#withers away why is capitalism like this i deserve to be able to get people kyutesy little gifts

[angeltism]

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEE ok so the meetup for gi cosplayers is on a day im nawt going to comicon . . . but the general gaming one IS so i can go to that instead !! :3

[omgsquee2001]

Chapter 14: Erumalu, The City of Green! [Y/N]'s Ture Power!

//Not My Art//

~~~~

After getting the situation with the Kung-Fu Dugongs sorted out, the group continued on with their trek to Erumalu. You wiped some sweat away from your forehead. 'Man. This heat is intense. I've never experienced something like this before.' You thought. Zoro glanced at you.

"You doing alright?" He asked. You nodded and smiled at him.

"Yeah. This heat is just intense. We had hot weather back on my island, but never something like this." You said. Suddenly, Vivi stopped at the edge of a city in ruin. You gasped at it. What happened to this place?

"What's this?" Sanji asked.

"Are we in Yuba already?" Luffy asked. You shook your head.

"This can't be Yuba. From looking at the map Vivi showed us earlier, Yuba is still much further away." You said. Vivi nodded.

"[Y/N]'s right. This is Erumalu. It was known far and wide as the City of Green." Vivi said, pain and sadness in her voice.

"It was green?" Luffy asked, puzzled because the ruins of the city didn't look green at all. Vivi turned to look at everyone.

"Take a good look around everyone. This is Baroque Works, has been doing to my country! The people of Alabasta, this is what they've had to go through." Vivi said, her voice cracking. You gritted your teeth together in anger.

'This isn't right! Back home, my real home, watching the anime didn't make me as angry when I watched this exact scene. But seeing it right in front of me now, it makes me so angry! How could Crocodile do this to this country?! These peaceful people didn't deserve this!' You thought. Suddenly, your eyes flashed a pure white.

'[Y/N], control your anger. Don't let it take control of you.' Raava's voice said. You sighed and closed your eyes, shaking your head. You opened your eyes again and they returned to their normal [e/c].  Ace glanced at you in worry, having seen the flash of white. You all walked down into the ruins. Luffy looked around.

"Wow. There's nothing here at all anymore." He said.

"No. It's nothing but a ghost town now. But up until a few short years ago it was a thriving city full of gardens, palm trees and lush greenery." Vivi said. Zoro looked at a Palm Tree that had withered and died due to not having water.

"This place?" He asked, kicking at the dead bark. A few pieces fell from the bark.

"Rain was always scarce here, but by saving every last drop of water and using wisely the city was able to live to its fullest," Vivi explained. Unfortunately, that stopped when the rain did. Not a single drop of water has fallen in any part of this country for three years now." Vivi said.

"Three years?!" Sanji asked in astonishment.

"Wow that long?" Chopper asked. Zoro looked at Vivi.

"But wait. Even without rain there was still rivers and other water sources." Zoro said, confused as to how a city close to the river had completely dried up. Usopp nodded.

"And it's close. Why couldn't they just pipe the water in from over there?" He asked. Vivi looked at the two of them.

"Well the answer to that, is just up ahead." Vivi said. With that, the group continued on. "Even though it's a desert kingdom, never in the thousands of years of Alabasta's history has the rain ever stopped completely. However, there was one place in the country where the rain fell more than usual. Alabarna, the capital. The city where the King's Palace is located," Vivi explained.

~Flashback~

The rain fell heavily in Alabarna, the towns people collecting water and rushing to get to where they needed to be. The rain didn't make them nervous or irritated. It made them happy. Their crops and livestock thrived, giving them plenty of water and food. Cobra smiled up at the sky, happy that his citizens could live without worry of long droughts.

'The people of the city called it the King's Miracle. At least they did until one particular day.'  The Baroque Works ships docked at the Alabarna docks, bringing from the ships, huge backs of something.

"Get that cargo unloaded! We've got a schedule to keep!" Someone shouted. Members of Baroque Works were rolling the large bags on carts, pulling them to the Palace. Suddenly, one of the wheels broke and sent the bags falling to the ground. The people pulling the wagon dodged the large bags and the cart as best they could. Green sand of some sort spilled forth from the bags. One of the Baroque Works members sat up, fear and anger on his face.

"Damn it! What are we supposed to do now?!" He shouted. "It's a delivery for the king! What's he going to do when it doesn't arrive?!" He shouted. The citizens approached the green powder. One of them picked it up in his hands.

"This green power is for the King? What is it?" One of the citizens asked.

"What is it? How the hell are we supposed to know! We're only following your King's orders!" One of the members of Baroque Works said.

"We're just carriers! Run!" The two members got up and raced away from the scene. If only the citizens of Alabasta had known that it was a set up. This was the start of throwing Alabasta in chaos.

"Wait a minute, could this be?" One of the citizens asked, picking up the powder in his hands.

~End of Flashback~

"Dance powder?" You asked after Vivi's explanation. You looked at Nami. "Nami, do you know anything about this dance powder?" You asked. Nami nodded.

"Yes. I sure do. It summons rain." She said. Chopper looked at her.

"A powder can?" Chopper asked. Nami nodded.

"I've only heard stories about it. But apparently Dance Powder was created by a researcher in a country where it never rained," Nami explained. "Burning it creates a misty smoke which rises into sky. Once it reaches the clouds, it causes them to rain. In essence it gives you the ability to create rain on the spot." Nami explained.  

"Oh!" Luffy exclaimed, slamming his fist into his hand. "I know what you're talking about! I've seen that stuff before! I ate some a while back. It tasted pretty gross though, yuck!" Luffy said, smiling. You sighed and shook your head.

'Only Luffy would eat something like Dance Powder.' You thought. Nami narrowed her eyes at Luffy.

"You ate Dance Powder?" She asked, not seeming convinced.

"It's not even food it's for making rain." Zoro said, walking past Luffy. He turned around and glared at the two.

"Hey! I'm not lying! I'm telling the truth! I did eat it! And it tasted so gross!" Luffy shouted in anger. Usopp looked at Nami, who was ignoring Luffy's shouting.

"Hold on, I don't get it. Wouldn't that stuff be perfect for a desert country like this?" He asked. Nami looked back at him.

"You'd think so. In fact, as its name suggests, the country that developed it was happy enough to dance," Nami explained. "It got lots of rain. But there's a catch. It's neighboring country had a drought. Let me explain how it works," Nami said. "Now, the mist from the burned Dance Powder targets small clouds that aren't ready to rain yet. It artificially matures them into full rain clouds. Those clouds would have naturally grown into rain clouds, but when they're further down wind." Nami said. You hummed.

"I think I get it now. It steals all the rain that would have normally gone to the neighboring country." You said.

"That must have caused some big problems." Usopp said. Nami nodded.

"Oh it did. A war broke out between the two countries. Ever since then, the World Government has instituted a world wide ban on the production and possession of Dance Powder." Nami said.

"Even so, some of it managed to show up here." Usopp said.

"When it happened," Vivi said. "The country had been experiencing strange weather. There had been no rain, not a single drop had fallen anywhere, except one place. And that was the capital." Vivi said. Luffy pointed at Vivi.

"Vivi! That means your dad is the bad guy!" Luffy shouted, getting it all wrong. Sanji started kicking Luffy in the head.

"No! You idiot! He was framed! Her sweet dear old dad would never do something like that you got it?!" Sanji shouted, continuing to kick Luffy. Vivi sighed in sadness.

"Of course, my father was innocent. Unfortunately, a large amount of Dance Powder was discovered inside the Palace shortly after." She said.

"They even had people working inside the palace." Zoro said. The approached what looked like a dried up river.

"So, what is this? A road?" Sanji asked.

"No. It used to be a large canal that piped in fresh water from the Sandora River." Vivi said. The groups eyes widened in shock. "Till someone destroyed it. Now do you see what happened?" Vivi said. "With this canal gone, the City of Green lost its only remaining source of fresh water. People here waited and prayed, but sadly, the rain never came."

"Wow. Something like that and the Dance Powder would really make the people distrust their King." Nami said.

'That's exactly what Crocodile planned I bet.' Zoro thought. 

"A war broke out in Erumalu. To escape the violence here, there was only one thing the exhausted citizens could do. They abandoned the city and left for oasis in search of water." Vivi said. "And then, the City of Green withered away." Vivi said in sadness. A harsh, hot wind blew through the city. The wind got harsher. You gasped. It sounded like a voice was howling in sadness through the ruins.

"What, is that?" Nami asked, also hearing it.

"Is it the rebels?!" Chopper asked. A look of fear crossed Usopp's face.

"Or more of those creeps from Baroque Works!" Usopp shouted. The wind continued to bounce around the buildings. The group looked around in fear. Some preparing for a fight.

"No. It's just wind." Ace said. Luffy looked at his older brother.

"Sounds like a voice, right?" Luffy asked.

"Oh no! It's coming in all different directions! This isn't good!" Usopp shouted. "Ace what are we going to do?!" Usopp shouted, looking to the commander for guidance.

"There's no danger. it's just the wind blowing around the town and echoing off the old buildings." Ace reassured. You squinted your eyes as the wind blew the harder, blowing the hood off of Vivi's cloak.

"It's like, it's like the city of Erumalu is wailing over what's happened to it!" Vivi said. Suddenly, a dust devil formed and was heading right for the group.

"Watch out!" You shouted. Ace quickly stepped in front of you, taking the force of the wind. You grunted as the dust devil surrounded you.

'All this pain,' you thought as the wind kept blowing around you. 'All this suffering. All because of one greedy man who wants to take a country for himself!' You thought. Your anger and sadness at what has happened in Alabasta was getting to you. You blocked out Raava's voice of warning. Then, as quickly as the dust devil came, it left. You looked around and saw something, like a cloak, billowing in the wind. You gasped.

"Someone's collapsed over there!" You shouted.  The group raced over to where the figure was. Only to gasp and stop. It wasn't a person at all. Only a human skull. Vivi knelt before the skull.

"What did my father, and all of the other good people, what did they ever do?" Vivi asked, her voice cracking. "They don't deserve this. It's hard enough to live in the desert everyday is a struggle just to survive!" Vivi shouted. That was the last straw for you. You were standing close to Vivi. You clenched your hands into fists.

"This isn't right," you muttered. Vivi and the others looked at you.

"[Y/N]?" Vivi asked. Your hands were shaking in anger, your head scarf covering your eyes.

"They, they shouldn't be able to do something like this! Why don't the marines do anything to help these poor people?!" You shouted in anger. Your eyes were now flashing between white and [e/c] rapidly. "Why? Why? WHY?!" You shouted. Your head shot up. The group gasped in shock. Your eyes were now glowing a pure white. A gust of wind burst out from your form, much stronger than the wind from before. Sanji's eyes widened.

"Vivi! Get away from there!" He shouted. Vivi quickly raced over to the group. Nami's eyes widened.

"What is going on with [Y/N]?!" She shouted. Your eyes never wavered from the glowing white. Ace stepped forward.

"[Y/N]! Can you hear us?! Snap out of it!" He shouted. He had never seen this happen to you before. You didn't respond, blocking out all sound. Your face was expressionless. Zoro narrowed his eyes.

"This must be their true power!" He shouted over the wind. Suddenly, one member stepped forward, approaching you.

"What the hell are you doing?! They're dangerous!"

"I'm not leaving them to suffer alone! Someone has to help them!"  

~~~

//Bum, bum, bum! [Y/N]'s true power is revealed! Who will help them? Ace, Zoro, Sanji, Usopp, Nami, or Vivi? In the next chapters to come, you can choose who you want to help you. If you don't like the dividing into different scenarios, you don't have to continue reading by any means, because the dividing into different scenarios is going to continue. So, if you don't like this format, don't feel pressured to read it.//

[dany-is-my-queen]

Born To Be Yours | Part VI

Sansa Stark x Fem! Baratheon! Reader (Daenerys Targaryen x Fem! Baratheon! Reader eventually)

Season 1-8

Word count: 1,993

Pt.1 Pt.2 Pt.3 Pt.4 Pt.5 Pt.7 Pt.8 Pt.9

The Hound was fighting an unarmed opponent atop the Walls of the Red Keep during a tourney to celebrate your brother’s nameday. He knocked his shield away and the man fell hard into the courtyard below.

You were seated next to Myrcella, Sansa was on the opposite edge, faking smiles to keep the King pleased. You grew closer and closer with each day that passes, so as your feelings.

“Well struck, Dog!” He said out loud.

“Did you like that?” He turned to Sansa. You rolled your eyes.

“It was a well struck, your grace.” She replied.

“I already said it was a well struck.”

She waited a few seconds to confirm. “Yes, your grace.”

“Who’s next?”

“Lothor Brune, freerider in the service of Lord Baelish. Ser Dontos the Red of House Hollard.” The announcer exclaimed. The last one didn’t appear to be in his five senses. Joffrey gestured him to have more wine, Ser Meryn Trant and another Kingsguard began to pour the liquid down the funnel and the poor knight gurgled and struggled to continue drinking.

“You can’t!” Sansa suddenly shouted before the man collapsed.

“What did you say? Did you say I can’t?”

“I only meant... it would be bad luck to kill a man on your name day.”

“What kind of stupid peasant’s superstition...”

“The girl is right.” Sandor tossed.

“Yes, she is. You’ll reap what you sow on your nameday.” You added.

“He’ll make such a better fool than a knight. He doesn’t deserve the mercy of a quick death.” How kind of the northerner to save the life of someone she doesn’t even know. Those small actions make you admire her.

“Did you hear my lady, Ser Dontos? From now on you’ll be my new fool!”

“Thank you, your grace. And you, my lady, thank you.” They took him away.

“Beloved nephew.” Your uncle’s voice made you instantly smile. He was accompanied by multiple men.

“We’ve looked for you on the battlefield. Joffrey sat down. “You where nowhere to be found.”

“I was here, ruling the Kingdoms.” You almost sneer.

“What a fine job you’ve done.” He jokingly said.

“My dear niece! You look older and prettier.” He kissed your forehead. You grinned.

“You look younger and more handsome” He winked.

“Look at you!” He smiled at your sister. “More beautiful than ever.”

“And you! You are going to be bigger than the Hound, but much better looking.” The three of you laughed.

“We’ve heard you were dead.” Joffrey unconcernedly said.

“I’m glad you are not dead.” The little princess assured.

“We’ve missed you. We have to catch up.” He nodded towards you.

“And we will. Death is so boring, especially now with so much excitement in the world.” He looked at Sansa. “My lady, I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Her loss? Her father was a confessed traitor!” The blond angrily screamed.

“But still her father. Surely having recently lost your own you can sympathize.” Not his, but yours. You closed your eyes before the grief took over you.

“My father was a traitor. My mother and brother are traitors too. I am loyal to my beloved Joffrey.” All she can do is pretend and say the right words. The loathe she had for him was only getting bigger.

“Of course you are.” Tyrion smirked sympathetically. The redhead looked your way and you gave her a sweet smile.

He left the tent with his group of people ignoring the King’s questions. It’s so good to have your favorite uncle back. You were still concerned about Jaime. Will the Starks trade him for Sansa? It was sure that Robb was not going to come to the capital. Arya was still missing.

You wanted her to be reunited with her family. The other part of you was shattering at the thought of her leaving. If there was an opportunity you would definitely support her, after all, what mattered to you was her safety and happiness, you tried to provide both but nothing can really fill that hole. Not with Joffrey tormenting her. You would be sad but relieved if she left, you couldn’t be selfish.

“Walk with me, my lady.” You offered your arm to Sansa what she gladly accepted.

“Where are we going?”

“I’m going to steal you.” You quipped and saw she blushed a little. “Would you fancy visiting the streets of the city?”

“Yes, I’d love to.” Two soldiers were accompanying you keeping their distance.

“I remember when I used to wander around the castle in Winterfell. They were all warm to each other.” She seemed to recalled.

“The people who live here... some are happy and some are not. They don’t have enough resources to subsist. They manage to survive.” You gave silver and gold coins to the elder and children who roamed.

“My mother used to tell me... humility makes people great. Envy and selfishness makes them small.”

“And she’s right.” You halted in the market. Spotting the tent you usually go to. They make beautiful things. Such as purses, necklaces, bracelets, etc. They are not made of the finest materials but they are nice and these merchants work really hard.

“Princess Y/N! You honor me with your presence.” The black-haired woman said, a friend of yours.

“Hello, Addy. What did you bring today?

“I have these pins. And the two lions you have it made.” She showed you the wood pieces with flawless details.

“Do you like them, Sansa? Choose the ones you want”

“For my siblings and my mother.” She picked five wolf brooches.

“Thank you very much. Say hello to little Cass. And remember, anything she or the other kids on the orphanage need, tell me.” Addy nodded with gratitude and bowed.

“It’s very generous what you do for them. You are truly an angel.” The lady smiled warmly.

“I know being in the Red Keep can be suffocating. I’ll get you out of there anytime I get the chance.”

“You are my hero.” You part ways once you entered the big castle. You headed to your uncle’s new room.

“The Hand of the King... I didn’t see that coming.” He waved at you.

“Me neither, sweet niece. It’s so good to see you! How is everything in here? I just had a meeting with the council. The summer is over. Your mother was quite angry with the fact I’m the Hand in my father’s stead. She brought this on herself. The North has risen up against us when your moron brother called for Ned Stark’s head.”

“I tried to stop him. It was useless. He thinks he owns the world now, he is not ruling cautiously, I fear for my siblings life, for everyone’s life.”

“Luckily I’m here to supervise his moves. Advise him. Save the city. Not as easy as it sounds I’m afraid.”

“Did you stayed out of trouble?” You asked him well knowing the answer.

“Well... I pissed out in the edge of the Wall. I slept in a sky cell. Lady Arryn almost sentenced me to die. I fought with the hill tributes. So many adventures.” You raised an eyebrow.

“Oh I see, that must have been a lot of fun.” Both of you laughed.

“You can’t imagine.”

It has been an unsteady week. Being with little Tommen and Myrcella has been a distraction from the incoming war you’re dealing with. Renly and Stannis proclaimed themselves Kings. You like to be up to date, so you talk with your mother about these matters.

“My uncles... they’re going to get here anytime soon. We have to be prepared.”

“They have no claim. Let them try. We’ll kick them off the moment they set foot on the shores.” Cersei declared dryly.

“I’ve heard some... disturbing rumors about-“

“You believe them?”

“Absolutely not. I’m just curious.” You shrugged.

“Everyone’s intention is to tear our family apart. Destroy us from within. This gossip is just feeding those who don’t want your brother on the throne.” And you said nothing more.

“You’re losing the people, do you hear me?” Tyrion tried to make her listen.

“The people, you think I care?”

“You should.” You told her, annoyed by her apathy.

“Yes. You might find it difficult to rule over millions who want you dead. Half the city will starve when winter comes. The other half will plot to overthrow you. And your gold-plated thugs just gave them the rallying cry, “The Queen Slaughter babies.” She remained silent. “You don’t even have the decency to deny it.” You scowled. “It wasn’t you who gave the order, was it? Joffrey didn’t even tell you. Or did he? I imagine that would be even worse.” Your uncle growled.

“He did what needed to be done!”

“No. They were innocent. What’s wrong with you? What kind of King is he becoming? You objected.

“You don’t even know who they were, Y/N. This is what ruling is! Lying on a bed of weeds, ripping them out by the root one by one before they strangle you in your sleep.”

“I’m no king, but I think there’s more ruling than that.”

“You’ve never taken it seriously. It’s all fallen on me.”

“As has Jaime repeatedly. According to Stannis Baratheon.” You averted your eyes.

“How dare you say that kind of filthy lies in front of my daughter!” The Queen Regent gave him a withering look. “You’ve always been funny. But none of your jokes will ever match the first one, will they? You remember... when you ripped my mother, open your way out of her and she bled to death.” It hurt to see the look of your uncle’s face.

“She was my mother too.”

“Now she’s gone, for the sake of you. There’s no bigger joke in the world than that.” She stormed out, you followed her.

“You shouldn’t be so cruel with my uncle. If I had lost you when either Myr or Tom were born I would never blame them. I know it must have been pretty hard growing up without your mom, but don’t take it out on him.”

“She died so he could live. A little freak. An abomination.” She spat poison.

“Don’t speak of him that way.”

“Why you defend him so much?”

“Cause he is my family. He is a good person.”

“Joffrey is also your family. And yet you detest him.”

“He has a serious problem. You don’t want to see it or maybe you’re okay with it. Remember when we were kids? I was four and he was five. He used to find pleasure on pushing me, you just stared at us and said it was a normal thing. I grew up and I was able to defend myself, one time I did it and you freaked out, you yelled at me, made me feel so small... you held him while I was sobbing, just because I moved when he tried to hit me making him fell to the ground. Of course, it was my fault according to both of you. How many times did Joffrey hurt me? Said I was ugly cause I wasn’t blonde like him? That I didn’t deserve to be a princess, he was so mean to me and you never lectured him. I recall how many nights I spent crying alone in my room wondering why my mother didn’t care enough to stand up for me when my big brother treated me like I was worthless. You broke my heart a very long time ago. I learned how to pick up the pieces. I’m not that helpless little girl anymore.” You could feel your eyes starting to get teary. You didn’t expect her to say something soothing. Cersei apparently ran out of words, you thanked for her silence instead of lying to you, deep down you hoped she’d embrace you. It was too much to ask for. You lingered a bit more before turning and leaving. Heartbroken once more.

[aphrodites-law]

A Bit of Clarity 🍂 (7/?) The visions had started last autumn, a year ago now. It had caused a bit of chaos for some, a bit of clarity for others. Two days ago, Clarke Griffin had been perfectly fine managing both her Café and her stress. But now she was curious - so deeply curious about the vision of herself entwined with the aloof Lexa Woods that it was leading her to complete distraction.

[part 1] [part 2] [part 3] [part 4] [part 5] [part 6]

Clarke usually went straight to the café, but the past few days she'd started taking a detour. Since the article in the Gazette, Finn's Coffee & Bagels had taken a serious hit. Costial was a city with a deep-rooted pride for small businesses; mom-and-pop stores that had earned their success and customers' fidelity. Hard work and honesty were appreciated - shortcuts and lies were not. In just the one exposé, Finn's shop had lost half its patrons. Other outlets had jumped on the bandwagon and word had spread very quickly that anyone who bought his food or coffee might as well buy it in super stores for the same mass-produced quality at half the price. Finn had lost the support of his backers, but, more importantly, the Mayor had publicly condemned his son's business tactics.

To be perfectly honest, Clarke took some joy in the fall of Finn's plans. She had no doubt he would come up with another project very soon, perhaps in the theater sector, but at least his future in restoration was bleak. Clarke knew gloating wasn't a good look on anyone, but she wasn't ready to climb down from her cloud just yet. She was sure something would soon come along to knock her down a few pegs, but these days she was feeling pretty confident.

The café had been busier, which Clarke and Wells planned to capitalize on with the right promotion. Today he'd surpassed himself with some mini marble cakes, one of which Clarke had shoved in her mouth as soon as he'd shown her. It was the perfect time to look more seriously into new hires, which Clarke had pushed back for far too long. Gaia and Harper had been noticeably excited by the news. Wells would vet any additional help in the kitchen, but she could tell it was a relief for him too. Their café was small, but the workload wasn't.

Clarke was drafting the job application at the end of the counter when she heard someone clear their throat. She looked up and closed the laptop with a mischievous smile, her heart doing its now familiar dance.

“Lexa.”

“Clarke.”

Lexa had her dark green raincoat on, hiding the plaid collar Clarke only associated with her now. It didn't seem like she'd ordered anything yet, bypassing the two people in line to find her.

“Have a good weekend?” Clarke asked.

“I did. Had a long chat with Semet actually.”

“And?”

Lexa smiled at Clarke's interest. “You’ll find my observations in the Gazette... eventually.”

"Nothing world-changing though, I take it?"

Lexa shrugged. "I think the world's seen most of the changes already."

"I'd knock on wood if I were you."

"Why? Wary of change?"

"No, but a break for… oh, the next five or ten years might be nice. I miss going about my day not wondering when aliens will come crashing."

Lexa laughed. "I assure you Semet's experience didn't give any indication we might soon meet our celestial neighbors."

Clarke glanced at Gaia and Harper, making sure they still had everything under control with the orders. 

“So um, I had an enlightening weekend too.”

“Oh?” Lexa asked, nonchalant.

“Yeah. I was thinking we could... discuss." Clarke bit her lip. "Maybe over dinner?”

Lexa's demeanor visibly shifted, not as casual as she'd been just a few seconds ago. “Is that really what you want?”

“Trust me, it’s become crystal clear what I want.”

Lexa seemed a cross between reticent and eager, like she was a wild animal in a cage and the door had just opened, but she didn’t quite know what might come from stepping outside- freedom or punishment.

“Clarke. Maybe we should... slow down.”

That was surprising. Clarke frowned. “Slow down from a glacial pace?”

“Just days ago you weren't even sure what to think of me."

“But then we- I thought the rooftop-" Clarke's cheeks felt warm. "I was under the impression we were on the same page."

Lexa looked away and Clarke felt her morning's happiness wither away. So much for staying on her cloud. She took in Lexa's demeanor: tense shoulders and the obvious inability to catch her eyes. Clarke truly didn’t understand her. It was frustrating - bordering on humiliating.

"You've got to be kidding me."

"Clarke-"

"No, no. I don't know what game you think this is, but I'm not playing it."

Lexa seemed panicked. "It's not a game."

"Then what the fuck is it?"

Lexa looked toward the door as two people came in. Harper greeted them cheerily, waiting for their order. This was neither the place nor the time. She looked back at Clarke with pleading eyes, unable to offer an explanation.

Clarke shook her head, tired of the silence. "I told myself I'd stop sitting around and waiting for things to happen, but I won't waste my time on someone who can't decide if I'm worth the chase. You clearly don't want any sort of relationship-"

“It’s not that simple,” Lexa argued.

“It is that simple," Clarke gritted through her teeth, feeling both stupid and angry. She'd fallen for Lexa's charm again only to be disappointed once more. It felt like being doused in ice-cold water. "You either want someone or you don’t. So which is it?”

Lexa shook her head imperceptibly. There was something on the tip of her tongue, Clarke could tell, but she couldn't get it out.

Clarke glanced at the front door when it opened, a family of three walking in. She swallowed her disappointment at the turn in her morning before giving Lexa a hard stare.

"I have to get back to work."

"Clarke-"

“You need to figure out what you want,” Clarke snapped lowly. “Preferably without stringing people along while you do so.”

She took the family's orders with a smile, trying her hardest not to look toward the door as Lexa walked out with hunched shoulders.

* * *

Clarke posted the application on their website and several job boards in the afternoon. Resumes came fast, but Wells wanted to be a part of the process - usually less involved in the business side now that most things were squared away - so they'd set some time aside on Wednesday to reach out to applicants. Wells even planned to speak to a couple smaller theaters over the weekend to expand their partnership program.

And yet, the more good news and exciting plans came their way… the more frustrated Clarke became. Clearly she wasn't incompetent and had a firm handle on most aspects of her life, but for some reason her romantic aspirations had turned into a complete disaster. Was that really all that was in store for her? Had she somehow agreed to a bustling café in exchange for an empty home? Professional success so long as she slept alone? The exchange with Lexa had left a bitter taste in her mouth, like it'd been a cosmic reminder her happiness would always be short-lived.

She kept busy to avoid blowing the lid off her anger, forcing smiles while she chatted with patrons, made coffee, and watched the mini marble cakes disappear one by one. There were so many reasons to be elated, but not even Finn's fall from grace could lift up her mood anymore. He'd get on with his life eventually - people like him always did.

Maybe Clarke had made a mistake with Niylah. She was sweet and charming in her own way. They got along great and were certainly compatible in bed. What they had was easy and uncomplicated - Clarke had never given herself a headache trying to figure out Niylah and Niylah had never chased after her only to run the opposite way. She was straightforward and easygoing; eager to share every aspect of her life Clarke might be curious about. Niylah was a Costialite through and through: honest, hardworking, and kindhearted. She didn't make her heart race or take up her thoughts, but she didn't make her feel like a tightly coiled spring either.

Which meant Niylah deserved better than her. She deserved someone who looked at her like she was the only person in the room. She deserved someone who wanted everything with her. Clarke knew it wasn't their sexual relationship she missed, but rather that period of time when she hadn’t cared as much about her loneliness. She missed the whirlwind of planning and opening the café, the breezy attitude that had carried her through so many problems.

One vision had changed it all, and Clarke couldn't say it was for the better.

* * *

Wells was already gone before closing time, the kitchen immaculate and the next day's ingredients already prepared. Clarke didn't know how he did it - as if he had ten hours more in the day than the rest of them. The last patrons trickled out until eventually there was no one and Gaia turned over the OPEN sign on the front door.

"Go home; I'll clean up," Clarke told her, putting her hair up while Gaia grabbed the broom from the back room.

"You sure?"

"Yeah, give Poppy a good cuddle for me."

Gaia took her coat and purse. "You should come over soon. Give her those cuddles yourself."

Clarke smiled tiredly. "I do miss those big ears."

Gaia had the sweetest beagle she took on long hikes every weekend. She'd been born with one ear much longer than the other, but her lopsided anatomy only added to her personality.

"You haven’t even seen my new place yet," Gaia pointed out.

She'd moved into her mother's second building a few months back, the one on the same street as Lexa's, which only reminded Clarke how poorly she'd neglected all her relationships. 

"One day soon I'll pop in with wine and a pizza and you won't be able to get rid of me," she promised.

Gaia smiled brightly as she shouldered her purse. "Holding you to that, boss."

"See you tomorrow," Clarke said as Gaia walked out.

Clarke dimmed the main lights, wiped the last few tables and put the chairs up. She straightened out the coffee mugs and cleaned the front of the display case, giving herself a few more minutes before she headed home. The rush hour traffic outside was slowing down, giving Clarke some needed quiet.

To hear their small bell ring as the door opened was more than a surprise. Clarke turned around and stilled, watching as Lexa pulled down her raincoat’s hood and looked at her across the room. Her hair was out of its braids, damp and frizzy.

Clarke felt her anger roar back to life and stoke the fire inside her. Her heart pounded, furious that Lexa had had such an effect on her mood today. But she wouldn't back down. She wouldn't look away until it was Lexa who was forced to do so.

"We're closed," she told her coldly. It was so unlike her to be so curt.

Lexa didn't move, didn't even open her mouth to attempt a reply. It was infuriating.

"What do you want?" Clarke asked harshly, echoing her question from this morning.

Lexa's eyes flashed with similar ardor and her jaw locked. Then, in four strides, she was in front of Clarke and kissing her.

Clarke felt her hands on her waist first, and then the heat of her mouth against her own. She gasped, fisted her hands in Lexa's collar and then unraveled. She kissed Lexa back with the force of her anger, pulling and pulling until Lexa had her pressed against the display case and her body flush against hers. Her tongue felt like silk when it brushed the tip of hers, when it took a risk and was rewarded. Her hands felt like embers, leaving a trail of fire wherever they touched her, first on her waist and then lower, on her hips, until they became more dangerous and cupped her ass while she pressed tight against her. Desperate and possessive.

Clarke moaned loudly, overwhelmed by the sudden force of her desire. She needed Lexa to take her, to be inside her, to fulfill her incessant need for release. She couldn't imagine a second away from Lexa's lips, a second where Lexa didn't touch her.

“God, I thought of this,” she moaned between kisses, eyes closing when she felt Lexa's mouth down her neck. She smelled like the rain; felt like a storm.

“I think about you all the time...” Lexa breathed in her ear, almost like she hadn't meant to say it aloud.

Clarke pulled back, cupping Lexa's face to make sure she wasn't imagining this again. After a beat, their next kiss turned hungrier. Clarke wanted nothing more than to pull Lexa in the back room. She didn’t need romance or a bed. She needed Lexa’s fire to consume her and for the world to stop existing for just a moment. At the same time she was content staying there, pinned between glass and Lexa's body while they kissed into the night.

But her imagination was kinder than reality, as a car suddenly honked at another outside, startling Lexa. She ripped away from their embrace with wide eyes, stumbling back like she was dizzy, the reality of the situation catching up to her.

Clarke could read it all on her face: the surprise at her own actions, the realization of where they were and what they had almost done so publicly. She could've cried when Lexa suddenly looked like a deer in headlights.

It was the same expression from this morning. Clarke shook her head at her, begging her not to run. But a part of her knew it was futile - Lexa had already made up her mind. Still, she had to try one last time.

"It's okay."

Lexa's bottom lip trembled. "I shouldn't have done that. I thought I could, but-" She pressed her hands against her eyes in frustration. "I'm so sorry, Clarke."

Clarke's chest felt heavy. "Please don't go. Help me understand."

"I won't bother you again."

"That's not what I want," Clarke replied in frustration, stepping closer.

Lexa shook her head. "You don't want me."

"Why not?"

To Clarke, Lexa seemed broken. Like something in her had finally shattered.

"You started looking at me after your vision," Lexa whispered. "We never spoke until… until you had it. And I never realized it was you in mine until I saw you drawing."

"What does it matter?"

"You don't know me," Lexa told her, voice cracking. "If you did, your vision would never become true. You'd want nothing to do with me."

"Don't you dare put words in my mouth," Clarke snapped.

Lexa stopped short, so Clarke took a deep breath and stepped even closer.

"Lexa. I don't need to be protected. You're right, we don't know much about each other. So let me learn and let me make my own decisions afterward. Please. You can't pretend there's nothing between us - you can't."

"The visions-"

"I don't give a fuck about the visions," Clarke told her stubbornly. "Maybe it opened my eyes, but it didn't create feelings out of thin air. That's not possible."

Lexa still looked skittish, ready to bolt at any moment. Clarke reached out for her hand, relieved when Lexa took it. It was so different than the rooftop, where Lexa had grabbed hers so confidently. How could a person be so torn?

"Maybe you were right this morning," Clarke said softly. "We've skipped a lot of steps. So let's start over."

Lexa finally caught her eyes. "I hurt people, Clarke. I don't mean to, but inevitably it's what I do."

Clarke knew that was all she'd get out of Lexa tonight. Hesitantly, she cupped her cheek.

"How about this? If the rain lets up, I take you to the river this weekend. We bring some drinks, some snacks, maybe some hiking shoes. You can tell me about the Mountain Men and I can tell you about the weird resumes I'll inevitably get this week."

Lexa let out a chuckle, which made Clarke smile hopefully. "Doesn't sound too scary, does it?"

"No. That sounds nice."

Clarke felt hopeful for the first time. "Just two people hanging out, getting to know each other."

"I'd like that." Lexa glanced at her mouth and swallowed. "I do want you, Clarke."

Clarke pressed her index against her lips. "I know. Nobody kisses a friend like that. But…"

"Fresh start?"

"Right.” Clarke still had to speak her mind: “Lexa, you can't keep running away without telling me why. I'm patient but I'm not a saint. I get angry too. I get scared."

Lexa nodded quietly, looking down at their hands before she glanced around the room.

"You were closing up."

"Yeah, did you not notice the chairs on the tables?"

"I was preoccupied. Can I help?"

"Lexa… I think maybe you should go home."

Lexa looked down. "I'm sorry, I must be giving you whiplash."

"Just a little," Clarke smiled.

"I'll see you this weekend?"

"I didn't mean you can't swing by for a quick hello and a cup of coffee. Or not coffee. Wells is baking up a storm, it'd be a pity if you missed it."

"That sounds nice."

Clarke accompanied her to the door, where she noticed the rain had become heavier. It was incessant these days, washing down the streets of Costial and keeping the coffee shops and movie theaters busy. Nothing unusual for the season. She grabbed one of the forgotten umbrellas in the stand by the entrance, giving it to Lexa.

"That's alright-"

"Take it. I don't you want coming in sneezing and sniffling this week."

"Thank you, Clarke." Slowly, hesitantly, Lexa kissed her cheek. "Goodnight."

After Lexa walked out in the rain and turned the corner with one last glance over her shoulder, Clarke stood in the dark for a moment. Then, she walked to the back room and slid down the wall until she was sitting on the ground. She clutched her heart, eyes closing as she let the last few minutes rush over her. Whiplash didn't even begin to cover it.

In the resounding silence, she tried processing what had just happened. She could still feel Lexa's kiss, everything she had imagined and more. But then Lexa had pulled away. It felt like she was two different people, one aching with desire like Clarke, the other convinced it would hurt them both. But why?

Clarke thought back to when she had first noticed Lexa. Courteous, quiet Lexa who had placed her order and sat near the weeping fig tree for hours while she worked. What could have driven her to Costial? It couldn't be the job opportunities - she didn't work in theater and the Gazette was no more reputable than their neighboring cities' newspapers. Family was the obvious guess, but then why not come earlier? What kind of life had she left behind that still haunted her today?

Clarke wasn't sure she'd be able to shut up this weekend, too wrapped up in Lexa's mystery to keep herself from asking questions. She wanted to know everything but knew she had to be cautious. Still, spending time together was a step forward. She was relieved Lexa hadn't run after all, but it would be difficult to forget the pain in her eyes. Despite the uncertainty of their relationship, if it could even be defined, Clarke had a feeling it would be worth fighting for.

-

[part eight]

[ashleyswrittenwords]

How to be a Queen [Part 24]

Summary: Princess Zelda is at a loss. Her handed royal responsibilities have begun to weigh heavily on her and she is eventually backed into a corner. Live a life she loathes or run away from everything she’s ever known? Navigating life is hard, and Link forces her to learn that she doesn’t have to do it alone.

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Part 1

How To Be A Queen

Hyrule flooded the day Nathaniel Nohansen III died.

It had rained for three days. Castle Town had closed its shops and barely no one walked the streets. The storms were so harsh that it was hardly a premonition when they told me he was deteriorating quickly. I found him in his bed as he had been for months. Soft cries of my father filled the silence as he knelt at the bedside and grasped a limp hand in his own. Guilt twisted deep in my stomach when tears didn’t come.

“I’m so sorry, Nate,” Father sobbed. The words hardly intelligible. “I’m sorry.”

For months I had mourned for this moment. When he stopped responding to questions almost two weeks ago, my heart knew that this journey would have a finite end. In the very least, my father had some time to step out from his veil of ignorance before now.

Gods. No matter how much I tried to will myself to cry, I couldn’t.

I hadn’t thought about death so much in my life. When before it was a quiet promise of my youthful failures, now it was staring me down at every corner. These coming days, I thought of it as a fear that had become a flirtatious caller. War walked hand-in-hand with death. They were synonymous actions I had come to expect; violence paired with the spilling of blood.

Presently, it came to me as an eerily familiar vessel of a man I adored, sleeping forever. It was as if a trickster had carefully sculpted a copy of my uncle from wax and stole the real one away. There was no grave injury or pooling blood, just the deep feeling that something was horribly wrong. The blood in my veins ran cold and suddenly I could hardly bear to so much as glance at it – that wasn’t my uncle. Never had been after his eyes no longer smiled and his casual flirting with his nurse ceased.

Numbly, I pulled my hand from Father’s shoulder. His cries subdued to soft sniffling pleas for his older brother to wake up. I softly pried him away, but he didn’t give much resistance in the first place. As we walked away, I barely heard Father’s voice.

“I love you. So much.”

The body wouldn’t speak back because its wrinkles were far too sunken and its hands far too still. The silence behind us as we walked towards the door was deafening.

“I love you too,” I said, but his words weren’t for me.

----------

“Your Majesty,” a servant said, breaking me from a far-off stare. “The coroner mentioned that the ground was too soft to bury General Nohansen this week.”

Cold hands. Cold eyes.

Impa cut through, stepping between my desk and the man with a series of hushed mentions that made the servant satisfied enough to leave. Lightning struck in the distance and lit up the study through the uncovered window. Soberly, she turned to me with a white swinging braid.

“Allow me to handle the funeral.”

I went to shake my head. “I feel like I should do it myself.”

Her eyes pried into me, making me meet them no matter how badly I didn’t want to. Impa stood with square shoulders, appearing so tall even when she barely reached my shoulder. Then, she softened with folded hands before her. I knew what she was insinuating: I sounded like my father.

A chill slithered up my spine. It caused me to fold and fear engaged me.

“What else am I to do?” I pleaded. The careful guard I had unknowingly constructed was being chipped away by intrusive thoughts. For the remaining years of my life, there will never be a grin as toothy as his. My arms will never be swept up in such a warm embrace for as long as my heart is still beating. No laugh was as baritone as his once was; capable of escaping even the thickest walls.

Nothing, nothing, nothing could compete with the man who died without meaning.

Suddenly, my cheeks were wet and my bottom lip trembled unrelentingly. I stared up at the rafters, hoping the sniffling would subside as I cursed aloud, “I can’t even give him solid ground to rest under.”

“Listen to me,” Impa whispered, pulling me into her bosom. “Listen to me, child. He is with the goddesses.”

She repeated it like a mantra.

“I hate this,” I withered and folded into her arms. “I hate feeling so weak.”

The tears were bitter now, stinging me with their presence and making my throat burn with abandon. I was the Queen.

Legally, I thought to myself, I had all claim to everything around me. I knew that my predecessors had wielded their power to dominate entire kingdoms from the peaks of the northern mountains to the shores of the south. They had brought about bloodshed and dominion to people for reasons as little as wanting to feel the warmth of their burning villages. Only two generations before me had sent their dissenting opposition to the gallows.

So, why was it that I felt so powerless?

“Do you know why the goddess Hylia descended?” Impa hushed. “Why did She leave the comfort of the heavens?”

I tamed myself to calm, though my voice was still odd and gravelly. “Because she loved a man.”

A maternal hand patted my head and she spoke through a smile.

“No,” she started. “No, because She loved the people created by Her hand. When She heard of the dangers coming from the underworld and how a king born of shadows was laying claim to land Hylia’s sisters had left Her, She had a choice.”

Impa sat back on the floor, taking my hand in hers like how she did when she recalled to me old myths before bedtime. I swallowed and waited for her to continue.

“Hylia could stay in paradise and allow the world to be buried,” she said, framing the choices as if she didn’t know how it would end. “Or She could descend and give Her people a fighting chance – no matter how slim it was. What do you think She chose, Zelda?”

“She chose to fight.”

“Very good.”

She procured a handkerchief from her breast pocket and allowed me to dry my cheeks.

“So,” Impa drew me in again after a couple minutes. “As we know, the goddess spent years on the Surface fighting off the darkness. She rallied Her people to find hope in the darkness and for that, they revered her only more so. For years, some say decades, Hylia lived among mortals and learned their ways. In Her time, She found that gods do not experience existence the same as humanity does.

“When the mortals experienced disappointment, their eyes grew watery. With fatigue, they grew sluggish and weary – sometimes lashing out at loved ones. When they accomplished success in battle, broad expressions crossed their faces,” she mirrored my small smile, “and oftentimes they laughed. They say Hylia enjoyed seeing that emotion the most.

“Eventually She found herself partaking in these feelings and paralleling those expressions She had once considered redundant. Her love for these mortals had only increased since She descended. However, their battles were hard-fought and even with Her light, they had only been able to maintain their ground. That is, until one day the spirit of Her holy sword told Her another was worthy enough to wield it. His name is lost to time, but the books say he was a valiant solider. In him, Hylia found a partner; the ability to feel another triviality that suddenly wasn’t so trivial.”

Impa’s smile was sad and she grasped my hands tightly in hers. “That was when She learned to love a mortal man. You and I know how this ends.”

“He dies,” I answer for her with a thick voice.

“And when he dies, She is taught that there is danger in love’s beauty. Born from his death was grief, an emotion so strong the goddess feels She will die. Hylia, the goddess of light and mother to all, realizes that the mortals around Her had been experiencing this for all Her years on the Surface. In that, She grieves more because how could She be so blind to this pain?”

I had let myself slack again the back of my chair and stared at the embroidery of my skirt. When she stopped talking, I thought aloud. “Was it worth it?”

“We are alive today because of it. I think Hylia knew that even though it would be centuries, She would see him again after life settled and after Demise was properly sealed. Similar to when we will see our loved ones when we pass on, however I do pray that we have many more years before that day,” she allowed a light chuckle.

“Yes,” I laughed with a small sniffle, “I think Uncle will be very cross if I follow him too early.”

“Now then,” she pulled me from my chair and walked me to the door. “Let’s get you to your room. You deserve rest after today and the weather is perfect to lull you asleep. When you wake, we’ll have your favorite tea and cake.”

------

“It will be an uphill battle,” Whitehurst sniffed, reading through a copy of the report sent from.

It had been a week since Uncle died and I hated the feeling of wasting time. Finally sitting with a couple advisors with a fresh stack of news felt worlds away from where I once was.

I agreed with Admiral Whitehurst, combing over the words once more. The rebels had declared the Gerudo capital as their own and announced that the aristocracy have been puppets to topple the purity of Gerudo traditions. The handwriting was distracting, but I ignored the repeated leaps in my chest and thumbed the unopened letter in my lap.

“They call us heretics of the true gods,” I rose from my propped hand with a sigh. “And then attempt another strike on our food supplies meant for starving infants. Urbosa, am I misunderstanding?”

She breathed in and rubbed the soreness in her neck. “It seems to me that from their threats to Link that they don’t consider us their people and would prefer dead children whose parents refuse their preaching.”

Whitehurst was still wary of the aristocrat and peered from across the table. “Who are their gods? Do they reject our goddess?”

“Partially,” she said. “They ascribe to the ancient three. Whereas we see Hylia as being the guardian goddess left to protect their creation, they see her as a usurper – ironically.

“Traditional creation story dictates that Hylia took advantage of the original three’s absence and bore Hylians as her minions to take over the world. The guardians of the sand fought back, baring a people that would be called Gerudo. A champion rose among them and found the Triforce. He used that power to save his people. That’s what I was told as a child.”

The Admiral wrinkled his nose. “How dubious.”

“It’s fragmented across villages. Most Gerudo in the capital worship money more than religion,” she shrugged, barely taking mind in the man. “Allow us to remember that this was a tactic in the early wars to turn people away from Hylian culture.”

Whitehurst nodded, somewhat perturbed. “What does Her Majesty call for?”

I hummed in thought. There were twenty causalities in the one hundred that accompanied the supplies. Out of those casualties were two deaths.

“It seems like the plan to send reinforcements along with reserves was the go-to,” I asserted. “I would like to refer to you to increase the amount of food three-fold. Impa believes levying taxes with grain farming territories would motivate morale.”

The Admiral stood with a stack of papers and nodded, “I’ll draw up the order.”

The letter burned a hole through my skirts and I couldn’t help looking down. The report was addressed to my full title, but between the pages of reports was a smaller envelope that simply read: Zelda.

“Riju has sent her regards to you. She says she is saddened to hear of Nathaniel’s passing. I would let you read it, but she has difficulties writing in Hylian,” Urbosa said, folding up the paper with Riju’s signature on it and setting it aside. “Truly, Zelda, let me know if you need me in any way.”

“You say that as if you haven’t comforted me for several nights already,” I smiled, negating her.

“My people grieve as a community. The commonplace of isolating oneself is considered unhealthy, while here it is almost expected.”

The way she crossed her legs billowed her Hylian skirts out as if she were wearing a Gerudo sirwal. I could tell it made Admiral Whitehurst uncomfortable earlier and the thought made me laugh.

“You aren’t wrong. If we weren’t in the middle of war, the court would have expected a three-month mourning period from me,” I only shrugged off the notion, tidying up my papers and setting Link’s letter on top. “I simply cannot afford it right now.”

Especially when the rebels were proving to be more organized than we thought. Encampments were appearing in the East Barrens with foreign flags. Not long after they were discovered the heads of three Hylian spies were found not far from the road leading into Gerudo Town. As of now, we had no way of telling if their strength or numbers.

The woman nodded. “And you have other distractions.”

“I,” I paused, momentarily bewildered by her expression. “I beg your pardon?”

“Distractions, my dove,” she laughed, lifting a hand to lazily gesture at what was before me.

Warmth bloomed on my face as I snatched the letter from her prying eyes. Urbosa only laughed heartily, “I cannot help but recognize that that hand matches the one who scrawled your reports.”

She let my embarrassment fester a moment longer. “Oh, don’t worry,” she leered. “I never said it wasn’t a good distraction.”

“Urbosa. I don’t know what you’re thinking, but this is not a regular occurrence.”

“Everyone has a right to hold secrets.”

“This isn’t a secret!” I bristled with wide eyes. “It’s a personal correspondence.”

Understanding was on her face but amusement danced in her eyes, a light I was all too accustomed to. “I see, with a man you had a short ‘engagement’ with before he left for war.”

“Engagement,” I blanched, “Engagement?! There was no engagement about that night, I’ve told you the extent of it!”

“Ah,” she closed her eyes, reminiscing. “I remember the first Hylian who followed me around like a dog. I was about Riju’s age – maybe a little older – when we snuck into the stables and she-”

The door to my office opened and a servant slipped through. He cleared his throat, “Announcing the esteemed Rito-”

“No, no, no,” a demanding voice cut through and in the doorway came a face Zelda hadn’t seen in many months. “We’ve rehearsed this,” the midnight blue Rito chastised, “The esteemed Ambassador. Yes, that is who I am. My title. Ordained by your King. It really, truly isn’t that hard.”

He carried on in subdued whispers while the poor man stood awkwardly by the doorway.

“Revali,” I called out. Then again when he was too engrossed in his discussion. “Why are you accosting my squire?”

“Accosting?” he primed, finally pulled away. The man scuttled back through the doorway and quietly shut it behind him. “Zelda – first of all, I will take the liberty of saying hello first – I’m not sure whether it has always been this way or if it’s the product of your reign, but these butlers of yours aren’t acknowledging my status and frankly? I’m shocked and perhaps a little appalled at the sight.”

“She is your sovereign and you will regard him as such,” Urbosa asserted, her tone commanding with an earthy undertone that took up the room.

Revali puffed out his chest, looking between her and I with admonishment.

I cleared my throat, “If you’ve just arrived, perhaps you’re exhausted. I can lead you to a room. I would have met you at the door, but we were expecting you tomorrow.”

“No, no, your Royal Majesty,” the Rito seethed, staring at Urbosa as he bowed with sweeping wings.

Some things, or Ritos rather, never changed. Revali had been the Rito ambassador at Hyrule castle for about three years now. Unlike other ambassadors, he preferred his home outside of Rito Village over staying at the castle full-time. However, Father had always kept that group at arm’s length, so it suited both parties up until now.

I was familiar with him and his disposition with the short interactions we’ve had. He was the son of wealthy traders and had no problem entering the realm of politics. The Rito people were bold, some would classify their pride as arrogance; those that did hadn’t met Revali.

He nodded my way as he pulled out a seat next to Urbosa. “May I?”

Neither of us could speak before he sat down leisurely.

“I see there have been many changes since I’ve graced these halls,” he said, touching the tips of his fingers together and took full advantage of the chair’s seat. “Yet I haven’t a signal update from the Crown!”

“I have sent reports of our decisions to Chief Kaneli when he sent his official recognition that I was Queen.”

Dramatics abound, he turned to Urbosa. “Is it not my job to relay these matters to my leader? Regale to me, my Queen, how I am to perform my duty.”

“I have seen nothing from you until I called for your presence last week, Ambassador Revali,” I straightened and sent him a pointed look. “And I’m willing to take much from you because I value our connection, but do not think for a second that I will willingly take commands from you. I am not my father and will not entertain your abuses because unlike him, they do not amuse me whatsoever.”

His beak fell open, but no words came out. This time he didn’t bear a glance at Urbosa, whose smug look made me stifle a grin. I didn’t get that tone from thin air. The gap of silence was the longest I had ever heard in the vicinity of this man.

Revali coughed into his fist and awkwardly shifted in his seat. “I see that my words have been misconstrued. I did not mean offense.”

“I accept your apology.”

“Yes, well, to lead into my concerns – which are very justified, mind you – my deepest condolences for the loss of General Nohansen. Even our great airmen are deeply saddened,” he bowed his head, a pivot from the dominant air of before.

I offered a subdued smile.

“And your replacement doesn’t seem awful, but I hadn’t heard that you were looking to fill the position so soon.”

Urbosa tilted her head. “We are in a war. I’m not sure if you heard about my people being persecuted.”

“Yes, yes, yes. Of course I have heard of the mad man. Gerudo women are already masculine enough. Maybe the roles have reversed, and he will be easily squashed.”

I rested my head in my hand and sighed, “No. Much of the opposite it seems.”

The Rito held an indignant look as he examined the tip of his feathers. “Seems my services were much in need,” he mumbled.

“Pardon me?” I asked. Was he expecting an invitation to be considered?

Oh, actually, that sounds very in character for him.

“All I’m saying is that it was a statement sent from Her Majesty to me,” Revali emphasized with splayed fingers.

I glanced to Urbosa who was glaring daggers at the Rito. I clasped my hands together in front of me, “I promise you that no offense was meant, Ambassador. Truly, the process of filling the position of Commanding General of Hyrule’s Royal Army was tumultuous.”

Revali leaned back with a stiff shrug and crossed his legs, then immediately uncross them to vehemently point his feathered finger at the ceiling. “Make no mistake! No offense was taken on my part. Zero offense because I would have merely turned down the offer in the first place because my title as the Rito Ambassador is already time consuming. Incredibly. Unmatched, even, across of the board.”

“Oh,” I blinked. “I’m glad that you see it that way.”

The man huffed, brushing an imaginary speck of dust from his right wing. “Indeed.”

“Zelda, I don’t think we should keep this from him.”

I turned to Urbosa, confusion written on my face.

“Don’t act coy. We can tell him,” she motioned towards Revali with a sweeping gesture. “Tell him how he was considered and how his resourcefulness would be better used elsewhere in the conflict.”

He chirped up and stared at me with wide eyes. I quickly nodded and masked any dubious expression.

“Oh, yes,” I piped up. “Your name was thrown into the mix several times by my cabinet.”

“It-it was?”

“Absolutely, Revali. You’ve been an incredibly valuable asset to Hyrule. Your years of service haven’t gone unrecognized, nor your training as a Rito airman. Such a wide variety of-” I tripped over a couple thoughts, looking for the right words.

Urbosa offered, “Skills?”

“Yes – thank you – such a wide variety of skills can’t be boiled down to ‘General’.”

Revali seemed to consider this greatly, rubbing his neck in thought. “Well,” he rasped. “Well, that I can understand. After all, Commanding General is largely a decorative title…”

“I wouldn’t necessarily go that far,” I muttered half of the sentence into my hand with a look at Urbosa. Ambassador Revali nodded affirmations to himself as he stared holes into the carpet.

“May I ask, Your Majesty,” he said, looking up finally. “What were your plans for me?”

I sat up in my seat and thumbed an ink quill in my hands. The feeling of opportunity rose in my chest with robust hope easing into my heart.

“I would like to inquire in your people’s support in defending fellow Hyruleans.”

He sat up with me, towards the edge of his seat.

“You mean to assert that you want additional support.”

“I do,” I said, feeling the pointed tip of the quill dig into my thumb. “The Rito and Hylian people used have strong bonds in meat trading. I wish to bridge the gap in the years our agreements fell through; even strengthen them more than what they once were.”

Revali seemed intrigued. “Under what pretense?”

“There’s no pretense,” I smiled, “I think we can both agree that Rito airmen are incredibly prolific through military history. Chief Kaneli’s support, no matter how little is, would be a great honor and assist our efforts in preserving the Gerudo aristocracy.”

“I can’t refute that,” he nodded. “I can say that Kaneli holds Her Majesty in the highest regard and has great hope for your reign… however our recent history has him wary. It will take some convincing.”

“I understand completely. If anything, do I have the Rito Ambassador’s support?”

He breathed a dramatic sigh. “Yes, I suppose you do.”

 --------

After meeting behind meeting, I snuck behind a rose bush in the gardens. The light was dying, but I couldn’t wait anymore. Wedged between the pages of my notebook was the small letter from before. It was no bigger than my hand and I took care to rip the wax-sealed seam.

Zelda,

I’m sorry this took so long to write.

A smile was already brimming my lips and I mouthed: Don’t be.

There was an attempted ambush as we passed Satori Mountain. Byron’s scouts spied them first and they were dispatched early on, but you should know this long before this letter reaches you. The supply line-

The last couple words were neatly crossed out.

I don’t know why I want to give you a report when you’ve most likely already read the one I’ve already written you. It’s been on my mind too much, but so have you. I’m sorry I couldn’t stay longer that morning and I’m sorry I couldn’t have been there when Nathaniel passed.

There’s so much I wanted to tell you before I left. Being alone with my thoughts while we traveled only added to that. I could write one hundred apologies about asking you to forget about us and then dredging it up again. One hundred more if the nights between left you just as distraught as I was. It’s hard for me to speak about my feelings and when it comes down to it – pretending they don’t exist is what I usually resort to.

I couldn’t do that with you. I care about you. I tried to convince myself I didn’t, hadn’t, and I failed miserably; only making it more known to myself how helpless you’ve made me.

And despite everything, I hope you’re smiling when you’re reading this because the selfish thought keeps me from ending this letter. I want to talk to you as I do this paper and hear your witty remarks that are far too intelligent for your own good. The same intelligence that I am convinced will end this conflict far sooner than I anticipate so I can see you again.

But I’m rambling.

I’m safe. The only casualty on the road was a lad with a twisted ankle. I did run into the boys from Hateno. Do you remember Mac and Toma Ratliff? They thought it was a prank when someone mention “General” in front of my name and got written up for insubordination.

Nonetheless, Zelda, I will wait for you.

Yours,

Link

[the-house-of-the-nine]

In Mind of Misery: Reflections, Part 1

[Forward:  Since the end of “In Depths Below” the Nine have been busy trying to reclaim Lazarius’ family fortune, rebuilding, and forging new allies.  We are current in the WoW Timeline with this entry, NZoth has risen, the world is in chaos, and now, the Council of Nine are at a disadvantage.  New Readers, please note each of the roleplayers as the following...

[ L.K ] - Lazarius Kashebahl,  Algus Kross, Doctor Whistletorque, Marseille

[ V.D ]  Verzatea Duskflame , Pame

[ S.K ] Siida-Ray Kashebahl

[ K.A ] Koltun Ancientveil

[ J ] Jursol (AND JIMBA!)

And as always, thank you so much for continued support, posting, reblogs, likes and friendly messages!  Please enjoy! ]

[ L.K ]  The Bastille.  Several months had passed since the botched bank heist on the goblin city of Undermine.  Despite its success in freeing the capital of the families estate, Lazarius had cost himself several good captains within his order, as well as potentially risking so much more.

Though it did seem like it would have been a catastrophic end to the organization, with the help of Siida and Marseille; the Kashebahl estate was reinstated back into Quel’thalas and the Magistrate.  The family earned its titles and lands back; but also received compensation from the Horde and now Alliance for the loss of Tirisfal.  Because of what Sylvanis had done; they were given a large sum of funding to compensate for the loss of their estate.

Siida was fully in charge of the running of the house; because for now Lazarius was busy in Stormwind.  Also the fact that she was a surviving victim of Dawnseeker and his plan; the fact that she was a strong independent woman, not to mention an eligible heiress, she was the perfect choice to be the face of the legitimacy of their house.

When the public learned of what the rogue Magister had done, as well as how she survived, she was brandished a hero for her efforts.  It was a true rags to riches story and the public devoured it up.

That particular evening; the quiet organization had grown smaller.  Many who were still devoted to Nzoth and sought to join the old one in its madness had left.  The operation of Azerite that was being mined in Silithus was all but shut down with the end of the war, thusly Krazzlowe had begun moving most of those workers to his own mine and abandoned the order, goblins after all were known for looking out for themselves.  

The little green scum bag had been filtering out resources to fund his own works for some time, and they knew.  Another loose end.   But, he had no idea what was actually coming, and the truth that lay in the sands at this very moment.  What had already transpired there which remained a mystery even until now.

Lazarius sat at the massive drafting table in the library with his eyes tracing over the losses and names of those who had been sent away.  Their several thousand strong; now dwindled to a mere handful of hundreds.  He’d already sent agents to deal with stragglers and deserters; and Marseille had filled his quota for blood lust in quelling the possible dangers.

Kross was tending to books within the library; cleaning up possible students work and things that were no longer being used.  And Lazarius pressed his fingers against his eyes while thinking. What plagued him? What was it that drew on his mind?  Perhaps the resurgence of Nzoth was causing him pain.

[ J ] Jursol was walking the halls of the Bastille as she used her tail to amuse Jimba, who had grown since they arrived. Her scaled clawed hands curled around a book that seemed to have her attention. Lots had gone on over this time. She like others had grown over time. Learning all she could from her time with her new friends.

Nearing the library she spotted the elf who seemed deep in thought. Closing the book in her hands as she smiled approaching him.

“Ya seem ta be lost in thought. I know dat look of being plagued by ya own mind.”  She glanced at Kross as Jimba ran over to him for attention.

“Perhaps speaking about what be troubling you be helpful, hmm? Ole Jursol is a good listener.”

[ S.K ]  Siida had grown so quickly in what felt like such a short period of time. Protecting her family's name and getting it reinstated had possessed her waking moments and now that it was complete she finally found time to rest.

Being the face of House Kash'ebahl was tiring, but it was a task she'd been born for. Her gentle smile and kind demeanor made her easy to trust and people often seemed charmed by her. The Matron at the moment found herself wandering, unable to sleep as her mind seemed full to the point of bursting.

[ L.K ]  Lazarius gazed upward when the sound of the trolls feet padded across the room and she spoke.  Jursol knew his condition well; his sunken black eyes were heavy as he peered toward her.

“My dear Jursol...”. He reached his withered mummified hand toward her; void wrappings covering his badly mangled flesh.

If she’d taken his hand; he would pay it the respect of his forehead pressed against it; a gentle kiss against the top of her scales and his other hand patting it, to hold her three fingered hand.

“It always eases my mind to have you near...”

Lazarius sensed Siida nearby and peered back at Kross.  The old steward vanishing from his games with the raptor to tend to Siida. Such an unspoken way they had with one another.

Lazarius glanced back at Jursol. “The tides are calling Jursol.  The eyes of the black empire... it is the moment id hoped to avoid...NZoth is reborn...and now..”.

He sighed and shook his head. “I...have a fear that I understand my purpose now...why my Mistress chose me...”

Kross had moved into the halls and appeared beside Siida; walking through the shadows and into being.  

“Miss Kashebahl.  Your brother is in the library.  It is good to have you home for a bit.  Please come for a moment to see him.”

[ S.K ]   "Good evening Kross....of course, I'd planned on taking some time and it seems fate answered before me."

Siida smoothed a hand through her hair and moved towards the library, knowing the way better than most people, likely able to find it with her eyes closed if she tried hard enough.

As she entered the library she kept her steps soft, not wanting to create too much noise in the temple that she cherished.

[ J ]  Jursol gently took his hand in hers as she glanced at it sighing softly. She could tell it was in bad condition, but it was not due to reasons she fully understood. The void she knew some about, but as much as others. She listened to him as he spoke. Nodding some as she spoke softly.

“Ya know I nevea ask why you be chosen by her. What ya purpose is in da end. Felt it be better ta let you discuss it when ya be ready.”

Jursol knew full well that the Old God was back. This meant they all had a part to play in the upcoming events of the world. What part she would play, she could only guess.

Hearing Siida nearing in the halls caused her ears to twitch. A smile forming on her lips. She seemed to find Siida interesting, as she did others of The Nine. One day she hoped to speak to the others more to get to know them better.

[ L.K. ]  Lazarius has brought his attention full circle when his youngest sister entered the room.  Another soft pat would be offered to Jursols hand as he calmly released her.

“Though it is not my intention to keep anything from you all...it seems the truth of my origin is even more mysterious than I had wagered.”

Lazarius made a motion toward Siida as she entered. “Flower.” he said as warmly as he could, despite the pain in his voice that lingered.  

The golden haired vision was the light that brought him back.  She was his world.  With Vari and Koltun both dealing with Silithus, Lazarius leaned desperately on his younger sister for that bond of affection.

 “You are a sight for these tired eyes...join us please.”. He smiled and motioned her over.

[ S.K ]  "I could never refuse an invitation. Jursol, it is always lovely to see you." Siida offered a polite bow and moved towards her brothers side and gave him a gentle touch.

"Hello Lazarius, it is nice to see you again." Siida did everything she could to make things easier for him, so that he didn't worry. She felt the weight of her responsibilities, but see Lazarius made them all feather light.

[ L.K ] “These halls are quiet.  So much more quiet than before.  Our dominance in the sun seems to be waning...losing numbers as we did was a difficult blow. ..” Lazarius nodded into her touch; however it was given.

“Those who abandon us in our greatest hour do not deserve such sympathy Master.”. The voice of the ever present shade appeared in full form.  

Marseille stood beside Siida.  The withered ancient elf had been running ragged between helping deal with the loose ends and staying by the young sisters side at all times in Silvermoon.  He also looked exhausted but would not show it as he hid it well behind his cloth mask.

[ S.K ] "We have dealt with much, taking time to mend and repair is not weakness. We will regain our numbers for the times that are coming."

Siida looked to Marseille and offered him the faintest of smiles, that small touch of puppy love was still there, but she knew there was a time and place for everything. Her duties were to her family first and foremost, her hearts wants and desires could wait.

[ J ]  Jursol nodded in agreement with Siida. She knew others were out there, hiding, laying in wait till it was time to come forward to offer their help. For now was the time to plan, heal, prepare for what lays ahead.

“Ya sister be right. We can not be rushing into anything before it be time. Be prepared for times ahead, mentally and physically. Ya be lucky to have so many who be caring for ya. Don’t be taking it for granted my friend.”

[ L.K ]  “I never take anything for granted.  Not now...not since.”. He trailed off and shook his head.  

They would all remember the loss of nearly being crushed beneath the Magisters.  Lazarius gave them both a glance as he moved his fingers toward his tunic.  He wore a loose fitting black shirt which was slowly being untucked at the waist.

“...we do not have the luxury of time I am afraid...” Lazarius stood before the group of them, his shirt rolled up and showing off his abdomen.  

He turned to the side and allowed them the most horrible sight of his wounds and lashings of his youth.  But in the center of his rib cage on the side of his body was the tattoo.  One that he always assumed was for his mistress and her madness.  It was an eye, massive in size with its lids drawn closed.

“It is seeking...”. He whispered softly, and in that same voice the eye would open and reveal to them a very bloodshot and corrupted looking eye which darted around looking in all directions.  The folds of his flesh that served as the lid would blink open and closer as Lazarius held it available for them to see.

“Even in death Raelyndia continues to curse me...I had no idea what she’d done with this mark until now...why she always kept me close...like I was her crown jewel...” He sighed and shook his head. “I suspect it was her way of knowing Nzoth returns...”

[ S.K ] Siida had seen such horrid things since coming to this house, since aligning herself to the Nine, but this, it gave her pause. Her poor brother had been through so much and even the past had it's hooks dug so deeply into his flesh that he never seemed able to escape.

Sitting down  she looked at the eye before lifting her gaze to Lazarius.

"With Nzoth's return...the balance of the scales are going to topple even further...how...what are we going to do?"

Siida was very much accepting of her role as Matron, she would protect her family and those still loyal to the Nine. "The old ones...endless hunger and limitless reach..." She seemed to say that last part to herself, her lips stuck together in a thin line.

[ J ]  Jursol scanned the mans broke body as she frowned. Such pain she saw on his body. As he lifts the shirt more, her eyes rest on the tattoo. Her eyes grew wide as she peered closer at it. Ever the curious troll she was. As she reached to try and touch it, she saw it open. This caused her to leap back from him.

“Dis be bad juju.”

Her eyes still locked into the large blood shot eye. Hearing about the risk of balance being tipped, she calmed herself and stood up straight.

“She clearly be haven her own motivates, your old Mistress. I never seen anything like dis before.”

[ V.D ]  There was very little that unnerved Verzatea. She was a devoted woman, unshakeable in faith and stalwart to the temptations trying to veer off the course of the Nine. She followed her people blindly, advocating for her fellow devotees ans protecting them with her very life. That was before she returned to the state of the Nine now, the halls emptier and much lonelier than usual after a great many students and practitioners of the dark crafts had abandoned the Bastille in pursuit for more power.

This had left Tea feeling hollow and empty... Friends and students alike had disappeared without a goodbye, before she could wish the great fortune... She thought often of the people who had left, wondering if they were happy. She sure as fel wasn't. But she wouldn't complain. She couldn't fathom what led Lazarius to his decision, but she wouldn't question it. No matter how deeply the sudden change frightened her.

In truth, Verzatea followed Lazarius. He was their Inquisitor, he was her guiding light when she first joined as a young naive elf seeking purpose, he was the wisest of the lot who guided them and connected them to the other side of the thin veil separating the living world from the realm of the supernatural-- of the Gods which they worship. Or rather... Worshiped. So his sudden change in allegiance was... Startling. In the least to say.

Verzatea walked the halls as if on eggshells, desperate to not disturb the Bastille in fear she'd chew everyone up and spit them out like the traitor heathens Tea felt they'd become.

Desperate to not bring attention to herself, an overly cautious measure she practiced to try and ease her anxiety since her return. She even have gone as far as keeping her daughter in her arms or in her sight as Tea worked. She would not risk losing her precious child-- her miracle baby... Her sweet Brinys.

Tea feared that if somehow she drew attention to the young child the Gods would rip her straight from Teas arms... And Tea would be helpless in saving her babe.

Currently the mother daughter duo walked hand in hand, Brinys's quick growth resulting in the black haired babe having found her ability to walk during Verzateas four month long voyage across the great sea to visit her mother and father. Another major event of which Verzatea had to miss, thus setting the first time mother in a sour mood as she wished desperately to have been present for such a feat... Although, Tea was not shy about dotting on Brinys ever-still.

Quickly the mother had become happy acquainting herself with the joy of dressing her child up fashionably. Tea had a knack for her usual pastel colors and modernized, appealing vintage fashion, of which was a far cry from her current darker toned modest (though chic) gown.

In truth, this was the style Tea had changed to after she returned from her journey. Surely it was just a coincidence? After all, the layered fabric which hung loosely off the woman's thinner frame, was a stylish set that also gave her daughter a girly vibe.

For Tea, the dress billowed in an elegant fall, the layer of dress beneath the second layer clung to her waist and hugged the woman's thin, narrow pear shaped figure (in which her bust is smaller in comparison to her slightly larger hips). The dress stopped just at her ankles, feet wearing a matching color pair of open toed ankle strappies (unlike Brinys's sandals). Over all the greenish-blue fabric still managed to stand in contrast to the partially matching duo, Tea and Brinys sharing in their fair skin tone.

The sunken of Teas cheeks and the heavy bags of exhaustion beneath her eyes expertly hidden beneath a carefully applied layer of makeup meant to contour her face-- all in the effort of softening the devastating state of her emaciation.

Along with wearing makeup, the woman also wore a polite smile as she guides Brin toward the library, encouraging the girl to open the library for them, eager to help Brinys work on her motor skills, strength and coordination. After all, Tea had her hands full with one hand clinging to her daughters whilst her other arm had clasped her larger journal beneath the limb, too with writing supplies in her hand.

As they'd enter the library Tea pauses to acknowledge the other entities of the room, her eyes alight with a wave of peace. She felt less vulnerable with her beloveds close by.

"Blessings," she murmurs, her tone lacking a significant amount of confidence,

"I wasnt expecting seeing nearly everyone in one place tonight. Are you all conspiring without the others present for an official meeting?" She aims to tease, though her dry laugh would only make it awkward.

Another unusual far cry from the often perky and charming Confessor. Brinys stares up in wonderment at her mother, her free hand moving to pat Teas hand before releasing her mother all together. With a playful giggle the child bounces forward toward Siida before sweeping the woman's legs up into a hug as she clings to her favorite chosen-aunt.

And just outside of the library doors stood a hesitating Pame. She had been offered the decision to go, or stay by Lazarius... And she fought long and hard with herself over the decision, despite how easy you'd think the choice to be.

Especially after the mental and physical torture she endured as both prisoner and slave to the Nine. But there was... Something here. Purpose, Pame had come to assume, especially so after Lazarius denounced the Old Ones. She felt more at peace with joining ranks.

Although... She was quite hesitant meeting others that had remained, no matter how much she respected their devotion to one another as a group. In truth it had nothing to do with the individuals themselves. It was all due to the fact that she was just... A very socially awkward woman.

She meant well, but often came off as aggressive and even hostile-- It’d be no secret by now that Pame had made one girl cry after what Pame assumed was a friendly argument over a game of chess they were playing... Of course, as Pame later reflected, she came to understand and make note of how "I'll rip your heart from your chest and devour it before your eyes prior to my slurping those from your skull, you dense fool!" was not an appropriate way to substitute "Check mate".

After that experience she'd become a real wall flower, trying to fit in but failing miserably. Now that she'd watched so many pour into the library to mingle and work, Pame was fighting with her decision to enter and join in an exercise of her socializing.

Her doubt was winning out, evident given how she nervously picked at her more casual attire-- Having found comfort in a fresh, long sleeved brown tunic partially tucked beneath her ripped work trousers(ones often paired with her armor), though against her very nature Pame opted to wear shoes (her armor boots). Her long, dark green hair tied up into a messy bun, few strands hanging freely all around.

Her muscular and broad figure cast quite the intimidating shadow against the doorway, likely peeking from beneath the doors, her arms folding beneath her moderate sized breasts, a massive thoughtful frown weighing her thick lips, silver eyes practically burning holes against the door with such intensity.

[ J ]  Jursol seemed a bit more at ease when the mother and daughter walked in. Her smile came off as warm as to not frighten the child. With a bow of her head she greeted them. However her eyes caught the shadow of another who was not yet in the room.

Jimba noticed right away and was in mid leap before she stopped him. Grabbing him up into her arms, Jursol walked over to the doorway. Her usual scent of herbs linger on her body.

“Ah, I see someone be hesitant.” She said softly as she eyed Pame up and down.

“Come now I be sure no one gonna bite ya for entering. If dey not be wanting ya here they tell ya.” Reaching a scaly clawed hand out to Pame as she smiled.

“Come, we can enter together.” Jimba struggled to get free from the trolls strong arm. Clearly he wanted to play with Pame, but now was not the time.

To Be Continued: In Mind of Misery: Reflections, Part 2

[hcpefulmarshmallow]

Zansakura (Danganronpa) & Leaves From The Vine (Avatar: The Last Airbender) Are Shockingly Similar, And Both Remarkable 

-- The Essay No One Asked For.

I vaguely eluded - and by that, I mean bluntly stated - this comparison before, but as a big fan of both these series and these songs, I figured this whole thing deserves a real, proper post, meta tag and all. But in order to compare the two, we must define them first. 

 It's fair to say I’ve done a lot of thinking about Zansakura. A while back, I even did a rather, let’s say, meticulous deconstruction of the song as well as Zettai Kibou Birthday, and compared the two to one other. In the interests of saving time and effort, I’ll do my best to summarise the key points; but if you’re interested, here’s the link. 

 Zansakura is one of Nagito Komaeda’s character songs, in which he conceptualizes his life as Sakura petals falling from their tree, and being carried away in the water. Sakura flowers - or cherry blossoms, as we know them - carry a certain significance in Japanese culture. The long and short of it is this: they signify impermanence, transience, and a wistful sadness in the face it. Cherry Blossoms are considered at their most beautiful, not as they bloom, but as they begin to wither and fall; see his canon dialogue: “As soon as my life entered the final round, it quickly became a rollercoaster ride!” Nagito, of course, suffers from an illness that is likely to take his life very soon. Throughout the song, he expresses a deep, regretful sadness at this being the state of things; but moreover, for the one line he breaks his Sakura motif in the song, it’s to say: “To live an ordinary life and die together with you/Oh, if that could come true”. For Nagito, the saddest thing he’s losing is not his life, but rather, the potential to love and be loved in return. 

 In the world of Avatar, Leaves From The Vine is a well-known nursery rhyme in the Fire Nation, and going by the lyrics alone, seems to have a vaguely optimistic message - a soldier returns home from war. However, the out-of-universe meaning behind this song is something else entirely. 

 We, the viewers, are not exposed to all aspects of Fire Nation culture, but rather those that are relevant to the story. So we do not know the song as any kind of nursery rhyme. We know it from Book 2, Episode 15: The Tales Of Ba Sing Se. This anthological filler episode - and I use the term filler loosely, because boy, was this show good at filler - follows various characters throughout the same day, as they go about having separate adventures in the Earth Kingdom capital. Each story serves a different purpose, but by far the most memorable and heartbreaking is the tale of Iroh. Iroh is a very beloved character, and for good reason. He used to be a renowned General, and the heir to the Fire Nation throne. But after his only son Lu Ten was killed in battle, fighting the war the Fire Nation started, Iroh lost all faith in his purpose. His life spiraled and his grief eventually lead to him being disinherited by his father, becoming a disgrace in the eyes of the Fire Nation (though still loved by many for his personality), and perhaps most importantly, turned him off the war altogether, and into the kind and nurturing figure we the audience know, and Zuko relies on. I mean, it was a little more complicated than that, but that’s the crux of it. 

 His tale in Ba Sing Se mostly revolves around disjointed, seemingly random events in which he somehow makes a stranger’s life better; talking a thief and mugger into turning his life around, comforting a crying child. But at the day’s end, Iroh climbs a hill and sits alone beneath a tree, retreating to grieve privately. There he lays out a cloth, incense, a picture of Lu Ten, and after having helped so many people, expresses his regret that he couldn’t help his son. This day happens to be Lu Ten’s birthday, and in his memory, Iroh sings a tearful rendition of Leaves From The Vine. He is barely able to make it through the final lines of the song: “Little soldier boy/Come marching home/Brave solider boy/Comes marching home” and that’s where is tale ends. Remember what I said about Avatar’s filler being remarkable? This, right here, is the entire essence of Iroh. At the end of his segment, we’re left in awe at how much pain he carries with him, and how he’s able to easily help so many people despite it. 

 This is where the song leaves an impression. This is the context through which we remember Leave From The Vine, so this is the lens through which I’m going to interpret and compare it to Zansakura. 

 Both songs elude to similar themes: namely death, loss, ephemera, ideology, and the downfall of having been devoted to an imperfect cause. In Iroh’s case, it’s the loss of life and purpose; and in Nagito’s case, is the lacking of purpose and love. 

Imagery

 In both songs, a certain sad imagery is evoked. It’s through this medium the bulk of the emotion is expressed. It is the withering and dying of nature. Though not sentient, the vines in Iroh’s case and the Sakura trees in Nagito’s are both undergoing a process that cannot be stopped, and will mean the end of everything that is beautiful for this living thing. 

 In both cases, however, this motif is broken to address things more literally. In the case of Zansakura, Nagito breaks to give the “to live a life” line. But it’s said in a way, and in a context, where we are meant to understand that he doesn’t believe he will ever achieve this. Likewise, even as Iroh sings about the Solider coming home, we know he never will. Both state a simple desire, to be with someone they love, despite the fact that it’s impossible. A perfect summation of each song, as it’s presented to us. 

Death, Loss & Ephemera

 Ephemera might just be one of my favourite words. Something that is said to be ephemeral exists for only a short time. Going back to the significance of cherry blossoms, the most common variety actually bloom and fall within a week -- and remember, this is when they’re said to be their most beautiful. Both Nagito and Iroh express a certain sense of defeat. They know their time has passed them by and there’s nothing they can do to get it back. While there is a huge difference between losing a loved one and losing your own life unloved, in both cases, it leaves things unsaid, undone, and unlived. There is a powerlessness both characters feel, that is palpable throughout these songs, and throughout several moments in their respective canon. Though they’re worlds apart, grief is something that can touch anyone, no matter what universe they live in, fictional or otherwise. It’s something that will touch everyone at some point, so perhaps that’s why these are such memorable themes for both Iroh and Nagito. 

Ideology And An Imperfect Cause

 For Iroh, it was the war that the nation he served began that lead to the death of his son. He fought for the glory of the Fire Nation his whole life, passed on this ideology to his son, and Lu Ten paid the price. Similarly, Nagito’s cycle of luck for which we can blame his illness, is largely tied to (perhaps even responsible for) his belief in hope and despair. But as we’ve seen, for that cause, Nagito will go to lengths so extreme, he often does more harm than good. It because of his luck he may never have the chance to live long or know love; the thing that, by his own admission, he wants more than anything.

 Both characters have faced unimaginable pain in the name of a certain ideology. However where they differ is that Iroh used his pain to follow a new path, one that would lead to a better world. Nagito only believed even harder in hope, followed more determinedly the path he was already on. But either way, despite the fact that winning their own personal desires is literally impossible for them, both characters have instead made it their life’s ambition to make the world better for others in whatever way they deem most valuable, no matter the cost to themselves. 

 In conclusion, I don’t really have one. Sure, the songs dabble in similar evocation, similar themes. A lot of songs do. Loss and pain are hardly unique subject matter, and both materials - almost all materials - handle them differently, just as different people do. I guess this was nothing but an excuse to riff about stuff I like. So there. 

[dat-town]

Destined to fall | scene iv.

Characters: Taehyung & You

Setting: fallen angel au, reincarnation au, historical au

Genre: angst

Warnings: attempted suicide, character death

Summary: Your love story is a tragedy written with blood throughout the centuries.

Words: 4.7k

Chapter index

SCENE IV. GARDEN OF EDEN London, Victorian era

Taehyung had long accepted that God indeed wanted to teach him something. Manners? Respect? Or how to be a good man? He never knew nor cared. He had been living his boring life sitting on a throne of guilt and regret, commanding to an army of powerful soldiers but he despised his own influence. What was it good for if he couldn’t save you? If he had to watch you wither away in every single life you had? He swore he wouldn’t torture you – but also himself - anymore, because after dozen failed attempts of breaking into heaven, bribing his way through its entrance, he realized he couldn’t face the Almighty just because he wanted to. He couldn't question him how long his punishment would last and how much more you would have to suffer. He didn’t give up but focused more on ruling his kingdom than battling in a war he couldn’t possible win against a faceless god.

“You never asked me to join you. Why?” Seokjin asked, the one creature in this wide world whom he considered the closest thing to a friend he knew and had.

The angel visited him from time to time, on neutral grounds in hazy times. His snow white suit made him outstanding in the grey crowd and his fluttering white wings only Taehyung could see, rested close to his back. The fluffy, soft feathers stirred a pang of jealousy even in Devil because he had missed his wings as black as his soul, but the fractured bones couldn’t sprout again leaving him with two identical scars on his back that ached constantly like a never-ending dull music in the background, constant reminders of what he was and what was taken away from him because of his rebellion.

“I have enough demons,” he shrugged thinking back of those prideful angels falling one by one and searching for a new, more liberal reign under his hands. They listened well, that was something God taught them well but saying no was now in their blood and the only thing that kept them in order was fear. They feared Taehyung, at least since one of them tried to snatch the throne from him and ended up on Hell’s torture table. “Everybody needs something to fall for. You have to decide it for yourself. That's the beauty of free will.”

Each of them, angels and humans made choices and carved their own fate. Even if it wasn’t a conscious decision that time, he didn’t regret falling for you. Loving you was the best thing that happened to him no matter how short-lived it was. He never knew when you would be taken away from him, so he liked to spend and cherish every possible moment with you but not in the possessive way he once did, he swore on that.

“What He gave us as a gift,” Seokjin reminded him kindly and it was something Taehyung couldn’t deny. God really gave them the right to choose.

“Yes and it may be his fatal mistake,” he nodded looking down at the mass of people below the building. Clueless, dense people running around in the haziness of life, sacrificing themselves in the process, losing their purpose setting a mindless treadwheel ahead of them. Angels, humans, all the same: their existence lost its meaning when there was nothing more to live for.

Decades passed in silence, Taehyung drifted with the flow. He laughed when people pointed at machines calling them devilish and inhumane, although it was only the evolution of their race. With the industrial revolution, came the new danger of getting caught because of his forever young looks if he stayed in one place for too long. But Taehyung was really good at fleeing and staying in the shadows if it was necessary, he changed his identity as often as those rich girls throw out their clothes.

A few years after Queen Victoria occupied the throne of England he settled down in the British capital as a foreign artist. In this life he was a painter called Vante, one who lived for art, beauty and self-fulfilment. He enjoyed 5pm tea afternoons, chatting with other artists in downtown pubs and drawing people. He took up art during his first years of loneliness as a way of coping and till this day, he couldn’t get rid of this urge of creating. It was in his nature despite the Devil was said to be able to destroy only. His talent wasn’t recognized until this century when it became popular among the wealthiest families to order portrays. Still, he didn’t do it for the easy money. He didn’t even need that since he had no desire for such human things. He took these jobs out of boredom and curiosity, for the sake of art.

He lived a lowkey life in which he had no intention of searching for you. He gave up on that in order to provide you with a normal life, finally, without bloodshed and pain and suffering. He didn’t care about the constant longing in his heart, the stinking pang in his chest, the thorn of his never-ending love that bled from inside. He told himself he didn’t deserve you and you would be better off without him anyway but jokes on him, fate had brought you together once again.

He should have said no when he was called into another rich British household. He should have because his cold heart just skipped the beat knowing you would be there waiting for him. But he couldn’t, oh how could he? You were the gravity he fell for, he stood no chance.

“Pleasure to have you here, Mr. Vante. We are all admirers of your works,” a man his age greeted the painter and he nodded in acknowledgement, a lump of anticipation choking him.

“Especially our dear daughter. She was the one who chatted our ears off about your works until we hired you,” the head of the family chimed in.

“But papa…” you protested with your cheeks dusted pink and cast your careful gaze down.

“It’s an honour that my questionable talent is recognized by you, Miss,” Taehyung bowed again with a smile playing on his lips because of your adorable shyness.

The fashion in this era made women wear gloves and high-collared dresses that covered as much skin as it could, so when you were introduced, it didn't matter that he took your hand to give it a kiss, the thin silk stopped you from remembering. Maybe it was better this way because on your fourth finger, over the glove you proudly wore a diamond engagement ring labelling you as another man’s fiancée...

Taehyung didn’t cry, nor did he throw a fit. He took defeat like a man with his chin high up. He loved you so much that he wanted nothing else for you but happiness. However, he wasn’t selfless, he wasn’t that kind of person. He thought it was unfair that God decided another man could have you right in front of his eyes. Yet, he knew better than to blame Him, it was better to think of it as a challenge, a test to see if you really loved him as you claimed in your earlier lives or it was merely your sense of duty all along after you remembered your time together. What if you regretted loving him after so many awful deaths? Didn’t you deserve a peaceful life?

He should have left, go far away but he couldn’t stay away. As Vante the artist, he had bi-weekly visits at your family’s mansion working on you and your future husband’s portray. It was for your wedding, you said once with a forced smile when the strict man you were engaged to stood beside you rigid in his pose, with a hand over your shoulders.

Since after spending decades without you, Taehyung only had two methods of passing time: killing and his newest hobby, art, he was pretty good at both. He loved to get lost in details, absorbing each tiny miniscule piece of reality into a painting. He was a precise artist but he kept making mistakes when it was about you. Sometimes the yous got mixed in his head, different faces but the same sparkling in the eyes and the same loving heart. Even though you had ginger curls brushed under a laced hat and eyes blue like hyacinths, he knew it was you, he could feel it like every other time. And it distracted him, remembering your times together while you had no recollection of it at all. Maybe that’s why your fiancé got bored of these painting sessions, the mistakes and he came by less and less often.

Sometimes you read a book in your lap giving the fallen angel the opportunity to stare as much as he wanted. Sometimes you asked him questions of Paris, the city he supposedly came from. Sometimes like now your gaze was fierce, your posture tense as you were sipping on a tea. Taehyung couldn’t help but wonder. Did you have an argument with your parents? With your fiancé perhaps? Is it about the wedding that fabricated arranged marriage he knew you never wanted? Or did you?

“Is everything alright?” he asked as a tentative approach and you pursued your lips shaking your head, fingers playing with each other.

“It’s nothing, just… complicated wedding preparations. George’s family is a little bit too enthusiastic and I…” you bit down on your tongue, hard, to stop yourself from saying more but you had already done the damage.

Taehyung’s gaze zoomed on your hand, your fourth finger in particular with that gorgeous diamond ring and he blurted out the most impolite question ever:

"Do you love him?"

A short pause. A hiss in the silence and you looked at him coldly, answering a bit belatedly. Too late to not be written off as hesitation.

"Of course I do. I wouldn't marry him otherwise," you scrunched your nose slightly offended.

It was a lie and you both knew.

Your fiancé was a busy man, he barely made time for painting sessions since he had more important things to do than standing there watching an artist work. So most times the two of you were alone in the study room of your family's impressive house. Vante with a brush between his fingers, you sitting on a sofa, your midnight blue dress falling to your legs in airy waves. Small talks came natural to you but anything else felt too intimate to share with a stranger, another man who wasn’t supposed to captivate you like the artist did.

There was something in his eyes, the way he looked at you like you were his muse that made you blush and uncharacteristically shy. Especially now when you had his intense gaze at you after such a blunt confession that shouldn't have happened. You wanted to change the topic immediately.

"The girls on your paintings..." The words stumbled out of your mouth slowly, without your consent but Vante didn’t stop you, he didn’t interrupt, so you kept the eye contact and asked it anyway before curiosity could have eaten you up: "Do you know them all?"

Ever since you fell in love with this mysterious artist’s paintings at an exhibition downtown, it intrigued you. There was only a handful of portrays he didn’t do for money and all of them had young, pretty women on them. They all looked like they were in love, eyes shining, mouth curved up in a mysterious smile but somehow there was also sadness in those orbs.

"Yes, I once knew them."

"They are beautiful,” you nodded as a slight pang of jealousy poisoned the blood in your veins. Ridiculous! You had a fiancé and yet you were jealous of past muses, perhaps-lovers of an artist you barely knew.

"So are you," he said easily like it was nothing, merely a fact like the Sun rising on the East. Given your family status, you weren’t used to genuine compliments. Still, it had you blush.

"Oh please, you only say that sir because my family pays your bills."

"I don't need your family’s money," the man answered very seriously, lightning in his eyes as he looked at you. There was it again, that something in his gaze that made you feel as if he was reading you like an open book.

You wanted to ask what he needed then but you didn’t dare and you lost your chance to say anything at all when the door opened and you mother busted in calling you into the salon for dress rehearsal. Excusing yourself early had never felt so wrong.

You fell in love slowly but too easily for a woman with an engagement ring on her finger. Meeting Vante brought those smiles and fluttery feelings you associated with love and it scared you. Being the only daughter of a newspaper firm’s owner gave you many benefits: piano and dance lessons, the prettiest dresses, treated like a princess among your acquaintances but for all that you owned your father something in exchange: to marry the man he chose, the man who would continue to build his empire and make it famous. George was a good man, he had always acted polite towards you and it was more than a lot of fiancées could tell about themselves. You got lucky but it wasn’t enough for you to love him and you couldn’t help but be doubtful about your future marriage.

When the painter appeared in your life he made you feel he was there all along. Like you came home to him… like he was home. Impossible, right? You had just met him! But he was so different from everybody you had the pleasure to meet: the way he asked about your days, complimented the way you dressed, dared to disagree with you on meanings of certain poems and discussed politics with you, a topic from everybody hushed women away. He was interested in every aspect of your life, in your opinion about everything and maybe it flattered you enough to say yes to his bold question.

“Will you walk with me?

Asking an engaged lady for a walk alone was just as immoral as agreeing to the said offer. But after weeks of tiptoeing around each other, stolen glances between four walls and whispered conversations, you felt your heart swelling with this exciting new feeling that filled your insides until you feared you would burst.

“I finished the painting,” Vante said quietly just as you passed by the fountain in the middle of Hyde Park. His voice carried a spoonful of bitter sadness and your throat closed up nervously. The pleas that were choking you lately came alive again scratching at the back of your throat.

“Does that mean I won’t see you anymore?” your made a clumsy attempt of masking your disappointment but you failed badly when sadness clearly stained your voice.

“Would you miss me?” the painter stopped in his tracks and looked at you bewildered. That foolish hope in his eyes made you reckless too. Now or never, you thought playing with the ruffles of your beautiful dress.

“I… I know it’s wrong in its every bit but… I can’t control my heart and I am terribly sorry, that I put you into such a bothersome situation,” you blurted out without thinking, letting the urge to speak your mind have control. You would never want to burden him with your company since you knew he was such a busy person, yet you hoped he wouldn't say goodbye forever.

“What do you mean, Miss?”

What do you mean? Such a great question. You have no idea what to wish for, what to hope with that diamond ring on your finger. Would you really leave your comfortable and stable life behind just to be with him and turn childish dreams of true love into reality? You had no idea but you wanted to get rid of the weight of this heavy confession that had suffocated you for weeks. You couldn't let him go until he didn’t know how you felt.

“I… I am a disgrace to my family," you stuttered and since you didn't bear to look into Vante's black tea eyes, you rather marvelled at the way the sunshine hit on his beret in the rainy afternoon weather. “An engaged girl who caught feelings for an artist. A shame, they would call it but yes, it’s true. I have feelings for you.”

The man looked a bit shaken, the lazy curve of his mouth trembling as he asked: “Are you sure?”

“Yes… But please do not feel obligated to reciprocate anything. You are free to reject my indecent confession. It’s absolutely not fair on you, I know,” you were quick to answer and reassure him that no matter his answer, you wouldn't hold anything against him.

“How could I ever reject you?” It's a rhetorical question because he didn't need to ask twice to know he had you for a while now. “I have loved you in every life you had and I will love you in every following one. I love you more than anything.”

“It’s blasphemous to say such things,” you gasped.

As a Catholic you were taught that God was supposed to be the one you love the most. But it didn’t stop your heart from feeling things it shouldn't, like happiness for being loved back by a man who wasn’t your fiancé.

“What now...?” you whispered and your touch was so light he barely felt it: your bare fingertips brushing against his knuckles.

Realization only hit him when he locked eyes with you and saw that look. The look of those who had lived long enough to know what pain feels like. Your eyes were suddenly swimming in tears, rosy lips trembling. Hastily, you pulled your hand back so you could clench onto your chest with your panicked gaze turned away. Contrary to before, any other times when you remembered, now you had your responsibilities, a promise you made to a man who wasn’t Vante, who wasn’t Taehyung, your fallen angel you had never stopped loving.

“How many did you kill?”

The sudden question birthed silence. Taehyung took a deep breath.

“Thousands.”

It was the truth. There was no point in denying it.

You had loved him before. Fiercely even though you knew he was a killer. You had loved him before despite status and sins and how much of a monster he was. But now, now you stood up and turned your back on him ready to leave.

Taehyung didn’t think or calculate odds, he grabbed on your hand halting you, in need of answers and explanations.

“Love...” he called you desperately clinging onto your non-gloved fingers searching for your eyes, those traitors but you avoided his gaze at any cost.

“Please no...” you hissed at the pet name and flinched like he burnt you.

“But you said yourself… You fell in love with me even if you didn’t remember our pasts. What changed?”

You did, he was right. You fell in love with the painter just like you had fallen in love with the rich merchant, the royal advisor and the second-in-command. You had fallen deep and deeper you got with each day. It was a well too deep for you to get out, an ocean too vast to struggle to swim to the surface, because not loving him didn’t seem like an option. You were meant to be, like you were made to be the yin to his yang and for that reason you never felt whole until you met him.

“I can’t do this,” you kept shaking your head because it was too much, too painful. All the memories, the pain you endured and the unfortunate fates you had.

“Do what? Why?” The fallen leaned closer and gently cupped your face wiping away the tears you shed. They couldn’t help but fall.

“I can’t do this anymore. It hurts too much,” you cried grabbing at the fabric of your dress implying to the place in your chest where your heart burnt, ached. “Maybe it’s really a punishment. For you and for me for all the sins I have done and for the ones I will commit. Maybe we both deserve it: to love until it hurts, until our heart bleeds. Maybe we shouldn’t be together.”

“You don’t mean that. You can’t,” Taehyung begged, his heart breaking into tiny pieces. If you couldn’t be his, he was happy with you being his muse and nothing more but knowing you loved him and remembered him, it was unthinkable for him.

“I’m sorry,” you barely managed to force the words out because you were sobbing so hard. There were knives at your throat and poisoned arrows piercing right through your heart. It was a torture to look him in the eye, yet you still killed yourself slowly. “Please… Just let me be. Leave me alone.”

The words burnt like you slapped him, hard, across his face, it left an uncomfortable tingling and a wound deeper than the scars on his back where once his wings were. He thought he knew what pain and suffering meant, to drown while everybody was watching but this, this was worse than all punishments of Hell.

Quite a few demons had tried to kill Taehyung over the time. Rebellions against his rule weren’t rare but he was too powerful to die because of these weak attempts. However, he never tried to end his own life and standing on the edge of the hundred years old Westminster Bridge he wondered if God had let him die if he wanted to. He was finally ready to test the theory.

It had been almost two weeks since you left him behind in Hyde Park. He respected your demand and stayed away but today, he couldn’t. Even if he could only watch you from afar, he had to come here mixing into the crowd of guests of London’s elites. He saw you getting off a flowery, white horse carriage in front of the Cathedral and you looked so beautiful, so gorgeous in your snow white dress, the pearls around your neck and white petals in your hair. You looked like the princess you deserved to be and in your earlier lives, he would have given everything to make this possible. It was worth living just to see you like this, Taehyung concluded, but his heart ached so bad imagining you by another man’s side. Smiling at him, kissing him, making love to him. He couldn’t handle that, he just couldn’t bear that thought.

Dying because of a human girl, such a pity, others would have said, would have called him weak. He had everything after all: wealth, a handsome face, immortality and an empire to rule. But what did all this mean if he had nobody to share with? If he was all alone?

He took a step closer to the edge. Nobody cared. London rushed through around him as the busy commercial market it was and the Cathedral’s bells sounded magical as its clock hit seven o’clock. It was long overdue, to say goodbye. He should have died a long time ago anyway...

“Taehyung…” your lovely voice echoed in the dark, coming from afar and the once angel laughed sarcastically. He had hallucinated already, great. God must have found it appropriate to torture him till the end.

“Taehyung!” the sound of his name resonated louder this time, closer, not so dulled by the waves of Thames and the more he tried to ignore the chanting the more pragmatic, more frantic it became. He felt the pull on his coat as somebody yanked him backwards. At first, he suspected the always so nosy Seokjin, the angel who acted like his guardian but when he turned around he saw a different kind of celestial being. You.

You panted, holding your skirt with one hand, hair a mess, eyes frightened. It seemed too good to be true. Maybe he really was dreaming. Or dead already.

“You ran away? From the church? Why?” he deadpanned and raised his hand eye-level, uncertain whether he was allowed to touch.

“Because I realized I can't let God bind me to someone I don't love,” you said loud and clear taking his hand in yours and leaning into his touch. Oh, gods, you had missed this so much.

“But what if you were? What if once I will be too late? And you will love them?” Taehyung asked, still perplexed, holding you like he once did, like you were something fragile or simply a dream that can dissolve into nothing if he let down his guards.

“That won't happen. Because I'll always love you more,” you protested shaking your head that had your ginger curls fall into your face, framing your ocean blue eyes. You didn’t hesitate, you pushed yourself up to your toes and kissed the love of your life and your entire existence like you meant it because you really did. For a moment, he stilled, still processing what just happened but then he kissed you back deeply with all the desperation in his heart. The barrier made of stone dug into your back ruining your pure white dress but you couldn’t care less. Even the indignant shouting of your relatives coming from the Cathedral seemed dull.

“Let’s get married. Not in a church, of course. But let’s make a promise. I want to be with you forever,” you whispered pulling away and little did you know, your wish would come true this time around.

Taehyung had long stopped believing in Mercy but you were religious in this life and you had a different view on current event. You thought this wasn’t about God taking you away from your love but keep giving you back to him. You still prayed for his soul every day. Taehyung claimed it was naive and useless but it kept you alive. For the first time in forever you had things like wrinkle to worry about and you whined about being too old for a twenty something looking guy despite him being immortal and thousand years old. Miraculously you grew old with Taehyung and a bunch of dogs by your side. You weren’t ready to have kids after what happened last time and now you were happy with what you had. It was nice, growing old and experiencing things you couldn’t before. Taehyung showed you the wonders of the world, you travelled a lot and you loved deeply. You celebrated every anniversary like it was the first and appreciated each moment like it could be the last. You spent together decade after decade arguing more and more over the time because you thought he should move on, leaving you alone to grow old but he wasn’t willing. Never, when his soul was older than a millennium and he loved you even with your hair grey and winkles.

Even a heart attack couldn’t take you away but it landed you in a health care centre. Whenever you heard nurses talking about your handsome “grandson”, you chuckled. You weren’t jealous, not anymore because you wanted Taehyung to be happy more than anything. And lately, you had seen sadness in those mesmerizing eyes of his as if he was preparing himself to say goodbye.

“Why don’t you go find another love? You have plenty of time and there are so many people out there. You shouldn’t wait for me,” you told him who sat on the edge of your bed dutifully, not leaving your side if he didn’t have to. He signalled no with his head. At first, you thought he was about to scold you for talking about your own death again because he hated to hear about the inevitable.

“For me, there’s nobody else but you,” he replied and squeezed your hand like he never wanted to let go.

With your wrinkled hands in his forever young ones, death took you away in your sleep but this time, you left with no regrets and Taehyung cried because he had nobody to blame but himself.

Next chapter

[megsblackfirewrites]

My Gift of Blood: Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Gabriel didn’t want to be awakened. He killed the excavation team that uncovered his coffin without a second thought, draining each of them until they were a withered husk. He wanted to climb back into his coffin and pretend that nothing had happened, but his nose demanded that he see what had become of his homeland. He knew that a lot of time had passed, but he couldn’t be certain of how much; he had to see what had happened.

What he found was a wave of blinding lights, things moving at impossible speeds on hard roads, and a world filled with never-ending sounds. It disoriented him, left him groping for stability that didn’t seem to exist anymore. He holed himself up in the remains of his estate, trying to figure out what was happening around him.

The language he spoke did not match those of the humans around him. Each time he tried to communicate, they gave him a flat look and walked away, clearly writing him off as a madman. At first, he was certain that he was going to die from a basic lack of communication, wondering if this was how Jack felt when he first moved to Argon. Then, a miracle unravelled before him.

He learned the new language, Spanish, at impossible speeds. Within a few weeks, he was almost fluent enough in the language to confidently ask about the world around him. Most people asked if he was from the countryside and he replied that he hadn’t gotten out much in his youth. That seemed to amuse the humans he questioned and they happily told him about the world around him.

So much time had passed since he had gone into his coffin. Argon was gone. The Scottish Moors were gone. Nothing of the world he knew remained. There was something called ‘democracy’ running rampant in the world, along with ‘capitalism’. The monarchy of kingdoms were little more than figureheads with lots of wealth but no real power. The governments were run by elected officials and Gabriel doubted the legitimacy of their reign.

He found it easier to feed, though. People seemed to be in love with the idea of a vampire feeding on them and openly sought out anyone that would indulge their fantasy. He did his best to control himself while he fed and he managed to not kill most of his prey items. Sometimes, though, he was unable to control himself. Sometimes, the beast in his soul took control and he tore his victim to ribbons to get as much blood as he could. Then he would dump the body after mutilating it even more so it was unrecognizable. He didn’t want anyone to know the faces of his victims. He was too ashamed.

He was curious about the country that used to be the wilds of the New World. He managed to sneak aboard a ship and stay hidden in the cargo hold devouring the rats that stowed away there with him. He slipped out in the night when it made landfall, heading out into his new world. Which spoke too many languages to ever hope to learn them all. Still, English was easy enough for him to grasp after a week.

He was given dirty looks, but he didn’t care as he started existing again. He came to adore movies and ballet, marvelling in the beauty moving before him. He came to love fashion too, carefully procuring his items with money that he shouldn’t have had. He did his best to keep up to date with what was considered in fashion, even going so far as to get several fashionable piercings on his face and body.

He grew to love the world around him, reveling in the delights that this new world offered him. He ate better than he ever had as a lord; ‘my king’, Jack’s voice would sigh in his ear when he thought about it, sad until the last; and at a lower cost. He found suitable accommodations after playing the stock markets better than most. He charmed heiresses into giving him money and fucked their fathers while they were distracted. Before long, he was sitting on a beautiful amount of money, enjoying the world that was more than eager to give him what he wanted.

He should have known that it would not be milk and honey forever.

One night, while he was enjoying the alluring dances in a strip club, he spotted a familiar figure settled in at the bar. The man’s hair had turned shock white and heavy scars covered his face, but Gabriel would recognize those blue eyes anywhere. They had stared up at him for years while they had been wed. They had always been happy, always laughing and shaking with mirth. Now, they were hard and cold, like the world had sucked the warmth out of him.

He got up slowly and made his way to the bar. He signaled for the bartender to bring him a glass of whiskey before he sat down beside the man that had turned him into a vampire. He stared at his hands, waiting for his drink to arrive. He saw Jack’s lip curl as Gabriel took a deep breath, thanking the bartender for his drink.

“You have some nerve,” Jack growled. “Approaching me after what you did.”

“I’m sorry, Jack,” Gabriel said. “I was scared.”

“Scared?” Jack hissed as he whipped his head around and bared his fangs. “Scared? I was there for you! I was going to show you everything! You pushed me away. You called me a monster and threatened to burn me alive!”

Gabriel looked down at his lap. “Jack, I am so sorry,” he whispered.

“You should be,” Jack said as he got to his feet. “Because you are the monster, Gabriel Reyes, not me.”

Jack swept away from him as he threw his huge coat over his shoulders. He swept out of the club like a lord of old, drawing many eyes in his wake. The humans were in awe of his charisma and he wasn’t even trying. Gabriel swallowed a lump in his throat and looked down at his hands.

He deserved that. He deserved that and so much more. Jack had every right to hate him. Jack must have been out in the world all by himself for centuries while Gabriel got to sleep in a coffin as the world changed around him. Jack had aged, grown bitter and cold as the years went on. Gabriel would never be able to draw the kindness out of him. If there was any left to be had.

He paid for his drinks and left the bar, tucking his hands into the pockets of his coat. He walked along the road back to his apartment, running his tongue slowly over his teeth. He didn’t feel hungry anymore. That frenzied desire that had guided him to the club was gone like smoke in the wind. He was going home alone and he deserved it.

Jack tracked Gabriel back to his home. He stood there on the balcony for a while, watching his husband putter around inside. Anger burned in his heart. He was angry that Gabriel had just appeared in his life again looking like he hadn’t aged a day. He was angry that Gabriel had thought he had the right to come talk to him. He was angry that at the end of it all, Gabriel had the audacity to think that saying ‘sorry’ would fix everything.

He wanted to kill him. He wanted to plunge his talons into Gabriel’s chest, break his ribs apart, and tear his heart out. He wanted to crush the worthless organ in his hand while Gabriel died in front of him. Then he’d burn Gabriel’s body and scatter all of the ashes to the wind where he belonged.

And yet, in spite of that anger and desire for vengeance, his heart still wept at the sight of him. Gabriel had been so young, had not weathered the changing seasons like Jack had. His name had been expunged from the annals of history, as had Jack and his lineage, but Gabriel showed no signs of caring. And he seemed to be getting along just fine.

Swanky apartment. Swanky clothing. More money than he probably had in his entire life. Vampires were good at that; like dragons, they accumulated wealth and never stopped, hoarding it under their bellies until they eventually died. Jack knew that Gabriel was enjoying his luxuries. What else was he to do between his hunts?

Jack curled his lip before he turned and left. His body exploded into smoke and he rushed down the side of the building. Anger curled in his belly as he headed for home. He killed someone in a back alley to alleviate his anger, not caring about who they were or what their crimes in life were. He needed to release his fury in a way that no one would care about. What was one more murder in this cesspool of a city?

When he was done rending his prey to pieces, he returned home. The little house in an unassuming part of town had always been his safe haven since he’d made it to the New World. From its humble beginnings of a shack while Los Angeles was growing to the beautifully well-kept house that he stayed in, it had been his sanctuary from the world. His landscaper had been by to keep the front lawn looking beautiful and had probably been in the back too to make sure that the pond and the koi were tended to. Under normal circumstances, Jack would have been proud of his home. Not tonight.

He headed upstairs without a word, curling up under the covers. He wept furiously, pressing his face down into the pillow. Why had he been allowed to grow old and ugly while Gabriel had remained young? Why had he been punished for existing while Gabriel had gone on like nothing was wrong? What had he done wrong?

He whimpered and covered his head, sniffling pathetically. He wallowed in his misery, letting the world pass him by. He didn’t want to think about anyone or anything, ready to kill whoever disturbed him. No one did. He was allowed to sob and wail all he wanted. No one would disturb him. No one would care.

That made him feel even worse. He’d spent all that time alive and he didn’t have a support group ready to come to his aid. His father was hidden out in Indiana somewhere, pretending to be a simple farmer. His mother was long dead. He had no siblings. His husband had shunned him and the man he had raised from childhood would be just as ready to slip a dagger into his gut as help him; he had no one.

What a pathetic man he was; no one would want to be his friend. He was too miserable. Too cold. Too unapproachable. He was bitter and angry and no one wanted anything to do with him. He was terrible. A creature meant to be left to the shadows to rot and decay without a thought from the rest of the world.

If only Gabriel had stayed away; he could have gone on pretending that he was happy. Now he had to confront the fact that he was alone, miserable, and sick of being without the warmth of another. He wanted to be held. He wanted to laugh again, to sing and enjoy the world. He didn’t want to be alone anymore.

“Damn you, Gabriel,” he whispered as he covered his face. “Damn you to Hell.”

[myfriendpokey]

puf puf

previously tried to write however incoherently about videogames and a certain "futuristic" quality - the idea that they stand less as things in themselves than as pointers toward a future, or rather THE future, a kind of generic archetypical notion of futurity which it is an implicit promise of videogames to try to delineate, and the argument that this futuristic quality is less something arising organically from their constituent factors than an emerging external sensibility that they were put together like dreamcatchers to snare. and that this "external sensibility" had something to do with the idea of the virtual, with essentially the notion of experience disconnected from material causation. types of experience both enthralled and threatened by their own vertiginous, ungrounded quality - or grounded at most by purely voluntary gamelike conventions (scenes from science fiction films come to mind where the protagonist finds their feet in an initially disorientating, hallucinogenic dream world at the moment that they finally internalise that world's arbitrary game-like systems of logic). the causes of this virtualist outlook would require more nuanced investigation than i could offer but i'd like to return again to a suggestive comment of jameson's tying it into an emerging awareness of a "finance capital" which seemed to grow more and more powerful the less defined it was by any particular territory. and i return to it specifically because a related notion of seems to me a useful one in this context: that of speculation. the focus on the 'youth' of the medium, and on its potential rather than any actual qualities; the early amenability of videogames to something like kickstarter, where payment is less for a particular good than a donation in the service of some future change; the furious entitlement of xhardxcorex videogame players around a format they could be said to have 'invested' some significant amount of money, time, space or identity into, out of who knows what hope; the weirdly split rhetoric of the early indie scene as it mixed the demand to make it new with an eminently cynical historical fatalism (of course we all know there'll be a citizen kane, a godfather, a whatever else, since we  saw it happen with movies and comics and pop music all within comparatively recent history: the only question is just how the cultural and material goods resulting will get divvyed up this time, and to whom); the heavily monetised and in some cases preemptive nostalgia of the format, as it persistently offers the prospect of being there, at the right time, or of having been there, at the right time (consider an analogous case in comic books when a boom in speculation came with a sudden burst of rebranded "issue one"s); the strange admixture in the format of relentless, in many ways astonishing, accumulation of technological potential with a strangely listless and ambivalent provisional application of it. this is a loose list and certainly many of these issues are not specific to videogames. but if we treat that format as both a vehicle of speculation (in the same way as all capitalist ventures) and as one with speculation at its formal core (as being in part a way to conceptualise and engage with emerging computer technologies) it might help us to consider just why it is that videogames frequently seem to enact an accelerated form of more general tendencies, up to and including the kind of aggreived consumer fascism of those terrified at the prospect of being cut off from the future profits on their investments. in acting as a kind of aestheticised cultural form of the speculative impulse - allowing people to purchase or create something that just might be a piece of the future, a key to the new world - in a form comparatively unencumbered by much history or much respect, we can see a purer example than most of that impulse's results.

i don't know whether this speculative aspect is still present, or that it will be for much longer. the internet has long effaced any claim videogames might once have held of a priviliged position re. the enroachment of the virtual into the everyday: that change already happened, and the networks of cause and consequence that games once claimed as their own now seem as clunky and antiquated as punch cards in comparison to the sinuousness of the web. it could be as well that part of their old role as a site for, less the implementation of than the hysterical imagination of technology, has also been superseded - for example by VR, which seems to have absorbed a lot of the old holodeck fantasies that videogames to their own embarrassment (if nobody elses's) were never able to maintain. i hope it's not presumptuous to say i get the impression of a gradually mounting weariness among my colleagues in the form, a gradual sense that yes, this might be all there is to it, and wonder if after all those years of harassment and unspeakable labour practices and general awfulness beyond imagination the final tipping point for it all is the idea that this is after all the plateau, the very summit of all that "the medium" is willing to do. bereft of that notion of imminent potential they suddenly seem quite paltry: the same old ideas, the same people, a withering away into "classicism" (surely the saddest point for any popular format, particularly if the golden age just means 20 years ago), the fate worse than death which is the return to game design and "interesting decisions", a fate probably no more than the medium deserves. i'm sympathetic to something like robert yang's idea of taking the lessons learned from indie games and applying them to VR, which has not become quite as ossified yet as a format. but i'm also truthfully a little skeptical of it, as many of the most awful qualities of videogames there seem if anything intensified: the exclusive technology, the heavy capital investments and speculation driving it from the start, a form already bought and sold. and it's horrifying to imagine a deathless tech speculation striding terminator-like from the flaming debris of videogames to colonise yet more imaginary space, and more horrible still to think about thoughtful and committed people getting to work on clearing the rubble from its way. a handful of nervous nerds get to star in "oculus: the movie" as the loveable, creative, human faces for a new industry as their colleagues and associates are ground into the dust. so i guess without wanting to dissuade anyone, or persuade, what's been on my mind lately is: what can you do with a dead format? or specifically, what can you do that being "alive" in ways suggested above (paradigmatic, future-oriented, ripe for speculation) has tended to prevent? to use a truly hackneyed analogy i think of something like "punk" music, or post-punk, which was arguably just a necrotized rock music: a rock music no longer able to be used for anything, to appeal to anyone, where all the old claims for it (youth! novelty! excitement!) had long since curdled but where the shambling husk of the format continued lurching doggedly along, a kind of nightmare parody and reversal of itself, something that died AS WELL AS got old.. but which was newly able to speak to a public, to imagine new forms of public, by dint of this very negativity. and i think of the numerous attempts at establishing something similar in videogames, and how they never seemed quite right, a bit too dutiful, too healthy, as if once again claim staking for the future: you be the lydia lunch of puzzle bobble and i'll be the slaughter and the dogs of chex quest. and all those other games, hating videogames, truly critical of videogames, nevertheless being timidly espoused as videogames: see the diversity of our medium! just the kind of fire that we need! if speculation was an artificial injection of life to a format which, on its own qualities and merits alone, would surely long ago have been buried, it was nevertheless not a neutral one, rather something that continuously distorted and redirected in favour of the capital which stood most to benefit from the notion, exacerbating the worst qualities in the process: what were all those expressions of gamer outrage but the hysterical entitlement of people who'd sunk hundreds of hours and dollars into a format that now looked like it was never going to achieve whatever mysterious transcendence they thought that they'd bought? and the constant anxious minnowing, the insistence on some shared focus and inner consistency, a terror of diffusion expressed both as anxious universalism (w-we gotta keep the band together!) and as cobbled-together "formalist" constructions aimed at gathering some spearhead of the elite (while you were making twine games, i studied the blade....). what would happen if they did diffuse, if they could peel away from that central core and disintegrate, scattered across the web, across life? fragments of outmoded futures, of the gristle of modernity, lurking in and moving through the bland "flow" of life online, existing in this new context as something like found art, a kind of devolution into commentary: contextual, discursive, evasive. and finally able to utilise in these new contexts those peculiar awkwardnesses of effect, too flat or too busy, those emotional alienations and sexless intensities which always haunted the form. in a weird irony, speculation could be said to end at exactly the point where it builds productive capability to as far as it can go - videogames are burning out at the same time as the conditions for something like a feasible and interesting culture of them have arguably never been better, as more people are on computers, more types of people, more habituated for their purposeful usage, with readier access to all kinds of tools, and mostly not giving a shit about the 50-year sewer that is the history of the medium, except to pick up and toy with whatever discarded remnants of it hold their interest for a while. again i don't mean this as any particular call to action, whatever that action might be... more the consideration that when / if videogames finally do "die" they could be in better and more interesting shape than they ever were when they were alive, and that it might also finally put them in position to enact a future that would truly be more appealling for everyone: one where videogames are no longer made out of love, but out of spite.