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someoneyoucantstand · 4 years

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Of Security in Memories

So I couldn’t get the new love of my life and the way he protected Squirrel out of my mind so I wrote this. (Also found on Ao3 if you could give it some love over there too)

OF SECURITY IN MEMORIES

He remembers vaguely that, in his previous life time, he had only ridden a horse a mere two times. Ash people had very little need for steed to the degree he’d imagine other clans had; they lived high up in the mountains, towering over towns and villages in private isolation. They had the freshest of water, collected from the beginning of the slipsteams at the top of the mountains so close to their homes, had caves to keep their slaughter from escaping, and could source warming sunlight for their own grains, meaning that only but a handful of men needed to be riders in order to journey to neighbouring towns for a renewal of medical supplies and some seedlings if the yield was less than expecting.

Nevertheless, the children of the ash folk took pleasure in trotting around the village on the large beasts, taking turns to ride or run alongside the animal, with an elder brother or doting mother leading the horse at a steady pace with a rope attached to its head reins.

The first experience he’d had on a horse was surrounded with humiliation, and was banished to the back of his mind with or without the teaching of the bible to cloud his memories. He had been young, maybe five or six years, when an older boy - whose face remained foggy on the rare occasion he thought back to his life before the brotherhood, preventing him from truly recalling who he was - had clapped him on the shoulder, declaring that it was his turn on the horse, before gripping him under the pits of his arms and hoisting him into the air and onto the leather saddle with a thump.

He had never been that high up before, and distracted himself with the view of his home from such a towering height. It was this distraction that left him vulnerable when suddenly the horse lurched forward without warning, leaving little time to steady himself and grip the reins, and instead left him toppling to the side and straight into the dirt.

The only vivid part of that memory was the chorus of laughter that erupted from his peers when he landed harshly on his arm, his cheek grazing the ground below. He remembered the horse stopping abruptly and the older boy's feet charging around him, pulling him to his own feet and brushing the mud from his trousers as he inspected for injury. The children laughed on heartedly, as if it was the most humorous thing they had witnessed in some time, and the older boy in front of him gave him non-injured cheek a warm tap before berating the children for their foolish laughter. Still, it was too late and he was already red in the face with embarrassment and vowed never to get back on such a foul creature.

Despite years of training and conditioning to the teachings of the Red Paladins, there is still one memory from his childhood he can recall as clear as a summer’s sky.

He had aged on in some years and was now possibly eight or nine years, but no more than that. True to his vow, he had never rode the horses again and had even avoided partaking in the chase behind the animal the other children led whilst waiting for their turn.

On this morning, however, the children were granted the opportunity to play on a new horse their village had taken in only weeks prior.

A tanned horse with a mane of black hair that looked as if to be shimmering in the spring sunlight; it was the finest creature he had ever seen in his small amount of years. Because of this, even he, who had sworn off the breed all those years prior, found himself trailing after the children to watch it in action. He recollects following the steed all morning and into the afternoon, watching its majestic legs prance around as children squealed with delight from atop its back. When children began being called back into their homes to complete this chore or that, the elder girl in charge began leading the horse back to the stable. He frowned at having to leave the horse, and went to retreat back to his mother - or what family he may have had; he had long forgotten aspects of such nature - when a familiar hand clapped his shoulder and steered him towards the girl.

“Rosalind,” the voice behind him spoke, “let me tie him back up for you, I would quite like to test his pace myself before he goes for his rest.”

The girl - Rosalind - had nodded and passed the horse over to the boy without question. She left and the boy with the face blocked by fogged memories crouched in front of him.

“Lance,” he spoke softly, “might we try you once more on horseback?” He imagined he must have nodded because the boy sprung upwards and mounted the horse with such elegance. A hand was extended down to him and he gripped it - it was soft, and warm, and felt so familiar in the back of his condemned mind - as he was lugged upwards and into saddle.

Like those years previous, he became distracted once more. This time it was not by the height advantage, but by the wonderful mane in front of him. He reached a single finger out to touch it, swapping to a whole hand once pleasantly surprised by the silky texture as he stroked it gently. Once again, the horse began swift movement without his knowledge, jolting him to the side, his body reddle to topple.

This time, however, he was met not with the roughness of the harsh ground below, but instead, a warm and strong weight wrapped around his stomach.

“Steady now, Lancelot.” A voice said close to his ear as the boy pressed to his back held him securely on the saddle. His chest heaved with slight panic as he looked down and, indeed, saw the boy’s arm embracing him, hand splayed across his stomach to keep him in place. He looked back and saw the boy grinning at him, tightening his arm for a moment in a sincere squeeze before relaxing and ripping the reins once again, “I have you, Lance. No need to fear.”

The memory stayed with him for all the passing years, he assumes, because it was the last time that he felt such a strong sense of security before a brotherhood of men donning red cloaks attacked at dawn some weeks later, burning his entire tribe and snatching him away until the pretence of redemption and messages from God.

Of course, one of the first things the Red Paladins did was make sure he knew how to ride a horse, for what good is a warrior that cannot lead his men into battle? It had been a slow process, one that was littered with bruised ribs from the swift kicks delivered to his chest whenever he panicked and took a fall, but in the end he rode with great talent and no longer feared he would take a tumble.

Still, he never felt that same sense of safety and security on horseback like he did back in that last moment of his childhood.

Until now, that is, in the present moment, when suddenly that memory of security returns to him abruptly, this time from the other perspective.

Feeling the burn of his injuries, he had been quite content with resting slightly on the back of the young fey in front of him, his arms reaching around him to lightly hold the reins, entrusting his trusty steed to get them to safety. He gave little thought to his charge and their riding skills, instead letting his mind be consumed by the transpiring events and the hot rush in his side that squelched with his own blood, until his horse tread over a particularly rocky part of path that left his charge unstable and falling to the side, ready to topple.

The child let out a cry of alarm and, instinctively, he surged forward and wrapped his arm around his small waist, pulling him into his chest, ignoring the flash of pain it sent up his injured side.

He breathed out a sigh of relief at the feeling of the child’s weight against his body, his bloody hand now being gripped by a smaller one. He felt that hand against his and thought back to the soft and warm hand that helped him onto his horse when he was no bigger than this child in his arms. This memory seemed to work of its own will, subconsciously leading to him presenting the child with the same sincere squeeze around the waist that he had been gifted a long time ago.

“What is your name, boy?” he had asked as they crossed the wastelands.

“Squirrel”, had been the reply and he couldn’t help but point out that “a squirrel is an animal. What name were you given?”

The child had not hesitated to say that “I don’t like that name,” but when met with the reply of “It’s still your name,” had presented the answer of “Fine. It’s Percival.”

“Percival.” He had replied in confirmation, but had not planned to speak the name again, instead wanting to keep as much emotional distance as he could.

And yet, as the child - Percival - sat himself straight again, he - “Lancelot”, he had to remind himself, for it had been so long, “my name is Lancelot.” - found that he couldn’t help himself, couldn’t relax completely.

Instead, Lancelot moved his hand just enough that he could reach to hold a rein in each without actually having to let go. He could still feel the heavy breathing of Percival, a mirror of his own such a long time ago, and chose instead to keep his arm loosely embracing him, his hand resting against his stomach similar to how a hand one once did for him, hoping to convey the same warmth and strength that had given him the security to feel safe enough to breathe again.

“I have you, Percival. No need to fear.”

#cursed #cursed netflix #cursed netflix spoiler #the weeping monk #weeping monk #squirrel #daniel sharman #percival #lancelot #merlin #nimue #nimue cursed #arthur cursed #morgana #katherine langford #gustaf skarsgard #devon terrell #shalom brune franklin

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crowcialist · 6 years

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Hiking “South Brother,” Olympic National Park: 6/20 (Part II)

We sit at the top and take in the view and after we realize it’s the wrong top, just west of the one we’d been aiming for all morning (or for well over a year, really, in my case--I’ve been yearning to sit atop South Brother ever since I learned you could do it without rope), we don’t say anything for a good long time.

All the triumph and exultation I’d expected to feel is just...not there. I’ve been picturing this moment for so long and it’s the wrong moment, the wrong spot. All the rosy glow I thought I’d be flush with has made way for something else, a sinister chorus: You fucked up. You fucked up. You fucked up.

It’s beautiful up here and I start to kick myself for not making the most of it. Will and I talk it over: if we pick our way back down to the top of the Hourglass, we could almost certainly find the path to the true summit--we can see the damn trail from where we’re sitting. But there are no guarantees, and we’re completely spent, and the hour it would probably take us to get down and up and down again would be an hour of sun on the snow, meaning we’d be making the final descent that much more dangerous for ourselves. It’s hard enough to plant axes and kick in steps on steep slopes in crunchy snow; on slush you’re asking to eat it.

With the decision not to try it, with the realization that there is very little we could possibly do, comes a modicum of closure. I take a moment and look around and try to breathe in the vast expanse of mountain and cloud and sky. I eat half a PBJ and we pass a plastic water bottle full of whiskey back and forth. I’d meant to drink it in celebration. Instead it’s half for the searing heat it brings to the gut and half to steel my nerves for the long, difficult trip down.

Our leaving catches the attention of a family of goats--billy, nanny, and kid. Mountain goats are some mixture of formidable and hilarious and utterly captivating. Would that I could move so easily. We’d watched them come down off the true summit a few minutes earlier; stifling the feeling that I’d just had my ass kicked by a literal baby goat was no small feat.

Still: no time for appreciation. Mostly they just want to drink your pee, but they can get territorial, and a fair few Washington hikers have been killed over the years by getting knocked off mountains by goats.

The nagging feeling of failure (or maybe just the toll of five-plus hours of struggle) makes my legs heavy and my head starts to get thick and a little stupid. I used to get bogged down in anxiety spirals once in awhile on the PCT; this feels that way. Like I’ll never get where I’m going and that this was all a tremendously bad idea to begin with. It doesn’t help that I start to feel like dead weight--Will isn’t exactly breezing down the mountainside, but he’s still taking the lead across the snow and the rocks, spotting cairns and kicking steps and doing roughly 100% of the work. I’m reduced to a trailing call of “see a way down from here?”, a repetitious phrase I start to hate myself for.

This is all to say that I’m not in a super great place, emotionally speaking (physically I’m in a stunning place, the most gorgeous place I’ve been in a long time), and there’s no end in sight. Following Will, I try to delay the inevitable while picking my way down the Hourglass, but there’s nothing to be done: we have to glissade. On the PCT a glissade was a godsend, a relief from walking; here, it’s a 50 or 55 degree pitch that requires a real short stop lest one smash into an ochre field of rock.

A deep breath. I’m braking and steering with my axe, but it’s not enough--whether it’s my own fault or conditions I’ll never know. I don’t pull up quite fast enough, and I add a few bumps and scrapes to my total. Those are less of a concern than my general panicky attitude.

Fortunately I get a chance at redemption a short while later, because we still have to go down the same narrow snow chute where I confronted my mortality on the way up. This time I’m a little more prepared, though the panic and hesitation are still nagging. (High speeds, high heights--I’ve always been something of a coward when it comes to such matters.) Will goes first--of course--and I’m beside him a minute later, laughing off the latest brush with my own anxiety.

Below the trail becomes an endless series of rocky slopes that have to be scrambled and scooted down very carefully. The further we descend, the more I’m in awe of the fact we ever got up at all. It’s steep and treacherous and fuck, we somehow we walked all the way up it in a relatively short amount of time. Another layer of resentment about our false summit peels itself away to make room for that happier thought.

The goats are still behind us and gaining speed. They’ve found four companions, including two more babies, and when we finally slide down the last bit of scree adjacent to long snowfield No. 1, we sit for a long while and watch them bucking and jumping and just generally loving the shit out of life. No hesitation, no sliding, no panic. Just the joy of being on the mountainside.

I fill up my water bottle in the frigid runoff of the raging stream beneath the snowfield, whose division we can now see clearly open up into a set of ice caves that will probably be gone in a few weeks. I’m less furious at my own softness as I embrace the fact that the worst is over, the danger has passed. We still have a long way to go, but it’s all forested and we can ditch our microspikes and helmets for good.

It strikes me that I’ve been terrified for I don’t know how long. Weeks, months, maybe, as this trip drew ever closer. I think I realized there was a non-zero chance I could ruin (or end) my life out here if I wasn’t both careful and lucky. On the way down I spent a lot of time thinking about all the people who would never forgive me if I had let that happen. Now that the possibility is gone, I don’t know exactly how to handle the release of that anxiety. It’s dizzying.

The blowdowns and red dust of the forest are an uninteresting chore that my legs force themselves over and under until there’s nowhere left to descend, and I’m chasing Will back into camp, and all I have left in me to do is grab the rest of the whiskey and a salami and a wedge of cheese and set up my hammock, where I pass out cold for the next two hours.

#Washington #Olympic National Park #olympics #backpacking #hiking #mountaineering #hiker trash #mountain goats #goats #baby goats #explore washington

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linkspooky · 7 years

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Do you think Amon character development lies with the defeat or any sort of talk with his foster Father Donato ? Do you think Kaneki will become a proper king ? Do you think there is more enemies than the eyes can see in TG looking at it Furuta never felt like an end game boss fight ?

There are two possibilities that could clear Amon’s character block, and he is experiencing a character block because he says this one chapter.

Then he says this:

and this:

Basically Amon has a fire on the inside of him that burns at the world, but he also doesn’t feel like fighting for ghouls, and he also feels empty on the inside. It’s like Amon saw Kaneki building himself on one level of conflicting denial and said “You are like little baby man, watch this”.

Originally, no matter what you thought about Amon’s character you had to agree even though he was pursuing the wrong kind of justice, he genuinely did care about justice and ethics outside of his actions and his character arc in og tg was about trying to find where correct justice existed in the world so he could pursue that. Unlike Ui, who say only cares about pursued justice as secondary to the people around him, Amon self drive was built around his pursuit of justice.

Now justice still exists, but Amon’s self drive isn’t built around it. He doesn’t care about the injustices that ghouls face, nor about the dark side of the CCG that he’s been exposed to and also dealt first hand with. His self drive instead is built around contemplating emptiness which... isn’t really going to get him anywhere.

I’ve said this before but the way he talks about it doesn’t have recovery in mind. All he knows is struggle, so he thinks that is all there is. In the same way his advice to Takizawa is built around sin, punishment, and repentance, but conspicuously absent is forgiveness.

In the same way, Takizawa in his next bit of self reflection doesn’t see any redemption for himself either.

Takizawa also does not envision himself as on a path toredemption either. Amon’s words that were meant to inspire may have justshunned Takizawa to the side once again, as he steps away from any potentialfuture reclamation of himself in the two people, his ‘self’ now belongs to Amonand Akira by choosing to stay clear from both.

Insofar as Akira as well, Amon’s advice has steered her awayfrom where the obvious redemption would be, in working with Kaneki and lendingher strategic knowledge to Goat’s cause and more human voices to give itvalidity. A path that would also give Amon what he wanted to, a pursuit of truejustice against those who were dealt injustice in a world where the framework,the cage surrounding the world prevents true justice from ever existing.

However, Amon’s advice to Akira also does not haveredemption in mind, only contemplation of her own self. Something which Amoninserts himself into as well. It seems consistently that Amon’s choice insteadof fighting for justice as was originally his path, is now trying simply tosave his comrades. First Takizawa and Kurona, and now his focus has shifted toAkira. Considering however, he has not even talked to Takizawa or Kurona afterputting so much effort to follow them for three years, I doubt their wellbeingis his number one priority. Rather, saving others allows Amon to live and findmeaning in his endless and empty search through them, since he no longerenvisions any answers being found for himself.

In other words, Amon has a block on his emotions the same asever, and just like every character in this arc no amount of revelations orchange will seem to break up this method of coping he’s built for himself,because if he does not find the answers he wants in Akira or if Akira was everto break away from him, Amon will simply find another. The same way that Kanekihas an unlimited number of groups to run to, if his refuge in the Quinx failshim, he can run to GOAT. However, if GOAT becomes too much pressure, Saiko andUrie of the original Quinx are still halfheartedly hoping he might return home.

The problem with trying to run away or find refuge in asingle person, is that since you’re not really treating them as an individualperson, they become utterly replaceable to you, no matter how much you mightthink otherwise.

If Amon has basically an infinite way to run away from hisproblems them, with only the slow emptying out of his own self as the onlyconsequence to his actions, then what exactly could break him out of thiscycle?

There are two confrontations that are built up then. Onethat would show Amon the results of his own actions, and another that wouldbreak Amon the same way Kaneki’s egg was broken, exposure to genuine human loveand connection.

The first confrontation lies in Hakatori, or little Bin. Whoclearly from her actions of killing investigators and then taking their Quinckeand using them, has never forgiven the making of her own two older Bin Brothersinto a Quincke. Not only was she intentionally spared by the plot, but also shehas conveniently disappeared choosing not to be a part of Goat. At the sametime, Amon also seems to still be using Dojima if only as a way of controllinghis Kagune, and still does not seem to grasp what Quinckes meant to ghouls theywere taken from even though in a way he himself is too a human walking Quincke.As long as Amon continues to deny his individual fault in the injustices dealtto ghouls, he will not see the reason why he should fight for them.

The second confrontation lies in Donato, who Amon has beenlong in denial of loving his father figure. How exactly would his opinions ofDonato change, now that Amon understands what it is like to live as a ghoul?Dealing with the hunger of one? He can’t simply condemn Donato for being aghoul now, ro see Donato as the example of all ghouls.

The parallel here is the same as the one Kaneki had whenfacing Arima. Kaneki claimed Arima was too complicated to understand, but atthe same time Kaneki was unwilling to admit the affection he had for Arima, orshow any of himself to him. Kaneki could not face Arima, because he could notface himself. It was only after truly facing himself that he could come toterms with, despite all of the complications of their relationship he did loveArima and was loved by him in return. The same kind of relationship existsbetween Donato and Amon, though built up much longer throughout the entirety ofOg Tg and Tg Re, so I expect it to explode much larger.

Another reason why I believe that Donato will be the one tobreak through Amon’s own shell is because he’s already done a mini version onUrie. You have to wonder with the specificity of these words, and the parallelsbetween the Urie fight and the Amon fight, whether Donato was hoping to saythese words to Amon all along and he was simply using Urie as a substitute.Projection is the name of the game in this manga after all.

#metasks #Anonymous

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