#⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙ ‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆ — oop. right in the heart | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

imogenkol · 11 months

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— WIP WEDN- UH- THURSDAY?

tagged by @inafieldofdaisies @adelaidedrubman and @sstewyhosseini thank you beloveds!! 💕

no pressure tags: @marivenah @socially-awkward-skeleton @corvosattano @voidika @detectivelokis @aceghosts @kyber-infinitygems @jinfromyarikawa @shegetsburned @risingsh0t @florbelles @simonxriley @loriane-elmuerto @jackiesarch + anyone else that would like to share a wip!

Posting the facepalm moment to put my own oc on blast

“His concerns are not entirely unfounded,” she slowly admitted.

Bix shot her a deeply confused look. “Are you saying you care what Cassian thinks?”

“No,” Imogen said with a scoff. “I simply mean that he harbors the same judgments everyone else holds against me. I have accepted them long ago and so should you, lest that scowl overstays its welcome.”

The mechanic shook her head bitterly, ignoring Imogen’s attempt to lighten her mood. “They just don’t know you.”

“And they never will, not like you do.”

“Maybe that’s the problem,” Bix pointed out as she came to a stop. “All he sees is the Inquisitor.”

Imogen tried not to roll her eyes. “I have nothing to prove to him or anyone else. Why should I waste my time with such an endeavor? Especially when they are not wrong.”

“They are wrong.”

“No, they aren’t. Not about me. Not about us. What does it matter?” Imogen placed her hands on Bix’s arms. Her caress had a sort of melancholy that lingered in the small smile across her lips. “I don’t think I’m the right person for you, I don’t. But I do know that I am the one who can keep you safe.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Bix asked incredulously and shook off her touch.

Imogen felt a tightness at the back of her throat. She moistened her lips and swallowed with difficulty, her voice hollow. “Have you considered that your feelings for me might be influenced by gratitude? By the simple fact that I got to you first on Ferrix? Would it not be Cassian’s embrace you’d wish to fall into every night had it been him?”

It pained Imogen incredibly deeply to voice an insecurity that she had failed to bury. The way Bix had looked at her differently since Ferrix filled Imogen with a warmth that she had never felt, but she couldn’t shake the whisper at the back of her mind that gradually became another scream in the cacophony. A part of her didn’t care if it was true, she would be grateful to have Bix in any capacity. But the much larger part that truly loved her felt she needed to hear those words.

An intense, furious expression twisted Bix’s features as her body stiffened. She fixed Imogen with that hard look and the bounty hunter nearly took a step back. “No,” Bix said with such curt firmness that Imogen realized her mistake. “And I don’t like what you’re insinuating.”

“Bix –”

“And I’ll tell you why you’re wrong,” she continued fiercely and took an assertive step towards Imogen, entering her space. It wasn’t until that moment that Imogen realized she had, in fact, backed away. “What I feel for you was there before all of this, and everything you’ve done for me only made me love you even more. So, despite what you might think of me, I won’t just fall for the first person who comes to my rescue.”

Imogen’s gaze became downcast in shame before she responded softly, “Forgive me. I misspoke.”

“You sure did.” Bix turned to walk away and Imogen felt conflicted on whether she should follow.

She refrained from pursuit, but she couldn’t help but call out after her. “You know I don’t truly think that.”

Bix hesitated. Some of the tension dispersed from her shoulders as she released a sigh and glanced back. “You still don’t believe that I can love you for you. I thought we were past this, Imogen.”

“I do not doubt you.”

“Well, some part of you does.”

Imogen dared a couple of steps towards her mechanic. It was difficult enough to decipher what went on in her heart on a good day. Now, her thoughts and emotions rushed in too many directions to track. “Maybe... But I swear not to let it rule over me.”

Bix held up a hand to stop her. “Look, first it was Cassian and now it’s you, just… give me some time, okay?”

Imogen hated Cassian. And she wasn’t particularly fond of herself at the moment, either. She conceded. “Of course.”

As she watched Bix walk away, Imogen felt the invisible tether between them tighten. If her foolishness finally made it snap, she would never forgive herself.

#my writing #oc insp: imogen kol #ship insp: if i had a heart #this was supposed to be just a prompt but then became assimilated into their main story oops #anyway poor bix has to deal with both cass and imogen acting a fool. she argued with him right before this....#everyone just needs to let her have her problematic girlfriend #including the problematic girlfriend #oh imogen bless ur heart you're trying and you didn't mean it that way #but poor choice of words :/

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void-kissed · 1 year

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taken life, given soul (Xenoblade Ship Week 2023 Day 1)

Vanea's work in constructing Face Nemesis requires a suitable pilot to house the soul of Lady Meyneth. After finally acquiring a worthy candidate, she is surprised to learn that the chosen Homs still lives after the procedure, and is even more surprised at her willingness to strike up conversation with a supposed enemy. (2311 words)The second part of this writing replaces the Face Nemesis cutscene from the end of Chapter Six.

This is the first meeting between Vanea and my self-insert, Citri! ..Not the most conventional or romantic of first meetings, but here it is in writing nonetheless! Despite being a couple of days late on the finishing, I decided that hopefully this could be fitted to this year's Xenoblade Chronicles ship week, as set up by a friend of mine - I hope that that's alright ^-^

(Anyone is welcome to comment on or reblog my work if they wish, as long as my DNI is respected! Tag list and document transcript are under the readmore.)

Document transcript:

The Central Factory that lay within the chest of the Mechonis was where all Homs were taken after their capture, ready to be repurposed in the bodies of the Faced Mechon and used to assault the titan they had once dwelled upon. The recent attack on Colony 9 had provided the Mechon with some valuable resources, even if some of the initial reports were conveying worrying news about a new wielder of the Monado arising. Within the metal walls of the facility, new Mechon soldiers of all kinds were constantly being manufactured, mass-produced Faces among them. All operations were brilliantly orchestrated by the lone man spearheading the charge against the Bionis, who even now was doubtless deep in thought about how best to proceed in his efforts.

However, in an illuminated chamber that sat above the rest of the vast factory, his sister - a similarly-tall Machina woman with long grey hair - was overseeing the automated construction of a vast white-silver figure. Its parts all towered above her, interlaced with golden details and a doubled red diamond on its helmet-like faceplate. Below the mechanical figure lay an additional array of compatible pieces resembling parts of a human body, ready and waiting for a pilot to be fitted into them. Dozens of individual pieces were being put together by fine machinery, each one being subtly tweaked or modified as the woman carefully adjusted the many glowing controls before her, but the overall structure had yet to be properly assembled.

"Lady Vanea." came a sudden voice from the communication system above the woman. "There is a matter which requires your attention."

"What is it?" Vanea responded, addressing the empty chamber with cautious, distracted uncertainty. "I am still trying to resolve the faults in this Face's digits; can the matter not wait until this is resolved?"

The other voice seemed to pause, but only for a moment, before continuing its announcement. "It is about the pilot for the Face you are currently working on. Two potential candidates have been identified by our preliminary systems."

That was enough to catch Vanea's ear, as her eyes widened slightly before she finally turned her head to face the other voice. "..Very well. Please bring them here immediately, then."

A few robotic chirps could be heard, before further machinery began to whir into action - this time at the other end of the chamber, which Vanea had now turned to face with her back to the silver Face's controls. Its parts continued to be constructed without her direction, aside from what should have eventually become its pilot's fingers, given that they still lacked the proper range of movement to be fitted onto such an important Faced Mechon.

After a few moments, an opening appeared in the dark metal floor of the chamber, and the bodies of two young Homs women were lifted up through it, held up by actuators from the factory. Both looked somewhat similar at the first glance, being the same height and appearing of similar age - they both had golden blonde hair (though one wore it in a long dishevelled plait where the other's only fell to just past her shoulders), and as they were each scanned for further information, Vanea could see on the displays that they both had dark green eyes. One had freckles dotting her shoulders and rounded cheeks, and was littered with a number of scrapes and bruises, while the other's skin was clearer and she appeared to have suffered one particularly significant wound that had clawed at her clavicle.

"..What about these Homs has marked them out as worthy vessels?" Vanea asked, before the continued operations of the myriad machines circling each Homs began to output the pertinent results on the floating screens around her in the chamber. Carefully examining the data that had been gathered, Vanea found the answers lying within each girl's scanned memories, snapshots playing from them like a slideshow - the pair clearly shared a long history with not only each other, but also several other inhabitants of their home colony, and one boy with light blonde hair stood out particularly strongly to the Machina.

"..The Heir of the Monado." she said aloud in recognition. "They were both friends with him, it would seem.."

She pored over the memories closely, trying to glean what information she could about the two Homs' personalities from them. It seemed like somewhat of an invasion of privacy to do this, but it was of the utmost importance that everything was as perfect as it could be for her current project, so such measures had to be taken to ensure the correct compatibility. Finally, after some time, she had made her decision - it was the freckled Homs with the longer hair who would be used for this purpose, due to the piercing injury sustained by the other one potentially making it difficult for the key component to be added correctly. The glimpses of her many days spent pursuing scientific endeavours with the Monado's newest wielder had also caught Vanea's eye more strongly.

"Please take this girl and prepare her for piloting Nemesis." the Machina stated to her assistant machinery, before turning to look over her shoulder at the unfortunate error still blaring from the screens behind her. "..Adjust the current pilot specifications to her body plan, but- try to preserve her original hands, if possible. That may have to be the workaround for the defects in the current digits, non-ideal though it may be.."

She then sighed, and addressed the chosen girl's companion.

"This other one does still hold promise, though.. Perhaps see whether any of our experimental designs might be compatible with her frame - Azure, for example."

As the machinery around her whirred to action once more according to her choices, and each girl was sent to her fate, Vanea took a moment to compose herself, staring up at the pieces of her dream - the central prism of golden metal standing out above all others.

A vessel had finally been found to hold the soul of her people's goddess, and with her divine revival thus at hand, the time had come for the tides of war to shift.

As long as everything in this experiment proceeded as it was meant to, the end to such ceaseless conflict may have finally begun.

What a shame that the Homs' past would be erased in the process..

==========

Enough time had passed for all the preparations to be made. The Homs girl chosen by Vanea now had most of her body replaced by the mechanical components made beforehand, each piece now individually modified to ensure maximum compatibility with her remaining reconfigured immune and nervous systems. The only parts of her left that still appeared biological were her head above the neck and her hands past the wrists, though even they had received artificial upgrades below the surface to better serve as the Faced Mechon's central nerve unit.

This pilot unit was now being lifted into the central cockpit of the much larger silver Mechon, which had now itself been fully assembled. Its spiked and winged structure hovered high above Vanea like an angel, ready and waiting dutifully for its first activation as the final touches were smoothly made to its surfaces.

“Face Nemesis." Vanea began, addressing the construct above her.

"Your frame is complete.

As is the integration of your pilot."

Some of the assistant Mechon receded, revealing the pilot's unconscious figure sat in place within Nemesis' torso.

"This Homs..

She holds memories of the Heir of the Monado.

She appears to have seen him as a friend.

..I wonder what she would have been like to know.

But, that is not important here.

It only means that her body will be an able vessel for you, my Lady.

All that remains is the soul transfer..”

All other machines departed as the final Mechon descended, carrying the golden metal prism in its grasp. With exactly-calculated precision, the triangular component was fitted onto the chest of the Homs pilot. There was a moment of silence, before familiar red energy started to flow through the body of Face Nemesis; the soul component then started to glow with power, before settling down again as the armoured plating closed over the cockpit chamber.

"..I have fulfilled my duty." Vanea stated, allowing herself to smile as everything finally fell into place.

"You and only you can bring about a new age on Mechonis -

no, the entire world.

My mistress,

Lady Meyneth."

She waited, and then became all too aware of how empty the chambers around her still felt.

"..Lady Meyneth?"

A feminine voice suddenly rang out through Nemesis' speakers, but it was not the kind and caring tone that the Machina so fondly recalled, even all these centuries since she had last heard it directly.

"Ah.. Where.. W-Where am I..?"

Vanea's own voice caught in her throat from hearing such an unexpected response, and her brow furrowed. "You.. Are you Lady Meyneth?"

"What?" came the other voice, sounding weary and confused from inside the Faced Mechon. "No, my name is Citri. Um.. What *is* all of this..?"

At that moment, all Vanea could do was blink. She had never spoken with a Face pilot directly before, and the concern rising inside of her about what she had done wrong was making it all but impossible for her to properly address the anomaly.

"Something has gone wrong with the soul transfer.." she mumbled to herself, beginning to anxiously flit between the different screens and keyboards in her vicinity. "Yet, the scans themselves seem to be indicating that everything is properly in place.. Her presence is clearly *detectable*, and yet the central core is not showing signs of *activity*-"

A sense of panic flared within her, and her ability to maintain a composed exterior was rapidly deteriorating.

"My dearest goddess, what have I done wrong..?"

As she stifled a sob, the sound of mechanical joints moving rang out through the chamber, before they stopped (having been moved in error) and the torso plating opened back up instead.

"Um.. When you say "central core", do you mean this part?"

A tiny *tap-tap* noise, much quieter than any type of metal hitting metal could produce, prompted Vanea to lift her gaze. The Homs girl - *Citri*, as she had called herself - was tapping her still-organic fingernail on the prism of golden metal that was fitted to the chest of her new body.

"..Yes, that is correct." Vanea admitted, blinking uncertainly again.

"It.. feels as though something is inside of it." she then tried to explain, tilting her head as much as the cockpit would allow her to. "Some*one*, rather, if.. what you were saying before about your goddess is true. But.. I'm not sure whether she can wake up yet?"

The Machina took a moment to consider Citri's words. "That would be unfortunate, but.. it is reassuring to know that you are able to sense her presence."

Citri gave a small nod, very tentatively, but her expression was uncertain.

"..What was supposed to have happened?" she then asked.

"That Lady Meyneth's soul would be swiftly transferred into your body, overwriting your own, for her subsequent use as a vessel to pilot Face Nemesis." Vanea stated matter-of-factly. Then she stopped.

"..That was rather callous of me, wasn't it?"

"Somewhat, yes." admitted Citri, who would have mustered a smile if not for how disoriented she still felt. "But if nothing else, you definitely answered me clearly with how you said it, so.. thank you."

An awkward silence then settled in between the two.

"..Could you possibly tell me more about what's happened? What you've done to me, and all?"

The genuine nature of such a question, and the absolute lack of malice that she had expected to permeate through any Homs unwillingly stolen by Mechon, made it impossible for Vanea to simply dismiss the girl's curiosity. Something softened in her expression, and she opened her mouth to try and form an explanation, but the same voice from before piped up through the communication systems as she did so.

"Lady Vanea." it called out. "Master Egil wishes to see you."

This made her pause with some uncertainty. "Understood. Tell him I will see him.. momentarily." she then settled on.

"Acknowledged."

The device whirred away as Vanea's gaze fell back onto Citri, her red eyes meeting her green ones for a moment before neither felt able to hold the gaze further.

"..I apologise for this interruption, but- you may have my word that I shall return to these chambers once I have finished meeting with my brother." she then said. "It may well be that Lady Meyneth has properly awakened by that time, but if not, then.. If you would listen to our story, then I see no harm in sharing it with you."

"I understand." replied Citri. "That means a lot, Vanea."

She smiled at the mention of her name. "You miss little, I see. Very well then. I shall return shortly, Citri."

With nothing more to say for the moment, she then left her alone within Face Nemesis.

Only *after* she had turned to leave the chamber did Vanea realise her own instinctive use of the girl's own name, and she was surprised to have found herself recalling it from one mention. Nevertheless, she persisted in her next objective, doing her utmost to regain her usual composure even as she silently came to the conclusion that it was a name she wished to remember, despite part of her also knowing it was not a name she should have ever had a chance to learn.

Thankfully for both, there would still be many opportunities in the days that followed to converse, and to learn, and to get to know each other more than either could have envisioned beforehand.

#a call from the void #creations from the void #my writing #xenoblade chronicles selfshipping #xenobladeshipweek23 #yes i'm using the proper tag no I don't care if other people see this i'm going to be brave #this post is okay for anyone to reblog as long as my DNI is respected!#heart of the void #selfshipping #love: a wish for peace (vanea)#selfship: a love to last millennia (vanea/citri)#or its beginnings at least #self‑insert: vessel of nemesis (citri)#of gods and titans (xenoblade chronicles)#another character also technically shows up but not very prominently #and lady meyneth is *supposed* to show up but doesn't #..I really feel like this needs some kind of content warning but I cannot think of how to word it right this second sorry #and on the note of right this second it is quarter past two in the morning oops #uhh. mechanisation I guess? would that work I don't know #i have no idea how accurate this is story- or character-wise I apologise #canon is what I make of it or something along those lines #anyway I hope this is okay

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