#mourn them ? Or tell tales about them or just make them show up with a smoothie and being like... THATS MY DEAD BEAT DAD I HATE THEM
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Memorial of the Dead
Context: For as long as you can remember, there has always been a festival to remember and mourn the dead. And at this time around, a lot of paranormal activities started happening in the vicinity of your home...
Warnings: Female reader, Yandere behavior, obsession, haunting, panic attack, kidnapping?, hallucinations, death, blood, ooc.
Note: If you do not do well with these kinds of warnings then I suggest you stop reading for your own good and health!
For as long as you can remember back when you were just a kid, there had always been a festival to remember, mourn, and celebrate the dead. You always enjoyed the festival since it was such a memorial festival and has such a meaning.
Your mother would always tell you all kinds of stories about the dead around this time of year and they always interested you and you always wanted to hear more. One of the reasons why you always loved the festival.
"Your favorite story was called "Memorial of the Dead," a tale about a boy who died while attempting to bring back his brother from the dead due to a serious mistake. As punishment for his egregious misdeed, the boy was condemned to eternally roam in search of a way to reunite with his little brother. According to some, his translucent appearance can be spotted in the graveyards wandering and always had a longing to be with his little brother again.
And as he wandered, he was mocked by the Gods as they watched him like he was some sort of show that was purely for entertainment. And maybe in that case, he was. He was only another entertainment by the Gods above.
That was a story you loved very dearly. You admired his passion and determination of getting his brother back, but in the end, all was for naught as he was punished for his doings and forever wandering for all eternity in this world.
And now it was this time of year where everyone would now began to celebrate and mourn for the dead. You didn't had that much excitement anymore like you used to back when you were younger, but that's just the way it is. Although you can't deny that you always had a feeling of excitement.
I guess you just wanted something new.
You sighed as you walked through the festival, banners hanging, lanterns hanging from the street posts, candles being lit everywhere for the dead, so on and so forth. The people were mourning for their loved ones and lit up a floating lantern and released it from the sky. You had your own and were going to the graveyard.
Where your Mother was now.
No one really knew how she died and you didn't either. You were only 15 when she died and now you were 19. It had been four years since she died mysteriously and you missed her dearly. You wished to bring her back just like the boy did with his little brother.
But you knew better, besides, it was just a fairytale anyways. Not like it was real in the first place right? But you sometimes had a longing for your Mother to be back and wished for some miracle she would be back and you both would be happy again. But atlast, such things can never happen. As the Gods hates such things.
And in present time, strange things began to happen in your home. The lights would always flicker and at night the wind would get cold and the windows would sometimes be open despite closing them and making sure they were shut tight. And at night, you always heard something break.
And in those events, you would always see a silhouette hiding in the shadow, watching you with their glowing yellow eyes.
You thought it was some sort of punishments from the Gods by your longing and hope. But you should have been more careful, as you were merely another puppet for their entertainment.
And maybe, you should have seen the signs sooner or later, but never late.
Once you finished talking to your Mother's grave and lit up the floating lantern to the sky, you returned home to get some rest and hoped for this day to end and begrudgingly try to get up in the morning and do the same thing over and over again and then just repeat. Besides the events in the night.
You don't exactly remember when it started. It started small when you felt a air chilling cold as the window was opened, you thought you just forgot to closed it and went on your way once you closed it.
And that's when things started going downhill from that point on.
You always felt eyes on you all the time everywhere inside your house and during the Festival. It creeped you out and you felt goosebumps every time you had a feeling someone was watching you. You considered moving out on occasions but decided against it since you didn't want to leave your Mother.
But maybe you really should have just left and never looked back.
Because the paranormal activities became too much until the suspect finally decided to show themselves.
And now, you were in this situation. And it's all your fault that you were now in this mess.
You should have trusted your instincts, you should have trusted your gut and went somewhere far away from this place.
But you didn't.
And now you were locked in your room with no way out as every exit was locked and your back pressed against the wall as you finally came face to face with him. Your breath was ragged as you looked at his eyes, shining and reflecting the moonlight. But there was something off about his eyes.
There was obsession, deep obsession within his eyes as he continued to look at you, curiously as you tried to keep your distance from him.
Was he the ghost your Mother always told you stories about? He looks so much like the boy your Mother described. And the most distinctive feature was his blue flamed hair. And If so, then why is he here? And what did he want from you?
You gulped down your saliva and asked him with a shaky breath-
"Why are you here? And what do you want from me?" You said as you kept pressing your back against the cold stone wall, trying your hardest to really keep your distance. But it was quite hard considering you were already at the corner of the room and there was no where else you could go now.
Nowhere to run.
He had you right where he wanted you, like a cat finally cornering its mouse, finally ready to devour its prey.
He had a grin that spelt trouble and I felt my nerves flare up, his gaze wanting to make myself smaller and smaller with each passing second he keeps gazing at me with those yellow glaring eyes.
What felt like hours that were most likely just a few seconds, he finally decided to talk.
"You and I, we share similar passions and feelings. And I can't help but be attracted to you." He said as if it was the most normal thing to say to someone.
"And besides, you always looked so cute whenever you slept you know? I had cameras all over your house."
His words made you freeze, he watched you sleep?? And had cameras all over your house? What else could he have seen he shouldn't have seen? And if he's a ghost then why does he need cameras?
As if he read your mind, he shrugged.
"Because I have limits, I can't always watch you with my own eyes so I decided to watch you from cameras, I don't like it but it would do in the meantime I wasn't around."
At this point you felt your heart racing rapidly, your breath became heavier with each second that passes and your body trembling as you felt dizzy. You were disgusted by his behavior and all this time you never knew he had cameras all over you. And we share similar passions and feelings??
"Well it really doesn't matter now since I have you now, and for all eternity you'll be stuck with me forever and ever, I won't lose you like I lost him." He said before taking small steps towards me before hugging me, trying to comfort me.
I suddenly felt a sharp pain before I coughed up blood.
Wait, blood?
I looked down to my hand and saw blood on my hands as I subconsciously touched my abdomen, feeling a gash on my stomach.
He then started saying some words I didn't know nor did I care. All I cared about was the blood on my hands, and now on the floor.
"Shh, it's alright, I'll be here when you wake up alright? Like I said, we'll be together for all eternity."
That was the last thing I heard before closing my eyes shut and leaned against him.
The Gods were really cruel huh? But this was a blessing for him. This was a curse for you.
.
.
.
"The end!" A young woman said as she closed the book in her hand, looking at the 6 year old in front of her who still wanted to hear more.
"That's it? No happy endings?" The girl asked as she was confused, most fairy tales she heard always ended with an happy ending. She didn't like this story as it didn't had one and it was sad for her.
The young woman patted the young girl's head and shook her head sadly.
"There are no happy endings in this one I'm afraid little one." She said before yawning and stretching, getting ready for bed now. The six year old merely pouted, wanting to hear an alternative ending besides the bad ending.
The woman noticed the girl's expression as her face softened and sighed.
"Listen, not all fairytales end in happy endings I'm afraid, there are just stories that won't always end up being a happy ending like everyone else wants it too be. And that's the way it is." She said as she tried to consult the girl who was still pouting.
She sighed as she scooted over next to her and tried giving her some comfort to make her feel better.
"You'll understand soon when you get older. But go to sleep now okay?" The woman said to her daughter as her daughter nodded, but still not understanding her words.
"Good."
As she was about to get up and go to her room, she suddenly was stopped by her daughter.
"Mama, what was the title called again?"
The Mother smiled and replied happily-
"Memorial of the Dead"
Hii! How are you guys today? I hope you're doing well and I'm sorry if I'm not posting very often. I've became very busy recently but I am still trying to post every now and then! But I hope you enjoyed this!
#atier's works✎#twisted wonderland x reader#twst x reader#yandere twisted wonderland#yandere twst#yandere idia shroud#Idia Shroud x reader
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I love how many people on here are always talking about who is and isn't doomed by the narrative in DFF like -
Are you sure? Because I've analyzed the hell out of this show and I cannot tell who is and isn't doomed by the narrative at this point. The story is too complex and nuanced and there's so many pieces of it moving at any given time.
Are Phee and Jin doomed by the narrative for betraying Non? I doubt it, because Non isn't the smiling little ingenue that people think he is. He's a character who has also made mistakes and fucked up, so idk if putting him as the tragic hero at the center of this tale makes sense. Like, of course he is the true victim of the show, but he's also way more complex than a tragic little kid. I know that people want Non to be that, and Phee and Jin to die because of it, but is it true? I don't think so.
Is Tee doomed by the narrative? You'd think so, and yet I feel like I've been seeing him move toward a redemption arc in recent episodes. I honestly can't tell if he'll live or die. He's not an irredeemable asshole because he loves White, and loves him so deeply that he'd rather die himself than bad things happen to White.
I don't think that anyone in DFF is obviously doomed by the narrative. They're all too complex and sympathetic for anything that simple and clear-cut.
That's not to say I'm positive Phee, Jin, Tee, or any of the others will live. It's impossible for me to say at this point because the show hasn't had a single high stakes death so far. I cannot tell how cut-throat the writers will be toward the end of it because we haven't lost anyone that actually hurt yet.
So far the deaths are:
The spoiled bratty rich kid (and we only found out that he was a more complexly sympathetic character AFTER he died)
The driver uncle who had 5 minutes of screen time total
The evil uncle who we all wanted to die anyway (and who was killed off-screen so far)
The narcissistic bully who has no backstory
They've killed four people and none of them hurt. The only reason Por's death hurt was because we got a moment of the characters mourning afterwards. We didn't get that with Top, and tbh I don't think I'd even care if we did because he's so flat. All of the characters who have actual nuance to them aren't dead yet.
I feel like DFF kind of sacrificed being a horror for the sake of being a mystery. It would've made for a better horror (in my opinion) to confirm Non is already dead in episode 8 and then work back toward a bloodbath. But instead of that, they've kept us in suspense for three more episodes without confirming if he's alive or dead.
I don't particularly mind that because I love a mystery, I just think that they'll have a hard time course-correcting back to a bloody slasher in the last two episodes after so much time spent in the past and on this mystery element.
I hope the show sticks the landing and doesn't throw away all of the interesting and complex writing and nuances built into it for the sake of a shocking ending, that would truly ruin it.
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Love in the Dark Chapter 2
Kisuke Urahara x reader, mini fanfic series.
Chapter 2: When the past catches up.
110 years later...
You've been residing in the World of the Living since the incident many years ago. The streets of Karakura Town are mostly silent, the occasional hollows appear and you take care of them.
You weren't sure what happened to Kisuke Urahara. Aizen might've been telling the truth or Kisuke could still be in the Soul Society for all you know. You were almost praying that he was still in the Soul Society, being a leader and happy.
As long as Kisuke is happy and doing what he loves, you'll be satisfied either way. As long as he's not alone then he'll be okay. You miss him everyday...wishing you could be with him.
You wish you could be with Kisuke without bringing danger or attention to him. Aizen Sosuke has eyes everywhere and you won't risk it.
You were still a Soul Reaper, but you've been keeping your identity a secret. Wearing a black cloak and having your sword tuck in your side.
Then there's Kisuke Urahara. Also, residing in Karakura Town running a tiny shop on the edge of town. He thought about you every single day, wondering what had happened.
He never thought that you would leave him, you expressed your love for him so often and never showed any signs of leaving. When Kisuke woke up the next morning to find you gone, he was devastated.
Almost as devastated as he was when he was banished from the Soul Society for hollow experiments, that he never participated in. It was a stab in the heart, losing you and then his entire life.
Kisuke mourns you everyday as if you're dead. He assumes that you are, just to ease his pain. He spiraled for a bit before Yoruichi joined him, leaving the Soul Society behind and he decided to open up his shop.
The waves of spiritual pressure ripple through your body. It makes you freeze for a moment, feeling spiritual pressure so familiar, it shakes you to your core.
It's Byakuya Kuchiki... and Renji Abarai. You would never forgot the feeling of the noble's spiritual pressure.
Your feet carry you to the spiritual pressure where you see Byakuya Kuchiki, Renji Abarai, and Rukia Kuchiki. Your eyes flicker down to Ichigo Kurosaki laying face down on the ground, injured and near death.
You have heard of Ichigo Kurosaki, who accidentally took Rukia's spiritual energy.
"Y/n...it's been a long time," Byakuya speaks up. Something's different. This isn't the same person Byakuya knew before.
"I'm surprised you recognized me. Some would say too long, but I'd prefer to never see you again," you speak firmly, the wind blowing back your hood.
"I would have to agree with you. I'd prefer we didn't have to meet on such vulgar terms," Byakuya sighs out with annoyance.
"I assume that you're trying to take Rukia back with you because she broke the rules and now she has to be executed, hm?" you ask, your eyes raking over Rukia's fragile frame.
"I'm going back on my terms," Rukia speaks up with confidence and you chuckle with disbelief.
"Rukia, I didn't think you were that stupid. I mean, your friend is lying here on the ground, on the brink of death and you chose to go back to your noble brother. I can't say I'm that surprised," you shrug your shoulders, taking a step and standing in front of Ichigo.
Your hand shoots to the handle of your sword attached to your side and your fingers wrap around the hilt. Renji glances down at your side, almost hidden by your cloak.
"I can take her, captain," Renji speaks up, stepping forward with a cocky grin on his face and his sword slung over his shoulder. You cock an eyebrow at the young soul reaper and scoff quietly.
"You'll never win, but you may try," you suggest, a smirk forming along your face. You pull away your sword and it glistens in the moonlight.
"Renji, don't be a fool," Byakuya speaks harshly with annoyance.
Byakuya knows that you're much older and stronger than Renji, you could easily wipe him out.
"I've heard the tales about you, y/n. How you were banished from the soul society," Renji speaks up and your stomach twists into uneasy knots.
You glare at him and step forward, your nostrils flaring.
"I'm gonna be the one. I'm gonna be the one to take you down," Renji growls out, a smirk forming along his face.
You laugh at his remark and throw back your head.
"I'm afraid you and your sword will never be up to the task, Renji. It's been a long, long time since I've felt something like this. Now, let's begin...Hadō number 63. Raikōhō."
Renji's eyes widen as you lift up your hand, your palm facing him as the yellow lightning strike forms in your hand.
"Renji!" Byakuya calls out with concern as you release the lightning rapidly and it strikes Renji in the chest. He grunts heavily as pain ripples through his body and it sends him onto his feet.
The portal starts to open up behind Byakuya and Rukia. You narrow your eyes and Renji pants heavily, scrambling up onto his feet.
"Silly little boy likes to play with swords," you comment, a wryly smirk tugging along your lips. Renji glares over at you and scoffs quietly.
"It seems like your past might be catching up to you, y/n," Byakuya speaks calmly, stepping into portal along with Renji and Renji. You let out a heavy breathe as the portal starts to close.
You turn around and kneel down beside Ichigo. The rain starts to pat down on your skin and you grimace.
"Ichigo..." you call out, placing your hand on his shoulder.
"Who are you?" he groans out, his voice muffled. The rain drops pelt down onto your face and you lift your head up.
A gasp is caught in your throat as your eyes land on him. His kimono swaying back and forth in the strong wind. A green and white stripped bucket hat over his head, his silky blonde locks poking out.
Your heart pounds in your eardrums and your body freezes.
It can't be...Kisuke Urahara.
It's been literally months since I posted chapter 1, lol. Anyways, y/n is pretty badass in this :)
#Kisuke urahara#kisuke urhara#bleachanime#bleach x reader#bleach anime#bleach x you#bleach x y/n#bleach headcanons#bleach x female reader#bleach imagines#kisuke bleach#urahara#urahara kisuke#kisuke x reader#bleachichigo#bleach#urahara x reader#urahara kisuke x reader#urahara x yoruichi#bleach urahara#kisuke#urahara smut#kisuke urahara smut#kisuke urahara x reader#bleach kisuke#urahara kisuke smut#bleach fanfic#bleach fandom#bleach fanfiction#Kisuke Urahara fanfiction
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I read vision of the future (hand of thrawn book 2 aka Who Scams the Scammers)
(spoilers) and once again it turned into a liveblog, apologies
Hold up are we doing Warrior Cats? Is this Warrior Cats Planet??
What base is “arm around your waist to serve as a psychic translator conduit”
Omigod I WISH my Warrior Cat name were “Jaded of Mara”
Everything I know about Soontir Fel I learned from x wing but I would not have guessed his primary motivation to be "dirt"
@ luke and mara: the girls are talkingggggg
North Barris Spaceport has me twitching
Ghent not remembering who the president is and just assuming it’s probably Leia. I mean fair
What base is "holding hands to brace yourselves over a swarm of flesh eating insects"
So we’re finally asking why Mara ISN’T actually dark side and the answer is… shrug emoji?
Man Zahn really is stuck on “character bonding hike” as a device huh. But consider I eat that shit up
Oh No Lando is racist
LMAO at “so oblivious you need a child pterodactyl to tell you to just kiss already” to “besides I don’t want my life to be like spiderman three I hated that movie” to “kissing with dubious consent” ALL ON THE SAME PAGE like Zahn finally realized he really needed to get this show on the road
LMAO at Ghent getting a free pass from Pellaeon to hack the empire. Like you’re just going to get the thing you need and not steal all of our military and political secrets right? Riiiight? Even more LMAO at the fact that that would probably not even occur to Ghent
When everyone assumes they're the protagonist so finding this one macguffin is their job personally. Like guys I like the energy but maybe we've got enough different plans to do the same thing (the exception, hilariously, being Luke) (and Oh No it turns out Luke is the one to find the macguffin because You Have to Follow Your Heart and Let the MacGuffin Come to You. I eat that shit up also)
Mara’s just... So great.
Not to make everything about my blorbo but absolutely to make everything about my blorbo I do wonder to what extent Ahsoka’s characterization post-Rebels doesn’t click for me is because a lot of the more obvious directions for Oldsoka overlap with Mara, and the powers that be didn’t want to reinvent the Mara Jade wheel. Not to say they have similar characterization – Mara has terminal sam coded dean girl syndrome – but idk, in dynamic range maybe? Calling out bullshit, weaponizing her own abrasiveness, covering insecurity with humor, being Kind of a Lot with a side of trust issues at any given moment – there are modes Mara and Youngsoka share that didn’t pass to Oldsoka apparently. Idk possibly all this is just me wanting them to TALK
Establishing that you can do evil things for selfless reasons without necessarily being in any danger of falling to the dark side is... Philosophically interesting
We interrupt this tale of political espionage to bring you Jedi Relationship Counseling (spoiler alert: communication is key)
"That part of her life [Mara’s time with Palpatine] had died unmourned" I mean mourned a little bit. Mourned for at least a book and a half
I've been willing to suspend my disbelief on everything in this book until "both Luke and Mara forget that ysalamiri exist"
I will never not be a sucker for The Movements and Transferred Ownership of Emotionally Significant Weapons
Oh No thrawn made a second foundation
The Aing-Tii seem OP but whatever
Oh No the second foundation forgot to close the garage doors
(Re: The Jade’s Fire) I know Mara’s having a Moment, and I promise I’m taking it seriously, but when the warrior cat asked “What is it you want, Mara Jade” my WHOLE BRAIN responded with "I want Hermione Granger! And a rocket ship!"
Moranda has real Kevin from home alone energy and I'm living for it
Is it bad that I’m actually kinda happy the Imperials’ Bothawui shield plan worked? Like, they had a really interesting plan and I’m happy for them. They earned it
WAIT IS MORANDA DEAD FR?
What base is “full mind meld while you’re fighting for your lives”
Who would win: ~1.5 Jedi, 2 sentinel droids droidekas, or Artoo with a sauntering gun
If I had a nickel for every time this duology explicitly established Jedi can’t go completely without oxygen, even when in a trance, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot but which makes me feel like the Ahsoka show had a weirdly specific axe to grind with the source material
Luke’s proposal to Mara is Just. The. Funniest. Thing. That’s some Anakin-level cringe and the prequels aren’t even out yet. He truly is his father’s son.
I mean POV there’s this guy and for a couple years you want to kill him, and then you realize that’s more of a You Problem, so then you’re friendquaitances for a decade mostly because you don’t approve of the shit he’s getting into, and then you have one (1) honest conversation and get caught in a death trap and he’s like “so I think the next step for us is marriage”
LEIAAAAAA! Full Jedi Knight Leia is both terrifying and hot. I would run.
“So it is treason” – Some random guy
Lando needs to be on the New Republic payroll simply for being willing to speak to any of the other characters and also he needs a raise. This poor guy getting called on to command the entire New Republic fleet mid-battle and he’s like “I’ve been a civilian for 15 years and also I knew you would pull some horse piss like this steve”
Mara Jade, Imperial protege. Skills include: Identifying load-bearing walls. (Now all I want is Property Brothers: Sith Edition)
Mara please. Luke please. These absolute idiots. This is some pear scene shit. I hope nothing bad happens to them ever
The whole back half of this book has been an emotional rollercoaster for me specifically because I wanted Flim to be Thrawn FR soooooo baddddd. And now I’m sad. His name literally means scam don’t do this to me Zahn
I’ve been amused by all the Star Wars universe idioms but I gotta take a moment to specifically showcase “burned your sky-arches.” Karrde is a delight to have in class
Having an independent intelligence agency that’s supposed to work for both the New Republic and the Empire seems absolutely unhinged but go off I guess
When the New Republic and Empire sign peace accords and Luke can’t even be bothered to show up
Mara is great and her arc is fuckin hilarious to me. The narrative has identified her as The Damaged One and I’m like???? She came to terms with her troubled past, drew her own boundaries regarding the Dark Side, recognized that there are people who care about her instead of pre-emptively pushing them away, and resolved to form deeper emotional connections. Smash cut to ROTS Anakin whose physical and psychic damage has literally turned his brain into oatmeal
Again I know this was before the prequels Mad points for explicitly saying Mara needed to form attachments to become a Jedi. Zahn being pretty gangsta there
OH NO THEMB
#long post#hand of thrawn#vision of the future#star wars legends#mara jade#ghent#timothy zahn#ahsoka tano#because ahsoka just sneaks into all my mental processes sorry
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Miscellaneous Star Wars headcanons :3
((This aint all of them but we’d be here forever if i put all of them))
Ahsoka grows to be taller than Anakin (yes Anakin is offended by this)
Anakin’s first language isn’t Basic (its not even his second its like 4th. Outer Rim folk don’t speak a lotta Basic)
Tatooine is like Australia, Colombia and Texas combined SO the accent is Australian, Colombian and Texan combined. Luke’s Tatooine accent leans harder on the Texan side. He says howdy :)
Leia studied former politicians from the Pre-Empire days (because Bail wants his girl to be EDUCATED) and accidentally ends up learning a little about Padmé.
Leia’s first words would’ve been mama if Padmé and Anakin had gotten to raise their child
Luke felt isolated as a kid, even though he was very social. Partly because kids found him weird, partly because ‘Skywalker’ is a slave name.
Obi Wan doesn’t find it gross that Anakin eats bugs, he finds it gross Anakin eats RAW UNSEASONED bugs. So uncivilised
The Clones on Kamino have hug piles. (They need comfort ok)
Rex cries a lot in private.
Even though Aalya and Luminara are a few years older than Anakin, Anakin befriended them really quickly became friends :)
Canonically Anakin is a really good artist but doesn’t show people SOOOOooo the headcanon is Obi Wan finds a sketch of him one day by Anakin while cleaning up after Anakin’s mess in his room and loves it so much he hands it in how own room.
Padmé proposed to Anakin
Padmé gets just as jealous as Anakin, she’s just not as melodramatic and can destroy people with words
Anakin smokes from time to time (don’t tell Obi Wan or Padmé they will kill him)
Obi Wan had 0 spice tolerance before living on Tatooine and had to build it up when he started living there
Anakin, Leia and Luke are all autistic
Han is surprisingly good at mingling with ‘the higher ups’ during politics dinners/parties with Leia
Shmii was a lil bit Force sensitive and helped shield Anakin when he was little
Padmé experienced prenatal depression and didn’t tell Anakin. Or anyone.
Shmii and Anakin couldn’t write and Anakin only knew how to read a few words. Anakin learnt when he was taken to the temple
Togruta’s yawns like a snake. When Ahsoka yawned infront of Rex for the first time his soul left his body
Yoda hunts frogs in the ponds within the Temple. Little Dooku saw him donit once. No one believed him
Owen mumbles to Cleigg and Shmii while he works like they’re still alive and with him
Shmii would tell Owen tales of what Anakin was like
Both Leia and Anakin make attempts to befriend any droids they meet. Its polite :)
Luke would dig for bugs with Beru and they’d pan fry them for dinner
Vader heard so much gossip because officers and stormtroopers just assumed he wasn’t listening to their whispering.
Ahsoka is banned from any and all kitchens because she burns 99.99% of everything she cooks
Shaak Ti had to babysit lil Anakin once and found him delightfully courious
Anakin swears in Hutesse to get away with it infront of Ahsoka. Ahsoka figures it out and starts repeating after him.
Anakin is banned from 501st game nights because he’s too competitive
Obi Wan experienced really bad nightmares after Qui Gon’s death for months
Anakin thrives in disfunction
Leia never really allowed herself to properly mourn her parents. Breha and Bail always plagued her mind.
Padmé is a dancey drunk. Anakin finds this hilarious
#There are 35 headcanons here ooooooo booooyyy#i have so many thoughts#so many things to say#many many thoughts#star wars#star wars fandom#sw fandom#anakin skywalker#leia organa#padme amidala#sw#obi wan#ahsoka tano
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The Maiden and the Drowning Boy | Aegon x OC | Chapter Three
Rating: Explicit
Ships: Aegon II Targaryen x Abrogail Strong (Lyonel Strong's Daughter), Jacaerys Velaryon x Helaena Targaryen
Summary: As the kingdom teeters on the edge of chaos, Alicent Hightower swaps the pieces on the board: Aegon will marry Abrogail Strong, Larys’ younger sister and heir to Harrenhal. Caught in the web of intrigue and political machinations, the pair must figure out where their loyalties lie, and what they mean to one another.
Tropes: Childhood Sweethearts/Friends to Lovers, Generational Trauma and Cycles of Abuse, It's All About the Character Development, Unreliable Narrators, Multi-POV, Canon Divergent, Bisexual Aegon II Targaryen, Book/Show Mash Up, Fix-It Of Sorts, Stopping the Cycle of Abuse before it gets us all killed, Team Neutral, fairy tale vibes meets victorian medievalism meets grrm
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Chapter One | Chapter Two
CHAPTER THREE - SORROW IN IDLE MIND
Aemond is the most put upon person in the entire history of Westeros. Aegon is the most navel gazing, half drunk prince to ever hold the title. Alyn Hull is just here for figs and a good time.
Traipsing through the narrow, winding alleyways of the Street of Silk was not how Aemond Targaryen wanted to spend this evening. Nay, this was not how he wanted to spend any evening. He mourned the cloak he wore, for he was certain that amidst the cloying scents of perfume and incense, and of the sour of human stink beneath, he’d never get the evidence out.
He wished for the quiet comforts of mother’s solar with a thick tome upon his lap as he read aloud to Mother and Helaena as they sewed. Better yet were the times when he could retreat to Helaena’s room and read only to her. She would card her fingers through his hair, brush and braid the long strands back as she always had. Other times, she’d lean into his side, soft and warm and smelling of the peppermint tea she always drank before bed. Her long curls would tickle against his neck where her head tucked perfectly, like it belonged there, on his shoulder. Aemond would adjust the warm blanket over their laps to ensure she was cozy. The book would span across them both and he would wrap an arm about her, fingers playing with her beautiful hair.
He’d read stories of the lands beyond. The tales of djinn promising wishes and sphinx spinning riddles from the furthest parts of the Essosi continent. The monstrous woman with half a snake body, and hair made of living vipers from the Basilisk Isles, would always draw gasps when he’d describe the garden of stone heroes the monster made. Helaena would gasp at all the appropriate places, look at him with wide eyes and would ask, “Do they make it out alive?” He’d brush a soft, reassuring kiss to the crown of her head and with a grin, tell her to listen.
They’d read into the night, and then when it was time for bed, Aemond would relish the sleepy kiss he’d receive, chaste and innocent, and still able to make him flush. “Goodnight, dear brother,” Helaena would murmur and he’d eagerly press a kiss to the warmth of her palm, over the lifeline, the blood they shared thrumming beneath.
Dear brother, she always said with such love and reassurance; such care and surety that he was her dearest brother, her favorite brother.
“Goodnight, my sweet Helaena,” he would tell her before floating his way back to his own bed.
Instead of all those pleasant options, he was left grimacing as a patron from the tavern they were passing expelled the contents of his stomach all over the cobblestones. His brother called his name with obvious exasperation.
“Uncivilized,” Aemond muttered, and narrowly avoided pitching forward into the mess when Aegon’s hand grabbed his shoulder and hauled him up between him and Alyn Hull, who clapped him on the back with a hearty laugh.
The smile that Aegon gave was not a jovial one, although the drinks he had at the previous tavern made him less sullen and more focused, more intent on forgetting; running as far as he could in another direction. Though not so unusual for Aegon, the lone man in his brown robe and bare feet on the corner beseeching men to return home to the loving embrace of their wives had turned Aegon’s frantic need to flee into something darker when his gaze turned inward.
Aemond saw nothing wrong with what the man said. After all, he wanted nothing more than to return to the warm fire and loving embrace of his wife.
“Gellys!” Aegon called and Aemond immediately tried to hide behind the elder boys at the woman in the doorway. “A room for us! Best Arbor you’ve got. Some Dornish as well.”
“Milord,” Gellys drawled with that familiar smile - the one burnt on the backs of his eyelids - knowing better than to address the one before her as Prince. “We’re happy to serve.” Eyes swept over the trio and Aemond tilted his head down enough that his hood made it more difficult to see, yet it did little. “And you’ve brought this sweet one again! How lovely. Bess, the usual for his Lordship.”
The brothel had changed little since Aegon had dragged him here for his nameday nearly two years ago. The tapestries which draped the sandstone walls were not so dissimilar to the ones his mother had moved into the gallery back in the Red Keep. It portrayed men and women in acts of carnality and some kind of sexual acrobatics. The acts portrayed were ones that Aemond is not so certain of, but he’d rather study the ones back at the castle and not amidst the ribald laughter that clashes with the music. Aemond was sure that beneath the flicker and shadow of the torchlight, they were littered with worn spots and moth-eaten edges.
Heleana would know the kind that dwelled amid the fabrics and he wondered if he might find a dead one to bring back to her. Something good could at least come from this ridiculous adventure.
Laughter and gentle music permeated the first floor, and Aemond was grateful to be here and not in the boisterous racket of the last tavern they’d been kicked out of.
A sandy-haired bard, pug nosed and red-faced, strummed his lute with a flourish. Along with his three minstrels behind him, also clad in various clashing frocks, the four held court along the far end of the room while women flitted between light and shadow to entertain the men. Aemond thought he also spied a few feminine patrons as well, among the settees and tables, surrounded by a variable spread of fruits, wines, meats, and cheeses.
Another yank on his shoulder by Aegon’s hand hauled him towards the staircase, and his stomach lurched with the unpleasant memories of the last time he was in this place.
It’s different this time, Aemond reminded himself while being jostled up the stairs, following his brother’s silver head, Hull bringing up the rear. He did not need to ‘wet his wick’ on this particular sojourn into The Pearl and Oyster; instead he was here to make sure that Aegon did not end up going too far off the drunken path. And as little as he paid Alyn any mind, Aemond knew that the elder boy would also ensure that Aegon did not end up dead in the river or with a knife between his ribs.
Why was this a concern now? Aegon had frolicked about Flea Bottom for years. Not even three moons ago, his brother was dragged back to the Holdfast with a split lip and double black eyes from his broken nose by two broad Gold Cloaks who’d pulled him spitting and scratching from a tavern brawl.
He gave his brother credit where it was due. Though Ser Criston taught him how to wield a blade, Aegon taught him how to throw a proper punch.
‘Blades are good for when you have them, but in a pinch, use everything you have’, Aegon had said as he whipped the apple he’d been eating with surprising accuracy straight at his forehead.
It had hit hard enough to momentarily daze him, but luckily no one was around to see.
Wariness kept Aemond from immediately divesting himself of the cloak when they entered the room on the third floor. A roaring hearth was set along the outside wall and the primary source of light for what Aemond assumed was some attempt at ambience. Swaths of dusty, crimson fabric wound through the rafters and draped down to give the illusion of some Dornish pleasure tent and not a private room of a brothel in King’s Landing. A thick rug, far too fine for an establishment like this, muffled their footsteps as they crossed the room. Woven strands of scarlet and cream, embellishments in gold etched a design that would not be too out of place in his sire’s room.
Past further drapes of fabric, Aemond could see an enormous bed in the corner. His stomach twisted uncomfortably with nerves that barely eased at the reassuring sight of his companions taking to the table by the hearth and no women bursting from behind the fabric like shrieking ghosts in the night.
When Aegon and Alyn weren’t looking, Aemond tugged aside a drape to confirm that there were none silent and hiding - assassins or whores or some secret, third option that was just as unwelcome, if undefined.
It wasn't long before a stream of women and girls arrived, bearing plates of simple fare to go with the bottles of wine bearing the marks of familiar orchards of the Arbor and the Dornish sun, and a bottle of what he was certain to be a golden vintage from the Jade Sea - the kind his sire ordered to be served only in the company of the most important foreign dignitaries.
There were young girls with downcast eyes and soft blonde curls, women with bold gazes and plump red lips, ones with Lyseni features and hair that glowed in the firelight - though nowhere as fair or pure as his Helaena. Brunettes with messy curls and giggles batted their eyes at him. A pair of raven haired twins with lilac eyes and hair shorn to their bared shoulders brought up the rear.
Alyn already claimed the twins before they even finished setting their plates of meats and fruits on the scarred wood, giggling as he pulled them in. Aegon’s half-sullen, half-hungry expression gave way to heavy-lidded eyes as a buxom brunette carded her fingers through his hair.
Aemond wondered if this was the best the brothel had to offer, for they were perhaps pretty at most, but none truly stood out. He skirted away from the curious hand of the Lyseni and narrowly avoided bumping into a little redhead swerving around him with a quiet, “Excuse me, m’lord.” Young, and pale, with straight hair, she cut a path between the other whores and set a platter of figs and dates before his brother.
The scrape of the platter against the wood drew Aegon’s eyes from watching the woman who was crooning to him up to the new arrival. His eyes opened slowly, a frown pinching at his face, and Aemond watched his brother’s hands flex against the edge of the trestle. In a fascinating display, Aegon lifted a hand to reach for a lock of that red hair, eyes glazed and face flushed deeper.
“Aye, this is one of our new girls. We thought she might be to your liking, m’lord.” A laugh shook from her, breasts jiggling close to Aegon’s head but his brother didn’t even turn to look. Instead, whatever spell overtook his brother shattered and the hand that was reaching out for the girl’s red hair smacked on the table.
“Out!” he roared at the assembled women. The redhead gave a yelp of fright and stumbled back, toppling over a chair as the brunette crooner came to get her up off the floor. It was difficult to tell what fed Aegon’s angry outburst more: the mess she left in her wake, or the mere presence of her. “Get the fuck out!”
Alyn looked stunned. The whores about them looked stunned. Aemond was stunned.
Aegon’s jaw clenched as he rose to his feet. His brother was not a large man, not like their grandfather who looked above all, but the fury on his brother’s face ignited a flame of unease in his gut. Out of the pair of them, Aegon was, strangely enough, not the one most prone to outburst especially without an obvious reason for it. “If I have to tell you again, there won’t be any money for you to share tonight. Get out!”
The room fell quiet as the door slammed shut behind the girls. Aemond slowly took off his cloak and looked at Alyn, who met his gaze with confusion and then something like dawning realization. Aegon ignored them both, pulling over one of the Dornish bottles to fill his goblet.
“For fuck’s sake, Aeg-”
“Don’t you start with me, Hull.” A pause and then Aegon reached to his right side, grabbing the chair and sliding it out. “Aemond, sit your pissy ass down and eat something. Mother’ll have me locked up should I bring you home in a cart faint from hunger.” He took a large swallow of his third cup of wine that night, garnet liquid dripping along his chin like blood and staining the old linen tunic and along his pale chest, revealed from where the laces were undone.
Alyn shifted in his chair, striking with the way his freckles stood out along his darker skin with the silver twists of his hair leaving his expression clear. Aemond met his gaze as he took the chair his brother offered. Alyn did not have purple eyes - his were a vivid jade color, but he looked far more Velaryon than his own nephews. Aemond reached a hand up to adjust his new eyepatch. He ran his thumb along the strap, where he could feel the embroidery in the leather that Helaena had worked so hard on for her dearest, favorite brother.
Aemond tried not to sigh. He would not get his goodnight kisses tonight.
A sharp kick hit his shin and Aemond gave a startled, “ow!” Indignant and annoyed, he focused back on Alyn who raised his brows with the clear look of what in the name of the Seven is going on with your brother?
What wasn’t going on with Aegon?
They both looked back at the man in question, who was tearing into a fig with his glowering expression and greedy fingers. Aemond’s stomach growled, and he grabbed one for himself before his brother could devour them all. He sniffed it first, unsure about trusting brothel food, but it smelled of warm honey. Biting into it, the taste of apple and strawberry burst on his tongue. Alyn was helping himself to one of the dried meats on another platter. It was a higher fare than Aemond had expected, but the relative cleanliness of the room belied the money that lined the pockets of the one who owned the place. At least Aegon hadn’t dragged them to something filthy and (obviously) flea ridden.
He recalled the first and only time his brother had brought him to a brothel. This very one. It was a different room, him alone with that Gellys woman who kept pestering him about the type of girls he liked, or if he’d ever touched himself. She’d brought in a Lyseni girl, young but still older than him. She had a sweet face, and for a moment he wondered if he could just pretend to get through the night.
Instead, she listened rather sweetly while he spoke of saving his sister from the unwanted betrothal with Aegon. His brother had not relished in the duty, but Aemond did. He had a dragon now, Vhagar, the largest and oldest of all of them. It was with his dragon, he explained to the Lyseni girl, that he had enough power to storm in and break up this farce of a betrothal, And they listened to him. Helaena was ever so grateful about it, charmed, and touched, and gave him a kiss on the cheek and called him her gallant knight. She didn’t even protest when he told her they would be married instead. Helaena had only hummed in her little agreeable way while mother tried to protest that they shouldn’t be too hasty. Aemond did not share that marrying Helaena, riding Vhagar, and having his mother acquiesce to his demands, might even mean that he would be who they wanted to make heir. Of course their father wouldn’t put Aegon on the throne over their eldest sister. But Aemond? Aemond rode his grandsire Baelon’s dragon, and he’d marry his sister, and he had started to outpaced Aegon in the training yard.
Aemond had proven them all wrong. They had laughed and gave him a pig, and he’d gotten Vhagar.
He was grateful Aegon was disinterested in throwing women at him this time, let alone in taking any for himself. He could at least sit here and eat decent finger foods and wait for his brother to either pass out from drinking or give up and head home.
“Did you get called into the tower as well today?” Aemond ventured in ill-disguised casualness, reaching for a piece of cheese this time. He didn’t meet Alyn’s curious gaze, for both of them were watching Aegon refill his goblet already.
A grunt was all the answer he supplied.
“What got you pulled into that old fucker’s room?”
Another grunt and a roll of his eyes. “Not blamed for once,” he muttered. “Just bullshit.”
How taciturn. Aemond shifted in his chair, and carefully offered, “You know, Abrogail got pulled into his office as well. He came to Helaena’s room himself to retrieve her.” Aegon’s flushed face reddened more, pink eyes narrowing over his goblet he held to his mouth but did not drink from.
Aemond pursed his lips and thought of the scene in the gardens earlier. Abrogail came back from their grandfather’s office far quieter than usual before so harshly snapping at his sweet Helaena and squashing one of her bugs. At the moment, Aemond had been rageful at the behavior, for his Helaena didn’t deserve that. But hours later, he had realized that, mayhaps, he’d been a little harsher than he ought to have been. He would not apologize, of course, but Helaena was always getting on him about his temper. It had been rather unusual for his cousin. He could not recall the last time she spoke so angrily that wasn’t caused by someone doing something reckless in the training yard - however that was far more mother hen than annoyed and snappy.
“Abrogail?” Alyn rolled her name around his mouth and drew it out in a tease. “And here I thought it was simply wine not getting your cock up. But Abrogail, hm? All of that yelling over some red hair?” A lazy shrug, dagger stabbing into a piece of meat before him. “Makes sense now.”
“I told you not to start,” Aegon warned once more before taking another mouthful of the Arbor red. His eyes were dark, a smirk slashing across his soft face. “Came to Helaena’s room himself, you say? Spend the night, little brother? Has our sweet sister finally let you beneath her skirts or did you creep in again even though Mother forbade it?”
Aemond felt his cheeks color, and he slapped his hand on the table. “Don’t talk about her like that.” A deep breath, the way his book from Bravos recommended. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Center. Stay within the moment. Aegon’s eyes were slicing through him, as if he could peel back the layers of skin and see what lay beneath. A gaze even more dangerous, given his brother’s dance into the land of inebriation, but Aemond simply continued. “Abby got upset with us. Her eyes were red. It looked like she’d been crying.”
His brother made a sound and took another swallow. Alyn caught his gaze again and pinned him there until Aemond gave a slight nod, confirming that this was what in seven hells was going on. Whatever had happened in their grandfather’s office, whatever had his cousin crying and Aegon ready to bite everyone’s head off like Helaena’s pet mantis.
“Both of you pulled into the old Tower’s office this morning? Maybe it’s less about those two-” Alyn waved a negligent hand towards Aemond. “And more about, say, you finally getting under your little Maiden Marchpane’s skirts?” A laugh and the bastard Velaryon snagged up the Arbor red and pulled the cork with his teeth and spat it out towards the fire. “Then you what? Left her before sunrise covered in-”
“Don’t you fucking talk about her like that!” Aegon lifted the plate of figs and flung it across the table, sending the fruit scattering and the plate clipping off of Alyn’s surprised shoulder to shatter against the hearthstones. Aemond’s single eye widened, and he pressed back in his chair even though the trajectory was nowhere near him. “I didn’t fucking touch her.” The hand that flung the plate still hung in the air, trembling as his brother loomed over the table. He lacked any sort of threatening implement but Alyn raised his eyebrows and cocked his head. “I didn’t lay a hand on her. I wouldn’t. I never do.” Defensive, as was Aegon’s nature. Defensive in the face of accusations that were true. Except for once, Aemond thought, phantom pain lancing through his face. Except for maybe now.
“Well, you mope about her enough. Fuck me, no wonder you got so worked up over the redhead. So what happened, hm? Did she accuse you of something? Did they say no more rides on the back of that dragon of yours?” A smirk at the double entendre, but he raised his hands in surrender before Aegon could throw something else.
Silvery hair, limp with sweat, fell into Aegon’s eyes as he shook his head. “No, nothing like that.” He raised his goblet for another drink and collapsed back in the chair, slouched and melancholy in the worst of ways. Aemond tried not to roll his eye again at the display of dramatics. “Worse.”
Aemond’s brow furrowed. “Worse?” he asked, confused. Dramatic, yes, but he also wanted to know what had happened.
A log in the grate popped and cracked from the heat as conversation fell silent. The brothel outside the door continued to bustle. There was the distant shriek and laughter of someone down the hall, but no sounds of violence. Aegon was staring into his drink as if it held all the answers he could ever need. Aemond supposed that wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. His brother had gone to drink before anything else for years now. This wouldn’t be any different.
“They brought us up to go over all the missives asking for her hand,” he finally said. Aemond strained to hear him and Alyn leaned forward in his curiosity. “Had an entire basket of scrolls wanting the heir of Harrenhal. Mother was there, and her dog, who said nothing regarding his sister.” Aegon made a face and shook his head. “I’m marrying Abrogail.”
That wasn’t what Aemond expected. “Is that why she looked like she was crying when she came back to the gardens-”
“Yes, yes, that’s exactly fucking why,” Aegon hissed through his teeth and pelted him with one of the figs scattered on the scarred tabletop. It bounced off Aemond’s chest and rolled across the table where Alyn snatched it up. “Told her to be fucking grateful, stop lying about - it doesn’t matter. Made her cry, and she best get used to it.”
“Then why the hell are you complaining about it?” Alyn asked with a shake of his head. “Aeg, you’ve panted after her for years, now here she is. You don’t have to marry your weird sister, you get to bed someone you actually like. Sounds as if for once, Tower’s done right by you. What are you so fucking upset about? That you weren’t the only choice? You’re a jealous prick, you know-”
“Done right by me?” Aegon raged, his hand holding the cup gesturing out and splashing arbor red up his wrist and across the floor. He hissed and shoved at his sleeve, where deep red scratches stood out against his pale wrist.
Alyn looked at him with an almost bored expression. “They’ve given you a cherry ripe wife-”
“No, you fucking cunt, they gave me the fucking Maiden!” Clay and wine smashed against the wall as he flung it at his friend’s head and missed this time. “The last uncorrupted, perfect thing left in my life.” A stabbing finger punctuated each point, and the resemblance to the angry, spitting rage their father rarely showed was never more pronounced. “The last one who doesn’t look at me like they wish I were someone, anyone else. They give her in all that innocent glory on a fucking gold platter-”
Alyn bit into a date. “And you made her cry.”
“And I made her fucking cry!” Aegon’s sharp bark of laughter held the familiar, manic edge and it rang in Aemond’s ears. Tears spilled down Aegon’s face amidst it. Sad. Pathetic. The self-loathing in his brother’s face made him feel sick and uncomfortable, and Aemond said nothing, couldn’t find anything to say and left it for Alyn to navigate for the time being. “I’ve never fucking touched her ‘cause I… I can’t ruin her. I won’t. Get her sick with whatever the fuck is wrong with me. No. No, and you know what’s worse?”
“The others-” Alyn began patiently, prising open the fig.
“The fucking others! Bastard had a whole bloody basket filled with little more than filth not worth to look upon her, wanting to shove their cocks in her till she breaks giving them their muddy fucking brats.”
“But you wouldn’t break her.”
“I wouldn’t! Not unless she asked me to, and I’d make it so good for her. But no, she’d burn me as soon as I touched her. Too unclean to fuck her, get her belly full of me.” Aegon groaned and collapsed into his chair, palm on his chest. “She’d burn me and I’d sing her praises. Burn my filthy damned soul just to touch her, Alyn.”
Aemond did his best not to sigh, warring feelings of relief and annoyance that Aegon’s focus was on the baseborn Velaryon across the table.
On the one hand, he didn’t mind that his brother was mostly leaving him alone. Aegon knew he was only here because of their mother’s insistence on Aemond being his brother’s keeper. While he’d rather be anywhere but here, Aegon wasn’t poking at him or trying to get much of a rise.
On the other, every time Alyn Hull opened his mouth, every time the two silver-haired miscreants shared a laugh over some inside joke, Aemond wanted to scream. They spoke with easy familiarity to annoyed tavern keepers, and every time Alyn showed how close he was to Aegon, it burned something in the pit of his stomach.
He was used to jealousy since the day he could understand his place among his siblings. He was used to the jealous feeling that he would not be Aegon, had grown used to the jealousy that Helaena had been born for Aegon and not him. It was only with the breaking of the betrothal that Aemond felt a cooling of his blood towards his brother. However, now in the face of his so-called friendship with the bastard, it reignited. Aemond still felt awkward speaking up or inserting himself into the conversation, and both of them included him to a minimal degree.
Yet, Alyn was waving a hand at Aegon’s dramatics, and while Aemond also felt annoyed at it, he knew there was more. Aegon was snappish, perpetually amused, arrogant in the way of dragonriders, and thus closer to being a god.
His brother was moody and glassy eyed, flinching whenever their mother raised her voice or moved too quickly with wild gesturing. He became wide eyed like a little child whenever Ser Criston praised him in the yard, preening beneath the encouragement. Whenever Abrogail laughed in that bright and honest way of hers at one of Aegon’s dumb jokes, Aegon looked like he’d sprouted his own pair of wings to hover above the ground. She always laughed at his jokes. Every stupid one. She always had an encouraging word for him, for all of them, but he saw the way Aegon’s shoulders would straighten, the pink on his cheeks ill disguised.
It had been like that for as long as he could remember. For as long as there was the jealousy that he was not the eldest, that Helaena was not born for him, that Aegon had a bond with a dragon so innate that no matter how much of a disappointment he was, it seemed to be the only thing truly good about him.
Aemond had thrown him into their father’s jaws, and though surprised, Aegon didn’t even flinch. Aegon had stood stoic in front of the fire and without hesitation, had spoken the truth to their father’s face, to everyone’s face.
Alyn Hull would never have Aegon stand before their gathered family and protect him, them, and their mother. Aegon would for Aemond, and so Aemond would do his best to help.
He had the most relationship experience out of everyone here. Him and Helaena were practically married already, regardless of mother’s insistence on finding him a Baratheon marriage. Confident in his unique qualification for such a moment, Aemond would rise to the task the way their grandsire did. A true Hand, when his brother needed one most.
“Did you mean to make her cry?” Aemond broke the silence that had descended with his carefully worded question, and Aegon’s pink eyes, glossy and red from drink and the tears that threatened, gazed incredulously back through the strands of his silver hair. “You can be an idiot and careless, but you’ve never been cruel to her.”
Aegon had been plenty cruel to him and Helaena, the trio of them rolling in the dirt or knocking over side tables with the bites they took out of one another. Abrogail was different; she may have grown up with them and shared blood, but she wasn’t their sibling, rather, an innocent bystander to the theatrics of his family.
Alyn looked as if he might try to catch his eye but Aemond did not grace him with a return look. Hull needed to learn his place, and be reminded that he was Aegon’s brother, and knew him best.
“Skoros mōris aōhys issa, valonqus?” Aegon’s tone was flat and sullen and did a poor job of masking his wariness. His shoulders shifted quickly straight to the way he held them when Mother would broach the subject of Aegon’s doing better and Aegon’s acting more princely and Aegon’s doing anything but being Aegon.
What is your point, little brother?
What is your end, little brother?
Fuck, Aemond thought, fingers tapping on the edge of the table. Aegon never used their mother tongue, and only did so in the most dire, dangerous moments. He’d have to tread lightly.
“Have you bothered to ask her?” Aemond tried a different approach. Surely, his brother couldn’t know her inner thoughts without asking and the obviousness of such a thing shouldn’t stoke his brother’s ire. He was never certain of Helaena’s mind until he asked, and they were twin flames who rode the eldest dragons. Two halves of a heart like those songs that she so enjoyed.
It was foolish of Aegon to think he knew Abrogail’s mind, but luckily, he was here to offer guidance.
Aegon pointedly ignored him, turning his glare to Alyn. The older boy chuckled, “What? He’s right.” Alyn muttered something but he couldn’t hear. It did not truly matter.
Aemond continued, emboldened by the agreement, “Only, when Helaena and I argue -”
Aegon let out a laugh, his usual nervous idiocy replaced with a cackle and still with that mad sounding edge. “When you and Helaena argue? You, Mother’s Holy Voice of Reason? Dreamy little Helaena and her kingdom of bugs? Arguing?”
Dreamy little Helaena had left a scar on Aegon’s forearm from when she’d bitten him so hard she drew blood when they were young, but Aegon’s memory had been dodgy of late. Even in his growing annoyance and the heated flush creeping over him, Aemond could forgive.
He could try to forgive. Later. When his patience wasn’t running out and he wasn’t grinding his teeth so hard they might break.
“That’s not -”
“Which riveting topics ignite such quarrels between you babes? Whether you obsess over your blade and books too often? If Helaena’s upset about her stupid bugs being in the wrong place? Whether she actually likes you over the attention she’s been giving that squire lately and how she giggles for him instead of you? Do not presume to know my dealings with my Maiden, valonqus. You wouldn’t know passion if it were riding your cock.” Aegon was rarely cruel, but he was good at it, and the smirk that twisted his features was just that. Cruel. “Seven knows our dreamy sister has no interest in riding you, or she probably would’ve done it already..”
It felt foolish that the first thing Aemond thought of was that no simple squire could ever be a better option than he, for he was a Targaryen and above the laws and expectations of the simple, common man. They were as close to gods as any could hope.
The second foolish thing burst from him as Vhagar burned inside, his fury and embarrassment pulled him to his feet to lean across the table and get into his pathetic brother’s face. Aegon no longer loomed over him, and was no longer as intimidating as he once was.
Aegon may have the perfect bond with his dragon, but Aemond had Vhagar.
There was nothing left to be jealous of his brother for.
“At least I know what love feels like,” Aemond snarled, his single eye locked on Aegon’s face and his teeth bared, every inch of him vibrating with the insult, the desire to curl his hands around his brother’s flushed neck barely suppressed. “At least I’m not too stupid to recognize it.”
The air in the room vanished in the wake of his outburst. The world held its breath and not even the logs popped. Not even baseborn Alyn with his japes and his commentary made a sound.
Aegon was still before him, eyes bright and sharp with a focus he’d never seen before except in the eyes of a dragon. The instinct to pull away was screaming at him but Aemond remained pinned in place. His jaw shut with a click, his eye widening when he finally registered what he’d said.
Oh yes, he’d fucked it up.
Aemond could feel Alyn’s gaze fixated on him but he didn’t move. He felt like if he moved, Aegon’s teeth would sink into his throat and rip it out. He couldn’t move as the fear and horror trickled ice through his veins, quenching that jealous, angry fire.
Aegon’s face had gone ashen; the horrid, blank look he got when Mother or Grandfather screamed at him came over him. His wisteria eyes continued to pin him. Aemond’s mouth grew dry as his brother’s ashen pallor turned pink, and then slowly red.
A muscle in his jaw ticked, and it was like Aegon was releasing him from a spell.
“Aegon,” Aemond rasped. “I didn’t-” He could speak but the abject regret and humiliation strangled him from being able to form any words.
Aegon’s face had turned a shade of purple and with a feral yell and the distant sound of a dragon’s scream coming from the open window, Aegon lunged across the table at him.
They went crashing ass over chair, food and goblets scattering and Aemond hitting the floor hard enough to knock the breath from him. A startled shout sounded somewhere, distantly, but it took everything in Aemond to focus before his brother’s fist connected squarely, solidly with his jaw. His face erupted in a million bursts of pain with a crack in his ear, yet Aemond’s fists reached up to push Aegon off, wordless yelling doing nothing to prevent his brother landing another blow.
Instinct drove Aemond now, Ser Criston’s training discarded in favor of the overwhelming voice that compelled him: get up or he’ll kill you. Get up or he’ll pummel you like Harwin Strong pummeled Ser Criston in the training yard until he was beyond bloody.
Even with his incandescent fury, Aegon was still closer to drunk than sober, and after spitting in his face, Aemond got his leg up and kneed his brother in the stomach, pushing him off and scrambling away so he was no longer pinned like one of Helaena’s favorite bugs to the display board.
Viscous blood spat from his mouth. “I take it back!” he yelled, shoving the chair in Aegon’s way while he scrambled to his feet.
With a roar, Aegon threw the chair and Aemond darted out of the way, the wood crashing against the stone wall. Alyn shouted Aegon’s name, another dragon call sounded over the city, and then Aemond felt Vhagar’s bond vibrate in his own chest, concern that was not his own clouding his mind.
Oh fuck.
“Aegon! Stop!” Aemond darted around the table to get it between them.
Alyn, the useless bastard, backpedaled out of the line of fire.
Aegon was on his heels and yanked him back by his long hair, landing another hit square on his nose. A sickening, dizzy feeling swept through Aemond at the stab of pain through his face, blood pouring from his nostrils.
Aegon reared back again.
Sunfyre was screaming across the city.
Aemond could not reach for the platter on the table to smack his brother with, and so he did the only other thing he could do: as Aegon went to throw his next punch, Aemond grabbed him by the shoulders and kneed him in the balls.
Just like how Helaena taught him.
[Chapter Four]
#house of the dragon#asoiaf#house of the dragon fanfic#hotd fanfic#hotd fic#aegon ii targaryen#aegon ii targaryen x oc#aegon ii targaryen fic#aemond targaryen#aegon targaryen fic#aegon x abby#fic: the maiden and the drowning boy
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Peaky Blinders with a SO who’s a time traveler (from the future)
🌕Tommy
🌕One moment Tommy’s standing at the edge of the cut, smoking a cigarette, the next he watches as you materialize out of thin air right above the water.
🌕Of course he can’t just let someone drown regardless of whatever witchcraft he just witnessed, so he dives in and fishes you out.
🌕The thing he notices first is how fucking oddly you are dressed. Colors and patterns on fabrics he’s never seen before. If you have dyed hair, that’s another thing that has him speechless, how did you get your hair that color?
🌕Obviously he’s going to be demanding answers, probably with a gun drawn. If you manage to survive that initial encounter, Tommy will be glued to you from there.
🌕He has so many questions and he’s always fairly rude when he asks them. But, late at night maybe after he’s had a few too many drinks, he’ll soften up and ask you earnestly, “What is the future like?”
🌕There are a million and one things you could tell him about, most of them horrible, but you look at this man who’s been weighed down by the world and you tell him about the best parts. His eyes brighten at your words, at tales of fast cars and accepting societies and cured diseases. You give him hope that he didn’t have before, that maybe everything really will end up okay in the end.
🌕That’s how he falls in love with you.
🌹Alfie
🌹Alfie is adaptable to most situations. It’s what made him a good captain in the war. However, he admits he struggles when some person dressed so fucking oddly shows up in house saying it’s theirs.
🌹He manages to not shoot you, surprisingly, and once he’s got you sat down he starts getting the full story.
🌹He’ll demand proof, of course, because anyone can just sew weird ass clothes and claim they’re from the future, but surely there’s something that you can show him.
🌹Luckily you have your phone with you and Alfie is both mesmerized and horrified by it.
🌹“You’re telling me, yeah, that that little glass brick lets you talk to anyone in the world?”
🌹I think he’d be very delighted by the photos you’ve taken, though. Snapshots of parties with friends, selfies with your parents, beautiful pictures of your dog; all these things would almost make him tear up.
🌹He wouldn’t want to know anything else about the future, though. “Don’t want to mess nothing up by knowing.”
🌹If you were stuck there, he’d let you stay with him and he’d do his best to guide you in this time period that you don’t belong in.
🌹He might get frustrated sometimes, “It’s not like where you’re from, treacle! You’re not there anymore!” But he’d never abandon you.
⚡️Michael
⚡️You we’re hopeful that it was all a dream or that you would return to your own time. But after a few weeks it becomes clear you won’t be going back.
⚡️So you started looking for work. That’s how you meet Michael. He’s looking for a secretary to offload some of his work onto.
⚡️Despite being in the past for a few weeks, you’re still not very good at blending in and he can tell right away something’s off about you.
⚡️Maybe that’s what makes him so attracted to you, that you just aren’t like other people.
⚡️Eventually you tell him the truth about your whole harrowing journey. He might struggle to believe you, but he’ll stand by you regardless and when you mourn the life you once had, he’ll be there to comfort you.
💥Arthur
💥He is making his way home from the Garrison when he sees some asshole attacking you in an alleyway.
💥He saves you, this scared, confused and oddly dressed stranger. He takes pity on you (especially when you start crying) and he takes you home.
💥He’s not much interested in where you came from, just that you’re here now. He’s absolutely smitten with you.
💥If you do tell him you’re from the future, he’ll struggle to understand (as in the concept of time travel is just so beyond him and what he understands) But he’d never doubt a word.
🌞John
🌞He got arrested for something or another and as he’s bailing himself out, he sees you being brought in.
🌞You’d just appeared in a time that wasn’t your own and were immediately arrested for being indecently dressed.
🌞He’s delighted by your outfit (and a bit turned on if we’re being honest) and he decides to bail you out.
🌞The connect between you two is instant and magical. You talk and swear like no one he’s ever known before and he can’t get enough.
🌞You’re what he’s always been looking for and something he didn’t know he needed.
🌞The time travel thing will throw him for a loop (and he might not believe you) but your strange story won’t matter, you’ll be his forever.
#peaky blinders imagines#peaky blinders#tommy shelby imagines#Tommy Shelby#alfie solomons imagines#Alfie Solomons#john shelby imagines#john shelby#arthur shelby imagines#arthur shelby#michael gray imagines#michael gray
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Fic Rec Friday #2
Provenir
by @allteacher
Read on Ao3
Esila, and stories, and consequences.
Rating: Gen | Word count: 2,043
Warnings: Canonical Character Death
Sometimes she forgets she is still growing. She has been aging faster, after they left the Distributary, but compared to humanity the pace is still glacially slow. Here she is, child and woman, wise and famed and impatient and young. Esila is carried over the crowd of Awoken, those that have fed on her stories for centuries, and becomes their voice once again. She already loves this place as much as she loves her people, and that is exhilarating and frightening.
This week’s fic rec is one of the first works of Allteacher’s that I read. Maybe I’m so soft about it because it’s a story about a storyteller, about a girl and then a woman and then a legend; about how a writer looks at the world in wonder and fishes out the crumbs that then become tales. A teacher-child with ink-stained hands, Distributary-ancient but not overburdened by wisdom. And oh the prose is so ethereal and Dreaming City-esque, I mean—“glacially slow”!!!!! I’m absorbing the language through my pores!!!!
The fighting grows worse, and Esila turns inward from a perfect world towards a more perfect one. She is older now, old enough to explore without a babysitter, though with the Theodicy War her mother seldom lets her past the garden gate. So she makes her own path out of the gates, writes her way down the old hunt-paths long ago abandoned in favor of richer prey. She learns to walk where she could not go before: under the Crystalline Lakes, into the jewel-caves of the Andalayas. The stars become a carpet and she buries her face in them when the funeral barges throw up smoke. Here she does not need to think of politics and debts and death. Here she can dream of the stars.
I remember reading this paragraph for the first time and having such a vivid image in my mind. “Writes her way down the old hunt-paths long ago abandoned in favor of richer prey”!!
Here she is: dual-ringed, two-sided, spinning stories to close the divide between her people. She cannot heal the wound, but she has spent centuries learning, growing, teaching. She can show her people how to look elsewhere, how to reach outwards.
On the last day Esila sits in the Hull and tells her mother she loves her until the connection severs. In that last frantic second she promises her mother she will write. The last thing she hears from her mother is a laugh, a promise to write back.
This is also a story about a mother and a daughter—and isn’t it interesting how Esila, the famous historian and storyteller, whose life and death was a tale in itself, is being titled “Esila, daughter of Sila”? It’s her bond with her mother that defines her, and it’s handled so beautifully in this fic.
During their journey, Esila sits by the window in the common room and writes every fable, every story, every legend she was ever told. She asks the others for the stories they were read as children, records them, marks the differences that show between tellings. When her hand cramps too badly to write she takes the quiet moments to mourn for her mother, who will outlive her. She thinks of her home, the day they left, the day they were almost shot out of the sky. Esila hopes her mother feels her daughter, alive, in her joints. She hopes her mother will not feel her die.
Oh another thing I love is the little namedrops of characters mentioned in the lore like, once. I had to look up Owome on Ishtar, and maybe that’s just me, but I find it incredibly satisfying when I have to google a name mentioned in a fic and find they’re actually a canon character. Fr his could be an entry in The Dreaming City lorebook.
Esila daughter of Sila grows and ages slowly but is still so young, so lighthearted. On the second solstice Azirim comes to her and lies and she knows it but he reminds her of one of the first stories she ever wrote, about a Corsair who shot a man with her bow and traveled the Distributary doing good in an attempt to repent. She is not Sanguine, but she adores a tale of redemption.
She agrees to listen. She will die for it. This is history in action: the consequences of her mercy.
History in action… A tale of redemption... The consequences of her mercy… Delightful, delightful.
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When you say Claudia gets surgery wdym?
Hey!
Okay, so ... BIG SPOILER ahead. For season 2 as already foreshadowed from the scene they gave us and the sixth book, "The Vampire Armand".
In "The Vampire Armand" Armand recounts what really happened to Claudia, because she is not at the farce of a trial when Louis sees Lestat there.
I'm just going to paste the relevant passages here so you can read for yourself, but in real short: the surgery is done ON her.
For the record, she was slain by my Coven of mad demon actors and actresses, for, when she surfaced at the Theatre des Vampires with Louis as her mournful, guilt-ridden protector and lover, it became all too clear to too many that she had tried to murder her principal Maker, The Vampire Lestat. It was a crime punishable by death, the murdering of one's creator or the attempt at it, but she herself stood among the condemned the moment she became known to the Paris Coven, for she was a forbidden thing, a child immortal, too small, too fragile for all her charm and cunning to survive on her own. Ah, poor blasphemous and beauteous creature. Her soft monotone voice, issuing from diminutive and ever kissable lips, will haunt me forever.
But I did not bring about her execution. She died more horribly than anyone has ever imagined, and I have not the strength now to tell the tale. Let me say only that before she was shoved out into a brick-lined air well to await the death sentence of the god Phoebus, I tried to grant her fondest wish, that she should have the body of a woman, a fit shape for the tragic dimension of her soul.
Well, in my clumsy alchemy, slicing heads from bodies and stumbling to transplant one to another, I failed. Some night when I am drunk on the blood of many victims, and more accustomed than I am now to confession, I will recount it, my crude and sinister operations, conducted with a sorcerer's willfulness and a boy's blundering, and describe in grim and grotesque detail the writhing jerking catastrophe that rose from beneath my scalpel and my surgical needle and thread.
Let me say here, she was herself again, hideously wounded, a botched reassemblage of the angelic child she'd been before my attempts, when she was locked out in the brutal morning to meet her death with a clear mind. The fire of Heaven destroyed the awful unhealed evidence of my Satanic surgery as it turned her to a monument in ash. No evidence remained of her last hours within the torture chamber of my makeshift laboratory. No one need ever have known what I say now.
(Re the last sentence here: Of course Armand dictating this to David who will publish it... makes you wonder.)
Armand... cuts off her head, tries to stitch it onto a grown-up's body... and when that fails, he allows the others to put her into the sun.
The show has already teased this event with Armand's comment in the scene we got, and... I don't think they'll skip it, given the history of the real Grand Guignol theater, and the BTS posters we saw already from Prague (if you haven't, let me know, I'll dig them up for you).
#Anonymous#asks#ask nalyra#amc iwtv#iwtv#amc interview with the vampire#interview with the vampire amc#iwtv amc#iwtv 2022#interview with the vampire#iwtv armand#armand#iwtv claudia#claudia de lioncourt#iwtv s2#iwtv spoilers#surgery
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Btw major tom aint made by the author so its not confirmed cannon that adam and evelyn are abuse,ffs yall just want to make them seem more evil,yes theire negligent since sarah was born they had no choice but to use tj to heal her but they were in mourning
First reaction:
Now onto the actual essay, research and resources. Jump towards the bottom at the General Conclusion if you wish to skip the entire essay:
Part 1: The concept of Canon in SCP
The fundamentals to the SCP fandom is that there is NO canon in SCP. This has been stated over and over by the authors, wiki staff, content creators and even fans of the SCP wiki. Some prominent figures of high standing who agreed to this and had contributed to the wiki and the fandom on a large scale itself are Dr.Sherman from Site-42 and Author Raddhager- writer and creator of the Find Us Alive podcast.
SCP Canon is fluid. Period. There is no "One Truth Above All". Articles, tales, series and canons had time and time again, constantly contradict each other because everything is based on the authors' interpretation and canon- which, surprise, the authors are in fact the consumers itself.
Such incidents of contradiction can be seen in the multiple canons, the existence of the few dozens of SCP-001s and every other article that follows its canon (Factory and its lore, Daybreak and its lore, etc) and even who are on the O5 council.
If we're going on the logic of "Everything written in an article is canon", then let me propose a question. What if two articles using the same character/SCiP are contradictory towards each other? Does it mean that one article is "canon" and the other is "a headcanon"?
And this isn't a thought or a what-if situation because this has actually happened in multiple SCP articles. One I can bring up is literally the article for SCP-963.
In SCP-963, the amulet containing Dr.Bright is confirmed and tested to be indestructible. Yet in SCP-6170, an anomalous incident has caused the amulet to crack (and fucking up Dr.Bright in the process). This isn't the first incident where 963 is damage or Bright dies. In the tale for Yesterday in the Resurrection Canon (re: CANON), Clef "kills" Bright by sending the amulet towards the sun. The arguement of "it's a tale" doesn't work here as well because in SCP-6170, an SCP article, 963 begans showing cracks upon the death of the anomaly (6170)- which should be impossible if "SCP-963 is indestructible". Also the argument that 6170 affecting all anomalies in general so 963 being affected isn't wrong can't be brought up cause in many cases, 963 has been pretty much an item that doesn't follow reality's rules
Part 2: The Bright Family, lore and Author Bright.
Trigger warning for this part for rape, incest, pedophilia, racism and ableism
The actual canon of the Bright family written by the author is really fucked up and if you wanna kiss their ass and make that canon, be my guest but keep in mind that the Bright family is canonically incestual, openly support rape, pedophiliac and ableist.
I won't go much about all that but @canorrus made a pretty good post collecting all the parts here. [a big tw of rape, incest, pedophilia, racism and ableism before you click the link.]
Anyways if you are standing on the hill where canon can only be confirmed by author bright that means you are in full support of the canon that the bright family is incestual, rape-positive, pedophiliac and ableist. These aren't my rules love, they're yours <3
Also I don't know how to tell you, having YOUR LIVING SON who can heal people heal your DEAD DAUGHTER is fucked up. TJ's anomaly comes in the form of absorbing their injuries and making it his. Are you telling me that the risk of TJ absorbing Sarah's DEATH to revive Sarah is a form of love? Are you telling me that Adam Bright, in his grief of losing his daughter, making the decision to sacrifice ONE LIVING CHILD to bring back a CHILD WHO NEVER LIVED, is not fucked up?
I don't know how to put it in words to tell you that sacrificing a living child to bring back a dead child is not fuck up and grief and mourning doesn't excuse literally hurting a child <3
You wanna know what choice they had towards Sarah's death? NOT USE THEIR OTHER SON TO RAISE THE DEAD.
Part 3: The topic of abuse with Adam and Evelyn Bright. As such, big TW on Abuse
According to Google, abuse refers to "cruel and violent treatment of a person or animal." There's roughly 11 types of abuse towards children which are:
Bullying and cyberbullying
Child sexual explotation
Child trafficking
Criminal exploitation and gangs
Domestic Abuse
Emotional Abuse
Female genital mutilation
Grooming
Neglect
Non-recent abuse
Online Abuse
Physical Abuse
Sexual Abuse
As you can see form the list that I've gotten here, then you can clearly see that Neglect is a form of abuse. Therefore, putting two and two together would make Adam and Evelyn canonically abusive if they had committed neglect towards their 4 children prior to Sarah's birth.
This isn't a thing the fandom came up with, smartass. This is an actual fact that they are abusive
Abuse comes in many different ways and just because Adam and Evelyn don't hit their kids, they still fucked them up severely. Abuse is abuse. There is no "neglect isn't that bad".
If it weren't "that bad", it wouldn't be on the fucking list, genius.
My thoughts:
First of all, so what if we want to make Adam and Evelyn more evil? There is nothing wrong with that in a fandom that has no canon (refer to Part 1). Everything is up to interpretation and if you're being a pissbaby about a majority of the fandom agreeing that Evelyn and Adam Bright are shitty parents, then maybe don't interact with them.
Don't like? Don't interact. If you don't like my canons and interpretations of the Bright family, then kindly please remove your presence from my blog before I do it for you. The block button is right there. Stop shitting on my canons, interpretations and headcanons.
Also like, if you're like "Nothing is canon unless the author of that character makes it canon" then SCP is not the right fandom for you because again, please refer to Part 1 of this entire essay to get it through your thick skull that EVERYTHING and NOTHING is canon and it's up to readers' and writers' interpretation.
SCP and the wiki uses the creative commons license. That means everyone is free to use, distribute, remixed and BUILD ON what is posted in the site and surprise surpsrise, the Bright family were. Don't get your knickers in a twist because what people had build on isn't what you wanted or expected, love.
Oh, one more thing, just because they're mourning doesn't give them an excuse of using their son to bring back their dead daughter. Yes, grief absolutely changes and causes people to act irrationally but at the end of the day, you are still using a paying a living, breathing child to bring back a stillborn, dead daughter. I apologise for the cold and rough wording but I want to be absolutely clear and straightforward with this situation.
General conclusion/tl;dr
Firstly, SCP Canon has never been canon and it belongs to the people and how people interpret it. Canon is cherry picked and nothing is certain.
In addition, canon Bright family is fucked up thanks to the author and if you deem only what Author Bright write as canon, you need to self reflect on some of your personal values and critical thinking.
Plus, Neglect is still abuse. Therefore, Adam and Evelyn are abusive.
Lastly, SCP runs on a creative commons license so everyone's interpretation is valid. Respect other peoples' interpretation and canons and if you don't like it, move on.
Resources, links, other explanations:
SCP Articles & Tales brought up here:
Authors and Content Creators Mentioned who can explain better than me:
Site-42/Dr Sherman:
Wiki Profile
TikTok
YouTube
Author Raddhager:
Wiki Profile
TikTok
General/Other Resources:
NSPCC Types of Abuse
Creative Commons License
Your move.
#Alt answers#anon#putting it in the main tags to max out the broadcast on this clownery#also to set this as an example as to what happens if you come in with your clownery#i have a reputation of hunting down and documenting things to a T so if you fuck around you will find out#beef said i was an apex predator when it comes to this sorta thing afhjdhfkds#scp#dr bright#bright family#jack bright#evelyn bright#sarah bright#tj bright#tw.abuse#tw.incest#tw.rape#tw.pedophilia#tw.racism
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A Gift, A Curse
A story in which we discover just how damned an ascended vampire can be, and just how far you will go to save the spawn you loved.
Read in full on AO3
dead dove/not beta read
fic warnings: Abuse, Angst, Biting, Blood and Gore, Blood Drinking, Bondage, Dom/sub, Dubious Consent, Food Restriction, Hate Sex, Horror, Mental Coercion, Mind Control, Rape/Non-con Elements, Rough Sex, Sexual Coercion, Torture, Total Power Exchange, Trauma, Vampire Bites
Chapter 20: Dawn
In taking your voice, Astarion has killed your last hope of getting out of here alive. That’s alright, you tell yourself. Alive doesn’t mean that much to you anyway anymore. You’re so trapped here that it hardly feels like living. You’re compelled to stay within the boundaries of the estate, and even then, you can only enter the grounds at night.
You can only enter the grounds at night.
So you do exactly that. You go into the grounds at night. You wander under the stars, remembering times on your travels when you looked up at the clear countryside sky with the man who became your husband and he wistfully spoke about how the celestial sphere never looked quite so beautiful from the city. You tell yourself the stories of the constellations, the myths of victories and tragedies from times gone by, and you feel a wondrous sense of peace in the knowledge that the epic narrative of the universe will continue onwards, even without you there to witness it.
You stay outside through the darkest hours, getting lost in the sounds of your fellow creatures of the night. Rustling leaves and whispering wings tell you tales of the lives of the unseen things that cling to their existence even in this estate of death. You sit with them until the pale blue of dawn starts to creep across the firmament. Slowly a pink tinge washes upwards from the east, and you go tense with the anticipation of the sun's first rays finally reaching you. You think it will feel like an embrace, even as you die.
It does not feel like an embrace.
It feels like burning.
Your eyes are blinded at the sight of the very first sliver of sun that rises over the horizon. The pain is too overwhelming to even remember to scream. If your eyes could still see, they would know that your pallid skin has started glowing, flaking, flashing like molten silver, ready to slough off your bones, to be loosed from your frame, to dissipate into the cold dawn air. There is only one word you can think of throughout the pain.
Free.
And then the pain stops. You think that your nerves must have melted away. You feel your very soul being lifted, carried in a pair of strong arms. You think this must be death's grasp; that you have found the final comfort that you had been so desperately seeking.
Then death speaks, and his voice makes you weep from eyes that still cannot see.
"Darling, what in the nine hells are you doing?"
You don't answer. You feel fast movement, somehow, even though your senses have been shaken to uselessness by the pain.
"Are you trying to die?"
Again, you do not answer. You are too focused on mourning the escape that you had been so close to holding. You continue to weep, silently, like a wound.
He tuts. "My silly little treasure. No more wandering the grounds for you, I think. You are not to leave this house. Do you understand?"
You give the barest nod. Your vision is slowly coming back, and you see blurs of familiar corridors, a familiar door, a familiar bed.
"There's a good little pet. You will stay here until I return, and then you can show me how grateful you are to me for saving your life. Because you are grateful, aren't you?"
Gods, you hate him for it, but as soon as you hear the words, you are grateful. He speaks, and it becomes truth.
He goes to leave, but his hand lingers on the door handle.
"Oh, and darling? Don’t try anything like that again." His voice is light when he turns back to look at you. "If anyone's going to kill you, it will be me."
With that he leaves, the door clicking shut behind him.
#astarion smut#astarion x reader#bg3 fanfiction#astarion x you#astarion x tav#bg3 astarion#astarion#bg3 spoilers#astarion romance#a gift a curse#astarion fanfic#baldur's gate 3#baldur's gate iii#baldurs gate astarion
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howdy! i’m pluto ( 21+, she/they ) and would like to introduce the catastrophe that is woo hyeseong. y'all he's just a funky fella... i’ll try my best to keep it as organized and brief as possible, but i do tend to overdo it . below the cut is the long story short. as for plotting and such i don’t mind giving out my discord!
𝖆 𝖘𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖓𝖌𝖊𝖗 𝖈𝖆𝖑𝖑𝖘 … have a drink at my table , allow me to tell you stories — stories of dragons and burnt men . tell me about lord woo hyeseong .
( lee taemin, cis male , he/him ) : ̗̀➛ twenty-nine years young , a firebender from the noble house of woo . many know them to be overconfident & aloof . how unfortunate , truly … i’ve always found them to be intuitive & captivating . they oft fulfill the duties of a courtesan . oh , i should tell you — they are impartial to the rule of house yi . well , you know how every storyteller bends the tale they tell .
the second born to house woo, not his father’s child. his mother was having affairs with various people after the oldest child was born. he eventually became legitimized
their family dynamic is shaped around a scornful & unforgiving father and an extremely cunning & manipulative mother. none of them are very close to one another. lord junwon’s death ( many are skeptical of lady minji and believe she brought him to his untimely end ) was truthfully mourned by everyone but his own family. whether it was his mother or not, hyeseong believes the man got what was coming to him.
the passing of the youngest daughter, yunha, should’ve been something he felt strongly about, but it was something he instead learned how to push down and tuck away.
overtime it seemed lady minji only became more and more cold. if that were even possible. she was excellent at convincing him that everything she said or did was out of love and that it would only make him stronger. the world was far harsher than anything she’d done or put him through, so he should count his blessings. he wasn’t alone in this, she was fair and gave her children equal treatment.
he seemed to constantly be in one competition after another with each of his siblings. between dancing, bending, various fighting forms, picking up their mother’s teachings with poisons, or any independent creative outlets, there was always something to prove. it was a losing battle, and one they all tried to kill each other over.
the pride he felt from his mother was brief, but it was there when he fully committed himself to mastering his firebending. she gave him absolute hell when he struggled to control his breathing or concentration, but overtime his control over the flame, and the balance between it and himself, became second nature. his performances showed that balance as he danced, and as beautiful as it was he would never quite reach his mother’s level of talent. something she used for that extra salt in the wound and motivation.
dancing felt more like a chore and something he was forced into as he was growing up, but he found peace in it the older he got. he found a rhythm with it and would create his own movements and dances as he went.
his life as a courtesan wasn’t anything he’d planned, and being of noble status he certainly didn’t need to venture down the path. at the end of the day his hands were too soft to be roughing it out in the military or undergoing any more training than what his family had already put him through. besides it pulled him out of the monotony of day to day life under his mother. clients and patrons funded his various creative whims. over time he filled his private room with expensive paints, canvases, jewelry, silks, tapestries, hallucinogenic teas, and whatever else he found value in.
hyeseong’s passions are fleeting and change with the seasons, but the one constant is his love for painting. he will frequently lock himself away for days to finish a piece. not many people see them and he’s not in the business of showing them off.
interactions with him go exactly how people imagine them to go. if he is anything, it’s predictable. he’s not outwardly friendly, insults people with backhanded compliments, picks at nerves in a way only he can, and is extremely confident in his abilities/decisions without having any reason to be. there’s not much of a soft spot in him for anything aside from himself, and even that is debatable. while he’s predictable, he can also be very sporadic in his decision making and values his wants and desires above all else. somewhere along the way he weaseled his mindset out of following in the line set out for him by his mother, and leaned into being the family disappointment.
heavy on the impartial stance for the rule of house yi. if it doesn’t stop him from going about his day to day life then he won’t ever see much point in putting his foot on either side of the fence. it could very well change as the political landscape changes and if those changes directly affect his wellbeing, but for now he chooses to live in blissful ignorance.
okayyyy... i think that's all i've got for now. it feels a lil messy, but i'm still pulling bits of him out of the clay. that being said, i do have a headcanons page here & a page for specific wanted plots here ( that i am still working on.. y'all caught me slackin ) for a little more insight. i'm super excited to dive into him and see what he gets into, so like this for plotting and i'll come to you!
#the burning sea: intro#rs.intros#iiiiii am so excited#this feels so unorganized but i can't keep looking at it🤩#ill be editing his pages and should be around when i have time at work today!!#guys i also don't know what that picture up there looks like im on mobile.... its driving me a lil nuts
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(Tw: suicide) I'm the original Pike confessor and I think people are misunderstanding what I'm saying. I've taken a bioethics class before and I've sat on the side of those for assisted suicide. I've been in the shoes of both the disabled person, the person who had to make a really hard decision on behalf of another and the person who had to watch while someone ignored every wish a person had in the last few weeks of dementia (if you know how they finally died, you know).
When I say update, I mean that in the 60s those writers sat down and thought what's the worst piece of medical equipment someone could ever be hooked up to. I know! The Iron Lung! And then they made it Future. There's only one person on Earth still hooked up to one of those because we don't need them anymore. We've moved beyond them. So if the tech they based the chair off of is obsolete, then yes, I do fully think they should update the chair. That chair has to be reading his brainwaves somehow because he's making no movement for it to read. Computer programs now can translate a code to a word, so the idea that it's somehow reading yes and no in his thoughts and blinking a light is ridiculous. If your brain is able to understand questions being asked and can communicate yes and no, then he should be able to at least communicate other simple one word statements like "food" or "thirsty". They don't let him.
If your reasoning for this treatment is sci-fi BS like unraveling DNA then you can Sci-fi BS a better explanation. As someone who has worked with DNA let me tell you, unraveling it isn't that big a deal. I've unraveled, reraveled, inserted, deleted, and moved DNA sequences around and the bacteria lived to tell the tales. It's much more resilient than people understand. I'm not saying by the 23rd century we can do this to an already living human but if we're already suspending our belief that unraveling their DNA won't kill them instantly we can suspend our disbelief about other things. They just won't because they have to get rid of him somehow.
And that's what it really comes down to: they have to get rid of him. I really don't mean to be rude about this, but let's maybe stop making up reasons Pike's depiction isn't bad or defending the depiction based off our reframings of his experience, through our lens as disbaled people, rather than the show's actual framing. Maybe you relate to feeling like disability was equal to death and it took a long time to see it otherwise, if you ever did. I'm not going to lie and say I haven't, but the writers of Star Trek are not writing from the perspective of someone who gets it. They are writing it from the perspective of able-bodied people who think disabled people are a thing to be pitied and hidden and you can tell both in the 60s and now from the way they framed everything around it.
Pike thinks becoming disabled is equal to death because his able-bodied writers think they'd rather be dead than disabled not because grief and mourning who you were is a genuine feeling every disabled person goes through at some point. Pike accepts his disability not because he's learned to deal with and work around it but because if he's not disabled then Spock dies and rather he be "dead" than Spock be dead.
I'm not saying you can't relate to Pike by reframing his behavior (and you do have to reframe it because its not the intention of the writters for you to relate to Pike but rather for you to be afraid of becoming like him) but I'm saying they put him in a cage out of sight and there's only one way to take that.
Pike was not written for us. We can reclaim him and his story all we want, but he wasn't and isn't written for us. I'm going to hold the writers accountable for that fact.
Posting this as a response to a previous confession.
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SPOILERS for The Sandman comic book series. All of it. Especially the ending. Okay spoiler alert over.
And a content warning about suicide.
I'm not into the fandom of Sandman so I don't know if Gaiman addressed this or if this is a widely held thought but from the incredibly affecting day I finished it so long ago, I've always held the belief that the series is essentially Morpheus's suicide note. Essentially, it being a series of him wrapping up his affairs as he orchestrated his death. I remember reading the quote from Gaiman, "“The Lord of Dreams learns that one must change or die, and makes his decision." and then realizing his actions in a purposeful way, lead to his death. He set it all up. I know he says he didn't but how else can you see his actions? He even finds his own successor. He comes back out into a dreamless world that could use him more than ever and he's tired. He's playing catch-up and barely keeping up. And his devotion to his duty doesn't let him rest. He sees the need and knows he can't fill it. He can't meet the change. He tells his sister as much. And his constant orbit around his sister shows him everything he can't be. And the opportunity that lies there.
But that's not what The Sandman is about, it's just what it is. What I find the most interesting is when the Dreams of Morpheus come together with Stories that are a result of those Dreams. And how Death wraps those two up in her arms. They're all intrinsically tied to each other. The Inn at the end of the world serving as both the prologue and epilogue to Morpheus's death really shows that they are. We are a lot of things, people I mean. Or maybe just even living things. But in one way we are the same. We are stories. We have a beginning. We have a middle. And unfortunately we have an end.
I don't know if it was just me but I remember feeling a profound emptiness and hollowness at the end of The Sandman. A grief at the story ending. And I feel as if that is what Gaiman intended. Through the inn we learn of the ways Morpheus had affected people. When we leave this world we leave a lot of grief behind. Grief in the form of stories and dreams. I remember once seeing an ask of Gaiman where it was mentioned he was the one who said "Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem". And I think The Sandman reinforces that philosophy through the grief it shows. In a way, the tales those at the World's End Inn share are a form of grief but we also see the way dreams, death, stories and grief intersect in many of the important side characters. Hod Gadling, an incarnation of dreams as much as death, an outlier and an immortal. Someone who more than almost anyone would mourn Morpheus. We see it in the Dead Boy Detectives, a ghoulish emptiness where a story should end. And in Orpheus, forced to live on in grief. They are all twisted apparitions of dreams, of death, of stories, and of grief.
We are stories. And when we end, people grieve. They grieve through retelling and remembering. One of my favourite iterations of this idea is the story of Shakespeare and Hamlet. Shakespeare pays for the price of his dreams through his son and as we in the real world know, he grieves through telling a story of Hamnet. Hamnet gets turned into a tale that lives on long after he passes. These are all imperfect forms of life and death but they're all stories that do end. They have to. Maybe through telling and dreaming up these stories we keep them alive just a bit longer. Maybe until the heat death of it all, Hob Gadling will live on, being the last person Death take in, but she will take him. Death may be a mug's game but it's a game we all have to play. And grief is the price those that love us pay for it. It's the high cost of living.
#the sandman#the sandman spoilers#I hope i'm not misremembering too much and this actually makes sense#it's been so long since I read it#something I wrote recently about cowboy bebop brought me back to this train of thought#beyond that I hope the ideas make sense too#cw: sui mention
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The Betrayer | Chapter Six: The Trial
Just another casualty to mourn, you thought bitterly.
Pairing: Albert Wesker/F!Reader, Chris Redfield/F!Reader
Tags: Angst, Violence Mention, Terminal Illness, Minor Character Death
Notes: Finally finished chapter 6! This chapter took a bit longer to get out both because it's finals season at university so I've been swamped with assignments and exams, and also because I wanted to get the details of the station right. I had to flip back and forth between the RE2 remake and a bot match in DBD so I could note the differences. I know I could have just not mentioned some of this stuff, but Lucky is a cop and an observant person and also she worked at the station for a decade, so I feel like she'd notice lol. ANYWAY, enough rambling. As always, hope you enjoy! Let me know what you liked about it!
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Day 2; R.P.D.
You remembered the first time you ever stood in front of the Raccoon City Police Department. You were filled with such awe and pride then, having just finished your training at the academy.
You never really dreamed of being a cop in your youth, but you had always been loud and brash and determined to stick up for what was right, so it seemed a good fit. Who really planted the seed for such a career was your mother, though she would never know it.
She was a free spirit, one who had marched on the side of liberty during the civil rights movement, despite the risk of jail and potentially losing her job as a nurse. She was emotional and bright and always knew the right thing to say to convince you to join her side.
Your mother truly believed the world could be saved with a strong sense of justice and a burning hope for the future. When you were born, she chose to become a stay-at-home parent and made sure to instill these beliefs into you.
Your childhood was full of her warmth and laughter. During the day, the two of you would watch her favorite action shows and talk about how anyone could be a hero. And every night, she wove tales of strong-willed princesses and how love would always win in the end.
You clung to her every word, making sure to reenact those epic stories on the playground with any child who was willing to play along. And as you aged, you brought these lessons with you into the classroom, standing up to bullies and showing those who were tormented by them the kindness other students refused to.
You wanted to make her proud. You wanted to grow up to be just like her.
And you were only seven years old when she first got sick.
Your parents didn’t tell you right away, but you had always been an observant child, despite your audacious nature. You knew from the start something was very wrong. But your mother often spoke of miracles, and you had been so confident that if anyone could pull one off, it would be her.
The doctors had only given her a year to live, but she pushed right through. Sure, the chemo cost her her beautiful long hair, and her natural curves were sharpened by protruding bones as she kept losing weight, but she was alive and as dignified and tenacious as ever.
If she was afraid, she never showed it. Even now, as an adult, you could only ever dream of being that brave.
As the months passed, however, you started to lose hope she would make it.
You were nine–nearing ten–when she became bedridden.
Still, you sat with her every day after school to watch those cheesy action shows she loved so much, and every night you would lay your head on her chest as she told you her fantastical tales despite thinking you were getting too old for bedtime stories and knowing them all by heart, anyway.
“You know, honey,” she started one evening, carding her now bony fingers through your hair, “the world could really use more heroes. My whole life, I wanted to be one, but I think the time for that has passed. You, though… You have the makings of a great one.”
You felt tears well up in your eyes as you looked up at her. “But I’m not strong like you are, Mom.”
“No,” she replied, a soft smile alighting her face, still beautiful despite her sunken features and pale, sickly skin, “you’re stronger.”
She passed away only four months later.
You became an anxious and angry kid after that, and for a long time, you stopped believing in miracles. But as you looked back, you supposed the real miracle was that you got to spend an extra two years with her before she died. A silver lining.
Despite the rage that followed your adolescence, you kept your mother’s words close to your heart. If she believed you could be a hero, then by god, you would become one.
You continued to fight bullies, but now there was an edge of violence to your attempts at peace-keeping. More often than not, you came home with a busted lip and bruised knuckles. The other kids–even the ones you helped–started to fear you, and you were getting into near-constant trouble with the school.
You didn’t care at the time. You needed to feel like you were doing something. The adrenaline pumping through your veins after a good fight was one of the few things that could quell the cold emptiness inside of you where your mother’s warmth had once been.
One day, when you were sixteen, a young police officer who had been tasked with dragging you away from a particularly brutal fight, pulled you into the empty auditorium and sat you down next to him right on the stage. As your legs dangled off the side, kicking nervously, he asked you why you were doing this. It was something no one had bothered to question since your mother’s death.
For the first time, you let it all out, shocked even with yourself that you were telling a complete stranger every damn thing that had been tangled up in your chest for years. You explained your pain and your anger and your desperation to do the right thing. He listened intently and even let you cry on the sleeve of his uniform.
After a moment of silence, as you sniffled and wiped your eyes, he said something that would change your life forever:
“Your anger is justified and your intentions are good, but there’s more to fighting for justice than going after someone who’s done something wrong. Violence can be necessary, especially when you’re defending yourself or another person. But kid, you need to learn the difference between violence to protect and violence for the sake of it.”
His words stuck with you. You decided after that talk that it was time to turn things around. You never asked his name, something you regretted, not knowing that your paths would someday cross again.
You convinced your dad to put you in mixed-martial arts classes to take out your aggression in a more controlled way and stopped getting into physical altercations unless the other person attacked first. You even learned how to take them down without hurting them, something you had become proud of.
Then, as soon as you graduated high school, you joined the police academy. Finally, you had a way of weaving your desire for justice with the wrath that always bubbled underneath your skin and the training to manage it, surrounded by others who felt the same way. A perfect match.
Before long, you were hired at the R.P.D., ready to take on the world. For once in your life, you felt like you belonged.
You knew that corruption ran rampant in law enforcement; your mother, as an activist, made sure you were aware that sometimes the police were on the wrong side of the fight. But the R.P.D. never had a scandal, and every cop you had interacted with over the course of your volatile teenhood had been kind to you and to others. You went out on a limb to trust it was the right choice for you.
Knowing now that the higher-ups of the department were in the back pocket of Umbrella the whole time made you realize they were probably just very good at sweeping their messes under the rug. To think you ever took part in that, even unintentionally, made you feel sick to your stomach.
And, as you faced the abandoned precinct before you, you also felt a deep sense of dread and a soul-crushing kind of sadness.
It was raining, the droplets of water freezing as they splashed upon your face. You glanced around the dark courtyard, horrified by the sight that greeted you.
There were bodies… everywhere. Wrapped up in cloth and piled on top of each other next to the entrance.
Was this how it looked when the outbreak happened? Before everything was reduced to nothing but ash? You wondered if any of those bodies belonged to people you knew.
But they couldn’t be actual corpses, right? They were just set dressing. Just a painful memory conjured up to hurt you and your friends.
You don’t think you ever wanted to test that theory, though.
Beyond that, there was some strange orange substance bubbling through cracks in the walls, the ground, and various other surfaces. The doors of the station looked like they were torn from their hinges and you could see inside the main hall a bit, books and papers scattered on the dirty floor.
What had once been a home away from home was now nothing more than a stage built to display your execution.
How much crueler could the Entity hope to be?
Reflexively, you squeezed your hand into a tight fist, forgetting that Chris’s was in your grasp. You looked up at him and he offered you a sad glance when he saw the mix of emotions on your face.
It seemed like he wanted to say something, but there was no need. You would just have to suck it up if you wanted to survive.
“This way,” Jill said in a low voice, pulling you from your reverie as your group shuffled along the side path of the station instead of going inside it. “There’s usually a gen over here.”
You released Chris’s hand before following behind them, making sure to avoid touching that orange matter, whispering, “What is this crap?”
“We don’t really know. Hard to study it when the only time we see it is during trials. Not to mention, we don’t know if it’s dangerous to touch,” Rebecca replied.
You simply blew air out through your teeth as the four of you reached the generator, situated pretty evenly between the gate and the east half of the station. There were only three sides available to work on and you gave the team a questioning look.
“Here,” Chris said, beckoning you over towards him as he knelt in front of the section that faced the building, “I’ll show you how to do it. The next gen, I’ll let you try.”
You nodded in nervous agreement, watching intently as Chris worked the machine; crossing wires, moving around gears, and reconnecting hoses. It looked… complicated.
He was going slow for you, quietly explaining what each action was meant to do, and you were trying your best to retain his instructions.
You nearly jumped out of your skin when the sound of a helicopter blared overhead, shocked you didn’t yelp and garner the attention of whatever killer you were facing today.
You stared at the sky in confusion, seeing that there was nothing but the distant light of false stars and the Entity’s moon adrift between billowy clouds, the rain stinging your eyes.
You looked at your friends, Jill and Chris not even phased by the loud noise. Rebecca didn’t jump, but you could tell she was tense.
“What was that about?” you questioned, returning your attention to Chris’s large hands, maneuvering through the repairs with practiced ease.
Jill glanced at you for a second before turning back to the generator. “We think it’s like an echo from our world. The Entity just pulls things from our memories.”
“Fantastic,” you responded under your breath.
After another moment, the generator came to life, the floodlights that had been flashing were now fully lit and bathed the path in a bright white glow. You were reminded of how there was no electricity in the survivors' camp, while all the lights in this empty building–and any repaired generators–were working perfectly fine.
Just another cruelty, you supposed, to force you to live by firelight.
You swished your hair behind your shoulders to get the rain-wet strands out of your face, forgetting exactly why you had kept it hanging across your collar in the first place. In the gen’s floodlights, Chris’s eyes raked over you, immediately seeing the bruise that marred your throat.
He rushed over to you and inspected it, his hand so careful as it caressed your skin. “What is this?”
“Ghost Face tried to kill me, remember?” you replied dryly, awfully distracted by Chris’s warm fingertips against you.
Chris’s other hand balled into a fist at his side, his eyebrows furrowing in anger.
“C’mon, guys, we gotta find another one,” Jill said, trying to keep the two of you focused as she headed toward the side door of the station.
Chris only shook his head and retracted his hand from your neck. Despite yourself, you immediately began to miss the gentle contact.
As you trailed behind them, you passed by what you recognized as a meat hook, looking so out of place as it stood by the fire escape. The sharp metal was stained with blood and you wondered if that was a decorative decision on the Entity’s part or if it was used so many times, it was just coated in it. You shivered at the thought of the latter.
You entered the building, thankful to be out of the cold, wet courtyard until your gaze fell on the floor, met with streaks of dark red blood staining the linoleum.
Well, that’s not foreboding at all.
Jill led you through the east office and you paused, scanning the disheveled room to find what had once been your desk. Your eyes traveled to the one next to it, taking in the messy surface.
Kevin.
You were just a beat cop when you started on the force. You had been assigned partners with Kevin Ryman, who was only a couple of years older than you.
You were rather serious-minded when you began your career, the carefree attitude of your new partner something that often drove you crazy. Eventually, he taught you how to relax a bit. You then fell into an easy friendship and had each other’s backs through hell or high water.
As the months passed, the two of you started to feel more than friendly with each other, sharing lingering glances and gentle touches. One day, it came to a head, the two of you throwing caution to the wind and jumping into a passionate romance.
You spent your time together drinking at J’s Bar and playing darts, which you’d always win (shocking he was so bad at it, considering he was a great shot with a gun). And every couple of weekends you’d drive out of the city, no real plan but to get as far away as you could.
He taught you how to better your aim with firearms and was to blame for the smoking habit you would soon develop. He easily gained the respect of your father, wooed your stepmother, and your siblings adored him.
It lasted three years.
The two of you knew it was for the best to end things, both for your careers and your differences in what you wanted in life. He was noncommittal, with no desire to settle down, while you wanted to get married and have kids.
It broke both of your hearts that the relationship didn’t pan out, but you would remain close friends for several years. A part of you would always love him.
You kind of fell out, though, once you joined S.T.A.R.S. He would never admit it, but you knew he was bitter that you got in on request by Wesker himself after you told Kevin initially you weren’t interested, while he was rejected twice.
However, it was as you got closer to your fellow S.T.A.R.S. teammates that you and Kevin started to really drift apart. You still hung out on occasion, but between your new workload and Kevin being assigned a different partner in your stead who definitely kept him busy–the rookie being somehow more straight-laced and by the books than you had ever been–your lives shifted in opposite directions.
You were filled with guilt and regret as you gazed at his desk, wishing you had tried harder to keep in touch. The sudden fear that he may be one of the bodies tossed out in the courtyard bloomed painfully in your chest.
“Do you know what happened to Ryman?” you asked your friends quietly, the group exiting the room through a large hole in the concrete. You noticed another one in the wall of the hallway–somehow even bigger than the first–which led into the lobby, the debris from it making a sort of ramp.
You wondered if it was the Entity who had created these, or if something from your world had. Neither reality conjured up a pleasant feeling.
“Last I heard, he moved out to Florida,” Chris answered.
He survived.
You smiled wistfully. “He always told me he preferred hot weather. Must be living it up, spending all his free time on the beach.”
“I definitely got that impression when I got ahold of him.” He chuckled.
You wondered why Chris went through the trouble of tracking him down. They had met–even got along to a degree when you went on group outings together–but they were never friends. You supposed Chris just wanted to know who all survived the outbreak. You’d have to ask him later if that was the case.
Rebecca silently pointed out a generator sitting next to the storage closet, the door of it boarded up for some reason. The gen only had three sides facing outwards, like the one on the courtyard path, and Chris beckoned you to kneel before it, squatting beside you to help you with the repairs.
On the floor nearby was a sleeping bag and a couple of filthy shirts. The police station must have been a shelter during the outbreak.
You then realized the generator was in front of where the vending machines (that you must have sunk hundreds of dollars into over the years) once belonged, a door that you knew didn’t exist in the real R.P.D. in their stead.
It felt more like a dreamlike approximation of the place as opposed to an exact recreation.
Or a nightmarish one, you mused.
As you looked at the generator, you didn’t even know where to start. You pulled a screwdriver from your toolbox and reached out your hands to the machine, but paused, unsure of yourself.
“Here,” Chris said, placing his hands over yours. He guided you to a loose component that needed its screws tightened, his lips so incredibly close to your ears as he added, “Like this.”
You felt your cheeks redden at his proximity, internally admonishing yourself for acting so juvenile. You pulled in a deep breath and focused all your attention on the task in front of you.
Feeling confident in your capabilities, he retracted his grip. The generator was almost done on your side, the only thing left was to reconnect some wires and you would be good to go.
But as you went to touch them together, your hand slipped.
“Wait!” Chris exclaimed, reaching forward to stop you.
He was too late.
You were blinded when the generator exploded in your face, Chris tugging you backward and into his arms to prevent you from being electrocuted by the exposed wires.
“Fuck, I’m so sorry,” you cried, terrified that the noise would alert the killer to your whereabouts.
“Hey, it’s okay. We’ve all fucked up a gen before. You were doing pretty damn good for your first time,” Chris reassured you.
You were frankly shocked by his blase attitude, considering the situation, but you only let out a sigh and leaned forward again to finish the job.
Before you could, though, you heard the heavy sound of boots on linoleum approaching from down the hall, likely entering from the side door as you had.
Your heart dropped and the four of you leapt to your feet, booking it through the large hole in the wall that led into the lobby.
Jill and Rebecca took to the stairs, heading for the upper east wing. You were about to follow, but Chris grabbed your arm, steering you towards the west side of the station instead.
“It might be a good idea to split up,” he explained. “We can cover more ground this way and force the killer to bounce between us.”
You only nodded as he pulled you into the west office. You turned just in time to see the tail of a long black trench coat disappear behind a wall upstairs. It made your blood run cold.
You hoped Jill and Rebecca would be okay.
As Chris led you through the room, you saw the “Welcome Leon” sign hung from the ceiling. You knew it was Marvin’s doing. He had done the same thing for you when you first joined the force.
Imagine your surprise when your lieutenant turned out to be the cop who saved you from yourself when you were just an angry teen. He ended up becoming your mentor and a father figure to you.
You learned later he had been married once, but his wife died in a hit-and-run. That ever-present grief was something you shared, the bond between you strengthening.
They never had kids, and he told you all the time that if he had a daughter, he’d want her to be just like you.
Your heart suddenly hurt when you remembered what Leon had told you, that his first day on the job was when chaos had already consumed the city. Did he even get a chance to meet your lieutenant?
“Did Branagh–” you started as you darted into the hallway, met with more blood stains that soaked the floors and walls, to your dismay, “did he survive?”
Chris slowed to a brisk walk, looking behind you to make sure you hadn’t been followed before turning forward, refusing to meet your imploring gaze.
“He, uh… he turned, after helping Leon find a way to escape the R.P.D. during the outbreak.”
“Oh…” was all you could say, your breath shuddering. You could feel tears spring to your eyes, but you refused to cry. Not now, when you needed to get out of here.
Just another casualty to mourn, you thought bitterly.
Chris cursed under his breath when he realized there wasn’t a generator in the safety deposit room, deciding to head for the stairs. The two of you reached the second floor, cutting through the library and the lounge into the hallway that you knew so very well.
The two of you entered yet another giant hole in the wall, this time in the linen room, which took you directly into the S.T.A.R.S. office.
“There’s one in here,” he said, relieved, as you arrived in the enclosed space.
You swallowed thickly, taking in the disordered state the place was in.
All the desks that used to be in rows of two along the far wall were haphazardly pushed into the middle of the room, a vending machine that had once been in the hallway sitting against one of them. The large dispatch console, where the S.T.A.R.S. team would man the comms, was moved from in front of the hole you entered to the side. On the other end of the room, the wall that separated the armory from the main office was nonexistent, the area only holding some lockers.
Two red ones had been set there as well, and you were reminded of what Carlos had told you about them yesterday:
“The red lockers can be used to hide in, but don’t stay for too long. For one, the killers know to check them, but the crows that hang out around the place will start flocking overhead to snitch on you. Sometimes I feel like the damn things are useless.”
The thought made you uneasy as you met the eyes of one such crow, standing on the floor nearby. The large black creature twitched its head towards you at an unnatural angle and you grimaced.
You returned your attention to the rest of the room.
It was… strange… to see it like this. Everything that once showed the personalities of your friends–like pictures or jackets or bags–was nowhere to be seen. Like it was just another office in the police station and not a place you all made a second home of.
You thought of your fellow officers, then. The ones you would never see again. Of the times you all shared together in this very room.
You thought of Joseph and Forest, how they used to joke around and play pranks. You thought of Marini and how he’d roll his eyes and admonish them, trying to hide his amused smile.
You thought of Richard’s soft-spoken words of encouragement on the days you complained about doing paperwork instead of missions, and Kenneth's half-hearted complaints that he seemed to be the only one to take the job seriously.
You even thought fondly of Brad, despite how annoying you used to find him. Until you remembered the fact he abandoned your team in the wilderness to fend against monsters. Monsters that killed them all.
God, it hurt. All of it.
You dropped to your knees beside Chris at the generator. It was up against the wall of Wesker’s office and you could see through the window, all of the blinds torn from their panes.
You stared at his desk, images of that last night you met with him before everything went to shit flooding your brain. You could almost still feel his cool fingers against your skin when he gripped your face.
He betrayed you all. He got so many of your friends killed. He got you killed.
And yet, you still missed him. So fucking much, it made your chest tighten.
If only I could see him again…
“You can do this, Lucky,” Chris told you, breaking you from your thoughts. He must have believed you were nervous about messing up again, which was technically true.
You nodded, taking a deep breath before diving into the guts of the gen.
You were about halfway through, the repairs going without a hitch, when you heard a bloodcurdling scream echo from across the police department.
“Rebecca!” you cried, about to drop the tool in your grasp.
“Hold on,” Chris said firmly, placing a hand on your arm to stop you from getting up. “Jill was with her. Let’s wait to see if she can save her so we can finish this gen.”
You didn’t like the idea of leaving Rebecca to just hang from a meat hook. “But–”
“I know, it’s not ideal. But the faster we finish the gens, the faster we all get out of here in one piece, okay?”
“Fine,” you replied, still upset, though you knew he had a point.
You just got back into what you were doing when you heard another scream. It was definitely Jill’s.
“Shit,” Chris said before standing up. “I’m going to go help them. You stay here and try to finish this gen.”
“Wh-what do I do after? Where do I go?” The idea of being left alone terrified you.
He gripped your shoulder as he looked down at you. “If I don’t come back, you can try to come get us off our hooks. If the killer finds you first, try your best to outrun them and maybe pick a place to hide. If you can’t make it to us in time, a hatch will open somewhere on the first floor. It’s the only other way to escape the trial if you can’t get the gens finished, but it only shows up for the last living survivor. Do you understand?”
Your mind was racing as you parsed through his words. “Y-yeah.”
He leaned forward, kissing you on the top of your head, a sensation of warmth radiating from his lips. “We’ll get through this, don’t worry.”
With that, he sprinted out the door.
You shook your head to clear it, wishing he didn’t leave you behind, and went right back to fixing the generator.
Everything will be fine.
You were getting close to finishing when you heard a deep yell bouncing off the walls of the empty station.
No, Chris!
Your hands began to tremble and you started to hyperventilate as you pushed on, desperate to fix this gen so you could go and help them.
“Come on, come on!” you begged, pulling the final crank.
Now all that was left was to cross the wires. You rubbed your sweating palms on your pants, fingers shaking as you took them in each hand.
You were just about to press the ends together when you heard heavy footsteps approaching behind you, coming fast.
You panicked and dropped the wires in order to make a run for it, the gen exploding in your face like the one downstairs. You fell onto your ass, vision white, before you tried to scramble to your feet.
You froze in place, though, when the killer spoke, their voice so hauntingly familiar:
“There you are.”
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#albert wesker x reader#chris redfield x reader#albert wesker#chris redfield#dead by daylight#resident evil#dbd#re#the betrayer
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philip (the wraith) with a gn!s/o who doesn’t come back after he hooks them (HCs)
@demonbitterbite asked:
can I make where the killers s/o’s gets permanently killed by the entity. But maybe they were the ones that placed them on the hooked but their s/o doesn’t come back.
i defaulted it to just philip bc philip angst <3
due to you and philip’s relationship, there were times during matches when he occasionally lets you off easy
maybe he pulls an ‘oops i didn’t make it to the hook in time so you get to wiggle off’ or ‘oops i couldn’t find the hatch before you did’
but other than that, philip is all business during your trials together
to set the scene, it was another normal match in the suffocation pit
you were on a generator with david, the bulky male boasting about his life before being taken into the fog
when the engine roared to life, you were quick to depart from david, wanting to get started on another generator
you heard the soft tell-tale bing bong behind you, philip’s cloak disappearing as he appeared in a shimmer of orange
you turned around and gave him a small wave and smile before bolting it for the nearest tile with philip hot on your heels
something down in your gut told you that something was… off, but you brushed it off and simply labeled it as ‘trial paranoia’
you looped him and inevitably were downed by philip
you knew philip had a job to do, so you harbored no hard feelings towards him when the time came for him to hook or mori you
you struggled in philip’s grasp as per usual, screaming when he slammed you on a hook
philip cast you a glance before striking his bell and disappearing
you waited for someone to come save you, but no one did
soon enough, you were taken by the Entity
philip knew that sometimes, the survivors failed to save their teammates during trials, but he knew that they had countless openings to save you from being sacrificed
yet no one did anything
for the remainder of the trial, philip was consumed by his anger and showed your ‘teammates’ no mercy
once it was all over, philip ventured near the survivors’ campfire to whisk you away
you could imagine how confused he was when he didn’t see you seated near the roaring fire
philip never saw you in the forest on his way there, but he checked the surrounding area to just to be sure
when you didn’t turn up, philip couldn’t help but panic
where the fuck did you go? had you accidentally wandered off into another killer’s realm? or were you kidnapped by another killer?
philip immediately cloaked himself and ventured to each realm, continuing his journey after trials he was transported to
nothing. absolutely nothing.
he returned to autohaven, his long dead heart heavy with grief
you were just… gone.
philip mourned the loss of you, his performance during trials diminishing
of course, he was punished by the poor quality of his ‘work’
the Entity allowed no excuses, and so, it used philip’s grief against him
mirages of you began to appear, in and out of trials
whenever philip would try to touch you and sometimes approach you, you would simply disappear, as if you were never there
love was something scarce to come across in the Entity’s realm, and it almost always ended in tragedy.
#bee's requests#dead by daylight#dbd#dead by daylight x reader#dbd x reader#philip ojomo#philip ojomo x reader#the wraith#dbd the wraith#dead by daylight the wraith#the wraith x reader
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