do a satanic ritual with hubert to bring her back

claude is stapling memes to her coffin

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byleth: you dropped your dyn- dy- dyna… mite…

byleth: uh… what else have you got in there?

cassia: oh… gunpowder, nitroglycerin, notepads, fuses, wicks, glue, and… paperclips. big ones.

cassia: uou know. just office supplies.

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cassia to annette: when you turn 18, people are gonna try and tell you to buy drugs or cigarettes because you can. no. you know what else is legal to buy at 18? blades. get yourself a damn sword. a big knife is also okay.

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cassia: we both look very beautiful tonight.

jeritza: you know, if you- if you’d just said I look beautiful, I would’ve said “so do you”.

cassia: i couldn’t take that chance.

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dorothea: you need a hobby.

cassia: i have a hobby.

dorothea: staring at jeritza’s face isn’t a hobby.

cassia: you’re right. it’s a profession and i excel at my job.

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cassia, looking in the mirror at 3am trying to practice self love: you’re doing great you stupid bitch..

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manuela: i didn’t want to do this, but i know one way we can get the money.

cassia: you’d make a decent prostitute.

manuela: i’d make an amazing prostitute, but i was actually talking about this guy I know.

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byleth: admit it! you like cassia!

jeritza: oh, come on. i mean, am i attracted to cassia? sure. do my days feel better when I’m around her? yeah. does she get me in ways no person ever has? indubitably. do i fantasize about her? sure, of course, but only in two positions. but do I like her? the answer is no.

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cassia: when have i done anything rash or irresponsible?

claude: i keep a list if you wanna see. it’s alphabetized.

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byleth: whose turn is it to give the pep-talk?

cassia: (sighing) felix’s…

felix: fuck shit up out there, but don’t die.

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annette: is anyone else scared?

cassia: not really. i’ve already lived longer than i expected.

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flayn: what is the best way to kill someone?

byleth: kindness.

cassia: If we’re being stealthy, potassium cynaite. otherwise, anything from a knife to a bazooka works...

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cassia: *crying*

byleth: i would like to join you in acknowledging the difficulties of your life

cassia: you are the WORST at this comfort thing

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claude: if edelgard, dimitri and i were drowning, who would you save?

cassia: you morons can’t even swim?

edelgard: teacher, it’s a hypothetical question.

dimitri: yeah, who would you save?

cassia: my time and effort.

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annette: The cookie isn’t sweet enough, and the texture is runny because it’s not fully baked. if I have to rate this, i would give it three points.

cassia: i made it myself…

annette: it’s out of three points.

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edelgard: if I ask you a boy question, will you promise not to be weird?

cassia: i promise.

edelgard: so, there’s this guy-

cassia: you can do better.

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cassia, torturing a prisioner: we have ways of making you talk…

cassia: flayn, what are you doing here? you’re not allowed in here

flayn: (hands her a drawing)

cassia: did you draw this? this is so good! i promise we’ll hang it in the entrance of the dungeon so everyone can see it before they get tortured!

----------

sylvain: i rarely give compliments, teacher, but that shirt looks great. i bet it would look even better on byleth’s assistant’s bedroom floor.

jeritza: …

cassia: sylvain, are you … hitting on jeritza for me?

-----------

cassia: it’s hard being byleth’s assistant teacher sometimes, but i love the my students and that’s all that-

caspar, in the background: teacher cassia! I tried to make spaghetti in the coffee pot and accidentally broke it!

cassia: *inhales*

-----------

post time-skip, black eagles route

cassia: i need some peace and quiet...

edelgard: i’ll be quiet!

hubert: and i’ll be peace!

-----------

jeritza: everything’s going to be fine. it’s just a crush.

cassia: hey, jeritza!

jeritza: i love you.

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

post time-skip, blue lions route

dimitri, talking about cassia: i know you think my judgment’s clouded because i like her a little bit.

dedue: you doodled your wedding invitation

dimitri: no, that’s our joint tombstone.

dedue: ... my mistake.

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

post time-skip, hubert’s support

edelgard: (whispering to hubert) start with a compliment! tell her she looks thin.

hubert: (to cassia) you seem malnourished.

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

post time-skip, edelgard’s support

ferdinand, watching cassia train: she can’t be good at everything. maybe she’s a bad kisser.

edelgard: no, she’s good at that too.

ferdinand: what?

edelgard: what?

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

sylvain: I'm grounded?

cassia: yes, you're grounded.

byleth: you disobeyed an order.

dimitri: and now we're going to bury you until you learn your lesson.

cassia:

byleth: dimitri, that's not how grounding works.

-----------

dorothea: i promised byleth we wouldn’t do anything illegal.

cassia:

cassia: Why would you lie to our resident parental figure like that?

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

linhardt: i slept for almost 12 hours but I might still be tired so let’s go for 12 more just in case

cassia: linhardt that’s a coma

linhardt: sounds festive

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

cassia: don’t worry, i have a permit.

seteth: …this just says ‘i do what i want.’

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

cassia: there are no mistakes, just happy little accidents

cassia: ... and lorenz

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

post time-skip, golden deer route

cassia: this is it

cassia: this is the darkest timeline

hilda: we just ran out of alcohol you dramatic little bitch

-----------

post time-skip, blue lions route

felix: cassia?

cassia, sighing: jeritza used to call me cassia…

felix: because it’s your fucking name

----------

cassia: WHO THE FUCK ATE ALL MY MACAROONS?! IM GOING TO KI-

annette: it was me.

cassia: KISS YOUR HEAD SO SOFT BABY, YOU KNOW I LOVE YOU THE MOST RIGHT?

---------

post time-skip, black eagles route

edelgard: so what are we gonna do?

cassia: i don’t know... pizza maybe?

edelgard:

hubert:

ferdinand:

edelgard: about the war, cassia

----------

during a mock battle

ferdinand: start waving your white flag!

hilda: THE ONLY THING I WILL BE WAVING IS YOUR DECAPITATED HEAD ON A STICK IN FRONT OF YOUR WEEPING MOTHER.

cassia: ... Yikes...

----------

cassia: hey flayn, do you think I could fit fifteen macarons into my mouth?

seteth: you're a hazard to society.

flayn: and a coward. do twenty!

----------

byleth: your trainee said a swear word in class.

cassia: i’ll talk to them about it..

cassia, to lysithea: what the fuck, dude...

----------

rhea: this was a 100% successful trip.

byleth: we lost cassia.

rhea: this was a 100% successful trip.

----------

sylvain, flirting with a girl: so, are you from heaven?

cassia: yes, she's a ghost...

cassia: she died fifteen years ago...

cassia: like that pick-up line of yours.

----------

dedue: felix lost cassia…

dimitri: how do you lose a woman?!

ashe: you forget to cherish her.

-----------

cassia: you like me? you like my personality?

byleth: i was surprised too.

----------

lysithea: [covers cassia’s eyes] guess who? she’s sweet, she’s adorable~

lysithea: and she’s gonna be really mad if you get it wrong!

----------

ignatz: i lose at everything. i even lost my glasses.

cassia, staring at the glasses on top of his head: i’ll help you find them for five gold...

-----------

jeritza: what are you, a cop? fuck off!

cassia: jeritza...

jeritza: okay, sorry, one more time.

priest:

priest: do you take this woman to be y--

-----------

rhea: cassia, can we speak privately for a minute?

cassia: ooooh, someone’s in trouble!

cassia : no, wait.

cassia : it’s me.

----------

cassia: wait, stop, think!

caspar: no, no, and no.

----------

bernadetta: i’m just worried about hurting their feelings!

cassia: hurting their feelings…? you just walk around all day caring about peoples’ feelings?

bernadetta: yes, of course. don’t you?

cassia: no.

-----------

byleth: you’re smiling, did something good happen?

cassia: can’t I just smile because I feel like it?

dorothea: seteth tripped and fell in the courtyard.

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

claude: i trust cassia.

hilda: you think she knows what she’s doing?

claude: ... i wouldn’t go that far.

-----------

cassia: oh, yes, i’ll live.

cassia: but i won’t enjoy it.

-----------

cassia: you piss me off so much.

rhea: i literally just said “hello.“

cassia: yet here i am, boiling with rage.

----------

cassia: don’t worry, you’ve got everything you need to defeat them.

marianne: the power to believe in myself?

cassia: no, a knife.

cassia: stab them.

----------

petra: i’ve never done anything wrong in my life

cassia: i know this and i love you

----------

ignatz: *trips on nothing*

cassia: ha, you’re so clumsy.

(5mins later)

cassia: *aggressively punching the air* what’s your–fucking problem huh?? what–did he ever–do to you??

-----------

byleth: now we’re going to compliment the person to our right.

cassia: *looks at seteth fondly*

cassia: nothing brightens up a room like your absence.

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

shady guy, coming up to cassia: if you care about your student you’ll come with me..

cassia: which student?

shady guy: lorenz hellman gloucester

cassia:

cassia: *turns around and walks away*

-----------

cassia: did it hurt?

jeritza: *rolls eyes* let me guess, when i fell from heaven?

cassia: no

jeritza: what?

cassia, grinning: did it hurt when you fell for me?

jeritza: ...

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

marianne: does this make me a bad person?

cassia: marianne, there is not a force in history that could make you a bad person...

-----------

cassia: you and me? we both want the same thing.

cassia: but we’re gonna have to work... near each other.

seteth: you mean together, cassia?

cassia, turning around angrily: did you hear me say together??

-----------

cassia: annette’s at that very special age where she has only one thing on her mind.

manuela: boys?

cassia: murder.

----------

cassia: *hugs dimitri*

dimitri: what's this? what's happening?

cassia: it's going to be alright.

dimitri: why are you squeezing me with your body?

cassia: it's a hug, dimitri. i'm hugging you.

-----------

cassia: claude, can we talk, one ten to another?

claude: i’m an eleven, teacher, but continue.

-----------

mercedes: oh fiddlesticks.

cassia: look, i understand this is a tense situation but let's watch the fucking language.

-----------

linhardt: i’m busy.

cassia: do you think drinking 36 glasses of wine consecutively would make my battle senses and crest powers even more heightened or would I just die?

linhardt:

linhardt: i’m on my way.

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

cassia: we’re engaged

jeritza: IN COMBAT

jeritza: *pulls out his sword*

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

manuela: why does everybody always assume I'm having a stroke?

cassia: age.

dorothea: diet.

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

leonie: i sort of did something and i need your advice. but i don’t want a lot of judgment and criticism.

cassia: ... and you came to me?

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

cassia: what do we say when life disappoints us?

dimitri: called it.

cassia: NO--

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

cassia: *sees someone do something stupid*

cassia: what an idiot.

cassia: *realizes it’s sylvain*

cassia: oh, that’s my idiot.

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

cassia: ferdinand, we tried things your way.

ferdinand: no, we didn't.

cassia: i did it in my head and it didn't work.

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

manuela: between claude, ignatz, lorenz, and raphael - if you had to - who would you punch?

cassia: no one! they are my golden deer! my students! i wouldn't punch any of them.

manuela: lorenz?

cassia: ... yeah.

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

cassia: you need them to think that you are stronger than you actually are.

ashe: that’s what you do, right?

cassia: oh, no. my power is no illusion. i can fucking demolish you.

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

cassia: before i do anything, i ask myself, would rhea do that? and if the answer is yes, i do not do that thing.

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

flayn: do you really think we should stay outside or do you just not want to deal with this right now?

cassia: two things can be true...

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

cassia: name a way to be nice to others.

dimitri: don't kill them.

cassia:

cassia: setting the bar a little low, dima, but I'll allow it.

-----------

cassia: remember that time you made me lick the swing set?

dorothea: no, i said "cassia don't lick the swing set!" then you said "don't tell me what to do!" and then you licked the swing set.

-----------

cassia: what are the signs of depression?

byleth: why are you asking?

cassia: manuela was doing laundry earlier and she dropped a sock and i heard her say “why has the goddess forsaken me?”

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

cassia: i just realized. i had a terrible childhood.

manuela: yeah, i know.

cassia: what do you mean, “you know”?

manuela: look at the way you stand... people who had good childhoods don’t stand like that.

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

cassia: you have to learn to love yourself.

marianne: but don’t you hate yourself?

cassia: yes, but this is about you, stay focused.

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

hilda (with lysithea probably): REMEMBER THE PACTS FORGED BETWEEN OUR PEOPLES LONG AGO.

cassia: stop it, it's 4 in the morning.

hilda: YOU PLEDGED ETERNAL SERVITUDE.

cassia: i did not.

hilda: IN EXCHANGE WE WOULD COME TO YOUR AID IN YOUR HOUR OF NEED.

cassia: i'm not feeding you.

hilda: REMEMBER THE PACTS.

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

annette: hey, can you do me a favor?

cassia: i’d kill for you, but go on.

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

in the garden

mercedes: annette, can you grab that hoe?

annette: *grabs cassia’s arm*

mercedes: wait, that's not what I meant...

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

flayn: hey cassia, can i go get some candy?

cassia: what did seteth say?

flayn: no.

cassia: then why do you think i’ll let you?

flayn: because seteth’s not the boss of you.

cassia, internally: it’s a trap it’s a trap it’s a trap

-----------

dorothea: if I die, my ghost is gonna haunt you!

cassia: then your ghost is going to see some disgusting stuff.

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

hubert’s support in a nutshell

hubert, in the margins of his notebook: mywife is soft nd ilikeher

hubert: my wiwwwfie wife is visiting a noble family with the empress and i miss her

hubert: MY EWFIE IS HOME MY WIFE

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

felix: see? this is my “i don’t care” face.

cassia: that’s your normal face.

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

cassia: of course, i care about everyone in this house equally!

claude: we were attacked while you were away.

cassia: is marianne okay???

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

cassia: if edelgard jumped off a cliff, would you?

hubert: *stares into the distance with a blank expression*

cassia: hubert!

hubert: well- er- i mean, it depends.

cassia: DON’T JUMP OFF A CLIFF!

hubert: well, i wasn’t planning on it.

cassia: but if edelgard did, you would!?

hubert: *stares into the distance yet again*

cassia: HUBERT!

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

lysithea: if i run and leap at cassia, she will almost certainly catch me in her arms.

lysithea: COMING IN! *runs at cassia*

cassia: NO! I’M HOLDING COFFEE!

cassia: *drops the cup and catches her*

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

leonie: why are you helping me so much?

cassia: because my life is a mess right now and i compulsively take care of other people when i don’t know how to take care of myself.

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

hubert’s support, post time-skip

dorothea, barging into the library: you two ARE having sex!

hubert: really? cassia, why didn’t you tell me? i would’ve put my book down.

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

cassia: we have fun, don’t we?

ashe: i have never been more stressed out in my entire life.

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

cassia: why are we laying on the ground?

sylvain: you got knocked down so i laid next to you so everyone would just think we were chillin’.

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

petra: i did something terrible.

cassia: it’s okay, i have a shovel.

petra: wait, what do you think i did?

cassia: it doesn’t matter, no one will ever know.

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

seteth: time for bed.

flayn: cassia says that I can stay up as long as I want, and YOU need to die.

seteth:

seteth: what the heck, cassia-

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

ingrid: i think rhea is in trouble!

cassia: alright... struggling to give a fuck, if i’m honest.

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

marianne: i made a friendship bracelet for you!

cassia: i’m not really a jewelry person.

marianne: oh, you don’t have to wear it.

cassia: no, back off, i’m gonna wear it forever.

-----------

manuela: i��m playing a new drinking game. it’s called “Every time i’m depressed, i take a drink.”

dorothea: that game exists. that’s called alcoholism.

manuela and cassia: *take a swig simultaneously*

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

during hubert’s support

cassia: i love you. you’re the best thing that ever happened to me.

hubert: i’m the best thing that’s ever happened to you?

cassia: yes.

hubert: … now i’m starting to feel a little sorry for you.

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

cassia: alright, listen up you little shits.

cassia: not you, bernadetta. you’re an angel and we’re thrilled you’re here.

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

cassia: do you ever wanna talk about your emotions, felix?

felix: no.

sylvain: i do!

cassia: we know, sylvain.

sylvain: i’m sad...

cassia: we know, sylvain.

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

cassia: since when is babysitting them my—

cassia: oh, my god, that’s exactly my job.

#i'm trying to pinpoint her personality and i finally think i've got it #so like... just a completely self indulgent long list of convos that never took place #obv these are from various different tv shows/movies/books/etc #also if anyone already used these in a similar manner - sorry also we've ascended #for everyone who knows anything about the game - i have like 10 s support routes prepared for her akljdkksj because no control thot life #THIS IS A WIP and i'll add more of these from time to time~#oc: cassia montal

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impendingfascination · 6 years ago

Text

The Terrible Future Of Christopher Pike Brings One Of The Best Star Trek Discovery Episodes This Season

Captain Christopher Pike is one of the more familiar characters in the ‘Star Trek’ lineup that we know the least about. That is, until this episode. With ‘Through The Valley of the Shadows’, Pike becomes one of Star Fleet’s greatest heroes, even if no one will ever know exactly what he sacrificed to save the future. The moment also serves to tie ‘Discovery’ a bit more to the main timeline of the show, which isn’t a bad thing for this show to do. Now if we could only figure out if we’re seeing the beginnings of the Borg or something else entirely.

Discovery travels to Boreth, the Klingon monastery world and home to the child of Voq and L’Rell. It’s where they hope to obtain a time crystal (ok, I’ll admit, I’m a little bothered by the idea of a ‘time crystal’, but I’m letting it go to the greater plot. At the very least it makes some sense there would be such a thing from a race whose home planet sounds like it should be more about time traveling than warrior’ing.) Tenavik reveals that time moves differently on the planet by revealing that he is the grown son of L’Rell and Voq, completing that storyline pretty effectively for now. He also reveals that Pike can take a time crystal if he accepts the future he is shown. And boy, what a future.

We all knew that Pike would eventually end up in a full body wheelchair, and now we know what happened. Knowing what would happen is relatively unimportant to everyone except Pike. He can choose to not let that future happen simply by walking away from the crystal. Keeping in mind that he isn’t shown that ultimately, he can be kind of happy with his fate on Talos IV, the fact that he still chooses to seal his own fate to protect the Federation says a lot. It does also kind of downplay the rest of the season for the show though. A dramatic element has been removed because we know that we are now on the path to the future we’ve already seen in the rest of ‘Star Trek’. Control will be stopped because otherwise, Pike can’t live to his own future.

I’m still a bit bothered by Michael being the center of now two galaxy-changing events, but that is the problem of a less episodic more single story driven ‘Star Trek’. With the possibility that Control might be evolving into the Borg, it would almost make some sense to throw Michael and the rest of the ‘Discovery’ crew into the future. Let the rest of this season explain the continuity errors so far, and then get rid of the need to have to explain anything else. Moving the timeline of the show would allow them to create their own additions to canon without having to worry about how it affects the past. It would also give the opportunity to have Burnham and company interact with Picard, who will be returning to the network soon. I’m not sure if this is where the show is going - The Discovery itself turns up empty about 900 years past Picard’s era in ‘Short Treks: Calypso’ so there may be something else entirely going on - but it is one way to solve one of the chief complaints of the show.

#star trek #star trek discovery #discovery #michael burnham #captain pike #christopher pike #spock #the menagerie #the cage #pike #voq #ash tyler #l'rell #sonequa martin-green #anson mount #ethan peck #shazad latif #mary chieffo

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robininthelabyrinth · 7 years ago

Text

Fic: Slaves of Destiny (ao3 link)

Fandom: Flash, Legends of Tomorrow Pairing: Barry Allen/Mick Rory Series: Flashwave Week 2018 (Destiny Series) Warnings: Discussions of suicide, non-linear narrative

Summary: He's there when Savitar makes his first kill, this strange man called Kronos.

They both travel through time - and they keep meeting again and again and again.

Must be destiny.

A/N: @flashwaveweek - Flashwave Week: Kronos/Savitar

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

The man is there when Barry - he still thinks of himself as Barry back then - makes his first kill.

(Not his first, not really - there was the one who turned to lava, the one who aged too fast, countless others who were hit just a little too hard or too fast - but the first one since what he's calling the Split.)

"Well done," the man says. He's wearing armor, toughened and used and totally inappropriate to the time period that Barry found himself in the first time the blue lightning took him back to the distant past.

Guess evil Wells was right, Barry thought bitterly when he first arrived to this period, guess all you really need to do is practice to get faster, because it's not like he did anything special to get to the blue other than run all day and all night in the vain hope that he could escape the reality of someone living his life and blaming him for the Iris they did not save.

He’d wandered away from STAR Labs one night, hopeless, looking for direction, and he’d found it in the strangest of places: a strange man in an alleyway, his hood pulled up and over his head so that his eyes could not be seen as anything other than black coals hidden in darkness, a man who told him to run until there was nothing else left in him but the running, and for lack of anything better to do, run Barry had, straight into the endless blue of ultimate speed that took him away.

And now he is here, killing the man who was known to history as being Savitar’s first victim.

It all fits, in a strange and horrible way; it is Barry (the split Barry, the scarred Barry, the not-as-good Barry) fulfilling his destiny.

This strange man in his heavy armor and a tattered cape, his helmet hiding his features? He doesn’t fit.

"Who are you?" Barry asks.

"Who are you?" the armored man responds. His voice is heavy, deep, mechanical. Very Darth Vader without the asthma. "You're new."

Barry shivers. Can this man tell what he is, a time duplicate that didn't die, a mere copy of the original? Can everyone tell?

"To the timeline," the man amends.

Barry's interest is piqued. "You're a time traveler?"

"No," the man says, voice dry as dust beneath the distortion of his helm. "Ancient India had lots of people in full-clad armor. With pulse rifles."

Barry giggles a little at that. He's aware that it sounds hysterical, but he is - he is - he's gone insane - he went back in time, suicidal, to find Savitar and defeat him no matter what the cost, a desperate effort to make the others understand that he can be of use, only to realize when he ran into the blue - Savitar's blue - that he was Savitar, but instead of rejecting it, he accepted it - he understood that this was his destiny - he committed himself to becoming Savitar - all so that he might live -

"I'm here to judge if you're a threat," the man says. "And to eliminate you if you are."

"Well, then?" Barry says, holding open his hands. He knows he is a threat. "Go ahead."

Maybe he's still a bit suicidal. He can't decide if he wants to live or to die.

(He can't decide if becoming Savitar is closer to living or to dying.)

"Speedsters can't be seen by the Eye," the man says instead. "Seems like a waste just to kill you."

"You don't think I'm a threat?" Barry demands, suddenly offended, and in a blink he's standing in front of the man, hand on the man's throat. "Of course I'm a threat! Kill me!"

The helm reveals nothing of the man inside, but Barry can feel that the man is indifferent to him and his desperate flailing actions.

"No," he says.

"Then I will kill you!"

"Why?"

Barry falters.

He only killed that first man to make the reputation for himself: the first reported victim of the God of Speed, they'd discovered (not they, not them, not Barry - that was from the memories of the other Barry, the original Barry, the one everyone still loved), and Barry'd followed the man around for days before he fully accepted the truth.

The truth: that he is Savitar.

The truth: that he was only born when Barry, the original, split himself in a desperate and ultimately futile attempt to save Iris West, who Barry, the copy, still loves.

The truth: that he must kill his love to be born.

Iris West, who he still loves.

Who he still hates.

But there is no reason to kill this man.

And Barry is not (yet) a murderer.

Barry releases him.

"You'll learn to be more ruthless," the man says, still sounding indifferent, as though the risk of his own death was not a matter of any great importance. "In time, you will learn to kill people like me - people who do nothing but stand in your way."

"Do you want me to kill you?" Barry asks, confused.

"Of course I do," the man says. "But as one slave of destiny to another, I'm sure you understand that."

He leaves, after that. Barry - no, Savitar, his name is Savitar now - lets him.

A slave to destiny.

He doesn't like the sound of that. He remembers how the future went: Savitar trapped in the speed trap, Iris dead, Barry mourning - that's how he left them. Is he doomed to run in a circle?

He can't be.

He has to try. Try to fix the mistakes of the Savitar that came before him, try to kill Iris and escape the consequences, try to live.

No matter what the cost.

He turns, and runs once again into the blue.

There are others out there he still needs to kill.

"Your colleagues are a lot less friendly than you are," Savitar says to Kronos, whose name he has since learned.

Kronos shrugs, a silent answer. He's younger than the man Savitar first met, Savitar thinks, but not by too much - it's hard to tell, when the man never removes his armor.

It's the bitterness, really. This young, he still obeys the orders of his Masters in silent resignation, rather than in endless seething hatred - though it's always there, hidden beneath.

Savitar rather prefers the overt hatred.

"Trying to kill you again, are they?" Kronos asks, almost amused.

"Indeed so."

"Idiots."

"Oh?"

"They'll figure out how you affect the timeline soon enough," Kronos says. "And then they'll want to keep you."

"They hate speedsters. You said so yourself; we mess up the timeline more than they'd like."

"As an executioner," Kronos clarifies. "You kill those who try to kill you, don't you?"

Savitar has been, but he won't anymore. He hates being manipulated and used.

Kronos knows that, though, how much he hates it. Telling him about the Masters' manipulation could itself be another trick, another manipulation, the inducement of the sought-after behavior by a true master of the art -

Savitar sniggers.

"What?"

"Just thinking of you manipulating people."

"I prefer to shoot them."

"I know," Savitar says, and his voice is fond. When did that happen? Sometime in the last dozen or so times they've met, clearly, but when exactly, and why? "You never did have patience for anyone manipulating anybody."

He's expecting affirmation: Kronos hates his Masters with a heat stronger than the burning sun, forced to play their games when he prefers to be straightforward and honest, and he is rarely silent about it.

"No," Kronos says instead, after a long pause. Too long. "Not anymore."

Savitar feels something, in a heart he thought long since dead, consumed by Iris and her other Barry.

He's pretty sure it's jealousy.

Huh.

He needs to think about this development.

So he turns and he runs.

The world goes blue.

"I had him, you know," Kronos says, his voice gruff and distorted as always.

"Just lending a hand," Savitar says, jaunty and cocky. He's got his own cult now, a corrupted monastery or three or maybe even three dozen; he doesn't actually keep count. Here in the isles they think they can save them from the fury of the Nordmann, which he can, of course.

Whether he will is a different story entirely.

Still, he enjoys the tribute.

It certainly gives him a reason to run freely through the isles, and that in turn gives him the opportunity to run through a man with a sword who was just about to stab it into Kronos' back as he dealt with another.

Yet another countless life he's saved of Kronos' - countless because if he counted them, he might have to also count the times Kronos has gone out of his way to save him, and that would just be embarrassing.

Kronos shakes his head, but Savitar can tell he's amused, even through that awful helmet he always wears.

"You're slow today," Savitar adds. "Unusually so."

Not that he cares, of course. He's a god. He doesn't care about anyone.

(He's a liar.)

Still, Kronos is a good ally, if not the only ally Savitar has; it pays to be on the alert for these things.

"My leg was shattered in half a dozen places last week," Kronos says, in the same resigned tone one might remark about a particularly horrid stretch of weather. "Still recovering full mobility."

"Don't they let you heal those up first, those Masters of yours, before sending you out on a job?" Savitar asks. Kronos likes him to be blunt and straightforward, and to ask questions about the Masters Kronos serves, which no one else does.

They watch the world through their dreadful Eye, these Masters, but they can't see a speedster, and that means, whenever Savitar comes by and is around, that they can't see Kronos, either.

A small breath of freedom.

There's nothing worth more to a drowning man.

That's why Kronos helps Savitar out when he can.

Why Savitar helps Kronos...

Well.

Kronos snorts. "Usually, yes," he says, answering Savitar's question. "But not if they're the ones that broke it."

That gets Savitar's attention. "Why?"

"Had a relapse," Kronos grunts. He means that he did something too free for his Masters' preference.

Or maybe that he remembered something he shouldn't have, something they didn't want him remembering, some emotion they didn't want him feeling.

(Kronos doesn't always remember Savitar, and it's not only because they meet earlier in his timeline.)

Savitar doesn't like it.

He likes the thought that there's nothing he can do about it even less. He's a god; he should be able to do as he pleases. He should be able to save who he pleases.

But as he's learned in the years since he began to run, he's not the only god out there.

"Are they trying to eliminate you, your Masters?" Savitar asks. "Set you up to fail and use that as an excuse to take you out?"

"No, not at all," Kronos says, and his confidence reassures Savitar. "Merely to punish me, and to mock me for my failure - which you've averted."

"Will that be an issue?"

"My Masters approve of success," Kronos says dryly. "But it does mean I'm already late to return."

Savitar steps aside, and watches Kronos go back to his jailors.

Back to his other gods.

And Savitar, too, goes running, deciding that this time he will save his foolish monks from the Nordmen they so fear, if only to distract him away from wondering if he can run so fast that he can leave behind the growing feeling of possessiveness that's curdling in his heart the way he left behind things like kindness and empathy.

Because he's finding, more and more, that he would rather be the only god in Kronos' life.

"This is a bad idea," Savitar says, his head lolling back against the filthy ancient Roman wall.

"Probably," Kronos agrees.

"Wasn't talking to you," Savitar grumbles.

"Then stop talking," Kronos says, and tightens his grip meaningfully.

Given that Kronos' heavy glove is currently wrapped around Savitar’s cock, which despite his assumed divinity remains an extremely sensitive area, Savitar opts to listen. Kronos rewards him by moving his hand faster.

Good. Savitar likes fast.

(- not like him and Iris were, all soft and sweet and slow -)

Savitar forces his mind away from that. He's not back there, with a woman who loves a man he no longer is, a man who he's just a duplicate, a copy, a badly-done Xerox and nothing more -

"I like how you spark up bluer and bluer when I do this," Kronos says. His voice is mild, easy, relaxed the way it almost never is, like the hatred that roils beneath his surface the way it does for Savitar is eased. Like he's managed, just for a minute, to forget the torment of destiny that is his existence.

All of his attention is on Savitar right now.

Savitar, and no one else.

Savitar grunts and comes hard, his hips jerking forward at an inhuman speed.

"There we go," Kronos says approvingly. "Practically turquoise; must've been a good one."

"This is such a bad idea," Savitar says again. He's a god, now, faster and faster than ever before, master of the blue. He should be alone, independent, isolated.

He should need no one.

Just like a real god.

"No harm in passing time," Kronos says with a shrug. "I like you.”

“I never understood that.”

Kronos shrugs again. “Sometimes I think I like you better than fire,” he says nonsensically. “We understand each other. And besides, like I said - no harm in passing time."

It's not that Savitar disagrees. That was why he agreed to do this the first time, and the fourth, and the fifteenth, until it's become commonplace. Savitar has a long road before him (and behind him, and to his side - constant time travel makes things a bit weird), and it's more pleasant to pass the time with company; that much is still true.

It's that he's starting to worry that it's not just passing time anymore.

"Still a bad idea," he says.

Kronos straightens up, but he doesn't say anything. He never asks for anything, though he's taken to offering, the times that he remembers Savitar. Sometimes even when he doesn't remember. But he doesn't ask.

He never asks.

His Masters have tortured that selfishness out of him.

Savitar could leave Kronos now, leave him unsatisfied and wanting, and he'd never complain.

The glove Kronos worked him over with is still stained with come.

Savitar smiles at Kronos. "Good thing I like bad ideas, then."

He goes to his knees, reaches for the stupid codpiece part of the armor; it's the only part he's ever been allowed to remove. Try to take off anything else, and Kronos goes into spasms of pain, courtesy of his Masters.

Savitar truly dislikes these Masters, even though he knows he ought to be learning from them the brutal cruelty necessary for true divinity.

(He should destroy them and take their worshipers for his own, should keep Kronos his high priest, in his bed and by his side -)

He should be alone.

But for the time being, Savitar finds himself pleased to have someone who understands.

He lowers his head to use his mouth, and wonders what it would be like to kiss his lover.

"They call me two-faced, you know," Savitar says, looking at the perfect mirror made of bronze, the height of Qin artistry. He's clad in blue, his favored color, the color of his mastery, but try as he might he cannot find a place that will construct him the armor he needs to finish his ascension. He knows what the armor looks like by heart, but where it is he does not yet know. "The Two-Faced God."

He sneers at his reflection, which he's never liked.

(was that why they rejected him, because he reminded them of an imperfect mirror?)

"Two-faced," Kronos says from where he's absently tossing a vase hand-to-hand. "Because you only keep your promises half the time?"

Savitar barks out a laugh, surprised; he turns to Kronos. "Are you blind under that armor?" he asks, gesturing to his face, to the melted burn scar that devoured half of him. "This is why."

"What, do you object or something? It's your best feature."

Savitar scoffs.

"I like scars," Kronos says. "Gives a man character."

"Half of my face is ruined, and you think it gives me character?"

"You can eat," Kronos says. "You can talk. You can still mostly see. Can hardly say it's ruined."

"I was thrown out of heaven for being an imperfect copy -"

"Yeah, yeah, and you've been running ever since," Kronos says. "I've heard your origin myth in more countries than you've even had a chance to visit yet."

He might be right, he might be wrong: hard to tell, with two time travelers who do not travel together. Even all of Kronos' computers have difficulty figuring out who is where and how old.

"It means you exist, you know," Kronos adds. "The scar."

Savitar frowns. "How's that? Of course I exist."

"Scars are left when something happens," Kronos says. He puts down the vase - it'll be worth millions a few centuries into the future, should it survive being brand new as it is now - and stands, coming over to stand by Savitar by the mirror. "It shows a time when you collided with life, and survived it. Even if you don't remember exactly what happened, your skin does."

He reaches out and touches Savitar's face.

His fingers are gentle through the roughness of his heavy glove. Kronos hasn't repaired it in some time, old and battered, and one of the fingers is so worn through that the heat of Kronos' skin bleeds through.

Savitar leans forward despite himself, chasing that phantom sensation.

"I've seen your face before," Kronos murmurs, and Savitar starts violently. He didn't know that Kronos had ever interacted with Barry. "I don’t remember when or how, but I did. It was even and neat, brown eyes both. But it was never dear to me before it got this scar."

Savitar's hands are shaking, he suddenly notices - not vibrating, the way he sometimes likes to stim, but shaking.

He wonders if the Barry Kronos met was the one whose memories he shares, the single being they were before the Split, or if he was the hated self-double that was judged to be the "right" Barry after.

"I don't always know you," Kronos continues. "But I always know this scar, no matter how long I've traveled or how short my memory, because only someone who's met life head-on the way I have would have a scar like this - and no one else would ever understand."

"He wouldn't," Savitar says, his tongue heavy in his mouth and his throat tight, and he can't say why. "He wouldn't understand you. You or me."

Barry never hated the world enough to understand how that hatred carves its signature into men like them, on men like Savitar and Kronos, never understand how it carves them up from the inside, writing itself on their very bones.

It's not that Savitar doesn't remember what it's like to want to save the world.

It's just that he also remembers what it's like to want to destroy it, and to mean it when he did.

The Two-Faced God indeed.

"No," Kronos says. "He wouldn't. Only you."

"Only me," Savitar agrees, for he is a jealous god, an only god. He swallows, trying to ease the tightness of his throat and the dryness of his mouth. "Tell me, under that armor you never remove - do you have scars?"

The ever-blank lenses that constitute Kronos' eyes seem to bore into Savitar's soul as he waits with bated breath for the answer he knows must be coming.

"Many."

Savitar jumps forward, into the blue, and takes Kronos to bed.

"I loved someone once," Kronos says as they stand by the bar.

"I bet you don't remember them," Savitar says, cruelty so natural to him now that he couldn't stop himself even if he wanted to, yet somehow his cruelty slides off Kronos' shoulders like water.

The only thing Kronos cannot abide is to be called stupid or worthless, and Savitar has never thought either one of those things about him.

"I do," Kronos says. "They let me keep that much."

"Why?" Savitar demands, knowing he sounds petulant. "I'd give anything to be free of my memories of her."

Her, yes, and him, his other self, the self everyone liked better.

The one they comforted instead of blamed.

"Rage, I think," Kronos says, his voice thoughtful. "He betrayed me; they let me keep that so that they could send me against him."

"Have they?"

"Not yet," Kronos says. "You'll know when it happens."

"Will I?"

"That'll be the oldest you'll see me," Kronos says peacefully. "That's the mission they're saving me for, the one they'll have to give me back my memories for. I don't expect to survive it."

Savitar scowls.

He downs another glass like a shot, the synthetic alcohol working it's way through his overcharged system and dissolving in a breath.

Savitar appreciates it anyway.

Sure, there might be bombs dropping every which way, but the alcohol in this era is great, and by great he means such utter piss that even he can taste it.

"They wanted to cut out everything from me but the betrayal," Kronos says thoughtfully. "But it wouldn't be a betrayal if there weren't love first."

"Suppose so," Savitar allows. "Is this your way of telling me not to kill her? It'd mean I'd never be born."

"No," Kronos says. "This is my way of telling you to make sure you don't let destiny fuck you up the ass about it."

"You're the only one I let fuck me up the ass, I promise," Savitar mocks.

Kronos reaches over and grabs Savitar's hand - quick as a wink for anyone else, yawning slow and signaled in advance for Savitar - and he crushes Savitar's fingers under his gauntlet. "Don't let yourself be caught," he says. "Don't let them beat you."

"They won't," Savitar says. "I'm a god."

"So was your predecessor," Kronos reminds him. "And he didn't end up anywhere good, did he?"

"You're such a downer," Savitar complains, so as to hide the fear that still lurks in his heart at ending up with that fate. Destiny’s last laugh in his face.

"Feelings will throw you off your track," Kronos says. "They'll throw me off mine, one day. I won't be able to look at the man I once loved and kill him the way I should; that's why it'll be the end of the line for me."

Savitar snarls at that.

"Not like that," Kronos says, because he somehow knows how to hear what Savitar means without Savitar ever saying a word. "He was my partner, my brother by oaths instead of blood. One sight of him...I'll threaten him, I'll do my best to hurt him, but I won't be able to follow through on it."

"How are you so sure?"

"Because the Masters are counting on him being the only light in my life," Kronos says. "They want that light to blind me with rage until I do what they want without thinking. But it ain't true anymore."

"What do you mean?"

"He's my guiding light," Kronos says. His hand is still on Savitar's. "But you're my god."

Savitar supposes he can accept that, if he must.

(He hates sharing Kronos.)

"You think I'm at risk of being screwed up by my feelings when I see her again?" he asks instead.

"No," Kronos says. "I think you're at risk of being screwed up by your feelings when you see him again."

Savitar bares his teeth.

"You hate him, the other you," Kronos says. "You've been waiting so long, too; you'll want to gloat. You'll make mistakes, god or no god."

"What are you trying to say?" Savitar asks.

Kronos tilts his helmet in a way that always reminds Savitar of a smirk, or of a smile with bloodless lips pulled back into a tortured grimace of agony.

Perhaps for Kronos they are the same.

"I'm saying," Kronos says, "Remember thou art mortal."

"You don't seem to be very popular," Kronos says. He's smirking, Savitar can tell even through that damned armor.

At the moment, Savitar doesn't much care.

The giant mob chasing after him is doing a good job of convincing him not to care.

Normally this wouldn't be enough to concern him - what's a mob to a god? - but there's something wrong with the land here, this wretched Mediterranean island he finds himself on, and he cannot reach the blue, his heels dragged down slower and slower as he runs ever onward away from them.

Apparently this forsaken place is significantly more developed than he realized, for all that they call their defenses after the names of archaic Greek deities.

"Popularity is overrated," Savitar says, and he's very nearly panting for air. He hates it, the reminder of his mortality - but he can't die, he hasn't even found his armor yet, though the metal he stole from the Temple of this place will do perfectly to construct it, and he still has to go forward in time to be born. This cannot be his end: his timeline has not yet even begun.

His timeline...

"Are you here to save me?" Savitar asks, drawing to a halt as his legs burn and his body feels rooted to the earth in a way it hasn't in forever. "Or to watch me die?"

Kronos snorts.

A doorway from nothingness opens over his shoulder.

Savitar looks at it. He's seen Kronos' ship before; he's even seen it cloaked, but he's never been invited on.

"Go ahead," Kronos says. "Their power to squeeze the powers out of you is bound to their Isle; the effect will fade once we're away."

"Have your Masters agreed to this?" Savitar asks, not moving. "You wouldn't let me on the ship if they haven't."

"They want me to make sure you survive this encounter," Kronos says. "The details of how are left up to me."

Savitar arches his eyebrows.

"I suspect their preferred answer would be for me to kill enough of the mob to let you get away."

Savitar smirks. "As tempting as that thought is, escape is good enough for me."

That's the problem with being part of a pantheon, he reflects as he limps onto Kronos' ship, waving jauntily to the AI, a duplicate of Gideon in the same way he's a duplicate of Gideon's creator. No matter how powerful you can be, it's still never a good idea to go up against another god on their own territory.

(He wonders if Diana knows the truth yet.)

Kronos's ship is every bit as empty and soulless as Savitar would have expected, the chains of a slave rather than the spartan freedom of a sailor, but Savitar feels better already, his speed returning to him. As they lift off and hurtle away into the timestream that Kronos navigates, he feels better still.

"So, you've got me," he jokes, draping himself on one of the less necessary-looking consoles on the bridge. "What are you going to do with me?"

Kronos is still a man, for all his fancy tech; he could never truly conquer Savitar and he knows it. But in all the time and times and tomorrows they've known each other, Savitar's never been in Kronos' bed.

He's interested in changing that.

"The Eye still can't see you," Kronos replies, his fingers moving over the controls confidently as he steers them through the time stream. He'll never be nimble and swift, not like Savitar, but he doesn't need to be. "It can only see your impact, which is why I was sent to avert your demise. Once that was averted, you're free as a bird again."

"So?" Savitar asks, marveling at how Kronos can say such things without resentment. Kronos resents only his Masters; it's one of his (few) virtues, alongside unbreakable loyalty - so long as that loyalty is won freely and without coercion. That guiding light of his won it, and never lost it, and Savitar likes to think he's won it, too. "What does that mean? Where are you planning on dropping me off?"

"I don't," Kronos says.

"What?"

"That was my last mission in the set I was assigned," Kronos says. "It's time to go back to base to refuel and rest and get new assignments."

Savitar sits up straight, understanding racing though him like lightning. "You're taking me to the Vanishing Point?"

"You did always say you wanted to see Mount Olympus," Kronos says, and pleasure curls through his voice. "Figured it'd be as good a time as any."

Kronos has been waiting for this, Savitar realizes: a chance to intervene in Savitar's timeline that is sanctioned by his Masters, a way for him to achieve his own ends even as he obeys what he must.

"Do you want me to kill them?" Savitar asks.

Kronos shudders, a spasm of pain at the very thought. "Not yet," he says. "I haven't broken the kill switch yet."

The one in his head, meant to deal out death if he turns against the Time Masters; the one that can only be destroyed when it is loosened by the demands of destiny, by the return of his memory - and that in turn is only to be found when a man crosses his own time.

Kronos will need to go after himself or another who recognizes him as himself when he is finally loosed against his true prey, and when that time comes - if Kronos is not killed as he gloomily predicts he will be, then -

The Masters should really know better than to let such a viper so close to their chests.

Savitar, who rather likes snakes, smiles.

"In that case," he says, "I would rather like a tour."

Savitar isn't impressed with the Masters.

The Time Masters, they call themselves, the pretentious assholes -

(He who calls himself a god has no room to talk.)

- but they're boring. Awful and cruel, yes, but nothing more than the basic sort of human cruelty that shows up any time someone decides that another person isn't worthy of sympathy. That another person isn't human.

Savitar is intimately familiar with the feeling.

On both sides, by now.

Either way, it turned out they wanted Kronos to report immediately, a process he'd predicted to take a few hours, so Savitar jumped into the blue and reappeared in the hallways, then slowed his run to a walk to look around. Kronos was right: put on a hood and you're indistinguishable from the rest of them. He's wandered through half of the complex already, observing greedily at first and then with less and less enthusiasm.

He's bored now.

Luckily, Kronos is exiting the chamber where he'd been giving his report. His shoulders are slumped, suggesting - not quite exhaustion, but resignation. Hatred, yes, but hatred beaten down so many times that he's almost lost hope.

Almost.

Savitar slides in beside Kronos as he walks away, watching with pleasure as Kronos' shoulders square once more. He might be a god, but he has only one true worshipper - only one who truly draws strength from his presence.

(Not like it used to be, when he was the Flash and everyone loved him. Not at all like that. Better.)

"How'd it go?" he asks lightly.

"They were pleased," Kronos says.

"This is how you look when they are pleased?"

"You can tell that they're pleased because I'm returning to my quarters rather than reporting for punishment."

Savitar snorts at that, but he's abruptly more interested in another part of what Kronos said. "Your quarters?" He smirks. "Will I get the tour? A thorough tour?"

"I want to show you something there."

"I hope it's the bed," Savitar quips.

"No," Kronos says, puzzlingly enough. "It's not."

When they get to Kronos' quarters, though, cramped and sparse as they are, there isn't really anything there but a bed, just a rather bizarre stick-like piece of furniture with pieces of wood jutting out of it. Savitar can't figure out what it's for, much less why Kronos would like to show it to him.

He's just started wondering if it's some sort of disturbing sex toy when Kronos finishes locking the door and sweeping the room for bugs or other recording devices and turns back to face him.

"What is it?" Savitar asks, nodding at the thing.

"A stand," Kronos says, moving over to stand in front of it.

"A stand?" Savitar repeats. "A stand to hold what, exactly -"

Kronos reaches up and begins to undo the clasps that hold his helmet in place.

Savitar's not slow in any respect. He gets it at once: this is where Kronos is meant to rest between jobs.

This is where he is allowed to remove his armor.

And that means -

Savitar will get to see Kronos.

To feel him, skin against skin instead of again armor.

To see those scars he knows are there.

He inadvertently vibrates with excitement like he hasn't in centuries, sending out sparks, but it doesn't matter; Kronos likes it when he does that, when he loses control, even if it's only a little bit.

Kronos removes his helmet and places it on the stand.

The back of his head is the first thing Savitar sees. Kronos is shaved bald, he notes, the white scars of old shaving nicks scattered across his head; he's older, physically, than Savitar is, but only by a decade or two. He's still physically very strong, muscular; that much is evident.

Savitar finds himself captivated by the base of Kronos' neck, and the scar that curls up from beneath his armor to rest at the nape - a scar white and red and every bit as grotesque as the melting of Savitar's face.

Kronos turns.

Savitar looks his lover in the eyes for the first time in the lifetimes upon lifetimes they have been what they are to each other.

"I know you," he blurts out, instead of commenting on the fierce eyes, or the soft mouth, or the firm jaw. "I know you!"

Kronos' eyes narrow. "You know me?"

Without the distortion of the helmet, his voice is familiar, too: deep and rough, with the same cadences that Savitar has grown accustomed to, but without the grinding mechanical sound underlying it.

"From - before," Savitar says, frantically searching his memory. It's been so long, centuries and lifetimes, and he doesn't think he knew him well, the man before him, but that face is familiar to him.

He knows him.

Kronos, who does not know himself, whose memories have been stolen by his keepers and held hostage against him, who has only the faintest memories of a life without bondage.

Savitar knows him.

No.

Not Savitar.

Barry.

Barry knows him, knew him, met him - before the split, he saw that face. It was focused and serious, just as Kronos is now, except for when it wasn't, when it was enraptured and joyous in the face of the burning flame -

"Heatwave," Savitar breathes. "Your name was Heatwave."

Kronos shudders as though he's been struck.

"Your real name was - Mick Rory, I think," Savitar continues. "You fought the Flash - you tried to burn him with your heat gun. You worked alongside -"

"Len," Kronos says, and his voice is a groan of rage and betrayal and love. "Len!"

"Leonard Snart," Savitar agrees. "Captain Cold."

Kronos sucks in a harsh breath, rocking forward, gloved hands going to his chest as if he's been stabbed. "Yes," he whispers. "Yes, I did."

"Do you remember what happened?" Savitar asks, curious.

Kronos looks up, then, and Savitar does not know if it is love or hate that shines in his eyes. "Yes," he says again. "I remember everything."

Savitar hesitates, suddenly - not shy, never shy, he's a god, after all, but feeling strangely wrong-footed. "Is that good?"

"Would you be who you truly are if you didn't remember?" Kronos asks.

"No," Savitar says slowly. "I suppose not."

That wasn't what he meant, though.

But Kronos hears the unspoken question, and he smiles - a smile, a smirk, an expression after centuries of reading nothing but body language - and he reaches out to Savitar. "I might be myself again," he says, and his voice is low and intent and certain. "But you're still my god."

Savitar's shoulders give way in - he wouldn't name it relief, would never admit to it, but that's what it is.

"Like you better even than fire," Kronos adds, something he's said before but never meant the way he means it now and that's it, the rest of that armor's coming off now.

Just because Savitar is a god doesn't mean he can't do some worshipping of his own.

(After all, their destiny is coming for them: this may yet be the last time he has a chance to.)

After that, of course, the Masters have no choice but to send Kronos on his final mission, aimed as a weapon against his younger self and his old partner; they had drawn it out as long as they could, but with the key of his memories unlocked, they had to send him to war before his rage died down enough to let him think.

Savitar could have gone with him, if he wanted: he could have helped him succeed the one mission his Masters most expect for him to fail.

But Savitar is a jealous god.

He does not like to share.

He stays at the Vanishing Point instead, looking to see if there's a way for him to murder the Masters and destroy all that they hold dear.

It's only hours later by his reckoning that Kronos returns, stripped of his armor and his defenses, and he wears the name Mick Rory again like an ill-fitting coat.

"We've improved the chair since the last time you've gone in it," one of the Masters crows as they tie him down. "This time, there will be nothing left behind. You will not escape our bindings again."

So Kronos has escaped their bindings.

How interesting.

Savitar kills the Master where he stands.

Kronos smiles at him from the chair.

"My god," he says, and means it.

He's still Savitar's Kronos, then.

"Get back your armor," Savitar suggests, nodding at the stand waiting at the side of the room. "You might need it."

He watches Kronos rush off with a smirk.

He watches -

Well.

It's a good thing he's a speedster.

It's a good thing he's a god.

Not that that fact seems to bother Leonard Snart none.

"You hurt him and I'll kill you," Snart wheezes, the time radiation of the Oculus just at the moment it was starting to explode reacting strangely to the blue that Savitar pulled him through. Savitar thought he got him away in time, immediately before the explosion, but now he's not so sure. Snart's eyes are filmed over, swirling Oculus blue, but regardless he's still got a decent glare.

"You hurt him first, you know," Savitar points out, amused by the ordering of Snart's priorities. Snart hadn't even checked himself for injuries before he'd gotten into his shovel talk.

"He forgave me," Snart says with dignity. "Eventually. And anyway, he's my partner. Who's going to stand up to his god if not for me?"

Savitar frowns.

"Partner," Snart reminds him. "Best friend. Of course he told me."

"Did he tell you who I am?"

"I got a name, yeah," Snart says, purposefully obtuse.

"I meant -" Savitar gestures at his face.

"What, the scar? He always liked scars."

"You're not this stupid."

Snart scowls at him.

...maybe not purposefully obtuse.

"Can you see me?" Savitar asks. "Can you see - anything?"

"I see plenty," Snart says, which probably means he's blind as a bat and bluffing. "More than I'd like, that's for sure. And if you're talking about your resemblance to Barry Allen, come off it; you're nothing alike, even if you were once."

No, not stupid at all.

"I'm going to destroy him or he's going to kill me," Savitar says, wondering how Snart will react to that. He'd rather liked Barry Allen, Savitar recalls, and it'd been mutual. "Barry Allen, I mean. One or the other, and if I don't try, I'll never get born. No way out - any way you look at it, I'm destiny's bitch."

Snart looks at him, eyes swirling blue, and says, "I wouldn't be so sure about that."

Savitar's shaken. He doesn't know why, but he'd swear those words weren't Snart's.

Or at least, not just Snart's.

Not anymore.

"Besides, it's doesn't matter; nothing's going to happen anytime soon. I don't even have my armor yet," he demurs. "It's not like I can go do what I want to do anyway."

Snart smirks.

"If I say I know a guy -"

"We'll be even," Savitar agrees. He doesn't know why he trusts Snart with finding something he's been searching for without luck for so long, but he does. "Your life for my armor."

"Good," Snart says, so full of confidence that he seems almost certain. "I'll get you that armor of yours, just the way you've always seen it in your dreams. Then we take care of you, take care of Mick, and when that's all done, I need to see a man about a book."

"Aren't you blind now?"

"Don't worry," Snart says. "So is he."

The albino who gave Savitar the armor smiled sadly as he did, murmuring something about wishing his siblings would stay the same for longer and something also about starting a trend, but anyway by that point Savitar isn't listening because the armor is perfect.

Better than anything insipid old Barry could dream of, that's for sure.

The blue comes even easier now, practically leaping to his command. He visits a dozen of his old stomping grounds, missing his former self by seconds, and roars out his name: his followers beam, grateful to see the true face of their god, even if only for a second.

The entire process takes less than fifteen minutes.

Oh, yes, Savitar likes this armor.

With it in place, with Kronos gone and hidden beneath the skin of Mick Rory - whatever Snart might say, Savitar still feels like he's lost him - Savitar goes to fulfill his destiny.

Central City at last.

He finds acolytes - he always does, wherever he goes - and some of them have truly unusual powers, this being Central City and all. He uses them to get Team Flash's attention, dancing on the faultlines of the timeline caused by his former self.

He goes to spy on them, his former self and her, and as he does he remembers how much he hates them.

Both of them.

(He still loves her, in his own way, but she has to die for him to be born and Savitar likes his life too much to just give up and accept non-existence - and anyway she would've been like just the rest, picking the clean-faced Barry over him.)

An interesting effect develops: this close to his past self, his memories begin to change, altered by his own interaction with himself.

Becoming the Savitar he remembers fighting.

(Becoming the Savitar he remembers losing to.)

And in the end –

In the end, Kronos was right.

Savitar lets hatred blind him, and weaken him, and he fails.

He fails.

He should have remembered how good he used to be at beating the odds, even when destiny itself said otherwise.

No.

Not how good he used to be.

How good Barry used to be.

Not Savitar.

Savitar’s just the copy, the wrong one, and maybe they all figured that out from the very beginning, that there was something missing in him, and that’s why they rejected him, rather than just for his burned out face.

Maybe that’s why he’s never had a real choice in all the things he’s done.

Maybe that’s why he never had a real chance.

Maybe that’s why all his desperation to stay alive, all of the terrible things he’s done, all the centuries he’s live, and the one person he thinks he might have loved were all for nothing – all for nothing more than being a learning experience for Barry fucking Allen and his charmed fucking life.

Destiny’s slave.

Destiny’s bitch.

Iris lifts her gun and fires at him from the back, and he hears her, he does, and he’s fast enough to outrun any bullet but maybe he shouldn’t, maybe he should just let it happen, maybe the bullet in his head will make up for his failure to do what he needed to do and stop the non-existence which he can already feel tearing at his heels –

“No, I don’t think so.”

Savitar finds himself unable to move.

That’s a first.

No one else seems to be able to move, either, but Savitar’s pretty sure he’s the only one who’s actually noticing it happening.

“Are you really sure about this one?” the voice continues, sounding doubtful.

“Yes, you asshole,” another voice says, warm and amused, and this time Savitar knows that voice, even though he only heard it without the distortion a few times. “I’m sure.”

Kronos.

Savitar finds himself free to move again, though the world around him remains frozen, and he turns to look.

Kronos is standing there, dressed in jeans and a grey shirt that suits him somehow better than the old armor ever did, and by his side stands Leonard Snart, who is holding in his hands – of all things – a book.

No measly paperback, either: this is one of those grand old tomes that you see in movies, old and massive and dusty. And, for some bizarre reason, it is attached at the spine to a chain that trails from the book to Snart’s wrist.

“…new fashion accessory?” Savitar guesses.

Snart barks a laugh. “Never mind,” he says to Kronos. “I like him.”

“I thought you might,” Kronos says, sounding satisfied. Sounding like Kronos, the way he always had, not like the Mick Rory Savitar feared he had lost him to be. “Well, Savitar?”

Savitar arches his eyebrows. “Well, what?”

“Will you stay or will you go?” Snart asks, voice sing-song, smirk on his lips, but the smirk dies quickly enough. “Seriously. Your choice.”

Savitar doesn’t understand.

“You can come with us and live,” Kronos clarifies. “Or you can stay and die.”

“That seems like a straightforward choice.”

“It isn’t,” Kronos says, and his face is serious. “You’ve been destiny’s slave all your life, running on a circular track that you had to run, running along on a hamster wheel because if you didn’t you wouldn’t be born, but what you got for losing your freedom was security. Certainty. You knew you were on the road you needed to go on because there wasn’t any other way you could go – sure, you could fiddle around and chance the details, but your torment was always going to be to run this race a million times over and find no other exit.”

He’s not wrong, Savitar knows. His own memories have come back to him now, stolen away from him as surely as Kronos’ old Masters stole his from him: this is not the first time he has run this race.

He was Savitar before, and he was Savitar after, and it was only because Barry Allen made different choices that the result was different. That’s what it was all about, in the end; Barry Allen learning his lesson and making things better for himself.

It was never about him at all.

A slave of destiny indeed.

“That’s the choice,” Kronos says. “You’ve been running a long time, Savitar. You’re tired, you’re angry, and you’ve been fueled by hate for so long you don’t know what else there is. You turn around now, there’s a bullet waiting for you, and it’ll give you the rest you’ve not-so-secretly wanted since the very beginning. Or –”

“Or?”

“You keep running,” Snart says. “But this time, you run without the guardrails. No more hamster wheel, no more circular track, no more certainty. This here’s the exit ramp of free will, and what lies beyond is entirely up to you, for better or for worse.”

Savitar takes a step back, involuntary. “That’s impossible. My destiny –”

“Don’t talk to me of destiny,” Snart scoffs. His eyes glow blue under his silly fluffy parka hood, pulled up until it shadows over his face. “I know everything there is to know about destiny. Destiny’s a thief and always has been, stealing away at people’s lives to try to make them run like clockwork when they ought to run free, making the patterns that seem like they have a purpose when purpose is nothing more than something we decide upon. The world ticks on until the end and the patterns of destiny are lies we tell ourselves, and there’s no better liar than a thief.” He smiles, harsh and proud. “There are no strings on me but those I choose, and this one –” He shakes his wrist, the chain sounding against itself. “– this one, I think, will suit me just fine for quite some time.”

Savitar doesn’t understand, but he doesn’t think he has to.

He has a choice to make.

A choice that should be easy, except it’s not: he’s wanted to die for so long that it became what he lived for, his motivation and reason. Kronos isn’t wrong; he’s been running on hatred since the beginning, hatred for the life that was stolen from him, hatred for the birth that he never asked for. He’d have to give that up, if he wants to live; give up that hatred that spurred his heels for so long.

He’d have to find a new reason to live.

“So if I accept,” he says slowly. “If I accept, I – live. And I’m free.” He swallows, his eyes skittering over to Iris’ frozen face, which has no sympathy, no pity, no love, nothing but determination. Putting down a rabid dog, for all she cares; she won’t even remember him in a few months after the next big crisis. “Free - but alone.”

“Not quite,” Kronos says, and Savitar looks at him. Kronos smiles, a crooked thing. “Not quite alone, if you don’t want to be. You’re still my god.”

“I failed,” Savitar points out.

Kronos shrugs. “What about me suggests I want a god that’s perfect?”

Savitar feels a hysterical giggle rise up in his throat.

(Just like at the beginning.)

“Yes,” he says, before he can regret it. “Yes. I’ll live. I’ll go with you. I’ll – I’ll figure it out, what it is I’m going to do now, and I’ll figure it out for myself. Not destiny, not anymore.”

“No,” Kronos says, holding out a hand. “Not destiny. Freedom.”

Savitar takes his hand, and Kronos leads him into the blue.

“This is a bad idea,” Savitar laughs, pressing his lover against a dirty tavern wall, somewhere in ancient Egypt.

“I keep telling you,” Kronos says, mock-sincerely, “Hollywood taught me many things –”

“Now that’s a world-ending statement if I’ve ever heard one.”

“Shut up, you’re just bitter what’s-her-name wouldn’t give you an autograph.”

“Her name is Lena Turner, and she’s perfect,” Savitar says. “And I didn’t want an autograph!”

“Uh-huh. Sure.”

“I got a kiss on the cheek. That’s better.”

“Pity kiss.”

“Was not.”

“Was so, but that’s not the point –”

“The point is that I think those handful of years you spent with the Legends before coming back to me have gone to your head.”

“They have not. The point is that, according to Hollywood, there’s got to be something worth seeing inside those big old pyramids.”

“Yeah – dead people!”

“Dead people who, when alive, saw themselves as gods on earth. Like someone else I can think of, maybe?”

“I’ve grown as a person since then,” Savitar sniffs. “I’m older, wiser, more mature –”

“So you are going to help me break into a pyramid to fight some mummies.”

“Yes, of course I am,” Savitar says. “Do you really think I’m going to miss a chance to get laid in the resting place of a god on earth?”

Kronos snorts. “Older and wiser, huh?”

Savitar grins. “What can I say? I’m a jealous god; I don’t tolerate any rival.”

“Yeah, you are,” Kronos says, and his voice has gone soft. “Older, yes; wiser, no; but one thing’s for sure: you’re my god.”

Savitar kisses his lover for the hundredth time that day – it may grow old, at some point, but it hasn’t yet – and takes him by the hand. “Yes,” he says. “And you’re mine, and together we are both free. And now –”

He grins.

“- let’s go fight some mummies.”

In an dark alleyway in the middle of Central City, a man is standing in the darkness, ready to do his duty. He is in his middle years, that ageless time between thirty and sixty, and his shoulders are slumped as if he is very tired. His hood is pulled up over his head, casting his face into shadow, and his blind eyes are black coals hidden in the darkness.

Another man steps out behind him and taps him on the shoulder.

The first man turns his head.

“I think,” the second man says with a smirk and a drawl that suggests that he was born in the slums of this very city, his eyes just as blind but an unearthly blue, “that I’m going to take over from here.”

They watch as a third man – younger, in his twenties, and lithe as a sprinter – staggers out from the large building, his face in his hands as if he could hide the terrible scar that marked one side of it. His shoulders heave as though he is ill, but the illness is all within him: the isolation, the rejection, all crystalizing into hatred.

“Run,” the first man tells the newcomer when he falls into the alley. “Run until there’s nothing left of you but the running.”

“Run,” the second man echoes, but he stands behind the first man and the newcomer cannot see him. “Run until you are free.”

The newcomer shakes himself and rises up straight and turns and runs.

There is a crackle of blue lightning, and he is gone.

“Blue?” the first man asks. It hadn’t been blue the first time around, not until the young runner picked up the armor from a terrible far-future world that died shortly after he visited it.

Last time, it’d been black.

The second man shrugs. “I like blue,” he says.

“In my story, he comes back and kills the girl,” the first man says, conversationally. “Only to be trapped within the vortex of speed itself forever. Or maybe he doesn’t, and his death comes here, to the end of the circle, to meet him before he ever starts.”

“That’s nice,” the second man says. “In mine, he doesn’t. In mine, at the end, he runs free.”

“Someone will pay the price for that.”

“Let them,” the second man says. “I have faith that Barry Allen will find his way out in time.”

“Faith,” the first man says musingly. “There can be no faith where there is only what is already written.”

“No, there can’t be,” the second man says. “But I never much liked reading ahead anyway – and anyway, he’s dating my best friend, and for him I’ll do anything, even this.”

“That must be nice,” the first man says. He is about to speak, but then he pauses. He realizes. “I don’t know what happens next.”

He sound excited.

This is the first time that has happened in a long time.

The second man smiles – not a smirk, a smile, touched with sympathy and just enough ruthlessness that he will manage to survive this task he has taken upon himself. “This is where part ways,” he says. “I stay here, to watch over things, and you? You go visit your sister.”

“Yes,” the first man says. “I think I will.”

“One last thing first.”

They both turn as one to look behind them.

Blue lightning flashes, and two men appear: a god-on-earth with his face half-ruined, his loyal servant with burns along his shoulders. They stand together, laughing, shaking their heads, and they walk off together, human-slow, their hands intertwined.

The circle is complete.

The end comes, but it does not take the god; instead, the first man steps forward in his place, and disappears into a puff of dust that smells faintly of old books.

The second man looks upon the two lovers.

And he smiles.

“I love it when a plan comes together.”

#flashwave #flashwaveweek2018 #mick rory #barry allen #leonard snart #my fic

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