#deep space escapism lore
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TWO SIDES OF THE SAME COIN
-PART EIGHT
Pairing: Lucifer Morningstar x Seraphim Angel! Fem! Reader
Fandom: Hazbin Hotel
Genre: Angst (for now)
Warnings: family trauma/lore
Notes: we love a family that bonds.
PART ONE | PART SEVEN | PART NINE | NAVIGATION
Xavier was worried, scared even. He's pacing back and forth in his room. Having second thoughts whether he'll go down to hell and look for his beloved mother or just wait for her here.
What he's afraid of is what'll happen if his mother sees his father. His father already caused so much emotional pain to her. Xavier cannot imagine what kind of heartbreaking pain she'll experience once she sees her husband.
Xavier looks outside his window, rays of setting sunlight peaks through the white curtains, giving his room an orange like glow. He runs his hand through his light blond locks in frustration. He can't wait a second longer to look for her.
Xavier wonders if his parents already met down there, the idea makes his blood boil.
The idea of his father suddenly back to their life makes his skin crawl. Xavier knows how much influence his father had on his mother's heart.
He sighs, a long exhale filled with tension and worry. It's already been a few hours now, what could she be possibly doing down there? He thought to himself.
With a small huff, he fixed his uniform. That's it, I'm going down there. He took a deep breath, snapped his fingers together and opened a portal that leads to hell.
He steps inside the portal, summoning his three pairs of wings so he can fly down. Xavier hopes that his mother is alright.
The portal closed and the angel who once stood inside his large magnificently large white room was no more.
Lucifer returned back to the palace, teleporting back to his bedroom. A sigh of relief escaping his lips as he saw that [Y/n] was still passed out asleep. His eyes softened, sitting at the corner of the bed, in the empty space beside her sleeping form.
He lets out a long exhale, a tired sigh. He gazed down at her sleeping and tired face, his heart ached. Clearly torn between two women. Lilith, his wife of many millennia and [Y/n], his first wife and the angel who stood by his side and supported him despite his neglect.
He regrets it, genuinely. He was young and stupid, he and [Y/n] got married when they were in their 200's. Romance wasn't common back then, nothing to learn from. The only love they were taught was loving heaven and its creator. Romantic love barely existed during those times as every angel was busy with their respective duties.
He loves [Y/n] genuinely and he was wrong for not upholding his vows to her.
He gently swept away some strands of falling hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear. A small smile on his face once his eyes landed on his hand, devoid of any rings. He finally let go of his wedding ring, the one he used for Lilith. He didn't wear his wedding ring—the one he used for [Y/n]—as he feels like he doesn't deserve it.
Lucifer remembers that he didn't want to remove his first wedding ring with his first wife but Lilith insisted he should.
Lilith was envious, because after so many years he still wore it and led to some arguments.
He can't just forget about [Y/n], he doesn't have the heart to. Her heartbroken face is forever embedded into his memories, her empty and blank face as she stared at him and Lilith when they were banished.
A look in her face told him that she was tired, tired of waiting for him, tired of his second priority.
He should've been better, he should've treated her better. He should've been her perfect husband just like how she was his perfect wife.
His love for Lilith is slowly disappearing, ever since they've begun arguing. Their beliefs and ideals no longer match with one another.
He accidentally mentioned [Y/n]'s name during their heated arguments, which causes Lilith to be mad at him and eventually left, leaving divorce papers for him to sign on his desk.
He tried so hard to bury his love for [Y/n], he tried so hard to forget her as he knew he wouldn't see her again and most likely didn't want to see him either.
A single tear runs down his rosy red cheek, breath hitching. Emotions are finally spilling forth, his love and heart ache that he bottled up for so many eons finally erupting.
“So this is how it feels,” he sang softly, careful not to wake her up. His voice broke as he sang ever so softly, “To fall in love with you, to always think of you, to always dream of you,”
He made a mistake in his decisions, he admits that. He should've done things better. Choosing Lilith over her was a mistake, “Yes, it hurts so much to fall in love with.”
He sighs softly, choking on his words as he sings his unspoken feelings. His hand trembled with emotions, “Sorry for leaving like that, you don't deserve to get caught in my mess.”
He was a troublemaker, he didn't want her to get caught in his mess but whatever silly idea he had, she was always ready to listen and comfort him when the elders rejected it. He gently held her hand, feeling how cold her skin was, he cups it with his hand and blew some warm air to it to warm her hand. He used to do this when they were back in heaven.
He gently laid down her hand back to the bed and back to her side, a small smile on his face before he let out a sad sigh, “Loving me is just so difficult, I don't know how I should tell you that.” he admits softly, he knows how tiring he can be, he knows... He had to deal with himself after all. He sighs, he's been doing so much of it lately.
“I've fallen for somebody else, happened so quickly, I lost myself.” he admitted, he realized years ago that he was only infatuated with Lilith, when the honeymoon phase was over, arguments started.
“A shadow of you drifts along by my window or did I imagine that?” he could remember when he would spend all by himself at the kitchen, drinking after a fight with Lilith and during his drunken delusion, he would often see figures of [Y/n] comforting him.
A shaky breath leaves past his lips, eyes tired and dull. He looks at the sleeping once more, she looked so peaceful.
He wonders if he should transfer her to the hotel, he needs to check up on Charlie and the others too. With a heavy sigh, he gently lifted her up into his arms once more—effortlessly carrying her. A sense of deja vu hits him, a memory of the time he carried her like this after they got married, [Y/n] happily laughing in his arms while he grins at her as he held her. Times were simple back then.
A single tear drop, running down his blemish free pale skin, the droplet running past his rosy red spots of his cheeks.
He took a deep breath, summoning a portal that leads to an empty vacant room of the hotel, he steps in with her still asleep on his arms. The portal closes behind them as the room shifts into one Hazbin Hotel's newest guest rooms.
He gently walked towards the bed, gently laying her down comfortably, making sure to tuck her in.
Finally, he slowly gave distance between them. Standing just a few feet away from the bed, a sad look on his face, “This is how it feels, to fall in love with you, to always think of you, to always dream of you,”
Seeing her after all these years, ignited the fading flame of his love for her. Adding gasoline to a flame.
“Yes, it hurts so much to fall in love with you.” he silently admitted, she doesn't hurt him, he knows it was his fault. He made everything complicated, his decision caused harm to her and their son, to these sinners. He made a reckless decision of abandoning her, giving both of them pain in the process.
He doesn't deserve her. Not after the things he's put her through.
He thought sadly, before turning his back away from her, walking out of the room. He took one last look at her sleeping form before eventually closing the door as he left the room.
The heels of his boots tapped against the dark red tiles of the hallway of the hotel as he walked towards his own room. He needs some time to process everything.
Charlie wasn't expecting a visitor this soon after the extermination, she certainly didn't expect her visitor to be her half half brother, a frown on his face and a glare on his eyes. She would've mistaken him for her father if he didn't have [e/c] eyes and also if the boy wasn't ridiculously so tall.
Charlie smiled nervously, how could she not? Xavier was looking down on her literally with the same coldness in his eyes.
“Xavier... Hi! I didn't expect you to be here...” Charlie says nervously, waving at him.
Xavier just raised an eyebrow, clearly not interested in small talk, “Where is she?” he asked, voice cold and means business.
Charlie tilted her head, “Who...?” she asked, wondering who the older boy was referring to.
Xavier scoffed, [e/c] eyes narrowing down on the blonde girl as he crosses his arms together on his chest, “My mother,” he answered, a deadpan look on his face, “—She came down here a few hours ago, she should've been back by now.” he added, a worried tone on his voice. Xavier was beyond worried, his poor mother alone in this disgusting place—the realm his blood father ruled. He can't imagine the possibilities that could happen to her.
Charlie's eyes widened in realization, oh, the angel. Why didn't she realize it sooner? Of course he's referring to the passed out angelic woman. Charlie is slightly nervous about telling the older boy, but she has to, “She's resting, she suddenly passed out awhile ago....?” She says, nervously, avoiding Xavier's eyes.
Xavier's eyes widened, ears ringing as everything suddenly went numb. For a brief moment, it felt like he was alone once more, the scared little boy who begged for his mother's attention.
He could remember how close she was to him but for some reason, he couldn't reach her. His mother can barely look at him in the eyes without crying. He felt useless, pathetic for being born this way and caused his beloved mother so much pain. He failed, he failed, he failed, he failed, HE FAILED HER. He couldn't save her again.
Mom...? Where are you? Please... Don't leave me again...
Charlie's eyes widened when she sees a single tear slid down Xavier's cheek despite the boy's unchanging glare, Charlie though could notice how sad his eyes were.
“Xavier...?” She calls out to him, no response.
“Azrael... He looks so much like him... I... I can't... It hurts to look at him.” his mother sobbed on the unknown taller and black haired man's shoulders. Xavier grips his duck plushie, he was somehow fond of the animal. The little boy peaked through the small gap of the door to his mother's room, hoping for some comfort after a nightmare—he didn't expect to see his beloved mom crying about him and that made him freeze on the spot. He was a smart child after all, just like his father.
“[Y/n]... He's just a kid... He needs you...” Xavier heard the man say, he still has trouble saying his name. Was it Azwawel? Or Azrawel? He forgot. Xavier, despite being so young, barely six years old—suddenly felt so numb. He slowly walked away from his mother's room, dragging the duck plushie. It felt heavier than usual, his little arms too weak to hold it.
He felt his chest tighten, he couldn't breathe. Chest heaving up and down as he tries to catch his breath.
Charlie got even more worried as she saw him begin to hyperventilate, “Xavier! Hey, hey... Look at me.” She says softly, holding on to the arms of the shaking boy, the physical contact snapping him out of his trance as he quickly pulled his arms away from the girl.
“Do not touch me.” he hissed, glaring at Charlie, “Tell me where my mother is or I'll destroy this hotel just to find her.” he threatened, making Charlie's eyes widen in fear. She knows she can't fight him, let alone her friends aren't as powerful to fight an angelic being—a Seraphim.
“She's upstairs, resting... Just don't hurt anyone.” She stammers, giving way for the older boy to come inside the hotel. She knew as her father texted her about it.
Vaggie's eyes widened when she saw the angel walks in, she could feel the man's power as he entered the room. Suddenly, the room got colder. Vaggie summoned her spear but she saw Charlie crossing her arms into an 'X' while shaking her head. Vaggie hesitantly lowered her weapon as they all looked at each other, she had to grip Angel Dust's arm to stop the arachnid from doing stupid—thankfully, Angel Dust seemed to get the memo and closed his mouth. Husk had to hold Niffty to stop her from causing chaos again.
Charlie led him up the stairs to the second floor, the others watching as they disappeared from sight.
Xavier's eyes widened as the door to where his mother was resting was opened, the first thing he saw was his mother's passed out form, lying down on the bed.
Xavier immediately kneeled down to his mother's side, holding her hand affectionately. What happened to her?
He looked angrily at Charlie, dull [e/c] eyes staring at bright red ones, “What did you do to her?” he asked, voice lowering and clearly pissed off. Charlie shakes her head, clearly afraid of him, “We didn't do anything! She suddenly just passed out on her own.” she explained and he just sighs, shaking away his thoughts.
‘They wouldn't just recklessly harm an angel, they couldn't land a hit on her if they tried. She must've overworked again.’ he thought to himself, sighing.
“Just leave us alone please? Now.” he ordered, Charlie flinched in fear but nodded and quickly left the room, making sure to close the door on her way out.
Xavier sighs, his shoulders dropping. It suddenly felt like the weight of the world was on his shoulders. His mother is his world, after all.
“It's going to be okay, mother. I am here for you, always.” he spoke softly, kissing his mother's hand before lowering it back down to the bed, hovering his hand over her sleeping form and began to heal her.
Lucifer stood outside the door to where [Y/n] was resting, his hand hovering above the doorknob—shaking. Charlie just told him about the situation. His son is here, the son he didn't know who existed was here.
He took a deep breath, ‘You can do this, Lucifer... This is your chance to ask for forgiveness.’ he thought to himself before knocking first and then slowly twisted the doorknob, pushing it open.
It felt like he was looking at the mirror, it felt like he was looking at a reflection of himself—the reflection glaring at him, sharp [e/c] eyes glaring at him with so much hatred.
“You!” the boy growled, standing up from where he was kneeling.
Lucifer was taken aback from the boy's anger. It felt like he was looking at a past version of him, the past him who despised heaven who treated him so wrongfully.
“What are you doing here? Why do you have so much audacity to come here like you didn't do anything wrong?” the boy asked, his voice filled with so much distaste for his father.
Lucifer's eyes widened, words stuck in his throat. Say something!
With a heavy inhale and exhale, Lucifer looked at the glaring boy, trying to calm him down, “I know what I did and I... Want to apologize... For all the things I've done.” he said softly, stammering slightly. He's trying so hard not to show that he's beyond nervous.
Xavier's glare sharpened, who does this man think he is?! Did he think a mere apology can undo all the damage he has done to him and his mother.
“Who do you think you are?” he asked Lucifer mockingly, a cold look on his face. Lucifer just stood frozen on the spot.
“Just because you're the most beautiful being of all of creation doesn't mean you can have anything you want,” Xavier sneered, a mocking smile on his face, “Your title and power doesn't mean anything to me, how does it feel to be the most beautiful being in all of creation yet you are thoroughly despised by your own flesh and blood?” Xavier asked and suddenly Lucifer couldn't speak, his chest tightening at the harsh words his supposed son had said to him. His breath caught up on his throat.
“This face...?” Xavier says, his hand moving towards his own face, he glared at his birth father, “I despised it so much, it's horrendous.” he says flatly.
“I do not know what my mother sees in you,” he says, looking up and down on his father's frozen form—not moving a muscle, “All I see is an angel who failed to become what he needed to become. A failure, nothing more and nothing less.” he says sharply, [e/c] eyes dull and hollow as he gazes at dull red ones.
Lucifer felt the familiar sting in his eyes, he desperately willed himself not to cry. What a failure of a father he is. First Charlie, now it's.... He doesn't even know the boy's name, he remembered Charlie telling him, but he somehow forgot. Pathetic.
Xavier's lips were formed in a thin line, turning his back away from his supposed blood father. He still doesn't understand why his beloved mother loves his father so much. He's too afraid to ask. Too afraid of making her remember such painful memories. He'll wait for her to open up. They have so much time to heal, he'll wait. He could remember young him who wanted to meet his father so much, the young naive Xavier who admired his father—the father who created the very species he loved so much, ducks. Poor naive Xavier who finally learned the pain his father gave to his mother to point his mother can't look at him, her beloved son in the eyes.
With a shaky breath, finally letting go of the breath he took in. Xavier sighs, “I will be taking my mother back home, thank you for your hospitality.” Xavier murmured, gently lifting his mother into his arms with no effort.
Lucifer's eyes widened from what the boy has said, they're going to leave. He needs to do something, anything to earn their forgiveness.
“Wait..! Please let her recover mor—”
“Haven't you done enough damage already?” Xavier asked, his voice devoid of any emotions as he tilted his head slightly to look at his father, a single stray tear running down his pale cheeks, the single droplet running past the rosy red spot on his cheek.
Lucifer was taken aback once more, the King of Hell can see so much sadness, anger, and longing on the boy's eyes. Lucifer wanted to reach out to the boy, his fatherly instincts kicking in. His hand extending where the boy stood, pausing as he hesitated.
Even after all these years, sweet little Xavier is still somewhere inside him. The sweet naive Xavier who wanted a complete family, who wanted a father.
“I said what I said, she'll be going home and get proper treatment. I doubt hell is a appropriate place to treat an angel like her.” Xavier says flatly, clearly not open for any discussion left. His decision is final. Lucifer can only respect that, he owes it to them. Lucifer finally lowers his hand, regrettably so.
Xavier turned away from Lucifer once more, summoning a portal back to their home in heaven.
A bright golden light formed in thin air as a portal opened, Xavier stepped in with his mother in his arms. He dared not look back. He doesn't have any reason to.
The portal closes in. Lucifer was left alone standing in the guestroom, his first family gone in a blink of an eye.
He cried in anguish inside that room.
He can hear his bones rattle against his skin as he dragged his body to his mother's bedroom, Xavier is incredibly exhausted. Physically, no. Emotionally and mentally? Yes, absolutely.
He is still carrying his mother in his arms, prioritizing her comfort over his.
Kicking the door open, he walked at the center of the room where his mother's bed was, gently laying her down. Making sure to tuck her in.
[Y/n] snuggled, against her blanket. Xavier smiled, a gentle yet strained smile on his face.
“I'll protect you mom, sleep well and dream well.” he says softly, planting a small kiss on his mother's forehead before eventually leaving the room.
TAGLIST I:
@valerie-36 @blackbleedingrose @adaizel @xx-all-purpose-nerd-xx @thedarkkitten @selvyyr @froggybich @brithedemonspawn @kottenox @totallymitya @many-fandoms-lover @dou-dou @mezzyb0nb0n @n1chxyaaenthusiast @cherry-4200 @koirb @galaxyj3lly @crystalplays28 @luleck @zc000ter @rory-cakes @mixplara @crescent-z @bitchyzombienacho @kalisha2004 @altervex @nehy019 @napbatata @kouyoumarryme @sxgacxbe @kooidoom @ok-boke @random-3455 @izzieg3987 @snoozewritezz @dreamzaremyreality @hcneyiced @witchbunny1210 @ghostdoodlen @aikobakugou @just-here-reading @dzhanett-blog @des-deswain5621 @cocomollo @haleypearce @onyxstarhigh06 @nirvana5874 @shaebutter-baby
#lxkeee updates#hazbin hotel#lucifer morningstar#lucifer morningstar x reader#lucifer hazbin hotel#lucifer#lxkeee hazbin hotel masterlist#hazbin hotel x reader#lucifer magne#“TWO SIDES OF THE SAME COIN”#lucifer x reader angst#lucifer x y/n#lucifer x reader#lucifer x you#Lucifer morningstar x reader angst#lucifer morningstar x female reader
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Rotes Mädchen: Chapter 7
(Werewolf! König x Red Riding Hood! Reader)
(Art by the lovely @zwienzixes)
(Masterlist)
Word count: 5k
Rating: Mature
Tags: Werewolf! König, Fairytale AU, Monster Hunters TF141, Traditional German Fairytale setting, World Building/Lore, F! Reader, Domesticity, Literal sleeping together, Bed sharing, Angst/Comfort, (Brief) Fluff, Cuddling, Love bites/Hickeys, Claiming bites, Emotional Angst/Comfort, Cliffhanger
Warnings: None
A/N: New cover as we head into the finale!
The sun dawns on the final day before the full moon.
You awaken gently, feeling the cold grip at your limbs as you snuggle deep into the covers. The motion disturbs your bed partner, who makes a small sound of protest before adjusting to drag you closer against his chest. You happily snuggle into the warmth of him with a little whine, willing yourself back into blissful dreams. The cage of his arms provides steadfast protection against the waxing moon as it hesitates beyond the horizon, counting the hours until sundown. It feels as if König senses your thoughts, for there’s a low, purring growl that vibrates his chest against your cheek. Defensive, a warning to the shadows that lurk in the woods.
There’s a heavy set to your limbs that forces you into limpness against his frame. It drags at your senses with drowsy intent, makes your head loll against his collarbone with a happy sigh. Grey, misty light washes over you both, a gentle baptism of dawn that you wish would suspend both of you in time, caught here forever in his embrace.
It’s your stomach that at last rouses you, and even as you try to ignore it the sharp pang of hunger eventually gurgles low in your belly. König answers it merely with a huff, arms caught around you a little tighter, preventing your escape. You smile at him, at last opening your eyes to see him.
He replaced his hood sometime while you were asleep, and though you mourn the chance to see his blissful, sleeping expression, you’re grateful for the simple grace of seeing his eyes closed at such a near distance. You can see his brow slightly scrunched, as if trying to ignore the pull of wakefulness, and you resist the urge to poke at it just to hear him grumble in his sleep. Instead you settle for observing what little of his sleeping expression you can discern, memorizing the way his eyes flutter in dreams.
Eventually you lean forwards, gently bestowing a kiss upon his masked mouth before delicately wriggling from his hold. It takes several attempts, and eventually you manage to avoid his grasping, heavy hands so you rise to your feet. König curls around the warm space you’ve left, murmurs something you cannot hear before he goes still. You smile fondly down at him, try to ignore the way anxiety pierces your heart as a morning lark declares the dawn.
You coax the dying embers of the fireplace back to life and set water to boil above it, tucking a loaf of bread above the hearth to warm up by the time it is done. You ignore the shake of your hands as something whispers that this could be the final day you ever live this mundane routine, that your life could be stolen from you tonight by dripping red claws and gleaming fangs.
It takes effort to shake off the thought, and instead you focus on washing yourself with water warmed by the fire. You pause as you look in the mirror above the basin, blinking in surprise at the marks painted across your skin. Love bites, gentle bruises, places where his lips descended to your skin with a scarcely contained growl. There’s an ache to your hips that remains where he split you on his cock over and over again, as if he were possessed by the feast of your flesh. You’d barely been able to crawl from bed long enough to eat and relieve yourself for the entirety of yesterday before König had decided you’d been gone for too long, had pursued you just so he could carry you back and press you into the sheets once more.
He seemed almost crazed with lust, your beloved, consumed by the act of defiling you. Growling, pressing, hauling you to him, holding a leg aloft just so he could sheath himself back inside you with a growl. He’d mouthed dragging endearments into your skin, had followed them with sucking teeth and apologetic kisses when you’d whined at him. Lost as you were in the buttery haze of lust and warmth, it still became quickly clear to you that his attempts to mark you seemed almost like a claim- an attempt to ward off others, to ensure you remained his, only ever his. Territorial, possessive, gorging himself on the sounds of your desire as you begged for more.
You trace the smattering of love bites that adorns your collarbone and chest, tilting your head to reveal the full indent of his teeth on the arch of your neck. It makes you blink in surprise, as you twist to reveal more marks along your bare back and shoulders. König had left no inch of skin untouched, it seems, and you silently shudder to think how you’ll explain this to Laswell.
Nevertheless you wash and dress yourself, once more donning your red cloak before you carefully step outside towards the well down the lane. You’re grateful that your long layers hide the marks, consciously tugging your hood up to conceal the bite on your neck. The last thing you need is more neighbors and village folk accusing you of being some type of seductress, or asking too many questions about who spent the night in your home.
As you draw water from the well you look to see the misty forms of others bustling about morning chores. There’s sounds of wood hammering against shutters, trying to barricade windows and doors for the coming darkness. Animals that would normally be escorted to pasture now kick at their stalls, safely shut away for the coming sunset. You’re scarcely noticed amidst the distractions, and you pause to watch your neighbors conduct preparations for the full moon that will rise above the forest tonight.
You wonder if the wolf watches even now from the trees. Silent. Waiting.
You make yourself scarce as you dart back towards the direction of your home, ignoring the passing stares of others as they see you pass by. The reminder of the hunter’s son, of the accusation levied against you and Laswell forces a heavy weight down onto your ribcage, an imminent danger that follows in your shadow.
"I bet you're a witch too! Just like her! You probably brought the wolf here yourselves to kill us all!!"
You need to tell her, to warn her.
A thin frown of worry presses your lips as you slip back inside, trying to plan your options. It will be difficult to slip from the village unnoticed before nightfall, especially when you’ll be trailed by a huge, scarred, hooded figure on your heels. You’ve not yet told König of your plan to retreat to Laswell’s by nightfall, and you know you’ll have to convince him of the safety she and the others provide. You’re not sure you can, not with the way Price and the other witchers are tensed, ready for battle, vigilant of threats. They may see König as a monster not unlike the one they hunt. For all you know, you could be walking him into the jaws of a greater beast than the one that lurks in these woods.
To stay here, however, to do the same as the other villagers and barricade yourself inside, knowing now that your neighbors see you as a potential source of their misfortune...
You see a vision of yourself, tied to a pillar in the center of the square under the full moon, listening to the howl of the werewolf, watching as they force König to his knees and screaming for help-
He said he’d protect you. How are you supposed to protect him, when you can’t even keep yourself safe?
The woods press in on you from all sides, arching above to tangle into a thick entanglement of branches with you trapped inside like a small, scared creature trying vainly to escape. You stare up through the brambles and thorns to the dark sky above, where the moonlight casts pale light against your eyes of despair.
You’re so caught in your thoughts you nearly miss the figure that lurches into your view right in front of you.
You startle, and in doing so the bucket of water you have sloshes lopsidedly, spilling across your boots. You hardly notice it, staring instead at one of the older village women who has suddenly seized your attention. You recognize her. She’s one of the few that often comes to Laswell in search of tonics for her weary bones, a persistent cough she’s never been cured of. You’ve arrived at her doorstep many times over to deliver remedies, and she’s always returned the favor with a soft smile, a gentle pat to your shoulder or an apple tucked into your pocket.
Now, you try to catch your breath, settle your heartbeat as she squints at you with a narrow gaze.
“You don’t belong here.”
You blink in surprise, mouth pressing into a frown. Shock, hurt blossoms in words across your tongue. Yet before you can respond she steps forward, jabs a finger against your chest insistently.
“You need to leave these woods.” She intones with a creaky voice, staring up at you with displeasure. “You’re no longer welcome here, girl.”
You can feel the other villagers pause now to observe the dispute, their wary eyes looking on as you’re harassed by someone who had once been kind to you.
“T-this is my home-” You try, taking a step back, but she only presses forward once more. You feel your heartbeat claw at your throat, and your eyes flick past her to the path up to your cottage, where familiar smoke curls from the chimney in a beacon of sanctuary.
“Not anymore it isn’t.” The old woman hisses, and you feel your face contort in a returning snarl. Yet then the woman softens, the sinister sneer from her face easing into a look of concern.
“You need to leave.” She whispers hastily, eyes wide. Suddenly her voice is once more that of a friend, one with grave worry and urgency in her words. “You and Madame Laswell. It is no longer safe for you here.”
You freeze in surprise, trying to form words past the veil of shock that colors your eyes. Cold air seizes your lungs, an uncomfortable prickle of awareness raising goosebumps on your skin as the other villagers pause to watch the fear dawn across your face.
“The others, they think you brought the wolf here.” She adds, a wrinkled hand grasping at your sleeve in a touch much harsher than her words. “I heard them. They think you and Madame Laswell are witches, that you summoned the wolf to kill us.”
She gazes up into your eyes, this unexpected ally, and even though her mouth is set in a grim frown, her eyes portray fear.
“They plan to kill you both.”
You jolt away as if scalded, ripping your arm from her grasp, heartbeat hammering wildly against the cage of your ribs. The ground under you seems to shift, and the trees that had once been your home now seem to slowly creep to your shadow, ensnare it with tangled thorns so they press into your skin and yield red warmth. In your mind's eye you see the figure of yourself bathed in moonlight, clothes ripped and hands bound to a pyre that alights the sky in a wicked red haze. You see Laswell struggling as she watches below, held by the villagers, screaming for Price and the others as they chase the wolf who howls dangerously at the moon.
and König...König...
His blood soaks the earth, a sacrificial lamb to an unknown, evil god that reigns in madness over the village you had once called home.
The bucket in your hand drops, and the water sloshes out to seep into the cold earth, just as his blood will come nightfall.
You don’t thank the woman as you run, but her voice chases after you anyways, feigning sinister intent.
“Run, girl! Leave these woods and never return!!”
Your cape flares out behind you as you sprint for the cottage, racing up your garden and to the heavy door which shuts behind you with a thundering clank of the lock. You brace on it, hands pressed to the frame, chest heaving and eyes wild. You can’t contain the shaking of your limbs, and even the warmth of the hearth at your back does little to alleviate the icy grip of terror that seizes in your chest.
They plan to kill you both.
You try to reason with yourself. Price and the others, they’d never let the villagers touch you or Laswell. They know you both, know that no matter what accusations the villagers levy against you, that you will never be what they say. You know you’ll be safe with them. If you flee now, you can make it to Laswell’s cottage by sundown, tell her all that you’ve learned. You know Price and the others will protect you from the promise of a pyre, from the misplaced wrath of those you once called neighbors.
But...König...
You shake your head. It doesn’t matter now. You cannot stay. If you stay, if the villagers come for you, they’ll no doubt find him as well, will wrestle you from his arms and restrain him like a wild beast even as he snarls, tries to fight his way to you. They’ll see him, this stranger you’ve kept hidden, take his hood and reveal the terrifying visage he keeps hidden and they will fear him. If you stay, it will be a death sentence for you both.
The woman is right. You need to leave. Now. Daylight be damned.
“König-” You breathe as you race to your bed, lay your hands on his still slumbering form and try to wake him. “König, we need to leave. We have to go-”
König stirs, but it’s with a groan that sounds almost painful. You freeze, hands stilling, before you once more try to rouse him.
“König, wake up, please wake up.” You urge him, swallowing down a gasp of fear. He seems to hear at least that much, because he rolls over only slightly, echoes your name in a groggy slur.
“Rotty?” He asks, voice cracking with something that sounds weak, almost ill. His eyes flutter open, glassy gaze turning to you as he tries to focus. The confusion softens into something fond, and you feel affection flutter in your chest at the way his eyes melt upon seeing your face. “Rotty...”
You force a smile despite your trembling hands. “Yes, love. It’s me.” You whisper, and he sighs at that, eyelashes fluttering before drowsiness claims him once more. You swallow down the growing panic in your throat, forcing yourself to not imagine the footsteps of the villagers pounding closer to your door.
“König.” You insist, shaking him now with rising franticness. “We must leave. It’s not safe here. We need to go to Laswell’s, the villagers-”
“No, no, not the witchers...” He interrupts with a groan, and you frown at that, fear tugging sharply in your stomach.
“König we need to leave.” You tell him again, leaning full over him now so your cape drapes partly across his form. Your arms bracket him on either side of his broad, bare shoulders adorned with thick, coarse hair. “The villagers-”
You pause at the abrupt whimper that bubbles up his throat, unexpected. It sounds not fearful but hurt, as if rousing him from dreams forces him to endure an affliction you cannot see. You feel your brow crease with worry, a hand tracing over the bare skin of his scarred shoulder, and he flinches.
“König...” You breathe, and with a worried urgency you begin to try and pull away the covers, at last noticing just how damp they are. It’s as if he’s sweat through them while you weren’t paying attention, and as you reveal his bare form you see a thick sheen of sweat glistening on his skin. You don’t know how you didn’t notice earlier, curled in his arms as you were. He feels too hot to the touch, shivering under your palms, eyes stubbornly scrunched shut as if he’s trying to block out a phantom pain.
A different type of terror grips you now, as you lay a palm to his damp, clammy skin, hearing him groan at the touch. He reaches up to clumsily bat at your hand, and you’re not entirely sure if he’s trying to chase you away or drag you closer.
“König.” You repeat again, swallowing the dryness in your throat. “König, what’s…”
“Rotty.” He whines, and you ignore him, reaching for his hood. Before you can touch it König arches with a wet gasp, his large hand seizing your wrist. His head lolls towards you, hazy gaze focusing on the acute worry plain on your face. He blinks, as if trying to focus, and you see his brow pinch for a moment before it relaxes.
“What lovely eyes you have, Schatz.” He sighs, head drooping once more. His hand goes lax around your wrist as he melts back into the bed. When you try to sneak it under his hood to feel for his forehead however, he tenses with a growl, the sound rumbling low and deep in his throat like some wild, feral animal.
“Shh, it’s alright.” You coax despite the tremble in your words, and your palm lays flat against his searing, damp brow.
“König, love.” You breathe, hands shaking. “You’re burning up with a fever.”
König groans at that, pulls your hand away and rolls to the other side of the bed. You try to follow him, but when your hand lands on his shoulder König growls at you again, this time deeper, almost savage. You pull away as if burned, but your missing touch prompts a whine instead, as if his body can’t figure out what to do with itself.
“König.” You try again uselessly. “Please, get up. I- I can take you to Laswell’s. She can help you. We can’t stay here. It’s not safe.”
“No.” He slurs again in protest, and you feel frustration and panic rise hotly in your veins as you resist the urge to bang on his broad back with your fists in your vexation. Instead you once more soothe a hand across his bare shoulder so his muscles unwind under your touch.
He relaxes then, sighing in relief before he turns part way back to you. His eyes are gentle as they regard you through his strange delirium, and you hold his gaze, unable to hide the mounting fright in your stare.
“The wolf won’ hurt you, Rotty.” He tells you, words low and jumbled. He reaches a large hand out, and you wonder for a moment if he’ll drag you back into bed. Instead he strokes your cheek with his knuckles, tilts his head wearily to regard you. “I’ll protect you. I swear it.”
You suck in a sharp breath at that, feeling the building terror, the grief, the panic and the confusion of the past few days finally overwhelm you. Hot tears flood your eyes, and you try to swallow them to no avail. A hiccup forces its way up your throat, and you clutch at his hand, holding it desperately to your face as if it’s a lifeline.
“How are you supposed to protect me when you can’t even stand?” You cry, feeling your voice crack in your throat with despair. “I-I’m supposed to protect you, I’m supposed to keep you safe from them- from the villagers, from Price and the others, from the wolf, I-“
You sob, a broken sound pouring from your chest as you’re no longer able to contain the rush of emotions wash over you. It cracks in your bones like the snap of wood in an evening hearth, a sharp sound that disturbs the peaceful silence you long to share with him. The embers alight across your skin, force a cry of hurt past your gasping lips and into his palm.
“I’m scared, König.” You confess in a raw whisper, eyes wide, staring into a vision of the pitch-black forest where the object of your nightmares awaits. “I’m trying so hard to be strong, to keep us both safe, but I’m scared.”
You swallow, but it does little to stem the words that come tumbling forth, first as a trickling stream and now as a raging river.
“I’m terrified. I wake up every morning thinking you’re not going to be here anymore, that this was all just a dream. I’m scared you’re going to disappear, that the wolf is going to hunt you alive, that the villagers will find you and hurt you, that Price and the others will refuse to protect you. I’m scared that the final thing I’m ever going to see is fire or the fangs of the monster. I’m scared of living a tomorrow where you no longer exist.”
You sob openly, words hiccupping desperately into his knuckles entwined between your palms. You can no longer stop it, the untamable tide of desperation that seizes your chest, your heart, your limbs. König makes a little noise of distress as he watches the tears roll down your face, land on his worn hand.
“No-” He tries again, and you see his expression pinch as he tries to find the words. “Don’t cry, Rotty. It won’t....won’t hurt you.”
“Please.” You beg him again, gasping and bowing your head into his hand. “Come with me. We can go, Laswell can help you, I can explain to the others. They’ll keep us safe. They’ll kill the wolf, and then we can leave the village like you asked me to. We can go and never have to look back, like you wanted.”
You hunch forward, eyes closing shut, sending up a prayer at the same time your words form the plea.
“Please.”
König pauses, and you feel him hesitate before he gently draws his hand away…
Only to push you so you topple backwards onto the floor instead.
“I’m sorry, Rotty.” He whispers, voice cracking with pain, clearer now. “I-I can’t come with you.”
You sit, sprawled and stunned at his words. You feel the air in your chest pause, gripping tightly to your lungs as you try to understand, trying to make sense of his sudden rejection. You can hear the blood rushing in your ears, face open with confusion, distress. The world seems to suck into a silence that is unknown to you, words absent as the desolate wind howls in your thoughts.
“K-König…?” You ask in a small, fragile voice as you try to understand. It only makes König hunch further into the bed, as if your words are a slicing wound that carves into his turned back.
“Go, Rotty.” He tells you, growling low with warning. You flinch. “To the captain and the others. They’ll keep you safe.”
You stare at him with hurt, shock warming your eyes with fresh tears, trying to understand, trying to unravel the riddle of him you’ll never find the answers to. He’s retreating into secrets once more, and you watch helplessly as he walks into the dark, misty woods ahead of you, vanishing beyond your reach as the echo of a wolf howl rattles your bones.
“Don’t do this.” You tell him in a voice that’s hardly a whisper. “Don’t…don’t make me leave when I’ve already fallen in love with you.”
König tenses at that, form curling further in on himself before he goes still once more. He doesn’t speak.
You want to scream at him, to cry, to beg and plead for answers you know he won’t give you. You want to throw yourself into his arms, apologize for whatever transgression you’ve committed, for the sin of loving him if he did in fact never love you in turn. Yet you do none of those things, instead frozen on the floor, tracing the rigid rise of his spine, the way he shivers as the fever grips at him.
“Please.” You try once more, voice raw with emotion, a desperate entreaty that he stubbornly ignores.
The moon rises on the horizon. You’re running out of time.
You gather yourself, stand and scrub the tears from your face, stand over him at your bedside. Your fists curl with resolve, expression grim as you stare down at his curled, shivering form that tries to ignore the shadow of you cast by the fire.
“I’m leaving.” You tell him resolutely. “and I’m coming back. I’ll bring Laswell, and I’ll bring Price and the others to protect us. She’ll cure you, and we’ll stay here until the night passes, until the wolf is dead.”
You swallow the urge to hurl yourself onto his form, drape yourself across his chest and will time to return itself to the moments after wakefulness only a mere hour ago.
“Then. Then, once it’s over, we’ll leave these woods. Together.”
He doesn’t shift. You try not to fracture with the hurt that lays bare across your skin.
“You can’t push me away. Not when you allowed me to keep you for so long.” You finish and turn before you can stop yourself.
It takes effort to stride to the door, to lay your hand upon the iron latch. You feel your face pinch, tears once more obscuring your vision as you glance one last time at him.
“I love you.” You whisper. You’re not sure if you can hear it.
Once more, you walk into the woods, and you pray to the Gods that in the next dawn, you’ll walk them together.
----
He waits until you leave.
He waits until after the lock has shut, until your footsteps have faded, until silence settles over the cottage in your absence. He waits for the pain of betrayal in his heart to be quieted by the sickening, feverish hunger that grips his limbs.
“I’m sorry, Rotty.” König whispers in the solitude of the cottage. “I’m sorry. I’ll keep you safe.”
Soon now, he knows. Soon the sun will set, the moon will rise, and he’ll no longer be able to control the ravenous hunger, the desire to feast on flesh, the instinct to hunt, kill. The fever of bloodlust grips his limbs, and already he can feel his bones try to crack, reform, strengthen into monstrous size until he lifts his muzzle to the moon. He’s tried a hundred times to stop it, to refuse to gorge himself on the blood of beings only known as prey. He’s watched a hundred times as his victims scream, trying to flee from his outstretched claws.
He remembers each face, each final, breathless plea before his fangs snap through skin and bone.
You’re among them in his dreams. He sees your face the first time he saw you on the back of the captain’s dark mare, holding tight to his waist as your red cape fluttered behind you. He remembers seeing your eyes shining brightly in the moonlight, and thinking to himself not of prey, but of something delicate, fragile, beautiful.
Little did he know you’re a creature of the woods as well.
König had long ago resigned himself to this fate of his. It is his destiny to be cursed in the way he is, to roam the earth endlessly in search of blood to quench his wild, savage hunger. He’s long since stopped praying to the gods to free him, resigning himself to his imminent demise at the hands of humans for the sin of his existence- for being a monster that he cannot control.
He’d expected to die the night he first saw you, the strange creature cloaked in red, cradled by the trees as if they were your ally. The witchers had pursued him through the forest relentlessly, chasing him into one of their many traps. He’d barely escaped, and even now he wonders if he should have simply accepted the slash of a sword to his neck, breathed in his last as he gazed up at the beautiful autumn moon.
Yet you’d found him.
In the hollow where he’d licked his wounds, had shuddered against the cold, you’d come to rescue him from his own wretched existence.
“I’m not going to hurt you.” You’d whispered, and he had believed it, had allowed himself to deceive you just to feel the warm touch of kindness he’d forgotten. He’d allowed you to take him to this, to your home, to tend to him. He’d allowed you to burrow into his heart, into the empty hollow that had resigned itself to the terrible ending fate had divined for him.
He hadn’t intended to fall in love with you.
How could he not? How could he not be mesmerized by the captivating, beautiful strangeness of you? You with your wistful eyes, with your lonely smile, with the way you were so kind despite everything, despite the suffering, stifling solitude that he could see haunt your gaze? How could he possibly ignore this creature that was like him in so many ways, one who filled the emptiness of his aching soul?
Your smiles, your laughter, the brightness of your eyes and soft greetings, the way your bare skin was cast aglow by the fire- sights, sounds, scents that had forced him to forget who he was, the feral creature he was born to be. He’d gone willingly into your palms, had sheathed his fangs just to nuzzle against your delicate touch.
He should have left sooner. Perhaps then this fate would not be so cruel.
At least, in the end, he was loved. If only for just a while.
König waits until the ache of your final words has subsided, rises from the bed that still smells like you and gathers the clothes you’ve made for him. He drinks in the scent of you once more, remembers what it felt like to have you safe in his arms, in his den, in the place where he loved you too.
He hopes that you’ll forgive him for this someday.
König staggers from your home, down towards the edge of the forest.
And once more, he vows to keep you safe.
Safe from himself.
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❝HELLO, PRINCESS❞ — park seonghwa & kim hongjoong.
PAIRING. kim hongjoong x fem!reader x park seonghwa
GENDER/WARNINGS. enemies to lovers (without the lovers part). suggestive, but not really?. cursing. slight yandere behaviour. way too much fucking tension, i'm sorry.
SYNOPSIS. once your superiors called you saying they caught two of the leaders of the Black Pirates, you rushed to meet them at the abandon building they were in, but the conversation ended up getting a little out of hand.
WORD COUNT. 3,123.
NOTE. this is based on Ateez lore, also is an idea it's been going on and on in my head since i learned a bit more about their lore, once i saw the MATZ mv, idk, it just cliked and i couldn't stop thinking until i wrote it down. it was supposed to be more, but idk if i'll make this into a series or not, so there's a lot in the open. let me know if you wanna see this as a series (:
UPDATE: i did the series (here's the link).
IMPORTANT. this is a work of fiction, it has zero intent on portraing how any of the people quoted here are in real life.
The Black Pirates had been a problem for a few years now. Your family has always dealt with the rebels in Strickland, you grew up among great leaders, you were trained as one to succeed your parents when you reached a certain age, which would be four years from now, when you turned twenty-eight. Despite this, you had already led persecutions against those who participated in the rebellions since you were seventeen to eighteen years old, shortly after the appearance of the Black Pirates, led by a group called ATEEZ.
You had already managed to meet them at other times, never all in the same space. They were stealthy enough, they had given up their black clothes and fedoras for a while now, making it harder to find them in the crowd, they started to blend in, wear less flashy clothes, although they continued to cause problems to whoever was around.
The guards were no longer able to keep up with them, their incompetence making you laugh every time they returned empty-handed. Which leads to the situation you found yourself in now. Two of the eight members had been captured, or rather, allowed themselves to be captured. You didn't know their names, the few times you met them, there was never much friendly exchange of information.
All except for one. It was at the beginning, when you had your first direct contact with one of the ATEEZ, but curiously he couldn't fully comprehend your words. His stoic beauty didn't help much with the concentration process, especially when he looked so intensely at any information you provided, even if it didn't make sense to him.
He looked like a statue, a beautiful statue, an ancient painting, just like the ones you had seen stored deep in one of Strickland’s main command centers. The Fallen Angel, an 1847 painting by Alexandre Cabanel, a French painter. You knew that it was a copy of the original painting, but it didn't matter, because it was at that moment that you named the first member you had contact with.
Angel managed to escape a while later. The incompetence of the guards is already irritating the superiors. When the recordings were reviewed, the interaction between you and Angel caught the attention of the supervisors, who put you in the Search and Capture Team for all members of the Black Pirates. Over time, more and more interactions took place between you and the leaders, each time more intense and direct than the previous ones.
Angel, Serpent, Fox, Bear, Lion, Cat, Wolf, Squirrel. Each name earned for a specific reason. Angel and Squirrel were the last ones you had come into contact with, but as always, the guards' incompetence caused them both to escape, but not before Squirrel threw a slight wink in the direction of the security camera, knowing that you would see.
A disbelieving smile painted your lips when you saw that recording. Your eyes now saw the same recording followed by the transmission that had just ended, but now the smile was victorious as you walked in the direction where Squirrel and Serpent were, tied to chairs by iron chains.
“Leave us.”
“But ma’am -”
“Are you questioning a direct order?” At no point did your face leave the two chained to the chairs who were still looking ahead. Heads touching at the back. The smile returning to your lips with the movement and noise of boots against the concrete of the place where you were. “Don’t bother us until I call for you.”
The last soldier nodded before closing the metal door behind you. The cameras used by the two were still perfectly placed, but properly disconnected, the drones had been confiscated, some of the Black Pirates that followed them had been captured and were already heading to one of the confinement locations.
Despite the silence that ensued, neither of the two leaders looked at you, but the smile never left their lips. Your eyes passing through every detail of that space, absorbing any trace they left behind, even if deliberately. Over time you learned that everything was a clue, even if you didn't understand it at that exact moment.
As the boots came into contact with the concrete, Serpent opened his eyes, but they didn't find your figure, even as the sound of the boots on the concrete became closer, the pace was slow, not because you wanted to make an impact, no, that wasn't necessary, what you wanted was time to observe all the possible holes they could put any object into to continue the shitty revolution they wanted.
Your steps stopped at the beginning of the stone circle that the chairs were in, one of your feet was placed on top, a long sigh leaving your mouth as your hands rested on your hips on the leather belt of the special outfit. One last look around before your steps continued in front of Squirrel who finally opened his eyes, the smirk bringing a slight irritation, making your blood boil slightly. They thought they were intelligent, what irritated you was that they really were, but the guard wasn't the best either.
“Good to see you again, princess,” he purred the pet name. Your features were controlled, but internally you rolled your eyes. You knew who they were, just as they knew who you were. There was no need for an introduction between you, not since Angel disappeared from the compound he was staying at. “I knew I would see you again, but I didn’t expect it to be under these circumstances.”
“Don’t you like being tied up and having a woman looking you from above?”
You allowed yourself a sly smile, being greeted by another from Squirrel who looked you up and down, the smirk never leaving his lips, making you want nothing more than to wipe that fucking smile off.
“Oh, don’t get me wrong, I like it, especially if she’s you,” this time you couldn’t hold back a cynical laugh, which mattered little to Squirrel, “but public places aren’t part of my fetish.”
“Funny, because every time we meet you are in public and open places, just like this.” Squirrel refused to answer, making you close your mouth with a small toothless smile, continuing to walk around the stone circle, stopping quickly in front of Serpent, his eyes closed, his head tilted back, leaving the tattoo that adorned his neck visible. “Matz.”
Although you didn't notice the smirk Serpent gave, you saw the movement of his Adam's apple, your eyes quickly moving up to his face, perfectly sculpted, just like the last time you saw him. The brown eyes slightly hidden by hooded eyelids reminded you of the first time you noticed the duality that the leaders possessed, making you change your approach for the third time since you had joined the Search and Capture Team.
“It’s our unit,” his voice was low, gravelly, you ignored the shock that ran down your spine when you noticed his eyes roaming every part of your face and body, his mouth slightly ajar as his damn tongue – that seemed incapacitated to be kept inside his mouth – made small appearances between Serpent's teeth. “We don’t all have a unit name, but we all have units that overlap...” Your eyes fell on Serpent’s tongue that touched the left corner of his mouth, a movement that didn’t go unnoticed by him, causing a sideways smile to appear there. “What is it, princess? Cat’s got your tongue?”
Your mind ignored the automatic connection with the leader you had named Cat, but the millisecond it took for that to happen was captured by Serpent's vigilant eyes, making his eyebrows arch slightly, making his eyes momentarily remember the bobba that you used to take when you weren't searching for them all over Stricktland.
“Why does it matter to you? Are you trying to say that you care about me?”
“First of all, your eyes never left my tongue, so don’t blame me for worrying about losing it,” the lighthearted smile returned to his lips just as the eyelids fell over his eyes, returning the tantalizing look he always had, managing to get under your skin. At your eye roll, the smile only grew, “there are a lot of things I like and still want to do with my tongue, I wish I could keep it for a little while longer.”
"You can barely keep it in your mouth," Squirrel said laughing, it being the most genuine laugh you've ever heard come out of him, being imitated by Serpent, making you watch them for a moment, seeing the duality happen in front of you, the duality which always broke the image you had created of them over time. “What’s the second thing?”
Your eyes continued to dart from one to the other as Serpent stared at you, his eyes wider but still hooded, his smile now shyly present but still there taunting you.
“Second of all, I thought we already made it clear that we care about your well-being princess,” the pet name rolled beautifully in his lips, making shivers run through your body and you martyred yourself for it. Ignoring your body's signals for that simple sentence spoken that way by Serpent, but he – somehow – noticed the effect, letting out a small nasal laugh. “Cute,” he said simply, his body moving away from the back of the chair, his face as close as it's been in a long time, “but I want to know, princess, what are you going to do with us now that you've got us tied up the way you wanted?"
You allowed a smile to appear on your lips, noticing when Serpent's eyes fell on your mouth, using the opportunity to get even closer to him, his mouth mere centimeters away. A warm breath came out of your mouth, and you noticed Serpent moisten his own lips before you turned your face away, moving closer to him, your lips lightly touching his earlobe and you noticed the hairs on the back of Serpent's neck rising, making your smile increase.
“Who said I wanted you tied by iron chains to a chair?” You quickly walked away, boots firmly against the floor as you retraced your steps, standing exactly in the middle of the two chairs, facing the door your team was waiting for any sign of you. Their eyes fell on the cameras that surrounded them. “Wasn’t what you did last night enough?”
Your eyes fell on the two pairs of eyes that were watching you curiously. The security image of Squirrel and Serpent entering a store and destroying the objects there, returning to your mind, the angry screams of your superiors still reverberating in your eardrums, the loss of the work the government was doing, the work and time to be able to replace everything that had been destroyed. To make matters worse, the recording of the destruction they had wrought had already been disseminated, but this was a problem for the Information Transaction Control people, despite their job being Crisis Management, your only job now was the Black Pirates and their leaders.
“Told you she looked tired,” Squirrel said more to Serpent who just nodded, making you roll your eyes at the comment, ignoring when their worried eyes were directed at you, “did your superiors not let you sleep?”
“My job is to catch you, so when you show up in the break of dawn destroying government property,” you sighed, climbing into the circle, standing directly in front of Squirrel, eyes watching your every move, you noticed his movement in the chair as you bent down, hands resting on the arm of the chair, cornering him in some way, but none dared to show any other type of reaction, “I’m the one who has to lose my sleep and go after you.”
“Glad we made your life easier and came here, getting caught in the process.”
Squirrel’s cocky smile made you let out a weak sigh followed by a sideways smile, barely noticing when he got closer to you, his face millimeters away from yours, but you refused to move, maintaining eye contact with him, ignoring when you felt his knees touch your leg, ignoring the way he opened his legs enough for him to corner you this time.
Before you could react, he lifted his legs, wrapping yours around his own, pulling you in such a way that you lost your balance, resting on the back of the chair, before realizing an arm wrapped around your waist, while two hands held your wrists. Squirrel had a small smirk and his mouth was slightly open, your breaths were mixing, making it take a while for you to realize that Serpent had left his chair and was now behind you, one of his arms wrapping around your waist, but before you could say anything thing, Serpent's hand covered your mouth, his breath in your ear, making your blood boil.
“We don’t want anything drastic to happen, do we, princess?”
You could feel the smile on Serpent's lips, imagining it was almost a copy of the smile you could see on Squirrel. Despite the quick head movement, Serpent was faster, clenching your jaw tighter, throwing your head back, using his right shoulder to hold your head in place.
“Now princess, don’t be like that, you know us well enough to have expected this to happen somehow,” Squirrel’s legs let go of yours, making Serpent squeeze you tighter against his body, and you cursed under your breath when you realized how firm his body was, the fit was almost perfect to yours, making any movement impossible, “I love our cat and mouse games.”
Squirrel’s voice was low, hoarse, he approached you and Serpent like a predator. The truth is, you should expect it, Squirrel was stealthy, quick and smart, whenever he had been caught there had been a reason behind it; Serpent was slender, charming, but mysterious, never allowing you to see beyond what he wanted to show you. The two of them together and being captured should have told you enough.
The second Serpent freed your mouth, Squirrel placed tape over it, feeling Serpent's hand go down to your throat, fingers still gripping your jaw, mouth close enough to your ear for you to hear and feel every breath and reaction from him. Squirrel looked at you with a different sparkle in his eyes.
“They sent the drone; we have to go.”
Serpent's voice made your entire body shake, not just because of the proximity, or the tone, but precisely because of the information. A drone. The others were close, the drone was the sign that they were running out of time, again you would lose them, but this time it was all your fault.
“Unfortunately, our time is short, but I look forward to our next meeting, princess.”
Squirrel left your point of view, leaving your wrists to be taken care of by Serpent who finally let go of your neck, turning to face you, a place that was previously used by Squirrel. You could hear the other one walking, trying to memorize the paths they used so you could follow them as soon as they released you and you managed to escape the possible restraints they would place on you.
“I'm sorry, princess, but we can't risk it,” Serpent said quietly, the affection he felt on your waist startling you for a moment, trying to ignore how hot that specific part of your body had become, ignoring the shock that that simple movement caused to your body as a whole. “We’ve already risked so much for you.”
Before you could have any kind of reaction, a cloth was placed in front of your mouth, at the same time as the tape had been ripped off. They were going to drug you, but as soon as you realized, the control of your legs disappeared. The last memory was of Serpent's arms wrapping around you and a murmur coming from Squirrel.
All eight of them were eating dinner that Wooyoung had made, Seonghwa and Hongjoong were hungry, considering how long they had stayed in that building, waiting for you and your team. Both of them just hoping that what they did that afternoon wouldn't cause them too much trouble.
Not that the others would say anything, they all knew how each of them felt about you. The problem was what Nightingale would say when they found out how irresponsible they had been, just to be able to stay longer in your presence, to see you again, to feel your skin and scent.
Almost instantly, a message arrived for them, a small alert noise and the eight were quickly on their feet, their eyes scanning the space they were in while Yunho went in the direction of the beeper, opening the message that was accompanied by a small digital bird and everyone already knew what to expect with that.
“You are lucky that I already expect you to do this and I managed to prevent you from being seen, but I need you to be more careful and obey the rules, not flirting instead of helping us reach our final goal. In any case, congratulations on what you managed to do in the last few days, wait for the next contact. If anything, you know how to contact me.”
All eight exchanged glances and sighs. That was better than they could have expected, but it also explained what had happened when Seonghwa and Hongjoong left the building, getting into the car with Wooyoung to go to the complex. For a moment, everyone's thoughts went to you, a simple exchange of looks between the two older ones said enough, they should have taken better care of you, but time was short, Yeosang had already sent the drone, they needed to prioritize their safe exit.
“Do you think she’s okay?”
Jongho's voice was low, his eyes searching the elders' eyes, seeking some kind of confirmation, that he shouldn't worry, but Matz had said how they left you, there was a 50-50 chance that you were okay, and it was what they wanted to focus on.
“We should have kept her further away from the door.”
“For her to possibly roll over and fall over the railing?” Hongjoong fussed a little and Seonghwa just gave him a warning look, noticing the leader of the eight running his fingers through his hair nervously. “She’s going to be fine, worse has happened and she survived.”
The eight nodded, but they knew it was just an automatic reaction, not necessarily one they agreed or trusted, not until they saw you in one piece, even from afar.
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Ok this one will be long!
“Is not good Phil, the Voices are very insistent that the Egg is getting more powerful now that it has Dream, I can even say that Dream is more powerful too, but the way the vines cling to him… we need to get him out” said Techno bandaging his own injuries as he saw Philza walk around taking books and then going through his comm and then back to what Techno could only compare to a telephone guide. “Phiiiil what are you doing?”
“Oh, sorry mate, just trying to find someone that could help us” informed Phil as he smirked “and I think I found the perfect demon for the job”
—————————
“I dont like this plan” complained Techno quietly, he was once again sneaking around Pandora’s, he was barely healed and now he was again in the accursed place.
“You dont have to like the plan but this is going to work, you just need to keep keep distracted whoever is going to be there with him” said Farfadox, a demon of the same race as Bad, he was a friend of Dream from out of the server, and he immediately came once he was explained the situation.
They found Dream closer that what they thought, he was talking to little panicking blobs and both knew they where out of time, Farfa stepped out of the shadow that had been covering for them so long and struck Dream, blood and vines spilling from the wound, repairing the damage as Punz appeared to protect Dream, the mercenary was good but not as good as Techno and Farfa together.
“This is for your own good” said Techno tying Punz down as Farfa made sure to strike Dream again as the vines kept trying to heal the priest.
“We need to go now” said Techno hearing more people coming. Farfa nodded and carried Dream, vines withering as they put more space between them and the Egg.
————————
“You both know that he needs to heal right?” Mused Phil as he saw the floating looking corpse on the main fountain of the church. The silence that followed made him chuckle without humor.
Phil looked at Dream, it was… a terrible thing to see, the once proud fighter was little more of a skeleton at this point, the vines that had been purged out of him had been literally all that had been holding Dream together, he lamented to see him like this, the potions did almost nothing to help until a bigger dose with resistance was added.
“Is going to be ok mate, you are safe now” he said almost fearing that it sounded more like a lie.
————————
Dream was dreaming, so so deep in his mind where the last traces of what he once was had gone hide, now he was hiding in the too, escaping from the pain and the screams of the Egg that wanted him back, but Dream was dreaming, he was a dreamer, he was not to awake soon, not when it was so warm and so quiet and so cold but he could handle this mix of warm and cold that made him remember the feeling of swimming in the ocean during the hot summers, it was wam and cold and quiet like a lush cavern, he like that thought so he dreamed again, not wanting to wake up yet, he was a Dream so he kept dreaming
This, this is what I have been saying when I say to fill in the blank!!!
So, for context because sometimes it escapes me too. This is not the first time the Egg has appeared, so this is playing into the whole time loop thing. But also, this time loop is not a 100% lore compliance, more like I subsitute with Dream's past life aka tales.
It is not the first time the Egg has approached Dream either. In the past, the red eye war, Sir Billaim's mansion are all instances in which Dream has confronted the Egg. And knowing how the current timeline is still...well here, it is safe to assume that the Egg is defeated in each timeline before this, often with sacrifice on Dream's end as well.
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duality of man
summary: foul legacy only bends to childe’s will, he isn’t fully controlled by him.
a/n: foul legacy speaks in bold, childe speaks italicized. internal/mental speech is quoted ‘like this’ rather than simply italicized for the sake of childe, as tumblr does not have underline capabilities :/
word count: ~2.1k
-> warnings: spoilers for childe lore / liyue archon quest, childe is his own warning (and is frequently bloodthirsty and strange), violence and gore, it/it’s pronouns for foul legacy because it’s childe’s pov and also i said so, imposter sagau things. technically isn’t 100% canon compliant according to wikipedia.
-> lowercase intended!
taglist: @samarill || @thenyxsky
childe stalked through the forest, the foliage tinted by foul legacy’s vision. this form wasn’t the best for stealth, but it would help him find you faster.
he could hear your heavy breathing from the corner you backed yourself into, and grinned.
“surrender is a valid option,” he purred, voice warped and distorted through the heavy mask. your breath hitched, and his smile only grew. he had you. all he had to do was reach, reach with the clawed hands of his abyssal form and drag you out of wherever you’d hidden and he’d earn his place at his gods side. to be the one to find and kill you was an honor, one he was not keen on giving up.
he could imagine it now. dragging you along with his claws sunk deep into your neck, whatever blood left in your body staining his hands. your corpse would fall, lifeless, at his god’s feet, and he’d be the one to reap the rewards of their love.
you would not escape. he would not leave empty-handed.
he couldn’t.
childe tried to reach for the bush you were hiding behind, but his arm wouldn’t move.
no, not his arm, he realized. it was disobeying.
‘what are you doing?’ he hissed into his mind, pushing with all his might. still, the arm of foul legacy wouldn’t move. it was strange; it had never disobeyed before, and aside from the initial period to get used to piloting a body, he’s never had any issues.
‘i cannot allow you to kill them.’
‘what? why? if you want to have a hand in it, i’ll let you have a while to-‘
‘no. they are not to die.’
his arms moved of their own will, moving aside the branches much slower than he would have.
‘i refuse to allow the death of the one who made me.’
what?
the leaves eventually reveal you, tucked in as small a space as you can manage, holding a broken-off spearhead. your clothes are tattered, leaves caught within the creases. your hand is shaking so badly childe doubts you could hurt anybody but yourself with it.
your mouth opens like you want to say something, but nothing comes out. a thrill runs down childe’s spine at the fact that they’ve scared you from words, but it’s quickly overrun by the concern coming from foul legacy.
wait… concern?
“your grace… how ruined you have become.”
your eyes flick between the pearl of its eye and the hand, likely trying to decide which is a better target, and childe wants to laugh. he wants to urge you to strike, to watch as you fruitlessly spend your energy bashing that spearhead into foul legacy’s armor, blunting the steel against it.
the devouring deep doesn’t let him speak.
“please… i’m sorry.”
normally, hearing somebody beg for their life would make childe’s day, week if they do it prettily enough, but this… some part of his heart, as beaten and rotted it is, hurts.
whatever sadness he feels quickly burns into rage. what right did foul legacy have over his emotions? making him pity this imposter, as if you weren’t fit to die the moment your treacherous tongue claimed you were somebody you weren’t.
“i know, i know.” legacy’s claw extends and you flinch, feet kicking up dirt as you press yourself further against whatever rock you’re against.
“stay away from me!”
foul legacy hums a low note, and childe wants to scream as his hand falls to the dirt. what power did you have over it? why didn’t it just take whatever it was it wanted from you?
‘why are you hesitating?’
‘you wouldn’t understand.’
the first sensible thing it’s said. he didn’t understand.
“it is alright. i am not the one you fear.“
“yes you are! i… i know you, childe.”
childe allowed himself a smile. no matter how much foul legacy pushed aside his commands, it would always have to deal with his reputation. the fact that he disrupted its plans just as it did his brought him a little joy from the situation.
“i am not him, leading light. please… do not be afraid.”
‘leading light’?
childe had heard many names and titles for the divine creator in his time, and knew that that one in particular was favored by abyssal creatures. he’d heard it shouted and screamed, people slaughtered in the name of the light that they claim leads them from the abyss. he even adopted it himself, at one point, for the first few years after he was freed from it himself. he’d killed with the title on his tongue, and ripped out others’ that dared to dirty it.
all of this to say that foul legacy was claiming you were the divine creator.
you. you.
you, who dared to walk with a face that wasn’t yours, to gaze with eyes that didn’t belong to you. you.
he could admit that he didn’t sense the aura of the creator—with a bitter, sour tongue, but admitted nonetheless—due to his time spent in the abyss. his soul was too rotten to resonate with theirs, only able to find solidarity in their violent retribution cast down on those that dared cross them. he acknowledged that he was beyond saving, that even the highest of the high could barely begin to fill the gaping maw of the abyss inside of him. he’d… not accepted, but come to terms with it.
but even he did not dare to call another by their name.
“you’re… you’re what?”
“i can hear him.” foul legacy’s hand extended once more, slower, gentler, with much more care than any other action childe had seen from it. “he is in my mind, but we are not the same. i can promise, while i am here, no harm will come to you.”
you didn’t trust it. good, as childe was starting to distrust foul legacy as well.
“you… you’re saying you’re…?” the spearhead in your hand lowered, some of the fear—regrettably—fading from your eyes. recognition flooded instead, and childe was confused as to how you found comfort in a creature of the abyss. he knew he had a reputation, one stained with violence and blood, and surely that would extend to it as well, right? foul legacy… it couldn’t be more trustworthy than him.
“i am his foul legacy. i am the devouring deep.”
its clawed hand finally reached yours, and you let it close around your wrist even as hesitation shone in your eyes. your lips parted, but whatever you had to say died before it spoke again. “please… can you find it in your heart to trust once more? if only for me, if only for a moment?”
childe tried once more to take over the form, and was again met with the stone of foul legacy’s will. he huffed; it shouldn’t be getting this close to you, and he shouldn’t have to watch as it did. it shouldn’t have even disobeyed in the first place.
“why don’t you hate me?”
foul legacy sighed, the sound warped and roughened by its mask. “this world- no, these people are fools. do not hold the mistakes of the many in your heart. they do not understand the weight of their actions. they are being pushed, puppetted by another.”
‘what are you talking about?’
‘hold your tongue.’
childe was in shock. first it went against him by taking over his actions, then it claimed you were the sacred creator, then told him to shut up?
you were sitting up, carefully daring to come closer, and childe beat at the boundaries of his will with all his strength. he couldn’t let this go on any longer. he could take being disobeyed, he could take his anger out on some innocents with its hand once it was tired enough to give him control, but for it to disrespect his god?
he could not- he would not let that go so easily.
childe pushed at his arm with all his might as foul legacy sat itself on the floor, tugging you closer. he sent the command to move at least a thousand times, begging his own hand to squeeze, to snap the bones in your wrist, to show any sign that he still had control in this body.
the most he got was a twitch of the ring finger.
he refused to allow foul legacy to take him over like this. he could not let it shatter his reputation and attack his beliefs like this. it could not say that you were his god, it could not say that it was in control, it could not say that childe was wrong. it should not hold you will claws that should kill, and you should not gaze so deeply into the pearl of a monster’s eye.
it was almost as if you could see him within it, your searching eyes piercing right into his. he hoped you could, that you could see how much he hated the situation he found himself in. how much he hated you, you for warping his foul legacy’s mind, you for making it think you were it’s god.
“how long do i have?”
“hm?”
“before he comes back.”
childe tried again to assert his presence. he failed.
you shifted closer to foul legacy, sitting against its side. part of childe wanted to laugh at you, at the fact that you dared to lean on a creature of the abyss. part of him wanted to sneer and call you pathetic for it.
the same part that knew it was fruitless even as he tried to follow through on it.
foul legacy put its arm around you, pulling you into its side. the glass of its eye bumped against the top of your head, words of reassurance buzzing in its head.
childe huffed to himself, feeling his anger start to bubble again. there was no reason for this behavior. there was no reason for foul legacy to try and influence him by bleeding their thoughts together, nor for it to subject him to this. even it should recognize the creator, even if by context clues from the people around it.
and if this was all a trick, childe could accept it. if foul legacy had whispered into his mind, told him that yes, it knew, it believed, then he could tolerate the attacks against his god. he could bite back his words and let legacy do what he did best: follow orders.
if this was a ploy, childe would be fine. but foul legacy’s claws never dug into your side, and the whispers it spoke were not of retribution, but of reverence. how he wished it would just obey, even if not his orders but theirs.
follow the orders of the true god, who was in their palace, waiting for their trusted followers to capture and kill you. sitting, waiting for your corpse to be tossed at their feet, waiting for their loyal followers to carry out their word. the true creator, their god, not you. not you, not any other fake that dared to imitate them, and not those that behaved as foul legacy did here, following the impersonators and claiming they were real.
foul legacy hissed in his mind. ‘still your traitorous tongue.’
‘i won’t! if you took a moment to even think-’
‘and if you paused to allow yourself to do the same, you would agree.’
he did think, he had plenty of time to think when foul legacy was- was almost cuddling you, the warp of its voice doing nothing to mask the affection within it. he can’t move, he cant take control, and it has the gall to say he should think? all he’s able to do is think! he could sit here for an eternity, listening to the quiet rumble of legacy’s voice, mulling over every action he has or could taken, and he still wouldn’t be convinced. he wouldn’t agree. all he would be is sore, tired, and angry.
and of all the ways he could spend his time… he could fight for eternity, he could hit at the boundary between their brains with mental fists that never tired, he could give himself a headache with how hard he tried to dig his hand into your side. he could plan out his revenge against foul legacy, he could start to draft the prayer of repentance he’d surely have to raise to his god, he could do so much and yet precious little.
and that beast wanted him to think?
inside a body that wasn’t his, childe screamed.
#sagau#genshin impact sagau#genshin sagau#self aware genshin#childe#sagau childe#tartagila#sagau tartaglia#foul legacy#sagau foul legacy#genshin#sagau impostor au#foul legacy x reader#sure why not#‘This power has no relation to his Delusion’ shut the FUCK up wikipedia#it’s MY fanfiction and I get to choose the canon.#foul legacy is somebody he learned to harness through his delusion#i don’t give a shit if it’s a ‘talent’ or ‘skill’ and that legacy ‘isn’t a sentient being at all’ it’s called storytelling#words cannot describe how much i hated editing this shit#let ALONE porting it to tumblr. actual hell.#editing to montero by mr nas x. this is the lgbt experience /hj#fuck it i’ll post this 12 hours before i’m meant to. if god has a problem with it he can kill me himself.#i should not have done that. Regret[TM]#post once every 4 days or twice within 6 hours. this is my curse; this is my burden; this is the eternity i am doomed to face
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𝔻𝕣𝕒𝕘𝕠𝕟'𝕤 ℂ𝕣𝕒𝕕𝕝𝕖 (Blade x F!Reader x Jing Yuan)
PART 13
PART 1 , PART 2 , PART 3 , PART 4 , PART 5 , PART 6 , PART 7 ,
PART 8 , PART 9 , PART 10 , PART 11 , PART 12
A/n : -
HI IM BACKKKKK
sorry for disappearing so suddenly, i bet yall have been waiting and i am so so SO sorryyyy.
Life news ! : I am a university student now !
I was seriously gonna update last week, but orientation week was EFFING HELL (like who tf sends me to sleep at 1, and then wake up at 5. not to mention the LINE TO THE SHOWERS--
anyways, now that things are a little more stable now, i should be updating again ! thank you for waiting and being so patient my beloveds !
Here is a little more lore dump before we get on with the main story !!
I'll update that in a few days, i promise...i'm so sorry ;;-;;
Taglist : -
@rebeccawinters , @nayukiyukihira , @pix-stuff , @fluffy-koalala , @swivy123 , @starxao , @kaoyamamegami , @kimura-uzuri , @rsvye , @seikouryuu , @just-here-reading , @matsulovesyou, @sincerely-aaronette , @prettyliliy , @chibiduck , @hermosacolibri , @la-diablas-thingz , @farelady-fate , @everi-eve ,
@shadowfoxey , @helloyuki , @immahuman
"Lady (Y/n)...a-are you alright ?" the master diviner asked the dragon woman before her, eyes wide with concern and confusion.
"Wh...what happened...I...I don't remember what happened..." the legendary woman asked, looking at Fu Xuan with the same emotion swirling in her (e/c) eyes.
What was it that she had just witnessed earlier ? Why did she feel like something was missing from her...?
Something was indeed stolen from her.
"Lady (Y/n)...you...once you entered the Matrix of Prescience, I...I lost all connection to you. I couldn't reach your consciousness. It was as if something was in my place, watching over you instead. It blocked me out and..."
"And when I regained hold of the true reality, you and I are here, staring at each other..." Fu Xuan said, looking fearful and confused.
This wasn't something she had ever confronted before, not even past all those centuries of learning, studying, foreseeing and foretelling.
"Did you...see something...?"
"Perhaps...the Ambrosial Arbor's resurrection and the Stellaron contamination is hazing up the sea of ancient tales..."
Ambrosial....Arbor...
Stellaron...Contamination...
"My Lady ! Get back ! The infestation of the Plagues Author is overwhelming and will be breaching our ranks ! We must retreat !" called out a distant voice.
"Wh-what...?" (Y/n) muttered, feeling a blunt thumping in her head.
"No ! I mustn't hide ! He hasn't returned yet ! I must find him ! He needs me !" a familiar voice screamed out, pure terror and fear heard in her quivering voice.
The dragon lady stumbled backwards, finding it even hard to get a grasp of reality, much less balancing herself on her two feet. Her hand was put to her head, fingers digging into her head as she grimaced and winced. Eyes closed, as her ears blocked out all other noise.
"Lady Dan Jia !"
'Where...am I...?'
As she opened her eyes...she was in the dark, sinking further and further into the unknown. The darkness that engulfed her was cold, wet, and lonely...
Her tired (e/c) eyes only looked up, breaths escaping her lips forming bubbles of air varying in size and density. Her body felt heavy, head no longer pounding, as she submitted her fate to the deep unknown.
"No ! Why didn't it work ?! Why isn't she waking up !" a distraught voice screamed out through the sound of pattering rain.
It was as if a void had ripped through the space of unknown, bright light of the gloomy sky displayed before her. There was a horned man, dark brown hair shining with wetness from the rain as he held a figure tightly in his arms.
"No, no, no ! This wasn't supposed to happen ! She was supposed to survive, and she would wake up ! Why isn't she waking up ?!" the voice screamed desperately as he held the body close to his chest, tears running down his cheeks.
"Dan Jia ! D-Dan...Dan Jia ! Wake up ! Y-you were meant to awake after taking the heart ! Y-you weren't supposed to still be tied to the heart ! Why did you tie yourself to it ?!"
"Dan Jia..."
"My beloved sister..."
"Wake up...please..."
"Please...I beg you..."
"Open your eyes, sister..."
"I'm sorry..."
Tears escaped (Y/n)'s eyes as she watched the display of tragic love of siblings being displayed in front of her. The cries of Dan Feng as he cradled his sister in his arms pierced through the sound of rain.
"Now...I have no one..." the man said woefully.
"I betrayed you...I used Yingxing...I took advantage of your love towards your soulmate...I took advantage of your care to me...I took advantage of his devotion to you and his loyalty to me..."
"I had him bait you into stripping you of the Heart... our plan failed and she...she turned into a monstrosity. Because you weren't ready to give up the heart, not all power was surrendered to her...not all our authority was given to her..."
"Why...why did I force it from you...? Why did I have Yingxing bait you here ? Because I knew... you would never go against the Unpardonable Sins, if it wasn't Yingxing that wilted to the ground had his time come..."
"But now..."
Before she could hear more, the vision of the previous High Elder cradling his sister in his arms faded before her.
"Let me see her one more time..." a voice whispered, feeling defeated, relishing all hold of his fate to those who held him tight in their hold.
"Dan feng..." the slow lazy voice (Y/n) had recognized almost immediately.
"I said let me see her one more time !" The man roared, chains that held him down clashing and clanging as he refuted, his tail smashing wildly. Shackles that held him down was not spared a single glance. His skin was marred and raw from the friction, but he cared not.
All he craved for was a final glimpse of his sister, and he would go through the molting rebirth. He didn't care what they did to him. he didn't care what would happen to him after.
"Please...Jing Yuan....let me see my sister for the last time...I beg you..." the High Elder begged.
For the arrogant, high and might High Elder Imbibator Lunae to beg, kneeling on the ground by the feet of the current general of the Luofu...
"I was going to let you see her anyway. You deserve to see her one last time, at least." Jing Yuan replied, kneeling down to the level of his friend.
"Sister..." she heard as the rift before her dissipated just as the first vision did.
In that motionless space of time, she felt warm arms creeping from behind. They meant her no hostility, and she reacted not as they wrapped around her form, pulling her down. Her back then came into contact with another surface, warm and breathing, comforting and beating. Another chest.
"I'm...not her..." was the first thing that escaped her lips in that void.
"Dan Jia..." the voice replied again.
"Let me go."
And before her was the man she's been seeing constantly in her dreams. Though he wasn't real...
The man before her was a handsome man, even more so now that he was standing before her. His long brown hair flowed, his teal horns perched on his head glowing as brightly as his lustrous teal eyes. His expression was serious, without an ounce of regret that she had now addressed herself by a different name as he stood before her a few feet away.
"You are indeed still Dan Jia. You have the same face and voice, a voice I yearn to hear since you left. Yet your power...your memories...you--"
"I told you, I am not HER !" the woman screamed, hands to her heart as she screamed her lungs out, denying all the claims the man before her had spread out to the table.
"What makes you so sure that you aren't her ?"
"She may be my past..." (Y/n) said, her fan appearing in her hand.
The woman began running towards the man before her, her fan materializing in her hand.
"But she wont lead my future !"
"Ignorant." he replied, a spear forming in his hands, familiar to her eyes. But she knew it wasn't her own eyes. It was Dan Jia's.
With strength and fury running through her veins, she parried all the attacks struck by the man before her. Sparks flew from the collisions, as (Y/n) controlled her fan in her hand, sending strikes, even using telepathy and magic to control the weapon out of her hands.
The man never faltered, letting out his own lines of sorrow and reminiscence. He attacked back the woman before him, eyes clouded but expression stern.
"Your attacks are the same as hers. Your moves, your stance...it's all hers ! " He exclaimed, grabbing his spear and swinging it in her direction. "You are her ! Dan Jia !"
Suddenly the man launched up two fingers straight up. And (Y/n) gasped, feeling a tremendous amount of pain pierce her. Spears of water impaled her body, hooking her and pulling her down to the depths of the deep dark sea.
(Y/n) gasped and screamed, hands failing to try prevent herself from descending deeper into the water, familiar pain coursing through her veins. The sensation of her skin torn, her muscle and meat being torn out from her back and chest....
And the heart. The source of her power.
Or rather the lack of it.
Tears pricked her eyes as she endured the pain, her screams forming bubbles that drifted up to the surface who knows how many feet above her.
Phantom pain that coursed through her body caused her breathing to hitch, even when there was nothing at all that had even done so much as dented her skin, not even those spears.
All of that was just deep memories...
Memories...
Of Dan Jia...and her past.
Her smiles...her laughs...her dances...
Her joys and her sorrows...
And all those people appeared in her mind. Baiheng...Jingliu...Jing Yuan...Yingxing...
Where did all of them go...?
She couldn't think anymore...so she closed her eyes and let herself fall deeper and deeper.
"(Y/n), my princess..." the warm lazy voice of the man that had taken care of her since she awoke resounding loudly.
Her eyes opened to meet a vision of Jing Yuan as he helped her out of the starskiff, a warm and lazy smile playing on his lips, emotions swirling in his honey gold eyes.
But other people relapsed her mind as she reached out her hand to the man before her.
Bailu...Yanqing...Blade...Jing Yuan...
"(Y/n)..." the husky voice of the man she holds dear called out. Strong arms wrapped her figure from behind, as a head landed on her shoulder. She closed her eyes to bask in the feeling of his arms that held her close.
She was like them. Like Blade and Jing Yuan.
Blade who is just a shell of his former self and a living weapon that lives in Yingxing's shadow.
Jing Yuan who had lived for hundreds of years, but still living on no matter how much burden he had to shoulder since he was young.
(Y/n) is like them. A person who lives in the shadow of her former self, yet carries the burden, pain and memories of the person she no longer was.
Visions of her past self and current self began to surge into her, reminding her of who she once was, reminding her of who she is. The pain that surged her body was proof enough that she was still who she was trying to run from.
What Dan Feng is saying has some truth to it. But he was wrong.
She was indeed Dan Jia... but she is (Y/n) as well.
"You...killed me once..." she whispered, feeling determination consume her fragile and pure soul as she opened her eyes, bright (e/c) eyes that ebbed with the shine of a Vidyadhara High Elder.
"You took my power...and my lover..." she said, voice growing stronger as her hands as she began to channel as much energy into her arms, trying to rise to the surface.
"So don't get in the way of my future !" She screamed, powering through the pain that pulsed through her body, overcoming the suffering that kept her awake with the new resolution.
The water around her burst, releasing her from its cold and harsh conditions. Her horns and tail shone brightly alongside the power that seeped from the vibrancy of her eyes. Her fan appeared once again in her hand, and the faint tingling from the windchime earring on her right ear reminded her of herself.
Chains came up from the ground, shackling her in place, just as she had seen in her visions. Dan Feng chained down to the ground, in the shackling prison, alone and cold.
"You will pay for the sights and visions you have seen. For you and me are one of the same heart. One of the same power. One of the same High elder of the Luofu."
"I will not atone for this sins you have committed ! I refuse to be subjected to a life I did not lead myself into ! And you shouldn't let him suffer either !" she said as she pulled at the chains.
"You have nowhere to run." The man before her said.
"But I have someplace to return !" She declared back, swinging her fan powerfully as the water bent to her command, breaking the chains beneath her.
The man before her looked stunned, his long brown hair flowing freely before a warm, unfamiliar smile graced his lips. The woman before him was still as fragile as ever. Kind and gentle, as her attacks never meant to land a hit on him at all.
It was still his sister that was standing before him. All grown up. Independent.
The dragon woman before him was still fearful of him, and he didn't blame her. After all, he had caused her demise of the past...involving her without consent, with consequences spiraling out of his power.
"Very well...lead a life you would regret the least..." the dragon man before her said.
"But remember...the pain that you bring with you upon obtaining these memories and power shall be yours alone to handle."
"For blood runs thicker than water."
"She's awake ! Hurry, get the Master Diviner ! The Imbibator Saltator has awoke !" Said a bright and familiar voice.
As (Y/n) opened her eyes, she was met with the worried eyes of the current High Elder of the Vidyadhara. But for some reason...she felt particularly close to this...girl.
"Are you alright ? Try not to stress yourself out too much. You've been through a lot..." The dragon lady said.
The way her turquoise eyes shone brightly with mischief and childish delight...the way her purple hair flowed freely behind her as she ran around. The way she called (Y/n)'s name so gently and carefully.
"Baiheng...?" She said, letting the name slip past her lips without her realizing.
"No...sorry...Miss...Bailu. I let a slip of tongue a moment there..." she said, shaking her head softly as she tried to sit up.
"No, it's alright. I understand that you can still be a little disoriented !" Bailu said, brightly, handing her a cup of Immortal's Delight.
Why did she feel so...close to Bailu...?
Why...did she call Bailu...Baiheng...?
Then it hit her.
She never knew what happened to Baiheng.
She wondered what had transpired once she had been subdued to a cold and deep slumber for a couple hundred years...
But she for sure couldn't see Blade and Dan Feng's reincarnation the same way ever again...
#dragon's cradle#honkai star rail#honkai star rail x reader#honkai star rail x you#hsr x you#hsr x reader#hsr jing yuan x reader#hsr jing yuan x you#jing yuan x reader#jing yuan x you#hsr blade x reader#hsr blade x you#blade x you#blade x reader
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Week 1 Retrospective: Who Is John Egbert?
It’s official - Homestuck is one week old today! And while a week is not a long run for a comic, it’s already got more pages than the author’s earlier work Bard Quest, so maybe it’s something worth recognizing. So I wanted to mark a week of Homestuck by doing a deep dive on what we’ve learned about our protagonist John Egbert so far. It’s some fact collection, some wild speculation, and some ongoing questions. It’s over 3000 words, so it’s under a readmore for anyone who’s interested.
If that doesn’t sound like a fun time to you (or even if it does), you can take the John Egbert Big 5 Personality Test to see how you score on John’s five key personality traits. It’s 14 multiple choice questions, so a much quicker read.
We’re introduced to John on page 4, where we’re given five key interests of his: bad movies, programming computers, paranormal lore, amateur magic, and gaming. I’ll take these one by one and use them as a framework for John’s character so far.
“You have a passion for REALLY TERRIBLE MOVIES.”
John has eleven (11) movie posters on his walls. Of these, three star Matthew McConaughey and two star Nicolas Cage. More notably, six have a Rotten Tomatoes rating below 50%, and two of these are below 10%. I haven’t seen any of these movies, but as far as I can tell, here are the one sentence summaries [broad spoilers for all these movies].
Little Monsters: A boy befriends a monster and visits the monster world, where they try to convert him into a monster too.
Con Air: A paroled man disrupts a gang of prisoner’s escape from a prison transport plane.
Deep Impact: Earth tries to prepare for extinction after a comet is found on a collision course with Earth.
Ghostbusters II: After going out of business, the Ghostbusters reunite to combat a negative energy slime monster.
Mac and Me: A boy befriends a young alien who gets separated from his family and lost on Earth.
Contact: An Earth scientist successfully discovers alien life and travels to an alien world.
A Time to Kill: A father is acquitted in court for killing the perpetrators of racial hate crimes against his daughter.
Failure to Launch: A 35 year old man’s parents hire a woman to persuade him to finally move out of their home.
Face/Off: A terrorist and a FBI agent go through facial transplant surgery and temporarily swap identities.
Armageddon: A group of space workmen go on a mission to stop an asteroid from destroying Earth.
Ghost Dad: A man temporarily dies but is able to interact with his children in ghost form.
From this we can see that John really likes science fiction movies related to aliens, ghosts and monsters, as well as action comedy. We also know from page 21: ‘Films about impending apocalypse fascinate you’. A Time to Kill and Failure to Launch are the only ones that don’t fit his taste. The implication here is that John really loved Matthew McConaughey in Contact and so watched his other movies even though they were things he wouldn’t usually watch.
I’m curious if these movies are intended as clues to John’s character, the future of the comic, or both. In terms of his character, they make me see him as someone who’s imaginative and goofy, young and carefree, not concerned with other people’s opinions, more interested in watching movies for their surface meanings and exciting stories, maybe wants to escape to a different world, might be a little bit gay.
In terms of the future of the comic, it could be that we’re going to see literal aliens or monsters - they could even be already here, keeping John ‘homestuck’. Slime monsters are particularly highlighted, with Slimer from Ghostbusters appearing on John’s shirt and computer background, and his chumhandle, ectoBiologist, relating to slime. Slime invasion honestly feels too obvious, and anyway, several of John’s movies are about befriending a more benign supernatural force - could John’s Pesterchum friends be something other than human? Or maybe it’s a more metaphorical meaning, referring to John having a very different life to his friends?
Two of these movies feature Earth extinctions by giant space rocks, but there’s absolutely no indication of this being a real world threat John is dealing with. Again, it could refer more generally to a sudden, life changing event that’s about to happen to disrupt John’s current state, something that would fit thematically with this being John’s 13th birthday, a milestone age.
There’s also a theme of crime and the legal system in several movies, including Con Air, the one that’s been most highlighted. The most obvious interpretation of John’s dad right now is that he’s a clown or performer, but there’s an outside chance he could be in law enforcement, or a criminal. It’s even possible that he’s currently in hiding or some kind of safe house. This would explain John being ‘homestuck’ and sick of spending time with his dad.
Speaking of John’s dad, I’m concerned for him based on the Ghost Dad summary - the comic keeps teasing his presence, but we haven’t actually seen him yet. Could he be a ghost? Or become one at some point? Alternatively, we know John has an already dead relative - could his nanna be a ghost? Did John dropping her ashes release her ghost? Family is a really common theme in movies, so I don’t know if a large number of these movies being about family (especially fathers) is relevant, but I’m noting it all the same.
“You like to program computers but you are NOT VERY GOOD AT IT.”
John claims he ‘likes to program’, but it actually seems to make him angry. We first learn ‘[y]ou were never all that great with data structures and you find the concept [of the stack modus] puzzling and mildly irritating.’ We then see three files on John’s desktop, two in ^CAKE - ‘pff.^CAKE’ and ‘FUCK FUCK FUCK.^CAKE’ and one in ~ATH - ‘AAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGH.~ATH’. These tell a clear narrative of John trying to work on his programming and getting increasingly more frustrated with his attempts, until inevitably giving up. Both of the programming languages are puns, too. ^ is often called a carat (carrot cake) while ~ is a tilde (til death).
I know this is wild speculation, but… John started off coding in a harmless programming language, was already struggling, then for some reason switched over to the most ominous possible sounding language, screwed it up even worse, and now… he’s constantly haunted by the ghost of failed programming attempts in the form of his sylladex, which he appears to be new to using (he had no prior understanding of it on page 7 - although this could be handwaved due to video game tutorial logic), and which operates similarly to a computer program and seems to cause John endless frustration. He’ll have to figure out how to exploit the inventory system in ways that help him, which involves actually figuring out some stuff about coding, in order to partake in some real life ghostbusting, or monster hunting, or dealing with whatever threat he’ll have to deal with by using inventory hacks.
“You have a fondness for PARANORMAL LORE,” (...)
By far the interest of John’s that we’ve seen the least of so far, John’s love of the paranormal is mostly inferred through his movie preferences, and we don’t see any direct evidence of an interest in lore. However, I can’t stop fixating on John’s chumhandle: ectoBiologist. The comic’s first act was to draw attention to giving John a name, and for many 2009 kids, the names they go by online are more meaningful and representative of them than their real world names.
‘ecto-’ means ‘outer, outside, external’ according to dictionary.com, and it’s actually a common prefix in a variety of fields of biology, but there’s no such thing as ‘ectobiology’ as a field, or an ‘ectobiologist’ - neither term has any search results prior to Homestuck. I think it’s way more likely that this refers to ectoplasm, a term from both cell biology and spiritualism that was popularized by Ghostbusters to mean any substance secreted by a ghost, in practice often manifesting as green slime. Slimer, who we can guess is John’s favorite, is a benign ghost made of pure ectoplasm. I love the idea that John loves this dumb ghost so much that he’s memorized all the lore about them in their appearances throughout the franchise, and devised this username based on being an expert on these ghosts right down to their biology (or at least thinking he is).
The only catch is, ‘fondness for paranormal lore’ is very passive and doesn’t even imply much knowledge, much less action, while ‘biologist’ implies that John has been doing actual experiments. The idea of John trying to create a real life Slimer the same way other kids make slime in their kitchens is really entertaining, if an off the wall theory. Does ‘homestuck’ just mean John is grounded for an unethical science project?
(...) “and are an aspiring AMATEUR MAGICIAN.”
The magic chest is one of the biggest, most eye catching and most colorful objects in John’s room. We see its contents on page 8, which lean more into joke store items than things a magician might use, except for the trick handcuffs and perhaps the collapsible sword. The narration on this page states that John is neither a skilled magician nor a cunning prankster. I’m nitpicking definitions here, but everything John has done so far has been way more about pranks than about magic.
John’s uses of the magic chest to date are…
various putting things into his inventory and removing them (funny, but unintentionally)
combining fake arms with cake (p.36) out of necessity, which ‘makes the cake at least 300% more hilarious’
merging hat with beagle puss to create a clever disguise (p.45) and wearing it for 25+ pages, which he acknowledges is a ‘shitty disguise’
attaching fake arms to harlequin doll (p.65), which makes it ‘AT LEAST a million percent funnier’
All of which are definitely not magic tricks, and honestly not even pranks. Arguably John’s best and most successful prank so far has been when he pretended not to have arms for the first six pages, before revealing his arms after the interface had gone to the trouble of moving the cake off his magic chest to get him some arms.
John keeps thinking about reading Colonel Sassacre’s Guide to Magical Frivolity and Practical Japery, but always finding some excuse not to. He can’t read it until he captchalogues it, but once he does that, it gets buried in his inventory. He assumes that the book can tell him the exact percentage increase of hilarity a prank leads to, but it’s too big for him to actually look anything up.
An outside theory for this that I don’t think is likely simply because it’s so much darker than the comic has been so far, is that John loves this book, but since the incident where his nanna was killed by a copy (perhaps even this copy?) he hasn’t been able to bring himself to read it. A far more likely theory is that while John is an aspiring amateur magician, it’s more of a big idea, and he hasn’t actually done any magic yet. This also tracks with his weaksauce pranks above. And if that’s true, then it says a lot about John that he defines himself by a hobby he aspires to but doesn’t actually practice - he’s someone with big dreams and less motivation, just like his big dream of going to collect the mail from his father despite the lack of motivation that’s kept him messing around for 70 pages.
“You also like to play GAMES sometimes.”
Potentially most important of all is Gamer John. We get a list of games John likes to play from inspecting his CD tower the same way we get a list of movies from looking at his posters.
Bard Quest
The Caper Havers
Problem Sleuth
And It Don’t Stop
What Pumpkin?
Ghostbusters II MMORPG
Little Monsters (for Nintendo)
Harry Anderson: Call My Bluff!
The first five games all reference previous work by the author of Homestuck, and as such probably don’t need in depth analysis. However, the fact that within the world of Homestuck, these are all games (instead of comics) is one of several suggestions that we should think of Homestuck as a game, something that needs further analysis.
The next two games are video game adaptations of movies we know John likes, and the last is a branded video game from Harry Anderson, whose book we’ve already seen in John’s magic chest. Notably, none of these are real video games in our world either. It says a lot that John plays game versions of things he already likes (he’s put ‘countless manhours’ into this assortment of quality titles).
However, it’s undeniable that the most important game in John’s life right now is Sburb. The poster is behind his head in the first panel, placed centrally with one of the only two splashes of color in the panel. The beta release is the only thing marked on his calendar for April besides his birthday, and the Sburb logo is even the picture printed on the calendar - perhaps it’s a calendar themed around new game releases? There’s clear delight on John’s face when he thinks about getting the beta, and his quest to fetch it from the recently delivered mail is the closest thing to a story this comic has so far.
Unfortunately, we know almost nothing about Sburb, so we don’t know what it says about John that he wants to play it. It’s publicized as the Game of the Year, and according to GameBro, the game may be about houses and the player may not get to thrash anything, although these details are provided by someone who hasn’t played the game so I’m not taking them as expert opinion. It might be multiplayer - TT has been pestering TG all day about playing it with her. Maybe John just wants to share a game with his friends.
Speaking of GameBro, John can’t stand the magazine, although he for some reason has a copy on his desk. He describes the publication as ‘a joke’ to TG, and he makes the effort to take it downstairs to the fire and burn it, presumably releasing asbestos fibers into the house and causing serious lung damage to himself and his father. Does he read this because it’s the only games magazine that exists? Or did he like it just fine until now, when it trashed the game he’s excited about, and now he’s furious with it? Either way, it tracks with John’s overall fondness for critically panned media that he would be angry about contrarian critics.
–
All of this has left me with a few questions about John as our main character. These are the things that I’m keeping an eye on and trying to answer as the story continues.
What is John good at?
We hear so much about what John is bad at. He’s explicitly stated to be bad at programming, pranks, and magic. He’s bad at using his sylladex. He’s clumsy and knocked over his nanna’s ashes. He’s got bad taste in media. He’s funny but only when he doesn’t try to be, and even then he’s sometimes the butt of the joke, where the joke is how not funny John’s joke is. He was tempted to squawk like an imbecile and shit on his desk. He has like six different prankster props and he doesn’t even use all of them. I’m saying all this with love and kindness because he also just seems like such a sweet kid, but so far he doesn’t have any defined strengths or skills.
Is he going to turn out to be really good at gaming and kick ass at Sburb? Are we going to get a curveball where it turns out John is an amazing baker, and he hates the cakes in his room and the smell of Betty Crocker because he can do so much better than that packet mix? Or is he starting off from this low point so he can develop skills as time goes on?
What is John’s relationship with his dad really like?
John doesn’t want his dad to monopolize his time and feels trapped in his room, despite his dad baking cakes and leaving notes on gifts telling John he’s proud of him. John’s dad gets his son one great present that John’s really appreciative of, and one terrible present that John immediately hates. All of this feels very reasonable and normal for a teen feeling misunderstood by a parent who’s trying their best.
And then there’s the clowns.
John can excuse magical frivolity and practical japery, but he draws the line at harlequins. He’s an aspiring magician, but his dad’s figurines are ‘fucking garbage’ and his dad ‘sure can be a real cornball’. John seems like somebody who gets angry at ultimately unimportant things, like bad reviews of games, too many cakes, and harlequin figurines, but because of the subject matter it reads like an intense rivalry between two highly specific subcultures that outsiders would group together. John is really making a huge deal of needing to disguise himself and mentally prepare himself to go down and face his dad, and I want to know if there’s any genuine reason behind John’s fear, or if it’s solely the overdramatics I’m starting to think are typical of him.
Is John ‘Homestuck’?
‘Sometimes you feel like you are trapped in this room. Stuck, if you will, in a sense which possibly borders on the titular.’ (p.30)
John clearly feels like he’s stuck at home, but is this the extent of the title’s meaning? His dad has recently returned from getting groceries, so leaving the house is in theory possible. Reasons why John might be homestuck include: he’s not allowed to leave the house (for example, he’s grounded, or his dad is very controlling), he can leave the house but there’s nowhere to go (he lives near major roads, bodies of water, farms, or other obstacles, and there’s no public transport to get anywhere), or he can leave the house but it’s not safe to do so (there’s some sort of external threat, either supernatural like a monster or alien invasion, or mundane like a criminal or bomb threat). Seeing out of John’s window and into his front yard does not provide any clues; it looks like an extremely average front yard with a tree, swing and mailbox, and we know the mail was recently delivered, so there can’t be anything too world-ending happening in the neighborhood. Right now John’s goal (the Sburb Beta disc) is inside the house, so this might not get answered right away - in fact, my running theory is that the game itself might hold the answers, as its logo is a house.
What’s the differentiation between John and the narrator?
My biggest question of all, and one that probably deserves its own essay. I’m fascinated by the lines ‘In a kid's yard, a tree without a tire swing is like a proper gentleman without a monocle.’ (p.27) and ‘In a home, a FIREPLACE needs a fire, because that's what FIREPLACE is for.’ (p.50). These lines carry so much opinion, but because the narrator is constantly addressing John with the second person ‘you’, I don’t think these are John’s opinions. The narrator does have a window into John’s thoughts, so the line between them can be blurred, but there's clearly a distinction somewhere, because there have been pushbacks and disagreements between the two of them.
One theory is that John’s dad is the narrator - John’s at home a lot for whatever reason, and so the constant and overbearing presence of his dad means that he can’t get him out of his head even when he’s alone, the commands at the top of each page reflecting John’s dad’s level of control over his son’s life. But I think this question is open ended enough that I’m not willing to commit to one theory yet. After all, we ‘examine 3rd and 4th walls of [John’s] room’ which is a directly meta allusion to the comic’s audience that only really makes sense if the narrator isn’t a character in the comic itself.
–
I think John Egbert has been really well characterized so far. He feels like a real kid, one who keeps getting off track and forgetting what he should be doing, but one who it’s enough fun to get to know that I don’t really notice. While the main character in media often doesn’t end up being the most interesting character, I do want to keep an eye on John because I think he has a lot going on to analyze. Above the style and the world and the mechanics, John as a character is the aspect of the comic I’m most interested in right now.
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Half-Lore #1: Xen, The Nihilanth, and Race X
As promised, here's the first instalment in my deep dives into HL's worldbuilding! You all voted for this topic to go first- I'll work my way down from the list I made, but if there's anything you'd like to hear about, let me know. So, without further ado... have a gander at the wall of text under the cut. All images have descriptions!
Xen
Xen is what's known as a 'border world', a planet right on the edge of our understanding of space, and the primary subject of a lot of Black Mesa's research. The planet is also used as a teleport 'slingshot', according to Mossman in HL2, as its latent energy acts as a launching pad for whatever's being teleported.
Crystals from Xen (the orange-yellow rocks found all around the planet) were able to facilitate early teleportation research, the likes of which made Black Mesa a hell of a lot of money. A sample of these Xen crystals was delivered by the G-Man to Black Mesa, at the behest of Administrator Breen. This was tested by Dr Gina Cross and found to be the purest sample they'd seen yet, and they were sent to the anti-mass spectrometer for testing immediately. At this point, the crystal was swapped out for a corrupted sample by the G-Man, therefore kicking off the Resonance Cascade.
Xen is a hostile planet, home to quite a few dangerous creatures. However, it should be noted that nothing is native to Xen. Everything you encounter on Xen wasn't born there, but instead fled there. This is because they were escaping persecution on their respective homeworlds by the Combine. It's unknown whether this was the result of the Nihilanth teleporting them to the planet to act as its invading force, or mere coincidence that so many ended up there. Speaking of which...
The Nihilanth - In-Game Lore
The Nihilanth is the last of its species, having fled the Combine's invasion of its home, and possible enslavement of its race. The Nihilanth was also implied to be a former slave itself. It oversees a vast slave colony of vortigaunts, who toil away in its factory. It's unknown what this factory was actually producing- in typical chunky 1998 fashion, a lot of it is just boxes with pretty textures. This is why the Vortigaunts all wear a green collar and chains in HL1.
When Gordon inserted the corrupted Xen crystal into the anti-mass spectrometer, the resonance cascade allowed the Nihilanth to finally breach through to Earth and directly teleport its alien forces in. Again, it's not known whether the Nihilanth intended to take over Earth, or simply find another place to hide from the Combine, and was willing to do whatever necessary to secure it.
The Nihilanth was also not particularly fond of human scientists taking things from Xen for research purposes. In a level transition in HL:D, it'll say "Thieves, you are all thieves..."
When the Nihilanth was killed, the Combine took notice of Xen- and by extension, Earth. The resonance cascade had already shattered Earth's natural defenses to teleporting aliens, and so the Combine quickly swooped in to conquer Earth. That's the 7-Hour War, but we won't get into that here. The death of such a psychically powerful creature sent shockwaves throughout Xen. The vortigaunts were freed from its influence, however, leading to their tense alliance with the humans.
Curiously enough, it appears that the Nihilanth was actually aware of the G-Man, and his influence over Gordon. During level transitions, The Nihilanth makes repeated references to the G-Man deceiving Gordon, and that he "is not man." It's the first reference we have to G-Man explicitly being non-human, and also led to a lot of fan theories that the G-Man was actually part of the Nihilanth's race (though this is unlikely, as the Nihilanth is clearly referred to as 'the last).
The Nihilanth - An Interpretation
The Nihilanth is the most blunt piece of symbolism we get in Half-Life's story. The entire first game is an analogy for fighting against nihilism in an uncaring world that will constantly seek to break you down. Gordon is battling against forces completely outside of his control, trying to fix a mistake he didn't realise he was making, which was orchestrated by a man who's been manipulating him from the very beginning. It's a pretty grim tale. Gordon's reward for defeating his own nihilism is to be forced into another situation outside of his control- he quite literally does not have a say in it. He either takes a new deal, or is killed.
Gordon's defeat of his nihilism became a source of hope for the rebels 20 years on- despite being a single scientist in Black Mesa, facing impossible odds, he lived. That's why it's such a big deal when he comes back, and why the lambda symbol became synonymous with the rebels. Gordon is hope, the light in the darkness for so many nihilists who didn't believe they could do anything to fight back against the Combine. Gordon is a character to be projected on- this was explicit in the game's design. He doesn't have a personality, a voice- anything. He's the human spirit, and whenever you play through Half-Life, you're going on your own journey to defeat your inner nihilist. How cool is that?
What the hell is Race X?
Race X is a funny one. This is one of those "It'll be a cool idea, guys!" moments that never comes up again. In fact, it's pretty much agreed that Race X has been retconned entirely. Sorry, Pit Worm lovers.
They were essentially a group of aliens from beyond Xen, first featured in Opposing Force. Race X itself was entirely created by Gearbox (the studio behind Opposing Force and Blue Shift), rather than Valve. Even Marc Laidlaw said that he doesn't consider them canon. Yowch.
It's implied that Race X is more powerful than regular Xen creatures, as they actually have access to advanced weaponry and teleportation tech. They were discovered by chance, when a group of Black Mesa scientists accidentally teleported into their realm. Where this realm is located is pretty nebulous, if you'll pardon the pun. It's just... somewhere beyond Xen.
Their leader is the Gene Worm, whom they were clearing space for when they first teleported to Earth. The Gene Worm required a pretty sizeable portal to get to Earth- hence needing to clear space by force. Obviously, this doesn't happen. Adrian Shepard massacred them so thoroughly that they aren't even canon anymore.
That's all for this instalment! If you got this far, thank you for reading! Here's a video of Gabe Newell pretending to be Ringo Starr as a prize.
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I want to talk about something in regards to Flight of Icarus.
disclaimer: I fully read the book, slept two nights over it and enjoyed it a lot. There is a possibility of finding content on my blog from now on that contains lore from the story. My Eddie characterisations won't change much in their essence though since I pretty much head cannoned him like he's pictured in the book the whole time.
Okay. Let's go. No detailed spoilers ahead.
Feeling jealous in the light of the romantic arch in the book or the mentiones of Eddie's experiences with intimacy is okay.
It's not a great experience I bet, but you're not being a bad or silly person simply for feeling that way.
Many of us have built a deep emotional connection to this fictional character for all kinds of reasons. While I personally don't
think that the fact that the book is coming from the creators of ST makes a difference to canon, I do understand that for some
people the book has a different weight than fanfic. And that is ok too.
So right now, many people can't help but feel heartache or jealousy over the story. Emotions are not rational. And I am deeply sorry
that some of you feel bad about something that used to be your escape and save space. That sucks.
However, we all have control over how we act upon those feelings. And being hateful or mean towards others (including the author) ain't it. No exceptions.
I don't care for your personal reasons why you feel that way, I'm not your therapist, that is your business to deal with, but lashing out about your personal, very subjective feelings is just not the way to deal with them.
Slipping up can happen to everybody, and that is human, but there is a line when a slip-up stops being that. And accept the fact that nobody owes you to listen to your opinion. Accept that people might find your opinion a reason to stop interacting with you, even if you voice it in a civil way.
Find a friend who gets it and let out all of those feelings in a closed safe-space with curse words and shit. Get it out, cleanse yourself from that pressure. That's cool.
Writing a fix-it fic that will get your emotions out? Ask an author who is comfortable with that to write something like that? Cool.
Journal. Skip rocks. Work out. Angry clean your house. Throw darts at a copy of the book. Get creative without getting other real people into the crossfire.
And then, maybe step away for a few days to let the dust settle and then come back and see how it feels. Oftentimes it's just like poking
at a wasp's nest to keep leaning into those feelings and the pain and get all heated up again and again.
Give yourself some time. Be kind to yourself. But also be kind to others!!!
I believe with my whole being that kindness is the best fucking thing we as a fandom can practice right now. And nuance. Always nuance.
That book isn't a bad thing just because it makes you feel uncomfortable or because it didn't fulfil your wishes or expectations. You have the right to have your opinion but opinions do not exist in a vacuum.
Opinions can be hurtful and harmful.
They are not neutral - that's the whole point - so giving it a few moments of thought on how and where to voice them is imperative. Or if it's even necessary to voice them at all. It's ok to fuck up but own that and say sorry. Be kind.
Criticism of the book is valid, not liking the thing is valid, it's not about that. (Fucking hell I love discourse and meta and analysis.) It's about being mindful and responsible for what energy you put out into the world and how you treat real human beings.
When in doubt, step back, give it time to cool. Making posts in the heat of anger is rarely a good decision.
We're all here to have a good time. Why do we keep tearing each other down about something we all claim to love?
It's not worth it.
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Forget fictional characters - share some hamster deep lore with the class!
which one?? There were 19! (and I will say to anyone concerned, only 2 of the hamsters died unnatural deaths, neither at the hands of any humans)
Do I tell you about Eevee II's secret hideaway inside a carebear? Do you want the highlight reel of Smokey's fight against the cat? Gidgiddonihah's hide-and-seek prowess? Isaac's tragically good timing of his own death? Why we had to ban the game 'hamster on the loose'? Do you want their Genealogies? the great Art they inspired (aka, my dad made up stories about "detective Hamster" every sunday starting in july of 2000, several years before Geronimo stilton, the copy-creature....)
hmm.
I shall tell you about. The Stove.
the Hamsters, as a general Rule, lived in their large cages under The Farm Table in the kitchen, the table where we put groceries, canisters, odds and ends, etc. occasionally the cages were moved to my bedroom, or later to the basement (for cool darkness!) but most of the time it was kitchen.
and the hamsters liked to Escape. This was, you know, a Problem, especially when doors get left open. there was a sort of design flaw in the first set of cages we had, where the hamsters figured out out to get the lids to pop off, then shove bedding under their wheels and climb up them like ladders. we figure Isaac taught Eevee to do it, since he was the most frequent Escapee. invariably, we'd come to breakfast in the morning, check on the critters to give a yogurt drop, and notice on or the other was Out. they never escaped together, these two hated each other and had separate cages. but we'd always find them in the same place, under the kitchen stove, a huge white double oven monstrosity with a very rusty drawer that we got very good at pulling out to access the dusty space underneath. we'd see the little hamster pawprints. luckily, it was a storage drawer and not a broiler drawer-- but they never got into the drawer anyways. just the space between it and the floor. Not a very big space!
after those two died, we got two more hamsters, figured they'd have their own Place to run. behind the fridge, maybe, or try climbing the carpeted stairs?
no. the stove Drew them. we never had mice back there. but it was like some holy shrine for the hamsters. It would get to the point where my brother or I would shout a house warning "[hamster's] missing?" and get the callback " check the stove."
which was. uh. certainly a Thing for my friends to hear when they were visiting for the first time, I tell you what.
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"Go To Hell" - WIP (Gale x Tav)
I have this curse of "I can't write anything in order" (It's ADHD) so I haven't posted a lot of my writing on here yet, despite the 50+ pages of lore I have for my Tav and Gale's story XD
So instead I wanted to share a piece of this scene I'm working on! (based on Gale's First Night in Camp dialogue)
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With little else to do aside from pacing across the grove all night, SJ decided to check on him.
Gale let out a deep sigh, warming his hands over the campfire as she approached.
“Go to hell.” He said, slowly, never taking his eyes off the flames.
She hadn't expected Gale to be optimistic about their decidedly terrifying situation, but a more polite greeting to the person who saved his life would have been nice.
Blinking at the sudden attitude, SJ replied with, “Been there, done that. Wouldn't recommend it.”
“Ha-” he turned his head to look at her with a half smile. “You're a good sport.”
“I do try. Mind if I join you?”
“By all means.” Gale gestured to the space at his side, moving away to make room as she sat down beside him.
The smoky aroma in the air, combined with the heat radiating off the fire seemed to calm the tadpole's insistent writhing.
“Anything in particular I did to deserve that lovely greeting?" SJ asked, attempting to distract herself from the sudden itching sensation behind her right eye.
“Nothing, I assure you. I'm just… poorly making a point. A rather trivial statement in other circumstances. But we've seen hell, and it isn't trivial.” he replied, staring miserably at the fire.
“So your point was best made by telling a tiefling to go to hell?” she chuckled, hoping to make light of something whatever was bothering him.
Gale opened his mouth to explain, but quickly abandoned the thought in favor of another.
“Perhaps one day I'll be able to speak to you without making an ass of myself, but it appears that day will not be today.”
“Well there’s always tomorrow.” she shrugged, already wondering what might come of their mission to rescue the archdruid. “That is, assuming we survive the night.”
“Hmm. True enough. What a difference a day makes.” he added, wistfully.
“Tell me about it. Why do you think I'm out here? I can't sleep with this... thing, in my head.”
As she spoke, SJ could already feel her eyelids grow heavier. A weariness began to seep into her body as the warmth of the flames caressed her skin. Despite the many unknowns of their unwelcome passengers, it seemed odd that the tadpole would respond to a change in temperature outside the body.
“What are you still doing up?” she asked, through a yawn.
“The fire was starting to dim. After the debacle with those goblins, I thought it best to keep as much light around us as possible.”
“I can keep an eye on it,” she offered. “if you wanted to get some sleep.”
Gale considered the statement, before shaking his head. “A ballet of flames invites reflection. I’d rather stay, if it’s all the same to you.”
It didn’t take the connection of a mind flayer tadpole to know what was really bothering him. Their shared affliction had been on (and in) everyone’s minds since escaping the Nautiloid.
“Afraid I’ll turn while you’re sleeping and eat your brain?” she smirked.
Gale wasn’t quite as amused. His eyes locked onto hers, nervously studying her face as if she was about to transform right in front of him.
“I’m just joking... I’m fine.” she said, firmly.
“Oh I’m sure you are.” Gale replied, his expression relaxing as he turned towards the fire once again. “Illithids aren’t exactly known for their wit. Famously humorless creatures.”
“Then I’ll be sure to crack a joke or two every once and a while, just so you know you’re safe around me.” SJ said, nudging his arm with her elbow.
Hidden in the firelight reflecting off his face, she could have sworn she caught him smile.
#galeposting#gale of waterdeep#bg3 gale#bg3 tav#gale x tav#bg3 spoilers#gale dekarios#bg3 oc#bg3 writing#gale x f!tav#gale x female tav
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opinion on susie?
hi sorry this took *reads clock* oh god this is from 8th of september oh christ i was procrastinating on finishing planet robobot bc i didnt want it to be over :c
anyways the short answer is i absolutely ADORE susie n shes easily one of the best antagonists
(note:my knowledge of anything being confirmed outside the implication of how susie knew sphere doomers and her 2.0 pause screen is non existent so uh lol if i get smth wrong? this is just how i connected the backstory lore drops in my head)
the long answer is i think shes extremely good at being sympathetic while still being extremely funny in an evil way, on one hand, i feel its very easy to understand what her deal is, she gets sent to hell as a child, crawls out of it likely already wondering deep inside why nobody came for her but too focused on reuniting with her father, only to find out not only has his work lost the purpose she knew of, but he didnt even know her anymore.i think it makes perfect sense with this shed end up not knowing what to do other than get back at him, like growing up in hell/space void/whatever man im sleepy will not result in you getting out fine and dandy specially if the person who mattered most to you, and who youd remember as your main reason to escape to reunite with, seems to not even care you were gone, and w having to fend for her life constantly, i can see why she wouldnt care for cooperating with his company as long as it leads her to the result she wants (of having haltmann remember and beg for her forgiveness), no reason girl wouldnt have a self benefit only survival sense
also i have nothing deep to say on her being funny shes just objectively the funniest kirby character.yippee! *gives you fatal computer brain damage while already fantasizing of you begging for my forgiveness*
n regarding what she did to meta knight (which is what pisses off most ppl)...its literally no worse than what taranza did to dedede, and not nearly as bad as what forgo did to him.theres nothing implying the robot turning process was painful for him and he literally flies it off like its no big deal.hes fine.also if she was a guy yall would be writing essays on the homoeroticism of your still overly angsty hcs of mecha knight.if you wanna complain abt something susie might have had dedede buried back into the castle rubble after getting his clone dna thing.kinda rude!
tl dr 2.0 no empathy revenge fueled queen whos funny.yippee!
#ask#im so seepy.#shes so easy to sympathize w for me.tbh to me shes like a better expanded m.agolor in a way.#funny.fucked up.just shes not stuck with very loose implications forever
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Piarles + 6 ("Are you jealous?") 🙏
It's not like he's expecting all that much on a race weekend, of all things. Pierre knows that every team's media responsibilities are different, and that Ferrari especially thrives off of the content it's putting out between race weekends. He's been training himself not to be bothered by it...or, at the very least, trying his damnedest.
It's been getting harder, lately, considering Carlos' driving has been infuriating Pierre for the better half of this year so far and Charles still giggles and laughs along with him whenever they're in front of Josh's work phone.
Josh, of all people! Pierre's friend. He'd never wish anything bad on him, truly, but the little jealous creature that is permanently entrenched deep in his gut wishes he'd never left AlphaTauri. He'd been good at playing up the heavy bromance between himself and Yuki back in the day, which will only mean it will work just as well with Charles and Carlos. It's a nauseating thought.
But he's trying not to have it. It's especially difficult this weekend, because Monza is so steeped in Ferrari lore that there's no way Pierre is going to escape without being forced to witness some god-awful onslaught of red teammate shenanigans on his Instagram feed, but he is trying. It's what has him clenching his fist as he walks through the motorhome lot, the water bottle in his other hand getting the white-knuckling treatment as he thinks about how he is not thinking about Charles getting too close to Carlos to make the tifosi happy. "It is only a weekend," he mumbles aloud like he's actually going to listen to himself. It's only a weekend, and Jack had texted him earlier in the week that the two of them will be doing some TikTok trend because Esteban is too busy to have fun or whatever. He'll survive.
And then he hears a bright peal of laughter as he's walking by the alley between the Ferrari and McLaren motorhomes, and his confidence in that statement wanes dramatically. When he turns towards the sound, Pierre is greeted with the sight of Carlos fucking Sainz leaned onto Charles, tickling him as someone not named Josh films the two of them for some stupid challenge. He's almost chest-to-back with him, one arm hooked around his waist, and oh Pierre is seeing red. Is there a color beyond red for this? If there is, he's being swallowed up in it. Charles lifts his head at the perfect moment, mouth open wide and giggling as he seems to register Pierre's presence. His eyes are sparkling with joy.
Pierre doesn't even have the wherewithal to wave. With a noise that feels like it's been clawed from deep in his chest, he stalks off the rest of the way to Alpine's setup, anger boiling in his blood and filling his ears from what he'd just seen. There is no personal space between them, he thinks hotly, there is never any fucking space. He's rationalized instances like this before, and he will again, but the sight of Carlos pressed so intimately against Charles is burned into his retinas right now. He swings his driver's room door open and then slams it shut. Ben asks him if he's alright through the door and Pierre barely manages an I'm fine before he throws himself onto the couch like a child having a tantrum. "Fucking Monza," he mutters to the empty room. Like he didn't win here once upon a time. Like he doesn't love Italy with his whole heart.
Truthfully, Pierre doesn't know how much time he's actually spent coiled up in anger when the knock at his door breaks the silence. "Pierrot," Charles' voice is sweet and concerned, which means Pierre doesn't stand a chance against him right now. He sighs and sags further into the couch.
"Come in, Charles," he answers. The door clicks open immediately and Charles doesn't even bother waiting for it to swing shut again before he's clambering onto the couch, wrapping his arms around Pierre's shoulders to deliver a wet kiss to his cheek. The wildfire of rage in him cools off a little.
"Hi," Charles murmurs, nose smushed against the line of Pierre's beard. His mouth is warm. Pierre wants nothing more than to tug him into his lap and kiss him senseless--kiss him until he forgets his teammate, his team, his purpose here in the first place.
Instead, he sighs. "Hi," he responds, trying to keep from sounding too despondent. "What are you doing here, calamar?"
Charles peels back to raise his eyebrows. "What do you mean," he says flatly. "I did just witness you storm off like you were going to commit a murder, Pierre. Was I not supposed to come make sure you were not in trouble?" His mouth is quirked in a little smile, but his eyes hold a glint of concern that makes Pierre feel a little guilty.
"I'm fine," he replies. But it sounds flimsy to his own ears, and Charles snorts and shakes his head. "Don't worry about me, Charles. I'm alright. Nothing is wrong." He tries to pull Charles into his lap, now, but Charles is firmly settled into Pierre's side right now, and is apparently using all of his toned muscle to stay there.
"You're a terrible liar," he mumbles. "You can tell me any--" but then he cuts off, inhaling sharply all of a sudden, and Pierre swallows because this is exactly what he does when he figures out how exactly to read the mood. "Are you jealous?"
He sounds so incredulous that Pierre can't help the flush that colors his cheeks. "No," he lies. Charles tuts softly and grabs at Pierre's jaw, tilting his head so that they're now facing one another properly. He can't hide this for long.
"You are a terrible liar," Charles repeats, voice even quieter. "Pierre, I don't--you have nothing to be jealous over, Carlos is my teammate. I have to do this with him. We are a brand, no matter how much I don't like it." He wrinkles his nose. "You know I only love you."
Pierre does. Hearing Charles say it out loud again makes him blush even more, embarrassment putting more and more of his heated feelings out. He does know Charles loves him and him alone, and he does know that it's all Ferrari mandates and propagandas, but...
"Charlie," he murmurs. "I'm sorry. I know." When he tugs at Charles again, this time, he's rewarded: the Monegasque hums softly and goes along with it, settles in Pierre's lap like a weighted blanket and drapes his arms over Pierre's shoulders. The expression on his face is loving and knowing and nonplussed all at once.
"I know you are not his biggest fan," he hums. "And you know I am mad at him for what he has done to you this season. But I can't avoid him, mon petit." Charles rubs a gentle hand against Pierre's chest. "Please don't be upset. Please?" He's giving Pierre the big doe eyes that always, always work on him. Damn his boyfriend for knowing him so well.
He swallows, then reaches up to rest his hand against Charles' cheek. "I won't be," he answers. Then: "I will try my hardest, Charlie. For you."
Charles' face breaks into a grin. "For me," he echoes. "Thank you, mon petit." He swoops in for a kiss--chaste, quick, warm. Pierre wants to keep him trapped in his arms all day long. "I love you." Their noses bump. Pierre sighs, then leans in again for another kiss. (He can't help it. Habit.)
"And I love you."
#piarles#10 x 16#fic#everyone look away as i rearrange the 2023 f1 schedule for my own writing convenience!#i will literally never shy away from jealousierre btw he is hall of fame To Me#thank u for the prompt cerona!!!!!!!!!!! ily!!!!!!!!!!!#romance meme#ask reply#cerona10
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i love how ur bio says safe space for hopper haters bc too many ppl in this fandom are always like “whaaaaat!? but how can u not like jopper 🥺” when he is not only a full grown man who abuses his power and was horrible to Joyce in s3 but also his character itself is literally copaganda
and it’s concerning and so weird (but also unsurprising) that jopper is like… elevated as this god tier ship, even in queer spaces, when in reality it’s pretty mid and also why would I want to ship Joyce byers with a cop
Hey booksandpaperss!
I am a safe space for ALL HATING. But specifically Jim Copper hate simply because he is shown a lot of undeserved grace by the fandom and the writers.
Since it's now in vogue to hate on s3 I'll take this opportunity to escape being called a negative nancy for once and just a hatering hater. Here goes:
My hate for Hopper is not as a result of season 3 but in fact it began with s2. (s1 a wee bit) But truly honestly deeply since season 2.
Hopper in season 2
After giving up Eleven's location in the prior season, Hopper then out of the goodness of his heart (😒) starts leaving Eggos for El in a reverse HansEl and GretEl. The feral El now has a home. But is it a home? Or just another prison? Hopper leaves her alone in the cabin with nothing but a TV. And so El spends her days mindlessly going through all the shit the idiot box has to offer. The only time she's actively interested in the TV is when she wants to use the static to get into the void. Because she has been kept away from the ONE friend she made out of the lab. And let's bffr. It's Mike. She is looking for Mike. And Mike too is the only one thinking about her. Hopper keeping her away from him and lying and being nothing but and angy aggressive cop of a dad is supposed to make the audience feel.....wait what are we supposed to feel? Mad at Hopper? Cuz the end result was people hating on El rebelling against Hopper. And it is all because El's resolution at the end of the Lost Sister episode was......that she needed to go back to Hopper and her friends. However, again it is a point in time when Hopper's at the lab and in mortal danger.
So since we love deep dives and shit and developing lore around characters, would she have been compelled to return to Hopper were he just, idk sitting in his cabin or at the station or whatever. A lot of ST is just about characters deciding to do stuff when someone is in REAL DANGER™️ But specifically with Hopper, he only steps up as dad when El's in danger. Otherwise he's treating her as a pet, something Mike was wrongfully accused of.
The whole entire (almost) year that El was with Hopper we do not see a change in her personality. Her rage has worsened. Her vocabulary is still lacking. In spite of the word of the days. There's no female presence in her life. He neither recruited Joyce nor her aunt (though that would have been sus, agreed n yet would it have been any different seeing as El managed to do it alone.) She's been held hostage for her own good.
Hopper: You put us in danger.
El: You promise. I go. I never leave. Nothing ever happens.
And then he grounds her. Like she was living it up otherwise. (S2E4)
We know it was because this was El's story of rebellion and trying to find her identity and so the story does not have Hopper do these things. But that still means that the story chose for Hopper to not do these things. He is even shown apologising (meh. half assed like his foil Mike, but that's for later) for it towards the end. And yet, that's something that's rarely discussed in fandom circles while talking about Hopper.
Hopper in Season 3
Oh he proves he's a blackhole alright. Sucked Joyce's character development. He's only marginally improved letting Mike see her but beyond that it's still mostly the same. She still is under-socialised. Speaks like that. El herself seeks out Max. Joyce is still too busy being ungrateful (I know not the intent, but the execution nonetheless) she's still not leaving the cabin much and has some curfew. Again which is, well why is it there? Cuz she's been coolly gallivanting with Max at the mall and everywhere else without a problem.
He's a proper asshole to Mike and a bully. Who tf threatens murder to a 13 year old kid? Like between having a chat and threatening homicide, he could come up with ZERO options. He needs emotional laxatives that aren't just anger and bullying.
Hopper in season 3 is an unfunny comic relief. A man baby. A bully who uses his cop privileges. Who treats the woman he supposedly likes like shit. He was so mad about Joyce not meeting up with him despite her telling him the reason. I mean mister you did that with Eleven too and just expected her to understand. The juvenile hUmOUr and the macho man action scenes where he's outwitting trained Russian mercenaries (lmao) is a step down from the basement he was already in. Him treating Alexei like shit when he was the only one who could have helped them. Make it make sense. (Anti-Russia/USSR pro USA copaganda and nothing else)
Also beyond all of this I simply hate Hopper for taking away valuable screentime from the kids that this show is supposedly about but hasn't really been that for some time now. He's a white male war veteran cop who's a Hawkins native and was a popular kid in school too. So he's not even an outsider in terms of being the new man in town, let alone the shit that really matters.
Hopper in Season 4
Not dead enough.
Jopper throughout the show
Mid chemistry. Joyce is already a semi-absent mother but becomes entirely absent after Hopper's message from Russia. She has ZERO clue of what her kids are going through in Cali and then has the fucking audacity to walk out on them without even letting them know that she might not return. She also leaves the only responsible person in that household with the charge as if she ever took it. She is now been relegated to being the comic relief which is neither comical and far from a relief and Hopper's girlfriend. Every season she has proven to be right on the money with her instincts and every season everyone including Hopper question her as if she's the dumb one. Hello. Do you guys clear up your memory after every season? It's annoying and one note. Hopper is a jealous manbaby all of s3 and a fucking liar. "i shOuldn't hAVe seNt yOu the LeTteR" Bitch u did. You wanted out. Dasvidaniya! El's college fund. But you'll only need it if you make it through school 🤷♀️. WHICH SHOULD HAVE BEEN HOMESCHOOL HELLO. Though I do commend the subversion of the found family trope where both the adults are pathetic parents. Do love one of the main couples being failparents! (is that a thing? or are they pioneers?)
#byler#stranger things#wewe's askbox#jim hopper#jim copper#joyce byers#anti jopper#kinda had to reel it in
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Introduction: Level 5 Inmate 0001: The “Slender Man” aka. Dr. P.J Hopkins (for lore purposes, the facility has no clue they are the same guy)
Classification: Unknown
Threat Level: Severe
Primary traits: Quiet, aggressive.
Abilities: Can sting its victims and turn them into “zombies” of sorts. Other abilities are unknown as of now.
Age: Unknown
Gender: Unknown (suspecting male)
Debrief: (tw. Animal death, body horror, violence)
6 years ago, The Underground was founded. A place to keep ‘Inmates’ (unexplained anomalies) away from the regular world. From demons, to super-humans, to sentient machinery. The Underground was supposed to house, study, and neutralize these threats. The founder, Dr. P.J Hopkins, was a very well equipped man to find out the secrets of these strange beings. But, he used the space on the lowest level to do his own strange and unusual things. You see, he was a man of all trades, he knew everything you could ever ask, even the things you never thought had an answer. He knew it. He was a very smart man. And humble.
Dr. Hopkins was trying to find a way to expand. To find something more than this world, more than this universe. He worked for years to build a gateway to find alternate dimensions. He did. He opened “The Gate”. A large hole that crackled with deep and un heard of power. Dr. Hopkins appointed a small group of interns and scientists to his study as long as they kept it quiet of their secret operation. Trials and tests to find if the idea of travel through the gate was even possible turned up inconclusive. They used animals like dogs, cats, and rats to travel between the gateways and some came back fine. Shaken, but fine. Others…were changed, mutated into agonized forms of their past selves. Given they only stayed in the Gate for no longer than an hour, they concluded that staying between the gateways was harmful. But if you managed to reach the other side, you seemed fine. The final test before human trial was a dog, a husky named Kibbles. The Dog walked in with its long rope lead. Everyone waited as the rope tugged on for 30 minutes, which was the supposed amount of time it took to get from one gate to the other. But after a moment, the rope tugged, that dog wasn’t strong enough for that. Dr. Hopkins demanded they pull the dog back but within minutes the rope was cut and Kibbles was gone.
Dr. Hopkins deemed the project unable to host human trails that night.
After Kibbles went missing, every time Dr. Hopkins passed the Gate, he would hear something. Something…wrong. At first he thought it could have been his imagination. But as weeks went by, the sounds only took over his head. Whispers. Whispers beckoning him to come into the Gate. To follow their call. Dr. Hopkins had enough. He decided it was best to shut down the project. Knowing that it was too dangerous. But, as he started to shut down, the voices came. He tried to ignore the pleas, and only focused on closing the Gate. But something made him stop. Curiosity? Fear? No one knows why he stopped and found himself walking into the Gate. Having someone travel in and the machines keeping it open already going through the shut down process made the Gate unstable. His team heard the alarms that something was wrong and rushed to his aid, only to find that the Gate was closed. And Dr. Hopkins was gone.
Years. 2 to be exact. His trusted team was appointed as the new heads of the facility. They held a funeral for Dr. Hopkins. After some time, the basement was cleaned and abandoned. Until one day. There was a noise in the elevator shaft, a screech of some kind. Had an Inmate escaped. The facility went into lockdown and swarms of teams with weapons went down into the basement to see the commotion. What they found was harrowing. A ten foot tall naked humanoid, with 2 long scorpion tail like appendages on its back, and seemingly no face thrashing and screeching. After mild panic they sedated the thing and kept it in a level 4 cell. Studying it was hard. The thing was unresponsive and animalistic almost in nature. It couldn’t speak. They had found that it had 4 white eyes and a slit in its face that opened into a mouth for feeding. But from a distance, the thing appeared to be featureless.
Over time, staff noticed that it was using its scorpion tails to sting rats in almost an experimental way. Like it had no idea what it was capable of doing. Staff never found out what the stings could do. Until one day. A guard was stung when she was trying to get a better look at its antics, she showed symptoms of sweating, auditory hallucinations, and paranoia. The higher ups appointed her off the 4th floor. But she kept going back down and being detained. When questioned she said “It talks to me.” She was hard to speak to, and often she muttered to herself when left alone in a room. It wasn’t until she was stung a second time. This time, her symptoms were impaired brain function, lack of awareness, heightened strength, and aggression. Unfortunately, she was killed by gunfire in an attempt to attack fellow staff. The higher ups found it fit to move the creature into the basement in a special containment. They are still in attempts to study the thing. So far to no avail.
(End of debrief)
Staff notes:
• It talks to me. No please you have to believe me, its talking to me! It’s in my head I cant get it out, help me! Help me! CUT IT OUT OF MY HEAD!! - Staff member Rosa Oswald (deceased)
• The thing gives me the creeps, all it does is stare and sometimes I swear I can hear it whispering to me. -Anon
• I decided to start calling it the Slender man, but I cant really tell if it’s a man? Maybe it’s a woman? Who knows, its freaky - Staff Member Cody
#creepypasta#creepypasta au#creepypasta in 2024!?#creepypasta the underground#my art#the slenderman#slenderman#I FINALLY WROTE HIS LORE#Hes kinda silly#why he kinda#creepypasta art
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113 L. SEUNGJUN
genre. onf universe au (byubyu specifically). fluff.
warnings. kissing. seungjun kinda overthinks a tad but reader sets him straight. seungjun is locked up for time travel. a brief mention of guns and a past wound ig?
pairing. seungjun x fem!reader.
wc. 1.5k.
request. no.
a/n. i'm pretty proud of this fic idk why skdjs onf lore fics are always so fun to write im still fascinated by their lore even tho i don't understand it too well lol but i try my best.
The sound of metal clashing outside made a groggy Seungjun blink his eyes open. He had been locked up for over 48 hours now with no access to food. He was allowed a little water if he begged the android guards extra nicely. His throat was scratchy and dry from the time spent locked up despite the water supply. They certainly didn’t treat time travel criminals as nicely as escape rebels.
Seungjun was sure he looked horrible by now. Or “a little bit scruffy around the edges”, as you would say, even the time when he had a gaping wound in his side. He missed the way you could make light of any situation right about now. He would do anything to have a reason to laugh again.
Seungjun was no stranger to the computer operated prison cells he was often shoved into after being caught. Years ago he had been thrown in for smaller crimes, but got out within a couple hours when he figured out the lock code while no one was looking. This time, it was a lot harder. They had upgraded their system; those damn robots learned quicker than the human brain could.
He had almost accepted his fate of rotting in the small square room by the time 24 hours had passed, but he still kept out a sliver of hope. You were still out there and free, which meant you could still come to save him.
He wanted to laugh whenever he found himself stuck in a situation where he had to rely on your good graces to get out. One of these days he was sure his sweet words and gentle kisses wouldn’t be enough to convey his thanks. You were sure to get sick of him eventually, right? He was always the one messing things up.
His pride didn’t entirely allow him to accept that you were better than him, though he knew in the back of his mind that you were. You were perfect wherever he was faulty and just as decent at the skills that he professed he excelled in. Maybe that was why you were perfect for each other— or, rather, why you were too perfect for him.
It was strange how the human mind always wandered back to the people they loved. So much time and energy was spent just reminiscing memories, and while he found it beautiful, he also acknowledged it as one of humanity's weaknesses. The androids certainly didn’t spend their hard-drive space with personal connections. They didn’t have anything to lose, and that was why it was so hard to win against them.
Seungjun shook off the thoughts in his head and focused on the noises he heard from the corridor. From his watch, he knew it was deep in the night hours, a time when security usually lessened in numbers for recharge sessions. Now was as good a time as you were ever going to get if you were coming to save him. And, by another glance at the watch, Seungjun had a pretty good idea that you were.
The entire team’s locations were shared across the watches; a necessary safety measure for situations like now. The little red dot that showed your location was moving steadily closer to Seungjun’s, and that was when a shadow of a smile started to form on his face.
He stood up and walked to the edge of his cell, peaking out into the dark corridor while also being careful not to get too close to the electrically charged door. If he touched it, he would get shocks charging through his body— something he learnt the hard way. In order to escape, he’d have to take down the electricity system, but pulling off such a scheme without the android guards finding out was beyond his power with such limited resources. You, however, might just be able to pull it off undetected.
A hushed curse just barely reached his ears, and he perked up, trying to hear anything else. It definitely came from you; there was no way any of the robots would let such profanity past their voice record logs. They weren’t the best with advanced vocabulary.
Soon enough, your figure appeared into view, searching around quickly between cells. Once your eyes fell upon the room with the code that read ‘113 L. SEUNGJUN’, you were quick to rush up to the other side of the door.
“Hey, time travelling dumbass. Long time, no see.” You whispered out with a smirk playing on your lips. Seungjun could feel his heart leap in his chest and he returned the smile. He had really missed you.
You quickly punched in the code to his cell and Seungjun watched as the door flickered away. You reached out for his wrist, already pulling him along before he could ask what the escape plan was. You seemed more than familiar with the layout of the building even in the dark. Seungjun opted to let you lead him to the way out without a word. He still didn’t know if there were any guards who might be on patrol.
It was a smooth escape, and you both were out into the cool night air before too long. Seungjun let the crisp fresh air fill his lungs fully, now realising how he had been holding his breath out of caution on the way out.
“How did you disarm the security cameras without getting caught?” He asked once he had caught his breath. Though he had been mostly focused on getting out, he had noticed the distinct lack of little red flashing dots that had been his constant reminder that whatever he did was being watched those 2 days straight.
“Minkyun figured out how to hack it from the inside, so all I had to do was find the control room. Hyojin got me the blueprints and Jaeyoung helped set up the game-plan. My job was pretty simple; get in, disarm, and then go find my stupid ass boyfriend.” You grinned, ruffling his hair as you said the last part.
Seungjun would’ve complained about you messing up his hair, or even the crude nickname that he secretly adored, but he had been apart from you too long to object to anything that came out of your mouth. He was hanging onto every word, soaking up the sound of your voice as his eyes studied yours fondly.
“You’re uncharacteristically quiet. What, did something else happen while you were in there?” You questioned with a quirked brow. Seungjun just shook his head at your question.
“Nothing happened. I’m just glad you came for me.”
“You didn’t seriously think I would ditch you that easily, right?” You stared at him in shock as his eyes told you all the confirmation you needed. “Lee Seungjun!” You smacked his shoulder as you called out his name, causing him to jump and rub the spot afflicted in pain.
“Do whatever it takes to get this thought into your ant-sized brain, okay? I am in love with you which means I will not leave you behind. Ever. Even if I get blasted by one of those androids and die— I’ll haunt you as a ghost until you realize that you can’t get rid of me that easily! Don’t you ever forget that.” You told him sternly, your eyebrows furrowed.
He wanted to laugh, or maybe cry, or maybe kiss you until he couldn’t breathe; he wasn’t sure which. How he had ever ended up winning your heart was beyond him, but he was so grateful that he had. And so, he decided to go with the third option.
“I won’t forget.” He whispered, leaning closer until his breath hit your lips.
You took the first move, pushing your lips on his, starting the gentle dance of passion and care. You didn’t mind that his lips were dry and slightly chapped from the days locked up. No matter what state they were in, they still felt perfect over yours. He pulled you closer almost desperately, but you were just as eager to have him as close as possible. The effect of his absence for 2 days on you was something you never wished to repeat. Though you were sure it would come back to bite you someday; you needed Seungjun like oxygen.
The kiss lasted until Seungjun was gasping for breath, just like he had hoped. Still craving your touch, he stayed in your arms, his chest pressed against yours as close as possible until he could feel your heart racing as much as his.
And he realized that maybe you weren’t too perfect for him after all.
Maybe you were just right. Maybe he could be yours without feeling guilty about all the trouble he dragged you in. Maybe you even liked how rebellious he was, Seungjun thought as you curled your fingers through the section of bright red hair blanketed under his raven strands. The thought made him smile, summoning that warm feeling in his chest that he had always been a little wary of in the past.
Maybe he liked having someone to rely on as well, even if it was another weakness he had to account for. He made up his mind that no matter what, he wouldn’t doubt you again; you deserved at least that much, after all.
↳ onf taglist: @eternalgyu,, @candewlsy,, @weird-bookworm,, @seunghancore,, @haecien
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