#everyone loves to condemn both sides and call for world peace it's so easy and non confrontational
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justifying the bombing of a hospital and a shelter because there were supposely tunnels underneath is the most disgusting insane thing i have ever seen. i'm losing so much hope in people every day i come across people who think that palestinians deserve to be genocided. because they fought back. because they elected hamas ummmmmmm in 2006. the avg age of palestinians is under 20 and half of the entire population are under 18. the maths isn't difficult if you have any sort of compassion
#sickened by the people in my own country. spoiled westerners are so disgusting and selfish and hypocritical#everyone loves to condemn both sides and call for world peace it's so easy and non confrontational#and secretly they think that once palestine is eradicated there will be peace. and then they can condemn it in retrospect#a perfect solution for westerners who love their couch politics and their moral superiority#🌌
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Jeankasa Royal AU: A Knight's Mission
Sir Jean Kirstein has been sent to hizuru by the Yaegar brothers with one goal: become princess Azumabito’s close guard and pave the way to betray and conquest the eastern country. But the hizuran princess is much lovelier than what he imagined. Can Jean’s loyalty stay with the yaegar brothers or will it tilt towards the woman he may, or may not, be falling in love with?
AO3
The capital city of Hizuru, Heian-kyo, is thrice as large as some eldian cities. Flanked on all sides by tall, snowy-peaked mountains and home to about two million citizens, it is the largest city in the eastern country. Despite the high altitude, the noise and music and laughter in the city equal –or maybe rival— the cold winds blowing from the mountains.
The royal palace, built beautifully halfway up one of the tallest peaks, is nothing like it.
I curse lowly as I’m being led through the passageways of the Azumabito palace, with its sliding doors, quiet servants, and even quieter rooms. There’s the sound of running water coming from somewhere to my right, perhaps it’s the famous gardens I was told about on my induction —a gift from one of the previous empresses to her emperor, a place of peace and quietness so they could grow old together. Although in all honesty, the last things this place needs are peace and quiet.
Some faint music would be fine, I think as I find myself missing the horrid sound from Reiner’s little cousin practicing the violin. I guess I would even take a whole concert of that if it meant breaking the perpetual silence of the palace.
I look to my right, noticing that Marco looks calmer than Reiner and I put together. I’m not surprised; he helped the Yaegar brothers concoct the plan to gain Hizuru’s vast territory, free its people from a monarchy and, above all, get Eldia’s claws on their precious mines.
“Take a deep breath,” Marco whispers, his voice as serene as the rest of the palace. The servant, a tiny girl in a simple kimono, is far away from us that she won’t hear. “She will be pleased with us.”
We’re presents, gifts sent to look after the princess by her fiancée in Eldia, her political alliance once she comes of age, Eren. He chose us well; the three of us are nice to the eyes, charming to a degree. If the princess takes a liking for any of us, we might be granted the charge of close guard for either the princess or her guardian, and then it’ll be an easy task to learn the secrets of the castle, be aware of its military routes… all in all, we’ll know more details how to overthrow the teenage ruler and free the people.
By taking over Hizuru, we will give Zeke Yaegar access to the hizuran mines, and we’llhave our hands filled with silver. Enough silver to leave knighthood, enough silver to convince a nice girl to marry me, enough silver to buy a whole castle.
If we manage to keep our heads on our shoulders, the grimmer side of my brain chirps in.
I shake my head, quite enjoying the fact that it is still attached to my body. This must work. It cannot go awry. If it does go awry and we manage to escape, I can imagine Zeke and Eren condemning us to a lifetime of menial tasks within the military, without a chance to become rich through any of their colonization schemes.
And if we don’t manage to escape…well, we all became acquainted with hizuran torture methods before coming. I’m not looking forward to dying, let alone be tortured.
“Jean,” Marco calls, giving me a sideways glance. We are standing at the doors of the throne room, where the princess and her guardian await us. The servant girls leading us have disappeared beyond the doors, perhaps to announce our presence us to the princess. “You need to stand straighter than that.”
Again, I do as Marco says. He’s much more put together than I, and a bit of me feels a twinge of jealousy of how good of a leader he is among our tiny group. He’s told me before I have much more leader material, however Zeke chose him to lead this expedition, not me.
“Are you okay?” Reiner asks at my side. “You look like you’re about to puke.”
I glare. “I’ve never met a proper royal before.”
“What about all those fancy folks in Eldia?”
“I meant I’ve never met a princess.” I say, shrugging, wondering what awaits us behind the door. Not much is known about hizuran royalty back home, and there are no pictures nor paintings of the hidden flower of Hizuru.
She might be hideous for all we know. All chances point to her being hideous if she refuses to get pictures or paintings of her face. Although I’m not sure if her being hideous will help or damage our attempts at charming our way into her private guard. If she’s hideous, I pity that poor Yaegar bastard.
“It doesn’t matter what she looks like,” Marco said, guessing his thoughts. “Remember we were sent for a reason.”
I look around, wondering what is up with his sudden burst of information, or if a group of guards will come get us from sniffing our betrayal in the air. But nobody comes; in fact, the palace is as quiet as before. Maybe it’s the way Marco talks, maybe that soft purr of his voice makes his words mingle with the eerie peace of the palace.
“What’s taking so long?” I say, looking away from Marco, clearing my throat.
“There’s an extremely specific etiquette to informing the princess of new guests in the palace. And then you add the etiquette of the Pine Room, it’ll take a few minutes,” Reiner replies, giving me a frown at the confusion in my face. “The Pine Room? The throne room, Jean. Do you not remember anything from our lessons? Did you not read the booklet?”
To be fair, I didn’t. We stopped by a seaside city on our way over, and that beautiful redhead had kept my attention from studying our booklets on the way before discarding them. “I’m an idiot.”
“Just remember, bow deeply, don’t raise your head until she allows you, let her speak first, call her imperial majesty when greeting her, then just call her princess,” Marco lists with a soft smile. “Walk ahead of her only when you are allowed, let her call you by your name.”
“Seems like a lot of fucking rules for a kid.” I reply.
“She’s not a kid,” Reiner says with an exasperated sigh. “She’s seventeen. Aren’t you eighteen yourself?”
“I have more life experience than a princess could ever have,” I say with a flirting smile, but then drop my stance at Marco and Reiner’s concerned gazes. “Alright, alright. I won’t screw up. I never do, remember?”
“Which is why Eren chose you as her present too.” Marco says with a wink, making me blush.
“Any other rules I should remember?”
This time it’s Reiner who answers. “Never call her by her name, never touch her.”
“What’s her name anyways?”
Marco leans into me, whispering even lower, almost looking fearful to pronounce the princess’ name too loud. “Mikasa, that’s her name.”
I mouth the syllables underneath. Mi-ka-sa. Huh. Doesn’t sound like a too awful name; not hard to pronounce anyways. Not that I’ll be using it much, mind you. Out of the three, it’s Marco the one who is more likely to charm the princess, to become her friend or lover, whatever he needs to get the information we need about Hizuru. He’s got a much softer demeanor; it doesn’t work much with girls at bars, but it will surely work with a princess. I can see the confidence in his face as the servant girl slides the door open.
We got this, that’s what his face says.
Two, three years, and we’ll be richer than god. Bless Eren for choosing us for this plan.
“The princess is ready to see you.”
We are led across an enormous room with wide windows at both sides, from which I can clearly see the city sprawled in a thousand different colors below. There are some people gathered in the chamber that stare at us as we walk by. From their clothes and expressions by seeing foreigners, I figure they’re not all royals. The princess must be holding audiences for her people.
I see her throne at the end of the room, and her sitting on it. But we are too far away for me to see anything but the deep blue color of her kimono. I stifle laughter; if she sits this far away from everyone, she must be horrid.
Two guards flank our way as we moved forward, and I fear troubles have begun already. We are taller than the hizuran guards, but they train for decades to become skilled at combat, and I’ve no doubt we would not win against them.
“Princess,” the servant girl says, talking in her direction. “Your gifts have arrived.”
“Please, let them come before me.” She says, and the soft cadence of her voice surprises me. She must be a good singer, I think hazily. And this must be some sort of ritual.
We walk ahead until we are standing about ten feet away from a screen seemingly made from crystal, which impedes anyone from walking any closer to her throne. Ah, it must be a security measure. A bulletproof screen to guard the princess form any madman that might sneak their way in the Pine Room while she holds audiences.
The three of us fall to our knees and bow, pressing our foreheads against the pristine floor. Again, I haven’t seen her royal face.
There is the soft shift of fabric on the wooden floor, and then tiny steps. “Rise, eldian knights, gifts of my future husband,” she says, in perfect eldian, to my surprise. “I would look upon your faces.”
I smile slightly at the silliness of it all, at the fancy words she is using to perfection, but my smile freezes the moment my gaze lands upon her face. And my first thought is that Eren Yaegar is the luckiest bastard in the world.
This princess is the most beautiful, perfect woman I’ve ever seen. Ever. She has gray eyes, jet black hair and is not as small as I thought she would be. Her face isn’t precisely hizuran, but it isn’t quite eldian either. It’s strange, but not unpleasant to the eye.
Who am I kidding? She’s a vision to look at.
“Thank you for your journey, knights of Eldia,” she says, her expression serene, giving away not much emotion. “Please, bring forth the bread and salt.”
Servants scurry around the room and bring us jade platters full of bread and salt. I blink, realizing they’ve accommodated to the eldian custom of sharing a meal with your guests to assure their lives will be well guarded while under the host’s roof.
I look at her as the servants make the long way from the entrance to the throne room. She wears no jewelry, and her kimono is of a wonderful shade of purple and silver. Her hair is not combed upwards in the traditional hizuran fashion. It’s long, beautiful and darker than night itself. I’ve seen dark before, but not like this. It is deep, tantalizing, beautiful.
Her gaze catches mine during the seconds we wait for the bread to arrive, and I look away instinctively. She noticed I was staring, I curse myself. Staring like an idiot is not the way to get her trust.
My eyes trail to the throne, and I notice another woman has been looking at me the whole time. I’m guessing that’s her guardian, Kiyomi Azumabito, and curse myself again. She won’t want a staring creep near her protégée.
The bread comes on a platter for each, and Mikasa —no, the princess. The princess has a platter too. We eat the tiny salted bread buns while looking at each other in silence. Once we are done, Mikasa cleans her hands on a towel one of her servants offers to her.
“Now, we have done your eldian tradition and you must know you are safe and welcome,” she says in that serious tone of voice. I wonder if she ever laughs. “I would like to know your names. Blond sir, please go first.”
“Reiner Braun, your imperial majesty,” Reiner says, bowing slightly. I hold the need to roll my eyes. We won’t have to bow each time we speak to her, will we?
“And I must call you?”
Another custom. I really should’ve read that booklet.
“Either is fine, your majesty.”
“You may call me princess.”
“Thank you, princess.”
Mikasa, the princess turns to Marco and he gives her a polite smile. Her face proposes the name question to him, and Marco catches the intention of her face quickly. “Marco Bodt, your imperial highness. You may call me as you wish.”
“Your face, I don’t know the eldian word for the dots,” she says, gesturing to the bridge of her own nose. I hold back another smile. She’s so cute. “What is the word? Oh, you may call me princess.”
Marco smiles charmingly, and I feel jealousy again. “Freckles, your highness.”
“Freckles,” the princess says, pronouncing the word as if she were tasting a new meal. So pretty. She looks at Marco, gives him a tight smile, stirring the fire of jealousy in my chest. Damn his freckles to hell. “Thank you, Sir Marco. You’ve given me the gift of a new word.”
Marco bows, and now I roll my eyes. What am I supposed to do after that? He just gave the princess knowledge. For a royal that owns a thousand mines, knowledge is the one thing one can give her to make her smile is knowledge.
“And you, sir?” She says expectantly. Our eyes meet again, and I feel the rush of blood to my cheeks. I gather my thoughts; I’m a knight. I’m here to betray her and get rich, not stare at her pretty self or get jealous from Marco making her smile.
I bow in the same way Reiner did. “Jean Kirstein, your imperial majesty.”
“Nice to meet you, Jean,” she says, then opens her eyes slightly, seemingly catching herself. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Kiyomi Azumabito narrowing hers. “How may I call you, sir?”
Yours, the rawest part of my mind shouts.
“You may use either, your imperial majesty.” I say, feeling my breath quicken at the thought of her slipping. What was it about me that made her slip? My looks? Or maybe she’s just trying to intimidate the creep that’s been ogling her?
“You may call me princess, Je—Sir Jean.” She says, stumbling a little with her words. She clears her throat. “You’re taller than most, aren’t you?”
Heads turn in our direction, and I guess this isn’t part of the protocol. My height has made her curious, which makes me feel like a proud little kid. “I am, princess.”
“Good sparring partner.” She mutters, more to herself than to the crowd, but the three of us hear her clearly. She looks at me again, and this time there’s nothing I can do to hide my blush. “Good knights, it seems. I am grateful to my future husband for his gift. We will see that you are well taken care of within court.”
“Thank you, princess.” We say at unison.
“I hear my husband wants to make you three part of my personal guard,” she says thoughtfully.
“Yes, princess.” Marco says.
“I appreciate my future husband’s will to look after me,” Mikasa says, and something in me suspects she’s keeping the protocol once again. “We will discuss these matters in future meetings. For now, please enjoy your dinner in your quarters and have a rest, my knights.”
Hearing her call us my knights almost turns me into a puddle. But I hide my feelings behind a mask of proudly knighthood. This mission isn’t to lust after a princess. This mission is to get rich. After I claim my part of the silver mines, I can woo as many princesses as I want.
“Thank you, princess.” We say at unison, and we are dismissed from the throne room.
The servant girl leads us to our room, a big, furniture-less chamber overlooking a series of hot spring pools for us alone. She explains to us how to lay out our futons on the curious tatami flooring, but my mind is on Mikasa. On the princess and her purple kimono and how much I would enjoy seeing it on the floor of our chambers. And her in the hot spring pool with me.
“Stop it,” Marco says after the servant girl leaves.
“Stop what?”
“Lusting after her. Crushing on her,” Marco says in a disapproving tone of voice. He’s figured it out. He knows me too well and knows when a woman catches my eye. “Jean, we are not here to crush out on a woman. We are here to—”
“I won’t try and sleep with her, Marco,” I reply, closing my eyes and throwing my back against the floor. “Just let me have my mind fun for a little while. She’s a beautiful girl.”
“She is indeed,” Reiner agrees as he examines the clothes they’d prepared for us. I wonder if they’ll let us wear our uniforms if we do manage to become her close guards. “Pretty eyes, and not even you can deny that, Marco.”
I open my eyes and notice that Marco raises his eyebrows. “She is a cute little thing.”
I frown. “I thought we weren’t here to just after her? Also, don’t call her a thing.”
“Now you’re protective of her?” Reiner asks, crossing his arms over his chest. “Stop giving me that face, Kirstein. You were the one who was ogling her today. You cannot compromise the mission.”
“He won’t,” Marco assures him, patting my shoulder. “Jean just has an eye for pretty girls. The moment he sees another servant that catches his eye, he’ll stop being weird about the princess. Won’t you, Jean?”
“Yeah,” I shrug. “We should just stop talking about the princess altogether, though.”
“Why’s that?”
“If anyone hears us calling her a pretty little thing, we’ll get in trouble.” I reply with another shrug, and that seems to convince them. My intentions are slightly devious, though. Maybe I don’t want them to think of her the way I am. I don’t want them to call her pretty or think about her at all. I know we have a mission, and my eyes are on the silver at the end of the rainbow. But for now, the thoughts of the princess are all mine.
“How’s the liaison?” Reiner asks Marco. “Do we know who it is yet?”
“I’m sure they’ll show themselves soon.” Marco replies, and their conversation diverges into territory that isn’t related to women, far away from the princess. I sigh, trying to focus on their talk of hizuran customs and the architecture of the palace (subjects that might seem innocent to any casual listener) but my mind is on the princess and her pretty, serious face. It’d be fun to see her laugh at a point, but I don’t say this out loud.
For now, I want the image of her to be mine alone.
Maybe I’ll try to beat Marco at being her close guard.
___________________________
I enter the royal chamber and get rid of my kimono to walk about in my undergarments. Kiyomi is sitting on the far end of the room, and she gestures me to sit at her side to have our afternoon tea. I take the cup and walk out towards my garden, cringing at the idea of sitting down a moment longer.
I understand the need for audiences, and it is not that I don’t enjoy listening to queries from the citizens and solving as many problems as I’m allowed…but I’m not one to made for sitting down.
“That boy,” I hear myself saying before I can stop myself, looking at Kiyomi over my shoulder. “The tall one.”
“What about him?” Kiyomi asks, in that casual tone I know so well. She’s curious to know what I’m thinking, because she already formed an idea of the boy herself.
“He’s got a good height,” I say, turning again towards the gardens. “I haven’t sparred with someone so tall in a while.”
“He’s an eldian knight,” Kiyomi replies calmly. “He could harm you.”
“He was sent by Eren, wasn’t he? I doubt they mean any harm.”
“I don’t trust Yaegar.”
The words make me arch an eyebrow, and I’m persuaded to go sit at her side. I’ve met the Yaegar boy sporadically since I was brought back into the castle and became Kiyomi’s protégée. He was a loud child and, for a while, an even louder teenager. It’s been a while since I saw him last, and I wonder if he’s quieter now; a quieter demeanor would fit those green eyes of him much better. “Why don’t you trust him?”
“He’s sent handsome men.”
I snort. “Are you scared of handsome men, Kiyomi?”
“It concerns me he’s sent them to test you,” Kiyomi says, taking a sip of her tea, closing her eyes. “Three handsome men, all sent to be your close guards.”
Ah, my noble future husband, I think sarcastically. For a political alliance, it seems like too much trouble to test my loyalty for him this way. It’s not like we will always live together after we are married; we will have our wedding night, and a few months together every year afterwards. Because he is bound to Eldia as much as I am to Hizuru.
“I won’t jump into bed with them, you know. Not at first, at least.” I reply, and my words cause Kiyomi to choke on her tea. I cover my mouth with a hand, stifling a giggle. “I’m sorry, Kiyomi. Let me help you clean.”
“Don’t.” she warns, narrowing her eyes. She knows I just said that to shock her, but she does not like the ring of my words. An unmarried and young princess is a dangerous thing, she has told me. She and my servants told me I am lovely to look at. According to her, I am ripe for picking.
According to my skills, whoever comes near me will end with a broken neck.
“About the sparring,” I mention again. “I really haven’t had a tall fighting partner.”
Kiyomi smiles and narrows her eyes again, this time playfully. “You are rather set on that boy,” she says. I shoot her a questioning look, but all I get in return is the same placid, cheerful smile of hers that tells me she’s seeing something I am not. “You were looking at him since they walked into the room.”
“Because he is tall. I haven’t practiced against someone that tall,” I reply, but Kiyomi remains silent. Her silence hurts my pride. “Do you really think me capable of jumping into bed with the presents Eren sent me? Why do you think I would act this way?”
The hurt tone of my words placates her teasing somewhat. She puts her porcelain cup down and places a hand atop my own, a loving gesture that’s not uncommon among families behind closed doors. I smile; I barely remember my family before Kiyomi. In a way, she’s the closest I’ve ever had to a mother.
“He just reminds me of someone, dear princess, that is all. I trust your judgment with these gifts as much as I trust your judgement with the council,” she says. Her words swell my pride as easy as they hurt it a moment ago.
“Who does he remind you of?” I ask, curious. “That Jean knight.”
She shakes her head. “Not important at the moment,” she sighs, using a piece of silk cloth to clean some of the crumbs around us. “What is important is you choosing which one of the three will be your close guard.”
“Must I choose?” I ask. The last thing I want is a close guard; someone to accompany me everywhere, stand by my tub when I wash, stand by me when I eat, watch over me while I sleep. It seems invasive, at best. “I can defend myself. We could give them the treatment we give ambassadors. They will much prefer that.”
“This is not for you. Your future husband has clearly gone out of his way to send you protection,” Kiyomi says. “Not allowing at least one of them as your close guard will mean offending him. The Yaegar brothers are the head of a powerful nation, a conquering nation. A nation we must keep in our good graces.”
Unlike the Yaegar brothers, the two eldians who rose to the head of the Eldian empire in a mere five years, I do not care much about conquering. The emperor before me, a distant uncle of mine, resembled them more than I ever will. He spread our dominion to the islands on the shallow waters to the west, and the vast horse plains to the north…lands I intend to return once I ascend to the throne of Hizuru and clean out my council.
Having an empress who doesn’t want to conquer won’t settle well with most royals, and it will surely make us weak in the face of Eldian prowess. So, my marriage must keep us in Eldia’s good graces for a generation or two, depending on how many heirs Eren and I produce. He has displayed every hizuran gift we’ve sent him, so I must do the same. Although I’ve never sent him humans as presents, to be fair.
This must’ve been his older brother’s idea. As little as I’ve treated him, I can’t conceive the idea of Eren sending three humans as presents. He values freedom of will too much.
“So, how will I choose my close guard?” I ask.
“We will give you time with the three, on your own,” Kiyomim says easily. “It’ll be a trial period, of sorts. You will choose in the end. I trust you will choose wisely, and go for the one who will tempt you the least.”
“None of them tempts me.” I reply, again hurt in my pride. Why does she think I will act like a giddy teenager? The three men are not bad to look upon, but I value my commitment to Hizuru far too much to put it at risk for a foreign man. My own mother already did, and it did not end well.
“Do you have one you’d prefer me to choose?” I ask, curious to know about her impression of the three knights. “One you think would make a good job?”
“I do,” she says. I look at her expectantly, but Kiyomi remains focused on pouring more tea for the both us. “I won’t tell you, Mikasa. You are bound for a throne and decisions will be your daily living. We start small, but important: you must choose this close guard of yours mindfully and responsibly.”
I sigh, sipping a little more tea, finding it bitter. I’ve taken decisions before but choosing a man who will guard me day and night is not high on my list of priorities. “Can I still have the tall one for sparring? Even if I don’t choose him.”
“I’m sure he won’t mind.”
“He can’t mind if he’s a present,” I quip back, thinking there must be a flaw to Eren’s logic. Why someone who loves the concept of being free so badly send three humans as presents for his future wife?
“Even so,” Kiyomi says with a soft smile. “I’m sure the Kirstein knight won’t mind.”
I frown, there’s a playful tone to her voice that I don’t recognize. Is she trying to imply Jean will agree because he will think I am not strong enough to beat him? I take another determined sip of my tea. Kiyomi is good at reading people, and if she thinks the tall knight considers me weak, then it must be so.
“I will show him.”
“What, princess?” Kiyomi asks.
I shake my head, undermining the matter, my head filled with thoughts of the tall knight.
__________________
The next morning, Kiyomi sends a message with one of her servant girls. Princess Mikasa will meet with us one at a time throughout an unspecified period of time, and then she will make her decision before the summer festivities.
Marco is called first, although I am not surprised. He did impress her first with his vast knowledge of the word freckles.
He comes back and tells us how he and the princess went visiting the art museum within the palace. They talked for hours about hizuran artists, and then see a small play together, in which he met the members of the council that handle cultural affairs within her palace and the city.
The next day, Reiner is called. Mikasa takes him to the silk market in one of her official visits, and they have lunch in the hanging gardens at one of the mountains, where he meets the minister of trade.
Despite their vastly different experiences, both Marco and Reiner agree on something.
“She’s quiet.” Reiner says from the pool of hot water in our garden. “She’s like an old volcano.”
“Did you just call her old?” I blurt out.
“He’s right,” Marco says, putting an appeasing hand on my shoulder. “She does come off as an old volcano. Never make a sound, and when they do, it’s important.”
I frown. “Could you not make conversation with her then?”
“You need to know the right things to say.” Reiner says, arching his eyebrow. “Do you think you can handle it?”
I scoff and roll my eyes. Reiner wants to be her close guard. Out of the three, he perhaps wanted it from before we even reached Hizuru. This is a mission to not only get rich, but also to get honor. He wants to be the hero that conquered Hizuru, perhaps he wants to conquer the whole country for himself. “Are you forgetting who you’re talking to?” I say, with an amount of confidence that I do not feel. “I can catch anything she throws my way.”
The next day, I get a call to go to the northmost garden in the castle, and a group of servants to accompany me to boot. Marco and Reiner both give me a thumbs up as the group of servants leads me away from the room; I smile confidently at them, but in reality, there’s a hole in my stomach that seems to be growing bigger.
The servants take me to a changing room first, and they hand me clothes that seem too cold for the weather outside. Black pants and a black, sleeveless shirt. I don’t ask questions, mostly because I know they won’t be answered by the group of silent servants.
I don’t want to think why she chose me last. On one hand, she might’ve not wanted to deal with my annoying ass for the first couple of days. On the other, she and Kiyomi might think to leave the best for last. Either thought is equally terrifying. Reiner and Marco met important people, and I can’t help but to wonder who I will meet todayu, or how I must act around them. I studied the members of her council, yes, but I reading about a person and meeting a person are two different things.
I find Mikasa –the princes— in a large, barren stretch of land that overlooks the mountains, talking to a man a few decades older. She wears pants and a sleeveless top much like mine, all black. I have to look at the ground as I walk forward; I’m not a prude by any means, but the clothes she has on would be considered scandalous for any hizuran royal. There is something in her hands, a black, metal-looking stick, and the man at her side holds it too.
It must be some sort of test, I tell myself. She wants to see if I can keep my mouth shut, my eyes to myself, and my face expressionless, qualities any future empress would want for a close guard. So, I must not, by all means, let my eyes wander to the curves of her body in that black ensemble, which matches so perfectly with her ponytailed hair.
I catch her eye and she gestures us all forward. The servants lead me until we’re standing six feet away from each other. I bend forward, meaning to bow, but the man with her presses the butt of his stick against my chin, stopping me.
“What?” he says in a booming voice, using eldian for my sake. “Do you intend on fighting right away?”
I blink, stepping back in an attempt of self-preservation. “Come again?”
“Sir Jean,” Mikasa —the princess says, greeting me with a polite smile I barely manage to give back. “I’m happy I look upon your face this morning.”
“Thank you, princess,” I say, stopping myself before I bow again, giving the long, heavy stick in their hands a fleeting look. “Thank you for this opportunity, princess, for letting me accompany you for the morning.”
The princess blinks at me and gives me a tight-lipped smile. “This is Yoshida Kururugi,” she says, giving the man next to her a look. “He was a head drill instructor for the hizuran troops. He became my personal teacher when I turned nine.”
The trainer looks hardened by the years, to say the least. Long scars traverse his face, prints from Hizuru’s bloody past. He stands straight, and I take that as a permission to bow before him. I do so, feeling more angered than confused. I might’ve been slightly out of line when meeting her, but that didn’t mean she had to give me this treatment.
Marco and Reiner met ministers, council members. And here I am, stuck with an old, bittered trainer for the frail princess. “Princess, I am confused,” I say after I finish greeting the man. “What are we doing today?”
She nods, acknowledging my question as valid, and takes a deep breath before answering. “We are sparring, Sir Jean,” she says, putting both hands on her long stick.
I blink, confused. “Princess, I do not wish to hurt you.”
Mikasa arches an eyebrow, in a surprisingly proud expression. “I will be fine.”
“But, princess—”
“I have not had a tall sparring partner in a while. You won’t be in trouble if you hurt me,” she says haughtily, and her voice reminds me I have no say in the discussion, no authority. If the princess wishes to spar with his shiny new present, so she shall. I hate it. “I am not familiar with eldian swordplay, and you are not familiar with eastern fighting styles.”
In that she is mistaken, I think as I try to force myself not to smile. I perhaps know more about hizuran fighting styles than she does. As much as a war veteran this man may be, Mikasa is still a princess. And no mere princess can stand against an eldian soldier.
“It shall be done as you say.” I say. The metal stick is against my chin before I can bow before her. I look at Yoshida, barely containing my frown. “I know, I know. No bowing before a fight.”
“A smart eldian,” he tells Mikasa, who nods in agreement.
“Let us begin,” she says. “You can have Kururugi’s weapon.”
Yoshida goes to the side of the training arena and Mikasa stands before me, regal, beautiful and, above all, unthreatening. I can’t say my pride isn’t more than a little hurt by her decision to make me a sparring partner, but I won’t say it aloud. If the princess wants a puppet to play sword with, I won’t make it easy for her. If the princess wants sparring, sparring she shall have. We bow to each other, and thus our fight begins without giving me a second to gloat to myself at the fact that the powerful hizuran flower has bowed for me.
She lifts her weapon and waits, her back straight, her body waiting. Ah, she wants to play the waiting game, wants me to lure her out into the struggle. Alright, I’ll give in. I charge forward with my weapon, dodging in the very last second to hit her behind her legs, thinking that if I make her loose balance, we can be done with the silly fight and move onto meeting members of her council.
To my utter shock, Mikasa jumps and avoids my stockade. She twirls, defying physics, and lands a kick to my chest that sends me stumbling back. I fall on my bottom, cursing lowly, and it is only then that I notice the muscles shifting in her arms, the way she isn’t even out of breath from her jump.
“Come, Sir Jean,” she says. “We are not finished yet.”
I stand again, feeling heat rushing to my cheeks. She’s a proud royal, and she is mocking me for having thought I could be a match to her. My pride overwhelms my sense of logic, and I charge forward again. I was the sixth best cadet in my generation; I’ve beaten Reiner at sparring, and I’ve even beaten Eren Yaegar himself at a fist fight. A mere princess with a few muscles isn’t a challenge.
She blocks my stockade again and tries hitting me with her stick, but I avoid it as good as she did it before. I hear her sighing in surprise, but I give myself no time to be proud. I kick forward, connecting my feet to her chest, and she steps back a few steps. Unlike me, however, she does not fall to the ground.
Mikasa stays at a safe distance. “You are tall, but slow.”
“You want conversation now?” I ask as we circle each other, both trying to find an opening.
“It is good to have conversation with the opponent,” she says seriously.
“Not when we’re fighting,” I reply, feeling my temper rise. “What are you hoping to get out of this?”
Mikasa blinks in confusion. She opens her mouth to answer, but I take an advantage of that brief moment of distraction to charge at her. Our weapons touch and I kick forward, but she is smaller than I am and, just as she said, I perhaps am too slow for her. She slithers away, aiming a blow at my hip, which I stop with my own weapon.
I attack once again and swing at her ankles, but she jumps and avoids the blow easily, as if she’s skipping rope. I go for her again, and my weapon connects with the muscles of her abdomen. Mikasa gives out a startled yelp, but she doesn’t back down. She charges at me with the most serene expression I’ve ever seen in a fighter and her weapon connects with my lower back.
I cry out from the pain from the sheer weight of the weapon, wondering why she isn’t crying from the blow I gave her.
“Damn you!” I shout, using my arms to grab her by the waist and lift her in the air. Not even that startles the princess, however. Letting go of her weapon, Mikasa wraps both of her legs around me and, using all her weight, brings us both down against the floor.
For a second, all I see is white flashes of light pass over my eyes, all I can feel is the throb of where her weapon connected with mine. After a moment of heavy breathing, I look down to realize she’s caught under my weight, her eyes wide in surprise and her face flushed from our fight. “You’re full of surprises, aren’t you?”
“You-you—”
“I’m a great fighter?” I guess. “I know. I was sixth of my class.”
“You…”
“What is it?” I ask, my head thumping from exasperation. “You were all confidence back then. What ate your tongue?”
She flushes harder, and it is then that all the hizuran rules about physical touch flood my brain. I’m keenly aware of how little fabric we’re both using, how well I can feel the curve of her breasts against my body.
“You can’t touch me,” she pants, finding her ground and pushing me back. I move without protest, reeling still from the fact that I had her so close. Yoshida is at the princess’ side in less than five seconds, but, to my relief, I see no wish to punish me for touching the princess in his face. He eyes me up and down as the princess comes to her feet.
“Tall, slow,” he says, and I feel myself flushing in embarrassment. “Good fighter, though. Strong, good with your arms. Under whose command did you use to be?”
“Commander Smith,” I reply reluctantly. “Erwin Smith.”
“Ah, Smith,” Yoshida replies thoughtfully. “He did a good job. He must be disappointed to have lost such a good fighter.”
No, he’s looking forward to collecting another victory for Eldia, I think, but keep my mouth shut. Most of my attention is on the princess anyways. On the princess and her reddened face, the reddened shoulders, the feel of her body against mine. She averts her gaze from mine and part of me wonders if this is an accomplishment or a terrible mistake.
“Need help, boy?” Yoshida asks, his tone jovial, almost friendly, grabbing my hand to bring me to my feet. I stand, but the princess remains silent. “You sure are tall! What do people eat in Eldia?”
“I’m taller than most.” I say, giving him a half smile.
“It’s been a while since I saw the princess struggle in a fight,” Yoshida says, giving Mikasa a wide, friendly smile that she doesn’t return. I frown; it didn’t feel like she was struggling at all. “Princess?”
“Kururugi, do I have permission to leave?” she says, her eyes barely meeting mine.
Her master opens his mouth, as if recalling the rules and etiquette when it came to Mikasa. Now, he knows why she seems so upset, and why she refuses to look at me directly. “Of course, child,” he says with a nod. “You may leave. We will talk about your fight later.”
The princess runs past by me to enter the palace, and she is soon surrounded by three handmaids dressed in gray kimonos.
“I didn’t even apologize.” I say as the handmaids dress the princess with a beautiful green gown. I’m so focused on the movements of the muscles in her back that I barely have time to notice that one of the handmaids has a head of yellow hair. The liaison Zeke talked about, perhaps?
“I’m sure she will apologize to you in due time,” Yoshida says, bringing my attention back to him. “You just need to give her a little time. She is proud, but she is fair. She knows she forced your hand into the fight, and thus you broke the rules that bind her so.”
“How do you know her so well?” I venture.
Kururugi smiles at me. “Why, I’m Kiyomi’s partner. We raised her. She’s practically my daughter.” he says with an amused smile, and I curse myself for not having studied the booklet with all the information about the royals of Hizuru more thoroughly. “Don’t worry, boy, she will come around. In the meantime, I’m guessing you and I can have tea out in the gardens.”
I swallow saliva. Sure, she can’t stay shy forever, but I have a mission to fulfill. A timed mission, a mission that will make me richer than God. I don’t have time for the princess to be shy, or to be offended. What if she stays mad for the whole year?
I look at Kururugi, feeling the hole in my stomach become true and deep. This is the man who has raised her, the man who has trained her in the hizuran arts of combat. And I just embarrassed the princess in front of him. No, I touched the princess in front of him. I had her under my body in front of him, which must be the royal hizuran equivalent of getting caught half-naked by your own father in a barn, with a boy.
I feel lightheaded suddenly. I definitely screwed up.
#jeankasa#Jean Kirstein#Mikasa Ackerman#JeanKasa#Jean x Mikasa#JeanMika#fanfiction#ao3#shingeki no kyojin fanfiction#Royal AU
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A Letter to My Mother (That I am too scared to send)
Okay. We’re having this talk now. I have been putting it off because there’s never been a way for me to keep my cool long enough to say it straight. I’ve been nice, I’ve been polite. I’ve walked away from conversations rather than address this directly because I don’t want to lose my mom.
Yesterday was unlike anything in American history. There is no both-sides-ism to be taken here. There is no even vaguely similar violence unleashed by the Left. This isn’t to say that NO violence has ever been unleashed by the left, it can and does happen. But nothing like this. This is unprecedented in both it's scope and audacity.
Unless you can point to an instance in which a Democrat president (or Senator, or Governor) whipped up a riot and unleashed those rioters on the Seat of Government of the United States of America, causing it to be breached and overrun by a hostile force for the first time in 207 years, the things don’t equate at all.
Unless you can point to a riot held by alt-right wingers in which the police cracked down on them HARD to the level of being condemned by the International Criminal Court as bordering on war crimes, the things don’t equate at all.
This was a direct assault on our government by a crowd whipped up by a sitting president. This has never happened before.
The Capitol Police removed the barricades and guided the insurrectionists in.
They chatted and took selfies with them. Exchanged fist bumps with them.
The seditionists were allowed to leave with few arrests, just… gently guided out once the barbarian hordes had their fun.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaPTjQZBLhQ
And yes, Trump (eventually) told them to go home, but refused to condemn what they'd done and finished his speech with "We love you. You're very special." and continued to refer to his political opponents as "evil".
This is quite literally unprecedented in American history. As in, nothing comes close. That's what "unprecedented" means.
If this had been BLM, the response would have been entirely different. DC would be on lockdown. The police would be bringing WAR to the streets. There would be helicopters, APCs, and beat cops dressed like the US Army rolling into Baghdad in 2003. The DC area hospitals would be overwhelmed with rioters suffering from horrific head and spine injuries from trigger-happy use of rubber bullets and night-sticks. Hell, Trump tear-gassed ACTUAL peaceful protesters last summer just so he could stage an awkward photo op in front of a church, which even the Clergy called him out on.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzBhYhu7NYI
Don't you DARE equate the two.
I'm tired of the whataboutisms. I'm tired of ignoring the evidence right in front of you. Donald Trump is the single most corrupt, evil man America has ever elected to the presidency. He has worked hard to transform the Republican party into something that actual Holocaust survivors and experts have called "Neofascist" and even less flattering terms.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/10/5/17940610/trump-hitler-history-historian
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2018/07/16/its-not-wrong-to-compare-trumps-america-to-the-holocaust-heres-why/
https://www.delawareonline.com/story/opinion/2020/10/25/holocaust-survivor-fears-rising-tide-ugliness-blames-trump-opinion/3740781001/
https://forward.com/scribe/455507/100-year-old-holocaust-survivor-compares-trump-to-hitler/
https://www.sacbee.com/latest-news/article223718330.html
Historians and victims of fascism the world over point to what Trump and his transformed Republican party have been doing as president when asked how the Weimar Republic fell and the Nazi regime rose.
The overwhelming amount of terrorist attacks in the last five years have been Trump supporters (Well over half stemming from that singular cause, with the rest divvied among a MASSIVE swathe of motives), but none more so overwhelmingly so than yesterday's.
There is no left wing equivalent for this in America until you go all the way back to the Weather Underground bombings, and even they were not goaded on by the incumbent politicians of a party.
Your party has been STOLEN from you. The Party of Lincoln, Eisenhower, and Reagan is no more. And now it’s stealing you from your children as we have watched you and dad drift further and further into the Hannity-Limbaugh-Carlson echo chamber.
88 years ago next month, right wing extremists set fire to the Reichstag in the Weimar Republic. Over the next few days, they seeded reports that it was actually the communists, maybe socialists, no, it was definitely anarchists… or was it trade unionists? Either way, it HAD to have been The Left who burned down the Reichstag.
This was used to expand and hold onto the power of the Chancellor, a man who need not be named. The next few years proved to be sorrowful for everyone.
That same blame-shifting is already happening again, but it's not in some far away country, it's happening here, where we all thought it couldn't.
This sort of event is unprecedented in the United States, or it was until yesterday. It is not so unprecedented elsewhere.
The only difference is that this attempt failed.
The attempt was made because Trump’s own administration found that this was the most secure election in American history, and Trump’s lawsuits to the contrary were laughed out of court by Trump-appointed judges, including his Supreme Court justices, and his exceedingly incompetent and well-documented attempts to get state officials to overturn a legitimate election all failed.
I still believe you and dad are good, honest people. Patriots who want America to do well in the world.
You can not-like Nancy Pelosi, or Obama, or Biden, or Hilary Clinton. That’s your prerogative, and we’ll agree on plenty in that regard. You’re well within your rights to believe that my preferred economics don’t work. We’ll disagree heartily, but that’s normal for families, especially between parents and their kids.
But your party has been hijacked by neofascists, malignant narcissists, and white supremacists.
I am on my knees BEGGING you to see what so many experts and victims have been warning you about for years.
The Left did not do this.
Trump did.
You have been led astray by an vain, selfish, greedy demagogue, a well documented honorless grifter who embodies everything Christ opposed, and uses people until they have nothing more to give him and discards them. He has cloaked this latest grift in the American flag and set a cross upon it, the only way Fascism ever COULD take root in America, as we saw with Joe McCarthy in the Second Red Scare.
It’s changing you. You can’t see it because it’s happening to you, but those around you can, and it’s scaring us.
Please, finally, truly see this. I want my parents back. You’re going down a path I can’t follow and it’s breaking my heart.
In 2016, I broke from the Republican Party because I saw calamity coming in the nomination of Donald Trump. Only 4 years later, and history has soberingly showed me that I was more right than I could have ever guessed, and my world view has never been the same since. I have looked back at the political opinions I wrote and posted then, and they were so selfish and hateful that it was physically painful for me to put myself through that review. I was a puppet. I couldn’t have seen it at the time because I was at the center of it, and I still live in dread of the monster I would have become if I’d kept to that path. I see that same kind of speech coming from you now - the jingoism, the recycled talking points, the Orwellian denials, and the near-unquestioning loyalty to the stars of the Republican Party and their mouthpieces at Fox, OAN, Newsmax, and the AM Radio circuit. I see the most selfish parts of who I used to be, and I know that deep down, you are not that person because I still see you constantly striving to be a good mother, a good Christian, and a model human being.
I’m imploring you to finally look at the evidence, the boundless clear and present evidence, and see what men like Gingrich, McConnell, and Trump have turned your party into. What they are turning you into, the same as they tried with me.
I know you wouldn’t be happy as a Democrat - I myself am only begrudgingly a Democrat because the system doesn’t allow for a viable alternative (and that’s a whole different issue that deserves it’s own library of articles). I’m not trying to convert you. I just need to know that you can look at the evidence with your own eyes like I did and see that you’ve been played for a sucker by men who cry wolf and distract you by having you chase shadows while they line their pockets with money and power. Please stop listening to these monsters, stop swallowing their poison. I know how easy it is to be in that world because I myself have lived in it for most of my life. I fully understand the appeal: there are easy answers for everything, you always know who the enemy is and who your supposed allies and benefactors are. But I also left that behind, and yes, it hurts. It hurts a lot, and frequently. But despite the pain, I know I am better off for having done it.
Yes, I have to question the people who claim to represent me more. I have to question EVERYTHING more because I now know that nothing is as clear cut as I thought it was - once removed from Plato’s Cave, I no longer had the luxury of a simple world. And yet I am still happier because I am so much more my own person now. Yes I falter, and worse still, some days I fall back into the old ways of thinking, but now I recognize that for what it is and it is easier to deal with.
You’ll always be a Conservative, Mom, but I see you on the path that I was on, a path that nearly robbed me of my critical thinking and objectivity, and one which would have weaponized my sense of patriotism to benefit people who are not me. You have kept that course far longer than I. Please put aside the whataboutisms, the both-sides-isms, and finally see the evil, ravenous monster that killed your party from the inside and now wears its skin to deceive you into feeding it further.
I don’t ask that you agree with my politics or economics. I AM begging you though to split from this political machine which is changing you into something I no longer recognize. I want the parents I used to have, the ones who could look at things objectively and form their own opinions instead of repeating talk show buzz lines.
Please, recognize the shadows on the wall of the cave that wicked men are showing you are NOT reality. Please, join me in the truth of the world outside.
#I very nearly sent it#but she's already having tremendous issues between her and my sister and I didn't want to compound those and split the family apart#more than it already has#at any rate#if she doesn't start cooling down by fall#well#at least I have it written down here for easy access#politics#family#trump#republicans#democrats#echo chamber#republican#mitch mcconnell#conservative#conservatives#family issues
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Halfway Home - Ralph Anderson x Shifter!Reader (The Outsider)
GIF CREDIT: X
Author’s Note: I think this gif set really cemented this fic as something I was gonna do.
This one is the closest thing I will write to Show!Canon, although I’ve borrowed a couple of Shifter ‘Tells’ from the book.
I thought this was going to be really short, but in the end I’m glad I wrote it like this, instead of the way I had planned
And I really really hope you all enjoy it 💙💜
Also the lyrics to this song are PERFECT
Halfway Home - Carly Pearce
Disclaimer: Characters & Plot are Stephen King’s (or... Richard Price’s characterization...) / Lyrics not mine (and lyrical liberties taken) / gifs not mine - credit as appropriate. / Direct quotes used from Episode 10 - so, spoilers ahead!
Premise: This was never a problem in a million years you’d expect to have to face. And in all the lifetimes you’d lived you never had faced it. But now the Frankie Peterson case is over Ralph is aware your species exists, and that discovery may well rip you both apart...
Words: 8729
Warnings: Swearing / The Outsider show spoilers
⚠ Angst/Hurt Caution Warning ⚠
____________
Blame it on me, I'm an actor, I'm a fake
Blame it on me, I broke your heart but by mistake
Call it what you wanna, good intentions or denial
But if I'm bein' honest, I've been lyin' for a while
Halfway right doesn't make it right
Halfway wrong is still wrong
Half of me is with you here tonight
And half of me is long gone
But halfway to Heaven isn't Heaven
And halfway home just ain't home
And I put it off, I was selfish, I was scared
I put it off and I know it isn't fair
You don’t want to stay, but you don’t want to say goodbye
Let's call it what it is and we'll get out of this alive
And I'm sorry
If I hang onto you, I'll drown
I'm so sorry
If I don't let go, I'm goin' down
Halfway right doesn't make it right
Halfway wrong is still wrong
Half of me didn't see it comin'
Half of me knew it all along...
---
[Holly] “Are there more of you?”
[The Outsider] “Why? Have you seen someone like me before? Are there others? Cause there have been times when I sensed there could be more...”
***
You stood in the sliding glass doorway, looking out over the back yard, everything about your senses was heightened - it was like you could even hear the grass move.
You knew there were others out there - heck, you were old enough to have walked amongst your own kind before you became an ancient relic left to history and ghost stories. A time when you were gods amongst men, until men rose up.
But here? In Cherokee City, Georgia? It didn’t make a lot of sense to you. Not for there to be another. You knew why you were here. Tired of running, tired of tracking, tired of being everything your species condemned you to be - you wished only for a quiet, peaceful existence. And you had one now; Detective Ralph Anderson saw to that in every way he could. And to him you were a normal human being, that lived their life out just as accordingly. All your weird little ticks were exactly that... because every human had exactly the same – a long list of ticks and traits that made them the person they were.
The problem was this shapeshifter wasn’t doing what you were doing. You’d sensed it before the Frankie Peterson murder, but as soon as Ralph came home from that case you knew something was wrong. Something was different this time. And he explained in lengthy detail the crime scene, and the DNA. That alerted you. No criminal left their DNA just lying around, but you could be so careless. Because everyone would suspect the person you had shifted into, not you. You could just as quick become someone else and be well on your way... to do exactly the same somewhere else. So long as everything added up. So long as the person who you had replicated got caught and the evidence was water tight.... and they had no alibi.
Well that was easy once, before DNA testing came into play. And then it took humans a little while to get that up to scratch, and DNA was your whole game. Witness accounts could be sketchy, but as long as your kind could produce enough, and better, witness accounts to the contrary you could get away with it. Their word against... well, something you’d fabricated.
The problem was, the victims of this was both a child and a man, named Terry Maitland, who didn’t deserve what had happened. Of course, really no one deserved it - but a man who was a teacher and had seeming never done anything bad in his life was not a man that deserved this. And to you, the child was unforgivable, it wasn’t uncommon amongst your kind to eat people – even now – but children? That was wicked and cruel – which may have explained the malice in the air. Not just the feel of it, but the feeling it was stirring up within the town. Drunk on pain and suffering. That made you hold on to Ralph and his love a little tighter – because an emotion like that was far more sustainable. And you weren’t about to let yourself go down the same path that this one clearly had.
But you were selfish and worried, and all you wanted was for this to go away, be buried, and you could go on living your quiet little life. If Terry went to prison, and your counterpart moved on, it would just be something unforgivably terrible that happened here. Even when you knew the repercussions of that... but you didn’t care so much about that so long as your identity was hidden.
Ralph had every single confidence that they both had the guy, and that the evidence was so good that Terry was going away whether he denied it or not. And Ralph’s confidence bled into you, which was a bad thing, of course and you let yourself get comfortable and cocky about it.
Sure, you could absolutely tell him - and that made your conscience weigh heavily on you - but he’d say you were insane... You could show him, but how would that hold up in court? And what would it do to you, and the life you had worked so hard to build here.
Then it all hit you; because Terry Maitland was at a conference in Cap City, and he was on video tape. That wasn’t something that even the best evidence could save a shapeshifter from. How did you combat that?
Stupid and careless - that’s what your counterpart was. And a child, to get so confident as to display itself so openly. You did, but that had taken many years of good practice, and you didn’t go around killing and eating children.
The other problem was it didn’t go away. And as the Peterson family fell one by one, and so did Terry at his arraignment, it stuck around. New to the game, maybe? But if it couldn’t sense you then it was young, and if it could but was looking to encroach on your territory, then it had another thing coming. The crude monster drawings you’d seen of your race weren’t far off an accurate depiction of your true form. You hadn’t had use for claws and needle like teeth in a long time - but you would surely use them if you had to. And to protect everything you knew, and everyone you loved here? Without question.
***
But just as suddenly it was gone. The tension that loomed over you dissipated. The case however, did not.
And before you knew it Private Investigator Holly Gibney was in town. You had an uneasy feeling about this, and when Ralph asked if you were going to accompany him to the meeting you flat out refused. You didn’t know what she knew, what if she took one look at you and shattered your world into pieces? You couldn’t risk it. And perhaps it was better you didn’t go, because when he got home, Holly in tow, Ralph was beside himself.
When you’d gotten him to quiet down about what a waste of time it was - and stop being so rude, with her in the house - you asked him what was up. When Ralph rolled his eyes and refused to do anything but mute it, you gently coaxed it out of Holly yourself. And although a lot of her ideas were misconceptions, she had it right.
“El Cuco”: a mishmash manifestation of stories and rumours carried on for centuries about your species. Not all shapeshifters were the same, and this new one was not the same strain as you. But close enough.
You didn’t think telling Holly that you believed her held too much consequence aside from trying to get Ralph on side and to believe something. Even when he still scoffed and called you crazy too. You had some effect though, because lying together that night, with the quiet of the darkness that surrounded you – Ralph asked if you really did believe her – you could only answer that you really did, and it took him a little longer to dismiss it with a soft hmph!
But then they all went out to Tennessee and you were left behind. And you didn’t see what Ralph saw, or hear what he heard... or say what he said. And he came back to you with far more in his head than he’d ever wanted. And whenever you asked him about it he simply told you you wouldn’t believe him, and Holly gave you a similar story. Even when you tried the prompt of so it’s all true-!?
Ralph clearly wanted to forget something he probably never could, and certainly didn’t want to talk about it. Holly left soon afterwards – with Ralph’s gentle smile and wish to work together again, sometime. Though of course he hoped on something less Supernatural.
That evening you sat together on the couch in silence – your head resting on his chest. Maybe it was all over now? Terry Maitland would get completely pardoned in Hayes’ press conference, and you very much doubted that the other shifter got out of the situation alive. Though you were also aware there were many others that didn’t make it out of there also. Ralph had told you that much, but didn’t elaborate on anything else. And you’d just as soon help him forget, it to blow over, and you and he to go back to your quiet small city life.
***
It didn’t. Because Ralph couldn’t get it off his mind. Sure he didn’t want to talk about it actively. He could barely wrap his head around it – around what he’d witnessed, around the idea that there were things out there beyond the explanation of science. Of everything he’d ever known.
He might have asked Holly out of curiosity what else was out there, and watched her shrug with a smile… but did he want to find out? Did he even want to entertain the idea that this was anything other than a nightmare?
Of course he didn’t. But part of him realised he had to. Having been cleared to go back to work Ralph was at least glad of something to put his mind to. But he was also worried – and dare he say it even scared? What if the things out there were perpetually WORSE than what he’d been through. He could handle himself, always had. But what if those things came for you? Ralph couldn’t handle the notion of that, but what if it happened? He’d never forgive himself if something happened to you – whether you be the one that was transformed into or… no, he couldn’t bare to even think of you as the body. He was glad you didn’t have children, together or your own – dare he even say relieved that you couldn’t have them. Because that was just another thing to worry about – and those were mounting on Ralph pretty quickly. And now he watched you so closely; he knew it might end eventually but how couldn’t he get paranoid? Scratches always came with questions, and you always gave him that little look of annoyance - Ralph, I just scratched myself. If someone did it to me after what Holly said, I’d come to you – you KNOW that! - and he also just as closely monitored the back of your neck. But you knew exactly why – and you let him do what he needed to do to get over this, because you knew you couldn’t become a victim of your own species. Not in the ways he was thinking anyway.
The problem was everything coincided at just the wrong time. The shifter that Ralph had dealt with was clearly a great deal younger than you. A strain that shifted by shedding skin like a reptile, should have been easy and over in a few minutes for one as old as you. Like taking off a jacket and leaving it on the bleachers on a Friday night. But it took this one a month or so to change from one person to another, during which the composition of one victim broke down as he prepared to shed.
Something very similar happened to you.
A human form was not your true form – however the human form you chose was not someone whose DNA you had acquired. Each one of you could present human as necessary to blend in – but you weren’t meant to sustain it for more than a few months at a time. And, like he had, you would break down. It’d last for nearly 3 days total, but you would feel extremely uncomfortable in your own skin until your body was ready to regenerate itself. Technically you could shift at any point, but it wasn’t exactly the easiest thing to do under the watchful eyes – and even more so now – of a Cherokee City detective who was suddenly aware of the existence of your kind.
It'd take an hour of quietly sitting alone in the midst of the woods with no one around, and then you could go back to being you again, but it was a long hour. And you made the mistake of choosing the park where the Peterson murder had happened. But it was oddly cathartic to sit in the middle of all that and contemplate. To cry, and feel that sorrow like a strange shot of adrenaline; to beg for the forgiveness of your kind for doing something so goddamn awful. And one lunchbreak later you’d step out of the trees and brush yourself down, shiny and new, and no one would know any different. It took about a day to really set back again, but even the most observant of humans wouldn’t be observant enough to know that your face probably looked a little off – it would be something so insignificant they couldn’t place.
You’d probably never been more wrong about anything in your life. You’d been with the same man for four years; and he was a detective. He’d never noticed anything before, but he’d never seen one of you before Tennessee. And the one he had seen, had made many mistakes.
***
For four days Ralph Anderson had witnessed things in you he wanted to believe might have been figments of his imagination. Like his paranoia was making him see these things and they were tricks of the light. He thought he might be able to deal with it once or twice and write it off, but when the fourth day came and it was still happening, his suspicions had never been more heightened.
Your eyes were the one thing you couldn’t control. You didn’t leave that odd gooey residue because you didn’t shift the same way he had – yours was more of a ‘shimmer’ from one person to the next and that meant you didn’t really leave much trace. Your skin might have felt odd, but that was only to you – and you could shake off feeling uncomfortable as anything: that time of the month… or just an uneasiness about the world right now (and he’d understand that with the Terry Maitland case still fresh!). But your eyes in light – that was a hard one; they flickered usually when you got emotional but you could control that. An odd silver sheen that would come and go and could be down to any number of tricks, including ones people’s brains played on themselves, but that wasn’t what this was.
Ralph had seen that shine before. And it was too much of a strange coincidence for it to mean anything else. That shine wasn’t a reflection in your eyes, but something that seemed to come from within them. And he’d seen that in ‘Claudes’ eyes in the cave. And now in you for four consecutive days. Straws for eyes. Too many people had given that description, every nightmare Maitland’s daughter had had mentioned that. And it was odd to see in that cave – but it was horrific to see in you. It came and went but it was there. And every fibre in Ralph’s being tried to deny that. Surely you weren’t one of those things? How could that be – he had to be seeing things, he just had to be. He couldn’t accept anything else but that – not you, anything or anyone but you. He’d been with you for four years, he KNEW you. And he loved you. And Ralph didn’t know which was worse.
He couldn’t even believe that lying in bed with you now, watching the way you breathed, he could even contemplate that thought. You’d looked like this since he met you – the other shifter didn’t last more than a few weeks, and then took nearly a month to become something else, but you were here. Like this. But was this you-!? Was this a victim of yours? Why the hell was Ralph talking so crazy to himself!?
He had to be seeing things; but no matter how many times he told himself that, Ralph Anderson also couldn’t bring himself to believe it to be true. It was like the evidence was staring him in the face and he just didn’t want to acknowledge it. He didn’t want to believe it with Terry either – and that was just as concrete. And he’d been wrong there, he could be wrong here. But that was almost worse.
Ralph bit his lip, and was even more horrified to find that the usual gap he maintained with you – of about two inches, close enough to reach out and hold you, to be protective – had now subconsciously widened; he couldn’t have been further across the bed from you if he’d tried. And he wasn’t sure he even wanted to fall asleep next to you – but hell he had done for nearly your whole relationship. He would have to get to the bottom of this and soon… at least he knew that much. And racing around his head were the same questions;
What the hell are you? Is that even what you really look like? Is that even your real name? Who ARE you?
You had already left for work before he awoke, and you left a sweet little note wishing him a nice day. But it just left him empty. Ralph placed it back on the counter and made himself a coffee. He had to know – but he couldn’t just go rushing into a confrontation with you without being sure. He wouldn’t make that mistake again. And he didn’t know exactly what you were yet, his experience consisted of one shapeshifting entity; you might have been one but you weren’t necessarily the same kind. But he’d killed one of you before – would he hesitate to do the same again?
Ralph cursed himself for even thinking that. He could be so wrong about this – but had the uneasy feeling that he wasn’t.
***
This continued back and forth for a few days; Ralph Anderson was in denial. And although you could sense something was wrong, he’d been acting odd since he got back from Tennessee and you didn’t blame him for it. You were more inclined to think that was just going to continue. And you would allow him to adjust back to normal at his own pace. If he ever really got back to that – if normal was something Ralph could rebuild for himself after the Frankie Peterson case.
You knew life wasn’t yet as it had been before, but you were confident it was going that way. And your gentle sunny disposition wasn’t one you were about to let get dampened. In fact, you were sure Ralph needed it right now. You hummed along to your music as you made yourself breakfast, took a shower and got ready for work, and were still doing so as you reached the front door.
Your partner was standing in the kitchen, staring out across the front lawn as you passed him, you paused and turned back.
Something was troubling him; “Ralph?”
He continued to stare forward.
“Ralph? Babe? Ralph!? Sweetheart-!” It took you a little while to rouse him from his thoughts.
“Huh-? Oh! I’m sorry.”
You titled your head; “You okay, babe?”
“…Yeah…” His eyes seemed to look everywhere but your face, “I’m fine, why.”
“…You just… seem a little distant lately…” You took a few slow strides towards him, “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’ll be okay.”
“Okay…” You smiled gently, “You know you can tell me anything, right?”
He tried not to obviously wince at the irony, “Of course I do.”
“Alright, well, I’m off-! And… I’ll see you later.”
“Sure. Have a good day.”
You waited, thinking perhaps he would offer you a goodbye kiss, but he didn’t. Something was up. “…And you.” You tried not to sound dejected, and knew you’d clearly failed.
“Y/N!” He caught your arm, pulling you back towards him – eyes looking straight into yours and hoping against hope that the next three words out of his mouth sounded genuine right now; “I love you.” Though he’d never lied more.
You didn’t see through him, not even slightly. In fact your only thought was that you knew he did. “I love you too.”
He let you go, smile still on your face and then watched you turn with a renewed spring in your step and exit the house. As soon as he heard the door slam closed Ralph lifted his hands to his face. He’d used exactly the same trick on you that the other shifter had used to collect everyone else’s DNA – with that yank back on your arm as an excuse.
It was just a scratch sure, but it was so much more significant than that. Underneath his thumbnail was just a trace of blood. But it wasn’t red, like his was. It looked a lot more like he’d contemplated a sentence too long and pen ink had leaked, stubbornly burying itself under his nails. Blue-black. He’d seen quite enough of that coming out of the hand he’d stabbed to pin ‘Claude’ down.
“Oh. Fuck!”
***
Ralph had a hard time of it at work – and even more so when those too inquisitive wondered why he was bringing up the files for Frankie Peterson. He would simply answer that he just wanted to check on a few things, only to have them say ‘Why!? It’s closed!’
Because she’s a monster – was his only thought, and yet he couldn’t vocalise it - I fell in love with a monster. And he stared hard at those images until his vision blurred, not from tiredness – not because his brain had enough and needed to zone, but hot, angry tears. All this time he’d been with something capable of this – how the hell did he even know that you hadn’t done this? He didn’t know what you were doing when you weren’t together – and now Ralph was beginning to think that he didn’t know you at all. Why was this happening to him? Why again? Why in such a short space of time? Because he’d made a mistake with Terry? Now the Universe was just hell bent on destroying everything…
You by comparison had a good day at work with your friends and barely noticed anything, not even Ralph’s little nick of your wrist. Although, when a colleague pointed it out you simply laughed – you had a bad habit of being clumsy sometimes and scratches appeared out of nowhere, even when you were careful. And of course, you had to be careful, the only time you bled the same colour as a human was when you shifted into one – and it was probably your one tell. Scratches happened, anything deeper than that and you’d be in trouble. Up until now you’d managed to avoid anything so serious ever happening.
When you returned home Ralph was still pondering over notes, not so obvious as to be Frankie’s, and was so out of his head that it was difficult to get a read on him. Your kiss on his cheek did cause him to flinch;
“OH! God-!” He placed his hand over his heart, adrenaline immediately spiking “Shit – I’m sorry, I’m just…”
“It’s okay-!” Although your heart was racing equally fast, “You’re working, I’m sorry…”
“No it’s…” He couldn’t even bring himself to say it, and his smile was restrained, but to you, at least he was smiling. You backed off;
“I’ll make dinner-! Alright?”
“Sure…” You beamed, and his eyes followed your walk away before he returned to his notes. Did he fear for his own safety? Truly he wasn’t sure – but how many times had you linked your hands behind his neck, or rubbed his shoulders after a hard day or even just placed a gentle kiss there. He shuddered slightly as he thought about Jack Hoskins; could you do that to him? Right now, Ralph hated that he had to assume the worst.
Right now, you were none the wiser.
***
It was approaching midnight and Ralph had made sure you were once again safely in bed. If there was something else he’d payed great attention to with Holly Gibney, it was how to check for traces of that ‘El Cuco’ entity. Ralph’s best guess was that if you truly were one of those things, you would leave that same trace everywhere that he had. Leave your fingerprints the same...
He stood alone with his flashlight in the middle of the living room – fingertips hovering over the light switch. Could he bear to know the answer? Didn’t he already know.
Ralph took a deep breath, and bit his lip – closing his eyes, he flicked the switch. It took him far too long to reopen them – and when he did, he ran cold from head to feet. It was everywhere. He was barely exaggerating to say there was more white than blue. He suddenly felt weak, stumbling backwards Ralph had a hard time trying to catch himself against the wall. His breathing was hard and ragged and he felt sick. He knew he probably would be sick. The house was dark so now the only light being thrown up was this, from you.
He tried to swallow but his mouth was dry – sweeping the light to the stairwell, he followed it. Trying to calm himself down – but how could he? Everywhere he turned his beam that you had touched, or brushed against, was this substance.
It caught brightest in the bathroom and he had to stop. In some places the white was faded - even if it completely covered a surface it was faint - But not here. Ralph approached cautiously. Aside from your bedroom he supposed this would be the place you’d spend the most time without clothes – only here water ran down your body in droplets and cascaded to the ground. The shower looked like someone had thrown a pot of white paint over it and the floor wasn’t much better – and even though it was white, it reminded Ralph too much of blood spatter.
He was afraid, and repulsed, and hurt, and heartbroken. He gagged, and then realised that it wasn’t going to stop there. Not even at his worst crime scenes, or as a rookie seeing shit for the very first time, had Ralph Anderson ever thrown up at the sight of something – he was too calm and steady for that. But this was beyond words, this was you, this was the woman he loved, the person he wanted to spend forever with. And all of a sudden everything he’d been trying to hold in didn’t want to stay in his head, or his heart. And Ralph was crying again – but these were real body shaking sobs.
He had to do something about this, but he was just as afraid of what he would do to you.
***
Ralph didn’t even wait past waking up the following morning. Dressing, he wasn’t even sure what he was going to say, or how he was going to do it – but he walked down those stairs with a fully loaded pistol in his left hand.
You could have kicked yourself a million times – maybe you just wanted to pretend everything was alright, that his tone wasn’t off, that his vibe wasn’t off. That it was everything that Ralph had been through over the past month and not you.
But as soon as you heard the hammer click back and felt not just the malice, but the intent, you knew it was all but over. You didn’t even look at him, staring straight at your coffee cup – there was no point hiding this now.
“You better be careful with shooting that.”
He should have been fazed by your sentence; he almost was. Instead what came out of his mouth was defensive and venomous; “I already know you can die.”
You breathed out, is that how he was going to play it? “Not easily...” You turned to him, stare measured “I’m not some child who has barely grasped the concept of shifting and makes careless mistakes Ralph. I’m much older than he was.”
His eyes flicked away from yours and his brows furrowed – it made him look angrier, rather than his usual concerned; “Who ARE you-!?”
Your voice raised to match his, but you were determined not to shout; “You know who I am!”
“How can I-!? You’ve lied to me from day one-!”
You took a step back: no matter how right he was, what did he want you to say? “And if Frankie Peterson hadn’t turned out the way it did, you would be none the wiser-!”
“So if another you had gotten away with what he did, that would have been okay-!?”
“Ralph. Terry Maitland, Frankie Peterson… no one who lost their lives over this deserved it. Except the son of a bitch that did this in the first place-!” Your heart hurt, “What do you want me to say Ralph?! If I’d have told you what I was, then what?”
“Four fucking years we’ve been together – and you didn’t even - Who are you, right now!?”
“Me.”
“Bullshit!”
“I have a human face, as much as I have a form that’s a lot more like what you would traditionally call a monster-!” You winced, thinking you’d probably said all the words he didn’t want to hear; “Ralph, will you please put the gun down.” A bullet through your head might only slow you down. To be honest you’d never had much contact with human weaponry, but you didn’t fancy testing it out when the man you loved was the one pulling the trigger. “…I can’t sustain a human form for four years. Not even this one… But I promise you this face is my own.”
“How many have you killed?” You noticed his gun hand didn’t waver
“What?”
“Children. People – I don’t care, how many, killed and eaten-!? FUCK! What the hell-! Do you know how crazy this sounds out of my mouth-!?”
You furrowed your eyebrows and tilted your head; “I don’t know.” Not very “Considering you’re pointing a gun at me for being a shifter.”
“Answer my question.”
“Ral-”
“ANSWER the question.”
You sighed, “I don’t eat children that’s insane – that’s cruel, and heartless, and downright repulsive.” But people? Yeah – once, but how far back in your history did he want to go? Human sacrifices to Gods were once a thing. But ever since you’d walked predominantly on two legs with the face you’d chosen for yourself, you decided looking human meant acting like one too.
Ralph’s laugh was cold, like he couldn’t believe he was trapped in this; “But what anything else is game – what do you get off on, is it the killing, or the suffering!?”
“Suffering is like Heroin, but that’s unsustainable. If I wanted to feed on emotions those aren’t the ones I’d chose.” You followed the barrel of his gun as he shifted his weight; “I don’t kill people, that’s murder and there are laws against that. I am dating a fucking detective; how dumb do you think I am-!? And eating people?!” You scoffed, “If that’s what you think of me then we are done here.”
That smile was just as cruel; “Yeah. We are fucking done. Hold your hands out.”
You stared at him in disbelief, “Are you kidding me-!?”
“I figure I can’t fucking shoot you in my own house. HANDS.” Though right now as he looked at you that wasn’t mercy, that was I’d rather not have to move out because they’re busy turning this into a crime scene!
“You’re going to arrest me-!? On what charges-!?”
“Whatever I have to. You’re dangerous.”
You figured with a gun still pointed at your face you’d rather do what Ralph said, and placed your wrists out; he would have nothing on you if you did what he asked. There was just one problem, your thought to instinctively try to take his own arm – to pull him closer to you and say something, or kiss him or anything. You were still you. Why did things have to change because of what you were? Ralph could be angry and upset but he was reacting to what he knew, why did that mean something had to happen? Of course as soon as your skin touched his he withdrew;
“DON’T. Touch. Me.” Then he took a deep breath, rethinking his idea, “Turn around.”
“What, so you don’t have to look at me when you shoot me?”
“TURN. AROUND.”
You narrowed your eyes, voice displaying your astonishment, “You really think I’m gonna turn you into Jack Hoskins, don’t you? You are un-fucking-belivable Ralph Anderson.” But you did turn away for him, and his yank on your arms was not gentle, “…If it makes any difference, I can’t do that. Whether it be a trait of his kind or just because he was so sick and twisted and evil…”
Ralph pulled you back, cuffs tight against your skin. He hoped you wouldn’t strain and bleed blue again. “If it makes any difference…” He breathed, your back up against his chest (You didn’t dare tremble at that because it would be for all the wrong reasons), and you heard the faint click of his safety going back on, “I don’t care.”
***
Ralph pushed you into the back of the car, and whilst he had you cuffed the questioning continued. But you felt his revulsion, and he didn’t look at you.
“Was it ever really real? Any of it!!?”
For a moment you pitied him, that he would be forced to say any of this; “Ralph. I love you.”
“Don’t say it. Don’t you dare say it-!”
“How can it not be real-!?”
There was silence and then he sighed “You told me you couldn’t have kids... because you’re this?” You blinked hard, staring at the back of his head. Why would he chose to fixate on that specifically? You knew he’d been disappointed about it when you’d told him, but it was Ralph’s decision to stay anyway. Besides, any time he was on a case that involved children – particularly this one – he was always glad you didn’t have any.
You cast your eyes to the floor and then the window, but you didn’t want to be anything other than honest with him; “I can’t have children with you. Because you’re human. If my mating season coincided with his presence in Cherokee City then... I could have kids, yes.” You rested your head on the window, wondering why you were continuing but suddenly couldn’t stop yourself from giving him something like a Discovery Channel documentary on your species “…Females are bigger and it gets pretty nasty. Like you shoulda seen the other guy nasty – with teeth and claws like that… And he was pretty young, so even worse. That’s if he survived; females used to kill and eat males after mating. I believe there’s spiders that do similar. Though it’s always the female that chases… Shame that stopped to preserve our race; would have saved you a job…”
Ralph found himself almost retching again and wished he’d never asked. The car ride fell silent.
Eventually he pulled out his mobile and tapped away an urgent text - despite trying to lean over to see what he was doing, he’d done it at such an angle that you simply couldn’t. You thought about telling him that texting and driving wasn’t safe, but preferred to keep quiet – less you get him yelling at you again. It wasn’t something you liked very much. Perhaps you deserved it, but you had to admit to yourself any time you’d thought about telling him, it never ended like this – perhaps he’d need some time alone to come to terms with such things and you’d help him through it as best you could, but it was never in the back of his car snapped in handcuffs.
Besides, he was sitting texting so you didn’t know who he was talking to. Ralph Anderson was defiantly an “I’ll call you!” man.
When he pulled into the precinct you knew exactly who he had messaged, as standing on the front steps looking equally confused and worried, we’re both Hayes and Sablo.
You were outraged; “You’re kidding-!? You’re getting our friends involved-!??!”
He turned to you with a look that said both shut up and how dare you call them friends, before exiting the vehicle and coming around to your side.
Yune was the first to move “Shit! Ralph! What the hell are you doing-!?” You supposed the question was warranted; Ralph was pulling his girlfriend out of the car in handcuffs. Hayes was staring, mouth open like this could only have been a dream. Try living it from this angle, mate.
“What I must.” Was Ralph’s bitter reply
“Y/N! What happened-!? Are you okay-!?” Though Ralph was putting his body firmly between Sablo and yourself. Possibly to protect him, but you’d roll your eyes at that – did he really expect you to go around attacking everyone now he knew?
You gave him a weak smile; “Best to stay away from me Yune...”
Ralph yanked you away from him and, holding you firmly, marched you into the building. Hayes was shoulder to shoulder with him;
“What are you doing!?”
“She’s going in a cell!”
“Why-!? I hope you know what you’re doing calling me into this after Frankie Peterson!! What are the charges-!?” His shout-whispering definitely verged on the former, and you almost wanted to tell him to shut up also.
“Whatever the hell you can possibly put on her.”
“You haven’t CHARGED her-?!” Hayes stopped dead causing Yune to almost crash into him, “Ralph are you fucking insane?!?! Let her out of those cuffs right now, I’m not being a party to this!”
“Well guess what - you are! And you have been for longer than you realise.”
Yune placed his hands on his hips still watching you, and you were staring at the wall because right now your emotions were peaking all over the place, and if your eyes were going to burn silver it was now. “Will you at least tell us what this is about?”
Ralph presses the button for the elevator; “Yeah. I’ll meet you in my office.”
As the elevator door pinged he walked you in, and pressed the button for the holding cells. You remained silent, finding your shoes more interesting. But what would you give to have those hands on you lovingly right now. Ralph’s grip was strong and you thought he was currently using more pressure than necessary, but supposed you understood.
Yune and Hayes turned to each other in the lobby in utter disbelief - and Hayes sighed to break the silence, hardly daring to think he could possibly have been thrown into this situation again; “This is a lawsuit waiting to happen.”
***
No-one asked him any questions. Probably because Ralph didn’t look like a man who wanted to be asked any questions right now – and you looked just as unlikely to say anything. In fact as he marched you down the corridor people actively stepped out of his way; man on a mission.
He stopped to breathe only when he had you in front of the cell – and for once you could read your detective like an open book. He had no reason to hide emotion from you when he didn’t know you could read his aura, or get a vibe from him – but now they were loud and clear.
Ralph pushed the cell door open and brought your wrists closer to his, paying close attention to your fingernails in the process. He unlocked the handcuffs, luckily they’d only made faint marks on your wrists because you didn’t struggle – he’d have a hard time explaining otherwise – and he almost sighed in relief, before giving you a hard shove in. You stumbled, caught off guard by the
movement and he slammed the door shut behind you.
You turned around – damn near glaring at him as he locked it up, but he still wasn’t looking at your face. Ralph couldn’t, yet. Couldn’t bring himself to look at a person he thought he knew, and was now a damn near stranger.
“You’re staying there until I figure out what to do with you-!”
“Why don’t you just take me out to a cave and put a bullet through my head Ralph, that’s what you want-!! I can read you!” You almost spat it at him – because the nerve of him not to look at you was nearly insulting. Like he could throw away four years of good memories just like that.
And then he all but did; “Because I LOVED YOU.” His voice raised and so did his eyes, that gorgeous blue now so in pain, and you couldn’t take it away this time – he was hurt and betrayed, but there was nothing in that sentence that held untrue and you could feel that. Loved. Past tense. Just like that.
“Ralph…” Your eyes flickered silver and stayed that way, your shoulders and your features slumping in defeat, “Ralph, please…”
“Oh no, you’re staying here. Now I gotta sort this fucking mess…” He stepped away from you, unnerved even more by that unnatural eye colour,
“RALPH!” You couldn’t take that. How could he say that to you? How could he just walk away after saying loved!?
But Ralph Anderson didn’t stop, he kept going, and you heard his quiet murmur that no one was to touch you, to see you or speak to you before he came back. There was agreement, and then your partners footsteps faded.
You slumped down on the bench, unsure of what you were feeling for the first time in your entire life. You’d been through the rise and fall of empires. Been treated like a God, feared like a monster and hunted like an animal. Hidden in many different countries under many different identities in cities that didn’t even exist anymore.
But in all those lifetimes – you hadn’t ever felt something quite like this.
***
Yune Sablo was eerily quiet, he couldn’t even find the words. That was okay though, because DA Kenneth Hayes was livid - and couldn’t get them all out quick enough.
“You WHAT-!?! This WHOLE time!? All that shit you told me on the phone about Jack Hoskins and-!?” He paused only to collect his thought, hand to his temple momentarily, “And some other police guy - that was all crap!? Do you two HEAR yourselves!? Shapeshifters - tell me this is all a big fucking set up, please! God, let this be a joke!!”
Ralph shook his head; “Every word is true. And I can prove it, if you wanna walk with me to the holding cell. I mean it won’t be hard - she bleeds blue.”
Hayes made a face; “I don’t want to go anywhere near that. What I wanna know is why everyone was in on this but me. Did I not matter? Was it something I said-!?”
“You’re smart Hayes, but you’re logical. I would never have believed it until I had to, you would have laughed us out of your office. Easier to let you do what you had to on terms that make sense, and don’t sound insane.”
“Like you do!” Hayes then did laugh, but not in humour, “Ralph-! You’re saying she is the same kinda thing that killed and mutilated Frankie Peterson - and that’s not the only murder, you’ve given me two more that are known about and an attempted kidnapping - stole identities of countless people, made mind slaves of others and almost killed all of you in Tennessee-!? And she’s just locked up in a holding cell-!?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying.” Ralph folded his arms, “she denies that she does any of that, but who is to say... and I couldn’t exactly shoot her in my own house could I-!?” Would have been a hell of a clean-up operation, and it’d taken more than a bullet to stop the last one. If he could withstand that, and you were older, then what could Ralph put you through before you died. He shook that thought quickly away when it started to remind him too much of torture.
“And you believe her-!!?” Ralph was silent, and looked across to Yune for support. The Lieutenant clearly didn’t want to interject however, causing Hayes to put his head in his hands; “She’s met my KIDS Ralph-! She’s been to my house—! We’ve all been around her and to plenty of events -! And all she needs is a drop of blood to become us-!?”
“I. Know.” Ralph sounded exasperated, “How do you think I feel-?!”
***
It was a lot later in the day when he returned. You’d been left alone with nothing much more than your thoughts, and had watched shadows pass along the floor. You were glad for the silence and you slept in short bursts – but all of it was broken. And when you awoke you wanted to reach for a person who was no longer there. Because you weren’t in bed back home like you usually were. It was almost strange that you’d ended up being the one with the nightmares now – having soothed Ralph out of more than his fair share since the beginning of all this.
He walked in, duffel slung over his shoulder. He’d changed his shirt from this morning, so he’d clearly been home. You didn’t even have a clock to tell you the time. You’d mutter something about human rights – but knew you’d give Ralph the perfect opportunity to remind you that you weren’t human, and you refused to do that.
He dropped the bag by the door – still giving you that same stare – like you were dead to him; the worst of the worst. And given the kinds of things Ralph had seen during his tenure, even you thought his look was a little unfair. But justified; why would you look at someone who had just broken your heart as anything less than a monster. And you really were one, at least in his eyes.
He opened the door just a crack, satisfied that you would stay still - try and show that you were no harm to anyone - and kicked the bag over to you. You looked pretty subdued, just sitting there on the bench – Ralph hoped you’d had some time to think it all over and stew, like a real perp. He wanted you to make some kind of mistake. But he’d been through it with Yune and Hayes, you could be held here for 48 hours, despite cries of insanity and protest. Neither of them was about to let a shapeshifter run loose in Cherokee City (again), and Ralph just didn’t know what to do with you otherwise. Or if he could be trusted.
For a moment sympathy seemed to cross his face, and you weren’t sure if you should believe it or not; “I brought you some things. Clothes and pieces. I figured you might want them. It’s the decent thing…” Unlike you he seemed to say, but not out loud.
Your eyes fell to the bag, and you reached for it slowly. Indeed, when you upzipped it, he’d given you fresh changes of clothes and a few things to make you more comfortable. You didn’t know why; he had no reason. Unless Ralph felt even just a little guilty about the situation. You supposed that was what he wanted you to feel most of all.
You should have been thankful, but you weren’t.
“Oh you’re bringing me things now!?” Your smile was thin, “I assume that means I’m staying? The full 48 hours is it, Ralph?” You raised an eyebrow, standing; “…Why? Why the hell even pretend you still care about me!?”
His face fell immediately, the sadness in his eyes that pulled across his face replaced by steel blue anger. You weren’t about to beg his forgiveness and Ralph knew that. But you standing up in the way you just had, that determined stance, hard eyes – he barely took a breath. All his feelings about everything, from pulling up at the Frankie Peterson murder to right now came out at once. He was venomous and cruel, and he didn’t care, he’d had enough;
Ralph slammed his hand up against the bars; “There’s nothing stopping me from walking out of here right now, coming back with a bus load of tourists, and just watch ‘em fucking push each other out of the way, desperate, trying to get the best angle of your fucking face. Just look at your eyes… The colour of your blood? How much do you think could be charged for that?” It was a disturbing thing to see. Suddenly the man in front of you was a complete stranger, there wasn’t a person in the world that you thought would recognise the smile on Ralph Anderson’s face now; “And then comes the ever curious scientific community. They’re gonna be real interested in you. Poking, probing, injecting, extracting…” He gave a slow shake of his head, lowering his voice to no more than a whisper, delivery as casual as if he were simply passing the time of day; “They’ll cut little pieces of you off, take you back to the lab.” You took a step back, lips parting, what was wrong with him? There was no way in hell he’d get to speak to a human being like this; but you guessed it was okay. Because as Ralph was reminding you, you weren’t one. He raised his voice again, that hatred wasn’t just for you, it was as much for the dead body in a cave in Tennessee, but it cut deep – deeper than you were prepared to admit whilst he was standing in front of you; “-Just keep fucking carving you, and carving you, and carving you until...” He paused, because your eyes flickered back to that silver, and Ralph figured he might have gone a step too far. Maybe but what the hell, he’d said it now – and didn’t your kind deserve it, for all you’d put this City, and all your victims through? “…yeah. You wouldn’t want that, would ya? And it would serve our purposes much better if no one ever knew that you even existed.” He took a step back, shaking his head, “So you gotta go.” Then Ralph turned, without another word, and walked away.
The silence was suddenly eerie, and you wanted him back yelling at you again. You were aware that your eyes were still shining and worse, they smarted. You heard lights flickering on and off throughout the station, and Ralph’s equally angry footsteps fading away. And all you could think of was him returning to that house all alone. You just hoped that his friends would support him… because you knew that he might be saying love in the past tense, but the pain in your chest told you you weren’t about to let him go. Not easily.
Your head lowered, resting against the metal, and when you knew he was gone, and you couldn’t feel his aura anymore you let out a breath; shaky. Just the one, before you started sobbing.
‘So you gotta go.’ That echoed far louder in your head than anything else. What had they decided in that room? That it was okay for them to kill you? Because surely no one else in the world would miss you. A lawyer and two detectives could cover it all up easily, it’d be seamless. He’d loved you for four years – and suddenly he could contemplate putting a bullet through your head. And with that line, would probably go through with it.
You placed your hands over your face, trying to quiet them. But realised just exactly what you had to cry about, aside from sitting in a jail cell, and losing a man you didn’t think you could live without; you had lost your city… and quite perhaps your life. In every sense of the word.
It’s all over. It’s all fucking over.
---
@menndelsohn @3134045126 @happyskywhale @wltz-bby
#MendoTagSquad
Well this is it! The last fic of 24 - roll on all the ones I will write at 25!
#The Outsider#The Outsider HBO#HBOs the Outsider#Ralph Anderson x Reader#Ralph Anderson#Shifter!Reader#Ben Mendelsohn#So. She isn't Dia because that's not who I see in my head... but basically the entire cast of The Outsider has their own Shifter!Reader#and I WOULD write them all#major angst#I love reading back through my work and being damn impressed with myself and THIS is one of those moments#D A M N#I love this piece - so much!#This turned out so much longer - but also so much better than I could ever have hoped for#so I really REALLY hope you all enjoy it#124#AU!Harmony#last fic of my 24th year-!!!
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The Others Were Sacrificed - FE3H Fic
I’m so sorry about this one...
---
“So...you’ve decided to turn against us after everything we gave you?”
Edelgard glared into the shadows. Thales was nothing more than a silhouette, but his presence still chilled the air around her nonetheless. “You’ve taken far more from me,” she spat, tightening her grip on her axe.
He chuckled, and she shuddered at the sound. “Then perhaps we should try to make things even,” he drawled, stepping forward into the light, “After all, we could still use a valuable weapon.”
“I’m done working with you,” she growled, “There is nothing you can offer that would bring me crawling back into the darkness.”
He cocked his head. “Isn’t there?” he asked, his voice smooth and dark as velvet.
“El?”
Her blood ran cold. She nearly dropped her axe but caught herself in time, and she whipped around to face the source of that voice. That...that painfully familiar voice...
Paler skin, and deep, red eyes, but the light brown hair, the soft features, the gentle smile - everything else was the same. Edelgard took a step back, shaking her head, refusing to believe her eyes.
That couldn’t be her big sister. Her big sister was...
“It’s me, El. It’s Abby.”
“Abagail...” Edelgard breathed.
“My, how you’ve grown. You’re just as tall as me, now,” Abagail said warmly. She took a step forward, and Edelgard took another step back. Abagail frowned. “What’s wrong, El? Didn’t you miss me?”
“I...” Edelgard stammered, before turning to face Thales. “What did you do?”
“I merely wanted to give something back to you, my dear,” Thales told her, “You’ve sacrificed so much for us, after all. It seemed only fair. We needed test subjects for our...grand...plan, and well, your family passed these tests with flying colours.”
Her breath caught in her throat. “My...my family?”
They stepped out of the darkness, then. All ten of them. Just like Abagail, they looked too pale, too sickly to be alive. Their eyes were an unsettling demonic red, but everything else about them...was the same. Like they had never been touched by the experiments that killed them. Like they had never grown older than her last memories of them.
They smiled, and greeted her fondly. The youngest, Millie, she came running right up to her and threw her arms around her legs before Edelgard could pull back. “I missed you, Edie!” Millie squealed with delight.
“This...this can’t be real... I...” She didn’t know what to believe. Her heart pounded furiously in her chest. Tears stung her eyes. She wanted this, oh how she wanted this to be true. But something was sinister here. Those eyes weren’t the eyes of her family. Anything Thales touched turned wicked... This couldn’t be true...
“Now, Edelgard,” Thales said, sauntering toward her. She couldn’t move, still bound by her baby sister’s tight hug, “Surely you missed your family? They missed you. And they’d like you back.”
“Yes, yes! Come back, Edelgard!” they all chorused, their chanting echoing in the darkened cavern so loudly it made her ears ring.
“Join us again. Give up this pointless fight and ally yourself with us. The world you seek cannot happen without our influence. You will always need our strength. And,” Thales gestured around to her revived siblings, “We can give you everything you ever wanted.”
“Please, Edie?” Millie begged, looking up at Edelgard with those big, unsettling red eyes, “Come back.”
“I...I can’t,” Edelgard stressed, “Not after everything. Those Who Slither need to be stopped. I’ve seen the light. I can’t go back to the darkness.”
Millie’s pleading expression shifted in an instance. Suddenly, a dark shadow was cast across her expression, and before Edelgard could react, the child released her and ripped her axe from her hands with inhuman strength. She tossed the axe to Edelgard’s eldest brother, who also had a sudden shift in his expression.
They all did.
“Oh, little El,” Thales sighed mockingly, “What a mistake you’ve made. There is still value to you, my dear, but I’m afraid you’ve run out of use as you are now. Fortunately, we can change that.”
Thales waved his hand, and her brother charged her. “Frederick, wait!” she cried. But her words fell on deaf ears. Frederick swung with unnatural speed, completely unfazed by the axe’s weight. She just barely managed to dodge, and as she recovered she reached to her holster and pulled out her sword. “I don’t want to do this!” she exclaimed as he rushed her again, forcing her to parry his attack.
He swung with so much force it sent the sword flying from her hands as well, leaving her down to a dagger as her only protection. Another brother, Ludwig, managed to get ahold of her sword and he joined the battle, too.
It became more a matter of staying on her feet than actually landing a hit. Both of her brothers had been expert fighters when they were alive, and it seemed that now as living dead they gained supernatural skills. She could barely move fast enough to avoid their blades, which were coming in with such unendingly strong blows that one hit would be all it took.
She forced out the thought of what Thales would do should she let that happen.
She needed her axe back. She’d have a chance if she could just get a hold of it... Frederick swung the axe forward and it grazed her side, slicing through a few layers of flesh. She cried out in pain, and mid-wince she noticed Ludwig thrusting the sword forward. Rather than dodging, she took advantage of the close-quarters and dropped to the ground. The sword came dangerously close to her head, taking a few strands of silver hair with it, but it made more devastating contact with Frederick’s arm.
Her brother cried out, and in his moment of weakness, she pushed herself up, dagger ready, and stabbed him square in the gut. As he staggered backward, he dropped the axe, and she dove for it.
Ludwig made a move toward her, sword ready to impale her. But she was faster. She rolled, taking the handle of the familiar weapon in her hand, and launched herself up, arching the blade up and over her head.
She took Ludwig’s off.
His body dropped to the floor, her sword clattering on the stone beside him. Undead or not, he still bled like a human.
There was a beat. She stared at the body of her dead brother, blood pouring from his headless neck. No, that wasn’t Ludwig... Or was it? She didn’t know. She didn’t know. For the first time in her life she almost retched at the sight of a dead enemy, the bile rising up burning in her throat.
But then all hell broke loose.
The rest of the siblings, if she could even call them that, became more demon than human. Weapon or no, they all launched themselves at her, shrieking like banshees and clawing at her like feral wolves. She was thrown out of her shock, and her mind quickly shut down into a battle state she had come to rely on as she fought former friends and classmates. All that mattered was the fight, and winning. Surviving. No matter the cost.
Brothers she used to get into mischief with, who used to teach her the proper way to hold a sword, who used to intimidate any snotty prince who tried to bug her. Sisters who used to do her hair, read her stories, play in the gardens with her. These monsters looked like them, had their faces and voices. But they were demons, now.
Everything Thales touched turned wicked...
It was only a few minutes. A few agonizing minutes. But she cut them all down. She was soaked in their blood. She bore scratches from one of them on her cheek. Tears streamed from her eyes. The unholy shrieks went silent, and all that was left was Millie.
Somehow she had gotten ahold of Edelgard’s dagger.
“Why did you do it, Edie?” she asked, her voice too sweet, too condemning for her precious sister, “We only wanted you back. You’re our sister.”
Edelgard’s breaths came out hard and irregular, exhaustion and sheer panic making it difficult for her to get any air into her lungs. She looked at the thing that held her sister’s form and thought she was going to damn near lose her mind. “Not you, too,” she uttered, begged, “Please, Millie...”
Millie stepped toward her, red eyes looking so innocent and pure...
She unsheathed the dagger.
Thwack!
Edelgard’s shoulder burned. She reached up carefully and pulled on the hilt of the dagger, removing the blade from her flesh.
Her little sister’s body lay before her, in two pieces.
Edelgard dropped her axe before falling to her knees. She sobbed, and screamed. Painful, raw, revolted screams. Her hands...her hands were covered in their blood.
“If you think this is over, then it’s not,” Thales’ voice echoed in the dark, “We’ll just bring them back. Again and again. And perhaps we will bring back more. All your little classmates you’ve had to put down over the years. Anyone you’ve lost. Perhaps your monstrous stepbrother? Your mother, even... They will never find peace. I will continue to use them, all of them, for my purposes until you either yield, or join me.”
He paused, and she could tell he was hovering right over her. “And if you think death is your only escape,” he said dangerously, kicking the head of one of her sisters closer to her, “Know that doing so will only make you that much easier to control.”
“El!”
“Hmm... Perhaps we can use her, too... Now she is no longer the Fell Star she should die easily.”
“El! I’m here, El!”
“Everyone you’ve ever loved can be used against you, little El. Especially her.”
“El! Wake up!”
Edelgard gasped as her eyes flew open. Someone was hovering over her in the darkness, and her mind - still convinced it was Thales - forced her fist to do something about it. Thankfully, Byleth had quick reflexes.
“Whoa! Whoa, easy, El! Easy...” she said, slowing her voice down as she gently lowered her wife’s fist away from her face, “Easy, it’s me. It’s ok. You’re safe.”
“B...Byleth?” Edelgard whispered, only then realizing that she wasn’t breathing. She took a few gasping breaths, struggling to fill her lungs, but fear still had them ensnared.
“It’s ok, El,” Byleth uttered, gently cupping her cheek in her hand, “Just focus on me. In... Out... In... Out...”
She wasn’t able to quite match the slow rhythm Byleth was guiding her toward, but she got close. She became more aware of her surroundings as she settled. The sheets were a tangled mess. Drying tear streaks felt sticky on her cheeks. Her throat was raw, as if she had been screaming all night.
Byleth looked more worried than she’d ever seen her.
“Was it that bad?” she croaked sheepishly. A stupid question, really. Every blink sent her back to the carnage of her dream.
Byleth swallowed hard. “You were...you were pretty deep in that one,” she admitted, “I’ve been trying to wake you up for a while, now. But you just...”
Edelgard winced. She had been doing well. Ever since defeating Rhea, since confessing her feelings to Byleth, her nightmares had started to diminish. Then she began her silent war against Those Who Slither, and they only started up again.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Edelgard gulped. Her mind flashed back to her dream, back to her zombified siblings turning into monsters and having to cut them all down with an axe. Her shoulder, side, and cheek still stung from the phantom pains of the wounds received in the nightmare. She could still hear their shrieks in her ears. She still felt their blood on her hands.
Thales’ threat sent a shiver down her spine.
She screwed her eyes shut as she felt fresh tears forming. She shook her head, desperate and frantic, and curled in on herself as the memories began to overwhelm her.
She felt Byleth settle beside her, pulling her gently toward her. Edelgard nestled close, pressing herself right up against Byleth’s chest. Listening for that wondrous heartbeat.
“Whatever happened in your dream, you don’t have to worry,” she whispered, softly running a hand through Edelgard’s hair, playing with the silver locks, “You’re here, with me. You’re safe.”
“And you’re safe,” Edelgard mumbled into Byleth’s chest, “I’ll keep you safe.”
Byleth chuckled softly. “I know you will, El,” she said fondly.
There were questions Edelgard wanted to ask, about what her dream meant. It felt...far too real to only be a dream. She shuddered again. Thales haunted her mind in ways she didn’t think possible. The lengths he would go to, what he could do, seemed to have no limit.
He could take everything from her. Again.
She was exhausted, and Byleth was warm. But the fear still remained, nagging at her for the rest of the night.
She held Byleth tight, praying she’ll never lose her like she lost them.
---
AN: I’m just saying... If the Agarthans can raise a dude who’s been dead for centuries and all his evil cohorts then why not a few kids? Especially if it would royally fuck with Edelgard’s head.
It’s a shame CF ends where it did. There could have been a lot of angsty goodness had they made Thales or another high-ranking Agarthan the final boss of that route. They’re the main cause of Edelgard’s trauma - and they know it, too. Hence how they were able to keep her on their side for so long.
She’s not a little kid anymore. She’s stronger, wiser, more powerful. In part, thanks to them. But in CF, she does something Those Who Slither would consider a mistake: she allowed herself to love. She made friends, a new family. It would be very easy to break her, all over again, should anything happen to that new family. I think she knows that, and would worry about it constantly.
Battling Rhea was about overcoming an oppressive, outside force. Battling TWSITD is about facing her own oppressive fears.
#fe three houses#tw blood#tw gore#shit gets dark#i'm sorry el#if it's any consolation i actually dialled it back a bit#fanfic
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9 Examples of Thanksgiving in the Bible
With promises of really great deals on Black Friday littered between college football timeouts, the meaning of Thanksgiving sometimes gets missed. We pause to give thanks for the food, family members and friends gathered around the table in the midst of preparing elaborate meals and navigating family relations. But giving thanks isn’t a practice reserved for a single day each year. It has deeper spiritual significance and benefits that ring true long after the leftovers are consumed.
Gratitude is a heart tenderizer. It keeps our eyes focused on God, the source of all good gifts. It keeps our hearts open, and with open hearts, the fruits of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control—have ample room to grow.
Here are nine examples of thanksgiving in the Bible that have nothing to do with pilgrims or Native Americans, turkey, or touchdowns:
1. Thanksgiving When Something Big Happens
The Red Sea just parted. Pharaoh’s army disappeared in its waves. And the Israelites stand in awe on the other side of slavery — free at last, free at last. Moses and his sister, Miriam sing a song (the “song of the sea”) about the victory, including these lines from Exodus 15:2 (NIV):
The Lord is my strength and my defense; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father’s God, and I will exalt him.
The song of the sea is one of the oldest surviving texts describing the Exodus, possibly written as many as three thousand years ago. When something significant happens in our lives, it seems embedded in our DNA to celebrate with song. Songs become landmarks in our memory, resurrecting decades later and returning delight to our eyes, thanksgiving to our hearts.
The Song of Moses and Miriam
Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the LORD: “I will sing to the LORD, for he is highly exalted. Both horse and driver he has hurled into the sea. “The LORD is my strength and my defense; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father’s God, and I will exalt him. The LORD is a warrior; the LORD is his name. Pharaoh’s chariots and his army he has hurled into the sea. The best of Pharaoh’s officers are drowned in the Red Sea. The deep waters have covered them; they sank to the depths like a stone. Your right hand, LORD, was majestic in power. Your right hand, LORD, shattered the enemy. “In the greatness of your majesty you threw down those who opposed you. You unleashed your burning anger; it consumed them like stubble. By the blast of your nostrils the waters piled up. The surging waters stood up like a wall; the deep waters congealed in the heart of the sea. The enemy boasted, ‘I will pursue, I will overtake them. I will divide the spoils; I will gorge myself on them. I will draw my sword and my hand will destroy them.’ But you blew with your breath, and the sea covered them. They sank like lead in the mighty waters. Who among the gods is like you, LORD? Who is like you— majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders? “You stretch out your right hand, and the earth swallows your enemies. In your unfailing love you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling. The nations will hear and tremble; anguish will grip the people of Philistia. The chiefs of Edom will be terrified, the leaders of Moab will be seized with trembling, the people of Canaan will melt away; terror and dread will fall on them. By the power of your arm they will be as still as a stone— until your people pass by, LORD, until the people you bought pass by. You will bring them in and plant them on the mountain of your inheritance— the place, LORD, you made for your dwelling, the sanctuary, Lord, your hands established. “The LORD reigns for ever and ever.” When Pharaoh’s horses, chariots and horsemen went into the sea, the LORD brought the waters of the sea back over them, but the Israelites walked through the sea on dry ground. Then Miriam the prophet, Aaron’s sister, took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women followed her, with timbrels and dancing. Miriam sang to them: “Sing to the LORD, for he is highly exalted. Both horse and driver he has hurled into the sea.”
2. Thanksgiving in the Face of the Unknown
In times of uncertainty, it may seem strange to turn to gratitude, but think about it: when else do we need to rely on God most except when faced with the unknown? Mary’s song, recorded after her encounter with her cousin Elizabeth, is a perfect example of the kind of praise we can give when the future looks uncertain. For being pregnant out of wedlock, Mary could have been shunned. Mary could have been cast out by her family. Mary could have been condemned to death. And yet Mary gives thanks for this new thing, this unexpected gift. You can read her song in Luke 1:46-55.
Mary’s Song
And Mary said: “My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me — holy is his name. His mercy extends to those who fear him, from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever, just as he promised our ancestors.” Mary stayed with Elizabeth for about three months and then returned home.
3. Thanksgiving in Lament
Over and over again, the psalms show us what it means to be thankful, even in times of fear, sadness, and grief. Gratitude draws our eyes away from the pain, terror, and anxiety of loss and helps us focus on the gifts of this world, moving us forward along the healing process.
After he loses his family, his wife, his property, and his health, Job, the sufferer of sufferers, cries out, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” (Job 1:21, NIV)
Psalms that demonstrate this include Psalm 22 (which is what Jesus quoted from the cross when he cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”) and Psalm 69.
Psalm 22 starts in anguish and suffering, but takes a turn toward the end when David writes,
"I will declare your name to my people; in the assembly I will praise you. You who fear the LORD, praise him! All you descendants of Jacob, honor him! Revere him, all you descendants of Israel! For he has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help."
Psalm 69:29-36 reads:
"But as for me, afflicted and in pain— may your salvation, God, protect me. I will praise God’s name in song and glorify him with thanksgiving. This will please the LORD more than an ox, more than a bull with its horns and hooves. The poor will see and be glad— you who seek God, may your hearts live! The LORD hears the needy and does not despise his captive people. Let heaven and earth praise him, the seas and all that move in them, for God will save Zion and rebuild the cities of Judah. Then people will settle there and possess it; the children of his servants will inherit it, and those who love his name will dwell there."
4. Thanksgiving When You Don’t Feel Like It
Sometimes God feels distant or silent. When this happens in my life, the full emotions of joy, empathy, grief, and anger seem to level out to monotony, routine, and boredom. If God seems distant, the desire to praise him and give thanks for the routine just isn’t as exciting as the other seasons, when things are good, life is full, joy is easy.
Yet again, the Bible shows us thanksgiving as a response to God, even when he’s silent, even when we don’t feel like it. This sacrifice of thanksgiving — and it is a sacrifice, mustering up the habit of praise if your heart isn’t in it — drags you, step by step, back into the presence of the Lord.
Read Psalm 13 if you’re feeling distant from God.
For the director of music. A psalm of David.
How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me? Look on me and answer, LORD my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death, and my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,” and my foes will rejoice when I fall. But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the LORD’s praise, for he has been good to me.
5. Thanksgiving in Contrast to Our Current Circumstances
There are also times when life just doesn’t seem like a season for gratitude. Maybe you have a chronic illness. Maybe you’re caring for an elderly parent or a special needs child. Thankfulness for these circumstances - even when each day brings fresh challenges — helps us to find hope and meaning. Paul writes to the church in Rome, “Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us” (Romans 5:3-5).
Similarly in Philippians 1:12-21 Paul wrote from prison,
Now I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that what has happened to me has actually served to advance the gospel. As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace guard and to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ. And because of my chains, most of the brothers and sisters have become confident in the Lord and dare all the more to proclaim the gospel without fear. It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill. The latter do so out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice. Yes, and I will continue to rejoice, for I know that through your prayers and God’s provision of the Spirit of Jesus Christ what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance. I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me, to live is
Christ and die to gain
6. Thanksgiving as a Community
Gratitude collectively as a family or a community is a tremendous equalizer — when differences of political or religious or cultural opinion and stance are present, gratitude helps us to focus on the areas of our relationships that matter the most. It’s hard to be grateful for each other and still wield our theological, political, and cultural weapons.
The Jewish tradition includes several feasts as a form of remembrance. The Passover meal with Jesus and his apostles, the Feast of Tabernacles, and more are all examples in Scripture of the community of believers coming together to remember the past and respond in gratitude to God. Read about the Last Supper in Mark 14:
The Last Supper
On the first day of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, when it was customary to sacrifice the Passover lamb, Jesus’ disciples asked him, “Where do you want us to go and make preparations for you to eat the Passover?” So he sent two of his disciples, telling them, “Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him. Say to the owner of the house he enters, ‘The Teacher asks: Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there.” The disciples left, went into the city and found things just as Jesus had told them. So they prepared the Passover. When evening came, Jesus arrived with the Twelve. While they were reclining at the table eating, he said, “Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me—one who is eating with me.” They were saddened, and one by one they said to him, “Surely you don’t mean me?” “It is one of the Twelve,” he replied, “one who dips bread into the bowl with me. The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born.” While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take it; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, and they all drank from it. “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many,” he said to them. “Truly I tell you, I will not drink again from the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.” When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
7. Thanksgiving for Others
At the start of each of the letters from Paul sent throughout the first century following Jesus’ resurrection, Paul expresses his thanks for the people. “First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is being reported all over the world,” Paul writes in Romans 1:8. “I always thank my God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus,” he writes to the church of Corinth in 1 Corinthians 1:4. “I thank my God every time I remember you,” he tells the church in Philippi in Philippians 1:3. “I always thank my God as I remember you in my prayers, because I hear about your love for all his holy people and your faith in the Lord Jesus,” he says to the folks addressed in Philemon 1:4-5.
There’s something about expressing your gratitude for a person — not just saying thank you when they do something, but saying thank you for just being — that forms a bond of trust in your relationship. It acknowledges a particular characteristic about a person that raises their esteem in the way Paul says we ought to encourage one another or build one another up. Gratitude for another person may be one of the most impactful and practical ways we can build one another up.
8. Thanksgiving Rituals and Touchstones
After Joshua and the Israelites crossed the Jordan on dry ground, Joshua instructed the chief priests of the 12 tribes of Israel to gather up 12 stones from the Jordan. They set up these stones at Gilgal. Then Joshua told the Israelites, “In the future when your descendants ask their parents, ‘What do these stones mean?’ tell them, ‘Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground.’ For the Lord your God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over” (Joshua 4:21-23).
The traditions we enact with friends and family are perhaps one of the most obvious forms of thanksgiving. Traditions performed together spotlight seasons of our lives in which we’ve seen God active and present in our lives. They hold the record of years past, when the children were younger, when we all were together, when great-grandpa was alive, and so on. They provide opportunities to reminisce.
When we “always” do this particular act (praying together before a Thanksgiving meal, eating together at Aunt Sue’s, stating what we’re grateful for, making the traditional turkey meal or partaking in grandma’s passed down recipe for pumpkin pie), we create a spirit of unity, one that connects us to the past and manifests thankfulness.
9. Thanksgiving in God’s Presence
And then there’s Sunday morning. Then there are the times we gather together as a community of believers. Then there are the times we walk in the woods, wander along the coast, stare into the sky, watch the leaves shift in the trees, and wonder, awe, and joy bubble up. Wherever you find yourself deeply connected to God — in nature, in a chapel, in your backyard, in silent meditation — is an opportunity for gratitude.
When the Ark of the Covenant is brought back to Jerusalem, the whole population of Israel sings its thanks. “Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, his love endures forever.” (1 Chronicles 16:34). When we are in alignment with God, walking in the Way, it’s a time to give thanks. Life is full, life is good, and his love endures forever.
Revelation 7:9-12 points forward,
The Great Multitude in White Robes
After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice: “Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.” All the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell down on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying:
“Amen!
Praise and glory and wisdom and thanks and honor and power and strength be to our God for ever and ever. Amen!”
#takeyourlifebacktodayshow
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I have a question about your experience in the church if that's okay. Do you feel like it's possible for Christians to be supportive of you and love you whilst also thinking homosexuality is sinful? I'm sorry bc I'm not sure if this is a stupid question but I hope it makes sense. Do you feel like the doctrine breeds hostility and homophobia in every Christian even though the message of Jesus was actually to love indiscriminately? Is it possible to do these things simultaneously? Thank you
“Do you feel like it’spossible for Christians to be supportive of you and love you whilst alsothinking homosexuality is sinful? I’m sorry bcI’m not sure if this is a stupid question but I hope it makes sense.”
-Not a stupid question atALL. It’s one I have to ask myself very often, honestly, since most of myfamily and two of my closest friends are somewhere on the “it’s wrong to havehomosexual intercourse” spectrum. For instance, by Aunt thinks it’s morally wrongand two men dating is yucky. My uncle thinks it’s wrong to the extent I’mkiiiiind of afraid he would violently hurt me if he saw me with another man.Meanwhile, my best friends, last we talked about the issue, said “it’s possiblethat’s what the Bible means, but we aren’t sure….”
Honestly….I think the answer to your question is complex
On one hand, I know manygay people feel that unless you cannot love them while believing homosexual “expression”is morally wrong. Or even that there is some difference in the moral goodness ofsame-sex couples versus opposite-couples. And on some level, I am one of these people
Every gay person who livesin connection with organized religion has a complex relationship betweenthemselves, their loved ones, and this issue. And honestly, I feel out of placecalling any of their convictions on this question wrong. I know that’s a littletoo far on the “well everything is subjective” side of rhetoric, but Isimply can’t….argue with a gay man or lesbian when they say that refusing tosee homosexuality as morally neutral means refusing to love them
So I’ll only answer for myself
And it’s complicated
On one hand, I think theanswer is easy
If I met a new friend and foundout they believed homosexuality was immoral, I would drop them. Full stop. I don’twant that in my life anymore. I don’t want those kinds of people in my life anymore.I would say that these people, no matter what they claim, do not love me. Youcannot exist in our world, in our homophobic reality, and still hold those beliefswithout sacrificing genuine love for me
But then it gets messy
My dad, when I first cameout, had no qualms in treating me the same way. Honestly, we had a betterrelationship because I wasn’t hiding my self-loathing anymore and could get professionalhelp for my mental illness. However, this peace was partially influenced by thefact that I came out with the caveat that I still saw homosexuality as sinfuland would never “act on it” by way of dating, relationships, marriage, orsex. My dad held the opinion, and even said it out loud, that “whatmatters most is that you know I love you and you know what’s right.”
This would make thingstricky when shit hit the fan and I came out AGAIN, this time saying that I’mgay AND I’m not going cut love out of my life anymore. Suddenly my dad has towrestle with his two major concerns: that I know he loves me and that I know “what’sright” (in this case that homosexuality is wrong and I cannot follow God completelywhile believing and acting otherwise). Which is going to win out?
My dad, in a very incharacter moment, just…didn’t talk about it
I remember overhearing himtalk with my mom and say “I just can’t talk about this, I’m not going totalk about this” when she tried to ask what he felt about my announcement. Thiswent on for several months. Luckily I was away at college so there wasn’t a lotof tension. I knew something like this would happen. I had braced myself
But then….he slowlychanged. Even before he reached the point of accepting my sexuality asperfectly healthy and normal (which is where I think he is now, he’s hard to read),he started to talk about things. He told me that he would be at my wedding, nomatter what. He listened to me when I talked about unhealthy relationships andtheir effect on me. Even though he, internally, held a certain belief, hisexternal actions were…supportive and, dare I say, loving (?)
So it becomes a complexquestion
If love is an action, notjust an emotion, was my father loving me despite not supporting thathomosexuality can be morally expressed?
Honestly…I don’t know
Maybe I’m just thankfulthat he did what he did. Maybe I’ve set the bar very low. In some ways, I thinkI have. However, at the same time….I question wonder….if someone believesthat you are doing something wrong but genuinely treats you no differently thananyone else, or actively takes actions of love, where does that leave you?
Two of my best friendsdon’t know where to land on the homosexuality issue. Quote: “it feels likeboth sides have good theological arguments.” However, at the end of the day,they still treat me like all their other friends. They ask me about my datinglife, they encourage me to find someone, they support me when I get my heartbroken
So again, it becomes aquestion, where does the importance lie: in the beliefs, or the embodiedactions? Both? Neither?
I don’t think you can lovethe sinner and hate the sin when hating the sin means treating people as lesseror different. Hate and love are actions
But can you ideologically condemn the “sin” and still take actionsof love? And if you do…are those actions still love? And if they are, are YOU aloving person despite your beliefs?
When it comes to the people like my father and friends…I end upunable to answer…
“Do you feel like the doctrine breedshostility and homophobia in every Christian even though the message of Jesuswas actually to love indiscriminately? Is it possible to do these thingssimultaneously?”
Short answer, yes, absolutely.
There’s a reason why I don’t sayflatly that you can see homosexuality as sinful and still love gay people. Thepeople who I think get closest are literally the most influential people in mylife who I may honestly just be giving a break
The problem that comes with saying “Jesusloved everyone so why do Christians not love gay people” is that Jesus DOESN’Ttell you to accept every part of the people you love. Jesus calls you to loveyour neighbor but still see their wrongful actions as wrong. So when you alsobelieve that homosexuality is wrong, you believe that LOVING gay people meansNOT ACCEPTING that their love is ever good
If the belief that homosexuality is(in any way) morally lesser than heterosexuality (I would agree with thisstatement) then yes, the current sexuality doctrine of mainstream evangelicalisminherently breeds and generates homophobia.
And I believe that in most cases, thisleads naturally to hostility as these people fail to actually interact with andmaintain any relationships with real gay people. You get a large socialcommunity which views something as morally reprehensible, and then fails tointeract in any way with those same people they judge, and also has a doctrineof working to change the world and make it more of “The Kingdom of God on earth”,and you have a storm brewing
I simply cannot look at the instrumentalways that evangelical Christianity has helped form, maintain, and strengthenthe institutional homophobia in my country without coming to the conclusionthat “condemning homosexuality” at a religious, doctrinal level will not INEVITABLYand UNAVOIDABLY create real-world damage against gay men and lesbians
In some ways this contradicts my lastanswer, so make of that what you will, haha
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A God Like Old Ben Weaver
“But nothing can be good in Him, Which evil is in me.” - John Greenleaf Whittier, The Eternal Goodness, 1865.
There was an aged man in town who reminded everyone of old Ben Weaver from the Andy Griffith Show. He always kept score and never let a slight against him slide. He was a stickler for doing things right, and the smallest deviation from doing things his way, the right way, was duly noted and registered in his little book that he might well have titled, The Misdeeds of Others. If anyone ever got on his wrong side - which was pretty easy to do - it wasn’t good enough to go have a talk with him, honestly tell him you were sorry, and ask for his forgiveness. He always demanded recompense, and a little extra in the payback. Did your child break his window with a baseball? Apologies be damned, you had to fix the window, which I suppose is understandable, but the way he figured, that wasn’t enough. I mean, the window was perfectly fine before your kid played Nolan Ryan with it and his life was disrupted with all the bother and the mess and the broken glass and the temporary patch job and the loss of peace of mind and house. Your boy saying he was sorry wasn’t enough. Your saying you were also sorry wasn’t enough. Your fixing the broken window wasn’t enough. That didn’t “even things up.” You still owed him because of the, what is it the lawsuits call it - “punitive damages.” And, I mean, he wasn’t wrong, but he wasn’t much loved by his neighbors either.
Have you ever known someone like old Ben Weaver? Did you like them? Did you think they embodied goodness? Would you consider them Christlike? Honestly, would you even want to be around them?
I’m assuming by now you know where I’m taking this - why are these qualities considered less than good in old Ben, but perfectly fine and dandy when we speak of the person of God? Why are the qualities we find reprehensible in fellow humans somehow considered “good,” “just,” and “right” when applied to God? God keeps track of our misdoings - but that’s OK, he’s God. God demands payment for our wrongdoings - but that’s OK, he’s God. God has to be “satisfied,” not only with recompense, but even with punitive damages - but that’s OK, he’s God.
So many times when I bring up this incongruity, people respond with, “Well, the Bible says God’s ways are not our ways.” What does that even mean? Better yet, “What even does that mean?” We can’t throw that line out as some kind of defense of God every time we run across him being attributed qualities which are reprehensible in every other living thing. The truth of the matter is that when God says that of himself (in Isaiah 55.8 and surrounding verses), he is specifically referring to his extraordinary level of mercy, not his “just demands,” or his wrath.
In point of fact, in Amos 1.11, God condemns Edom for these very faults. Edom “cast off all pity,” his “anger tore perpetually,” and he, “kept his wrath forever.”
For the love of God, let’s all please stop saying that something is good when it is in God, but terrible when it is in creatures created in his image. God is not like the sins he condemns. Let me say that again in bold, God is not like the sins he condemns.
“But,” folk respond to me sometimes, “God is so majestic that even a slight sin against him demands justice. He is a great king, and a crime against a king is greater than a crime against a commoner.” Seriously, I’ve been told this, because this is kind of a classic argument from medieval days that has hung around till now. But I say hogwash. If a king has an orchard with 10,000 apples and I steal one, that isn’t a greater crime than me stealing an apple from my neighbor who has only one apple. In fact, the deed done against my neighbor is worse (remember Nathan’s parable to King David). God’s greater majesty doesn’t mean he is more exacting in dealing with offenses. It means precisely the opposite: “Let us fall into the hands of the Lord, but not into the hands of men; for as His majesty is, so also His mercy.” (Sirach 2.18)
Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes, oftentimes when I teach or write about God’s love, his mercy, his forgiveness, I am met with, “Yes, but…” and what follows is a demand that I balance it out with focusing on his justice, and wrath, and righteous punishment. Laying aside for a moment (actually for this whole article) that I believe good, solid, orthodox theology does deal with these issues without abrogating the mercy and love of God, what I find intriguing is that these very same folk, when they hear a sermon or read an article about God’s just demands, his wrath, his punishments, never bring up the, “Yes, but” remark then!
It is almost as if something within our spiritual framework can’t handle the idea of a God who really and truly forgives without demanding payment; that there is something in our spiritual condition that can’t abide a God who acts toward others the way he teaches us to act toward others. I suspect that maybe way down at the bottom of our hearts the reason we don’t want to see God in this light is because it would demand that we who follow him also really and truly live the same way. That “something” in our spiritual framework, that certain je ne sais quoi as the French say with such flair, is what St. Paul would call, “the flesh,” and it isn’t from God, and it isn’t like God.
John Greenleaf Whittier, whom I quoted at the beginning of this article, was a 19th century American poet, and a devout Quaker. When you read the whole of his poem, The Eternal Goodness, you discover that it is a conversation between Whittier and a friend who keeps bringing up the, “Yes, but.”
I walk with bare, hushed feet the ground
Ye tread with boldness shod;
I dare not fix with mete and bound
The love and power of God.
Ye praise His justice; even such
His pitying love I deem:
Ye seek a king; I fain would touch
The robe that hath no seam.
Ye see the curse which overbroods
A world of pain and loss;
I hear our Lord's beatitudes
And prayer upon the cross.
I have a dear pastor friend who was discussing theology and the Bible with me one day, and jokingly said, “I’m going to go home and look it up in Greek, and make it say what I want it to say!” We both laughed, because he wasn’t serious, but he was onto something. Folk can make the Bible say whatever they want it to say. They can find verses here and connect them with verses there, and paint a very Ben Weaver portrait of God. I would suggest, instead, that we look at Jesus. “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father,” he told Philip (John 14.9). The Old Testament saw God, but only in shadows (Colossians 2.17), “but the substance is of Christ.” Abraham, Moses, David, the prophets - they saw God, “in many parts and in many ways…,” the writer of Hebrews tells us (1.1), “in bits and pieces” (Phillips), BUT, “…but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son…He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature” (1.2). If you really want to know what God is like, he is like Jesus.
I really wrote this whole long article to make a single point, which I guess I could have just come right out and said and saved everyone a lot of time and trouble: enough of this seeing something as good in God, but as evil in others. If it isn’t good in old Ben Weaver, it isn’t good in the Almighty either.
Not mine to look where cherubim
And seraphs may not see,
But nothing can be good in Him
Which evil is in me.
The wrong that pains my soul below
I dare not throne above,
I know not of his hate - I know
His goodness and His love.
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Deer Sam
Title: Deer Sam, please excuse my fawning. What Do You Know About Cervidae?
Summary: While lost and wandering in reflection, Gabriel stumbles upon a new charge. Who better to help him, he thinks, than Sam?
Rating: T
Paring: Sabriel, Gabriel x Sam
Here is my submission for September prompts,
@gabriel-monthly-challenge!
@archangelsanonymous @archangel-with-a-shotgun @archangelgabriellives @warlockwriter @ttttrickster @revwinchester
Prompts used:
Statement: The rain fell around him, the water cold but gentle in its cascade down his face, and he couldn’t help the smile that spread across
Dialogue: “Are you going to come in, or just be creepy in my doorway?”
Ambiance: Footsteps crunching leaves in the night
Word count: 3053
Read on AO3 at: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16012904
Gabriel loved everything about Earth, from the birds flying overhead, to the colors painted in subtle hues at the back of the sunrise, to the changing of the seasons. New buds forming with green leaves that would darken into shades of auburn before descending into piles on the ground, only to be covered by a light dusting of snow that would eventually allow for the cycle to be repeated year in and year out.
But who was he kidding? As the archangel walked through the forest admiring the trees adorned with crowns of gold and umber, his footsteps were delicately chosen so as not to disturb the fallen leaves. This was his favorite season. His season. Each archangel had been tasked to paint the world in their image, and this was Gabriel’s vision.
Raphael had painted new growth into the forest, bright shades of every color. Michael had been summer, a season that could be as bright and hot as his fiery grace, and Lucifer had sought to create that which was as cold as himself.
Gabriel might have followed at the curtails of Lucifer, but he had been both the most like and the least like Raphael.
The archangel could not help but smile as he passed a patch of autumn crocuses, their vibrant purple a stark contrast to the leaves surrounding them. They were not what was expected of them. It was not the season of new growth, and yet that did not mean that there was no growth. Some flowers yet defied all expectation placed on them.
Each flower and tree had been carefully named, and Gabriel took his time as he walked his well used path. Man’s Paradise had been a garden for a reason, and even masquerading as a pagan, he felt closest to his true self here.
It started raining before he left. There was not so much a destination as he would walk through the ever changing forest until it was time to fulfill another duty. He was a hedonist with a short attention span, but the forest had been his only true home since leaving heaven. He couldn’t have his siblings, but he could still find them and see their impact on the planet he called home.
With each new blooming flower and barren branch he came across, Gabriel reveled in his season. He witnessed one squirrel chasing another, leaping from branch to branch and skittering down the trunk before running across his path.
The sun had begun setting behind him, and Gabriel paused his journey to admire the dull shades of pink and orange in the distance, mostly blocked by the dark clouds threatening a rain or mist. He was an archangel, and for right now, he didn’t have a care in the world.
The sun faded, and Gabriel began hearing the sounds of the nocturnal forest. Owls screeched in the distance, likely hunting small rodents living in the forest. There were some crickets chirping, but not many.
As he kept walking a hint of movement caught his eyes. His view was hindered by a yew tree, but as he moved closer he could see it. There was a small white fawn with brown ears nestled impossibly beneath the protective boughs of a wintergreen growing beside the yew. An ear twitched, a movement identical to what had drawn his attention in the first place. The solemn fawn gazed up at him, unharried and unworried.
The rain fell around him, the water cold but gentle in its cascade down his face, and he couldn’t help the smile that spread across from the simplicity of this scene. This small and beautiful creature may not have traditionally fallen under his purview, small baby animals traditionally came to Raphael of the Spring, but he would have fought his brother for this fawn, lying in a bed of fallen leaves and bracken.
It was fall, he thought. Why was there a fawn so small, lying in wait for its mother to come home? It couldn’t be more than a few weeks old, at most. It would not survive the harshness of winter out here. Where was the fawn’s mother? It was dark, and the fawn should not have been left alone, was not old enough to survive a cold night its mother.
He had to do something. This was his season and he would not leave the fawn to the mercy of Lucifer’s cold winters. As Gabriel approached the fawn, the ethereal creature made no attempt to move. It allowed the archangel to approach with the acceptance all creatures held for his kind. The archangels had held a much larger piece in creation than anyone would ever be able to understand, and animals had an instinctual acceptance for them that ran counter to human sentience by design. If Adam and Eve had not broken Sacred Divine Laws, their place in the hierarchy would have been higher, and their understanding even greater.
As it was, the fawn allowed Gabriel to approach in a way that it should not have allowed any humans. “Hello, Fawn,” the archangel whispered, using a little power of his true voice to reassure the creature.
The fawn remained stoic, but extended her head in an instinctual way that allowed Gabriel to pet her. She was a wild creature, yes, but in a way all animals were merely pets of the celestial beings. Humans did not understand what they were ruining and what their original purpose had been. Lucifer had not been wrong about them, but they had been driven so far away.
Gabriel loved humanity, even if they were incapable of becoming what they were supposed to be. They would get their heavens if they were good, but there would be no higher calling. They had been destined to be stewards of the Earth, and they couldn’t even reach a state of equality among their own species.
The archangel waited even as the rain strengthened from a light pattering to a heavier drizzle. It concerned him that the fawn’s mother had not come back yet. He was an archangel, so it was not his presence here that was preventing her return. If he had been human, that would keep her away, but he wasn’t human and she should have felt the instinctual need to return to her young and shelter the fawn.
He waited well into the night, and yet still the mother of the fawn did not return. Fearing the worst, the archangel used a bit of pagan magic to scour the forest for a familial relation to the fawn. His concerns were confirmed and he released the spell. The fawn’s mother would not be returning.
But what would he do with the fawn?
Before Gabriel could decide what to do with the fawn that he could not leave here all alone, the fawn cried. Deer did not often make noises, but a fawn crying hungrily was a heartbreaking chirp. The fawn butted her head into his side, as though looking for something.
“I’m not your mama,” he whispered, running a hand along her back. As he genuinely contemplated shapeshifting into her mama, he’d done it for Sleipnir, he could do it again, the archangel heard a whisper at the back of his mind.
“Dear Gabriel, I hope you are okay.”
That was all that was said. That was all Sam Winchester had ever said, every night before he went to bed for the last week since he’d vamoosed. He had heard Dean’s characteristic anger at everyone involved, but even with Dean’s anger at both Sam and himself, of which the archangel was certain Sam had faced most if not all of, the hunter had not once condemned him in any way. Had only made the same prayer every night “I missed you, I hope you’re okay. I’m glad you’re alive.”
Would the hunter have any idea how to raise a fawn? Would he enjoy the possible challenge it possessed?
Gabriel decided that it didn’t matter if it was a good idea or not. He was going to take this deer to Sam, and then he was going to help him raise it. He was the archangel of leaves changing colors, and deer mating season, and he was the archangel of this little fawn right here, that had been born far too late in the season but that he was going to raise right anyway.
Navigating the bunker was easy. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t been in a very good state of mind the last time he’d been here, he had the better than perfect recall befitting of an immensely powerful being even if he didn’t always believe in himself. Which was total bs. He had more power in one pinky finger than any other half-assed pagan. He should not have allowed Asmodeus to take so much of his confidence.
It was late at night, and only a few people were even present, so it was easy to avoid anyone. He could have turned himself invisible and no one would ever know he was there, not even Castiel, but he chose not to. He was here for a different reason, related to the fawn he had tucked carefully into his jacket because she was cold, and who was currently nestled happily up against his ribcage.
Finding Sam’s room was easy. The hunter was reclining on the bed with his head angled downwards towards the book in his lap.
The archangel couldn’t help standing in the doorway and admiring the hunter.
The giant moose man seemed so at peace with his surroundings. His hair falling loose down around his shoulders as he reached out to gently turn the page of his book with one hand. He was wearing one of his ever-present flannels, this particular one in shades of gold and green. And Gabriel couldn’t help but think that the colors brought out the same shades in the hunters eyes. The blanket on his bed was neatly tucked into place, arranged just as orderly as the rest of the objects in his room, although it was rumpled where he lay back against the headboard.
“Are you going to come in, or just be creepy in my doorway?”
Gabriel blinked. At some point his reason for being here had poked her head out of his jacket and the object of his attention had seen him without him realizing it, so he’d been caught staring. Whoops.
“Why is there a deer in your jacket?” Sam asked.
“Her name is Faline,” Gabriel declared boldly and moved to enter the room. “She deserves to be loved and cared for.”
Sam closed to book and put it on the nightstand. He decided asking was probably a bad idea. “And?” Sam asked, a questioning look on his face.
“And you seem like you’d know what to do with animals,” Gabriel told him.
“You want me to help you? I don’t know much about deer, are you sure this is a good idea?”
“I am the archangel of Fall, of course this is a good idea!” Gabriel approached the bed and started unzipping his jacket. “May I?”
When Sam didn’t argue, which Gabriel took as consent, he put the fawn on the bed. It took a little bit of archangel mojo to convince the fawn that this human was on par with cherubim as far as whether or not she could trust him, but eventually she was curious enough to investigate Sam.
Gabriel conjured a bottle of milk just the right temperature. “Faline is going to need to be bottle fed for a few weeks until she’s old enough to be weaned. Would you like to do the honors?”
Sam still had no idea why Gabriel had a fawn, or why he thought he should be the one learning how to take care of it, or why it was white and spotted instead of a regular deer color, but he wasn’t going to question an archangel that could, and probably would, smite him if he got too annoyed. He just hoped this wasn’t some weird prank. That wouldn’t be fair to the fawn. He took the bottle and held it so the fawn could investigate the tip and drink from it. She did so happily.
The archangel watched quietly as Sam fed Gabriel’s fawn. He hadn’t anticipated him participating so easily, and it made him happier than he’d been in a long time, even if he wasn’t sure why.
“I’m glad you came back,” Sam said as they watched the fawn eat. “I know you need time and space to process what happened, but I was worried about you. You’re welcome to stay as long as you want to.” Sam eyed the archangel hesitantly, not sure if his talking about feelings would scare Gabriel away or not.
Gabriel didn’t answer, but he also didn’t flee, which Sam took as a good sign. Sam didn’t continue because forcing the issue wouldn’t help. They sat in comfortable silence, the only noises coming from Faline as she suckled happily at the bottle Sam was still holding for her.
“Why a deer?” Sam asked eventually.
“She’s an orphan, Sam. I couldn’t just leave her to the tender mercies of winter. Fall is my season. The changing of the leaves, the migration of birds, the mating season of many creatures, but that’s not just it. It’s also the blooming of very specific and unique flowers, and even a few births. Like the birth of this fawn. She is mine, Sam, as much mine as any prayer or pagan sacrifice in my name.”
Sam stared at him. He could see the archangel in him as he spoke with great passion on the things he loved the most. “She’s beautiful,” he breathed. But that wasn’t the only thing he was thinking. He was also thinking that the archangel was breathtaking. Gabriel was passionate, and kind, and he clearly cared a lot about the nature he saw as being within his realm.
“That she is!” Gabriel agreed, grinning easily.
“She probably shouldn't sleep on the bed,” Sam said as the fawn finished the bottle of milk.
Gabriel seriously considered objecting to that, but then decided against it. “Does this mean we get to stay?”
Sam nodded, blushing slightly. “Isn’t that what I said? I want you to stay, but only so long as you aren’t uncomfortable.” Fiddling gently with the bottle still in his hands, Sam bit his lip as he looked up at the archangel in question, hoping that he would stay, but knowing that there was a great possibility he wouldn’t.
Gabriel leaned forward, the young fawn still nestled in his arms, bringing them even closer than before. Meeting whiskey-gold eyes, Sam thought he could feel himself drowning in them just from a glance, and desperately tried to rein himself in. He didn’t want to scare Gabriel away, again.
Gabriel’s eyes never left his, even as he watched the emotion warring inside of them. “I still haven't gotten to thank you for those prayers,” he whispered, lowly. The rich timbre of his voice dragging a shiver down the hunter’s spine. “I'm definitely feeling closer to full strength.” His voice was almost more than just the words spoken, a statement, a promise.
Blushing, hesitant, unsure, Sam moved a hand to Gabriel’s forearm, brushing his fingers across the skin and watching with fascination as goosebumps rose and the archangel's hair stood on end. Maybe, maybe. “I wasn't sure if it would do any good. I just wanted you to know that I care.” As whiskey-gold eyes met unending hazel, Sam could feel the same conflicts within those eyes as were in himself. “Gabriel-” he whispered.
“I know,” Gabriel growled, and then they were together. Lips pressed in a surprisingly chaste kiss, but nonetheless powerful, it seemed to rock Sam’s very existence, his very presence on this planet. Gabriel growled again, quiet, but the vibrations against his mouth had Sam holding back a low moan. Bottle abandoned to the wayside, Sam’s hand snaked itself around the angels neck to wrap through Gabriel’s silken hair. Their lips pressed together, moving, pulling away a hairsbreadth before coming back together, and even with just these simple motions, Sam felt like he was gone, blown away by the incredible presence that was Gabriel. He was burningly aware of Gabriel’s thigh that was currently slightly between his own, at first to better support the fawn but now his skin burned in every place they touched, in all the best ways.
Then. Then, Gabriel’s tongue swiped across his lips, seeking entrance of its own, and Sam truly was gone. Heat sunk into his stomach, a golden glow to rival Gabriels own that sent sparks through his chest and tingling down his limbs. Sam parted eagerly to admit Gabriel, meeting his tongue with his own. Heat, power and a flavor that was purely, intrinsically, Gabriel filled his mouth, filled his mind. Distantly, he felt Gabriel wind a hand of his own through Sam’s hair and giving his scalp a few gently tugs. Sam moaned at the sensation, the vibrations seeming to excite Gabriel as much as they had Sam earlier, and the tempo of their kissing increased. Tongue’s sliding together, lips meeting in hungry clashes, a second hand joining Gabriel’s first in Sam’s hair. They pressed closer, Gabriel’s leg sliding closer to Sam’s as they explored each other’s mouths.
They might have gone further, but Faline evidently felt smothered and let out a high pitched “Meep!” Startling both of the men, who quickly pulled apart to stare at the offending fawn between them.
“That’s why she can’t sleep on the bed,” Sam said, lower lip protruding into a pout.
Gabriel could agree that might be true. He snapped, conjuring a warmed bed of soft leaves and grasses in the corner of the room. He carried the fawn over and laid her down. “This is your bed, Faline.”
Sam watched as Gabriel whispered reassurances to the fawn until she fell asleep. When the fawn was sleeping, the archangel rejoined the hunter on the bed. “I’m glad you’re here,” Sam said, pulling Gabriel towards him. “I’m glad you’re safe, and well, and-”
Gabriel wrapped his arms around Sam. “I’m glad I’m here too. I’ll stay as long as I’m welcome.”
Tagging the people I normally tag
@ladylilithprime @karategirl80 @thallencambricaltran @nathyfaith @altyex @hyrulehearts1123
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“I get where you’re coming from dude, but honestly shut the hell up and don’t talk about her/him that way.”
Thank you for the ask, @ikeracity! Sorry it took this long to get back. And sorry for the length of the answer.
—-
The Genoshan public know the Professor and Magneto as veritable adversaries. As Mutant activists, Professor X and Magneto have rarely, or never, seen eye to eye on mutant issues and rights. They oppose and contradict each other even they fight on the same side– as rare as a blue moon the occurrence is. With Magneto becoming the leader of the extremists’ club called ‘The Brotherhood of Mutants’, and the Professor’s followers declaring themselves as the ‘X-Men’, announcing Dr. Charles Xavier as their leader, their radically different viewpoints have made them something akin to cult figures.
‘The young front of Mutant Politics,’ the Genoshan Daily reports.
What would have been benign arguments with anyone else turn into raging wars when these two are involved. Their infamous debate in the Parliament on the Mutant Registration Bill, though a thing of the past, is still on the common tongue.
‘Things get very furious very fast with these Mutants,’ MP, Steve Rogers quips about Professor Xavier and Magneto.
The press seems to love them; for when they share a screen– or even breath the same air– there’s no dearth of drama.
When he’s not the acclaimed HOD of Genetics at the Genoshan University, Professor Xavier is a socialite, the darling of the Genoshan elite club. His step-father, the late Kurt Marko, was a member of the Congress. His mother, the late Sharon Xavier-Marko, founded most of the charities in the country. However easy the Professor’s entry into the Parliament was, the telepath quickly gained popularity and became the leader of the Integrationalists by his cogency alone. He’s loved by subsets of the human and mutant population alike for this very quality. The Parliament, however, seem to love him for another reason entirely. For the reason that he’s their only shield against their abominable opponent, Magneto.
Magneto has a murky past– more based in rags than in riches. His cryptic persona is a hit amongst the mutant youth, and paired with his phlegmatic character and baritone voice, it has garnered him the support of the mutant masses. It is safe to state that the leader of the Separatists and master metal bender has street cred. That, however, hasn’t stopped him from making his presence felt in the Parliament from time to time.
And when the Professor and Magneto come face to face, the Genoshan public is in for a treat, for their fights are nothing less than a display of fireworks.
-x-
They fight at home, too. Only here, they’re Charles and Erik, and their fights are the kind that come with a terrifying sense of domesticity.
‘Charles, I can’t find my other sock. Have you seen it?’ Erik shouts from the walk-in closet, scowling at the grey sock in his hand.
‘Just a minute,’ comes Charles’ reply after a pause.
‘Keep scowling like that, and you’ll give yourself more wrinkles,’ says Charles as he walks into the room. He’s dressed in Erik’s track pants and sports a pair of mismatched socks on his feet– both in close variants of grey.
‘Keep stealing my socks like that, and you’ll make me an old man ahead of time,’ Erik retorts on spotting his missing pair.
‘Hey, you know my feet get cold quickly. Besides, it’s not my fault that you own only grey socks. It’s hard to differentiate.’
‘You have the same kind of tea with different names in ten different boxes. You don’t see me complaining about it.’
‘Just like I don’t complain about your stupid hat collection that doesn’t see the outside of the coat rack?’
‘Hey, firstly, they’re not hats. Secondly-’ Erik stops and sniffs forcefully. ‘Something is burning on the stove.’
Charles’ eyes go wide in remembrance and the alarmed oh dear ricochets between their minds. They both run to the kitchen at once.
It’s mundaneness at its best at the Xavier-Lehnsherr household.
*
With over three million followers– and growing– on each of their social media, the Professor and Magneto’s accounts quickly turn into combat zones without much instigation. While Professor Xavier– a.k.a Professor X– is well known for his diplomacy, the infamous metal bender, Magneto, is celebrated for his ripostes. Their interesting dynamics have encouraged their followers to deride those on the other end. To add fuel to the fire, the Professor and Magneto choose to mutually censure each other publicly. When the Genoshan Mail asked for his opinion on Magneto rallying for Genosha to become an all-mutant state, the Professor said:
‘Magneto is an impetuous narcissist. He can rally all he wants. It won’t change the fact the Genosha is for everyone.’
In 2016, the Professor made a verbal jab at Magneto’s suit and his lopsided cape.
‘It’s tacky and belongs to a circus,’ he said.
Magneto himself has called the Professor ‘a naive fool’ on multiple occasions. Once during the UN Peace Summit, no less.
When asked about the Professor’s trust in the Government to pass a bill banning suppressants, Magneto has been reported to have said:
‘Professor Xavier is a pretentious know-it-all in a tweed suit. The fact that he’s an all-trusting fool on top of it will be doom of mutants.’
Acting by their leader’s examples, several prominent heads from both the sides have indulged in verbal wars over the years, slamming the other down with slanderous comments.
The Professor and Magneto, however, seem to hold the rights to mutually disparage each other just to themselves. When Mark Blackwell had asked the Professor on how he felt being associated to a supremacist monster like Magneto on Follow the leader, the Professor’s outburst had stunned the filming crew– and the larger part of the population when the show was aired.
‘No man is a monster, Mr. Blackwell. And certainly not Magneto. He might be an extremist and blunt in his approach, but his intentions have never swayed from Mutant equality. Please choose your words more carefully in the future.’
The Professor’s blue eyes had reminded one and all that inciting the ire of an omega-level telepath isn’t the wisest idea.
Magneto, too, has made it clear that he isn’t the one to fall behind. The proposal for a dynamic medical insurance scheme for those with extreme and physical mutations had taken the mutant community by storm. Magneto had cried that the scheme was a sham in a rather colourful language, and the Professor had assured that the Government was amicable for negotiations. The Genoshan Broadcasting Network had brought the two leaders and their supporters for a Prime time face-off, witnessed by audience from all fragments of society. The steady stream of subtitles on the screen had run through several speeches and arguments– including that of the two leaders.
With the last half hour of the show dedicated to audience questions, a mutant by the name of Leech had taken the stand behind the microphone and thrown his question at the Professor.
‘Give this stupid scheme a chance? Trust the Government to treat us fairly? Look at me, Professor,’ he had said, pointing to his green skin and overly large head, ‘Do you think a hospital would be willing to take me in if not for monetary benefit? An entitled mutant like you will never understand the plight of the likes of us. Who are you to fight for our rights? What have you done for us other than looking pretty and writing fancy books? Hell, why do we need an enemy on the outside when scums like you are amongst us?’
Magneto had snapped immediately, face stony and voice as hard as iron,
‘I get where you’re coming from, dude. But honestly, shut the hell up and don’t speak about him that way. Charles Xavier has done more for mutants than you’ll never know.’
Though the transcript on the display had read ‘hell’, members of the audience had heard it differently– something the network chose to politely omit.
‘That still doesn’t stop them from calling each other names,’ observes comedian Remi Lebeau.
-x-
On their sofa, Charles turns in Erik’s arms to face the latter. The thick blanket that is careless
thrown over their laps wrinkles with the action. Here, too, they call each other names– if endearments and sweet nothings could be categorised thus.
‘You didn’t have to break his camera, darling. He was only doing his job,’ Charles scolds mildly.
Erik rolls his eyes. ‘I didn’t break it. Just disabled it. Besides, he wasn’t doing his job. He was condemning you.’
Charles sighs. ‘Why won’t you listen to me when I tell you that I can defend my own honour?’
‘My point precisely, liebling,’ Erik takes Charles’ hand and interlaces their fingers. ‘You can, but you don’t. So I don’t care how many times you prohibit me to, I’ll do it-’ Erik pulls Charles close and whispers against his lips ‘-because I love you.’
Charles looks at Erik then like he’d handed him the moon, and brings their foreheads together. ‘I love you, too,’ he coos.
‘Not more than me. No,’ Erik says shaking his head against Charles’ petulantly.
‘You’re such a child, Erik,’ Charles says chuckling fondly. ‘A six foot child.’
‘With a nine inch dick,’ Erik completes.
Charles looks bemused when he pulls back– torn between laughing over and punching Erik.
He settles for punching Erik in the ribs.
*
With all the hype that surrounds the Professor and Magneto, little, or nothing, is known about their personal lives. It’s only business when these two mutants are in the Primetime Bulletin. While a golden band has made the Professor’s ring finger its permanent residence, what resides under the metal bender’s leather clad hands remains a mystery.
A small fraction of the society, however, have a notion that the two were, or are, involved. To what capacity, is the goal of their mission. A steady stream of blogs run on the world wide web that decrypt their speeches and catalogue their appearances against plausible theories of their coupling.
‘They’re fucking for sure,’ says Kitty Pryde (24), founder of Ishipprofessorxandmagneto.com. ‘The fact that the Professor is married be damned.’
Professor Xavier has been evasive on the topic– neither confirming nor denying the rumours of a significant other.
When Syrin confronted Magento for mutantlove.com, the metal bender responded,
‘Whom I fuck or don’t fuck is none of anybody’s business.’
Very few have dared to broach the topic publically after that.
-x-
Charles sighs standing at the foot of their king sized bed. ‘I thought we decided not to get presents, love.’
‘It’s not a present. I saw this and thought that it would look good on you.’ Erik says as Charles picks up the lilac sweater laid out on the comforter. The label reads: ‘Happy 10th Wedding Anniversary, Charles’. The telepath holds it to his torso and smoothens his hands along the soft wool. ‘Look, it even brings out your eyes,’ Erik says with a pleased smile.
Charles places the sweater on the bed carefully and closes the distance between them by looping his arms around Erik’s neck. ‘That’s cheating, because I didn’t get you anything,’ he drawls.
Erik circles his arms around Charles’ waist and pulls him impossibly close. ‘You’re more than enough,’ he says with a dreamy smile.
‘Romantic!’ Charles giggles.
‘No, I’m not.’
‘Yes, you are!’
‘Absolutely not!’
‘Do you want to fight me on this one, too,’ Charles aks with raised brows.
Erik grins with far too many teeth. ‘Only if it’s foreplay.’
*
The Professor, with his Oxford education and the three PhDs that come with it, is regarded highly amongst the intellectuals. His students often see him in frumpy cardigans and floppy hair. But on the rare occasions when he chooses to grace the read carpet to raise funds for charity, he’s a dashing vision in bespoke tuxedos and stylised hair. His rather charming personality, posh British accent and manners complete the ‘gentleman’ image of Charles Francis Xavier. His ‘No Violence’ policy only ramps it up to higher levels.
His students, colleagues, and acquaintances have nothing but high praises to offer about the good professor.
‘Charles is the kindest man I know,’ says Dr, Moira MacTaggart, HOD of Criminal Law at the Genoshan University.
‘We love the Professor. He’s been a guiding light in many of our lives,’ says Jubilee, a student in Professor Xavier’s Mutations class. When asked what vexes the Professor the most, she laughs. ‘Expletives. He hates them!’
-x-
‘Fuck…’ Charles moans impatiently below Erik– his skin flushed and hair disheveled– and levels a smack to Erik’s backside.
‘What was that for?’ Erik asks cluelessly, eyes wide and mouth ajar.
‘Come on, Erik, move. Put your back into it, and use your dick,’ Charles growls, bringing his hand up to twist it in Erik’s hair.
‘Mein Gott, Charles,’ Erik gasps out in mock indignation. ‘What a dirty little mouth you have.’
‘It’s the same mouth that sucks your dick and kisses you every morning. Unless you want to change any of that, shut up and fuck me.’
That puts an end to Erik’s line of rejoinders. ‘Yes, your Highness,’ he groans and promptly complies.
*
Very few to none have seen the man behind Magneto’s helmet. The image of his Maroon bodysuit backed by his lopsided cape, however, has become the definition of the Government’s nightmare. The Press and the media in general have an on and off love affair with the metal bender. One one hand, he can shoot their TRPs heavenwards with his instigating speeches that move the masses and sets them afoot. On the other hand, he can break their cameras and recorders when it pleases him, leaving them as eyewitnesses as proof of their news.
While a devoted fragment of the society worships him as their hero– embodying his moto of ‘Mutant and Proud’, and willing to follow him to the ends of the world– not many are pleased by Magneto’s violent approach to solving issues.
‘You can love him or hate him. But you can never ignore him,’ says Claire Ferguson, host of the Late Late Show.
His displays of his powers have simultaneously induced awe and terror in many.
‘I’m terrified of him,’ says Samuel Wilson, recalling the time when he had simply watched in horror as Magneto uplifted a football stadium. ‘The man can melt metal for fuck’s sake!’
-x-
In the kitchen, Erik melts a bar of dark chocolate and stirs it steadily. On the counter, a metal sheet bends in the shape of a heart. A red gift wrap and ribbon lie still to be used.
‘Where is my husband, and what have you done with him?’ Charles deadpans when Erik enters the study with the box in hand.
Erik chuckles and floats the box to Charles. ‘Happy Valentine’s Day, liebling.’
Charles beams, but just to be difficult, he adds: ‘Aren’t we a little too old to be celebrating Valentines’?’
Erik walks to Charles’ side. ‘That reminds me. What do the kids ask these days?’ He makes a show of thinking, and with a smouldering smile, asks: ‘Will you be my Valentine, Charles?’
Charles laughs and pulls Erik in by his shoulders. ‘You old fool, I already am,’ he says fondly, and crashes their mouths in a searing kiss.
-x-
They’re either furiously fighting, or passionately making love. There seems to be no in-betweens for these two mutants.
—
Prompts here
#cherik#cherik fic#ikeracity#protective sentences prompt#sorry it took so long to reply#i hopw this fulfills the prompt#vaguely atleast#jjcherik
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The Hobbit Equation
Starting my reread, I questioned the workings of hobbits more deeply than before. I questioned what exactly the difference is between Bilbo (then later the four LOTR hobbits and to a lesser extent, Buckland) and the rest of the Shire that is so distasteful.
Here’s what I came up with.
Most hobbits: simplicity + ignorance
The distasteful exceptions: simplicity + knowledge
Ringbearers: knowledge - simplicity
Simplicity and ignorance is the rule of the Shire, at least near Hobbiton. You can see this in the culture, the dialogue, the narration, and the priorities. They value comfort and good food, party invitations and pipeweed. The entirety of the Shire gets caught up in Bilbo’s party. The post office is flooded and overwhelmed, food is essentially the central feature of any event and hobbit parents are willing to bend their rules if it means their children get a free meal. It’s only the Speech they dread.
Hobbits are simple. They want a simple speech. Before it even starts, the hobbits dread hearing Bilbo’s poetry, or his allusions “to the absurd adventures of his mysterious journey.” The hobbits don’t want knowledge of the outside world. They want to remain isolated for the sake of simplicity, but what they end up with is willful ignorance. They look down on Buckland, call its people strange, because they ride on boats like the outsiders and live unnaturally close to the Old Forest and the edge of the Shire. They live too near to danger, to knowledge that would change them. They don’t want to hear it, and they dismiss all who do as crazy and uncivilized. They blame Frodo’s parents for their own death because they tempted fate. They say Bilbo’s cracked and Frodo’s cracking. They make fun of Sam for learning from Bilbo and condemn Gandalf, an outsider, as a disturber of the peace.
It is with Bilbo’s Speech that this silent battle comes to the forefront. This has been simmering the entire time Bilbo has been back, and now it is boiling over. The battle is Bilbo’s knowledge and complexity versus the Shire’s willful ignorance and simplicity.
After Bilbo greets the different families, the book reads,
“Today is my one hundred and eleventh birthday: I am eleventy-one today! ‘Hurray! Hurray! Many Happy Returns!’ they shouted, and they hammered joyously on the tables. Bilbo was doing splendidly. This was the sort of stuff they liked: short and obvious.”
But then the Speech starts to change. He says he has called them all here for a “Purpose,” with a capital P. This is when some of the Tooks begin to listen carefully. Because Bilbo is deviating from the norm. Something about how he says this implies something new. This is a sign of Bilbo’s Speech going off the rails, and a reference to the “Took-ish spirit” of Bilbo’s that leapt at the chance for adventure all those years before. The Tooks pick up on the change, and they are interested.
Bilbo then announces that he has Three Purposes, and each one is more unacceptable than the last. The First is well received at its beginning (flattery is easy to understand), but then it becomes too complex. The hobbits are confused and unsettled. Thrown off, and made to think.
“Indeed. for Three Purposes! First of all, to tell you that I am immensely fond of you all, and that eleventy-one years is too short a time to live among such excellent and admirable hobbits. Tremendous outburst of approval.
I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve. This was unexpected and rather difficult. There was some scattered clapping, but most of them were trying to work it out and see if it came to a compliment.
Secondly, to celebrate my birthday. Cheers again.
Bilbo returns to the simple, and receives a positive response. They are easy to forgive this short complexity, because they don’t want to think too hard about it. They are ready to move on and are still happy to be filled with good food.
“I should say: OUR birthday. For it is, of course, also the birthday of my heir and nephew, Frodo. He comes of age and into his inheritance today. Some perfunctory clapping by the elders; and some loud shouts of ‘Frodo! Frodo! Jolly old Frodo,’ from the juniors. The Sackville-Bagginses scowled, and wondered what was meant by ‘coming into his inheritance’.
Now he alludes to what is about to happen. He is not only celebrating Frodo; he is setting up his imminent inheritance of Bag End, which of course is noticed by the Sackville-Bagginses. This is a transition from Bilbo to Frodo narratively as well. We followed Bilbo in The Hobbit, and now we will follow Frodo through The Lord of the Rings. We see that Frodo is liked by his peers, just as Bilbo once was. But the hobbits are more suspicious of Frodo because of his upbringing with the changed Bilbo. But Frodo still has his simplicity. He can balance well the simplicity of the Shire and the complexity of Bilbo. He knows how to mediate between them. Bilbo has shared his knowledge with Frodo, and Frodo does not yet have the Ring (something that will take away childlike simplicity). But the Ring is part of his inheritance, both literally and narratively. He is bound to the same fate, and the hobbits notice this as the years pass. (I’m getting ahead of myself; more about the Ring later). Frodo is still in love with the Shire, and the Shire accepts him, because he still has simplicity. He is popular: smart, adaptable, and open.
“Together we score one hundred and forty-four. Your numbers were chosen to fit this remarkable total: One Gross, if I may use the expression. No cheers. This was ridiculous. Many of his guests, and especially the Sackville-Bagginses, were insulted, feeling sure they had only been asked to fill the required number, like goods in a package. ‘One Gross, indeed! Vulgar expression.”
Here, some of Bilbo’s feelings come through. He has been isolated so long from hobbit society that he no longer sees them the same way. One Gross: an expression not meant for describing people (as stated earlier in the chapter). These hobbits, his relatives, are no longer his people. Except for Frodo. He and Frodo are now the only people he knows. He is setting them aside from the general populace. And it is this populace, these people present, that he wants to send a message to. And these hobbits are now both unsettled and angered, now even most of the Tooks. Bilbo, no longer caring what they think of him, is committing social suicide before he leaves just so he can finally challenge their way of life.
“It is also, if I maybe allowed to refer to ancient history, the anniversary of my arrival by barrel at Esgaroth on the Long Lake; though the fact that it was my birthday slipped my memory on that occasion. I was only fifty-one then, and birthdays did not seem so important. The banquet was very splendid, however, though I had a bad cold at the time, I remember, and could only say ‘thag you very buch’. I now repeat it more correctly: Thank you very much for coming to my little party. Obstinate silence. They all feared that a song or some poetry was now imminent; and they were getting bored. Why couldn’t he stop talking and let them drink to his health? But Bilbo did not sing or recite. He paused for a moment.
Thirdly and finally, he said, I wish to make an ANNOUNCEMENT. He spoke the last word so loudly and suddenly that everyone sat up who still could. I regret to announce that -- though, as I said, eleventy-one years is far too short a time to spend among you -- this is the END. I am going. I am leaving NOW, GOODBYE!
He stepped down and vanished.
Bilbo has felt since his adventure that he has been keeping a secret: the secret of culture, history, the Ring, adventure. Knowledge that he has been trying to share for years, but the hobbits have been willingly blind and deaf to it. This creates an unhappy dichotomy -- a tension that Bilbo releases in his Speech. He literally SHOUTS his differences at the hobbits, going through the list of what they think is unacceptable or what they don’t like. He has everything in this speech: complex words, references to adventure and foreign places, ‘One Gross.’ And when he does this, even though they’ve been insulted, they pass it off as just mad old Bilbo. Because that is easier than examining it. But there is unrest; the hobbits are upset that he made them think. For a brief moment, they are speechless. Frodo gives them a simple explanation they can accept, but for a while, they are still disturbed; even good food will not satisfy them. Bilbo has succeeded in briefly challenging their way of thinking. But then the hobbits blame Gandalf, an outsider, and decide that Bilbo must have fallen in a pool or river and died. A normal way of dying -- his adventure cut short with a realistic end, as a warning to any who might also get such silly ideas. They want things to be simple as they always were, but Bilbo is on a different level; all of his knowledge, his complexity, made him an outcast. One side has to give.
Bilbo has lost both his simplicity and his ignorance, and thus cannot stay in the Shire. He no longer belongs. There is no place for him. Frodo, as the years pass after the party, also begins to lose this belonging, and often regrets not going with Bilbo. He knows things about the world, he knows that great and terrible things are out there. That knowledge becomes a burden in the Shire, where no one else knows or cares; just like the simplicity and ignorance of Sam, Merry, and Pippin are initially an obstacle for them in navigating the world outside. But Frodo is different. Wheras Sam, Merry, and Pippin have a hard time because they still belong to the Shire, Frodo has a hard time in the Shire because he’s starting not to belong. What is different about him, then, that Sam, who was also taught by Bilbo, does not share?
The Ring, the sinister part of Frodo’s inheritance. Part of Frodo’s dissatisfaction may also come from his personality, but the Ring is an instrument for the loss of simplicity. It creates dissatisfaction, the want for more. It twists who you are, and you lose your innocence. This is the thing that drove Gollum, another hobbit-like creature, away from his own people. The longer Frodo carries the Ring, the more he forgets about the simple things. As he gets closer to Mordor, and the Ring becomes stronger, we get this dialogue from Frodo: “I can't recall the taste of food, nor the sound of water, nor the touch of grass.” This is eerily similar to what Gollum experienced under the mountains, where the Ring had so long to corrupt him.
“And we wept, Precious, we wept to be so alone. And we only wish to catch fish so juicy sweet. And we forgot the taste of bread... the sound of trees... the softness of the wind.”
This quote is a close echo of Frodo’s (or rather, vice versa). The Ring works to separate you from comfort, to go against your nature. For the simple hobbits, this is good food, nature, and especially companionship. This is why Frodo would have failed without Sam and his loyalty. Sam not only reminded him of these simple things (with his yet intact simplicity); he refused to leave Frodo even when the Ring tried to drive Sam away.
Eventually, even Sam, who also bore the Ring however briefly, feels the need to leave the Shire and sail like Frodo and Bilbo did. Frodo and Sam are the only two that listened to Bilbo’s stories and poetry as children. They had that knowledge from early on, and the Ring took away their childlike simplicity.
Merry and Pippin are different. They retain their simplicity throughout the story and beyond. Their shared connection of simplicity with the Shire allows them to become excellent leaders with the knowledge and experience that they gained. This difference and growth is highlighted in the Scouring of the Shire, when the hobbits take charge and Merry blows the horn of Rohan in response to Sandyman. I’ll get into this when I get to the end of my reread.
Finally, we’ll look at the Grey Havens. This is where Merry and Pippin most show their difference from Frodo and Sam. After Frodo leaves, Sam is comtemplative, sorrowful, and silent (though he can still delight in his family). Merry and Pippin walk back to the Shire singing. They are still joyful, mature and yet childlike (as opposed to the childish ignorance of the Shire previously). They still have their simplicity and, after the Shire has been so rocked, can bring their knowledge to the changed Shire in a subtle way. Because it was by the hobbits’ ignorance that they were susceptible to Saruman.
Merry and Pippin have been built up by their adventures, they have grown (literally and figuratively) and give off an aura of competence but also an aura of joy. They adapted to the world beautifully. Frodo and Sam were torn down by their adventures, Frodo so much so that he can no longer find peace in Middle Earth, while Sam can still be rebuilt by his family and his own rebuilding of the Shire itself. By restoring the nature of the Shire, he restores a bit of that simplicity in himself, until his own time to sail.
To conclude (at last), the proper growth of a hobbit is from childish to childlike: something Frodo achieved before even leaving the Shire. He experienced negative growth with his loss of simplicity, and thus, like Bilbo, was no longer able to stay in the Shire. He did, however, go a bit more quietly than Bilbo, whose Speech was the manifestation of the dichotomy of ignorance vs. knowledge, and a measure of how the Shire needed to change. So this is the hobbit equation: simplicity and ignorance, or simplicity and knowledge. The Ring takes one away from their nature, and they become un-hobbitlike, like Gollum became un-hobbitlike. Theirs is a healing that can now only come from the peace of Valinor.
(This has gotten abhorrently long. I’ll continue building on this idea as I go through the books, along with my other thoughts and theories. Hope you enjoyed! )
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for the never have I ever, have u ever written anything where a character goes dark side? (MCU)
hmmmmm. I don’t think Tony playing the villain in a simulation counts. I have a thing where Natasha was an international terrorist and it takes a long time before she plays on the good side, but it’s not really what you mean either.
But I do have strong feelings about this, and since Secret Empire makes me so mad I had to go take a walk, I was actually thinking about this recently.
And If I were to write something like this in MCU it would be absolutely without doubt be Dark!Steve.
But none of this hand wave now he’s evil bull. None of this he always was, not even the idea that the serum itself is the corrupting force. I want Steve to be so righteous it turns to evil.
I would let Steve’s frustration with the modern political climate and the entrenched ideas, and the gridlock that stops them from helping push him further and further. So one day he does something the world isn’t ok with. Something like taking down a dictator because yes, they were beloved by 80% of their country, but they were killing the other 20%, and Steve wasn’t having it. And the world condemns the act because the leader was beloved.
And Steve just kinda twitches, and apologizes, and says all the right things in interviews, but he also gets a second suit put together, without any of Tony’s trackers in it. With enough difference that you can’t tell it’s him. And yes, he has to leave the shield behind with the Cap suit, but he has guns, he’s not unarmed, and anyway, the world seems to think that Captain America hates guns, so this helps hide who he is.
And that’s where it starts. One step at a time as Steve starts doing what HE thinks is right for no more reason than that HE thinks so. At first it is good things, but doing that slowly slides him further outside of morality. Just, one by one, Steve takes down bullies, or those that might be bullies, or those that might become bullies, and leaves increasingly graphic calling cards as The Nomad for those he kills/throws at police.
And people are becoming scared of this man, and Steve is happy about that, because it means fewer and fewer are stepping up to be awful. Fewer people need to be punished. He can hear the echoes of Hydra’s mantras but knows that this is ok, this isn’t like that, bc Steve is a good man, and this is the right thing to do.
And it’s so easy when Tony confronts him to overpower him. It’s so easy. Tony didn’t come with the suit, he came to talk, he came with trust, and never expected to be thrown in a cell. And Steve announces that Tony was killed in a fight, and talks about how broken he is by that, bc the world still loves Captain America, and look to him. And Captain America won’t condemn the Nomad bc the people being killed are bad, and the world trusts him, and the world listens.
So Steve is both reviled villain and beloved hero and the world doesn’t know that he’s controlling the entire story, for their own good, of course.
Tony sits there, with a news feed playing on a screen outside the cell, and watches reports of how this new villain is growing bolder. A country’s entire naval fleet is destroyed, with the sailors on board. Anyone that tries to hide the Nomad’s targets becomes a target.
It’s not until months later, when the world is sitting in terrified peace that Steve actually speaks to Tony instead of handing him food and water and departing.
Steve talks about how he’s finally done it. How the world is at peace, and there are no more bullies and how proud of himself he is. Bc of course steve talks to tony, he can’t tell anyone else what he’s achieved. Tony listens, and knows he should keep his mouth shut. If he can wait until Steve slips and lets Tony near technology, then maybe it can be fixed. Maybe Tony can tell the world and pry this claw from around the world’s neck.
But Tony isn’t great at keeping his mouth shut, and rips into Steve, telling him how he’s the only bully left, and how his friends would be disgusted, and quoting everything he’s ever heard about fear, and calling Steve Hyrda’s spawn. How Bucky would be disgusted by what he’d done. How Peggy would hate him for this. How he’s betrayed everyone that ever loved him.
And Steve smiles in this poisonous way and says something about how Tony will understand one day, and then Steve will let him out of the cell again.
A few weeks later Bucky gets thrown in the cell with Tony, clearly on the losing end of a fight, and Steve is furious, lecturing about traitors, and what he’d done for these two men, how hard he’s trying to save the world.
The Nomad destroys the UN and NATO later that night, the AU and the Arab league the next, simply because they were leading investigations to find and stop the Nomad.
Steve doesn’t understand how what he’s doing is wrong. He is moral, he is just, he is a Good Man. He knows how to help, and he’s going to, whether they ask him to or not. He doesn’t see how far he’s fallen. Not at the start, not when he wipes North Korea off the map after accessing the nuclear launch codes. Not at the end, when Bucky and Tony take him down. Even then he’s arguing that he knows what’s best, and yelling that he’s going to protect the world.
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Your Latest Trick
Chapter 17
(Loki x Reader)
Long after everyone has stopped talking about Loki and his misdemeanors, his failed attempt to take over Midgard and his punishment, you meet him at a party.
A tale in which Loki woos the reader despite life imprisonment, mortal wounding and the cumbersome pretense of impersonating his father.
Covering the events of ‘The Dark World’ and beyond
Original Prompt: Imagine Loki undressing you slowly, entirely by magic, only touching you with his eyes.
All chapters to date at AO3 (42K, NC-17)
Tagging: @frenchfrostpudding
Chapter 17 (NSFW)
You’re aware that you are leaning slightly on Dagny, on her good side. It could look companionable to anyone just glancing at you, but in fact you’re falling from sleep. This morning was fine, but here, standing listening to Odin’s latest speech, you’re paying the price for your short night. You wanted to hear the official line though. How much of what Loki told you are the people allowed to know? How much of what you know will you have to hide. Everything it seems. In Odin’s speech, there is nothing to suggest that Malekith is still at large, just plenty about the glory of Asgard, a monument to Frigga that will be built, and praise for the good work of the builders repairing the city. He drones on rather, his habitual dramatic pauses seeming more like an old man losing his way. You long for it to be over, stifle your yawns and lean on your friend. Dimly you register Asta moving to support you from the other side.
Odin doesn’t talk about Asgard’s allies on Svartalfheim. Is that where Loki has been going? You usually manage to avoid thinking of him during the day but here you drift off - imagining his voice, his warmth against you, his hair touching your face. The trouble is there’s not just him there in your thoughts. There’s the elf girl. She saved his life — he is indebted to her. You are indebted to her! The face that he showed you was both alien and beautiful. Was that because he found her beautiful?
You are sagging into Dagny and she pushes you upright. Odin is reminding all present of the importance of fighting skills once more. Then he starts talking again of the glory of Asgard. It’s a speech you’ve heard time and again since childhood. His voice, deep and proud lulls you with its familiarity. You know these words by heart.
Asta gives you a sharp a dig in the ribs and you’re suddenly awake, like you fell here. It’s only then that you realize you had been fully sleeping, standing propped up between your friends. You can’t hear Odin’s voice any longer and it’s not a dramatic pause. You glance up toward the throne, terrified to be caught. But there your eyes meet not the condemning stare of the King but those of your own mother. She’s up there on the dais in front of the throne and for a moment you haven’t the slightest idea why. But your confusion and her glare are over in a moment as she continues talking, telling the crowd how her team are working to harness the power of the Aether. It’s simplified for the masses but you still don’t understand much. You only know that if your mother and her team at the armory are involved, then any harnessing is unlikely to be for peaceful purposes.
When she’s finished, Odin thanks her and there’s a round of applause. It’s over. The crowd disperse. You should be glad; you can go and rest now. Only now of course you don’t feel tired anymore, only anxious.
On the way out, your father greets you warmly. He either missed the vital embarrassing moment or thinks it of no matter. You don’t see your mother afterwards though and decide you must go and apologize right away, rather than let your shame and her annoyance fester.
*******
The armory is set away from the palace but still within the protected perimeter. You’ve got rocks in the pit of your stomach as you approach. This is supposedly a social call, but it doesn’t feel like one. When you ask for your mother, they send you on to her lab but you have to pass through a security point before they let you in. That’s new. Finally, you step into a great room divided by a glass screen. Mother is back at work already. She hasn’t seen you and you know better than to disturb her. She lays out a bowl and hooked lance in the center of the workspace, then pulls on thick protective gloves.
On this side of the glass, protected from the experiments, there are books and papers everywhere. This is a place for planning research and discussing it. There are drawing boards, innumerable unnamed machines, and scrolls. This is a world where she once tried and failed to entice you. Against one wall are working models of some of their creations, a pivoting plinth for an antiaircraft weapon and various models of armor, including the one you so labored to get Loki out of.
Mother has a workgroup with student apprentices from across the realms. The two with her now are dwarves from Nidavellir. Through the glass shield you see them supporting a shield of lead before the three of them while mother holds a spear with, at its end, an impaled cabbage. You almost laugh, but your mother’s expression is so serious that you simply wait and watch, wondering at what military significance this could possibly have.
On the opposite wall of the room, a door in the wall slides open and there emerges a bright-red horned creature. As it advances, you see that it is in fact only a common goat, but bright red and pulsing.
The animal goes to take a bite from the proffered cabbage and as it does the red color jumps to the vegetable, leaving the goat’s coat a pure white.
The group go into action. Resting the shield down, one of the students lobs a second cabbage into a far corner and the goat goes running after it. Mother lowers the glowing one into the bowl you saw and her second assistant drops the lid from the end of the hook. There are audible sighs of relief.
She turns her head to you immediately. She must have known you were there all the time. Then she smiles and it’s much more conciliatory than when she caught you napping earlier. Perhaps this won’t be too bad.
She pulls off her gloves and enters the study area. Indicating a chair to you, takes the one opposite.
“Progress is so slow.” She sighs.
You sit down and one of the students brings tea. There is the ceremony of offering, pouring, milk and sugar and stirring while you squirm inside. Then her eyes rise over her cup and meet yours.
“It’s good to see you, but we need to t–“ she stops herself an instant. The other student is still the experiment room, fussing over the goat; hugging him round the neck and calling him a ‘good boy’.
“Hornace. Stop that.” she calls to him. “We don’t know he’s safe yet.”
Then she turns back to you.
“Even at times like these…”
“Mother?”
“When will you take life more seriously and just, stop with this…?” she spreads her hands in an exasperated gesture.
Even in your tired state you understand what she thought she saw: you falling from sleep after a night of partying. But it’s too complicated to deny and the truth must stay hidden at all costs.
“I thought, when you started to help the sick…” she continues. ”Well I thought it was strange – for you – but I was proud. You were going somewhere, doing something more than gallivanting.”
‘Gallivanting’? You’d hardly call calming Loki’s nightmares gallivanting, but you’ll take the criticism rather than risk revealing anything.
“But, now I see you with your friends, in the state you were in, in a speech by the King of all places. Thank goodness it wasn’t seen.” She pinches her brow.
“Soon you will be old enough to bear children and marry. This will have to stop.”
To bear children and marry.
Once you would have retorted that you wanted to make the most of your freedom, but her comments are so at odds with reality that you don’t know how to reply. You stay silent.
“You know this. I don’t have to tell you,” she says. “I don’t like having to tell you, But try…Try to start behaving like an adult. Your lifestyle is so….“ She can’t relate. This you know. You couldn’t make her understand it if you tried. And she’s got it all so wrong anyway.
Your eyes have wandered back to the armor model as she’s talking. She notices and narrows her eyes.
“Very proud of that one. If only everything were so simple.”
“Its very robust.” You say, hoping to divert the subject.
“Fuckproof,” she affirms.
“What?” You feel yourself blush, shocked by her use of the word.
“But then you knew that.” And you’re blushing no longer. Your blood runs cold. How could she know? Were you and Loki seen?
Or could it be only that she’s only guessing, guessing that you’ve tried to have relations with men in armor before. Your heart is thudding. That she knows the truth is impossible. That she simply thinks the worst of you… Ridiculously, that’s the vastly preferable option.
“The whole point being that our warriors bring their passions home with them. Something I think you’ve appreciated a great deal up until now. But the time’s coming when you have to make a choice. Find a husband.”
Once upon a time you might have answered back that ‘appreciating’ was the best way to choose objectively (with no intention of actually doing so), but at the moment that choice would be easy. Impossible, but easy. Meanwhile, she’s virtually accused you of harassing on-duty guardsmen. You can feel your anger rising, but you hold it down.
“Mother, I know. But I am years from being able to bear a child.”
“I thought you were gaining in responsibility, yet you still consider life a party.”
You know what you want to say - What is life if you don’t enjoy it to the max? But you hold your tongue, just hoping she’ll finish.
“You need to slow down and choose one who is worthy to love properly.”
“What if I already had?” you say, defiant and finally too tired and angry to stop yourself.
First, she looks at you in surprise, then with scrutiny. You’re not lying, you don’t need to. She looks shocked, disbelieving, confused, and then…elated.
You’re horrified at the turn this has taken and at yourself. You can’t take it back, can’t hide it. Only try to limit the damage.
“Oh but that’s wonderful, darling,”
“Please, please, its early days. Please don’t ask to meet him yet.”
She’s smiling broadly now and it’s far worse than anything she said.
What can you do? You can’t produce him. You’re sworn to silence and it’s almost a no go subject – all wrapped up in Loki’s secret.
Between the you and Loki it’s just so very real. Why is he holding it back from existing in the real world? It’s not that Loki ‘meeting your parents’ is something you relish, but why oh why can’t he come home properly?
She doesn’t press, just wishes you well and let’s you go. She looks pleased and you feel like you’ve been played. Those few seconds when you thought she knew everything she was just trying to goad you with vulgarity. And she succeeded.
You traipse home, wondering how you will stop her from pressing for more details. You’re amazed, afraid and intensely mad at yourself.
********
He’s already there when you arrive home, sitting in your reading chair. Light from the lamp warms the colors on his face. And, though he does look tired, he is beautiful. The sight of him chases everything else from your mind, like magic, like you’ve stepped into another world. He’s clearly just taken a bath and is wearing one of your peignoirs. An ample and unsexy garment, or so you thought. But seeing him in it, it’s as though you’ve already wrapped a part of yourself around him. His hair is damp and bits of it stick out at crazy angles. He’s either unaware or doesn’t care that you see him like that, which feels cozy… until he turns his gaze fully on you. It’s cold and serious and you are almost afraid for a second, until you realize that what you see here is lust, pure and simple. And it feels like it’s catching.
He’s staring. You might as well be naked, for he has stripped you with his thoughts. He comes no closer though and you watch as his eyes soften and his brow furrows with some unvoiced concern. He looks away again and you miss those eyes terribly. The moment passes and you’re still standing there, aware no one has said a word. Then he turns to you, his seriousness gone.
“I was hoping to help you wash as soon as you got home, but I think that can wait.”
Your breath catches as he rises, slowly and deliberately, his movement shifting the peignoir and drawing your eyes to the ‘v’ of skin that widens below his throat and down his chest, and yes, of course, he’s naked underneath. He holds out a hand to you and when you take it you feel the sureness of his grip. He looks you up and down and you wonder if he will disappear your clothes, but no. He rests a hand on your hip and turns you, then starts unbuttoning your dress from behind, his breath hot on your neck.
He works slowly, kissing your nape all the while and you struggle to stay still. On him, you smell the notes of the spiced oil you put in the bath. He’s using your own weapons against you! Once the dress is loose enough he puts his hands inside and caresses you through your undergarments, then he starts to undo those too without finishing with the dress. All this is delaying things still further, but his mouth on your neck is persistent and when he succeeds in finding a particularly sensitive spot you cannot keep still or quiet any longer.
You’re half in and half out of two layers of clothes, hobbled by your dress and desperate with want when, in a single movement, he casts the spell that strips you naked and sweeps you up and onto the bed.
Still trailing your peignoir from his shoulders like a cape he’s upon you and in you all at once, hot, urgent and desperately welcome. You enfold him in your arms and legs, entwining your heels behind his back as he moves, eyes gleaming and fixed on yours, grinning from ear to ear. He chases off all that remains of the stress and embarrassments of the day. He chases away the very need for words.
You spur one another on. You’re starting to be able to read him now, to know when he’s about to lose control. What’s more he knows for you. You see it in the quirk of his mouth, just before each of his breaths becomes a hissed ’Yes’. You love seeing the moment the venire of humor cracks revealing what’s behind. But it’s already too much - the weight of him, the heat of him and the feel of him inside you, so perfect. You couldn’t make a ‘yes’, or any other word for that matter, if you tried. You’re already shaking with pleasure when you feel the heat of his release.
Your climax draws out as his moves slacken and he watches at you as you plead and sigh and stretch and arch with the sensation. He looks ridiculously pleased with himself.
When finally you have calmed, he leads you to the ready-warmed bathroom where you wash and dry each other fastidiously.
Then, wrapped, almost modestly, in towels, you return to the bedchamber.
The bed is a mess. You laugh when you see it. There is nothing modest or innocent about the state of the bed. And there creeps the shadow of your mother’s words, about your lifestyle, about your future. How you hate her for following you here.
Loki’s magic has everything looking spick and span again in an instant but those rogue thoughts and the questions linger. You wish he could come home for real, or that he could at least tell you why not. You think with incredulity of him meeting your parents. Besides having to explain his return from the dead and obtain a formal pardon from his father, he is still, in the eyes of your parents, the boy who publicly embarrassed you and who got you lost in the forest when you were a little girl.
He’s looking at you, wondering perhaps why you aren’t saying anything. He’s relaxed and you daren’t bring up such realities. You don’t have the strength to ask him, you won’t break this moment. But then, thinking of all your past you remember something. A simple thing that symbolizes how closely you’ve been linked and for how long.
“I have something of yours.”
He hums like he’s known all along and smiles at you, softly in a way that makes you want to melt, a way that almost makes you forget everything.
You had only been thinking about a trinket. The pendant made from a stone that his mother made him give you as a child.
But his expression is so earnest and expectant that it hints at something much more profound and that gives you pause.
Could he be thinking of his heart?
Chapter 18
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sidney crosby // rise and fall
warnings: none
who: sidney x reader
premise: you get in your first real fight
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Sidney was the easiest person to get along with. That was one of the reasons you loved him: his mellow, agreeable personality. Sure he was passionate, the most passionate individual you had ever encountered, but he knew how to make a relationship work: compromise and understanding.
That's why you two worked so well: his calm nature always perfectly balanced your hurricanes of emotion and impatience. You ignited him as he doused your raging fires with soft words and fluttering kisses.
It was hard to anger him; he was used to being intentionally shoved by jealous players into solid ice and booed by opposing fans when ever he was on the road. Anything you could do never matched the adversity he dealt with on a daily basis.
That's why, in almost three years of dating, you had hardly had an argument that surpassed a raised voice or a passive aggressive comment. It was almost unnatural how perfectly you got along, filling the spaces in each other's lives perfectly, fitting together like puzzle pieces.
Everyone always tried to find the holes in your relationship. Interviewers were always looking for a juicy story of your latest brawl, a sign that you two weren't dolls living out a perfectly designed happily ever after. They always groaned when Sidney would smile, shake his head, and share a small moment of the love you two shared, your little pockets of heaven.
The only thing is that perfection doesn't exist. Some days prove it to you more than others. Some days play every bad card they have on you, testing you, watching to see you break.
And, unfortunately, today was when of those days. To start, you were absolutely exhausted. Work had been especially draining this week, leaving you with sleepless nights filing reports and sending e-mails. And, to make things worse, Sid had been away the entire week. When you returned to your shared house every night, the emptiness consumed you. All you wanted was to be held by your boyfriend as he made you take a break, sleeping and feeling at peace with yourself as you felt overwhelmingly safe and loved. But without him, you became a bitter shell of yourself.
All this pent up exhaustion and bitterness culminated when Sidney returned home late from his trip, waking up the five seconds of relaxation you had experienced in days.
You didn't mean to snap but you couldn't help it. That was not how you wanted to welcome your boyfriend home: you knew he had had a rough week too, losing two games on the road and being criticized throughout Pittsburgh for his performance. But the collection of weight on your shoulders didn't exactly allow for your sympathetic, loving girlfriend mood to come out.
You had yelled at him, called out his weak spots, and slammed the door on him, condemning him to the cold, drafty guest bedroom, all in the span of 5 dreadful minutes.
He didn't stay silent, though. For the first time, you had pushed him past his breaking point. He yelled right back at you, saying things you could have never imagine he would, matching your anger and shooting you a stare filled with daggers.
As tired as you were, you couldn't sleep well that night, your pillows stained with tears as you replayed the words he spoke over and over.
"You're selfish. You always have been, always will be."
"God, who even are you?"
"I'm sick of this. Your words, your attitude. You."
You knew he didn't mean it. You knew he was angry and he said stupid things, just like you. You knew he just wanted to make you feel as bad as you had made him feel. But, damnit, it worked.
The words completely consumed you– you couldn't escape them, no matter how hard you tried.
You tried to not let it get to you, failing immediately and letting your grief devour you.
By the time the morning came around, your sadness had been replaced by another round of anger. Things had changed so quickly. This time yesterday, you were a girl waiting to be reunited with the boy she loved. Now you were questioning everything. Would you two ever be the same again?
You walked over to your vanity to examine the puffiness of your face that last night had left you with only to catch a glimpse of your calendar. Shit.
Today was Sidney's mother's birthday and you were planning on going with him to visit her, a two hour drive away. Normally, you would take more time away from him, hopefully letting this blow over and getting to talk through where you two stood when he returned. But, you loved his mom. You two had always gotten along extremely well and you didn't want to disappoint or upset her on this day.
You rushed to get ready, putting on a necklace she had gotten you for Christmas last year and a maroon sweater dress with black boots. When you got downstairs, Sidney was waiting with his back to you in the living room, dressed in your favorite button down of his, the one that perfectly hugged his body.
You knew he had probably come to the same conclusion as you, confirmed as he silently got up and opened the door for you, gesturing towards the car. A gentleman until the end.
As you buckled yourself into the passenger seat, a world of emotions flooded your senses. You were nervous: was he holding off breaking up with you until you saw his mom? Did he hate you? Did you hate him? You decided you did not.
As angry as you felt right now, you still had an overwhelming amount of love for him.
You knew he was it for you and that you couldn't let him go. But you weren't ready to get over what he said just yet.
As Sidney sat down in the driver's seat, his face stuck in a stern grimace, you knew that these would be the longest two hours of your life. The tension could be cut with a knife.
The minutes rolled along like years as you tried to distract yourself with anything and everything. You could see he was struggling too, hyper focusing on the long expansion of road in front of him. This was the loudest silence you had ever experienced, both of you screaming without making a sound.
An hour in, and the silence was unbearable. You knew Sid had reached his limit too as he turned to switch on the radio, letting the monotonous tone of the weather reporters fill the tight space around you.
As the tape approached its fourth loop, you jetted your hand out to switch the channel just as Sid did, your skin meeting for the first time in seemingly forever. His hands were icy cold and the sensation lingered as you pulled back, trying to gauge his facial expression without meeting his eyes.
He switched the channel to a music station that was on a commercial break, rambling about pointless events and news stories that you couldn't bring yourself to care about.
Finally, the music was starting up again. You froze as you recognized the beat, your cheeks flushing. Your song. Of all of the songs in the world, the station had played your song. The song that had been playing when you first met three years ago. The song you would lovingly sing to each other on sleepy mornings and during drunk karaoke dates.
You could feel the bad energy leaving you as you are rushed with memories of love and happiness. Out of the corner of your eye, you see a smile creep across Sid's face.
So much for the silent treatment, you think, before you instinctively sing along.
In seconds, Sidney is joining you, starting off quiet before belting it. You giggle as you both struggle to hit the high note, knowing you won't make it but trying every damn time anyways.
Everything is easy: you're you and Sid again, not puppets dragged into roles too big for them to comprehend.
Life is blissful for about 3 minutes before the music stops and your left with the mess you still have to handle.
You shut the music off, realizing that it's now or never.
"Sid" you speak, barely a whisper.
"No." He says, his voice demanding and strong.
Before you can inquire more, he cuts you off, continuing the though.
"No, I need to go first. (Y/N), I am so sorry. I can't tell you how heavy those words felt on my tongue last night and how painful they feel in my thoughts. I didn't mean it, God, (Y/N), know that I didn't mean it. I was afraid– afraid that maybe you didn't need me anymore. That you didn't need me as much as I need you. Because I need you, (Y/N). I need you so much that it hurts. And to think that I hurt you..."
He looks down, a single tear remaining still on his cheek.
You put your hand on his knee, willing him to continue.
"I love you. I'm sorry and I love you. I don't even know how to ask for your forgiveness but–"
"Sid. Stop talking like that. I forgive you a million times over. But you aren't the one who needs to apologize. I hate myself for what I said last night. I get tired and cranky and a new side of me comes out. I think that's why what you said hurt me; because I knew it was true. I'm sorry that I'm selfish. I'm sorry that I'm too selfish to let you go. I'm sorry that I never will. I love you too, Sidney."
Your eyes catch Sidney's again so he can mouth I love you to you. As his eyes turn back to the road, he shakes his head softly, smiling a bit.
"What?"
"(Y/N)" he said, his voice back to his teasing ways.
"Can we never fight again?"
#sidney crosby imagine#sidney crosby#sidney#crosby#imagine#nhl imagines#hockey imagines#hockey imagine#pittsburgh penguins#penguins hockey#nhl imagine#imagines#sid the kid
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People don't like lupin?
I've been reading resons why people don't like or trust lupin and it's all crap. So I've decided to write his back story down here along with some personal opinions so here you go. Dumbledore made the decision that harry should not have contact with the magic world. So Remus wouldnt of known his location or be able to check on him. Also he would not want to put the burden of him being a werewolf on harry because even though it physically only affected him 3 nights a month it did affect him in other ways. He is discriminated against and not able to get/keep a job. For instance he had/chose to quit hogwarts as the parents of the kids said they didn't want him teaching. He's called a dangerous animal by many people who don't know him. He was turned because his dad upset fenir grey back, a werewolf and said that werewolves were ‘soulless, evil, deserving nothing but death’. After lupin was turned at age 5 his father regreted his acrioned and tried to find a cure. They thought he wouldn't be able to attend hogwarts. Remus was not allowed to play with other children, in case he let slip the truth of his condition. In consequence, and in spite of his loving parents, he was a very lonely boy. At first it was easy to contain him on full moons however, as he grew, so did his wolfish self, and by the time he was ten years old, he was capable of pounding down doors and smashing windows. Powerful spells were needed to contain him and his parents grew thin with worry and fear. They adored their son, but they knew that their community – already beset with fears at the mounting Dark activity around them – would not be lenient on an uncontrolled werewolf. The hopes that they had once had for their son seemed in ruins, and his dad educated Remus at home, certain that he would never be able to set foot in school. Dumbledore however didn't give a flying fuck about the discrimination and still enrolled the boy. Even though his parents tried to stop him. Due to the widespread prejudice around werewolves, Dumbledore agreed that for Remus’s own sake his condition should not be broadcast. Once a month, he would leave for a secure and comfortable house in the village of Hogsmeade, guarded by many spells and reached only by an underground passage from the Hogwarts grounds, where he could transform in peace. This made the 11 year old with no friends happy as he could finally talk to people and go to hogwarts. At school hw was always the underdog’s friend, and was kind to Peter Pettigrew, a fellow Gryffindor, who James and Sirius might not have thought worthy of their attention without Remus’s persuasion. Soon, these four became inseparable. That was bad in the long run but how could he know? People also say he had no backbone but he just didn't want to offend anyone. He was scared of losing friends as he hardly had them and I'd they found out about his conditionit could go badly. Thisead to him not tellung his friends of his conditon. Inevitably, his three best friends soon became curious as to why Remus had to vanish once a month. Convinced by his lonely childhood that his friends would desert him if they knew that he was a werewolf, Remus made up ever more elaborate lies to account for his absences. James and Sirius guessed the truth in their second year. To Remus’s astonished gratitude, they not only remained his friends but thought up an ingenious method of easing his monthly isolation. The death of James Potter, along with his wife Lily, at the hands of Lord Voldemort, was one of the most traumatic events of Remus’s already troubled life. His friends meant even more to him than to other people, because he had long since accepted the fact that most people would treat him as untouchable, and that there could be no possibility of marrying and having children. Even worse, within twenty- four hours he had also lost his two other best friends. Remus was in the north of the country on Order of the Phoenix business when he heard the horrible news that one of them had murdered the other, and was now in Azkaban, a traitor to the Order and to Lily and James themselves. The downfall of Voldemort, such a source of jubilation to the rest of the wizarding community, marked the beginning of a long stretch of loneliness and unhappiness for Remus. He had lost his three close friends and, with the Order disbanded, his previous comrades returned to busy lives with families. His mother was now dead, and while Lyall, his father, was always delighted to see his son, Remus refused to endanger his father’s peaceful existence by returning to live with him. Remus now lived a hand-to-mouth existence, taking jobs that were far below his level of ability, always knowing that he would have to leave them before his pattern of growing sick once a month at the full moon was noticed by his workmates. Then life decided to give him false hope, the discovery of the Wolfsbane Potion. While this did not prevent a werewolf losing his human form once a month, it restricted his transformation to that of an ordinary and sleepy wolf. It had always been Remus’s worst fear that he would kill while out of his right mind. However, the Wolfsbane Potion was complex and the ingredients very expensive. Remus had no chance to sample it without admitting what he was and so he continued his lonely existence. Once again, Albus Dumbledore changed the course of Remus Lupin’s life when he tracked him down to a tumbledown, semi-derelict cottage in Yorkshire. Delighted to see the Headmaster, Remus was amazed when Dumbledore offered him the post of Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. He was only persuaded to accept when Dumbledore explained that there would be a limitless supply of Wolfsbane Potion, courtesy of the Potions master, Severus Snape. At Hogwarts, Remus revealed himself to be a gifted teacher, with a rare flair for his own subject and a profound understanding of his pupils. He was, as ever, particularly drawn to the underdog, and both Neville Longbottom and Harry Potter benefited from his wisdom and kindness. However, Remus’s old flaw was at work. He had grave suspicions about one of his old friends, a known fugitive, but did not share them with anyone at Hogwarts. His desperate desire to belong and to be liked meant that he was neither as brave nor as honest as he ought to have been. Later on after lupins transformation Snape was an asshat and told EVERYONE about his secret. This made him resign. As Lord Voldemort once again gained ascendancy, the old resistance regrouped and Remus found himself once more part of the Order of the Phoenix. This lead him to meet tonks who was to young the first time to join. Remus did fancy the girl but never told anyone. He had never been in love and if he ever felt that way he wold move. It had never occurred to Remus that Tonks could return his feelings because he had become so used to considering himself unclean and unworthy. One night when they lay in hiding outside a known Death Eater’s house, after a year of increasingly warm friendship, Tonks made an idle remark about one of their fellow Order members (‘He’s still handsome, isn’t he, even after Azkaban?’). Before he could stop himself, Remus had replied bitterly that he supposed she had fallen for his old friend (‘He always got the women.’). At this, Tonks became suddenly angry. ‘You’d know perfectly well who I’ve fallen for, if you weren’t too busy feeling sorry for yourself to notice.’ (yes he dropped the ball there but he didn't want to put her or future children at a disadvantage.) Remus’s immediate response was a happiness he had never experienced in his life, but this was extinguished almost at once by a sense of crushing duty. He had always known that he could not marry and run the risk of passing on his painful, shameful condition. He therefore pretended not to understand Tonks, which did not fool her at all. Wiser than Remus, she was sure that he loved her, but that he was refusing to admit it out of mistaken nobility. He then stopped talking to her as much. Remus and Tonks both fought Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters in the Department of Mysteries, a battle that resulted in the public exposure of Voldemort’s return. The loss of the last of his school friends during this battle did nothing to soften Remus’s increasingly self-destructive attitude. Tonks could only watch in despair as he volunteered to spy for the Order, leaving to live among fellow werewolves to try to persuade them to Dumbledore’s side. In doing this, he was exposing himself to the possible reprisals of the werewolf who had changed his life forever, Fenrir Greyback. Remus came face-to-face with both Greyback and Tonks at Hogwarts barely a year later, when the Order clashed with Death Eaters within the castle. During this battle, Remus lost yet another person he had loved: Albus Dumbledore. Dumbledore had been adored by every member of the Order of the Phoenix, but to Remus, he had represented the sort of kindness, tolerance and understanding that he had received from nobody in the world outside his parents and his three best friends, and had been the only man ever to offer him a position within normal wizarding society. Later he was inspired by Bill and Fleur to marry tonks which he did in a quiet fashion. This later kind of turned to shit as within a few weeks of their marriage, Remus realised that Tonks was pregnant and every fear he had ever had surfaced. He was convinced that he had passed on his condition to an innocent child and that he had condemned Tonks to the same life as his mother, forever moving around, unable to settle, having to hide her increasingly violent child from sight. Full of remorse and self-recrimination, Remus fled, leaving the pregnant Tonks, seeking out Harry and offering to accompany him on whatever death-defying adventure awaited. To Remus’s shock and displeasure, the seventeen-year-old Harry not only declined his offer but became angry and insulting. He told his ex-teacher that he was acting selfishly and irresponsibly. Remus responded with uncharacteristic violence and stormed out of the house, taking refuge in a corner of the Leaky Cauldron, where he sat drinking and fuming. However, after a few hours’ reflection, Remus was forced to accept that his ex-pupil had just taught him a valuable lesson. James and Lily, Remus reflected, had stuck with Harry even unto their own deaths. His own parents, Lyall and Hope, had sacrificed their peace and security to keep the family together. Bitterly ashamed, Remus left the inn and returned to his wife, where he begged her forgiveness and assured her that, come what may, he would never leave her again. For the rest of Tonks’s pregnancy, Remus eschewed missions for the Order of the Phoenix and made it his first priority to protect his wife and unborn child. (He was scared his child would end up like him or that he would have to suffer more/be discriminated against) The night teddy was born he went to Harry to be his godfather. Both Remus and Tonks returned to Hogwarts for the final battle against Voldemort, leaving their tiny son in the care of his grandmother. The couple knew that if Voldemort won this battle, their family was sure to be eliminated: both were notorious members of the Order of the Phoenix, Tonks was a marked woman in the eyes of her Death Eater aunt, Bellatrix Lestrange, and their son was the very antithesis of a pure-blood, having many Muggle relatives and a dash of werewolf. Having survived numerous encounters with Death Eaters and fought his way skillfully and bravely out of many tight corners, Remus Lupin met his end at the hands of Antonin Dolohov, one of the longest-serving, most devoted and sadistic of all Voldemort’s Death Eaters. Remus Lupin was posthumously awarded the Order of Merlin, First Class, the first werewolf ever to be accorded this honour. The example of his life and death did much to lift the stigma on werewolves. He was never forgotten by anyone who knew him: a brave, kind man who did the best he could in very difficult circumstances and who helped many more than he ever realised. This shows how Remus Lupin was discriminated against in the wizard community and how he helped change that with his death. He was a scared lonely boy trying to fit in and this lead him to hate himself. He never wanted to be a burden even though he wasn't. He lost many close friends as never got to raise or know his son. He had a hard life no mater what you say. He was to ashamed to even produce a copral patronise in front of others as it was a wolf(not a werewolf) even though the wold was a family thing not an affliction of his condition. Jk herself also said *Lupin’s condition of lycanthropy (being a werewolf) was a metaphor for those illnesses that carry a stigma, like HIV and AIDS. All kinds of superstitions seem to surround blood-borne conditions, probably due to taboos surrounding blood itself. The wizarding community is as prone to hysteria and prejudice as the Muggle one, and the character of Lupin gave me a chance to examine those attitudes.* And that *Remus Lupin was one of my favourite characters in the entire Potter series. I made myself cry all over again while writing this entry, because I hated killing him.*
#marauders#harry potter#ron weasley#james potter#lily evans#lily potter#prongs#moony#young remus lupin#remus lupin#moony wormtail padfoot and prongs#ginny weasley#fred weasley#george weasley#gred and forge#percy weasley#bill weasley#charlie weasley#molly weasley#arthur weasley#albus dumbledoor#dumbledore#padfoot#wormtail#sirius black#sirius#remus x sirius#Peter Pettigrew#unfair
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A/N It's a bit longer this time since I'm trying to cram a summary of a what if game. I tried to mix up the murders and survivors a bit for a change. Feel free to adopt this and turn it into a full fledged fic (with credit), if you would please. Or if this inspires you to write something, let me know and I'll read it!
Read the prequel: All Hope Lost
New World Program version 78th class - 78th despair enters NWP
When she came to, she was inside a classroom filled with other students.
She didn't even have time to make sense of it all when the room virtually collapsed and they found themselves on the beach. At the edges of the smooth flat floor was sand that was coarse and shifted under their footsteps. As bizarre as it was to have been transported to an island, it didn't quite top the fact that their teacher was a pink bunny mascot who talked like a child.
She didn't know which was more ridiculous. The teacher's spiel about hope or the fact that she was missing her memories.
"I'm Mukuro Ikusaba. SHSL Soldier." The person beside her politely introduced herself first. She paused as if waiting for a reply.
A panic registered in her chest as her heart thumped wildly in its ribcage. Her mouth opened but no words spilled. There was a blank space where one shouldn't be. She didn't know what to answer at first until she registered the weight fitted in her hands. A notebook that she'd been holding on for a while now but only took notice of right now. She opened it and read the first page as if the foreign information was about her. "Ryouko Otonashi... I'm the SHSL (???)?" She answered hesitantly.
"Are you asking me?" Mukuro asked incredulously.
Ryouko almost flinched at the sharpness of her gaze. "I don't remember..." She visibly slumped as she looked down, her eyes were shut as she tried to focus with all her desperation. Her hands shot to her head, squeezing it with surprising strength as if it would force the memories out. Nothing. Her head was practically throbbing from the pain of thinking too much but without any memories to push out, her brain felt like it was bleeding and she's pretty sure that wasn't a good sign. Then again, having amnesia was never a good sign.
"Hey, are you okay?" A concerned voice called out. It was someone else's voice and the gentleness in it caused her head to snap up and stare into worried eyes. "You look like you were having an episode or something. Is something wrong? Do you feel sick?"
She blinked warily and upon looking elsewhere, she noted the curious glances of their classmates. She steadied herself and forced her chattering teeth to clench shut. "Yeah... m'fine. Just a bit dizzy." She finally said through gritted teeth.
He let out a relieved breath. "That's good. You probably just need to rest for a few minutes. I know everyone's a bit confused over what's happening, myself included, so it's okay to take a breather." He said with an understanding smile. "I'm Makoto Naegi by the way. I guess I'm the SHSL Luckster. I'm not that sure either." He said it with a laugh.
Something about the way he said it struck her. "You're not sure? Could it be that you... don't remember either?" She asked almost hopefully.
He blinked slowly, confused at first, and then replied with a tone that danced, light and yet at the same time it carried weight that was heavy enough but not exactly dragging. "Oh no, not like that. It's more of my personality. I'm just not sure about a lot of things especially things about myself but I'm learning. I guess it just kind of comes up when I talk." He paused and then continued somberly, "I'm sorry that my phrasing confused you and... sorry to hear that you don't remember."
Before she could even respond to that, another person joined in their conversation. "Amnesia, huh?" She turned to the source and saw a girl with purple hair who was flipping through the notebook. Ryouko's eyes went to her now empty hands. Since when did she get a hold of it? As soon as she noticed its absence, it was rightfully back. "Interesting..." She said as she handed back the notebook after perusal.
"And who are you supposed to be?" Ryouko huffed. She's still not sure whether or not the notebook was hers in the first place but that didn't mean that she was okay with strangers looking into it. In fact, she was almost seething in anger at the blatant breach of privacy.
The girl on the other hand was calm. If she noticed Ryouko's hostile demeanor then she paid it no mind. "Kyouko Kirigiri. SHSL Detective."
Ryouko knew that Kyouko would probably be the best person to ask for help in solving the mystery of her missing memories but right now she didn't want anything to do with the snoop.
"Sorry about your... amnesia thing. I didn't know and I think I was insensitive." Mukuro apologized and it's only then that Ryouko remembered about her presence.
"Oh, it's okay! I mean it's obviously not. Me, I mean. But what else can I do?" Ryouko mumbled incoherently. It was odd how her lips moved so fast despite not having much to say and so her words came out as a mess.
"It's too early to think like that! I'm sure it'll come back to you at some point and we're here to help you in any way we can." Makoto spurred her on encouragingly.
"That's awfully optimistic of you to believe in." She replied a bit skeptically.
"Well optimism is my one redeeming quality, I think." He said with a smile that never faltered. "We'll figure things out together. Let's not lose hope!"
Ironically enough, Ryouko vaguely remembers the feeling of despair.
---
Despair. That's the foreboding feeling that weaved all throughout the class.
An impromptu island field trip was one thing, a bunny mascot as the teacher was another, but a mutual killing? That was an entirely different level and quickly overshadowed everything in a malevolent sense. Whatever friendly atmosphere they had built in the first hour was harshly crushed by the suffocating miasma of despair.
Monokuma. She thought she knew the name of the sinister bear before he even announced it. His laughter echoed inside the walls of her head before it even escaped its sinister smile. He was familiar. Despair was familiar. Something about this screamed familiar to her and there was a foreboding sense to everything.
"Upupu! Welcome to the island trip of mutual killing! A rehash of the original because everyone loves beach OVAs!" Monokuma roared in laughter. Ryouko couldn't even suppress the chill that she got from that weird laugh. It irked her and yet it also beckoned her. But ultimately, she knew that he was dangerous. "If you want to leave this island then all you gotta do is do in somebody. Kill and not be caught or else you'd get executed and all that jazz. I'm sure you already know this so let's just skip tutorial."
"Uwawa! No killing! Usami will stop you!" Their so called teacher launched at him.
"Yeah, not gonna happen. This isn't island mode, sistah." Monokuma chortled and easily took down his assailant. He even gave her a total makeover for good laughs. "Now be a good baby and behave, Monomi. Big bro's talking with the soon to be murdering kids." Usami- now Monomi, couldn't even argue since her mouth was taped shut as she dangled over them tied up in rope.
"No one will be murdering anyone!" Makoto strongly objected when everyone else refused to speak out loud. "We're not going to kill each other just because you told us to! We're all friends here and friends don't just kill friends!"
"Oyaoya?" Monokuma tilted his head to one side as if curious. "That's some disgustingly positive words you got there. You should be a speechwriter or something just as pathetic." He mocked him and the redness in his one eye shone malevolent. "But do you really think that everyone here is as naive as you?" With a menacing grin, he added, "Besides, what can you do? You can't do anything on your own."
Makoto visibly flinched at his words but he didn't back down. He stood his ground and pushed forward. "I believe in them. I believe in us. I trust that we'll overcome your despair and hold on to hope instead."
His faith was clearly misplaced since there was already a murder the day after the motive was handed out.
The most shocking part was that the culprit had an entirely separate motive than the one Monokuma gave them. It was a crime of passion and it was her most passionate murder yet judging by the bloodbath of evidence. Genocider Syo was on the loose and Byakuya was right within her MO. The trial felt so wrong not only because they were basically condemning someone to their death, but also because Touko was an innocent bystander dragged into this. Just because they were separate personalities didn't change the fact that they shared a body. Syo was the one who killed and not Touko but both of them died together during the execution.
The next murder happened three days after the motive was given. Most of them thought that money wasn't enough reason to kill someone but Yasuhiro thought otherwise. He wasn't planning on killing anyone at first but then he divined that he'd pull it off successfully and he trusted his fortunes despite being correct only a third of the time. He chose Leon only because the fortunes told him that red was his lucky color. Unfortunately for him, this was one of his missed fortunes and he begged for forgiveness all throughout his execution.
Perhaps the most unexpected of them all was that caused by the Despair Fever. Kiyotaka had been the unfortunate soul to be inflicted with the remembering symptom without anyone noticing the change in his demeanor. He just wasn't the same person anymore. He kept going on and on about how despair was the ultimate compass and how he was leading justly. He admitted to killing the ever trusting Mondo who walked in when he had just finished slaughtering the easy target Hifumi. It was disturbing to see him so at peace over what he had done. He was the only person who looked like he was enjoying his execution.
The fourth murder wasn't supposed to be one at all. They were trapped in the strawberry house and they were starving. They would have all starved to death if nobody killed. Sakura was going to quietly sacrifice herself so that the rest of them could live. However, when Aoi found out, she raced to kill herself first. She even had her suicide note written hurriedly. In her final breaths, Sayaka had accidentally walked in on her. Instead of helping Aoi, she saw this as an opportunity and delivered the final blow. She almost got away with the murder if it weren't for Kyouko pointing out inconsistencies in her testimonies. She struggled but ultimately lost her life at her execution.
The final murder case seemed like the longest one not just because of the trial itself but also because of the high strung tension before it.
"Shall we make a gamble?" Celes played her best smile. "I bet that I can weed out the traitor."
"And then what? Kill him?" Mukuro eyed her warily, judging her every movement.
"There's no need for you to go to such extremes." Sakura intervened with a calm voice in an effort to diffuse the incoming fight. "What good would finding out the traitor's identity do us? Our priority should be preventing any more killings."
"I'm inclined to agree with Sakura." Makoto swallowed thickly. "We just got over that last one. I think we should rest and clear our heads first before jumping into decisions."
That sounded reasonable enough and yet- "But what if the traitor's planning something behind our backs?" Kyouko didn't even falter when all eyes fell on her. In fact if anything, she narrowed her eyes at Celes. "You're not the volunteering type. Finding the traitor's identity seems like an out of character move from you. What's your angle?"
The accusation only made Celes smile wider. "Oh, is that worry I hear in your voice? I'm flattered over your concern." She giggled when she saw Kyouko's lips form a thin line. "Relax, I'm just exercising my talent. It has been a while since my last use of it."
Kyouko did not have the patience today not when she knew that the gambler was planning something. She had to back her to a corner and make her talk before any more casualties arose. "What did you see in the Final Dead Room?" She pressed on.
Celes had been the only one able to enter the Final Dead Room during the lockdown and she's been tightlipped about her findings ever since. Weapons was all she would answer when asked but Kyouko knew that she was hiding something. Her poker face was incredibly unreadable so whether or not Kyouko's interrogation was phasing her, it was hard to tell. Celes' smile had not faltered ever since the conversation started.
"Weapons." She answered again, her smile was a touch bit of mocking. "But if you must know, a weapon is only as lethal as its wielder." She added lightheartedly what sounded like a threat.
Mukuro instantly changed her stance and growled, "If you try anything, I'll have you personally know why I'm called a human killing machine."
"P-Please, no violence!" Chihiro pleaded while shaking out of fear.
Ryouko on the other hand, wanted nothing of this. "This has nothing to do with me..." She mumbled to herself as she turned a blind eye over the fight. She's just here to figure out her memories. Anything outside of that, she was not obligated to be a part of.
As if she ate death threats on a daily basis, Celes answered Mukuro's steely gaze with her own, silently conveying her own resolve. She turned her eyes back to Kyouko's and proudly said, "I haven't lost a bet before in my life."
"What are you wagering?" Kyouko asked her one last question.
Celes' smile almost seemed genuine. "The highest stakes, of course."
She went missing that night and led them on a wild goose chase that lasted for almost a week. Just when they thought they'd caught up with her, the trail would go cold and a different clue would surface. They wouldn't have played her game of chase if only she hadn't taken the islands as hostage with bomb threats. She kept everyone on edge and on the lookout for her and for the bombs.
They found the bombs first and then her corpse next.
A locked room murder. That's what it was and after clearing suspicions on each other, they had decided that it was clearly suicide. There was just no other possibility.
"You've got that wrong!" Makoto objected just before they could cast their votes. "Don't you think it's a bit weird? Celes isn't the type to just kill herself."
"Yeah, well Kiyotaka looked plenty innocent too." Ryouko argued back. "For all we know, she could have been infected by the despair disease and hiding her symptoms all this time?.
"But wasn't that cured after the third trial?" Chihiro chipped in.
"It's true. My fearing symptom was alleviated as soon as the... execution was over." Sakura confirmed morosely.
"Well if you put it that way... We still don't know why she wanted to kill herself." Mukuro added thoughtfully.
"She obviously couldn't find out who the traitor was and killed herself out of gambler's honor or something." Ryouko argued with a scoff. She just wanted this to be over and done with.
"I doubt that honor is the first thing that comes to mind when being a gambler." Kyouko crossed her arms in thought. "But it is rather peculiar as to why she chose this specific method to die. Given all the hardship she's thrown over us this past few days, this death seems too easy."
"Then we all agree that we should discuss about this more, right? At least let's try to uncover the whole truth before we close this permanently." Makoto suggested and with most of them nodding in agreement, he continued with heavy breath, "We'll get through this, I'm sure of it... No matter what truth we uncover."
The truth may have been better left unknown as they all turned to the culprit with a sickening sense of betrayal.
“...Aww, you totally guessed right!" Makoto tried to smile but it came out half-hearted, somber. "Just as expected... Yeah, you got that right... I'm the traitor.”
But even more powerful than betrayal was the conflicting sorrow they felt over his fate.
"There... There has to be a mistake!" Mukuro pleaded with desperation. "How sure are we that it was the traitor who did the killing blow? Maybe it was Celes for all we know! Maybe Makoto's luck somehow saved him a few seconds just before he could become a killer unknowingly!"
"We've gone over this before..." Kyouko cut her off right there. Her bangs covered her eyes so it was hard to tell what kind of expression she was making but her voice sounded more collected than usual, unfeeling. "We're absolutely certain that Celes died by accidental intervention at the traitor's hands. With Makoto's streak of bad luck, it even makes more sense that he'd be the culprit."
"Of a murder he never planned!" Mukuro shouted, her voice was raw with emotion. "Are you seriously accepting this? His only crime was that he was at the wrong place, at the wrong time, and threw the wrong bottle! He's a murderer by a goddamn technicality!"
"But a murderer under the rules nonetheless!" Kyouko yelled back and the whole room fell silent. She held her chin up and revealed streaks of tears down her eyes. Her voice trembled now and it was so soft, it sounded like she would almost break. "I don't approve of this any more than you but we both know what we must do in order to survive." She couldn't hold back any more and covered her face as she cried over her helplessness.
Mukuro wanted to say something to that but she bit her lip. She knew and understood their situation. It wasn't Kyouko's fault that they had to make this choice but that didn't make her any less angry. Her fists were clenched so hard that if she hadn't been wearing gloves then she would have drawn blood. It wasn't just the two of them who were hurting over this. Everyone had their own anguish painted across their faces and sobs echoed through the trial room.
And Makoto, sweet innocent about to die Makoto, he was smiling softly.
"It's alright... I don't blame you for making this choice. If anything, I guess I'm happy that you chose to live." He offered with a small genuine laugh and that made them feel even more guilty at what they were about to do. "I'm sorry that you had to find out about me this way but at least I get to help you in the end."
"Why?" Sakura asked barely above her sobs. "If you just revealed that you were the traitor then maybe we could have avoided these fatalities."
Makoto just smiled somberly and crossed his arms as he explained, “A traitor who's not allowed to think that they're different from everyone else... A traitor who can only interact with everyone as a traitor..." He barked out a bitter laugh. "Because that's the nature of their existence... They can only exist as a traitor...”
"That's right. In the end, you're still the traitor!" Ryouko pointed at him with a scowl. Unlike everyone else, her anger seemed to be directed at him. "You've been deceiving us all this time! I... We... We thought you were our friend but it turns out that you're working for them! All that talk about friendship and hope? Was none of that real?"
He steadied her a hard glance, his voice unfaltering. "Everything was real. Everything said and happened between us was real. Believe in me when I say that all of that was real and genuine. The only difference is that I'm just a traitor. I lied about not being the traitor but everything else was the truth."
"I don't understand. If everything else was true..." Chihiro said in between his sniffles. "Then what does you being a traitor make you different?"
"Sorry... but I don't have what it takes to tell you." When met with pleading looks he continued, "Even if you want to fly, you can't, right? Even if you want to swim where you please, you can't right? It's the same for me, I guess..."
Aside from the sounds of crying, no one spoke. The air felt too heavy to breathe in. Some of them shut their eyes in a futile effort to look away from the inevitable while the others bravely looked on with blurred visions, memorizing every detail before he would cease to exist. He was crying too but he was smiling more than anything.
It was his kind smile that they would miss the most.
"Yeah, yeah whatever! Look are you going to vote or not? 'Cause I swear I'm going to execute all of you regardless if nothing happens in the next ten seconds!" Monokuma ordered them impatiently and even began his countdown.
Makoto's smile was heavy in their hearts.
“...You guys can stay alive by believing in me.” He urged them on, almost pleading. He placed a hand over his chest, a gesture that showed he trusted them wholeheartedly to make the right choice. “You don't have to worry. Believe in me... and cast your vote.”
So they did and they were right. And oh, how they wished they were wrong.
“Monomi... I'm sorry, too." He said as he crouched to her level. "You're probably gonna get scolded by a lot of different people for this... But still, I want to protect everyone by any means. And... I'm happy that I'm able to do that.”
"I'm surprised that you would even do that!" Monomi said in between her sniffles. "I didn't think you could... pull it off."
“Maybe I wanted to protect everyone, no matter what the cost.” Makoto confessed and then shook his head. "No, not maybe. I'm sure of it." The smile on his lips seemed lighter as he continued, “I was able to think I wanted to protect everyone. That's why... I feel proud of my actions.”
"I'm proud of you too! You did good!" Monomi cried as she hugged him. "I can't let my student go in alone so... this teacher's coming with you."
"Are you sure?" He pulled back and stared questioningly at her eyes. "You know you don't have to. I'm the one who's supposed to be executed. Who's going to watch over them?"
"You've grown up, Makoto. You're able to make decisions on your own now. If you believe in them so much then I want to believe in them too." She puffed at her chest for emphasis. "This teacher needs to do some growing up too. I'm coming with you and that's final."
"Okay, okay. Thank you." He laughed out of relief. "To be honest, I'm kind of scared. I feel bad for bringing you along with me but if you say so..." He tightly held her stuffed paw as he stood up. “Let's believe in everyone... and leave the rest to them...”
He turned toward his friends who were reluctant to let him go.
“Well, I guess this is goodbye." He waved at them one last time with a smile that was too happy for the occasion. "Bye everyone... It's okay. A shining future will always be waiting for you. It's true... It's absolutely true... Because I believe in you! So don't lose hope!”
Makoto left them with hope but all the others could feel was an emptiness where his life should have filled in.
---
They didn't know what to believe in anymore.
Everything about this world was fake. The whole island and even them included, all was fake. This was all a literal game, a virtual program where they were just mere avatars walking about. They were all just strings of numbers without knowing it. No matter how real everything seemed to them, it just wasn't. They saw it firsthand how their world glitched and collapsed right in front of them. This was a virtual world and they were merely players. It made them question their existence. Was none of this ever real?
"So if our brains believe something is real... then it's no different than if it actually happened?" Ryouko couldn't believe what she was saying. This has got to be a lie, a horrible yet terrifyingly believable lie.
"If a lie is a believable lie... You're saying it might become the truth?" Sakura looked just as bewildered as the rest of them.
"We're really just connected to machines and our consciousness was uploaded into here...?" Chihiro understood more than anyone else just how possible that was but that didn't mean he was more accepting. "So we genuinely believed that this game world was real and we didn't know any better."
"The truth is... it was all a lie... That is this world's truth." Kyouko concluded grimly.
Mukuro tried to combat the shock with anger. "Who cares if it's a lie? If this is really a game world, everything that happened here took place inside the game, right?"
"I see, just because they died in the virtual world doesn't mean they died in real life." Sakura jumped onto her train of thought with an unexpected hope. "Those who left before us only died in spirit here but are still alive in the real world."
Chihiro didn't seem that convinced with the theory however. "I'm not sure if that's how it works..."
"You sore losers just don't get it do you?" Monokuma sighed and shook his head almost sympathetically if he was even capable of that. "The New World Program isn't just any game, it's next-gen software containing the ultimate reality. And speaking of that reality, if a player's avatar experiences death... Their brains inside their actual bodies will stop functioning too!"
Whatever little hope they were building up was trampled on just like that.
"Well nobody's gonna appreciate a game where you don't die where you're supposed to, right?" He casually said as if their lives meant nothing to him.
"You bastard!" Mukuro swore and she would have murdered the bear many times over if it weren't for the stupid rule about violence against this so called headmaster.
"Hey, don't blame me. I'm just here for the show. If you want to be mad at someone then get mad at Future Foundation. They're the ones who are forcing you to play this game." Monokuma suddenly paused and if it were possible, it's smile seemed to grow wider. "Speaking of the devil... The main cast has arrived!"
There was a flash of bright light at one of the stands. As the light began to fade, strings of numbers started to materialize until those numbers converged into something more tangible- a person. This person carried an air of power and authority that was more than just from their suit. Their hair was black and there was something abyssmal about its length as it mixed with their own shadow. And then there was the all piercing gaze from his red eyes. This person wasn't just anyone, whoever he was, he was unspeakably dangerous.
"Look who came for a fan favorite comeback! Classic!" Monokuma cheered and even clapped in encore. "Welcome Future Foundation's poster boy, the Ultimate Hope himself, Izuru Kamukura!"
Ultimate Hope? Ironically enough, all they could feel was trepidation as they regarded the suspicious newcomer with caution.
Izuru paid them no mind as he cut right to the chase, precise. "If you want to be saved then you all need to fully accept the situation you're in. Why do you think Future Foundation put you in the New World Program in the first place?" He expounded, "The New World Program has another name: Hope Restoration Program. By now you should be able to piece together your true identities."
"True identities? Aren't we the fifteen survivors of Hope's Peak Academy who were rescued by the Future Foundation?" Chihiro asked, obviously afraid of where this was going.
"But why would they put us in a Hope Restoration Program?" Kyouko countered and judging by her sudden pale expression, it seems that she may have already figured it out.
Something flashed inside Ryouko's mind, something fleeting and yet also familiar. A feeling. A memory. A truth.
A horrible truth.
"We're all... Remnants of Despair?" The words escaped her lips without thinking, her mind was still in shock over the discovery.
Izuru ignored the collective gasp and added, "Despair in human form but utterly inhuman... that's what you are."
Despair. And that's what they felt in this moment, despair piled on top of despair.
"That cannot be true! I refuse to believe that we are capable of falling so low!" Sakura found herself shouting at the outrageous accusation.
He sighed as if bored by their reactions and continued monotonously, "It might seem unbelievable at first because you only have memories from before you entered high school but you changed at Hope's Peak Academy. You were all tainted by Ultimate Despair when you came in contact with HER."
"Her? Just who is this bitch?" Mukuro practically snarled.
"The true Ultimate Despair... Junko Enoshima."
Junko Enoshima. There it was again, that name. It was that same name that nagged at her mind more than the name Ryouko Otonashi. For someone as forgetful as her, it was the one thing that she didn't forget. It was strange, it was as if the name was a parasite that dug itself into her brain. The roots were so deep that it was like it didn't want her to escape from this name. There was something important about it but she didn't feel thrilled at the chance that it was related to her memories. There was something sinister about that name and now she knew that it was because this name belonged to a sinister person. Not just any sinister person but the Ultimate Despair herself.
"Junko was the one who strongly influenced you in school and changed you into Despairs. And in order to remove that influence, you've been placed into the Hope Restoration Program." Izuru explained with no remorse. "The reason you're able to act like your normal selves is because you're within the New World Program but your true bodies in the real world are different. In the real world, you're part of a group that cruelly destroyed your family, friends, and even your own body. The Ultimate Despair defy all understanding and even their own hopes."
The room errupted into a chorus of denial and each face was painted with despair.
"T-There's no way we'd do something like that!" Ryouko objected but was surprised because a part of her believed what he was saying. No, not just believed... it was more like she already knew from the beginning.
"It's useless to feign ignorance anymore. Don't turn away from the truth." Izuru slammed his hand, effectively silencing the room. "Now face what you've done and from there take the first step towards the path of hope!"
Hope? What did he mean by hope?
"But if we're already Despairs as you said then what hope do we have?" Mukuro asked weakly not quite meeting anyone's eyes.
"There's no need to worry. If you just advance toward the hope I provide then you'll be saved. It's that simple." He crossed his arms as he expounded, "Essentially, your cohabitation inside the New World Program was just a simulation. If we removed the memories of your time at Hope's Peak Academy, would it also remove your Ultimate Despair? Although it deviated from the original plan of you collecting Hope Fragments, nevertheless you guys were able to overcome your unexpected trials and make your way here." He paused to let that sink in before adding, "That's why... all you need to do is choose 'Graduate'."
"And by choosing to 'graduate', we can get out of here?" Kyouko asked skeptically.
"However, if you 'graduate' from here, your school memories will never return." Monokuma pointed out.
"If you choose to 'graduate' and the Observer determines that there are no problems then you will complete the Hope Restoration Program and your avatar will be 'uploaded' into your real body." Izuru explained furthermore.
"By uploading our avatar's memories into our bodies, we're also forcibly erasing our past selves..." Kyouko pieced together out loud.
"H-Hey... What happens to the people whose avatars died?" Mukuro on the other hand was more concerned about those left behind than this existential crisis.
"If an avatar that needs to be uploaded has been deleted, there's nothing we can do." Izuru bluntly answered without hesitation. "If you choose to 'Graduate', it'll transfer your in-game memories but your school memories will be gone forever. Unfortunately, the people who have already died will not be able to wake up."
Despite being in a virtual world, they still couldn't escape the reality of their friends' deaths.
"Then... What will happen if we don't choose to 'graduate'?" Mukuro asked, her voice carrying a slight tremble.
"You'll continue living your tropical life. How boring." He stifled a yawn.
"Why would you even ask that? Don't you want to get out of here?" Ryouko asked, her voice laced with betrayal.
Mukuro simply looked away. "Well even if we wake up, we're still messed up... So what's the point?"
"You don't have to force yourself to return to a painful reality. Let's just play this game forever and ever. Don't worry, I won't judge." Monokuma commented snidely.
"Is it really okay to sacrifice the others just to save ourselves?" Chihiro offered his own thoughts.
"But if we don't get out of here now, all the deaths we've endured will be in vain. We at least owe to them our survival." Sakura argued but even she seemed torn about it.
Kyouko who has been silent this whole time, finally spoke up but it wasn't about the current issue. "Something's not right..." Specifically concerning a certain bear. "How come Monokuma's isn't trying to stop us?"
"What? Don't tell me you're expecting so much from little ol' me." Monokuma blushed. "Hate to break it to ya but I'm just an NPC. Even I know when I'm not needed for plot."
"Are you really? Are you truly going to stay quiet and overlook us getting out of this game world? Then everything you did would be pointless, too." She continued her line of reasoning.
"Hey, not everything has to have a point! I'm an impulsive bear who does what he wants with no greater meaning." He needlessly twirled. "Not bothering to care or plan for anything keeps the stress away. How else do you think I got this wrinkle-free face of youth?"
"Not only that..." She then directed her accusation towards the only other silent person in the room. "Is it really okay for us to believe him? Don't you think it's a little strange?"
"Strange? It seems you still don't grasp your situation." Izuru didn't seem the least bit phased at all. "Be saved or don't be saved. Be grateful that you're even offered the first option when you are Remnants of Despair. How hard is it for you to understand that?"
"You said you were the Ultimate Hope and that it was you who put us inside this program, right?" She wasn't intimidated by him at all as she continued her interrogation with narrowed eyes, "Then tell me who Hajime Hinata is whom we met earlier and claimed to be the same?"
"..." He fell silent for a long while until a chuckle passed through his lips. "So you've made contact, huh? Should have known that he'd be able to hack through... I should have gone with his face after all but then again even I don't want to wear that boring loser's face." With that, he disappeared from sight.
"He vanished because he couldn't keep up the charade anymore." Sakura pointed out, still staring at where Izuru was just a moment ago.
"So that fake was all Monokuma's doing?" Chihiro was still overcoming the shock from that.
"Awwww, you found out I was faking! Th-This is so embarassing, I just wanna kill myself!" Monokuma acted all flustered and shy.
"Why would you give us a fake Future Foundation member!" Ryouko yelled indignantly.
"That fake was trying to get us out to the 'real world'..." Kyouko pointed out with a scowl.
"Then that's your plan? Is that where your trap is?!" Mukuro shouted, absolutely furious. "I don't care about the rules anymore! I'm going to kill you right here and now!!"
"Stop! You can't kill me yet! This isn't some stupid game with a half-assed ending like that!" Monokuma shouted back with just as much anger.
"You should stop calling all of this as that. This isn't a game." Sakura reprimanded and it looked like she was ready for murder as well.
That actually made Monokuma chuckle. "Oh, but this IS a game. And like all epic games, there's still the final boss." He tucked in his elbows and began charging energy. "Upupu... Get ready for the transformation you've all been waiting for! AAAAAHHHHHH!"
Ryouko felt an intense foreboding feeling about this. Like the inside of her brain was burning, sizzling, building up to explode kind of feeling. An inescapable kind of feeling of what was about to come.
"Now then! Make sure you burn this ginormous despair you're about to see into your memories!"
As Monokuma burned brightly in an aura of his own energy, a gigantic manicured hand squashed him unceremoniously out of nowhere. More of the world collapsed and crumbled, and from the debris rose a giant woman with a face that showed no remorse. Despite having the face of a fashionable teenager, there was something menacing about her aura. It's as if malice practically seeped through her. She then nonchalantly pulled out a phone and placed it in front of them. The screen flickered to life as the same woman was shown but this time more animated.
"This is... Monokuma's identity?" Sakura regarded her warily.
"We have to deal with this thing?" Mukuro's hand was already on her knife.
"Thing? How rude!" Junko huffed and wailed her arms. "I don't want to hear that from such a disappointing sister!"
"?!" Mukuro flinched and without a moment's hesitation, her glare turned up to a dangerous level. "Don't ever refer to me as anything remotely close."
"Well girl, do I have some news for you." Junko giggled shortly and all of a sudden her mood swung to a more somber tone. "Ah, but then again, spoilers. Can't let you know that early in the game."
"Can't let us know what?" Kyouko hounded her.
"Y'all can't take a hint, huh? I just said NO SPOILERS!" Junko yelled harshly and then started acting all bashful. "Kyaaah! This is so embarrassing! Everyone's staring at me so intensely!"
"Her personality isn't consistent at all." Chihiro pointed out fearfully.
Mushrooms sprouted all over Junko as she sighed. "Well sorry for trying so hard to cater to your generation's short attention span. You guys get so bored so easily that the only way I can keep up is by changing personalities every five seconds."
And while everyone was trying to absorb the sudden appearance of their ultimate enemy, there was one who was taking this harder than the rest, for reasons not even she could comprehend. "Are you... Are you truly the Junko Enoshima?" Ryouko asked with a trembling voice.
Junko paused and a large grin slowly spread across her face. "Hmm? Why would you ask that specifically?"
Ryouko's mouth opened to answer something but nothing came out. She's not sure either why she asked that or what answer she was expecting. If they only had memories from before high school then there's no way for her to have known Junko's face and yet... For some reason, Ryouko couldn't help but feel that she recognized Junko. And the manic grin on her face told her that Junko recognized Ryouko too. It was unsettling.
"I am the great Junko Enoshima among other things but you can just call me Junkie! After all, aren't we all Ultimate Despair here? So that makes us all buddies!" Junko happily announced in a sing-song tone.
"Like hell we are!" Mukuro objected and so did the rest of them.
"Sheesh, tough crowd." Junko sighed dejectedly. "And here I was thinking of you guys when I tampered with the Graduation Program."
"Tampered...?" Chihiro hesitantly asked.
"Got yer attentions now, ey?" Junko winked at them. "Remember what that fake Izuru said earlier? About what happens to you when you graduate, right? I feel like you guys weren't getting a big enough reward for graduating... So I decided to modify what happens so it's something exciting and unique, just like a game!"
The gigantic Junko retrieved the phone and tapped on the keypad a few times before setting it back with an image blown up on screen. "Uploading your game memories into your real bodies is fine, but letting your friends stay dead just sucks! That's why I'm pulling off a deus ex machina to ressurect them! This is the 'new Graduation Program' that I'm offering!"
"Can you really... bring them back?" Mukuro asked desperately, almost hopefully.
"Of course I can! Who do you think I am? I hacked into here so I can hack their lives back!" Junko then stood up straighter and sharply declared, "Besides, what are you all getting stressed for? It's just a game. Each and every thing that happened in this world was just an event within the game."
"Isn't what you're saying now is just contradicting what you said earlier?" Chihiro countered.
"I was obviously just messing with y'all. There's no way anything that occurred in the game could affect the real world." Junko casually said. "That's why you should finish this game and go back to living a normal life in the real world!"
"Will our friends be there with us on the other side? Is returning truly that easy?" Sakura doubted.
"I just said so, didn't I? Sheesh, kids these days don't know how to listen anymore." Junko scoffed at them.
"If we go back, what do you get out of it? What benefit do you get by making us return to the real world?" Kyouko questioned her, still not buying into the deal.
"All I want is to put on this graduation performance in a more dramatic way." Junko answered in her sickly sweet tone. "Well, if you doubt me, you don't have to go back. Is that what you want? Not to go back?"
"If it'll bring our dead friends back... it's all we can do."
"Everyone can go back together. There's no reason to hesitate..."
"There is no way we can choose to stay here after all we've been through... we have to get out."
"In the end, we need to get back to the real world... where we'll all be together again."
"There's no other choice... but even so..."
Light flashed and in its place, a person materialized. "Don't press it! This is... Junko's trap!"
"And thus, the main character gallantly appears!" Junko practically squealed in delight. "Here's the bland looking hero Hajimemes!"
Hajime just scowled at the nickname. "It's over, Junko. Now that I'm here, I can finally settle things between us once and for all."
"Uh, don't you mean twice? Since this isn't our first meeting or did you forget, silly?" She giggled and then her whole demeanor turned cold in a blink. "Your presence here won't do shit. As long as you're here, you'll be treated like one of my students. So you can't pull off any Ultimate Hope convenient talent under my watch."
"I know better than to use cheap tricks to defeat you." He crossed his arms defensively, not backing down.
At this point, everyone had forgone questioning Hajime's sudden appearance. There was something more urgent than that in their minds. "Hey, just what do you mean by "trap"? What is Junko's trap?"
His lips were a thin line as he answered, "She's lying to you about your dead friends coming back to life. Junko's goal is to convert the Hope Restoration Program to the Despair Restoration Program. She intends to upload herself into the bodies of everyone who's had their avatars deleted."
The whole room was shocked into silence as the color drained from their faces.
"Ding! Ding! Ding! Operation: Junko-fy All Mankind begins here!" She announced and even flashed a slideshow to go with her exposition. "Even if they're overwritten by my Alter Ego, it doesn't mean they'll be a completely different person. The data of everyone who died is stored within me, so I'm sure I can convincingly act out their personalities." She hollered boisterously. "With this, my despair utopia where you can despair as you please, Junkoland, will be complete! Aw yeah! Our dreams are expanding-anding-anding!"
"Why would you... why would anyone do that?"
"Because Junko Enoshima is the True Ultimate Despair." Hajime answered for them. "She doesn't yearn for any kind of future at all. She fills every person she meets with despair!
"For me, despair is not a goal, or a set of principles, or a lifestyle, or even an instinct." She added with a hint of pride. "It's what defines me as Junko Enoshima! It's just my characterization!
There was something about her words that resonated with Ryouko and at this point, she may have already gone past the point of caring.
"There is a way for you to get out of here without Junko getting out." Hajime offered. "The shutdown sequence that not even the teacher can stop."
"You say that as if it was an option." She stuck out her tongue at him. "Did Mr.-I-Have-All-Talents suddenly forget how to do math? Because last time I checked, six ain't a majority vote!"
"Who says that I didn't bring backup?" He smirked at her.
And as if summoned on cue, a bright flash of light shone in the stand on his right and from there another person materialized. "It's truly an honor to be here and witness despair get crushed by hope yet again!"
The same happened with the stand to his left. "There's no way we can leave these guys alone not when everyone has been fighting so hard!"
"Nggh! Fan favorite characters!" Junko scowled at the new arrivals with obvious disgust. "Stop stealing the spotlight from me! This fic ain't about you guys so scram!"
"Of course this isn't about you. You are merely a pawn in the grand scheme of everything. You're just here to serve as a stepping stone for hope." Nagito said with a smile but there was an underlying threat in his tone. "And it seems that you've already outlived your use."
"This isn't a game and you shouldn't be alive. You've been brought back to life one too many times and it's time to put you down." Chiaki declared with solid determination. "This is the final boss fight and we'll definitely beat you!"
"It seems the majority has spoken." Hajime's smirk hasn't been wiped off the whole time. "You set yourself up to fall the moment you hacked into my program."
Junko looked like she was backed into a corner but just like her personalities, that didn't last long since her confidence came back in full swing. "Is it really the majority? Wouldn't you like to know what the rest's thoughts are?"
The attention suddenly shifted back to the five survivors who was too caught up with the abrupt pace that they almost forgot that they still needed to decide.
"If we do the shutdown sequence... what will happen to us?" Chihiro asked even though he already had a vague idea as to what it was.
"If you shutdown the New World Program, everything within the program will be deleted." Hajime replied and looked them all head on. "That includes Alter Ego Junko and... even your avatars."
"Does that mean we'll... be deleted too?" Sakura asked softly.
"Yes, most definitely." Nagito answered all too nonchalantly. "But don't worry! It's a small sacrifice to pay for defeating the Ultimate Despair. You'll all be practically heroes of hope!"
"It doesn't mean you'll be deleted. The program will just finish without completing the Graduation Program." Hajime corrected. "Basically, your avatars will not upload... so you will revert to your original state before you entered the program."
"Back to being Remnants of Despair." Ryouko concluded.
"It may be a painful decision but I know you guys can endure it." Chiaki offered her voice of support. "That's why, in order to defeat despair, I want you guys to fight alongside us!"
"The brainwashing your bodies have gone through will be undone." Hajime further explained. "That's why I'm pretty sure you'll quickly revert back to the state you're in right now. Your safety and well-being will be guaranteed with this command."
"If our brainwashing is undone, the memories we made up until now... will vanish?" Mukuro knew it was the logical choice but she still couldn't help but hesitate. To forget...
"Does that mean we'll completely forget everything we did on this island? I don't want that!" Chihiro started crying over what would be the loss of precious memories. To forget...
"Even if there were a lot of painful memories, there are those that I would still wish to keep." Sakura brought a hand to her chest as she silently grieved. To forget...
"To forget everything that happened here... including him whose existence was solely created here." Kyouko didn't even mask her emotions this time as tears formed in the corners of her eyes. To forget...
"This is cruel! Why are we forced to make these shitty decisions? It's unfair!" Ryouko wailed in frustration at everything. Even if these weren't her original memories, they're still all that she has. To forget them all would mean having her start from nothing again. To forget...
"It doesn't matter what's fair, that's the reality. Every meaningless thing that happened here will vanish." Junko mocked their suffering with a lopsided grin. To forget...
"Oh, right let's not forget to thank the mastermind!" Junko clapped her hands giddily. "Who else could have pulled this off other than... ME!" She then turned her head to one person in particular. Her smile was full of malice. "Isn't that right, Ryouko?"
To remember...
In that moment, Ryouko finally remembered and so she died.
"Upupu..." She started chuckling until she was all out bursting with laughter. "Upupupu! That's right! Ryouko Otonashi, never, even, existed, in, the, first, place!" She was laughing so hard that she was hysterical. "Upupu, hilarious, isn't it? It's so despair inducing that it's hilarious!"
"Man, I can't believe that I was stuck playing this half-assed character for the span of a whole fic. Laaaame!" She complained with grand hand gestures. "Oh it feels so great to be me again! God I missed myself so much! I mean, there's no one quite as despairful as me!"
"What's going on?" Chihiro asked fearfully.
"Oh, right. I forgot that you guys aren't updated." She deadpanned to her classmates. "Turns out that Ryouko was just a poser. My true identity is far grander than that not so flat trying hard character."
"Could it be that you've regained your memories?" Mukuro questioned warily.
"Well duh! Obvious much?" She groaned. "Way to go for filler lines. Oh my god, you're as disappointing as ever! Just go kill yourself!"
"Did she really?" Sakura doubted. "It seems as if she's showing Despair Fever symptoms rather than mere memory recollection."
"What if it's both?" She smiled knowingly. "What if my memories are so despair inducing that I've fallen into despair all over again? Isn't that just despairing? All this struggle for survival and hope, only to find out that there's no hope for me at all! In fact, I don't want hope at all! Like get that disgusting hope away from me ya freaks!"
"This speech pattern... there's only one possible candidate." Kyouko's lips formed a grim thin line. "Your true identity is... Junko Enoshima, isn't it?"
"Fucking finally! The totally expected plot twist is revealed!" She whined. "Man, if this were a fic and I were a reader, I'd probably have given up on this at the third cutscene because the buildup for this has been too long! In fact, it's been so long that this scene is just anticlimactic!"
"But enough about me! Let's not forget that this whole thing was made for you!" AI Junko interrupted with a cheerful shout. Yeah, now there were two Junko's in the room. "You still have to cast your vote!"
"Tch. This was your trap all along..." Hajime said through gritted teeth.
"Um, correction. This was YOUR trap all along." AI Junko smugly replied.
"It seems that the plan backfired. As expected of the Ultimate Despair, rehabilitation was just not possible." Nagito let out a dejected sigh. "No matter how much you erase of her, there's always a residue of despair that no amount of overwriting can completely wipe off."
"We were hoping that the New World Program could rehabilitate even the True Ultimate Despair and maybe it would have if there weren't any interferences..." Chiaki crossed her arms. "But this turned out to be the worst case scenario. Rather than rejecting Junko Enoshima, she chose to accept her and rejected Ryouko Otonashi instead."
"And with Ryouko's personality dead, there's no chance of resurrecting her with that identity anymore." Hajime continued grimly. "If we did the shutdown sequence, everyone will revert back to how they were before... everyone including Junko Enoshima."
"Wait! That means that whatever we choose, this bitch will still come back to the real world!" Mukuro yelled, her face was the picture of desperation.
"Sucks to be you!" Junko stuck out her tongue at them. "Don't you wish you were me instead?"
"Never. You are the embodiment of everything we stand against. We would never even think of becoming anything close to a monster such as yourself." Sakura strongly objected.
"Ah, ah, ah!" AI Junko wagged her finger at them. "Don't say things that you don't actually mean." She grinned mockingly. "After all, we're all Remnants of Despair here. That means that at some point you did choose to become like me and at present, your real bodies are still the "monsters" you hate! Isn't that absolutely despairing?"
"We didn't choose you. You brainwashed us. I'm sure you manipulated us at some point and turned us into... into those things!" Chihiro trembled as he argued back.
"Fair enough, there was some brainwashing involved." Junko casually shrugged. "But let bygones be bygones, am I right? Who cares if I brainwashed you before, you're gonna have that conveniently ctrl+z'ed once you shutdown this shindig!" She grinned lopsidedly. "And I'm gonna be there with you once you get out and we're gonna party so hard it'll be like the end of the world all over again!"
"Don't think we'll let you get away with what you want." Kyouko glared at her with a venom unlike ever before. "We'll figure out a way to stop you and your despair. This isn't over."
"Oh, that you got right. It's far from over, upupu..." Junko laughed audaciously at their misery and AI Junko bellowed from behind. "The final chapter hasn't been decided just yet. Isn't that excitingly despairing? Who knows how this will end? Hell, even I don't know! So it's time to play one final game!"
The world as they knew it had long been destroyed and now all they have left was the future, a future that they had yet to decide on.
TO BE CONTINUED...
A/N Yeah, sorry for leaving you guys with a cliffhanger but you gotta understand, this was getting frustratingly long. I even got so tired that I forgone Junkie switching personalities. It was just too damn long and I wanted to write something else already. I burned out I guess... sorry.
It's kind of ironic that I started this prompt because I wanted to write specifically the scene where Naegi's ghost comes back to talk hope into the survivors but in the end, that's the only scene I didn't get to write. I do hope that you'd still appreciate the rest of this. Again, sorry for the incomplete mess but I hope you enjoyed some part of it.
#shsl prompt#too lazy to tag everyone#sdr2#dangan ronpa zero#danganronpa zero#makoto naegi#ryouko otonashi#mukuro ikusaba#junko enoshima#kyouko kirigiri#celestia ludenberg#sakura oogami#chihiro fujisaki#hajime hinata#izuru kamukura#nagito komaeda#chiaki nanami#dangan ronpa#danganronpa#leon kuwata#genocider syo#byakuya togami#touko fukawa#aoi asahina#sayaka maizono#kiyotaka ishimaru#hifumi yamada#mondo oowada#yasuhiro hagakure#dr3
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