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trafficlife · 6 months

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And I Am Left Here Withering

"Can this day get any worse?" Joel had asked. The universe responded yes, three different times, each response more heartbreaking than the last. Joel would've preferred the universe proving him wrong.

word count: 1250 ao3 link

The first thing Joel heard was an explosion.

And his first instinct was to look up. Needless to say, he hadn’t completely moved on from Skynet and the TNT minecart traps. But no TNT could be spotted, thankfully. He didn’t think anybody would risk their hearts by creating a Skynet 3.0.

His second instinct was to assume that it was the Wither. If only he knew how badly that would come back to bite him later on.

His third instinct was to check his communicator, in case someone died. He didn’t see any lightning flash in the sky, which he thought was weird.

Joel pulled out his communicator, just in case he missed something, and—

Oh.

Oh, no.

For a moment, he thought he was experiencing déjà vu. He gritted his teeth and he tightened his grip on the communicator, nearly destroying it. Hot red blood pumped through his veins, speeding up his heart rate and he thought he was going to go snap. Joel behaved this way when Jimmy died first in Limited Life. When he had failed to sacrifice himself for him. But there were two major differences this time: 1) Joel wasn’t a red name (yet); and 2) it was Lizzie who died first.

He blinked rapidly. Once, twice, five times, because he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He didn’t even see the death message in the chat. Does anybody even know what’s happened to her?

Joel sent a few messages, alerting everyone of Lizzie’s sudden departure. He was right: nobody knew what happened and responded with shock. Jimmy responded with happiness.

Joel wanted to be angry at Jimmy’s inconsiderate response but he couldn’t be. For the first time since these games started, Jimmy wasn’t the first one out. He remembered the last game. Joel wanted to sacrifice himself for Jimmy, he wanted so badly to free him from that cycle. And he failed.

He failed and he went insane and it ended up being his downfall.

Joel was happy for Jimmy, he really was. However, it was difficult to express his happiness considering the news he just received.

He had a suspicion that Scott was somehow involved in Lizzie’s death and that just made him feel even worse. Because, like the idiot he was, Joel just had to send his wife to kill Scott. He didn’t see lightning in the sky, so she didn’t even die in the overworld.

He remembers Lizzie telling Joel that she’d lure Scott into the End and try to push him into the void. Now it only seemed reasonable to assume that Lizzie fell into the void instead. Joel would’ve felt better if Lizzie dragged Scott down with her.

So, Lizzie was dead, Jimmy was celebrating, and Joel was craving vengeance even more than before. Though he failed his task, he would kill Scott. He was only a yellow name for now. And, there was a somewhat bright side: the canary could finally escape the mines.

—----------------------------

Unfortunately, the canary could not escape a warden and a Wither. At the same place. At the exact same time.

Joel, trying to calm down after hearing about Lizzie’s death, was killing some zombies. Mainly for experience, but also because mobs were the only things Joel could legally kill. Then, a series of explosions and some muffled shouting could be heard on the surface. Now, this has to be the Wither, he thought. Secretly, Joel hoped he would be wrong. But when went up to the surface, he found that he was, unfortunately, 100% correct. A Wither was flying in the dark sky, hot on Scar’s heels and firing skulls at him. The fact that Scar was still alive and not taking any wither damage was pretty remarkable. If only he wasn’t luring the bloody Wither to Joel.

So Joel had to run from Scar and the Wither, hoping they’d both leave him alone. As he ran, Joel wanted to say “could things get any more chaotic?”

And then he saw a warden chasing Etho.

Apparently, the universe felt “bad” for always proving Joel wrong so it wanted to prove him right for once. He’d rather be wrong for the rest of his life.

He just wanted to breathe for a moment and collect himself. But obviously, the universe can’t let him catch a break. Lightning flashed in the sky and Joel felt his already-fracturing heart crumble into pieces. He didn’t want to check his communicator, he just didn’t want to because he didn’t know if he could handle the truth. He saw Tango pull out his communicator, shock written all over his face. And Joel just had to look over and see—

“JIMMY!”

Once again, he felt his sanity slipping. He was already in a horrible state but to lose his wife and his best friend, barely ten minutes apart from each other… Joel wanted to curse this world and its twisted sense of humor.

Tears stung Joel’s eyes and his breathing became more ragged. This wasn’t happening, this wasn’t happening. He nearly fell to his knees in despair but he knew he had to keep running. And, as if the universe wasn’t already having a blast, Joel heard Grian scream.

“Mumbo, LEAVE!” Grian cried, followed by a flash of lightning and Grian screaming Mumbo’s name in distress.

If Joel had any sanity left in him, it had disintegrated the moment the second lightning bolt struck. The only reason why he was still keeping himself together was because he wasn’t red, and the bloodlust hadn’t kicked in. Never has he wanted to be red so badly, to hurt someone and get revenge and take out the rest of this bloody world.

How could he lose three of the people he cared about in rapid succession? Lizzie died trying to kill Scott (the fact that Joel was responsible for it left a horrible taste in his mouth); Jimmy couldn’t run from the warden fast enough; and Joel barely even got to know Mumbo and he was already gone. They barely had any time to spend together because of the stupid task mechanics that separated the Mounders more than it brought them together.

He had surpassed his breaking point. He wasn’t even red but he tasted blood in his mouth and his heart was pounding in his ears.

(Everyone he loved had withered away but Joel was still here. But he didn’t know if he wanted to be here.)

—----------------------------

The Wither was defeated but that didn’t mean shit to Joel. Not when it felt like he’d lost everything.

Part of him wanted to wither away as well. But that would mean giving up. Joel was a lot of things but he sure as hell wasn’t a quitter.

Skizz told Joel to win for Lizzie. Well, Joel was going to take it a few steps further and win for Lizzie, Jimmy, and Mumbo. He’d rise above this somehow.

Exhausted and on the verge of tears, Joel walked back to his fairground, clutching a wither rose in his hand. He doesn't remember when or why he picked it up, but holding the stem gave him a little bit of stability. He couldn’t tell if he was bleeding from the withering effect, the thorns in the rose, or from his nails digging into his palms but it didn’t bother him. He had more important things to worry about, such as finding a way to kill Scott.

In the end, the florist could only send regards to himself.

#꒰☆彡꒱— karma speaks #꒰➳꒱— writings #secret life spoilers #secret life #trafficblr #trafficsmp #life series smp #secret life fanfic #smallishbeans #joel smallishbeans #(others are mentioned but i wont tag them here)#so... session 6 was something wasnt it?#(title from unraveling by the crane wives)#i was thinking how much the song fitted joel in this session + how he responded to the deaths

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daybringersol · 25 days

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dude tongues & teeth by the crane wives is so clearly an aromantic song to me, like it’s about being pressured into being in a relationship you know you won’t be good in and warning the other person over and over again from pursuing you but they won’t listen, and freeing yourself of the guilt (by reclaiming being a monster) that comes with being forced to hurt someone because it literally isn’t your fault, you have adequately warned them and at some point people can make their own decisions for themselves, but like a few days ago i saw a post about someone else’s interpretation of it as the POV of an abuser and tbh that felt like a hate crime.

for the record im only half-joking, though their analysis was pretty flawed in my opinion, if that interpretation helps them situate themselves a difficult situation like abuse that is completely fair. they were very clear that this was only their own interpretation and other interpretations were valid as well, so like no hate to them at all.

it just hurts like a lot. personally. and i keep thinking about it. like i finally found one song i relate to (cuz god knows theres not a lot of songs about the pain of having to break peoples hearts over and over again for something you cant control about yourself), and being told that you’re relating to an abuser, especially since ive been a victim of domestic abuse myself. might make a post doing my own analysis of it.

#tongues & teeth #the crane wives #solsthoughts #aromanticism #aromantic #aromance #aro #tw abuse mention

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threeostrichesinacoat · 8 months

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Desert duo is such an interesting duo, they had at least some sort of alliance in each of the life games(when G swore his first life to scar, threatening to kill him to get a life, soulmates, and extended family) while also in hermitcraft they were neighbors, opposite sides war leaders, neighbors 2, ect. They were paired up together a bunch of times and that’s a big part on why they’re so popular together, plus we even have stuff from some bonus small series like the 100 hr one. And they’re dynamic can switch a lot depending on what you’re basing it off from, and you can place a bunch of tags on them like enemies to lovers, superheroes, and falling in love in a war. You can even place a bunch of songs in them too, that’s one of the main reasons why the fandom just adopted crane wives

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tonariofjananda · 5 months

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For the ask game: Tonari - 5, 7, and 12!

Heya Ray! Ok here goes

5) What's the first song that comes to mind when you think about them?

Honestly I’ve got a handful, most for maybe a line or two of association, but the first one that came to mind when reading this question that’s completely hers in my head was “The Moon Will Sing” by the Crane Wives. I love imagining the song as her reflecting on her dad, friends, Hayase, and Fushi, and how they’ve all contributed to the way she feels about herself and her legacy. Fun fact, the association came about from my mishearing of a line as “I shine only with the life you gave me,” the original word being “light” instead of “life.” But the more I reflected on the song, the more I felt her presence in it (I described this to my best friend as Tonari clawing her way to the surface lol), especially in the third verse. That one in particular draws a really vivid image to me of what Tonari’s headspace must have been right after Fushi pulled her away from the flames. I imagine she’s remorseful that she couldn’t give her friends a better life and is rallying to find her courage to kill them before Fushi steps in. “Instead you hoarded all that’s left of me” is a complicated little line too, filled with the bitterness and confusion at Fushi of keeping her from death. There’s not much left of her with the death of her friends, what Fushi did was selfish, but also implies Tonari didn’t realize Fushi cared if she lived or died. Then he takes the sword from her hands, “swallowing your doubt,” and she’s… grateful, angry, upset… but most of all, she acknowledges the mutual hesitance between herself and Fushi, even though they both know this is the only course of action. Even though it makes her feel like he’s taking the sword through her own body. He might as well be. The line “I want to feel the fire that you kept from me” is the most straightforward in my opinion, and what really solidified this song as being hers for me. It’s a little funny what I’ve done here tbh. The song probably meant the line as “i want to become the person you stopped me from being, I want to regain the life that was supposed to be mine,” but for this Tonari interpretation, I’ve given it the opposite implication… cough

Anyway, the chorus also kind of ties in with another song I somewhat associate with her, “Your Best American Girl” by Mitski, for the lines “Well I’m not the moon/I’m not even a star,” but I’ll spare you the analysis for that and “Goodbye My Danish Sweetheart” (also by Mitski) til… later 👀❗️

For now, I’ll leave you with the three following, lighter songs: Laufey called “Best Friend,” which I listen to as something directed towards the immortal army as a whole; “Wings,” by So!YoON! and Phum Viphruit as a song between her and Ligard and Fushi woah who said that; and “A Thousand Years” by Christina Perri bc immortalism and the heartbreak of waiting to reunite with someone. Also please imagine the second verse as being from Fushi’s perspective on getting not just her but all of their friends back at the end of the past era arc with potentially rough implications for their thought process in the modern arc WHO SAID THAT

7) What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you like?

(Lyn asked me this too so I’ll cover it here for the two of ya!)

Tbh… I just like it when anyone talks about her ówò Tonari tends to get overlooked- even tho I’d argue she’s something of a deuteragonist- so I really just love whenever people acknowledge her importance to the story and show some enthusiasm for her plotlines. In terms of stories and fan art, it’s always awesome to see all the different sides of her shine through! Tonari’s badass, bitchy, and a little judgmental, but she’s also fashionable, studious, and warm, especially toward March and Eko. It’s also nice to see the occasional silliness she used to show on Jananda shine through every now and then. She’s changed a lot by the next arc, for obvious reasons, but she was pretty silly to Hisame when she was inviting herself to dinner, I don’t think all that playfulness should just disappear! So it’s nice to see fans playing with Tonari without vilifying her ;w; Also without reducing her to her feelings for Fushi, because yeah she has some but that’s not the only thing she’s about (even tho…. I fixate a lot… on that particular subject……… cough). While I’m on the subject, I really love that most ToFu art is limited to things like gentle physical affection. A head on a shoulder (I spent hours running around my house when you sent me that pic Ray, HOURS), a meaningful hug, and touching hands- an absolute must if you like em. I’m definitely getting carried away now though…

12) What's a headcanon you have for this character?

(Limit yourself, limit yourself, limit yourself…!!!)

(Also Coop if you’re reading this, the green one is the only safe one lol)

Bisexual Tonari is an obvious one, I’m convinced she was attracted to Parona’s form (who isn’t in this show tho lmao), and I find those ship posts between Tonari and Mizuha to be so fun tbh. Enemies to lovers maybe, invited to hold hands with her and Hanna! That theory you had about Nagisa having a crush on Tonari lives in my head rent free too, absolutely canon to me. Actually the MizuNariHanna stuff would be extra funny in a world where Nagisa has a crush on Tonari bc now Mizuha’s a girl stealer too! Nagisa just can’t win!!!

Tonari loves writing! And she’s a woman in STEM! Not a headcanon just fact but it lays down the groundwork for my following headcanon: she probably went away to grad school or something. Bon asked if Tonari knew how to do surgery, implying to my insane head that she’s probably gone away for school or something, maybe even received a doctorate, but Bon doesn’t know what for. Her stitches look a bit spaced out and wonky tbh, so she probably doesn’t have the patience for things like needlepoint. I’d wager her calling probably isn’t physical art either haha.

She absolutely goes drinking with the immortal trio + Bon and maybe Gugu once she’s old enough to do so (… would Hairo drink? Designated driver Hairo Rich, but also it’d be so funny if he’s completely normal in the stupidest way while drunk. “Stands like perfectly normal but topples over the second he goes to take a step” typa drunk- BUT THIS ISNT ABOUT HIM SORRY). I think they’d love having Tonari around to pal around with! I imagine that old Jananda arc silliness comes out full force then, if her excitement at Mizuha’s birthday was anything to go off ✌️

(This one’s safe Coop!) Her hair’s been short and choppy since before she got to Jananda so I like to think she did that little kid thing where she tried cutting her own hair and it came out looking uneven. Instead of letting her parents fix it though, she just insisted it wasn’t a mistake and wore it out like that for years. Then when she got to Jananda all the scissors sucked so she just had to keep cutting her hair in the same shabby way. Mia and Oopa having long hair is so funny to me too cuz I imagine they wouldn’t let Tonari get anywhere near them with scissors in her hand (OK stop reading here Coop!)

While I’m here, i think Tonari probably sees a little bit of her old friends in the immortal army tbh. Like, @/alphaofdarkness made the connection that March probably reminded Tonari of Oopa ;; So I feel like Gugu could remind Tonari of Uroy in some ways too, like in the buff, blond, older brother figure kind of way. Eko could remind her of young Sandel in the same way both were kind of upbeat and cute, but quiet in a way that they faded a little in the group (my brother INSISTED Sandel had NOT been there the entire time we were watching the Jananda arc). Meanwhile Messar might remind her of the older Sandel, the kind who probably was more like a brotherly shithead to her after all their years of growing up together. And Mia… imma be honest Mia’s weird as hell, chair fighting, curly hair collecting? Ain’t nobody doing it like Mia 🫡 ACTUALLY ITS BON, BON TOTALLY REMINDS HER OF MIA LMAO

OK IM ENDING IT THERE (Believe it or not this is me limiting myself, I’d typed out an entire section on Tonari’s relationship with each of the members of the immortal army). Hope these were decent enough responses to your questions Ray!

If you- or anyone- has anymore questions on Tonari or literally anyone else please feel free to send them! I have thoughts on like literally everyone, no character too obscure ✌️

#Nova Rambles #Ask Game #Tonari #Tonari of Jananda #Tonari Dalton #Fumetsu no Anata e #To Your Eternity #To You The Immortal #long post #what a fun little exchange we had here Ray!#I never mentioned this but I’m the dumbass who sent the anonymous Kahaku question #sending asks anonymously is second nature to me but I didn’t realize it done it for your question so I do apologize 🤦‍♀️#anyway I mean it when I say no character is too obscure I swear I’ll do it #for example my favorite Hayase descendant is Oumi for some fucking reason #I know everyone’s going wild for Doro rn (and I agree she’s cute as hell!!!) but so far she hasn’t outranked Oumi as number 1 for me yet lo #God I should include a ‘read more’ tab but I’m not sure after which one #I hope the long post tab is good enough for now #edit: I realized like just now I wrote Crane Sisters instead of Crane Wives idk why how misremembered so bad

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attollogame · 9 months

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Very important: what Crane Wives songs are the ros?

Pariah: Ribs

Vasilisa: Keep You Safe

Operator: Hard Sell

Suha: The Garden

Dreamwalker: Strangler Fig

Sysba: Show Your Fangs

#thank you!!!#me spending 40 min looking for the most lyrically relevant bye #did i mention i adore crane wives bc i #adore them

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wildflowercryptid · 4 months

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i've been thinking about how uncanny by ghost fits kieran hinoki so well again... like

these lyrics are driving me up the fucking wall rn.

#i've mentioned it once before but depersonalization and not feeling truly human is a huge thing for my interpretation of kieran #and this song fits so freaking well for that ugh #the ''i need to feel like i'm human through you'' line especially kills me #is the you referring to florian or ogerpon? both it's referring to both #i'll also say that hinoki struggling with feeling othered and nonhuman definitely goes hand-in-hand with him having undiagnosed autism #( speaking from personal experience as someone who struggled a lot w/ depersonalization b4 i found out i was autistic )#anyways i'm still sitting on my kieran fanmix but once i can play the dlc epilogue i'll probably drop it #there's a lot of vocal synth stuff on it. surprisingly no crane wives but that's only bc it doesn't fit the vibes #wait. could i put take me to war on there..... 🤔 we'll see #chara : kieran hinoki #mj.txt

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the-hilda-librarians-wife · 6 months

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Sketchbook Week Day 2 - Curses

Summary: "The trees are the same.

When Johanna moved back to Trolberg, it felt like everything was different. The buildings were higher, and new ones had been brought up. The streets were smoother with new asphalt, and many of the shops she’d known had been closed, usually making room for other ones. The places where there were benches to sit in her favourite parks had been switched, and even the librarian she used to chat with in her youth had been replaced by a mysterious, yet very intriguing woman.

But when she drove back to the wilderness, the trees were the same."

A Johanna character study written for the Sketchbook Week day 2 prompt - Wilderness

Notes: Written for @sketchbookweek day 2 - Wilderness

Okay, some serious notes about this fic: Do keep in mind that this is character exploration for a character that canon has yet to explore. Which is to say, so much of this is headcanons stacked together & will come tumbling down once s3 comes around. Just pretend it makes sense & understand it’s not all supposed to be perfectly explained. What matters most is Johanna’s emotions and not so much what caused them. Honestly a lot of this fic’s writing is experimental, let’s see if it lands. Also, content warning: there’s a brief mention of past abuse, but it’s in a flashback and completely skippable. I’ll put a * mark before and after, so anyone who wants can skip that part.

Anyway, more importantly: this fic is dedicated to my wonderful co-host in this event, @waddles-ex-machina. I just wanted to thank you for being not only an amazing sport in this situation we’ve brought entirely upon ourselves (seriously if group projects were all like this I wouldn’t even complain about them), but also for having been such a lovely lovely presence in the sketchbook community since the very beginning (I mean, not like you could run from being *here*, sketchbook ask and all, but you could run from being nice and you didn’t shksgdjdvd). It’s always been a joy to get to interact with you, your ideas and creations, and to me at least you’re a huge part of why this community feels so friendly and captivating. So, yeah. This got rambly but it’s my way of saying thank you for five years of goofing around with our favourite girls <3

(In case it wasn’t obvious enough from the dedication, Mattie is @waddles-ex-machina ‘s OC!! You can find more content on her at @airborneice & I STRONGLY recommend you do, you won’t regret it :))

Read it on ao3

This house says my name like an elegy

Echoing where my ghosts all used to be

The trees are the same.

But when she drove back to the wilderness, the trees were the same.

That’s the thing about nature. It’s never still, so the constant change feels like steadiness.

It’s not the first time Johanna goes back to her former home since she was forced to move out. Twig, sitting obediently on Hilda’s lap in the backseat, was proof of that.

But it was the first time she was doing it since everything changed.

Johanna gripped the wheel as she drove, the sky perfectly blue with only a couple of innocent clouds above them, the stereotype of a perfect day. She felt in an almost dissociative state as she retraced those familiar roads, until the point where there were no roads anymore. Luckily, she had just enough of a grip on herself to interact properly when her children called, but they were more than capable enough of entertaining each other in the backseat. Johanna thought she heard Hilda pointing out different types of trees to Mattie as they passed by; she wasn’t sure. Things were quite blurry inside her mind.

Her wife’s attention was harder to shake. She noticed something was wrong as soon as they left city limits, sneaking not at all subtle glances at her every two seconds. At one point when the kids - could she even call Hilda that, anymore? - were particularly distracted, Kaisa leaned towards her and put a hand on her shoulder.

“Everything alright, dear heart?” She asked softly, her breath brushing warmly against Johanna’s ear.

Johanna nodded stiffly, and gripped the steering wheel tighter.

…......

The contrast was jarring enough that it made Johanna stop feeling like her mind was clouded with haze. As soon as they arrived at their destination, Johanna felt like she was simultaneously in the past and in the future. The future, because there was no way that that’s what their cabin looked like now, because no matter how many times she’d seen the rubble it still didn’t truly sink in on her that all that had truly happened. How could it, after all, when she’d ran away before giving herself time to process the loss, without giving herself time to think clearly -

Because if she did, she wouldn’t have gone back to that city-

- after what was probably the biggest tragedy she’d experienced, putting everything that had been salvaged in her old car, handling the mundane items with care because they were survivors, survivors just like her -

And if she’d never gone back, she’d never have any of this-

And now that same cabin was overgrown with lichen and covered in dust, as if time passed more quickly when no one was there to experience it. As if two people and a deerfox had been all that had been anchoring that old cottage to their moment in time. And now they weren’t there anymore, except they were now, except it wasn’t who they’d been because it wasn’t a girl, a mother and a deerfox, it was two mothers, a young woman, a little girl, an elf, a catowl and a deerfox. And they weren’t headed for the rubble.

That was the ‘feeling like she was in the past’ part of it. Sitting by the rubble was a cabin almost identical to the one Johanna’s grandfather had built. This one, however, put a more respectful distance between itself and the elf village, and was very distinctively painted in a dull lilac colour.

They’d decided together to rebuild it. Mattie had been growing and they wanted her to have that experience of close contact with nature. Johanna knew it would do her well like it had done her sister, to have a place to spread her wings and let her curiosity run, to live knowing what pure air felt like in your lungs. Kaisa knew that it was necessary for a young witch to be close to untamed nature, to study the stars without being dimmed by city lights, to look for that sort of knowledge where it was wild and free.

Besides, Hilda was getting to an age where she appreciated being alone at times, and they couldn’t deny that having somewhere to run to when it all became too much would do her good, and at least at the cabin they knew she’d be safe.

So the choice had been made by the two of them, with their daughters in mind. But Kaisa had insisted she handle the construction, both because her magic would make it easier and because she wanted to gift it to Johanna. Johanna, for her part, had allowed her to go forward with the plan, and never thought about how alien it would feel until she actually arrived and had to see how the hubris of her family’s former house looked in contrast with the brand new cabin.

“Anna?”

Johanna turned her head, which had been staring straight ahead, to look to the right. Her wife was standing outside of the car already, the door open as she frowned at her with concern. The children had already climbed down, and Johanna could hear Alfur’s voice as he formally introduced Mattie to the elves of the Northern Counties. The girl, for her part, looked like she wanted a much closer look at their homes, the architecture a lot more sophisticated than that of the elves she was used to back in Trolberg, but was held back by her older sister whispering in her ear that it was a bad idea.

Johanna was still wearing her seatbelt and gripping the wheel.

“Sorry.” She muttered, turning the car off and avoiding Kaisa’s gaze in favour of opening the car trunk to get their heaviest suitcases out before anyone else could give it a try.

If the girls noticed something was off, they didn’t say it. Yet the witch’s worried gaze burned at the back of her neck.

…......

The first thing you learn about witches once you got close enough to one of them, is that they take tea seriously. Even Kaisa, to whom a cup of coffee was much preferred to anything herbal or calming, treated tea as a type of ritual. Like it could heal. Like it could ground you. So, naturally, in a family composed of essentially witches and familiars, they inaugurated the new cabin by brewing tea for them all.

The layout of the cabin was exactly the same as it had been. Kaisa’s magic had guaranteed that much. But instead of making her feel like she was in a familiar and well loved place, each corridor just felt like walking a gravel path in a cemetery of memories. Some she mourned for. Some she was glad were buried under the rubble, the lichen, the dirt.

This cabin had been built to look like the former one, but it wasn’t, and she could tell all too easily. The paint wasn’t red. The floorboard in front of the stairs didn’t creak. The paintings on the walls had been either made or chosen by her, instead of her grandmother. Everything had changed.

Change was a part of life.

That didn’t mean she had to like it.

Which didn’t mean she couldn’t crave it.

”You’re really running away?” Her brother had said when she was nineteen and putting everything she owned into her yellow beetle. “That’s how you’re going to deal with the situation? You’ll just run from them?”

“How is that any different-” She’d answered, not daring to look up at his face. “- from what you’ve been doing?”

Years before, Hilda had resisted it when Johanna talked about them moving to Trolberg. She’d sighed and groaned and used every argument in the book for why living out there was so much better, as if Johanna didn’t know them all. What she hadn’t realised - and who could blame her, she’d only been a child at the time - was how much Johanna herself had been resisting it. Enough to not flee the first time their house had been attacked by an invisible enemy. Enough to build her career from a place where she had no way to easily meet new clients. Enough to raise a child with no support and to live otherwise by herself.

It had been enough. For years.

For years.

Years.

An animal that’s used to starvation doesn't realise when there’s no food.

“Hey, are you ok?” Kaisa asks in a low voice, avoiding being overheard by their daughters, as she hands Johanna a mug with the freshly brewed tea. It smells of ginger and cinnamon, and is hot enough to burn Johanna’s fingers through the ceramic.

The mug had been one Mattie had given her, one father’s day - Johanna had those for herself and left mother’s day for Kaisa, since she already got gifts from Hilda on that occasion. It was plain white, but the young girl had painted on it. Their entire family was drawn in stick figures, holding hands.

“Yeah,” Johanna sighed. At least the heat of the tea made her feel something. Something she could recognize and name, at any rate. It was more than could be said about everything else in her mind. “I’m just… thinking. this place brings up too many memories.”

Her wife matched her sigh, looking like she’d more than expected some reaction of that sort from Johanna, looking like she had hoped it wouldn’t be the case either way. The more self hating part of Johanna’s mind suggested that it was so rude of her to act so forlorn in the face of Kaisa’s gift. The realistic side of it knew her wife would never hold it against her and was just worried about her wellbeing.

“I imagine it does. Let me know if you want to talk about anything.”

She didn’t. Not really. She didn’t even know what was there to talk about. Her memories were just that, memories. They’d stayed in the past just as surely as the sunlit cabin where she’d sang her first daughter lullabies. Just as surely as the far too clean corridors of a house she’d never been able to call her home.

It doesn't matter. It doesn’t matter. None of those feelings would ever see the light of day. It’s what she’s always done.

Her silence is eloquent enough. She’d been silent enough in her life to be good at it. Kaisa bites her lip and steps away.

…......

They were telling ghost stories. Not the kind meant to scare one away. Literal ghost stories. Precisely, Hilda had begun talking about the time a ghost had stolen David’s shoes, and the trio had only been able to get them back with Twig’s aid. That led to Kaisa, head on Johanna’s lap on the couch, making a dramatic retelling of hunting a ghost around the Witches’ Tower after it had stolen her homework when she’d been a teenager. All that, only to then find out Tildy had asked the ghost to do that so she could learn lessons that were more moral than they were magical.

Predictably, Mattie heard them with wonder in her eyes, and asked if she could see a ghost as soon as they were done. Hilda and Kaisa looked at each other and cringed. Better not.

And Johanna-

Johanna only heard static.

She felt outside of her own body as she looked at her family, laughing. All she had the presence of mind to do was card her fingers through Kaisa’s hair, but not even that grounded her. It felt like it was slipping from her all the time.

“You think you can take care of a child? You can’t take care of yourself!”

She flinched, despite knowing that the raised hand wouldn't come down on her, that it had only ever been all talk.

“I can do better than you.”

Her wife looks up with a questioning look when Johanna didn’t join them in making up excuses for why their five year old shouldn’t go see a ghost. Generally she’d be the one to take Hilda and Kaisa’s anxious mumbles and shape them into actual sensible reasons.

But Johanna can’t speak. Her body feels frozen, in that spot and in every moment that wasn’t the one she was currently living.

Ashes, ashes, dust to dust.

What if she ruined this family too?

She’d always fared better when she was alone. Well, alone with Hilda. A strong girl, curious and bright enough on her own that for so long it hadn’t been an issue that Johanna was who she was. Sturdy and wild like the forest she’d grown up in.

But they were just a few metres away from proof of what happened when anything at all relied on Johanna.

Rubble, and lichen, and dirt.

The devil’s after both of us.

Something painful flashed across Kaisa’s eyes. She looked away quickly, and rejoined the girls’ conversation, not giving them the chance to see there was already a ghost in the room, with wavy brown hair and eyes that couldn’t possibly hold life.

…......

Johanna woke up in the middle of the night.

She’d gotten used to the city again. To the certainty of activity. To be back somewhere so silent was eerie; every single noise was heightened.

She immediately heard her wife’s breathing. The rhythmic sound soothed her, but only just. She wished she could hear her heartbeat, as well. Maybe that would be enough.

Then she heard the cicadas. And the wind rattling the windows every now and then. She couldn’t sleep again.

She knew how to not let her feelings see the light of day. The moon’s, however, they were much more familiar with.

The sleeping woman in her bed didn’t wake up when she changed out of her sleeping clothes, putting on much older ones she had been surprised to find still fit her. A button down flannel with a moss green sweater on top. Pants. Old shoes that had been worn down by the forest floor.

She steps out into the cold night. Her skin stings with it, and her mind doesn’t notice.

…......

The woman felt more like herself after a couple of minutes of walking. Which is just as well, since it was the middle of the night in the wilderness, anything could come out of those bushes to lunge at her at any moment, and she hadn’t even brought a compass. All the attention she could pay wasn’t enough.

Technically, if she got lost she wouldn’t be so for long. Twig and Freya both knew how to track, and Kaisa certainly had spells for that as well. She just didn’t want to worry her any more than she already had.

Besides, she had a reason for being out there. She still hadn’t figured out what it was, but she had one. She was sure of it.

Maybe.

“What could bring someone to wander around in the woods all on her own? And in the middle of the night, too?” Said a voice behind her, and the question was so good that it took her an embarrassing long while to realise that the voice had not been her own.

Johanna turned around with a gasp, her brain torn appart between ‘we’ve been approached in the woods, we should run’ and ’we know this voice, why run?’, which resulted in her simply staring like a scared animal at a face that she was sure would be lifting an eyebrow at her.

If he had any, that was.

“How rude.” Said the Woodman. “Come inside, it’s cold. For you.”

With that he turned and walked away. And she followed, because he sounded like he could have an answer to the question when she hadn’t even gotten around to asking it yet.

…......

Johanna had no idea what the sleeping habits of a creature made of bark could possibly be, and she wasn’t about to be impolite to her impromptu host by asking. But when he led her inside the very house she’d been once before, it didn’t look as if she’d interrupted anything.

She didn’t know why she’d expected it to. It wasn’t like she’d come knocking for him.

The place was cool and damp, which was probably justified by it being on the inside of a large tree. She’d been too worried to muse about it the first time she’d seen the house, but now she wondered what it felt like for him. To live inside a place that was like a dead version of himself.

She wondered if he felt anything like she did at that moment.

If so, she’d been too harsh the times when he’d shown up at her doorstep. She’d wanted to run away too, hadn’t she?

And now she was in his house.

It was a bit dizzying.

The Woodman didn’t engage her in conversation. She thought she’d be glad; what use did she have for an old neighbour poking his nose (or whatever equivalent he had for one) in her personal business, after all. Instead, Johanna found herself almost disappointed when he left her at his couch and went to the kitchen, seemingly planning on ignoring her now that he’d gotten her out of the cold. She waited for a bit, expecting him to come over with another muddy concoction he called a warm drink; he didn’t. He just kept tinkering around in his kitchen while humming a tune under his breath.

“Thank you.” She said, at last, when the silence began to feel like ants crawling under her skin. “For bringing me in.”

He didn't even lift his eyes (eye sockets?) from whatever he was doing, his back to her.

“It’s bad manners to let old acquaintances get eaten by wolves.”

Johanna forced a chuckle, but he didn’t reciprocate. Not a joke, then. She squirmed uncomfortably on the couch.

“We are that, aren’t we?” She sighed, and suddenly the Woodman forcefully put down whatever he’d been holding.

“You’re chattery. It’s distracting.” He stated, not sounding any angrier despite the comment. “If you want to talk, just say what you want to already.”

Her breath caught in her throat, a denial and a promise to stay silent at the tip of her tongue. But she realised - she did want to talk. It was a startling realisation, considering she hadn’t wanted to confide in her own wife. But that had been because she knew what Kaisa would say. She knew the affirmations and the comfort that would come if she managed to get close to verbalising what she was feeling. But Kaisa’s view was biassed, biassed by her love and the fact that she’d married her, but mostly biassed by them having met each other so relatively recently.

The Woodman, however, she’d known since she’d been a child and came to the cabin to visit her grandparents.

And the Woodman pulled back no punches.

“Go on, then.” He encouraged. “Out with it.”

The creature standing metres away from her had gifted her with logs when they’d moved out. She found herself understanding why. A piece of herself seemed like something she could offer. So she did.

“Remember when you told me that sometimes it’s better to retrace old steps than forge new paths?” She asked, and got a hum in response.

“Why wouldn’t I? I said that.”

Johanna ignored the question, figuring it wasn’t meant to be answered. “Well, I forged a new path, one I’m very happy with.” She thought of Hilda, trusting her enough to confide in her about her first crush. About Kaisa, the sheer blinding love in her eyes as she recited her wedding vows. Of Mattie’s first ever smile, aimed at her, toothless and awkward and utterly perfect. “But I’m afraid it’s too good. I’m afraid it’ll all come tumbling down because-”

Johanna sighed, suddenly feeling like there was something stuck in her throat. Words tended to do that, when you held them down for long enough. They tangled into one big mess of feelings that couldn’t be revealed separately. You let one of them out, and then everything you’ve been holding back has to go too.

“Because I’m the same person I’ve always been. Because I run. It’s what I do.”

She didn’t know where that had come from. The realisation was coming to her at the same time as the words were leaving her mouth; if she’d worked that out earlier she would have done something about it. Gone to therapy, probably. But only now that her chest felt hollow did she notice that those conclusions had been kept locked in there for as long as they’d existed.

With a disturbing raspy sound that Johanna was sure was completely unnecessary, the Woodman turned his head a full 180 degrees to look directly at her.

Or through her, it felt like.

“Digging back skeletons is always easier when you never got around to burying them, isn’t it?” He asked in the same nonchalant voice as ever. She half hoped he’d have snapped at her to stop being ridiculous, or growl that she was being a nuisance. It would have been easier to react to that than to this apathetic analysis. “You look like you have a packed closet full of them.”

It doesn’t have the intended effect on her. Mostly, because she has no idea what the intended effect should be and what on earth that even means.

Blast him for not being satisfied being a literal cryptic and having to be so metaphorically as well.

The Woodman has no such thing as pupils, yet Johanna feels with certainty that her face is being assessed. She does her best to school her features into neutrality, while knowing that he’d still read her like an open book if he so wanted.

“You said you haven’t changed. Do you truly believe that?”

He didn’t sound judgemental. Just curious.

Okay, maybe a tad judgemental, in a ‘how could you miss this simple memo?’ type of way.

“Do you make a habit of not watching where you’re going?”

Johanna gasped, immediately shaking off the grip that the strange creature had on her backpack.

“What are you?” She asked it.

“You’re not a very polite little girl.”

“I do.” She said with her head hung low. The Woodman had now moved to sit on the armchair in front of her, and she hadn’t even noticed.

“Oh, is that so? That is stupid.”

His fireplace - how morbid for him to have one - cracked. Along with the wind rustling the leaves outside, it was the only sound they heard for a couple of seconds. Johanna lacked the energy to argue, mentally, physically and emotionally. Kaisa was always going on about some ‘spiritual energy’, which she had no idea what that was but she’d bet she was running low on that one as well.

“There has not been a single time I’ve met you that you were the same person as you’d been before.” The Woodman stated, apparently undisturbed by her lack of reaction. “You say running is what you do.” He turned his gaze, almost imperceptibly, to a portrait on the wall, of a boy Johanna had known like the palm of her own hand, yet a man she didn’t at all. His voice softened. “Well, nature changes. It’s what nature does. And you’re part of it.”

Johanna chuckled darkly. “I’m too old to change who I am, Woodman. And who I am hasn’t ever been enough.”

Rubble, and lichen, and dirt.

The look he gave her wasn’t one of pity, though she couldn’t be sure that wasn’t just because his face only allowed for a very limited amount of emoting. “One’s never too old to grow up. And you’ve grown. A lot.”

She bit the inside of her lip, something irksome unfurling on her low belly. “Change is scary.”

“Is it worth it?”

“Yes.” She doesn't hesitate for a moment

“Well, then.” He shrugs as if he’s saying the most obvious thing ever. “Do it scared.”

…......

The Woodman walks back to the cabin with her. Her cabin, that is. He doesn’t ask if she wants him to. He doesn’t say why he does it. Just silently helps her find her way back home. It’s not as cold outside anymore, nor as scary. The sun is rising, and it’s not exactly bright yet and the shadows are still soft and unthreatening. When they’re close enough that the lights of the elf village are within sight, he begins humming a tune she is certain she knows, but can’t remember. Something that itched at her memories, but in a good way for once.

“Want to come in for breakfast?” She asks once they are out into the open field that surrounds the elf village and the cabin. There’s no way to know if they have anything he’d even eat at their house, but it felt like the least she could do was ask. They could see the sky more clearly, now. It was orange and pink, like the roses that Kaisa liked to give her.

“No need. But do tell Hilda, Mattie and the witch that I’ve sent my regards.”

“I will -” She nods, thankful for his help and completely at loss for how to express it. And then it dawns on her, slowly yet strongly all the same, just like the dawn she was currently witnessing, that she’d never told the Woodman who she’d married or that she’d had a second child, nor said child’s name. “- wait how do you -” Johanna turned to look past her right shoulder, where the Woodman had been, but the creature was already gone “know…?”

There was no time to dwell on that, nor to wonder if she’d perhaps hallucinated the entire night, because she immediately heard her wife’s distressed voice calling out to her.

“Anna!” Said the witch, who was sprinting from their cabin door directly into her arms, carrying her wand. Johanna’s breath caught in her throat at the sight of tear tracks on her face, but it was soon squeezed out of her by the collision of their chests when Kaisa locked her into a desperate hug.

“I was looking for you for hours.” Being bitten by one of the wolves that roamed those woods would have probably hurt less than hearing the despair in Kaisa’s voice did. “Are you hurt? Where were you?”

Johanna didn’t let her lift her gaze or step away to check for injuries, keeping her wife as close as possible, the shorter woman’s face in the crook of her neck.

“I’m okay.” She admitted with guilt cutting at her heart. “I’m sorry, love. I’ve been a mess, and I didn’t even know how to talk about it. Went for a walk to clear my head, but I didn’t realise I’d been away for so long. Didn’t want to worry you.”

“Yeah, you did.” Kaisa whined with a lot of relief and barely any anger. “Don’t do that again, please. Leave a note. Take a flashlight. Anything.”

Her chin resting on top of her head, Johanna squeezed her tighter, eyes falling shut. “I will. I promise. Are the girls - ?”

“Hilda woke up when I was searching the house for you. She wanted to help, but then Mattie woke up as well, so she agreed to stay in their room playing with her so she wouldn’t notice you were missing.”

Johanna let out a long exhale. She’d been irresponsible. Her family deserved better.

But they wanted her nonetheless.

“I really am sorry. And I want to talk to you about it. I want to try, at least. My mind has just felt like it’s been on fire lately. I’m not as unbothered by things as I thought I were.”

Kaisa lifts up her gaze. Her tears have mostly dried, but her eyes are still red. Johanna reaches down to press the gentlest of kisses to their lids, as if that could make it better.

“Having second thoughts?” The witch asked in a small voice, as if Johanna could ever be anything less than sure when it came to her.

“Never.”

“Then what -”

“I don’t know, dear.” Johanna sighed. “I just know there’s too much of me in this forest. That means the parts I don’t like, too. So being back is…”

She leaves the sentence there, knowing Kaisa would read her sufficiently well to complete it in her mind. The librarian took a hand that had been at the small of her back and brought it to cup Johanna’s chin.

“We’ll talk about it.” She whispered. “When you want. When you’re ready. I’ll help however I can, you know that.”

Johanna wasn’t able to nod in her hold, but she tried it anyway. Kaisa’s eyes sparkled with the rising light.

“But there is not a single part of you I do not like, Johanna. You’ll do well to remember that next time before running off dramatically into the woods again.”

Her laughter was cut short by a kiss pressed to her lips, which was also eventually interrupted by a young woman running to them with a giggling child in her arms.

Tell me I am good enough.

They played cardboard games the entire morning. In the afternoon, Alfur gave them a proper tour of the village.

Oh, lay my curses out to rest

She brought a tray with breakfast for Kaisa come morning, before she’d even woken up, and this time left a note that she’d be at the forest for a bit with Hilda and Twig, for old times’ sake.

After the weekend was over, they went back to Trolberg. And they all remained the same: ever changing.

Make a mercy out of me.

#do you ever realize you've been talking to a mutual for 5 years and get emotional? well i do #Sorry waddles this was going to be a lot less angsty. idk what happened :')#(if you read these tags before the fic dw. nothing bad happens to The Girl. Only to your wife ig)#I should. probably mention that I took inspiration from ‘Curses’ by The Crane Wives #I forget that not everyone is obsessed with this song #sketchbookweek #sketchbook ship #sketchbook ship hilda #sketchbook ship fanfic #johanna hilda #my fic #fic: curses

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jahiera · 9 months

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looking thru your baldur's gate radio play tag like it's the morning paper

I just finished retagging the posts I'd missed with this tag too, I love our community-created playlist for that horrible horrible man <3

#so far the crane wives is the most consistently mentioned band. we ALL take 10 pts psychic damage from that band #never love an anchor also hits from the Astarion pov.......... hmrmmrrmrr #baldur's gate radio play #answered

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the-sun-is-also-a-star · 1 month

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Inbox me (1) thing you want to know about me.

What’s the song that remind you most of you, butterfly?

Hope today has been kind to you, darling ❤️

Ooo this is a hard one actually. I don't have a particular song that i associate with myself, but i guess it is my life goal to be associated by people with NFWMB by hozier!

and thank you, i hope today has been kind to you too <3

#honorable mentions to :#sunlight by hozier #war by hypnotic brass ensemble #spine breaker by bts #tongues and teeth by the crane wives #before the world ends by anarbor #smoke sprite by so!yoon! ft. rm #premier amour by nour #real men by mitski #sofrcore by the neighborhood #🍊#asks #ask game #sheba asks

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witchwhodoesvoodoos · 1 year

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well, if it isn't the bright side of my brain manipulating my dumb ass to listen to celtic music while studying for finals so that i can imagine myself as a studious elf who lives in a village in the middle of the forest and goes to a prestigious school where i learn alchemy in the form of incomprehensible chemistry notes. you're doing a great job sweetie.

#am i the only one?#the whole situation is amusing #tbh it motivated me to study #it feels fun #kudos to solas #they're an amazing band fr #the crane wives #u too #the oh hellos #hozier #i can't even name half of the musicians i listen since i just let the songs come and go #but they're all awesome im telling y'all #study tips #school #finals #celtic #alchemy #i know some of the bands mentioned aren't nearly related to celtic but they're good af

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anirlcryptid99 · 1 year

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Not to maybe be cringe music taste on main but…Rule #9 - Child of the Stars by Fish in a Birdcage has me crying screaming blowing up

#it’s. the way the singers voice wavers at the end and the instrumental is so fucking good #Also want to mention Rule 11 - My Dream My Addiction for that absolute banger instrumental as well #finally. a band for certified cello enjoyers #if you like The Crane Wives/Oh Hellos/Dirt Poor Robins/ and or Cosmo Sheldrake this is the band for you #fish in a birdcage

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sentinelpri · 1 year

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Sapphire & Gold

The moon sings a song of pale light and soft wind as Itachi Uchiha and Kisame Hoshigaki walk through the outskirts of Kirigakure, their sandals plip-plopping against the puddles that litter the grassland they’re trekking through. Kisame has the incapacitated body of their target on his back; some sort of Kirigakure politician that was getting in the way of Tobi’s work. They’re trying to get to a safe place to dispose of the body with Itachi’s crows where no one will stumble across them.

Eventually, they get to part of the forest where they’re surrounded by enough trees and fog that Itachi feels secure to do the disposal. So, they do, and as their target is ripped to shreds and consumed by the birds, he glances over at Kisame.

The older man is covered in blood from head to toe and doesn’t seem to mind it. The rusty grime mats in his indigo locks and crusts over his sapphire skin, tainting him, but his golden eyes seem to glow against the dull night with the adrenaline and dopamine that rushes through his veins.

And oddly enough, he looks more beautiful than ever; in his element, covered in rain and in blood, his hands scraped to shreds and his cloak torn and stained from the fight against their target’s bodyguards.

Itachi doesn’t blush, and he doesn’t fawn, because he knows Kisame is smart enough to pick up on those things if he dares to let his composure slip. So, Itachi commits the image to memory and looks away instead, even as anger dares to consume him- yes, that’s the emotion that he feels when he and Kisame are alone like this; anger. Itachi is angry. He’s angry that, were he partnered with literally anyone else in the Akatsuki, he could have stayed to himself and refused to fall for anyone before his inevitable death, angry that after a life of shoving everything and everyone away, he allowed Kisame to melt his icy composure so easily.

He remembers the first day they met. He was sitting on the edge of a dock overlooking the ocean when Kisame approached and introduced himself.

“I’ll be teaming up with you starting today. I’m Kisame Hoshigaki, formerly of the Hidden Mist; one of the seven ninja swordsmen,” A basic introduction, but nothing special. Itachi didn’t bother turning around at the time, too entranced by the shadows of the sharks that swam in the water below. They danced around each other so gracefully back then. “So pleased to make your acquaintance… And you are Itachi Uchiha, formerly of the Hidden Leaf. I’ve heard the rumors that you slaughtered all of your fellow Uchiha clansmen. I think that we’re alike, you and I. That’s the reason I wanted to be teamed with you in the Akatsuki. It’s really indescribable, isn’t it? Killing your comrades is quite the sensation, wouldn’t you say so, Itachi?”

Itachi had been offended at the time by both the implication that he was a stonecold killer who delighted in murdering his comrades and by the way Kisame so easily talked about killing people. At the same time, though, he’d been utterly entranced.

“You talk a lot. You don’t understand me; you don’t even understand yourself,” Itachi spat, looking over his shoulder. He remembers not being able to control that urge to blush at the mere sight of Kisame back then; his cheeks had burned bright red, so he’d been forced to face the water again even though all he wanted was to stare into Kisame’s golden eyes. Fearful and fresh off of what he’d done to his clan, Itachi resorted to insults. “You’re just a thug who got lost in the mist and ended up here. You can’t even control where you’re going. Am I wrong?”

“Do you want to know something interesting? Most sharks are ovoviviparous, which means that the eggs hatch inside the female’s body before the young are born. However, with some kinds of sharks, the number of eggs that hatch will differ from the number of young that emerge from the mother’s belly. Do you know why that is?” Kisame asked, but Itachi said nothing because no, he hadn’t known; sharks were never seen back in Konohagakure. Kisame answered the question for him after a few minutes. “Because of cannibalism. Right from the moment they hatch, they start eating each other inside their mother’s uterus. The fratricidal warfare begins as soon as they’re born. To each shark, all the others are just food to be eaten. Starting today, you are an Akatsuki member and my companion, so be wary… Of me.”

Itachi activated his Sharingan, not to fight or to intimidate, but to lock the moment in his memory for eternity; something he now regrets. He only did it because he was so terribly entranced by the way his heart started to skip beats like never before, so he could encapsulate the fear and the curiosity and the obsession.

“Same goes for you.”

“Now, let’s be friends and have some fun, alright?” Kisame had put a hand on his shoulder, so cold and firm. “And hope that we will not end up as each other’s final opponents.”

“No one who dares to raise a hand against a comrade ever dies a decent death,” Itachi stood, trying to avoid Kisame’s gaze. Perhaps he assumed that he would run the risk of Kisame seeing through him if their eyes met. He still tries to avoid eye contact with the man to this day for that very reason. “Remember that.”

“Well, that means our fates are sealed; you and I are depraved and worthless.”

“Not true. We’re both human- not fish,” Itachi murmured, sounding much more sure of himself than he actually was that day. He wanted to convince himself that Kisame was more human than monster. He still tries to. “No matter who you are, you do not truly know what kind of man you’ve become until you reach the very end. One realizes one’s true nature at the moment of death. Don’t you think that’s what death is about?”

With that, he’d left, unable to shake the feeling of Kisame’s hand on his shoulder.

Even though his feet knew the path he should’ve taken back then, he has since walked alongside Kisame in the dark without giving a single thought as to where it might lead.

And all the empty rooms- the homes of the Jinchuriki they’ve captured, the hotels they’ve stayed in, the little tea shops they’ve lingered in for too long for some sense of normalcy- they- Itachi- could have left the Akatsuki at any time and chosen to go anywhere else. Instead, Itachi made a bed with his apathy and followed the orders of his village to get intel from the S-Rank organization, and Kisame continued on his path of darkness with Itachi by his side.

Clearing his head of the painful memories, Itachi peers down at the body before them. He dispels the crows and watches Kisame scatter what’s left of the teeth and bones deep underneath the earth. It’s a disturbing sight, even after everything they’ve done. The death never seems to become any easier to witness- or to cause. Itachi averts his eyes and continues to walk down the dark path they’ve grown used to.

Kisame follows behind. The lull of their usual silence, however, is broken by Kisame, whose voice is barely audible over the rain that begins to pour over them.

“Itachi… You’ve been off lately,” Kisame starts, and Itachi thinks that might be it- a simple voicing of Kisame’s concern that he can brush off like the rest, which has been a frequent occurrence since his illness has gotten worse. Much to his surprise, Kisame continues. “I think we need to talk about it.”

“I think we’re fine,” Itachi says. Even he can’t deny how his voice shakes despite how he tries to remain calm. As he gets closer and closer to his death, his emotions get more and more potent. “Let’s move on, yes?”

At this point, Kisame tends to drop the subject, but this time, he grabs Itachi by the wrist.

“No,” Kisame insists. His fingers, cold and firm like they were the day they met, squeeze around Itachi’s wrist, which is much thinner than it was back then. Itachi doesn’t dare turn to face him. He’s scared that, if he does, he’ll finally break after so many years of keeping himself together for the sake of not pushing this thing that they have until it breaks. “I’m serious. I’m sick of always moving on from the things we need to talk about. You know I’m not one to dampen the mood like this, but neither of us should pretend that things haven’t changed lately. Do you seriously expect me to ignore what’s been going on between us?”

Itachi’s heart knows the weight of continuing to ignore his feelings, but that’s what he’s grown used to. Ever since he was little, he was forced to shove down everything he felt and keep a straight, calm face- for the sake of the clan, for the sake of Sasuke, for the sake of the village, and now, for the sake of Kisame and for the sake of the Akatsuki. After over ten years worth of dust and neglect, his heart is beyond trying to explore the depths of.

Why not just keep shoving everything down until he dies? That’s all he knows, anyway.

Itachi tries to pull away, but Kisame holds him firm. He debates on using his Sharingan before deciding against it. He needs it for his inevitable fight with Sasuke, and the more he uses it, the less time he has left. So he turns to look at Kisame and attempt to convince him to let go, but when he does, Kisame is staring at him like they’re human. Not monsters, not murderers, just two human men; two true comrades.

“Don’t you dare look at me that way,” He commands, too overpowered by his emotions to think better of it. “Not after everything we’ve done.”

At one point, perhaps even just before Kisame decided to open this Pandora’s box, Itachi thought he’d made peace with his weariness and let it be. Now, flames of raw emotion feel like they’re licking up his body and melting his icy exterior before their very eyes. He despises how Kisame has made him feel all of these things so suddenly- it’s almost as if he has been hoarding parts of Itachi that the Uchiha himself didn’t know existed before now.

“Why? Are you going to stop me, Itachi? You can’t deny the tension that’s been boiling between us,” Kisame smiles. His sharp teeth shine a brilliant white underneath the beams of moonlight that peek through the storm clouds. Itachi’s heart skips a beat, just like it did back then. He hates himself for it. “I’ll stop if you tell me what the problem is. We’re comrades, remember?”

He loves Kisame like the sun- he has since the start, boring the shadows that the older man always seemed to make with no light of his own. Aside from Sasuke, Kisame has been the only thing to keep him going through illness, violence, and trauma.

“The problem is that you make me want things I can’t have,” Itachi confesses, his composure finally faltering.

Itachi thinks of all the things they could have had- anything else, any other life, with peace and love. If it were another life, they could have been normal people who met under normal circumstances and fell in love. He sees how Kisame looks at him; he knows that the very tension Kisame mentioned is very much there, so thick between them that he could cut through it with a kunai if he were to acknowledge his presence.

“Like what?”

“If you must know,” Itachi clears his throat and trains his eyes on the muddy ground. He doesn’t even pause to consider it. He’s going to die soon, so why not do this? Why not ruin everything in his wake? Kisame is practically begging for him to do so. “Love and trust and all of those other meaningless things we left behind when we abandoned our villages so long ago- when they abandoned us.”

“Abandoned? I like to think of it as freed,” Kisame quips, his grin growing. He’s braver than Itachi in how he reaches forward with his spare hand to rest it on Itachi’s cheek. This man, this killer, caresses his face like it’s fragile glass. Sweet. Gentle. Words that no one else would use to describe Kisame or his actions. They’re the only ones who know each other like this. “And you can have those things alongside our lifestyle, whether you believe it or not.”

“Don’t you think that’s cruel?” Itachi asks. The rain that streams down his face allows him to cry. The tears blend in with the water seamlessly. “We both know I’m going to die soon.”

“Life has been cruel to the both of us regardless, why not let this be the cherry on top? It’s as they say, it’s better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.”

“I can’t say I agree with that sentiment,” Itachi replies with a frown.

He snatches his hand away. This time, Kisame lets him. It seems as if he’s gotten what he wanted from Itachi; an admission of guilt.

The two men continue to walk in the rain. Itachi hopes that will be enough, but within minutes, Kisame is talking again.

“So, Itachi… Why me?”

“I’m sorry?”

“You’re attractive. So, out of everyone, why would you love a monster like me?”

Itachi pauses. Then, he answers.

“Because I, too, am a monster.”

“Then wouldn’t you say we belong together?”

“No, Kisame, I’m more monstrous than you could ever dream of being. Unlike me, you still have a shred of humanity left,” Maybe it’s true, maybe it’s not. Itachi isn’t sure. Neither of them are quite monsters, but neither of them are quite human either. They’re somewhere in between, in a state of limbo that only the two of them could ever understand. “We don’t belong together. We never have.”

“Are you saying our partnership never should’ve happened?”

“Precisely. We both… We both would’ve been better off that way.”

The rain seems to settle into a light sprinkle as the two approach a stream. Wordlessly, they undress, knowing that they should wash their light wounds and get the blood off of their bodies before anything gets infected. Neither of them bat an eye at each other. It’s practically a post-battle routine now.

“Well, we can’t go back in time, and if you really do feel the same way, I’m not going to give up on you,” Kisame sinks into the water. For the first time, Itachi dares to look at him; dewy sapphire skin, soft gills, hard and defined muscle. Kisame is big and brawny, the exact opposite of Itachi, who feels small in comparison. The ravenette knows he’s slowly wasting away into nothing but pale, cracked skin coiled around increasingly visible and fragile bone. He’s not just small in comparison- no, he’s nothing in comparison to this man. “I want to feel the fire that you’ve kept from me, Itachi.”

The words stab through Itachi like swords to the pit of his belly. Kisame looks back at Itachi, who is awkwardly holding his Akatsuki robes in front of himself instead of getting into the lukewarm Kirigakure water.

“I won’t let you feel it. I’d burn you, after all,” Itachi finally responds after remaining silent for far too long. He tries to disregard Kisame’s prying golden eyes as he drops his robes and gets into the water a couple feet away from him. He manages to find some comfort on a smooth rock. The current is soft and clear. “As many threats as I’ve made over the years, the last thing I want to do is hurt you, Kisame.”

“Look at you, being a coward. What’s new? You’re always running away; running from your village, from your remaining family, from the enemies we face. You always err on the side of caution even though you chose this path just as I chose mine,” Kisame criticizes, criticizes, criticizes. Something he’s always been good at. Itachi doesn’t even dignify it, just lets it roll off of him in tangent with the stream’s water. “Name your courage now and take a risk for once, will you? I’m getting tired of how predictable you’re becoming.”

He manages to swallow his doubt, if only for tonight. He knows it’ll be one of the last before he has to face Sasuke.

“How’s this for predictable?” Itachi asks and moves through the water so he can sit closer to Kisame. Kisame stares over at him. This time, Kisame’s the one who’s blushing. His cheeks are dusted purple and he looks at Itachi with measured curiosity. Itachi revels in the way Kisame’s body tenses with anticipation when he reaches forward, only to drag water over his muscles to wash off the blood. “Not what you were expecting, was it? If you’re so insistent, I’ll cease my running away for now, Kisame.”

“Then come,” Kisame grabs Itachi by the hips and pulls him closer. Itachi offers the biggest smile he can muster and continues to wash the blood off of his partner. Their bodies, worn and rough, seem to mold together within the flow of the stream. Golden eyes burn into charcoal ones. “Come and burn me to ashes, Itachi.”

“If that’s what you want, I suppose I have no choice but to indulge you for now.”

Itachi acquiesces against his better judgment and, within seconds, Kisame is grabbing him by the face and locking their lips together in a silent promise.

#itakisa #kisaita #kisame hoshigaki #itachi uchiha #naruto #naruto shippuden #naruto fanfiction #naruto shippuden fanfiction #tw corpse #tw corpse mention #angst #fanfiction #oneshot #oneshots #songfic #song: the moon will sing (the crane wives)

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