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wri0thesley · 30 days

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my heart a frozen thing (I of III)- capitano x reader

the tsaritsa's handmaidens are enviable indeed; perfect, chaste, and honoured beyond measure. a well-oiled machine. but you do not quite fit in. lucky, then, that the tsaritsa herself has intervened, to find you a position that befits who you once were - to arrange your marriage to one of her most trusted lieutenants.

cw: arranged marriage, mentions of death/freezing to death, corpses, weird religious themes, bullying. reader is referred to as a 'handmaiden', wears a gown, but no pronouns are used. wc: 5.4k. sfw.

a/n: capitano and his little handmaiden are a little thing i've wanted to explore for a while; i don't usually do series, but i have a very clear idea of where this is going and i hope i can get it there! in my head this ought to run to three parts, but here is the first! i had a lot of fun just making up background for this honestly fbgnkjgbfn.

The halls of Zapolyarny Palace have never felt so cold.

They are halls that you have walked a thousand times, at the behest of your Goddess; chambers that you have traversed for as long as you can remember. You learnt yourself here - so much so that the person you once were, the family you once had . . . that has faded to nothing. You have been a ward of the Tsaritsa since you were six years old, and you would not have had it any other way.

After all - are you not one step down from divinity? Do you not follow in her wake, untouchable and lovely? Do you not provide her with anything she could need? You see the Fatui members who walk these halls, the Harbingers - their hands are stained with blood up to the elbows, their figures stooped from war, their faces twisted with their troubles. They have clawed their way up the ranks -

And you? You have done no such thing. Something about you had called out to the Tsaritsa and she had welcomed you to her bosom and you had accepted, allowing yourself to be draped in furs and glittering crystals, to stand proud and haughty, to kneel for her and ensure her skirts are never dirtied, her every whim is met . . .

Until today, you suppose.

Her lips had felt like ice when she had kissed you on your forehead, and you had known then that you would walk from her chambers freezing cold and stripped of everything you held dear. You have always known that your fellow handmaidens did not like you; that they had envied you the Tsaritsa’s favour, that they have whispered that you are unworthy. Such things are easy to ignore when you know that you are cherished, though - and you had ignored them. You had ignored how they had ripped holes in your stockings and sent you on wild goose chases and errands, how they whispered behind your back when you fell into formation looking harried and rushed and imperfect because you had not been able to find your hairbrush in the morning.

But the handmaidens of the Tsaritsa are supposed to be a unit. You are all supposed to see one another as siblings; to think of nothing more than Her, and how you may serve Her. It is this that the Tsaritsa had said to you in your private meeting, as you had shivered and burned with the cold ice of humiliation.

“I love you,” she had said, with her voice as lovely as shattering crystals, as she had pressed that traitorous kiss onto your forehead. “Do not worry, little one. I shall ensure that you will not be thrown to the wolves.”

And then she had told you exactly how she was ensuring that, and you had had no choice but to stand before her, trembling, chin jutting proudly up - and pretend that you agreed with her decision.

There is nobody in the dormitory when you go to pack what little things you have; you are glad of that, at least, so that those who have brought you down to this station in life cannot gloat at you. You do not have many things of your own; of course, the handmaidens are given fine clothes, but they are more uniform than ordinary wardrobe. You pack your hairbrush, a book, a few other creature comforts - but you are supposed to be a homogenous unit, after all, and to make yourself too individual would simply not do.

One of the Tsaritsa’s servants is waiting outside of the door for you when you emerge. You shiver in the cool air, but try to keep a thread of your calm; give her a trembling smile. She looks at you with curiosity in her gaze, but she does not pry; that is not the way of things here. You soon lose track of where she is taking you.

In Zapolyarny Palace, there are paths that you walk every day; to the chapel, to the Tsaritsa’s chambers, to the hallowed halls and meeting rooms and anywhere else a handmaiden may be needed. But you do not wander freely beyond that. You know there are offices and spare bedrooms and studies and libraries galore - it is a most magnificent work of architecture - but you are not at liberty to explore them. So you soon lose your bearing as the servant brings you through hallways you’ve never seen, past doors you never knew existed. You feel your heart begin to beat too fast in your chest, anxiety crawling up your throat.

You do not know what is to happen to you now.

You know in theory what the Tsaritsa expects to happen, and you ought to believe her - find her infallible, as your Goddess and Archon surely is - but you have learnt, today, that nothing is infallible. You do not think any handmaiden in the history of Her Majesty’s service has ever been let go like you - and, too, you know none of them have suffered the humiliation of being--

You can barely even think the words. You think of the first Harbinger again, the one directly beneath the Director; the looming presence, the always-worn mask, the whispers that follow in his wake . . . you cannot imagine yourself on his arm. Cannot imagine yourself in his bed. Cannot imagine yourself standing beside him at an altar, promising him eternity--

“We’re here.” The servant’s voice is timid; even though she must surely know that you are disgraced, there is still - in your bearing and in the fine white furs and silks you wear - the reminder of what you were before disgrace came knocking at your door, and she has been taught that the Tsaritsa’s handmaidens are pure and perfect and precious. How you wish you felt that way.

“Thank you,” you say to her, swallowing to try and clear the dryness in your throat, trying to summon a smile. She bobs an awkward curtsey and inclines her head before she scurries away down the corridor, no doubt to whisper to someone about the scandal that is unfolding within the palace’s halls.

You look at the door to your new life. It is carved with swirling snowflakes; a solid impenetrable wooden shield from the rest of the palace. You do not know if it will stay your door, but you have nowhere else to go now. You cannot go running back to the dormitory of the handmaidens; surely, by now, they will all have been told exactly how you have been disgraced--

Your gloved fingers fasten about the doorknob as you force your traitorous heart to beat evenly. You must take things as they come; there is no point getting too frightened just yet. Some of the Harbingers do indeed keep quarters in the Palace - Pantalone, you know, has a wing set aside for his use. And Pulcinella, too, needing to be near the beating heart of Snezhnaya, has rooms here.

It is in the nature of a handmaiden, you remind yourself, to be calm. To keep their wits about them. It is proper of you to maintain an even voice and a pretty face, to be ready to be called to your service at a moment’s notice; and though you are not, really, a handmaiden any more . . . your entire life has been governed by these rules, and such things do not desert one so easily. So you keep your head held high as you step into the room, your chin jutting out, your eyes wide, your face proud--

And you do not let the tears fall, like your life is collapsing into the sea around you and leaving you adrift with no safe harbour (your beautifully designed ice sculpture of an existence), until the door is closed and nobody but you and the sharp coldness of the mirror mounted on the wall opposite is there to see it.

ii.

You are expecting to be brought before him, as would befit a man of his status - a status that now far outranks your own. You are expecting Fatui grunts or serving maids to come and fetch you from the neatly appointed little room of the Palace, to drag you before the Harbinger you are to become reliant upon, and to have every part of you scrutinised. Perhaps he will find you wanting, you think bitterly; perhaps he does not want to be a part of this mockery any more than you do. Perhaps he will snarl beneath the mask and despite the Tsaritsa’s attempts to save your life, will have you banished to some cold unfeeling corner of the Palace where you will freeze to death and nobody will find your corpse.

(It would hardly be the first time such a thing has occurred in Snezhnaya).

You are not expecting that the first of the Fatui Harbinger, he of the war glories, second only in the chain of command to the Director himself, would lower himself to come to you.

But come to you he does.

The room that you have been given is lovely if impersonal; a bedspread patterned with sprigs of blue flowers, an ornate mirror, a wardrobe and a shelf of knick-knacks. You, as a handmaiden, have never had cause to tend to the guest rooms - that is for those whose service is less important, whose place in the world is less holy - but you do at least know enough to know that is what this is. And you suppose, too, that is what you are now too.

No longer somebody who truly belongs in the Palace; no longer one of a flock of beautiful befurred doves, cooing and twittering over who will be granted the honour of smoothing Her Majesty’s dress, of combing her hair. Simply a guest - a person waiting to see what the next step in their life will be. Perhaps Zapolyarny Palace will be a pitstop; perhaps your new betrothed will have somewhere else to put you like an ornamental doll.

Perhaps he will take you to his camps, his fields of war, install you in his tent until you have forgotten the luxury of silks and glass and the blood he sheds stains your white furs red. Your nails dig crescent moons into your palms at the thought of it; of all of the ways your life could spiral into decay and dirt when it has only ever been pristine and beautiful before.

You are sitting on the bed when the knock comes, when the door is opened before you can even call out. You see the faintest outline of some Fatui soldier, before his bulk is silhouetted in the doorway and your breath is robbed from your chest.

Seeing him pass by you in hallways, or at the table when you have been called to the Tsaritsa’s side, does not do the man justice. He seems to tower over you; his presence in the room makes it seem like a dollhouse more than anything functional. Your eyes flitter, afraid to rest upon him too much lest you see something terrifying staring back at you.

You cannot describe it, but your entire body seems to go into a freeze response; you sit there, exactly like the ornament you are so afraid of becoming, your gloved hands neatly balled into fists upon the luxurious fabric of your handmaiden’s gown, your eyes wide with surprise and fear.

You expect him to stride in; to take what he has been given, self-assured as only a member of Her Majesty’s most esteemed lieutenant can truly be. Thoughts flash through your head; of him throwing you upon the prettily patterned bedsheets and having his way with you, of him grabbing you roughly and letting his hands explore the merchandise he has been granted.

Certainly, the visual of him makes those seem the most likely course of action. The massive stature, the shadows that his shoulders throw across the room. The impassive iron mask; the armour that he dons, whether he is on official business or not. Your shoulders draw up against your ears, preparing for something, though you know not what. You catch a glimpse of eyes, bluer than the hottest fire--

And then Il Capitano sinks to one knee in front of you and reaches for your trembling, gloved hand. Your breath catches in your throat as he draws it closer to himself - but then, he presses his mask against the fabric in an echo of a kiss, and from beneath the helmet he wears comes a voice like an echo in an iron chamber.

“Little handmaiden,” he says - and then, “I regret not coming sooner.”

“I--” Your tongue will not work around the syllables. It trembles in your mouth; only your willpower alone stops your teeth clacking together like some awful grisly musical instrument. “My Lord Harbinger, I . . .”

“Do not worry,” he says, his voice still a strange echo - you cannot imagine getting used to it, cannot imagine it whispering words of love into the shell of your ear. You can imagine it, though, booming across a battlefield, and the thought makes your heart seize in your chest. “I have no intention to hurt you. I am . . . most honoured by the privilege that has been entrusted to me.”

You realise with a start that you are the privilege; that this is punishment for you, but it does not seem so to him. The thought gives you pause.

Even the word . . . ‘privilege’. He does not call you a reward; does not act as though he has been given you as some Archon-won right, to do with as he pleases. For the first time, you let yourself wonder if perhaps your fate is not to be as cruel as you had feared.

“Thank you,” you say to him, your voice a thready little mouse-whisper of noise. Capitano does not move from his place before you, kneeling upon the parquet flooring of the room - his hand does not let go of yours for a moment, as if he cannot quite believe that you are real flesh and blood there before him. You cannot properly see his eyes behind the helmet - only that bluefire suggestion, the glow of something behind the ornate visor - but in your time as a handmaiden of the Tsaritsa, you have grown used to the sensation of being looked at, and that is certainly what he is doing.

“I intend to do this properly.” He tells you, with the door still open, with the Fatui soldiers who had accompanied him still stationed outside of the door listening to every word that he says. “I intend to make you mine in the eyes of the Tsaritsa and everyone else who matters.”

You think once more of the altar; you think of your uniform of pure white furs, traded for something lacier and gauzier, something more of a wedding gown than a ritual dress. You think of being chained to this man for all eternity--

And though he has been kind to you in these few brief moments, though your Archon had said she wished to see no harm come to you . . . once more, you think of Capitano’s reputation. Of the war fields and the bloodshed, of his victories and his spoils, of the way you have heard he throws himself into conflict like it is the only thing that keeps his blood pumping through his veins.

But you cannot say a thing.

“Tomorrow,” he tells you, and he says the word like a sacred thing - a prayer on his breath. “Tomorrow, I will marry you, and I will take you home.”

He does not leave his words in a question; there is no space for you to reply. You swallow your protestations as he stands back up and bows his head like a gentleman, though you know he is stained with blood in a way you had never expected to be yourself.

(You think of his hand on yours; imagine bloody fingerprints where he had clung to you. Marked. Soiled. No longer pristine and pure; no longer one of the Tsaritsa’s favourites. You stand upon the precipice of becoming something else, and it terrifies you).

“Tomorrow,” you echo, but the door has already closed behind him.

iii.

You cannot sleep.

The bed is fine; finer, perhaps, than the one in your dormitory that you have slept on for decades. The blankets and coverlets, with their pretty patterns, are warm (warmer than you are used to; the handmaidens are kept close to Her Majesty, and coldness permeates the air wherever she dwells. You had not realised just how cold you were used to being until you had slipped into this bed in a guest-room of the place you thought of as your home).

But your mind will not quieten.

You cannot stop thinking of Capitano, and all that his future entails; cannot stop the whisper of his voice, constrained as it is by his helm, when he says the word ‘home’. What is a home for you, now? At this moment in time, ousted from Her Majesty’s Service and not yet yoked to the first-ranked Harbinger, you are a creature that has nowhere to lay down their roots.

If you slipped out of this room, and out into the cold Snezhnayan winter . . . you would be another nameless person, another corpse frozen to a block of ice. You have not been out amongst the general populace in some time - that is not a duty that befits one of the handmaidens - but what memories you do have, before six, remind you that you would hardly be the first. Indeed, finding some poor soul frozen into the next life is an occurrence that happens to all citizens of Snezhnaya, eventually.

A memory rises unbidden to the forefront of your mind; another child, who looks like you but older, concentration writ clear on their face as they try and unbend fingers from a poor man rimmed with frost with lips of pale blue. An older woman, shouting - a sickening snap--

You squeeze your eyes shut and force the memory away. There is nothing, you remind yourself, before the Tsaritsa’s tender care. If there ever was, it has gone the way of snowstorms and blizzards; there is no use remembering. It has been so long that all of the figures in your memories, too, are perhaps no better than markers in the frozen ground.

If you cannot sleep, you tell yourself forcefully, you are not going to allow yourself to be haunted by nightmares of your own making. You will lie here, in this lovely little room. You will let yourself think of the warmth that seeps into your bones; you will let yourself remember it.

One final night; the first night you can truly remember where you are free.

And as for what tomorrow holds - as for the thought of standing beside Capitano, as to the thought of his home - be it tent or wing of rooms or little shack or anything in between - you will not think on them. You will think of how, if you wished, you could toss and turn and no other handmaidens in the dormitory will hiss anger at you beneath their breath. How you could sing in this room, like a pretty bird, and nobody would shout for you to shut up as they throw their pillows at you.How there will be no ringing bell in the morning, no sidelong glances from your fellows who do not think you deserve to play the role you are given.

There is blissful silence; the luxury of having a bedroom to yourself, of being an individual when you have for so long been an entity made up of so many.

You do fall into sleep, eventually.

You dream of being a beautiful white horse, your hooves leaving distinct prints in the snow, blending alone into the barren landscape of your homeland.

When you awake, there is a dress hanging on the wardrobe opposite the bed.

You do not question it; how they found time for your measurements, who made it, whether it is Capitano’s design. Your training does not fail you; things happen, and you must accept them. The easy freedom of last night is gone, and the weight of what you are to become settles like a mantle around your shoulders.

It is still service, you tell yourself, as you bathe in the little basin in the adjoining room. The soaps and potions that are lined neatly up on shelves are scented like something fresh and clean and floral; the kind of flower that makes you think of rolling hills and ticklish breezes. The handmaidens used toiletries scented with spearmint and frostflower, as the Tsaritsa had chosen - you wonder if these bottles here are the choice of your betrothed, or merely coincidence.

You perform your ablutions and ignore the fact that you are preparing yourself for something you do not fully understand. If you stop to think too hard upon what it is you are primping and preening for, you do not know if you will be able to keep the thread of your calm - as it is, your hands are shaking when you step into the gown left for you.

It is undoubtedly a wedding gown.

It is not cut in the Snezhnayan fashion; there is no trimming of pale blue diamonds, of furs or feathers or warmth. This is the gown of a beloved maiden in a tower; something to be worn whilst dreaming of gardens, all pretty eyelet lace and delicate embroidery. Wearing it, after being so used to the garb of one of Her Majesty’s attendants, feels almost like being naked.

There is nothing for your hair; you leave it unbound. There is no other ornamentation; you suppose, when you think about it, your glimpses of Capitano have never suggested him to be a man of excess. If it were one of the others you were to wed - Pantalone, perhaps - you have no doubt you would be draped in jewels.

If it were Pantalone that you were to be wed to, you think, he would not have been satisfied with a mere ceremony, rushed through the next day. You know from gossip he is a man who thinks he deserves better than the world has given him, that he would never take less than excess. A brief gladness that it is not the Regrator that your Archon has given you to flashes across your mind--

And then you remember Capitano, the size of him, the mystery of what lays behind his mask, and you swallow the lump in your throat.

There is a serving maid at the door, holding a bunch of flowers in her hand - they are delicate things, white petalled and lovely, scattered with pink roses. You breathe in the scent to calm yourself and recognise them as the same scent that lingers on your skin and in your hair - and the serving maid gives you a small, nervous smile.

“They’re Cecilias,” she tells you. “from Mondstadt. The Captain asked for them specifically.”

She says his name in the same way so many of the citizens of Zapolyarny Palace do; with respect, and reverence. There is none of the fear that edges those who whisper of other Harbingers in her voice - you have heard horror in the tones of those who speak of Dottore, the Doctor . . . But Capitano seems to command awe and respect. You want it to be comforting - but you cannot help but wonder if it is merely that those who know his true nature are quieted by his sword.

“Thank you,” you say, for you cannot make your voice shape any other words. Your tongue has grown leaden in your mouth, the moisture gone from it completely, and you know the thing that has sapped your ability to speak is fear. She gives you another smile, and looks at you in your gown.

“You’re beautiful,” she says to you, as if to reassure; perhaps misunderstanding your terror of your bridegroom as the normal nerves of someone about to tie their life to someone else’s in matrimony. The whispers of your dismissal have had time to grow their own stories, after all; few things move faster than gossip in a place like this. “Come. We shouldn’t keep them waiting.”

You’re helpless to do anything but let her lead you. The hem of your gown trails on the floor behind you, but the Palace is spotless; it does not gather dust or dirt. You pass through the halls like a ghost, and you wonder if that is how you look.

As a handmaiden, you had moved with purpose, with the assurance that you were Somebody. As the betrothed of a Harbinger, you move like somebody sentenced to execution, your heart pounding in your throat. The halls seem silent around you. You wonder, if given the chance to do it all again, how you would stop all of this so you would not find yourself in this position, walking to what could very well be your own doom.

“Here,” the serving maid whispers, stopping by a door. You look at it with dumb terror in your heart, but you keep your face an impassive mask as you have been taught to do. You know where you are; you know this chapel to be the Tsaritsa’s most sacred place. You have been given access only a handful of times; the handmaidens who serve your Archon here are far more senior than you. In time, you had hoped you would become one of her most trusted, one who could sit with her in prayer in this private sanctuary--

You suppose that is a dream that will never come to fruition now.

You give her a smile - a trembling thing, but you have been taught how to behave - and as she opens the chapel door for you, you square your soldiers and summon all of the courage you have (what little there is; courage is not a thing that is encouraged amongst the handmaidens, amongst those who must move and act as one), and you place one foot in front of the other as you begin your walk down the aisle.

You tell yourself you will not look at the pews - hewn of glass, the more to resemble the Tsaritsa’s beloved ice - but as you begin a walk that feels as though it lasts forever, you cannot help it. The chapel is still a sanctuary; it is almost empty, in fact, but for a few faces sitting at the very front.

The Tsaritsa herself presides, and you immediately lower your eyes to the ground. You have seen her before, of course - have tended to her when called - but it would not be proper of you to stare. She is still your Archon. Your fingers tremble where they are wrapped around your bouquet.

Capitano stands, as patient and as still as a massive statue, at the altar. He is dressed still in his armour; the only concession he has made to the idea of a wedding is a buttonhole tucked into his chest, of matching roses and Cecilias to your own. You can see that burning bluefire from across the room, and as you walk closer and closer to it you are hit by the urge to laugh at the thought that perhaps you are simply walking into hellfire.

And a few other familiar faces fill the first row; that is Pierro, you know. The Director. He sits ramrod straight, the second-largest man in the room, his cloak serving to highlight the severe lines of his face. There is The Knave, too - in her beautifully-cut suit. There is the smallest smile playing on her lips, as she looks from you to Capitano and back again.

Not all of the Harbingers have come to see this spectacle - you are silently glad of the absence of the Doctor - but there are enough there that you feel sweat prickle down your spine, gathering in the small of your back. You force yourself to swallow and to breathe. This chapel’s aisle has never felt so long before.

But even though it feels as though the aisle will never end, end it does - too soon, too quickly, and you are at the end of your last walk as somebody free and unmarried. You are standing beside Capitano, ready to pledge yourself to him as your Archon has demanded you do.

You wonder if he is smiling beneath the helmet. Your own face, you’re sure, must have the look of a deer staring down a bow and arrow; wide, frightened, terribly aware suddenly of its own mortality. But there is nothing a doe can do when she is a hunter’s quarry, and there is nothing you can do now either.

So you say the words, after they issue forth from the Tsaritsa’s lovely voice and she commands you to repeat them. You listen to Capitano make the same oaths, his voice still a strange echo. You do not hear them, not really - but it does not matter, because they are binding in the eyes of your Archon and it is your Archon who has witnessed them being said.

Your hand is shaking when Capitano takes it to slide the ring upon it. It is plain, too; a silver band, etched all over with some decorative scrollwork and words in a language you do not understand.

You have never seen a marriage. The handmaidens do not do such things - they are chaste, and pure, and when they are done with the service of the Tsaritsa they remain so even when cast back to the powdery snow. But you have read books, and you know that a marriage usually ends with a kiss; a sealing of the pact that two people who love one another have made.

You steel yourself, then, to see below Capitano’s mask. You try not to dwell on possibility; the idea of him being monstrous or disfigured or perhaps even just perfectly ordinary. You try to prepare yourself for the feel of another’s lips upon yours.

But the Tsaritsa never decrees that it is time for Capitano to kiss his spoils.

Indeed, Capitano takes your hand - his own like a massive claw, yours delicate and tender in his grip - and leads you back down the aisle. He does not look at you as he does it; but you have the strangest sensation that he is . . . uncomfortable, with the way that everyone is looking at him. That such pomp and circumstance is perhaps not something he would generally choose.

In fact, when the door closes behind you - when you and he are briefly, briefly, briefly along in the corridor . . . something in him seems to unknot. He lets forth a rattling breath, his shoulders sagging just a touch, that would perhaps be invisible to any other eyes but the eyes of a frightened, lonely little mortwal who has been torn from what they thought was their purpose in life and thrown to the whims of somebody that may yet be a monster.

“Little handmaiden,” he rumbles, from somewhere low in his chest, and you wonder if it is indeed relief that makes his tone seem almost comforting. “The formalities are done with. You are mine, and I am yours.”

He tilts his helmet, and that bluefire burning behind the visor finds your own eyes; almost imperceptibly, perhaps because he sees the terror in your gaze, he seems to soften at the edges.

Hesitantly, he reaches out a gloved hand; just as hesitantly, he cups your face, the metal cool against the softness of your cheeks. He turns your face towards him, with a grip that you expect to be rough and possessive but is as gentle as the first layer of snow upon a shooting leaf.

“Let’s go home,” he says.

Home brings to mind your dormitory; the identical rows of beds, the identically dressed handmaidens, the comfort of routine. Home whispers in the back of your mind of something cooking in the oven, of a rowdy family gathered around a battered old table, of three children older than you and three children younger than you.

You cannot return to either of those places.

So all you can do, then, is smile for the man who could be captor or lover or liberator, but is now, inarguably, your husband.

And let him lead you home.

#genshin impact posting #writing #capitano x reader

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soulprompts · 9 months

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an unexpected arrival. (A PROMPT LIST!)

so a lovely anonymous angel asked for a list of prompts relating to an unexpected pregnancy, and i made a list! i have two other lists over on my other blog that i'm gonna reblog over here, but there may be some slight overlap with these; however, unlike the other two lists, these focus exclusively on the unexpected part. DON'T ADD TO THIS LIST, DON'T CLAIM IT AS YOUR OWN! but do have a tonne of fun with them!

" so, remember last week, when i had the flu and i couldn't leave my house? turns out it wasn't the flu. i'm pregnant. "

" i'm telling you about this baby because you deserve to know. that's all. i don't expect anything from you. i don't need you to step up or whatever. i just thought you ought to know. "

" i'm sure you don't need to be reminded, but... getting pregnant wasn't exactly part of the whole life plan. "

" you're sure? i mean, you did the test properly? maybe it was a false positive. or, or maybe you didn't read the results right... "

" a baby... well. that certainly complicates things, doesn't it? "

" i don't even know if i want kids. "

" could you please just stop reminding me that this isn't part of the plan?! you think i don't know that?! we're having a baby, i'm terrified enough without you reminding me! "

" look. i'm/you're not the first person to get pregnant, and i/you won't be the last. we're gonna figure it out, alright? "

" my place isn't even close to being big enough for a baby... they need so much stuff. cribs, prams, diaper stations... and my neighbors complain enough as it is, they'll evict me if i have a screaming baby as well... "

" hey... why don't you move in with me? i've got plenty of space, and my walls are thick, so the baby could scream as loud as they want. you could stay as long as you like. "

" should... we get married? i mean, that's what you do, isn't it? when someone's having a baby? "

" okay, we're not getting married. i mean, i appreciate the gesture, but... there's plenty of single parents out there. what's one more, right? "

" god... we are so stupid. i mean, seriously! any idiot knows that condoms aren't 100% effective! if we're dumb enough to forget that, how are we meant to look after a baby?! "

" you... you're kidding, right? this is a joke? it's a fake pregnancy test, some weird, slightly out of touch belated april fool's prank? "

" it's honestly insane that we didn't figure it out sooner... i mean, those were some wild cravings, right? "

" when you say late... do you mean like, a few days? or are we talking... months? "

" no, no, this... it changes everything. EVERYTHING. i... i don't know if i'm ready for this, i don't think i'm parent material, i... "

" hey. you're not alone. you got that? it takes a village, right? i'm gonna help you every step of the way. we all will. this kid, if you choose to go through with it... they'd be okay. "

" you know i support you. whatever choice you end up making. i will always be by your side. okay? "

" if this is some weird idea of a joke, i have to tell you, it's not funny. i mean, you're having a baby AND i'm somehow the dad? a little much, no? "

" no, i want to step up. it took two of us to make this baby, and i want to make sure you know that, if you go ahead with this, there's gonna be two of us to raise them, too. "

" the father doesn't believe that the baby is his. "

" okay. so screw the father. i'm going to be here to help you. okay? we'll parent this kid so well, they'll never want to know who their real dad is. "

" so... you wanna tell me who the father is? "

" the surprise baby is actually not just one baby. we're having twins/triplets/etc. "

" hey, hey... don't worry, okay? it's alright. it's all going to be okay. condoms break, yeah? it's no biggie... "

" what do you mean, you think?! haven't you taken a pregnancy test yet? "

" that's a lot of pregnancy books you got there... got something you want to tell me? "

" have you told the father yet? "

" i guess, seeing how you rushed over here so fast to tell me the news, that you think the baby is mine? "

" look, we both made plans, right? and obviously shit happens, but... a baby is a pretty massive deal. "

" how many other people have you told about the pregnancy? "

" what do you want to do? "

#pregnancy cw #pregnancy tw #tokophobia cw #tokophobia tw #roleplay meme #rp meme #sentence starters #ask meme #writing prompts #roleplay prompts #rp prompt

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nightislandnoveltymug · 3 months

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actually, proper answer now that i'm awake and have had some time to percolate lol. best thing armand did!

i should say this is kind of a tie for me because the person armand becomes with daniel is always going to be up there -- he didn't let him die, he gave daniel what he wanted, but more importantly he told him, and showed him, that he loved him, and just in general in their time together he allowed daniel to see so much of his real genuine vulnerability and cared for him and worried about him so much and that fucks me up!!

but!! the thing i actually wanted to mention is his homes! (this is maybe cheating a little bit because it isn't something he did, it's something he does, but whatever.) one of the things i love most about armand is that he's always creating these stable places and central points for everybody to congregate on. while a lot of the others are sort of nomadic and don't stay in touch and you don't really know where they are, he is always (as he says) "a canker in the very eye of the world". he's easy to find, he stays in one place and he uses his resources and his power to create these stable, lasting home bases and then opens his doors to others. he creates stability and then shares it in a way that really nobody else does.

and i think it's very interesting because this sort of stability is a character trait that (i think!) maybe most people would first and foremost think to associate with elders like maharet, or marius, when in actual fact, the truth is that neither of them has ever done that -- for their own disparate reasons they've always been highly reclusive, and have protected their own stability by staying out of touch with the rest of the vampire world, not opening their doors, and for the most part not helping anyone or intervening in anything in any way.

there's something fascinating and honestly poignant about like... armand, maybe subconsciously, running a household according to an ideal which (imo!) is based on marius, except that marius has never actually done that. not for vampires. and so in actual fact, this is something that armand has innovated; this actually comes from him, and is coloured by his experience with the covens (which marius has never shown anything but disdain for), and perhaps even beyond that, by his experience with the sense of community in monastic life (which really ditto).

i personally suspect that rather than praiseworthy, he probably sees this as ultimately pretty self-serving on his own part, because he has this longing for community that drives him to create these places, so he probably just sees it as something he does so that he won't have to be alone. and also, from the way he talks in late canon you get the sense that he rather sees himself as trying to atone, and as trying to emulate those who are better than him. when in fact he's doing something that nobody else is doing, and in many ways (imo) behaving more like a leader of a community than any of the characters that everyone else thinks ought to lead, like marius or lestat. not because they couldn't, but because neither of them has ever had the resources, capabilities, patience, and willingness to create something like that and then open it up.

and for a character who's been so lost, and has spent so much of his life feeling lost, feeling abandoned (and i think, right up until present day, still feels that way really), and has spent so much of his life looking for something to anchor his life to, without ever having the luxury of truly finding it, and having to just sort of go on anyway, keep living anyway -- for that character to be a stable anchor point for everybody else is something that really really gets me about him, maybe especially because i think he isn't fully aware of it himself.

#aaaaand there's the ramble!#tumblr will hide this but lmk if i should put it under a readmore LOL #armand #i just have. a lot of feelings about this !!#logs back onto my vc blogs for the first time in 2 years and just spills every single thought i've ever had lmao sorry

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meyerlansky · 12 days

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twenty questions for fic writers!

tagged by @redbelles AND @inkpot-demigod 🖤💙🖤💙 took me eighteen years but i figured i ought to get it done before the emoji asks >_>

1. how many works do you have on ao3?

39!

2. what's your total ao3 word count?

133,253

3. what fandoms do you write for?

right now it's just masters of the air, because i really only focus on one fandom at a time but i also don't really LEAVE fandoms so much as they go dormant for a bit. in the last year i've at least TOUCHED wips for boardwalk empire and the witcher, and once bachelor route drops i will probably go back to some of my pathologic 2 fics and maybe come up with new stuff. same with HotD s2, although i don't know how much new stuff will come out of that vs finishing up things in metamorphoses.

4. top five fics by kudos

keep safe broad shoulders, warm hands keds and tube socks vestis virum facit denuo

so mostly burakhovsky smut, except for keep safe which is outsider pov nearly-gen lambden (from the witcher and specifically witcher 3) fic, and i have NO idea how it's my most-kudosed fic; and keds and tube socks, which is a long-ass (for me) steddie fic that i WILL finish at some point i am so sorry to everyone who's subbed to that fic /o\

5. do you respond to comments?

I TRY MY BEST ;___; i really like talking to people about fic, mine and others', so every comment i've left unresponded-to haunts me, but sometimes i can't get over my own anxiety enough. the only time it's deliberate is if the only content in the comment is "you have to write more of this" or anything similar and phrased EXCLUSIVELY like a demand, because It's Rude and also i have no idea how to respond to that.

6. what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

explicitly angsty is probably with my ash-stained palms or broad shoulders, warm hands because neither ryuzo or daniil get what they want in those ones, though i think bswh!daniil would get what he wants eventually. ryuzo, maybe not >_> dancing cheek to cheek (to cheek) is also probably up there, but that's more interesting because it's not angsty on the page! and i WAS planning on leaving it as is, originally! that's why it has the canon compliant tag! but now i'm 8k deep in a canon-divergent sequel so idk if it counts anymore. genuinely i was planning on answering this with "i don't write a lot of unresolved angst" but. hm.

...wait, also hot blood, deep roots. which is the dark mirror nightmare counterpart of bswh and is... definitely worse. and i have something even worse in my wips okay i guess i write more angst than i thought

7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

probably vestis virum facit, since the final section is implied to be far-enough post-plague that they're Gonna Be Okay. but like the angst question, i don't really think of too many of my fics as the And They Lived Happily Ever After, The End type so much as like... they're happy In That Moment and that's what matters

8. do you get hate on fics?

i got put on the patho fandom blacklist for associating with Freaks And Criminals, and then i wrote hot blood, deep roots to cement my spot on it, so if that counts that's the extent of it afaik. i do worry about catching flak for stuff down the line, but honestly haters tend to be cowards, sooo

9. do you write smut?

LOVE WRITING SMUT. LOVE IT WHEN MY GUYS NAIL EACH OTHER. IT'S MY FAVORITE. i had like a year-long stint before stranger things s4 where i only posted genfic and i was SO disappointed with myself, even though the stuff i posted was GOOD genfic

10. craziest crossover:

don't really do crossovers! but entertaining daemon au thoughts is how i know i'm in a fandom deep enough that it's gonna stick for a bit, even though i've only posted daemon au fic for bwe thus far

11. have you ever had a fic stolen?

not to my knowledge

12. have you ever had a fic translated?

also not to my knowledge!

13. have you ever co-written a fic before?

i'm not opposed to spitballing with people, and some of my best bwe work has come out of very long headcanon exchanges with @goatsandgangsters and @therestisdetail in particular, but i am not a consistent enough writer to saddle anyone else with my habits, so that's the closest i've gotten to cowriting anything.

14. all time favorite ship?

L A N S K I A N O. they are my forever boys. nothing will topple them. ever.

15. what's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

NONE OF MY WIPS ARE ABANDONED THEY ARE ALL GOING TO GET DONE EVENTUALLY DON'T LOOK AT ME LIKE THAT

16. what are your writing strengths?

snappy dialogue and the internal character work involved in a tight third person pov, which is good since a tight third is the only way i like to write

17. what are your writing weaknesses?

speed. if i don't finish something inside of a week of starting it, it will drag out for an infinity and a half and i'll have to chip away at it and hate myself for being slow the whoooooooooole time. i also... i have no idea how to explain this, but i don't consider myself an especially creative person, so i have trouble if i don't have a jumping off point to start with? most of my fics have pretty solid touchpoints in the canon and tend to be one-shots, if not single-scene. coming up with new shit for my dudes to do can be a struggle. which, tbh, adds to the speed thing, especially for stuff that tilts off into canon-divergent territory

18. thoughts on dialogue in another language?

alright, listen, i might have an entire buryat dictionary database downloaded onto my hard drive to spice up patho fic, but i'm in agreement with previous answers on this one: it can get dicey to write in a language you don't know, and if your readers don't know it it will interrupt the flow in a way that's not usually what i'm looking to do in a fic. that said, most of my fandoms have at LEAST one non-english language involved, if not multiple, so i do end up doing a lot of research into those languages, and i'm absolutely not opposed to pulling out single-words or phrases after either a. checking with someone who speaks those languages, if it's a real one, or b. pulling them from their usage in the canon itself and/or sometimes extrapolating out a bit, like the high valyrian i peppered into chrysalis

19. first fandom you wrote in?

boardwalk empire my beloved 🖤🖤🖤 i played around with some stuff prior to that—i think i'd noodled with what would technically be alice in wonderland fic in high school, although i don't remember what happened in it—but nothing substantial enough to count as Actual Fic, and definitely not anything i have access to anymore

20. favorite fic you've written?

MAN. HOW TO CHOOSE. it's maybe a little bit of recency bias to say dancing cheek to cheek (to cheek), but i think it's a tie between that and junkyard dogs, and both for the same reason, which is that i am really proud of the character work they do with curt and eddie, respectively. i'm not SURPRISED jd is as low on the hits/kudos/etc scale as it is since it's genfic and billy is...... divisive........... but i really think i nailed eddie in it. with dctc(tc) it was fun to get to play with curt, who's... look, i'm just gonna say it, i think he gets mischaracterized in a lot of the other fandom stuff i've seen involving him, so it was fun to get how i read him down on the page. it's also interesting to not only develop curt internally but to look at the buckies from an outsider POV, because they are UNDENIABLY the love story at the center of MotA's narrative, but they're both IN IT so they can't SEE IT. i also don't usually do scene breaks? like most of my fics are single-scene but i dragged dctc(tc) out and shockingly it WORKED? so yeah idk i'm just really proud of it.

OKAY. WHOOF. TIME FOR TAGS. let's seeeeeeeeee i will tag @goatsandgangsters @hosseinis @chirpybirdy @sweaterkittensahoy @reiverreturns

@samuelroukin @stoportotouch @notgrungybitchin @adriennefrombrooklyn and anyone else who wants to, but no pressure as always!

#twenty questions meme #my fic #it counts. why not.#long post #forgot that tag. sorry.

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paradoxcase · 5 months

Text

Chapter 11 of Nona the Ninth

Day Three has dawned, and it looks like Corona will appear in this one

Chapter 11 has a Fifth skull. Why? I have no idea

Nook app is back to crashing every time I take a screenshot of it, lovely

I don't think there was a part of the story where either of them was holding someone underwater? There was that one part of the pool scene where I think it was meant to make you think that Gideon might try to drown Harrow, but she didn't do that at all

This sounds maybe more like Harrow's pool scene memories?

The pool scene dream is not sexy, but acting it out with Camilla is?

So possibly she's interpreting "sexy" to mean aesthetically attractive, and you know, that's totally fair, I did that as a teenager too, but Nona doesn't have any presupposition that only people can be sexy so she just calls it as she sees it. It's still interesting from that perspective that she doesn't find the pool scene sexy since presumably Harrow and Gideon do find each other aesthetically attractive

That's pancakes, apparently. I guess pancakes are maybe the only food that Nona actually likes?

Pyrrha was so worried that Camilla was going to go to the park and do something dumb, and made Palamedes promise not to go to the park and not to let Camilla go, and then she went herself

What exactly is Nona's experience of what marriage means and how people who are married ought to act towards each other? Does Nona actually know any married people? If we count Gideon and Harrow's experience, I think their sum total experience of married couples might actually be just Harrow's parents, Ortus's parents, and Magnus and Abigail

I'm guessing this means that Pyrrha killed the people in the cages so they wouldn't have to burn to death

I took a break, and I think I've lost track of what people have told me of the politics here, whether BOE/Merv Wing or locals are the ones burning the "necromancers" to death? Either way, I guess Hot Sauce is involved with those people, which isn't really surprising

I guess Pyrrha/Wake was inevitable, wasn't it?

Palamedes also gets to be heterosexual. As a treat

Camilla seems to have been weirded out by Nona calling her sexy, honestly I think that's fair

At first I though, oh, no, someone has found out about them and they're about to be carted off to the park or something, but then I remembered that it said that Corona takes Nona to school today, so possibly this just Ctesiphon Wing paying them a visit and this is just their way to saying hello

#the locked tomb #nona the ninth

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edsbacktattoo · 7 months

Note

ok i was kind of purposefully avoiding the details of the gravy basket theory because it's sounded so dumb but holy shit i really didn't know the extent of it. sorry in advance to be rambling in your inbox.

i thought if i wanted to talk about it i should read the post in full but honestly that was a struggle on its own. it just completely misunderstands the way the show uses ed experiencing purgatory as metaphor. like, the innkeeper does not show us this sort of wish fulfilling dream state at all, and ed externalizing his self hatred into the figment of hornigold is a simple, concise idea that the show specifically goes out of its way to make clear. episode 8 just doesn't have this. like, you'd have to make the argument that literally EVERY CHARACTER PRESENT IN THE EPISODE is somehow representative of an aspect of stede's psyche. it's not just a matter of him projecting his desires into a falsely constructed space, it's a matter of internal issues manifesting from the subconscious, which is what the show has established. it's particularly bizarre to me that they don't make any effort to argue what izzy is meant to represent in this theory, or what him dying could mean symbolically (which is. y'know. the point of the gravy basket as it's been explored). also there's just a complete disregard for ed's arc in the finale which is. eugh. come on.

and this is all still being generous in taking the idea of the "gravy basket" at face value. like, it feels a little ridiculous to even entertain the idea enough to try to argue it. i'm just so baffled.

(it did make me think about psychonauts to the point of wanting to replay it, so. i guess there's that.)

PRECISELY!!!!!!!!! don’t apologise for rambling in my inbox when you’re so correct my dear friend <3

i can’t believe that this theory has such a vice grip on some people. when it first appeared on my dash (and it did, not because a mutual reblogged it, but bc i follow the ofmd tag, and tumblr is evil and gave me the post bc it thought it was being helpful) i thought it was. a joke. i thought the op was having a laugh. but the more i read the more i started to worry. it takes a very distinct lack of media comprehension to come up with something like this.

now, i want to make it clear that i do feel for the people who enjoy izzy normally. like the folks who just like him because he’s interesting and fucked up and strange. the people that don’t woobify him, ya know? those guys are all right.

but the kind of devotion that leads to behaviour like this? threatening and belittling the writers of the show? calling ed violent and thinking he’s going to be an abuser to stede, the man he’s in love with? if you genuinely believe that then there is something seriously wrong with you, and i think you ought to look introspectively <3

also, as a side note, a large criticism i’ve seen for season 2 is poor writing (which is just not at all correct) but to make up for said “poor writing” the theories that people are whipping up are genuinely like. worse? imagine if they did the gravy basket thing again. gravy basket 2: electric boogaloo. that would be bad writing. that would be lazy!!

no, what they did instead was deliberate and careful and beautiful and hopeful. open ended and bittersweet. and yet. AND YET!!!! you get folks trying to cope so bad it makes them look stupid.

and this is all that i will say on the matter. tho, ive never played psychonauts and this might be the thing that makes me dive into that :)

#fandom critical #it’s actually been nice to talk about this #bc what the fuck is that theory and why are people convinced it’s real #like. no babe <333 #anyway if you jump in my inbox and call me names i’ll start crying #ofmd #ofmd s2

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americanwerewolfontheinternet · 1 month

Text

{Microfic May} 3. Horizon

CW: horny Ron, swearing, references to drinking, death | ron x hermione (T)

🍊Horizon🍊

One– Hermione had promised him one date that didn't end up in their solving a mystery, but, alas, here they are, at the far end of Diagon Alley, around the corner from Carkitt and a bit too close to Knockturn, his girlfriend banging on a brick wall.

“It's just– we've walked by here every summer–”

“I don't know about you, love, but I'm not especially in the habit of remembering everything about every wall in Hogwarts. I spend a lot more time walking by them–”

“Yes, but that's a bit different, Ron. Those walls aren't up to something–” she catches Ron's mouth dropping open, argument ready, and beats him to the punch– "mostly, anyways. Oh, you know what I mean. We know their secrets, Hogwarts wouldn't harm us.”

“We can't possibly know all of Hogwarts's secrets. And it's a magic school, ‘Mione. I'd reckon it doesn't give two figs about us.”

Hermione glares at him, then, personally offended at the idea that something all knowing and potentially omniscient has more pressing concerns than her. It’s understandable, really (then she lit up her candle, and she showed me the way) Hermione Granger is the center of his universe, in any case.

Music drawls out from a distant bar (such a lovely place) filtering into the air through the cracks in the mortar, resolute and destitute, and Ron doesn’t argue when Hermione (such a lovely face) turns around again. She taps at the wall, and he inspects her ass. Lovely, lovely view.

“–listening to me? Ron? Ronald,” she huffs, rounding back on him.

“Mhm? No, I wasn’t, I was lookin’ at your bum.” He's got to be the luckiest man in the world, he thinks.

Hermione huffs again, shoving her hands on to her hips. “Oh, honestly. Men! What am I supposed to do with you lot?”

Ron frowns at her and takes a step up the cobblestones, closing the distance between them. “Meaning just me, right? What’re you going to do with me?”

She rolls her eyes and frowns right back at him, but given the way her glare darkens alongside her cheeks, he’s feeling confident enough to reach out and put his hands on her hips, from where her own have vacated. She has one hand now twirling a strand of her wild hair, which she usually has up– Ron had vanished all her hair ties, and he’s not sorry– the other is in its crook, forearm cross her front. Blimey, does she know what she’s doing, pressing against her chest like that?

She’s Hermione Granger, of course she does. She’s hellbent on driving him absolutely mad.

“Let’s go home, love,” Ron suggests. It’s not that he’s not curious about where exactly Harry’d gotten drunk the other night (other nights? Harry’d spoken as though he’d been there weeks); it’s just that he has more… pressing things to attend to.

“I’m worried, Ron,” she says softly, and it’s the softness that reminds him to take a moment. His brow furrows pensively.

“Of course you are– I am, too. But he seems alright, doesn’t he? I mean, he seems–” Ron’s not quite sure what he wants to say here. He is a bit worried about his best friend, though he’s not sure what’s nagging at him about it. He reckons Hermione does, so, he thinks, maybe he ought to ask. “Why are you worried?”

She chews on her bottom lip. “It’s just– well everyone grieves differently, I suppose. It just seems– too fast?”

Maybe. She could be right. The war had ended 132 days ago– was that a long time? Was it a short one? Did the time truly matter at all when it came to something like grief? Ron thought maybe he was doing a bit better these days, but sometimes, out of nowhere, Fred's death hit him like a heart attack, wretched and incapacitating. Like there wasn't quite enough air in the world anymore. He still carries the guilt of abandoning the loves of his life in a forest; still feels his skin crawl in the dead of night, the weight and chill of a phantom locket heavy on his heart.

Should Harry still be all beat up? It's not a competition, Ron knows, but he can't imagine what it might have been like to be his best mate growing up. To think– Merlin, how he used to envy Harry his charm, his inherent competency, that confidence that he would accomplish any feat in front of him. Ron thinks a younger version of himself would hate his best friend now. Fourteen year old Ron would loathe Harry Potter who hadn't changed by the end of it all, who had merely grown into his life and destiny like one grows into their ears or their eyes or their smile.

But eighteen year old Ron wouldn't give up anything about his own life anymore, not for all the glory in the world. He can't even be sure he'd go back and change anything, not if it ran the risk of ruining what everything had become. Ron has Hermione, and he has Harry; he has his mother, and his father, Ginny and George and Charlie and Bill and Percy. He still has so much, and there will always be someone missing. Fred will always be gone, and Ron thinks he'll grieve over him forever. He doesn't know if that's too long, or not enough.

Hermione wraps her arms around him, pulling him into her, burying her face in the soft spot of his shoulder. He wraps one arm tight around her, the other coming up to rest in the curls at the back of her head.

He doesn't have the answers to any of these questions. He doesn't know the first thing about anything. All he knows is that he loves this woman, and he loves his best friend, and he hopes they're all going to be alright. And, anyways, he'll be there whether they are or not. Come hell, highwater, or horcruxes.

“Come on, ‘Mione,” he murmurs softly. “Let's go home," and he pulls her in closer for the warmth and the Side-Along. As they vanish, a door slides open with a hum, a paper lantern bounces in the breeze, music drifts out like the vines of a Devil's Snare into the alleys of Diagon and Carkitt and Knockturn.

(You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.)

🍊🍊

(all mistakes mine; song referenced is Hotel California by Eagles)

(1063ish words)

(<<2. Resplendent.) (4. Decision>>)

@microficmay (if you'll take it late 🧡)

#microficmay2024 #prompt: horizon #ron x hermione

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tinylantern · 1 year

Note

Starry, please tell me your thoughts about that asafure Beauty and the Beast AU you mentoned in a recent post? That sounds so good, honestly, and I'd love to hear your take on that sort of plot!

Oh jeez, buckle up friends, because I have extremely tasty IDEAS (some of which I actually discussed ages ago with @kindlystrawberry now that I think about it.)

I've mentioned in other posts that the specifics of the curse are based on its portrayal in Karma's route of Cinderella Phenomenon; namely the fact that Arthur does not initially appear as a monster. He looks normal, acts normal, talks normal—the curse only rears its ugly head if he ends up falling in love with someone, at which point he transforms. He can hold off said transformation for a while, but doing so causes him a great deal of pain. Regardless, the only way for the curse to be broken is for his love to be returned, even once he has transformed and the person he cares for has seen his true form.

Anyway, I can imagine Arthur got cursed because an enchantress or such approached him while disguised as a foreign businesswoman hoping to strike up a trade deal, and she was not impressed when she saw how distrustful he was of her during their negotiations. Once Arthur politely declined the deal and ended their meeting, she revealed her true colors and declared that his heart "now has more thorns than a rose" before hitting him with the curse beam. And the thing is that while of course everyone at the castle is freaking out because one of the princes has been cursed, Arthur is like "Well, I'm only supposed to transform if I fall in love with someone, right? And while I've certainly fancied a person or two, I've never genuinely felt anything for anyone. I'll probably go through my life without experiencing any actual issues."

Except then he gets sent Selphia and meets Frey.

So, you know, canon initially plays out like normal(?), they do the prince switch and end up spending a lot of time together. By the time Leon is rescued, everyone agrees that they're pretty much joined at the hip and a few people are making bets about whether they're gonna get together or not. Arthur treats it as a good natured joke not to be taken seriously, but Frey is like. Getting increasingly fidgety around him and has suspicions she may have caught feelings for him, but she's still not sure how to approach the issue.

Except Arthur starts to behave strangely. It starts off with a weird habit of him occasionally clutching at his chest, which some worry is indicative of a heart issue and that he ought to see Jones. But then his usual workaholic habits get amped up dramatically, and Frey can't help but feel it's because he's deliberately trying to avoid her, and eventually she heads over to his office one night to confront him about what's going on.

She hears glass shattering and runs in to discover Arthur bent over at his desk, the shards of a broken mirror scattered on the carpet. At first she thinks he's sick, but when he notices her and looks up, she can tell from looking at his face that something is very, very wrong with him. Arthur, very calmly, tells her that she ought to leave, but Frey won't. What's wrong? Tell me. If it's something I can help with, please. Don't suffer on your own like this.

Arthur, in a moment completely out of character for him, snaps and tells her to get out. Frey, shocked and hurt, does as he asks, but not without looking at him one more time with a sad expression. The next morning, no one can find Arthur anywhere in town, much to Frey's distress. Several days later, rumors begin circulating of a large monster lurking in the nearby wilderness, one that travelers demand be dealt with for their safety...

#rune factory #rune factory 4 #rf4 #arthur x frey #asafure #rf4 frey #rf4 arthur

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justastarholder · 9 months

Note

Aha hello it’s the nosy person again

(Sorry for asking so many questions, every time I send an ask, I think of like ten more, if I’m annoying you or something just let me know and I’ll stop)

If you haven’t guessed already, I have more questions again. It’s just the way you word things, Afton!! You make it all sound so mysterious. So you were a familiar once? Interesting. What was it like? What made you want to… well, transition to the goals you have now? According to your responses, it sounds like demons are just corrupted gods, existing to keep the world in a sort of balance. What kind of debt do you owe to… the Aberration? How did you even go about seeking him out? Also, how do you feel about being a demon that looks like an old decrepit rabbit? (I mean no insults by this, just my observations)

Why did you adopt kids? Why did you even go about having kids? You don’t really strike me as the type of demon that would want children to take care of. How do demons even have kids? All right, with (most) of the serious questions I have out of the way, how about some (two) questions about your preferences instead?

Who’s your least favorite god? Favorite? And those are all of my questions ahaha…. (I ask far too many I’m so sorry-)

Hello!

Before I bully Afton- ahem- ask our friendly rabbit to answer your questions: You're not annoying! Afton may make cranky comments, but those are purely the character. I've had lots of fun reading and answering your questions! You never have to worry about sending too many asks or asking too much. If it's something I can't answer for spoiler reasons, I will let you know! I'm honestly happy to answer most questions, so long as they're not just downright insults or bullying. I also try to keep the characters amiable, even if they're the antagonists.

"Oh boy. Here we go..."

The rabbit rose from the throne with a soft groan, making his way down the steps to pace absently.

"Yes, I was a familiar. I can't really tell you about my early years. I was a young rabbit and don't really remember much of the first twenty years or so. But I do recall the moon god. I adored them. We had a good bond. There was also Hermea- the familiar of the sun god. He was this great, golden bear. We were good friends. And his daughter, Charmea, was the reason I ended up deciding to foster a child in the first place... She was so bright. Eventually Hermea had a son, too. Fred'r." He half-smiled, recalling those simpler days.

"I think you ought to know how children are made," Afton mused. "The reason I adopted was because I had no love of my own to mother a child- so I adopted a young fox god... Redtail. He was a good kid, a god born from a legend, so he had no parents of his own. Redtail was always a bit rough around the edges. He was like me in that way, I suppose. Rushing forward with his heart on his sleeve."

"I did eventually have two children, but their mother and I weren't exactly in love, so I took them in and she left. My daughter, Elizabeth and younger son, Evan. They were human, like their mother. By this time I was well into my godhood, so it wasn't all that strange. Evan and Elizabeth never really got on with Redtail, since he was so much older. But I loved all of my children, regardless of what history will say about me."

The rabbit moved to one of the windows. He stared out into the darkness for a long time.

"...It was when Evan died that things shifted." He picked at some of the grime on the glass.

"We all know what happens when the gods die. Their stars remain and become new gods. Their consciousness rejoins the Mother Star, up in the heavens." He sighed, mangled ears dropping.

"But we're not really sure about humans. I mean- we understand decomposition. And sure, you could argue that a body returning to the soil is beautiful in its own right. But what about the mind? What about the soul of my son? Was that it? Was he gone forever?"

Violet light bubbled off of his skeletal hand as he clenched his fist.

"I didn't want to lose my son forever. He was still just a child."

Afton turned back to the tapestry handing just behind the throne. A red banner emblazoned with a glittering gold sun, tattered and ruined.

"I pleaded with the greater gods to find some way to undo it. They told me I was meddling in something I'd be better off leaving alone. I couldn't stand that thought. Even my former master told me that the only choice I had was to let go."

"But I didn't want to let go." The window beside him shattered as he slammed his fist against it.

"I poured myself into my research, and I confess I neglected all else. The humans began to pray for me less and less and I grew weaker. Older." Afton dragged his good hand down his face.

"...And then Elizabeth died, playing around in the ritual room of the temple. Ensnared by one of the very tools I'd created to try and understand how I might bring Evan back to us." Afton laughed bitterly.

"At that point, my oldest son left for the seas. He no longer wanted anything to do with me. And my good friend, Hermea, had lond since taken to wandering... I became desperate. When I again appealed to the greater gods, most of them shunned me. They told me I had only myself to blame... But the youngest of them. He took pity on me and told me a well-kept secret. He told me about the Aberration."

Cold white eyes bore into you. Afton seethed with a hatred that couldn't be fathomed.

"Do you know what corruption is? What it truly is?"

"It's not a disease or some sort of physical change. Corruption is what happens when a god makes a pact with the Aberration. It hasn't happened many times, but I'd take being forsaken by the Mother Star a hundred times over if it meant I could see my children again. I don't care how this body festers. I don't care what it costs."

"...As for what the Aberration asked of me... I'm afraid that I can't say. You'll know soon enough. Everyone will." He turned back to the ruined window.

#star holder au #starholderanswers

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risu5waffles · 1 year

Text

Finally Time Enough <glasses fall off and break> For Ten More

youtube

ONOR67 really did us dirty wiv that bug suddenly being hazardous. What wiv the level being, like, 15minutes of backtracking and no checkpoints. The environment is top-notch, which is to be expected, but the gameplay/story is nowhere near engaging enough to maintain interest. Kinda disappointing from the creator of the Proxima series, to be honest. Still, i liked the witch/demoness/whatever, and the slug things were cute, and the bit wiv the cheese.

youtube

Thankfully this one was not nearly as flashy as advertised, which i was a bit worried about; i don't think are nearly as concerned about photosensitivity as they ought to be. Not quite so thankfully, it's really over-long, and i was starting to want the checkpoint just about half-way through. Certainly by the point we got the grabbinator and bombs bit. That just dragged forever. Blowing things up to progress has never been as fun as it should be, even in LBP1 &2's story modes. The explosives never quite blow up as much as you need to progress, and then it's "welp, guess i gotta go back and do it all again."

youtube

Yes it's my level, i know. But hell, i'm proud of it, even if i did only rate it as an Orange Diamond. i'm the only gal running this archive, i can show off a little, as a treat.

youtube

Ehhhh.... i really wanted to give something by Efan8467 a look, since they've been doing an awful lot of work republishing old DLC levels in LBP3 for folx to play (i think there's some kind of glitchery-witchery going on, 'cause all the prizes here were, like, the actual prizes from the PSP LBP). Also i never got to play either of the handheld LBPs, so it's always nice getting a chance to see what they were like. That being said, this was the game intro, and you don't really get to do anything. Like jetpacking about on that track was neat, but also really limited? Also also, look, i love LBP to bits, and i honestly think MM's heart was largely in the right place, but they have never had a totally respectful take on other cultures. Very "It's a Small World After All" at best, and i can't imagine their take on Aboriginal culture in PSP was particularly sensitive, and given the history there, it's... kinda a lot, it feels like?

youtube

Nicely decorated, if a bit kludgy in shaping. Short, not particularly painful. i wish i could say more, but my mental index card just says "alright level. i had fun." Look, my memory is for shite. That's not on the creator, but i don't have time to watch the video again right now. Sorry MagicalMare!

youtube

This one's such a weird little thing, because Pign's levels were usually so polished and well-presented. It's not bad. i know i had a good time wiv it. But it really feels like they were tossing a bunch of things together to see how it all would work. They tell us they were trying stuff outside their usual comfort zone, and i respect that a lot. Even more that they went and left the level public instead of having it live for a few months to gather feedback and then pulling it down.

youtube

What the actual but this one is weird. Not weird bad, but definitely weird frustrating. You can tell that they updated some of the things in the dialogue when they re-pubbed it in 2012 (i think?), there are some cheeky references to being "back in 2009;" but if DrunkenFist_Lee got any feedback about, say, maybe having more clarity in communication wiv the player, they did not implement it. It's not a bad experience, but it's certainly not something i feel like i would want to go back to.

youtube

Back-to-back LBP1 goodness. This one is much more straight-forward, and manages a few nice presentational touches. Also, i will always love those old-school score bubble spawners. Definitely a fun trip in the way-back machine.

youtube

Oh, dear Entropy, what the hell Evandip-? Why would you think that gameplay bit was going to be in any way fun? Especially after a level that was smooth and cruisy? This is why difficulty spikes are such a problem wiv games. The sudden shift in gears can be way more off-putting than if the whole thing was just hard from the start.

youtube

Go play Firespike Tower. Unless you don't have LBP3. In which case you can just watch this video. It's a fun level, and i'm glad Morphology76 asked for plays over on the subreddit.

-------------------------------------

And that's that. Another 10 in the bag, and already 100 episodes deep. Just 9million+ to go!

#littlebigplanet #little big planet #lbp #lbp1 #lbp2 #lbp3 #Youtube

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blueheartedmayor · 2 years

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Oh man, a Switch?! Yesssss, I’ve wanted to play one forever!

“You better believe I’ll use it! I’ll need to get used to it first.”

She listens to him before shrugging and nodding.

“I know. I’m honestly not close to either of his boyfriends. But they do treat him right, so maybe…that’s all I really need to know.”

Good thing I didn’t tell him one is a stubborn minotaur and the other is Yancy’s creator. Pretty sure the advice wouldn’t be much different, though.

Back to the topic at hand, as the shock subsides, she feels happy tears brimming but forces them back. Even when happy, she still hates crying in front of people, especially someone she’s just met.

“I… Damien, I can’t thank you enough. This is the nicest thing anyone’s done for me since prison. God, I wanna hug you, but I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable.”

She fidgets and sips her coffee, a slow smile forming as he continues.

“I like that. ‘Life is Ours to Choose.’ I really need to start living more for myself, for sure. Not that I don’t like caring about other people, but I put others first most of the time. Especially Yancy. So… Yeah, relaxing sounds wonderful.”

She then frowns.

“They definitely wouldn’t know to find me here, but I kinda…left a note saying I’d be back after a while. I didn’t tell them I was staying with anyone, just so you know. I don’t know how worried they’d be if I’m gone longer, but there’s a chance they might try finding me. They also know Wilford, though I dunno if he’d tell them I’m here.”

@the-crypt-of-randomness

"Good. Videogames are a fantastic escape, in my own experience." When he would have time for them. "Barnum enjoys watching them too, for some reason. It's one of the reasons I keep it docked and connected to the TV, otherwise he's climbing onto my lap and blocking the screen in his quest to see what's happening."

Speaking of, Barnum's head lowered onto his paws. It appeared as though he was not as tense about this situation as he initially was. He could manage another human in this place.

"That's all you need to know," he agreed. "You are all adults. Whatever he gets up isn't anything for you to worry about. If someone is constantly there to stop you making mistakes, how do you expect to learn anything in life? Likewise, if you spend your life worrying about someone else, are you really enjoying your own life?" Of course, there were obvious exceptions to this, but Damien did not believe she and Yancy did not fit into any of those categories.

He reached over to the tray, lifting a napkin and placing on the edge of the table closest to her. "I am simply happy that I'm able to offer the support you need. Not only that, it will be an ideal starting point to help you without having the looming worry of rent, at least until you are in a position where you can fully support yourself." No doubt Wilford and his eccentric team would help with that side of things better. As for the explanation of his personal mantra, he smiled.

"Precisely. Find the time for yourself. This is where one does encourage selfishness. If you want that coffee, you should take it. If there's a book you want to read, you should look into it. If you don't think it's healthy to be in a certain situation, then you ought to step back from it if you can." Easier said than done, but sometimes it needed to be heard in the first place. "And as this is Wilford's idea, I doubt he would go against himself and reveal this place. Of course, if there is a chance they could be a threat, I can inform security to watch out for them. However, I imagine that's unlikely, so I suggest you simply get all this frustration off your chest. If there is something you need to talk about now or at a later time, do so. It helps."

#thecryptofrandomness #v; keeping the egos in check #(scheduled post)

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noraheyter · 7 months

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Interesting details I've noticed about Deltarune Chapter 1 - part I

Heeello, Tumblr folks! I know that probably no one will read this, but I have to say sorry for taking so long to write it, nevertheless.

So: sorry :)

Now that that is out of the way, let's go to some details that I've noticed while replaying the chapter 1 of Deltarune on Halloween (also it's anniversary).

The very first thing is right in the beginning, when you decide do play the game. Toby never puts a dialogue that is useless, and while there are five more chapters to release, I think it's worth to pay attention to how we start.

When you open Deltarune, the very first image that appears is a dialogue:

"Are you there?

Are we connected? "

Who is talking to us? We don't know. What does it mean by being connected? We don't know. Where is "there"? We. Don't. Know.

And then, a SOUL appears. A symbol of our very being, based on undertale. However, this is not Undertale, and we are playing through Frisk.

I know, I know. Everyone likes to put these two in contrast, but I want to see Deltarune as an isolated game, as if Undertale never existed. Why? Because it is telling a different story, so we should respect this, even if it's just a little.

Anyway, after the SOUL appears, we get a response from the voice:

"Excellent. Truly excellent."

Which means, that we are "there" and we are connected through this heart-shaped thing that appeared after we initiated the game. This voice was not waiting for a character to show up, they were waiting for the player to open the game.

A background scenario appears, some strange music, and the voice continues:

"We must create a vessel."

Now, I want to point out that the voice says that they will create a vessel alongside the player. This is really interesting, because after this, every time that they refer to the vessel, they say "You".

They are worried about how you feel about your body, how you want its personality to be like, what names and gifts do you want to give it.

The voice makes very clear that you are responsible for this creation, after all:

"This is your body. Do you accept it?"

And when you do:

"You have created a wonderful form."

After having giving it a shape, you give it a mind. I selected these four things:

Food: sweet

Blood Type: D

Favorite Color: Green

Gift: Voice

Then they proceed:

"How do you feel about it? (It will not hear)"

Love

"Have you answered honestly?"

Why do we ought to answer honestly if "it" will not hear us? Why does the voice care? Isn't it our body? Our vessel? Don't it mean that we are the ones that will control it? We are the ones that are going to become it?

Not only that, but our options are strangely specific: Love, hope, fear, disgust. Two really positive and two really negative.

And yet, one of these options feels out of place. Fear. Why should we be scared of our own creation? What could it possibly do to us that would make us, in the real world, to be afraid of it?

With that question, the voice slowly starts to show its true intentions, which I believe is to trap the player in this body. And what's the devil's way to imprison people? Contracts.

"You acknowledge the possibility of pain and seizure."

Sounds familiar? It should. This is not a question, like the others. This is an affirmation. What's worse? The voice doesn't say who is going to suffer pain and seizure. Up until now, they were always reffering to either the player or the vessel, like a conversation.

This sentence doesn't sound like something you would say to someone. What it sounds is like a pact, or rather, a contract.

Moreover, when you "sign" this contract by accepting it, the voice goes to the next and final stage: names.

Which I'll detail in the next post.

#deltarune #toby fox #undertale #Theory?#Me having an excuse to play the game again

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robertwalton · 1 year

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2,4,6,8,10,12 for the writing asks!

THANK YOU... honestly i'm sure you were just sending the even numbers as a pattern but these happen to be really good questions!!!!!

2) what work of yours, if any, are you the most embarrassed about existing?

HAHA UM. well the casual observer might think i'm about to say the theodred series but i'm not remotely embarrassed about that. ok i reflected i looked inward and it's probably all the nddp fanfic i orphaned on ao3 from 2016

4) favorite character you’ve written

PLEASE I CANT CHOOSE MY FAVORITE... theyre all real people that live inside my little head... okay fine kajack. and yes i am saying it because i wrote an entire book from his perspective, but sue me... he just comes so naturally to me. otherwise i like writing robert (i haven't written him very often, but i keep finding myself giving him a unique wistfulness + nostalgic kind of tone, i think first person perspective works really well on him, AND he's a million billion times easier to write than victor, who i Just Don't Know About)

in twb specifically, i've really enjoyed writing mira so far, but i've mostly stuck with third person omniscient, so we haven't gotten to see anyone's voices intimately yet... although i think i Will start switching up who dominates the narrative as soon as i get them out of the city

6) something you would go back and change in your writing that it’s too late/complicated to change now

interesting... i don't tend to regret a lot... i mean colleen and winter are always building out their setting which means my bode series gets more & more outdated the more mestrian culture develops, BUT i don't regret that and i wouldn't change it - it's like a time capsule. in my mind anything written in a collaborative/constantly evolving setting doesn't need to be consistent with the most updated information because there is always going to be more updated information, and editing old work all the time to try to keep up would be. well. sisyphean! and punishing. HMM... WHAT WOULD I CHANGE THEN... no i'm sorry i don't have any regrets. i'm having fun i wouldn't change a thing

8) favorite genre to write

SCI FI FANTASY!!!! and the reason for this is that i am so much more confident with fantasy settings. embarrassingly enough, whenever i try to write a story that takes place on earth, i get really bogged down in whether i'm representing real life/science/law accurately... i need to research the funniest little things, like gas prices or how you're supposed to pay at a restaurant or how laws work or what the weather ought to be like in x geographical area etc etc. i feel like i need to get everything absolutely accurate if i'm writing in real life, and that pressure kinda overwhelms the actual story. plus. i'm 23 and i have limited life experience (no car never been to a party rarely go on adventures have only had a few jobs) so like. BASICALLY I DO NOT FEEL LIKE I CAN ACCURATELY REPRESENT ADULT LIFE IN A REALISTIC WAY!!!!!!!!! i feel like people would laugh at me. my naivete. my complete lack of intuition. you don't have to worry abt any of that in a fantasy setting because you can make up your own rules

i make do with robert + victor + esme because i'm completely obsessed with them as people and they're worth the effort of researching... and plus the city they live in is not only fictional but Meant to be a little quirky

10) write in silence or with background noise? with people or alone?

silence... oh my god im the worst i can't even do music... IT DISTRACTS ME!!!!!! if im on a really good writing kick i dont need that kind of stimulation anyway! plus i constantly talk to myself while i'm writing (most of the time i'm reading everything under my breath to make sure it flows well, ESPECIALLY dialogue). and sometimes if it's really good i hoot and holler and slap my thighs

i would LOVE to be the kind of person who is capable of engage in parallel play + write while someone else is in the room, but i have NEVER EVER successfully written anything whilst hanging out. i get too excited about having company. i keep trying to enlist them in the writing. like i will giggle and kick my feet and talk... im so bad at hushing up and just being quiet together... ill ask for suggestions ill try to read stuff out loud to the other person and then nothing gets done

music is a really useful tool For Writing though! i'll listen to my little character/plot playlists and i'll feel very intensely and then i'll pause the song and write

12) your weaknesses as an author

see the real life setting issue above

i really struggle with pacing

i'm flighty... i get discouraged too easily and give up if i think the writing isn't good enough

i take a lot of random risks and i write without outlining (or i hold the outline in my head) and that can lead to me having 10 pages of absolute garbage that serves no purpose that i wrote off the cuff and yet i never wanna delete it so then i either give up or commit to the garbage. 50% of the time it works out and the garbage becomes genius. currently doing this rn in twb

i dont know how to write a cohesive short story. ONLY longform narratives and short snippets that aren't complete and don't stand on their own. i'd write a trilogy before i successfully produced three short stories. i wouldnt say i'm even particularly long winded. i just dont know how to resolve conflict fast. LMAO

#mail #LOVING THESE i feel like im doing little author interviews

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sburbanrelapse · 2 years

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the last thing i wanted you to be was broken the same way i am. i don't know how to pick up my own pieces; how the hell am i supposed to pick up yours? fuck, i don't know. don't know anything, really, other than that you've got that same haunted look in your eyes i do now and when i gaze upon you i behold aphrodite stabbing me in the heart. just let me stay with you, okay? stay near you. stay close enough to you that you don't die alone if you decide it's not worth it to stay in a place with people that see you as a pimple to be popped. i promised you you wouldn't go into that dark alone. i promised. let me fulfill that promise, okay? let me do something, something at all, to deliver you from this hell i introduced you to. it's a shame you probably aren't going to be allowed to overdose again, honestly. at least planning a mutual kill with a pocket full of pills is simple. i love you. love you so much, even now, love you more than words can really describe but i've chosen this as my trade so i'm going to try to put that intangible infatuation to paper anyhow even if sometimes it feels like trying to hold running water in my hands. how every day you choose not to tell me to jump back into the hole i came crawling out of is a mystery i'll never solve but goddammit i'd burn this whole place down to repay the favor, prove you right. i'd be dead without you. i think i could handle that, if it didn't also mean i'd be dead alone. can't force you to say anything. that'd be worse than counterproductive. can't try to force you to feel happy, either, because i'm in the same shoes you're in and misery is a lilith whose seductive grip on me i'll never let go. can't force you in general, i'm not worthy of that sort of power over you and you've ought and struggled and clawed your way this far for your own independence and taking it from you'd make me worse than the monsters wearing guardians' faces that pushed you to swipe their painkillers in the first place. whether you live or die isn't up to me, realistically. but god, god, i just want to help. i just want to help you so bad. because in you i now see myself, and there's no worse torment i can think of than being me. i wish i could stay with you forever. hold you close, never let you go, never let you fall. help you rebuild yourself, bring the light back into those hallowed brown eyes, wave away the darkness and grime and fog of despair that's plagued us both like a parasite since we took our first breaths into a world of possibilities and found only the wrong markers on a birth certificate and a lifetime of regrets waiting for us there. burn this place down together, just the two of us, and carve out a little alcove in the ashes, a place we could stay without having to worry about the cycles of greed, abuse, torment, depression that left us roadkill so young. but i also know you weren't using as much hyperbole as you'd have liked when you said your tormentors would have killed you if you let me live under the roof that's rightfully yours. i love you. i know you don't feel the same. i know you don't think your burned-out husk of a mind's capable of feeling that for anything ever again. i know you don't think it's worth it to stay here any longer. i know it's not my place to do anything more than weakly try to convince you otherwise. but please survive.

#kicking it in the asylum #friends don't let friends kill themselves in a baseball diamond

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a-gal-with-taste · 2 years

Text

Rubbing It Out (Oneshot)

@sweatandwoe gave me the idea. Something short, simple, a little sweet and quite silly. Enjoy!

They always talk about hearing the pin drop, but you'd argue that the pen rolling off his desk and clattering onto the ground was far louder. And when Silco spoke, you had to admit, the quiet question was far louder than any pin or pen ever could be.

"What did you just say?" It never occurred to you that the normal eye could stretch as wide-open as the more infamous one. It's the first thing that comes to mind when your mouth gaps, seeking a response to his bewildered, and yet stern question of pure bafflement.

Thankfully, you don't respond by noting the new detail of your employers eye-width, and instead slowly repeat what Silco just heard you say, off-handedly, and far too casually-spoken, "Do you want some help rubbing it out?"

The eye narrows to an acceptable level, and equally, his mouth closes fully too, and partially scarred-lips pale as his jawline tenses even further, and he hums. Thoughtfully so.

Silco, thoughtful. The thought makes you sweat, and you immediately work to backtrack, "I just... you look... I-i'll just go...?" You phrase it like a question, even when you are already halfway turning on a heel, and halted with a foot mid-step when he raises his hand.

"No, you won't. Not..." There's a pause, then. "Not until you look me in the eyes, and explain what do you think my reaction ought to be, for my employee to walk in and offer to... 'rub it out' with me."

"I... no, not like that-" Your mouth is back to gapping but, despite now being caught under a rapidly-souring glare from the kingpin, you manage to hold his gaze, "I-i just... you look-"

"Look what." It's now a snarl, and you can't tell what is about to break first: the man's composure, the desktop, or that vein that's beginning to throb beneath the skin of his forehead. If one of the latter-two are about to break, you subtly shift your feet to prepare for a swift exit to call on the nearest doctor (for yourself or him, you're not even sure if he's decided yet) but if it's the first-former, you resign to get your words out in full, in some attempt of sparing yourself from Silco's ire.

"Sir, you look very tense, like... I-i just wanted to know if you wanted help... rubbing out the tension? I-i mean your shoulders alone look stiffer than iron, sir."

Honestly, it was some divine miracle they hadn't seized up and left him frozen at his desk. Said-shoulders relax, but more like from steel to stone in it's actual progress. Few could tell the difference, and you were one of the many. "Are you standing here and offering to be a masseuse?"

"... again, I can just go." You had already brought the papers to him - average report, a little Firelight activity that had made his jaw turn taut like wire but otherwise normal - so there was no reason for him to keep you here.

"Do you always leave an offer on the table before escaping?" He drawled, tone smooth when everything else about him was anything-but at the moment. You blinked, "Well... you don't really pay me for the business side of things, sir. Negotiations or offers aren't really my thing."

"But 'rubbing it out' is?"

You blink, then feel your eyes squint slightly at the mocking tone in his voice. It feels like it's only partially at your expense, the rest dedicated to easing the shock at, what you can fully admit, was a less-than-a-professionally given offer. But not one born out of nothing, which you curtly tell him, "Look, sir, the offer on the table. All I'm saying is that you look like you need a hand to help relax - if you don't, then I'll go."

"I don't," Silco says, almost immediately. It's an effort not to roll your eyes, as he almost looks offended, though thankfully, not in the way that makes you worry if you're about to face termination from employment or life. "It's flattering that one of mine decides to show concern, but not only is it unneeded, I don't recall it being any of your concern."

At this, you did roll your eyes, and with that loss of self-control, you lose the rest of it, and started striding over around the desk.

"Don't you dare."

"Throttle me later, I'd rather not continue watching you practice your rigor mortis a couple years early."

"A couple years...!"

Taking a page out of his book, you lean on his desk with a palm on the wood, looking down at him with unimpressed eyes as he glowers, but doesn't get up. It's amazing that he has enough flexibility left in his muscles to bristle. "Dock my pay or get Sevika to kick my ass later, but I'm being serious here. You're more tense than a block of wood, and I can't think of a time when you weren't trying to imitate marble. Call a professional if you want, but I'm making an offer here and now. You can take it, or tell me to hit the road, but I am telling you that you need to relax."

For a moment, there’s only silence, and two sets of eyes boring holes into the other. You think the red one, color of fire enveloped in black, is halfway to succeeding in burning a hole though your brain, before you finally move.

It’s a little suicidal that you chose not to move away, but the part of you that’s still rational tries to convince yourself that you are simply taking initiative - a trait you would hope Silco could appreciate, if it didn’t include walking around behind his chair, reaching over, and setting your hands on his shoulders.

His nails are just beginning to bury into the skin of your wrists, a snarl of pure outrage piercing the air, when you roll the heel of your palm against the back of shoulders, with fingertips kneading through fabrics and leathers to press into stiffened skin, and Silco, goes fully limp.

Not limp to the point where he falls out of his chair, but enough that the room becomes still and quiet, and you find yourself freezing when his hands slacken considerably around your wrists. You wonder if maybe Ran had the right-idea about those talks of ‘pressure points,’ and perhaps you just pressed the one that effectively killed the man.

“I... are you-”

Pulling away to escape, or perhaps check the limp-man’s pulse, becomes a futile effort when his grip comes back to life the moment you start pulling away. It takes another minute for words, quiet, and a bit hoarse, to sound from your employer again, “You’ve never... been the type to leave a job undone.”

Still frozen, almost as stiff as him, you manage to blink. “Ah...Sir, are you...?”

Your tone is innocent. It’s in direct contrast to that wicked little sigh you get out from Silco, as you press knuckles into the sore muscles there on his shoulders. Indeed, there’s a shock that this is evening happening - that you have your hands on Silco, in a dare-you-say vulnerable way, and somehow, not already dead, but it’s also... amusing?

“Stop discussing it. You set out to do a task, the least you can do is see it through,” Another pause, before the undeclared King of Zaun settles back into your grip at his shoulders, fingers slowly peeling from your skin to settle atop the armrests. “If we must have a discussion afterwards, it can be about your neglect of...of minding your...”

“Minding what?”

It’s certainly bordering on domestic, particularly when he almost sinks back into your touch at another deep kneading into stiff, sore muscles. The thought makes a laugh slip out of you, close to a giggle. “Don’t... This is hardly for your entertainment.”

“Okay, Silco.”

“And don’t mistake me... I don’t need this.”

“Mmhm.”

He opens his mouth to insist again, and you press your thumbs deep into a particularly hard bundle of stress-sore muscles at the uppermost of his back. Rubbing it out into smoothness, you nearly draw blood with how hard you bite your lip when you hear the tiniest moan - a moan - slip out of the mouth of the most feared man in Zaun.

The sound may be just a reflection of his pleasure as muscles are pressed and prodded into relaxation, but it’s a sound that you can’t deny you want to hear again. You imagine, once the euphoria of lessening muscles and eased soreness wears off, that you’re either going to get the dressing-down of your life, or the most reluctant, threatening thank-you in existence from doing this.

But in that moment, you find you don’t care about that. Instead, you care more about sliding your hands further along the Eye of Zaun’s shoulders, and finding the next spot to massage firmly into.

Partly to finally get the man to relax for once in his life, and, selfishly, also because you want to hear him make that breathless little groan again.

You quickly come to find out, that there’s a lot of places that could make him recreate that little sound again.

#[slaps butt of crimelord] this man can hold so much stress #I could believe he's 35 in act 3 now #bet this man hasn't gotten a massage in his life #except that one vander gave him but it was a bit to close to the neck to be comforting #ba dum tss #this is 90% crack #10% luck #arcane silco #arcane #fanfic #silco x reader #silco & reader #gender neutral reader #oneshot #reader insert #silco #humor #fluff #short story

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