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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 12 days ago

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In The Gloomy Depths [Chapter 6: Bloodstone]

Series summary: Five years ago, jewel mining tycoon Daemon Targaryen made a promise in order to win your hand in marriage. Now he has broken it and forced you into a voyage across the Atlantic, betraying you in increasingly horrifying ways and using your son as leverage to ensure your cooperation. You have no friends and no allies, except a destitute viola player you can’t seem to get away from…

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), parenthood, dolphins, death and peril, violence (including domestic violence), drinking, smoking, freezing temperatures, murder, if you don’t like Titanic you won’t like this fic!!! 😉

Word count: 6.1k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Tagging: @nightvyre @mrs-starkgaryen @gemini-mama @ecstaticactus @chattylurker, more in comments 🥰

💎 Only 1 chapter left!!! 💎

You must not have heard him correctly. Down by the bow, third-class passengers are still laughing as they kick pieces of ice back and forth. Children who have been shaken awake are giggling as they dash around in their worn, patched coats. On the Promenade Deck, tycoons and aristocrats are flagging down stewards to fetch them fresh drinks. There is no more humming of the ship’s engines, although no one else seems to have noticed; they have quit and will never work again. In a few hours, they will be resting on the bottom of the North Atlantic Ocean. It’s just barely April 15th, and half the passengers aboard won’t live to see the sunrise.

Kill Daemon??

You’ve never even hit anybody, not unless they struck you first. “I can’t kill someone.”

“Yes you can,” Aegon insists. His tone is urgent; there isn’t much time left. “And you won’t have to do it alone. Like I said, I’ll help you.”

A drop in your stomach, a chill down your spine, wide-eyed primal fear like a prey animal’s. “Even if I wanted to, Daemon can’t be killed.”

“He’s not a monster. He’s just a man. He has blood and organs just like we do. I promise you, if we cut him he’ll bleed.”

“He’ll hurt me,” you whimper. “He’ll know what I’m trying to do and he’ll break my neck or push me overboard. You don’t know him, he’s…he’s…he’s relentless, he’s cunning—”

“We can have what we want,” Aegon says, grabbing your face with his hands, fingertips callused from years of playing viola on streets, in pubs, in small rented rooms, on the decks of ships. “We can leave Titanic together. We can stay with my family for a while in New York, and then we’ll go back to Ireland so you can be with yours, and when my father dies we’ll spend half the year in England and the other half with your parents, and you’ll get to keep Draco, and Daemon will never touch you again. You’ll be free, Petra. And you deserve that. But no one is going to give it to you. You have to fight for it.”

Is it possible? Is it really? You imagine having breakfast with your parents in Lough Cutra Castle, the table full: you, Aegon, Draco, Fern, everyone smiling over plates of fried eggs, bacon, beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, and white pudding, cups of tea breathing steam into the cool morning air. Are you willing to fight for that? Are you willing to murder? At last you say: “Daemon isn’t the only problem.”

“Who else?” Aegon asks, demanding, impatient, though his hands are gentle. “Rhaenyra? And the old woman, right? Draco’s governess. Dagmar.”

“And Daemon’s bodyguard Edward Rushton, we call him Rush. He carries a pistol.”

“Okay.” Aegon nods, his eyes distant, his thoughts whirling like Titanic’s colossal propellers once did and never will again. You know he’s devising a plan. We only have an hour or two.

“Aegon…I have to get Draco into a lifeboat first.”

“Right.” He kisses you, a quick brush across your cheek like a dusting of snow, and you think: I can’t lose him. “Over a thousand passengers are going to die tonight. Let’s make sure four of them are people who deserve it.” Then he takes your hand and together you descend the steps to B-Deck.

~~~~~~~~~~

Scarlet fever is named for the distinctive rash that marks its victims, tiny red dots like blood blisters, so itchy they are soon scratched raw, raised bumps of braille in the shape of ominous omens, corporal constellations of bad stars. Dagmar was reminded of them the first time she ever saw bloodstone, a dark green crystal freckled with red, a pendant that Dameon sent her from across the world where he was opening a new mine in Australia.

Valentin was the first one to get sick. He was the youngest, the only boy, and while perhaps mothers are not supposed to have favorites Dagmar knew in her bones that she did. She held him—three years old, white-blonde hair, loud and wild—as he grew quiet and weak and hot with fever, and then he was gone. After Valentin was Juni, and then Karin, and then Mikele, and finally Gunnar, a lumberman who worked hard and never complained, not even when he was dying of kidney failure. Dagmar was once a woman with four children and a husband, but then she was no one, untethered to the earth, unmoored from everything that had been, and people left adrift in the ocean are likely to drown and spend eternity in the crushing, sunless abyss.

She wandered for a while, too old to fathom a new life, too young to simply wait to die herself, and of course suicide is a sin. To keep from starving she took jobs as a governess; the only thing Dagmar knew how to do was raise children, and she was good at it. With each new household she found herself searching for Valentin’s eyes and hair and spirit, for a child that could make her believe he was alive again. But none of the temperate, blue-blooded little boys or girls of England—where Dagmar had fled to escape the memories of her homeland—came close to filling his footsteps, his handprints, the hemorrhaging puncture wound he left in her chest.

Then one brutally cold winter, Dagmar was referred to the 8th Duke of Beaufort Baelon Targaryen, deep in mourning for his wife Alyssa who had recently perished in childbirth and at a loss to handle his two sons. Viserys, the heir, was already eight years old and too set in his ways to ever see Dagmar as a mother. But Daemon, only four—so much like Val, Dagmar had thought as she lifted him from the floor—was sad and needy and vicious, furious at the world for stealing his mother from him, and this was something Dagmar could understand. She became his new mother. He became her reason for living.

Daemon grew up, as all children do if they are not preserved forever in youth by untimely deaths, and Dagmar drifted away to other castles and mansions, other families, other attempts to silence the ghosts that rattled doors and windows as she slept. But no one could replace Daemon, and each time she received a letter or a gift from him—photographs from his mining expeditions, bracelets and hair combs, taxidermied foreign beasts—Dagmar would write him a thank you note and always include the same postscript: Daemon my dear, my brave rogue prince, it would be the greatest joy of my life to one day help look after your own child. And at last, when Draco was born he summoned her, and little Valentin was alive once again.

Now unlike Daemon, Draco did have a mother, but she was young and easily managed, inexperienced with babies, eager to please her husband. Daemon was so sage and charismatic and renowned, and she faded into his shadow until all her colors were gone and she was black and white like a photograph, never knowing what to do or say, staring inanely from doorways. This was just fine as far as Dagmar was concerned. She could pretend that Daemon’s wife was dead like poor Alyssa Targaryen.

Here on Titanic, the baffling shockwave yanked Draco out of his dreams. He’s crying, soft disoriented whines, and Dagmar soothes him and reads him The Little Mermaid and tells Fern—also awakened by the shudder and now pacing restlessly around the staterooms—to make some tea. Just as Draco is finally dozing off again, there is a loud knock at the front door. Dagmar brings Draco out into the sitting room, leading him by one of his tiny pawlike hands, to find Fern speaking to a steward who will not come inside any farther than the doorway, as if he is in a hurry. Fern, puzzled, is clutching the white lifebelts he has given her.

The steward is explaining: “I’m sure it’s just a precaution, ma’am—”

“It’s not a precaution,” Daemon’s wife says as she sweeps into the room, and for some reason there is a man with her, a blonde man in a black wool coat. Immediately, Dagmar’s blood turns to dark viscid poison. What is she doing? Why can’t she disappear? “Thank you,” Daemon’s wife tells the steward briskly. “I’m sure you have other rooms to visit. You should be on your way.”

The steward is evidently too busy to be offended. He retreats into the hallway and vanishes, and the strange blonde man shuts the door behind him. Dagmar scrutinizes the intruder, and he glares back at her with eyes like deep water, a murky melancholy blue. He’s the same man she saw on the Boat Deck, the one who reminded her so much of Viserys when he was young, that solemn, grieving boy she could not coax into loving her.

Why can’t Daemon’s wife just die? Why should she live when so many have been lost? Why would God judge her more worthy than Valentin, Juni, Karin, Mikele, Gunnar?

“What’s going on?” Fern asks Daemon’s wife, her voice reedy and timid.

Instead of an answer, there is a question in return: “Is anyone else here?”

“No,” Fern says, perplexed. “Why? What’s happened?”

Daemon’s wife holds out an empty hand, not to Fern but to Draco, who Dagmar is still grasping with bony fingers gnarled by arthritis. She says: “Draco, please come with me.”

“Why?” he asks, but he has already taken a step towards her, tiny bare feet. Dagmar does not surrender him. She will not, she cannot. He stops when his arm is fully extended and then looks back to his governess, his surrogate mother, his pale eyes full of doubt.

“We have to go somewhere,” Daemon’s wife says. She is still reaching for him. “Draco, please. I need you to listen to me, we don’t have much time.”

“No,” Dagmar sneers. “You don’t know how to take care of him. You never have.”

“Can I go?” Draco asks softly, and Dagmar pretends she has not heard him.

“Draco,” Daemon’s brainless young wife pleads. Her eyes flick up to Dagmar’s, and there is a moment of terrible understanding between them, as if they are mirror images: neither can try to force him without driving him into the embrace of the other. He is not a child who is easily tamed; he is a wolf, he is a dragon.

“Dagmar?” Draco says, peering up at her, and he’s asking for permission but in another minute he might be stomping his feet and screeching loud enough for the entire hallway to hear.

Dagmar glances at the lifebelts Fern is gripping tightly. What’s wrong with the ship? Is it sinking? But no, Dagmar cannot believe this. Titanic is unsinkable; everybody in the world knows that. She tells the boy: “She’ll take you away from me. She’ll steal you. But she won’t keep you safe and warm and happy like I would.”

“I’m your mother,” Daemon’s wife tells Draco, and now her voice is choked and there are tears glittering in her desperate eyes. The blonde man looks at her like he would carry the weight of her anguish if he could, every last pound. Who is he? Why is he here? “I know it might not feel that way sometimes, but I am. And I love you more than anything. I would never hurt you. I’m trying to protect you. Draco, I need you to come with me right now.”

And horribly, unthinkably, he yanks his little hand out of Dagmar’s. She claws for him and he spins around to face her. “No!” Draco shouts. “I decide! Me! Not you!” She is stunned into silence. She watches him careen across the sitting room, and Daemon’s wife scoops him up as if he belongs to her. She holds him for a while, a minute or more, before she sets him down on the floor and quickly helps Draco get his socks and shoes on. The boy does not complain. Then she lifts him again and—with what appears to be great effort—passes him to Fern, who while bewildered accepts this task, now carrying both the boy and the lifebelts. Daemon’s wife grabs all the coats hanging from the coat rack and piles them into Fern’s already full arms.

“Fern, take him upstairs to the Boat Deck. Get to a lifeboat, do not wait. They will be launching them soon if they haven’t started already.”

“Lifeboats?” Fern repeats, blinking, stymied.

“Yes,” Daemon’s wife says, and she and the maid share a long, silent, meaningful look. Draco gazes worriedly around the room, gnawing on his fingernails. The blonde man watches Dagmar, his expression severe, hateful.

Fern asks: “How much time until Titanic…?”

“An hour or two. You won’t be in the lifeboat for long, a ship called Carpathia is en route. But she’s not close enough.”

“Oh,” the maid exhales numbly. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph…”

“Stay with Draco. Don’t leave him for a second. Get into a lifeboat, keep him warm, wait for Carpathia. I’ll follow you as soon as I can, but…there are some things I have to do first.”

“Like what, ma’am? What could be so important? You shouldn’t wait either.”

Instead of answering, she says, low like a dire warning: “If you happen to see them, do not speak to Daemon, Rhaenyra, or Rush. Don’t tell them what’s going on.”

“Yes ma’am,” Fern replies quietly, and nods like she suddenly understands. She takes Draco and hurries out of the room. Now Dagmar is alone with them: Daemon’s idiotic little girl of a wife, her inexplicable companion.

“This ship can’t sink,” Dagmar says; but is the floor tilting? She has only just noticed it.

“Of course it can,” Daemon’s wife counters. “Any ship can. I kept telling everyone how terrified I was of the voyage and you all treated me like I was insane. But I was right. I wasn’t a coward and I wasn’t stupid. And you can’t make me believe that I am anymore.”

Dagmar is about to reply—something cutting, something cruel—but then her steely Scandinavian eyes snag on the stranger and all at once it hits her like a man’s knuckles. She gasps, shocked, ferocious. Aegon. Viserys’ son. A villain, a traitor, an unworthy beneficiary of a grand inheritance. “I know who you are. How the hell did you get here?”

The man grins menacingly. “Fortune brought me a ticket. Best luck I’ve ever had.”

Dagmar screams, hoping he will hear her: “Daemon?!”

Aegon lunges, catches her around her long thin waist, wrestles her towards the door to the private promenade deck. Dagmar isn’t strong, but she is fierce; she scratches at his eyes and bites his hands when they try to smother her howls. They stumble together through the doorway and out onto the pine planks, knocking over lightweight wicker furniture. When her teeth close around Aegon’s fingers, Dagmar tastes blood like warm copper.

“A window!” Aegon is telling Daemon’s wife, but she’s already there after slamming the door to the sitting room shut, franticly turning the hand crank under the nearest window. The glass opens, and freezing night air pours in.

They’re trying to kill me, Dagmar realizes. They’re going to throw me overboard.

She jabs a bony elbow into Aegon’s throat, and he collapses to the deck, wheezing and helpless.

“Daemon!” Dagmar shrieks again. If he hears me, he’ll save me. My savior, my son. “Help!”

But it’s his wife who arrives instead. She collides with Dagmar, strikes her with two open palms, shoves her through the window. Dagmar’s hipbone cracks against the windowsill, a dry brittle snap, and then she tumbles out into the darkness.

Her last thought as she sees the stars—before she hits the frigid water and is knocked unconscious, then dragged under by the merciless weight of gravity—is that if they were red they would look like the dots on the skin of a child with scarlet fever, like the crimson flecks in a bloodstone.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Oh my God, I…we…” You stare down into the black waves that swallowed her so effortlessly, a flash of her long silver hair as it came undone and then nothing. “She’s gone. She’s really gone. We killed her. We’re murderers.”

In reply, Aegon coughs and gasps for air, still crawling around on the deck. You run to him and help him stand up.

“Thanks,” he croaks.

“Are you alright? What can I do?”

“I’ll be fine,” he rasps. “Just need a minute.”

You look down to see blood dripping from his fingers, thick beads of crimson like teardrop-shaped rubies, like oil paint. You ache for him, you feel his pain as if it is your own. “Your hands, Aegon, your hands…”

“I’m okay,” Aegon assures you, smiling. “The bitch chewed me up, but I’ll live.”

“I want to save your paintings,” you say. “We can’t let them go down with the ship. We’ll take them to the Boat Deck and give Fern your portfolio, make sure she and Draco get safely into a lifeboat, and then…then we’ll…” We’ll finish what must be done. We’ll free you and me and Draco.

Aegon is nodding as he rubs his throat, already bruising. “Any idea where Rush might be? The guy with the gun?”

Before you can answer, you both hear it: the sound of a door swinging open and heavy footsteps inside.

~~~~~~~~~~

He likes that Daemon calls him Rush. It’s better than Eddie, which is who he was when he was a boy being kicked and backhanded by his stepfather, and laughed at by the other kids at school for not having shoes to wear. Now he is someone brand new, and that boy Eddie could be a character in a book or a song, vaguely familiar but not real.

Daemon has never hit Rush, never even threatened him. He has never stolen his laborers’ promised wages or cornered maids to violate them, impregnate them, ruin their lives. He goes into the mines he opens and periodically travels the world to inspect, descending into clouds of dust and chipping gemstones from the walls with his own tools. He is kind to his son Draco. He is brave, he is brilliant, he knows how to have a drink with working men and captivate them with his stories. Rush would do anything for Daemon, who saved him from a life of obscure, powerless poverty. He would overlook any number of sins.

Rush gusts into the bedroom and sets about gathering up valuables and stuffing them into a suitcase: business correspondence, jewelry, sketches of designs, bundles of cash from the safe. Daemon will regret having to leave the taxidermied tiger head, but it’s simply too large and heavy to bring with them. Rush hasn’t located Daemon and Rhaenyra yet, but this isn’t so unusual; they are always sneaking around, evading being found purely for the sake of it, the deception, the thrill, ravaging each other in ever more inventive places. God knows where they were when Titanic struck the iceberg, or if they are aware of the impending sinking. Rush is not panicking yet; there’s still time, though perhaps not too much of it. With each passing minute, the ship lists further towards the starboard side. He is just about to get Daemon’s dagger from the writing desk when he hears the door open to the private promenade deck. Rush turns to see Lady Targaryen peeking in from the threshold, pale blue dress, white coat.

He has never felt any loyalty to her. She is a thoughtless, mollycoddled girl, raised in a castle with parents who loved her, and what would she know of what the world was like for everyone else? Daemon only roughed her up when she deserved it, when there was no other way to make her listen, and never too badly: no split bones, no scars. In Rush’s opinion, it was just enough to give her a taste of adversity.

He sighs. “Well, unless you plan on drowning or freezing to death tonight, you might as well follow me up to the Boat Deck. I’m just here to collect some things. They’re only putting women and children in the lifeboats now, but I’m sure first-class men won’t be far behind.”

She says nothing, only watches him from the doorway. The old witch Dagmar isn’t here; she must have already taken the boy to the highest level of the ship, where affluent passengers are waiting impatiently and still in denial that Titanic will soon disappear beneath the waves, asking stewards to fetch them drinks and cigars, calling out song requests to the string quartet.

“You wouldn’t happen to have seen Daemon or Rhaenyra, I assume?”

“I thought they were with you.”

“No,” Rush says, smirking. “I seem to have lost track of them. They’re not in either of their staterooms. But don’t fear. Daemon is more than capable of looking after himself. He’ll turn up soon enough.” Perhaps I missed them up on the Boat Deck; it was crowded, it was chaos. Perhaps Daemon is already helping Rhaenyra into a lifeboat, his large rough hands steadying hers as she steps inside. He would save her first.

“I’ll help you pack the valuables,” Lady Targaryen says suddenly, and starts towards Daemon’s writing desk.

“Just keep out of the way,” Rush snaps; and then he sees something and stops dead.

A painter’s easel has slid halfway out from beneath the bed as the floor tilts. This is a peculiar enough item, but the paper clipped to it is stranger. The image is of Lady Targaryen, that is certain, but she isn’t alone; there is a man with her, and while nothing is shown below the collarbones, the activity in which they are partaking is unmistakable.

If she’s found a lover, Daemon really will kill her this time.

Rush gapes at the painting for several long seconds and then looks up at Lady Targaryen. “What the fuck is that?”

~~~~~~~~~~

Your hand hovers on the handle of the desk drawer. You can’t open it and take the dagger while Rush is watching. You know that beneath his coat he wears a shoulder holster containing a Colt 1911. Even with a blade, you are outmatched.

Aegon appears in the doorway to the private deck with a wicker chair. He hurls it at Rush as hard as he can, and as Rush curses and fumbles for his pistol, you seize Daemon’s dagger from the drawer and plunge it into Rush’s back, once, twice, three times, many more. You can’t help but scream as you stab him, because it’s horrible beyond description: the resistance of gristle, the muffled popping of organs, kidneys or a liver or a spleen, and Rush is groaning and contorting, dark blood spilling across the slanting floor. Aegon struggles with him for the gun, ultimately wrenching it out of Rush’s weakening, shaking hands. He’s dying, and while you harbor no affection for him and never have, you remember the children your parents lost. Life is not something to take carelessly. It is already so fragile, and each death creates mourners like heads springing from a hydra.

Over a thousand people will die tonight. Is that really possible?

Rush has stopped moving. You are kneeling with the gold hilt of the dagger in your fist. The gemstones are splattered with blood: amethyst, tiger’s eye, black opal, emerald, ruby, bloodstone, sapphire.

“Here,” Aegon says, trying to give you the pistol.

You recoil. “I don’t know how to use that.”

He laughs, a half-hysterical little cackle. There is a smudge of Rush’s blood across his cheek like a stain of lipstick. “I don’t either!”

“Keep the gun. I trust you.” You turn to the easel that has slid out from beneath the ruffled bed skirt—once white, now speckled with red—and realize that stray blooddrops have been flung across the painting, dots of red turning tacky on the thin layer of oil paint. “I ruined it,” you say, soft and mournful.

“No,” Aegon disagrees, smiling. “You just added some more color.”

You use the bedsheets to wipe the worst of the blood off your hands and the dagger. Then you pull Aegon’s leather portfolio out from underneath the bed, open it, and store the new painting safely inside. In the meantime, Aegon rolls Rush’s body into the closet and entombs him in a heap of gowns you’ll never wear again. You stand, pick up the dagger, and catch a glimpse of yourself in the oval-shaped mirror…and instead of looking away, you stay there for a while. The woman in the glass—like silver, like moonlight—has frightened eyes but a glinting blade as well. There are massive maroon splotches on the belly of your ice-blue dress; you button your coat to conceal them. Through the open door to the private deck, frigid night air floods in like the seawater slowly filling Titanic.

What does water that cold feel like? Like knives, like fangs? A thousand people will soon find out.

“Ready?” Aegon asks. He puts the pistol in the pocket of his stolen black coat.

“Almost.” You find your handbag from yesterday, green to match the emerald-colored dress you wore before Aegon painted you, before he uncovered you like a rare gemstone. Within is Aegon’s small aluminum lighter; you tuck the dagger inside as well. You yank out a handkerchief and clean the blood from Aegon’s cheek with it, then peer down at his swollen, bloodied fingers and knuckles, ravaged by Dagmar’s bitemarks. They are trembling. “Are your hands—?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” he whispers, pulling you in and kissing you, touching your face and your hair, his lips warm and soft in a haze of copper-scented glacial air. Would you do this again for him? For Draco, for yourself? Yes. I’d do it a hundred times. “We’re halfway done.”

Up on the Boat Deck, people are finally realizing that the ship is in mortal peril. First-class women, shimmering in their gowns and their jewels, are being hastily loaded into lifeboats along with their maids and their children. You spot Fern in one vessel; she is wearing two coats herself, and has bundled Draco in at least four from what you can tell. She holds him on her lap, and Draco is uncharacteristically hushed, compliant, fearful, gawping with startled blue eyes beneath disorderly white-blonde hair. They are seated beside Benjamin Guggenheim’s elegant French mistress, Léontine Aubart. Ben himself is striding back and forth on the deck with a number of companions, all in pristine black suits and puffing on pipes or cigars, assisting the weeping women as they flee to the lifeboats.

“We are prepared to go down as gentlemen!” Ben is trumpeting. Nearby, a string quartet is playing not an Irish song that you have known since childhood but the mellow, merry, please-don’t-panic melody of Samson and Delilah by Camille Saint-Saëns.

“I guess my viola is long gone, huh?” Aegon tells you. “Oh well. I hope the fish enjoy it.”

Ben Guggenheim continues: “Let it be known for all time that we stayed until the end to save the lives of the innocent, our beloved women and children, and that they survived because of us. Our bodies may fail, but our Christian good deeds will last eternally.”

“Hear hear!” other men are shouting drunkenly, raising glasses of brandy. Stewards and officers cast them brief, rather impatient glances. You wonder if any of the aforementioned gentlemen have considered the women and children of the third class, many of whom must have already predeceased them as they were drowned below deck, ignoble, invisible.

You think for the first time: Are they going to let Aegon into a lifeboat?

“Mam!” Draco shouts when he sees you, reaching out with both arms. You sprint to where he is still secured in Fern’s lap and lean over the side of the lifeboat, clasping his cold little hands and kissing the top of his head. Then you give Aegon’s portfolio to Fern.

“Take this with you. Try to make sure it doesn’t get wet.”

“Are you climbing in now, ma’am?” Fern asks hopefully. “There’s room for one more if we squeeze together.” Her eyes dart to Aegon. “Perhaps two.”

“I can’t,” you reply. “Not quite yet. But I’ll be back soon.”

“No, you have to come with us,” Draco says. The ship’s officers are signaling for the vessel to be lowered into the water. You spy other familiar faces aboard: young pregnant Madeleine Astor, the glamorous Countess of Rothes, the newly-wealthy Margaret Brown. Being a first-class passenger will save her life tonight.

“I’ll get in another boat. I promise.”

“No,” Draco says, and now he’s sobbing. He can’t understand the scale of it, but he knows something is terribly wrong. “Mam, we can’t leave without you. There’s room in the boat. Please get in. Please.” And you think: Maybe he does need me after all. Maybe he always did.

“You can go with them,” Aegon murmurs through your hair. “I’ll finish this. I’ll take care of Daemon and Rhaenyra.”

But he might need your help…and you cannot leave him here alone to freeze or drown or be murdered when Daemon discovers his lethal intentions. “You’re safe,” you tell Draco, one last touch of your palm to his hair, one last reassuring smile you hope isn’t a lie. “Stay with Fern. I’ll be in another lifeboat and I’ll see you again when this is over.”

“No, no, no!” Draco cries, still grasping futilely for you; but the lifeboat is lurching down towards the water and he is soon beyond your reach. High above, a flare explodes in the inky night sky, gleaming silver rain to tell any passing ships that Titanic is doomed. The North Atlantic is like black glass, smooth and reflective. Distant constellations are mirrored there, and you remember a passage from a book you gifted Daemon for your second anniversary when you still believed he might one day love you, an ancient tale from India about the beauty of the ocean: Its huge white waves looked like clouds; its gems looked like stars; its crystals looked like the moon; and its long bright serpents bearing gems in their hoods looked like comets, and thus the whole sea looked like the sky.

“Lady Targaryen,” Ben Guggenheim says as he marches over. He is swaying like he might be drunk. If he is, you can’t blame him. The truth is cold, and poison is warm: alcohol, smoke, a lover’s hands, a gush of blood. “Do you require any assistance, my darling?”

“No, thank you,” you reply swiftly before he can inquire further, and Aegon’s arm circles your waist as you hurry towards the entrance of the Grand Staircase together. You clutch your green handbag close to your chest. Where are Daemon and Rhaenyra? When will this be over?

From back by the lifeboats you can hear Ben Guggenheim shouting: “Tell my wife and daughters in New York that I love them! Tell them that I died a hero, and that I shall see them again when one day we are reunited in heaven…pray for my soul��tell the newspapers of our courage tonight…”

You and Aegon escape into the very top level of the Grand Staircase, the dome of glass and wrought iron above, the English oak wood steps winding below. As you enter, a frenzied crowd passes you on their way out to the Boat Deck: shipbuilder Thomas Andrews, J. Bruce Ismay, a number of others. And then, just as you and Aegon are beginning your descent, you see her on the landing below, frozen in place where she gapes up at you from beside the clock. Soon its ticking will fall silent forever. It will live on only in the memories of the survivors.

Rhaenyra is alone on the staircase. She is wearing a red and black gown and a white lifebelt; she is on her way to evacuate the sinking ship. You have intercepted her not a moment too soon. But she is not looking at you. Her Targaryen-blue eyes are fixed on Aegon, incredulous. It is the first time she has truly noticed him since she came aboard, and she remembers his face from photographs, from portraits, from awkward, frosty visits when they were both children.

“Aegon?” she says. “What are you doing here?”

In response, he removes the pistol from his coat pocket. Rhaenyra screams and bolts down the staircase, Aegon right behind her, flying like a phantom, like a shadow in his stolen black wool coat.

You try to follow, but they are faster. You slip on the steps, one of your blue shoes clattering away as you grip the banister to keep from falling. You reclaim your shoe where the staircase meets A-Deck; outside the illustrious Promenade Deck encircles the perimeter of the ship. You steady yourself against the bronze cherub statue as you slide your shoe back on, then resume the chase…but you don’t know where Aegon and Rhaenyra have gone.

Farther down the Grand Staircase? Out onto the Promenade Deck? Into the maze of hallways?

You try to listen for them, but the turmoil outside is growing louder. You hear a gunshot, but you cannot tell from which direction; the sound reverberates through the steel of the ship and melds with the chorus of failing machinery: groaning joints, snapping beams, steam vented from the massive funnels. You pause in the doorway that leads out to the Promenade Deck, black freezing air drawn into your heaving lungs.

Which way?

Now there are footsteps on the Grand Staircase coming up from B-Deck. You race back to the bronze cherub, but it is not Aegon or Rhaenyra who meets you there. It is Daemon, appearing on the landing like a fogbank or a thunderstorm, black suit, glinting deep-set eyes, towering over you; and once again you are a seventeen-year-old girl climbing into the marriage bed with him and hoping he’ll like you, once again you feel yourself to be entirely at his mercy, in terror of him, in awe of him.

Daemon grabs you by your coat and pushes you against the bronze cherub statue, its edges prodding at your spine. You yelp and he chuckles, and he asks, so casually he must know nothing about Aegon or his pursuit of Rhaenyra like a hound after a fox: “And what are your plans for this evening, dear? Dinner and dancing? Or perhaps a nice brisk swim? Good for one’s health, I hear.”

You can’t find your words. Your fingers that grasp your handbag are numb and useless. Daemon is inside you again, not your body this time but your mind, snipping threads and dissolving mirages. How did I ever believe I could kill him?

Slowly, Daemon’s grin dies. He releases you, and then for some reason—a trick?? a trap??—offers you his empty hand. “Come on,” he says, as if relenting. “I’ll help you get to a lifeboat.”

You stare up at him, and the shock must show on your face, the disbelief, the cautious wonder.

“I can’t take you away from Draco,” Daemon says, answering a question you don’t need to ask. He owns all of you; you have no secrets. “He’s so young. And I know what it’s like to lose a mother.”

Draco, you think with abrupt glass-sharp clarity. I’m doing this for him, and Aegon, and me.

You don’t take Daemon’s hand. Instead, you open your handbag and rip out the dagger. You slash at Daemon’s throat, and you almost cut him deep enough, a fraction of an inch from the carotid or the jugular or the windpipe. But Daemon pulls away at the last second and you only wound him, scarlet rivulets spilling down his neck and staining the white shirt beneath his suit jacket, melting rubies, hard soulless gemstones in the sockets of his eyes.

Daemon throws you down the staircase and you hit the oak steps hard, bruising, twisting, rolling, the thoughts jolted out of your skull. The dagger is knocked from your hand and is lost. You fumble blindly for it where you are sprawled on the next landing, halfway to B-Deck. Your vision is blurred by stars like those in the mirror image on the North Atlantic Ocean.

But I need the dagger, I need it, I need it, I can’t kill him without it.

And as you lift your head you see Daemon coming down to meet you, a gemcutter here to break you over and over again, until there is nothing left but glimmering dust, until you have never existed at all.

#aegon ii targaryen #aegon ii #aegon targaryen ii #aegon targaryen x reader #aegon x reader #aegon targaryen #aegon ii targaryen x reader #aegon ii x you #aegon ii x y/n #aegon ii x reader #aegon ii fanfic #aegon x y/n #aegon x you

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whereforarthur · 2 months ago

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It's Been Way Too Long

Request: id love a george smut, perhaps one of us have been rlly busy like all summer and barely had any time to see each other so when it gets to september time (ish) we havent realised how much we miss each other

Pairing: George Clarke x Reader

Category: Smut

Word Count: 2.2k

*****

“I think I'd miss you even if we never met.” — The Wedding Date

The London skies were a canvas of soft grays and muted blues, hinting at the promise of rain. The bustling streets below were a blur of umbrellas and rushing footsteps. Amidst the thrum of the city, a solitary figure sat on a bench in a small, overlooked park, a patch of green nestled between concrete giants. George Clarke, known to the internet as "The Clarke Cut", was a man of sharp contrasts. His online persona was vibrant, full of life and humor, but in this quiet moment, he was lost in thought, his eyes reflecting the weight of the world.

For months, George had thrown himself into his work, leaving little room for anything else. His YouTube channel had grown exponentially, the demands of content creation an ever-hungry beast that consumed his days and nights. The price of success had been steep, and he felt the cost keenly as he stared at the empty space next to him, where you, or y/n as he liked to call you, should have been. The vividness of your laughter and the warmth of your smile had been replaced by the cold metal of the bench, and the echoes of the city's cacophony.

The first leaves of autumn began to dance around him, a sad ballet of nature's end and rebirth. The chill in the air seemed to mirror the chill in his heart, a stark reminder of the seasons passing and the time lost. You had been his anchor, a steady presence that kept him grounded amidst the chaos. Without you, the city felt like an alien landscape, one he was navigating for the first time without a map.

George pulled out his phone, thumb hovering over your name in his contacts. The urge to hear your voice washed over him like a wave, but fear held him back. Would you be upset? Would you even have time to talk? With a sigh, he sent a text, keeping it light, hoping it didn't betray the tumult in his soul. "Missing you," it read, with a simple heart emoji. It was all he could manage.

Minutes ticked by, the silence stretching into a symphony of unspoken words. His phone buzzed, pulling him from his thoughts. It was you. "Miss you too, George," it said, followed by a smiling face with a tear. His heart clenched at the sight. You had felt it too, the distance that had grown between them like an invisible wall.

The rain finally made its appearance, lightly kissing the leaves before turning into a steady rhythm against the pavement. George didn't bother moving, the cool drops a soothing balm on his heated skin. The scent of wet earth and the faint smell of rain-soaked flowers filled the air, a familiar comfort that only heightened his longing for your presence.

As the drops grew heavier, his thoughts grew clearer. He knew what he had to do. Success meant nothing if he couldn't share it with the one who truly mattered. The realization struck him like a bolt of lightning, illuminating the path ahead. He had to make time for you, to prioritize what truly made him happy. The rain grew into a crescendo, each drop a beat in the rhythm of his newfound resolve.

Standing up, George tucked his phone away and took a deep breath, the rain soaking his clothes and hair. He'd rearrange his schedule, make the calls, and do whatever it took to bridge the gap that had formed. With a renewed sense of purpose, he stepped into the storm, the cold water mixing with the warmth of his determination. The city around him blurred as he set off in the direction of your flat, eager to feel the warmth of your embrace and to apologize for his neglect. The rain washed away the dust of the summer, leaving behind the promise of a fresh start, a chance to rekindle the flame that had been smoldering between them.

By the time he arrived, the rain had become a downpour, turning the streets into rivers and the air into a thick mist. He took the stairs two at a time, his heart racing in anticipation. The door to your flat stood before him, a symbol of the comfort and love that waited within. He took a moment to compose himself, wiping the rain from his face before knocking softly, his breath hitching in his chest.

When the door opened, the sight of you took his breath away. You looked tired, your eyes a bit sad, but the moment they met his, a spark ignited, lighting up the room. The silence stretched between them, filled with the unspoken words of regret and longing. Without a word, George stepped inside, closing the door behind him, the sound echoing through the small space like a declaration of intent.

You stood before him, rain-soaked and beautiful, your hair clinging to your face like a veil. The air was charged with tension, the kind that comes from months of missed moments and unspoken truths. He reached out, his hand brushing against your cheek, the touch sending a jolt through both of you. Your eyes searched his, looking for reassurance, for a sign that he truly meant it. And in that moment, George knew that he had made the right choice. He leaned in, capturing your lips in a kiss that was both desperate and gentle, a silent promise to never let you go again.

The kiss grew in intensity, a conflagration of passion that had been smoldering for too long. Your arms wrapped around him, pulling him closer, as if trying to erase the space that had grown between you. The world outside the flat disappeared, leaving only the two of you, entwined in a dance of love and apology. The rain outside was now a mere backdrop to the symphony of your hearts beating in unison, a testament to the fact that no matter how busy life got, you two were destined to find your way back to each other.

Breaking the kiss, George whispered, "I'm sorry. I've been so caught up in work, I forgot what's truly important."

You looked up at him, your eyes glistening with unshed tears. "It's okay," you murmured, your voice a soft melody that soothed his soul. "I understand. But I missed you. So much."

He cupped your face in his hands, thumbs brushing away the stray teardrops. "I missed you too. And I promise, from now on, I'll make more time for us."

You nodded, a small smile playing on your lips. "I'd like that."

With the storm outside mirroring the tumult in their hearts, George took your hand and led you to the couch. You sat down together, the fabric warm and welcoming against your cold, wet clothes. He wrapped an arm around you, pulling you into his side, and you rested your head on his shoulder, feeling the steady beat of his heart beneath your cheek.

The sound of the rain grew softer as you talked, sharing stories of the summer's escapades and the moments you'd wished you could have shared. Each word was a thread weaving the fabric of your relationship back together, stronger than before. The warmth of the room began to seep into your bones, chasing away the chill of the rain and the months of separation.

As the conversation lulled, George reached over to the coffee table, picking up a notebook and a pen. He flipped through the pages, his eyes scanning the words and doodles that chronicled your life together. "Look," he said, pointing to a page filled with sketches of the two of you in various stages of laughter and love. "I want to fill this book with more memories. Starting now."

A blush crept up your cheeks as you took the notebook from him. The promise in his eyes was more than you could have hoped for. With a shaky hand, you wrote, "September 15th - The day George realized what truly matters."

Underneath, he scribbled, "And the day I came home to you."

*****

The moment was filled with the quiet understanding that sometimes life gets in the way, but true love always finds a path back. The rain outside had slowed to a gentle patter, as if it too knew that the storm had passed and that now was the time for growth and renewal.

George's hand slid down from your cheek to your neck, his touch sending shivers down your spine. He kissed you again, this time with a hunger that had been building for months. Your bodies pressed closer, the warmth of your skin a stark contrast to the cold fabric that separated you. The rain had made the air thick with desire, and you could feel the heat radiating from George's body, his need for you palpable.

Your hands found their way under his shirt, feeling the dampness of his skin and the tautness of his muscles. The sensation sent waves of electricity through you, and you realized just how much you'd missed the simple act of touching him, of feeling his heart race in response to your touch. His hands roamed your body, exploring the curves and valleys that he knew so well, yet somehow felt new and exciting. The rain outside had become a soft, rhythmic backdrop to your reunion, a natural metronome setting the pace of your passion.

As you kissed, you both began to peel away the layers of clothing that had kept you apart, revealing the warmth and desire that had been trapped beneath. Your skin met with a sigh of relief, like two long-lost friends finally reunited. The couch cushions grew soggy with rainwater, but you didn't care. All that mattered was the connection that surged between you, a current more powerful than any storm.

The smell of damp fabric and the gentle scent of your perfume mixed with the musk of passion as you became lost in each other. The storm outside had brought you back together, and now, you were determined to make the most of every moment. The sound of the rain grew fainter as you became more attuned to the sound of your breaths mingling, the beat of your hearts syncing up as one.

George lifted you effortlessly, carrying you to the bedroom, his eyes never leaving yours. The floorboards creaked underfoot, a gentle reminder of the history you shared in this space. You knew every inch of this room, every crevice and corner, but it had never felt more intimate than it did in that moment.

Laying you down on the bed, he hovered over you, his gaze intense and filled with love. The soft light from the streetlamp painted shadows on the wall, playing across your bodies as you moved together in a dance of passion. The thunder outside rumbled in the distance, punctuating the silent promises made between kisses and caresses.

Your bodies intertwined, the coldness of the rain forgotten in the warmth of your love. The room was filled with the sound of the rain, the sighs of pleasure, and the whispers of sweet nothings that meant everything. The storm outside mirrored the intensity of your reunion, each flash of lightning illuminating the passion in your eyes, as if the very sky was celebrating your reconciliation.

The rain grew softer, the thunder a gentle reminder of the tempest you had weathered. As your bodies found their rhythm, the storm outside seemed to mimic your own, building to a crescendo before subsiding into a gentle lull. You lay there, tangled in the warmth of each other's arms, the city of London a silent witness to your love.

In the aftermath of your passion, you both lay still, listening to the fading patter of rain and the steady thrum of each other's hearts. The world outside had continued to turn, but for a brief moment, it had stopped for you both. You knew that from now on, no matter how busy life got, you would always find time for each other, because you had just survived the storm, and the calm that followed was more beautiful than any summer's day.

You leaned up to kiss him softly, tasting the salt of the rain and the sweetness of your shared love. "Thank you," you whispered, your voice a mere breath against his skin.

George smiled, brushing a stray strand of hair from your face. "For what?"

"For reminding me what's important," you said, your eyes searching his. "For coming back to me."

He kissed you again, his arms tightening around you. "Always," he murmured, his voice a solemn vow. "I'll always come back to you."

The room was a cocoon of warmth and love, the storm outside a gentle lullaby, as you both drifted off to sleep, the sound of the rain a soothing serenade. Hours passed, the city's heartbeat growing quieter as the night deepened. When you awoke, the rain had stopped, leaving a freshness in the air that seemed to cleanse the very essence of the world. The scent of wet earth and the faint sound of distant cars washed over you, bringing with it a sense of peace.

******

@gvf23

@xxkatxgracexx

#british youtubers #imagines #george clarkey #smut #george clarke fics #george clarkey x reader

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lord-squiggletits · 10 months ago

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Having late night angst Pharma thoughts and I think besides wanting to write a scene where Pharma lashes out in anger, and scenes where he does his crazy evil doctor persona to keep pretending he doesn't care, I also do want that scenario to eventually include peeling Pharma open emotionally somehow to get him to actually say his real emotions with no pretense

I'm not sure what scenario would lead to that or what would be an in character way for Pharma to express his grievances. Out of all the things he's angry/upset about which one hurts the most? Getting betrayed by Ratchet? None of the other Autobots caring about him either? Being made to murder people and possibly never getting to be a doctor again as a result?

Canon focuses mostly on the thing with Ratchet but I do think a Pharma centric scenario should delve deeper. After all even if Pharma is in love with Ratchet, it's boring and bad writing if EVERYTHING revolves around Ratchet and Pharma doesn't have thoughts/feelings about other things

So again, idk how it would be voiced in character or what scenario could lead to it, but I'd like to somehow see Pharma stripped down to the actual agonizing hurt and grief that you could read into his actions like.....

Ratchet left him alone to go to Delphi, then abandoned him again after Delphi and didn't even bother looking for his body after presuming him dead. If that's how Ratchet treated him after a lifetime of friendship, did he ever actually care about Pharma?

Is it any wonder that all the other Autobots left him for dead and treated him like a monster if not even Pharma's own best friend cared about him or was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt?

If Ratchet tries to patch things up, is he doing it because he actually cares or just to assuage his own guilty conscience? If he said he was sorry, would Pharma believe it/would it make him feel any better, or is it too little too late?

Why is it that Pharma's endless fate is to be left alone, facing down torture and coercion, alone, with no one who's his friend and barely anyone who even thinks he's tolerable/doesn't outright hate him?

(In a post-LL/Pharma doesn't die scenario) What is it about Pharma that makes him so despicable but people (especially Ratchet) are willing to tolerate and even befriend people like Drift or Megatron who did things as bad or worse? (No hate to them this is just a 'what if' angle of Pharma coming into this scenario)

Bc on one hand not giving a shit and being arrogant are valid parts of Pharma's character, but on the other hand there's a good amount of canon evidence implying that Pharma wasn't always Like That and even evidence that his crazy doctor thing was an act he was putting on. So why not write something about Pharma getting to voice insecurity, loneliness, betrayal, etc?

#squiggposting #pharma apologism #im feeling the whump in this house tonight #i just really really want to see a moment of pharma just dropping the act #baring his emotions in a grieving and messy kinda way idk #plus tangent but i think a cathartic ending for pharma would involve him getting over ratchet #not for ship reasons but bc he realizes he can stop being desperate for rstchet's care by just not csring #and recognizing he doesnt need to keep an old flame kindled if he feels that abandoned #maybe make new friends like velocity or something

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seidenbros · 2 years ago

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Don't Panic, I'm a Mechanic - Part 1 Lover's Lake

Pairing: Mechanic!Eddie x Shy!Plussize!Bookstore!Reader

Warnings: modern AU, female reader, allusions to smut, fluff, insecurities (body image), I tried not to include anythign about yn's looks uncluding skin colour, so if there's anything you find, anything I can make better, please let me know, cause I wanna try to make you all enjoy this, best friend Steve, very shy y/n, teasing and petnames (princess), mutual pining, eddie &reader are 29/28 (let me know what I misses)

Word Count: 2198

Author's note: here we are, I'm not gonna have chapters in themselves, like the next part won't start exactly where this one leaves off. There might be shorter blurbs or longer parts, I don't know yet, but they will (hopefully) appear in order.

Summary: You like Eddie, Eddie likes you, but you are too shy and cannot talk to him properly. Especially not when he keeps teasing you. Meanwhile Eddie thinks you don't like him like that and just get flustered beause he teases you. A day at Lover's Lake suddenly brings a little change when Eddie sees what book you read and you get closer than you've ever been before.

Part 2

The unmistakable sound of a motorcycle made your ear perk up. It wasn’t just any motorcycle, you knew exactly who it belonged to. Even the sound of his motorcycle made your skin tingle and your heart beat faster. What it was about Eddie Munson that made you behave the way you did, you couldn’t tell, but he’d gotten to you the moment you’d set eyes on him.

For some time now, you’d been part of the same group of friends, because Steve had pretty much adopted you when you’d moved to Hawkins, Nancy had become one of your closest friends as well, and when you’d been introduced to Eddie after some time, he’d taken your breath away, and he’d occupied your thoughts and fantasies. But you were never able to say anything. Well, it was hard for you to speak at all sometimes, when he was around. With everyone else, it wasn’t a problem at all. You were witty, made them love, showed how enthusiastic you could become about something you loved, but with Eddie? Your mouth betrayed you, and you weren’t able to form coherent sentences sometimes. Especially not when he called you princess. Rationally, you knew that he called a lot of people that, but when he used that petname for you and gave you that little smirk, you were close to a heart attack. He was only teasing you, you knew that, but it still got to you.

Today, you spent the time with the others at Lover’s Lake. You’d planned this day ahead, so Steve had brought pizza and beer along, and you’d helped him carry everything, cause he’d picked you up and taken you along with him. You’d gotten into a bit of a rush in the end, so you’d just grabbed two books from your table to bring them along. You never left the house without a book, no matter where you went, even if it was just to go grocery shopping. Ever since you were little, you’ve stuck your nose in a book, so it was probably not a big surprise that you were working at a bookstore now. Whenever someone needed a book recommendation, they could come to you and ask you about it. There was a good possibility that you knew just the right book for everyone.

You sank lower in the water when you watched Eddie approach. While he walked, he pulled the helmet off, shaking out his locks. When he found your spot, he put down his bag as well as the helmet and took off his leather jacket. You felt your whole body heat up when he lifted his hands to put his hair into a low bun, his shirt riding up to reveal just a little patch of his stomach, but enough for you to see that little happy trail.

“What’re you looking at?” Steve’s teasing voice was close to your ear, making you jump slightly, before you duck under water completely, nearly letting out a frustrated scream. Steve knew you too well. Way too well, and he always managed to tease you like that when it came to Eddie. But he’d promised never to breathe a word about your feelings. Nancy had found out all by herself, and she had also promised you not to say anything. She only tried to encourage you to say something to Eddie. Yeah, but that wasn’t possible if you always managed to stumble over your words when it came to him. With everyone else, it wasn’t a problem at all, but Eddie…

When you came back up for air, Steve was grinning at you. Goddamn, you should have known that Eddie would be here as well, that he’d come by when he’d finished work for the day, but you’d somehow forgotten about the time, because you were enjoying yourself with the others. Otherwise, you would have been out of the water, wrapped in a towel or dressed again already when he got here.

There were days when you felt really good in your own body, but then there were days when you just wanted to vanish, when all the insecurities bubbled up. Usually those days were rare, and your friends hyped you up so much that you felt comfortable in going for a swim with them, in putting on a bikini and joining them. But with Eddie around, you somehow felt more aware of the size of your body. Not that you thought that Eddie would judge you, he was one of the least judgemental people you knew when it came to something like that, but… still, something in your head switched and made you want to put on some more clothes, or go swimming with a shirt over the bikini.

“I should… get out of the water,” you let Steve know before you swam to the edge and got out of the water. Eddie’s eyes were on you the moment he spotted you getting out, and he didn’t take his eyes off you. That was only more reason for you to walk quicker to grab the towel to wrap around your body. You didn’t want to be rude and sit down somewhere alone, you were friends after all, so you hurried to your clothes and put on the flannel you’d brought with you that hit you about mid thigh, grabbed a book from your bag, and walked over to Eddie.

“Hey Eddie,” you managed to say, before you sat down on the landing stage, leaving a bit of space between the two of you, dipping your feet into the water.

“Hello princess, already enough swimming fun for today?” Eddie tilted his head to the side, eyes roaming over your body until they focused on your eyes. God he really couldn’t get enough of looking at you. Especially when he saw you talking with someone else about something you really loved. Books most of the time. He just wished that you would talk to him like that, but there was something holding you back. He was pretty sure you didn’t like him all that much, at least that was the feeling he got, but Steve had assured him that this wasn’t the case. Steve, who always managed to make you laugh. Steve, who even made you squeal when started tickling you to make you loosen up. Steve who was always there to save the day for you.

Honestly, Steve was Eddie’s friend, a good friend even, but when he saw you two together, he couldn’t shake that feeling of jealousy that crept up on him. Rationally, Eddie knew that there was nothing going on between the two of you, but his poor heart didn’t really listen to that all the time. Especially not when you were so open and always smiling with Steve, and with him… you always seemed to have nothing to say, when he knew for a fact that you told wonderful stories.

“Yeah… just… need a break I guess,” you managed to say, focusing your eyes on the water in front of you, nibbling on your bottom lip.

“Too bad, I thought I could join you, but maybe I can convince you to get in the water with me again.” He smiled at you, his eyes scanning over your thighs, then slowly up your torso to your face. To the way your teeth bore into your lips, the way your nose scrunched up slightly before you answered.

“Yeah… maybe.” That was as good as he was gonna get, he knew that. But he was determined to at least get you talking a little bit, so he asked about the one thing he knew you were passionate about.

“Whatcha reading there?” Eddie nodded towards the book in your hands. Since you had no idea which book you’d taken, you simply handed it to him.

“Haven’t started reading it yet,” you managed to say, looking over at Steve, who asked you without a sound, if you were alright. You weren’t really, but that was because of your heart beating for the metalhead next to you. The guy who made you so nervous that you had trouble speaking. But apart from that…? So you nodded.

“See Jane Score,” Eddie read the title, turning the book over to read the blurb on the backside. You tensed next to him, figuring that you had grabbed the one steamy romance novel from the table. There had been five books altogether, all of them different genres, and you had chosen that one blindly. Fucking perfect. It was the second book in a series you had just started, and the first one had already made you squirm in your seat when you’d read it. Maybe because it combined ice-hockey and the steamy romance aspect. But now that Eddie held it in his hands, you felt your whole body heat up again, your flannel suddenly feeling way too tight and warm for this day.

“Sounds interesting,” he said, looking at you with a twinkle in his eye, when he handed the book back to you. “Should maybe give it a read myself.”

You took the book back from him, his fingers lingering on yours a moment too long, but you tried your best to ignore it, putting the book beside you.

“It’s not… it’s completely different from what you read most of the time, so… I-I don’t know…” You sighed, shaking your head.

“If I’ll like it? Gotta have to try to find that out. Besides, I wonder what makes you tick, what you enjoy.” He winked, before he slowly got up, rising to his full height, before he whipped his shirt over his head.

“W-What are you doing?” you asked, eyes wide with surprise, because you hadn’t expected this at all. For a moment, your eyes were glued to his stomach, before you were able to shake your head and rip your eyes from him and stop your mind from wandering. What he did to you with his mere presence was simply not fair.

“Getting in the water, what does it look like?” There it was again, that smirk that made your knees weak. “You gonna join me?” The soft smile on his lips, the pleading look in his eyes… you weren’t able to say no. Gone were your insecurities for the moment when you started unbuttoning your flannel again, while Eddie dropped his pants and pushed them aside.

“Lemme help you,” he offered, holding out his hand for you. Without thinking about it, you took his hand, expecting him to just help you up, but instead, he pulled you flush against his chest as soon as you were up. Your boobs were squished against his chest, your eyes set on his lips, slowly moving up to look into his deep brown eyes. God, you were sure, he could feel your heart beating, could probably even hear it.

“Hold your breath,” Eddie mumbled before he jumped into the water with you. You managed to do as you were told, but once beneath the cold water, Eddie let go of you, even pushed you slightly towards the surface, because he didn’t want you to swallow any water or lose your breath. He stayed below the surface a moment longer. When you came up, you gasped for air. The water managed to cool your body down a bit after everything Eddie had done to it, to you with his presence and the closeness just now.

Every single one of your senses was on high alert, your skin tingling, your heart racing, your thighs clenching together just because of Eddie. Eddie who was gone a moment longer before he popped up again a bit away from you, pushing the loose strands of hair from his face to look at you.

“You alright? Didn’t wanna tackle you like that.” A look of concern crossed Eddie’s face, but it was quickly gone when he saw the pretty smile on your lips.

“‘M alright… Was getting a bit hot anyway.” But that was not exactly due to the weather.

“Yeah… Yeah me too,” Eddie admitted, but he was quickly called over by Dustin and diverted his attention to his friend. He needed that, needed the distraction from you. because he’d pushed you away from himself beneath the water for a reason. A reason that was very prominent in his boxers right now, so he really had to cool and calm down, and definitely stop himself from thinking about your soft body beneath his, his hands all over you while he was buried deep inside you. Needless to say, you’d had the same thoughts being flush against him, but neither of you did anything about it, and instead, you’d be spending your evening in bed, writing up another scenario for your readers on tumblr with your original characters Wallace “Ace” and Heather… Steve was the only one who knew about that, and he was your biggest fan. He just had to blend out that you had modeled Ace after Eddie.

Tag-List: @hellv1ra @sweetpeapod @eddiemunson95 @e0509 @munsonology @niceboyeds @loverology @bolontiku @tessab154 @m00nlight101 @tellhound @ghosttownwherenoonegoes @bellamy-barnes @hardysbitch @give-em-hellfire @samlealea @hacker-ghost @kirsteng42 @princesseddie @anaisweird @harringtonfan4 @ethereal27cereal @goldenkinglouis @goldylions @lightvixxen

Tagged a few of the people who asked about it and who I thought might be interested 💚 let me know if you want to be added or taken from this list 💚

#eddie munson #yes eddie munson drives a motorcycle in this #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x you #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fic #eddie munson blurb #eddie munson fluff #eddie x you #eddie munson x y/n #stranger things fanfic #stranger things x you #staffi writes #don't panic I'm a mechanic

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paranoidginger · 5 months ago

Text

Lab-rat part 15

Tw: Descriptions of Gore, Violence, Panic,

His body betrayed him, numb and loose and heavy. The pressure of his own bodyweight made him ache, his breathing slow and automatic as his body did only the bare minimum to keep him alive.

"Zhe Blu medic did a vonderful job at putting you back togezher, I must admit. Zhe fact zhat he managed to give you new eyes is quite an achievement on its own!" The medic laughed, looking down at Bait's face for a moment. "Such a shame all his hard work is for nozhing. I vonder how long you vould survive if I skinned you down to bare muscle. Zhat's somezhing I've never tried before!" He chuckled a bit more "I could take everyzhing except for zhat pretty face of yours, you know. Zhe Blu spy was a decapitated head in my refrigerator for quite a while. I'm sure I could arrange somezhing similar for once I run out of uses for your body."

Bait could do nothing but listen, frantically looking around for somebody -anybody- to come to his aid. He could feel himself drool slightly, unable to force himself to swallow his own saliva under the effects of whatever it was the Medic had injected him with.

"I zhink once I skin you, I'll remove your muscles individually, by groups. See vich ones ve humans don't really need. Of course, before all zhat, I'll remove your vocal chords. Can't have you screaming vhile I skin you, now can I! Sewing your mouth shut vorked temporarily, but zhat vould be a much better solution. Or maybe I'll just seal your mouth off entirely, I'm sure I could graft a patch of skin over it, zhat vouldn't be so difficult." The doctor continued to speak, laughing as he described what he was planning to do to the clone, the young man's panic unable to be expressed in his paralyzed state... He was going to die, wasn't he... "Or I could simply do both. I don't see vhy I vouldn't."

The Blu Sniper respawned, throwing his hat onto the floor as he paced, swearing to himself. Shit. SHIT! This was his fault, he should have been keeping a better eye on the man- He jumped slightly as a couple of the others respawned as well. The Medic, followed by Heavy and Demoman. The announcement of the Blu team successfully grabbing the enemy intelligence was drowned out as Sniper stopped the Medic, grabbing his sleeve as he walked past.

"I lost 'im- The-the bloody scoundrel got him- I-I couldn't save 'im." The Sniper picked his hat up off of the floor, dusting it off as he clutched it to his chest as he admitted the loss to his Medic.

"V-vhat do you mean? You can't be joking-" The doctor's heart sank as he processed what the Sniper told him. "Scheiße. Go ahead and get back to your spot, mein freund. Keep a look out in case you see anyzhing, zhere is still hope. Ve vill get him back." The doctor left the respawn chamber, leaving the Sniper to his own devices as he bit back stinging tears behind his glasses, his hat crumpled in his hands.

After a moment, Sniper felt a hand on his shoulder, turning to see Demo, a worried smile on his face.

"The doc knows what he's doin' lad. Ye don' have tae blame yerself. Ye died." The Demoman ushered Sniper out of the respawn chamber, gesturing to one of the benches. "You have a sit, I got an extra bottle o' scrumpy, we can have a drink, an' then go kick those Red bastards' arses!" He went into the supply cupboard, holding up two bottles of alcohol before making his way over to sit beside Sniper, who graciously took one of the bottles uncorking it and taking a long swig, a small tear running down his face. "Chin up, lad, he'll be back." The Demo spoke uncharacteristically softly, gently wiping Sniper's tears with the knuckle of his forefinger before pulling him closer, giving him a small squeeze.

The Blu Medic ran as quickly as he could, trying to think of where the Red team's Medic would keep his captive until the mission was over. The way to the enemy base with the most cover was the sewers, and he knew from experience that the flooded tunnels were the most likely route to take.

He made his way down the stairs, into the flooded tunnels, moving as quickly as he could to hopefully catch up with the enemy Medic. Thankfully, he was correct, catching a glimpse of the man in red as he disappeared around the first bend of the enemy sewers. By the time he had caught up, whatever it was that he had shot the clone full of had begun to wear off, and he had begun to weakly squirm and whimper.

The doctor watched as his counterpart roughly placed Bait onto the floor, propped up against the wall of the little corner platform as he drew and loaded his syringe gun.

"A higher dosage should do zhe trick. Don't go anyvhere." The Red medic teased, examining each of the drugged syringes as he loaded them into the little machine in his hand. Bait's gaze drifted as he spotted his medic from the corner of his eye, another whimper escaping from deep in his chest. The man's head turned as he heard the quiet sloshing of steps behind him, his grin widening as he spotted the Blu medic. "Ohoh! Wunderbar! My creation gets to see anozher one of his friends die! I must say, arzt, you did vell putting my favorite lab rat back togezher! I can't vait to see your handiwork on zhe inside of him."

"He is a human being, Ludwig! Vhat even is all of zhis torture you put him through for? Zhere is no point to it if you just vant to see him suffer!"

"Hah! You consider it human? Mein freund, it came out of a test tube! I doubt it even has a soul. Zhis thing you care so much about is just a copy. It came from nozhing more zhan a blood sample I took from your spy vhile his head was in my possession."

The Blu medic fell silent, anger unlike anything Bait had seen from him plastering itself across his features, his body language, down to the way he began approaching the other Medic. He pulled his bonesaw from his labcoat, rushing the other man and shoving him against the wall, causing him to drop his syringe gun as he grabbed a fistful of the Red Medic's shirt collar and rammed his saw into the soft tissue of the man's stomach.

"You do not get to speak of him zhat way! You are a miserable coward of a man who does nozhing but take pleasure in everyone else's suffering!" The Red medic choked slightly, still grinning as he coughed, wincing.

"S-someone heh... Someone's emotional..." He paused for a moment, taking a shaky breath as he broke eye contact with the other Medic. "Spy, now!" He shouted, despite the blood seeping from the corners of his mouth, soaking through the white of his coat. The next few moments were a blur as Bait watched on in horror. The Red Spy uncloaked himself, moving with the swift precision of a killer.

"Apologies, docteur... I have no intention of becoming his next experiment." He drove his knife into the Blu Medic's back, both Medics collapsing to the floor as the spy shot Bait a short, sympathetic glance before disappearing once again.

Bait looked on, tears streaming down his face as he weakly tried to scoot himself away, the Red medic slowly getting back to his feet. He coughed and winced, growling to himself as he pulled the saw out of himself, grabbing the med kit and tending to himself before picking his syringe gun up from the floor, firing it, yet again at the clone. This time, he did not stay awake...

Part 14

@thatonesimp-e @gravitytrips @realccre

Everything has to get worse before it can get better, isn't that the saying?

#tf2 #team fortress #tf2 spy #tf2 ocs #tf2 spy oc #tf2 fanfiction #tf2 Lab-rat

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a-thousand-lives-lost-for-peace · 8 months ago

Text

thinking about how post re5 jill has so much trouble when it comes to allowing others to help her and her whole struggle with control after the events of kijuju.

Nowadays she tends to be a lot more guarded and careful with whatever she says - and this also stems to her physically as well, she sleeps away from the other survivors in some corner of the clearing by the fire, or out by the river on some occasions. She tends to be the one to treat her own wounds and not let someone else do it for her, same thing with keeping her spirits up and keeping her strong in the fog.

This relates a lot to her experience in Africa in RE5, because nobody came to look for her until Chris did in RE5, but even that was pretty much an accident, he wasn't initially there for her.

So for three years she was the only one to hold onto her own sanity and her own humanity which had been taken from her due to the P30, she would have spent every night exhausted but unable to sleep, quietly thinking to herself, encouraging herself, thinking about the people she knew and willing herself to stay strong for them.

During the first year, she would have held on so much to that hope and been the only person to help herself, every night would have been spent unable to sleep even when she went through rigorous training every single day until her body got used to the p30, so eventually she just got so exhausted to rhe point she struggled to keep herself awake.

She was the only one who would let herself be treated by, after every training session, and even after she was rescued, she wouldn't really allow anyone to patch her up or try and help her because she got too used to that independance.

Her trust is fragile and shatters so easily, it takes forever to build her trust but it's fragile, it can break in a split second. She never talks about the events of RE5 except to those she trusts the most - if she ever shows you her chest scar, you just might be the person she trusts the most. She's used to being betrayed by people she used to be close to, the next time isn't so difficult.

When it comes to her own sense of control, Jill will *never* listen or even give something the time of day if its phrased like a command or an order, she got too used to it in Africa and hates being reminded of her powerlessness and her lack of control, and she will never let herself get ordered around again. She'll push back, she'll fight, but she won't let herself be controlled.

She needs to choose even the smallest things, she needs to know that she at least *has* the choice, and she isn't being made or directly told to do something without any chance for her own perspective or losing her control to another person.

#resident evil #jill valentine #jill valentine headcanons #jill valentine my beloved #jill valentine analysis #resident evil analysis

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theogonies · 2 years ago

Text

No Return

prompt | nico robin x gn!strawhat!reader + childhood friends to enemies to lovers (for the @onepiece-blorboexchange event)

summary | a betrayal, a reunion, and a promise.

happy holidays @daeryn !!! i haven’t written much enemies to lovers, but it was such a good prompt, i had to give it a shot. hope i did your wish justice :3

word count | 2.5k

content warnings | just fluff really. mild enemies to lovers with some hurt/comfort, canon-typical violence including a couple mentions of blood.

When you first met Robin, you were sixteen and naive.

It’s hard to believe you didn’t see it sooner. She wasn’t any older than you when she arrived on your little island in the West Blue, yet somehow she’d already earned an impressive bounty to her name and the reputation to match.

Everyone wanted a piece of Nico Robin back then. The Marines, D-list bounty hunters looking for their big break, all the crews she’d already found time to betray.

The Mafia family who ran your hometown, too. They claimed she’d skipped out on her debt, and that was reason enough for you to keep her secret when you found her squatting in your basement one day, semi-conscious and bleeding out from a grisly wound.

So you nursed her back to health, and in return, she told you stories. Adventure tales of turncoat marines and fearless archaeologists. Histories of civilizations you never knew existed.

The ones you liked most were simpler, though: a language that sounded like ringing bells. A spiced cake that was only made on one particular island. A hundred folktales about seagulls. All reminders that there was a whole world out there across the sea, out of the reach of the Five Families and the Marines and anyone who wanted to decide what your life meant for you.

“You’re too kind,” she’d told you once, when you offered her a portion of your supper for the night.

“What,” you cocked an eyebrow, half teasing and half genuine curiosity. “You think I’m going to put all this work into patching your wounds, and then let you starve before you can heal?”

“You don’t ask for anything in return.”

“S’okay,” you shrugged. “I like talking to you. That’s enough for me.”

You watched as Robin nibbled at a slice of crunchy bread, gears clearly turning in her head.

Eventually, she responded, “I can do more than tell stories, you know.”

“...Like what?”

“I’ve been on my own for a while.” She avoided your gaze as she fidgeted with one of the tassels on her jacket, lost in thought. “It’s easier to make it at sea with a crew, especially someone with your medical skills.”

Sometimes you wonder if you still would have answered the way you did, knowing how it would end.

Probably, yes. Nico Robin wasn’t an easy girl to turn away from.

“Think it over first” she’d warned you. “You have to understand, I’m a dangerous person to be around. I understand you want to get out of this place, but it’s not enough to keep running. If you don’t want to end up worse than where you started, you have to ask yourself what you really want.”

She didn’t leave you much space to argue, but then, you didn’t exactly think it over, either. You didn’t need to, because you knew what you wanted so intuitively that it felt stupid to question it: to sail out to sea. To enter the Grand Line with Robin. To learn the history of this world together.

By the time the year was up, you’d found yourselves a small crew and a caravel to call your own. You were well on your way to leaving Robin’s history behind and becoming successful pirates in your own right.

The worst part is that you don’t know why it all changed; just that one day she was there, and the next, she wasn’t.

Even if the Marines hadn’t been mysteriously tipped off, you’re not sure there was anything else you could have done. Not with Robin’s Devil Fruit powers gone, the trust between yourself and your crew shattered.

You lost everything that day. Your treasure, your ship, your friends.

Despite everything, the loss that stung the most was Robin.

ii.

Still, somehow, in the years following you managed to stow away on another crew’s ship and make your way to the Grand Line.

Maybe it was because that was your best lead for finding Robin. Maybe just to prove to yourself that you could do it without her. All those years in-between, scraping by to survive with nothing but your wits and a sword, it never seemed like there was much of a point in looking beyond the peak of Reverse Mountain and asking why.

All that level headedness vanished your first night on Whiskey Peak.

The crew you’d traveled with slaughtered, their ship taken by Baroque Works. If it weren’t for the fact that you were a stowaway, forced to hide from them, you never would’ve had a chance of survival. As it was, the best you could do was keep to the shadows and wait for a miracle.

Lucky that you’d learned so well how to keep yourself hidden.

The next pirate crew to arrive was a ragtag bunch, headed by some kid in a straw hat. It was hard to believe that they’d survive when the crew you arrived with didn’t, but somehow, one of them, an imposing green-haired young man, managed to slip away.

You caught up to him in an alley outside, shaded from prying eyes.

“I can help you get out of here,” you promised him. “You and your crew.”

He just eyed you skeptically before turning to walk away with a wave over his shoulder. “Don’t need help.”

But he was your best hope, so you fought at his side anyway, or at least, did the best you could to keep up. Even if he was the only competent man on his crew, the man was a beast, cutting his way through Baroque Works’ members without hesitation.

By the end of it all, your efforts seemed to have paid off, because their captain thanked you with an impudent grin.

“So what are you doing here?”

You hesitated before finally answering, “...I don’t know.”

“Tch,” the green haired pirate chided. “Nobody comes to the Grand Line without a reason.”

“Mm-hmm,” their captain agreed, neck stretching distressingly far as he leaned in to inspect you. “What do you want?”

You hesitated, shock written across your face. Nobody had ever asked you that question.

Nobody but Robin.

Something about this boy put you off your guard, made you want to answer without thinking. So that’s what you did.

“Someone betrayed me once.” You bit your lip nervously, realizing that this was the first truly honest conversation you’d had in years. “I think she’s part of Baroque Works. Maybe if I learn more about their organization, I can… understand why.”

The pirates seemed to catch the sincerity in your tone, because they glanced at each other and nodded before the boy in the straw hat gave you a winning smile.

“I’m Monkey D. Luffy, captain of the Straw Hat pirates! We’re on our way to Alabasta to find their leader, and you’re pretty tough. Why dontcha come with us?”

When you’d told them you wanted to find Robin, you hadn’t expected that day to come so soon. But as you were sailing out of Whiskey Peak’s harbor, there she was, so casually perched on the bannister of their ship like she was meant to be there.

At first, it was like your mind shut off completely.

Limbs locked, unable to move or speak, you stared on as a ghost from your past came to life. She’d always been a good liar–something you once admired, before she turned it against you–but in the years she was gone, she’d truly come into her own, her voice honey-sweet and teasing.

But what struck you the most was how she’d grown. So much taller, and more fleshed-out, too, lithe muscles shifting as she crossed her thighs, sea breeze ruffling her glossy black hair.

Drooping eyelashes shaded her blue eyes as they skimmed across the rest of the Straw Hats, carefully avoiding looking at you.

At least until she left.

Finally, just as she was turning to go, she glanced over her shoulder in your direction. She was still smiling, but you knew her well enough to read the sadness in her gaze when it caught on you.

“If you survive, I hope we meet again,” she promised.

You couldn’t be sure if she was talking to the whole crew or you specifically, but either way, it was enough to break you from your panic.

“Wait!”

You charged forward, reaching for her wrist, her jacket, anything you could get your hands on, but it was too late; she’d already leapt from the railing of the Going Merry, and this time, she didn’t look back.

iii.

Eager as you may have been to prove yourself to your new crew, by the time you arrived in Alabasta, there was only one thing on your mind.

Ironically, in the heat of the battle, it was only thanks to the Marines that you were able to find her.

Seeing her standing there in the middle of the square, hands falling to her side, surrounding in bodies was so much like the day she left that for a moment you wanted to freeze up again, let your voice catch in your throat until she was gone like before.

But you couldn’t let her escape. Not again.

“Robin!” you called out, startled by the viciousness in your own voice as you commanded, “wait.”

She eyed you up and down, brows furrowed, before stretching her hands into the air, fingers splayed wide in a gesture of surrender.

“(Y/N),” she greeted you, her voice reserved and tense. “It’s… been a while, hasn’t it?”

“You could say that,” you said, hand perched lightly on the hilt of your sword as you stalked closer. “Haven’t forgotten the last time we saw each other, have you?”

Her face twitched at the question, eyes dropping to avoid meeting your gaze.

“How could I?”

Your hand fell from your sword, once again caught off guard by her regret. It was palpable in her tone, in the way she carried herself, in the way that she didn’t seem able to so much as look at you. All this time, you’d seen her disappearance and the Navy’s arrival as a betrayal. You’d hated her for it as much as you missed her.

And yet she didn’t seem to feel anything but grief.

“I–”

It was just a moment’s hesitation, but then, she’d never needed more than that. Her hands fell, swooping across her chest in one elegant motion, and before you had time to react, you could feel fingers clutching at your jaw and wrists and ankles.

She leaned in, breath tickling your ear as she whispered, “I’m sorry. I wish it didn’t have to be this way. But–I don’t have time for this now. I need to go.”

Her grip was stern and unforgiving, holding you too tightly to so much as speak. And yet, it was still her, skin soft and warm and familiar pressed up against your own.

A touch that would have been reassuring, if it wasn’t accompanied by her back turning, leaving you behind.

Again.

You shouted incoherently, writhing against the hands holding you in place, but it was no use. By the time they dissipated into cherry petals, she was already gone.

iv.

You weren’t able to hold back your scream when you saw her there, crumpled on the floor of a crumbling tomb, Crocodile towering over her as his hook dripped with blood.

This time, your shock and your fear weren’t enough to hold you back.

Sword drawn, you charged forward, but still you passed through him effortlessly as his body dissolved into sand, rematerializing at the foot of the stairwell behind you. Panting, you turned to look at him, pure loathing in your eyes.

“Stay away from her.” You struggled to force the words from your heaving lungs, worn from having run all this way to find where Robin disappeared to. “She’s mine.”

You weren’t even sure of which way you meant it this time: yours to hunt, yours to long for. But evidently, Crocodile didn’t care either way, because he just peered down his nose at you, impassive and unthreatened.

“Die with her, for all that I care,” the man said with a gloating curl of his lip. “I’ve already–”

You cut him off with a scream and charged forward again, sword braced at your side. It sent shockwaves through your arm when it clattered uselessly into the wall behind Crocodile.

“Are you finished yet?”

“Never,” you snarled, voice cold and feral in a way that you’ve never felt before. “Not until you’re–”

Lips brushed gently against your ear. A whispered voice, soft like honey, instantly eased the tension in your body and the panic in your mind.

“Water.”

And in that moment, it was like all of the years between you and Robin faded into nothing. Like you were young again, perfectly understanding each other, ready to take on the world together. In one fluid movement, you charged forward as you slid the worn leather canteen from your hip, uncorked it, and splashed it across Crocodile’s chest.

This time, when you thrusted your sword forward, it met its mark: the telling resistance of human flesh.

Crocodile’s eyes went wide in shock as he stumbled backward, your sword still impaled in his chest.

“Again?” he wheezed. “What is it with–”

It was at that moment that the wall blew open.

And there he was: Luffy, your captain. You’d never felt so reassured by his bullheaded determination as you did in that moment.

“Luffy!” you called out. “Take him!”

“Mm,” he glanced at you with a short nod of agreement.

It was all the approval you needed to run back to Robin, sliding to your knees at her side. Her blood pooled around her, seeping into the cobblestone, but if she could still use her powers, if she could still speak, it meant she was alive.

“Robin,” you murmured, oblivious to the ceiling crumbling around you as you slid your robe from your shoulders and began tearing it into strips. “Robin, talk to me.”

She blinked up at you, eyes fuzzy and unfocused.

“(Y/N)? I–” she coughed and for the first time you noticed blood specking the corners of her lips. “I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”

“I’m here now,” you promised, any memories of betrayal gone from your mind as you lifted her into your lap and began wrapping the fabric tightly around her wound. It was too thin to fully stop the bleeding, but at least it was something. Enough to keep her alive until you could get to the surface.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered brokenly, her head nestled in the crook of your arm. “I’m so sorry, I never wanted to–”

You squinted your eyes against the welling tears and bent over, pressing a gentle kiss against her forehead.

“You can apologize later. I’m going to get us out of here. Together.”

Robin doesn’t seem to have the strength to speak again, but when she meets your eyes again, there’s a small smile flickering across her lips. An unfamiliar expression, one you’ve never seen her wear before: peace.

#one piece #nico robin x reader #one piece x reader #one piece headcanons #one piece fanfiction #one piece fanfic #nico robin #nico robin x y/n #nico robin x you #op y/n secret santa #ronan writes

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systastic · 4 months ago

Note

sissasystem based on these three songs?

No One’s Here To Sleep by Naughty Boy

Part Of The Band by The 1975

NOT ENTIRELY ALONE by The Narcissist Cookbook

only thing we request is that you use irl people as faceclaims! :D if not thats okay too

one sisasystem , made just for you !! :3 hope you enjoy ~

collective name(s) :: laynie, harrison, wendall, wilder, august, arizona, cavendish

collective sign off :: 🌅, 🛤️, their collective name, AMT (stands for amos, maxie & tj), yeehaw [ironically]

name :: amos, altair, layne, sav/saf (safia), bree

age :: 13 to 17

pronouns :: she/her, it/its, zhe/zher, xi/xir, di/der (dirtself), si/sin (sinself)

roles :: protector, persecutor, avenger, fear shifter, candorian

species :: human; embodiment of “sin”

gender identity :: syrvivgender, videretrian, analogix, missinggender, purgatorean

orientation :: cuiporomantic, autosexual

source :: brainmade, songtive (no one’s here to sleep)

aesthetic :: analogue horror, zombie apocalypse, darkcore

appearance description :: “amos is gross” : that’s what everybody says when they look at her. it cakes its hands in mud, lets its hair get greasy, re-wears the same clothes over and over again. zhe knows it’s unhealthy - but zhe can’t stop zhirself. letting xir guard down for even a second could get xem and xeir headmates hurt. di opts for darker, less noticeable clothes that dey can move around in; the more di can move, the less likely dey are to get trapped. si keeps sir hair long (no time to cut it), sometimes snapping it into a ponytail. when si does change clothes, si always keeps one thing on: a black jacket covered in patches si made with sir former friends.

personality description :: amos is most well known for her hostility towards people zhe doesn’t know. new people are seen as possible infected: kept at an arm’s distance, keeping communication to a minimum lest they be potentially hostile. zhe is quiet most of the time, often thinking about how zhey would deal with the worst outcome should it come to pass. (this often involves fighting.) even after befriending zher, zhey don’t get much nicer: zhey always have a backup plan in place in case the other person betrays zheir trust.

likes :: fighting hostile entities, keeping the way clear, survival skills, survival YouTube channels, pocket knives, portable gear, zombie movies where the humans win, first person shooters, PvZ, barbed wire bats, punching people in the face

dislikes :: sleeping, shadows, long creeping hallways that twist and turn, unsettling environments, things that upset the “norm”, zhemself (especially in terms of being a good person), other people, zombies seen as “good”, being called cute or adorable

front triggers :: bedtime (actively fights off going to sleep), physical danger, zombie media, eerie settings, hotel hallways, der source song

signoff :: 🐦‍⬛, ⚾️

mood board :: amos

songs for you :: run boy run by woodkid, enemy by imagine dragons, i love you by woodkid, DARKSIDE by neoni, the phoenix by fall out boy, daydream by ruelle

kins :: ellie from the last of us ; ace of clubs from the batman universe

typing quirk? :: prefers shorter sentences. proper punctuation. opts for simpler words to get the message across. does not capitalize zhir sentences.

name :: tj, frances, miles, wendall, rhodes

age :: 20, on the cusp on 21

pronouns :: he/him, hu/hum, per/pers, roe/roeself

roles :: absorber, optimist, caesian, energetic alter

species :: human through and through!

gender identity :: your typical male. he doesn’t really like labels, as he finds them more confining than they are helpful.

orientation :: bisexual with a preference for men

source :: brainmade, songtive (part of the band)

aesthetic :: wanderlust, americana (specifically wide open plains), campcore

appearance description :: tj is simply incapable of dressing normally. he is that one guy who wears shorts during the winter and long pants during the summer. hum reasoning? “hey, you never know, maybe we’ll end up in Florida today!” per likes to mix and match, but he does have some semblance of consistency: everything he wears is easy to move in and won’t end up with bloody knees if he does some parkour tricks. while he does wear some jewelry for funnies, he almost never takes those camping with him unless they’re designed for extreme conditions. breaking his accessories would be heartbreaking.

personality description :: the most out-there guy you’ll ever know. tj does things that make him happy whenever he feels the inkling to. this can be climbing on top of things, scaling walls, jumping up a tree, driving five hours to see a friend — he cannot and will not be stopped. unlike amos, tj sees the best in people and situations no matter what happens. he sees the silver linings in the grey skies: sure, the game got rained out, but hey… that’s perfect sleepover weather!

likes :: taking things as they come, road trips, long car rides, sporadic adventures, being active, camping, sitting around the fire, walks through nature, natural wildlife, having a good time, fucking around and finding out

dislikes :: people who can’t chill, hyper-specific organization, charters, control freaks, plane rides (can’t see the world go by), over-urbanization, pollution, hostile architecture, people being addicted to social media (he doesn’t get it — why fixate on a small screen when you can see the real deal?)

front triggers :: car rides, sightseeing, camping, being with friends, trips, natural beauty, worldly wonders

signoff :: 👣, 🪵, 🗺️

mood board :: tj

songs for you :: could have been me by the struts, the great escape by woodkid, where is your rider by the oh hellos, someone to die for by hurts, torches by x ambassadors, FUNGUS by the narcissist cookbook

kins :: bennett from genshin impact, indiana jones (allegedly)

typing quirk? :: rambles a heck of a lot, chronically allergic to punctuation, never swears and rather substitutes them for sayings (dangnabbit = damn, flipping flapjacks = flying fuck)

name :: max/maxie, jessie, waylon, cora, wilder

age :: 17 to 19

pronouns :: he/they (alternating), he/him, they/them, thon/thons, co/cos

roles :: apparently normal part, pseudo host, sensory soother

species :: human (asomatic)

gender identity :: cassgender, dazegender, coyotething

orientation :: gay, reciprosexual

source :: brainmade, songtive (NOT ENTIRELY ALONE)

aesthetic :: amateur photography, prairie, rustic

appearance description :: despite spending so much time in the sun and desert, Maxie is soft by nature. their clothes are kept clean and tidy, their hair is a reasonable level of messy, and they take good care of their skin. Maxie opts for large baggy clothing in neutrals and dark colors due to the fact they’re often outside.

personality description :: calm and comfortable, maxie doesn’t lean too hard one way or the other unlike his system mates. they are a watcher of all the things they can see, trying not to take things for granted. thon would love to share thons appreciation for the world with others — but with everything around them feeling like it’s falling apart, it’s harder and harder for thon to get people to listen. cos is horrible with conflict; whenever cos is faced with a problem, they switch out to let either tj or amos say their piece and (hopefully) smooth things over without starting a fight.

likes :: watching the sky, birds flying overhead, talking to people, rustic furniture, country music, playing the guitar, pottery, horses, coyotes and wild dogs, what has yet to come

dislikes :: things outside of his control, natural disasters, darkness, animal abuse, rapid urbanization, people forgetting his name (really, it’s so simple!), being talked over, people who don’t listen, conflict, picking sides

front triggers :: country aesthetics, wide open spaces, horses & horse riding, taking pictures, peace and quiet, howls in the night

signoff :: 🌵/📷

mood board :: maxie

songs for you :: fire by barns courtney, ghost on the shore by lord huron, foreigner’s god by hozier, the mute by radical face, swan upon leda by hozier, o susanna by the smoky mountain band

kins :: none to speak of, but he likes dolly parton a good bit. (and mater from cars, but he won’t admit to that one.)

typing quirk? :: doesn’t quite… finish their sentences. frequent use of ellipses… oh… lots of interjections… always seems a bit distracted.

#alter packs #build a alter #build an alter #build a headmate #headmate creation #headmate pack #bah blog #baa blog #build a system #kitty creations #level four #level 4

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morgana-ren · 1 year ago

Note

I made it to the moonrise tower and encountering the drow made me almost cry for Astarion. The camp scene was the sweetest, I opted for the hug and his facial expression/ reaction did not disappoint. I know this is odd since he is a video game character but his reactions are like a real person would be. I’ve seen videos of the bad options and what happens. I like it how each character is progressing, even Laezel (I know I spelled her name wrong) when she finally accepts her Queen betrayed her and their whole people.

Larian did so, so well at breathing life into the characters and making them real. Especially with how incredibly everything was animated and mocapped.

They are so well written, so diverse, and just so incredibly driving. People who stick out the initial 'rough' patches are deeply rewarded. I keep seeing people whining about the companions and just 'not liking them' because they're 'not nice' or whatever, and they're weak-willed little bitches. People who didn't stick out the story and were just driven off by the initial impressions. What, you never became best friends with someone who hated your guts before? Weaklings.

You really get invested in their stories and are genuinely happy when they meet good conclusions. Your heart breaks alongside Lae'zel's when she finds out her entire life-- her entire culture-- is a lie. You want to rip the flesh from Cazador's bones for what he did to Astarion, and when he's finally dead, you rejoice alongside him. Watching Shadowheart go through the tumultuous ups and downs of her faith is heartwrenching.

That's part of why I take so much care in my options, because I cannot abide bad endings, especially when I am this invested in them.

#morgana and friends #Baldur's gate 3 spoilers

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pacifymebby · 1 year ago

Text

t r o u b l e / Chapter Ten

a peaky blinders Modern AU balletcore story?

Chapter List

Previous Chapter (in case u missed it bc tumblr is being weird)

John

"Don't like this John," hummed Esme where she sat in the bedroom window, her hair wild and long, trailing down her back her curls knotting down to her lower back, brushing over her bare thighs when she turned to look at me over her shoulder. She'd been up half the night with the baby and now that the littlen had finally settled down she was sitting alone watching the dark garden, wearing one of my tshirts, one which had been worn to death and had grown with her baby belly throughout her last pregnancy. She still wore it now, when it was late and she couldn't sleep. She'd taken to sitting in that window all through the night, starring out at the garden like a caged bird, smoking her cigarettes one by one.

"I know love," I sighed stepping up behind her, letting my hands hold her shoudlers, thumbs rubbing over the bones. "Won't be for long, we'll go back to the farm soon..."

"Thats what you say," she said turning back to the garden with the dark shadowy eyes of a girl. A girl pining. Which is what I knew she was. She was restless and she had been for a long time, long before this shit with the Italians. I'd been trying my best on the farm, trying to help her feel free, connected to the earth. I humoured her when she walked out in the garden barefoot, curling her toes into the muddy vegetable patches when it rained. I'd promised her we'd travel, that we'd pack up and take the kids with us, and I'd meant to keep that promise. But now there were other shadows looming over us, and not just over me and her but the whole family. And keeping my promise to Esme would mean betraying my brothers and sisters.

I couldn't even toy with the idea. Of course sometimes the way Tommy was made me want to say fuck it and leave, but the rest of them, no. I couldn't leave Ada and the twins. Couldnt abandon Arthur who needed the family to stay together more than any of us.

And even Tommy, at the end of the day, no matter how cruel he could be, how unfeeling, he was still my big brother. And he wasn't as selfish as he seemed, it just takes a lot to lead a family, especially one like ours. He was just doing his best to be the person steering our battered ship.

"We're never leaving here," Esme said, her voice low and dark and gloomy like the empty garden at night. That expanse of lawn, so tame. That wall of trees just that, a wall that hedged us all in. Marked out our bit of land and kept it ours. A perimeter that Esme understood, kept her caged.

That was why she spent her evenings starring out at it with dark eyes and a heavy heart. Smoking her cigarettes. Making me feel all kinds of guilt and inadequacy.

"We will flower, just as soon as this is all over, gonna take you and the littlens far away," I said leaning over her, tilting her head right back so that i could kiss her from above. I meant it, in my heart when I said it I meant it but we were neither of us naive and so we both found ourselves looking out at the garden then, whistful and doomed.

This wasn't going to be over quickly. Might never be over at all.

The house was quiet but only just and only for now, the twins had gone to bed, too shaken up for my liking - and I felt guilty for that because I'd aided in the shaking - but Arthur hadn't returned with Ada and I knew that she had all the fight of little Sylvie and all the zeal of having grown up in a shithole like small heath. That is to say I knew she wouldn't be affraid to tell Tommy exactly what she thought of him. How much of a cunt she thought he was.

When our mother had died Tommy had stepped up for the girls because they were only small and suddenly left without a mother or a father to care for them. He'd tried to be that father figure to the best of his ability, which was limited because he'd never really had a sturdy father figure himself. As a result the girls had wound up with this fear of him, that fear only a father can instill. In healthy relationships its known as respect but theirs was a distant and troubled relationship and so fear was the only way of describing it. Ada hadn't had that, didn't fear him and probably wouldn't ever. So I knew that when she got here she'd do the shouting and the fighting for all three of them. Wouldn't give a fuck that it was 4 in the morning and the littluns were in bed, that I was in bed, only just managing to drift off. Would blame me for that, would tell me it straight.

"Ada will stay," said Esme then, "she's not stupid she knows whats at risk..."

"Yeah," I sighed, "its the girls ain't it," I said, "gonna be trouble..." I said and she smirked as if to say 'you don't know the half of it' but I did because every step of the way we'd done everything wrong. We'd sent them away, let them grow up wild in some far away city, in a boarding school that taught them how to lie and cheat their way to the top, taught them they could have everything they wanted if they were cut throat and selfish, if they thought only about where they were trying to go and took wild risks, pushed themselves too far.

And it was obvious looking at Sylvie, that the both of them had taken on board everything that theyd been taught. That they weren't affraid to push themselves too far, test their limits. That they didn't mind their own safety when it came to taking risks to get what they wanted.

And they'd take these risks because we'd always tried to keep them sheltered, always tried to keep them seperate. The twins had never seen their brothers with bullets in their chests, they'd never seen the men we'd snatched from wives and children. They didn't really know what we did with the bodies. They didn't know about the arms severed, the threats sent. They didn't know the things we'd done to our enemies, they thought our wars were all money and talk but they were usually always retaliation to meetings gone sour, deals fucked up, families we'd made the mistake of only half slaughtering.

And because they didn't know any of those things, then they could never really understand what they were risking, what our enemies would do to them, how they would be used, how they'd be tortured.

It wasn't even a year passed since our Aunt Pol had narrowly escaped death at the hands of the Changretta's. They'd had her neck in a noose, left her balanced on her tip toes for days, a sinister act of torture we were all certain had tipped her over the morbid edge she'd been teetering on for years. They'd told her they had all of us, tricked her into believing that whilst she stood their desperately trying to keep her balance, feeling the strain of the noose against her neck every time she faltered, that each of us was fighting for our lives in an equally painful way.

No one knew, not even her, how she'd actually managed to escape. But it hadn't been any of us who had cut her down. Tommy said she must have done it, must have worked out a way to cut the bonds on her hands, to sever the rope around her neck. Polly insisted that it hadn't been. That it had been the ghost of her mother, that now she'd spent several days with death hovering around her, waiting for her muscles to spazm and falter, she could see death all the time. That she could hear the voices of those past, that she could see their shadows lingering around the living.

And though it all seemed a little mellodramatic to me, seemded like rot to Arthur, I could tell Tommy empathised with the darkness. And we couldn't laugh her off because of what she'd gone through. The days of pain, her muscles sore to burning, her adrenaline savaging her body so that when she finally returned home she was a shell of her former self. Something changed behind her eyes.

That was the darkness our fens were risking every time they fought back against Tommy. If they disobeyed him, if we couldn't keep them here, safe with us, well, thered be no ghosts that came to save them.

"Sylvies got her brothers temper," said Esme, her strange impersonal judgements reminding me that they'd never really met. That the wedding had been the first and last time they'd seen one another. So it was all the more strange, all the more uncomfortable.

"Aye but which brother..." I smirked making her laugh, making her dark brooding eyes light up for a moment as she shook her head.

"Well," she let her smirk linger, her dimple etched into her expression so that she appeared impish in the pale nights light, "ain't arthurs is it..."

"Shes nothin like Tommy," I said shaking my head, refusing to believe that that could be true, refusing to believe that there was anything about my brother that could possibly have been passed onto little Sylvia who had always been so wild and sweet.

"They're like our mum," I said trying to reiterate my point. Trying to prove Esme's observation wrong, "I guess you wouldn't see that yknow," I shrugged turning away from the window, pulling my shirt over my head, knowing there was no point trying to get to sleep. Lying down anyway and asked her to lie down with me. For want of nothing else to do.

"Come on love, can't sit in that window all night you'll get cold..."

"What and I spose you're gonna keep me warm?" she asked turning with that clever little smirk, outsmarting me again.

"Aye," I said with a cheeky caught out grin of my own, "Somet like that aye..." I chuckled opening my arms out for her, letting her crawl across the bed to me, that too bed tshirt hanging from her soft curves as she moved feline and feminine over covers to come curl up in my arms.

I kissed her hair and let my hand trail over her thigh, fingers teasing a line up to the hem of her underwear. I knew how to ease her troubled mood, even now when her eyes were dark and I could see that she was worrying.

So we didn't get any sleep, and when Arthur returned with Ada and Karl, their voices ricochetting down the corridors, their disturbance caught me and Esme off guard. Her beanth me, her thighs trembling on each side of my neck as I ground my hips against her hips a little harder than before, burying myself deep inside her.

We'd been close when that front door had slammed and Karl had woken, started crying but the moment Ada's sharp words began tumbling vitriolic and shattering the silent house, we knew it was over.

"Fuck sake," whined Esme burying her face into my neck, clutching at me still, her body clinging tight to mine. She didn't want to let go and I didn't want to pull out and away from her but I knew that any second now Ada would be hammering her fist on that bedroom door demanding to drag me into the battle.

I laughed, let my grin linger because there was nothing else I could do. Just had to keep smirking through it and appreciate the humour of it all, forty fuckin one years old and still being cockblocked by my big sister.

So I accepted my fate, kissing Esme on the nose as I pulled out and she whimpered again. Smirking at her sweetness because it wasn't a side to her that came out very often. Had never been a side she liked to show. One it had taken me a long time to find hidden and secret beneath all those rough and wild layers of defense.

"To be continued," I said pecking her cheek, trailing teasing kisses down her body, leaving one between her legs that made her whine and then push me away, kicking at me playfully as she let out a dissatisfied sigh.

"Fuck sake John," she groaned as she pushed herself up and wrapped the covers around her. "I'm going to sleep, better not wake me up when you get back..." she threatened, her smouldering eyes teasing me, her sullen lips leaving me longing to kiss her again, push her buttons just a little more.

"Oh you'll be awake lass," I grinned, "Ada'll make sure of that..."

And Ada did make sure of that. She'd no patience because despite what he said, Arthur had done nothing to calm her on the journey home and even then, when I came stumbling into the corridor tugging my tshirt over my head, laughing at the drama of it all, Arthur was watching her despairing and nervous.

"Fuckin hell Ada some of us are tryna sleep here, its 4 in the fuckin mornin..." I said still chuckling, knowimg that I was risking her temper and carrying on anyway. I was her little brother afterall, I could get away with it if I tried.

"Perhaps you'd be having an easier night if you didn't always bend over backwards to accommodate our canniving pig of a brother," she said sharply, standing in the hallway lit up by the the little light coming in through the front door and the windows in the cieling.

She looked pale as a ghost and just as cold and I didn't know what to say to her because she wasn't wrong. Wasn't right either. I wouldn't have had an easier night because Tommy would have killed me and then he'd have sent someone else, someone like Isaiah, and then my ghost would have been haunting the halls all eternity with the guilt of having left my little sisters in the hands of someone else.

It wasn't that I wouldn't have trusted Isaiah with my sisters, it was that really when it came down to it, I didn't trust anyone with them. Not even my brothers. Not to do things right anyway.

If Arthur had gone for them he'd have lost his temper because he'd have been scared, because he'd have been paranoid that they didn't respect him, because he'd have been angry at himself for not being able to do as Tommy had asked. For not being the kind of brother his little baby sisters would trust.

If Tommy had gone, then the speech which had brought Sonya to petrified tears in the office that night, would have been given much sooner, with no care for the audience, no care for who was watching, recording or making notes. He'd have lost his temper because he'd have realised they only feared him, didn't respect him. And they were more delicate than either of them liked to let on. Sonya and Sylvia had always been a little less Shelby like our father. Much more like their mother than anyone wanted to admit.

I had noticed it in Sylvia straight away. The thin quality, that washed out pale tone, the greyish brown which shadowed her eyes, which lingered and left her looking tired. Sonya had hidden it better but I'd still seen it there. They were both just so much smaller than they should have been but I knew that if I mentioned it to my brothers they'd tell me I worried too much, that they were tougher than I gave them credit for.

"Ada love come on now eh its late, you'll wake the twins..." said Arthur, all sheepish and tired, one hand on the back of his neck, his features flushed, embarassed to be approaching 50 and still unable to quell his sisters temper. If there was one thing you could say about Ada it was that she'd always been the one to put us in our place. Humble us when we let our position and our reputation get to our heads.

"You care for their wellbeing so much then why in gods name would you drag em back to this fuckin place?" and then she sighed and shook her head, "fuckin go to bed arthur it aint you I need to speak to..."

"Tommys in his..." I trailed off when my eyes met my brothers down the hall, he was walking slowly, a shadow approaching, a cigarette unlit hanging between his lips.

"Ada love," he said making her jump but doing nothing to hush her or shake her determination. "Good to see you made it up safe an sound..." and when I saw his patronising little smile I resigned myself to a sleepless night and a long morning of achey heads and sore throats. Tension bristling.

It was exactly what we got, but not what we didn't deserve.

🔪🦢

"She won't forgive you you know..." said Polly the next morning when it was only myself and her left in the dining room.

Sylvie had left with an angry static buzzing all about her, Tommy had sent her to fetch Sonya and, in his usual tactless charm, had said something so patronising that I was surprised our Fen hadn't torn his head from his neck right in front of us.

"No," I said with a sad smirk, "Fens right, gonna fuck Sonyas whole career up ain't it, poor lass must fuckin hate us..." but when I said it Pol just chuckled and shook her head.

"I wasn't talking about Sonya," she said lighting up her cigarette and drawing in a long leisurely inhale, "Sonya knows she can't go back, I don't even think she's going to put up a fight..."

"Its Sonya who's losing her job not Sylvia," I shrugged a little confused, not understanding when Polly laughed.

"Ha," she said, "stupid lads the lot of you..." she turned her head from me, looking across the dining room and out the window at the gardens where the mist was just beginning to thin.

"What?" I couldn't keep the confusion off my face despite wanting to hide it, I hated it when she made me feel stupid like that, perhaps I deserved it, perhaps I was as daft as she said. Even so I didn't like the fact being highlighted so bluntly.

"Since their mother died those two girls have had only eachother... Their big brothers weren't there were they? In London? Learnt to look after one another didn't they..."

It was painful to hear it from her, our Aunt Pol who has always been the matriarch, the one who looked after us all, the one we all looked up to. She it was painful to hear her tell it so straight, how we'd let them down. How we'd abandoned them. Left two little girls down south on their own, fending for themselves among strangers.

"I should never have let him do that," said Polly then, her voice as dark and gravelly as her eyes, that harsh kind of doom lingering around her like a shadow. One of those auras she claimed to be able to see around people these days.

"When our Tom puts his mind to somet..." I started only to trail off, only to remember that none of us had really fought against it, "we all believed it was for the best..."

"Fools," murmured Pol sucking in another drag on her cigarette, watching the cloud of smoke linger and then disperse just in front of her, "the lot of us."

#peaky blinders imagines #Trouble #tommy shelby modern au #peaky blinders modern au #peaky blinders x sister!reader #peaky blinders x oc #Alfie solomons x oc #peaky blinders fanfiction #peaky blinders imagine

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animentality · 9 months ago

Note

I've wanted to do this for a while, but was held back by shyness for a while. (By a while, I mean I haven't even experienced Patch 6 yet. I *believe* this entire experience was in 5.)

I played Dark Urge as my first complete run of Baldur's Gate III, and it was beautiful in a way I don't feel is captured in the normal Tav playthrough, but I only intend to partially unpack that to keep things on topic for Durgetash.

From the very beginning, who you are and what you've lost *burns* as a question in your head. You meet the violation with rage and the promise of bloody consequences, but — it fades. You have people to care for, with varying degrees of suddenness, who understand you and the circumstances that may have shaped you.

And violence and potential death meets them at every turn. I, not the Durge, grew murderously protective of everyone in my party. Astarion. Karlach. Shadowheart.

I killed Alfira and never regretted it, save for wondering if the party would reject me for the barbarity of it all. The butler was delighted, and Astarion wore the reward for my first slip of control for the rest of the game.

If you can't tell, I was already thoroughly invested in feeling this story so much I purposely blurred the lines between myself and the Durge I had for the sake of acting as they would, fighting like I felt best suited them (they were a Storm Sorcery Sorcerer).

By Last Light, I wasn't fond of this unknown observer and their wants. I had no interest in killing Shadowheart, or the town of unknown innocents to "make up" for serving her in what I get in hindsight looked like —to Fel, Orin, and Bhaal alike — another unacceptable fit of perverse sentimentality.

Isabel still died, because I had taken on the fight not yet quite strong enough to save her. Dammon died, as well, and the party and I had to move on. Fel visited that night, and bestowed the form of the Slayer upon me. I was Murder Incarnate, he joyfully proclaimed, and I killed him in the hopes of removing him from my sight. From the camp.

There were letters in rooms I fumbled through in Moonrise, and Gortash started becoming relevant, both in those signatures and through Karlach's sharing of her history.

The vague negativity I felt towards this largely faceless, seemingly largely political threat shattered when infiltrating his palace on the day of the ascension to Archduke of Baldur's Gate turned into an occasion my Durge was *invited to*.

How was I? Did I remember? Would I like to rejoin forces? I can't imagine now how many questions were going through his head, seeing me alive and on my feet after all the time that had passed.

And where Ketheric had acted with rage when I inevitably betrayed him at the top and bottom of Moonrise Towers, or Orin had seethed that my Durge had dared to return and threaten every bit of goodwill she had painstakingly clawed together from the Bhaalists, Enver simply shrugged it off, offering me the first of two chances to ultimately just get their stones and return to rule together with him.

For Karlach's sake, I considered it impossible. I wasn't whoever had orchestrated the plan to enslave the brain.

Somewhere along the way during this campaign, I had seen your posts, but didn't really delve into them or read them too thoroughly since I was trying to not spoil myself by accident. Was that bit of fondness in the throne room that had stayed his hand it? I wasn't going to judge, by any means, because I've certainly shipped things ferociously for much less meaningful gestures, but I didn't understand why it would prompt the intensity with which you fawned over it.

And then I reached the underwater prison. I got lost in the sewers and somehow found the submarine, and the destination was where I had seen Wyll's father rumored to be kept. I had already made the pact with Mizora on his behalf, and didn't really expect to find more than his corpse in the prison after the bombs went off.

But more importantly — I finally understood, in the conversation with Gortash where he demanded I turn back, and looked incredibly unsurprised when I didn't. Somehow, despite my Durge tearing one of his most secure advantages from between his fingers and forcing him to dash it against the ground rather than risking it falling intact into their hands... he seemed *amused. Delighted.*

And so I set to proving myself, somehow wanting to find myself worthy of his approval of my strength, while also wanting to spite Mizora.

I got everybody out, and by happenstance, only Karlach died. His foil, I discovered in hindsight, since she is ready to leap into the House of Hope itself for my Durge the same way they did for Enver once upon a time.

Most of the remaining relevant crumbs dry out here, as Enver didn't even comment on the prison specifically regardless of the outcome for me.

But between "I always liked you better" and the warmth with which he says anything to you, the delight he shamelessly expresses when you simply are being the you that he knows, that is viciously carved into your bones so deeply it will always return no matter how you heal after being broken?

If you look at it as a story of breaking cycles, what Durgetash was should be objectively regarded as the hardest thing to lose in becoming a better person.

It's the intoxication of being known when you are amongst those that know nothing but the use you can offer them. The twisted fun that makes you question, again and again, whether you really *need* to be better than you were. The painful sorrow, of looking on someone you've grown past, and knowing you can't fit yourself in the spaces belonging to who you were then, even with how you still long for that aching, bloody warmth that their harmful presence would make you feel that you'll never forget.

I found myself happy I had had my Durge embrace the title of Murder Incarnate after the process of beating Orin and rejecting Bhaal.

All this to celebrate being able to play the game again after a long move, and that I'm looking forward to Patch 6, where I can hopefully be moved like that again. Made worse? Who knows.

What a delightful journey culminating into the descent into madness that is...Durgetash.

I'm glad you have seen this light...this dark....

You also got me with the line, "If you look at it as a story of breaking cycles, what Durgetash was should be objectively regarded as the hardest thing to lose in becoming a better person."

:D stab stab stab stab stab

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ciramaris · 8 months ago

Text

Glory

Chapter 3

Wordcount: ca. 1'800

Pairings: Commander Cody x fem!Reader

Summary: You are a Republic Naval Captain (Rank just below Admiral Block) and are rather new to the Negotiator. It has been two weeks since you arrived. Your fellow Bridge Crew betrayed you, now the Admiral and you try to bring the Negotiator back to Coruscant.

Autors Note: Chat *** Official GAR Report ***

⚠️Warnings ⚠️ canon typical violence ⚔ ambigious♨️

Tell me, if I forgot something

Blitz sighed while he starred at the Officers behind the ray shield. They were rowdy - understandably. But he hated prisoners who were loud.

Cody sighed too and starred at him. ,,Slick?”

Blitz nodded. ,,Yeah, I told her 'Slick' means Traitors. Here she used it as. ,We need to get out of here because of traitors.’ I knew when I saw her face, something was wrong.”

Cody nodded thoughtful. ,,And you really think Y/N and I could have something similar?”

Blitz smirked. ,,Kote, I’ve seen the way she looks at you. I’m sure you can have something similar, but made just for the two of you.” He sighed and grimaced. ,,And about me? She will pair me with her Medic Friend of the 31ft.”

Cody smirked. ,,Well, is she beautiful?”

Blitz grin. ,,Yeah, Cecilia is beautiful. I spoke with her fellow Medics. She is also smart and thinks outside the box a lot. Crowder was worried, when she first started with them but now he is not worried any more. She once patched their General up with only Bactasolution and Tape. The I.V. Solution. She created some kind of tape-foil bubble and injected the Bacta in it. Because they were out of Bacta patches and Gel. It healed properly.”

Cody nodded. ,,Sounds like this woman is just as Advanced and self reliant as you, Vod.”

Blitz smirked. ,,Yeah, I got that feeling. But I don’t want to make it too easy for Y/N to set us up.”

Cody laughed. ,,Yeah, I guess she would hold it over your head for a long time.”

Blitz grin snd was just about to reply, when his Datapad chimed, he frowned and looked at it. Then his eyes widened. ,,She did it again.”

Kote frowned. ,,Who?”

,,Cecilia. She went out after their MIA." (Missing In Action) He read further and sighed. ,,I’m beginning to think Y/N wants to pair Cecilia and me, so I can bring her home, qfter the recklessstunts she pulls...” He shook his head. ,,Look what that crazy woman did.” He held his Datapad out for Kote.

Kote frowned and took it.

***

15:45 Coruscant Time| Local time 23:45|

Sergeant Medic CC- 1209-67 {Crowder} reports:

《 Cecilia Hart MIA 》

Situation:

Medic Hart Reported several times to Captain CC-3408 {Chain} ,I know they are out there and alive, we have to get them back! No one is left behind.”

After several Regional Life scans, which resulted in no signs. Captain CC-3408 {Chain} ordered Medic Hart to her Quarters to cool off.

Medic Hart did retreat to her Quarters but unbeknownst to Captain CC-3408 {Chain} , she exited the Base perimeters and is now reported as MIA, since there was no live signs of her for 52h. Regional Scans have also showed no results in finding the Civilian Medic Cecilia Hart.

***

Cody shook his head. ,,What do you think happened? She found them or what ?”

Blitz shrugged. ,,I don’t know, Kote. But as soon as we are on Coruscant I’ll fly to her and find her.”

Kote frowned. ,,If you have the order.”

Blitz smirked. ,,Cecilia is the adoptive Sister of one of the Senators. It is vital for the Republic to get her back.”

Kote laughed. ,,Really?”

Blitz nodded. ,,Yeah, Senator Amidala’s adoptive Sister. She never took Naberrie as her last name, also to keep herself safe, since Amidala run for Queen quite early in her life.”

Kote clapped his Vod on his Pauldron. ,,Lucky Bastard.”

Blitz laughed. ,,I’ll get our Girl back, one way or another. I just hope, she is stuck somewhere in a cave and not in Separatist Hands.”

Kote nodded thoughtful. ,,Hope is always good, Vod. It keeps ya going.”

Blitz nodded. He frowned. ,,Did we just exit Hyperspace?”

Kote frowned and called Block.

,,The Admiral?”

,,Cody here, did we just drop out of Hyperspace?”

,,Yes, we did, we made some alternate calculations and we are above Coruscant. We will begin landing sequences soon.”

Cody frowned. ,,Good, Admiral.” And shut the comm off.

Blitz frowned. ,,It is a 8h trip to Coruscant. How did we do it in 4h?”

Kote shrugged. ,,You’ll go ask your Sister.”

Blitz nodded and left for the bridge.

He saw Block on the Comm Console with Yularen and spotted you in front of the viewport.

,,Y/N? How did you do it in 4h?”

You turned and grin. ,,Mathematics, Blitz. We let the Reactor core work double and cut the energy on several places, for example the hangar and the lifts, and we dimmed the lights on several decks, others we shut down completely.”

He frowned. ,,You want to tell me, we just traveled double light speed?”

You laughed. ,,No, not double but just as fast as light. You see light speed in not actual light speed it is the speed of the slowest lights but now we traveled with the fastest lights. Usually hyperspace is blue and dark blue and sometimes white with it. Now it was just white. Blindingly so even.”

He nodded. ,,Alright and now?”

You shrugged. ,,Now we set everything back to normal.”

Blitz nodded. ,,I need to leave I have another assignment. It starts as soon as I sit in my ARC 170.”

You nodded. ,,I’ll miss you. Be careful and come back home safely.” You hugged him.

Blitz grin. ,,I love you too, Y/N. Go out with Kote to 79’s.”

You laughed. ,,Matchmaker.”

He grin and kissed the top of your head. ,,See ya.”

You nodded. ,,Ret’urcye mhi” (Maybe we’ll meet again/ Goodbye)

Blitz grin and laughed. ,,Ret’urcye mhi, Vod’ika.”

You looked after him. When he walked out of the bridge you turned back to the Viewport. In ftojt of you, you saw the two massive blast doors of the main hangar open and a in comparison tiny ARC 170 leave to Coruscant. A moment later you saw a Gunship approach and your Comm chimed. ,,Yes?”

,,Would you be so kind as to open your Hangar for us, Y/N?”

You grin. ,,Already open, Admiral.”

Moments later Yularen and his Deck Officers were on your Bridge. ,,My dear. What have you been up to, this time?”

You grin. ,,Nothing much really. I just wanted to go home while they wanted to go to Ryndellia.”

He frowned. ,,Where the Medical Station is?”

You nodded. ,,Yes, I didn’t ask them. I’ll leave the questioning to the Jedi. They are much more persuasive than I am.”

He smirked. ,,Yes they are. Alright.” He louder said. ,,On your positions!”

You smirked, when you saw his new naval Commander. The last three he had were thrown out because of their incompetence. This one was with him for 4 months. Yularen glared at the rookie but you knew, his glare was better than being ignored. If Yularen glared, then you were doing it right but just too slow. If he ignored you, you were not needed and thus incompetent.

He sighed. ,,Would you mind showing him how it is done, dear?”

You smiled, nodded and helped the rookie.

------×--------×----------×-----------×----------

Cody sighed, he was tired and felt drained after all this, first the Campaign on Geonosis, then the Queen and now his Ships crew were traitors. He sighed and wondered if Y/N was busy. He opted to go up to the Bridge but remembered he needed to round up his men to get them ready. He sighed and ordered his men to pack their things and clean up the messes they made. While he was once again stuck behind his Datapad writing reports.

He sat down in the Messhall and sipped Coffee while he wrote reports and read reports from his Medics and Captains.

He was curious about Blitz, he looked up his Mission log but was blocked due to non ARC Status. The only thing he saw, was:

{On duty}

He sighed. Was he supposed to tell you, your best friends were both in danger out there somewhere? He hoped not. He got the feeling if he knew and didn’t tell you, you would feel betrayed and if he told you - you were worried. He sighed and focused back on his reports.

The next ting he knew, was you were bugging him to get up. He groaned. ,,No.”

You sighed. ,,Kote, come on, we’re home. Get up, or I’ll push you off the bench.”

He lifted his head and blinked sleepy. ,,What?”

You chuckled. ,,We landed and are on Coruscant.”

He sighed and stretched. His shoulders popped as well as his back from being in this weird hunched over position. He looked at you and smiled gently. ,,You would really push me off the bench?”

You nodded. ,,Absolutely. I want to get out of here.”

He sighed and stood up. He clipped his Datapad to his Utility belt and stood next to you. ,,So, you wanted to push me off the bench, while I was sleeping?” he asked determined.

You cocked your head. And hesitated to answer him, when he looked at you, like you were his prey. ,,Yeah… I told you….I wanted to get out… of here.” You studied him warily.

He smirked. ,,Well, you should better run then.” He flexed his Fingers.

Your eyes widened, your turned and run out of the Messhall as fast as you could.

Cody laughed, amused. You really thought you could escape him? There was a reason why Jango named him Glory.

You run through the hallway, dodging all his brothers and even the crates while you run towards the hangar.

Cody was hot on your heels.

When you finally arrived at the Hangar you glanced around and didn’t see him, your run to your Z-95 Headhunter and then out of nowhere he grabbed your waist and tickled you. You went to the floor laughing and giggling.

,,You really thought you could outrun me?”

You nodded while you laughed.

He grin. ,,Still think that?”

You shook your head and kept on laughing.

He smirked and let your breath for two seconds, then tickled your again.

,,I’m-“ you laughed. ,,-sorry.”

He grin. ,,What for Mesh’la?”

He let you breath again. ,,For saying I’d push you off the bench.”

He nodded. ,,Aha.”

You grin. ,,I just said it, so you would wake up faster.”

He raised his brows. ,,Is that so?”

You nodded. ,,Yes.”

He pursed his lips and tickled you again. ,,Alright, Blitz told me to go out with you tonight. You coming with me?”

You smirked . ,,Want me to wear gold?”

He gazed at you softly . ,,You shouldn’t.” Then he grin. ,,Captain Gold may think you actually like him.”

You laughed. ,,On no, thank you. No-thank you.”

He chuckled. ,,But I’m not telling you what to wear. Surprise me with something nice.”

You nodded. ,,Alright. What do you wear? Armor or Uniform?”

He smirked. ,,Uniform? No thank you.” He knocked on his chest. ,,This is more comfortable.”

You nodded. ,,Good.”

He helped you up. ,,Fly safely.”

You nodded. ,,See you later, Glory boy.”

He laughed, surprised at you nickname. Then he smirked. ,,Yeah, I know I am Glorious, maybe you’ll find out someday just how glorious.” He winked.

You blushed and hid your head inside your pilot helmet.

Cody chuckled triumphant.

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