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nikkywrites · 3 years

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Cruel Kings Make Cruel Worlds

Prompt: "What did you say?" | Fictober Day 21

Three weeks in! I'm struggling. But I kind of really like this piece? Hope you guys do too. Warning that it's very angry (idk, I feel like I should give a heads up).

*****

Kelan's palms slam against the table, causing it to wobble on it's uneven legs. His breath rattles down his throat, shaking steam. "What?" he demands, teeth clacking as he bites his mouth shut over harsher words. The steam swirling in his gut, lukewarm growing hotter growing molten, threatens to boil up his throat and drip from his mouth to set the table aflame. Set everything aflame.

"You heard me," Jule says softly, inching back with her arms wrapped loosely around her stomach. As if the heat burning in his gut is something he can inflict upon her at will, as if she's preparing to hack it up if he does. As if he's going to lunge for her and force his vile greed down her throat.

As if he's scary. A threat.

After everything he's done. As if he's been waiting for the opportunity to hurt someone.

His vocal cords convulse around a laugh he barely manages to keep back, at price of looking insane, judging by the soft concern that beckons her closer though fear is still tall in her body language, in her face, in her eyes. She is afraid of him.

"I," he says, face burning, too hot, heart drumming destruction and destroy and kill in his ears, bringing bitter taste of defeat to sit thick on his tongue, making him choke on a syllable alone. "That's not what I told them to do."

He-- he told them everything. Things he was sworn to silence on.

He betrayed his blood and everything he's ever known and they-- they ignore his attempts to help fix the wrongs his bloodline has wrought on the world. Ignore his plans that build to breaking the foundation his father uses to terrorize the kingdom he stole so they can liberate it back to the boy prince who was supposed to lead it next.

Because despite his eager willingness, his honesty, his proof, his evidence, the shackles he agrees to wear, the guards, the locked bedroom-actually-a-cell door, the lack of any privacy, of course it's all part of some plot to weed out those seeking to kill the False King.

Because what does truth matter, when assumptions paint him as such a beast?

If he leaves, he's dead. His people, his father's court, does not tolerate betrayals and broken oaths.

There is no going back and they've seen proof of others who attempted similar things and they still believe he's been attempting the same? The False Prince, walking into death, baring all of his blood's weakness in some game? Like he's toying with them? Willing to risk losing his heritage (as if his father was ever going to abandon the throne to him) and his life to rid would-be liberators from amassing a rebellion in the midst of another war?

As if he's a fool.

"I know." Her voice is weak.

Because he's a monster, exactly the beast he hails from. No different from the others of his kingdom. A heartless bastard who lives to sow chaos wherever he pleases. A ruthless prince playing with lives because he got bored lounging in the castle his father stole.

As if he hasn't given everything to aid them.

The very thought (and proof, proof. They sent men to die over trusting a turncoat prince's word) foams acid in his gut. Months of building trust and they ignore it. Toss it in a trench because surely they know better than the prince who lived the life they're looking to ruin. Because they cannot trust such a man. Because he was born to a rotten nation and rotten blood so therefore he too must be rotten, disregard the knight who was orphaned and brought over the border and was now trusted.

Because they did not grow surrounded by black lies. They did not lounge on the lap of barbarity, eat the fruits of sin. They did not grow the rancor son of a sadistic man who took a throne that was not his to have and burned the plentiful goodness of the nobility and the people in hungry rage that never dulled. Because surely a child who grows in a noble court of lies and rage and greed must be the same as those who reared him.

Apples come from trees and wrath comes from greed.

Blood makes the man, makes the monster, makes the beast. No freshness comes out of a rotten barrel.

"Get out," he tells her, teeth bared, feeling rabid. A wolf foaming at the mouth, a bear roaring, a lion bellowing. Snapping at anything that dares breathe because he is wild in rage, like his father, like the court he grew up in, like he was taught to become. He's a beast and beasts have no rationality, no wisdom, no thought. There is only hunger and fury and bloodlusting wrath.

That's all he is. An animal.

She does not listen. She lingers, tempting the savage brute before her who only knows to shred apart everything he touches.

"What did I say!" he screams at her, and she flinches like she should because he’s a risk, he’s a killer, he’s untrustworthy with anything that’s not getting tossed to let decay into sliming toxic putrid filth.

Because men are dead. Because they did not listen and that is his fault. Because he knew, somehow, that they were going to disobey and he’d planned everything just right to ensure that only three broken men out of over twenty made it back. Men who are dying, who are dead, who will not live to hear of his father’s corpse or their people's defeat.

"Kelan," she soothes, stepping closer, tempting death, tempting him, tempting-- how long have his eyes been burning with tears trying to spill over?

He swipes away the growing wetness with his knuckles, harsh and quick, like the brute he is.

"It's okay." Her voice is so soft and the fear he'd seen before (smelt, like an animal) is weaker, clouded over with silken concern and satin kindness. Her hands lay on him, one by his elbow and the other in his hand (larger than hers, a paw against a palm, waiting for the moment instinct decides to crush her with all the ease it would an upturned root).

Her fingers skim over his own, the softness calling to the man he's tried so hard to be: the one who is kind, who is not an incubator of explosions, who incurs suffering upon himself to ease the mind of another, who has a heart of warm sunrise instead of a sooty gorge dug in his soul.

"It's not your fault."

And just like that, the heat flickers out. Anger hardens into shame.

He'd acted like him. With all the brutal might that stole a kingdom well enough that it still sits under his rule, years later. That same anger had burned within him.

The men who left would have returned if they had listened.

"I gave them a plan," he says, his insides nothing but heavy heavy heavy. Dragging him down. What does it mean when he's borne all his vulnerability and truth for the world to judge and he is still not trusted? "They would have-- It would have kept them safe."

Her hands move to his hair, ashen black like his father's, ink that stains and predates terrible happenings. She pulls him close, forehead to her collarbone. The position is uncomfortable, splitting on his back, but it is a comfort nonetheless. "I know. They should have listened to you."

He's been nothing but honest. Why was it so hard for them to accept it?

"I've done nothing but give them reason to trust me," he murmurs into her skin, acting as if his shame isn't cracked through with rage, as if he is capable of going from melting to calm so quickly, as if anger is something he drops as fast as he finds it. As if he's not masked the worst of himself so his words may be held with more ease, though the attempt ended fruitless, mask too thin and blood too thick.

He's his father's son in ways he wishes he could rip from his bones. His hands curl in the need still pounding under his skin to shred something apart, with his hands, with his teeth, tearing until it is unrecognizable and fatigue pushes aside the rage.

Jule keeps one palm firm against his head, keeping him close, and runs the fingers of her other hand through the only thing he inherited of his father's besides the too hot, too fast, too big rage.

His next admission comes quieter, shame pooled in his mouth, having filled to the brim like some old cracked chalice, once great and now worthless. "I'm sorry I got angry with you."

"It's alright."

It's not.

If he’d gotten like that with anyone else, they’d have taken his head, seen the burst of temper as proof of his deception.

It would be a far kinder fate than the one that would await him at his once-never home. His father did not believe in mercy for those who have taken action to tear apart what he has built. Cruelty breeds examples breeds complacency among any who would dare disagree with him.

He wears the crown of a king he killed. Lets the people live, if only to enhance the lives of everyone who earned a place in his new court. He’s a mean ruler, born from the shared border of a mad king who wishes to unite the land as one so it sits under his heel. Blind and uncaring to all the ways he nurses a similar madness in his own heart.

Kelan's breath shakes, cold autumn wind. He's trying to drop the anger, telling himself it's poison to hold but holding it is the only thing that kept him alive long enough for him to flee and the thought of not being angry, in any sort of way, is terrifying in that he's been told it's weakness.

So he keeps grasp of the blazing blight, knowing that it will be the designer of his death if he does not let it go.

Death is not fearing to him. His father pushed it in his face as a child and he is familiar with the way it festers in his hands, decaying and decaying and decaying until it is noxious enough that it takes him in the same way he's seen it take others. He is not afraid of his end, having waited for the moment it leaps upon him for all the baneful things he's done.

Healing, however, he is. He is afraid that there will be nothing left, if he scrapes out all the rot within him, if he rips the wavering fondness for where he came from from his head and heart, if he burns the corruption in his blood until it is ash and flushed out and gone.

What if he tears out all the bad and there is nothing left behind?

He is afraid to look in his reflection and find the same creeping greed smoldering behind his eyes. Facing a truth that feels like dying. Cruel kings stain the world when they take decades before they die and the world lives in their cruelty regardless of the spread of their success and the emblem on the flag they live beneath.

Cruelness breeds cruelty from the brave the longer it fails to wither.

Centuries will see the effects of the Crazed King and the False King and all the others who will seek thrones after and until every court has been purged of the voracity plaguing the nobility.

He knows this, though it’s nothing he can speak for the way it will seem that he is encouraging foul wrath in those who are simply seeking peace.

As if angry vile kings will give their crowns before gentle peace.

They will give their crowns to frothing death and none other.

#writeblr #writing #original writing #prompt fill #fictober21 #nikkywritesstories #nikkywritesprompts #my writing #fictober #tw angry #this piece is very mad #it's vibe is... angry #i feel like theres a better thing to warn for/way to word it #but i cannot think of it #fictober is melting my brain #is this what burnout feels like?#ive never written a character angry like this before

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cienie-isengardu · 3 years

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The development of Law’s relationship with Zoro - Part 5: Zou, The Kindred Spirits (The Last Moments Before War)

<<Part I: Before Meeting>> <<Part II: Sabaody Archipelago, The First Meeting>> <<Part III: Punk Hazard: The Alliance (A)__(B)>> <<Part IV: Dressrosa, The Breaking Point (The Plan Failed)__ (Saving Law)__(Protecting Law)__ (Birdcage, Pica and Doflamingo)__ (Aftermath)>> <<Part V: Zou, The Kindred Spirits (Traveling Together)__(Searching for Nakama)__ (Reunion)__ (Ninja-Pirate-Mink-Samurai Alliance)__(The Last Moments before War)>>

After Jack’s attack, Zonesha required medical attention (chapter 822). Anime extended that by showing how various members of the alliance worked together to help the injured elephant and even included a scene between Zoro (who again was lost) and Law asking him about his awful sense of direction.

This scene is funny on many levels, because:

anime didn’t show Law to be involved in any task like making bandages or preparing medicine or, like Zoro, cutting the wood

which means either he wandered and just saw Zoro or went after him on purpose

the “you walked on your own, Zoro-ya” implies he was aware Zoro at some point disappeared which supports possibility Law searched him on his own

and thought Zoro’s sense of direction was ridiculously terrible which clearly made Pirate Hunter embarrassed.

At least we know Law paid attention to Zoro in the Dressrosa arc, when he twice got lost on different occasions.

Then the whole interaction was related to Law invading Zoro’s personal space. Either it was his “revenge” for victory party on Dressrosa or he simply felt that comfortable around the other man. Whatever Law’s reason was, once Carrot and Luffy showed up out of nowhere, Law stepped back. Not too far away, but the distance between him and Pirate Hunter was more casual.

Luffy and Carrot made fun of “stray swordsman”. Zoro retorted he will simply carry the wood into the right place and did not take kindly to Law’s comment about waste of time and that he may be lost again. Whatever Zoro wanted to say, Trafalgar without warning used shambles to send the other man into the right place. With wood. That fell from the sky with Zoro and almost killed some poor Minks. Zoro called Law “that bastard” but overall it didn’t change anything between them.

That makes episode 775 one of the most direct interactions between these two Supernovas. Involving violating personal space, commenting on someone's flaw and a bit of arguing.

Once the Zunesha’s wound was dressed, the alliance split in four groups:

The rescue mission for Sanji was carried by Luffy, Nami, Chopper and Brook, Pekom and Pedro. Heart Pirates (represented by Law) and remaining Straw Hats (represented by Zoro) were going to Wano as Kinemon’s group.

While saying goodbye to Luffy’s team, Law and Zoro stayed far away from each other but close to their respective crewmembers. Then Luffy grabbed his people and simply jumped into an abyss, shocking and/or scaring his companions, samurais, minks and Law alike (chapter 822).

Law definitely still wasn’t used to such a way of transport. And maybe seeing Luffy doing it again brought the not so happy memories of a similar jump on Dressrosa. In contrast Zor’s group was pretty much relaxed watching their companions fall down from such height.

And so, the Zou arc ended.

Luffy’s group headed to Big Mom’s territory while Zoro’s group with samurais and Heart pirates will soon travel to Wano cramped in Law’s submarine.

Zou arc is set up for the upcoming fight against Kaido and Big Mom. One one hand, chapters 803 - 822 provided details and pieces of history needed for better understanding of the alliance situation and what will wait for them in future. On another, there were a few days of needed rest for characters during which the similarity between Law and Zoro could be seen. Both have marks of “dark characters” with specific sense of humor and/or logic. Both are cool-headed and while analyzing their situations often emotionless, if not to say clinical or even heartless. In dangerous situations they aren’t prone to panic or showing worries. Both have low tolerance for idiots (unless said idiots were their crewmembers). Both are introverted, quiet people who don’t talk much but observe their surroundings. Often keep some tangible distance from the large group and seem to like their own personal space. At the same time, through the arc Law could be seen in close range to Zoro - sometimes with little to no personal space between them. They may not talk much about personal matters and don’t hang like Luffy and Usopp do, but they definitely feel comfortable enough to stick so often close to each other and share observations.

Zoro, as one of the quietest Straw Hats and less prone to being emotional (like crying after dying painted dragon) was still the safest person to stay around for Law. They understood each other without need of many words, had similar reactions to danger or shocking news and people saying idiotic things (Bartolomeo and Luffy) while not showing their own emotions - even when ninja picked their interest immediately. Which is why Zou arc was titled by me as “The Kindred Spirits” because finally manga presented their interactions in more detailed way and it is hard to miss how often those two decided to stay around the other, even if there wasn’t anything to talk about.

If I have to sum up the Zou arc in relation to the development of Law’s relationship with Zoro in one sentence, I think “Law hanging out with a fellow introvert when there are so many noisy extroverted people around” would do the work.

Here comes additional thoughts and details worth to consider:

↪ In theory, as non captain, Zoro is below Luffy and Law. Straw Hat and Surgeon of the Death are de facto leaders of alliance. But once Luffy went his way, Zoro led Straw Hat group (similar like Sanji led the separated part of crew to Zou). During that time, he and Law were on equal footing in the sense of leadership skills. Interestingly, the narrator called their group as “team Zoro”, totally ignoring Law’s status as captain or potential leader. Later on, when alliance split in four groups, the graphic illustrating the division showed Trafalgar and Zoro as equal leaders representing their respective crews while both were put into Kinemon’s team.

↪ Thinking more about “team Zoro”, there is a possibility that Law temporary accepted Zoro’s leadership:

- it is clear he hates when people order him around (what was seen on Sabaody Archipelago with Eustass Kid) and Luffy, every time Straw Hats makes a decision ignoring Law’s opinion or outright ignoring him.

- Nami mentioned in Dressrosa Law was a lot like Luffy - giving orders to others without caring what they think. At the same time on Zou he did not boss anyone from Straw Hats. All major matters (not waiting for samurais and finding Bepo) were decided by Zoro. Everyone was allowed to express their concerns - what Robin and Usopp did - but once Roronoa made the final decision, no one questioned his judgment of the situation. Not even Law who, as captain himself, should be on equal ground.

- Law said “we should head straight for [Bepo] if we want accurate intel” which sounded like a suggestion of best action instead of giving order. This adds to the impression Law was truly compliant through their journey into the unknown place.

- Considering that Zoro did not try to order Law around (like Kid) and listened to his observations and suggestions (unlike Luffy sometimes), there wasn’t any reason for conflict or power struggles between those two Supernovas. Trafalgar was treated well by Zoro and the group who asked about his opinion and respected him in the general sense of the word.

↪ There is also the matter of Carrot’s attack. Zoro took on himself to fight the unknown enemy and Law did not protest.

- Once again, Sabaody Archipelago showed Law did not take kindly to insinuation he needed protection of others when Kid insisted on fighting marines alone.

- During Dressrosa, he didn’t fight unless he had to; to save as much energy as possible in case of a facing Doflamingo. We learned then that though Ope Ope no Mi was a powerful devil fruit, using its powers consumed a lot of energy.

- It is hard to judge how much time Law needed to fully renew his strength but after three days of rest on Dressrosa and one week of journey, from the group that arrived to Zou, Law seemed to still be recovering from injuries. What the bandages on his arm implies. Not even Luffy or Usopp had any visible injury signs after so much time.

- In all fairness, Zoro was the only one person in the group who wasn’t really damaged during the previous battle. The fight with Doflamingo left Luffy sleeping for three days after, Law and Usopp were mercilessly beaten down at some point, Franky had a manly fight against Senor Pink that left him injured and exhausted, Robin was hurt while protecting Rebecca from Diamente’s attack.

- Now, considering that Law could be not fully healed - and if that was true, Law and Zoro should be very aware of such a problem - letting Roronoa to deal personally with the danger makes sense. On one hand Zoro is always first to fight an enemy, because he likes fighting. On another, protecting others is his natural reflex. But in contrast to Kid, Zoro doesn’t make a big deal of that; he doesn’t ask for gratitude nor make fun of those who rely on him for being weak. The same as in Dressrosa, Law’s inability to fight at full capability was acknowledged but didn’t treat as personal weakness. Zoro simply protected the group because it is what he always does - put himself between danger and other people.

- Which could explain why Law didn’t protest and let the other Supernova deal with the enemy instead of proving his battle superiority or something like that. Law allowed himself to be protected - maybe because of injuries or because of trust in Zoro. Maybe for both of those reasons.

↪ During the joint trip to meet Raizo, Law always stayed at the end of the group, just after Zoro. Anime made it especially look like Trafalgar kept quite a large space between himself and Pirate Hunter, even though for most of time he didn’t mind staying close to the man. This actually made me think about author’s notes included in volume 76:

“This famous Japanese saying that can be taken as even sexist. "A wife must always walk three steps behind her husband."

This saying comes from ancient Japanese samurai culture. Let's say we were one of those samurai who constantly carried around those dangerous Japanese swords, not knowing when we'd need to pull them out and fight- if that were the case, would we really make our loved ones walk right next to us? Those "3 steps" are equivalent to the distance we must make to keep our ladies safe!! If you're a man, say this. "Take 3 steps back and follow me!!!" Take 3 steps back from volume 79, and this is "Volume 76"!!” [translation according to one piece wiki]

Putting aside the context of wife, the “safe distance” from someone who is carrying katanas actually could explain the change in range between Zoro and Law. When the group went to and came back from the hidden place, everyone was walking in line, one person after another. Since Law was a swordsman himself, he may follow some unspoken safety rules, like not going too close to armed swordmaster. Also, maybe he prefered to keep a distance between Zoro’s cursed sword and his own? The cursed blades like to cause problems and some, like Kitetsu, are bloodthirsty. So in general, the distance kept then most likely was less about liking or disliking each other and maybe about some rules of safety understandable to swordsmen?

↪ This seems to be more anime-thing, but Law addressed Roronoa as Zoro-ya. In the previous arc, most male Straw Hat pirates get their own nicknames (nose-ya for Usopp, Black Leg-ya for Sanji, Straw Hat-ya for Luffy). Law is on a first-name basis with Zoro. On the other hand, Roronoa used Luffy’s nickname Traffy..

↪ The interest in ninja is another thing they have in common albeit for different reasons. Law was mainly interested in clone jutsu which fits his medical skills - he can manipulate someone’s body while a ninja may multiply himself. Zoro’s interest was focused mainly on weapons and ninja’s endurance to pain/injury, because of course he wanted to see how strong the shinobi was.

↪ Law seems to not be a fan of partying, at least not in a big and noisy group. I’m not sure if we ever saw him actually drinking alcohol (don’t remember that personally) and who knows, he may not be fond of that too. This time Zoro didn’t drink with Law, so either he respected Trafalgar’s wish to be left alone or simply knew that Law was surrounded by his own crew, thus didn’t need his company. Last time, Law was a lonely Heart pirate between Straw Hats and the new Straw Hat Grand Fleet, now his own crew for sure wanted to spend some time with a long no see captain.

That is all for now for Zou arc. The alliance had a chance to relax and rest a bit before facing Kaido. With the help of new friends, Zoro and Law headed to land of samurais now occupied by one of Yonko. How their relationship will work under new level of pressure will verify the next part - Wano arc.

#one piece #The development of Law’s relationship with Zoro #trafalgar law #roronoa zoro #straw hats #monkey d. luffy #an introverted law hanging out with fellow introvert zoro with so many noisy extroverted people around #zou arc #finally done #if ony tumblr didn't make so much problems with posting long text post i would published it much earlier #my analyze #zou arc was a nice in between more serious dressrosa and wano

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slasherholic · 4 years

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(psst... did someone say Mikey whump? guys I think someone said Mikey whump…)

Frisky February Prompt: Electricity~ (yes it’s 15 days too early shush) @slashthedice

synopsis: Michael gets served up some nasty, nasty revenge by someone who really, really has it out for him.

warnings: torture in a medical setting, sexual assault, mikey has a bad time ok

foreword: the opinions expressed here by the POV character about certain sensitive topics in no way reflect my own beliefs <3

No Faith in Medicine | Michael Myers x Reader | NSFW

The hospital corridor is long and grey and stretches onward toward a single bolted door, labeled by the rectangular sign hanging above it as Therapy Theater No. 5.

This deep within the bowels of the sanitarium, below the patient wards and the enrichment centers and the checkered courtyard, there is hardly any of the familiar clamour; so as you stride closer to the door the clack of your bootheels over the beige linoleum carries like thunder.

Smith’s Grove was never the sort of place you had pictured yourself ending up during all those sleepless nights studying for your Ph.D, and truthfully, you can’t stand it here. The deliberate blandness of the hospital, with its color palettes limited to inoffensive whites and blues and greys—meticulously designed so as not to provoke its residents—wears on you more than anything else.

You feel like you’re suffocating here; but it doesn’t matter.

This job was never about you to begin with. It was never about some commendable interest in the healing of troubled minds, either; oh-no. There are two-hundred-and-forty-nine permanent patients living inside these sound-proof walls, and while it may not be a very doctorly thing to admit, you don’t give a rat’s ass about two-hundred-and-forty-eight of them.

...and as for that last “troubled mind,” well…

The breezy summer afternoon that Michael Myers was sentenced to life imprisonment exists in your head as vividly as a snapshot picture.

Almost as vivid is your memory of the Halloween that a policeman had come knocking at your front door to inform you in a strictly-business-voice that your sister was found dead in her kitchen, her throat slit open from ear to ear.

You remember watching from your couch as the gavel came down and the judge ruled the man who had taken your sister’s life away as criminally insane—and not responsible for his actions on that fateful October night—and therefor not legally a candidate for the death penalty.

You remember the burning, frustrated tears streaming down your face, the shatter of glass as you hurled the remote at the television screen, and then sinking down in a heap on the floor and screaming until your lungs were raw and your voice was in tatters, because it wasn’t fair, wasn’t fair, wasn’t fair.

So when the news came out that Myers was to be transferred back to Smith’s Grove—hardly a forty minute commute from your own house—you had been out the door that very same day, speeding in your car down the highway, ready to accept any available position the Sanitarium would offer you for your credentials.

It had been your one shot at revenge on the sick, evil fucker who had ruined your happiness; and you were prepared to move heaven and earth just to bring Myers hell.

It had taken eight months before you even laid eyes on the man for the first time.

You’d landed yourself a patient therapy position, but only had the clearance to treat patients who fell under the “medium” and “high-risk” categories. In the entire hospital there were only two patients who fell under the third and final category: a spitting lunatic of a man, who couldn’t be safely approached without first being drugged half-asleep with antipsychotics...

...and Myers.

You had possessed the patience of a saint, climbing through promotion after promotion.

And the very minute that you were handed back a fresh copy of your I.D, now with a little red stamp at the bottom, the stamp that meant you were cleared to work with Myers, you had raced down to the front desk to file your recommendation for treatment.

Three days later, after hours of debriefing by Dr. Ashton, Myers’ new court-assigned psychiatrist, you came face to face with the worst criminal the sanitarium had ever known.

You had seen Myers’ face pictured in black and white on newspaper articles and in fuzzy low-definition on T.V.

And absolutely none of that could have prepared you for witnessing him in the flesh.

The thing that had startled you most when you were led by Dr. Ashton into Michael’s barren, cramped room—the thing that practically had you reeling when your eyes fell on the motionless figure sitting on the cot in the corner, chained at the wrists and ankles by a metal link fastened to the floor—the thing you still despise yourself for thinking—

—is that Myers was jaw-droppingly, stunningly handsome.

His were the kind of ethereal good looks that you might expect to find in some renaissance painting, or a Grecian statue, or a fantasy book.

You had stood staring across the room at the motionless young man, drinking in all the features of his vacant, pretty face; overcome by complete and total disbelief that this was actually the person responsible for all your grief.

And the very next second, that disbelief was shattered like a dropped vase; when you looked into Myers’ stare.

It brought down the temperature in the room like a cold-snap. It was not directed at you, only at the floor, yet it had you shuddering anyway, had all the hairs on your arms standing straight up. It was not a lights-on-but-nobody-home sort of gaze, the kind you were expecting from how Myers had been described by his former psychiatrist. His face was blank, yes; that was accurate enough.

But his eyes, they were the furthest thing from it.

Michael Myers had the eyes of a ruthless, calculating, viciously deliberate predator.

The longer you had stood there, gawking at Myers as if he were a tiger in a cage, hardly listening to Dr. Ashton’s rambling about his admiration of your interest in his patient’s treatment, the more you became aware of the charge crackling in the air; like the moment in a thunderstorm just before lightning rips through the sky. It was as if every fiber in your body could sense the danger radiating from this man; you could all but see and smell the invisible blood staining his hands.

It had turned your vision into a seething cloud of red.

Here was a murderer—the worst kind of murderer, who was perfectly, undoubtedly aware of his crimes, a fact you could tell from just his eyes—who carried in his heart not a single shred of remorse for the lives he’d ripped away. Who, when he was unable to kill, had resigned himself to sitting and anticipating the day when he might once again have his hands around a warm throat, the day when he would pick right back up where he left off and take another life as carelessly and thoughtlessly as one snuffing out a candle.

And this man had been allowed to keep breathing.

You think of all these things as you reach the end of the corridor and swipe your I.D card on the door to Therapy Theater No.5. Hidden locking mechanisms whirr and click open.

You place your hand around the cool metal handle. For a moment, you just stand there. Feeling your pounding heart in your chest.

It pounds not because you are fearful; you don’t care if you get caught because of what you are about to do. You don’t care if you get fired, or if you get your license taken away, or even if you go to jail. Those are the most trivial, unimportant things in the world. No. Your heart does not pound for those reasons.

It pounds because, finally, there will be justice.

Finally, the evil son-of-a-bitch who slaughtered your sister is getting what he deserved all along.

And you get to be the one to flip the switch.

You turn the door handle and step into the room.

Therapy Theater No.5 is bathed in bright fluorescent light and smells strongly of antiseptic and sterilization. Three people are already in the room: two armed guards, who nod in acknowledgment at you when you enter.

And laid out at the center across a white padded table, dressed in a pale blue hospital gown, strapped tightly down at the wrists and ankles by hospital-grade cuffs, looking up at the ceiling as if utterly uncaring, motionless save for the rise and fall of his ribs—Myers.

A nurse had come in before you to prepare the room for treatment. The therapy you’re meant to be administering is simple and painless: electrodes are fixed to the patient’s body and a weak electrical current is passed through, stimulating choice muscle groups—and in more recent cases, even parts of the brain.

You had emphasized that part specifically in your pitch of the therapy to Dr. Ashton, referencing a study which showed how violent tendencies could be soothed in patients who underwent the treatment.

And no, you’d reassured him, it was nothing like electroconvulsive therapy.

The electrical current used in E.S.T is never strong enough to induce seizures. The only thing the subject feels is a mild, if not pleasant, buzz...

·…or at least that’s how it’s meant to be administered.

Tampering with the wattage of the machine had turned out to be laughably easy. A few snipped wires here, a few crunched numbers there, and now the bulky device sitting atop the roll-around table beside your “patient” can deliver a shock nastier than a taser with every throw of the switch.

It’s not strong enough to stop a human heart (god, you wish.) But it is enough to make Myers hurt.

Enough to make him writhe on that table.

Maybe even enough to make the heartless bastard feel something for a change.

You thank the guards before dismissing them. They leave the room but you know they won’t go far; no further than right outside in the hall, waiting through the entire session with their hands on their batons in case Myers gets out of hand.

Their security would be a welcome thing, if you were actually about to /treat/ Myers instead of torturing the living daylights out of him. But now, the guards are just another problem in need of a solution.

Though you are almost confident that Myers will retain his silence throughout the ordeal—that he’ll uphold his veil of distance and aloofness and total lack of care with the stubbornness of an ass—you’re not about to bet your shot at justice on it.

That’s what the ball gag in your coat pocket is for.

Reaching down to check that it is still there, excitement swells in your belly as your fingers graze the black silicone.

On the table, Myers is still motionless. He doesn’t tilt his head to regard you. He pays you no attention at all, in fact, as if you aren’t even there to begin with. Never do his steely eyes move from their fixed place on the ceiling light hanging above him.

As you walk up to the roll-around table, plucking a pair of latex gloves from a box stashed on the shelf beneath before snapping them curtly on, for a reason that you can’t put into words, you find yourself hesitating to look Myers in the face.

It doesn’t matter that he’s restrained; it doesn’t matter that there are two armed and capable guards standing watch right outside. Despite both these things, that vitriolic, charged aura you had felt in his cell still surrounds him now, polluting the room, hanging like a storm cloud over your head.

It’s as if some submissive animal instinct has gripped your brain and now screams warnings at you: Predator. Danger. Don’t look it in the eye. Don’t provoke it.

You do your damndest to dismiss the feeling as nerves.

In a little white tray next to the E.S.T machine sits a filled syringe; a sedative. Dr. Ashton has insisted on it to better ensure your safety, as well as Myers’ cooperation. In the psychiatrist’s exact words:

“These days Michael is, ah, fussier about this kind of treatment—you know, the kind they gotta bring in the guards for, the needles, the cuffs, the whole nine-yards.

It’s a theory of mine that, after living with the sort of power Michael did, the loss of his own control doesn’t sit as nicely anymore. He doesn’t like it. And he’s not afraid to let us know just how much he doesn’t like it.”

Fussy. That was the word Ashton had used to describe Myers.

It had taken every shred of self-control you possessed not to scoff in the Doctor’s face at that; as if the man laid out before you now were some sort of stubborn, overgrown toddler, and not a remorseless, murderous psychopath.

You don’t spare the sedative a second glance as you unravel the bundle of wires and nodes connected to the E.S.T machine; Myers is going to be awake to feel every goddamned second of what you do to him.

Only after you’re finished with him will you finally send him under.

You can picture the conversation with Ashton now: Yes sir, the sedative worked like a charm, he was out like a light the entire time; no sir, no complications at all.

You take your time setting up the machine because you’re still hesitant to even look at Myers, let alone touch him. But when the wires are all connected, the red power button flashing idly in standby, there is nothing left to do except attach the electrodes.

You force yourself to look him in the face as you approach. You should not be afraid of this man; you should resent him, should despise him, but should not fear him. He doesn’t deserve to hold that sort of power over you, or anyone else, ever again.

So you look.

Michael is still watching the ceiling. According to his eyes, he does not acknowledge you.

But just from how the hair on your nape stands on end you know you’re being watched.

Myers is regarding you coolly in his periphery with the curiosity of a feline, feigning detachment and disinterest; but the weight and pressure of that penetrating gaze could not be more obvious if it were a ton of bricks coming right down on your head.

With a deep breath to rein in your resolve, you reach down, your fingers working to undo the first knot on Myers’ hospital gown.

Quickly, you discover that it is one thing to look at Myers; to feel for yourself his ruthless awareness, the raw intensity of his presence.

But to touch him is another thing altogether.

He draws a breath of his own as you fidget with his gown, his strong rib cage expanding beneath your fingers. You shudder at the sudden pressure of his body; whether out of disgust, or anger, or some fucked up fascination, you aren’t sure.

After undoing the ties on both sides, you lift the front of his gown up and off—

—and find that Myers is totally naked underneath.

Standard hospital procedure for a therapy like this one. Nothing new.

But it’s different when the patient looks like this.

You hate yourself for ogling him. You detest the way your eyes rove across Myers’ body, lingering on all the features that your lizard-brain decides it likes; from the stark tendons in his neck to his sharp and angular collarbones, from his broad, rounded shoulders to the beautiful definition in his abdomen, and down even further than that before you can stop yourself.

To the V of his obliques—to the trail of curly brown pubic hair on his pelvis—and all the way down to his flaccid penis.

You snatch a towel from the roll-around and drape it hurriedly over his hips. Not for the sake of his modesty; just so you don’t have to worry about your eyes straying down to the cock of the man who murdered your sister.

As far as the placement of the electrodes on his body, you honestly haven’t given it much thought. It seemed like the sort of thing that would come to you like an epiphany, as if suddenly, in the moment, you would know exactly where to hit Myers to really make him suffer.

But no such epiphany comes. Oh well; you have an hour to experiment.

Grabbing the two nodes off their holders, you run the wires across his chest and press the little round circles down flat against his pectorals.

When your gloved fingers graze Myers’ skin you nearly jerk back your hand, startled. The man is hot like a stove.

Your medical fascination is instantly piqued—Myers must have the hottest resting body temperature you’ve ever encountered. You have to force away intrusive thoughts of sticking a thermometer in his mouth to see that number for yourself.

Focus.

Tugging up on the wires, you test the integrity of the node’s suction. They don’t budge from his chest, lifting his skin with them as you pull. Perfect; It’s nearly time.

Now for the gag.

You just have to cross your fingers and pray that you can actually get it in his mouth.

Looking Myers in the face a third time proves to be no less jarring than it had been the second or the first. You’re just relieved that even after all your poking and prodding he is still pretending not to be interested in you, or in the things you’re doing to his body.

You clear your throat before speaking to him because you don’t trust it enough not to crack.

“Open up,” you command him, mustering every authoritative bone in your body and sounding very official even to your own ears.

Removing the gag from your pocket, you hold it up as if to show him, taking care to conceal the black silicone ball with your hand.

“Mouthguard.”

You doubt that Myers has seen this sort of gag before. Or that he even knows what a gag is. Still, you’re not taking that risk. If this doesn’t work then you’re going to have to drug him just to get the damn thing in place, then wait for him to sober up again—a colossal waste of time.

For a tense second, Myers does not respond to your command. He just lays there on the table, inhaling and exhaling, looking incredibly bored with you, with his nakedness, with the electrodes strapped to his chest.

Your jaw goes tense. You nearly repeat yourself.

But then, he opens up his mouth.

Beneath the harsh overhead lighting his teeth gleam wetly. You suspect immediately that he’s going to try and bite your fingers off the second you get too close.

Game on, fucker.

From the shelf below the roll-around you snatch up a small blotting rag. Walking around to stand at the head of the table, you gaze down at Myers again.

“The strap goes underneath.” You inform him. “I need you to lift your head up.”

He does.

And you strike. Faster than you had thought yourself capable.

You drape the rag over his eyes so that he can’t see what’s coming. Thrusting the gag hard into his open mouth, you wedge it firmly between his teeth. In the corner of the room, Myers’ heart monitor spikes suddenly, the electronic beeping speeding up momentarily—a sound that has you beaming with pride.

You’ve actually managed to startle him.

As you clip the strap into place around the back of his head, a strange sense of accomplishment floods your body—you’ve done it. You’ve actually done it. Everything is ready.

Every sacrifice you’ve made in these past eight months, every hour spent in this godforsaken hellhole, it was all worth it just to bring about this single moment.

The moment is made only sweeter when you rip the rag away from Myers’ face.

Oh. Now you have his attention.

Those pale eyes are looking straight up at you. Considering you with the cutting gaze of a hawk. Working out the situation.

You glare right back down at him. You stare deep into his eyes, the triumphant fire now raging in your chest burning hotter than the ice in his stare, more furiously than all the danger—and you find that you are not afraid of him anymore. Like this, Myers is nothing. He’s not a boogeyman. Not a phantom. He’s just a man—stripped of all his mysticism. Strapped to a table. Naked. Gagged.

Powerless.

Just as powerless to stop what you’re about to do to him as each and every one of the people whose lives he took away.

“Hello, Michael.” You hold his fierce eye-contact as you speak. “Ten months ago you broke into my sister’s house and murdered her.”

Myers doesn’t blink. But neither do you.

“When they tried you, you were supposed to leave that courtroom a dead man walking; you were supposed to die. That's how our justice system works—when you do the things you did, you don’t get to keep on living.”

Nothing changes on Myers’ face as you speak. Nothing changes in his eyes. Not one molecule in his body has an atom of care to give about the words you’re saying. He breathes around the gag, his heart monitor beeping slow and steady.

“I don’t give a single fuck about what that judge said,” You continue. “And I don’t care how sick in the head you really are. You knew exactly what you were doing that night. I can see it in your eyes, Myers—you loved every fucking second of it. And that’s the only thing that matters.”

You draw a long breath. One that you hold in your lungs before letting slowly out again.

“You’re the evilest son-of-a-bitch on this entire fucking planet; and you deserve to die.”

Walking over to the E.S.T machine, fighting back with tooth and claw against furious tears now threatening your eyes, you place your finger over the power switch.

Myers watches you; and you notice something flicker to life in his glacial eyes. Not an emotion. Just a realization.

Good. He understands now. He understands what you’re about to do to him.

“Someone has to make you pay. Someone has to.”

Michael just stares. Watching you. Watching your finger on the switch. His pulse on the monitor ticks as leisurely as if he were about to fall asleep.

“And guess what, you sick fuck?”

Still staring—not blinking—breaths coming slowly.

“I’m so fucking happy that it’s me.”

You throw the switch—

—the wires crackle with live electricity—

—and all of Myers’ deliberate, calculated control is shattered like a dropped glass.

His body seizes. His eyes snap shut. His fingers curl into fists that turn his knuckles whiter than the table beneath him. The tendons in his neck and forearms jump out, straining beneath his skin. His heart monitor beats erratically, the little green line on the screen spiking sharply, racing out of control.

Your eyes are glued to the grisly scene. You devour each and every involuntary reaction, relishing in the complete and utter breakdown of his control.

Fifteen gorgeous seconds pass before you remember that you were supposed to be counting to ten. Whoops. You might be frying his brain into an unfeeling stupor at this point. You flip the switch off in an instant because you need him awake, aware.

Myers’ back falls flat against the table, the current cutting off as abruptly as it began. The muscles in his chest continue to contract and seize beneath his skin long after the electricity is gone; you count the spasms as they tear through his pectorals like sets of waves.

When the spasming stops, his chest heaves up and down, winded. His breaths around the gag come heavily. His eyes are still shut; but no longer are they /squeezed/ shut.

For a moment, you really think that he’s passed out.

Then his eyes twitch beneath their lids and flutter open again. Blinking. Focusing—

—flitting right back on your face. Right back to the spot where he had left them before the current forced them shut.

Myers’ eyes are devoid of care. He is entirely unperturbed by what has just happened to him; entirely unthreatened. But now, that murderous intent—the charge which until now you’d only felt in the air around him—is written in his stare as plain as day.

I am going to kill you, says Michael’s gaze, as nonchalant as if he were stating some trivial fact about the universe, like water is wet, or the sky is blue.

It makes your blood boil.

Adding insult to injury, the speed at which Myers regains control of his body is nothing short of infuriating. You fume as you watch the way his breaths level out again, the beeping from his heart monitor falling back into the former slow, rhythmic pace.

You feel as though you should say something to him; like you should retaliate to this defiance in some way that isn’t staring, because you’ve already lost that battle; you cannot possibly hope to match the severity of Myers’ gaze.

But you don’t.

In your heart of hearts you know that your words will go right through his skull, unheard. There is only one language that Myers understands; only one language that he can comprehend down to his marrow. So you’ll speak it to him.

Without wasting another breath, your fingers find the power switch again. And those defiant eyes of his snap shut a second time.

When you shut the current off the results are the same as before; Myers is heaving on the table. But he takes back his control just as quickly, his stoicism prevailing.

By the third time however, his breaths have begun to linger in their heaviness—

—by the fourth he draws them as shallow as a winded sprinter running a race—

—by the fifth, the intervals between the violent seizing-up of his body are too brief for him to catch his breath—

—and the way he now gasps around the obstructing gag, fighting and failing to suck in air past its silicone, his nostrils flaring rapidly to compensate, is the most beautiful display of desperation that you have ever witnessed.

The sixth time you throw the switch, Myers actually does pass out.

When the current stops his body loses its tension with the abruptness of a cut wire. You wait impatiently for him to open his eyes again with your finger lingering over the switch, preparing to meet that steely gaze with another brutal jolt of electricity.

You wait; and Myers’ heart monitor chugs away like a freight train going up a hill.

Still waiting… waiting...

...and nothing happens. Myers is out cold.

The contentment now pulsing through your veins is what you imagine a shot of heroin feels like. Snapping on a fresh pair of gloves, you walk up to the side of the table to admire your work.

The first thing you notice is the sweat. Myers’ body is drenched in it. It beads up on his chest and clavicle, on his biceps and shoulders, on his brow and cheeks, the skin there flushing a shade of stark, exhausted pink. Gorgeous.

Your eyes travel down his body to continue the examination; you stop at his hands.

Myers’ hands are bloody.

Crescent-shaped cuts litter the skin of his palms, marking the place where his own blunt fingernails had dug in uncontrollably, over and over and over again. The fresh blood streaks in little rivulets down his hands and pools on the white padding of the table beneath.

You chew the inside of your lip as you stare at the mess; these cuts might be tricky to explain away. You’ll have to gauze them and tell Dr. Ashton that his patient did it to himself; maybe recommend that he be switched to a higher Thorazine dosage to really sell the lie.

Luckily, that’s a problem for the future. As for right now, you’re rather enjoying the irony of Myers’ own blood staining his hands for a change.

The inspection continues. Further down his body, you finally notice it; the bulge beneath the towel strewn across his pelvis.

Oh my god, he isn’t. You think, lifting the side of the towel for a peek.

And oh my god, he is.

Rather frustratingly, just like the rest of him, Myers is pretty down here, too. Pretty and big. Which is not a compliment, you reassure yourself. Just a medical observation. You let yourself stare this time, because you’re not ashamed anymore. You’re not threatened by the notion of admiring Myers’ physiology anymore.

Not when he’s so completely at your mercy.

Somehow, Myers doesn’t seem to be the masochistic type, so you highly doubt that actual arousal is responsible for this. Sheer adrenaline coupled with his frantically pumping heart are probably to blame, his brain mixing and misinterpreting the signals, resulting in this little accident.

The longer you stare down at the “accident,” the more you find yourself wondering what Myers would look like fully-erect.

You cannot rip the electrodes off his chest fast enough. Plucking the towel from waist and discarding it on the floor, you stick the two nodes down flat against his obliques, then hurry to rig up a third. That one you plant just above his penis; as close to its base as the curly dark hair will allow.

You stand with your finger ready on the go-button again, opting to let Myers’ still-racing pulse dip out of the red before you pull the trigger and plunge him back into hell. Bloodied hands you can explain away, but cardiac arrest? Not so much.

The beeping slows. The green lines on the monitor settle. You throw the switch.

Myers’ pelvis bucks uncontrollably up from the table—

—and he grunts.

The sound makes your heart sing. It is muffled by the gag, low and reverberating, not very loud to begin with. Most definitely not on purpose; just a reaction that’s managed to slip through while his barriers are down.

Myers’ groin is still quivering when you cut the current off. His cock stands upright, stiff and swollen, totally erect. A line of saliva now dribbles down the side of his mouth, trickling between the gag, collecting in a shimmering mess on his shoulder. He blinks sluggishly up at the ceiling light as if transfixed; still dazed, you would guess.

Something twisted occurs to you as you drink in the scene. Something that you can’t deny.

Seeing Myers like this—fighting for his very consciousness, struggling to retain some sliver of control—is the single most arousing thing you have ever witnessed. You want nothing more in the entire world than to climb onto this dangerous, wounded man’s hips and claim him.

You want nothing more than to give him a taste of what true powerlessness feels like.

It’s a lovely fantasy, a beautiful temptation, and a real shame that it can’t happen. You don’t feel like getting knocked up with the child of your sister’s murderer today; or ever, for that matter. Instead, you think you’ll make a game out of guessing how many more shocks will have Myers coming on his own thighs.

Striding up to the head of the table again, you plant your arms on either side of his shoulders, leaning over him, hardly ten inches from his face.

“Looks painful Myers.” You jest. “How about I make you a deal?”

Michael looks up at you. Unfocused. Blinking slowly.

“I flip the switch,” you continue,

“—and I keep it flipped until you’re covered in your own semen, and after that I jam a needle in your arm, pump you full of drugs, and you get to live out your next eight hours as an unfeeling fucking vegetable. Fair?”

You wait for Myers to do something. For your words to register in his brain. For some flicker of a response to let you know that he’s even still in there.

To your immense disappointment, Myers does nothing. Absolutely nothing. He just...

...well, you can’t even call it staring anymore.

He doesn’t seem able to manage that sort of focus, you realize, inspecting his face closer. His eyes are alarmingly barren; there really isn’t much of anything there, now. None of the ruthlessness, none of that predatory awareness, none of the murder.

You’ve actually shocked the bastard totally, one-hundred-percent out of it.

Whoops.

Back at the roll-around, you snatch up a hand light. Returning to the table, you shine it in his eyes, assessing the damage. His functioning pupil is slow to dilate. Worryingly slow. You click the light off with a contemplative frown.

Half of your mind begs whatever force might be listening that this isn’t a passing affliction, that whatever damage that’s done is done. If the courts insist on keeping Myers alive, then maybe reducing his brains to soup is what it takes to keep him docile. To keep him from hurting another living thing ever again. You can only hope.

As much as you’d love to do so, electrocuting the living daylights out of him some more isn’t likely to bring Myers back to awareness; and the session is supposed to be over soon.

You glance at the clock on the wall—

—Shit. Very soon.

You need to find out right the fuck now if you’ve just rendered Dr. Ashton’s patient catatonic.

Walking around the side of the table, you take Myers’ swollen cock in your gloved hand—trying not to think about the fact that you’re jacking off a condemned murderer—and pump hard, stroking him all the way from the shaft to the swollen tip, squeezing the head, massaging your thumb over it, rubbing all the way back down again.

“Come on, asshole,” you spit. “That can’t be all the fight you’ve got.”

Myers’ hips jerk slightly up from the table as you touch him. Probably just an involuntary reaction. You’ll need him to do better than that. Stroking him faster, squeezing even harder, you pray that the friction of your latex glove against his cock feels just about as pleasant as a rug burn.

As you watch his vacant face like a hawk you see him begin to blink harder, his eyes squeezing shut, twitching beneath their lids, staying closed for a beat before opening up again, like he’s struggling to wake from a deep sleep. A much more deliberate motion; he’s coming back to it.

“Can you feel that? Hurts like a bitch, doesn’t it?”

He breathes hard around the gag. His knees lurch up from the table, the cuffs around his ankles straining, holding him in place.

You give his cock another hard squeeze.

“Forget where you are Myers?”

His jaw goes absolutely rigid with tension.

Ah. He heard you that time. He’s back.

How unfortunate that his brain isn’t fried after all.

You can see it all coming back now as his eyes flit down, locking on your face, rebooting within him like a program on a script; the chilling intensity, the sharpness, all the things that had made your skin crawl in the days past. Despite the torture, nothing at all about Myers’ demeanor has changed.

“Welcome back.” You state dryly. “We aren’t done yet.”

As if to make your blood boil on purpose—as if the battered state of his body means less to him than dirt, as if he hasn’t spent the better part of the hour being brutally, mercilessly tortured by you—

—Myers just watches you. Damning you with his eyes alone to the same grisly demise as before.

An odd sense of something, not quite admiration, sparks in your gut. Looking into Myers’ eyes, there is one single thing that you are willing to give this monster credit for:

What sits before you is a creature that cannot be broken. One that will never be dissuaded from its primal, violent nature. To try it is an impossible task. You suspect that you could stand in this room for days, flipping the same switch, delivering the same current, knocking him to and from consciousness, and into all the states in-between.

And the result would never change. Not ever.

He’d still be looking at you with that same deadly stare. A stare as cold and sharp as the blade of a carving knife.

And it would only get more piercing.

And what a relief it is that your goal in the first place was never to break Myers,

just to bring the gates of hell down on his pretty, curly head.

And you have. You can hear it in every breath he takes; he’s struggling. Although he draws his inhales slowly, with mechanical control, the ragged wheezing in his chest is no longer possible for him to hide. Myers is hurting—he’s hurting bad.

As much as you would love to stay and twist the knife in even deeper, it's time to wrap things up. You’re all out of time.

Pulling the electrodes from his groin and thighs with one hand, you let two of the nodes dangle freely off the side of the table.

The third you stick against his cock.

“Count your lucky fucking stars that not everyone in the world is as heartless as you are.” You tell him, walking back around to the E.S.T machine.

Myers follows you with eyes the entire way, stone-faced, impassive. Like the fact that you’ve just fastened a live wire to his dick is about as boring to him as watching paint dry.

Flick goes the switch.

His back arches off the table like a bent bow. He scrunches his eyes shut, breathing hard around the gag, tugging furiously at the cuffs, the muscles in his calves and biceps straining dangerously, pulling upwards with a brutish force that has table whining beneath him.

You’re transfixed as Michael comes. His mess shoots out in thick ropes, reaching further than you thought possible, coating the table, getting on his legs. The sheer power of his body is a stunning thing to witness. You keep the current running to milk him down to the very last drop.

When he stops coming, you power off the machine.

The node comes away from Michael’s skin in a “pop” that is all-too satisfying. Bundling all the wires and electrodes back into place on the machine you listen to the only measurable signs of the man’s distress; the tortured intake of his breaths, the elevated beeping of his heart monitor.

Then, picking up the needle from the little white tray, you cross back to Myers’ side.

The vein in his forearm is thick and pronounced and the needle slips in beautifully. You press slowly down on the plunger, grateful when he doesn’t try to yank his arm away, relieved when he accepts the drug without a struggle. He must be exhausted.

The sedative works its magic quickly. You pull up a stool and sit down beside him to watch.

The vitriol in his eyes begins to melt and soften. One by one his strained muscles are allowed to relax again, the tension ebbing away; from his jaw, his shoulders, his abdomen, his legs. The electronic beeping on the monitor slows and slows until its powerful rhythm beats steadily again.

Evidently, Michael has decided he isn’t ready to go under just yet. Though sleep pools in his eyelids he blinks it away, clinging in a death grip to his consciousness.

Just to leer at you. Just to picture in his mind the day he will have his hands around your throat; as if it is already set in stone. As if it is just a matter of when.

Then, Michael’s eyelids flutter—

—fighting to stay open, still staring—

—closing, for just a beat too long—

—lingering shut—

—staying shut.

You move to clean him up quickly. The gag comes out first. Lifting his head to unbuckle the strap, you tug out the black ball, letting his strained jaw fall shut again for the first time in an hour; then carelessly drop his head. It thunks satisfyingly as it comes down hard against the table. Glancing at the gag’s silicone, you notice the deep markings worn into it, perfect impressions of Myers’ top and bottom teeth. You almost shudder; a bite from him would have been nasty.

You blot away the drool dribbling down his chin and shoulder with a rag, and then move on.

The last thing you expect as you begin to clean Michael’s bloodied hands is the tears that spring to your eyes. Even with your fear of the man gone and buried, you wish that you didn’t have to touch these awful hands; let alone treat them, bandage them, heal them.

You wipe away the tears on your sleeve as you gather your supplies together on the roll-around.

Grabbing each of his wrists just above the restraint cuffs and turning them so that his palm is facing upward on the table, you hastily swab him down with alcohol pads, wiping up the clotting blood from his skin, squeezing out a blob of antiseptic from a tube to smear across his cuts. As you wrap Michael’s palms tightly in gauze you try your hardest to snuff out that invasive thought when it comes searing like a bullet through your skull—

—these are the hands that killed my sister.

You simply can’t afford to linger on those thoughts right now. Maybe when you’re at home tonight, alone in your bed, you will let yourself cry; but not now. Not while you still need to clean up after Myers’ unfortunate mishap.

Toweling him down from his forehead to his calves, you soak away the sweat. And the semen. Then, you fasten back up the front of his hospital gown, knotting each and every tie.

And just like that, the job is done.

You knock on the door. The guards come in and wheel Myers’ unconscious body out of the room.

The next day, you have a debriefing session with Dr. Ashton. You feed him your meticulously rehearsed lie: that the therapy went without a hiccup, that you firmly believe this treatment could be the key to alleviating Michael’s tendencies for violence.

The moron laps up your every word.

Ashton ends the session with a delightful little surprise; he’s pulled some strings to allow for Michael’s therapy to be carried out bi-weekly. He is so impressed by your drive to treat his patient that he’s offering you a position as Michael’s secondary caretaker. He only hopes that you’ll accept.

The smile you give him is bright and sincere, one that beams from ear to ear.

“Doctor, believe me when I say that nothing in the world would make me happier.”

#Michael Myers #Halloween #Slashers #michael myers x reader #writing

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jitterbugperson · 4 years

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Talentswap Au- Character Info

This is a Talentswap au, where the characters from v3 are given the talents of the characters from Trigger Happy Havoc, and are put into the same general plot and setting as the first game. The mastermind, motives, order of people murdered, victims, how they’re murdered, and who murdered them are all completely different from the first game. The personalities of the characters are similar to their canon personalities, but based on their new talents, their personalities were changed as a result of and in order to fit their new roles.

Angie Yonaga [Ultimate Clairvoyant]

She’s strange and mysterious, people don’t know a lot about her because she doesn’t share a lot about herself. Angie claims she can tell the future, and more often than not, she’s right. However, she tends not to share her readings of the future unless prompted to. She’s usually quiet, and she’s almost always smiling. At first her presence can be calming, but after a while she can be unsettling to be around as she tends to watch people without realizing it. Her gaze can be scary, and sometimes when she looks right into someone’s eyes, they feel as though she’s staring into their soul, reading their thoughts and uncovering their secrets.

Kaito Momota [Ultimate Lucky Student]

Although his title is the “Ultimate Lucky Student”, he’s anything but. Kaito has the worst luck of anyone he knows, but despite that, he’s managed to keep his chin up and stay positive. At first, he’d tried to enroll into Hopes Peak as the Ultimate Botanist, since he had a particular love for plants and somehow managed to get every plant in his care to flourish regardless of the plant’s condition beforehand. But, because of his luck, last minute he was denied entree because all of the available spots had been filled. Except for one. He shot his last shot in the Lucky Student drawing, and somehow managed to get picked, against all odds. But that was just another trick from his rather shitty luck, and it only served to get him involved in the Killing Game. Aside from all of that, Kaito is stupidly optimistic, and is constantly trying to see the best in people, no matter the circumstances. He believes that with enough care and nurturing, anyone can flourish into a wonderful person, regardless of their circumstances and past. He has an incredible belief in anyone he considers a friend, and he’s a bit naive, so he considers most people his friend. He’s also a bit of a dumbass, despite having an extensive knowledge of a lot of things. He seems to lack a lot of common sense, while also being a little bit of a nerd when it comes to anything he likes. His mind is an enigma, half of the time he’s incredibly intelligent, and other times he has no idea what he’s doing. The entire AU is also in his point of view, so he’s the protagonist.

Kaede Akamatsu [Ultimate Affluent Progeny]

She’s the nice rich girl at your school. She always wears really nice clothes and is often nice to others, unless certain people are around. She’s sometimes a bully without realizing it because of the people she’s been raised around. She doesn’t exactly have the best role models in her life, so she has some beliefs that aren’t exactly the best. Sometime she doesn’t even realize what she’s saying is rude or hurtful, that’s just how she thinks people should treat each other. Other than that, she’s a generally pleasant person to be around, and is usually nice to people unless they give her a reason not to be. She uses sarcasm as a defense mechanism when she’s feeling threatened, nervous, scared, or anxious, so she isn’t always all buddy buddy, and her sarcasm can be scathing and hurtful if she really wants it to be. Usually however, she’s a pretty outgoing person, and has no problem making friends with her seemingly cheery personality.

Rantaro Amami [Ultimate Gambler]

Another mysterious character that’s constantly smiling, but unlike Angie, his smile isn’t one of happiness, but it seems to be more of a front, like a constant poker face to mask any emotions he may be feeling. It’s a skill he’s honed from years of gambling, and it’s turned over to his personal life, making him guard his emotions constantly without realizing it. He also has incredible luck and intuition, but he’s almost always quite about it. Outwardly, he’s charming and friendly, but underneath that exterior, he’s a little bastard man. He is always silently judging people, and as soon as the killing game is announced, he’s watching out for people who may try to get him, filing their weaknesses into his brain in case he has to face any of them. He acts like he trusts everyone, when really he trusts no one, and is doubting everyone else during every trial, although he has a much quieter way of voicing his opinions. But he’s never going to tell them that.

Gonta Gokuhara [Ultimate Moral Compass]

He’s a very good boy, a big gentle giant with a huge heart. While Kiyotaka was a moral compass through being a part of the disciplinary committee at his school and having good grades, Gonta is the moral compass by being a part of student council, as well as being class president and a part of several extracurricular activities. He doesn’t get the best grades, but he’s naturally charismatic because of his overwhelming compassion for everyone around him. This made it easy for him to gain the positions he’s in, since most people trusts that he wants whats best for everyone. He tries his best to better his school, making fundraisers for clubs and classes getting less of the budget they should, like the arts and drama. He’s the kind of person who you will feel bad if you make him cry, he’s a very sensitive baby and if you hurt his feelings he will cry.

Ryoma Hoshi [Ultimate Biker Gang Leader]

Also very quiet, he prefers to observe everyone from afar rather than through actual human interaction. He’s very untrustworthy of everyone he meets for the first time, just because of how he was raised. Often goes with his gut feelings and intuition, and because of his keen observation skills, he’s right more often than not. He’s done a lot of morally questionable things in his life, and it’s made him experienced in the art of emotional repression. Although, he’s not mean spirited or hot headed in any way, he’s more of a loner type, and likes to be alone. But if someone were to approach him and try to talk, he wouldn’t yell at them or try to leave, he’d just be a bit uncomfortable, but he’d stick it out and talk to them. Underneath his rough exterior, he has a good head, and he wants to change, the environment he grew up in just hasn’t allowed him to be anything but heartless and cold.

Kiibo Iidabashi [Ultimate Programmer]

Programming is his everything, he loves it, he could talk about it for hours if you let him. He’s a huge dork with a big heart, he would have more friends if he was more confident. He’s very sweet, but he has self-esteem and anxiety issues, so that makes it hard for him to talk to people without second-guessing himself or shutting down. He really wants friends, but his naturally timid nature and love for programming often get in the way of that, and he’s definitely been picked on for both of those before. He’s very logic oriented when it comes to life, and he’s a great problem solver, but isn’t the best when it comes to dealing with his or other’s emotions. He’s also rather dense and gullible despite his intelligence, and will often not get jokes or sarcasm unless it’s super clear or is explained to him. He also has a horrible sleep schedule, since he’s often holed up in his room working on programming, he can lose track of time and what day of the week/month it is very easily. He’s also a very sleepy boy when he’s out of his room, because sleep deprivation will make a person constantly tired.

Miu Iruma [Ultimate Fashionista]

She has the ideal body proportions and has no problem flaunting it. She’s very proud of her appearance, and makes a constant effort to keep her clothes and makeup looking their best. She does still make dirty jokes, but less than in canon. Most of her jokes are directed at herself, not exactly self-deprecating, but they hammer in the fact that she sees herself as nothing more than a pretty item. She tries to appear very self confident and like she has her shit together, but she does, in fact, not have her shit together at all. She’s very sensitive, if you insult her she’ll insult you back 10x harder, then cry in her room for 15 minutes straight. She does not take criticism well, and if you insult her she will take it to heart even if it was intended to be a joke. She won’t let it show that it hurt her, and she’ll probably even joke along with it.

Tsumugi Shirogane [Ultimate Swimmer]

She’s a sweet girl with way too many siblings who grew up by the ocean and taught herself how to swim at a very young age. She has a lot of empathy for other people, and finds it easy to make friends because she understands people easily, having spent her life in a household with far more people than it should have housed. She’s very emotional, and very emotionally in tune with those around her, making her a grounding source for people when they’re sad. She’s good at comforting people, and knows what to do when it comes to taking care of others. She’s also a bit loud and sometimes gets carried away, having little control over her volume when she gets excited. She can get a bit possessive over her possessions, and gets a bit snippy if people touch her things or food without asking first. If you do ask, she’ll probably share, albeit, reluctantly.

Himiko Yumeno [Ultimate Pop Sensation]

She’s very small and tiny, but also very flexible and limber. She’s been in the entertainment industry as long as she can remember, and performing has been almost her entire life. She enjoys singing and dancing with her group, and considers the members her family. She has no problem showing her emotions, and she’s very sensitive, so she shows them a lot. She is very outgoing and energetic most of the time, but she she has a very short fuse energy wise and runs out of energy quickly. When she isn’t energetic, she’s tired or napping. Despite her naive first appearance, she’s actually very intuitive from interacting with so many people throughout her lifetime, and it’s not hard for her to tell if someone has good or bad intentions.

Tenko Chabashira [Ultimate Softball Player]

She’s still a huge feminist, but not as much as in canon. She loves softball, she’s incredibly passionate about it, and will say that softball is leagues better than baseball if either subject is back up. She’s very protective over the other girl students, and is especially protective over Himiko, considering they hit it off very early on. She is nice at first, but can be extremely aggressive if provoked, and it doesn’t take a lot to provoke her. She’s muscular, and could easily body check almost anyone else present. She’s emotionally tough and it’s very hard to hurt her feelings, or hurt her in general. She’s easy to get along with, as long as you respect her. If you make her mad, it’s lights out. She’s got a bat on her and she’s not afraid to use it.

Kirumi Tojo [Ultimate Martial Artist]

Kirumi is no nonsense to an extreme degree when it comes to mental and physical health, both her own and others, more so herself. She’s a bit too strict with herself, and she is almost always practicing her Martial Art skills, since Martial Arts is incredibly important to her and her family. She often has trouble talking to other and making friends, socializing is not her forte. She’s rather enjoy other people’s company in silence rather than by talking, preferring a good sparring match over a touching conversation any day. Like Kiibo, she also doesn’t get jokes a lot, but she tries to make an effort to learn more about her peers and their interests, despite not being around them a lot. She’s very observant, so it doesn’t take much to learn a lot about the people around her. She is usually tough emotionally, and it takes quite a bit to make her sad or angry. It is however, very easy to make her flustered, as giving her any form of compliments makes her immediately blush. It’s easy to make her smile if someone knows what they’re doing, and once someone finds out how she works, it’s easy to become friends with her and stay that way.

Korekiyo Shinguiji [Ultimate Writing Prodigy]

Korekiyo is best known for his vivid and terrifying horror stories, which he has an abundance of. Despite horror being his forte, he’s not creepy in the slightest. He’s actually a very nice guy, although he is a bit shy at first. He’s a kind soul and although he can be very jumpy at times, he tries his best to social with others. He’s usually quiet when he speaks, although this is mostly unintentional. He doesn’t like physical contact, but he’s a nice person to be around if someone’s looking to vent or relax. He has a calming presence about him, and he’s able to stay unusually calm during stressful situations. He also has a fun slew of random knowledge solely based on research he’s done for his horror novels, such as where most of the main arteries are located on a human body.

Maki Harukawa [Ultimate ???]

Maki doesn’t remember her talent, although she seems like she may have a suspicion as to what it may be. Maki could be best described as cold, calculating, and observant. She likes to stay in the background, watching other people interact instead of involving herself in friendships. She bottles up almost all of her feelings as a coping mechanism, so she usually comes off as heartless or emotionless at first glance. Really, she’s just horrible at processing emotions, so she just shoves them deep down to avoid confronting them. She also is incredibly distrusting of others and their intentions when people try to talk to her. Like Kirumi and Kiibo, she has problems understanding jokes, although, unlike Kirumi and Kiibo, she makes no effort to understand them, as she doesn’t really care. She’s very factually intelligent, and relies on science and logic to solve most problems. This has nothing to do with her personality, but she often does the leg bouncing/pen clicking stuff, more when she’s nervous, but she does it a lot other times too.

Kokichi Ouma [Ultimate ???]

Kokichi says he doesn’t remember his talent, but it’s implied that he may have a pretty good idea of what it is, he just thinks it’s nobody else’s business. He’s a pessimistic smartass, which immediately puts him at odds with Kaito. He finds the fact that Kaito always tries to see the good in everyone incredibly annoying, because most people just suck and there’s nothing more to it. So, naturally, Kokichi does everything in his power to piss Kaito off, just being a general nuisance. During trials he often shoots a lot of Kaito’s claims and ideas down, and it’s only more infuriating for Kaito because more often than not, Kokichi is actually right. Kokichi is smart and observant, not as much as Maki but almost to the same extent. He’s often passive aggressive towards Kaito, and he doesn’t really spend time with the others unless he’s forced to. Even then, he doesn’t talk much. He doesn’t trust anyone, and he prefers it that way, considering the situation everyone’s in. Despite being an asshole, he’s doesn’t exactly have a temper, and often keeps a level head throughout the madness. He doesn’t expression a lot of emotions, and when he does, it’s usually annoyance or disbelief at the others’ incompetence. He’s rarely truly angry though.

Shuichi Saihara [Ultimate ???]

Shuichi has no idea what his talent is, and despite trying his hardest to figure out what it is, he’s had no luck. Shuichi is a nice boy, and he smiles a lot, usually in an attempt to cheer others up. He’s quiet, but in a reserved sort of way that lets you know he’s listening, he just knows he doesn’t need to give his input in order for it to be a good conversation. He always feels really guilty when he makes someone upset or angry, and apologizes profusely to anyone he thinks he’s wronged. He’s also a bit jumpy, similarly to Korekiyo. He is very much more on the introverted side, and he greatly prefers to be alone in his room rather than mingling with others. This, mixed with the fact that he can’t remember his talent makes other wary of him at first, even though he’s just someone who’s comfortable being alone. He’s not super intelligent, but he is fairly perceptive of his surroundings, and often notices things that others don’t upon first glance.

#dangnaronpa #dr1 trigger happy havoc #trigger happy havoc #danganronpa v3 #danganronpa au #talentswap au #drv3 #dr1

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medeafive · 4 years

Text

Blood and Stone -01

Masterpost

She's good. Really good. That's why Fury turns a blind eye (haha) when she sometimes sneaks out alone into the night. She's got senses. She's done this longer than almost anyone else and she can just tell. No one tracks vampires down better than her, so why would she let herself be slowed down.

Tonight, she is after two young breeds. She caught their trail somewhere around Anděl, followed it up the Petřín, lost it, picked it up again in Holešovice and traced it to the other side of the Vltava, a basement in Karlín. They're inexperienced, alone, reckless, hungry, and she's going to wipe them out before they can get their shit together. This ends tonight.

She needs to be careful, though, because young vampires actually have a keener sense of smell, coming with the insatiable hunger. There's no moon out tonight, which puts her slightly at a disadvantage. Still. Not waiting for backup. Not when she's got them right here.

She's prepared. She smells like mud, smeared her face with it, her neck under the bite guard, her wrists and hands. She stinks. She's armed, knives and guns strapped to her thighs, her back, inside her sleeves. She breathes deeply.

One of them is wailing inside, inhuman noises. It's been forever since she felt empathy for that kind of thing. Yes, it's painful, turning into a monster, but they're still monsters. She'll gladly put them out of their misery. So they won't rip more people with them and create more wailing families, actual wailing people. Not this scum.

The heavy wooden door is barred, so she'll have to slip through the shaft. There are scratching marks on the wood. They really don't know how to be careful. They'll pay for that. She smells blood, probably their own. Whoever turned them just abandoned them, and now they're easy prey.

She breathes deeply again, pressing the handle of her silver blade into her palm. The anticipatory adrenaline rushes through her. Now. She's ready.

She rips out the grid and jumps down the shaft, not caring about the noise. It's a little brighter inside, old broken furniture strewn around, bicycles, canisters. It smells of oil. One of the vampire fledglings jumps up, hissing, baring her bloody fangs. Young vampires sometimes feed on each other, as long as there is still human blood inside their veins. They're strong until they burn through it. Natasha grins, baring her own teeth, flashing the silver knife. The vampiress jumps onto her and she rolls out underneath her, slashing at her calf. The monster howls. The other vampire, barely more than a boy, cowers. Natasha lets the knife cut through the air, in his direction. The vampiress lunges at her again and she's strong, fast, but clumsy. Natasha kicks her in the chest so she crashes into a couple of flimsy bikes. The other vampire prowls towards her and Natasha spins to sink the knife into his shoulder, eliciting a whimpering growl. The vampiress crawls up again, blood around her mouth, eyes fresh red. Natasha elbows the other in the face, knocking out one of his fangs, then tangles with the first. She's strong, high on blood as she'll never be again, sinking her claws into Natasha's forearms. The armour holds, though it cracks, and Natasha knees her in the stomach, breaking her down, and she swings back to trade blows with the other until she slices his neck, shallow, she'll have to do that again later. Finish the job. Wait. Her hair stands.

She's knocked forward all at once, crashing into a solid wooden table, knocking the air out of her. Stars. Shakes her head to clear it. Vision blurry. The third vampire, tall, male, stalks towards her, sneering. This is bad. Something trickles down her forehead.

She rolls away before he slams the table to pieces, rolls away again before he kicks her, but then there's no more room, she scrambles upright, knife knocked out of her hand, barely dodging the claws of the vampiress, then he grabs her and flings her across the room like a dirty sheet, she hits the concrete wall groaning, now she's really dizzy, get up, get up-

There's a subtle woosh and then it's quiet all of a sudden. She preens her eyes open, ready to throw up. Black. Black cloak. She's only heard of those, never seen one before.

There's a thump as the now dry vampire hits the floor, pale, crumpled up. She crawls back in disgust. And fear. Hits the wall immediately. The vampiress is beheaded, body twisted unnaturally, and the boy's slit throat bleeds into a puddle. The black cloak turns. His eyes are white. Their eyes turn black once they've burned through their own blood but with every full moon they see, they become lighter. He must be old, just a sliver of grey left. Old and powerful. She tries to crawl back farther into the wall. No one survives seeing a black cloak. Hardly anyone.

The white eyes study her, stepping over the dry one's arm. This cellar is too fucking small. He's not armed, other than claws and fangs, and he moves excruciatingly slowly. Dressed in all black, like the freaks around the castle she wouldn't approach over her dead body. Even they do not dare to don the black cloak. He's either an impostor or, judging by the color of his eyes, the most dangerous vampire she's ever met. He stops. "I know who you are."

The silver throwing star slips from her hand easily and he dodges just as easily, swiftly, she hardly sees him moving, just hears the cloak cut through the air. He straightens with annoyance, brushing dark hair out of his forehead. She bares her teeth at him, hissing, snarling. He mirrors her, automatically, presenting the longest fangs she's ever seen, streaked with gold. Yes, he's old, decades old. Maybe even a century. "I don't care who you are," she returns, even though she is burning to know.

He seems very annoyed with her. The hair on the back of her neck doesn't like it, any of it. "You're not difficult to find. The mud won't cover the smell of your blood."

Not for a vampire his age, no. "What do you want," she spits out, not really a question. Just bite her already, get it over with.

"There is something that-" He dodges the next throwing star as well, swooshing cloak. "You know what, under vampires, that is just considered rude."

"Under humans as well," she returns. Nobody ever considered her polite. And she's done caring. Now that she's going to die anyways.

"Would you let me finish," he demands. "I'm not going to kill you. Or you would be dead already."

Fucking liar. She's heard about that. Old vampires like to play with their fickle human prey. She brandishes her teeth again and he can't help but do the same. The black coat has golden patterns stitched into it. Would be considered nobility, under any other circumstances. "Go on. Please."

She pushes herself up while he is momentarily distracted with a car going by outside. Reckless, at this time. She leans against the wall, still dizzy. Ready to throw up. The smell of blood and death doesn't help. Oh wait, now's her chance to-

He knocks her against the wall roughly, gun clattering on the floor. Oh, now he's angry. He doesn't smell dead, sort of like an old book. His eyes look less white from close up. "Seriously," he hisses, though no breath hits her. His fingers are tight and cold as stone. "I'm not going to kill you. Get that into your-"

The silver slashes through his forearm, barely missing the bone, and he groans, recoiling, flesh turning gray, she doesn't bother kicking him and runs. If he were human, he might just have bled out from that. The door's only held shut by a broom stuck through the door handles, easily discarded, and then she runs , the hair on the back of her neck not going down until she reaches the hunters' stronghold.

"Are you fucking serious ," Fury hisses at her, even though she's barely dressed. "Alone? Again?"

Bruce studies the bruises on her arms, not saying a word. She can tell he agrees, though. "It was just two," she returns feistily. "Well, three. I could have handled three."

"Is it so fucking hard to ask for help," Fury curses. "Would it cost you an arm and a leg or what? Ruin your cold, heartless persona?"

Bruce folds the scalpel kit and pulls the blanket over her. Like she's not going to get up and dress. "She's right. Not even a scratch. Plenty of bruises, though."

"You're the luckiest bastard I know, Romanoff," Fury snaps. "Are you sure it was a black cloak?"

"His eyes were almost white," she repeats, pulling a clean jacket on. "You think I'm making things up?"

"And he just let you run away," Fury remarks sourly. "On foot. You do know they can basically fly ."

"That's just a stupid rumor." Natasha waves him off. "I've never seen a vampire fly. "

"I have," Fury returns dryly. "Believe me. A black cloak would've never let you get away."

"I cut his artery," Natasha repeats, slipping off the table. "Guess that slowed him down enough. Stop doubting me, I have no reason to lie to you."

Fury does not look convinced. "And he was looking specifically for you."

"I guess," Natasha agrees, tugging her pants up. "Claimed he knew who I am." She leaves out the rest. No need to tell them those lies.

"So you have a black cloak on your trail," Clint remarks, quietly leaning in the doorframe. "Guess you're not going out anytime soon."

"If there's really a vampire like that in Prague," Fury interrupts. "We're all as good as dead. I don't care about your bloody arteries."

"Well, good," Natasha agrees, even though she doesn't. "Then I can sleep till sundown and go on another round, yes?"

"Are you sure you're okay?" Pepper asks. "I can cover for you, if you want. Haven't paid you back for last time."

It's very invasive but matter of fact is, going out when you're on your period is a risk and they have to plan around that. Just like when you have a small cut or a recent nosebleed or anything. Can't risk vampires smelling that and going berserk. And rather than informing Fury about their exact menstrual cycles, they rather just switch the shifts around. "It's fine. I'm fine."

"Really?" Pepper repeats unconvinced, tightening her ponytail. "Bruce said you crashed into a bunch of things. It's okay to just take a break."

"I don't need a break," Natasha returns, fastening the thigh holster. "You can pay me back another time. Go see whether you can detach Tony from his project instead."

A faint smile enters Pepper's face, automatically. "Probably not, but I'll go try. But really, if you need anything, just a word."

"I don't need anything," Natasha replies, putting the magazine in. "But thanks."

"You're not taking this seriously, are you," Clint remarks.

"If I did," Natasha returns, giving up stepping lightly. "What would I do? Hole up inside the tower? How's that going to save anybody?"

"You don't have black cloaks in Russia, do you," Clint asks. Natasha shakes her head unwillingly. "They're not just strong vampires. They were turned by Schmidt himself during the first Uprising. Lots of them were killed but some went into hiding with him. They're fiercely loyal and only listen to him. Every other vampire who dares wear a black cloak is brutally slain."

"Yeah, yeah, the famous superspreader." Natasha scoffs. "But I thought he's somewhere West. Why would he send a black cloak here ?"

"They're enforcers," Clint explains. "Take out hunter cells that get too annoying. Or clean up unallowed newborns. You know, there's long been rumors those crazyheads over in the castle swore allegiance to Schmidt."

"So we could all die," Natasha repeats. "Is what you're saying."

Clints grins. "Eh, life's dangerous. Stop, I think I hear something."

Something turns out to be a stray cat, jumping on a trash can, almost giving them a heart attack. It hisses at them. Clint gives it the finger, though that doesn't appear to impress the shoddy beast. "Where were we. Oh, yeah, there's all sorts of rumors, that they have special powers and all that. Of course, nobody knows what's actually true because no one-"

"Quiet," Natasha whispers. "It smells, doesn't it?"

Clint tries, over the trash can. Natasha slips past, peeking onto the next street. Deadly quiet. She smells blood, vampire blood. Must have passed from the other side of the river again. She unlocks her gun, holding it close to her chest as she proceeds over the street. All her senses tell her they're here. Clint's close on her heels.

Probably infighting. Those baby vampires never manage to form significant groups without killing each other. Not that she minds. Makes things easier for her. She breathes in through her nose and follows the scent to a backyard.

Corpses. Impaled. That's not infighting, that's an execution. She shudders staring at the bloody wood peaking out of their chests. Five. Five of them, though two of the bodies are ripped in half, strewn across the yard carelessly. A shitton of dark blood. Pretty fresh. "Tasha," Clint remarks quietly.

She looks up from the carnage, taking a second before she spots the dark figure towering high on the roof. The cloak still sends a shiver down her spine. He's staring down at them and they're helplessly cornered in this backyard. Then he drops off the roof, swoosh , like the wind, and then he's gone.

"Well," Clint remarks, shuddering visibly. "He certainly was wearing a black cloak."

"Shut up," Natasha mutters. "Let's get back to the tower before he realizes he doesn't have to run from us."

Fury goes full tower defense mode, putting up more traps, more alarms, increasing the guards on each shift, constantly accounting for everyone and not letting a pin drop without his knowing. She can tell, though, that he doesn't really believe in it. She's heard rumors that he lost a whole hunting cell to a black cloak, himself escaping only with one eye, the lone survivor. She's not sure it's true, though. And how are a couple of booby traps going to prevent this from happening to them, too?

She hates being controlled like that. Free spirit, as Alexei used to say. Just because she couldn't stand being around him after some of the stuff he did. She has her red lines, too, though not everyone believes that. So, she drops out one night, just slipping through the window down the grey stones of the powder tower, and then she's gone.

Prague's always quiet at night, as every vampire-infested city, but tonight it's especially quiet. She wonders how many people have heard of the black cloak in town, how far the rumors have spread. There's not a single open window as she strolls through the Old Town, no noises coming from inside. She feels weirdly at ease. At least she's pretty sure there are no more baby vampires in the old districts. The Malá Strana is, of course, a totally different business.

"Reckless," the awful voice remarks. "Going for a walk alone at night."

She looks up and she could've sworn he wasn't standing next to the Astrological Clock just seconds before, but now he is. "You do know those are the Twelve Apostles right next to you."

His white eyes make it very hard to read his expression. As if that monster's expressions mattered. "You do know that sort of thing has no effect," he returns calmly.

She breathes out with annoyance. "Are you stalking me?"

"Yes," he replies. "Pretty easy, as I said, you're the-" It looks like he knocks her knife away with his cloak, though that's obviously not it. She doesn't believe in fairytales about magical cloaks. The knife clatters on the cobblestone. "Could you stop throwing stuff at me?"

"Sorry," she replies, not sounding it. "Force of habit. Go on."

He scoffs. "You're the worst smelling human I've ever come across."

She snorts. "Oh no. So, if I cut my palm right now, you won't care at all?"

His nostrils flare just at the mention. He rolls his eyes, dropping off the ledge, cloak flaring up, landing soundlessly without really bending his knees. "What's wrong with you?"

"Got a vampire stalking me and can't get rid of him," she replies, unconsciously reaching for her gun. "Not for lack of trying, though. I thought that was obvious."

"How about you leave that gun where it is," he suggests. "And you just let me talk. As I said, I'm not going to kill you."

This fucking liar again. She's not in the mood for games. "Did Schmidt send you?"

"He wants you," the vampire replies.

"Dead," she specifies.

"Alive," he corrects. "He wants to turn you. Recruit you."

She shudders inwardly. "Oh, so you are going to kill me."

"I will merely bring you to him," he claims. "So he can turn you himself."

She scoffs. "If I end up bitten by a vampire, you better believe I would walk straight into the sun."

"Trust me," he returns softly. "You wouldn't."

She bares her teeth at him, him doing the same. Can't shake it. "Sure. I've seen plenty of young vampires, I know turning is just great ."

"It's painful," he admits. "But you'll always want to live."

She sneers. "That's not living. You're not alive ."

"Point of view," he says. "But I certainly won't kill you."

"Why me?" she questions. "What's so special about me, except for my horrible smell?"

"You're giving Rumlow a hard time," he states. "Ever since you came here. So why not turn a pain in the ass into an advantage?"

"I'm not going to be an advantage to you," she repeats. "So you can just kill me, really, that's easier on both of us."

He scoffs. "Again, not doing that. But take your time. I have a couple more nests to clean up."

"You really think I'm going to agree to being turned?" she asks, bewildered. "I'm a hunter. Are you sure you thought that through?"

"You will," he replies. "Trust me."

"I don‘t," she clarifies. "Even if I'm not currently throwing silver things at you."

"So you don't want to hear about the nest in Žižkov," he remarks.

She groans inwardly and asks the stupid question. "So you're not going to kill all of my hunter friends?"

"Oh right," he states. "I won't. If you agree to be turned."

It knocks the wind out of her. "What?! You just forgot the extortion part?!"

"Sorry," he actually replies. "So yes. I think you will agree."

Fuck. How could she- she's not cuddly or anything, not even polite, pretty prickly actually if you ask anyone but Clint, but sentencing them all to death - but she's going to do worse if she's a vampire. The perfect dilemma. Hurting people either way. She grabs the silver knife, he already looks annoyed, but she only slits through her left palm, hissing at the sting. Blood on the blade, blood in her palm, blood dripping on the cobblestone. He sniffs, involuntarily, fangs coming out, eyes turning into animalistic slits, growling. "What the hell are you doing?"

"Just suck me dry," she says. "Really. I'd prefer that over turning into a monster."

He comes closer, though he clearly doesn't want to, the scent drawing him in. Apparently, her blood doesn't smell bad at all. She holds out her hand, waiting. He growls, prancing back again, moving incredibly fast. Pupils blown. He's shifting so much, breathing in the scent, dragged towards the source, yanking himself back, trying to escape but not really wanting to. She waits, afraid, hand shaking, more blood dripping down. She smells it, too. He growls again, fangs bared, resolve growing thinner and thinner, though he is way more controlled than any other vampire she's ever met. He's still a monster and she never wants to be like him. He has the face of a hungry animal, starving animal, predator. She wiggles her fingers, pressing out more blood. He sneers, sniffing, nothing remotely human about it. Her hand's still shaking, even more.

He flings himself at her, too sudden for her to see, she tries to slash at him but he knocks the knife out of her hand easily, dislocating her right shoulder in the process. Good Lord, he's strong. He yanks her left hand towards his face, breathing rapidly, all tight, she's got tears streaming down her face because fucking shoulder, his eyes are almost all black now, fangs just a few inches from sinking into her hand, but he stays there, blinking rapidly. She groans, get on with it, make the pain-

"What did you put in there?" he snarls, sounding not even remotely human. "What did you put in your blood?"

She presses her eyes shut, praying he'll just do it already, kill her already. "Nothing," comes out as a faint whisper. "Just do it. Suck my blood."

He growls, yanking her hand even farther up, she moans in pain. Just end it already. Just do it.

She's pushed back, all of a sudden, at least a dozen feet, crashing into the chairs of some outdoor restaurant, the pain becomes even worse, she rolls about, groaning, whimpering, trying desperately to breathe. Run over by a truck, that's the feeling. She preens her eyes open, just in time to see him- not fly but jump, black cloak flaring, onto one of the towering ring buildings, 30 feet, 50 feet, she's too broken to estimate, then jump again, seemingly carried by the wind, and he's out of her field of sight. She groans, pressing her eyes shut for just a second and then dragging herself up, limping back towards the tower.

#blood and stone #buckynat #vampire au #natasha romanoff #black widow #bucky barnes #winter soldier #fanfic #my writing

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starofvelaris · 5 years

Text

The Waiting Game Part II(ish)

I haven’t quite gotten around to finishing part II of my nessian fic, The Waiting Game, but here is an excerpt to tide you over and give y’all those nessian feels we’re all craving. -g

Her hair was soaked, her limbs shivering as she threw the sodden fur collar aside, stalking to the cabin hearth. She stood as close to the flames as she could stand, swaying slightly on her feet.

Cassian’s eyes followed her from the shadow of the kitchen were he waited. He noted her body trembling from the cold, her hair disheveled and escaping its leather strap and pins that had once kept it so perfectly contained in a neat crown of braids. He watched as she peeled away another layer of her clothing, her cloak and then her jacket. She loosened the ties of her billowy cream-colored shirt, exposing her collarbones to the heat of the fire.

“You’ve been drinking, I see?” Cassian muttered from behind her. “Found the camp tavern, evidently?”

Nesta spun around on wobbly footing, barely flinching at him, though he could tell she was surprised to find him there.

“Oh…it’s you,” she slurred, now removing a boot and soaked woolen sock. Not seeming to care that at this rate she would be nearly naked before Cassian had a chance to speak again. “Going to reprimand me?”

“Well, I would if I hadn’t already done that umpteen times,” Cassian said as he stepped towards the light of the hearth.

Nesta turned her back to him, kicking off her other boot and peeling her brown soft leather pants down her legs.

Cassian froze for a moment, but he could not act not surprised. He had done far more scandalous things whilst intoxicated than this.

“You know, there is a private room upstairs? With a larger fire?” he offered, tucking his wings behind him and crossing his arms before her.

“I don’t care,” Nesta said, keeping her back to him. “I am cold,”

“And drunk,” Cassian muttered.

“Judge me, I dare you,” she said hollowly. “Remind me of all the things I should be happy darling Feyre and his royal highness, precious Rhysand have so graciously given me. How I should be grateful to you for bringing me here, to this shithole,”

He had never heard such poison in her voice, such bitterness. Or clarity, despite her drunkenness.

“I wasn’t going to reprimand you,” Cassian said softly, leaning against the old wooden table. She spun back around to survey him with those unearthly eyes.

“No? Then what?” Nesta said, lowering herself ungracefully, dropping down to her rear on the rough wooden floor.

“I was actually going to offer to drink with you,” he walked to the modest wooden cabinet on the side of the hearth, and opened it. He knocked one side and opened up a small, secret compartment. From inside he pulled an amber glass bottle.

“So you’re hiding the liquor from me, now?” Nesta gave a heartless laugh.

“No, this liquor has been hidden here for more years than I can count, long before you arrived here,” he closed and locked the compartment. “More centuries than I can count, come to think of it,”

Nesta’s face softened, in some kind of awe, which turned to confusion. “And how do you know about this?”

“This cabin used to be Rhysand’s mother’s home. And his home. And then mine,” he explained, stepping back over to her as he took a long sip from the bottle. He held it out towards her below him.

Nesta was silent. She did not take the bottle.

“I….I didn’t know,” she mumbled, looking at the floor. “You never said,”

“You never asked,” Cassian shrugged.

A flash of guilt overtook Nesta’s face, and she hugged her knees to her chest as she gazed into the flames. “How…did you come to live with her?”

“She took me in. I was just a boy….a bastard, as they called me. But to her, I was a son, and I will never be able to repay her for that, or all the other things she provided,”

“She was murdered,” Nesta said, though it was not a question. She took the bottle from him. Cassian did not know how much Feyre had told her sister of the horrors of how Rhys’s parents had died, but he could tell by the sadness on her face that she knew enough.

“What was it like?” she asked softly, taking a deep drink from the bottle finally.

“What?”

“Growing up here?” she passed the bottle back to him.

Cassian took a long sip of liquor, and lowered himself to sit beside her.

“It was hard.” He set the bottle down gently on the uneven wood floor between them. “Rhysand’s mother certainly made it easier for me than it would have been. I had a warm bed and meal to come home to because of his mother….but still, life in this village is not an easy one. Now with the right frame of mind, I have become grateful for it. I was given strength and a sense of self I’m not sure I would have otherwise,”

“A sense of self?” Nesta repeated, looking over to him, though her face was guarded.

“Being here gave me a purpose, eventually. Fighting shoulder to shoulder with my people.”

“Why did you leave, then?”

“The camps can be brutal in the best of times. It was difficult to watch my people be mistreated by our own leaders, and the females got the worst of it. So when Rhysand offered me a place by his side, in his inner circle, I knew it was time to move on for awhile, to see more of the world,”

“And leave them behind?” Nesta’s gaze was unyielding. There was no accusation in her voice, but Cassian bristled.

“I’ve worked countless hours negotiating with the commanders here, to let the females train if they so desire. Even compete in the Rite. Just because it’s from afar, doesn’t mean I’ve left them,” he tried to keep the derision from his voice.

They were quiet for a moment, only the sound of pattering rain on the roof. Nesta’s eyes were faraway, staring off into the dim lit corner of the room. Cassian watched the firelight cascade across the planes of her face.

“Tell me about the Rite,” she demanded in a low voice when she returned her attention to him. The ice of her suddenly lucid eyes startled him. He could almost feel his knees buckle beneath him where he sat.

“Well,” Cassian began, regaining his composure. “It’s an ancient tradition. All young Illyrian males compete. You begin deep in the Illyrian mountains, no weapons or supplies or barely even clothing allowed…once the signal is rung out, you must climb the sacred mountain and cross the boundary to the monolith, as fast as possible. Many live to touch the sacred stone. Many more do not,”

“They perish from the cold, the elements?”

“That, sometimes. But more often from the blows of their brothers,”

“You…kill one another?”

Cassian just nodded solemnly.

“Brutal,” she remarked. Cassian expected such a reaction, but he did not expect what she said next.

“And beautiful,”

He raised a brow and took another swig from the bottle. “You think so?”

Nesta leaned back so that she was nearly horizontal on the floor, resting her elbows behind her. “The world is cruel. Best to show that to your children while they are young. Teach them that you can only rely on yourself, that you cannot trust anyone but yourself. Best to learn that before they grow up and learn it the hard way,”

“And what exactly is the ‘hard way’ to learn life lessons?” Cassian asked with a smirk. “Surely there isn’t a harder way than the Rite?”

“Seems I found the a harder way,” Nesta muttered humorlessly.

Cassian regarded her for a moment as he slowly sipped the liquor again.

~ t o b e c o n t i n u e d ~

#nessian #sovfic #fan fic #fanfiction #nesta archeron #cassian #nesta x cassian #sarah j maas #acotar #acomaf #acowar #a court of mist and fury #a court of thorns and roses #sjm #a court of wings and ruin #cassian x nesta #illyrian #the night court

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janiedean · 5 years

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Hi. I haven’t read the books, but I’ve seen a lot of animosity between book!arya fans and Book!sansa fans. Arya’s fans claim that Sansa’s fans demonise Arya to make Sansa seem more moral, but that Sansa actually symbolises everything wrong with high borns (she’s shallow, doesn’t care about small folk, actually bullied Arya, etc). I was wondering what Sansa is actually like in the books? I know the books take place over a shorter period of time, so how much has she changed by the end of ADWD?

premise: I think that’s a discourse that has not much sense existing and that it’s born out of show-related bad readings/show-only stans being... what they are, but:

book!sansa is nowhere near the same as show!sansa and I wish I could find that post with receipts on it but basically she never went to winterell, she never had the QUEEN IN THE NOOORTHHH storyline, she didn’t go around telling theon anything (it’s her friend jeyne poole in her place in the books) and her journey has gone from ‘I’m a shallow 11yo girl same as all shallow 11yo girls are but I’m a good person deep down’ to ‘I suffered a lot because of the circumstances I was thrown in and now I’m in a pretty damn delicate position that challenges my morals but I stayed kind and empathetic and hopeful in spite of all the crap I got thrown at’ for now, and she’s... still courteous and kind and empathetic towards most people she meets, which is not how it went in the show;

also, there’s no way book!sansa goes the way show!sansa did;

that said: the point with book!sansa is that she changes. like, in the beginning of the books she’s more or less like in the show and okay sure she’s pretty shallow and only thinks about boys and getting married and shit, but... that’s like, regular 11 yo. everyone was insufferable at 11yo. and you can see through book one (esp. with her interactions with sandor) that she has a lot of empathy and is an extremely kind person, and she overcomes most of those damned issues throughout the books - she doesn’t care for the smallfolk in the beginning but later when she poses as lf’s bastard daughter she gets a taste of it and that’s after being abused to hell and back in king’s landing, etc. like, there’s an evolution of character there;

that doesn’t mean that she and arya didn’t have a difficult relationship in which they think they hate each other and in which arya feels like sansa hates her and wouldn’t want her (at some point in acok she thinks she’s only sure JON would want her if she showed up which... says all tbqh), and like sansa did call her names and arya did suffer from it greatly/it hurt her self-esteem a lot, but I mean that’s unfortunate regular sibling rivalry and when you read their povs it’s obvious they do love each other deep down as siblings and that if they reunited they’d only be overjoyed of it especially after a lot of time apart;

but I can’t fault a lot of arya stans on this site because there’s... hm... let’s say a certain tendency coming from some prominent sansa stans/the show!sansa stans side of fandom of a) demonizing arya and painting her as a cold hearted heartless killing machine, b) negating that she has love interests (I mean before S8 people legit shipped sansa and gendry and like...no judging but come on that’s arya’s love interest, sansa/gendry is crackship level and that’s it), c) taking all her good qualities and giving them to sansa at random when sansa doesn’t have them or didn’t have them in book canon or developed them later, d) painting sansa as 100% not criticizable and conceiving arya as basically her bodyguard, which... is... yikes.

like: the point is that people don’t... get that the point of those two is that they love each other for how different they are and for how specular they are (I mean... what did ned tell them, you two are like the sun and the moon but you need each other?? XD) and the point is also that grrm is exploring two opposite way of dealing with trauma same as he does with jaime and tyrion - specifically what I mean is that jaime and tyrion are on opposite scales because jaime doesn’t even know he fucking has 80% of his trauma and deals with it by selectively removing memories/dissociating/not wanting to deal with it, tyrion keeps on thinking about it all the time and dissects it instead, right? well, sansa and arya are both about being taken forcibly from their family and being thrown on their own having to deal with it - sansa deals by keeping on being kind (BOOK VERSION) and quietly watching and learning how to play the game at the best of her skills, arya has the child soldier trauma thing going on in which she reacts with violence to violence and risks losing her sense of self, but that’s like.... two shitty situation explored in opposites and they’re meant to be foils. not to hate each other. because the point is that they have to overcome it and find their way back to each other if you ask me. *shrug*

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #anti show sansa #ch: arya starks #ch: sansa stark #got negativity #whatthe show did to sansa was one of the worst consequences of it ffs #abuse cw #Anonymous #ask post

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icharchivist · 5 years

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So your meta of Lavi is a masterpiece and it helped me put into words a lot of stuff. I kinda wanted to talk about Allen though, one thing you mentionned is that Allen is really positive/optimist and want to save everybody, and while some of his 'light' probably comes from Mana's mask because so far it seems Allen's idea of Mana was of a really kind and positive and cheerful person. I wonder how much of his optimism/positiveness and desire to strive for the best for everybody come from -part 1

part 2-himself ? And I suddenly remembered DGM reverse, and woah, most exorcists backstories so far are really horrible, but they all had normal-happy memories mixed in (that doesn’t make up for the horibleness of other stuff and I’m not downplaying their stories nor am I interested in comparing who had it worse), Lenalee had her family before most got killed by Akuma and she was ripped away from Komui to be psychologically tortured and abused by the black order and it quite obviously distressed

part 3- her, her life so war was happy until akuma and the B.O ruined it. I dunno for Lavi but most panels of him as a child are cheerful and cute af, and he became a bookman for his desire to know about history and know more than most people, then increasedly got sick of humanity and their wars and their stupidity. Kanda’s backstory is the stuff of nightmares and OW, but he had Alma with him from the beggining and his friendship/love/I don’t think he quite knew with Alma meant a lot for him

part 4- etc etc. Allen’s backstory in reverse ? Kinda the opposite. Red didn’t have anything happy, no happy memories, no people that loved him, nothing. He barely had shelter (one that didn’t quite block out the chilling cold), and had to work to the bone for and while he had food, it wasn’t something he took for granted, because if Cosimo or somebody else felt like it they’d say lies to the ringmaster that Red slacked off and the Ringmaster would get pissed at Red, ‘put him in his place’part 5 (I think it’s 5)-and make him starve that day as punishment. And he was under constant threat of violence from pretty much anybody. The best reaction/treatment he could hope for at the time was being ignored (and all his human rights with it), and had to face disgust/physical violence/insults/slurs from all others. Red kinda accepted that nobody’d ever love him (though he admitted he longued for love once he witnessed it), but that didn’t matter because he hated other people right back

part 6- and the first time he received warmth/got treated as a human was from Allen the dog, then from Mana himself (who Red thought the worst of at the beggining), then had fluffy and happy memories and moments during two years after his miserable and hellish life (people probably treated him normally once Mana got him a glove to cover his Innocence Arm). The thing that differentiate him from others is that most others experienced at least some warmth before getting disillusioned/cynical

avant-derniere part-most experienced some warmth before discovering that no, humanity/life suck (for Kanda it happened at the same time)(that’s even how the earl bait most into making Akuma, they experience happiness and love then get crushed when the source of hapiness gp away), but for Allen/Red ? He was utterly done with life and didn’t remember any instances of a good memory/life and didn’t even know what positivity felt like ? And then he got to experience that life doesn’t suck THAT much.

final part- then he got to experience that life doesn’t suck THAT MUCH. that’s why witnessing/enduring fucked up shit won’t faze him in his goal, fucked up shit was the norm before this weird magical thing called love came. (aside from his duty to atone to what he did to Mana) He didn’t get the transformation from hopeful to cynical. it was the other way around. He went back to save Tykki in the ark once the Noah problem was taken care of, because in Allen’s worldview, Allen himself and his -

the true final part- Allen himself and his friends doesn’t qualify as 'white/light’ in his worldview. Tykki is a sadistical homicidal bastard ? He does have human friends and people he care for anyway, so if he’s not a threat/able to kill exorcists anymore he might as well save him. And that’s why he didn’t judge Suman for being a traitor. Or maybe I’m just sprouting useless pretentious bullshit and am mistaken,sorry, idk, enlighten me.

Heyaaa!! first thank you so much for the compliment it means a lot to me ❤ but huge shout out to the anon who helped put it all in words like that.

Second, I think you’re completely spot on on everything you mention.

(Before jumping in the whole thing while i agree with all you say, i’ll just mention that one of the Guidebook, the Grey Arc one, mentions that Lavi joined the Bookmen at 6yo, and almost gets killed by a stray bullet when he was 7yo (the guidebook mentions he clang to Bookman’s hair when he was healing him, leading Bookman to say it’s Lavi’s fault they’re falling off now). So by all account despite this incident Lavi had a happy upbringing with Bookman, or well as much as the heartless Bookman training had to offer).

For Allen, yes, all you say is very true and it’s honestly super interesting to me? Allen’s life before Mana was hell. Hell, hadn’t Allen-the-dog died because he was beaten up anyway? The only happiness he had with that Dog was taken away by him likely by his abusers. Before Mana, he lived through hell. He was 7 when he met Mana and they were together only 3 years. That’s only 3 years of real happiness. And if anything we get from Cross’s memories chapter, is that it took Allen a long, long time to get over it (and while there’s camaradery between them, Cross’s teaching traumatized Allen to this day so. Poor guy went through a lot).

Mana seems to be the only window of time in which Allen was happy, and he doesn’t have anything else in his early memories that allow him to cling to that. tbh that’s also why the changes of names matter a lot with Allen. from “Red” because it was the color of his arm, something people insulted him for, it was either an insult he got too used to to correct since he didn’t have a name anyway, or seeing himself as nothing else than what made his monstruosity to others. To “Allen”, the name of the dog. Of the first being who showed him love and affection and who died unfairly. To then take on the “Walker” last name after he turned Mana as an Akuma, likely in a way to remind himself of him, to “Keep Walking” but also to remember everytime he hears his name of what he has done to Mana and his duty toward him.

And you’re entierely right: Allen’s story was one of cynism and suffering who eventually ended up getting better thanks to Mana, and Mana’s loss and the guilt of turning him into an Akuma from Allen in the mindset of constantly trying to take it over his shoulders.

It’s obviously not meant to disregard the others backstories, like you say- but it’s interesting bc even Kanda who had the most horrible early years in life had Alma, and Alma balanced out the horrors he had to go through, and he had him from the start. And the scientists were actually kind to the kids outsides of the experiments. (not excusing any of the shits they pulled the kids through- but it sure does contrasts with Allen’s past that had people abuse him for no reason).

Mana is the catalyst of Allen’s storyline in many ways: for being the first being who showed him kindness and changed his viewpoint of life, to then the grief of losing him shaping Allen’s future guilt that isolates him from others.

Had Allen not been able to create an Akuma for Mana, it’s to wonder how “selfless” he would have become. While I think that him wanting to smile, be cheerful, be kind, comes mainly for being raised by Mana- His selflessness, his self-sacrificing attitude, his way to distance himself emotionally from others all come from the fact he “betrayed Mana” by making him go through the Akuma making process. If Allen could have remained kind and sweet growing up, a lot of his worst habits may not have existed has the guilt from the Akuma not happened.

I think it would be the nuance of what Allen evolved into due to Mana’s raising him, and what Allen evolved into due to the grief of losing Mana and therefore forcing himself to wear his mask.

Had Mana not existed at all in Allen’s life, I don’t doubt he would have turned into a bitter person until someone showed love and care for him. Imo, Allen was someone who was starved for affection but was in an unsafe environment for it to happen, and he grew cynical. The only fact he cared this much about a dog being kind to him shows that he was already fundamentally a kind soul that was just unable to express himself and only bitterness remained. What Allen needed was someone kind to encourage this side of him. (and like you mention, Allen does agrees he longued for love, just didn’t know what it was beforehand)

I think Mana made Allen feel safe to be “gentle”. He showed him how being kind and cheerful could help himself and others. Like a parent teaches his child to evolve in life in a way. Allen was only 7 after all, he was still young enough to learn, to be shaped by his experience.

“Mana’s mask”, that fake smile though, comes from Mana’s teaching pushed to the extreme after Allen’s guilt over Mana pushed him to push people away.

So yes, you’re right: Allen’s journey was of cynism to cheerfulness. To determination to carry on. I think he had the potential to cheerfulness all along but just needed someone to push him in the right direction, and Mana was that push (but for that we need a little more “casual times between Mana and Allen between Allen’s 7 and 10 years old”). But the guilt and trauma of the Akuma!Mana incident pushed Allen to do this to the extreme, often at the detriment of his own feelings.

I believe his willingness to see the best for everyone comes from the Akuma!Mana incident as well. It is hard to believe that finding One Gentle Person after years of being abused would change Allen’s view this much. But i think seeing something like gentle and sweet Mana being turned into a weapon of Mass destruction, and then see this repeat itself with others people, knowing that Akuma were people just as desperate than he was, people who loved so hard, that they called onto a soul who hadn’t asked for it to be turned into weapon: would have Allen see that there must be something good into anyone. That if an Akuma, a weapon of mass destruction, could be just a suffering soul being chained into life because they were loved too much, then what about anyone else?

I think understanding the Akuma the way Allen does have him reconsider the way he sees everyone else. That everyone has their chains that bind them to the world. That some of those Chains are heavy and can turn people into assholes to stand it, to stand this life they were chained into. But there’s still a soul behind the chains and Allen wants to believe in it. I believe it’s a way also to hold on to the last memories he has of Mana, to keep it as a positive figure in his mind, rather than an already twisted creature. And that’s why the humanity and salvation of the akuma is so important to Allen to start with.

By humanizing the Akuma to that extends, Allen can push his compassion to anyone else. So imo, i don’t think it would have happened had the Akuma!Mana incident not happened. It’s likely it is that bad in canon as well because of his eye only: perhaps if he only ever saw Mana, he would have developped differently, but seeing all those Akuma’s souls made it impossible for Allen to ignore it. The moment he sees a soul, he sees a story there; he sees a person who was loved too much and was chained back into life to commit horrors. And from that point on, I think that compassion just become a reflex.

So as such it makes sense Allen extends that to anyone else. Suman becoming a fallen told a story about why he became this way, of his relationship with the Innocence, of his suffering with it. Meeting the Light part of Tyki first had Allen sees all sides of him, and know that Tyki was duty bound to the Noah as well, and that people cared for him. And if Allen didn’t extend this compassion to Tyki per se, he would have had to the people who loved Tyki because he knows what loss feels like and he doesn’t want anyone to go through this.

I find it harder to word than i expected welp but yes, i agree with all you say, and y e there’s just. a lot to Allen. and imo his whole viewpoint comes from he sees Akuma to start with. Mana was his greatest influence in general.

allen breaks my heart ;;-;;

Take care!

#ichafantalks dgm #ichameta dgm #wouhouu #seikyoko #ichareply #dgm meta

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rinaizumo · 6 years

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------- Bloody Shore ------- The sun hangs above the water, so bright that it seems it has burned out to white. This is how sunset appears here. Aki rests against the sea or more likely – grows into it, like the trees grow into the ground. And the lord has to protect his own in every way possible, but it’s not just that. The Sun Child understands perfectly well, that guarding the borders turned not enough long ago: in Sengoku age the one who can’t see further than the tip of his nose will be dragged in the mire, and his lands will get covered in ash and be torn between the more thoughtful conquerors. That’s why politics and betrayal are so closely intertwined and heading together, hand in hand, like a married couple. Toyotomi offered him alliance... it was more likely Takenaka’s idea though. Hanbei’s clever, but if Motonari plays the cards he has right, the lord of Aki will come out victorious and destroy previous companions before they demolish him. This union is build upon “Keep you friends close, but the enemies keep even closer” motto after all. It was much the same when he allied with his opponents to fight Nobunaga Oda. Just for the sake of removing a common threat they managed to unite, but it lasted no longer than couple of days after they reached the goal. Why? Because each of them fights to take the whole Japan over. Even this is not quite true though… They fight for the future in their dreams. The future where is no longer war and where just one person rules the country. This is the desire of Kai Tiger and of his eternal Etigo rival, of Oshu’s One Eyed Dragon and of Maeda clan, of Ieyasu Tokugawa and of this irritating “demon” Chousokabe. It was shared by Azai Nagamasa and by Nobunaga and it’s the current aim of Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s army and even of the old Shimazu. Only Maeda Keiji like a baffoon closes his eyes to the obvious things and keeps preaching that they can solve it peacefully. It’s laughable and somewhat bitter. He should’ve killed the guy, when he had had the chance. Mouri Motonari also awaits the new world ruled by his hand. People dread the Sun Child and hate him. Merciless attitude to his own soldiers spawns detestation and fear. Motochika in one of their usual clashes cries out something about kindness and calls him “disgraceful heartless bastard”. Maybe he’s right. But those people, have they not pledged their Lord and Aki loyalty? How dare they throw their weapon and run then? Where is their dignity and following the moral code? He judges and sentences them as the criminals in the wartime are to be judged and he mustn’t feel any remorse. Mouri never spares those who violate the oath given to him, much like he will never ask for mercy if it all turns the worst way. Long ago Shojumaru was very well taught such understanding of virtue and honour. In the end he, Toyotomi and even Nobunaga are less pretentious than other lords. Motonari doesn’t lie himself hoping one will be able to live this war through never soiling his hands. Will Takeda and Uesugi not seize each other throats for the sake of victory? Will Masamune avoid fighting against Chousokabe? And will Ieyasu spare the Maedas? And Mouri is fully aware that some battles he will win by massacring the remnants “winner’s” army within the two fighting opponents. It’s not the most dignified victory, but for reaching the goal he’ll sacrifice some of his virtue. Pretty illusions and words in Sengoku Era are good only for hovering around the new graves instead of incense. The sunset turns the sea and the skies red as if the they drank and soaked in blood he spilled on this shore, on HIS shore, and the blood he is shedding in the future. This time of the day has so little tints that even his green armor fades to the likes of the luminary. Lord of Aki sometimes thinks that being the Sun Child is not enough – only the Sun itself can equally indifferently burn and kill or grow crops and dance on someone’s lashes. And he is still too much human. Mouri Motonari hates sunsets. And often – he can’t take his eyes off them. When the waters of his homeland shore splash like the red juice by his feet it feels like he hates this filled with death bay and the drenched in blood land. But it’s gibberish of course. Motonari fights for Aki. Only for the sake of his homeland and it’s people, whom he is said to detest and not treasure, he does it. Yes, it is nonsense. Lord Mouri just hates sunsets with their bitter fresh air and the shrieks of gulls resembling lost souls’ screams. He just. Hates. Sunsets.

#Mouri Motonari #sengoku basara #RI-BasarArt

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akingdomtheorist · 5 years

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KH Catch Up: KH2FM The FINAL PART

THE FINAL PART WITH LESS THAN TWO MONTHS TO CATCH UP. HOLLOW BASTION

"I forgot how to play this game."

-fleeing enemies- "Because why deal with your problems when you can just nyoom."

SPACE PARANOIDS

"So how does it feel to be pewpewpew'd back?" "Is this what I do to people?"

"I give these Heartless a 3/10. Not a fan."

He went Wisdom Form had no pewpewers remorse after that.

"Is this way to the I/O Tower?" "Well if you walk up to the entryway it'll tell you. You may have to go through a few maps." "Well okay that's great but which way is the I/O Tower?" -literally walks up to the entrance- "I'm sorry."

"Why don't they just reformat the computer?" "That's what the disc is for." "You don't need a program to do that!" "You do when they're sentient!" "Why don't they just CTRL+Alt+DELETE the MCP then?" "He's Win10." "Even Win10 lets you do that! He's Win11."

"Wait, did Leon not put the fuckin' disc in the computer? Aerith put it in the drive?! Leons from a futuristic setting!"

-walks into boss fight- "I didn't save."

"Man, he did deresolution him, he's at 144P now. He's like a JPEG."

Poor guy has hit the Limit Break instead of Delete so many times.

"We just deleted System32."

HOLLOW BASTION IS NOW RADIANT GARDEN

I force him to try Assault of the Dreadnought with the ships I have.

And then we realized where the Full-Auto setting was after all this time and he laughed at my agony.

"This is the most StarFox this game has been." "You don't even KNOW."

"This isn't bad. I've played StarFox Assault and that's not bad."

"Sorry I'm gonna disappoint you with the panic." "Oh we're not there yet."

I got to Mission Level 3 for him to try. Just waiting for the moment... He died BUT MY ENGINEERING WORKED SO WELL! We created Code Rave and our new Teeny Ship 'MAXIMUM PEW' to take on this break in the story. After finding out we need the power of Neon Orb all day all the time, we go back to Atlantica.

ATLANTICA

"We kind of destroyed her (Ursula) last game. Right, that's a thing we did?"

"Did we just have a fight off screen?" "Nah."

"She's plagarizing her!"

"Way to go Eric, you really... really leaped into action there."

"Just kill her, you have a trident, stab her."

"Really? We're having a dance-off to save the universe?"

"Why didn't Triton just impale her? Like Eric just did? When his daughter was in danger?"

Now we need to come back later with Thundaga. Except we don't the game just kicked us out anyway.

There was some trouble that totally didn't happen with the last song.

"Wait we didn't use Thundaga once."

TWILIGHT TOWN

"Oh it literally won't let me go anywhere else. Well at least they could give me a skateboard."

"Hey Mickey-wait guys stop everything I gotta restart Share Play."

"Well since that's the obvious direction of the plot, let's go the other way."

"Touch. The beam..."

"That's my data. That's me!"

Then he spent 5 minutes theorizing the name because clearly Xehanort is a Nobody name.

"Hi Axel. Why should we leave?"

"Ohh... it's just me..."

"Axel's just like 'don't mind me I'm just casually dying here'."

"Oh stop making puns while you're dying motherfucker."

"Aw he just wanted to bring his boyfriend back."

"Alright fuckin' wannabe Sephiroth." He's upset at Saix.

THE WORLD THAT NEVER WAS

"I'm betting it's Riku."

"Oh it's Roxas!"

"What's my dodge button? That's not the button-THAT'S NOT THE BUTTON!"

"You gotta dodge my dude." "Yes-thank you."

-tries Strike Raid- "OH NO THAT WORKED ON RIKU THAT DOESN'T WORK ON YOU!"

He died. Take 2.

He died. Take 3.

He died. Take 4.

Through the power of technical use of Limiting for more magic and drives, the lock on+dodgeroll tactic, FIVE TIMES THE CHARM.

The Two Become One has been obtained. I await the moment

THREE ANTI-FORMS IN A ROW. I made him try Master form and IT FINALLY HAPPENED. FINAL FORM ACHIEVED.

"Alright these mother fucker's got a giant flyin' saucer..."

"Namine's like, 'I'm bustin you out!'"

"Is this to the final boss?" "Nah."

"He's disguised! He's disguised, that's Riku. He's disguised right?" "Not exactly."

"Kairi's just like no, we're not- no, it's not happenin'."

"KAIRI GETS HER OWN KEYBLADE!"

"Is that DiZ? I mean I knew he was Ansem the Wise but I called that like ages ago."

"Is he gonna Luigi's Mansion all the Heartless into that thing?" "No." "But it looks like it does!"

"Organization XIII is real sassy for people without emotions."

"What are his weapons? How is he supposed to use them? Oh they're guns! I didn't think they'd give him actual guns."

"He doesn't have just a gun it's a fuckin' Halo Needler!" "Does this upset you?" "No, I just think it's a little cheap." "Oh it will though."

He died.

The second time around he abused the speed of Anti-Form to avoid ALL THE BULLETS and ended with a "FUCK YOU" to Xigbar.

"Did he (Berserker Nobody) just Minimize- did he just fuckin' minimize? No more of that."

"Oh Kairi just- cats outta the bag!"

"Riku took hair tips from Axel."

"Oh he's gonna Luigi's Mansion Kingdom Hearts!" "No he's gonna reverse ReBoot it."

"Ohh these are all the Organization Members I've killed? What's Marluxia the- oh of COURSE he's the Graceful Assassin."

Now it's time to play a game with Luxord. It was fairly easy though late on learning all the games was fun to watch in failure.

"Of course your weapon is called Soul Eater you edgy bastard..."

Time to go beat up angry moon barbarian.

"Oh what happened did you lose your weapon buddy?"

He did it first try.

"Yeah no Roxas didn't spend eight hours fighting this fucker."

"Too bad it's impossible [For Roxas to meet Sora] but I'm not gonna say it's 100% impossible, because this is Kingdom Hearts."

"Calling it now this is gonna change Riku back into Riku. I CALLED IT HIS HAIR IS BACK TO NORMAL. Back to his Axel hair."

"Riku get your bangs out of your face."

"Riku is a tol."

"We're finally working together! WE ARE GONNA FIGHT SOMEONE TOGETHER!" "Yeah, you are." "YES, YES-I can't shout because people are sleeping-BUT YES."

"He's- oh my god I'm basically playing as two people. I love this."

"Oh his sword- look it has an angel wing! I just noticed that! Riku dah best."

AND THEN THE GRINDING OF 8 HOURS COMMENCED

We are joined by one more friendo who has completed the game. They will be F2 in conversation quotes.

"Oh that's a lot of Heartless."

"You murdered people. You had a choice to not murder people."

"Okay, is this round one? Yeaaaahh..."

"Okay first round done. I've played the first game I know how this is gonna fuckin' end."

"Well he's dead, we can go home!"

It’s victory, or oblivion. "Well I have Oblivion so, it's just victory then."

"Is the castle fucking alive?"

"Oh we Dr. Strange now."

-uses slicer reaction command- "ALRIGHT Sora just, slice a building in half."

He thinks this is the best part, and he's only just begun.

"We're destroying the engines now? Oh no they're giant Death Star lasers."

"Of course this wouldn't be a Kingdom Hearts game if it didn't have you fighting an old man on a spaceship."

"Mickey uses his powers of darkness! No."

"Is Namine about to Cortana us--OH GOD OH GOD ROXAS JUST WALKED OUT OF ME."

"Roxas and Namine shipping Sora and Kairi together just because they wanna hang out."

"Riku, why do we always lose Kairi? Can we put a tracker on her so when we inevitably lose her again we can just find her?"

"Hey Riku do you wanna pick me up? This seems incredibly unsafe, I'm just standing on a platform."

PHASE FOUR INITIATE

"Did we do it? At least this phase? Are we onto the next phase?" F2 "-laughs- Oh ho ho we're only just getting started buddy."

"That looks bad. Hey Riku I don't like what's happenin' right now. This is a solid 3/10 experience for me."

"Okay Lich King wannabe round 2."

PHASE FIVE INITIATE

"Is it safe to use my drives? Is it? What if- OHHH FUCK." "Remember when I said what if you got knocked off the edge?"

"Oh whaaaaaat oh no."

"Let's just throw buildings at him, that seems to work."

"Hey remember how you have that reaction command that's a shield?" "Shhhhhhhhhhh."

"LET ME AT THE BUILDINGS!"

FINAL PHASE BEGIN

"Buddy... buddy... you are not the Aztec concept of nothing!"

"I can Limit Form!"

"Nope, nope nope, NOPE. STOP IT!" He isn't a fan of the lasers.

"Was he actually damaging me during that?? Let's just heal up!"

"You're gonna wanna spam Reversal." F2 "The DBZ fight continues!"

"Press the button as fast as you can." "Oh, OH IT'S A LIMIT OHHH."

"Oh hey we Roxas now."

"I think I did it?"

"I know you're in Kingdom Hearts 3 Riku, you won't die. Or at least you'll come back."

The final cutscene.

"Awww, Riku's a sap now."

"Sora how does your hair stay like that, you were underwater."

"Mickey just, Pikachu'd Riku." F2 "That's just how things work in this world, don't judge." "I didn't know Riku was Mickey's Pokemon Trainer."

"Riku get your hair out of your face. Don't you have a mom that can cut your hair?"

"Who are you? Some Anubis motherfucker-WHO ARE YOU? Why are we in Destiny now?!"

"Those are our keyblades..."

"Oh my god... that's a lot of Keyblades."

KH2FM has been beaten! At least, the main game anyway. I have a few more things I'm going to make him do first.

LINGERING WILL ATTEMPT TIME!

"Why is there a black hole in our castle?" F2 "I think we should go into that black hole."

F2 "Remember that place you saw thirty seconds ago? That is not this place."

"UHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH...."

"I don't like this."

"I'm not Xehanot, I'm not-I'm not-I'M NOT!"

"OH GOD HIS HEALTH WHAT THE FUCK?!"

He died in about thirty seconds. His second attempt was in two seconds!

"Well that's it for that boss!"

CAVERN OF REMEMBRANCE

-sees the car heartless- "Nope we're not dealing with these fuckers nope."

-takes look around the second room- "Help."

"Help. Help. Hlep."

Yes I helped him, I'm not a demon. No that third one is not a typo.

"That might have been the one time you wouldn't have wanted to revert." "Oh really? Whatever."

"Wait, is this the longest hallway?" "WELCOME TO THE LONGEST HALWAAAAAAY."

-beats first quarter- "Am I done now?" "Oh you sweet summer child." "You know you could just say no." "Yeah but that's boring."

Nothing says the longest hallway like eleventeen uses of Final Form!

"Fuck that place, fuck that hallway."

"Garden of Assemblage? Oh it's a place to redo all the boss fights!" "You're missing some because you need to do the absent silhouettes." "Aaaand we're done with this game!"

I made him to attempt Sephiroth.

"So a tip. When you fight Sephiroth, spam triangle." "Okay?" "While the cutscene is loading, spam triangle."

"Why do you have knee wings Sephiroth?"

He tried twice and gave up.

Well that's it, it's now 358/2 Days watch next! That’ll be all one part

#kh catch up #kh 2 fm #long post

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twistedsimblr · 6 years

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Have you ever met someone so awesome. Who loves your sims so much they actually draw them and incorperate them in an awesome story Well that happened... and @omg-puddingpie I wanted to make something out of this... adorable little edit I made for chu some brotherly love with :3 of our bois. Oh and there’s more check out the story under the cut...

Before I had the chance to start my bike up again.

Coincidentally sirens had begun blaring in the distance. That sound was an all too familiar sound to me, the only sound that kind of scared me, because I knew I was in trouble.

It was Likely unrelated as my uh... little incident wasn't recorded yet. At least not the part where I bit off like 2 or 3 of his fingers . But I guess my friend Adam didn't want to take any chances.

I’m not you’re typical vampire.. I get strange urges that push me to do more than just consume blood thank god not often. I learned to control it. I don’t have like a sick desire to kill anything. I’m not a heartless bastard. Sometimes I wonder if I’m even a vampire at all.

I know I’m half but am I really half vampire ... or am I something else?

I mean sometimes I can like... smell a freshly dead body from like a mile away. I don’t devour it or anything I just take a nibble here or there then take my leave. But it’s not like I fuck it or anything. I have a little more tact and respect than that.

Plus why would I fuck something that’s dead when women are trying to get in my pants like every day. Some even succeed. *shrug* That’s for ugly people.

I have to kinda chuckle though because I can only imagine the looks on forensic investigators faces sometimes. Heh, oh well.

But I’m not going to sugar coat it I hate that part about myself I fucking hate it!

and it’s something that I like to hide from everyone. The only one who has so far accepted this quirk about myself is my buddy Adam he caught me doing it once.

It’s like being caught cranking it in class not that’s happened okay maybe it has at least once hahah. But I haven’t had like a good fuck in like months. I’m tired of the fake ass chicks in this school. Their too easy... come with baggage I don’t give two fucks about. I just want to cum on their faces and delete their info off my phone.

I want a challenge.

I kinda love the guy kinda I mean I’m open minded been drunk and uh yeah found my self in situations I don’t remember how I got in them in the first place. But we always seem to have each others backs. despite the argument we had about his... other friend. You know the one that slugged this exchange student in the face I’ll tell you how that went another time . But I’ll give you a hint not well.. but not for me. But this girl Meg and I've been taking a bit more.. Not sure if something’s there but I think she’s been hinting there is. But there’s no denying it I’m a bad boy. I don’t really know how she feels about bad boys after her face almost got rearranged by one.

I kinda started getting to know a little better. I mean did you know Her country allows Kinder Surprises? That’s wild!

That girl she was kinda friends with Amber Stein a close friend of Armand the apple of Adams eye. But maybe for a brief period he kinda switched his attention onto me. I dunno why. I’m not gay but I won’t push away that kind of attention either. If it’s given only though. I can be surprisingly shy... I don’t like being put in a corner nobody puts me in a corner.

I’ll tell you how that went another time . But I’ll give you a hint not well.. but not for me. But this girl Meg and I've been taking a bit more.. Not sure if something’s there but I think she’s been hinting there is. But there’s no denying it I’m a bad boy. I don’t really know how she feels about bad boys after her face almost got rearranged by one.

We’ll see kinda don’t want to push things on her. I’m trying to be good this year, but it hasn't been easy. I’m kinda happy to have at least one female I can actually talk to and feel myself around. Anyway

He and I ran back into the school, it wouldn't be long til someone came across the team captain. Fuck he was noisy. Still screaming bloody murder on the field behind the bleachers.

But like I said I don’t...kill anybody. at least not in front of everybody.

Word of advice though, don’t fucking put yourself in a position where I mentally put you on my list of people I would consider making a free meal out of..

When I can’t control that urge I spoke about earlier. Anyway Fuck what is it with me and rambling.

He and I fled the scene we don’t typically like to use our powers but in this case it called for it. we were back on school grounds behind the building near where the school bus loading zone was. which was quite a bit of a ways to my little boo boo.

It was getting late the sun was hanging lower on the horizon, and I knew Adams dad was going to get pissed if he and I weren't home yet. More him than me,Adam was a good student.. I knew his dad well... He could even be considered a father to me as I was over there a lot...Okay maybe I even lived there I mean it beat living on the street. I couldn't live in an apartment anymore the cops are still kinda on my ass..They look into that shit.

Adam had this thing with this Armand guy and he didn't want some rumor to spread that we were together or something. I was the only one who knew this lol.. I figured it out.

And that’s cool I get it. But I love to tease him about him. Not that I had a problem with Armand but he was ....tiny for a man lol as in short kinda weird looking but who am I to judge love isn't shallow...

He couldn't have been much taller than that cute Shortt girl Meg I wonder how she’d feel if I called her Shorttie. She’s probably heard that before.

We had our uh awkward moments, Adam and me ... But a lot of drinking was involved. and we both agreed to never speak of it again most of them anyway. We were going to have another one I knew it when he lead me to the locker rooms after checking around to see if the coast was clear of any lingering teachers. or students.

I wasn't myself..After that like all the confidence I had was a show and nothing more. I was good at putting on a show ask anybody. I’m a class clown too so I’ve got this bad boy persona and this class clown thing going for me.

I started breathing pretty hard, as I would start to shift over to what would be considered normal for me. My eyes were no longer blood red. my skin was my usually lighter shade of blue gray. Than like deep indigo. or something that’s the color right?

Whatever. I started to panic inside but kept my cool . As I leaned against the locker behind me checking my jacket for blood spatters behind me before I pressed half my weight against the face of the locker. I couldn't take back what I did now. I regret it but at the same time it was totally worth it.

But I had a problem, I wasn't hiding my fear that well, I started to zone out. As my mind raced what consequences awaited my actions when they hunted me down finally.

“ Bloody hell M.K what were you thinking?! You’re going to get kicked from the team M.K I hope you realize that, give me your jacket. I’m going to clean it off.” Adam extended his hand

“ I wasn't... But you gotta admit that was awesome and no way!" I scoffed defensively.

I’ll just hose it off at some point this is real leather imported shit . and fuck foot ball.” I said as I snorted and spat off to the side.

Adam stood inches from my face, increasing my already high discomfort level I always thought it was adorable how he would try to make himself bigger over me but of course I could make him shake in his little vampire booties if I wanted to.

I swallowed as he continued to give me hard eye contact. He was trying to break me. Now I was starting to feel nervous.

“Adam don’t......”

He leaned in even closer to me, I had no where to go the only thing I could do was freeze in place.

“ You had my back.. Even after how I treated you the other day .. We stood there for a moment. I knew it was coming my heart started to feel funny ...Before I could even react it happened so fast . He semi whispered. a soft Thank you.. before saying . You have some blood on your lips.”

I felt his lips press against mine in a quick but somewhat intense peck.. .."Mmm Left overs licking his own lips." As he pulled away.I didn't even have time to become surprised he just...kissed me.I was stunned..Not gunna lie that was... Kinda hot I guess.

I gave my mouth a quick wipe with my sleeve. “ You could have just told me instead you know Whew, you need to save that for Armand.. I said with an awkward laugh.”

“ Nah, Adam interupted. I've wanted to know what that prick tasted like for a long while He’s been tormenting me since try outs. Fucking just as bitter as his his jerk ass” ...

“ You saw an excuse to taste my fine ass admit it” I grinned with another laugh.

Adam shot me an embarassed face which had turned red. He had daggers in his eyes. " I pretended you were Armand it was a practice kiss." "I shoved my hands into my pockets."Okay we'll go with that." I covered my mouth with my hand and pretended to cough "Needs work..." Adam returned to rummaging through lockers for anything something that I could change into... “Jackpot..” I heard him mutter.

He threw me a shirt and shorts that couldn't be any smaller or tighter...

“You've got to be kidding me...” I held up the shirt almost in awe...that some one could be this size.. My eyes shifted to the shorts that Adam was holding up questionably. I knew just by looking at them I would be putting them to the ultimate test of durability

“Just give me the damn shorts” I wanna go home.” I grumbled as i yanked them out of his hands.

#sims 4 #the sims 4 #omgs AU story #sorry if the grammars not great it was a bit rushed at the end #sims 4 vampires #M.K #Adam #inspired by omgs story

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writevswrong · 6 years

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Eris Fanfic * When The Last Ember Falls * Chapter Seventeen

When The Last Ember Falls by L.J. LaFleur

Nesta:

I wandered into the bathing room, everything from the tall ceilings to the copper bathtub mirrored the one in Eris’ chambers. I was thankful it was the same. Despite the incident with Ronan, I still felt safe knowing it was a replica.

Cindra waited outside the bathroom, informing me that she was going to pick out my gown since that’s what a guardian should do. I think she just really wanted to rummage through the wardrobe. Can’t say I blame her. It was packed with everything your heart could ever desire.

I stepped into the dark water, not realizing I was holding my breath. Willing the carnelian light to the surface of my skin, I formed similar patterns that Eris had once shown me. Breathing normally again, I sat down, the corner of my mouth curving upwards. I was still too scared to fully submerge, but this felt nice—really, really nice.

As I dried off, I thought of him. Of our time together since my arrival.

Then of Cassian and the guilt that was not there.

The guilt that should be there. He was right, I lost him on the battlefield. The one right outside these castle walls. Yet I wasn’t haunted, broken. Why did I not feel broken because of this?

Was it anger that pushed the guilt away? Was it happiness? Either way, I did not want to think of Cassian again. The bastard commander chose his fate, I should be able to choose mine.

I approached the magnolia bedframe where Cindra had laid out two choices. “Thank you for your kindness, Cindra,” I meant every word. She didn’t run from me when I turned into a Gryphon and nearly killed her. She didn’t judge me when I showed up naked and crying for Eris. She didn’t laugh, when I thought her and Eris were…gods, what foolish thoughts plague me.

“Pleasure is all mine,” she flashed a mischievous smile, “it finally gives me a chance to be a woman again.”

“I guess wearing armor all the time would do that,” I acknowledged, attempting to stifle my laughter. I liked her. She was fierce and unapologetic, a fighter.

Cindra bowed her head, guiding me to my options. “I think the metallic one is best but just incase you don’t want to feel too glitzy, here’s another in emerald. You looked gorgeous in the linen option when you first arrived.”

“The one I ripped?”

“Yes. But you still looked good. You have a body, flaunt it Gryphon.”

With a raised brow, I chuckled, “so, it was you, who picked the low-cut dress out?”

“It wasn’t me,” she contested as her eyes bulging, “it was given to me by the Lady of Autumn.”

I reached for the metallic gown, her first choice. Still not believing Eris’ mother picked out such a revealing dress. Why on Prythian would she?

Cindra had to help me into the copper and gold ensemble. It was form fitting, very, very form fitting. I examined the swooping neckline that connected to the dangling straps off my shoulders. From the beaded bands, a cascade of golden Ombre material fell to the floor. Slits in the fabric revealed my sparkling sleeves.

She laced up the center of the shimmering bodice with velvet ribbons, making sure my breasts were pushed up more than they have ever been. I blushed at the provocative neckline, by the gods…if I moved wrong I might just fall out.

“If you move wrong, you will fall out,” Cindra warned, finishing with an elegant bow just beneath my cleavage. Her eyes dancing from the sight of me, “just you wait until you see this!” she squealed, dragging me to the mirror. She had me close my eyes while she adjusted the cathedral length train; smoothing out the ripples of fabric. Cindra whispered, “okay, open them.”

I obliged, not able to recognize myself. Not in a bad way at all but that I looked new—whole. I felt like a star that had fallen from the sky. A walking sun in the land of darkness. Black and blue attire did not do me justice, I decided.

The long sleeves hugged my skin, cut into perfect diamonds that attached to two golden rings on my middle fingers. I looked closer, noticing the rings were engraved in a language I did not know. Bands of perfection.

Pearls and garnets were sewn onto the straps and the train…well, the train had much more material than I originally thought. There was even a bit of swooping fabric that connected the straps. The only open section of the train or cape—whatever it is—revealed my nearly bare back.

A thin, see-through material covered majority of my spine and ribcage. Looking from my shoulder and down, I self-consciously studied the scar I had received from Tamlin. You couldn’t notice such a hideous flaw in a gown like this.

Cindra motioned for me to sit at the sunstone vanity. “Do you prefer the golden ribbon with pearls or the copper ribbon with garnets?” She held both of the options up, her brows snapping together as she tried to decide what would look best.

“Pearls, they’re my favorite,” I uneasily shifted in my seat. I wasn’t used to this type of luxury without a price. I wasn’t used to being dolled up by someone else or even attending a ball, not since my time with Ronan. But it was different then, a fight for survival.

My palms grew sweaty as I thought of the amount of people who would be in attendance tonight. How many of them saw me bare before? On the day Beron forced me to have a walk of shame through the throne room.

She dropped the burnt orange ribbon on the table, “duly noted.” Cindra released my hair from it’s prison of a bun. The cascading waves of gold and brown were amplified by the dress. “So…” she began, weaving the ribbon through my long locks, “he’s quite the High Lord, huh?”

I turned into a column, stiff and heartless, “is this your version of small talk?”

“I was never very good with easy subjects,” Cindra scrunched up her nose, cackling at my resistance.

I swallowed hard, feeling the overwhelming sense of sisterly conversation that I’ve never experienced. “You want to know why I’m here, don’t you?” I questioned, knowing the answer before she could speak.

She shook her head, her mouth twisting, “that’s not—no, no.” Cindra stopped braiding my hair, “yes?”

I pursed my lips to the side, feeling the truth unravel before I could stop it, “I had run away from my family. That’s when he found me, Eris and his brothers.” I dragged my fingers against the countless options of earrings she set in front of me. “I ended up here, afraid and broken.” I chose the dangling pearls that would accent the others on my gown and in my hair. “He saved me. Then he saved me again and again without ever asking for anything in return.”

“Were you here during the war?” Cindra finished my hairstyle with two small braids to keep the ribbon in place. She tucked the velvet strings, displaying my pointed ears.

I saw my reflection, the fae side of me that I couldn’t hide. As a habit, I almost redid my hairstyle, afraid of the past haunting me if I did not cover my ears.

Cindra slapped my wrist before I could do any damage. She attached the dangling pearl earring, careful not to poke my neck.

I knew she was patiently standing by for my answer. Maybe that’s what the Autumn Court is known for? Patience. Or maybe Cindra and Eris knew I would speak if given time.

“Everything,” I replied quietly, feeling the anxiety wash over me. I took a deep breath, noticing that Cindra had stopped, she was waiting for me to either fall apart or keep going. I didn’t want to hide anymore, whether that was from bodies of water or my ears. “He saved my life and Cassian’s,” I finally finished, exhaling the past that threatened to ruin my future.

Cindra added the other earring then went to the wardrobe for some shoes. She hollered over her armored shoulder, “where is this Cassian?” She fetched the low heels, noticing a hair that was out of place from across the room.

I peeked up beneath my long lashes, her fingers working effortlessly as she waited for my reply. “I don’t know,” I responded, knowing that was the truth. I didn’t have a clue of his whereabouts. I hadn’t thought about it much.

She released her hands from my hair to apply a rosy balm to my lips. Her eyes glimmered with hope and anticipation, “I guess this is perfect timing then.”

“Timing?”

“Well, I do not see Cassian here or your family from the Night Court. I only see you and him. It seems like fate, that’s all.”

I didn’t know what to say, a mixture of feelings clawing to get out.

“I’ve only just become his guardian and I can already see the effect you have on him. I just hope that as he nurses your broken heart back to good health, that you will not break his in the process.” She kneeled before me, slipping on the pair of silky heels.

My jaw tightened as Cindra’s words sliced into my core. I raised to my feet, quickly retying the deep-v bodice. Desperately needing to breathe before I exploded, I needed this off—I needed out.

She was right, he was mending my heart but what about his? Was I hurting him by being here? Was I taking advantage of him and his kindness? Or was this different?

Was there something else?

Cindra stopped my trembling hands with hers. She had to redo the bodice, this time giving me a little breathing room. “For what it’s worth,” Cindra mumbled while stepping away.

I stared up at the guardian, searching for a sign of hope. My flames quickly curled around my fingertips before sinking back into my flesh. Please say something…anything…

“You will break his heart either way in this dress.”

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