#a man who tries to find peace and salvation after the many years of suffering he went through and the horrible deeds he committed during wa
Note
Not to be sappy but I'd love an Andy/Quynh first kiss, if and when you have the time.
This was a GREAT prompt and I hope you enjoy <3
touch the threshold, it is ancient
teen, 1.8 k, ao3 here
How long did you walk together before you walked together someone will ask, and she doesn’t have the answer. Long. Too long, maybe, but by the time she and Quỳnh find each other, they have a good idea of the kind of thing they’re in for, battles survived, even more, hunger and thirst and storm survived, skin that scars and wrinkles no further, hair that goes no more grey over the years. Family five and six and seven and then uncountable generations to their graves. They understand, maybe, how time will move honey-slow through their lives as it crashes down around the rest of the world as a wave from the sea slams the shoreline, leaving whitewater in its wake.
And maybe this is why, why it it takes so long for them to come to that calm morning in the town by the so, so many- not years, for them really, so much as cycles of the land, death and life and death that feels close enough to hold together in the palm of a hand, the sturdy rhythmic pattern of the gods beating out a dancing rhythm against the earth. Winter-summer-winter-spring. Fall in winter, rise in spring, and every time you turn your head, another generation has gone to the back to the earth or the ash or a sky above, the baby who took her mother in the birthing now an honored grandmother with many flocks and fruit trees and grandchildren at her feet. It does not take much to untie yourself from the earth and feel like you and this woman in front of you are the only people alive, walking blood-bound and human through the world of ghosts. So many have now worshipped them as gods, given them the finest lodging in their temples and brought them the finest woven linen fabrics and cowrie-shell necklaces, pounded gold anklets and jugs of honeyed wine, looked in their eyes for the salvation of rain and a good growing season, and so many others have bound then to the burning pyre when they could not bring the end to the hunger. They are always having to walk on. Quỳnh does not think they are gods. Anath does not know if gods know they are gods.
Anath only knows this: the music of the earth, and the woman in front of her, whose burning-spark soul she carries beneath her skin alongside her own. She knows she feels this woman in her heart, and that no number of her own deaths is too many to see her well and safe, and that when their skin trails against each other in the desert-cool night it is the fire of the world itself. That she is kind and soft of heart and always extends an open hand to the stranger and that she cries after every battle as they do their best to honor and say the burial rights of the dead so that the fallen can walk to the next world, even if it is different from their own, and yet she also knows that this woman is knife edge sharp, prefers to bring a tyrant down with a joke and a lampooning poem shouted from the palace roof than with a sword- though of course, she can very well do that as well. Anath knows that it does not matter if she is a god or not, for all that is divine rests in this woman, and she will stand next to her forever.
And like all amongst gods and men she has her rituals, the ones to honor her ancestors that she has carried with her from her first life and the other smaller daily ones, the neat arrangement of their shoes and clothes next to their bedrolls when they make camp. The precision of how neatly she plaits her hair in the mornings and secures it with twisted copper pins. And then the carelessness with how she undoes it in the night, running her hands through the soft braid-bends and letting it fall luxuriously around her shoulders. They are in a town that is one of the beginnings of cities at the edge of a great sea, a decisive turn in the braid of the great human story they are only beginning to fully see the threads of, becoming human again after a long trek through the desert dealing with roving bandits who tried to take the young men to be soldiers and even more worryingly, shattered the walls of cisterns and burned the fields. Anath stopped praying a generations past being the only one who could remember the names of her gods but she calls out to whatever may exist that she and Quỳnh will not return in years time to bury those claimed from the hunger that always comes knocking after war, even when the blood has been drunk thirstily by the earth.
“Shhhh,” Quỳnh says, running her fingers through her hair. “Your thoughts are extremely loud tonight. I need peace in my sleep.” She undoes a final braid and it unravels, and it strikes Anath how the moon on Quỳnh’s hair reminds her of the moon on the rippling night sea. “And I will kill you if I am disturbed.”
“You wouldn’t want to clean the blood from your sheets.”
She shrugs. “Maybe so. I am fond of this shift.”
Anath too is fond of this shift, simple in the extreme and with a sharp cut across Quỳnh’s collarbone, leaving her muscle-strong, sun-goldened arms to the cool night air, but her tongue will not let her say anything, so she only nods. Only watches Quỳnh finishing combing out her hair and then brush in oil to keep it strong and safe from the desert wind, same as she does every night in which they are free to do as they please and have their own home to make. The breeze rustles the tips of her hair as she gets up from the place at the edge of the room she’s crouched upon and climbs the ladder back to the sleeping room beneath, and Anath follows her. Unrolls the sleeping roll, even though it is not quite cold enough for the blankets, not with the heat of Quỳnh beside her, burning like her own sun.
“I have not had peace in my own mind since that night at the cistern,” Quỳnh says suddenly, to the back of Anat’s neck, her breath curling warmly there, and she grabs her hand and wraps it tight around her own and brings it to her lips, lightly presses them to the knuckles. Quỳnh shifts behind her. They do not say anything more.
The morning sun comes too early, as it always does, and Quỳnh is still asleep when Anath wakes, curled like an ally cat. Anath climbs down to the narrow street below, barters for weak beer and rough barley bread and, treasure of treasures, fresh sweet figs, milky sap sticky on their stems. She comes home to Quynh and lays these treasures on the low wooden table and tears the bread apart as Quỳnh finally rouses, stretching luxuriously, still all ally cat even with her messy strands of hair sticking up around her face, crinkled nose forever angry at the basic passage of the sun. For all time. For forever.
“I thought you had abandoned me for the barley malter down the street,” Quỳnh teases, like she always does. “You say he has the sweetest brew.”
“I will not leave you until the end of all things,” Anath says, like she always does, and she has never meant words more.
“We must know peace for a while before we again see war,” Anath says says, and Quỳnh nods, knows that it is true, even though it is always a most difficult decision to make when their bodies bear no scars from the war and the soul is not a visible thing and there are still so many out there suffering. It is Quỳnh who makes her stop, makes them both breathe, take long slow days from their lives to breath and listen to the songs of the marketplace, and if it were herself alone, Anath would never stop. But in the deepest parts of herself she knows she must take care of this one beside her, for all their days.
Anath wipes the few spare crumbs from the table and Quỳnh pulls out her carved-wood comb, her most valuable possession apart from her bow and arrows and knives. She has an eye for these sorts of things, jewellry and cloth, that Anath does not. Quỳnh carefully separates her hair into strands and then plaits them, her movements sharp and precise with the experience of time. Pins her hair with the copper pins. Anath watches her easy grace.
Quỳnh finishes and is about to pack the comb away again when she says, suddenly, “Why do I not braid your hair?” She has not made such an offer before.
Without words Anath sits in front of her, crossing her legs against the floor. Quỳnh’s hands are practiced and do not hurt, but even so, it is hard for Anath to keep her breathing steady, keep her thoughts within her head as she feels the steady pull of her hair back from it’s usual mess into a neat plait working its way down her back. She does not like this business of hair, prone to cracking or tangling or catching fire, would cut all of it off if it would not attract undue notice. The cool pass of air at her scalp and neck once it has been done back is a relief.
“There.” Quỳnh’s hands are at the bottom of the braid, tying it back with a strip of cloth. No extra pins. The calm morning silence. And then suddenly the lightest brush of her lips against the top of Anath’s head, even though she must have to push herself up to be able to do that. Her breath hitches, pauses, and so does Anath’s. Live long enough and know change swells across the land slowly, but this- this is different. A sudden shock, like lightening forking from the heavens to the world of man.
“You take care of me, and I will take care of you. That is the only way we can continue upon the earth.”
Anath reaches out and links her fingers through Quynh’s, turns so that their foreheads are to one another. Places a hand at the back of Quỳnh’s neck, and suddenly the storm that has been massing thunder for one thousand years breaks free and their lips are to each other, both familiar and shockingly, bracingly new. The kiss is chaste and then it is very, very hungry, and it tastes of the malt-bitter of beer and the sweetness of figs.
#andy x quynh#andromache of scythia#quynh#the old guard#the old guard fic#my writings#prompt fills#wlw tag#also did u see what i did with the sappiness? did you?
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Ok so I’ve done a complete re-read through and one thing that kept nagging at me was how little Gideon and Harrow’s relationship makes sense given its quite frankly abusive origins. Harrow spends her whole life making Gideon’s a living hell and Gideon just… forgives her. Total and complete forgiveness for an irredeemable girl.
At first I took the sudden shift in their relationship as lazy writing to rush along the end of the story, but that didn't make any sense either. Muir strikes me as an intensely purposeful writer. Then I remembered that Muir is also an intensely Catholic writer and it hit me. Muir isn’t writing a story about a healthy human relationship, oh no, she’s writing a story about Christ’s relationship with The Church… if Christ was a sword toting butch lesbian and The Church was a sardonic bone witch. Call it tender blasphemy.
Now Gideon’s role as a Christ figure is fairly easy to parse out given that her dad is… God. But for the sake of self indulgence (I have to put my 15 year long flirtation with Christianity to use somehow) I’m going to go through all the parallels anyway. There are a LOT of them.
Let’s start at the very beginning (a very good place to start).
Miraculous Conception
Luke 1:34-38
34 But Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I [e]am a virgin?” 35 The angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; for that reason also the [f]holy Child will be called the Son of God.
Gideon is conceived by artificial means when one of God’s own servants (Mercy) delivers a sample of John’s genetic material to Wake, a ‘normal’ human woman who chooses to carry Gideon in her womb. Notably, the sample lives far beyond its point of expected viability, thus making the conception somewhat miraculous (“Only the sample was still active, no idea how considering it was twelve weeks after the fact” HTN 441).
The Cuckold
Matthew 1:18-25
18 Now the birth of Jesus the [a]Messiah was as follows: when His mother Mary had been [b]betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be pregnant by the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, since he was a righteous man and did not want to disgrace her, planned to [c]send her away secretly.
Gideon the First decides not to kill his lover, Wake, and releases her out the airlock (AND HE TOOK PITY ON ME! HE TOOK PITY ON ME! HE SAW ME AND HE TOOK PITY ON ME” from Harrow’s vision of Wake’s note, HTN 124) just as Joseph took pity on Mary, his betrothed, by deciding to divorce her quietly instead of making her infidelity public which would condemn her to death by public stoning (Deuteronomy 22:21). Gideon the First knew that Wake was pregnant and didn’t tell John because he thought the baby was his. Similarly, Joseph goes on to raise Jesus as his own son.
The Birth
Luke 2:7
And she gave birth to her firstborn son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and laid Him in a [f]manger, because there was no [g]room for them in the inn.
Neither baby Jesus nor baby Gideon were given a proper cradle, one being laid to rest in a manger where the animals ate and the other stuffed in a transplant bio-container (GTN 23).
The Dead Children
16 When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.
King Herod intends to kill the prophesied King of the Jews and instead of finding the specific baby, he just has a bunch of them slaughtered. However, Jesus escapes the slaughter of the innocents by Herod when his parents secret him away to Egypt.
When the great aunts gas the nursery and kill the 200, Gideon is meant to die along with them but escapes her fate.
Now this event has a completely different biblical connotation for Harrow.
Firstly, the murder of the 200 children represents Original Sin. In the bible, Adam and Eve disobeyed God in the Garden of Eden, and as their descendants, all of humankind is doomed to also bear the weight of that sin from the moment we are born until the day we die. This is a fact that is drilled into Christians as soon as we’re able to understand it, we are born wretched and unworthy sinners, and there’s nothing we can do ourselves to fix that.
“I have tried to dismantle you, Gideon Nav! The Ninth House poisoned you, we trod you underfoot—I took you to this killing field as my slave—you refuse to die, and you pity me! Strike me down. You’ve won. I’ve lived my whole wretched life at your mercy, yours alone, and God knows I deserve to die at your hand. You are my only friend. I am undone without you.”
Harrow is a multitude, she is 200 children, the entire future of her house. Shes not just one human being,, she’s the whole damn church.
Naz/Nav
he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene.
Although Gideon is not from the Ninth, she is given the Ninth name Nav when she arrives as a baby. Similarly, Jesus is known as Jesus of Nazareth, though that is not where he was born.
The Poor Bondservant
Jesus' role as a servant is emphasized many times in the bible. He was a carpenter's son born in a stable
Philippians 2:5-8
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.
Gideon is described as being made “a very small bondswoman” (GTN 24)
The Sword
Matthew 10:34
Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
The Wretched Sinner
Harrow is wretched, self loathing, and cruel.
She is in thrall of the enemy of god, a figure who was once gods most favoured warrior, cast into hell.
She is like the depiction of the sinner who loves the devil
It's important to note that Harrow isn’t a single person, she is a multitude, the entire future of her people condensed into one body.
The Enemy of God
20 Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, nholding in his hand the key to othe bottomless pit1 and a great chain. 2 And he seized pthe dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and qbound him for a thousand years, 3 and threw him into othe pit, and shut it and rsealed it over him, so that she might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while.
Before the fall, Satan was described as a “guardian cherub” who resided in the garden with God (Ezekiel 28:14)
(a funny aside, in the bible the devil is known as the great deceiver but in HTN Muir specifies that Alecto is incapable of lying)
A Life of Abuse
Isaiah 53:3
"He was despised and rejected by mankind,
a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
he was despised, and we held him in low esteem”
They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff" (Luke 4:28–29).
Gideon lives a life of mockery and is abused by Harrow.
An Unlikely Savior
Despite the fact that Gideon does not fit the expected image of a Cavalier, Harrow chooses Gideon to be her sword and protector.
Despite the many openings Gideon has to make Harrow pay for the pain she caused her, she remains loyal to her
Trust
Harrow realizes that she cannot face the lyctor trials without Gideon, and places her trust in her
Christians are told they must place their trust in jesus in order to reach salvation
Purifying Water
Acts 2:38
Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Harrow confesses her sins to Gideon and puts herself at her mercy
Gideon forgives Harrow totally and completely, she baptises her
One Flesh
Mark 10:8
and the two shall become one flesh; so they are no longer two, but one flesh.
“The imagery and symbolism of marriage is applied to Christ and the body of believers known as the church. The church is comprised of those who have trusted in Jesus Christ as their personal Savior and have received eternal life. Christ, the Bridegroom, has sacrificially and lovingly chosen the church to be His bride” (x)
Ephesians 5:25-26
25 gHusbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and hgave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by ithe washing of water jwith the word,
They take the vow of necro and cav, one flesh one end
Gideon’s forgiveness of Harrow is reaffirmed
Harrow risks her life to stay and fight with Gideon, even if it means her death and thus the destruction of her death. Her love for Gideon is now greater than her love for the Body.
The Sacrifice
John 19:34
Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water.
They will look on the one they have pierced'" (John 19:36–37).
Gideon chooses to die for Harrow, death by piercing
and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
In order to complete the lyctor process, Harrow both physically and spiritually consumes Gideon
Because of Gideon’s sacrifice, Harrow attains eternal life at the right hand of god
The Tomb
The Resurrection
1On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women came to the tomb, bringing the spices they had prepared. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus
Harrow turns her body into a tomb for Gideon, a tomb fashioned after that on the Ninth
Resurrection on the Third Day
Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. Luke 24:46-47
“So many months had passed: and yet, at the same time, she had only lost Gideon Nav three days ago. It was the morning of the third day in a universe without her cavalier: it was the morning of the third day—and all the back of her brain could say, in exquisite agonies of amazement, was: She is dead. I will never see her again.” (HTN 374)
Just in case you missed this important piece of information, Muir repeats it three times.
Go, and tell them, then, that he that was dead is alive, and lives for evermore, and has the keys of death and the grave,"
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Devotional Hours Within the Bible
by J.R. Miller
The Visit to Nazareth (Luke 4:16-30)
Christ never forgot the place where He had spent His childhood years. We are not given many facts of His life there. Nothing indicates that there was anything unusual in the story of the thirty years He spent there. The more we think of His life at Nazareth as simply natural, without anything unusual - the nearer shall we come to the true picture of the boy and young man - who grew up in the lowly village of Nazareth. Our passage today tells of His visit to His old home after He had been away for many months.
"He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up." It was not an easy place for Jesus to visit. Everybody knew Him. He had lived there for thirty years. He had been playmate and schoolmate with the children of His own age. He had been a carpenter, doing work for many years in the shop and about the town. The young men of Nazareth thought themselves as good as He was, and were not in any mood to receive instruction from Him. It is easy for us to understand the prejudice and envy with which people listened to Jesus, as He spoke to them that day in their synagogue.
There are some lessons to be taken, however, from our Lord's example in thus going back to Nazareth. One is that we ought to seek the good of our own neighbors and friends. Many young men go away from plain country or village homes, and in other and wider spheres rise to prominence and influence. Such ought not in their eminence, to forget their old home. They owe much to it. It is pleasant to hear of rich men giving libraries or establishing hospitals or doing other noble things for the town in which they were born. Among our first obligations, is that which we owe to our old friends and neighbors .
Another lesson is, that as young people - we ought to live so carefully that when we grow up - we may be able to go back to our old home and, in the midst of those who have know us all our life, witness for God. There are some men, good and great now; who's preaching would have but small effect where they were brought up - because of the way they lived during their youth. Sins of youth - break the power of life's testimonies in later years. A blameless youth-time, makes one's words strong in mature days.
"And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath Day, and stood up to read" (Luke 4:16). Here we have a glimpse of our Lord's religious habits. From childhood, His custom had been to attend the synagogue service on the Sabbath. Here are good shoe prints for young people to set their feet in. The time to begin to attend church-is in youth. Habits formed then - stay with us all our life. If our custom is to stay away then from church services, we will be very apt to keep up that custom when we get older. On the other hand, if we go to church regularly from childhood, the custom will become so wrought into our life - that in after years we shall not incline to stay away. And the value of such a habit is very great.
"He opened the book, and found the place where it was written." The book was part of the Old Testament. Some people have the feeling that the Old Testament is dry and uninteresting. But we see here what precious things Jesus found in it, that day in the synagogue. The passage which He quoted drips with the sweetness and tenderness of divine love. It is a great honeycomb of gospel grace !
Some men were about to tear down an old frame house, long unoccupied. When they began to remove the outer boarding, they found a mass of honey. As they removed the boards at different points they discovered the whole side of the house, between the weather boarding and the plastering, was filled with honey. People regard the Old Testament as an old, worn-out book, a mere relic of old ceremonial days. But when they begin to open it - they find honey, and as they look into it at other points they find that all the passages, in among the histories, the chronicles of war, and the descriptions of ceremonial rites - are full of sweetest honey! Here is a bit of dripping honey-comb, and there are hundreds more, which are just as rich. We do not know what we lose - when we do not study the Old Testament.
"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed ." These are the special classes of people - to whom Jesus was sent. What a picture this is of humanity! Some people ridicule what the bible says about Adam and Eve's FALL. They tell us there never was a fall, and that the world is all right. They talk eloquently about the grandeur of human life. But this eighteenth verse certainly looks very much like the picture of a very bad ruin. Read the description - poor, prisoners, blind, oppressed. There is not much grandeur in that. Anyone who goes about and looks honestly at life - knows that the picture is not over-drawn. On every hand we see the wreck and ruin caused by sin. Then suffering and sorrow follow, and hearts and lives are crushed and bruised!
But there is something here a great deal brighter than this sad picture. Light breaks on the ruin - as we read that it was to repair such moral desolation as we see here that Jesus came. He came "to preach good news to the poor; to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed." He saw in all these ruins of humanity, something that by His grace - He could make beautiful enough for heaven and glory. Christ is a restorer. There are men who take old, dimmed, effaced, almost destroyed pictures - and restore them until they appear nearly as beautiful as when they first came from the artist's hand. So Christ comes to ruined souls, and by the power of His love and grace - He restores them until they wear His own beauty in the presence of God!
"To preach the acceptable year of the Lord." For the Jews this "acceptable year" closed with the condemnation of the Messiah. Jesus stood on Olivet and looked down upon the city and wept over it and said, "If you had known, even you, the things which belong unto your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes!" (Luke 10:42). When He spoke these words, amid the rush of tears and with loud outcry of grief, "the acceptable year" closed. After that - the doom hung over the beautiful city, which in forty years burst upon it in all its woe and terribleness. This is history.
But there is another way to look at this matter. There is an "acceptable year" for each soul. It begins when Christ first comes to us and offers salvation. It continues while He stands at our door and knocks. It closes when we drive Him away from our door by utter and final rejection - or when death comes upon us unsaved and hurries us away forever from the world of mercy. Since the past is gone and there is no certain future to anyone, the "acceptable year" to us all is NOW. Shall we allow it to pass and close - while we remain unsaved?
"Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing." Seven hundred years before, had the words been written. Now Jesus reads them and says to the people: "I am the One to whom the description refers! I am the One the prophet meant!" The whole Old Testament was full of Christ; and the New Testament is full of fulfillments of the Old Testament.
It is pleasant, too, to take this particular passage and show how Christ indeed fulfilled in His life and ministry - the mission which the prophet marked out for Him. He preached to the poor, He healed the broken - hearted. Wherever He went, the sorrowing and the troubled flocked about Him. As a magnet draws steel filings to itself - out of a heap of rubbish; so did the heart of Christ draw to Him the needy, the sad, the suffering, and the oppressed. He was the friend of sinners. He brought deliverance to sin's captives, setting them free and breaking their chains. He opened blind eyes ; not only blind natural eyes to see the beautiful things of this world - but also blind spiritual eyes to see spiritual things. Then He lifted the yoke off the crushed and oppressed, inviting all the weary to Himself to find rest. His whole life was simply a filling out of this outline sketch !
They "rose up, and thrust Him out of the city, and led Him unto the brow of the hill… that they might cast Him down." Their envy grew into murderous rage. We see first, the danger of allowing envious feelings to stay in our hearts; they are sure to grow into greater bitterness, and may lead us into open and terrible sin. We should instantly check every thought or motion of envy, anger or hatred - and cast it out of our heart.
This act shows also the natural hatred of God which is in human hearts. We talk severely of the Jews' rejection of their Messiah - but this opposition to God is not exclusively a Jewish quality. Is it not the same with all of us? So long as the divine teaching runs along in lines that are pleasing to us, we assent, and applaud the beauty of God's truth. But when the teaching falls against our own tendencies and dispositions and opinions - we wince, and too often declare our disbelief. They tried to kill Him; is not the rejection of many people now just as violent? They would kill Him if they could!
His word was with authority. His words are always with authority. We remember how all things hearkened to His words and obeyed them. Diseases fled at His command. The winds and waves were quieted and hushed at His word. The water changed to wine at His bidding. The dead in their graves heard His call and answered. Evil spirits owned His lordship. Nothing for a moment resisted His authority. Shall we not take Christ's Word as the rule of our faith and of our conduct? Shall we not yield to His authority?
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Romeo
Summary: “I should have left you with the Falzone when I had the chance.” It was the threat that hung between in the air.
Rating: MA - Content is only suitable for mature adults. May contain explicit language and adult themes.
Words: 2100
Notes: Here be lemons. It is even rather fluffy to the standards I am setting myself up with.
“Don’t.” Liliana whispered. “Please don’t. Don’t do this to me, Yang, I beg of you.”
Yang slowly pulled away his hand, his arms were now loosely hanging by his sides, a devastated expression on him as his eyes wandered across the marked tearstains down her face.
He watched her leave their living quarters towards the washing closet, as the stuffed panda he ordered for her so many years ago watched with that empty happy smile as the only witness to the tragedy beginning to brew over his life. He sunk down onto the couch, head buried in his hands, a dry, foreign hiccup left his lips.
Yang could not believe himself the words he had screamed at her, just seconds ago.
Regret began to fill him, his throat was tightening up, it felt as if somebody was cutting off his airway, tightly squeezing his skin, crushing his windpipe, making him suffer, for the profane words he did not really believe in that had left his mouth.
It was as if he was two people. Yang and Mao. He was Yang, but he wanted to be Mao. In the end, if he was absolutely honest, he was just one deeply flawed person who did not know how to administer the salvation assigned to him.
Hiccups rumbled through her as Lili grasped the sink in the private bathroom. Her knuckles were turning white. She was watching herself through the mirror, she was a mess, not being able to let go of his threat.
“I should have left you with the Falzone when I had the chance.” It was the threat that hung between in the air.
The way he had so aggressively screamed it refused to leave her mind. His eyes had been dangerous, pitch-black, empty pupils were staring at her, watching her crumble, fall apart as he kept on screaming and screaming. She needed some time to breathe, to calm down and think the whole scenario over.
Their fighting had been going on for weeks by now. Every time they would visit Hong Kong to pay tribute to Liu Huang Hui, all hell would break loose. Yang would switch his focus onto ‘something important’ and would leave her hanging and turn his back on her, as if he was a completely new person.
She had been going through thick and thin with him, had picked him off the floor, had pulled him out of his darkest holes. They had been for years by now, and Lili probably should be used to all the stresses and strains by now.
Lili would hide away in their bedroom, desperate for some time alone. She could not get herself to talk to him. Every time she would think about him, bile would rise in her throat, tears were welling up in her eyes, making her cry out over and over again.
She was not noticing that he was sitting across the door to their bedroom, out in the hallway. He wanted to clear his own head out in the roof, let the lights of the big city calm him down, but he could not find on himself to tear himself out from there.
Tears would threaten to fall from his eyes as he listened to the sound of her pained crying. He was suffering just as much, but for complete other reasons. This had been the first time Yang had felt terribly anxious, scared that she would finally give up, finally realizing how bad of a person he was, that she would finally turn her back on him.
He knew that it would be on him this time to make things right, so he did the only thing he could think of, Yang began to roam the small library his wife amassed over the years they spent together.
He had stared at the foreign volumes for hours on end, trying to come up with any idea. A tight smile would tug on his lips as he had finally come up with something that he could do. Something he could do to try to convey a beautiful memory Yang was trying to project with some literary work he might be intellectually invested, but it was emotionally beyond him.
The copy he ordered was decorated with a lithography, shipped over from the northern part of her home country. It was resembling of the small clearing where they had spent the night once, fleeing from wolves and mafiosos, finely imprinted in linen paper and elegant typeface, something that she would certainly enjoy and treasure, more so than those cheap copies she ratted out into their bases over the years, under Lan’s reluctant auspices.
Peace offering in one hand and the ever-present pipe on the other, he sauntered into the bedroom as if he was the Emperor of China and threw the book on the bed, just next to where she was curled into herself, letting the tears fall through her face freely.
Lili looked up at him and to the package next to her. “What is this?”
“Give me my Romeo, and, when he shall die, take him and cut him out in little stars…” He was murmuring her favourite lines out of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. “And he will make the face of heaven so fine, that all the world will be in love with night and pay no worship to the garish sun.”
She sighed. “What is the meaning of this, Yang?”
“This is not my name.” Her husband barked.
“What is the meaning of this, Yang?” The woman repeated.
“This is not my name.” He insisted, his rage raising and raising in response.
“Very well, Mao. As you like.” Liliana sneered. “What is this? Reading material for when you ship me back to the Vatican?”
“You will not be going anywhere without me.” He responded. “Not now. Not ever.”
She sighed, and finally raised her face to look at him.
“I can still remember the day we met for the first time.” Her voice was hoarse from all the crying. “You never deluded me, you never tricked me. I always knew you were violent, moody and nothing like the romantic heroes of the books I read in Church. Nevertheless, I was pretty sure you loved me in your way, but I am not that certain now. What happened, Mao? What did I do wrong?”
“You did nothing wrong.” He responded, looking out the window to the nothingness in the damp alley where they lived. “Nothing went awry, and no changes in course were made.”
Lili walked towards him, her naked feet were tapping against the wooden floor, she grasped his hand and sunk down in his lap, nuzzling her head against the crook of his neck.
“I love you.” She whispered, hugging him lightly.
“For what matters, I am sorry.” He responded, voice low and calm, with a clipped tone, a rare feat for him.
Liliana placed her pointer finger onto his lips, silencing her husband. “Show me, prove to me, how much you love me.”
His yellow, feline eyes were staring at her, burning right into her soul, trying to swallow down the guilt that was eating him alive.
Yang carried her towards the bedroom, smiling down at her, he moved some of her hair out of her face, slowly dipping his head down to kiss her. The loving kiss soon turned into something else, something much more passionate, fuelled by their rage, their sadness, that had been clouding their minds for the past days.
The standoffish man pressed his forehead against hers, his hands were moving along the sides of the hideously pink cheongsam she was currently wearing, expertly working through the clasps of the piece, as he mentally tried to assure himself of her continued presence close to him.
A shaky breath left Liliana’s lungs, he began to unbutton the undershirt, kissing her skin every time he popped open another button.
He attached his mouth onto her boobs, taking his time as if he was exploring her body for the first time, Yang pressed loving kisses all over her chest, her eyes fluttered close the moment he finally sucked on her nipples, making tingles erupt in her lower belly.
“Beautiful.” The criminal whispered against her skin, moving his hands down to her panties, he rubbed her clit through the fabric, slowly teasing her.
He did not want to rush things this time. It was best if he took his sweet, sweet time with everything.
“Please, Mao.” She bemoaned. His rings felt cold against her hot skin.
Slowly, he pulled her soaked panties down her legs and kissed down her upper body, to her hipbones, where he placed his hands.
He ran his tongue across her clit, circling it, eyes finding hers, a faint smile began to spread on her lips. She reached her hands out and tangled them in his fiery red hair, getting pulled back into the pleasure he was currently providing her with.
Yang plunged two fingers into her heat, pumping them in and out of her as he sucked on her sensitive nub, one moan after the other fell from her lips.
Her release was growing ever closed, as Yang curled his fingers upwards, teasing her sweet spot.
“Does that feel good, Liliana?” He groaned out, his pants were getting tighter, he could not get enough of her.
She could only moan a small “yes” tugging on his roots, telling him that she was close, her orgasm would wash over her any time soon now. His name fell from her lips, the familiar warmth began to spread through her, the knot in her belly exploded for the first time that night, leaving her breathless for a few moments.
His eyes would not leave hers. Yang pulled his shirt over his head, exposing his toned upper body to her green eyes, he ripped his trousers and underwear down his legs, his length was standing proud and tall, throbbing in his touch.
He crawled up her body and ran the tip of his length along her folds a few times, coating himself with her slickness. Lili grasped his necklace and pulled him down for a kiss, moaning against his lips as he sunk his length into her heat.
Yang completely filled her, she could feel every inch of him, buried in her heat, fully stretching her. He wrapped her legs around his middle, slowly pulling out of her before he thrusted his hips against hers.
His eyes were closed, he was building up the speed of his thrusts. He did not want this to end too soon, this was not about him, it was all about her and the love he felt for her, even if he did not care to admit, even if it hurt some survival instinct that he fostered over many years in unforgiving streets all around the world.
“Look at me.” Lili whispered. She was still holding onto his necklace to dear life, and managed to bring his face closer to her, as if she was going to share an unspeakable secret. “I love you too.”
A small smile began to spread on his lips, his hips were thrusting against hers more easily by now, excitement was flooding through the both of them, relishing in the feeling of being as close as possible.
“Faster, please, Mao.” She moaned.
Her toes were curled, he began to put pressure onto her clit with his thumb while he was pounding into her.
He kept on calling out her name, one hand was placed on her right thigh, the other one next to her head, her walls were clenching around him, trying to pull him even closer.
Lili tugged on his necklace once again, pushing his lips against hers, deep moans rumbled through her as her release washed upon her. Her whole body was tingling, the heavenly feeling overcame her for the second time that evening, a tear fell from her eye. She truly loved him and would never let him go, no matter what.
Yang pressed his forehead against her neck, moaning into her skin. It took him a few more thrusts until he released himself into her heat, his sweat was dripping down onto her skin, his hands had left some marks on her thighs, displaying the deep emotions he had felt a few moments ago.
“I am sorry.” Yang breathed out and pulled her into his tattooed chest, his fingers were dancing across her skin, trying to remind him, that this was indeed real, she had forgiven him and, once again, had not left him on his own.
*_*_*_*_*
Shakespeare in Hong Kong Masterlist
Piofiore Masterlist
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A story of Sammy stumbling upon siren head?
Summary: The studio wasn't the only place hiding the lurking horrors of the world.
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[[MORE]]
Freedom had come with a lot of existential dread and lingering doubts. It hadn't been the oh so sweet respite that everyone had coveted so much, not when they were still abominable creatures made of cursed ink (and in some cases machinery). Still, for all that they'd worried, Henry had pulled through and prevailed.
He'd not only gifted them their salvation from Joey's nightmarish dream, but also offered them a way to live unafraid in a world they no longer belonged in. He gave them a house, food, clothes, a life worth living.
Never once did he ask for anything in return. A true loyal and kind friend to those who desperately needed such a charitable heart.
"You don't need to repay me. I'm only doing what's right, and besides I got that house after my uncle died... It never really felt right to move out of town with Linda and the girls, and I never knew what I was going to do with it." He'd humbly dismissed any offers to repay his kindness. "You all need a safe place where you can recover and slowly reacquaint with normalcy without anyone judging or fearing you. The location is perfect."
And it was. An isolated corner of a vast forest, with nearly no signs of civilization. Easy for Henry to check up on them since he knew where to go to reach it, but out of the way enough that not even hikers came by often.
It helped that it had a bit of a... Dark reputation. Missing cases, strange sightings, and creepy sounds in the night. A deterrent for sane people with a yellow streak.
For someone like Susie and Allison who looked human enough to pass off as such if provided with an appropriate disguise, it was a bit of a hassle. Grocery shopping (when they were in the mood to be seen by the oblivious folk in the nearest town) took longer due to such a long trek.
For others like Tom and Buddy who were living cartoon characters it was a more comfortable experience. They could go out and feel the sun upon their skin without fear of what may happen if they were spotted.
And then lastly, for beings like Sammy, the Searchers, Butcher Gang, and for Norman, it was both a stark reminder of their inhumanity, and a blissful respite from the crippling dissonant thoughts that made them oh so prone to violent outbursts.
In the woods there was no one they could hurt if they lost their senses (which was not as common a thing as it once was, but still something the Projectionist suffered with on the regular). In the woods there was peaceful silence where they could wade through the madness and regain their footing. In the woods they could almost be their former selves.
Granted this was a double-edged sword on one regard: The Projectionist tended to wander far and not recall how to come back.
If Norman ended up somehow stumbling back into society, there would be trouble. Which is why Sammy was assigned to follow him every time he felt like going for one of his "little walks".
At first the once-music director had scoffed and been incredibly annoyed at being saddled with such a responsibility. He was not in a capacity to look after himself, much less a 7, nearly 8, foot tall half-ink half-machine man that could easily render him into ribbons if he set him off. Norman's transition from coherent sentient thoughts to downright feral and highly aggressive behaviour was too unpredictable for someone who's memories tended to evade him easily.
But then, as pointed out by Allison, Susie wouldn't be able to calm him because she knew neither sign language nor Morse code (which he'd learned specifically from Norman when he was still human just for fun), and Allison herself was not overly close to him so her presence would only distress him further.
When he'd still tried to refuse, Tom had resorted to threats which he'd returned in kind. In the end it was the pleading looks of both Jack and the rest of the band that got him to relent. But not before barking at them to never say he wasn't a charitable and patient man (things he really wasn't, considering his short fuse and unwillingness to socialize when he was in a particularly sour mood).
Once he'd committed to the task, Sammy found that the sounds of nature soothed him. Watching after the Projectionist wasn't too bad either, as he thought the large monstrosity looked quite happy as it wandered aimlessly, occasionally looking up at the expanse of darkening skies. Sunsets seemed to spark something more human in Norman. Got him to sign more and sometimes vocalize his words (as painfully gritting to the ear as that may be). It reminded Sammy of... Of times long past. Ones where he'd consider this brute as a bright and very accommodating (if not a little annoying at times) friend.
A friend he dearly missed even, for no matter how much they tried, Norman would never go back to being who he was before the studio chewed him up and spat him back out as something some would consider a dubiously smart animal.
The peace also sparked something in Sammy himself. It made him feel more grounded, more like himself, to the point where his form would shift accordingly. Because their bodies were reacting to their slow recoveries.
Over time a few Searchers had slowly become Lost Ones, and a few Lost Ones had begun transitioning into human forms. There was always something a little off and cartoonish about them, but it was progress nontheless. People were remembering who they once we're, and that was more than they'd ever accomplished in that hellhole.
Sammy sometimes could see his true face reflected back by a puddle or larger body of water, but it was a fleeting thing.
At times he could even feel his unruly curls brushing against his neck and shoulders, but they weren't the dirty blond he'd remembered. They were an inky black that upset him slightly, but better than the shiny bald head he'd had for so many years. Less saddening than the yellow glow of eyes that should have been a soft hazel, and much less startling than the sharpness of his teeth. Somehow he always got the nose right, which was adding salt to injury considering he couldn't regenerate his pinkies.
The Projectionist's walks were moments of introspection. Ones where he was sure he'd be able to get his true form back, even if slightly altered.
So imagine his annoyance when one such moment was marred by his selfish distraction...
He wasn't entirely sure when he'd lost sight of Norman, or for how long he'd spaced out just staring at his reconstituted face on the nearest reflective surface, but the moment he noted just how dark it was Sammy knew he'd fucked up.
They'd been wandering for hours and he'd been so absentmindedly worrying over faded memories that he'd just let the Projectionist wander off to the nearest flower patch to marvel at all the pretty colors (prettier than old sepia and inky tones that had made their horrid existence oh so much duller). He'd gotten so stuck in his own head that he'd never noticed his charge moving off to explore further and further into uncharted territory.
They'd never gotten so close to the mountains, and now? Now Sammy was sure he'd never be able to find the Projectionist again. He'd failed Norman.
Something which he absolutely refused to let happen. If not out of pride, then out of shame. He'd rather die than return to the others without Polk in tow, knowing they'd add it to the list of things that made him a genuinely horrid person (aside from ritualistic murder and allowing Joey to manipulate him to the point of idolizing a false god). That wouldn't do.
Sammy wouldn't be able to live with the scorn. So he trekked further to where he assumed the hulking ink creature had gone.
Henry had told them stories. The ones about the people going missing. Freaky tales that had unseen horrors lurking amidst the trees and skulking in shadows. One such creature he seeked (for the Projectionist had become one of these fabled cryptids just by being an out of place being in the woods), but the others he'd heard of, although fabricated, were mysterious and spooky to him.
Having such shluck looping in the forefront of his mind like a bad film reel was troublesome. It made him hesitant the moment he heard anything that sounded out of place.
Steeling his nerves was hard. Despite being made of ink, his heart was very much still human, so he felt instinctively fearful of the unknown. Those silly stories were genuinely scaring him and he resented Henry for being such a good narrator.
With every step further into the mountainside he hoped to see the light of Norman's lens, and hear the clicking of the projector he had for a head.
He was not expecting to hear... What sounded like an emergency broadcast.
It was so sudden and confusing that it made the ex-music director pause in his tracks. An echoing call that spanned miles, like it was being projected from up high.
Looking around his surroundings he saw nothing out of place. Just rows upon rows of trees and a watch tower in the distance further up north.
Turning his head more slowly yielded the same results. Nothing that could broadcast that loudly in sight... Until he saw it...
At first glance it looked like an old siren. Rough and weathered, rusty looking from a distance. Very strange to be found this far away from civilization. But then he really took the time to stare at it. Noted just how off the towering thing was, and then realized... Those sirens hadn't any speakers. They had teeth.
As soon as his mind picked up on this very fact, he saw everything else. And then, before he could exclaim in terror, he was up in the air held in a massive far-too-human-looking hand, and being pulled closer to said teeth.
Sammy screamed as he felt the pain of being bitten into, upper torso pulled into this nightmarish thing's eager maw, only to then be unceremoniously spat out and tossed on the ground. The shock and pain made him deconstruct into a puddle and, to then aggravate the issue further, the beast stepped down on him as if insulted by the vile taste of ink.
Sammy didn't much care. He lost consciousness soon after.
When Sammy came to, the sun was rising. He was groggy from the pain and confusion of being violently assaulted by something straight out of a Lovecraftian novel, and the intense light washing over his eyes didn't help.
Wait... Light?
Blinking away inky tears, Sammy found Norman staring down at him with a posture that read clearly of concern. The poor thing had likely found Sammy's puddle form and been fretting ever since.
The composer thanked whatever god was out there that the monster that attacked him hadn't found the Projectionist. He wouldn't have had the sense to run.
"H-home. Let's go home..." He whimpered weakly, despite the creature before him being deaf and unable to read his lips properly considering he currently had none. The pitiful look of him must have clued the bigger ink being, however, as Norman scooped him up with ease and began the trek back. Sammy directed him, mostly through pointing when he seemed unsure, all the while keeping an eye for that... Siren-Head thing that thankfully found him too disgusting to consume.
The one perk of his abominable state...
Needless to say, they were never coming back to these parts. Not as long as he allowed it. Some things were better off left undisturbed.
Because, as it turned out, the studio wasn't the only place hiding the lurking horrors of the world...
#Eps Writes:#Bendy and the Ink Machine#BATIM#Sammy Lawrence#Norman Polk#The Projectionist#Siren Head
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NAME. Anemos ( Lincoln Donato & Grace Tate-Starling )
AGE & BIRTH DATE. 3000+ & Unknown
GENDER & PRONOUNS. Nonbinary & He/She/They
SPECIES. Oneiroi
OCCUPATION. Photographer / Socialite
FACE CLAIM. Regé-Jean Page / Phoebe Tonkin
BIOGRAPHY
( tw: servitude, death, murder ) Anemos does not remember the exact time of their creation. Too many years have passed, and too much has happened for it to remain of relevance in their mind. If asked, they might simply shrug their shoulders, and pretend as if the matter was of no consequence. To give off the appearance of youth has always served them well, as to be underestimated by those around them. But in reality, the oneiroi has seen millenniums come and go, the rise and fall of kings and nations alike. Though created by the hands of Nyx, perhaps it is of some humor that the first solid memory they have is of Zeus. Summoned before the mighty God, Anemos was given the order to carry a dream to the Greek king Agamemnon, urging him into battle against the Trojans. They traveled to his tent outside of Troy in the evening, taking the face of the king’s most trusted advisor, and with them they brought the promise of the Gods’ favor from Mount Olympus, spinning it like a web inside of the king’s mind while he slept. It was with this dream that Anemos played a hand in the fall of Troy, giving them a taste of the power that they could wield over the minds of mortals. And yet, once their job was done, the Gods fell silent to the oneiroi. No more instruction came at the time, left to their own devices to wander the world freely without a feeling of true purpose.
It was fun, for a time. The influence they could hold on others was a source of entertainment, as they shifted through faces and identities as often as it pleased them. But a life alone is a life of loneliness, and Anemos was not immune to those feelings. Even as they enjoyed their revelry, there was still the feeling of being incomplete. So, in the absences of their creator, the Gods, and any others of their kind, Anemos began to look for companionship with the creatures of the earth. They began to make their presence known in the world, and became sought out by many kings and commoners alike for their abilities. Divination in particular was heavily desired, the mortal pull to know a man’s own future all too irresistible, though in seeking for themselves, the answers they received would only lead to a worse outcome as the people tried to escape their fate. The truly clever ones were careful with their questions, worded deliberately and under the promise of facing whatever the future may hold, no matter what answer they were given. It was these people that Anemos liked best, and often spent time in their courts of their own free will and desire.
One such court was that of Ramesses II, later to be known as Ramesses the Great. They came to him early in his reign, already a known oracle in the land, and the pharaoh was quick to extend an invitation to his palace. A bond of mutual respect and friendship was born between the pair, and Anemos stayed in his counsel until the end of his days. They followed him into every one of his Syrian campaigns, and cautioned against waging open war with the Hittites, instead suggesting to form a peace with the other king. And thus the first known peace treaty to exist was drafted, creating a harmony between borders that would last until the end of his reign. Already a great leader in his own right, with Anemos by his side, Ramesses became the greatest known and most widely celebrated pharaoh of all time. When death finally came for him at ninety years of age, Anemos still remained, and saw him through to the next life. It was the first time in their immortal life that Anemos experienced the feelings of grief and loss, an unexpected attachment to mortality that perhaps made them softer to the human species. Unfortunately, not all humans were so deserving.
Indeed, while the wise ones courted the favor of an oneiroi, the greedy ones desired their power for their own use and no one else’s. It was a mistake, a slip of the tongue in the room with the wrong person to hear, where word got out that the talisman Anemos kept was the source of their essence. Staying in Rome at the time, as a guest of the Emperor Septimius Severus, they had been in the area for a while, watching in amusement as the country struggled to regain its footing during the Year of the Five Emperors. They believed themselves to be safe in the Roman court, to wield their influence as they saw fit, and while Septimius held a great respect for the oneiroi’s abilities, his son was not so swayed. Caracalla craved Anemos’s power, saw it as an opportunity for himself to take charge, and sought to control them absolutely. Once he took possession of their talisman, they were bound under his will, forced to carry out his whims. In over a millennium of existence, it was the first true experience of betrayal for the oneiroi, an act that left them filled with rage.
Though they were incapable of defying the man, that did not mean they were powerless. An angry oneiroi is a dangerous thing, and Anemos was not one to take forced servitude lying down. They began to plant the seeds of doubt and paranoia inside Caracalla’s mind, exacerbated by the death of his father in a military campaign in Caledonia. Forced to share his reign with his brother Geta, he was all too quick to turn to the spirit’s divination for solutions to his problems, which Anemos was happy to provide. This coupled along with every foul idea planted through his head in a dream, Caracalla quickly began a downward spiral into dictatorial behavior. Indeed, it was the spirit who gave him the idea to kill Geta to remove him as an obstacle, along with every single man who supported his brother. A great many people suffered for this, many of them innocent, yet Anemos felt no remorse. If they were trapped and suffering under his thumb, then so should everyone else be as well.
After the murder of his brother, Caracalla took to the road, never to return to Rome. Though his mother Julia Domna requested for the spirit to stay in the city with her, the emperor refused, and Anemos was forced along with him. And yet it proved to be an unwise decision, for instead of favor, he only brought madness. Each time he pressed upon the oneiroi for knowledge, they would use it to twist his desires, and stroke his cruelty into a man that would become so infamously tyrannical. They encouraged his obsession with becoming the new Alexander the Great, which led to his persecution of Aristotelian philosophers, and also whispered a dream of the massacre and plunder of the city of Alexandria when the citizens mocked him in a satirical play, all the while turning him into someone who the world would not tolerate. When they saw his end at the hands of one of his own soldiers through divination, they pushed him into war with Parthia by presenting it as the only option to escape his fate, but in reality he only sealed it. It was only after that soldier stabbed the emperor to death on the road to Carrhae that Anemos was able to reclaim their talisman, and with it they took off running, never to look back.
The reality of being forced into servitude for so long shook Anemos, and they became determined to never allow it to happen again. No longer did they exist so openly among mortal men, hiding their talents in fear of losing control of their talisman again. Determined that they would rather die than live through that again, they began to search for a method to ensure it’s security. It was during this time that they finally came into contact with one of their own. Another oneiroi, likewise alone in the world, it had been a bit of a salvation for Anemos. Immediately bonded, the two stuck together like glue for over one hundred years, and fell in love in the time in-between. But fate would not allow them to stay together, as their lover’s tricks came back to haunt them in the form of an aggrieved former lord who had lost everything due to the other oneiroi’s machinations. They were outnumbered with weapons of iron, and though the pair fought back, eventually the man got his hands on their love’s talisman and shattered it to pieces with the swing of a mighty axe. Anemos just barely escaped with their own life, wounded and heartbroken, and went deep into hiding as they mourned for their fallen.
Nearly a century later, when they emerged from their shell of living, it was with a renewed energy to never let themselves fall victim to their talisman. Though it took time and effort, first to find one strong enough and then to make sure they were trustworthy, eventually Anemos sought the services of a witch to help them. And so the talisman was bound on a chain, and laced around their neck falling halfway to their chest, spelled to never be removed by a forceful hand. The chain is unbreakable, so long as the spell itself stays unbroken, and Anemos has never taken it off in over the five hundred years to follow.
For a while, when the world was still vastly unexplored, it was easy to take the face of others and have none be the wiser. But as the world became more modern, and hiding became more difficult, Anemos began to see the benefit of not only stealing faces, but also lives. They would insert themselves in the social circle of their target, learn what was necessary information to impersonate them, before promptly killing them and taking their entire identity. It’s a system they’ve perfected over the last one hundred years or so, giving them access to things otherwise unobtainable.
The two most recent victims whose lives Anemos has taken up are Grace Tate-Starling and Lincoln Donato. Grace was an Australian socialite, daughter of a former model and a billionaire whose family came from old money. Slipping into her life had been all too easy, and when she disappeared off to a “Greek Vacation” no one even questioned it. Lincoln on the other hand had been a traveling European photographer, not of great renown but considered to be an up-and-comer by the community. A loner in life who had little more than his camera, motorcycle, and website, there’d been hardly a more perfect choice for Anemos to take. With both their new appearances in hand, they made their way to Corinth Bay, to the pull of the veil in search of any others of their kind. For even though they had been burned by their desire for connection before, the feeling of loneliness never truly abated, except for the time when around one of their own species. If they could find any more like themselves, or a way to make more, then perhaps they could finally be happy again.
PERSONALITY
+ convivial, loyal, persevering
- vengeful, amoral, shortsighted
PLAYED BY ABBY. CDT. She/Her.
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So on the topic of a dark Carlisle Cullen... I have thoughts. Inspired by a post made by @charlieswanismyrealdad but not quite the same, so I didn't want to hijack, but I'd never have thought it up on my own!
A parallel timeline in which Carlisle Cullen embraces the monster his father had claimed his kind to be. A Carlisle who couldn't see the point in trying to be otherwise, who retains his complexity, his softness, but loses sight of the principles for which he honed them. A Carlisle faced with an eternity of crippling loneliness, far more devastating than any mortal isolation he'd faced before, and turns to God, not pleading for consolation but demanding of answers. He had been a servant, faithful - and he is to be condemned? He receives no explanation, no moral justification, in text or sermon, and so finding nothing in the religious, comes to understand the divine as something else. Something divorced completely from faith and human decency. Something entirely too like hunger.
He doesn't starve himself, not long enough to find a rabbit. Perhaps, instead, he happens upon a widower, seeking isolation in the woods as a balm to his unending grief. His death is a mercy and, choking between his teeth, the man gurgles out a prayer.
And from there, very little changes - but everything is different.
Carlisle spends his same years in solitude, pushing down the emptiness in favor of cultivating a character of kindness, of gentleness, of humanity - a mask he yearns to inhabit fully but rejects on behalf of his nature. He spends his time with the Volturi, then, and is dumbfounded - and amused - to find that playing demure can disarm the great Italian coven, can get him a seat at their power-laden table, a place among their mystical ranks. He is all the more entertained with the fact that he does not want it. It is so easy for them, to find, to take, to overpower, with their gifts. There is no grace or nuance to it. Their technique is as gaudy and grotesque as the baroque buildings they've appropriated. They do not know how to survive - only conquer.
Just as in the original canon, he cannot bring himself to stay, but this time, when he thinks, I am better than this, it is followed by I can be greater than this. This time, it is not his principles that elevate him, but his ambition. There is no place for me here, however much I admire you and what you've built, he thinks, as he spares Aro a soft smile, then fondly grasps his hand in farewell. As he lets go, and he turns away, he sees a glimmer of wistful resignation in the man's red eyes, so like his own, yet not at all. Aro's gaze is sharp and penetrating, where Carlisle's is soft and curious. Your strength will be your undoing. He leaves with a plan. He says farewell to the Italians and greets eternity as an old companion, as an ally, as a weapon.
And then he waits. And he travels. And he slinks into Chicago, and finds a dying woman on her bed, a mother who begs him, "Please, Doctor, save my boy." He sees the ferocity in her eyes, and thinks perhaps. He looks at the redheaded boy on his hospital, and gets a feeling, and thinks yes. He returns to her side, as she dies, and reassures her. He tells her that her son will not just be saved - he will be granted divinity. The relief in her smile - muddled only briefly by confusion before she fades - is misplaced, but he has told the truth as he knows it. This is the only kind of divinity he believes in anymore - the kind that comes with falling.
Carlisle is surprised, upon the boy's awakening. He is gifted. The boy can read minds without even a glance in the owner's direction. He complains of the noise - of knowing too much. This was not a part of his plans, but he can adjust. Even those blessed with more can be taught to survive on less.
Esme's creation is another animal entirely - this is no service. This is a work born of more than just a feeling. It is because she makes him feel. His rage at the suffering she has undergone ignites a thirst for justice, for right, that he has subdued for the greater part of many centuries. It burns again like flames licking up his bones - a vampire's only weakness - and he bites because if humanity does not appreciate her, he will take her for himself with pleasure. Esme has faced monsters before, but none so gentle as he, in red eyes and fingers and a white coat. Even with his teeth in her neck, he is soft. He trembles with the effort it takes, but he does it. He changes her, he saves her. He keeps her, and she gives him something precious in return - coven. Edward had been his creation, yes, but only now, looking into her red eyes so like his - red and soft, and curious, with delicate brown lashes that flutter like dragonfly wings - that eternity becomes more than just waiting. And when he sees that gleam - the one that wants for children - he smiles, because theirs will be as strong and gentle and divine as they are.
Edward finds the human responsible for her pain on behalf of both of them, tracks down where he lives, in a small town, in a small house, on a small front porch where he does small, cruel things. No one will miss him, no one who matters or will not be better off for his death. They sneak away from Esme's side during the evening, in each other's company, but it is Carlisle alone who disposes of him. There is so little difference between Aro's stare and that of the man they find - one is red, and the other blue, but otherwise, the same. Sharp, and penetrating, and eager to see others hurt. Carlisle does not drink his blood. He kills him as a man would kill another man. It feels curious, an act both craven and virtuous. For a brief second, as he strangles rather than bites, bruises rather than bleeds, he wishes he could be human, so that it might take as much effort as the task deserves, but to let loose his anger now would mean a quick death and for the first time in an eternity, he wants a body to suffer.
After tonight, he will not kill like this again. Perhaps he never should've.
When the man is dead and he lets go of the corpse, he is alone, and aching. The thoughts he had are too much for poor Edward. He disappears on the night before they can return home. Carlisle tries to tell himself as he runs back, by himself, that the monstrosity of humanity and vampires are different, that one is divine and the other is unseemly. But his mind flickers back to the wives of the Volturi, dulled to a peaceful stupor under the influence of Corin, like chains and collars you cannot see. He thinks of little Jane, no more than a glorified weapon, knowing nothing but pain, to give and receive. He thinks of the many coven's the Volturi has slaughtered and ripped apart, picking and choosing from the remains, not to mention the human lives they've destroyed, even without spilling their blood personally.
Esme greets him alone on the dawn, and they do not speak about what happened. He does not know what he can say. He does not know what to believe - what eternity will bring. He thinks of Edward's mother. Is this the salvation she asked of him? It is too late to ask. It's too late to make another choice. But in Esme's arms, he feels forgiveness, and faith. Perhaps this second life is not divine, but perhaps at each other's side, it can become a form of deliverance.
#carlisle cullen#twilight#twilight saga#carlesme#dark carlisle au#this was NOT HOW I WAS PLANNING THIS TO GO BUT IT DID#carlisle Murdered a guy then looked at me said hey man thats fucked up#i didnt ASK YOU TO KILL HIM DOCTOR#bilight writes#bilight's bs#bilight interacts#bilight's headcanon#bilight's aus
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Part two of : The anchor-Mercy
KlausxOC fanfiction
Warnings : hurt/comfort, rated T just in case ( the link of part one is added)
Unfamiliar but still comfortable and peaceful in away he never managed to feel in the thousand years he lived on this earth.
A beautiful smell coming from the candles she placed on the table beside him, the fireplace made did its role perfectly and the temperature for him was more than fine. He felt her all the night , placing that towel over his forehead and chest. The sound of music she chose mixed with the sound of hummingbird in her chest called heart..
It was heaven. Or maybe just an illusion of it
He never thought of something like that, he never felt that he deserved such kind of care. And again he started to question
*Why*
-“ Who are you ?! “ he asked. His voice faint and weak like it came from the other side of the world.
She looked at him putting the towel away, her hands are numb and bones ached from the continuous movement she had been doing since the night fall.
-“ It is dawn already and you didn’t seem like you have slept.”
This time his voice was soft, maybe it was because of the poison and maybe he just wanted to show her that side of himself.
-“ you opened your eyes seconds ago and you have a lot of objections already ?! “ Mercy said with a smile and her eyes showed affection and concern
-“ Who are you ? Why are you helping a monster ?! “
He tried to get up , she placed her hand gently on his chest getting him back to the rest mode and the strangest thing was that he obeyed. He didn’t fight her actions and for once he gave up the * Alpha Male * role
-“ My dearest king , I am afraid to tell you that all monsters are just humans. I have my own eyes and my own heart, to be telling the truth I don’t care about what you see in the mirror and I don’t care about what people say.
I do what I am good at and I will keep doing it no matter what.At this particular moment you can assume that all your sins are laying in the past.
Think of me as you wish. A slave , a stupid girl or even a monster in a suit of saint..”
Mercy talked about herself with a cracked and broken tone, he could feel how much she hated herself and how many times she had been fails - by those called lovers- so that she reached that stage.
The way she called him king and the way she called herself a slave. Every detail in that place left him a headache caused by overthinking and yet he wasn’t able to define a clear thought or feeling that he might take an action upon it.
-“ All monsters are humans..” he whispered and repeated softly after her and then he made clear and deep eye connection with her
-“ What’s your name? “
he needed to know. For him she felt like an outstanding artwork that he never dreamt of having it. She has something more than a pretty face, she has a tortured - shattered- broken soul and she did a great work gathering its pieces up to be whatever creature kneeling beside him.
-“Mercy..”
she broke the eye connection with him. Her voice is vivid like she was ashamed of herself, like the name was too great to be hers. She never felt enough and she never believed the goodness in her and it was a normal thing since she only got the blames no matter how hard she tried to do the right thing.
On seeing her name, the gaze he gave her betrayed no emotion and he kept his deep looks at her for couple of minutes until her voice broke the wall of his amazement.
-“ By the night fall I promise everything will be better..”
Again, the soft - broken - tone in her voice was like a dagger going deeper in his heart every time she talked , a dagger he has no intent to take it out anytime sooner.
-“ Your heart..” his phrase stopped her and then she cut his words
-“ I am sorry ! I know it is too loud for you and as you are sick all your highlights senses are becoming very painful at particular moment, but I really have no choice. I promise, by the night fall I will fix all things up..”
With a desolation tone she had in her voice for being herself, he decided to cut the carp for good and to follow his heart for one - maybe last- time.
-“ Why is it like that ?! If you aren’t afraid of me, then why?
Sometimes there is a beat missing , normal hearts don’t do that..”
he showed concern as well and it was one of his ways to love and to pay back.
-“ I have a small problem, for now it is not dangerous. But in the long run we don’t know what surprises life is hiding for us. At night it will temporarily fixed and I will be able to give you my blood with my safety concerned.”
Mercy reassured him and she was going to continue her path to the kitchen thinking that he got enough of this controversial talk.
-“ I am a thousand years old hybrid. I have a sense of control”
He objected again. He only needed to show her that he meant no harm, that he is worthy of the trust she gave him.
She knelt down beside him again, looking at him in such deep and fathomless way that he felt electricity going through his own heart.
-“ I see the manners you showed me. You didn’t hurt me and I trust you. Stop thinking, it is just I did what I needed to do. If there is a price , I will be the one paying it. There are things in my life that you don’t need to know, it will only cause you to suffer and you are already suffering enough. You can think of this as fate , coincidence or just a simple choice. I am going to be fine..
For now, what about me telling you a story?! You need to get your mind off the pain so you can get back to sleep..”
She offered kindly, her handed hanged in the air for a moment before she gathered her courage and placed it on his hair stroking it softly. A moan skipped his lips announcing how much he loved her touch..
-“ Your hands are so cold…” he mumbled. On feeling her hands making its way to his neck massaging and placing it on her knee, he closed his eyes surrendering to her touch.
-“ I will tell you a story of the Dark paradise: where monsters reach there safe heaven. “
He cut her again with another objection of his that started to be such an annoying thing.
-“ There is no such a thing , love. It is just your imagination.”
He smiles for the first time and god only knows how much she loved his smile. She would just refuse to say that out loud..
-“ Once upon time , in era that you have never lived in and a place that vanished before you were born. There was a man who was born sick, a black sheep as they always said.
He had no choice becoming a monster and he never liked it.
His days passed while he was asking for forgiveness, while he was searching for away to take his life with his own hands. The game of life was just a sarcastic thing, in order to find a proper way of death he learned how to survive and live.
Adapting to what he was led him to the darkest core of himself, but whatever remained human was still buried inside of him. That was when he found love, when he knew that he needs to come back to the person he once was.
She was so pure and innocent , yet she wasn’t normal like she seemed to be.
She was his salvation and only thing required for them to be together was just his true and honest well to seek forgiveness for whatever sins he had done.
The power of love purificate the soul and they were so deeply involved in that miracle called love..
This time he was going to live, he died once and she was going to fix the error happened back then.
It required a holly wooden stick , long enough to held their hearts on it at the same time. Being on the promised land, praying for the last time and dying together. Where blood was mixed together , the wound is replaced upon the wound, hands refusing to let go of each other and eyes looking with mixed emotions..
That was the way for them to get salvation, to find their path to the truly after life, to the paradise where there is no goodbye, where he is an angel with dark wings and not called a monster anymore..”
Mercy’s tears started to fall at the last part , but Klaus was deeply asleep since he heard his warm voice whispering like that spreading please and joy to his tortured soul.
###
The sun placed one of its rays on his eyes causing him discomfort which led him to wake up. For the first time - since he got there, three days ago- something wasn’t normal.
The perfection he felt was no gone even everything was in its place , except one thing!! She wasn’t there!!
No matter how hard he tried he wasn’t able to hear her hummingbird heart anymore and again the fear of lose took the control over him.
-“Gahhh..” he screamed loudly as he got himself in his feet. His wounds hurt and burned him like hell.
-“Mercy..” he yelled with her name as a groan of pain
Taking few - painful- steps in order to make it up stairs, he got closer and all his dark thoughts were scaring the hell out of him.
His wounds started to bleed again, before he managed to collapse he heard the door gets open and finally she was in.
-“ Where the hell did you go ?! “ he screamed all of his pain and anger - he never felt before- out.
She reached out to him quickly, holding his hand tightly and letting the weight of his body to be lent on her.
Those looks in her eyes left him speechless. His anger was vanishing away like he has no choice on keeping it.
Angst, fear, concern and affection that was honest and true emotions she showed him in every action and every look.
-“ Hey, Hey!! Easy , My king. It is too early for you to get up. I needed to get things done so you can feed, I needed shopping as well. It is a remote place as you see and it took me time. I am sorry, I should have told you.
You were just sleeping peacefully and I didn’t want to get you up so you would face this horrible pain alone, I didn’t think you would wake before I come and I didn’t know you were going to worry. May I ask for forgiveness?! “
She soothed him down.Holding his hands tightly like no one on this earth did before, not his mother, not one of his siblings and none of his lovers.
He looked at her with tears in his eyes wondering to himself what kind of magic such a young and normal girl like her has to make him fall for her that quick ?!
-“ Mercy..” he called in agony like he wasn’t able to recover from the pain left in his heart on the thought of losing her, losing his Dark paradise.
Slowly she helped him to see on the one of the stairs,rubbing
his face softly with her soft hand.
-“ Everything is fine now. You can get all blood you need..”
She whispered to closed eyes hybrid, offering him her wrist.
Looking at her with hesitation, unconcern but at the same time with lust. He didn’t wish for her body nor her blood , he just wanted a bond with her..to make sure that he is capable of control and he won’t hurt her.
His demons for the first time in centuries were silent and his true self started to talk up , telling him what he truly wanted to get. He needed unbreakable bond with some innocent soul that would believe in him..
He needed the love which would purify him and leads him to the promise land she talked about it. He wasn’t able to fight his urge anymore..
Her hands on his neck, getting him closer to her wrist. Grabbing his shirt tightly and hugging him while he did it.
It hurts, she won’t lie. But every salvation is started by pain and when it was coming to the end , she can admit to herself that - at some point or another- she liked it.
Now it was over and he was hugging her back as well, with his chin resting on her shoulders and his hands surrounding her waist..
-“ I got your phone a charger. You will need to call your siblings for help..” she thought that tired whisper of her will break the moment, but it only caused him to lock and engulf her deeply in his arms..
-“ It tastes different, I mean your blood. No matter how much this is going to cost me , but I need to know the truth you are hiding deep down. The truth you are going to whip yourself over and over by it because you have a stupid-wrong- thought about what you truly deserve.
I trust you, you will never hurt me. Tell me, what is your secret. “
He was pushing her on the edge with his sweat talk and he was so good at it, so good that she admitted it.
-“ I chose to become your anchor, you are my chosen for now and for good.”
#the originals x reader#klaus mikaelson#supernatural#klaus!father x daughter!reader#klaus x oc#supernatural imagine#dean winchester#the originals fluff#the originals angst#supernatural fandom#tvd one shots#tvd imagine#tvd fanfiction#klaus mikealson x oc#klaus mikealson imagine
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10th April >> (@VaticanNews By Francesca Merlo) #PopeFrancis #Pope Francis Way of the Cross: Meditations from a corrections facility.
The Via Crucis, or Way of the Cross, meditations for Good Friday this year have been prepared by prisoners, volunteers, family members and others, associated with a corrections facility in Northern Italy.
By Francesca Merlo
Each meditation represents a life and a story. Each one is associated with the fourteen stations of this year’s Via Crucis, or Way of the Cross. The meditations have been written by people whose lives are in some way connected to the “Due Palazzi” correctional facility in Padua, Northern Italy. They were collected by the prison chaplain, Fr. Marco Pozza, and journalist, Tatiana Mario.
Lockdown to prevent the spread of coronavirus in Italy began on 8 March. Prison riots around the country followed when prisoners were told they could no longer receive visitors. Two days after the riots, Pope Francis offered Mass for prisoners: “I would like to pray for those who are in prison”, he said. “They are suffering, and we must be near to them in prayer, asking that the Lord might help them and console them in this difficult moment”.
First Station: Jesus is condemned to death
The author of the first meditation is serving a life sentence. “My crucifixion began as a child”, he says, explaining that his stutter made him an outcast. He says he feels more like Barabbas than Jesus. Sometimes he weeps. “After 29 years in prison I have not yet lost the ability to cry, to feel ashamed of my past, and the evil I have done”. In the “non-life” he lived previously, he “always sought something that was life”, he says. Today, strange as it may seem, “prison has become my salvation”, he adds.
If, for some, I am still Barabbas, that does not make me angry: I know in my heart that the Innocent One, condemned like me, came to find me in prison to teach me about life.
Second Station: Jesus takes up his Cross
The parents of a girl who was brutally murdered recount how theirs “was a life of sacrifices based on work and family”. They used to ask themselves: “Why has this evil overwhelmed us?”. They could find no peace. "At the moment when despair seems to take over, the Lord comes to meet us in different ways”, they say. “He gives us the grace to love each other like newlyweds, supporting each other, even with difficulty". Today, they continue to open their doors to all those in need.
The commandment to perform acts of charity to us is a kind of salvation: we do not want to surrender to evil. God’s love is truly capable of renewing life because, before us, his Son Jesus underwent human suffering so as to experience true compassion.
Third Station: Jesus falls for the first time
“It was the first time I fell. But for me that fall was death”. The third meditation is written by a prisoner. He did not know about the evil growing inside him, he says. After a difficult life, one evening “like an avalanche…. anger killed my kindness… I took someone’s life”. After considering committing suicide in prison, he found people who gave him back the faith he had lost, he says.
My first fall was failing to realize that goodness exists in this world. My second, the murder, was really its consequence, for I was already dead inside.
Fourth Station: Jesus meets his Mother
The author of the fourth meditation is a mother whose son is in prison. She says she was not tempted “even for a second” to abandon her son in the face of his sentence. That day, she says, “the whole family went to prison with him”. She describes people “pointing fingers” like knives, and wounds that “grow with every passing day”. She has entrusted her only son to Mary and says she feels her closeness. “I confide my fears to Mary alone, because she herself felt them on her way to Calvary”.
In her heart she knew that her Son would not escape human evil, yet she did not abandon Him. She stood there sharing in His suffering, keeping Him company by her presence. I think of Jesus looking up, seeing those eyes so full of love, and not feeling alone. I would like to do the same.
Fifth Station: Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry the Cross
The author of the fifth meditation is a prisoner. He says he hopes to bring joy to someone someday. “Everyone knows a Simon of Cyrene”, he explains. It is the nickname of those who help others carry their cross up their own Mount Calvary. He describes his cellmate as another Simon of Cyrene: someone who lived on a bench, without a home or possessions.
His only wealth was a box of candies. He has a sweet tooth, but he insisted that I bring it to my wife the first time she visited me: she burst into tears at that unexpected and thoughtful gesture.
Sixth Station: Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
The catechist and author of the sixth meditation wipes away many tears, just like Veronica. “They flood uncontrollably from hearts that are broken”, he says. In the dark reality of prison, he describes meeting desperate souls, trying to understand why evil exists. Finding an answer is hard, he says. He asks how Jesus would wipe away their tears if He were in that position. How would Jesus ease the anguish of these men, he asks. So, he tries to do what he believes Jesus would do.
In the same way that Christ looks at our own weaknesses and limitations with eyes full of love. Everyone, including those in prison, has an opportunity each day to become a new person, thanks to Christ’s look which does not judge, but gives life and hope.
Seventh Station: Jesus falls for the second time
The prisoner responsible for the seventh meditation says he often walked past prisons, thinking to himself he would never “end up in there”. Then he was convicted of drug dealing, and found himself in what he calls the “cemetery of the living dead”. Now, he says, he did not know what he was doing.
I am trying to rebuild my life with the help of God. I owe it to my parents... I owe it above all to myself: the idea that evil can continue to guide my life is intolerable. This is what has become my way of the cross.
Eighth Station: Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
The author of the eighth meditation describes how her whole life was shattered when her father was sentenced to life in prison. She has been travelling around Italy for twenty-eight years, following her father as he is moved from prison to prison. Deprived of her father’s love, and his presence on her wedding day, she has had to cope with her mother’s depression as well.
It’s true: there are parents who, out of love, learn to wait for their children to grow up. In my own case, for love, I wait for my Dad’s return. For people like us, hope is a duty.
Ninth Station: Jesus falls for the third time
The author of the ninth meditation recognizes the many times he has fallen. And the many times he has risen. Like Peter, he has sought and found a thousand excuses to justify his mistakes, he says.
It is true that my life was shattered into a thousand pieces, but the wonderful thing is that those pieces can still be put together. It is not easy, but it is the only thing that still makes sense here.
Tenth Station: Jesus is stripped of his garments
The author of the tenth meditation is a teacher. Just as Jesus was stripped of His garments, so he has seen many of his students “stripped of all dignity… and respect for themselves and others” in prison. They are helpless, frustrated by their weakness, often unable to understand the wrong they have done. Yet, at times they are like newborn babies who can still be taught, he says.
Even though I love this job, I sometimes struggle to find the strength to carry on. In so sensitive a service, we need to feel that we are not abandoned, in order to be able to support the many lives entrusted to us, lives that each day run the risk of ruin.
Eleventh Station: Jesus is nailed to the Cross
The author of the eleventh meditation is a priest who was falsely accused, and later acquitted. His own “Way of the Cross” lasted ten years, he says, during which he had to face suspicion, accusations and insults. Fortunately, he also encountered his own versions of Simon of Cyrene who helped him carry the weight of his cross. “Together with me, many of them prayed for the young man who accused me”, he says.
The day on which I was fully acquitted, I found myself happier than I had been ten years before: I experienced first-hand God working in my life. Hanging on the cross, I discovered the meaning of my priesthood.
Twelfth Station: Jesus dies on the Cross
The author of the twelfth meditation is a judge. No magistrate, he says, can “crucify a man… to the sentence he is serving”. True justice is only possible through mercy, he adds. Mercy helps you find the goodness that is never completely extinguished, despite all the wrongs committed. To do this, one must learn how to “recognize the person hidden behind the crime committed”, he says.
In this process, it sometimes becomes possible to glimpse a horizon that can instill hope in that person and once his sentence has been served, to return to society and hope that people will welcome him back after having rejected him. For all of us, even those convicted of a crime, are children of the same human family.
Thirteenth Station: Jesus is taken down from the Cross
“Prisoners have always been my teachers”, writes the religious Brother, author of the thirteenth meditation. He has volunteered in prisons for sixty years. “We Christians often delude ourselves that we are better than others”, he says. In His life, Christ willingly chose to stand on the side of the least. “Passing by one cell after another, I see the death that lives within”, he says. But Christ tells him to keep going, to take them in His arms again. So he stops, and listens.
This is the only way I know to accept that person, and avert my gaze from the mistake he made. Only in this way will he be able to trust and regain the strength to surrender to God’s goodness, and see himself differently.
Fourteenth Station: Jesus is laid in the tomb
A corrections officer has written the concluding meditation for this year’s Way of the Cross. Every day he witnesses first-hand the suffering of those who live in prison. “A good person can become cruel, and a bad person can become better”, he says. It depends on that person. But prison changes you, he adds. Personally, he is committed to giving another chance to those who have chosen what is wrong.
I work hard to keep hope alive in people left to themselves, frightened at the thought of one day leaving and possibly being rejected yet again by society. In prison, I remind them that, with God, no sin will ever have the last word.
Topics
WAY OF THE CROSS
PRISONS
POPE FRANCIS
10th April 2020, 07:00
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A Red Lamb: Urokai One-Shot
A little One Shot with Urokai bc I love him k. also posted on ao3!
This must have been the quaintest little shithole he has seen in at least twohundred years. He'd managed to escape Zarga's endless nagging and the constant annoyance caused to him by the 10th and 12th Elders. They shouldn't even be allowed to talk to him at all, these miserable worms! He vaguely remembered the world map, and if he was not wrong, he was somewhere on an island called Ireland. No one in the world would go and look for him here. Good, all he wanted was some quiet.
However, this place did not alleviate his boredom. Urokai wandered through empty streets, the few people he saw averted their gaze in a sense of discomfort - good. He didn't want to talk to anyone anyway.
After about half an hour, he reached the largest building in the small town, an old church that must have stood here for longer than most of the other buildings. The heavy door creaked when he pushed it open and he was met with a draft of cool air coming from the inside. Dimmed sunlight fell through the windows of stained glass, throwing colorful specks of light on the floor and the columns. Other than that, the building was disappointingly unornate. Quite unlike the much larger cathedrals he had seen in other places. Still, the quietness of this place was one he could appreciate. Idly, Urokai strolled towards the row of candles that must have been lit at some point. Some of them seemed fresh while others had burned down almost entirely by now.
" “You look a little lost, if I may say so. Can I help you?" Not a quiet voice, but a calm one. Slowly, Urokai turned towards the human who'd addressed him. Dressed in black, early thirties, he'd wager, tousled dark hair. He did not seem too angered over the visitor. Still, Urokai huffed, feeling insulted by the mere fact that a mortal dared speak to him just like that, uninvited. Still, he didn't want to cause a scene, meaning to keep a low profile until Zarga and the rest decided they no longer felt the inescapable need to annoy him.
"No. I'm just having a look around."
The main church was usually empty, apart from sundays and the rare elderly person looking for company and comfort in the presence of the young priest. A small comunity of hardly a thousand inhabitants in a rural area, an inornate church that seemed to get emptier each year. Thus, he was surprised to see someone here - someone young, and someone new. Though Thomas most certainly did not know everyone in town, he knew all those who attended church regularly, and none of them a one-eyed redhead. Maybe he moved here only recently. For the first couple of minutes, he had not bothered the man in case he had come here to pray or light a candle. He didn't - and so Thomas approached the stranger, hands folded in front of his torso.
"Oh. I see. We rarely see tourists around here. I am afraid there is not much to see here."
"I noticed that. About as dead as it gets... You're a priest, right?"
"Yes, I am."
"What do you do all day, apart from preaching?" (Urokai realized he never talked to a human priest before. Why would he ? ) The priest seemed to be a bit taken aback by the question, but he still answered patiently.
"Apart from preparing the masses, I am responsible for counseling at the nearby nursery home and the school, as well as the local youth club and neighborhood community."
"So, talking to people all day."
The man in front of him laughed, it sounded off in this little church. But somehow Urokai liked that sound. It felt so... light. Genuine.
"Essentially. Of course, each priest performs different tasks. But I like people, so that's what I do: helping them."
"Isn't God or something supposed to help them?" Urokai snorted. He was vaguely familiar with the notion of religion, after all.
"God is the one who gives us strength to help ourselves."
Once again, Urokai was tempted to snort. Right. Humans needed something like that too. A Lord. A noblesse. Someone to look up to. Instead of their kings, just as foul and flawed as the common rabble, they turned to God.
"... I still need to tend to the chapel's Garden, but don't hesitate to ask, if there is anything I can help you with." The priest was too friendly, Urokai did not like it, and it almost made him snarl. That smile was too genuine, unpleasant to see with his own eyes, sore of all the bitter faces and false smiles he was forced to see whenever he had any union business to take care of. Zarga never has been particulaly funny and Roctis must have forgotten how to smile altogether. Ignes, though not much younger than him, was too intense for his tastes. For fuck's sake, how low has he stooped, to seek company from a human?
"I will just hang around," he finally replied through gritted teeth, and for a moment, he was certain the man must feel his tension (but ah, Urokai never has been good at hiding his feelings. He played with his heart on his sleeve).
"You're welcome. I rarely have company... My name is Thomas." He offered one hand. Urokai glanced at it with furrowed brows and, once the Priest realized that the redhead had no intentions of accepting the handshake, he let his arm drop back to his side.
"I'm Urokai."
He followed the priest out in the garden, slipping his hood off. A bunch of herbs and flowers he was not familiar with. The priest grabbed a pair of intensely yellow rubber gardening gloves and a green bucket with tools that were probably meant for gardening. Urokai realized he knew absolutely nothing about herbs and plants, he always left the garden of the clan's estate to the gardener. The man, Thomas, hummed a tune as he filled a green watering can with water from an old faucet. He wasn't silent, but quiet. This was one of the rare moments Urokai remembered that they did not mean the same thing.
"So, are you from far away?", the priest asked, kneeling in the dirt to clip wilted flowers from a shrub.
"I'm from New Zealand." One of the elders had told him to just always say that, if asked.
"New Zealand? What a far way you come from! Probably on the way to Cork? You should drop by at Kilkenny, it's maybe an hour away from here. Though I guess that won't impress someone from New Zealand. I heard it's an absolutely gorgeous place."
Urokai shrugged with a hum. He never has been to New Zealand and didn't care to.
"Why are you a priest? Must be a shitty job."
Thomas halted and glanced up to him before returning his attention to the rose bush. "Not everyone is made for priesthood, and that's alright. There are many ways in which people do the Lord's work, after all. I want to help people. There's many ways to do that, too."
"why bother helping people? As if they ever return anything you give them."
" It's not about receiving. To give and to receive is barter... The love we receive from God, we give back to our neighbours, or brothers and sisters. Compassion is not a single kind deed, but a way of life."
"And then you burn yourself like a candle, to keep others warm."
"If I am to burn, then so be it. Whether in this life or the next, whatever we sow we will reap."
Urokai laughed bitterly. How naive! How foolish! As if this man knew nothing of life. "Oh, yes. You love, you give, you love, you give, and you get nothing back. What you sow, another reaps. And you are forgotten and left behind. That's the way it goes. You do everything for someone you admire and cherish and you get nothing in return. You are forgotten. That's all it leads to."
Finally, the priest set down his gardening tools, shifting to look at him. There was a sadness in his green eyes.
"I am sorry you have been hurt so much," he said, softly. His voice was gentle, so gentle, like the tender caress of a loving father. Urokai gulped, feeling taken aback by his own outburst of emotion and the calm he was met with. In this moment, the human reminded him of someone he had tried to erase from his memory.
"Often, this world is not just... often, we despair, question, wonder whether there is a purpose and a reason. We ask ... how can there be a God who makes us suffer like that? How can God loves us and still let this world be like that? It's one of the hardest questions in the world. But we all have a cross to carry, such as Christ, and the Lord does not place a cross on our shoulders heaver than what we can carry - and if we keep our faith, if we can stay good people despite everything... through these hardships, we grow. And in this growth lies salvation."
Urokai swallowed, embarrassed by his own outburst of emotion before this stupid human who started talking of God.
"I should go." He felt uncomfortable being here.
The priest gave a little nod. "God be with you... Be safe on your travels. I hope you will find peace there."
Something about that stuck him, even long after returning to his base. I hope you will find peace there... In that little garden, in the company of that humming priest, he'd felt peace for a few moments. And for the first time in centuries, Urokai found himself wishing he could turn back time. Undo the wrongs he'd inflicted on the one he loved the most, go back to visisting the Noblesse with his friends, go back to Lukedonia, go back to times that would never come back.
Urokai found himself missing the happiness he once had.
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Some of my favorite Olicity fanfics
Since I’ve recently started re-reading Olicity fanfiction and here’s a list of some of my faves I’ve been re-reading :)
What happened in Vegas... by Jules_Ink
It's all fun and games until you wake up hung-over and married to a stranger. Five years ago Oliver Queen and Felicity Smoak made a drunken mistake that could never be corrected. After years on a hellish island he comes back as a man on a mission only to find out that what happens in Vegas doesn't always stay in Vegas. (Season One Rewrite)
In the Company of Shadows by ckksac
Felicity Smoak abandoned her entire existence after shocking events left her filled with guilt and remorse as well as heartbroken. She disappeared from the life she had built in Starling City, determined to right her wrongs. After five years of running, fate brought Oliver Queen, and the memories that led to her heartbreak, back into her life. Unwilling to trust him, yet unable to resist him when she is the cause of so much pain in his life, Felicity agrees to work with him to stop a force of evil who has Felicity in his sights.
The Darkest Hour by ckksac
Just weeks after moving to Starling City, Felicity Smoak is kidnapped for information she does not have. She endures weeks of torture before she is rescued by a man in green leather and his partner, John Diggle. As Felicity begins to put the pieces of her life back together, she realizes the trauma she suffered changed her in unexpected ways. Restless and with a driving need to help others the way the man in green helped her, she finds herself using her brilliant mind and considerable computer skills to follow a different path fraught with danger and violence. As Felicity grows closer to the Green Arrow and Diggle, helping them in their cause to save Starling City, the three struggle against unseen enemies, and discover the unexpected truth behind her kidnapping.
His Girl Wednesday by BlueBayou
Missing her interview for a position in the IT department of QC, Felicity Smoak meets Oliver Queen, son of the CEO and future CEO himself. Only Oliver doesn’t take the company as seriously as he should and after yet another fiasco with his assistant, his mother decides to take matter into her own hands and select one with more qualifications than long legs and deep cleavage. In an effort to get her off his back, he pretends he already hired one: the blonde nerdy girl he met a few minutes ago
The Strings We Attach by kwrites
Felicity Smoak knows that sleeping with the boss's son goes against the rules of her summer internship at Queen Consolidated in about a hundred different ways. She knows, but it doesn't matter.
(con’t behind the cut)
Some Things Are Meant To Be by BlueBayou
Three years ago, Oliver went on a cruise on the Gambit and never came back, leaving Felicity devastated. She forced herself to move on with her life, trying to forget that the love they had shared was one she'd never get to live again.
Except Oliver didn't die on that boat. But no matter how much he wants to, he knows he can't come back. Too many things happened, and the only way to keep his loved ones safe is to stay as far away from them as possible..
***The sequel to His Girl Wednesday
Eyes on Fire by Bindy417
AU. Felicity Smoak never wanted to be a member of the cyber-terrorist group Brother Eye. For five years she's been searching for a way out with no success. When Felicity hears rumors of The Arrow, the dark and dangerous Starling City vigilante, she knows she's finally found her salvation. Determined, Felicity seeks out The Arrow. What she discovers is a world beyond anything she could've imagined and a hero who may just need saving of his own.
Caught in the Rapture by Bindy417
AU. Being the daughter of a ruthless and notorious crime lord, Felicity Smoak didn't think her life could get any worse. When her father unexpectedly sells her in marriage as a peace offering to his enemy, she quickly learns it'll take more than just her sharp intellect to survive. But what starts out as a sentence worse than death may actually be her only shot at freedom.
Bound to You by Bindy417
AU. Felicity Smoak has always wanted to make a difference in the world. Working as an analyst for a secret government agency like A.R.G.U.S. to defeat the world's deadliest criminals has given her life purpose. It's also the only way to uncover what really happened to her long lost love, Oliver Queen. When a risky mission puts Felicity in the field, she makes the ultimate discovery that will reveal the truth of her painful past and alter the course of her life forever.
Oliver on Vacation by TinaDay3W
Olicity AU. When Oliver Queen’s best friend, renowned psychiatrist Dr. John Diggle, encourages the stressed-out CEO to go on vacation, Oliver can’t believe Digg’s “vacation” choice is actually a psychiatric retreat nestled deep in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Oliver simply doesn’t think he needs this kind of intensive therapy. And he definitely doesn’t think he needs the attentions of Felicity – the frivolous, frolicking forest fairy who flits her way into his life and challenges all his assumptions. What Oliver doesn’t know is that he’ll never be so happy to be proven wrong.
Always by MachaSWicket
Felicity and Oliver have some things to talk about when they get back to Star City. You know, once they can keep their hands off of each other long enough for things like talking.
Kiss Me So Sweet and So Soft by MachaSWicket
Post-episode for 6x03; picks up, hmmm, let’s say fifteen minutes from the moment Felicity pushed Oliver out of frame.
Deceive, Inveigle, and Obfuscate by MachaSWicket
When a threat to Felicity's safety isn't something that Oliver can put arrows in, the team has to look for different kinds of solutions to assorted legal problems. Diverges from canon during S2 mid-season
Long Time Coming by MachaSWicket
How Oliver and Felicity turned all that blistering UST to RST. Finally.
I Woke Up Like This by MachaSWicket
The morning after the night before. Felicity isn’t feeling flawless. Adult content (sexytimes).
Handprints and Good Grips by MachaSWicket
So, yeah. It turns out that beard burn is an actual thing. Felicity navigates the change in her relationship with Oliver with her typical wordy aplomb.
Took 45 Minutes to Get All Dressed Up by MachaSWicket
Honestly, her breathing is still a little unsteady, though she chooses to blame that on the last five minute frenzy of getting dressed and down to the car, and not, you know, certain *other* recent activities involving Oliver. Written as part of the Flawless series, but each story can be read independently.
Healing Touch by hope27
Felicity tries to sleep the night after The Count takes her hostage, but nightmares keep waking her up. When Oliver shows up at her door, they both come to some new realizations about their relationship.
somewhere beyond the darkness (there is light) by hope27
After Slade is defeated, after their conversation on the island, after they return to Starling City, Oliver and Felicity try to figure out where they stand and where to go from here.
What Happens In Russia... by hope27
When Diggle disappears, Oliver and Felicity travel to Russia to track him down. But their trip is interrupted by the presence of Isabel Rochev, and things do not go as planned. What happens in Russia doesn't always stay in Russia...
Somehere Only We Know by hope27
Oliver and Felicity find themselves seeking each other out when they need someone to lean on. Their friendship begins to grow, lines being blurred between friendship and something more.
Six Times Felicity Uses Post-It Notes and One Time Oliver Does by hope27
Six times Felicity uses post-it notes to tell Oliver something and one time Oliver does.
Checkmate by hope27
When a mission goes terribly wrong and a new foe is back, Felicity finds herself rushing to a safehouse with Oliver not far behind. They both realize that they are tired of wasting time...
Indecent Proposal by BookofLife
She hadn't known what to do... so she'd said yes. To Slade Wilson. For Oliver and all the people he cared for. But she'd had no idea, no clue, just how far this would go. And that in making this sacrifice, she was playing directly into Slade's hands. OR, how Oliver would gladly - and literally - go from 'you made me a hero Slade' to 'this is me killing you'.
What Wouldn't I Do by BookofLife
We all know that Slade killed Oliver's mother: we were there, we saw it. But where was Felicity? What would she have done if she'd known? How would it have changed things?
That Happened by BookofLife
What could have happened 2.23 (and because I am absurd).
The Phoenix by SuperSillyAndDorky06
Felicity Smoak fell in love with the broody, intense Oliver Queen, Captain of the Russian Bratva, ages ago but he broke her heart. So, when the sudden marriage between them is arranged, she does not understand it and she does not want it. Except Oliver Queen is not only a harder man to live with than she realized, he also has no intention of letting her go.
You Have (Not) Failed This 'Verse by So_Caffeinated
Sometimes a payday ain't exactly what it seems. (Arrow/Firefly crossover)
All Along the Watchtower (Pacific Rim AU) by Ambrosia
A calm silence filled the lift. It took approximately sixty seconds for them to get up to the Watchtower, but it seemed like an eternity. And Felicity started an inner monologue that would have dwarfed the best super villains. Was it uncomfortable? Was it awkward? Oh, god, it was probably awkward.
(Or, That One Time Felicity Smoak Designed Oliver Queen's Jaeger)
What Would Hildy Johnson Do? by seren_ccd
“Look, you wanted a Girl Friday, you’re going to get a Girl Friday” aka five times Felicity decides to channel Hildy Johnson and tell it like it is. Snark, pop culture references, hugs and pocket universes ensue.
The Reluctant Queen by December_Daughter
Oliver Queen's life is irrevocably changed the day Felicity Smoak sets foot in his office. And it has surprisingly little to do with the fact that the first time they meet, she's blackmailing him into a marriage.
The Bratva didn't prepare him for this (and Digg is never going to let him forget it).
Little Talks by December_Daughter
When Felicity is attacked, Oliver realizes that he knows almost nothing about her; in the course of helping her deal with what's happened, he's determined to prove that they are friends - despite Felicity's insistence that it's too complicated. The problem, he soon discovers, is that he wants to be more than just her friend.
The Crow by poisonangelmuse, TheAlternativeSource
Bratva Captain Oliver Queen has been looking for revenge his entire life. When he can’t trust his own family, the Bratva to get it, he finds the answer to all of his problems in Felicity Smoak; a genius hacker who is running for her life from the same object of Oliver’s hatred, The Triad. With an unlikely partnership, The Crow might just find out that light can shine in the darkest of places.
I want you close, I want you (I won't treat you like you're typical) by sarcastic_fina
[Pre-Island AU] When Oliver Queen meets Felicity Smoak, he's a billionaire playboy who likes the challenge. But she's not interested in being a notch on his bedpost and he has to decide if the life he leads is worth losing someone as remarkable as her.
I will make sure to keep my distance (say "I love you" when you're not listening) by sarcastic_fina
"So this is it. This is me making it really easy. Because when I walk away, there's no more rewrites. No more waiting for the day you change your mind… No more expectations. You get one chance, Oliver, and then I pull the plug."
Baggage Reclaim by wagamiller
Oliver walks out into the small crowd of press like it’s no big deal, like paparazzi and shouting always greet his return home. Actually, come to think of it, they probably do. Because he’s Oliver freaking Queen. Follow up to In-Flight Entertainment, an Olicity flying!AU
In-Flight Entertainment by wagamiller
“Oh, you couldn’t have been a nice quiet old lady, could you?” Felicity says, because apparently her brain to mouth filter is even worse when she’s terrified. Good to know. “You had to be–” “I had to be … what?” Oliver says, raising an eyebrow. That god-damn eyebrow, though.
Olicity scared-of-flying!AU
#Olicity#Olicity fic#Olicity fic rec#grateful for all the great Olicity stories the talened authors in this fandom blessed (and keep blessing us with)#Olicityfic
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Devotional Hours Within the Bible
by J.R. Miller
David's Joy over Forgiveness - Psalms 32
"Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. blessed is the man whose sin the LORD does not count against him and in whose spirit is no deceit."
Human biographers usually pass over matters that are not beautiful. They tell of the things that are attractive and honorable - but say little of faults and blemishes. One of the remarkable features of the Bible in writing biographies, is that it does not hide good men's faults nor conceal their sins. One reason is, that it would warn us against even the best men's mistakes.
On the Alps, places where men have fallen, are marked for the warning of other tourists who may come that way. So we are told of the sins and falls of godly men - that we may not repeat their mistakes. Another reason is to show us the greatness of the divine mercy that can forgive such sins and then restore the sinner to noble and useful life. As terrible as David's sin was - the story of his fall and restoration has been a blessing to millions.
"Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered." This is a most suggestive beatitude. If we had been writing it, we would have said, "Blessed is he who never has sinned." But if it read thus, it would have no comfort for anyone in this world, for there are no sinless people here. Holy angels might have enjoyed its comfort - but no others could. We may be very thankful that the beatitude runs as it does, "Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered." This brings the blessing within the reach of everyone of us.
It is the first in all the long list of Blesseds, for no blessing can come to any soul - until it has been forgiven of its sins. The gate of forgiveness is the first gate we must pass through, before we can receive any of the other blessings of God's love. Unforgiven sin lies across our path - as a mountain which no one can cross over. No other favor or gift or prosperity is of any avail - while our sins remain uncancelled. But with forgiveness, come all the blessings of life and glory.
The word "covered" seems a strange word to use about anyone's life. There is one way of covering sin which can bring no peace, no blessing. We must not try to cover our own sin, so as to hide it from God. That is what David had been doing with his sins which at last he brought to God, and he tells us a little farther on in the Psalm how little blessing he found in that way. Says the wise man: "He who covers his sins shall not prosper. But whoever confesses and forsakes them shall have mercy." Sins which we cover ourselves, even most successfully, as it appears, are not forgiven. They are like slumbering fires in the volcano, ready to burst out any moment in all their terribleness. But when God covers our sins - they are put away out of sight forever - out of our sight, out of the world's sight, out of God's sight. The Lord says He will remember our sins against us no more forever. So the covering is complete and final - when it is God's.
"When I kept silence, my bones wasted away, through my groaning all the day long." Sometimes we ought to be silent to God. This is the wise thing to do when sore trials are upon us, and we do not know what to do. "I was silent; I would not open my mouth, for You are the one who has done this!" There is a great blessing in such silence to God. It brings peace, joy, comfort. It means a submission to God's will - in time of suffering. But here is a silence to God, which does not bring blessing - silence about our sins. Unconfessed sins cause only bitterness and sorrow.
David's language here tells the sad story of the days when he kept silent about his guilt, when he tried to hide it, when he made no confession, was not penitent. It was almost a year. He went on with his work, keeping up the external show of royal honor, probably even engaging outwardly in the worship of God. But he could not put away the consciousness of his sins. This memory stayed on his mind and saddened every joy, embittered every sweet, and shadowed the face of God. His very body suffered, and his heart kept crying out continually. It will never do just to keep quiet about our sins and try to hide them and forget them. We should never keep silent to God, even a moment about any sin we have committed. We should tell Him at once - the evil thing we have done.
"Then I acknowledged my sin to You and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, 'I will confess my transgressions to the LORD' - and You forgave the guilt of my sin!" The moment David confessed his sins, back on the very echo of his liturgy of penitence, came the blessed assurance of pardon. "I have sinned" - "The Lord has also put away your sin." "I will confess" - "You forgave."
So we learn the only way to get forgiven of our sins - we must put them out of our heart - into the hands of God, by sincere and humble confession, and by true repentance. Then they will trouble us no more forever.
Some people try to hide away from God when they have sinned - but this also is a vain effort. Adam and Eve tried this, hiding in the garden after their transgression, when they heard the footsteps of God approaching. But God called them and brought them out before His face to confess their sin. The only safe flight for the sinner from sin and from God - is to God. In the divine mercy and beneath the cross of Christ - there is secure and eternal refuge. "You are my hiding place."
The Book of Revelation pictures men, in the day of judgment, calling upon the rocks and the hills to fall upon them - and hide them from the wrath of the Lamb. But the cry is in vain. In their despair many men and women resort to suicide, ending their lives in the effort to get away from their sins. Thus they only rush the more quickly and with added sin on their souls - into the presence of the Judge they so much dread! But God is the real hiding place from sin. His mercy is an eternal refuge. When He covers sins - they are covered forever. "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus." No pursuer or avenger ever can pass the door of that refuge, to drag the forgiven one out. Christ has died for him - and he is free forever.
"You are my hiding place; You will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance." God is also a hiding place, a refuge from trouble. "God had one Son without sin ; but He has none without sorrow ." But there is a hiding place to which sorrowing ones can flee, and where they will find comfort that shall give them peace. "In the world you have tribulation. In Me you may have peace," says the Master. The sorrow may not be shut out - but the divine peace comes into the heart and calms it.
God is also a hiding place from danger. In the wildest terrors and alarms we can run to Him, and lying down in His bosom, be safe. The danger may burst upon us - but we shall be safe; though we may suffer in our person or in our estate, our inner life shall be unhurt.
"I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you and watch over you." Forgiveness is not the whole of Christian life. The forgiven one enters God's school, and comes under His instruction. We are to go on increasing in knowledge. We have God Himself for our teacher. God is always setting lessons for us. The lessons are not always easy; sometimes they are very hard. God teaches us many of our best songs - in the gloom of sick rooms, or in some experience of sorrow. Life is full of lessons. Every day, new ones are set for us, and we should be good pupils, ready learners.
"Do not be like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding but must be controlled by bit and bridle." Then, God also guides us in the way we should go. If we would have His guidance, however, we must be ready to follow, to do all He bids us to do. We must not be like the horse or mule, which have to be compelled by bit and bridle. Our submission should be willing and glad.
"Rejoice in the LORD and be glad, you righteous; sing, all you who are upright in heart!" JOY is a Christian duty. God wants His children all to be happy. Do they never have troubles? Yes, many of them. It is those whom the Lord loves - that He chastens. It is the fruitful branches - that the gardener prunes. Still God wants His believing ones to rejoice and be glad. No duty is enjoined in the Scriptures with greater frequency, than that of joy. We must learn to rejoice even in pain and sorrow .
We must notice, however, what kind of joy it is that we are so earnestly urged to have. It is not the world's joy, "Rejoice in the LORD." The gladness has its source and fountain in God. It is God's own gladness, communicated by the Divine Spirit. There is a gladness which is found in sin, which comes from evil-doing; but the gladness of the child of God - is found in obedience to God and in holy living. Those whose gladness depends only on earthly things, have no assurance of its continuance, for all earthly things are transitory.
Flowers make us glad - but tomorrow they have faded. When it is the love of Christ that gives us gladness - our joy is sure, for His joy is everlasting. So we need to give good heed to the grounds of our gladness. To be glad in the Lord, comes from putting our trust in Him, in accepting His salvation, His grace, in believing in His love - and then in doing day by day our simple duty, leaving to Him all care, all providing, all protecting, and never allowing a fear or a shadow of anxiety to cross our minds.
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For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever Believes in Him shall not perish but have Eternal Life." - John 3:16
John 3:16 can easily run through our brains without much cognizant thought, but have we paused to consider what it truly means? Have we contemplated the depth of truths packed within this verse, preserved by God Himself, throughout countless generations? Most importantly, how do we live in the reality that John 3:16 presents—that God, who is love, actively demonstrated His love through Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, and through Him, offered Salvation to all mankind.
The Biblical Context of John 3:16Let’s take a look at that verse now. It reads, “For God so loved the world,” or, as the NLT puts it, “This is how God loved the world: He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.” There’s so much to unpack in those words, but first, we need to understand the historical and literary context surrounding them. We find John 3:16, perhaps one of the clearest presentations of the Gospel, tucked in a conversation between Jesus and a prestigious religious ruler. You may be familiar with the story.
One night, presumably after many of his colleagues were home in bed, a Pharisee named Nicodemus from the Jewish ruling council came to Jesus. “Rabbi,” he said, “we know that You are a teacher who comes from God. For no one could perform the signs You are doing if God were not with him” (John 3:2). This statement suggests a few things: Nicodemus was familiar with Jesus, most likely respected Him, and recognized that He indeed came from God, just like John 3:16 later states. Nicodemus obviously knew of the miracles Jesus had performed. He’d probably heard many truths Jesus spoke as well, all of which seemed to have triggered a driving question: Who are you? Perhaps you’ve asked God that yourself. Beneath his words of affirmation, of wonderment, Nicodemus appears to be investigating Jesus’ identity. To which Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are Born Again” (John 3:6).
Initially, one might call His words a redirect, but Jesus was probing something deeper. You see, we must remember whom Christ was speaking to, what kind of life He lived, and how Nicodemus was accustomed to relating to God—through religious works. Can you imagine how confusing Jesus’ statement must have been? I’m not just talking about the whole rebirth analogy, but consider as well the message conveyed to this well-educated, well-trained, and presumably “righteous” man. Jesus, in essence, told Nicodemus that all his years progressing in Judaism, all the time he spent reciting prayers and participating in festivals, accounted for nothing. Oh, they laid the groundwork, a foundation, if you will, for the truths Jesus was presenting. But they didn’t have the strength to carry Nicodemus to Salvation.
Why Did Jesus Use an Old Testament Reference to Explain His Point?"'Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.' For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever Believes in Him shall not perish but have Eternal Life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to Save the world through Him. Whoever Believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not Believe stands condemned already because they have not Believed in the name of God’s one and only Son" (John 3:14-18). To illustrate the point further to Nicodemus, Jesus referenced the bronze snake Moses raised in the wilderness, back when the Israelites wandered in the desert vacillating between rebellion and repentance (Numbers 21:4-9). As recorded in the Book of Numbers, a book Nicodemus would have been extremely familiar with, the Israelites chose rebellion and were punished for it in the form of venomous snake bites. To receive healing, they had to look at a bronze snake on a pole. Looking at the snake on the pole was an act of faith, and when they looked they were healed by God. The Israelites knew this was the only way they could be saved from this certain death by venom.
To get the full extent of this picture we need to remember Israel's pattern when they left Egypt: the people would rebel, the Lord's judgment would come, Moses would intercede on their behalf, and the Lord responded mercifully. In Jesus' earthly days the people of Israel were still rebelling, but this time there was a different intercessor . . . this time Jesus was the One whom the Lord would lift up and grant mercy through. However, this mercy that comes through Jesus the Son, our Savior, is an everlasting mercy. When Nicodemus heard about Jesus' death on the cross, you can imagine his memory of these words. Just like the rebellious Israelites in the desert, Nicodemus needed an intercessor so that he could have Salvation and be 'Born Again.' It is an illustration that likely stayed with Nicodemus for the rest of his earthly life.
“For God So Loved the World” Is a Picture of LoveJohn 3:16 follows this rich and theologically dense explanation of sin and salvation. “This,” Jesus said, “is how much God loves you. He sent you Me” (paraphrased). In Christ, we see a love so intense, so sacrificial, so incomprehensible, it makes all human expressions seem frivolous in comparison. The words Jesus spoke likely didn’t make much more sense to Nicodemus than Jesus’ talk of rebirth. After all, he likely had no idea Jesus was planning to die—for him (and us). He didn’t understand that Christ would, quite literally, be lifted on a pole, just as the snake had been, and that Christ’s death and resurrection, not well-spoken prayers or good deeds, would bring life. But we do have that knowledge, thanks to Scripture.Now, considering all Jesus suffered, all God watched Him suffer, for you and I, evaluate the beginning of John 3:16 again, “This is how God loved the world,” and everyone in it. “He gave His one and only Son.” Through His death, Christ revealed what pure, unfathomable love looks like. But He did more than that. Through the cross, God proved the depths of His love, because “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Such a passionate, self-sacrificing act is hard for my mind to comprehend. God reached out, expecting nothing in return, and emptied Himself completely, for the very ones who spurned Him. You and I included.
God knew how helpless we were. Watching us hurt, manipulate, use, and kill one another, God could’ve left us to our destruction. He could’ve been repelled and turned away in disgust. Instead, He drew near. Speaking of Jesus, Philippians 2:6-8 says, “Being in very nature God, [He] did not consider equality with God something to be used to His own advantage; rather, He made Himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross.”
God took action from the beginning of time, from that first sin in the Garden of Eden. The first thing God did was to remove the tree of life, lest we be trapped in a life of sin forever. He acted throughout history, weaving a plan and keeping His promise to save His people. He acted when He sent His Son through the Holy Spirit to be born incarnate of the virgin, Mary. And He acted when His Son was laid upon the cross, offering a sacrifice of His perfect life for our stained lives, which was the payment for sin.
Whenever I think of the cross, I’m reminded of the price Christ paid so I could be free. But I’m also reminded of how much I needed that freedom.
“For God So Loved the World” Is the First Part of God’s Rescue PlanJesus came so that, though we were guilty and tarnished by sin, we could receive forgiveness and pardon for all we’d done or will do. Because of Jesus, we can have peace with God the Father, be adopted as His child, and empowered by the Holy Spirit to live, fully, in His freedom. Christ’s life and death were prophesied and the gift of salvation promised, from the beginning of time. Adam and Eve rebelled against their good, attentive, and faithful Father. They chose pleasure in the moment over the peace and joy of a relationship with God. They chose their will and their wants, over trusting and obeying their God, and in this, they tried to elevate themselves above the very Creator who had loved them so faithfully.
Jesus is not surprised by sin; He was there in the beginning, the second person of the Trinity, and after He was born incarnate of the virgin, Mary, He learned God's Word from an early age and kept it in His heart. In Genesis 3:15, He said, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel” (ESV).
In this, God promised Sin would not win; though a battle would rage on between light and dark, between good and evil, Christ would ultimately prevail, and He did.
He secured His victory through His death on the cross. Colossians 2:15 puts it this way, “He disarmed the rulers and authorities” of darkness “and put them to open shame, triumphing over them.”
This allows all who Believe in Christ to say, “Death has been swallowed up in victory. ‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting.’ The sting of death is Sin, and the power of Sin is the Law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 15:55-57).
"For God So Loved the World" He Sent His One and Only Son to SaveGod sent Christ for one reason only, and here’s why: “So that everyone who Believes in Him will not perish but have Eternal Life.” We receive God’s free gift of Eternal Life through Faith, by Believing Jesus is who He says He Is—the Sinless Son of God who paid for the world’s ins—and did what He said He did—died in our place to grant us entrance into Eternity with Him. But to receive that precious gift, we must acknowledge we need it. That’s hard because it pricks against our pride. We often take great satisfaction in our achievements and knowing we’ve progressed solely through our own merits. But the Holy Spirit helps us realize the futility of our efforts; we cannot earn grace, but we can accept it by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Paul stated, “Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:24-25). This was the offer Jesus made to Nicodemus on that dark night so long ago. The offer was free. Nicodemus didn’t have to earn it; he simply needed to accept it. To step out of the darkness and into the light, out of death and into life. We don’t know how that conversation ended that night. Perhaps Nicodemus’ heart leapt with hope and he embraced the grace that Christ offered. Or perhaps he retreated, contemplated, and wrestled with his sin and pride, before finally finding the courage to surrender.
Regardless, we know Christ revealed a beautiful picture of love, of grace, and the freedom of complete absolution. No more guilt. No more shame. Zero condemnation. Only freedom, light, and life, and all because God so loved this world. In Nicodemus’ story is our story; Jesus!!! Hallelujah!!! Amen!!!
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The only life worth living
Perhaps some lessons in life, we are meant to walk through them ourselves before we will actually learn and become convicted. Growing up in church and around God-fearing friends and adults, I was constantly told that choosing Christ will bring me greater fulfilment, joy and peace. For the largest part of my life, I trusted these words as words of truth. I'm not one to question unnecessarily, possibly cause of sloth, but in any case I never questioned it. I believed fully that it is only in pursuing what is of God that I will be satisfied.
Yet last year, everything for me came crashing down. Since 2012 after a relationship ended, I sought to focus fully on Christ and in seeking Him with all my heart. I held on closely to the belief that if I focus fully on Christ, He will clear my path before me and give me what my heart seemingly desired the most at the right time. And so it is in 2016 that I felt that God has finally answered the desires of my heart and that was to send me a man who was God fearing.
"I knew my God was a faithful God; years of being faithful to Him are finally rewarded by granting me this relationship."
How transactional my thoughts were! Yet, those were my genuine thoughts and emotions then. I felt that the years of being faithful to Christ and constantly choosing Him was finally rewarded. Yet, the relationship came to an end very quickly and my world turned upside down.
I felt betrayed by God, angry even. What was the point of being faithful to Christ when what I ended up with was yet another heartbreak? Slowly but surely, the anger began to die down; but what replaced that anger on the other hand, was indifference and apathy. Precisely because I was angry with God, I chose to stay away from Him. Thus, I found comfort with my non-church friends who would bring me out for drinks and to just have a good time to unwind and get my mind off things.
Over time, I started to question what many have told me since I was young.
"Can I really only find fulfilment, peace, joy and happiness in the church and in Christ?"
I started to question because I looked around me and saw that my friends who were not christians continued to live what seemed like happy and contented lives! For years I found myself choosing to sacrifice desires of my heart in order to be faithful to Christ; yet here I was with a broken heart while my non Christian friends, had the beautiful live that I wanted! Many are happily married or engaged, and the future holds such a beautiful promise of raising families. That had long been my dream, but I found myself so far from it. What a fool I must have been! Must I really choose to sacrifice all these because Christ is inviting me for more? I mean, can he really offer me more than what my non Christian friends have, cause frankly, they seem happy enough.
With that, I convinced myself that it was okay to choose to live a life apart from Christ. I still went for community sessions and for daily mass even, but my heart was far from Christ. I started to live as a child of the world and not just god's child in the world. After the heartbreak, I longed for companionship and now without any guilt in my indifferent and apathetic heart, I sought to fill my desires for companionship by being with a guy who was going after me.
"Everyone in our world does it now. People who are attracted to each other just get together, sleep together and all of that and they are happy! I can live that life too! Honestly, who cares about Christ's standards when all it seems to bring is pain and sacrifice."
And so with these thoughts and new found beliefs, I dived head in into living this life of merely seeking for temporal pleasures.
Slowly, life became a meaningless routine. I would wake up every morning, attend daily mass and then head to work. After work, I would either go out to drink with friends or hang out with the guy to satisfy my need for companionship and then head home to rest. Next morning, the cycle repeats itself. Everyday was the same and life became monotonous and meaningless.
Yet in those few months on hindsight, I saw how God continued to reach out his hand towards me, beckoning me to come home.
"If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won't he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it?
- Luke 15:4
During the night when i found myself alone with my thoughts (because I somehow didn't fill my day up with activities), I felt the most extreme and intense pangs of loneliness.
Whenever I met my friends for drinks, or whenever I'm with that guy, I was happy. Yet, this happiness didn't last long and I found myself constantly seeking for yet another drinking session or night with the guy when the pleasure and happiness from the previous session wears off.
I felt like I was hooked onto a drug that could only give me a high for short period of time, and I constantly needed and craved for more. The scary part was that I knew if I didn't fill my days with these activities, I would come face to face with essentially the pains and loneliness that my heart has been trying to alert me too; and so to avoid that, I sought to fill my days and nights with more activities, and more superficial and self seeking relationships. I found myself trapped in a vicious cycle of superficiality and selfishness.
But as I wrote earlier, our God is a God who constantly pursues even though none of us are worthy of his time and his love. The moments of grace came when I found myself in unplanned moments of silence and aloneness as I lay on my bed at night. My heart had felt happiness no doubt when I was with my friends and the guy, yet alone, I realised how my life became meaningless and I found myself incredibly alone. Though I was constantly surrounded by people, even a guy who was attracted to me and vice versa, I found myself experiencing the greatest loneliness I have ever experienced when these temporal satiation wears off. But what was truly unbearable, was the thought that I was not living for anything anymore. I was merely existing, no longer living.
I found that I no longer lived for anything as everyday just became a routine and a constant seeking of temporal pleasures. Honestly, it is in these moments of true aloneness that one begins to realize the true state of one's life. I realised life for me, became reduced to one of loneliness and meaninglessness.
And it was in this darkest moment of my life, that I knew the people in church were right. I can only live a fulfilled life that is joy and peace filled if I choose to walk in the way of Christ. Sure, choosing to walk in the way that Christ is calling me to walk involves a lot of sacrifice and pain, and frankly sometimes seem foolish in the eyes of the world.
Yet from my own experience, I firmly believe that it is easy to be fooled by the happy faces that we see around us into believing that maybe we don't need Christ in our lives. If you saw me when I was drinking with my friends or with the guy, I would exude happiness, as though I was contented with life. Yet, what we do not see are the moments where these people find themselves alone and faced with the reality of the state of their lives, just as I had experienced when I lay alone on my bed at night.
Are they truly happy living a life apart from Christ, we will never know. What I know is that in those few months of rebelling and choosing to walk in the ways of the world, I never felt more alone and I found life incredibly meaningless. What was the point of living if it is just chasing after what is temporal and short lived?
With that realisation when I found myself alone and having to face the reality of my life and soul then, I understood that I needed to allow Christ back in my life and that began the slow process of coming back to Him. It was difficult because I had to break off the relationship that though granted me the companionship I desired, also became an obstacle to me giving my life and heart entirely to Jesus. After weeks of wrestling with God, I was granted the grace and courage to end the relationship with finality; and with that painful and difficult choice, I was finally able to move on and mend my relationship with Jesus.
Although I had been so unfaithful to Christ, I knew that He was still pursuing me and wanted my heart to be His completely and so ending the relationship was essential. I still suffer the consequences of ending the relationship cause I still see this guy at times, and there continues to be a lot of tension and awkwardness. Yet, I understood that this is just one of the tiny crosses that I have to bear to once again get back onto the path of Christ. I choose to bear the cross of awkwardness, tension and pain in exchange for eternal joy and salvation.
To say that the mere realisation that my life has been reduced to just chasing after temporal pleasures was enough to steer me back onto the path of eternal joy and salvation would be an oversimplification and inaccurate. What God blessed me with during that time (and still continues too), were friends who continued to pray for me and to challenge me to come back. I know that without the prayers and the constant support of these friends that Christ has placed in my life, I would still be lost in the vicious cycle of superficiality.
Looking back, I see how I could have avoided those months of darkness if I had just listened to the words spoken to me since young about the joy and fulfilment that only life with Christ can bring. Yet I also acknowledge that without having gone through this experience myself, I would never have been as convicted of how necessary Christ is in my life and in everybody's life. And most importantly, I am immensely grateful that God never gave up on me though I tried to ran far away from His love.
"Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you."
- Psalm 139:7-12
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, don't settle for less just cause it is easier or when things get tough in life, because trust me, the joy and peace from following Christ's way far outweighs the sacrifices and sufferings that He invites us to carry this day. Trust me.
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Happy birthday @love-and-partner!!!!!! Sorry this is so late!! I hope this is ok - haven’t watched/read gintama for a while, I’m a little out of touch with the characters. I hope your birthday was amazing just like you!!!!
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“I’ll be your general,” Gintoki says, maybe nine years old. His eyes, dull and steady and kind, are fixed on Katsura. “When I’m around, you can just be Zura.”
And that’s it. Some (most) part of him is Zura for the rest of his life.
-x-
Gintoki keeps doing that, worming his way into people’s lives without knowing he does it. Katsura asks Shouyou, once, where he picked Gintoki up; and Shouyou laughs, says, I’m not sure who picked up who, now.
He’s Katsura’s general and Takasugi’s rival. In the war, he’s a saviour and a killer, a hero and a monster. Salvation and damnation all in one bloodstained package, Katsura wants to laugh.
How funny, he thinks, that it’s Gintoki’s way of showing that he cares.
Never something as simple as you’re my friend. Gintoki doesn’t know how, the idiot. He says it in other ways - in the way he’ll face down an army to keep them safe, the way he stays up to pen letters to the soldiers’ families in shitty hiragana, careful not to get bloodstains on the paper. The way he snatches sake from the soldiers, snapping at them that guilt has no place on the battlefield, do they want to get killed?
But Katsura’s busy, too, being the a leader and general and strategist and warrior and, when there’s finally, finally breathing room, just Zura. They’re so busy all the time. There’s no time to be children, or friends. They’re thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, and Katsura can’t breathe anymore. He doesn’t know how to inhale without tasting rust on his tongue. They’re sixteen and generals and they’ve fought armies, don’t know if they’ve won. Don’t know what victory is, when people just die, and die, and die.
They’re seventeen and Katsura messes up, makes a bad plan, fails. And they’re lying on hot ground and Gintoki’s knuckles are white around a shaking sword, and Takasugi screams.
Katsura doesn’t scream. Katsura doesn’t have the breath to scream. There’s ice in his chest, blood in his heart. The ropes binding him are tight enough to choke.
Shouyou’s head flies and Katsura presses his face against the rocky ground, teeth chattering even though the hard-packed dirt is hot enough to burn.
Three weeks later, Gintoki suggests that they split up. He smiles when he says it, smiles like shattered glass, like it hurts. Not Katsura, not Takasugi - Gintoki suggests it, Gintoki who should’ve wanted them to stay the most, them who he killed Shouyou to save.
(Just like he should have wanted to save Shouyou the most. It hurts to think on it, so Katsura doesn’t.)
But Gintoki smiles, and says that he’ll go. Katsura thinks, later - when he’s in a cold, dilapidated shack, wondering if Gintoki and Takasugi are alive or dead; wondering if he’ll ever be just Zura again - that the idiot was probably trying to be kind. Spare them the pain of looking at the boy who killed their teacher.
It’s pointless, though. Gintoki thinks he’s the murderer, but he’s wrong. Katsura’s the genius, here, he would know.
And he sees Shouyou’s true killer every time he looks into the mirror.
-x-
But time keeps moving, even when it feels like their worlds have stopped.
Soon, five years have passed, and Gintoki is doing Odd Jobs. Moving on, he calls it, even though Katsura never sees him with the same people for more than six months running. Even though it’s been weeks since he’s seen Gintoki smile and months since he’s seen him really laugh.
Doesn’t it hurt, Katsura wants to ask, but of course Gintoki wouldn’t give him a straight answer if he did. Why don’t you just join me? Revolution may be hard, but at least I wouldn’t just leave.
“Join us,” Katsura says instead. Over and over and over.
And each time, Gintoki says no.
His leaving back looks smaller, colder, more lonely each time.
-x-
Ten years, and there are children.
Shiroyasha, Katsura calls Gintoki, once, right in front of them. Because he is so sick and tired of watching people leave. Because so many people have walked out of Katsura’s life, and so many have left Gintoki’s, and Katsura can’t take it anymore. They should just get it over with, he thinks. Like ripping off a bandaid - do it fast, so that there’s no time to really feel pain.
Shiroyasha, but the kids just look at them with wide eyes.
They don’t leave.
No matter how hard Gintoki tries. No matter how many times he doesn’t pay them. No matter how often he snaps, or complains, or bullshits his ass off. They stay.
Two months in and Katsura sees them on the street. Kagura, bright-burning brilliance and bursting at the seams with life, and Shinpachi, solid stable warmth, kindness a fierce spark in his eyes. Gintoki between them, looking content and warm, looking like he belongs.
And Kagura says something, Shinpachi nags, and-
-and Gintoki laughs.
Really, honestly laughs. His eyes go soft and bright and he doubles over, grinning like an idiot and shaking with the force of his laughter, and Katsura thinks, oh.
Oh.
-x-
Kagura is a Yato girl whose family tore itself apart and Shinpachi is a samurai boy in an age where samurai are all but dead.
They’re not meant to keep going but they do, anyway, Kagura blazing like a war flag and Shinpachi surging forward, step by step, as unstoppable as the rotation of the Earth.
Stubborn, the both of them, and fierce, and heartbreakingly kind. And they’re just kids, but when Kabuki-cho is invaded, when Nobunobu takes over the shogun’s seat, when the Amanto threaten to blow up the Earth, they stand by Gintoki’s sides, weapons in hand, and fight with him against the end of the world.
Katsura wants to laugh, wants to cry. He thinks Gintoki wants to do more than that.
But Gintoki watches the children, and teaches them to live, and he heals.
Katsura stops asking Gintoki to join the joui. Gintoki doesn’t need that, now. He’s not alone anymore.
(And neither is Katsura. And the Amanto still rule Japan, and there are battles every other day, but...
...this feels like peace.)
-x-
After the shogun’s funeral, there is this:
Katsura finds Shinpachi and Kagura sitting empty-eyed by the river. Their eyes are blank and wide, and they’re tucked by each other’s sides.
They are so young, Katsura thinks. Sixteen and fourteen and so damn young.
He feels so old. So tired of these pointless wars.
“It will end,” Katsura says. They turn to him, eyes wide, and he squats beside them, fixing his gaze on the horizon. The sun is setting, and the sky is ablaze. “For better or worse, this war will come to an end. And you will find a way to live.”
Kagura pulls her legs up to her chest. “But a person never stops fighting,” she says, tucking her chin against her knees. Her hair is gold beneath the setting sun.
“Yes,” Katsura says, easy as breath, though the knowledge did not come easy. “Life is a war. You may lose a battle, but that does not mean you’ve lost the war.”
Shinpachi’s hands are balled into tight white fists. “But,” he says. “If you lose a battle, you lose something. And we’re idiots, so it feels the same.” His eyes, solid and warm and brown, are glassy with tears.
“Yes,” Katsura says, “but it isn’t.” He’s learnt that many times over. “This battle will end, and win or lose, the war goes on.”
“It was all for nothing,” Shinpachi grits out. “Everything we did.” His jaw is clenched tight, so tight, and he’s shaking. Kagura just looks at them, eyes big and blue and bleak.
Katsura sighs. He reaches out, resting his hand in Shinpachi’s soft hair. He knows what Shinpachi is feeling. He knows it so well.
“Sometimes you have to move,” Katsura says, “regardless of the risks. Wasn’t that what you did?”
“We couldn’t just stand there,” Kagura says. Her voice is small and guilty, like she thinks that maybe they should. Should’ve stood there, and burned, and bit it down. Should’ve watched a man suffer and said nothing.
Who knows? Maybe they should. Maybe then the shogun would still be alive. Maybe then they wouldn’t be here today, battle-scarred and weary-eyed.
Or maybe the tendoushuu would’ve moved anyway, and the shogun would still be dead, and they’d have lived with a different regret for the rest of their lives.
“Didn’t Gintoki tell you? Sometimes there are things you must do to protect your soul.”
Kagura pulls her knees to her chest, looking young and tired and very small. “Yeah,” she says. Then she swallows, and says, “Don’t close your eyes, Zura.”
Katsura blinks at her. “What?”
“Don’t close your eyes.” Her eyes, blue and burning, are fixed on the blazing sky. “Gin-chan says it’s always darkest before the light.”
Glancing over, Katsura sees that Shinpachi, too, is staring out at the horizon, like the fire of the sky will burn the tears and pain away. And Katsura…
Katsura remembers Gintoki, always, always staring out into the distance, eyes narrowed and fierce, at something the rest of them could not see.
(Or maybe… Maybe Takasugi could. Some days he’d bitch Gintoki out, or throw a rock at his head when he wasn’t looking. But on others, he’d stand by Gintoki’s side and look out and out, hands fisted, refusing to shut his eyes. Like they were looking beyond the sky.)
Kagura and Shinpachi look at the horizon, hands fisted; stare out and out like the Earth is expanding before them, even when they’ve been pushed to a corner, backs against the wall. Refusing to shut their eyes.
He’s brought them up just like him, Katsura thinks, looking back at the setting sun, the burning sky. “I know,” he says.
They’ve lost the battle, but something in him is fiercely, fiercely proud.
-x-
We’ll meet at dawn, Katsura tells Gintoki later, and smiles.
Remembers the kids looking out at the burning sky. Remembers it’s always darkest before the light.
You remember, Katsura thinks, looking at Gintoki’s wide eyes. This is not self-sacrifice. This is a temporary concession, a false retreat; leaving an opening so that they can strike the enemy in the heart.
Katsura will break out, and Gintoki will come. This is how it has always been.
-x-
And then.
The Tendoushuu and Utsuro and Shouyou and when Katsura hears it he goes cold all the way down to his core.
His teeth are chattering even though his blood burns. Panic is hot, cold, numb in his buzzing, trembling bones. He is so tired of this old routine.
“Katsura-san.” Shinpachi finds him, eyes big and worried, soft and warm. Strange that a boy that seems so soft could be so strong. Strong enough to fight for the world, to stand by Gintoki’s side.
Katsura nods at him, sitting against the wall, one arm thrown over his drawn-up knee. “Shinpachi-kun.”
Shinpachi looks at him with soft, piercing eyes. “Gin-san said that he- he was your-”
“Yes.” Katsura wants to smile, for the boy’s sake. Finds that he cannot. “He was our teacher.” He was our father.
Katsura shuts his eyes. Keep your eyes open, Gintoki had said, but right now, Katsura cannot bear to even look. He is certain that his hands are sticky and slick with blood.
Cloth brushes cloth, and there’s warmth at his side. Katsura forces his eyes open, turns to see Shinpachi settling beside him.
There are shadows beneath the boy’s eyes, and bandages beneath his clothes. Shinpachi looks tired, too, and unsettled; scared, uncertain in his skin.
“I’m sorry,” Shinpachi says, ever polite. There’s understanding in his voice, too deep for a boy his age. Katsura remembers Obi-one, and self-sacrifice, and Shinpachi landing an ippon that must’ve felt like a killing blow, even if it was not. Gintoki had told him the whole sorry tale, eyes haunted with the ghosts of yet another he could not save.
Katsura wants to laugh, wants to cry, is too tired to do either. He waves a bandaged hand, taking a breath that tastes like metal against his raw throat. “How is Gintoki?”
Because this is a living nightmare, and Gintoki is taking the brunt of it. Gintoki, who cut Shouyou down once, twice, three times, more times than he can count, now, as he landed killing blows over and over on a man who would not die. Shouyou, who Gintoki would have gladly died to save, and Katsura wants to be sick.
Shinpachi looks at the ground. “He’s not sleeping. And he hardly eats.”
Just like the first time around, Katsura thinks. Gintoki had gone for days not sleeping, not eating, trying to fake composure while his hands shook beneath trailing sleeves. Would spend ages washing his hands in the river, scrubbing at blood that no one but him could see.
“He is an idiot,” Katsura says, just as Kagura arrives. She looks tired and old, irritation and exhaustion pulling at her eyes.
She drops at Katsura’s other side, less careless than she usually is, with the slowness of a person whose whole body hurts.
“Everyone’s acting like- like Gin-chan’s killed Shouyou before,” she says. She’s trying to sound annoyed, but her voice is just frustrated and very young. “But he wouldn’t- Gin-chan wouldn’t-”
Katsura looks up, trying to see the light. All he can see is the ship’s metal ceiling, and blinding fluorescent white. “He had to.” And his voice sounds bone-dry, brittle and exhausted.
He can feel their stares on him, and casts about for an explanation. It comes hollow, comes broken-cold. “Our teacher was captured in the war. Years later, so were we. And Gintoki was offered a choice: kill us, or kill our teacher.” Katsura fists one hand in his clothes, jaw tightening. They had been such idiots. Young and blind and willful and stupid, and Shouyou had died for it. Gintoki had killed Shouyou, Takasugi had lost an eye, and Katsura had been left alone. “Shouyou died. There was no mistake. Gintoki would not have made such a mistake, and we all saw Shouyou die.”
They’d watched Shouyou die. Right before their eyes, he’d died. “The Tendoushuu left us his head. We buried it beneath a pine tree, a few miles from Edo.” Katsura stares numbly at the ground. “He died by Gintoki’s hand. It is impossible that he survived.”
It is impossible. The dead do not come back to life. So why? Why was he-
-Katsura shuts his eyes. He wants to puke.
But Gintoki can’t take this anymore. Katsura remembers that young, scarred kid from sunlit dojos, who was terrified of ghosts because he’d made too many of his own. Who followed at Shouyou’s heels, always, and who cared so much, so deep.
Remembers, too, that cold, tired back, as Gintoki cut through Shouyou’s neck. Remembers a thin, shattered smile and tears in the eyes of a boy who never cried. Remembers the look on Gintoki’s face, broken to bits.
And then Shinpachi and Kagura had come, and Gintoki had finally, finally started to heal. Started to live, and laugh, and there’s only so many times you can be cut to the bone before you never heal again.
Katsura doesn’t want to hurt Shouyou. Doesn’t want to be left alone again, wants to grip tight to the sleeve of his teacher and beg. (Please. Please don’t leave.)
But Gintoki didn’t want to hurt Shouyou, either. Gintoki didn’t want to choose. Gintoki didn’t want to but he had to and it was Katsura’s fault anyway and-
-and Katsura knows that it’s his turn. Time to step up to the plate, because he can’t make Gintoki do that again. Can’t, won’t, it’s not right, not fair, Gintoki was only just starting to heal.
(Katsura hasn’t spoken to Gintoki since they boarded the ship. He only woke up from the treatment of his new belly button a few hours ago, and he’s torn between going to Gintoki and staying far away. Wants to offer comfort, and, at the same time, doesn’t want to see the look on Gintoki’s face, the broken exhaustion in his eyes. Something old - a reminder of the past.)
A bandaged hand wraps around his. Katsura looks up, sees Kagura biting her lip, looking at the floor with glittering, glassy eyes. A warm weight lands on his shoulder, and Katsura flinches. Then he realises that it’s Shinpachi, cheek on Katsura’s gi, looking determinedly forward. His expression is fierce, even as tears trace lines down his pale face.
“It wasn’t your fault,” Kagura says. “You and Gin-chan, it wasn’t your faults.”
And how, Katsura wonders, would she know that?
Shinpachi nods, soft hair brushing against Katsura’s neck. “Don’t blame yourself, Katsura-san.”
“I-” Katsura stares at them. Wonders how they know exactly what to say.
But he knows, doesn’t he? Kagura’s family tore itself apart. Shinpachi landed an ippon on Obi-one, and it wasn’t a killing blow, but it must have felt like one. They know exactly what to say, because they know how it feels.
Katsura wonders if Gintoki told them the same thing. When he found out about Kagura’s family. When Obi-one died. This is exactly the sort of thing Gintoki would say, offered like a lungful of air to a drowning man.
These children are just like him. So different, and yet. Exactly the same. Gintoki must be scared to hell.
“Join us for dinner,” Kagura says, not waiting for a response. “Shinpachi cooks good rice, uh-huh.”
“We’ll make rice balls together,” Shinpachi adds. Quiet and soothing and this time, when Katsura shuts his eyes, it feels like rest instead of breaking.
-x-
When Katsura sees Gintoki’s face, his heart breaks a little in his chest.
Gintoki has bruises beneath his eyes. He’s covered in bandages, limping and tired, and his shoulders are slumped with exhaustion that goes deeper than his bones.
And his eyes are everything Katsura was afraid of. Old, and hurting, and so achingly exhausted, just like they were so many years ago and Katsura’s breath catches in his lungs, bile rises in his throat, Gintoki can’t do this again and neither can Katsura, they can’t, once was tears and blood and shattered glass on the floor. Twice will cut them deeper than they know how to bear.
“Gin-chan!” “Gin-san!”
Shinpachi catches Gintoki’s hand and Kagura barrels into him, beaming like twin suns, like the dawn Gintoki was always looking for. Kagura chatters about everything and nothing, about how big the ship is, how Shinpachi dropped an entire bowl of rice, and Gin-chan do you think we can still watch Ladies Four in space? Do they have better connection in space since we’re closer to the satellites? Gin-chan- And Shinpachi nags at Gintoki because Gin-san, the food’s getting cold, and Kagura chan, you weren’t supposed to eat the rice off the floor- it’s the five second rule, not the five minute rule, Gin-san-
And looking down at them, Gintoki’s eyes go warm, and a little more light. He blinks, and it’s like he’s waking from a nightmare - one hand coming to rest in Kagura’s hair, the other curling solidly around Shinpachi’s, and he doesn’t smile, but his eyes are a little less worn.
Then, so fast and smooth that Katsura isn’t quite sure how it happens (he’s starting to sympathise with Gintoki, these children are good-) there’s a bandaged hand around his - Kagura’s - and he’s swept up in a sea of chatter and laughter and warmth. Shinpachi’s hand is on his back, and there is inane, constant chatter drowning the silence ringing in Katsura’s ears.
Katsura meets Gintoki’s eyes over Kagura’s bright head, sighing in exasperation-
-and Gintoki’s lips curl up in a smile.
It’s small, and tired, and nothing like wide, shattered grin he’d worn all those years back. It’s tiny and a little lost and real, and Katsura grins in response, even though, a minute ago, he’d thought that they’d never smile again.
(Somewhere in his chest, a broken, aching piece of him begins to heal.)
#gintama#gintama fanfic#sakata gintoki#katsura kotarou#gintama fanfiction#whoa it's been a long time#i've almost forgotten how these tags work#lol sorry to anyone who came to this blog for the writing#ahaha#anyway#hannah#happy birthday!!#:)#i hope you like this aaa it's much longer than i expected#sadder too#oops#i'll prob try to write something else too hehe#my writing#my fic#unidentified pie's fic#my shit#my stuff#nic fic#?#poor katsura and gintoki anyway
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10 movies about the end of the world that you can watch on Netflix, HBO and Prime Video
Do you think a catastrophe is coming that will end the planet? In this selection of apocalyptic films that we have prepared for you, you can see how the end of the world could occur.
In this imagination about what the future can hold for us, science fiction foresees all kinds of scenarios. Some of them conceive a prosperous future, but others are much more pessimistic and predict the end of the world as we know it. That is exactly the theme of this selection of films so that all the feature films that you are going to find here describe ways in which the world could end.
In this list, you will find different scenarios in which the end of the world could take place: as a result of a climatic catastrophe, by an alien invasion or the attack of mysterious creatures, and even because God Himself has decided that the time has come to begin the Last Judgment.
Some options seem more possible or realistic than others, but who knows for sure how the world will end? Meanwhile, check out how the cinema imagines this possible ending.
Movies about the end of the world
Matrix
Matrix is a cult film that marked an era both for its approach and for its visual effects and technology.
The plot introduces us to Thomas A. Anderson, a computer programmer who is also a hacker known as Neo. The young man, with the help of a group of rebels, discovers that he lives in a false world created by Artificial Intelligence, and in reality, the machines have submitted to the human race to obtain the energy they need to function.
And why have we selected Matrix as one of the recommended movies from the end of the world? Well, precisely because it presents us with a post-apocalyptic world that is the result of a war between machines and humanity. People have lost, and that is why they are now enslaved and subdued.
Release Year: 1999
Duration: 2 hours 16 minutes
IMDb score: 8.7 / 10
Where to watch: Netflix and HBO
The Road
We continue our list with The Road, an apocalyptic film based on the homonymous novel written by Cormac McCarthy and published in 2006, which earned the author the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.
The road places us at an indeterminate time when the lands have ceased to be fertile and the animals have died, so food is a very scarce commodity. This situation has in many cases brought out the worst of people, and thieves and cannibals abound.
In these circumstances, a father travels with his son, trying to protect him from the evils that plague the world, teach him to survive when he is missing and instill values.
Release Year: 2009
Duration: 1 hour 51 minutes
IMDb score: 7.2 / 10
Where to watch: Amazon Prime Video
War of the Worlds
War of the Worlds is a film based on the novel of the same name written by HG Wells and published in 1898.
The plot narrates the invasion of the Earth by aliens of superior intelligence and advanced technology. Humanity is trying to present battle, but the huge three-legged machines that are everywhere seem indestructible and kill or kidnap anyone they meet in their path.
Under these circumstances, Ray Ferrier, a father, tries to save his children from being arrested or killed by aliens.
Release Year: 2005
Duration: 1 hour 57 minutes
IMDb score: 6.5 / 10
Where to watch: Netflix and Amazon Prime Video
Cloverfield Street 10
We continue with our list of films about the end of the world with Cloverfield Street 10. The feature film was initially titled The Basement but eventually became the successor to Monstruoso, the 2008 film in which a monster attacks New York City.
Cloverfield Street 10 presents a world that has suffered a mysterious attack (possibly extraterrestrial) that has made the earth's surface uninhabitable. The plot puts us in Howard's bunker, a man who has a somewhat strange behavior, who has rescued Michelle after having a car accident and Emmett, another young man who is living in the shelter.
Gradually, the two refugees discover that their suspicions about Howard are not misleading.
Release Year: 2016
Duration: 1 hour 43 minutes
IMDb score: 7.2 / 10
Where to watch: Amazon Prime Video
2012
Another film about the end of the world that you can see on Netflix is 2012. The film explains that the Maya were right and that from 2012, when their calendar ends, a series of natural disasters, like eruptions, begin to unleash. volcanic and earthquakes.
All these events occur as a result of a solar eruption, which has caused the mutation of the neutrinos and, with it, the temperature of the earth's crust is increasing by leaps and bounds. To ensure that humanity survives the end of the world, world leaders have created an ark in which 400,000 carefully chosen people will travel.
Release Year: 2009
Duration: 2 hours 38 minutes
IMDb score: 5.8 / 10
Where to watch: Netflix
Legion
Another apocalyptic movie that you can watch on Netflix is Legion. We have selected this feature because it is quite original and does not tell a story of the end of the world to use.
Legion places us in a lost restaurant in New Mexico, where a pregnant waitress of the chosen one works to save humanity. God considers that humans no longer deserve to live in the world, so he sends his legion of angels to exterminate us in the Last Judgment, and the only hope for salvation lies in the little unborn baby.
The archangel Michael decides by his own will to help the rebels, who have no choice but to deal with what comes their way.
Release Year: 2010
Duration: 1 hour 40 minutes
IMDb score: 5.2 / 10
Where to watch: Netflix
A peaceful place
A quiet place is another of the films that we propose to you on this theme. The film tells how the majority of the population has been killed by violent creatures that attack everything that makes noise. Therefore, to survive it is necessary to remain silent and not make noise.
In these circumstances, he is trying to survive a family, which has already suffered the loss of his youngest son because of these creatures. Now the mother is in the last weeks of pregnancy, which will have to face a silent delivery and try to make the newborn make the minimum possible noise to stay alive.
Release Year: 2018
Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes
IMDb score: 7.5 / 10
Where to watch: Netflix
Waterworld
Waterworld presents us with a future in which the world ends as we know it because of a problem that surely sounds to you: the polar ice caps have completely melted due to climate change, which has made the sea level increase greatly and that there is hardly any land left on the planet.
In these circumstances, the majority of the population that has survived the catastrophe lives in the atolls, artificial floating platforms, the main concern is to look for freshwater and everyone dreams of reaching dry land, the mainland that mythology says is found somewhere in the immense ocean.
A girl has the exact location of Dry Land tattooed on her back, and she will have to escape from pirates who want to hunt her down. It will be helped by a hybrid, a human who has developed gills and is able to breathe underwater.
Release Year: 1995
Duration: 2 hours 15 minutes
IMDb score: 6.2 / 10
Where to watch: Amazon Prime Video
Knowing
The next title on our list is Knowing, another film that tells the catastrophe the world is heading towards. The plot begins in 1959 when some children make a time capsule in a school. One of the students introduces a list of seemingly random numbers, but when the son of an astrophysics professor discovers her in 2009, she realizes with her father that they really have meaning.
The astrophysicist investigates the numbers carefully and realizes that they hide catastrophic predictions. Some of them have already taken place and you can contrast them, but others are yet to happen, including a solar disaster that can end the planet.
Release Year: 2009
Duration: 2 hours 1 minute
IMDb score: 6.2 / 10
Where to watch: HBO
The wandering Earth
We finalize our list of films about the end of the world with The Wandering Earth, a Chinese feature film that has become the second-highest-grossing Asian country film of all time. He has received good reviews, and media such as Forbes claim that "as a movie it is great" and that "it has impressive moments".
The plot puts us in the year 2061 when scientists discover that it is necessary to look for another planet because, because of the aging of the Sun, the Earth will disappear in about 300 years. The world government decides to start a project to emigrate to Alfa Centauri, while on the mainland the population is being decimated by natural catastrophes.
Release Year: 2019
Duration: 2 hours 5 minutes
IMDb score: 6/10
Where to watch: Netflix
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