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whattimeisitintokyo · 3 years

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Somos Familia Ch 46: A Tale of Woe

Ch 46: A Tale of Woe

Pacing outside of the shack she just exited, Leti bit the end of her thumb and whined a little. This did not go according to what she had planned. This was supposed to be a joyous occasion. How often had Nieve said how she wished she could see her son at least once to tell him that she was sorry, to let him hear her side of the story? She was supposed to cry in happiness and embrace Papa like she never got to in life, and he would return it in kind. A mother and son reunited after over fifty years.

It should have been a happy occasion. It shouldn’t have ended up with Nieve being furious at her and Papa looking like he was going to throw up.

“I made the right decision, sí?” she asked the two animals sitting outside with her. “I mean come on. This is the kind of situation that would make for a good story. Haven’t these two always wanted to meet each other?”

Dante yipped in what seemed to be approval of Leti’s question, while she could have sworn she saw Frangipanni’s eyes dart slightly to the side.

“What? You don’t think this was a good idea?”

Frangipani just looked at her with what Leti swore was a wince, and let out a puff of air from her trunk.

“Well why didn’t you tell me before?!” Leti moaned. “Some spirit guide you are…” Easily dodging Frangipani’s attempt to splash water at her, Leti fought to put a confident grin on her face. “Well no matter! It’s been over fifty years since she’s seen him, and no doubt Papa would have tons of questions for her. I’m sure they have loads to talk about!”

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

…..

“I like your jacket.”

Jumping slightly after the break of near dead silence, Héctor looked down at his jacket and picked at the purple sleeve. “Oh, gracias. It’s Balenciaga.”

“What’s that?”

“He’s a fashion designer. From… Spain…”

“Oh.”

…..

This was excruciating. They both knew that this couldn’t go on forever, let alone for the next few minutes. Héctor was obviously running out of time, the slow disappearance of his skin a clear indicator. But for some reason Héctor couldn’t leave his seat. He just kept looking at this girl, trying to take in every curve of bone and every twitch of facial features. Trying to burn them into his memory. Several times he tried to say something, his throat constricting every time, until Nieve broke the silence once more.

“Look, we don’t have a lot of time.” she said. “And I know you must have questions.”

“Not really, no.”

His answer surprised them both, and Héctor knew that it was a big fat lie. Maybe it was because he was on a tight schedule and didn’t have time to ask her his many questions, or maybe he was too afraid to know the answers. But seeing her face crumple a little at what he said, and feeling a small bit of satisfaction at causing it, Héctor could conclude he was just being petty. Letting his long-buried feelings of hurt and anger from his childhood come back up, he wanted her to feel even a little bit of the pain he had felt.

“No?” Nieve asked in confusion.

“Fine then, just one.” Héctor relented. “Are you really my mother?”

“…Sí.”

It was confirmed. Héctor felt his belly drop and he sucked in a quick breath of air before pursing his lips and nodding. Okay, that was all he needed to know. He could just leave and never see this girl again.

Girl…

“How old were you when you had me?” Héctor asked. “You look so young.”

Nieve winced and lowered her eyes. “I was fourteen.”

Perfect, just perfect. He was the product of a teenage love affair. But his quick flash of disgust was quickly subdued when he remembered he was not that much older when he and Imelda had Coco. He had no right to be offended by that, especially since he assumed she was unwed at the time she had him.

Still, she seemed so young.

“And… how old were you when you died?” He had to ask, fearing the answer.

“Fourteen.”

Ay, Dios.

“Wh-what?” Héctor choked out, suddenly horror-stricken. “You mean? Are you saying that I-… That it’s my fault you-”

“No no!” Nieve reached out to touch him before stopping herself and drawing her hands back. Still she dared to venture a step closer to him. “No, I didn’t die in childbirth. It was hard on me, but all ten pounds of you made it out in the end.”

“Hah, good.” Héctor sighed in relief and sagged back onto the crate. “I was worried that-wait, ten pounds?!”

Nieve nodded and for the first time her bony lips turned upward into small grin. “You were a very fat baby. The nuns said that meant you were healthy.”

Laying a hand against his flat stomach, Héctor shook his head in disbelief. “Well I can assure you that the fatness didn’t last long.”

Nieve’s smile faded, sorrow finding its way back. “Yes, I’m sure there were many nights where you went hungry. Didn’t you?”

There were. More than Héctor would have liked to admit. The nuns were kind and Padre Mateo did all he could to make sure that the children under his care were well looked after, but Santa Cecilia used to be a poor town and food was lean then. Many a night Héctor found himself curled into a ball with a fist driving itself into his cramping stomach, trying not to cry through his hunger pangs. Even now it was difficult for him to gain weight, no matter how much food was available to him. It had made a lasting effect on him.

As Héctor stayed silent Nieve studied him some more and hummed in approval. “You look like me.”

“I do?”

Nieve nodded. “Of course my facial features look better on you as a man, not so much on a young girl. I always felt I was too homely to turn the boys’ heads… until I met your father.”

“…What?”

“You look nothing like him, by the way. Well, you have his height and a full head of thick hair. All the men in my family were short and bald.”

“Wait, you… know who my father was?” Héctor asked, not sure how many more surprises he could handle tonight.

This time it was Nieve’s turn to look a little angry, crossing her arms across her chest and tsking. “Really now, I’m not some common street walker. There was one man in my life and one only.”

Héctor mumbled out an awkward apology and had the decency to look ashamed of his unintentional rudeness. Looking around he had to ask. “… Is my father… dead as well? I mean, is he here?”

With a disgusted shake of her head and a sneer, she said, “No, that cabrón is still alive. Only the good die young, they say. He should be about… sixty-seven right now.”

“I see… So he was young too.” Héctor concluded after doing the math in his head, relieved that his father wasn’t some viejo who had taken advantage of a young girl.

There was a pause, Nieve processing what Héctor had just said, her face thawing into something more wistful but still hurt. “Sí… He was sixteen, considered a man by society but… Dom was still in his boyhood in so many ways. He was so regal and charming, but he was also silly. I can’t count the number of times he made me laugh with his antics. And so handsome, he could have any girl he could have wanted. I still don’t know why he chose me.”

Héctor found himself listening intently as Nieve described the beginnings of his parents relationship, hungry for the information. It was only natural, being an orphan, that he would want some inkling of what his family was like.

“He didn’t live where I did in Guerrero, he was sent to stay with his tío to learn more about the silver mine business and was set to leave for home in the summer. I met him at a New Year’s Eve party at his tío’s mansion where my parents had sent me to work at as a waitress. I don’t know why he came over to talk to me, but we really hit it off. He didn’t seem to care that I was a poor, he just liked me for who I was. And eventually… we fell in love.”

“We spent an incredible two months together until the wait staff found us one day mid kiss, and of course they informed his tío about us. Needless to say his visit was cut short and he was sent back to Santa Cecilia while I went back to my parents in shame. It was during that time while I was dealing with losing the love of my life and my parents’ coldness and harsh punishments… that I realized that I was pregnant.”

Shifting uncomfortably, Héctor didn’t know how to feel about that. He sensed that this was where the story was about to take a dark turn, and that he was the catalyst.

“My parents kicked me out, naturally. My brothers and my sister wanted nothing to do with me, neither did my extended family. I was alone in the world, but there was one shining light at the end of the tunnel: To head to Santa Cecilia to be with your father.”

“It took months to earn enough money to cross the state line to get to Oaxaca, and even more to get to Santa Cecilia. By then you had grown so much, so it was that much harder to make the distance. But in the end I did it! I made it to Santa Cecilia, found out where Dom lived, and walked straight to his house. I was so happy to see him, and he… just…”

Héctor watched as Nieve let the sentence die off, almost looking choked up and about to cry. But there was also simmering anger in her expression as well. He could easily guess what happened way back when, and if she couldn’t say it out loud then he would for her. “He rejected you.”

“…He did…”

“But I don’t understand?” Héctor said. “I thought you said he loved you. Why would he-?”

“’Because I am the son of a family descended from the richest houses in Europe, and you are a filthy peasant that came from savages and slaves.’” Nieve spat acidly, like the words had been burned into her mind and left to rot for decades. “He called me a whore, told me to never come to his house again, and slammed the door on me. Oh, after asking his servants to gently escort me off the grounds. My arms were bruised for weeks.”

Héctor grit his teeth. “Bastardo… What happened then?”

“I was alone in a town I was a stranger in, but luckily the nuns took me in and helped me get settled in the church. At least until you were born I had a roof over my head.”

Héctor nodded with a small smile. The nuns at his church were stern, for sure, but they were always kind to him. But a thought still bothered him. “So you never tried to pursue my f-… Dom… again?”

Nieve laughed bitterly. “Of course I did. Several times. Never at his home, though. Ever since my arrival it was guarded like a fortress. He dismissed me very time until the last time. Then he got physical. He grabbed me by the arm tightly, so hard it hurt, and shouted at me to never bother him again, or I would soon learn that no one messes with the Cavalleros.”

….

“WHAT?!”

Héctor’s outburst startled Nieve into such a state that she automatically moved into a defensive position, looking like she was ready to karate chop the air. “What?! What’d I do?!”

Héctor started to pace the room frantically, wildly gesturing as he went. “The Cavelleros?!” he shouted. “I’m related to the wealthiest family in-Oh no, my family is the wealthiest now… But the former wealthiest family in Santa Cecilia?! In Oaxaca?! I mean they’re not wealthy anymore, just today I got a business request from Ignacio and his father Dom…in…go…”

The fire that had lit underneath him sputtered out until there was nothing left. Shakily he sat back down onto the crate, feeling like he was going to be sick. Domingo Cavellero, the man who had never once talked to him but had often sneered at him if they came across each other in the plaza when he was just a small boy. Who forbade any of his children to listen to him play music with the rest of the crowd. The man who had actually bought his shoes from Rivera Zapatos, though always through a servant instead of in person.

“Domingo Cavellero… is my father…”

“A father is someone who loves their children and raises them, that cabrón did neither. Just forget him.” Nieve said. “At least one of us has to.”

Héctor had to agree to that. Domingo never did anything for him, it was best to just pretend like he was just another citizen in Santa Cecilia. But then he thought back to what Leti and her had discussed before he entered the room, and things didn’t make sense. “You have an ofrenda. One that you refuse to go to… Is it his?”

“… It is.”

“Why would he have an ofrenda for you if he rejected you?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t care to know. He told me to never return to him, and I am content to do just that.”

Héctor could tell that she was not content at all, far from it, but Héctor was not about to argue with a teenage girl. Wait no, his mother. Damn, this was all so confusing. And some aspects were still not synching up.

“Wait a minute.” he said, “I thought I was abandoned on the church steps. Padre Mateo and the nuns never told me that you were there with them until I was born.”

Nieve’s eyes lost their fire quickly at that, almost looking deadened, and she quickly turned back to the window. Looking out into the fog, she stayed silent for a few moments to the point where Héctor felt like he had to ask what had happened. Then she spoke again, quietly, “I assume they thought it was best you didn’t know about me.”

“Why?”

“…Because the cause of my death was not… condoned by the church.”

Héctor was confused for about a second before the meaning of her words set in. With a quick intake of air he stared at her, heartbroken and a little angry. “Did you… kill yourself?”

Nieve kept looking out the window, trying not to meet Héctor’s gaze, and sighed. “You were such a beautiful baby; I’ll never forget the way you looked at me when you first opened your eyes. I could tell, even then, that you were going to be what your father wasn’t: A good person to his very core. There was only one obstacle, I thought, that was standing in your way of happiness. That was me.”

“I was so confused, so heartbroken, my brain was going crazy at the time. For weeks I tried to care for you, but every time you cried I felt more and more like a failure as a mother. There were times I would just stare at you as you cried, couldn’t make myself to move and reach for you for comfort. Sometimes I wanted to just shut you up for good, and those times scared me the most. It was when that darkness kept overtaking me that I made the decision to stop it before something terrible happened.”

“But something terrible did happen.” Héctor said, his throat constricting painfully. “You killed yourself.”

Nieve slowly nodded, still looking away. “I gave you one final kiss and left you in the care of the nuns. They had no idea what I was about to do until days later when my body, otherwise they would have tried to stop me... I walked down to the creek in the middle of the night, waded in, and let it sweep me away. December 31st, 1900. Exactly one year after I had met your father… I thought I was being very poetic, as most stupid little girls do.”

Héctor sniffled and scrubbed his face with a boney hand, tears blurring his vision. When Nieve finally looked back at him she was saddened to see them fall down his cheeks, but still she dared not touch him. “I’m sorry Héctor, but I thought I had lost everything. I felt I had no other choice.”

“You didn’t lose everything!” Héctor snapped, wiping the tears away. “You had me. All my life I wanted to know who my parents were and why they left me. And now that I do know I feel cheated! I could have!...” trailing off he pursed his lips tight, looking up at his mother with watery eyes. “I would have been a good son.”

That was it.

Without a seconds hesitation Nieve crossed the threshold and pulled Héctor into a fierce hug, pulling him close to her and knocking off her straw hat at the same time. It didn’t seem like it would be compatible for a teenage girl and a grown man to hug, but they fit perfectly together. Even though he had grown, and she remained the same, Héctor was still able fit into his mother’s hold. Hesitantly he put his hands on her back, eyes wide, before he too melted into the embrace. An embrace fifty years in the making.

“I know you would have been a good son.” Nieve whimpered into his ear. “You would have been the sweetest boy from the stories Leti has told me… And that is part of my punishment, knowing that.”

“Punishment?” Héctor mumbled.

Nieve nodded. “When I took my life I didn’t care about what happened next. All I wanted was for the pain to stop. But it didn’t stop, it stayed and grew. Only difference now is that I’m in this gaudy, technicolor party town where everyone celebrates their death and does whatever they want that they couldn’t do in death. While I had something so precious in my life that I couldn’t see through my pain. Now I’m just an old woman, living in isolation in the slums while pining for something that I threw away.”

Pulling back, Nieve cupped Héctor’s cheek lovingly and smiled. “You deserved so much better, Héctor.”

“So did you.” Héctor said. “I’m sorry your life turned out so bad in the end.”

Nieve shook her head. “It could have been prevented. I knew something was screwing with my head and I just let it fester. I should have just asked for counsel with Padre Mateo or the nuns, or maybe gone to the doctor or an institution. Maybe then I would have been a better mother for you, if I had just… asked someone to help me, I guess.”

Héctor felt something in his chest drop at what Nieve had said. That seemed… familiar. Staring off a ways, thinking about earlier conversations he’d rather be forgotten, he barely mumbled, “Yeah, maybe…”

Smiling tightly, Nieve pulled her hand away from him. “Are you all right?”

Sighing a deep, cleansing breath Héctor nodded. “I think so. I just don’t think my heart can take any more surprises tonight… But I do have one more question.”

Bracing herself to what it might be, Nieve wrung her hands. “Okay…”

“Why did you name me Héctor? Is it a family name or something? I just got teased a lot as a child.”

Sighing in relief Nieve nodded. “In a way. I named you after my pet pig Héctor.”

“… What?”

She nodded fondly, “He was a very good pig, so pink and squishy. Until he got too big, and we had to eat him. That’s probably why he didn’t turn up as my alebrije.”

“You named me after a pig?!”

“I was fourteen years old! Of course I would name you after something I loved! And need I remind you that you were a fat baby!”

Crossing his arms in a huff, Héctor seethed while Nieve continued. “I had a lot of good memories with that pig, thank you very much. Riding on his back, rolling in the mud, eating fruit and chapulines. They were good times.”

His pout fading away, Héctor looked back up at her. “Did you say chapulines?”

Nieve nodded, smiling again. “Sí, they’re my favorite dish. Dios, I must have eaten my entire body weight in chapulines while I was pregnant with you. Why?”

His lips quirking up, Héctor shook his head in wonderment. “No reason.”

Again there was a long stretch of silence between the two of them, but it wasn’t awkward or painful anymore. They just stared at each other, smiling in contentment and newfound affection, before Nieve finally sighed.

“You need to go. Get that curse removed.”

“Yeah… I do.” Héctor said, a part of him aching to stay with her and learn more. But staring down at his boney hand he knew that that wasn’t an option for him. He made move to leave when Nieve suddenly put her hand on his shoulder.

“Wait, one more thing.” She said with a warm smile. Bending down and picking up her straw hat off the ground, she shook the dust off of it and raised it up. “I know it’s twenty-seven days until your birthday, but since I’m fifty years behind on your other birthdays I need some catching up. It’s not much, but…Feliz Cumpleaños, mijo…”

Reaching up, Héctor touched the frayed edges of the straw hat that had been plopped down onto his head. It wasn’t much at all, really. Especially when he had designers to make proper clothing for him and his entire family. Not to mention he had never been much of a hat person outside of performing. But this was a gift from his mother, his first gift, and it had instantly become a treasured heirloom passed on to a son.

Still touching it with reverence, Héctor fought the urge to cry again as he choked out, “…Gracias.”

“De nada.” Nieve whispered. “Now go.”

With a jerky nod Héctor stood up and away, pausing at the exit. “I… I will see you again, right?”

“Of course. All souls end up here eventually, though hopefully you’ll last a few more decades yet.” Nieve said with a grin.

Returning the smile Héctor peeled back the tattered curtain and, with one last look back, was gone. Alone now Nieve let her smile fall, sorrow filling her entire being, and collapsed to the floor. Trying to suppress the deep sobs in her chest, Nieve couldn’t keep herself to comparing this last time seeing Héctor with all those years ago. With a little sleepy baby, innocent to the turmoil he would face without her, looking at her with half lidded eyes in the arms of a nun. An imaged practically burned into her retinas.

And as she wept she said the same thing she told him almost fifty-one years ago.

“Goodbye, my little baby…”

#coco fanfic #somos familia #pixar coco #coco pixar #Hector Rivera

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consumeconstantly · 4 years

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If at first you don’t succeed... just live with your mistake

“My mommy’s the Style Queen.”

“Well my mommy’s an Italian Ambassador.”

Chloe scoffs. “So? My dad is the Mayor of Paris.”

AKA Chloe and Lila have a dick measuring contest.

______________________________________________________________

“This is your fault, Audrey! She acts exactly like you when you’re jet lagged and caffeine deprived. She definitely got it from you.”

“Excuse me?” Audrey delicately slams her iced mocha down on the imported Rosewood table. “She got it from me? I’m not the one whose name Chloe has dropped in every one of her little school fights.”

“I just don’t understand.” Gianna Rossi nurses her head in her hand. The whiskey that was delivered to her didn’t have the opportunity for water to condense on the sides, so the table remains free of stains. “How did Lila end up this way? I’ve always tried to lead by example, and I spend as much time with her as I can!”

Audrey pats Gianna’s forearm with a gloved hand. “Maybe it’s just teenage rebellion, darling.”

“I wish,” Gianna says, glumly. “Do you think it’s because she grew up without one of her parents?”

“Nonsense,” Andre waves his hand, still wearing the pretentious ribbon that proclaims he is the mayor of Paris. “Chloe grew up with a mother, and she turned out exactly the same way.”

He mutters more quietly, “Though a mother that was gone so often she might as well not have even been there.”

Audrey smacks Andre on the arm. “You know very well that you were gone more often when she was a baby. We agreed that we would rotate focusing on our careers every few years.”

“Yes, honey, but I’ve been on Chloe duty for the past eight years. You only took care of her when she was a toddler.”

“Who was the one who had to change diapers Andre? The one who woke up at 3 AM to feed her? The one who taught her the goddamn alphabet? Tell me that, Andre, tell me that.”

Gianna motions for another drink to be brought over by the butler that Andre and Audrey employ. Audrey holds up a hand and shakes her head. “Don’t do it, Gianna. It’s almost 4:30. School is going to get out soon.”

Pressing her head up against the lacquered wood, Gianna sighs. “All the more reason for me to drink.”

“You don’t want to be inebriated when you have to deal with Lila, do you?”

“I do,” Gianna wails. “I have to be! Do you know that Lila makes me drink more than my job does? And I’m the one who has to file all of those awful akuma attacks that always end up targeting Italian tourists because some people are still not over what we did in World War II!”

“Italy did do a lot of awful things back then,” Andre mutters.

“Shut it! Whether it’s right or wrong, one akuma attack out of every twenty five deals specifically with the prejudice against Italy. Italian tourists get caught up in seven attacks out ten. I’ve had to issue so many incident reports that I think I’m going to get carpal tunnel soon.”

“I can’t believe you have the statistics on those.”

Gianna’s voice shoots up two octaves. “You’re the mayor of Paris. Shouldn’t you be keeping track of statistics like these?”

“Ah,” Andre laughs awkwardly. “Of course I am. But back on topic. Who do you think it’s going to be this time? Chloe or Lila?”

A moment of silence. Then, in tandem, all three of their phones buzz.

“You just had to jinx it, didn’t you, Andre?” Audrey pulls out a pocket mirror, reapplies her lipstick, then stands. “Let’s go see what our girls did this time, non?”

Placing her sunglasses over her eyes, Audrey continues, “A hundred euros that the Dupain-Cheng girl will be one of their targets.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, honey. That girl has too much of a spine for either of them to get her involved.”

Gianna sobs for the umpteenth time that afternoon. “If Lila was just a little bit more like Marinette, so many of my problems would be relieved! Do you think if I pay her enough, she’ll be friends with my daughter?”

Audrey and Andre exchange glasses. Andre shakes his head. “Friendship won’t work. We tried to get our Chloe to play with Adrien. He’s still as well-mannered as ever, but Chloe… In any case, I’ll raise your hundred euro bet to one fifty and say that Sabrina will be involved.”

“That’s no fun,” Audrey complains. “You always take the obvious bets.”

The three parents make their way to Andre’s limo. Gianna may or may not take two shots of vodka on her way there.

“Chloekins!” Andre stretches his arms out to his daughter. His bad knee pops twice as he gets down to kneel.

“I don’t know why he insists on playing good cop bad cop when it hasn’t worked once in the past five years,” Audrey says to Gianna.

“At least you have a significant other to make that work. I have to be the good cop and the bad cop, all in one person, and it hasn’t worked ever. Maybe I should try looking for other single parents. Adrien’s father is single, right? And Adrien is such a sweetheart. Maybe I should try--”

Audrey waves her clutch slightly in the air to cut her off. “Trust me when I say that is an awful idea. Not only does the man still believe Emilie is alive, but he also keeps an obscene amount of iconography of her in his bedroom in his manor. And even if he somehow gets over Emilie, wish isn’t going to happen anytime soon, that snake, Nathalie, has been waiting in the wings even before Adrien was born.”

Gianna’s shoulders slump. “I thought ‘the good ones are all taken’ is only a phrase that’s supposed to be used by students.”

“Daddy!” Chloe stomped her foot. “I demand that you deport this-- this miscreant from Paris at once!”

“Daddy’s so proud of you for learning a new big word.” Andre continues to fawn over his daughter while Chloe and Lila’s classmates look on disgustedly at the dual display of affection and undermining Chloe’s intelligence. Nino lets out something that sounds suspiciously like, “Sick burn, dude.”

“Daddy!” Chloe’s voice gets even higher, and Audrey counts at least five of Chloe’s classmates cover their ears and wince. Andre glances back at Audrey, clearly expecting her to come in and lay down the law. Audrey doesn’t even bother raising an eyebrow in disbelief, She just stays completely still until her husband gets the point and turns back to their daughter, shoulders slumped.

“Sweetheart, we can’t just deport Lila for no reason,” Andre tries to placate Chloe, unsuccessfully. Somehow, the classmates and the teacher have gotten a hold of popcorn, and are now sharing it amongst themselves.

“I told you. It’s not for no reason. It’s because she’s a miscreant!”

Andre falters. He’s always given into Chloe’s demands, and Audrey has always been the one to fix things after. He gives in. “Okay, sweetheart. Then we can--”

“Hold on.” Gianna steps in between Andre and Chloe. Audrey smells alcohol coming from her mouth. Gianna’s cheeks are slightly pink. Audrey, herself, doesn’t believe in midday drinking, or really, drinking at all-- she thinks that it ruins skin and that inebriated people simply aren’t attractive-- but perhaps if Audrey wasn’t so involved in the fashion world, she’d be a little more similar to Mme. Rossi. “How about we hear both sides of the story before deciding what needs to be done?”

Lila and Chloe lock eyes, then immediately turn away with each other, crossing their arms at the exact same time. If Audrey didn’t remember every detail of Chloe’s birth because it was so painful, she’d be inclined to believe that the two girls were twins, or siblings at the very least. They’re just too similar in their mannerisms to believe that they’re completely unrelated.

Fluttering her eyelashes and playing up the image of a false saint that precisely nobody in the school believes anymore, Lila, looks at Andre and Gianna through watery eyes. “Chloe was bullying people! I simply had to intervene.”

“That’s not true! She was the one who started it!”

Gianna sighs. If she were any less of a woman, she would immediately buckle to the ground. But she’s been dealing with the Italian-Parisian politics, which are often fraught with tension, for nearly three decades, and with one Lila Rossi for thirteen years. “Why don’t we hear from an impartial third party?”

The three parents turn on the rest of the classroom. Sometime during the chaos, Caline Bustier fainted, and was promptly escorted to the nurse’s office by Mylene and Ivan. No matter. Caline isn’t the most… impartial or intelligent person they have to choose from. Audrey does feel slightly responsible for her lack of intelligence, as Chloe beaned Caline in the head with objects of various size and weight throughout Ecole, which is why the woman isn’t out of a job.

“Marinette and Adrien. Why don’t the two of you tell us what happened?” Audrey points at the two teens that are whispering to each other. They certainly have an interesting dynamic. If Marinette was taller, she’d love to have the two of them model for some of her shoots, together. No matter. She still has time to grow, and she has it on good word that Sabine is doing all she can to make sure her daughter grows to at least Tom’s height.

Chloe gasps. “You remember Maritrash’s name, but not mine?”

Beneath her sunglasses, Audrey rolls her eyes. Really, she makes one attempt at the younger generation’s humor, and it backfires on her horribly. She fired the intern who recommended that joke to her, so there’s really nothing more to be done. This is why it’s just so much easier to be harsh.

Luckily, Adrien deescalates the situation before Chloe starts on a second tangent that will likely end in tears instead of a fit of rage. Audrey wonders if she’s really that emotional when she’s jetlagged and in need of a pick-me-up. She’ll have to ask her assistant, next time.

“Well, it really started as two seprate issues at first.” Adrien rubs the back of his head and looks down at his feet. Maybe there’s a tradeoff. Indiscriminate rage in exchange for common sense. Confidence exchanged for timidity. “Chloe was… upset because she didn’t get a perfect on the last assignment Sabrina submitted for her.”

Audrey rolls her eyes again. What, there’s a reason she wears sunglasses everywhere she goes. She simply can’t deal with people’s stupidity, or when people make clearly exaggerated-- or in this case, very, very, almost criminally under exaggerated, judging by the bruises forming on Sabrina’s knees-- claims.

“And Lila was spinning another lie about Jagged Stone to Nino. Something about her being his lovechild,” Marinette finished. Now there’s a girl who has confidence, is more than confident at her craft, and is pretty. Really, the only negative things that she’s heard about the girl is that she’s sort of a clutz and rather bad at getting places on time, but both of those can be remedied. Etiquette class and a personal driver, and everything will be fixed.

There’s also the small matter about her apparently having the capability of picking locks and hyper fixating on whatever she likes, but Audrey has been trapped by men trying to get a ransom from Andre at least four separate times, and she wouldn’t be here today if she wasn’t a bit of a daredevil of lycee. As for the hyperfixation, so long as she’s able to move onto a new area of interest in time for each new collection, Audrey sees no reason why Marinette can’t excel in the fashion world.

“Lila Rossi! You know you are not the daughter of Jagged Stone! You’re going to be grounded for two weeks!”

Marinette nudges Adrien. “Excuse me, Mme. Rossi. Why don’t we finish the whole story before issuing any punishments? There’s… more.”

Adrien is associated with that good boy next door kind of aesthetic, but he pulls off unintentionally mildly ominous like he was born to do so.

“The short of it is that Chloe pushed Sabrina, Sabrina fell onto Lila, and that made Lila and Nino kiss. After that,” Marinette eyes Nino, who is wiping his mouth with his eighth wet wipe and being soothed by Alya with an arm on his shoulder. “Well, things kind of devolved from there.”

“You mean,” Chloe hisses. “That this wannabe pulled my hair, scratched my face, and knocked me to the ground!”

“You made me bleed!” Lila pulls her sleeve up. There aren’t actually any marks, but there aren’t any marks on Chloe, either.

“They did roll around on the floor for a while,” Alya admits, “But both of them were so up in each other’s business that it's difficult to make out who actually landed a hit on who, if either of them did manage to hurt each other. I have the footage, but even after we watched it a few times, it really just looks like the two of them are bear hugging each other on the floor.”

“Are you guys forgetting the real victims here?” Kim half shouts. “My beautiful face!”

Alix slaps him on the back. “Don’t worry about it. If it scars, it’ll just make you look mysterious. If it doesn’t… well I can’t say that your looks were ever good to begin with.”

Sabrina shuffles her feet. She’s definitely less injured than Kim’s nail scratches, with only bruising on one arm and on both of her knees.

“Chloe didn’t do anything bad,” she defends. “She’s perfect just the way she is!”

“That’s right, servant.”

Marinette turns to Adrien with a question in her eyes. He nods.

She bangs her head against his shoulder.

“Sorry about that, Chloe’s voice just really grates on me sometimes. I need to knock my head in order to get the ringing to stop.”

Lila shoots a smug look at the blonde girl. “See?”

“Lila’s too,” Marinette says, then bangs her head against Adrien’s shoulder one more time for good measure. “Adrien, Alya, do either of you want to continue?”

Adrien pulls Marinette into his chest. Alya steps forwards as the Champion of the Truth. “After their catfight, Kim and Sabrina broke them up. Sabrina took Chloe, Kim took Lila. After the two of them were separated, Mlle. Bustier went to M. Damocle’s office so all three of you were contacted. Chloe tried to go at Lila again once Sabrina loosened her hold, but Marinette geupplexed her.”

“Seriously,” Marinette stares at Chloe’s completely unruffled appearance. “What kind of hairspray does Chloe even use? Her hair is made of steel.”

“Her hairspray is made from venom and spite, dude.”

The tell tale sirens of a police car approach. “Oh, by the way, did M. Damocles not tell you that the police were going to take both of them in for questioning?”

“No,” Gianna Rossi says, curling in on herself. “No, he most definitely did not.”

Chloe and Lila are led away in handcuffs while the parents stand in a group, almost numbly.

“Why are our children like this?” Gianna pulls her hair. She’s had to take off so much time from her job this month alone in order to accommodate Lila’s ridiculous behaviors.

“Be comforted by the fact that they’re not working together. Can you imagine the kind of plans they’d think up?”

“Actually,” Alya interjects. “They have. Were you never contacted for the time they sent Marinette flying out the window?”

“WHAT?”

#original content #miraculous ladybug #chloe bourgeois #lila rossi #marinette dupain cheng #adrien agreste #nino lahiffe #alya cesaire #audrey bourgeois #andre bourgeois #gianna rossi #crack #comedy #everybody is done #lila salt #chloe salt

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lavendairs · 3 years

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♚ ━━━ ❛ ALL ABOUT AUGUST.

G E N E R A L —

NAME. his full birth name is august ahn-evergreene, his last names being a combination of his maternal and paternal last names because his mother wasn’t going to allow her children to not have her last name in some fashion. however, in his twenties he drops evergreene and only uses ahn as his last name due to a rift with his mother / wanting an identity separate from her ( he’s not fond of his father either but he has a habit of leaving town so it’s easier for august to distance himself from that part of his family’s ‘legacy’ ).

AGE. he appears in his late 20s ( 27-30 ) but is around 60 years old due to the extended lifespan of a mage.

HEIGHT. he stands at 6′1 ( 185.42 ). no, he’s not a sloucher and is the type to internally judge people who do because stand up straight wtf?

WEIGHT. 170 pounds ( 77.1kg ). he’s lean and not overly muscular; doesn’t do much heavy physical activity anymore due to his current ‘condition’.

ETHNICITY. korean-filipino american mage. he comes from a bloodline of magic-users. if commenting on his natural magical prowess, expect a dry ‘of course, i was breed to be.’ in response.

OCCUPATION. he is what the people of crescent creek call ‘the overseer’, the highest sitting member of the council of novema ( or just ‘the council’ for short ). they are the ones who ‘govern’ the town and its people, establishing laws and stepping in to resolve high-level matters between residents if it should come to it. with the council needing to hear matters from the magi, vampires, fae, werewolves, and other beings, august has a constant headache.

GENDER. cis-male.

SEXUAL & ROMANTIC ORIENTATION. he would state that he’s heterosexual but admittedly he’s never fully explored his sexuality enough for that to be a definite statement. he hasn’t seriously dated in a very long time™ and it isn’t interested in changing that.

MBTI. INTJ-A, The Architect — it can be lonely at the top. as one of the rarest personality types – and one of the most capable – architects ( INTJs ) know this all too well. rational and quick-witted, architects may struggle to find people who can keep up with their nonstop analysis of everything around them. these personalities can be both the boldest of dreamers and the bitterest of pessimists. architects believe that, through willpower and intelligence, they can achieve even the most challenging of goals. but they may be cynical about human nature more generally, assuming that most people are lazy, unimaginative, or simply doomed to mediocrity.

S P E C I F I C S —

FAVOURITE FOOD. he’s very particular about getting his three meals a day in if he can but he probably has the most fondest for food that was often served at dinner time with his family or when all his cousins spent time at his lola’s house when they visited her. dishes such as bopis, kimchi, pancit canton, tocino and rice, korean styled steak, etc. are personal favorites.

FAVOURITE DRINK. his day isn’t complete without having a nice, chilled glass of vintage red wine during dinner ( and maybe just drinking straight from the bottle by the end of the night ). he does enjoy drinking rosé during a nice breakfast or lunch depending on the bottle.

FAVOURITE HOBBY. brooding. joking aside, he does enjoy sparring matches, ‘magical’ based sparring matches. he does practice taekkyeon ( korean martial arts ) and enjoys mixing spells in by shocking opponents, blocking their spells with his own wards, etc.

FAVOURITE SCENT. the smell of freshly cut grass as well as the scent of pomegranates, vanilla, cinnamon, and musk. the former is bittersweet and nostalgic, reminding of his years as a teen: when he was young, oblivious, and only had to be concerned about being late to football / soccer practice. the latter reminds him of someone he would rather forget.

FAVOURITE PERSON. i. his twin brother, ansel ahn. his death still hurts and he’ll always partially blame himself for it - despite the fact that there would’ve been nothing he could’ve done to change it. ( this is the part where that wand.avision quote is inserted in ). the loss of his brother dramatically changes the course of his life. ii. his lola, nora evergreene. she grounds him a lot. one of the few times he’s at peace is when he visits her for brunch every third saturday of the month. iii. his ex, audrey cramer. he would never admit it out loud though - at least not anymore.

T E N F A C T S —

he’s well versed in magical creatures : one of the 'gifts’ of being the overseer is the ability to traverse pass the veil - a barrier / entry way that exist between ‘earth’ and the many dimensions that exist beyond it. this ability, however, is one that has fallen out of use over the past few decades. ever the abnormally, august makes use of this ability for his own personal agenda. outside of the different races that already live within crescent creek ( witches, vampires, werewolves, fairies, etc. ), there are those that prefer to live freely in their own worlds rather than live in secrecy on earth. so yes, he has met unicorns and he thinks most of them are actually assholes.

on the nature of the veil : the origin of the veil itself is a mystery. all that is known that about its existence is that many millennium ago, those from different dimensions ( or ‘worlds’ ) were able to freely pass through it without the need of assistance or a spell. as time progressed and humanity began to rise, passage through the veil became increasingly more restricted, leading to entry ways within the veil being sealed and only accessible through the leader in each world ( ex. the overseer in crescent creek ). although the town of crescent creek has always traded with other towns, cities, etc. pass the veil, many of those trades have slowed to a stop entirely as those dimensions have become inaccessible. to somewhat ease panic and concern, the council has framed the issue being due to other dimensions permanently closing themselves off from earth ( a situation that has previously happened some worlds ). in truth, the veil itself has become 'infected’ by a foreign spell that’s led to the blocking of entry ways that lead into other worlds. due to not knowing the source of the spell and its affect on the veil, the knowledge of its presence is unknown to most people in crescent creek. // note: this is more of an overall ‘lore’ fact that explains the backdrop of what’s going on in this ‘world’ to understand other facts about him. in the grand scheme of things, this wouldn’t come up when interacting with him.

he doesn’t believe in astrologists, psychics, fortune tellers, etc. : which may seem contradictory considering he’s a literal magical being but in his experience, it’s typically humans pushing pseudoscience or mages using their magic to con clueless humans. people in that line of ‘work’ are hacks to him - especially since he’s seen it first hand with his own father’s profession.

over the past twenty years, he’s been continuing his brother’s research : ansel, his older, twin brother, had been studying the distortions within the veil in secret before his death a decade prior. although the status of the veil was supposed to be concealed to those outside of the council’s reach, ansel confided in his brother before his death. in august’s eyes, whatever spell that’s taken over the veil is an active threat and with the backing of onyx crane, a vampire on the council, and his cousin, faye evergreene, he began an almost obsessive-like determination to complete his brother’s work and find answers - even if it’s to his own detriment. // *note: with a big soap opera trope being people returning from the dead, it shouldn’t be shocking to discover that ansel, is in fact, not actually dead. he used a storm that hit the town as a means to fake his own death ( disasters that kill off characters is usually a soap opera storyline that happens during ‘sweeps’ period ) and left town for his own agenda.

the youngest overseer to sit in the council : his status as the overseer is one steeped in controversy due to...a variety of reasons: an overseer typically is replaced by another council member by vote or an apprentice to the overseer should they have one after an overseer’s death, resignation, or if they’ve been forcefully discharged from the position. none of these things applied to august’s own mother, tala ahn-evergreene, when he usurped her - blackmailing the council by threatening to expose the truth about the current threat of the veil. // *note: in every ( american ) soap opera, it is a staple to have a ‘thing’, whether it be a business, a central institution in town ( ex. a hospital ), or a position ( CEO of a company, chief of staff at a hospital, etc. ) that many of the characters are tied to or even fighting for control over. ELQ, the quartermaine’s family business on general hospital, often have storylines where family members are fighting over shares of the company, who should run it, or the family teaming up to oust an outsider that’s taken over the company ( funnily enough, there is a story like the latter happening on the show right now ). the point here is that being the overseer or even sitting on the council of novema is that ‘thing’ that people fight over to be on for various reason.

he takes his personal upkeep very seriously : there’s a lot of things one could say about crescent creek’s current overseer but no one can ever say they’ve seen august ahn not look put together when he’s out and about ( this is him going out publicly basically ). as someone who values consistency and control in his life but pretty much never has it, august actually highly treasures the time spent doing his morning / nightly skincare routines, getting his acupuncture treatments, and so on. he supports the self care movement essentially.

he ( as well as his siblings ) once witnessed one of his father’s affairs : it was an awful experience. -10/10. doesn’t recommend. this incident shapes his attitude towards relationships in general and how he operates within them. august has a very black and white attitude about relationships: you are either with him 100% or you’re not with him at all. it’s unhealthy and he has to unpack that. // *fun fact: this is actually a real event that happened with this family back in the sims 2 over ten years ago - they just all had different names, were a different race, and so on at that point.. they’ve changed a lot:tm:.

may be an active suspect for murder : it happens. when marlena cramer, a former council member, suddenly passes on, the town is overtaken by a wave of a grief...that soon becomes shock and suspicion when her death is rules to be from unnatural causes. between being one of the last people to see her alive and reports of him wanting her off the council, august becomes one of the prime suspects for her murder case. // *note: whodunit’s are probably up there with ‘who’s the daddy’ storylines in terms of being the most common soap opera staple ( ex. who shot j.r. on dallas ).

voted most likely to be successful in his HS yearbook : august was the picture perfect prom king, the jock that was friends with everyone on campus, and the one everyone expected ride off into the sunset with his hs sweetheart. on paper, august was well rounded - some would say outright perfect. today, those who knew him in high school would shake their heads and ask themselves what happened to the boy who always smiled at them when he passed you by in the hallway or whose laughter could easily be heard the loudest in a classroom. august, as he is now, is a stranger to those that once knew him.

it’s happening gradually but he is, in fact, dying : many of the worlds that had become unaccessible were not only blocked off but were actively decaying - many of its residents fleeing to other worlds before they were forever trapped in a dying one while others locked their entry ways to stop the spell from spreading to their own homes. the overseers in crescent creek were restricted from traversing the veil themselves due to the unknown risk of the spell, a rule that august actively ignores. every time he travels through the veil, the more the spell slowly eats away at him - a fact that he is well aware of and he has no desire to stop. he will keep traveling worlds ( and helping those he can ) until he finds the source of the spell and kills its caster himself.

FIVE THINGS HE LIKES.

visiting the sauna. the heat helps with his internal pain.

eating home-cooked meals.

getting hydrafacials ( james_franco_so_good.gif ).

smoking with his cousin, faye.

blasting emo music as he gets drunk, questions his life choices, and stares at the ceiling

FIVE THINGS HE DISLIKES.

feeling used.

disloyal / uncommitted people

selfishness.

tough, chewy steak.

cheap wine.

COMMON WORDS / PHRASES THAT ANNOY THEM. during a misunderstanding or argument, the worst thing to tell him is that he ‘doesn’t understand’. even if the person is somewhat correct, august is a person that prides himself on being an objective observer of a situation, rational in his thinking, and not someone who lets his emotions dictate his choices. saying something like that to him would just further annoy him.

PERSONALITY TYPES THEY PREFER. those who are smart, loyal, and efficient. those who are willing to dirty their hands on occasion, and believe that the ends do justify the means.

PERSONALITY TYPES THEY AVOID. selfish and incompetent people, those who proceed to waste his time, useless people in positions of powers, jerky unicorns.

WHAT DO YOU FIND DIFFERENT / DISTINCT ABOUT YOUR PORTRAYAL?

the whole concept of this ‘world’ is based around soap opera cliches and tropes so the character is intentionally ‘tropey’ and meant to pull from different fictional men from the genre - as well as outside of it. i would say him being the leading man is unique within itself because people of color in soaps ( at least within american soaps which this is all inspired by ) are generally never the leads or involved in what i actually watch soaps for: the drama, the love stories, the scheming, the cheating, etc. they’re usually the straight men to the white characters; living well off but boring lives and are rarely given front burner stories. all black people in a soap opera are usually always going to somehow know each other, only date each other, etc. you can switch black people out with latinos, asians, etc. and it would still be true. the characters of color are easily written off as a result of this.

in general, soap operas are very white - and still are today. they have a history of casting white people as mexican characters, ex. lindsay hartley as theresa on passions. asian american soap characters are severly lacking - i could probably count the amount of i’ve seen on screen. a black actress formerly on general hospital mentioned how people jokingly called the show ‘generally white hospital’ behind the scenes. chad.wick bos.eman left all my children because of how much of a stereotype his character was - and he was right ( ironically, michael b. jord.an was his recast ). some shows are getting better, bold and beautiful currently has a story involving two characters cheating ( one of which is black ) and it’s hot af but it’s still not enough for the times we’re in. this isn’t a problem exclusive to soaps either - most media has a problem with this. people of color aren’t getting lead roles and especially not romantic lead roles - even if they do, the shows always make it a interracial romance with a white person ( ex. bridg/erton ) as if people of color of different races are incapable of dating each other.

finally, i’ve noticed that you rarely see asian american men portrayed as romantic leads or desirable ( at least in a non-fetishized way ) in western media. that’s pretty lame:tm: so that was also a factor when i revamped audrey’s love interest ( parts of ‘old’ him still exist, ex. him being a jock / king of the school as a teen, a complicated relationship with his brother, etc ). anyway, stan august uwu.

tagged by: i took it from myself. tagging: anyone who wants to.

#❀ . ❛ august : study : headcanon .#❀ . ❛ august : study : worldbuilding .#this is the closest you're getting out of me for an about page tbh #i might do a separate lore dump but i kind of don't want to lol #adultery //

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crimeronan · 4 years

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no supernatural au concept i haven’t been able to stop thinking about since considering ronan and opal were once the same age

the lynch family has a reputation. partly it’s because they’re fucking weird, but let’s be real -- every rural town has its share of characters. weird farmers are par for the course. if the lynch family just kept to themselves at the barns, no one would know they existed. however niall lynch is a swaggering larger-than-life storybook hero who loves attention and scandal, so: the lynch family has a reputation

by and large, the household is made up of known entities. niall, the irishman who never shuts the fuck up. aurora, the quiet beautiful wife with the bizarrely gorgeous beadwork at craft fairs. declan, the eldest son who’s got one foot in DC and won’t ever look back when he gets there. matthew, the youngest boy with the enthusiasm and adoration and intellectual prowess of a golden retriever puppy

however. the lynch twins are largely folkloric

it’s not just that they never seem to appear in public. it’s that there are a dozen decade-old stories told by knitting folks on their porches that cannot POSSIBLY all be true, including:

the lynch twins set fire to the post office

the lynch twins stole four pallets of soda from the back of a truck unloading at the henrietta general store and drank all the evidence

the lynch twins lured a man into the woods and stabbed him in the leg

the lynch twins helped the local vet’s office coordinate 30 TNR procedures because they’ve befriended a colony of feral cats

the lynch twins trained a rotating cast of corvids to shit on the mayor when he leaves his office every evening

the lynch twins were banned from three local churches after incidents involving a statue of mary, stained glass worth several thousand dollars, and the preacher’s microphone respectively

adam doesn’t give much of a shit about local gossip but has gleaned quite a bit of it when being deferential and polite to middle-aged women at the dollar store. it takes him a month of attending aglionby to put together that ronan and declan are siblings (they look unbelievably alike, but their body language and speech are SO different) and another week after that to realize ronan’s one-half of the unidentified lynch family variables

“isn’t there another one of him?” adam blurts

declan looks up and blinks, nonplussed rather than smooth for once in his life. “excuse me?”

adam’s eating lunch and has ended up at a table with declan not because of friendliness, but because declan’s taking a break from his roving cast of intransient social interactions to work on college apps and adam’s getting a head start on homework. neither is here to make friends. adam nods across the room at ronan, who appears to be constructing a fully landscaped mountain sculpture out of french fries

declan says “god, i wish” as ronan upends a bottle of ketchup over the fries and causes a volcanic eruption that obliterates everything in the lunch table’s path

that tells adam absolutely nothing but also he doesn’t really care. later, when he and gansey are friends, and he’s no closer to understanding ronan but much more actively annoyed by him, he asks gansey the same thing

“oh, his sister!” gansey says, and beams. this at least explains why she doesn’t go to aglionby. “she’s great. she’s taught me a lot about what plants want to kill you”

adam can’t decide what to make of this. once upon a time he’d think that the affection of someone like gansey predisposed the mysterious lynch sister toward being like declan, but it turns out gansey reserves that ebullient expression for losers like him and ronan and noah alone, so. more data necessary

it’s important to note that this isn’t like, occupying a huge part of adam’s mind. it’s just idle querying because he likes knowing things. to that end, he asks ronan once if he’d ever met ronan’s sister when adam attended the public junior high. they’d be in the same grade, right??

ronan gets weird and evasive with some response about how she homeschools with his mom, and adam’s like okay, some religious cult thing with the women running the farm. whatever. not my issue

adam and ronan get slowly closer over time, etcetc, you know how it goes. eventually adam's invited to the barns. his first few visits are normal. suspiciously normal. aurora is loving and gentle in a way that makes adam skittish - probably more due to his own issues than any Actual malevolence, but who knows - and there is zero mention or sign of a girl living there

it doesn’t Really bother adam, but it kind of bothers him. less because he’s dying to meet her and more because equations that don’t add up make him nervous. his running list of theories include 1) she doesn’t exist 2) she’s dead 3) she’s at some elite boarding school for girls in connecticut 4) she’s an emancipated minor 5) she’s not an emancipated minor but has run away anyway 6) she’s a fugitive from justice 7) she’s in prison 8) she’s dead but, like, worse this time

adam carefully and subtly raises his concerns to ronan by asking, “so is your sister being tortured in your attic or what?”

ronan, reasonably, is like, “the fuck?”

adam’s like, “look, all i’m saying is that when a twin goes missing in a story and no one seems to care, something sinister’s afoot. that’s all i’m saying here.”

ronan’s like, “say the word ‘afoot’ again. you sound like gansey. come on”

he takes adam out for a walk in the woods, which seems like a pretty murdery way to respond. adam, uncomfortably aware of that rumor about luring people to the woods and stabbing them in the leg, is like okay i’m about to die here. i’ve uncovered a lifetime movie plot and now i’m gonna be buried in unmarked barrel #457. what a way to go

this is pretty much confirmed when he gets attacked

he hits the ground before he’s really registered anything beyond a surprise impact. it drives the breath out of his lungs. he flips onto his back right away. ronan’s got half a foot of height on him and stupidly long legs so a sprinting escape doesn’t seem viable. he’s gonna have to rely on the old-fashioned power of fingernails and kicking

he has time to see a pair of blown-pupil eyes WAY too close to his face before the weight disappears from him. the culprit is a girl, late teens, with hair that’s probably blonder when the matted dirt is washed out of it. “for fuck’s fucking sake,” ronan is saying, hauling her to her feet and blessedly away from adam’s vulnerable internal organs, “why. WHY.”

“holy shit.” adam sits up, clutching his chest. he can feel every bone in his body. “god. god. god”

the girl is almost as tall as ronan. she’s dressed in some kind of baggy coverall-ish getup that might once have been an army parachute. she is not wearing any shoes. there’s some blood on her face from a recently-opened scab, and also a black speck on one cheek that adam thinks is a smashed fly

“you didn’t jump gansey!” ronan is saying, extremely exasperated. “why!”

“i didn’t have my hammock yet when gansey first came,” she says. she does not sound remotely sorry

adam looks up and discovers that there is in fact a hammock stretched between the trees. it’s one of those heavy-duty camping numbers with thick canvas and a full insect net. it’s also thirty feet in the air. there are branches on the way down, but they are very precariously spaced. adam does not want to know how she parkoured to leap onto his shoulders

“when you snap someone’s neck,” ronan says, “i’m not helping you hide the body”

“who says i haven’t already?”

“the fuck? and you didn’t ask me to help hide the body?”

she darts a few feet away and pulls herself into a tree. adam watches with slight fascination as she shimmies out along a long branch until it dips under her weight. as he gets to his feet, trying to piece together his wilted dignity, she rides her makeshift nature elevator down until she’s staring into his eyes again. hugging the branch like a snake. absolutely no consideration for how normal human beings behave. it’s almost marvelous

“sufficiently free of my attic, parrish?” ronan asks

“uh, yeah. yep”

“so this is opal,” ronan says

opal flips over so she’s hanging from the branch like a sloth. then hooks her legs around it and reaches down until her palms are flat on the ground. cartwheels out of the tree like a particularly feral acrobat. adam jerks back to avoid being smacked by a faceful of twigs at the whipcrack slingshot of the branch bouncing back

opal pulls a pocketknife from one of the folds in the DIY parachute sewing machine tick protection onepiece from hell. adam eyes her warily

“opal, this is parrish. or adam. whichever. don’t stab him”

“god,” adam says again

opal beams. she opens the pocketknife, but all she does is start cleaning bits of plaque from between her teeth with the tip, which is somehow so much worse than stabbing. adam looks at ronan and finds him pinching the bridge of his nose. it occurs to adam that this is the only time he’s EVER seen ronan express any sense of embarrassment in any social situation. ronan has no sense of propriety. adam didn’t know he was capable of feeling embarrassed

he immediately likes opal just for that.

“yes,” opal says, unconcerned, answering a question no one’s actually asked. “ronan is the normal one”

#i spent nearly. 2 hours writing this stupid thing. this concept is so excellent #trc #pynch #opal lynch #my writing #this was SUPPOSED to be short enough i wouldn't have to readmore it but. shrug emoji #adam parrish #ronan lynch

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weggocs · 3 years

Text

Game of Thrones

Name: Talison, no surname

Age: 31

Gender: Female

Sexual Orientation: Anyone, she’s not particular

Status: Single

Religion (i’m sorry, i fully made one up but it’s hype i swear): The Iron Pommel

Physical:

Height: 5’8”

Weight: 135

Physique: She’s toned and muscular, especially in her arms. I actively love women a lot and made her buff by design. She’s not, like, scary, but she’s definitely quite impressive, especially at a time when women were meant to be delicate. She’s average height, the product of protein and exercise, and holds herself with the confidence of a person who’s taken a lot of lives. Not threatening, per se, but certainly able.

Face: She’s been hit in the face more than a couple times and it shows. There’s a small bump in her nose from when she was struck in the face with a sparring sword, as well as a scar under her chin from a rock she tripped into. She’s on the laid-back end of confident, and a lot of her thoughts speak through her eyebrows. Her lips are fairly thin and her face overall is an odd mix of softened angles. Her hair, which began dark brown but gradually lightened after two decades of sunlight, is typically pulled back from her face in a ponytail but if it were down it would fall beyond her shoulders. She keeps it long against her better judgement because hey, she’s survived this long.

Clothes: The most notable article of clothing she uses is a length of cloth she uses to bind her chest. (NEVER do this, by the way, it’s super bad for you--it just helps me relate more to her at a time when binders didn’t exist.) It’s a practicle measure to allow for more unhindered movement but binding her chest down every single day has damaged her ribs and she can experience negative affects from that, which is why she tends to leave it off when she knows she’s not likely to encounter anyone. Beyond that she wears very little armor, as she’s generally surpassed the need for it. Her wardrobe is entirely brown, with a leather breastplace over a thin cotton shirt and loose leather pants that allow for better movement. There are a few tight belts around her waste, one slung over her hip to hold her longsword while the others support her axe, knife, and waterskin. Her shoes aren’t fashionable and an immediate goal for her is to find new ones; they’re worn down in the soles and the fur casing is falling apart. She doesn’t carry a heavy coat when she can avoid it which is most of the summer, and tends to travel north when the summer is at its climax.

Personality: Talison is generally very reasonable. She knows her strength to a degree, though there is an element of cockiness to her, and generally avoids pissing off the wrong people but doesn’t take insults lightly. As she tends to travel alone, her social skills aren’t very refined, and she tends to be quite blunt when she thinks someone’s trying to verbally outwit her. It’s an area of insecurity for her. Overall she’s quite confident and very dedicated to her religion. She refuses to be separated from her blades. She’s a decent judge of character but airs on the side of caution nonetheless, and prefers fighters to diplomats. She’s also a bit of a flirt, especially with women.

House: None

Occupation: She belongs to the Iron Pommel (it’s a religion I made up, very much swords based, there’s an explanation at the bottom!) which would make her an Iron Ward. She’s nomadic and primarily provides for herself but is always willing to do some menial tasks in exchange for a warm bed and a bowl of stew.

History/Family Relations: Nothing here is incredibly relevant. She was a lowborn child of a cobbler in King’s Landing. Her mother died during the winter of Talison’s birth and her father wasn’t a good enough cobbler to warrant a business. It’s not a notable story and it has very little sway on Talison now, though the early need to fend for herself contributed heavily to her independence in her early life and even now.

Strengths (I bunched it in with weaponry):

Talison is pretty much equally skilled in both hands. This is a popular trait amongst Wardens and part of the reason they’re so dangerous in combat. She has three swords and a handful of knives for battle. The swords and general weaponry are as follows because I’m so into this stuff that I had to look up specific types of swords and now you get to reap that reward:

Two sabers, very slight curve in the blades. Their sheethes are strapped to her back so she has to reach over her shoulders to bring them out. She favors these as she can easily use both simultaneously; they’re both balanced for one-handed use.

A large longsword, built for two-handed combat. She picked this one up by accident the last time she was caught in combat without her favored weapons. It’s quite heavy, inconvenient, and generally a nuisance. She would use it to chop wood if she weren’t afraid of spurning her god in the process. It sits on her left side and tends to swing around and bruise her thigh while she walks.

A small axe hangs at her other side. It’s not for killing but would do the job. She uses it for wood because she relies on fire for food and warmth.

She also has a decent amount of knives. Her first was actually a small knife, more for the purpose of eating, that she shoved through an assailant’s eye when she was twelve and new to the Pommel. She carries it with her because it comes in handy and because if she didn’t she believes her god would kill her. She also carries a thick-bladed dagger at her back and a couple smaller knives strapped to her thigh for the purpose of throwing. That’s the most long-range she gets and retrieving them can still be a hassle.

Weaknesses: Talison’s practically useless at long-range. She can throw a knife at a decent distance but she only carries two and after that she’s a sitting duck. No armor makes her a great target for arrows and she adamantly refuses to pick up a bow. She tends not to associate with archers as a result.

Fears: HORSES. She absolutely LOATHES horses to the point of genuine fear. They’re unnatural. They’re ghastly, unnatural beasts with huge eyes and a disgusting, mishapen skeleton and being around them makes her antsy. She has never mounted one and doesn’t intend to change that, in fact she’s repulsed by the thought. It would make her life much easier but she has nowhere to be and walking for hours on end beats a single minute on a horse.

Beyond that she’s a decently confident person, but does have reasonable fears like being caught in an early winter or her god foresaking her in combat.

Extras! (Romantic Stuff, Goals, Religion Explanation):

Personal Goals: Her primary goal is to introduce people to the Iron Pommel, which she tends to do by traveling to the most impoverished areas of large cities and speaking with the people with the least to lose. The threat of losing familial ties isn’t as significant there. Her secondary goal is to, ahem, encounter members of the nine great houses of Westeros. It’s a fun game for her and gives her an incentive to travel beyond the South. It’s like a more ambitious version of “making the eight.”

Potential Romantic...Folks: Petyr Baelish, Ramsay Bolton, Sandor Clegane, I Could Go On

Additional: The only reason she hasn’t contracted skin cancer from the amount of sun exposure she gets is because I don’t want her to die. On particularly hot days she sometimes forgos her leather armor and shirt entirely purely for the sake of Big Gay, and she has a brand on her mid-torso from first joining the Iron Pommel. It’s small and decently healed now but burn-damage that severe is typically visible for a long time after it’s done. It’s in the shape of the tip of a sword, nothing fancy. Beyond that she has scars all over her body - anyone who fights as much as she does would - but they’re mostly old as she’s good enough at anticipating blows by now to deflect or get out of the way.

Religious Explanation (Still workshopping! If any parts seem overpowered PLEASE don’t hesitate to let me know!):

Name/Deity: The Iron Pommel; The High Warden of Steel

Followers: Iron Wards

Lifestyle: They’re a nomadic people who tend to travel alone. Upon converting to the Pommel, one relinquishes all familial ties. No surname, no banners, no home - they must instead strike out on their own to better their skills relentlessly and collect stained souls for their God. They don’t actively kill people for the sake of it, but they are honor-bound to accept a challenge.

They are nomadic during the Summers but must settle during the Winter or else sail as far south as they can reach to wait it out. They can’t always rely on the dwindling respect for their people to secure them a place in a known house and, especially recently, have been forced to stay in the shadows of southern cities like King’s Landing, Highgarden, and Sunspear.

The religion’s forces rely exclusively on recruitment. Members cannot have children and every winter brings the death of droves of Wards who lost the race against the cold. Their numbers dwindle as a result, and the urgency to convert has risen dramatically since the past couple winters, especially with the fabled ferocity of the oncoming season.

Beliefs: They believe that upon killing a person, that person’s essence becomes imprisoned in whatever weapon was used to end their life. Because of that, they carry with them every weapon they have ever used to kill a person. The process of blessing a weapon to be fit to house the souls is incredibly ritualistic, as is the process of maintaining them. They have to be cleaned and sharpened every single day. Otherwise, the protection they believe they receive from their God will be rescinded as punishment. Because of the strict rules about bringing every weapon with them coupled with their nomadic lifestyle, Wards often restrict their weapon use to the blades already at their disposal. Talison herself has three swords, which isn’t unusual for her people but can make her cleaning routine tedious.

Status/Common Knowledge: They were once vastly respected and commonly known but as their numbers have dwindled, the Iron Pommel’s name has shrunk with them. The more educated and wealthier tend to have a grasp of them but the youth of the common people either don’t grasp the gravity of their position or have no knowledge of them entirely. Among soldiers the mindset varies: either they’re looked up to as loan warriors or regarded as pretentious scum. There’s also their more progressive policy of inviting women into the order which clashes with norms on a number of levels--the sworn lack of childbearing and skilled wielding of weapons to name a few.

Identifiable Traits: There is no particular form of dress for Wards but they do receive a brand when they first join. It’s a clumsy business as there isn’t any particular place for Wards to go to get their mark. Typically the converter holds one of their blades over the fire until it’s red and presses it to the newcomer as an act of spreading the High Warden of Steel’s blessing and the transaction ends. Talison’s is on her torso, above her gut, and it’s quite small now.

As they don’t typically walk around naked, the best way to identify a Ward is by the ridiculous amount of weaponry they’ll be carrying combined with some form of lightweight armor, if any. They can’t afford to be weighed down by plate- or chainmail and tend to gravitate towards leather instead.

Statistics: As previously mentioned, numbers have been dwindling at an alarming rate. The Long Summer brought some relief for the trend, but the past couple decades haven’t been kind. Where there used to be hundreds in Westeros, dozens in every large city, now one would be hardpressed to find more than one even in the Capitol. It’s rumored that a steady number has been moving down south to settle in Dorne but the truth of the matter is unknown.

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warofshadowstheorder · 3 years

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Chapter 01

It was summer and the days were long and hot. Dawn had broken, and while the sun was out the morning air still clung to the last remnants of the cool night air. The streets were quiet for the most part but the city air was rife with anticipation. It focused on the pavilion that was the central hub of the town. The eyes of the entire world would be directed to it that night, and the locals were especially looking forward to it. But there were two men who weren’t very excited at the moment.

In anticipation for the evening’s event a 24-hour detail of security guards had been placed on the pavilion before the arrival of their federal counterparts. The graveyard shift was being relieved, in every sense of the word, and the morning shift took over.

“How ya doin’” the first guard said after he and his partner had bidden farewell to their predecessors.

“Okay,” the second guard said, “it’s too f#$%ing early for this f#$%ing shit.” He brought out a Thermos and filled the plastic cup with a helping of steaming hot coffee. He brought it to his lips and winced slightly as he took it in.

“Damn that’s good,” he said after taking a breath and gesturing to his partner, “you want some?”

“Nah,” the first guard said as he brought up a can of Monster and very lightly shook it a few times.

“Trust me,” the second guard said, “this is my wife’s own blend. It’s a helluva lot stronger than the shit that comes in a f#$%ing can or bottle.”

“Thanks all the same,” the first guard said, “but this has always been f#$%ing good enough for me.”

The two guards indulged in their respective stimulants and passed the next several minutes in silence. They were immediately brought back to the present when a black Honda Civic drove toward the parking lot. They tensed slightly and reached toward their guns but relaxed when the car slowly pulled into a parking space a significant distance from the front gate. They stood in anticipation, and what followed was an incredibly welcomed surprise.

The driver’s door opened and a very beautiful 28-year-old 5 foot 6 inch woman with long flowing deep red hair stepped out. The way she exited the car seemed as though she deliberately wanted to tantalize the guards. She exited slowly, standing up to her full height and revealing her flawless body. She was dressed in black relaxed-fit pants with a pair of matching flats and a white t-shirt, her eyes concealed by a pair of cheap sunglasses.

She stretched out a little after exiting the car before opening the back door and getting out two hangers with a business suit on them and a gym bag. She closed the door and locked the car, then began moving toward the gate. Each step she took was firm and methodical, but at the same time done with a gentle grace.

“I’m going to have to stop you right there miss,” the guard nearest to her said when she approached, “I don’t know if you’re an Octagon girl or a fighter, but the MMA event isn’t until Thursday. The pavilion’s closed down until then except for authorized personnel.”

The woman blew a big purple bubble with her gum before setting down her sports bag and reaching into the right back pocket of her pants to produce an I.D. holder.

“How’s this?” she asked casually as she handed the I.D. over and removed her sunglasses to reveal a pair of arrestingly beautiful dark green eyes that both guards knew would never be surpassed by any others they would see in their lifetime.

After a moment, the guard looked at the badge and I.D. The name on the I.D. read Alexis Rose Bledsoe, the photo was an exact match, and the badge was for the U.S. Secret Service. The guard looking over the I.D. was having the biggest foot-in-mouth moment of his life, and the other guard was able to tell from his compatriot’s reaction that the beautiful woman was definitely authorized personnel.

“Yeah,” the guard with the I.D. managed to get out sheepishly, “this works. I didn’t think you people would be arriving until later.”

“I came early,” Bledsoe remarked coolly, “if that’s alright with you.”

Not wanting to further embarrass himself, the guard simply waved Bledsoe forward. She took her I.D. back and picked up her gym bag before walking past them and into the pavilion. The guards both took lingering gazes at Bledsoe as she walked past, enjoying every moment until she was out of sight.

“Damn,” one guard said, “I’m in the wrong f#$%ing line of work.”

Bledsoe walked straight to the women’s locker room, spitting her gum into a nearby trash can, and found a vacant locker. She hung up her business attire and set down her gym bag. She took out a white tank top and a pair of black shorts along with a pair of white socks and running shoes. She took off her clothes, leaving on the sports bra and panties she wore underneath, and placed them in the locker.

She took her time getting into her workout clothes, using the time to relax and prepare for what was ahead. She sported a 115-pound athletic and toned figure forged over decades of dedication and hard work. After dressing she tied her hair back in a ponytail and wrapped a wrist strap with an iPod inside around her arm. She then took out a water bottle and filled it at a nearby fountain.

She took her gym bag and made her way outside to one of the upper levels of the pavilion. The pavilion was primarily used for hosting sporting events and had a small gym to cater to visiting athletes as well as the local teams that played there. Bledsoe’s adamant desire to get in a workout before the day’s event was the reason for her early arrival.

The gym was pretty simple, featuring some treadmills, a punching bag, a few weight machines, and a chin-up bar. Bledsoe did a few stretches, selected “The Guns of Brixton” on her iPod, and then went to the bar. She took a deep breath before jumping up and wrapping her hands around the cold metal. The first one was always the most difficult, but once she completed her first chin-up she settled into the familiar rhythm of continuous strain.

Every time she lowered herself down only to pull herself up she felt invigorated and empowered by demonstrating her strength. As she continued, she relished the feeling of control and power coursing through her. The music only enhanced the experience, and she continued until she completed a set of ten and one extra.

She released the bar and dropped to the ground, taking a very satisfied breath after landing. She gave her muscles a few moments to relax, then went to her bag to take out her hand-wraps and grappling gloves. She wrapped her hands, then put on her gloves and moved to the punching bag.

This was by far her favorite activity, and as aggressive Hard Rock from her iPod permeated her senses she unleashed her full range of ability on the helpless bag. Every strike she landed caused her to smile inwardly. It all brought back memories of the many times she’d used that particular set of skills to triumph over various adversaries.

She moved around the bag in a fashion similar to a boxer, but with much more grace, speed, flexibility, and precision. Alternating between punches, kicks, and blows with her elbows and knees, she attacked with a controlled fury that would make any person thinking she was just another pretty face think twice.

She continued to strike the bag after a few songs had run their course and her tank top became saturated with perspiration. She relentlessly pummeled the bag until she got to the point where she could no longer lift her hands to punch…then she hit it a few more times. She stopped and let out several labored breaths before going to her water bottle and draining it with the same fervor she’d dedicated to her previous activity.

After a few minutes of sitting down, and some softer music, she refilled her water bottle at another nearby fountain, did some Ballet-style stretches for her legs, and programmed one of the treadmills for her workout. She put her iPod on a specially-made playlist and let the music be the driving force for her workout as she got started.

After nearly an hour on the treadmill, Bledsoe looked at her watch and saw that it was time to be concluding her workout. She hit the cool down button on the treadmill and slowed to a walk for a few more minutes as she once again drained her water bottle. After the cool down period was over, she stepped off the treadmill to collect her gym bag and equipment. She then walked back to the locker room.

She disrobed completely, let her hair down, then took a towel, bottle of body wash, loofa, and bottle of shampoo/conditioner out of her gym bag. She went into the shower area and turned one on, her muscles still sore from her intense workout, and waited for it to heat up. When the water reached an ideal temperature, she stepped under it and immediately felt a rush of pleasure course through her body as the hot water washed over her.

After taking a few blissful moments to allow the feeling of the water to rush through her, she prepared the loofa. Once she was satisfied she began to scrub her body. She was sure to get everywhere for a thorough cleaning. She cleaned in very smooth and thorough strokes, except for two spots; two small identically-shaped scars on her stomach just under her sternum and above her left breast. She’d become proficient at cleaning around them and letting the flowing water clean them and the immediately-surrounding area.

She finished washing her body then did the same to her hair. After her shower, she dried off and took a hairdryer out of her gym bag to work on her hair, careful to maintain eye contact with herself the entire time. When she finished she could hear male voices outside. Knowing that it was almost time for the preliminary briefing, Bledsoe quickly finished drying her hair, brushed it until it was flowing, and tied it back in a tight bun before dressing in her professional attire. She reached into her gym bag and took out a pack of grape Bubblicious, putting another piece in her mouth, before locking up her things and leaving.

She stepped out to see a few other agents dressed in a similar manner to herself moving to higher levels of the pavilion. She followed suit and moved up to the boardroom in the pavilion normally reserved for meetings between management and other officials who either ran the pavilion or passed through for events. Bledsoe found that she was one of the last agents to enter and that several of the others had already settled in.

The agents had been hand-picked by Secret Service Assistant Director Peter Andrews, who himself had been a highly-regarded agent before being moved to his current position, and were designed to provide the best protection while not being overly numerous.

Bledsoe had been in the Secret Service for 5 years, but was new to protection duty after having spent her career in Anti-Counterfeiting. She’d come to know a few of the agents in the room, mostly by reputation. They were all there for a briefing on their mission for the evening, and although the information that was to be presented was of vital importance every one of them knew that getting through it would be a challenge.

Bledsoe saw an empty seat in the back and made her way to it. On her way over she saw several agents already engaging in whatever activities they employed to keep awake and focused. The two agents she knew best were Tyson Kowalski, who was quietly slicing away portions of a piece of paper with a fairly large pocket knife, and Alejandro Cruz, who was turning a coin he got from his time in the Army’s 5th Group Special Forces over the tops of his fingers.

“Good morning,” agent Jamison Taylor, the head of the detail, said in a voice loud enough to command the attention of all present “we’ve all been through this drill before and I don’t need to stress the importance of tonight.” He pressed a button on a remote and a diagram showing the layout of the pavilion was projected onto a screen behind him. Different points were labeled with agents’ names and Taylor held a laser pointer in his other hand.

“As you can see,” Taylor continued, “the layout here is pretty similar to most of the other venues we’ve worked on in this campaign. But, as you well know, we can’t afford to get lax on this. I don’t have any special instructions for tonight that differ from our typical protocol. However, tonight we must be no less diligent than ever. Those of you who’ve been here pulling surveillance have given us excellent intel about possible security risks. For those of you who haven’t, here’s the rundown.”

Taylor began the often tedious process of conducting the briefing in earnest, focusing specifically on every, including those that to the outsider would seem irrelevant, detail gathered by agents who had been conducting surveillance around the pavilion and surrounding areas.

Many of the agents, including Bledsoe, felt that Taylor’s briefs went at least an hour longer than they needed to. Bledsoe tried to be positive and give Taylor the benefit of the doubt by rationalizing that his lengthy briefs were merely a manifestation of how seriously he took his job and assignments.

The brief dragged on, and those in attendance did their best to catch every detail and remain focused. Bledsoe blew a few big bubbles with her gum, careful to ensure that she wasn’t noisy enough to be a distraction to the other agents. After some time, Taylor concluded the brief.

“If there aren’t any questions,” Taylor stated before pausing to allow for any questions or input from his audience, “then we’ll move out for our final checks and then I want every one of you in position. Those of you on the escort squad will move out with me, the rest of you report to Agent Shaughnessy. Dismissed.”

With that a small group of agents moved to Taylor and then exited the conference room. The rest of them gathered around Agent Shaughnessy, a tall and stocky man with dark hair in a flattop and a stone-faced expression. Bledsoe and the other agents gathered around Shaughnessy.

“Okay,” Shaughnessy said with a deep strong voice, “if any of you tuned out the bulk of Taylor’s brief…you were right to do so. It’s basically the same drill tonight as we’ve been going through. There aren’t any unique threats in this area, and the surveillance intel didn’t bring up any red flags. So, usual procedure, everyone get to it and radio me when you’re in position. Move out!”

Shaughnessy waited by the door as the agents left and began to go about their respective tasks. He prided himself on being at least somewhat familiar with every agent in his group, at the very least he could place the correct name with each face. As each agent left, Shaughnessy would call them by name and give them some words of encouragement.

Bledsoe was one of the last agents to leave, Shaughnessy sent her off by saying “good luck bubbles.” Bledsoe responded by rolling her eyes and scratching the back of her head with her middle finger as she walked past Shaughnessy. She walked off to the stairs leading up to her assigned position, again depositing her gum into a trash can on the way up.

#novel #action-adventure #fantasy #historical fiction

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holidcy · 4 years

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i am actually embarrassed to say how long this intro too me to write out ? so im not gonna say it ! it’s not like it took be 3 hours or anything 👀 . and for what ? idk because this intro is a mess . but anyways ... i’m mia , i’m a whole twenty years old which really just feels like a glorified teenager but whatever , we’re not here to talk about that right now . we’re here to talk about my lil baby holly . guys she is literally the sweetest human ever ? but also ? to sensitive for her own good and really the good of those around her ? very happy feet energy coming form this girl . but without further ado , below you can read up on holly & if you wanna plot give this a like . also my discord is 𝖒𝖌𝖐'𝖘 𝖜𝖍𝖔𝖗𝖊#9789 if you wanna plot there or just generally chat !

𝐆𝐄𝐓 𝐈𝐍 𝐃𝐄𝐏𝐓𝐇

full name: holiday elena addams nickname: holly ( she’s basically turned this into her name , not one really calls her holiday ) , holls , elle ( by her parents ) birthday: june 3rd birthplace: chicago , illinois hometown: highland park , illinois ( although the family home was located in highland park her parents would in chicago and holly even attended private school in chicago ) residence: new york city , new york nationality: american ( est. 1999 through birth ) ethnicity: english ( maternal & paternal , 50% ) , polish ( maternal , 25% ) , spanish ( paternal , 25% ) religion: catholicism orientation: heterflexible ( she claims being straight but in all actually she’s not closed off to anything despite not having much experience outside the opposite gender ) languages spoken: english ( fluent , first language ) , spanish ( fluent , second language ) , polish ( conversation , third language ) , mandarin ( conversational , fourth language ) . father: leandro oliver addams ( 49 years old ) was born & raised in chicago , illinois by a politician / businessman & a philanthropist . leandro went on to take a little bit from both of his parents as he is a highly esteemed business tycoon as well as being regarded as one of the most charitable men in the world . ( relationship: there has never been a day that has gone by where the two didn’t get along . if there is anyone in this world who gets holly it is her father . truly , daddy’s little girl . the two of them are as thick as thieves . ) mother : susanna renee addams ( nee daniels ) ( 48 years old ) was born & raised in long island , new york . the daughter of a hedge fund investor & a stay at home mother . susanna grew to be an amazing cosmetologist and which the help of her father’s amazing business mind she was able to start up a salon in new york city . she gained the most devoted clientele , loving every second of her work . she took a break for almost a decade before deciding to return to the beauty industry . today she has salons across the globe in chicago , los angeles , toronto , london , and new york city . ( relationship: susanna often had to play bad cop when it came to parenting and because of this the two butted heads quite often whilst holly was growing up . despite this , her mom is her role model and the two have always had a friendship that underlined their mother - daughter relationship . ) social class: upper education: attending new york university ( s. 2018 ) she spent her first year of university at usc , she’s majored in creative writing at both universities career: author ( her book is a coming of age mystery called privilege that she’s recently admitted to writing the full book during a coke binge ) , internet personality , philanthropist , socialite , and student notoriety: being apart of the prominent addams family , amassing over 32m followers on all social media platforms , publishing a new york times best selling book at the age of seventeen . weight: 120lbs height: 5′5″ hair color: brown ( with blonde highlights ) eye color: brown positive traits: benevolent, high spirited , extroverted , romantic , honest , affectionate , intelligent , friendly , ambitious , passionate , approachable , charming negative traits: immature , vain , garrulous , critical , sensitive , stubborn , inattentive , naive , sarcastic , obsessive , insecure , impractical , irritable likes: anything strawberry flavored , flowers , driving fast , pink , watching the first snow fall , birthday parties , lips gloss , netflix , sunkissed skin , dogs , peanut butter , agatha christie , redecorating , driving with the windows down , long plane rides , denim jackets , taco bell , orange juice , makeup , sports , female empowerment , online shopping , fresh berries , roller skating , photography , writing , tea dislikes: liars , driving in the snow , coffee , having no siblings , deep water , bad drivers , body shaming , pizza , hateful people , being rushed , cuss words , repetition , disloyalty , being alone , horror movies , dentists , silence , cheap perfume , criticism , the unknown , traffic , wine , poptarts , small spaces , hobbies: reading with a hot cup of tea , video editing in the back of a car , smoking before bed to help fall asleep , going out to eat with her parents , napping , hiding alcohol in her bedroom , painting alternate universe cartoons , attending big soirees , stashing drugs in jewelry boxes , sleepovers with her closest friends , talking the dogs on walks , early morning instagram lives , old disney marathons , scribbling in a notebook while snuggled up in bed chara inspo: olivia baker ( all american ) , leila faisal ( all american ) , tan france ( queer eye ) , elena gilbert ( the vampire diaries ) , dorothy gale ( wizard of oz ) , lucy pevensie ( chronicles of narnia ) , lara jean ( to all the boys i loved before ) , elle woods ( legally blonde ) , jeffree star , jenny humphrey ( gossip girl ) , cassie howard ( euphoria ) fashion inspo: vsco girls , bella hadid , megan markle , rihanna , selena gomez , perrie edwards , emma watson aesthetics: ghostly sounding music playing as background music to a pen to paper , eyes widened at the chance to do something positive , the annoying beg for approval , infectious energy , a pout so crippling , the swell of regret as you sneak a bottle into your bedroom , tanned skin tousling with silk sheets , big eyes threatening to shed a tear , the zip of a pink mclaren

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐇𝐎𝐋𝐈𝐃𝐀𝐘 𝐄𝐑𝐀

holly is the only child to leandro and susanna addams ( the addams family 👀 ) . she was born with not just a silver spoon but the silver spoon . the addams are a prominent american family , that are regarded as one of the leading industrialist during the gilded age . in short her families been billionaire rich for a long time and are known as one of the families to bring wealth to the city of chicago . she was incredibly spoiled growin gup as you would assume but by the grace of her parents teachings she was anything but a brat . she had being filthy rich and being an only child working against her and she still managed to be the most giving and down to earth child . from a young age holly would give her toys to other kids during play dates & ask her parents if she could donate the things she didn’t use anymore to the less fortunate .

although her father had a busying career as he took over the family company just a year before holly was born , but in spite of that he always made time for his family . luckily her mother had stepped away from her career soon after meeting holly’s father , so she was able to be a stay at home mom and be there for every important moment of holly’s life . by the way , susanna was straight of of a real housewives show only just an overall better person ? they had dinner together as a family every night , threw parties at the house for every big moment in holly’s life . everything from birthdays , graduations , academic honors , to becoming captain of the cheerleading team and everything in between warranted a celebration in the eyes of susanna and leandro .

she grew up extremely sheltered , mostly because her parents wanted to keep their little girl well their little girl . they didn’t want the world to taint her . she went to church every sunday and even wednesday nights , if she wanted to have a sleepover it was always at the addams household , and her parents met the parent/s of every kid she befriended growing up .

despite their attempts her parents couldn’t shield her from one thing . getting her heart broken and at sixteen she experience her first bout of heart break . the boy she’d falling head over heels for just stopped talking to her one day , with no rhythm or reason he moved on to another girl with a blink of an eye . she couldn’t understand why ( pst ? it was because she slept with him and that was all he wanted to begin with ) someone could be so cruel an play with someones heart like that . it was her first experience of how the world could really work and in all honesty , holly couldn’t handle it . she got her hands on her parents bar room in the house and would literally drink every night before bed so she could sleep .

this soon turned into her going to parties , promising her parents "i just want to hang out with my friend , i wont touch any alcohol” and her promise was always kept , she didn’t touch alcohol at these parties instead she smoke weed and on the chance one of her friends had it on them she’d do a line .

this double life , if you would , didn’t lead to any real issues , at least not while she was in highschool . she still graduated top of her class and even got accepted into her dream school university of southern california . it wasn’t until she was a semester deep in usc that she realized she was losing control over her life . maybe it was a mix of her derailing mental state , being separated from her parents , and the los angeles social make up . whatever it was holly wasn’t too far gone to see she needed help .

instead of going back to school the following semester holly checked herself into rehab . her parents freaked out , unaware their daughter had touched a substance a day in her life . it was a long process and took alot of owning up for her own wrong doings but after a couple months she checked out of rehab and flew out to her parents .

she had decided upon leaving rehab that her best bet directly after getting out would be to surround herself with people who loved her . during her short stint in california her parents had made the temporary move to new york city so that her mom could focus on the salon in the city , so holly transferred to new york university to continue her studies and be around her parents .

she lives under their roof , despite being more than self efficient thanks to her multiple branches of income including her trust fund but she figures there is only so much more time before they leave to go back to chicago that the more time she spends with them the better off she’ll be when they leave the city . speaking of , she doesn’t know her parents will be leaving the city in the next few months . on a positive note they plan on paying the rent in the apartment they live in for her until she finds somewhere she likes better .

today , holly is a sober ( she smokes weed here and there but it’s not a addictive so it fine 🙄 ) and happy . although due to how sensitive the girl is anything could make her snap , she’s incredibly fragile guys . like capable of having a mental break at any moment but like we ignore it because if we bring it up it’ll happen . wooo .

not so fun fact ? when she has an off day she’ll literally sit in her room holding either a bottle she had hidden in her walk in closet or stares at the coke she keeps in her jewelry box . she hasn’t used any of it but she tells herself its there as a reminder when really it’s a crutch for if she ever needs it again , she has easy access .

secret time ? she pushed her ex boyfriend of a balcony while she was drunk . this happened before she went to rehab ... perhaps you could say it was what prompted her to realized her crazy ass needed to go to rehab . ummm , it’s not acceptable and she knows this but one thing we all need to know about holly is that holly + substances + being upset = toxic shit that is always the equation and there is never another answer to it .

𝐖𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐍𝐄𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍

a girl squad or just a squad in general really , give my baby her lil group of people please

maybe a fellow chicago native ? who she dated in highscool and you know is the one who dropped her like a hot potato after she slept with him

ex hook ups

frenemies but more like a blair & lil j circa season 1 situation ?

someone who just doesn’t like her , but like she does everything she can think of to get them to like her

an unrequited ting were he’s leading her one so he can sleep with her ?

or maybe someone has a crush on holly but she just doens’t have the heart to tell them she’s not interested so now here she is kissing and OMG YUP NOW SHES SLEEPING W THEM ...

someone she races ? she loves cars especially fast ones

a we hang out and watch/obsess over sports but the whole time i can’t help but think about how hot you are kinda vibe ?

someone who is v bad for her and they know it but she doesn’t care because she like them so much & he likes her too but knows he’ll hurt her ?!

someone who sees that she might be teetering on falling off the wagon ( maybe they were over her place and saw the stash of substances all over her room ), maybe they’re trying to get her to stop smoking weed bc they feel like for her that’s a huge gateway

smoking buddies where they literally just hot box cars together and munch on taco bell talking about why sound vibrates & shit

someone who she used to party with & be wild with ( could be from chi or nyc because she visited alot as a kid ) and now they feel like she’s a lame bc she’s sober

she’s a good influence on them ? they’re a bad influence on her ? ride or dies ? partners in crime ? only friends when there is a substance involved ? sugar baby vibes ? unlikely friends ? flings ? crush ? friends with benefits ? everytime they are around one another its a fight ? someone she lets crash at her parents place sometimes ? someone she’s backstabbed but like she got tricked into doing it ? anything fluffy , anything angsty ... reall just anything you got , i’ll take !

#wealthyhq:intro #❛ 🍒 ── 𝐅𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐃 𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑. / intro.#did i proof read this ? the lucky conch shell say ...#NO

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vanithesquidwrites · 5 years

Text

Waiting for Water - 2

Crosspost to AO3 for those who prefer to read there. Warning: 10k+ words post.

Maybe it's worth a try.

Maybe it's even worth thousands.

2 - SUBMERGE

You can't say that you've ever had much issue with yourself, especially not by Rhalâim standards.

...Well, much issue with your... physical self, that is. Your vessel. Your mind was a minefield as far back as you remember, and you always knew it, if not the full extent of it. Your body, however, had been reliable. Comforting in its constancy. Jittery on dry days, deathly sick on wet ones, and tense as a bowstring on all of them, certainly — yet nevertheless always there. Supporting you through thick and thin to the best of its ability.

Your lungs had admittedly been a complete disaster, especially early on, but you hadn't much cared once Letho took you in. Your scrawny limbs had come with the height expected of Aeterna, with quick footing, agile fingers, and genuinely impressive aim. Your thin frame proved an advantage when you first walked into the Pit, and when you finally put on weight, thanks to the meat and mushrooms victory let you afford, all of it was wiry muscle, strong and lean enough to dance along and around blades.

Your body hadn't merely been your vessel. It had been your temple. The one and only roof to have never caved in nor let you down. The single home to have held strong, no matter whether it was hunger, blades, bandits, or the Rhalâta itself banging on its doors.

Yet for all of its usefulness, for all its speed and size and strength, your favorite of its features had never been any of those. No — it had been your skin.

You'd always been festooned with scars, even long before the Pit. You had chased every rat, you'd finished every fight — albeit on the floor — and you had climbed the walls in the most literal fashion, active yet weak enough to fall from every ledge and roof in the Undercity. But those scars had never been anything but an advantage, and all the more so once the Dust Pit came to add its own fair share. They were proof of a gift for enduring in spite of pain, proof of a gift for survival, in caves intimidation ruled second only to the Rhalâs. You might have carved some into your flesh yourself, had it somehow made it out of your childhood unblemished.

Through your years as a Rhalâim, on those nights wrath was not enough and memories faded away, you always found a measure of comfort in that scarred skin. Every last burn, pit and blemish was a testament to before, a world beyond the Rhalâta, resurfacing for air when the mask and the robes came off. A criss-crossing web of memories, stretching from toes to fingertips, wrapped around your bones more comfortably than silken cloth. On those nights — on nightmare nights — you would tiptoe between bedrolls, volunteer for any duty that would take you into the caves, and there, hidden in dark corners, you would take your gloves off to cradle yourself in your scars, in the little reminders of why you were there at all.

All of the others, your so-called family, had shunned the pain of life and the marks it left on their hulls. You had embraced it. Reveled in it. Relished the way each cut and bruise would sting against the Temple floors, throbbing along with your heart, a myriad small treasons you could privately indulge in. Letho's face would often fade, and wrath could sometimes abate; scars stood eternal, untouched by the Father's words. He had taken your family, taken your home, taken your memories, even taken your name, your hair, and your choice of clothes — but he could never erase the past from your skin, and every look at your bare hands, every glance of your exposed arms, kept the pain that propelled you ever onward fresh and new. Sharp. Honed and ready for battle, just like your body always was.

Throughout all of those empty years, wrath and revenge may have buoyed you, and lies and murder sheltered you, but it had been that blanket of old wounds that kept you warm at night.

And so here you fucking are, former Voice of the Father, former Champion of the Pit, petrified by the sight of soap.

You throw an angry glance at the offending object, still sitting in the mercenary's hand, on the other end of the bath.

You had been doing well, so far. Not one serious argument in three days, be it with the tavern patrons or the mercenary. One small scuffle on the first day, yes, but an hour spent chopping wood outside with the woman had calmed your nerves as efficiently as balm on a wound. From then on, nothing had gone amiss. Not even when the woman argued you should bathe before leaving. You'd carried the washtub upstairs, brought up your half of the water, offered the innkeeper to wash the linens afterwards if she would lend you a cauldron to heat water by the fire. You'd managed to undress. To sit in the water. You'd even managed to convince the mercenary that sharing the washtub would be practical, less likely to leave her with naught but cold water and you with nothing but silence to try and occupy your thoughts.

You'd much rather have slept alone, and bathed alone, and been alone — but if there is any lesson of value to take from the past few days, from the cliff and the travel and all the empty years before them, it's that you don't actually handle being alone very well.

All your small compromises with isolation had worked perfectly, too, from the forced politeness to making yourself share the bath. You hadn't slipped, not even once. Not until that damn soap, lying inconspicuous in the woman's outstretched hand, forcing you to acknowledge your skin all over again. To realize that your temple had stood on rotten foundations.

That its artificial flesh has never been yours at all.

You look down at the hands, clenching a wet rag in the lap. You look at the burns and the old scars, half-hidden under bloody grime and the wrinkles of bathwater. You try to find a truly old one, one that could precede the Rhalâta, the Dust Pit, the Father, the experiments. The time you had been daft enough to try and lift Letho's so-called kettle from the fire with your bare hands. The time you sliced your thumb open peeling potatoes with Torus, and Sha'Gun had to sew it closed herself while Letho held your arm. The time you threw Nessah's stupid old wooden bear onto the roof, and Letho wouldn't speak to you until you'd rubbed your fingers raw climbing to retrieve the damn thing.

You think, and look, and think and look some more, turning the wet limbs to and fro in the candlelight — but the years down in the Pit have made patchwork out of the skin, and nothing looks so much like an old childhood scar than scores upon scores of others.

You wish you could have fought with Brother Sorrow and survived, somehow. Or been disciplined by him at some point. Or even simply not — not done what you had. Perhaps then you would have something real to remember Letho by, rather than the tatters of a dead child's memories. But no, that would only be yet more masquerade, wouldn't it? Brother Sorrow was no more Letho than Brother Wrath was Tharaêl Narys, in the end. Just a pair of counterfeit echoes chancing to meet in the void, both pretending that they were real.

"Tharaêl?"

The name brings you back to the present, to the half-filled washtub and the mercenary you share it with. She looks even smaller, even more out of place, without her steel plate to add some bulk to her diminutive frame. Wrapped in nothing but a towel, she looks almost childlike; as if time parted ways with her when she was all of twelve winters and then chose to return only two full decades later, to carve wrinkles across her face and spatter her with the small burns you had mistaken for freckles.

She sits staring at you, black hair dripping dirty droplets, black eyes empty as ever — yet the tilt of her head manages to convey concern, somehow. The hand that had been holding the soap is folded onto her lap, the soap itself nowhere to be seen.

"I was trying not to interrupt," she says, sounding almost apologetic, "but you still haven't so much as begun to wash, and you've been staring at your hands for a good five minutes. Did I miss a sprain or bruise? Is something wrong with them?"

"...Aside from their not being real?" You stare at the mercenary woman in disbelief, uncertain whether to feel contemptuous or insulted. "What do you think?!"

"I don't know what to think, Tharaêl, which is why I'm asking you." She straightens herself a little, folding back her legs to bring her knees level with her chest then prop her arms on top of them. An innocent enough gesture, if you could not see all too well that its purpose is to create distance, to erect barriers of bone between her torso and your hands. "Whatever else they may or may not be, they are yours. This is your body. It's the same as twelve years ago, remember? That still hasn't changed."

You do remember, of course. After three days of calm and of the migraine receding, you remember perfectly well.

'The same as twelve years ago.' Comforting words, in the abstract, while stranded on snowy slopes and desperate for direction — but damning ones in retrospect, once able to think clearly. Twelve years ago means the Corpse Pit. Late enough to place arena and Rhalâta on your shoulders, while snatching home and family from underneath your feet.

To Tharaêl Narys, Letho and the Refuge.

To the man born among corpses, the Child Killer of the Dust Pit, Brother Wrath of the Rhalâta? Only anger, death, and the void.

All for nothing, twice over. No result, for no reason.

The soul is the same, the mercenary said. But in practice, what does she know? She has not studied the Rhalâs, has not read through the Father's notes. She has no idea what he did or how his experiments worked. She is self-taught, by her own words, guessing her way through your memories and the Father's soft-spoken lies. A talented Sleeper, but a Sleeper all the same.

"Can I?"

Your eyes return to the woman as her voice pushes past your thoughts, and you find her own open hands held out towards you.

"Look at them," she says, clearly mistaking your reticence for lack of comprehension. "Can I? It's fine if you don't want to, I just — I might see something you don't."

You hesitate for an instant, torn between your constant desire for more information and your increasing reluctance to being examined. You enumerate to yourself the reasons for and points against, the whies and why nots of giving the woman insight into you, be it your vessel or your mind. Still, in the end, one thing alone affects the decision you make: that the woman was as disgusted with the Father as you were.

You give her your left hand, let her splay it over her knees. She angles it this way and that to better catch the candlelight, folding the fingers one by one, comparing the pulse to her own with a thoughtful frown. She pinches the false flesh, presses into it hard, indents it with a nail to observe how quickly marks fade. How fast the blood — if it is blood — resumes it flow under the skin.

"...It certainly feels and looks just as real as my own hands to me. You even have skin spots and ridges on your nails," she mutters, eyebrows arching upwards in interest. "I honestly can't tell that anything's amiss at all."

You can hear the awe in her voice. The wonder at the Father's work.

You always were my masterpiece.

You startle and jerk the hand back at the memory of the words, water sloshing against the washtub with the force of your recoil. His masterpiece. Hah. Yeah, right. As if someone half as careful and secretive as the Father would leave anything of value to rot in the Corpse Pit! What a fucking joke. To think that you even believed him, for a short moment. Had you been that fucking desperate?

You clench the hands together against your stomach, curling inward around them. Fuck this. Fuck it all. Fuck this— this— this casing the Father had padded with you. Fuck the Father for making it. Fuck the woman for fucking admiring his fucking work. Why did you even come here? What are you doing? Did you think this... this strangeness would somehow just melt away, if you distracted yourself long enough?

"Shit. Sorry. I — I shouldn't have said that."

You uncurl the hands again, staring at the shadow of what is passing for your veins, imagining the flow of whatever serves as your blood. How had the Father even put it all together? Was it built through magic? Grown in some vat? Did he sew the parts to each other somehow, fake guts, false skin and mock-up bone, then shove your soul inside like one would stuffing in a doll? How long had you laid bare on his table, like an insect pinned under glass, a trinket for him to toy with? Did he mold your vessel, did he mold your soul, like so much clay within his hands, just like he did those past eight years? Did his fingers roam beneath your ribs like yours once did through dead bodies, bits of flesh stuck under the nails, blood slathered up to the elbows?

Do traces of him still remain hidden inside of you somewhere? Some mark within the flesh, some signature on bone?

To think you'd believed he might have whored you off to some Sublime, once. Thought that that sort of violation was the worst he'd done to you.

"...Tharaêl?"

The thought makes your head spin, and you try to shake it away like you did headaches and nightmares, but no amount of force or speed seems to dislodge it from your mind. There you had been, mocking the other Rhalâim as they covered from head to toe, playing at pretend brotherhood while smirking at them in contempt. There you had been, the one true disgusting pile of flesh all along, and yet too much of a Sleeper to even begin to notice.

"Tharaêl. Wake up. Wherever you've gone, you're not there."

...That's right, isn't it? You're not here. You've never been here. Only some puppet of the Father's, thinking itself a long-dead child. Holding onto that dead child's memories of his just-as-dead brother, as if he could even recognize whatever you had become. Why would he? You had never met. What need did Brother Sorrow have for some delusional construct? What need did dead Letho have for pretenders clinging to his memory?

The arms hang limp and the chest feels hollow, heartbeat silent, skin gone numb. Air comes in unsteadily. Vision trembles. No, not vision — shoulders. Hands on shoulders. Not the vessel's hands. Shaking? Why would—

—pain erupts on the left side of your face, and your sight violently swivels. Punch? No, too light. You catch yourself on the wet wood of the washtub's edge, blinking in confusion, and raise your left arm to block any further oncoming hits as you turn your head to locate the source of the blow.

The mercenary looks back at you, right arm extended in what you guess to have been a slap.

Time seems to stretch for a moment, with her arm still held out, your own arm still held up, and your stomach churning with the disgust of your last thoughts. But the moment passes, and so does the tension. You let your arm lower, and the woman does the same.

"Thank you for not striking back," she says with an uneasy smile, but you feel so nauseous that you can only nod in response. "Are you alright?"

You almost want to laugh at the sheer stupidity of the woman's question — and you do, for a few seconds, your shoulders quaking all over again. But then the cackles turn to gasps and the gasps themselves into coughs, and you stumble out of the washtub to vomit on the inn's floor.

"Shit," you hear the woman say amidst splashing sounds, somewhere around the edges of your blurring vision. "I'll go grab some rags. Sit down. Here," her wet footsteps approach, and you can feel her put something between your hands. "Bucket."

You nod in silent gratitude, retching into the wooden pail until the vessel can produce nothing more but dry heaves.

The taste of vomit in your throat sends your mind back to simpler times. Better times, really, in the end. Knees in the gut in the Dust Pit, old bread just a little too old, water you'd forgotten to boil. Everything had been so clear, then. No questions of who you were — of what you were — or what you would do the next day. Only the routine of survival, of blades kept sharp and chainmail mended, your stomach filled with whatever had been within reach of your hands. No Seers nor mercenary to cast every word into doubt. No Father to play with your body and mind like you were his toy, to be thoughtlessly cast aside the moment he thought you broken.

"Do you think you can keep going?"

You raise your eyes from the bucket to meet the mercenary's gaze. She kneels off to your side, wrapped in a brand new dry towel, another bucket in her arms — that one filled with vomit-soiled rags. You take a breath in, let it out, wipe your mouth with the back of a hand.

"Yeah," you answer her, pushing your own bucket aside. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"And I'm Loram Waterblade risen from the grave to save mankind," is the woman's response, and you would snap back, were it not for her apologetic smile. "But you truly do need to wash. Well, anyway, I'm already done, so I can leave if that makes you more comfo— alright," she interrupts herself as you shake your head no. "If you want me to stay, I stay. But I am staying out of the washtub and putting on a shift."

"Why? No," you mutter, head still spinning. "I can—"

"—Overestimate yourself because you don't want to seem vulnerable, and end up making everything harder to do in the process? Yes, you can definitely do that," the mercenary retorts, voice kind and mellow to the point of condescension. "Which is why I am going to go cover up some more and spare your ex-Rhalâim arse the discomfort it won't admit to."

That's not— that's not it, your mind wants to scream as she turns to fetch clothes. That's not what the problem is, damn it. How can the mercenary feel so fucking self-important as to think you give a damn?! You've seen your fair share of bodies, each one more mundane than the last. You've seen them bared to entice, bared to humiliate, eaten alive by fleshmaggots and shitting themselves in the dust. You don't care about any of them, and about hers least of all, as long as their flesh never comes into contact with yours.

The problem isn't her stupid, small, weak mess of a body. The problem is that your vessel can't be kept at a distance. The problem is that you can scrub with all the soap the world can hold, and your skin will still be a lie. The problem is that if even the woman can't bear to see it like this, then the one person to have helped, the only one to have stuck by you in over twelve fucking years, will leave you over embarrassment, of all stupid fucking things.

And once she's gone, who will stand between you and the damn window? Who will pull you back from the cliff, the next time the void comes calling?

...Why are you even thinking this? This isn't you. You don't stop and ponder help and bare skin when washing. You don't focus on dying or on whatever the future holds. You're a survivor. You focus on now.

This. Isn't. You. This is only the vessel trying to assert control, to bend your spirit to its will by drowning it in emotion. Equations and chemical imbalances, all of it. You need to be more objective, to remind yourself of the chasm between sensation and truth. Flesh does not get to dictate to the mind what it should think. Let alone false flesh. You know better than to succumb to as petty an urge as this.

You exhale at the thought and squeeze your eyes shut tight, pinching the bridge of your nose between your fingers in frustration. From the Rhalâs to numbness to disgust right back to the Rhalâs. You have no other weapon with which to fend off intrusive thoughts.

That's the whole issue, isn't it. That tearing off your mask and brand can hide the Rhalâs out of sight, but that it will never let you carve it out of your bones, scrape it from underneath your skin like dirt from under fingernails. You can escape the Rhalâta, you can call yourself Tharaêl, but you will still remain a Rhalâim no matter what you do. Because for you to be able to call this mind and memories yours, you need to accept that the Father gave you your soul and vessel — and for you to accept the Father gave you your soul and vessel, you need the Rhalâs to force pain and disgust from your mind.

There's no way out. There never was. There'd been the fall, but you've fought it back long enough to grow afraid of the idea, to want to be pulled away from windows, cliffs, and banisters. To hear the mercenary talk of long-dead souls still stuck in place.

To wonder what happens to souls, once bodies shatter on the ground.

Maybe you should pursue another sort of radical option. Shock yourself out of your feelings by flooding them with stronger ones. Drink yourself under a table, hire the nearest pair of whores, get your life's worth of revulsion done and over with in minutes. You chuckle to yourself as you try to picture the scene: Brother Wrath, pissed-out drunk, framed by the Silver Cloud's harlots in some smoky parlor. Hah. As if.

You'd given it a go, of course. Twice, when you were... what, fourteen? Fifteen? You don't even remember. Coming out of the arena, with the bitch that used to work there. You might die any day, you'd reasoned, so why not try fucking first? But sex had turned out to be just as empty as lust and love themselves. The vaunted origin of half the bullshit in the universe, not to mention most of its art, hadn't been half as good a high as cracking skulls or breaking limbs, half as calming as a blade in your hand or food in your stomach. There'd never been a third attempt, and now... the mere thought of their hands on you disgusts you on the best of days, and these days are about as far from the best as you can conceive.

Something in the line of thought brings your mind to a grinding halt, as if whatever support it had been resting had gone and caved under your weight.

You frown, perplexed, your eyes lost on the still-wet stain your vomiting left on the floor. The idea is ridiculous, yes, but it should not warrant upset. Whores are as they are, certainly, and beacons of disease besides, but nothing to trouble the mind — nothing worse than the Corpse Pit was. And as for this day being about as far from the best as you can—

A strange, distant sort of numbness spreads through your chest and head, and for a moment you think yourself back up the mountain, severed from yourself in ways you cannot articulate. But the moment melts away just like the mountain snow did, and you return to the tavern, still sat on the wet floor, your head and shoulder leaning to the side against the washtub's edge. You look about for the mercenary, and find her sat nearby, in the bedroom's one armchair. Positioned so as to be close, yet face away from the washtub.

"...If I went and knocked up some girl," you mutter through the fading daze, and the woman turns her head back at the sound of your voice. "Would the child even be mine? Can I even— would it work at all?"

The mercenary's brows furrow as her head swivels further back still, but no words come out of her mouth. Her skill for talking your ears off seems inversely proportional to your desire for answers.

"And if it does work," you go on, raising your hands to indicate your chest. "If fucked someone with this thing that was meant to be empty from the start, will whatever child I father be—"

"Tharaêl," the woman interrupts you, pivoting in her seat to come properly face to face. "Do you have some girl that you want to go and knock up?"

"I — no," you stumble over the word, taken aback by the question.

The mercenary's lips twist into a sarcastic smile.

"I figured. And do you want children?"

"No."

The question bears no thought. Absolutely not. No children. Not now, not tomorrow, not ever. Even discounting your nightmares and the issue of your anger, you would make a dreadful parent. You are not father material.

You almost choke on the sheer irony of that last thought.

"Then let it go," the mercenary says, her voice more firm than you've ever heard it. "Look, I don't know you enough to know if this is how you normally act when grieving, or if this is years of repressed feelings falling on your brain all at once. But whichever it is, if you keep trying to think through everything at the same time, it's bound to spill over like this. No thinking of the future until you've been at home for a week, alright? Especially not things you don't want to do. They don't matter right now."

But they do matter, some part of you wants to scream at the woman. You would have wanted to— to— damn it all, you don't even know what you would have wanted. To wonder, maybe. To be able to ask yourself the question without the very idea making you feel faint and nauseous.

You would have wanted to have a choice, for once. Only a choice. It would have been enough.

...Yeah. And you would have wanted Letho alive, Sha'Gun decent, and a pretty pony besides. When has what you wanted ever mattered, and why should it begin to now? The world doesn't care, and it never will. Why do you?

You know better than this, damn it, you think to yourself as you gaze into the bath's still water. To the Black Guardian with what you want; busy yourself with what you have. You have a roof over your head, you have someone watching your back, you would have food in your stomach if you hadn't been a moron, and you have a damn bath to take.

You've clawed your way out of the Corpse Pit, fought your way through the arena, with nothing but determination and the willingness to face pain. This is nothing compared. So your flesh is artificial? Boo fucking hoo. At least it's there. Every last one of the fleshmaggot sufferers lining the caves would give life and limb to be you. You have two working arms and legs, two lungs and ears and eyes, ten fingers and ten toes and ten unfractured pairs of ribs, a head mostly screwed on straight and only five broken teeth besides. You're doing great, by all standards. You hadn't even noticed the body was fake until today. Why would you break down over this?

You're no longer young, frail, and weak. You no longer cough your lungs out everytime the seasons turn. What does it matter if that's because of the Father, sheer dumb luck, or Malphas and his so-called gods playing yet one more joke on you? You are a grown man, for fuck's sake. You can fight this the same way you fought your way out of everything: by gritting your teeth, steeling yourself, and choosing to move the fuck on.

Your mind is sound, and the vessel is functional. That's all that matters in the end.

You're not your vessel, anyway.

"...Yeah," you speak up, meaning the word both for both the woman and yourself. "You're right. It doesn't matter."

The woman's smile becomes a touch more genuine, for all that it still appears nervous around the cheeks and the eyes. You sigh and turn back to the— to your hands. Clenching and unclenching them, watching the way phalanges bend, muscle tightens and relaxes, skin wrinkles over pale blue veins.

It's still the same as yesterday, you remind yourself. Still the same as twelve years ago. Not Tharaêl Narys of the sewers and the Refuge, perhaps, but still Tharaêl anyway. The Tharaêl of the Corpse Pit, the Dust Pit and the Rhalâta. You can be certain of that much. It's not a comfortable truth, let alone a comforting one, but you are quite simply going to have to fucking deal.

You could handle being thirteen and covered head to toe in blood. You can handle being twenty-four in a synthetic vessel.

"Fuck this," you proclaim to the room, hauling yourself back to your feet, taking care not to slip on the still-soggy floor. You let out a long breath, step over the edge of the washtub, and sit yourself into the water, grasping for the white reflection of what you know must be the soap. You clench it between your knees, leaving it aside a moment more, electing to begin your task with a more familiar gesture: cupping your hands to hold water, and raising them to your head to let it cascade over your scalp. There is no shorn hair to rinse off, but the motion remains soothing.

"If I can do anything to help," the mercenary says, "just ask."

"No, there's no— actually, yes," you change your mind halfway through wishing that the woman would shut up. "There is something you can do. Babble. I'm told you should manage."

"Sure," she snorts, turning back within the armchair to face the wall once more. "What do you want to hear about?"

"Anything," you answer. "Something I don't know. The more of my brain is busy keeping track of what you're saying, the less will be free to ruminate on old bullshit I can't change."

"Like a mantra," she says, and you feel surprised that she even knows the word, until it dawns on you that she spent time in the Temple as well. Diligently listening to the Seers' sermons, at that.

"Exactly like a mantra. So do your thing," you tell her. "Ramble ever on. Distract me."

"I can do that," she agrees, and you practically hear her smile.

You inhale and exhale slowly, in through the nose, out through the mouth. You let your eyes fall closed, shut them tight, concentrate on your breathing. Then you grasp for the soap, wrenching it from between your knees, and set yourself to the newly-unfamiliar task of washing.

Once upon a time, there was a castaway — a black-eyed woman from Nehrim, gone overboard while out at sea.

She'd had very little before, the mercenary says of her, and she'd had nothing afterwards, save for eerie visions and a bout of arcane fever strong enough to fall an Ogre. A passing sellsword rescued the poor woman from bandits, shared his work with her for a time, and then off to Ark she had been, in search of an explanation for her sudden arcane talents. The Order had offered some hints, but the woman had been distrustful, unwilling to tie herself to a creed she disapproved of.

And so she'd left, to remain free. For the woman was not only poor and black-eyed, but quite naïve.

Freedom did not fill her stomach, nor did it buy her Ambrosia when arcane fever came calling. She'd tried to gather some pennies, but Ambrosia was expensive — as were equipment and shelter, when one came with nothing but the clothes on their back. And soon, in a story that you know all too well, the woman had found herself stuck between the rock of the fever and the hard place of the Dust Pit.

She'd rebounded, after it all. Motivation could move mountains, more even than hunger at times. She had been so angry at the Masked Men of the Buried Temple, so disgusted by their request that she go and slaughter the lost, so desperate for a salary not filched from the hands of the poor, that she'd gone back to the Order. She'd thought to garner support there, naïve and foolish as she was. It never could have worked, of course; Enderal was no fair kingdom, and Tealor Arantheal not the wise king stories spoke of. But somehow, the woman's strange visions garnered her their attention — and a few weeks later, by the grace of the Sea, she'd found herself exalted Keeper of the First Sigil, in possession of enough goodwill and funds to buy her own house.

Then the castaway-turned-Keeper had been told the world was at risk, and sent forth on a mission as crucial as there had ever been: one meant to rid Vyn of the evil that had borne the Red Madness.

And she had told the world to wait, to come chase the Father with you.

For some fucking unfathomably stupid reason, you presume.

Reconciling the tale with your own experience proves quite daunting. Not because of lack of detail — the mercenary's prattling more than takes care of that issue — or because of the drain on your mind that the washing proves to be, but because of the insanity of the sequence of events. You walked down into the Dust Pit, found yourself looking on the fights of a competent Sinistrope, decided it was she you would try and hire into your cause. But then, some-fucking-how, you walked out of that very same Pit in the company of a Keeper. A Phasmalist Keeper at that, trailed by an ever-increasing army of dead souls, who could prophetize the future by seeing echoes of the past. Then you'd set out to take down the Father, took down the animate but soulless remains of Letho instead, and discovered yourself to be some sort of — some sort of construct. And, last but not least, you found yourself invited to come live in the aforementioned Keeper's own house.

Just like that. Wherever the woman came from, Rhalâim of eight years moving in with Keepers appeared to make sense over there. With not a single question asked, not one guarantee provided.

All because you had volunteered to go hound Rasha that morning.

You have no idea how to feel about any of it, so you decide not to. You take the woman's story as the sequence of sounds it is, file them as pure information, and store them well away in that part of your mind where you keep the Rhalâs and Tharaêl Narys. Once you are fed and rested and as safe as you can ever be, then you will dig through the story again, try to excavate motes of sense from pile upon pile of chaos. You have enough incomprehensible things on your plate for now.

Regarding the woman herself, you only feel more and more torn. You are not so proud as to think yourself above all assistance; nor are you so daft as to spend too much time hesitating. But the lack of demand for reciprocity unsettles you. No one ever gives so much of anything for nothing. No one. That the woman appears to do so means you are blind to the cost — and the last time you were so blind, you woke atop a pile of corpses.

You stare at the backside of the mercenary's head, still reclining against the back of the armchair. You tell yourself that she would not betray you in such a fashion, that the woman has spent too much effort on keeping you alive to wish any harm upon you. But then you remember Sha'Gun standing by your bed and watching, and you remind yourself even years of kindness can hide treason.

By the time you leave the washtub, clean and all too glad to be done, the water is so cold and brown it could have come from the sewers.

You can't help but imagine it to be some sort of metaphor.

It's a matter of mere minutes, albeit quite a few of them, to leave the room as you found it and prepare to leave the Tavern. You get rid of the bathwater by way of bucket and window, while the mercenary makes the bed, sweeps the floor, repacks her bags. You help each other carry washtub and buckets back down the stairs, and, as promised, spend the next hours using it to launder linens, working in companionable silence by the kitchen's fire.

You worry, for a time, that laundry will see you leave late, but the woman explains that lateness is the purpose of the task. She is not eager to see you striding a Myrad's back, she says, so you will be leaving by scrolls — scrolls whose teleport runes lead right into Ark's bustling marketplace. Better to wait for late evening and for the streets to be empty. Less people to see you, less unfamiliar noise to stress you, less chances that the bright sky overhead might trigger your migraine.

You're unsure whether to feel grateful for her concern and foresight, or disgusted all over again by how fragile she thinks you are.

Once all the laundry has been hung and sunlight has left the windows, the mercenary gives your shoulder a tap — for courage, she says — and leads you outside Frostcliff Tavern to pass you a tightly-bound scroll.

"I'll go first and wait for you there," she tells you, giving your shoulder another tap. "Take a moment, if you need to."

You don't need to take a fucking moment to use a fucking scroll, you think, but you simply nod in response. No reason to be abrasive. You've done enough of that these days, and she is attempting to aid you, however clumsy her methods. What manner of fool would you be, if after so much time spent angered by the lack of help, you pushed its belated provider away?

You take a step back as the woman unrolls her own scroll, watches it consume itself in her hands as the magic takes hold, and smiles as her shape scatters into sparks swept by the mountain winds.

"See you at home," her afterimage says, vanishing into light.

You stare at the spot of thin air where the woman was just standing, then let your gaze wander about, taking in the Tavern, the snow, the jagged teeth of the mountains encroaching on the starry sky. You don't imagine you will ever see the place again. The cold and snow may be soothing, but there is nothing for you here. Only remorse, bad memories, and a grave so unbearable to dig you wiped it from your mind.

Letho's head rolls across the tiles, as if it was a ball that had fallen from his shoulders.

You shake the image from your head, like the dozens of times you've done so in the past handful of days. You take a few steps through the snow, hearing it crunch under your feet, feeling the wind prickle your eyes. It takes but a minute for you to reach some sort of outcropping, a ledge of snow-dusted rock jutting out high over the valley. The borders of the mountain range stretch out right underneath your feet, turning first into a forest, then the Dark Valley, further south. All of it hidden by the blanket of night and a sea of fog.

The world always seems so fucking big, seen from outside of the caves. An arena so long and wide, and so littered with obstacles, that there is no hope of flushing out every hidden opponent. No ways to avoid being flanked. No solid walls to put one's back to or to barricade between. No certainty of payment and food at the end of each battle. No formal rules of engagement, no announcer to warn of fights. No arbiter to call their end. No end to the fighting at all.

And there you are, empty-handed. No weapon at your hips, no armor on your back. Not even so much as a reason to defend yourself at all.

You throw a glance at the starry sky, the peaks it frames, the woods below. You set your gaze onto the ground, breathe in and out, steel yourself. You clench your hands into fists, straighten your shoulders.

Two hundred feet, or maybe three. Not quite as high, but high enough.

Last chance to jump.

...But what is it that happens to souls, once bodies shatter on the ground?

You close your stinging eyes, let a shaky breath out, and untie your scroll with trembling hands to let the spell do its work.

Once gravity resumes its pull, leaving you stumbling to your knees on cobblestones sprinkled with dust, you feel, for an absurd moment, as if you have just walked right back into the Dust Pit's ring. The darkness, anxious dizziness, the dry dust against your bare hands, all of it feels so familiar — almost achingly so, after so many years spent kneeling and lying on Temple floors. The Dust Pit had been home, in a disturbing way. More than the Temple ever was, and in the light of retrospection, perhaps more than even the Refuge. The one place where you'd been celebrated as a godsend, rather than seen as a burden best cast aside and left to die.

For a ridiculous, irrational second, you find yourself missing Rasha. Her stilted attempts at concern each time you walked into the ring. That beaming grin across her face each time you made it out alive. The look of surprise in her eyes when you first came to claim her tax — and the fear that grew in its place, when you proved just as concerned with her welfare as she'd been with yours.

She never said a thing, of course. Dog ate dog, when coin was at stake. She'd taught you that lesson herself, each time you'd looked up from a kill to find her collecting her bets.

Your hands clench on the cobblestones as you will the memories out.

"Well, welcome home," a voice exclaims, and raising your head brings into sight the mercenary's pale face, smiling in the flickering light of an arcanist's will-o-wisp.

She does not mention the shudders running through your breath and your hands, so you ignore the way light glints in her suddenly wet eyes, and let her weak arms fail to help you up as you haul yourself to your feet. Your gaze wanders, following the wisp as it circles to and fro, illuminating here a stall, there an old tree, elsewhere some shrubs. Garlands of colorful fanions hang over the plaza like cobwebs, stretch from stone wall to chimney to greet an occasion you can't name.

Barely two hundred feet upwards, and it's already so different. Bright garlands in place of clotheslines. Cobblestones rather than cold mud. Moonlight in place of Starling lamps. Twenty years of soul-crushing work, and not a single thing had changed — but two hundred feet up or down, and there the entire fucking world went and shifted on its axis.

You'd expected as much, of course, but seeing low expectations turn into depressing truths never became any easier.

"The house is just a few yards west," the mercenary interrupts your thoughts, as she seems wont to do. She taps your shoulder once again, with much more assurance this time, even pulling on it a little as she begins to walk. "Come on. Let's get you settled in."

You follow her out of the plaza, distractedly, passing between a pair of buildings to access a stall-lined street. High wooden walls frame it much as they would in the Undercity, but here the road is wide and dry, paved just like the plaza had been, and most importantly of all open to the skies overhead. It seems bright even in darkness — even discounting the pallid light cast by the wandering wisp — and infinitely less cluttered than the main cavern's alleyways.

Had it already been like this, when you came up back then to try and plead with those two guards?

...You don't know. You can't remember.

The woman takes a turn left down the cobbled road, her hand still held against your shoulder. Smiling all the while, she points to a narrow house nestled under a tree, framed by an old smelter and a sharpening wheel. Perhaps a weaponsmith's workshop, before the woman had bought it. Useful to keep your own swords sharp, if nothing else.

Letho's head rolls across the tiles, and you remember, vividly, why you are never going to sharpen your swords ever again.

"There we are," the woman says, happiness dripping from her voice. It mixes with your memories of blood on slate and cobblestones like oil with water, leaving you staring at a fractured image — half bloody corridor to the Room of Paintings, half quiet cobbled street at night. You tear your eyes from the sharpening wheel, willing the thought away like you did those of the Dust Pit, just as the mercenary pulls a key out the lock. You hadn't even noticed her bring it out or put it in.

"It's a bit on the small side as houses go," the woman continues, "but it's really easy to find. If you get lost wandering town, just keep an eye out for the smelter, or ask people to direct you to the old market smithy. Everybody knows where it is."

She turns back to you, smiling still, standing atop the three stone steps of the house's threshold.

"Guests first," the woman proclaims, sweeping her arms in a flourish in the direction of the door.

You cast an uncertain gaze at the door, but shrug your doubts aside. Whatever this may be, you have done, and have survived, worse. Yes, it may be a trap, or a deception of some sort, but this is not the Rhalâta or the Refuge. You can change your mind. You can leave.

Decision made, you grasp the doorknob, push the gate open, and walk in.

From the moment you step indoors, you find that a lot of things change, some of them rather brutally. Most of all your understanding of what the woman means by 'small'.

Her house being 'small' means that it could hold three families, with room enough to spare for the children of a fourth one. A floor with a wide hearth and covered in carpets. A separate chamber, if one without a door. And shelves, so many shelves, all of them stocked with a moon's worth of grain and various pickled foods. What had seemed from the outside to be a narrow abode is also a long one, and what you'd thought a mere high roof turns out to be harboring an empty mezzanine, wide enough to be its own floor. One with a proper flight of stairs rather than a simple ladder, solid floorboards and airtight walls, and even its own small window.

A second floor which is now yours, you vaguely hear the woman say; to be handled as your own house and furnished at your convenience. You wish she would pause there so you could address your returning doubts, but the words keep coming, commenting on the sight from the window and on the banister. She'd offer you the room downstairs to give you privacy, she says, but cannot afford to do so: nightmares and sleepwalking have plagued her her whole life, and make railings and heights — not to mention staircases — a poor choice of environment for her to spend nights in. You can borrow it and her bed until you buy your own, she adds, but it must be available for her when she is not working.

She says even more afterwards, speaks of where to buy clothes and furniture fit for an Aeterna, but you barely listen, still lost in the concept of having your own floor.

You even take a moment to rest your hand on the banister, purely to reassure yourself you are not hallucinating.

The woman fills you a 'small' purse of gold from a casket by the chimney, to buy your furniture and clothes and other such necessities. You start to count the coins and trade bars as soon as she has her back turned, but find yourself stopping once you reach three hundred with pennies left to spare, a sinking feeling in your gut.

Those are likely not the same coins, but you gather the amount is more than simple coincidence. Four hundred pennies, all in all. You would bet your left hand on it.

The advance you'd paid her so she'd join your crusade.

You can't make yourself ask, and so you say nothing; you merely stand, back to a wall, watching as the woman smiles and prattles about her furniture. She lights a fire with a spell and prepares each of you a 'small' dinner of a bowlful of oats, practically overflowing, topped with a boiled egg and a thick slice of salted lard. She has to ask you to sit down before you can force yourself to, joining her at the, for once, truly small table that the room is centered around. Cutlery in hand, you find yourself wishing the bowl was smaller; used as you are to the fasting that the Rhalâs demands, you're quite certain your stomach will not manage to fit it all in, even as empty as it is.

"...Alright, so I may tend to hoard and overeat a little," the woman mutters when you point it out, sounding somewhere halfway between ashamed and grudging.

You take it 'little' too must be put up for amendment.

Not that you don't understand it — not the quantity, but the drive. It took the Rhalâta to wean you off of rationing, of stockpiling all you could find and eating only that which was on the verge of spoiling. Not even the regular meals of the orphanage had managed. You had always kept stashes, hideouts, small corners you would fill to the brim with dried mushrooms and stale bread. A true sewer rat, through and through.

But the amount of stored food is not the part that unsettles you. Nor is it the pile of linens the woman threw over whatever she keeps under the stairs while you'd wandered above, unwilling to trust the reality of 'your' floor until you'd walked on it. You can guess what that must have been — either some manner of religious memorabilia, or whatever tools she plied her Phasmalist's trade with. No, the unsettling part is how prepared everything is. There are two sets of plates and bowls, two sets of silver cutlery. Two mugs, two goblets and two chairs, even as the rickety table barely fits a single person. An upper floor kept clear and clean while the lower drowns in clutter, most of it bags and crates one would expect to find in an attic.

Has the woman been expecting you would need a place to hide? Did she join you on your quest while anticipating failure?

But then why—

"—I'm glad you didn't jump," the woman suddenly tells you, cutting short both your train of thought and your attempts to dent the mountain of oats in your bowl.

I know, you think. The woman wants you on your feet, that much is glaringly obvious. She is as daft as sellswords can be while still staying out of the grave, but she does not strike you as likely to trek down mountains for fun, let alone in the company of helpless, half-blind Rhalâim. Clearly, for whatever reason, she thinks she can draw benefit from your continued existence.

"Why do you care," you ask, bristling at the thought. "You won't take the money. I've brought you nothing but corpses. What do you get from this?"

What do you get from me, you studiously leave unsaid. But even unspoken, the words still hang thick in the air.

The woman looks up from her meal to stare at you, brows furrowing in that way you know to mean puzzlement. She sits almost unnaturally still for a moment, then hastily swallows the oats she had still been chewing.

"I'm just glad you're alive is all," she says, wiping her mouth. "I wasn't going to say it, but you keep looking at everything like you're not sure if it's real. I thought you might need to be told. You didn't jump. You're here. I'm glad."

You feel your hands clench the silver fork and knife as they would your swords, and force them to relax, to put the cutlery aside. The woman, oblivious, returns to her own bowl, the question seemingly resolved to her satisfaction.

Why? Fucking why? Where is the anger, the resentment for the mess you dragged her in? The demand that you quickly find a way to provide for yourself? The reminders that this is just for now, that you must soon be gone? Where is the trap? Is there a trap, or is she truly that naïve? And if she is, then how did she carve her way through the arena? Why did her naivety somehow shield her, when yours had left you drenched in blood and murdered Letho twice?

Why is she so fucking lucky? Why are you? Why is Sister Pride to be killed, Brother Hatred to be stepped over, but Brother Wrath to be brought home and fed and given his own floor? Why couldn't it be Letho living to share a house in the sun, instead of the murdering piece of garbage you've let yourself become?

Letho's head rolls across the tiles, and you can almost imagine the mercenary's by its side, dull black eyes unseeing, sallow skin flecked with red. You stare at the too-full oat bowl, the overfilled shelves and cluttered floor, trying to will consistency into your surroundings, to derive some reason, some meaning, out of the last twenty years.

You find none whatsoever.

"I would have shot you," you state as calmly as you can make yourself. "If that woman hadn't been there, I would have shot you. I would have opened that gate with your corpse and wiped the splatter off my face."

The woman's gaze returns to yours, as unreadable as ever.

"Maybe you would have," she answers, putting her spoon down with irritating calm. "You know, everything that can happen will happen, so if you—"

"I would have shot you, damn it," you snap at her, willing her to make sense.

Your voice echoes, vague and blurry, bouncing under the high roof and the empty upper floor. You instinctively cringe back at its sound. Habit. Useless habit, now. Sound does not carry as far up here as it does in the tunnels, does not risk calling the attention of patrolling Rhalâim. Does not risk drawing the ire of the First Seer upon you.

The woman only tilts her head, crosses her arms on the table.

"You think I don't already think about this all day long? Yes, Tharaêl," she says, looking you in the eye, her expression serious yet on the verge of pitying. "You would have shot me, and on some wave of the Sea, you did. I know it, because I saw it. In perfect colorful detail. Do you know what else I saw? That on some other wave, I defended myself, and you fed the temple instead. And then on yet another wave, we struck each other at the same time, and died bleeding out on the floor while feeling extremely stupid. I presume the Father found it very funny."

You open your mouth to retort, but she forestalls you, raising a hand, refusing to let you interrupt.

"But here," the woman continues, "on the one and only wave of the Sea that matters, you didn't shoot me. I didn't burn you. We walked our way down Northwind Peak carrying each other's baggage. We shared a room, we shared a tent, we shared a bed, we shared a pile of coffins of all things, and we even shared a bath. Since in spite of it all we both seem to still be alive and in each other's company, I think we may as well admit we make a pretty decent team, and let the Sea of Eventualities handle the shoulds and woulds."

...A team.

Has the imbecile even been listening to you?

"Alright," you pretend to concede, unwilling to argue the point with a wall any further. "Let's say we're a team. What now?"

"Blazes, Tharaêl," she chortles, that moronic smile returning to her lips. "Which part of 'don't think through it all at once' is it that you don't understand?"

"What now," you yell at the infuriating mercenary, forcing yourself past your urge to cringe at the increased volume — and you can almost feel satisfaction flow through your veins as the woman's smile fades and she backs into her chair. "What's the plan, huh? What does a reformed Rhalâim do in the Upper City, exactly? I can cut throats and break fingers, but I don't figure that's what Sunchildren look for in their employees. What happens when no righteous man will hire some Pathless Aeterna with scars all over his face? Should I just sit pretty like some prized hound on your oh-so-fancy carpets, while you dump some gruel in my bowl and pat my shoulder every once in a while? What about when you go and get yourself killed playing hero for the Order? What happens then?"

The woman stares at you a while, hands nervously grasping at her elbows. Taken aback by your anger, clearly, in a way she hadn't seemed to be before.

Good. Maybe reality is finally beginning to sink into her.

"...Thanks for the vote of confidence," she quips in a deadpan voice, and you find your hands clenching all over again, nails biting into flesh, pulse echoing through your fingers. "Look, we'll figure that out when I come back. First, I have to check in with Grandmaster Arantheal as soon as I can, and—"

"You're a fucking sellsword of three moons out to fight transcendent beings," you interject, quite done with the woman's nonsense. "You think I need coddling?! Alright. Fine. Fuck you," you snarl to punctuate the idea, "but fine. But do me the fucking courtesy of not making shows of promising grand tomorrows when you don't even know if you'll survive today."

"What? No," the woman practically exclaims. "Tharaêl, no, you're taking this the wrong way, I didn't mean—"

"None of this is mine," you continue, undaunted by what would no doubt be yet another attempt to drown you in false reassurances. "Not the food, not the house, none of it. I can't count on any of it. Stop pretending I can. Just— just stop."

"Tharaêl—"

"—I said fucking stop!"

She does.

...You didn't quite expect that. You thought she would — well, do what she always does. Poke and prod. Insist on ramming herself through doors, barging into corners of your mind where she hasn't been invited. But she merely stays sat, hands resting atop each other on the very edge of the table.

"...Sorry," she mumbles, looking as downcast as you've ever seen her. "You're right."

You practically deflate as she says so, and so does your anger, letting your hands hang limp at last.

The woman sighs, seemingly as drained as you are. She looks to her left, and you follow her gaze — past the chimney and into the shelves, through the rows of fruit and herbs pickled in small glass jars. She stares at them, at the much-too-many baskets of potatoes, the pot of aging vegetables and the sacks of wheat and oats.

Her head slowly comes to hang, and you almost feel guilty.

"Look, I don't have the slightest clue how to manage any of this either," the woman finally admits, and you can hear your breath come more easily as she does, feel some of the ever-building tension leave your shoulders. "I'm making shit up as I go along. I know it. You know it. And I know you know it. I just — I want this to go right, so I'm trying my best, and—"

"—It makes you sound either delusional or blind as a cave fish," you interrupt her half-apology half-explanation. "You want to help me. I understand that. I appreciate that," you emphasize, lest you come to sound like an ingrate. "But I need to know where this field's obstacles are to maneuver around them, and I can't do that if you keep blindfolding me with pretty words."

The woman lifts her head back up to look straight into your eyes, and sighs a second time, nodding.

"This next part is all true," she says, looking much more reliable with that fake smile wiped off of her face. "You're not pressed for time. Not that much. It's like you said: there's enough food in here for weeks. And you have the purse; you can save some and find some place to hide it, if you want. Take some of both, make them last, and you can find some inn room or shack and hunker down for a while. That'll see you through if... if you can't trust me."

By the name of the Sun, finally. Finally, the girl is beginning to talk sense.

Would that it didn't take yelling at her to make her speak in plain Inâl.

"Yeah," you answer her as you ponder her words. "I can probably do that, but only once I know the place enough. You don't improvise stashes of food and money. Unless you want them to be filched by the nearest rat or lowlife."

"I don't figure you'll accept 'open an account at the bank' as good advice?"

Your brow reflexively creases as the woman smiles, but the quirk of her lips is wry and sarcastic this time. Sincere.

A joke.

"No," you say through your own small, faint shadow of a grin. "I won't."

"Well then," she continues, lying back into her seat once more. "If you're determined not to trust local establishments, a day or two should suffice for you to find some sort of backup plan. Shave, buy some clothes and a hat, and wander a little to get the lay of the land. Just... ask people if they have anything they need done for a few pennies, enough to reliably pay for a room at an inn. Carts to load or unload, floors to clean, anything. Be patient, be polite and mindful of people's faith, and you'll find some odd jobs here and there. I did."

It would be a start, part of your mind concedes. A foundation to build on.

The rest of your mind, however, is not so easy to persuade. Working out and about in Ark, provided you even manage to find some work in the first place, means being in sight of the guard. Unable to retaliate, be it against word or blade, without bringing yourself to their attention. No weapon at your hips, no armor on your back, no weapons in your hands but discipline and temperance.

You sigh, eyes lost into the thick oat sludge that still sits in your bowl.

"I can't convince you I mean any of what I say with words, can I."

You blink at the sound of the woman's voice, and let your gaze return to her. She remains sat on the other end of the small table, head tilted to the side, a pensive frown on her face.

"No," you agree. "You can't."

It doesn't particularly please you to admit it. For all that you can never attest to her true motives, the woman has, at the very least, acted loyal so far, if in sometimes perplexing ways. You don't want to compromise it any more than you did in Frostcliff Tavern or the Temple. Not while you have so little else to rely on, so few options to look into.

Not with the cliff so close and the climb so daunting.

"Alright," she answers, nodding to herself. "So I have an idea. How about this." She straightens in her seat, looking into your eyes. "Pick yourself a new name, and I can get you added to the title deed of the house."

The muscles of your back tense all over again as the enormity of the offer sinks in. No one ever gives so much of anything for nothing. No one. Not Sha'Gun, not the apothecaries, and certainly not some random mercenary from the Dust Pit.

You open your mouth to argue, to try and find the secret flaw, the hidden cost of the proposal.

"Why do you want to take my name," is what comes out instead.

You freeze at the sound of your voice, stunned by the sudden gap between your thoughts and words. How...?

"I don't want to," the woman replies to the question you hadn't meant to ask, forcing you to focus on her rather than on your racing mind. "But you're the only Tharaêl I've so much as heard of in my whole life. I've been dealing with the idiots in charge here for a while, and if there is one thing I know for sure about this city, it's that shady fuckers flock together. The Rhalâta deals in loans and in dirty money," she says, raising her left fist. "The folks at the bank, where you'd have to fill the ledgers, deal in investing and laundering," she continues, raising the other. "Tell me the twain never meet in back alleys and cushy rooms," she concludes, clapping both hands together in front of her face, "and I have sunlit fields in Thalgard to sell you. And with you saying the First Seer has ears everywhere..."

She shrugs.

It makes sense. You don't like it, but it makes sense. You've always been free with your deadname, convinced as you were it would never matter again. No doubt someone somewhere, some informant or spy, has heard of Tharaêl Narys, Voice of the Father.

"It's the middle of the night," you say. A weak retort, perhaps, but all you can manage, just as lost in the concept of having property to your name as you had been in that of owning an entire floor.

"And I'm a Keeper of the First Sigil, the Prophet of the Order," the woman shrugs. "What use is having rank, if I can't pull it on Samael Silren? Pick a name, any name, and I can promise you this. I can walk out this door and bring this house back to you, ink on paper and seal of the bank at the bottom. Right now."

You want to feel angry, somehow. To rage and rant at her as you had only mere moments ago. But the offer is more than fair, and well-trod ground besides. It isn't as if you've truly worn the name since the orphanage; only a litany of Dust Pit titles and nicknames, themselves soon discarded in favor of becoming Brother Wrath. You haven't been Tharaêl Narys in over a dozen winters. Haven't ever been him at all, really. Just a construct of the Father's, borrowing his name and memories.

You want to feel angry, but all you feel is numb.

"Letho," you murmur to the woman, hoping you will not have to explain your answer.

Not that you could, if she asked you to. There is no logic to the choice. Only the need to pull the name out of the void gnawing at you. To snatch it away from the Undercity and the Father and let it be spoken under the sun where it belongs. So what if you are not Tharaêl? Letho still existed, still deserved remembrance. And with the true Tharaêl gone, with Letho's body lost to the Father and to Wrath both, who will honor him, if not you?

You expect the woman to question, to argue, to call the choice a bad idea. But all she does is rise from the table and walk into her room without a single word. You hear her pull and rummage in her drawers for a while, even leaving something to clatter loudly on the floor; then she returns, inkwell, quill, and parchments in hand, as if nothing was amiss.

Perhaps she'd expected this choice just as much as your choice to pull back from the cliff.

"Letho it is," she says as she puts down the inkwell and quill by your hand. She unrolls the two parchments side by side on the table, and points to their bottoms, where what you guess to be her own signature lies. "Can you write 'read, agreed, and accepted' and sign these for me?"

You attempt to read the scrolls, but find the task impossible. The words are but lines of nonsense, letters refusing to coalesce into a coherent whole. Migraine? No, your head does not hurt. That... thing the Father called strangeness, perhaps? Wasn't it supposed to affect faces, not words?

Not that the words matter at all. You have no leverage with which to argue the terms of the contract.

No motivation to do so, either.

You sigh and simply sign the damn things, improvising some swirling curls to adorn Letho's name, then hold the parchments out for the woman to take. She does so with a slight frown, but does not comment, praise the Sun.

"Well, there it goes," she says, eyeing your cramped, uneven script. "These should be enough, as long as I'm the person bringing it to them." She shakes the parchments a little, takes a few seconds to blow the ink dry, then carefully rolls them back upon themselves. "We can go there together to discuss specifics when I'm ba— if I'm back. Or you can sort them out with Silren by yourself. Preferably soon. The bank is on the marketplace. Right at the opposite end of the central plaza, coming from here."

You understand the words. Intellectually, at least. You could define each and every last one of them, if asked. And yet somehow, to a degree, none of them register. As if the void had seeped out of you to sap them of their meaning, leaving only husks in its wake.

You look at the woman, for lack of better things to do, and the two of you find yourselves staring at each other, her standing, you sitting. Neither of you appearing to know how to proceed from this point.

A minute passes.

A second.

"Um," the woman eventually says, seemingly first to recover from your mutual lapse of consciousness. "Is there anything that would help right now?"

...Good question. You don't know. Probably nothing. What possibly could help, short of erasing all that happened since your tenth winter?

"Just some quiet," you try to answer the woman, more out of rote than out of any actual desire. "A lot of quiet. For quite some time."

She looks at you again, still frowning, and her mouth opens and closes in silence a few times before she shakes her head and sighs.

"Alright," she answers you. "Fine by me. The spare key is on a nail above the front window. If you need anything, anything at all, you can ask Mimi, right out the door. She's there every morning, brown hair, blue dress, you can't miss her. I'll let her know my outlander Aeterna friend could use some help with directions. She'll take a message to me in the Temple if you need. You'll have to pay, but she's reliable."

You let the words run through your head, wringing what meaning you can out of them. Keys above window. Ask the woman in blue. Outlander friend. Why not. You suppose it could make a good cover story. You certainly feel out of place enough to be an outlander, and it would serve to excuse inevitable cultural gaps.

It could work. It would work. It would provide a few tangible ways of handling your situation.

And you don't care.

Weren't you upset about this only moments ago?

You try to roll the minutes back, to retrieve the annoyance from out of your sudden numbness, or even simply remember why you had been upset at all. What words or poor turn of phrase could have possibly triggered it.

Nothing registers.

You turn your head to the mercenary, thinking to ask her, only to find that she has retreated back into the room. You can glimpse her, or at least her back, clad in the white and reds of the Order and the Guard. Changing to make her words to the Bank carry more weight, you presume.

Funny, when you think about it. Only three moons ago you would have laughed at the thought of ever associating with a Keeper. And now here you are, dining — and presumably soon living — in the abode of one you've known for but a scant few weeks, most of them spent fully unaware of the woman's rank.

"Tharaêl?"

You blink out of your thoughts to find the woman standing next to you again, looking like any other Guard if not for her black eyes and her diminutive stature. A Starling parent in her ancestry, perhaps. She raises a hand towards your arm, then seems to think better of it and lets it fall back down, letting her hands clench together over her stomach instead.

"I'm not Yesha Sha'Gun," the mercenary says, and the words clatter in the void that has been settling over you like a chime thrown into a well. "I have no idea what else I will or will not do, but I'm not going to sell you out. Not to the Rhalâta, not to the Order, not to anyone. I'm going to do my best to do right by you. Please trust in that, if nothing else."

She looks at you, steadily, clearly expecting some form of response. But what can you even say to that? 'I know' ? You don't. 'I believe you' ? You don't even know if the woman believes herself.

"I'm sure Sha'Gun thought the same thing," you answer her, numbness making a mild rebuke of what you would ordinarily voice as violent retort.

The woman's eyes lower, leaving yours to settle somewhere around your clavicle. She nods, quiet, almost somber, and leaves the tableside, grabbing her pack from a spare chair on her way to the door. She opens it and slips outside without any more words, locking the door behind her with two turns of her key in the lock.

You can hear the sound of her boots down the three steps of the threshold, faint echoes in the night, taking your name with them.

You'd only just gotten it back.

A weary sigh escapes your lips, and you push your still half-full bowl aside to lay your arms on the table, then lay your head on top of them. Finally, some calm. Some time to rest, to think without a pair of eyes hovering over your shoulder. The woman feels like nothing so much as a new Seer at times. A kinder one, perhaps, but just as omnipresent in her oversight and her disapproval.

Pushing thoughts of the woman to the side much like you did your bowl, you allow the void and its numbness to blanket you in blissful silence.

You don't know how long you've sat still, head buried in your arms, by the time the sound of paper brushing on wood catches your attention. You jerk back reflexively, head swishing to the side to locate the origin of the sound — and you find it, innocently laying on the floorboards. A letter, slipped under the door.

You stare at it like you would at a dog, half upset by its noise, half pondering its provenance. Still, in time, you manage to push yourself to rise, and cross the room at a brisk pace to pick the letter from the floor. A simple bit of clear parchment, wrapped around other ones — a small note from the bank, demanding a meeting 'within the week', and one of the two deeds the woman has asked you to sign. Now amended with a few lines specifying your ownership of 'the attic', a new seal, and what you guess to be Samael Silren's signature.

Well, there it is. You now own an entire floor.

Just like that. Because.

You keep staring at the house deed as you return to the table, uncertain how to feel about the parchment's existence. You are about to sit back down, hopefully to resume basking in the silence for quite some time, when you notice that the wrapping of the deed and note is not as clear as you had thought it to be — two lines adorn its other side, ink slightly smudged by your fingers.

Keep these safe, says the first one, written in what you guess to be the mercenary woman's hand.

Please still be home when I come back, says the second, more haphazard.

Something in that second line settles uneasily in your gut, tearing a hole there not even the void had managed to open. You try to will it closed, but only find its breadth spreading, leaking into your chest, your arms, the tips of your fingers. You can feel your anger bubble back up from the void at long last, and you kick at the chair, frustrated beyond words.

The force sends it skidding right into the table, and the rickety mess of course picks this time to tilt over, taking its contents with it in its fall. You stand and watch, silent, as the pots and pan spill over, glass jars and earthenware crashing into shards all across the floor. The sludge of the leftover oats splatters the carpet and floorboards, leaving wet, greasy stains in its wake.

Congratulations, Tharaêl, you tell yourself, instinctively sickened by the sight of the wasted food. Five minutes into your tenance, and you've already wrecked the house.

What a fine piece of work you are. Letho would be so proud.

Letho's head rolls across the tiles, and you press the heels of your hands against your eyes, rubbing as strongly as you can. The memory fades back, but the feelings remain — rage and regret in equal measure, wrath and shame and longing and wishing that for once, just fucking once, the arena would let you go.

Well. What did the woman expect? You warned her. This is what you do. You break things for stupid reasons, then you regret it afterwards. And what did you expect, anyway? You knew you should have jumped. Then neither of you would be dealing with any of this.

You sit down on on your haunches, observing the result of your latest outburst. Glass liberally dusts the oats and the lard once held by the pots, making them inedible even if you scooped them up. The pan is unsurprisingly unharmed, and one of the pots seems to have survived the fall intact, but the bowls are thoroughly shattered, as are all three of the jars. At least they were empty, you comfort yourself as you think of the pickled meat lining the shelves. Wasting the lard is bad enough.

Letting out a long, tired sigh, you set yourself to the slow task of picking up your own damn mess, fragment after fragment, one small piece at a time.

There's no saving the broken things, but you can probably wash the stains out of the carpet.

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idolbound · 4 years

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Meredith’s Appearance

BODY TYPE & PRESENCE

Regarding Meredith’s body type, she stands at a tall 5′11″ (180cm) in height, maintaining a fit, lean figure through her adult life.As an adolescent girl, she was quite tall, thin, and lanky, eventually growing into her armor as a young initiate in the Templar Order.

Meredith’s muscular frame gradually developed from the years of hard work and training that followed her initiation. She learned under Ser Wentworth Kell’s watchful eye, day in and day out, first as his personal page, and then as a young knight. She wanted to prove herself better than her ‘templar brothers’ and often pushed herself to keep up with the young men of her age cohort, sculpting her body into the epitome of a templar warrior.

Later wielding Ser Wentworth’s inherited great sword, Meredith maintains a certain finesse and agility in the way that she swings the blade, perfected in her decades’ worth of training. Her lean figure and long legs give her speed in battle, even while wearing a full kit of armor. Her broad shoulders hold the weight of her pauldrons with ease; her core strength is her center of balance; and her legs do not quiver under the weight of her blows.

While Meredith is no longer a young woman, she maintains a regular and active training routine, consisting of both prayer and exercise before dawn.

Along with this, Meredith utilizes her dominating presence and stature to intimidate and coerce people into agreeing with her orders or demands. Her taller-than-average height often gives her an advantage over those who are smaller (and those she considers weaker) than she is to force them into agreement. The way she presents herself with her shoulders back, chest forward, and her chin tilted upwards is a way that also makes her physically look down upon other people; it’s another assertion of her self-perceived dominance.

There are times that a few people stand taller than she does (mainly men, with a few exceptions), but she doesn’t allow them to stare down at her if she can best help it, be it by standing on a taller surface to level the height difference. It isn’t an obvious tell, but if one pays attention, actions like this are all a part of how Meredith presents herself very carefully to the public.

Meredith’s presence radiates power among other people. She is, at her core, a charismatic leader who upholds all that the Chantry teaches. She is a figurehead to Kirkwall’s Chantry and believes she must set herself as the perfect example for her templar knights to follow. This comes by way of her body language, and the way she speaks to other people.

Meredith speaks in a methodical manner. There is a certain drawl to her dialogue that is slow and purposeful, allowing those listening to her to take in what she is saying. Her charisma enables her to promote the confidence of her knights with speeches before heading into battle. People listen to her without questioning her authority (in the early years, at least). She inspires as she leads.

The notion that Meredith “glitters like the sun” suggests that she is a beacon, a white knight in shining armor to protect the people and the city as a whole. She makes it a point to be seen as outstanding, as well as a woman to be respected (read: feared) and doesn’t accept anything less. And that, all starts from first sight.

FACE & SKIN

The years have been somewhat kind to the Knight-Commander; many do not anticipate that she is under the age of 50. The crow’s feet at the sides of her eyes and the wrinkles around her mouth are truly the only initial indicators of her age as the rest of her body is still in great physical condition for her position as Knight-Commander. However, the stress that comes from maintaining the Gallows to her standards and foiling the plots of apostates and blood mages has brought other signs of stress to her body. Primarily, some nights she cannot sleep (in part, because of her PTSD-related hyper-vigilance or due to nightmares) and thus, she often wakes up exhausted, with dark circles beneath her eyes, giving her a particularly haggard appearance.

She has a square-oval shape face with prominent cheekbones and cheeks that narrow towards her mouth. Her chin is square, but comes to a slight point. Her nose is the most forward feature, sloping in a slight concave fashion, with a slight flare to her nostrils. She has thin lips, often pursed together, surrounded by deep nasolabial folds and wrinkles from the corners of her mouth. Her ears are big, hidden by her hood, but are round and stick out to the sides, usually also hidden by her hair when it is not tied back.

Her eyes are the shade of aquamarine, bright and brilliant in all reflections of light and times of day. They are her mother’s eyes, though not quite as vivid. Some would argue that lyrium consumption has made her eyes more vivid over time, but that is simply speculation. Her eyes are round and do not sit too far apart in her skull, set in an average distance apart. Her eyes are fairly expressive, and because of how bright they are, they are one of her most notable features. She is always alert (again, due to hyper-vigilance and paranoia).

Meredith is pale, and the circles under her eyes are rather pronounced, as with any veins or marks upon her skin. She runs an average temperature that is neither cold nor hot. Age has taken its hold, wrinkles are sporadic throughout parts of her body, most notably on her face, back, and hands. She does not blush often, but when she does it is very noticeable given her complexion. Her skin is not too soft, but she has callouses upon her hands and feet; her skin is taut across well earned muscle.

Meredith also has freckles. They are faint across the middle of her face, and were far more prominent when she was a child. As an adult, they appear only in the dead of summer when it is incredibly warm outside, and she spends time out of her office and actually outdoors. She does not tan, but after being in the sun, the freckles upon her face, and shoulders become visible. Even then, they do not generally last into the fall when autumn rains and overcast days replace the sunshine.

Meredith does not often wear cosmetics, finding that she has little to no interest in spending the time to apply them when she has so much to do as it is. While cosmetics in of themselves are not considered ‘terrible’, Meredith simply does not believe they have a place among her duties. Perhaps should she attend a formal event, she may indulge, but it is extremely rare to see anything more than eye colour and a painted lip.

As Meredith is of a relatively wealthy status in the Templar Order, she has access to the means to maintain decent dental hygiene. While she is not obsessive over it, brushing her teeth is included in her daily routine. Given her enjoyment of indulging in wine, Meredith’s teeth are far from perfectly white. She has never had a dental-related injury.

HAIR

Meredith’s hair is soft, thick, and grows in waves that can curl if her hair is braided whilst wet. Her hair is easily manageable, which is why she allows it to remain down, tucked partly beneath her red hood. If she is to wear an actual helm, however, she will tie it back into a low bun to be out of the way.

Another reason many mistake her age is because her hair has yet to turn grey, much like that of First Enchanter Orsino. However, in the later years of Act III, some slivers of grey hair begin to grow out, stemming from Meredith’s temples. It is hard to see the contrast of grey within blonde, but they are most certainly there.

In the summer, with Kirkwall being a port town alongside the Waking Sea, the humidity often makes her hair frizzy. When Meredith was younger, she attempted to cut her hair short, but found it would get too ‘poufy’ beneath her helmet. She has not properly cut her hair in decades; she has simply trimmed every few months to maintain the proper desired length.

As for Meredith’s body hair, her eyebrows (and pubic hair) are of a light brown variety and are thus visible against her pale skin. Like other women of a medieval era, the concept of ‘shaving’ body hair is entirely unknown and foreign, and as such, is covered in natural body hair. Hers is not as thick as some, but it is certainly present.

MISCELLANEOUS

Meredith has a number of scars, earned throughout her years as a templar. Primarily, they range from blades and arrows to burns from magic in the gaps of her armour or leather. There are too many to count, but none are overly severe and noticeable.

Meredith also has “Dimples of Venus” on her back (also know colloquially as ‘butt dimples.’)

Meredith walks with a slight turn of the toe outward, but nothing substantial. She has arched soles and is long and narrow footed. She has one knee that is weaker than the other and subject to arthritis (often triggered by changes in the weather) but it does not bother her enough on most days to keep her weight off of it.

#HEADCANON.#[ i've decided to just collectively bring together all my headcanons on a subject and then post them together to be consistent ]

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coruscantexpat · 4 years

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Bonds Unbroken - Chapter 20: For Auld Lang Syne

Atton tried to lean away from his assailant’s force pike, but she tilted the point up into the soft flesh beneath his chin. Her twin shifted her pale gaze to Kreia. “Let go of the weapon. I will not say it again.”

“Who are you?” The pike at Meetra’s throat pressed harder into her skin, a silent but clear warning, which she ignored. “Are you with the Exchange? Did you take our shi-”

“Do as I say, and your questions will be answered.” The woman’s voice was calm and measured, but she couldn’t hide the undercurrent of annoyance in her words. “It is not our wish to harm you.” She left the implication unspoken.

There was a soft clatter behind her and Meetra half-turned her head before the increasing pressure on her neck stopped her. The woman holding Atton hostage lowered her pike from his throat and stepped around him, returning a few moments later with Kreia’s vibrosword in one hand. She passed it off to her doppelgänger and reached for Atton’s blaster, the force pike held against his chest. He glanced sideways at Meetra, a question in his eyes, but her answer was a minute headshake. The woman tugged the pistol free of its holster, thumbed the safety, and slid it into the sash of her white tunic, then reached between Atton and Bao-Dur to pull the matching blaster from the Zabrak’s waistband.

Satisfied, the more vocal of the two lowered her force pike from Meetra’s neck, though she kept it held ready. “Follow me.” She turned and stepped back through the hatch without a backward glance. Her twin stepped to the side, but did not follow. After a moment, Meetra nodded to Atton and the two moved forward, Bao-Dur’s weight hanging between them.

Once inside, the sudden surge of warmth raised and then banished goosebumps along Meetra’s arms and legs, an involuntary chill making its way down her back. The hatch gave way to a spacious foyer, curved walls leading to a domed ceiling held up with a single tall pillar in the middle of the space. To either side of the path directly in front of the entryway the floor fell away, revealing a sickeningly long drop into darkness. Their guide waited at the base of the pillar, flanked by three more women dressed in white with snowy hair and pale eyes, all armed with force pikes. The last of the women followed Kreia in and closed the hatch before joining her replicas. The most central of the women spoke, and Meetra was no longer sure if she was the one who had led them in. “My sisters will attend to your companions. You — ” She pointed a slender finger at Meetra “ — will follow me.”

Meetra’s grip tightened on Bao-Dur’s arm. “We’re staying together.”

“That is not possible.”

“The hell it isn’t,” Atton growled, and Meetra felt a rush of gratitude. Behind them, Kreia remained silent, her blind eyes watching the performance unfold.

The woman never glanced at Atton, but her lips thinned. “Our mistress has requested your presence alone.” In the face of Meetra’s continued defiant glare, she sighed, her posture loosening a little. “Your companions will not be harmed, as long as you cooperate. You have my word — and my mistress’ honor.”

“And that means so much from the person who ordered our kidnapping.” When she refused to react, Atton turned to Meetra, but she didn’t meet his gaze. Her eyes flicked from one woman to the next, and he could almost see the wheels turning as she considered every scenario. From the way her jaw tightened, none of the outcomes were favorable. Not entirely surprising, considering the state they were in.

“We should play along.” Kreia’s voice was soft, and if not for Atton’s sharp look, Meetra was almost sure the old woman spoke only in her head. “For now. I sense no ill intent, and there may be a chance for us to learn why the Force drew us here.” Meetra felt blind eyes on her back, the unseen gaze hot and intense between her shoulders. “Taking advantage of their knowledge is worth the risk of separation.”

Atton glanced back at Meetra, watching closely as she weighed their options. Her gaze was unfocused, distant, one corner of her lower lip caught between her teeth. Under more pleasant circumstances, he would have found it charming, alluring even. After a long moment, she looked up, meeting the center sister’s eyes. “We didn’t come here to start a fight. I’ll go with you, but my friends are hurt. I want you to guarantee they’ll be taken care of, as well as kept safe.”

The woman nodded. “You have my word. My sisters will tend to them, and I will make their safety my personal responsibility.”

“Good.” Meetra’s tone was light, but something dark and violent lurked between the words. “If anything happens to them, I’ll expect answers.” She turned to Atton, and he braced himself for any lingering anger in her eyes, but there was only an entreaty as she tilted her head toward Bao-Dur. “Take care of him.” He nodded, but she held his gaze. “I won’t be long, I promise.”

“I’ll be waiting.” The words were out of his mouth before he could pull them back, but if she heard the inappropriate earnesty in his voice, she didn’t comment on it. Two of the women came forward, and Meetra slid out from beneath Bao-Dur’s arm, allowing one to take her place. Atton did the same and retreated to Kreia’s side. The center sister gestured with her pike, both indicating a long hall leading further into the structure and that Meetra should go first. Glancing back at Atton and Kreia, she managed a weak smile and hoped it was somewhere in the vicinity of reassuring, then did as ordered, the sister falling into step behind her.

As they walked, Meetra glanced up at the high walls, her eyes tracing the way they bowed outward before curving back in to meet the ceiling. There was something familiar about it, about the way the architecture caused their footsteps to echo back on themselves until the hall was filled with the sound. The thin path stretched out across the chasm, the drop devouring their footfalls as easily as it would one of them if they got too close. The structure was clearly designed to both impress and intimidate, and as the hall opened up, Meetra realized why she’d been struck with such familiarity.

The path ended in another wide room, this one connected to the far wall by a thin, sloping catwalk. Six high-backed white chairs were spread out evenly in a semi-circle around her side of the room, all turned to face the center, and thick glass windows curved along the walls. It was all very reminiscent of the Council’s chambers in the Jedi Temple, albeit on a less grand scale, but somewhat reversed in terms of power: the chairs were clearly meant for recipients of speaker standing in their midst.

“Wait.” Her chaperone’s command stopped Meetra short at the threshold. The woman came abreast and pointed at the bag on her shoulder. Meetra hesitated, then handed it over. The sister pulled it over her arm and took a step back, gesturing to the center of the room with her pike. “Our mistress will be with you shortly.” She raised a hand as Meetra opened her mouth. “Save your questions. She will provide answers… if she so chooses.” Without another word, she turned on her heel and left the way they’d come.

Meetra stared after her, lips pressed together in a grimace, before turning to enter the room properly. She drifted over to one of the chairs and ran a hand over the smooth stone. Marble, judging from the color and feel; sleek, but chill and unyielding. The seat was carved like a bowl and a thick white cushion was placed at the bottom. She gingerly tested its give, her hand sinking deep into the fabric. An uncomfortable chill ran down her spine. The chairs were designed to put those sitting in them in a position of subservience, maybe even reverence to a speaker. A pang of unease mixed with pity ran through her at the thought. Were the sisters as captive as she was right now, in a more sinister fashion?

The heavy thud of a barrier cycling drew Meetra’s attention from the chairs, and she lifted her head to see another white-clad figure descending the thin catwalk opposite her. Another woman, bearing little similarity to the sisters. Her hair was also white, but with a faint silvery sheen; far longer than the other women’s, it was drawn into a severe bun at the back of her head with two loose strands framing either side of her face. She was taller by at least half a head, closer to Meetra’s own height. As the woman neared, the hem of her pale robes ghosting against the catwalk, and her face came into focus, Meetra’s breath caught in her throat, heart suddenly squeezed in her chest. The face was more lined, the set of her mouth harder, but the pale blue eyes were as sharp and angry as they had been a decade ago.

Meetra’s breath left her in a rush. “Atris.”

Atton watched Meetra leave until she was out of sight, simultaneously hoping she would look back and relieved she didn’t catch him staring after her. One of the unburdened sisters gave him a small push, her pike held up as a reminder, and he turned to follow the other down a small sidepath to the left of the hatch, Kreia and the women holding Bao-Dur following.

He jogged a bit to catch up with the sister in front of him. “Where did they go?” She glanced back at him, eyes narrowed. “Look, your sister told her you would keep us safe; I just want the guarantee for her.”

“Our mistress will decide her fate.” The woman’s voice was cold. “Yours, as well.”

It was his turn to narrow his eyes. “That wasn’t the deal.”

“We do not make deals with murderers.”

The air went out of the room. Atton froze, mind racing in a hundred different directions, none of them useful. They know, how can they know, if they know I’m dead — He yanked himself out of the spiral and realized the sister was watching him, an odd look almost akin to pity on her face. He forced himself to relax, to breathe evenly. She didn’t know; she couldn’t know. Still, better safe than sorry. Add 2. The totals are 12 and 10. Switch the face of the +4/-4 card… She was still looking at him. “What?”

“Do you really know who she is?”

Her emphasis on the word gave him pause. What did he really know about Meetra? She was a Jedi, or, as she claimed, had been, and she had secrets, both of which made her dangerous. His own secrets only made her more so. But she was strong and kind and funny and… Maybe just a different kind of dangerous if he was honest with himself, but one he was finding harder and harder to imagine going without. Atton glanced back at the sister. “She’s a good person. More than I can say for most people.”

To his surprise, she chuckled, the first outright emotional display he’d seen from any of the sisters, but it was mirthless. “No, you don’t.” Her smile faded, the piteous look returning. “And for that, I am sorry.”

“What does that mean?” He tried to move alongside her, but she waved him back with her pike. “What do you know?”

“I am no historian,” she snapped, irritation slipping through the cool facade. “Nor is it my place to reveal another’s past. If you want answers, you will have to seek them from her.”

“Can’t do that if she’s dead.”

“No.” Her gaze hardened. “Though if that is her fate, you will likely share it. We are here.” They came to a stop at a large door spanning the corridor. The lead sister cycled it open and gestured for the others to go on ahead.

The room was small, made more so by eight bodies filling the space. On the far side stood a row of powered-down force cages and their control console, and Atton groaned aloud at the sight. “Great, more cells. At this point, we might as well install them in the Hawk’s barracks.”

“You may continue your complaints from inside,” one of the women said pointedly.

The other sister not supporting Bao-Dur moved to Atton’s side and reached for his sling. He swatted her hand away, the action almost unconscious, and she paused, an unreadable expression on her face. She reached out again, and this time her caught her hand and turned it away, the motion so smooth it almost didn’t look like he gave her wrist a sharp turn as he did so. “Leave it.” She gave her hand a small shake, eyes never leaving his, and he saw the flicker of uncertainty in their pale depths. He turned away and stepped into the nearest cage before she could question him.

Kreia entered the cell to his immediate left, her hand folded in the sleeves of her robe, gaze shifting from one doppelganger to the next. None of them met her eyes. The sister Atton had tried to interrogate activated his and Kreia’s force cages from the console and then gestured to her other. The four began to leave the room, taking Bao-Dur with them.

“Wait.” Atton stepped toward the cage’s barrier, leaning away as it crackled warningly. “Where are you taking him?”

“He needs medical attention.” The sister’s tone made it clear she thought her answer painfully obvious. “Likely he is only concussed, but if it is something more… We do not wish him to suffer. He will be returned when our examination and treatment are complete.”

“How long will that take?”

“Longer if you continue to delay us.” She turned away, signalling an end to the conversation. The sisters filed out without another word, and the door cycled shut, the heavy thud hanging in the air.

Atton leaned back against the rear panel of the cage with a sigh. “At least they left the heat on.” He glanced over at Kreia, who seemed enthralled with the room’s structure. “Why even lock us up? They already took our weapons.”

“We are leverage, not threats,” Kreia murmured, her tone distracted. “Our captors wish Meetra compliant.”

“Who are they?” He lifted his gaze, examining the walls with her now. “And what is this place? Some kind of doomsday bunker?”

“In a sense. It is a Jedi academy.” Atton glanced sharply at her, but she didn’t seem to notice. “Not a proper one — there are no students and these children are not padawans — but it evokes the same impression.”

“Why the hell would the Jedi build an academy in the polar region of a dead planet?”

“Academies are hidden from the rest of the galaxy, to keep young Jedi safe and ignorant of the outside world while their masters mold them. What better place can you envision?” There was nothing judgemental in Kreia’s matter-of-fact tone, which Atton found almost as chilling. “This place is different still; designed to train Jedi, but occupied by none…” She paused for a long moment, then punctuated the silence with a sudden chuckle. “Of course… How clever, Atris. I should have suspected on our approach…”

Atton eyed her warily as she continued to mutter to herself, but a different unease crept its way up his spine. He was comfortable with Meetra’s limited abilities and tolerant of Kreia’s eccentricities, but other Jedi might be harder to fool, harder to keep out. Even if Kreia seemed sure there were no others, the old woman was unfamiliar with this place, and even if she was right, who could say there weren’t more Jedi on their way there right now. He needed more information. “Who’s Atris?”

Kreia’s gaze snapped to his with a speed that was almost violent, as if she’d just remembered he was there. She narrowed her eyes, irritation thinning her lips. “None of your concern.”

He rolled his eyes to hide his alarm. “Whatever. All I care about is getting the Hawk and hitting lightspeed before any more Jedi show up.”

Immediately, he knew it was the wrong thing to say. Kreia paused, her head tilted just to the side, as if listening to something only she could hear. “You fear the Jedi.” It wasn’t a question.

“Don’t you?” Atton danced away from the implication in her words, careful to keep his tone light. “The last time a bunch of Jedi were in one place, they killed each other. I don’t wanna get caught in the middle of that.”

“A half-truth.” Her gaze was intense, laser-focused on his own. “This fear is deeper, more personal. What do you know of the Jedi?”

Atton’s heart hammered in his chest, loud enough that he was sure Kreia could hear it. “Less than you, I’m sure.”

“On the contrary, I believe you know much more.”

There was no warning before her consciousness slammed into his, her mind splitting his thoughts like a white-hot spike. A cry ripped itself free of Atton’s throat, and he sank, knees slamming into the cage floor. He clutched his head, as though he could ward off the probing thoughts tearing into his skull. Add 5. The totals are 11 and 13. Flip the +2/-2 card — “Get out of my head!”

“How strange.” Kreia’s voice was clinical, impassive, as if her search wasn’t rending his mind into a million jagged pieces. “I would not expect such strength from you.” She pushed deeper, drawing another ragged yell from him. “It will be less painful if you cease struggling. I will find what I seek regardless; your resistance will only cause you further hurt.”

“Stop… it…” He forced the words out through gritted teeth, body bowed forward under the weight of her assault. She tore through his barriers as quickly as he erected them, the years of practice utterly wasted in the face of her power. Pain shrank the world to a single point before him, and Atton could feel her mind burrowing into his, her thoughts jagged claws that sliced into his mind and pulled out the things he never wanted anyone else to see.

Memories flashed before him as Kreia dug them free of his defenses. A woman’s face leaning over him, a flash of momentary horror before he realized it was Meetra… The same face, bathed in the soft blue glow of hyperspace, exhausted and in pain, but smiling and so beautiful — Kreia’s amusement trickled down through their connection, and Atton wrenched away from the memory, embarrassment briefly superseding the pain. The respite only lasted a few seconds before the old woman renewed her assault, and a scream escaped his clenched jaw. Another night blackout drunk in the alleys of Nar Shaddaa. Waking up in a strange Togruta’s bed, leaving a handful of credits on her nightstand before slipping out to return to the cantina and repeat the last night all over again. It was the only thing that kept the nightmares at bay.

“Ah, and with the fear, there is guilt.” She sounded smug. This was a game for her, a challenge to be overcome. His pain, his fears — just rewards for her searching,

Atton forcibly pushed the memory away, and to his surprise, it worked, earning him a few breaths of freedom. “Why… why are you… doing this?” His vision was hazy, the world made blurry by the pain, but he could just make out the dark robes opposite him. “What… do you… want from me?”

“I dislike being at a disadvantage.” Kreia resumed her searching, and he collapsed fully to the floor with a whimper, body curling in on itself. “Her, I know. Everything she has done, all she has suffered. You, however, are much more of a mystery than I realized. What have I done to inspire such terror toward the Jedi?” The agony increased, and Atton’s vision disappeared entirely as a white-hot curtain fell over the world. “You hide your secrets well behind your feelings — behind the self-loathing and the infatuation — but I will not let you keep them.”

Atton feebly struggled against her intrusion, but Kreia brushed him aside. She plunged further into his memories, dredging up the darkest parts of them. Warm brown eyes, full of pain and fear and, most infuriating, understanding. His face was reflected in them, caught between rage and confusion. Soft bloodied lips formed words he didn’t want to remember and could not forget. A shaking hand touched his face, leaving trails of blood along his cheek. His hands closed around a slender neck. Blessedly, he lost consciousness before the memory could play out in its entirety.

When he came to, the room was silent, save for the crackle of the cages’ barriers and his ragged breathing. His lifted his head, wincing as the movement sent a fresh wave of agony through his skull, and found Kreia watching him. Her mouth twisted in a cruel smile. “Laid bare at last.”

“Don’t… please don’t tell her.” The world spun as Atton pushed himself to his knees, and he fought down the bile rising in his throat. “I’m… begging you… She can’t know, she’ll… ”

“What? Hate you?” Her lips quirked into a sneer. “Fear you?” She turned away with a chuckle. “That is not the way of the Jedi. Then again, by her own claim she is not a Jedi. Perhaps your fears are justified.”

Atton slumped against the back of his cell. “I’ll do whatever you want. Just — just don’t tell her.” He imagined Meetra’s face if she found out, her soft smile twisting in disgust, brilliant eyes darkening with anger. The urge to be sick grew stronger.

Kreia glanced over her shoulder, gaze narrow and calculating. “Calm yourself, Atton. I will conceal your past from her. In truth, it is no different from what I am doing with regards to her secrets.” She turned back to him and stepped as close as possible to the forcefield. “But make no mistake, I do not do this out of pity, or affection, or tolerance. If she learns of your transgressions, there is a chance she may turn you away. I would avoid this.”

“Why?”

“I do not know, not yet.” Her gaze turned inwards. “We found you on Peragus for a reason, even if it is not readily apparent. I refuse to waste any potential placed in our path, even as twisted as yours.” Kreia’s eyes found his again. “The price for my silence is your obedience.”

He gathered enough strength to sneer. “To you?”

“To her. The trials ahead will be difficult, and she will need more help than she knows.”

“And if I refuse?”

“You won’t.” She smirked, and Atton’s face warmed. Kreia had viewed Meetra through the lens of his memories; denying his attraction was pointless. “Even if you did, I would no longer be obligated to keep your secrets, and while Meetra may not be a Jedi, Atris most assuredly is. Were I to reveal your past, you would not leave this place alive.” She folded her hand in her robes again, suddenly introspective. “I had thought to remove you from her company once we regained the Ebon Hawk, but now I believe your absence would be more detrimental to her than your continued presence.”

A dry chuckle escaped him. “And here I thought I was only good for flying the ship.”

“There is also that.” Kreia met his eyes again. “There is something here she needs to see, something of her past she must revisit. It will put her on a dangerous path, and if even something so base as you can avert disaster, then you will stay by her side.”

“You’ve seen my memories, Highness; you’ve got the wrong guy.”

“I do not make mistakes. The Force is clear — you have a purpose that aligns with hers.” His vision was still a little blurry, but Atton thought he saw her eyes soften. “Now, I have wasted enough time and energy on you and this discussion, and it will do no one any good for her to find you like this.” Her mind ghosted across his again, and Atton flinched, but it was gentle this time, rolling over him like a thick blanket. “Sleep — I must be free of distractions.” Against his will, his eyes slid shut and he sank back against the cell wall, his last thoughts of soft blue-gray eyes and a warm smile.

Full chapter available on AO3 and FFN.

#KotOR 2 #kotor fanfic #atton x exile #The Jedi Exile #Female exile #Kreia #atris #bao-dur #T3-M4 #the handmaiden #brianna

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maddmuses · 5 years

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John Lawrence

Age: 17-50s (Verse-Dependent)

Aliases: Johnny Lawrence

Date of Birth: August 20th, 1967

Appearance Johnny is a blonde man of above-average height (6'0” in adulthood) of wiry build. His features are masculine and defined, complimenting his physicality, giving him the appearance of a dangerous opponent to others. In his youth there was often a spark of energy in his eyes, a fire that came naturally to Johnny's spirit as a fighter, often accompanied by a confident smirk. While this energy became less present as he grew older, it was still there nonetheless during the right moments.

As he grew older, Johnny naturally put on weight, and his features took on some roundness and softening as he fellt out of shape, though the returned exercise of training again would take some of this away, but the fact of the matter is that Johnny has gotten older, and that changes you.

During his adolescence Johnny often wore fashionable clothes, particularly band shirts and bright leather jackets, accompanied with a headband that his girlfriend Ali gifted him for their anniversary. During training, Lawrence would also usually wear a white gi and belt of an appropriate color to his rank in Cobra Kai at the time, eventually becoming a black belt by fifteen. During tournaments, Johnny would wear a sleeveless tournament gi composed of the cobra kai colors, not eschewing his trademark headband that he wore at all times, even after he and Ali had broken up.

During adulthood Johnny tends to dress less nicely, often wearing t-shirts, particularly those of his favorite bands, and jeans. He is rarely seen wearing a suit, or anything of the like, unless the occasion demands it. Until he established his dojo, Johnny rarely wore his headband, only doing so during training even after this, as it served as little better than a bittersweet reminder of his loss to Daniel in both love and martial arts.

Personality A warrior and a wild soul, Johnny was once distant and meek, often remaining introverted and enforcing this separation from the rest of the world by listening to his Walkman, rather than engaging with others. Once he joined Cobra Kai, Kreese fostered the spirit in Johnny, allowing him to become confident and social, making friends through the dojo, becoming popular at school. However, as the lessons of Kreese's Cobra Kai took root in Lawrence's psyche, he would become aggressive, to the point of harassing new student LaRusso following a brief physical altercation during the summer of Johnny's senior high school year.

Despite this, he still had the ability to be soft-spoken and kind when he wanted to, having been an otherwise loving boyfriend to Eli, faulting primarily in his habit of partying with his friends, forgetting her birthday over the Summer. During this time he was still adamant in his desire to rekindle their relationship, if a bit over-forwards, which worked against him when competing against the newer, less-blatantly aggressive, LaRusso. Even when speaking to Eli's parents at the country club, Johnny was able to conduct himself with enough cordiality to seem a well-mannered suitor.

As Johnny and Daniel's rivalry wore on it would become evident that Kreese's teachings had poisoned his mind, making him blatantly violent and hostile towards Daniel, coupled with the other boy's taunting once it had been established that students of the dojo weren't to lay a finger on him. This would come to a head when Johnny, albeit with some reluctance, was still able to use underhanded tactics in a tournament match to take advantage of an opponent's injury, that was similarly taken through cheating that was ordered by Kreese. It was in this moment that Johnny had begun to second-guess his teacher, and was able to let go of his sadness and anger at losing, for the moment, to be a good sportsman and congratulate Daniel.

During adulthood Johnny's spirit has become tempered by years of live knocking him down, unable to hold a job, divorced, and estranged from his son, Johnny was largely going through the motions, only able to show his former fierceness when antagonized sufficiently. Due to Daniel's success in business, to the point of using the loss that Lawrence suffered as a gimmick for his marketing, Johnny was forced to constantly relive his loss at the '85 All-Valley, making him grow bitter and resentful of his former rival, though he was still initially able to show enough politeness to not completely put off Daniel to his presence, as they had mutually been able to do before. Johnny feels that he had been cheated by the illegal contact of Daniel's final kick, and that somehow if he'd won the All-Valley, his life may have taken a different turn.

This attitude resulted in Johnny largely remaining stuck in the 80s, as it were, not upgrading any of his technology, purchasing a new car, or keeping up with any trends or current events outside of his own decade, often regarding anything new with various degrees of disdain on-sight. While training his students, Johnny would become less reluctant to use technology, though he would still display a great degree of inproficiency when attempting to use computers, smartphones, and the like. However, he would still determine that technology was convenient enough, if somewhat confusing to a man in his early 50s, taking a hard regression against it when Miguel was hospitalized, and Cobra Kai stolen from him by Kreese.

Once he took on Miguel as a student, Johnny's attitude would still remain coarse, but he would slowly accept that people who were cool and badass may not need Cobra Kai as much as the “geeks” and “losers” that he so frequently mocked and berated. Indeed, he lacked some self-awareness in this regard, as Johnny had almost no friends before Cobra Kai, and seemed to have a superficial group of acquaintances during his youth, as he insisted that he would still “hook up with babes”. But it was through this change, whether knowing or not, that Lawrence would become a teacher to downtrodden young people of all kind, teaching them the same confidence and warrior spirit that improved his life during his own teenage years. However, while intending to withhold the components of Cobra Kai that were toxic, it had seemed that Lawrence attempted to do so too late, with his students taking on that same poison from Johnny and Kreese that had once made him a bully. Even Miguel, the Cobra Kai seemed second-least effected by the bad parts of Cobra Kai, initiated a drag-out brawl with Robby Keene that took actually winning the fight for Miguel to show the mercy that Johnny had spent the entire Summer trying to instill into his student.

Biography [Summary of Karate Kid and Johnny's appearances in Cobra Kai appear here]

Johnny's Karate The style of karate that Johnny Lawrence employs actually resembles Tang Soo Do more closely than any traditional style of karate, largely due to the americanized idea that any hand-to-hand martial art that wasn't some form of wrestling or boxing was “karate”. However, components of Johnny's form are also fairly similar to sport's karate, able to make contact and land efficiently, taking points and downing opponents, though Johnny employs techniques frequently that allow him to knock down and injure his foes, rather than stopping at contact.

A self-stylized offensive specialist, Johnny's style of teaching is reflected in this, even to the degree that when teaching his student, Miguel, about defense, he doubled-down on teaching even greater offensive technique. As long as Johnny is able to keep his foe on their heels through continued pressure and rapid combos, he is able to keep control of the fight, not allowing an opponent to keep things on their terms, even when successfully defending against him.

Despite his highly-offensive style, Johnny is able to execute a strong defense and block enemy attacks, as well as launch counters, as one might argue that his style is primarily counter-oriented, striking like a cobra, before an opponent can complete their less efficient attack. Interception, rather than full-countering. This becomes more evident as his skills improve into adulthood, barfights teaching him to fight against multiple opponents at the same time, having to rely more and more on this method of interception in order to knock an opponent's attacks wide through anticipation and attack.

By adulthood, Johnny's karate skills have advanced to such a degree that he can defeat John Kreese one-on-one, only having the fight result in a draw as he chose to take mercy on Kreese, allowing him to turn the tables after the fight had initially been resolved. This feat was only every achieved by one other character in the series, Mr. Miyagi, who defeated Kreese in both single combat, and in a one-on-three situation.

In terms of real-life martial arts rank, Johnny would be considered a 6th dan, with the ability to become a 7th dan, likely over the course of the subsequent seasons of Cobra Kai. In his original appearance in Karate Kid, he was a 2nd dan, potentially with the ability of a 3rd dan.

#The Best Defense is More Offense (Johnny Lawrence)

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regrettablewritings · 5 years

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How You Met AU: Clark Kent

Lifted from this ship meme

The world was strange, and Clark wasn’t sure how much right he had to conclude that for himself. Because, on one hand, he was a flying, laser-shooting alien with unparalleled strength. But on the other, he was involved with a team composed of two technical demigods (both whose people were thought to be myths), a cyborg revived from the brink of death by a box, and a man fast enough to phase through solid material with just the proper amount of focus. This went without mentioning the fact that his enemy-turned friend was a billionaire who’d been dressing like a bat for the last three decades but, all things considered, that was arguably normal by comparison.

But, with the exception of Victor, you never would’ve assumed such oddities about any of them. Not at first glance at least. But that was the point: The world could only handle so much strangeness before people became too opposed to it for it to carry on. Which was why it made Clark a little more than on edge when things around Metropolis started to seem a little . . . odd.

It started off with little things: Black marks appearing in alleyways, cracking and booming noises often occurring before or after. “Not unlike thunderclaps,” witnesses would later say. TVs and other electrical devices going wonky or even outright snapping out of life. Fuse boxes would be blackened, the areas around them sometimes scorched. But the electric companies couldn’t find anything about the equipment that would suggest sabotage; and inspectors on the case found little to nothing that could suffice as evidence that there was purposeful vandalism. And with all the more obvious surveillance cameras damaged before any footage could be captured, there was only so much to go on. There was little rhyme or reason indicating a pattern to which areas got struck besides the fact that they tended to be in wealthier areas, but considering much of Metropolis was inhabited by the upper-class, it was nearly a moot note so the likelihood of a successful stakeout was remarkably slim – if performed by the average cop.

Bruce wasn’t a cop. But he also wasn’t the average detective. It had taken some time and a lot of surveillance, coupled with Lois’ own findings done on her own time, but by the end of a month and a half, they were pretty certain they had found their culprit. All that was left was to have Clark find them and bring them in, hopefully to join the League.

Why Clark?

“Pretty sure that if you get electrocuted, you’ll just register it as a tickle,” Bruce admitted. Blunt, but fair.

Still, Clark couldn’t help but think as he scouted the skies one night, maybe the rich guy who has plenty of time the next day to rest might want to go searching in the middle of the night?

But there was no use in arguing, much less at this point. Though some small part of him wish he’d put up a bit more of a fight beforehand. Normally, Clark was glad to have found the city experiencing little to no issues, especially at night. However, considering the added weight of expectations placed on this particular outing, there he couldn’t help but hold a little bit of anticipation in him –

VwwmmmmmpapapapKRACK.

It was faint, being in the distance, but it was nothing his hearing couldn’t register: The sound of fuse tampering and popping out of life. There, some odd three miles away: There was a glow swelling and slightly throbbing with diminishing power, crawling out of an alleyway into the night air.

Well, Clark thought somewhat optimistically. At least I won’t have to track them down based on looks alone . . .

+++++++++

Moving to Metropolis was supposed to be the start of something new. Something good and new, specifically. Not getting into a freak accident involving a weird, unnatural-looking cloud appearing just as you were checking out your apartment’s fuse box and waking up months later from a comatose state. That alone should have been enough of a cue that things weren’t going to go your way.

But, oh, it didn’t stop there. It would’ve been fine to have stopped when a majority of your clothes would stick to you regardless of the fashion; that was bearable. But it went on: From your phone exploding in your touch to your electronics following suit. It didn’t stop when the electricity in your building flickered with your rage; nor did it stop when, on a fearful whim, you attempted to summon as much voltage from as many transformers in a three-block radius as possible – and succeeded. Well, that is, before your attempts to return the acquired energy resulted in their sources exploding. You weren’t trying that again.

Not until you had a better grasp of it all. . . . But god, why was it all so dam hard to grasp?

You’d though it be best to practice in the richer parts of town – the electric company would be in a far bigger hurry to bring them their power back, the absolute bastards. But with how many generators and the like you were destroying, you were running out of practice space.

You groaned as you watched the circuit box before you begin to putter out of use.

“Greeeeat, (Y/N),” you told yourself. “You finally begin to get the hang of putting shit back where it came, you get a little too excited, and blam-o.” The all too familiar feeling of disappointment developed a sigh in you; you had long since passed feeling anxious about the destruction of property, and you knew you could do no good by trying to fix it. All you could do now was leave the scene, pretend to sleep peacefully, and try to figure out where to go next.

It had been nearly two months since you started your high-voltage, highly dangerous practicing; surely by now the cops were on to you, what with most of your “victims” being people of note. Logic said to shake them off your trail by moving to a type of location they wouldn’t have seen comic. But . . . that meant going to lower-income neighborhoods. And as much as you wanted to figure out how to stop blowing up electronics by touch, you really weren’t comfortable with doing it at the expense of those who needed the help more.

“Good evening,” came a voice, yanking you out of your nervous thoughts. It had taken your brain a moment to register it, but you could’ve sworn it came come from the sky: A type of voice dashing heroes in old movies would use; heroes with big, strong chins.

Superman did, of course, have such a feature on him, you came to find. But as he descending from the sky, into the alley (thus blocking your way out), you were forced to consider that every feature he had appeared to be big and strong: His towering height, his bulging muscles that the suit made no effort to hide, his . . . hands that would most definitely kill you if he so much as poked you with one finger.

That last thought alone, even in a hypothetical sense, was all it took for your fight or flight senses to kick in, your hands suddenly flying up in defense with fizzles of what electricity you’d collected springing in your palms.

Superman, however, did not flinch. He barely even regarded your sparkling, trembling hands (which did nothing for your confidence, both in your abilities and in your chances of getting out of this unmaimed).

“You don’t want to do that,” Superman stated. Simple as that. And he was right: You really didn’t want to have to “fight” him. But what else could you do?

On Clark’s own end, he could just feel the anxiety radiating off of you. He didn’t even have to listen for your heartbeat thundering in your chest. Honestly, though he hated to admit it, looking at you reminded him of seeing small, scared animals back in Smallville. Rabbits and mice found scittering about on the farm to be more specific.

On one hand, he was just glad you weren’t some hyper-powered hooligan willing to throw a punch in a fight they weren’t ready for. But on the other, he felt a little bad scaring you like this. It was probably best if he didn’t near you. For now.

“It’s okay,” he offered. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

You sighed and lowered your hands, your pitiful static fizzling to a halt. “Look,” you said quietly, “I promise I’ll go away. I’ll switch towns! I swear!”

At this, the man furrowed his brows. “I’m afraid that can’t happen . . .” Your heart plummeted before being slingshotted back into a revived desire to plea and flee.

“I swear, okay! Nobody was supposed to get hurt!” you insisted. “I don’t think anybody even really got hurt, per se . . . Just inconvenienced. But I promise, it won’t happen again – ” In the midst of your rambling, Superman took a step towards you. It was a simple movement, all things considered, but for you, in this moment of high stress, it might as well have been an outright threat. You couldn’t stop yourself from releasing a pathetic yelp, nearly stepping all over your own feet to take a few steps back.

Crap, Clark cursed. Okay, clearly acting serious and stern was helping nobody. At this point, you were probably going to run in the opposite direction and smack your skull against the dead end of the alleyway. To hell with this.

“Hey, hey, hey,” he suddenly said. He raised his hands in a weak attempt to show his change of demeanor. “It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you.” You had to admit, even in your moment of fear, the sudden shift in tone was not lost on you.

He still had hints of old school hero in his voice, but now there was something . . . more? It was hard to place (especially in your current jumpy state), but you were just able enough to pick out nodes of what his voice now held: Sunshine; apples; the type of voice a sweet man running a humble little bookstore or fruit stand might have.

It had to have been a trap. You weren’t one to disapprove of Superman, given all that he’s done, but being on the other side of him just wasn’t doing much for your ability to think straight. And Clark could sense it.

“Hey,” he tried again. “I’m sorry if I scared you.” You blinked, a brow slowly beginning to raise. “We – I’ve been looking for you, per a friend’s request, and – ” No sooner had he said it, Clark regretted it. The look of resumed discomfort of your face made him really acknowledge that.

“ ‘Friend’?” you demanded. “Who the hell is your friend? What do you want?!”

Oh, geez.

“Listen, please, remain calm!” Clark pleaded. To him, in that moment, he’d thought he’d been sounding gentle enough. But as the nearby streetlights began to flicker, he knew better.

Once again, regret: If there was anything he’d learned working with Lois and Bruce, it was that telling someone on the verge of panic or in the midst of complete frustration to “calm down” in any sense was a bad, bad, bad idea. Saying so to a person who had powers, controlled or not, however? Absolutely terrible idea.

While your previous attempt at intimidation by way of summoning electricity had done little to impress Clark, he had to admit: You were a bit better at it now. The more the streetlights blinked, the more streams of electronic light appeared to gather towards you, specifically in your palms and feet.

“Look, buddy,” you hissed. “I’ve been dealing with a lot of crap leading up to this. I moved to a new city. I got goddamn electrocuted into a coma – ” At this point, Clark couldn’t help but notice thin streaks of static begin to make a beeline towards your eyes. Not promising, if his experience had told him so.

You gritted your teeth, increasingly glowing eyes narrowing. “Then! I wake up to these – these stupid, stupid powers! Powers I don’t have the first fucking clue of how to control. But do you see me running around, actively trying to kill people like every other goddamn psycho in this ‘city of tomorrow’? No! I’ve had to figure all this crap out on. My. Own.” The brights of your eyes increased, simultaneously illuminating the growing rage of your expression while also blinding Clark to being able to make it out in the first place.

At your feet, small currents began to sizzle against the crackling pavement. You were no longer trying to back away: You took a step forward, and it definitely made Clark feel worry.

“Could I have done it differently? Sure. Maybe. But don’t forget, Flyboy: I could’ve been so. Much. Worse!” Clark could hear the tingling rattle of lightbulbs struggling within the streetlights, trying to retain whatever power they could.

“I – ” But Clark was cut off.

“And you,” you growled, “have the audacity . . . To tell me to calm DOWN?!” In that moment, three things happened in the following order:

The first had been that your eyes, filled with so much fury, could no longer remain squinted; they widened, revealing themselves to be entirely white with pure energy at this point. The second thing appeared to be connected with the sudden snapping, due to it being how any lightbulb in a streetlight or artsy lamp within a three-block radius became overwhelmed – too overwhelmed to maintain proper form, in fact. They popped and shattered, leaving bits of glass to tumble to the streets below.

The third instance, however, had nothing to do with your powers: It was just Clark, getting a word in.

“I get it,” he said. Had there been any lightbulbs left, they might have shattered as well in sync with the snarl you gave the man.

“Quit lying!” you demanded. The wave of volts began to ripple all the more erratically. But Clark held his ground.

“I’m not lying,” he swore. He even placed one hand to his heart, the other upright. “Scout’s honor.” Unfortunately for him, the sincerity of a Boy Scout appeared to mean little to you. He went on, “I didn’t always have control of my powers. I didn’t have anyone to help me figure them out; I had to wing it!” You raised a bemused brow in reaction.

Okay . . . Clark thought. It’s . . . better than the glare, I guess? He swallowed. Dare to try one last time before things potentially get yucky?

“That’s, uh, actually why I’ve . . . come to find you,” he stated. “The friend? I swear he’s a good man. A little rough around the edges, but – ”

“You’re not helping your case,” you snapped.

“I’m a part of a sort of group, there’s people like you and me, and we think it’d be best if you joined – er, if you wanted to.”

“Ah. So, you want to basically make me into a weapon?”

“Nonononono, not that at all. I swear. It’s just – Look, even if you don’t want to join,” Clark bit his lip, “we could at least potentially find a way to help you get those powers under control so that you won’t keep breaking stuff.” A beat passed. “Well,” he shrugged, “it’s more like my friend will. He’s good with science and can definitely provide the right materials.”

To his credit, Clark did begin to notice an apparent lapse in the energy you were emitting. It was hard for the average eye to properly compute it but for him, the change was definitely there.

On your own end, you had to admit: The temptation was definitely lingering through his words. But then, perhaps you were just desperate and overwhelmed and looking for an out in this entire situation. But something still very much bothered you.

“How can I know I can trust you?” you asked, brow completely scrunched with uncertainty. The entire situation considered, it was still a bit of a shocker for one to not entirely trust the great and beloved Superman’s words. And, judging by his stumbling, it wasn’t a scenario he had been prepared to answer right on the spot.

“Uh – Becaaauussseee . . .” Another thing Clark had learned working with Lois and Perry Mason: The longer you stammer and search for answers, the less legit your word comes cross. His mind scrambled for something, anything that would win your favor over. But, in the end, there was only one thing that stood out. And, for the first time completely since landing in that alley, Clark felt just as nervous as you had.

“My . . . name . . .” He inhaled deeply, trying his best not to exhale chill winds. “My name . . . is Clark Kent. I work with The Daily Planet.”

You blinked. “. . . Pardon?” The voltage at your feet dampened.

Clark continued, “I’m a Kryptonian refugee, but I was raised here on Earth. The friend who sent me here is – ” He stopped himself short before deciding that Bruce could kick his ass about this later. “It’s Bruce Wayne.”

“Bruce Wayne?!” you interjected. Part of you wanted to call crap but the other part of you had to remember that the man in front of you was claiming to be a humanoid alien who worked at the local newspaper; who’s to say he really wasn’t acquainted with the rich guy across the bay? Judging by the hint of smile this Clark Kent guy let slip, you . . . honestly couldn’t bring yourself to really disbelieve him. The static at your fingertips dribbled into your palms before shrinking away.

“Yeah, uh . . . It’s a bit of a story,” Clark claimed, a bit of sheepishness in his voice.

The shift from mostly illuminated to just barely lit by the light of the moon was sudden and startling. But for Clark, it was a good thing. The ground immediately beneath you had been blackened by your doing, but you otherwise appeared perfectly fine, if a bit curious.

“Got proof?” you asked.

“I mean, I gave you my secret identity – that’s pretty trusting if I do say so myself,” Clark pointed out. As much as you hated to admit it, he had a point. And you were getting awfully tired. In fact . . .

In that moment, you had realized something: That was about the most power and damage you’d caused ever since getting these powers in one fell swoop. You were a little impressed. But you were also plenty concerned. Sure, you’d meant to be threatening in the moment, but the fact still remained: If the only other person around hadn’t been Superman, how easily could you have actually harmed another person in your moment of anger? The second you attempted to truly ponder it, a shudder threatened to ripple through your body; you did not enjoy considering those odds.

But how long until you got so pissed off that you pulled another one of those? How long until you actually did cause harm? That thought was even worse . . .

“Are you positive?” you mumbled, causing Clark to cock his head by an inch.

“I’m sorry?” he questioned.

You looked him dead in the eye and dared him to lie: “Are you positive you guys can, like, help me control my powers?” The smile he gave you alone would have been enough to convince you.

“We’ve trained with literal scientific anomalies and legends, Miss. I can assure you: You’re in good company with us.” The sweet, honey warmness of his voice did everything to calm the well of fear and guilt within you. It was more than enough.

“Okay,” you said with finality.

“Okay?”

“Mhm. Let’s do this.” Almost instantly, however, you raised your fingers to draw a point. “But I’m not fighting or anything. Just so we’re clear. I’m just coming along to get my groove in order, so tell your ‘friend’, Bruce Wayne, alright?”

The man didn’t even try to hide a chuckle at your stance. You were going to be just fine, he’d decided. And you? Well . . . the jury was still out on whether or not this was where your move to Metropolis would finally turn into a good, new thing.

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