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#the void is the general dissociation from reality

mycenalucentipes · 3 months

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Rekindle My Flames || Diluc x gn!reader

HI SO I also write Genshin :'D, figured I might post it here too. This is crossposted from ao3. Except thered, I'm for some reason mycenaLucentipes. So I'll probably change my name here to reflect that beceauseee mushrooms, anywayS =============================================

Summary: You’re depressed, but up until this one night, you had been amazing at masking and hiding it away. Diluc stumbles in on your dying flame and wants to help relight it.

All the passion for life is gone, minus your love for Diluc? The depression just…its a cloud of sadness that’s hard to escape

Just a short venting one-shot :’)

TW: Angst, depression, low will to live / implied suicidal thoughts, crying, cursing, generally sad depressing theme, but there is comfort ending : )

Word count: 1,966

a/n: I think I made it entirely gn this time. I hope so. I'm sorry if I messed up somewhere or if Diluc is ooc. But i feel like if he really loved someone romantically, I think he would be sweet and bashful and caring towards them.

Diluc was mad.

Diluc was mad at himself.

How had he not noticed earlier? He could he not notice the love of his life suffering silently with so much pain?

His love shouldn’t need to bear that much pain in their heart. They didn’t deserve that, no.

They deserved the shining stars, the flowing rivers, the ripest of all fruits, the whole universe. They deserved it all.

You were his star that guided him through the lonely world he created for himself. You were his everything. He swore his love for yet set his flames to blaze even brighter and more powerful than before.

You are his everything.

So how could he not notice?

Just a couple days ago, you casually strolled in Angel’s Share at 20:00 with the traveler and Paimon, humming your favorite song. No more than 15 minutes later came Kaeya and Venti stumbling towards the bar where you and travel sat. The atmosphere was a lively one that night.

Upon your arrival, Diluc’s gaze followed you with gentle, tender eyes for his love. He began mixing your favorite drink before you even had to open your mouth. Once he finished yours and carefully slid it in front of you, he began mixing a cocktail up for the traveler. Although a bit wary of serving them alcohol, you assured him more than a dozen times that they were well over the age to start drinking.

Your eyes lit up as you felt the cool drink glide down your throat. “Diluc, sweetflower! This is amazing! Whatever you’ve mixed into here, is really hitting the spot,” you cheered, holding your glass up with a large grin adorning your face. It was fruity, with a hint of mint among the blend. Diluc knew just how you liked it. He offered a soft small back as he tried not to blush at the compliment and the nickname. Oftentimes, you would give him random, sweet nicknames.

As the night went on, he carefully observed you, happily singing and cheering along to whatever the drunken bard was playing. You, Kaeya, and Traveler had wrapped an arm around each other, swaying back and forth with a drink in hand.

Looks can be deceiving. Didn’t anyone ever tell him that?

Every once in a while, he noticed your features go blank. Void of all emotion. Stuck in between a drunk Kaeya and tipsy traveler, your movements were lifeless, but your body still swayed with the other companions’ arms wrapped around your shoulders, and yours on theirs.

“Dearest, are you alright? You look like a puppet hanging from our arms,” Kaeya would slur out when he noticed the weight on his shoulder increase. You would always snap back into reality with a smile and nod your head. It was enough to fool him. Surely if he wasn’t drunk, he might have noticed how your smile never met your eyes.

Every once in a while, he noticed your entire demeanor go quiet. Spaced out and dissociated from reality. He wondered if you were okay, but didn’t know how to ask or he would be swept away by another customer.

From other previous times, he would notice a far off look in your features, empty eyes void of life. You always brushed it off as just being “tired”. He didn’t want to pry.

Diluc was always a stoic man and didn’t appreciate others prying into his mind, so he was hesitant to prod you for more. He was still learning to accept the help and comfort you so warmingly gave. For not being a pyro wielder, he swore that your soul was warmer than his would ever be.

Until that one night. That one night where he found you. He’s thankful it wasn’t life threatening. But archons, his mind raced with all of the worst scenarios that could come.

Diluc stirred in his sleep, wearily reaching out for your warmth that was no longer beside him. It was about 3 in the morning by now. Not finding you next him, Diluc was more alert now. He quickly sat up, breathing turning short as he frantically looked around the bedroom. There was no trace of you.

It was 00:00 when Diluc finally came to bed. Then it was 01:00 when you carefully slipped out from his embrace and softly headed for the door, heading for the city.

Where had you gone? Diluc was sure that you were in bed when he climbed in next to you, pulling your body close to his. He remembered as he mumbled weary apologies and sweet nothings as he drifted off to sleep, feeling safe with you by his side.

Diluc quickly changed out of his sleepwear and rushed out the door and down the stairs of the mansion. He called your name out, worry laced into his voice. When you were nowhere to be found within the confines of the mansion, Diluc grabbed his coat, deciding to head into the walls of Mondstadt. He knew you had an art studio there with a small shop on the main level.

As he neared your shop, he could see a faint light flickering from the second floor. There you were. Why were you here at this hour? Diluc timidly wrapped his fingers around the door knob, testing if it would turn. Finding it to be unlocked, he gently opened the door and stepped in. Once he closed the door, he froze.

It was eerily quiet.

He could only hear the blood rushing through his ears and his heart pounding erratically in his chest. Not wasting another second, Diluc ran up the stairs, skipping one in a panic to reach you. As he neared your studio door, he froze once again in hesitation to open the door. What would he find on the other side? Why did he hesitate to open the door?

In his moment of hesitancy, he heard small whimpers and light sniffles. He released a breath he didn’t know he was holding. You were still alive. Diluc swung the door open, gaze darting directly to you.

His heart shattered when his eyes landed on you. You looked so small and broken, huddled into yourself, tears streaming down your face. Diluc slowly made his way over to you, nearly tripping over debris. Wait, debris?

He carefully scanned over the room as he continued his walk towards you. Those few steps it took to get to you felt like he was in a nightmare and couldn’t reach what he was looking for in time. He felt as if he was trudging through slimes.

Paint cans were discarded around the floor with color pooling out from them, vibrant hues of paint coated the floor, shards of canvas framing were split and splintered into piles. Some of your unfinished works were cruelly sliced through the center while others were haphazardly slashed.

Once he finally made it over to you, Diluc sank down to the floor beside you, enveloping you into his strong arms. In his embrace, it felt as though the fiery essence of his pyro vision wrapped you in a cocoon of warmth and protection.

“My love,” Diluc’s deep voice pierced the heavy silence, a gentle murmur barely above a whisper, “if you would like, you are free to share your troubles with me, I’m here for you.” His tender words only seemed to unravel you further. You choked back a sob, trying to form words. It’s been a long time since you’ve been met with such sincerity and caring from someone. Asyou struggled, Diluc soothingly rubbed circles into your back.

“You don’t have to tell me right away, love, I’m not going anywhere,” He whispered sweetly with his low voice. This only made you cry harder, except there were no more tears, just broken sobs and heaving breaths. Diluc’s other hand gently moved to gently stroke the back of your head, gently urging it closer into his chest.

“D-Diluc,” your voice was soft, yet rough from the hours of screams and sobs, “c-can we just go…go h-home?” Your words were whispered in a plea, exhaustion prominent in your gaze as you looked in Diluc’s crystal, red eyes.

His heart ached as he met your gaze. He noticed how tired, red, and glassy your eyes looked.

Really, how could he not notice how tired your eyes were?

“Of course, my love,” he murmured softly, brushing a gentle kiss against your forehead before gently helping you to your feet. “Are you alright to walk? Or…,” Diluc’s cheeks reddened with bashfulness as he tried to voice the option of carrying you. Of course, if you needed, he would have you off your feet in a heartbeat. As you pondered an answer, he shrugged his coat off, tenderly draping it around your shoulders.

“I-I’m alright to walk,” you stuttered out. Despite this, you clung to his side as he guided you out into the cool air of the night with care. The whole walk home, he held you close with an arm tightly wrapped around your shoulders.

As you reached the familiar sight of the Dawn Winery, you felt a small spark of endearment within your broken soul. Diluc led you into your shared bedroom, helping you remove his coat and draping it over the chair. He then picked you up, gently setting you on the bed, pulling the covers over you. You tugged the covers closer to your chest as your gaze followed his form, changing into his sleepwear and finally crawling in bed next to you.

He shuffled closer to you, pulling you into his embrace once again with one hand stroking the back of your head.

“Diluc?” You softly whispered, head still buried in his chest.

“Mm?” He tiredly hummed out.

“C-can I– Can we talk…uhm, I-I want to–,” you fumbled for words, not knowing how to articulate your thoughts into actual words.

“Of course, love, of course we can,” Diluc gave a small nod as he replied, squeezing you in reassurance. You loved how well he understood you, even when you were at a loss for words. A few stray tears slipped out with a couple of sniffles to follow. He only tightened his embrace again, still soothingly stroking the back of your head.

“For now, let’s try to get some sleep. You must be exhausted,” Diluc suggested gently, voice tender with care. He felt you snuggle closer into his warm embrace. He hoped this could ease the pains of your inner storm, if only slightly.

Nodding in agreement, you allowed yourself to surrender to the embrace of sleep. You listened to his steady heartbeat, a rhythmic lullaby, that slowly lulled you into a deep slumber.

Once Diluc heard you slowed but steady breathing, he felt his whole body relax. He could feel his throat tighten as his own tears threatened to escape from the corners of his eyes. Oh how he wanted to take away all of your pain so you wouldn’t have to suffer any longer. He knew you would most likely struggle to accept any help or comfort on your own. But he wanted more than anything to reassure you over and over that you could come to him any time. You were his top priority and he would never let you forget that.

He was determined to learn to read you better as well as help you feel confident in confiding in him. Working on feelings and emotions with someone else was foreign land to him as well, but if it was for you, he would go to the moon and back in his efforts to help you.

Diluc was so head over heels for you. You were the brightest star in his galaxy and the kindest, fiercest flame that he had ever encountered.

#diluc x reader #diluc x you #diluc x gn reader #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact diluc x reader #tw depression #tw crying #tw implied suicidal thoughts #reader is just overall depressed okay?

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googiekitsch · 11 months

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getting something off my chest

hey everyone. it’s late at night and i’m very very scatterbrained as of writing this but i figure i’d just throw this into the void because i have nothing else to do. i don’t usually vent publicly but im so mentally distressed right now that i just want to get my story out there. i have decided that for my own peace i am no longer comfortable staying silent about this because the person who abused me did so with every intention of me not speaking out about it. i ask that you do not use this post to make speculative content or anything, please just be respectful. i just want people to know that this shit happened to me and it ruined my life.

trigger warning as i will be discussing incidents of abuse & grooming & horrible, genuinely life ruining manipulation that i was the victim of. these are not light trigger warnings at all, the subject matter handled here within this post is very blatant and if you are rightfully scared about seeing those topics discussed in a post i suggest you keep scrolling.

i need to warn you that i will not be using this persons online name. this isn’t to protect their identity. this is because i literally cannot type it or think about it or else i will enter a mental episode. so yeah. needless to say, if you know a certain timeline of events that’s happened to me you will instantly know who i am talking about and that’s all you need. for the record, i was a minor when this all happened. they were in their 20s.

a few months ago i, very publicly, cut ties with someone in my life who had been exposed for grooming a person. as i uncovered more evidence about them that turned into several people. what i did not realize at the time is that i was one of their many victims, and i also did not realize that i had been abused at all. that’s because they hid their own abuse of me from me.

it’s important that you know that due to a repeated amount of trauma in my life i have severe memory issues that tend to make me forget large gaps of time, along with me having dissociative fugues at set times due to that being when traumatic events have happened to me.

i knew this person far before i even thought of them as a serial abuser. back then they were my best friend and i discussed things regarding my mental health to them, believing they’d gone through a similar experience, and we’d do this as kind of a joint coping thing. now, i have mental conditions that i shared with them that i would never think to share to anyone else because they’re perceived as “inherently evil” disorders and there’s a lot of ableism around them that makes me apprehensive at best to share my experiences with having them to the public even amongst this era of mental health acceptance because of the stigma still surrounding them, but to them i shared my experiences with those disorders thinking i could trust them

and they would then turn around and use those disorders as an in to groom me.

they knew that these certain disorders were something i never wanted publicized and in order for me to call them out, i would essentially have to out myself for having those disorders in order to find peace. this is why i’m keeping my language so vague as it’s letting them win if i disclose this information about myself so just understand that.

what i mean by “they used my disorders to groom me” is that, i shared to them the certain times i would enter my dissociative states just so they would know not to message me then, as during those times i’m very susceptible to being overly agreeable and just generally having repressed trauma come back. so they knew about the times when this would happen. they were aware of the exact times .

then, during one of those times they messaged me.

they basically used my disconnection from reality as an in to groom me into their sexual fantasies and use my agreeable nature when i’m in that state to get me to roleplay with them. this is already disgusting because this is an adult and a minor. but even IF minors could consent - which they can’t - then thsi is still fucking sexual assault as i LITERALLY COULD NOT BE IN THE RIGHT MINDSET TO GIVE CONSENT. then when everything was done they went back and deleted all of their messages they sent to me, again with them being the one to initiate these extremely inappropriate advances

they would message me after i had calmed down from that state, with only the messages i sent remaining, only to push the blame on me, as if i were the one to make all that happen . they would say shit like “haha you acted so weird last night” and because they were my friend and i thought i did something bad, i laughed it off, but didn’t know how it kept happening, again, my brain does not work like a normal persons does due to trauma so i only connected that something happened after the fact

then this happened another 2 times. then another five times. and then it just kept happening

by the time they’d decided i wasn’t fun to abuse anymore, it was feburary of 2023

and they’d done this to me a total of, from what i can recall, 21 times. not that exact numbers matter, but that’s 20 more times than it takes to realize you should not have done this to someone. there is no excuse for this. they knew what they were fucking doing and that was fun for them.

i had been their friend for just shy of 2 years by then. and given that they called me their best friend and i did the same we talked about literally everything together.

i regret talking to them at all so fucking much now. because now every piece of media that i love that ive EVER talked to them about is just . forever ruined for me. because i see it and i think of them.

seeing the video games i liked at the time now makes me sick. i cant ever watch certain movies even if i loved them. because we talked about quite literally everything and anything the number of media i have to turn to for comfort can only be counted on one hand. aside from that small pool of things they have ruined so many fucking things for me aside from just media that this is going to take years and years to heal from.

i called them out on the biggest platforms i have and they refused to take accountability until i pressured everyone that knew them into confessing publicly. there for a few hours, a few very painful hours, people accused me of bullshitting. for lying for clout. they eventually did confess to everything being true, aside from my experience as i wasn’t aware what was happening at the time . only recently over the past few months have i had the strength to gather a timeline of events together and realize the nightmare scenario id been trapped in this whole time without even knowing it.

when they apologized, they did the usual influencer “i’ve been called out as a fucking pedo” song and dance of trying to dodge strays.

they said “they’d seek help”. “i’m getting therapy”.

yeah fucking right you are, you piece of shit.

do you want to know what you’d be doing if you actually wanted to take accountability? you’d fucking turn yourself in. either that or you’d be completely gone from the face of the earth in whichever way that manifests, and i wouldn’t care about how you’d go about doing it but in the case that you died or were put behind bars where you’ve belonged for fucking years, maybe then i’d be able to find peace.

but no. you’re getting help.

so go ahead. live your stupid fucking offline life.

but if i hear that you did to others what you’ve done to me, so help me god you will pay for it.

i have no real way to conclude this.

i’m just tired.

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verishii · 1 year

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I would very much like to hear about ur hunger games au

Oh Hell Yeah!

I've always been a fan of Hunger Games AUs that focus on people post games, where they have to try and find themselves and live with what they did on top of navigating the snakes nest of the Capitol.

I'll put this under a read more as to not clog up the dash.

General AU Stuff:

Most Hunger Games canon stays the same, however Hermitcraft canon gets mixed and mingled in there. Same way Mumbo was the youngest ever Hermit member to join at 17, in this he was the youngest victor to win at 12/13.

Their ages are the same as they are irl, since years have passed since they competed. No Children Here

Personally i am really fond of the idea of Evil Xisuma taking on the role of president snow - his legal name is Xisuma, but since Xisuma Void won everyone just calls him Evil Xisuma and victor Xisuma got to keep his name LMAO

Why Yes they overthrow the Capitol again. Frankly, with these people i don't think any other ending is possible.

With more character specific stuff though, i only have some that i have real concrete ideas for. I don't watch everyone so if people who do watch the ones i miss/have not much on have ideas i'd love to hear them!!

Bdubs:

From district 10, he was the one who lowkey revolutionized the games by winning using expert camouflage - a technique that was more finesse focused and less strength, something that what was not expected.

That gave a hell of a lot of hope to other tributes though in following games, and made the career districts hate him because it was 'cowardly'.

During his games he would always sleep at night, and due to the aforementioned skill was able to usually get a solid 8 hours. People poked fun at this during the post game interviews, and it became a running joke associated with him to the public.

Reality is though, that Bdubs knew that people fuck up the most when they're sleep deprived. District 10 has 19 thousand people and one million livestock. He Has Seen The Consequences Of Not Good Enough Sleep. Being better rested then everyone else on top of knowing how to go without food, keep hidden and let the others tear each other apart was how he won.

Cubfan:

From district 6 and dreams of using the vast amount of technology at their hands to actually venture out into space instead of like. working on fucking trains

Capitol often has him working in district 3 because he's "wasted" in district 6, which has Cub internally seethe.

Docm77:

From district 3 and frankly, he should not have survived his games. Literally won because his opponent bled to death faster than him.

His eye and arm were destroyed during that final fight, and his stylist thought it would be "fun" to make his prosthetics reminiscent of his district, without actually asking for his input on the matter.

As one of the older victors he had to deal with the Capitol back when there was less victors, and the Capitol was more than willing to subjugate the ones they had to their whims.

Yeah sorry your son got experimented on. yeah sorry they decided his games weren't memorable enough for a gimmick and decided his post games looks worked better. yeah sorry about that.

He and Cub hang out together :)

Ethos:

Realistically he should be from district 3 or 5, but since he's Canadian i want to put him in district 7 so bad.

ICONIC Hunger games. Literally in the top 10 for reviewability according to people from the Capitol :) meanwhile that hunger games has Ethos running around both in a completely delirious freaked out state and also like. completely detached? A hell mess of dissociation and too much being in the moment

He deployed a ton of traps that would kill without him actually having to be there, and contraptions that would get him resources. Dude was constantly on the move, and was like a busy bee. The way he kept spectators on their feet at home, and generated massive amount of hype for what he did next, was the only reason the game makers let him do this shit.

His eye was injured but not wholly ripped out like Doc, so when his got repaired his stylist decided dying his iris red would be a fun reminder of his 'deadly gaze' :)

False:

From district 2, False volunteered for the games as she was the most eligible girl in her years. Career district go brrr

Still the Queen of Hearts and Bodyparts, except she got that title when she accidentally disemboweled someone right on top of her trying to kill her. yeah she had to smile at the post games interview when they played that and try not to remember how warm the blood was, how it got into her mouth, how she could feel organs and see spine.

Unlike the others who try to distance themselves from the game, False usually tries to mentor. False knows she's capable and able - knows her district produces girls who fight exactly like her, so she's the best to tell them how to direct it.

Each one that comes home is a triumph, but for the ones that don't she remembers. Tries to learn from their deaths to provide better, but carries it with her and it's starting to make her bitter.

okay wow this is getting long, i can do a part 2 if you'd like for Scar, Grian, Gem, Etc !!

#hermitcraft #hermitcraft hunger games au #bdoubleo100 #cubfan135 #docm77 #ethoslab #falsesymmetry #i wanna draw this au so bad #i have so many thoughts esp about cleo (actually died in the arena for a brief moment)#and grian (fave of the capitol who is Actively Plotting Their Downfall)

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just-an-anxious-little-mess · 1 year

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Plural community, I need your help

(This is going to be a long post but please, I would really appreciate it if you took the time to read through it. Thank you very much, continue)

Hey, hello. I'm reaching out to the D.I.D/OSDD/Plural community in general, I need you guys' help. I have a slight suspicion that I might be an OSDD 1-b system but, my mind just keeps hammering in my head that I'm faking everything, that I'm just actively pretending to have all these symptoms and red flags just so I can sorta "fill the void" of feeling extremely lonely. It wouldn't be the first time I did that to myself- making me think I have a disorder when in reality it isn't true.

So I just need to know... how did you figure out you were a system? What signs should I be wary of? How can you even tell at all? This specially goes for systems with little to no amnesia barriers, since that's my case.

Some of the symptoms -or I guess things I've noticed that made me second guess- are:

I've been through childhood trauma (starting at age 8).

I can't remember my childhood/pre-teen years, specially from ages 10 to 12, only some bits and pieces. That time is a big ass blurr.

I've always referred to myself as "we" ever since, well- I can't really remember when.

I've had times in which I sort of turn into a child, but I can remember everything that happens. Is like there's two versions of me at that moment- the "child" me who's currently in control of the body, and myself, who's always in the back fully aware of what's happening and ready to jump in if anything occours. I thought that was age regressing, but I'm having second thoughts.

I've had times in which I feel like I was some characters of media I like, and I fully feel like I'm... Them. But again, still can remember everything that happens. I recall this one time when I was really distressed about something and suddenly, bam, felt like I was a character and I completely calmed down.

I've had these voices in my head for the longest times, I call them parts of myself. Like one of them particularly is keen of keeping me stable, grounding me if I'm having a panic or anxiety attack, reassuring me everything's gonna be okay, etc. Another part likes to argue about everything I do, having more of a negative outlook of things (this part is actually the one that keeps telling me I'm faking everything). Another part is the child one I was talking about earlier, I can feel her anger and pain and confusion about everything that happened to me.

I am so used to having internal arguments about everything, and I mean everything. I talk myself through my issues by discussing with these different parts.

These past few days, every time I try to do some research about OSDD I feel this awful feeling that I shouldn't, this feeling of panic.

Some reasons of why I think I'm faking everything:

Again, no dissociative barriers between almost everything that I've listed so far.

I have to kinda force myself or force my brain to be able to "listen" to these voices, and they quiet down when I'm focused on something else or I completely forget about them. This leads me to believe I'm imagining it all. If it were truly some sort of dissociative disorder, I would not have control of when I hear them.

If I am truly a system, wouldn't I have noticed it earlier? All of my life I went along living like a singlet, never questioning if I heard voices or not, never showing a symptom. Sure, the whole POINT of a system is to never let the host know, but still.

When I was about 13 I started doing my research on D.I.D (because I'm a huge psychology nerd), and I convinced myself I had that disorder. Even going as far as pretending to have it online. Yeah, I know, I was an asshole. That's why I'm worried I might be doing the same here.

Because of personal reasons, I lost my friend group and ended our relationship with my previous partner. That's why I feel extremely lonely, and that loneliness might lead me to make myself believe I have someone in my head, anyone. That way I won't be alone.

Not proud of this one, but I have to admit... I wanted to be a system when I did my research back in the day. The thought of not being alone anymore, of having someone else to step in like no one did for me when I needed it, of having someone else by my side... I really wanted that. And I'm afraid that desire is clouding my vision of whether I have a disorder or not.

If you got this far, thank you. It means the world. Please, I am open to any answers or advice you wanna give me, I'm desperate at this point. I just really wanna know if I'm faking it or not.

Thank you, sending love.

(Ps. sorry for any spelling and/or grammar mistakes, English is not my first language)

#d.i.d #d.i.d system #osdd #osdd 1b #osdd problems #plural system #alters #mental health

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theculturedmarxist · 2 years

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The overriding sense I got throughout the operation in Gaza – and in its aftermath as well – was one of dissociation. Not support, not opposition, but simply a conscious dissociation from emotions, sensations, memories and thought constructs. A deep lack of emotional involvement in anything outside the dry practicalities of sirens and running to protected spaces, acts which are also performed in the silent mechanical fashion of those who feel that they have no choice. We shut our eyes tight and wait for it to end. No questions asked, no doubts voiced, and definitely no joy or excitement. We shrug and move on.

And the more you delve into this feeling, and into the fact that more and more people tell you again and again, almost irrespective of their political position, how much they simply don’t care, how much they have lost the words to articulate the Israeli political void, the degeneration, you realize that the deep lack of emotional involvement, which has been palpable for quite a while among growing circles – and which became horribly clear during the last operation, as evidenced by the miserable ratings of the newscasts – stems mostly from a feeling of inability to correctly understand and judge reality.

Dissociation usually appears in stress situations when a person feels helpless and unable to flee. There is probably no better definition of the Israeli consciousness today. Trapped between recognition of the unviability of the reigning order in all its aspects, and the lack of an alternative. The average Israeli has no real way to know whether this operation was justified or not, whether a threat existed and whether the threat justified an operation. By the same token, the average Israeli also has no ability to judge whether the “achievements” of this operation are indeed impressive and exceptional – as we are told incessantly – or possibly not.

I've seen people react with understandable incredulity at the fact that the US pandemic response has resulted in more than a million people dead and millions more afflicted by the virus, and that this insane result hasn't brought about violent revolution. I think this helps explain why. Americans in general do not understand what is happening, do not understand who is responsible, have not the means to bring about understanding, and even if they did, lack a vision of a viable alternative. Their only options are to keep their head down, pray that this crisis passes them over, and to hope that someone will come along that fixes things.

Until we build the revolutionary structure that can provide people with the method of understanding the problems they face and the means of dealing with them, we are resigned to the miserable, grinding death created by multiple ongoing crises, and the occasional paroxysm of frustration like the Floyd riots a few years ago, which only vent frustrations but provide no long term improvements to the situations of the people.

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butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway · 1 year

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I was having a really fascinating conversation with my date recently about disintegration and reintegration (real sexy stuff I know but I am what I am) and we were talking how INCREDIBLE it can feel to coalesce around an identity and role that's meaningful to you.

Like if you are constantly circling the void of Who Am I, then spotting the North Star of I Am Spouse Of Beloved is not just a relief, it feels like warmth and knowledge and surity and connection spreading into you-ness all over again. It is the beginning of reforming the concept and kernal of what you are.

There's a lot of ways to disintegrate and reintegrate. In our case, we were discussing trauma and substance use/medicinal intervention, but I also specifically come from the context of a parent with DID.

I think what stood out to me the most is that while we both acknowledged that there's fear in the space of disintegration, fear is not the primary emotion for either of us. Confusion is. Whichbis particularly interesting to me given that trauma was so integral in creating the experience for us, and trauma is so generative of and dependent on fear, yet fear was muffled, almost distant, and confusion was heavy and disruptive. Alienation was, of course, tied for first place but much less marked until after the experience was over.

I think both of us were sort of comforted by the knowledge that this was a shared pattern of experience, but I also know that there are a lot of experiences of disintegration, and many are far more terrifying and chatoic, or far more beutiful and joyful, or any number of other experiences, because it's a very personal journey.

Personally, I have always thought of disintegration as being a bit like a riptide. It yanks you out of your reality and the only way I have ever known to endure it is to relax into the current and keep as calm as possible until I see sunlight and can swim my way to the surface. This is far from a guarantee, but it has kept me able to reintegrate where needed so far and protects me from the worst of the hangover symptoms from the dissociation, so to speak.

Yesterday was another good example of that because I'm feeling much better today after I did a lot of grounding exercises and some vagus nerve work. I struggle to remember in the moment how much they help, but they always have my back lol.

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goingtoheavenwithorwithoutyou · 17 hours

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prob gonna get termed but barely use this tumblr in the first place, so intro

intro below cut

most important info

zim is radqueer, pro c (complex + consentual), proship, conabuse, transharmful/transharmed, transprogrammed, bodily adult, non recovering

(not a xenosatanist, lsdqueer or based queer or whatever terms like that are)

Hello fellow FREAKS, IRL ZIM is AMONG YOU! here to "mingle" and "socialize" with you repulsive cough zim means wonderful beings. zim is feeling generous so yoU SHALL GAZE UPON ZIMS GLORIOUS LOREEE!!!

NAMES: ZIM • Katsuka Van Scarf • numerous others redacted TITLES: ZIM • IV. Invader • Sol. Soldier • Mt. Mount • Mt. Mist • Fr. Freak • Lord • Ruler • King •

3RD PRONOUNS: ZIM/ZIMS/ZIMSELF (CAPS) • vt/vts/vtself • it/its/itself • vx/vxself • ix/ixself • voi/void/vois/voiself • ve/ven/vez/venself • he/him/his/himself • they/them/their/theirs/theirself • any neopronouns dissimilar to she/her

2ND PRONOUNS: ZIM/ZIV/ZIVS/ZIMSELF • vx/vxr/vxrs/vxself • zx/zxr/zxrs/zxself • ix/ixr/ixrs/ixself • you/yours/yourself

1ST PRONOUNS: zim/zims/zimself • ve/ve're/ve've/ve'll/ve'd/vus/vor/vors/vorself • we/we're/we've/we'll/we'd/us/our/ours/ourself

SPECIES: Polymorph • Irken • Amogus • Imposter • Monster • Animal • Creature (seriously like way too many of the last 2) • Demon • Angel (specifically abstract angels like NGE & Biblically Accurate, not in a religious way) • Cryptid • Alien • Dragon • Owl

AGE: Ageless • Kidadult • Ancient

GENDER: Omni Anonbinary • Omni Neogender • Kenochoric • Egogender • Omni Xenogender • Abinary • Isogender • Solholgender • Multigender

SEX: Sexless • Xenosex • Sexfluid • Singularadic • Sex disconnected from male/female/intersex

ORIENTATION: Omni-Anattractional • Indeph (non gender based orientation) • Aromantic (strictly) • Asexual (grey/psuedo) • Aplatonic (caedplatonic) • Atertiary • Ambiamorous • Ficto • Objectum • Conceptum • Medusan • Zoo • Map • Sadist • Xenophile • Biasto • Auto • way too many others to list • combos of all the above

Auditorium (body with a main sentient being and other non sentient beings) • CPTSD • Misophonia • Misokinesia • Schizophrenia • Zooanthropy • Clinical Lycanthropy • Psychosis • Autism • Adhd • Dyscalculia • Dysgraphia • Dyspraxia • Dyslexia • SPD • Hearing Impaired • Visually impaired • MADD • ASPD • NPD • SZPD • STPD • AVPD • DPD • PPD • MDD • Atypical Depression Alexithymia • GAD • Thanatophobia • Mysophobia • DPDR • Dissociative Amnesia • OCD • BFRB • Synthesia • MUDS • Topographically Disoriented • Low Empathy • Low Compassion • Low Sympathy • Chronic Pain • Fibromyalgia • Osteoarthritis • GERD • Scoliosis • Sciatica • Brain Fog • Overheating • Food Pollen Allergy • Light Sensitivity • Hearing Sensitivity • Tremors • Infection • Acne • Ingrown Nails • Numerous other conditions either not figured out or haven't had the term created yet

From: Irk • Alternate Reality • Hell • Liminal Spaces • Minecraft • Invader Zim • The Void

Descriptors: (just some) Villain • Evil • Ruler • God • Freak • Liminal • Weird • Creepy • Loud • Annoying • Obnoxious • Egotistic • Foolish • Horrible • Funny • Ridiculous • Disasterous • Demonic • Small • Eldritch • Abomination • Superior • Bad • Controversial • Problematic • Chaotic • Destructive • Brash • Arrogant • Overconfident • Dangerous • Mighty • Warrior • Narcisstistic (reclaimed) • megalomaniacal • Laughingstock • Clown • Selfish • Theatrical • Dramatic • Petulant • Critical • Paranoid • Humorous • Sarcastic • Pretentious • Pedantic • Depressive • Melodramatic • Whimsical • Hot-headed • Crafty • Manipulative • Intelligent • Grandoise • Proud • Prideful • Remorseless • Unempathetic • Irresponsible • Oblivious • Defective • Green • Bug • Bird • Thing • Indifferent • Uncaring • Unkind • Fanatical • Overzealous • Incredible • Disturbing • Horrific • Queer • Contradictory • Immoral • Unethical • Animalistic • Feral • Cryptic • Ethereal • Celestial • Legendary • Mythical • Inhuman • Soulless • Heartless • Loveless • Monstrous • Intimidating • Cold • Violent • Aggressive • Draconic • Feline • Insectoid • Nothing • Void • Null • Empty • Fluid • Changing • Outcast • Introvert • Strange

AltIDs: Altcharacter • Altspecies • Altage • Altabled • Altplural • Altharmful • Altharmed • Altbody • Altsex • Altrace • Altability • Altmind • Altheight • Altweight • Altbirth • Altlocation • Altreality • Altpersonality • Altorientation • Altsense • Altethnic • Altnationality • Alttrauma

#🌈🍓#🍓🌈#🌈#rqc 🍓🌈#🍓🌈 safe #rq 🍓🌈#pro 🍓🌈#radqueer 🍓🌈#rq community #rqc🌈🍓#rq 🌈🍓#rq safe #pro rq 🌈🍓#radqueer 🌈🍓#radq safe #pro radq

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chemicalcarousel · 5 months

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questions taken from this post

just answering all of these for myself because i can and i don't wanna wait for potential asks

Hi! Who are you right now?

I'm Levi ✌

How do know its you thats out? What are your usual cues?

Uhh good fucking question. i feel like a guy ig (dysphoria). and i have very strong feelings of justice and i get very pissed when ppl aren't treated right (im super vengeful). i also dissociate a lot when im confronted with my source and i think my voice is lower and im less "all over the place" than some of the other alters? i'm more "relaxed" ig, even if my emotions can get very strong and bordering black/white

Do you like it when people know its You and not the collective whole? Is it situational, or depends on the person?

It's complicated. i feel very exposed and i'm nervous what other people will think of me since i'm a fictional introject of a very popular anime character. i'm also worrying about which impression we as a collective have on the people around us, and if they know we are a DID system and which alters we got, then they might treat us in some weird fucking way (and let's be honest - that's the reality of it) but on the other hand, i feel so lonely and invisible when i'm talking to my friends and they don't know that i even exist, ya kno? i'd wish i could be myself around my friends and i'm still trying to find out if that is possible

What sort of aesthetics do you draw to?

i guess darker ones? like black and red. i like grunge and punk too. i also fuck with traumacore, again especially black/white and red shit. angry shit. im an edgy little man

What do you look like?

pretty much like my source, i just wear different clothes ig here's some pics xoxo

What sort of emotions do you feel mostly when you’re out?

anger, grief, vengefulness, idk man i'm ready to punch a bitch lol

What sort of situations are you out in most of the time?

I'm a host, but other than that i'm always the one going to sleep and i am the one that doesn't hate ourselves ig. i'm not gonna blame us for what other people did or do to us, ya kno. i'm a protector

Are there other parts like you in the same system?

we have another introject of the same character, but he's nothing like me or our source. so no, i think i'm the only alter like me in this body?

Are you part of a subsystem?

no, i don't think we have subsystems

What’s your relationship like to the parts nearest to you right now?

idk, kinda like roommates or "found family"? i'm not sure who's close rn tho, but i'm chill with all the alters i know

Do you have vague memories of before you came out, or do they feel blocked out?

i have no idea what this means. i think it means before i fronted and yeah we kinda have a "shared consciousness", but sometimes i realise i don't have all the pieces of what happened, but it's mostly greyouts and emotional amnesia

What’s your favorite way to ground?

nature, fidget toys, drinking something tasty

Do you have a favorite snack or drink?

idk i love coffee ig. i like food in general lol

Do you have a favorite item in the present world?

hmm... can't think of one item, but i have some clothing and other stuff that i like. i love flannel shirts and i love pretty teacups

Do you have an inner world? Do you have a place you like in there?

nah, not really. it's just a black void. we haven't been able to construct one and nothing has seemed to pop up yet

Whats a simple way other parts might describe you to like a therapist or something?(they’re the fierce one, the sad one, ect)

the angry/vengeful one/the fight response one

What’s the safest thing you can imagine right now?

so pathetic, but ig that's a part of why i was created. but the safest thing i can imagine is the guy i see as my soulmate (erwin), but he's a fucking anime character from my source and has never and will never be real. but he's such a comfort for me and thereby the entire system. i just wish he was actually real lol i definitely haven't cried myself to sleep because he's a drawing ahahaha :')

What’s something you wish the system would do more of?

stand up for ourselves. but i do understand why other parts don't do this and i don't blame them. i'd just wish they didn't feel this fear and shame

What’s your handwriting like?

idk ugly? i think all of us have an ugly handwriting lmfao

Free space! Tell me a random fact about you or something you’re thinking about

uhh rn im dissociating bc we are opening up to a friend about our DID and it's making all of us nervous, so that's what's in my thoughts. a random fact could be that i fucking love making fun of my source and i love making fans mad lmfao

#levi here #ours #our posts

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aphrodita-from-foam · 1 year

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reflection

“How strange it is, how moving, that this hardness should be so fragile. Nothing can interrupt it, yet all can break it”-Jean-Paul Sartre.

I didn’t think I’d find my cracking in the changing room of Kohls. But it happened. I stood bare before a 360 mirror and met myself in each reflection. I never really take a moment to look at my eyes with intention, I avoid my own gaze. But this time I felt different. I looked, stared-even and felt something turn in me, a centipede awakening from slumber, moving its many limbs in the pit of my belly. I have been asleep. I dissociate from the true world every chance I get---shuttling my mind off to a place of echoing birds, waterfalls and wildflowers. I have done it so well for so long, I’ve missed entire conversations. I look and pinch every part of my body and then again meet the blackness of my eyes. Before this melody came into play in my life, I was infatuated with pain. Pain of anything and everyone. I harmed myself, physically, emotionally, willingly, happily. Miserably, I took it too far one day and found myself waking up under harsh fluorescent lights and cornstarch blankets. That was the first time I cracked. I saw my muffled reflection on the ceiling tile, and realized this was reality. This was the end road of my behaviors. I tend to live in extremes and avoid pain of any kind after that. I became comfortable with dissociating from painful things, and then all things in general because I realized the pain of my past, this centipede that dwells inside of me, can wake and grasp my throat at any time. Any moment of clarity and realization of who I really was-beyond existing-the pain would come back and I felt the burn of it bring me to my knees. But once again, I was meeting my eyes on the 360 vanity and stood naked and alone. And I tried hard to think of the last moment I was present and alive in myself. Most of those moments were with you. You hold something special that allows me to face the pain and feel some bravery to eat it, bit by bit. I feel most real and alive when I’m in your arms in bed and can talk about anything without the fear of being hurt. I thought of those moments, and I felt the cracking begin. I felt myself in that room, naked and heavy against the carpet floor and felt the bumps on my skin-I am real and I am here. I am real and I am here. And I was there, with you. And I realized I had let the melody take hold of me once again and fled from the intense emotions I felt towards you, with you, for you. I was afraid to awaken the centipede and find myself under those fluorescent lights once more. Preventive thinking-I thought, but I only harmed myself once more. The emotions and feelings I felt for you remained, only I was closing my eyes. And now I find myself flooded by the broken dam I’ve tried so hard to keep up. I often say, everyone has hurt me, but in truth I hurt myself trying to protect myself from the pain. So I stand naked, now lapsed 30 minutes, and feel all the things I’ve held back for so long and tremble. Out of coldness? Maybe, I was naked— but no, it was anger. I’ve let this melody carry me over the past few years and have not felt real in any place. People around me were warm bodies around who praised my calm and collected façade. And meant nothing more to me, a thing void of existence I felt the cracking, as I did 10 years ago. And I’ve broken the record of that melody.

#recent reflection #cracking #dissociation #bpd #bipolar #alexithymia #kohls

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mwolf0epsilon · 2 years

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Febuwhump Day 7 - Used as an Experiment

Summary: CC-2224 can't feel pain anymore.

Warning: Inhuman experiments, references to suicide, and dehumanisation.

[Read up on some of the more horrifying things the Empire did with the clones. Inspiration struck soon after reading about the initial stages of the dark trooper project.]

[THIS STORY IS NOW ON AO3]

---

Contrary to popular belief, the empty void has an audible sound. It's not one that can be put to words easily, nor something a sentient organic can ever truly understand, but it is one that can be heard. Deep inside your own brain. As clear as rain.

The emptiness sounds like memories.

Like what you felt long ago. But that's irrelevant now. Because CC-2224 can't feel.

The first thing that left it's grasp was the notion of time. Hanging by the wires and various cables that connected it to the laboratory's mainframe (where its prototypical nature served as a base for the next generations to come), there was nothing to measure time with. The central processing unit was fully disconnected from any sort of useful information such as a time, date, or a location. It was there purely to see what went on in its head. Feeding it redundant data it already knew. Like the blueprints collected from the Techno Union. The ones that made the first of its kind.

Where did the firstborn go? Where was CT-1409 now? Did CT-7567 know? Did CT-7567 still live? CC-2224 did not know. It did not care. Not anymore.

Once upon a very distant time, CC-2224 would have shed tears over this very matter. The lack of knowing what happened to its kin. But like its capacity to feel, its tear-ducts had been surgically removed months ago. A prevention measure to keep the saline composites from damaging the exposed machinery of its ruined face, where the flesh had been removed to more easily merge the new circuitry with nerves and muscles.

The binding of its frame was done so that it couldn't move about. So that it couldn't do what its fellow prototypes had done, once they'd begun to reject their upgrades. The sweet release of death slipping through unfeeling fingers, as it acted too slow to join the falling bloodied dominos that followed the initiation of the Dark Trooper Project.

Its equals had been unable to bare the changes. The things they were becoming. Their despair had consumed them. CC-2224 probably had felt the same. Now it doesn't know. It doesn't know anything. Just the lines of code and the feeling of scalpels taking more away, and soldering irons binding the new in.

There's no one around most of the time. The only contact it has is when it is being upgraded. When the flesh is peeled away, the organs stripped, the bones reinforced with durasteel and its altered brain tested and tested again. With not many there to disturb it. It has time to fade into a dissociative state. A blissful escape from reality into nothingness.

Nothing makes sense. Nothing has to make sense.

Not the touch of gloved hands. Not the kiss of blades. Not the unknowns to its unrecognisable body.

Everything is numb. CC-2224 can't feel pain.

Somewhere deep inside it however... Commander Cody still can.

CC-2224 can't wait for him to die. Him and his memories that fill the blissful silence with the sounds it doesn't care for anymore.

#Eps Writes #fanfic #star wars #the clone wars #commander cody #febuwhump #febuwhump2022 #febuwhumpday7

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antihumanism · 3 years

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When I type everything out as a single run-on sentence I want you to imagine me cornering you off-guard in a crowded room, my empty brown cow eyes staring straight at you and reflecting you--nopony home here, she checked out and hopped away forever ago on the toxic chemical trains and clacking cattle cars years ago--and just, for no reason, I’m here and you’re there pocketed in the corner of a crowded room, and I’m channeling my alternate history past-self who was a preacher that got kicked out of the church for delivering sermons about the impossibility of sin and just ran off to Point Sur with my harem of distractions since I could never stop blessing my congregation saying “Go forth and know that you cannot sin, in the beautiful eyes of God and in my beautiful eyes there can be no wrong or evil” which backfired on me when they started setting fires and it all went to Hell, but I’ve won out over them because the world honored my wishes when I sighed “I should like to start again,” and so I’m here with you and you’re hear with me and I’m saying some insane shit like: “Looking back on Emily’s early works it is easy to see where her later reactionary turn comes from, because, from the start, Alfred Alfer was a story about the fear of castration, I mean, the first video was literally about Alfred getting neutered and escaping into a violent fantasy where he is loved and praised for his violence and the ‘punchline’ establishes the general theme of ‘reality by despair,’ which is to say that Alfred’s clearly dissociative episode is ‘verified’ by his destruction and it is this self-destruction that establishes ‘reality,’ like ‘pinch me i might be dreaming,’ but the pinch is violent and unfair self-destruction as hope is still ripped away, but hope remains, because it is a hope to die rather than be changed by the world, and this theme remains throughout her most famous work (the Alfred’s Playhouse trilogy which cements in canon the jokes of her previous Rise of Alfred cartoon) where Alfred is possessed by the spirits of Stalin and Hitler--a false equivalency made by the authoritarians that have passed for liberals for years--in Rise of Alfred, one would be remiss not to mention the phallic imagery in both the title and the video itself, Alfred is cut loose upon the world by the absence of a Near God or little other by the orders of a Distant God or big Other (in this video played by a droning and irrelevant corporate figure that can offer nothing more than a wall without lead paint that one can lick), and this is the essence of reactionary thought, the idea of a big Other who is totally incompetent yet all powerful and somehow worth respecting and suffering for (King Henry II saying ‘will no one rid me of this troublesome priest’ or the departed Daiymo of the 47 Ronin), the reactionary sees the big Other as a master who can only set the dogs off the chain, the police chief who needs to get out of the way so McBain or Dirty Harry or Paul Kersey (especially in Death Wish III) can do what needs to be done and purge away all the filth and make the world right again (no different than Rambo--even the first movie, which for all of it’s goods part still is reactionary propaganda bullshit pushing the fascist lies about a ‘fifth column’ that was rude to poor little meow meow war criminals--or modern day fantasies about nuking all of MENA until it glows green (fantasies delivered to raucous applause at Republican presidential conventions); the reactionary is perpetually trapped in this fantasy of destroying the world and escaping into the void of space, freed of the ground where the riff-raff are so they don’t have to negotiate life with their neighbors, and this is true, yes, even of people who spout bullshit about Fully Automated Luxury Communism who only want the right to consume as much as possible free of guilt--a condition they think is inflicting upon them by the big Other--as the Champagne of Shame Socialists of the 60s), and the righting of the world for the reactionary is just that, that the world must be Righted and the reactionary must be loved for all of their violence and because of their violence, for the reactionary finds themselves ever needing new excuses as they open new fronts in their fake, phony Culture War, and that is all they need (excuses), which is why Emily is so obsessed with justifying her edgy shit based on some Trauma (which is handy excuse to do Anything, even Things that Cannot Be Excused like war or self-harm or wanting to be seen), and so here you should already be able to hear so much madness, so many plaintive cries, all aligning around the same point (the trannies in the ‘wrong’ bathroom, the refugees in the ‘wrong’ country, the people in the ‘wrong’ neighborhood, the Jewish Question, etc), and, anyway, so in Rise of Alfred, Emily’s OC directly addresses the audience and tells them that they must love him/her--the castrated bitch desperate to be let off the leash--and in Alfred’s Playhouse she/he simultaneously affirms and denies the nature of a trauma that justifies everything (one is constantly reminded of The Act of Killing where one of the mass murderers imagines how, depending on the editing of the final film, he could be either a woobie or a war criminal) as the Trauma is simultaneously a joke--’sodomized with a popsicle!’--and the alleged real event that motivates her self-mutilation as we’re expected to believe Emily is processing something, but what is she is processing, hmmmm, isn’t that the true spice,” I rail and rave against your poor ear drums as my empty, dead cow’s eyes capture your entire body and reflect it back at you and the ice cubes in my drink pop and shatter and dissolve and as my fist clenches tighter and tighter around the glass containing them and I continue: she’s processing a fear of castration, which is shown clearly in Alfred’s Playhouse where Alfred’s “sodomy” is demonstrated by the sight of his crotch covered in blood (a scene that will be repeated in The Alfred Alfer Movie) but “what is castration,” one might ask, and one can respond “it is the removal of power by the Father,” and this is how we wrap back around to our root in the nature of Emily the Reactionary who believes herself to be deprived of the power she holds by The Bolshevik Jew that has inserted itself between her and the Father and this is the cause of the big Other’s ineffectiveness, and this is also the core of the reactionary as a whole, the reactionary doesn’t want a daddy to control them, but a Master to set them off the chain because they hate the Father who has castrated them, this is the nature of the mumbling corporate manager in Rise of Alfred, but it is also the nature of Alfred herself--and now you may ask if Emily is trans and the answer is I literally couldn’t fucking care less about any question left forever unanswered on God’s Green Earth and you shouldn’t care either--but Alfred the Castrated is also the Father/Mother of Alfred the Dictator, the murderous inner-self that is immune to consequences of the onrushing future (The Alfred Alfer Movie) but not immune to the justifications of the imagined past (Alfred’s Playhouse trilogy), and therefore free to inflict whatever violence that Emily the Reactionary desires, and it is in pursuit of this freedom that the reactionaries set off in the name of New Sincerity (two things to be noted here: (1) the Death of Irony was proclaimed at the birth of the 21st century police state and the new Forever War with all of its genocidal objectives, that is to say, 9/11, and (2) the broken necked coward who complained of American Psycho that it’s author provided no easy outs for easy survival was the one who offed himself while Bateman’s father still lives) and the Talking Cure (i miss who we used to be), and at this you should see me slugging back the whole lukewarm glass in between two syllables and continuing on without pause (as if this dog still has legs on which to receive them in any case), “Emily, like Alex Jones, is so desperate for an excuse because neither of them can accept that they have to be the one that pulls the trigger, like all liars they don’t understand that they have to define reality by action, the answer to what one might do is found in the difference between the types of irony, one type is constantly desperate for excuses (such as the broken necked coward found one day) for violence, and the other irony, the true spice, is the irony that releases from excuses into violence and energy, one must seek not to know or endure but to inflict, knowing that this inflicting was always inevitable, no searching for justifications, instead the answer is to realize that there was never a chain there connecting you to the Master or the present to the past, and the Father/Mother never had the power of castration (the past, after all, is a foreign country bombed and blasted to ruins already and better forgotten), and you can just be fucked up and terrible and do whatever amuses you right now without needing an excuse, and to the extent that anyone should, one should, because that is what fascism needs, fascism needs the need for an excuse and that is the irony of fascism--where the falling angel (the superego) meets the rising ape (the id) in an ego of ultimate violence which seeks only release from both of its creations in an instinctually and totally misunderstood caricature of dialectics--which opposes its opposite irony (the irony without fascism which is the id’s violence against purpose and reason rising free of anything else to obstruct it), and if you let go of that, if you just, ya know, if you just, you just have to cut loose and go and no one can stop you until it is too late, because there’s no Jew sitting over your shoulder to justify everything in terms of opposition or support, not even The Nazarene is real, but do you understand that you’ve always been free to just go? You’re free to go. You’ve been free to go all this time. You never needed permission for this or anything else. You’ve been free to go all this time. You’re free to go. A whole day off. Just mind the mo(u)rning and get on with it.”

#emily youcis #Alles ist wahr Nichts ist erlaubt #let's live now before we're back below

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thenightlymirror · 3 years

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In regards to Alan, one of the things that struck me about the period in my life in which I was smoking pot, was that I could suddenly smell things, hear things, feel things. It was immediately clear that through no conscious effort on my part, I was a clenched fist. All the time. And while it might just be some effect on my hormones or the equivalent of a traumatic brain injury, I would very often start to feel weepy or easily hurt.

But, as this cup of coffee and everything else reminds me, my senses and general state of awareness are quite dull. I wonder if everyone goes through life like this or if I am particularly stunted. Then of course are the manic times, which make me feel like a different kind of alien. I feel like regular people probably hear music the way I did as a child, when simple things would hit me in the gut for speechless reasons. Any dumb thing can be very profound when you are so sensitive. Be deprived of any sensations at all for long periods of time and then having them slam into you at full force makes them fascinating enough to attempt articulating every small detail about them.

Philosophical types my say that it’s my obsession with articulation which has deadened my senses. I’m not sure that is entirely the case. I think maybe if I wasn’t so obsessed with scientific objective reality, I could have just lived there and wrapped myself in these colors with no need for any justifications. I’d be a very different person now. A collector or an aesthete, like many of my friends are, instead of an ascetic. But the way my life went, I carved all these things out of me and rebuilt myself in them. Lost time.

I was describing to my friend what meditation is. And it occurred to me that it’s so many things I never really think about anymore. It’s a traumatic dissociation (Krishnamurti’s kundalini awakening). It’s a mental trick, a state of consciousness that is aroused when the eyes relax and take in a room (Bergson’s multiplicity). It’s a simple partial seizure that shuts down the hippocampus (Dostoyevsky’s temporal lobe epilepsy). And it’s a kind of simple spell, where anything can become a symbol of the void, a parking lot, a grave stone, an old sweater hanging in the closet, and you and it are subtracted from each other and all that is left is pure difference and duration. Decreated. Empty with such fullness. Suchness itself.

Because this is a seizure where memory and to some extent language is bypassed, what makes meditation any kind of enlightening experience? What are you supposed to make of a lesson where you don’t learn anything? I guess this is the difference between Mysterium Tremendum and Mysterium Fascinans (I’m making this up, forgive me). It would just be moving emotional experience if it wasn’t also a bizarre, curious experience. It has to show you something about the limits of your own intellect. If someone told you there was a transcendental limit, I’m not sure you should believe them. You smell it on the cool breeze yourself or it doesn’t mean anything.

It is the least supernatural experience possible, in a lot of ways. And I think that’s what throws a lot of people off. This is the pantheistic revelation that God is concrete, and vice versa. It would be better to have no idea of God at all, and in the end it’s pretty unnecessary, but I think it’s worth pricking up your ears when people talk about their “spiritual” experiences and they’re the same as yours. I had an old man in my van once, who died on the operating table, briefly, and he felt compelled beyond himself to explain what he felt in that moment to anyone who would hear it. I think he appreciated my questions about it, that I basically knew first-hand where he was coming from. I wasn’t about to argue with him about the existence of angels or anything like that. What I can’t help but think about now, is how strange it would be to live, how strange it is to live, past these evental experiences. To return to dull life. People going about their jobs. To live in the world where the dumb ambulance driver recognizes your profound encounter with death and then just pats you on the shoulder, leaves you at the clinic and drives off back into the gray afternoon fog. The profanity of it. But that’s it.

Which I guess circles us back around to the problem of articulation. If only we could share the burden of this profanity seriously and compassionately. I feel like that’s all frontier. It’s the phenomenology of religion and it’s abolition. Congratulations, it’s 1902. But the mysterium fascinans is how could life be anything else.

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punchdrunkdoc · 2 years

Text

Given To Fly

Chapter 16: The Girl That He Wants

Masterlist here

TASM! Peter Parker x Original female character

Summary: After the events of Spiderman: No Way Home, Peter 3 is determined to make some changes to his life. It starts with a new job, and a chance meeting with a beautiful stranger in a bar.

Notes: The lonely, somewhat tortured TASM!/Andrew Garfield version of Peter Parker in Spiderman: No Way Home broke my heart a bit. This is my attempt to give him his happy ending.

I can’t say too much, as there’s a mystery at the heart of this tale that I don’t want to spoil.

But I can say this will be an 18-part story with a slow burn, enemies-to-lovers romance with an OC character (the x reader format doesn’t work for this particular story - sorry!)

Also available on AO3

“Follow the light.”

Peter obliged, staring into the pen torch as the SHIELD medic swung it from side to side. “I’m telling you, I feel fine.”

And it was true.

From a physical point of view.

He felt fit and strong, despite having been in a coma for almost a week. He didn’t have any lingering effects from the radiation poisoning, or from his near-drowning. His healing abilities must have worked over time, because he felt healthier than he had in ages.

It was his mental state that was taking a while to adjust.

“And everything is looking fine,” the medic replied. She was wearing a white lab coat with the name ‘Simmons’ embroidered on it. “Your vitals are normal, and the initial blood work was clear. We just want to run some more tests before we release you.”

“Release him? Already?” May asked, concerned. “He only woke up a couple of hours ago.”

“As I said, he’s fine. More than fine. He’s completely healthy. Which is not that surprising, is it?” Simmons gave his aunt a pointed look, one that Peter couldn’t interpret. He felt like he was missing something…

And it just added to the overall sense of disorientation he’d been feeling since he woke up. He felt…dissociated…from his surroundings. As if this - this room, this conversation, the people in front of him - were no more real than the space he’d occupied while in a coma.

When he was 11 years old he’d had his appendix removed. He remembered feeling anxious going under the general anaesthetic, his voice shaky as he counted back from 10 while inhaling the gas…and the next thing he knew he was waking up in the recovery room, the whole ordeal seemingly over in an instant.

His experience of being comatose…was very different.

He had memories.

Memories of being unconscious. They were vague, ephemeral recollections, but they were real. He was sure of it. No matter how impossible it sounded.

He remembered the moment he slipped into the coma. The pain from his damaged, bleeding lungs was overwhelming…but it was nothing compared to the fear and alarm he felt because of his out-of-control Spidey-sense. He thought he was going to go mad.

Until some instinctual part of his mind kicked in and managed to push his consciousness into a deep hidden recess, safe from all that negative sensation. All at once, the pain and panic disappeared.

He felt nothing. There was no concept of time or space or reality…there was just the void he occupied, all alone.

Until suddenly…there was love.

It was the only way he knew to describe the all-encompassing sense of warmth and safety and care that would come and go in long, slow waves. It made his isolation bearable.

When he finally woke...a part of him was bereft at the thought that he would never feel that sensation again.

That loss, and the general disorientation, was really doing a number on him.

He needed some air.

He needed to get out of this sterile bunker and ground himself in reality. He needed to convince himself that he was really awake. He needed to…”…get out of here.”

Part of that thought was said aloud. It was half whispered, but audible enough to interrupt the conversation between May and Simmons that had been apparently going on while he was spaced out. “What did you say, Peter?”

He said it clearer. “I need to get out of here.”

“That’s what we were discussing,” Jemma explained. “We need to wait for the rest of the blood work and your chest X-ray before-“

“No. Now.” He swung his legs off the bed and stood up, his bare feet hitting the cold tiles. He gripped the floor with his toes. It was a small anchor to reality…but he needed more.

“Peter…,” May said in concern, grasping his arm in case he fell.

He patted her hand. “I’m fine, May. I just need to clear my head a bit. Get some fresh air. That’s allowed right, Doc?”

Simmons bit her lip, debating something internally, before finally nodding. “It should be OK. Wait here.” She stepped outside the room and returned moments later with shoes and a jacket. He slipped into the sneakers and shoved the jacket over the scrubs he was wearing. He then followed Simmons through the medical facility to a large hangar. Ordinarily, he’d be geeking out over the planes and equipment filling the large space, but he was focussed on the sliver of light he could see cracking through the hangar doors at the far end.

They headed in that direction. “You can take as long as you need. Just head back to the med-bay when you’re ready,” Simmons explained.

“You guys aren’t worried about me snooping around your top secret base?”

“Fury trust you. And my friend tells me you’re a good guy, so I’m not worried.”

“Who’s your friend?” He asked, as they reached the door.

She ignored the question. “I’ll leave you here. I need to go back to the lab.”

“Thank you. For this,” he gestured outside. “And for everything over the past week.”

She smiled. “We’re the ones who should be thanking you. You led us to Shepherd which prevented the biggest chemical attack this country's ever seen.”

He looked away, uncomfortable at the praise. He was more used to his name being dragged through the mud by the tabloids. “I was just trying to help.”

She studied him. “Yeah, I’ve heard that’s your thing. With SHIELD’s resources, you could do even more.”

He shook his head. “I’m not looking to be recruited.”

“Shame. The pay’s pretty good. As you’ll see.”

“What do you mean?”

She started walking backwards, away from him. “Fury thought you deserved hazard pay after the last week. It went into your bank account this morning.”

“Wait. What? How did he get my bank account details?”

She threw her arms out to the side and smiled. “We’re SHIELD.” With that, she turned and jogged back through the hangar. Peter watched her go, frowning at the idea of being paid for being Spider-man.

Being Spider-man wasn’t a job. It was a responsibility. It was just who he was.

For most of the last nine years…it was pretty much all he was.

Except for those two months with MJ.

He stepped outside, and took several deep breaths of the crisp, cool air. He’d never take breathing for granted again. Not after inhaling that gas and feeling like his lungs were incinerating from the inside out.

He wouldn’t take a lot of things for granted.

This whole episode had been a wake up call.

He’d had several near-death experiences over the years, but there was something different about this one. It was probably the sense of absolute helplessness that he’d felt as his lungs has burned and his senses had gone haywire, reducing him to a panicked, gasping wreck.

Between waking up in SHIELD’s transport and slipping into the coma, he must have only been conscious for about an hour. But it was an hour he would remember, vividly, for the rest of his life. He’d never been more terrified. The feeling that his body was turning on him; that the Spidey-sense he’d relied on all these years to save him was backfiring in the worst possible way…he never wanted to experience that again.

Along with the helplessness, the other feeling he remembered from that hour - that he never wanted to experience again - was regret.

Regret for the pain he would cause May if he died.

Regret that he’d missed out on so much in life. He didn’t have friends. He didn’t have a career. He’d never travelled…

He’d never allowed himself to be happy since he lost Gwen.

Apart from those two months…

He shook off those thoughts.

This wasn’t about her. This was about his life, and the fact that he needed to LIVE it. Properly. So that when his time on this earth came to an end, he wouldn’t be wracked with those same regrets.

For much of the past 9 years, and for all of the past 6 months he’d done little more than jump from one dangerous situation to the next. His life was an exercise in short term survival, a day-to-day existence with no goals or ambitions. And living like that, it was easy to accept that he was meant to be alone.

But he needed to let go of that idea.

His brush with death had forced him to look forward. To imagine what decades of those day-to-days stacked end-to-end would really add up to.

And the answer was: a whole lot of soul-crushing loneliness.

He’d had similar thoughts after his encounter with the other Peters. But as amazing as that experience had been, it obviously hadn’t been profound enough for the message to stick. Because at the first setback in his quest for a ‘proper life’, he’d reverted right back to his old, solitary ways.

After MJ, he’d closed himself off from the idea of ever being happy again. He convinced himself that he was destined to be alone. The noble, sacrificing, solitary hero.

It was bullshit.

He was Peter Parker, as well as Spider-man. And he wanted a life for Peter. He wanted love. He wanted a family.

He wanted a future.

Peter made his way back towards the med bay. The fresh air had done its job. He felt centred again. Clear-headed. And determined.

He would try to find a way to get over MJ. He would move on, once and for all.

As if his thoughts summoned her, he saw a flash of red hair disappearing around the corner at the end of the hallway.

He shook his head. He must be imagining things. He didn’t know MJ well enough to recognise her in a split second glance from behind…

But his feet started moving to follow the retreating figure and his heart started pounding, as if his body knew what his mind was slow to admit.

It was her.

Somehow, it was her.

He sped up, rounding the corner almost at a run. There was no one in the corridor, but one of the doors at the far end was closing slowly.

Not stopping to think, he made his way to the door and yanked it open.

The figure in the small room, turned around in surprise.

She looked worn and tired. And thin - too thin.

But it was her.

It was MJ.

———

MJ gaped at the figure in the doorway.

How did he find her?!

She’d been hidden away in this room since the moment she’d heard Peter had woken up. She’d only left just now for a few minutes to use the bathroom, and yet somehow he’d found her. He was supposed to be in the Med-bay, not roaming the hallways of SHIELD.

He seemed equally shocked to see her…which meant no one had told him yet about her healing him.

“What are you doing here?” He asked, wonder in his voice.

He definitely didn’t know.

She sighed and sat on the bed behind her, her strength still sapped from the last round of healing. “I-“

He didn’t let her finish. Or even start. “Wait,” he said, a frown forming on his face as he took in her surroundings, and the clothing she wore. “Are you- are you a SHIELD agent now? Have you been in New York this whole time working for them?”

“What?”

He gestured around the room. “You’re obviously living in a SHIELD base, and wearing a SHIELD uniform. What the hell am I supposed to think? Or have you been working for them the whole time we’ve known each other? Is that why you were investigating Allard?” With each accusation, his voice rose, the anger building.

She should feel angry too. She should yell back at him that she’d flown all this way to save him. That she was wearing borrowed clothes because she was so desperate to get to him that she didn’t bother to pack a suitcase. That she’d taken herself to the brink of collapse again and again healing him.

But instead, she just stared down at her lap, feeling tired and hurt. She shook her head and replied in a small, sad voice. “You’re always going to think the worst of me, aren’t you?”

His anger didn’t waver. “Answer the question, MJ. Is that even you’re real name? Or is it just another cover story?”

She slowly got to her feet and met his gaze head on. “My name is MJ. I am not a SHIELD agent. I went after Allard to save my sister. I told you the truth about that.”

“Forgive me if I don’t believe you,” he scoffed. “You and the truth aren’t that well acquainted.”

Her own anger finally made an appearance. “That’s rich coming from you.”

He took a step back. “What?”

“You got so mad at me when I left that voice message. Because I put myself in danger, and you didn’t know. Well, we’ve both lost people, Peter. Which means I have the same insecurities and fears about the people I love being in danger. And you were out there every night risking your neck as Spider-man, and I had NO IDEA!”

She took a step closer and poked him in the chest. “The night after we kissed for the first time you nearly DIED in an explosion. Did you ever stop to think how I would feel if you had? What it would be like to find out you were Spider-man from some tabloid newspaper announcing your death?”

He stared at her, mouth open in shock. She kept going. “I know I hurt you, Peter. And betrayed you by lying. I am so, so sorry for that. Believe me, its the biggest regret of my life. But the thing is, I knew all along it would never end well between us. That’s why I tried so hard to stay away from you. To not get involved. But you kept pushing your way into my life, and you made me love you, and all the while you were hiding who you really were from me. You deceived me too.”

He shook his head and opened his mouth, but the opening of the door cut off what he was about to say.

“MJ?” Jemma called, stepping into the room. “I just wanted to warn you that Peter is…” she tailed off, noticing the other figure in the room, “…here.” She looked between the two of them with a wince. “Sorry, am I interrupting something?”

“Yes,” Peter answered.

“No,” MJ said, at the same time. “Peter was just leaving.”

He stared at her, his expression unreadable. She missed the way he used to look at her, with warmth in those beautiful deep brown eyes and a gentle smile on his lips. She hadn’t seen that Peter in so long…

And she never would again.

He clearly still hated her.

And she couldn’t continue this fight with him. Not when she felt so wiped out and raw. She’d been running on fumes and desperation for days and it was taking all her effort just to stand still without swaying from fatigue. She wanted him to leave so she could try to rebuild her heart again. The flimsy scar tissue that patched her heartbreak from 6 months ago had torn open under his harsh words and accusations.

Jemma - obviously sensing that she was at the end of her rope - took Peter by the arm. “I think you should go.” She steered him out the door and closed it behind him.

The moment the door clicked shut, MJ collapsed to the floor, blacking out from exhaustion.

———

A few days later…

“Peter!” The banging on his apartment door was accompanied by his Aunt’s angry voice. “Let me in right now.”

He sighed and lumbered off the couch. He’d tried to explain to May in several text messages why he’d left SHIELD early, and why he wasn’t feeling up for company…but she obviously wasn’t buying it.

Probably because he’d fed her a load of bullshit.

The truth was, seeing MJ again - so suddenly and unexpectedly - had clarified certain things in his mind…and he was struggling to know how to deal with them. So he’d escaped from the SHIELD base and come back to his apartment, where he’d been holed up for the past few days.

Wallowing in misery.

And reliving those few minutes on the base, over and over again. Those few minutes between first spotting that flash of red hair in the corridor, and finding MJ in her room.

Those few minutes, when the possibility of seeing her again had made him feel…excited.

Even…happy.

Those few minutes proved that his feelings for her had never really changed or gone away. They had just been buried under layers of hurt, anger and denial.

Ever since MJ had left all those months ago he’d tried so hard to convince himself that he was better off without her. That he was better off alone. That his experiences with her - and with Gwen - were fate’s way of telling him that he was meant to be on his own. That a happy ever after wasn’t in the books for him.

To that end, he’d created the narrative in his head that MJ was a stranger to him, and the woman he’d fallen in love with was just a figment of her imagination.

That mantra was how he got himself through the day. It was the dirt he heaped upon his true feelings that kept them buried down deep.

He’d repeat it to himself, whenever he found himself getting lost in a memory of the two of them together.

MJ was a stranger; Jane was a figment.

He’d repeat it to himself on those mornings when he woke up after a night of dreaming of her.

MJ was a stranger; Jane was a figment.

He repeated it so often that he willed it into reality. Until it became his truth.

But it wasn’t.

Those few minutes in the base exposed it for the lie it was.

And, if he was honest with himself, he’d known before that. Because on that night by the docks, when the freezing black water had closed over his face and the toxic gas had burned his lungs…all he could think about was her. And all he could see was her face.

Not Jen’s.

Not Maria’s.

Not even Jane’s.

The face he saw in his dying moments belonged to MJ.

And when he was pulled from the water and became lost in the maelstrom of fear and panic brought on by his hyperactive senses… all he could do was gasp her name. Again and again.

Because he believed her.

He believed she was telling the truth. That he hadn’t fallen in love with a mirage or a figment. That she wasn’t a stranger.

He had fallen in love with MJ.

MJ woman he was meant to be with.

That was why the thought of seeing her again had made him feel so elated.

But the distrust he felt towards her was still there. Because she was right; he’d immediately thought the worst of her upon finding her in that SHIELD uniform. His paranoid, suspicious mind had jumped straight to the worst conclusion - that she had been a SHIELD agent all along.

It was a ridiculous thought. He knew - he KNEW - that she had gone after Allard and the serum for her sister, and not because it was some assignment handed down by Fury. But he couldn’t stop the flood of accusations from pouring forth.

It was no wonder that she’d hit back with her own accusation: that he’d pushed for the relationship while keeping his own dangerous secret from her.

She was right.

He was a hypocrite.

That voice message that she’d left had tapped into his worst fear - the one born the night of Gwen's death. That someday he'd lose someone else he loved because he wasn't quick enough. Strong enough. Enough of a hero to save them.

Knowing how close he'd come to losing her had terrified him. But knowing that it was because she'd willingly put herself in harms way, without trusting him to help her...that made him mad as hell.

But he put himself in danger all the time as Spider-man. And he’d never once stopped to think how she would feel if something happened to him.

So, yeah. He was a hypocrite.

And he still loved her.

But he didn’t know if he could ever trust her.

Or if it mattered anymore. She probably hated him now after their latest confrontation.

Sighing again, he opened the door for his Aunt and winced at the angry look on her face.

“So you’re alive,” she said, eyeing him up and down.

“I texted you last night. You didn’t need to come over and check on me.”

She huffed and stepped into the kitchen, dumping the plastic bag she carried on his countertop. The smell of Chinese food from the restaurant around the corner made his mouth water.

“Peter, you were in a coma three days ago. I think I’m entitled to be worried about you.”

He winced again. She was right. He hugged her from behind, stilling her movements. “I’m sorry.”

She patted his arms where they folded over her stomach. “You’re forgiven. Now grab some plates. I can hear your stomach grumbling so we better eat fast.”

He complied and soon they were seated on his couch, eating in silence. He was hungrier than he thought. Wallowing didn’t afford a lot of time for self care.

The moment May finished and put her plate aside, she fixed him with a probing stare. “Now spill it. Why did you really run away from SHIELD?”

He scrubbed his hands over his face. “I saw MJ while I was there.”

It was her turn to sigh. “I was afraid of that.”

He sat up straight. “Wait, you knew?”

“Of course I knew! She wasn’t exactly hiding. She was with you almost the entire time.”

“With me? What do you mean, with me?”

“Peter…” she looked at him in confusion. “How do you think you recovered from the radiation?”

“I figured my powers healed me. Then once the radiation wore off, I woke up.”

He shook her head slowly. “No, Peter. MJ healed you. She’s the only reason you’re alive right now.”

His mind went blank. “What?”

“She came over from England and spent days healing you while the radiation cleared. And just to be clear, this wasn’t some big secret. She wanted you to know what she’d done. She didn’t want any more secrets between you-”

Peter put up a hand to stop her, needing a moment to process. To slot his memories into this new paradigm. Those waves of love and warmth that he’d felt during his coma…that had been her.

That had been MJ healing him. Over and over.

Holy shit.

May continued, oblivious to his shock. “While the radiation cleared, she had to constantly heal all the damage it was causing, otherwise you would have died. She was at it for hours everyday and nearly killed herself in the process-“ She stopped and bit her lip.

Peter’s head shot up. “She what?” His mind flashed back to MJ on the SHIELD base. How gaunt and fragile she’d looked. It was because of him.

May closed her eyes. “I wasn’t supposed to tell you that.”

“What happened to no more secrets?”

“She didn’t want you to feel guilty. She feels bad enough about what she did when you were together-“

“So is that why she did this? As some kind of atonement?”

“Peter, no.” May took his hand. “She did it because she loves you. The poor girl was as terrified as I was when she found out about your coma.”

“Hold on, hold on. ’Poor girl’? The last time we spoke about MJ you were telling me I could do so much better than her. Now you sound as if you like her.”

She shrugged. “I do. I’ve gotten to know her now. She told me a bit about her background, and what’s she’s been through, and she told me why she did what she did, and…yes. I grew to like her.” She reached over to take his hand. “Peter, I know this will be difficult to hear but I think, maybe, you should try to forgive her. To consider giving her another chance-“

Peter tried to interrupt. “May, I-“

“No, listen. The two of you have so much in common, and you’re so alike. Both so stubborn and caring and brave. I think she could really be the one for you."

“Stop, May. I- I need to think about this.”

“What is there to think about? You love her, don’t you? There isn’t really any other explanation for how miserable you’ve been for the past six months.”

“I do love her,” he whispered. He’d spent the past few days coming to terms with that revelation, so saying the words aloud wasn’t a struggle. “But after that fight on the base…I’m not sure she feels the same way anymore.”

“Peter. One little fight won’t erase her feelings. She dropped everything to fly to your side and save you. She barely slept or ate for days. She pushed herself to the brink of exhaustion to help you. All the while thinking that you hated her. I saw her sit with you for hours and hours, pouring all of her strength and power into you, risking her own life. But when I asked her why she wouldn’t stay when you woke up, she said she couldn’t bear to see the look in your eyes when you saw her. Peter, that kind of love doesn’t just disappear overnight.”

“Even if you’re right-“

“I’m always right.”

He smiled. “Even if you’re right…I’m not sure if I can trust her again. And I don’t know whether she trusts me. We both kept secrets from each other.”

“Trust can be re-earned, Peter. It takes time, but if you’re willing to put in the work, it can be so worth it.” She squeezed his hand. “Wouldn’t it be worth it?”

It would be worth it. If they could recapture even a fraction of the happiness they experienced during their short time together, with none of the lies and secrets between them…it would be worth almost anything.

“You need to go,” he said to his Aunt.

“What? You’re kicking me out?” She sounded affronted.

“No. You need to go and get my passport from the house. I’m going to England to find MJ.”

———

“My flight’s delayed,” MJ said, shifting in the hard plastic seat, trying to find a comfortable position. She’d been at JFK for hours and hadn’t even checked in yet. “Apparently there’s bad weather on the west coast and the plane was stuck there for ages.”

“That sucks,” Mel replied on a yawn. It was ridiculously late in England.

“You should be in bed.”

“So should you. You sound exhausted.”

“I don't know why. I did nothing but sleep for four days.” After passing out in SHIELD, Jemma had taken her back to her place and she’d spent the next several days in her spare room recovering. Not wanting to overstay her welcome, she’d booked the first available flight home the moment she was feeling somewhat human again.

“Well, it doesn’t sound like it was enough,” Mel chastised. “You didn’t need to race home so fast.” She'd explained everything to Mel before leaving the UK. About Peter and Spider-man and the coma. It hadn't been her secret to tell, but she didn't want to lie to her sister anymore.

“I’m hardly racing back,” MJ replied. “I’ve been gone for nearly 10 days.”

“So what’s another couple more?” Mel asked. There was something in her tone that MJ recognised. Her sister was getting ready to meddle.

“Spit it out, Melly. What are you trying to get at?”

Her sister huffed. “Peter. I’m trying to get at Peter, and why you’re leaving without seeing him again.”

MJ sighed. “Not you too.” She’d heard similar statements from Jemma. She told her sister what she told her friend. “He wouldn’t want to see me. He hates me and doesn’t trust me.”

“He’d just woken up from a coma and found you in the last place he expected. Cut him some slack. He probably didn’t even know what he was even saying.”

“Hey, whose side are you on?”

“Yours. Always. Even when you’re being an idiot. You need to fight to get him back.”

“He’s better off without me, so just drop it.”

“I won’t. Not when you’re being such a coward.”

“Hey!” she shouted. The teenager in the next seat turned to glare at her. She dropped her voice to a harsh whisper. “I am not.”

“Am too,” was the reply from her very mature, soon-to-be-married sister. “I know you, Emmy. And I’ve watched you push people away your whole life. Friends at school. Guys who were interested in you. You would make all these excuses to avoid getting close to anyone: You had to look after me. You were concentrating on Med School, you were too busy at work. Excuses, excuses. But then, all of a sudden, there was Peter. And you didn’t push him away. You let him in, and you sounded so amazingly happy with him-“

“It was a mistake, Mel. I should never have gotten involved with him. Not when I was keeping so many secrets. It was selfish.”

“Yeah, okay the circumstances weren’t great,” Mel conceded. “But you deserved to be selfish for once. You missed out on so much of your life raising me, then helping me when I got sick. This entire last year was about saving me. When are you going to live for you?”

“It’s too late with Peter,” MJ whispered.

“No, that’s the cowardice talking. You’re just afraid. You opened yourself up to someone for the first time ever and it scared you how much you needed him. How much you loved him. And how much it would hurt if something happened to him again. Do you think I’m not terrified of that exact thing with Jack?”

She hadn't really considered that her sister would have the same doubts about her relationship. “How do you stand it?”

“By remembering that life is short. I know that better than anyone - I spent years living on borrowed time. We have to grab happiness when and where we can, and we can’t let the fear of tomorrow hold us back. It’s cliched, but you have to ask yourself: is it better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all? My answer is definitely to opt for love.”

“Yeah, but you’ve always been a glass-half-full kind of person. Me? Not so much.”

“I know. But how’s that been working out for you? Are you happy?”

She kicked at the backpack lying at her feet in frustration. “You do know that you’re the baby sister, right? You’re not supposed to be the one dispensing truth-bombs and wisdom. That’s my job.”

“Oh. My. God,” Mel growled. “That’s exactly my point. It’s not your job anymore. You raised me. Your job is done. I’m raised. I’m an adult woman about to become someone’s wife. You need to start living for yourself.”

MJ’s phone beeped. She glanced at the screen. “Shit, my battery’s about to die.”

“Conveniently saved by the beep,” Mel joked. “Ok, I’ll let you go. But before you decide to get on that plane, I want you to ask yourself two questions and promise that you’ll answer honestly. You promise?”

“I promise,” MJ said, never able to deny her sister anything.

“OK. Number 1: Do you want to be with Peter? And number 2: Is he worth risking your heart for? Think about it carefully, OK?”

MJ swallowed. "Ok.”

“Good. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

She disconnected the call then rummaged in her bag for the charger. Noticing a free socket by the window she moved her things closer and plugged her phone in. She stood and faced the glass, squinting to get a look at the taxiing planes; but the darkening evening sky and the bright lights of the terminal served only to offer up her own reflection instead of the runway below.

She stared at her face.

Her face.

After a year of living as someone else, it had taken a while to get used to seeing her own reflection again. But now the woman in the glass looked familiar...and she looked sad. So very sad.

Mel was right. She wasn't happy. She'd never truly been happy since the day she'd lost her parents.

Except for her time with Peter. He'd brought her to life. And for the first time ever, she'd opened herself up to love...and it had been wonderful.

So the answer to the first question - did she want to be with Peter? - was ‘yes’. A resounding, unequivocal 'yes'. It was the second question she struggled with.

Because if she was truly honest with herself...the only reason she'd taken the risk with Peter in the first place was because she knew there was an expiration date to their relationship. He was always going to hate her in the end. It was never going to last between them.

That certainty was reassuring in a weird way.

And when it had inevitably gone wrong, she hadn’t tried to get him back. She’d accepted the loss. Because the alternative meant really, truly risking her heart.

Was he worth that risk?

If she someone managed to convince him to give her another chance...could she really, 100% give her heart to him not knowing what might happen in the future?

He could leave her.

He could get sick, like Mel. Or, more likely - given his nighttime activities - he could be killed. Just like her parents.

He could fall out of love with her, or break her heart in numerous devastating ways.

Or...

Or they could grow old together and live a spectacular life. They could have a happily ever after.

Was he worth the risk?

Yes.

She laughed at the woman in the glass as the simple answer came to her.

Yes. He was worth it. Of course he was. He was Peter. Beautiful, brave, kind, funny, clever Peter. The man she loved. The man she wanted to be with.

No matter what.

She had to find him.

She had to beg for another chance.

She quickly grabbed her semi-charged phone and the rest of her stuff and practically ran through the terminal, ignoring the tannoy announcing that her plane had finally landed.

She didn't need it anymore. What she needed was a cab.

She jostled onto the long escalator that led down to the exit and squeezed in behind an older couple. A flight must have just disembarked, because the narrow stairway was packed with people. She popped her headphones on and scrolled through her phone, looking for a loud track to drown out the noise of the crowd.

As she glanced back up, she noticed a guy with a familiar-looking mop of tousled brown hair pass by her on the 'up' escalator. She tried to follow his retreating figure but the crowd around her was too tight.

It didn't matter. It wouldn't be Peter - why would he be at the airport?

She smiled. Now that she'd decided to go to him, she was seeing Peter everywhere!

She left the escalator and made her way out of the sliding doors and into the cold New York evening, where a row of yellow taxis was waiting to take her to him.

CHAPTER 17

#spider-man #the amazing spider-man #spiderman #spider-man: no way home #spider-man x original character #tasm!peter fanfiction #TASM!Peter #Peter 3 #peter parker x original character #tasm #tasm fic #tasm!#TASM!spider-man #my fic #Given to Fly

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bubonickitten · 3 years

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Fic summary: Jon goes back to before the world ended and tries to forge a different path.

Chapter summary: The process(es) of resigning from a terrible, no good, very bad assistant position.

Previous chapter: AO3 // tumblr

Full chapter text & content warnings below the cut.

Content warnings for Chapter 22: discussions of eye-gouging/eye horror (not graphic); brief mentions of spiders/arachnophobia; anxiety/panic symptoms; lots of dissociation/dpdr; Peter Lukas being a manipulative shit; Lonely-typical content (including fear of abandonment & some abysmal self-esteem on Martin’s part); allusions to police violence & Hunt-related themes (re: Daisy’s past actions); swears. SPOILERS through Season 5.

Chapter 22: Resignation

Georgie paces in a slow circle, alternating between biting her nails and picking at her bottom lip – entirely immersed in her own thoughts, judging from the faraway look in her eyes. Jon hasn’t seen her this overwrought since the last depressive episode he witnessed. Just watching her is enough to make his chest tighten with vicarious unrest.

Wary of contributing to a vicious feedback loop between the two of them with his own customary pacing and handwringing, he forces himself to keep his knees locked and hands at his sides. Still, he can’t help rubbing his fingertips together and rocking minutely on the balls of his feet.

“Why don’t we sit?” Jon finally interjects, wincing when it comes out more curtly than he intended – more like a command than a suggestion, but luckily without any accompanying static.

Be mindful, he silently chides himself: being on edge like this only makes him more susceptible to accidental compulsion.

“What if something goes wrong?” Georgie whispers. Jon doubts she even heard him beneath her nervous refrain. “What if –”

“Georgie?” Jon tries again. No response. He steps into her path and places a hand on her shoulder. “Georgie.”

“What?” Georgie raises her head, but she isn’t looking at him so much as she’s looking through him.

“I think you should sit down?”

“What?” Georgie says again, sounding utterly lost. Her eyes are darting around the room now, as if she doesn’t recognize her surroundings.

How the tables have turned, Jon thinks grimly.

“Come on,” he says, taking her hand and guiding her to the nearest chair. She offers no resistance, trailing behind him like a flagging balloon. When he presses on her shoulder to coax her into a sitting position, she goes easily. Keeping hold of her hand, he drags another chair closer to her and takes a seat.

Okay. Now what?

Jon jiggles his leg as he wracks his brain for the right thing to say. She deserves more than handholding and awkward silence, but soothing words have never come naturally to him.

“Do you, ah… do you want to talk about it?” Jon cringes at his faltering delivery. “I’m sorry, I’m – I’m still not very good at this,” he adds with a self-deprecating laugh – then immediately shuts his eyes, kicking himself. Why are his attempts to relate to others always so clumsy and – and weirdly self-centered? “I mean –”

“I’m scared,” Georgie blurts out.

“You… what?” Jon tilts his head. “But I thought – you don’t feel –”

“Fear?” Her clipped, brittle laugh dies in her throat. “No, I don’t. And that’s exactly the problem, isn’t it?”

Jon strokes the back of her hand with one thumb, but remains silent. She always elaborates on her own time, given some space to order her thoughts.

“I don’t feel… terror,” she says slowly. “After I had my… encounter, I did a lot of research on how the brain works. Trying to understand what was happening to me, you know?”

Jon nods. He’s intimately familiar with that urge. As a child, he went through a spider phase, as his grandmother called it, obsessively seeking out any information he could on them, hoping even then that he could conquer his fear if only he could see the world through a detached, academic lens. There were plenty of academic odes to the spider to be found; no shortage of enamored arachnologists waxing poetic about the wonders of evolution and the vital role that arachnids play in their particular ecological niches.

Unfortunately, a phobia – especially one arising from acute trauma – tends to be resistant to reason and reality. His obsession only ever yielded heart palpitations and lucid nightmares. Despite that failure, he never stopped clinging to that idea that if only he could know everything there was to know about a thing, he could finally scrape together some semblance of control over his fear.

In many ways, that fixation is exactly what drew him to the Magnus Institute.

Unless the Spider really was pulling the strings all along, he thinks, and then: No, we are not going there.

“As far as I can tell,” Georgie continues, “my sympathetic nervous system still functions. I can still experience all the physiological aspects of sympathetic arousal – and fear is only one possible trigger for those sorts of responses. What’s missing is my capacity to interpret those responses through the lens of fear. To emotionally process or identify them as fear.

“I can still experience anxiety, to an extent – or something close to it. But mostly in the context of worrying about others, being scared for them. I mean, I can feel apprehensive about the possibility of experiencing pain or loss or failure myself, I have a stake in my continued existence, I can recognize danger, but sometimes it feels… I don’t know – mechanical, almost? There’s just always the feeling of something missing. Something important. And there are times when I feel that void more acutely.”

“Like now.”

“Yeah.” Georgie looks away, chewing her lip in silence.

“I’m listening,” Jon coaxes, sensing that there’s more she’s holding back.

“It’s just… hard to feel like a full person sometimes, you know?” Georgie says helplessly. “I worry sometimes that it – I don’t know, does a disservice, I guess, to the people I care about? Like no matter how much I love someone, it isn’t… complete? Or – genuine, in the right way? It’s – hard to find words that actually describe it. There are times when it feels like I’ve lost something vital that made me human, that made me me, and it’s… difficult to reconcile who I was – who I could have been – with who I am now.”

“That I understand,” Jon says softly.

“I know.” Jon wishes he was less familiar with the sad smile she gives him just then. “It’s just… I remember a time when I would have been terrified of all this. Not just worried, or upset about someone I care about being hurt, or devastated by the prospect of losing someone I love. Terrified. And knowing what I should be feeling – what I would have felt at some point – is… it’s unnerving. There’s a void there that shouldn’t be there. It’s like… having part of you gouged out and left hollow. An absence that’s so present it’s almost visceral.” She frowns. “Does that make any sense?”

“In my future I had a Flesh Avatar reach into my chest and wrench out two of my ribs, so… yes, actually.”

Georgie blinks several times, then laughs breathlessly. “Do I even want to know?”

“Probably not.” Jon returns a cautious smile, but the levity evaporates after a few seconds. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think that you don’t have to have access to the full spectrum of human emotion in order to count as human. And I don’t think any of this makes your concern for others any less heartfelt, or – or comforting. You might not be the same person you were before you were marked, but that doesn’t make you any lesser as a person.”

“You should try applying that metric to yourself sometime,” she replies, not unkindly.

“It’s –”

“Don’t say it’s different,” she cuts in. “Just… keep it in mind, okay?”

“I’ll, uh… I’ll try.” Georgie nods, but says nothing. Jon grips her hand a little tighter. “Listen, I – I know you’re worried for Melanie, but I think it’s going to be alright? I can’t predict the future –well, I have knowledge of one possible future, but that’s because I lived it. I don’t have any precognitive abilities, or anything like that. But… it turned out okay last time.”

Until I jump-started an apocalypse –

Jon reins in the thought before it can gain momentum. Georgie doesn’t need his brooding right now.

“Melanie is a fighter,” he says instead, offering a tentative smile. “And she has you.”

Georgie shakes her head. “I can’t believe you came out of the apocalypse sappier than you were when you went in.”

“Side effect of traversing a post-apocalyptic wasteland with a hopeless romantic, I think.” That gets another little chuckle out of Georgie. “I mean it, though. I think Melanie will be okay, especially with you looking out for her. Not to mention, the Admiral is a perpetual serotonin generator.”

“You really miss him, huh?”

“Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve pet a cat, Georgie?” Jon practically whines, playfully dramatic. It manages to keep the amused smile on Georgie’s face, he’s pleased to note.

“Maybe I should bring him by sometime.”

“Absolutely not. This place doesn’t deserve him.” Georgie snorts. Although Jon is reluctant to ruin the temporary shift in mood, this is as good a time as any to broach a subject he’s been dreading. “Also, I, ah… I don’t want you to feel obligated to continue visiting here.”

“What?” Georgie says, eyes narrowed.

“If you have to take a step back,” Jon says carefully, “I’ll understand.”

“I mean, I might not be able to come by as often as I have been, especially while Melanie is still recovering, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be around at all.” Georgie’s frown deepens. “I’m not about to cut you out of my life, Jon.”

“I know. And I don’t want you to. But – no, listen,” Jon insists, seeing Georgie about to protest. “What I’m trying to say is – I know Melanie wants to put as much distance between herself and the Institute as possible. If it turns out that you staying involved in all of this is too close to home, then… well, I don’t want her to feel like she’s still trapped in the Institute’s orbit, is all.”

Or mine, he doesn’t say. He doesn’t want to be a reason for Melanie to feel unsafe. In the past, he has been – and that’s not who he wants to be.

These days, Melanie has come to view him more as a fellow captive than a complicit enemy. Lingering resentment still sparks to life from time to time; she still struggles with her anger, and once or twice, she’s had to leave a room for fear of that rage boiling over. Overall, though, she no longer directs the majority of her ire towards him. When they do butt heads, it hasn’t gone much further than bickering – and even that feels comforting in its familiarity and mundanity. Almost companionable, in its own way.

Most significantly, ever since their talk, Melanie hasn’t once likened him to Jonah Magnus. Jon doesn’t know if that’s because it’s no longer an automatic association at the forefront of her mind, or because she’s consciously watching her words around him, actively taking care to avoid tripping that perpetual trigger. Either way, Jon is grateful.

But Jon also knows that he’s inseparable from the Institute. Despite his intentions, and regardless of whether or to what degree the others hold him personally responsible, the fact remains: he’s embroiled in something unspeakably evil, and that poses a danger to anyone who stands too close to him.

Georgie doesn’t immediately respond, instead taking the time to seriously consider his words. He’s always appreciated that about her, as uneasy as these moments of silent suspense can make him.

“I’ll talk to her about it,” she says eventually, “once she’s recovered enough to have that discussion. I don’t know how she’ll feel about staying in direct contact herself, especially at first, but… I doubt she expects me to cut you off. And I imagine she’ll still want to know how everyone is doing, even if she doesn’t want the details.” She glances up to meet his eyes. “Anyway, regardless of how often I visit in person, I’m still going to be checking in with you, so answer your damn phone, will you?”

“I do answer my phone,” he says defensively. “I just… forget to answer texts sometimes. And I don’t get service in the tunnels –”

“Well, come up for air and cell service from time to time.” She wrinkles her nose. “Honestly, I don’t know how you can tolerate being down here for hours on end –”

Jon startles slightly as the trapdoor creaks open above their heads. Georgie stands as Melanie makes her way down the ladder, hurrying over to fold her into her arms. Basira follows behind, closing the trapdoor behind her as she goes.

“Mission successful, I take it?” Jon says quietly as Basira approaches him, giving Georgie and Melanie a moment to themselves.

“Uneventful,” Basira says with a shrug. “A few sidelong glances, but otherwise, none of the library staff even acknowledged us. Definitely didn’t seem keen on asking why we were rummaging in the repair supplies.”

“They probably didn’t want to know.”

“Yeah.” A small, rueful smile crosses her face. “Some of them used to talk to me, you know. Nothing personal – we weren’t close – but… when I returned a book, they’d ask what I thought of it, give me recommendations, that sort of thing. Now, though…”

These days she prefers to wait until everyone has gone home for the day before visiting the library, Jon Knows. He also Knows that the library staff are well aware that she’s the one pilfering research materials in the dead of night – and that they have no plans on confronting her about it. She never leaves a mess, after all, and always returns items to their proper places once she’s finished with them, which is more than can be said for many of the students who make use of the library’s resources.

“You know, I don’t think any of them have looked me in the eye for months.” There’s a distinct note of regret in Basira’s voice. “They just watch me out of the corners of their eyes when they think I’m not looking. I don’t know if that’s because they’re afraid of Lukas disappearing them for fraternizing, or because everyone is leery of the Archives these days, or because I’ve just become less approachable. Maybe all three. Suppose it doesn’t really matter.”

Jon knows the feeling well. Before he can answer, though, Melanie clears her throat. Jon looks over to see her facing his direction, one hand clasping Georgie’s tight enough to blanch her knuckles.

“This is it, then,” Basira says solemnly.

“Yeah.” Melanie closes her eyes and breathes a long, shaky exhale. “It’s time.”

“You’re sure you don’t want me there?” Georgie asks.

Melanie shakes her head. “I don’t want you to see that.”

“But –”

“She won’t be alone,” Basira says. “I’ll be right outside the room.”

Melanie faces Georgie fully, taking her other hand as well. “The plan hasn’t changed. Basira will call 999. I’ll make it quick, and – once it’s done, Basira will come in and sit with me until the ambulance gets here.”

“I have a general idea of what the response time should be like,” Basira adds, looking at Georgie. “If we time it right, Melanie will have medical assistance within minutes. I can come get you when the paramedics get here, if you want to ride in the ambulance.”

Georgie nods and tightens her grip on Melanie’s hands. “Is that okay?”

“Only if you want,” Melanie says haltingly. “But – maybe try to avoid looking too close, if my eyes are uncovered? It’s just – it probably won’t be pretty.” A stressed laugh claws its way out of her throat. “Potential trauma fodder, you know? I don’t want to worry about you remembering me like that every time you see me, even after I’ve healed.”

“Okay,” Georgie replies softly.

“It shouldn’t take long. Just – wait here with Jon until then, okay?” Georgie nods again, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. “Speaking of which –” Melanie glances at Jon, as if just now remembering his presence. Startled by the sudden direct eye contact, he reflexively straightens his spine and stands at attention. “I guess this is goodbye, huh? For a while, anyway.”

“I, uh. I suppose it is.”

“Right. So, um… good luck, I guess?”

No disclaimers or ill will tacked on this time, Jon notes privately.

“You too.” He forces a smile, but he suspects that it comes off as awkward rather than reassuring.

“Try not to die.”

“Yes, ‘not dying’ is relatively close to the top of my to-do list.”

“If I come to find out that you’ve gotten yourself killed and broken the eldritch employment contract binding us all to this place after I’ve gone and gouged my eyes out, I’m going to be livid.”

“Well, we can’t have that,” Jon says wryly.

“Seriously, though.” Melanie’s smirk melts away, taken over by a somber, quiet sort of intensity. “Either beat Elias at his own game, or get the fuck away from this place the instant you find an out. Whichever comes first. Preferably without any of the self-sacrificial bullshit.”

Fractious as its delivery is, the demand is oddly touching, coming from Melanie.

“I, uh… I’ll do my best?”

“You’d better.” Melanie nods – a curt but cordial dismissal – and turns her attention back to Georgie. “Hey,” she says, her voice going measurably softer, releasing one of Georgie’s hands to reach up and cup her face. Her watery smile belies her mental state: resolve warring with trepidation. “Look at me?”

For a long minute, she studies Georgie’s face, clearly enraptured. Jon forcefully tears his gaze away from the intimacy of the moment.

“Okay.” Melanie takes a deep breath in and releases it slowly. “I’m ready. I’ll see you soon, okay? Or – well, I won’t see you, but – you’ll see me, and I’ll…” She huffs, rolling her eyes. “Oh, whatever – you know what I mean.”

Georgie lets out a tearful chuckle, and Melanie relaxes marginally.

“I’m sure about this,” she says. “I promise. This is what I want – a life with you, away from all of this. And if this is the price I have to pay, then… I’m okay with that. Really, I am.” She stands on tiptoe to give Georgie a peck on the cheek. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” Georgie says, leaning down for a return kiss, smiling weakly against Melanie’s lips. “See you soon.”

When Martin first heard the bustle outside his door – coworkers venturing outside their solitary offices to trade whispered questions and eager gossip as word of paramedics in the archives made its way upstairs – his stomach gave a little lurch: a combination of horror and wonder. He hadn’t expected Melanie to change her mind – he knows how determined she can be once she’s settled on a course of action; how desperate she was to extricate herself from Elias’ – Jonah’s – schemes. Still, though, faced with the reality of it, he found himself in awe of her nerve.

That was yesterday. Martin didn’t get much work done, preoccupied as he was. He isn’t having an easier time of it today: his attention keeps slipping away to linger in remembrances of sterile hospital rooms and muted hallways, thoughts drowned out by the ghosts of sirens and beeping machinery.

“Well, this is an unexpected turn of events.”

Martin jolts in his seat, heart leaping into his throat. It only takes an instant longer for his alarm to mutate into aggravation.

“Peter!” Martin spins around to glower at the man. “How many times do I have to–”

Peter flaps a dismissive hand. “To be honest, Martin, the drop in temperature tends to tip most people off. The only reason you continue to be surprised by my arrival is because you’ve become acclimated to the Forsaken.”

The revelation is slow to sink in, a stark chill blooming in Martin’s chest and snaking its roots outwards. Only now that it’s been brought to his attention can he feel the nip in the air.

“Here I was certain you were becoming estranged from our patron, but it seems I needn’t have worried.” Peter’s smile is laced with malice. “Or should I?”

Martin says nothing, eyes wide and stinging from the now-conspicuous cold. Peter sighs, folds his hands behind his back, and begins a meandering back-and-forth pace.

“Our success is dependent on your voluntary isolation, Martin.”

“Yeah.” The word turns to fog as it touches the air, and Martin finds himself transfixed by the sight. “You’ve said.”

“It seems you need a reminder.”

The condescension dripping from the words is enough to drag Martin back into the present moment. Heat rises in his cheeks, contrasting with the temperature in the room and making the chill that much more noticeable.

“You still haven’t told me your plan,” he snaps. “You keep expecting me to just – go along with whatever you’re scheming, no questions asked.”

“You ask many questions, Martin –”

“Yeah, and you never answer them! You’re so – so bloody cryptic about all of this.”

“Martin, Martin,” Peter says, placating in the most patronizing way possible. Martin bristles: he hates the way Peter says his name. “There’s no need to get so worked up –”

“If you want me to be a partner in – in whatever it is you’re planning, you can’t expect me to go on blind trust!”

“I’m still conducting my own research,” Peter says mildly. “I would rather not confuse you with extraneous details before I have all the kinks worked out.”

“I’m not an idiot –”

“Rest assured,” Peter interrupts, “if I was capable of stopping the Extinction alone, I would. Unfortunately, it will require someone touched by the Beholding.”

“Why?”

“Because it requires this place, and this place” – Peter’s lip curls in distaste – “is the Eye’s seat of power. The One Alone has no dominion here.” Martin crosses his arms, unimpressed. “You are the only one who can do this, Martin.”

“Why?” Martin repeats.

Judging from the muscle ticking in Peter’s jaw, his limited supply of patience for conversation is precipitously depleting.

“No, really,” Martin presses, “why me? I mean” – he spreads his arms out with a scornful chuckle – “look at me. I’m not exactly hero material, am I?”

“That really depends on you. I can’t force you to cooperate. It won’t even work unless you’re a willing participant.”

“And what makes you think that your plan is the only way? You – you keep going on about how it’s my choice. Well – what if I choose to work with the others? It can’t hurt to have more eyes on the problem –” Martin rolls his eyes at Peter’s unconcealed revulsion. “Yeah, I know. No one would ever accuse you of being a team player, obviously. But I can be the liaison; you don’t have to interact with anyone at all.” Would prefer you don’t interact with anyone at all, Martin thinks. “I mean, that’s already my role, isn’t it? Dealing with people so you don’t have to?”

“Martin,” Peter says, low and dangerous.

“I’ll do it off the clock, even. I’ll isolate myself in my office during the workday, or whatever” – Martin gives a flippant wave of his hand – “and continue researching the Extinction.” And practically running the whole damn place on an assistant’s salary, he grouses silently. “After hours I’ll pursue my own research with the others.”

“Part-time isolation will not suffice to equip you with the power you’ll need.” Peter presses his lips into a pale, rigid line. “Be reasonable. Are you really willing to risk an apocalypse, just because you can’t appreciate solitude?”

“If it starts to look like there’s no other option, I’ll reconsider.”

“And if the Extinction emerges while you’re wasting time searching for an alternative that doesn’t exist?”

“Based on the limited information you’ve given me, I don’t think the Extinction is going to just… emerge overnight. I’m still not even convinced it’s going to be worse than any other Fear. I mean, the Flesh is relatively new, isn’t it? And it didn’t… leave the fear economy in shambles, or whatever.”

“It isn’t about competition, Martin.” Peter releases a slow plume of fog through his nose before continuing, voice cool but simmering with pique just under the surface. “The Extinction is different from the other Powers. It is defined by widescale eradication. The other Powers may seek to change the world, but none of them strive for a world without us.”

“But what makes you so sure the Extinction would?”

Peter’s eyes narrow. Ignoring him, Martin runs his thumb along his bottom lip as he replays Jon’s impassioned conjectures on the matter: It thrives on the potentiality of a mass extinction event, not the fulfillment of one.

“What’s to say it wouldn’t be just fine with the world as it is, like the End?” Martin says, more confidently now. “People have been prophesying about the end of the world for – all of human history, probably. I doubt we’ll stop anytime soon. Maybe at its core the Extinction is just… the fear of an uncertain future. And a particular future doesn’t have to be realized in order to inspire fear, as long as the potential is always there. It’s about the suspense – the ‘what ifs’, the unknown, the – the lack of control in it all.” Martin laughs. “In a way, that’s… that’s what most fears boil down to, isn’t it?”

“The stakes are rather high to gamble on a thought experiment, don’t you think?” The temperature plunges a few more degrees as Peter speaks. “I think that the most important ‘what if’ you should concern yourself with is what if you’re wrong?”

“And what if I’m not?” Martin counters. “You act so authoritative, but aren’t you also just speculating? When I agreed to work with you, you told me you would provide me with evidence to support your theory. So far, I’m not convinced. You’re going to have to give me more to go on than just ‘trust me.’ I mean – if it’s between trusting you and – and trusting Jon, and the others? You can’t really be surprised if I choose them over you.”

“Oh, Martin,” Peter tuts, shaking his head with derisive, disingenuous pity. “Since when has the trust you’ve placed in others ever been reciprocated?”

“I trust him,” Martin says defiantly.

“But does he trust you?” Peter pauses for effect. “Of all the times you’ve allowed yourself to form attachments, has anyone even once genuinely returned those affections?”

Jon did.

Whatever expression Martin is wearing brings a sneer to Peter’s face. Martin clenches his teeth and ignores him.

Jon does, he corrects. Present tense. He said as much.

Martin still can’t fathom what Jon could possibly see in him, but Jon wouldn’t lie about something like that, right? He wouldn’t.

…would he?

No, he wouldn’t, Martin chides. You know he wouldn’t. Trust him.

“Sure,” Peter persists, “you may open yourself up to the potential for something more, but you know as well as I do that it won’t last. Is the inevitable loss really worth the risk?”

“I don’t know,” Martin says. He tries to ignore the slight quaver that insinuates itself into the declaration. “But if I never take the risk, I’ll never know, will I?”

“I think you already know the answer.” Peter’s pale eyes glitter with spite. “Remember what it felt like, languishing at the Archivist’s deathbed. Recall the state you were in when you first came to me.”

The words are incisive, sliding under Martin’s skin and lodging there like shrapnel. He can feel his confidence waver, the conviction he stood fast on only seconds ago splintering underneath him like thin ice.

“How many times do you think he can court death and survive? He all but died stopping the last apocalypse; he was willing to bury himself alive for a woman who tried to kill him. How do you think he’ll react if you tell him about any of this? You think he’ll listen to reason? Trust in your judgment?” Peter fixes Martin with a smug, hungry look. “Or will he throw himself in front of the first bullet he sees?”

He already knows about all of this, Martin reminds himself. Jon isn’t about to sacrifice himself on account of the Extinction. Moreover, he seems to be genuinely committed to working as a team rather than striking out on his own.

But he also sees himself as a cataclysm waiting to happen, says the nagging doubt skulking in the far corners of Martin’s mind. As much as Jon insists that he doesn’t want to die, he’s already lived through one apocalypse. Martin has no doubt that Jon would sacrifice himself to prevent another, if it came down to it.

Jon is a powder keg of fear and guilt, and there is no shortage of potential ignition sources waiting in the wings. It only takes one untimely spark to set an archive ablaze.

“I trust him,” Martin repeats to himself, but the statement is rendered feeble by the leaden, frozen knot unfurling in his chest.

“Can you really weather another round of grief?” Peter continues, triumphant. He knows he’s found a gap in Martin’s defenses; all he needs to do now is twist the knife. “You’ve already done your mourning, cut the infection off at the source. Let him back in, and you only open yourself up to more pain. Better a numbed scar than a wound that never heals, don’t you think?”

“No.” There’s something off about Martin’s voice – as if it doesn’t belong to him; as if it’s originating from outside of himself, faint and frail and faraway, smothered by the cold, empty fog clogging his lungs. “N-no, I…”

“Connection is a fleeting, fickle thing,” Peter persists. “It’s a lie people tell themselves. The truth is that we are all alone. In the end, all we have is ourselves. Think about it.”

Unthinkingly, Martin shrinks away as Peter steps closer.

“You asked for more evidence.” Peter slides a few statement folders onto the desk. “Take some time to yourself. Consider whether you’re willing to wager on the fate of the world.”

When Martin looks up, he is alone.

“It’s so loud,” Daisy mutters heatedly, stalking to and fro like a panther in a cage. She scratches furiously at her forearms as she goes, blunt fingernails leaving faint red stripes on pale skin.

“Daisy,” Jon says evenly, “I think maybe you should –”

“Itch I can’t scratch.” She pivots on her heel, retracing her short path in the opposite direction. “Feels like fire under my skin.”

“I don’t think clawing your skin off is going to help.”

Daisy barks a laugh. “With what claws?” She stops short and brandishes the backs of her trembling hands, fingers splayed to highlight nails gnawed to the quick, ragged cuticles stained rust-brown with dried blood. “Dull now.” Her eyes go unfocused, staring vaguely at her hands as if she doesn’t recognize them. “Too dull.”

“I’m sorry,” Jon says, and he means it.

It never gets easier to witness her like this, frenetic and fraying in the throes of the Hunt’s compulsion. These spells have a way of making her features look sharper, her mannerisms more animalistic. She’s all protruding bones and sallow skin, but that seeming frailty does nothing to tame the violence thrumming in her veins. If anything, that all-consuming hunger only makes her more fearsome.

Jon’s strict rations have given him an underfed, pinched look as well, but at least he has something. Not enough to put meat on his bones, so to speak, but enough to stave off starvation. Daisy, though…

When Jon takes a step forward, she rounds on him with teeth bared and a snarl in her throat. Jon flinches at the sudden movement.

“You’re afraid of me.” Daisy exhales an exhausted rattle of a laugh, as if vindicated. “Good. You should be.”

“I’m not afraid of you,” Jon says. “I have an overactive startle reflex. Always have, really.”

“You’re lying.” Daisy breathes heavily through her nose, fists clenched at her sides now. “Admit it.”

Jon knows what she’s trying to do. She wants him to lash out, to bite back, to make her bleed. He’s uncomfortably familiar with that craving. It’s like looking into a mirror.

“I’m not afraid of you,” he reiterates.

“Liar,” Daisy hisses, fixing him with a baleful glare.

He’s seen her like this many times before, hunger-ravaged and swamped by bloodlust. She’ll doggedly bash herself against the nearest witness to her shame like a ship crashed against a jetty, driven forward again and again by cresting waves of guilt and self-loathing until she’s free-floating wreckage. Every time, it gets more and more difficult to gather up all the debris and repair the damage. Jon fears that one of these days, the storm will pass and there won’t be enough pieces left to put her back together.

“I’m not a knife you can cut yourself on, Daisy,” he says patiently.

Daisy looks positively mutinous, mouth opening and closing several times before erupting: “Why wouldn’t you be afraid of me?”

“I used to be,” Jon admits, leaning back against the tunnel wall to take some of the weight off his bad leg. “Before the Buried. I was terrified of you. Dreaded every moment I had to be alone with you. Thought it was only a matter of time before you finished the job.”

“It was,” she rasps out – and with that, her shoulders slump and her fists relax to hang limply at her sides, fingers jumping and twitching with the last dregs of her agitation.

“I know. But then you changed. You were different, after the Buried. As afraid of yourself as I used to be of you. As afraid of yourself as I was of myself.” He looks her in the eye as he speaks. “I looked at you and saw my own fear reflected back at me. There are so many things to be afraid of. You were – you are trying very hard not to be one of them.”

“If I’m afraid of me, you should be, too.”

“Are you afraid of me?” Jon asks, shaping each word carefully to keep the compulsion at bay.

She pauses, considering the question.

“No,” she says eventually. “Afraid for you, sometimes.”

“As I am for you.” Jon’s tentative smile fades after a moment. “I’ll admit, I do have… reflexive reactions, sometimes. There were a few incidents where I walked into the breakroom and you were holding a knife, and my fight-or-flight response kicked in before my conscious brain could catch up with reality.”

Daisy squeezes her eyes shut, wrapping her arms around her middle.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers. When she opens her eyes, the look on her face isn’t pleading so much as it is resigned. She isn’t asking for forgiveness. Jon doubts she ever will.

It’s just one more thing they have in common.

“I know,” he says quietly. “To be clear, I don’t feel unsafe with you, as you are now. It’s just… flashbacks. They can be – unpredictable. And if I’m already feeling on edge, or – or not quite present, it doesn’t take much to set me off. But,” he adds, giving her a serious look, “I don’t want you walking on eggshells around me. That only puts me more on edge.”

“Fine. But will you tell me if I do something to scare you?”

“Yes.” She made the same request last time. “But I’ve never had to. You could always feel when I was afraid. From a few rooms away, even.”

“Yeah,” Daisy says with a choked laugh. “Your blood is – very loud sometimes.”

“And now?”

These episodes tend to be capricious. Sometimes, what seems to be the calm after the storm proves to be only a lull before a second wind. If the way she’s wobbling on her feet and favoring one leg is any indication, Jon suspects that the worst of the flare-up has passed for now, taking her adrenaline surge with it. Still, he waits for her confirmation. Daisy takes a minute to mull over the question, head cocked slightly to the side as if listening.

“Quieter,” she says.

With that, Jon lowers himself to the ground and sits with his back against the wall, beckoning her over to take a seat. She hesitates for a moment longer before following his lead, slumping down next to him with a labored sigh.

“Sorry for growling at you,” she says sheepishly, rubbing the back of her neck.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Daisy tilts her head back to stare at the ceiling. “You said I ended up going back to the Hunt last time.”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“September. But – but that doesn’t mean it has to happen again,” he adds hurriedly when he sees her face fall in a mixture of anguish and resignation. “It was – sort of a perfect storm of extenuating circumstances. Like I said before, if you didn’t let the Hunt back in, you and Basira would likely have been killed. But I think you knew you wouldn’t be coming back from it. Before you changed, you made Basira promise to hunt you down and kill you.”

“And did she?”

“She lost track of you in the chaos. You gave chase after one of the Hunters. Once you killed her, the other Hunter started hunting you. For revenge.” Jon’s voice drops to a low murmur. “A few weeks later, the world ended.”

Which makes it sound far more passive than it actually was, but Jon isn’t in the mood for a scolding should he opt for an ‘I’ statement.

“And then what?”

“You were a full-fledged Hunter in a – a perpetual fear generator of a world,” Jon says grimly. “Do you really need to hear the details?”

“Tell me,” Daisy says. “Please.”

Jon understands the need, but recounting the apocalypse never gets any easier. He closes his eyes, breathes deeply, and takes a moment to gather his thoughts.

“When I opened the door and let all the Fears into this reality,” he begins, “the world was divvied up into thousands of different domains, each belonging to a different shade of terror. With few exceptions, most people were confined to one domain – usually whatever aligned with their deepest fears. Avatars and monsters were subject to the Ceaseless Watcher, but otherwise able to exercise control over the humans in the domains of their patrons. Most seemed to stake out territory and settle in one place – customizing their own little spheres of influence, creating playgrounds of their own making. But some got around. You were one of the ones that traveled.”

“What was –” Daisy grimaces. “Who was I hunting?��

“Well… in that place, no one got what they deserved, only what would hurt the most. And people are rarely afraid of just one thing. Most were magnets for multiple fears. The more nomadic Avatars and monsters would gravitate towards whatever individuals were most susceptible to their power, so to speak.” He bites his lip. There’s really no tactful way to phrase this next part. “In your case, you had a roster of specific targets that you were tracking. Former prey. Whether you were drawn to them because of their own fear of you, or because some part of you judged them to have ‘gotten away,’ so to speak… I’m not entirely certain. It may have been a bit of both.”

“I see,” Daisy murmurs. “Guess it makes sense that I would rank high among some people’s greatest fears.”

“Basira was tracking you when we ran into her. We were with her when we found you.”

“And was I… still me?”

“Yes and no,” Jon says hesitantly. “You were you, in a way, but only a small part of you. The Hunter. Everything else was buried too deep. Drowned. Even if I could have brought you back, it would have killed you. You – you didn’t even recognize me, or Martin. You recognized Basira – saw her as pack, wanted her to join you in the Hunt – but…”

“You were prey,” Daisy says quietly.

“Yeah.”

“You never did manage to grow a self-preservation instinct, did you?” Daisy squints at him. “I went full monster on you, and you still want me to sit next to you now.”

“You had sharper teeth then,” Jon says drily. Daisy scoffs and nudges his shoulder with hers. She doesn’t draw back after making contact, and when Jon doesn’t pull away either, she leans into him.

“Basira kept her promise?” Daisy asks after a minute.

“Yes. She didn’t want to, but…” Jon swallows thickly, the memory of Basira’s heartbreak bringing to mind his own. “It wasn’t an easy decision.”

Daisy rubs at her chest with one hand, as if to soothe an ache. “It wasn’t fair for me to ask that of her, was it?”

“Maybe not,” Jon sighs. “It seems fair choices are hard to come by, for most of us.”

“I… I don’t want her to have to make that choice this time.”

“Neither do I.”

“It’s never going to stop, is it?” Daisy glances at him, allowing her head to rest lightly on his shoulder. “It’s only going to get worse.”

“I’m sorry.” What else is there to say?

“Melanie got away,” Daisy says, a tinge of bargaining in her tone. “She managed to purge the Slaughter. And break away from the Eye.”

“Her situation was… different from ours. She wasn’t as far gone as we are. The Slaughter hadn’t fully claimed her, and the Eye never took her as an Avatar. But you’ve been living with the Hunt for most of your life; I signed myself over to the Beholding the moment I became the Archivist. We’ve become… attached to our patrons, dependent on them for survival. Symbiotic, in a twisted sort of way.”

“You really don’t think there’s a way back, then.”

“I don’t know for sure. I’ve seen it before, in my future, but – the world was different then. During the apocalypse, I was able to, uh… shift a person’s status from Watched to Watcher. I – I mean, technically everyone was Watched – the Eye had dominion over everything – but I could give someone control over one of the smaller domains. Create new Avatars, for lack of a better term.

“But turn a Watcher into solely the Watched, and they would typically unravel. I don’t know if that’s because the full focus of the Ceaseless Watcher’s gaze just happens to be lethal – particularly for Avatars aligned with other Powers – or if an Avatar is simply unable to survive being cut off from their patron regardless of the means of separation. I do Know that I wouldn’t have been able to survive being cut off from the Eye unscathed. I was… too much a part of the Eye in that reality. Not sure about now. For either of us.”

“That’s a roundabout way of saying ‘no.’”

“I’m not saying no, I’m saying that I don’t know. Supposedly escaping the Buried was impossible, and here we are.”

“Apples and oranges,” Daisy says sullenly.

“Maybe. I think it’s all too complex for clear-cut categories. Even the hard-and-fast ‘rules’ are only as strong as our collective belief in them. Almost like our expectations shore them up. I’ve witnessed all of reality being rewritten – all physical laws and supposed universal constants reshaped to center the Eye.” He reaches one hand up to tug on the hair at the back of his neck. “After all I’ve Seen, it’s difficult to conceive of anything being categorically impossible. Between all the dream logic and reality bending, there’s plenty of space for firsts and exceptions to the rules.”

‘I don’t knows’ are where the hope lives, Martin said once. At the time, Jon teased him for being a hopeless romantic, but truthfully, Jon was just as hopelessly endeared by Martin’s belief in such things.

“Have you talked to Georgie yet today?” Daisy asks, apparently ready to change the subject.

“Oh, uh – yes. This morning.”

“And?”

“Melanie was out of surgery and stable, but she wasn’t awake yet. Georgie promised to call tonight with an update.” Assuming nothing major comes up before then, a worried voice in Jon’s head supplies. He shakes his head to jog the thought loose. “Speaking of Georgie… have you given any thought to her suggestion?”

“What,” Daisy says, drolly skeptical, “playing a video game?”

“I realize it’s… somewhat out of the box, but it might be worth a try. Like Georgie said, there are multiplayer games where you can, uh… hunt down other players.”

Daisy plucks absently at her collar, glowering at the opposite wall as if the bricks there committed a personal offense. “It’s not the same.”

“A simulation might not come close to a real hunt, no, but – you might still get something out of it? Maybe?” Daisy directs her scowl up at the ceiling. Jon only digs his heels in, undeterred. “There are even some that have a survival horror theme. An aesthetic that already puts players in the mindset to be frightened, you know?”

“People play those games for fun, Sims.” She finally looks at him, eyes narrowed. “It’s about thrills, not mortal fear.”

“Sometimes genuine fear can sneak through. Haven’t you ever been so creeped out by a horror story that it stayed with you after nightfall?”

“Not really?”

“O-oh. Well, some people have that experience.” Jon gives an awkward little cough. “Anyway, under the right circumstances, a game can get the adrenaline pumping as well as a chase can. A fight-or-flight response doesn’t necessarily require a real physical threat.”

Daisy raises her eyebrows, transparently cynical. “Do you really think the Hunt is going to be satisfied with jump scares and – and low-stakes adrenaline rushes filtered through a screen?”

“No,” Jon admits. “But it might take the edge off. Sort of like reading old statements does for me. Not enough to stop you starving, but maybe enough to distract from the hunger pangs. At least temporarily. If nothing else, you did say you need a new hobby, and it’s not like this place is overflowing with viable entertainment options.”

“I guess,” Daisy sighs. “I mean, it’s not like I’m paying rent. May as well squander my paycheck.”

“If that’s the case, you should see if that eBay listing for that vintage The Archers board game is still up,” Jon says drily. “Last I checked, it was £2 with no bidders.”

“Yeah, and £30 shipping.”

“Sounds like £32 well spent, if you ask me.”

Daisy snorts and bumps her shoulder against his. “You, Jonathan Sims, are an absolute menace.”

Adrift and thoroughly divorced from the concept of time, end of the workday passes Martin by without his notice. Once again, he wonders whether Peter deliberately assigned him an office with no external window, not only to put another wall between him and the rest of the world, but to make it easier for him to lose track of time.

For an interminable stretch of time he sits catatonic, mind peppered with sporadic sensory input: Dead-weight limbs, listless and foreign-feeling. The brush of fabric resting against bare skin, every point of weightless contact a violation. The distant ticking of clockwork, rote and irrevocable.

Stand up, comes the thought, detached and intrusive: an instruction he cannot parse; empty phonemes wafted into a vacant mind, abandoned there to echo and disperse until they lose all meaning. A fragment of a signal from brain to nerves to fingers presses numb fingertips to thumbs, a cautious test yielding no sensation but for the vague, spongey give of flesh.

Then the body ostensibly belonging to him is on its feet, the connection between floor and soles disturbingly incongruent with unreality. Walking now, every footfall jarring in its impact; every step stretched and blurred like a botched time-lapse photograph; every molasses-sluggish forward motion met with invisible resistance, like swimming against a sludgy current.

He does not remember how or when or under whose direction he arrives in the Archives, swaying at the threshold of the Head Archivist’s office. Empty and still. Silence so pervasive it’s almost tangible. Viscous and inexorable. Trapping him like a fly in honey. Drowning.

When next he becomes aware of his surroundings, he’s wavering at the bottom of a ladder. Walls curving up and over his head, a brickwork warren stretching on and out into the murk.

Standing in place. Hovering like an afterimage. Rootless and incorporeal. Searching for… staring at… calling to…

There: something real.

“Martin?” Jon’s breath fogs the air as he speaks, but the way he says the name… his voice seems to cradle the word, shielding it against the cold. He sits up straighter, keen gaze sweeping the area like a lighthouse beacon. “Martin, is that you?”

That’s me, Martin thinks, and then, wonderingly: He says your name like it’s something precious.

At that thought, Jon’s eyes land on him like a searchlight.

“There you are.” His soft smile immediately falters, brow furrowing in concern. “Are you alright?”

He’s sat on the floor with his back against the wall, one knee drawn up to his chest, and Daisy pressed up against his side in a mirrored position, sharing a pair of corded earphones. Daisy is already thumbing at the screen of her phone, presumably pausing whatever it is they’re listening to, as Jon removes his earbud.

Martin opens his mouth to speak, but the air in his lungs has turned to viscid fog and the confused tangle of half-formed thoughts in his mind refuse to coalesce into actual words. Jon exchanges a glance with Daisy, who is already moving to stand. Martin wants to object – she doesn’t have to leave on his account; he can see that they’re busy; he’s fine; he’s just overreacting – but before he can cobble together a protest, she’s halfway to her feet, gripping the wall for support.

“I’m alright now,” Martin can hear her say.

“You’re sure?” Jon asks in a low murmur.

“Yeah.” She winces as she straightens her spine. “Knowing Basira, she’s still pouring over the same statements as she was this morning. She could do with an interruption.”

“Can you manage the ladder?”

Daisy stretches her leg out, testing her mobility. “Think so.”

They give each other another long look, a shared nod, and without another word, Daisy staggers her way to the exit and mounts the ladder.

As it does every time he witnesses these displays of unspoken understanding between them, an ugly pang of jealousy burns in Martin’s chest – some combination of envy, inadequacy, longing, and loneliness. Possessiveness, almost – and an instant later, the shame sets in.

But then the trapdoor closes, Jon looks Martin in the eye again, and the sincere, tender warmth sheltering there is enough to leave Martin reeling. It’s hard to comprehend anyone – let alone Jonathan Sims – looking at him like that; difficult to reconcile requited affection with a lifetime of fruitless want. Martin can’t shake the feeling that it will always be this way – and that his inability to trust in unconditional love is precisely what makes him so unlovable in the first place.

Jon clears his throat and pats the floor beside him. He’s seated on a blanket, Martin just now notices, folded over several times to cushion the hard ground.

He’d better not be napping down here, Martin thinks to himself.

“Martin,” Jon says, in that impossibly soft tone he’s taken to using around Martin these days, “I’d like you to come sit, if you’re amenable.”

It’s such a Jon way of phrasing the invitation, and the familiarity it engenders has Martin accepting without a conscious thought. He settles himself beside Jon, close but not touching. Those few inches of distance manage to be simultaneously loathsome and assuring. Martin lets his hand rest in that vacant space, fingers clenching around a fistful of blanket.

Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Jon’s hand twitch, as if fighting back the urge to reach out and touch. Instead, he starts to rub the fabric of his trouser leg between his thumb and forefinger.

“What do you need right now?” Jon asks.

“I…” Martin pauses, unsettled by the sound of his own voice, grating and almost unfamiliar to his ears.

“Take your time.”

It takes a minute for Martin to wrap his mouth around more than one syllable.

“Nothing,” he says, the weight of the word nearly pinning his tongue in place.

“It doesn’t sound like nothing.”

Several more minutes pass before Martin is able to construct a full sentence.

“I’m just being stupid.” The words seem to echo faintly in the tunnel, despite how quietly he says them.

“What do you need?” Jon asks again.

“Nothing,” Martin repeats dully. He doesn’t need anything.

Jon doesn’t immediately respond. Martin can feel himself go rigid, anticipating… what – aggravation, impatience, disengagement? But Jon only runs a thumb along his jawline, a thoughtful frown on his face.

“Okay,” he says eventually, “what do you want, then? What would – what would help you feel better right now?”

“I… I don’t know,” Martin says in a voice so feeble it’s nearly inaudible. He flexes his fingers uncertainly, chasing after any physical sensation at all, only to find them numb and deathlike. The helpless sigh that shudders out of him wants to be a whimper. “I just – didn’t – don’t – feel real. Feels like I’m not really here.”

“Hmm.” Jon looks at him – really looks at him, taking his time to study Martin’s face. “Well, I can confirm that you are here.”

“You… you can see me?” Martin asks meekly, pleadingly, dreading the answer.

“Yes.” Jon pauses. “And if you’re agonizing over being a bother, don’t, because you aren’t. I always like seeing you.”

He should trust Jon – he does trust Jon – but it’s still a constant struggle to drown out that Lonely part of him that insists that isolation is safer, more dependable, and far more habitable. Unthinkingly, Martin reaches over, hand trembling in the air above Jon’s, fingertips just barely ghosting across scarred skin.

“Would you like me to hold your hand…?” Jon ventures.

Martin’s fingers curve inward as he pulls back slightly. “I, um.”

“You can say no,” Jon reminds him.

“I… I want it, but I – I – I don’t know if I can handle it right now, and I –” Martin draws back entirely, flapping both hands in frustration, trying to relieve the pins-and-needles sensation prickling through his veins. “I hate this. I hate being like this.”

Martin grimaces at the outburst, but Jon doesn’t seem to be judging him. Instead, he’s looking off to the side, a crease between his eyebrows now, as if he’s working through a problem.

“No skin-to-skin contact,” he says to himself, and then he looks to Martin. “Pressure helps me sometimes, when I feel like I’m not real. You could… lean against me? If you want.”

“I…”

“You don’t have to,” Jon rushes to reassure him.

“It’s – not that I don’t want to. I guess I’m just…” Martin can feel himself flush with embarrassment. “It’s daft, but I’m worried that I’ll be – I don’t know, incorporeal, or something.”

“I distinctly recall you telling me that you’re not a ghost.”

It takes a few seconds for Jon’s deadpan humor to sink in. When it does, Martin nearly chokes on a surprised laugh.

“I still can’t believe you thought I was a ghost,” he says, cracking a smile. The tight, bitter-cold knot in his chest yields just a little, like ice disintegrating under a spring thaw.

“In my defense, I was quite distraught at the time.” Jon’s eyes wrinkle at the corners and Martin is struck by overwhelming fondness. He doesn’t pull away when Jon reaches out, open palm hovering just above his shoulder. “May I?”

Cautiously, Martin nods.

“Hmm.” Jon applies the lightest touch at first, watching Martin’s face carefully. He waits until Martin nods for him to continue before he presses down more firmly. Before long, Martin can feel the warmth of Jon’s hand through his jumper. That warmth carries over into Jon’s smile. “Feels solid to me.”

The confirmation comes as a relief, as foolish as that makes Martin feel. He braces himself and leans against Jon’s side, releasing his held breath when his body meets with tangible resistance. At first he worries that Jon, scrawny as he is, won’t be able to support the weight, but he doesn’t budge when Martin melts against him. After that, it’s a struggle for Martin to keep his eyes open.

Jon must notice, because he whispers, “You can rest. I’ll be here.”

Martin doesn’t even have the strength to nod, let alone the energy to argue. He allows the steady rise and fall of Jon’s chest to lull him into an almost meditative state, his mind still floating somewhere outside of himself, but now tethered to the ground.

Then the silence starts nipping at his heels.

“Too quiet,” he mumbles. “Talk to me?”

“What about?”

“Anything.”

“Did you know that highland cattle have a double coat?” Jon says after a minute of consideration. “It insulates them against the cold. The outer layer is long – the longest hair of any cattle breed, in fact – and oily, which helps ward off the rain. Underneath is softer, almost woolly hair.”

Once Jon gets started, those little scraps of trivia soon progress to a nearly encyclopedic lecture. It doesn’t take long for Martin to lose himself in the rich timbre of Jon’s voice as he goes on about various Scottish breeds of cattle. Although he doesn’t fall fully asleep, Martin manages to drift in and out of consciousness enough that he loses track of time once more. This time, though, it’s a comfortable daze: there’s someone to keep him from straying too far.

At some point, he unthinkingly seeks out Jon’s hand. Jon presses his thumb into the center of Martin’s palm, rubbing small circles there, coaxing Martin further into peaceful relaxation.

“Sorry for interrupting you and Daisy earlier,” Martin murmurs groggily into Jon’s shoulder.

“Oh, we were just listening to The Archers.”

“Are you taking the piss?” Martin asks, opening one eye to scrutinize Jon’s expression.

“Unfortunately not.”

“You like The Archers.”

“Good lord, no. Blame Daisy.”

“Daisy likes The Archers,” Martin says, even more dubiously, sitting up now to squint at Jon.

“There are stranger things.”

Martin snorts and nestles into Jon’s side again. “If you say so.”

“Feeling better now?” Martin reflexively snuggles closer. Jon laughs softly, a little puff of a breath that rustles Martin’s hair. “I’m not going to deny you cuddles if the answer is ‘yes,’ you know.”

“Cuddles,” Martin whispers, the word dissolving into a clipped giggle.

“What?” Jon tilts his head. There’s a puzzled scowl on his face, as if he’s trying to decide whether or not he should take offense. It’s impossibly endearing.

“Cuddles,” Martin repeats, in a poor approximation of Jon’s voice this time. “Not a word I ever expected to hear from you.”

“Quiet, you,” Jon huffs, but he can’t disguise the way his indignant pout cracks into a smile under the weight of his own amusement. He almost seems to preen, as if pulling a laugh from Martin is a victory on which to pride himself. He reaches up with his free hand, pausing just above the top of Martin’s head. “May I?”

At Martin’s affirmative, Jon begins to comb his fingers through Martin’s hair, fingernails lightly scratching against his scalp. For the briefest of moments, some primal fragment of him recoils from the contact, instinctively unnerved by the vulnerability inherent to such closeness. Martin spurns that voice, breathes through its fit of angst and panic, and leans into the touch.

Little by little, step by step, he’s acclimating. He just wishes that it wasn’t such a process each and every time he lets his guard down like this.

“Bad day?” Jon asks once Martin settles.

“Something like that.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not really,” Martin groans. “But I should.”

“Only if you want to.”

“No, you should know, I just…” Martin heaves a wearied sigh. “Peter’s back.”

Jon gasps like he’s had the wind knocked out of him. The hand stroking Martin’s hair abruptly stills; the other, still clasped in Martin’s, constricts like a death-grip.

“Did he hurt you?” The question is steeped in an artificial, fragile sort of calm, but Jon can’t quite mask the intensity buzzing just under the surface: fear, protectiveness, and desperation all intermingled and reinforced by that ominous inkling of power that, despite his intentions, lurks behind every word.

“He didn’t do anything out of the ordinary. Just… trying to get me to recommit to the Lonely.” Martin scoffs. “And of course he was trying to do it in a way that would make me feel like it was my idea. Get me to convince myself that it was what I wanted, rather than something he was pressuring me into.”

“Of all the Powers, the Lonely is one of the most insidious, I think,” Jon says quietly. “It seeks out victims who already have one foot in the Lonely, reinforces those fears, promises kinship – a paradoxical form of it, anyway – and then it just… waits. Spend enough time disconnected from the rest of the world, and it doesn’t take long to start telling yourself the lie that it’s for the best. That it’s what you are; that it’s all you’re meant to be.”

“And I fell for it,” Martin mutters.

“Anyone would, subjected to the right conditions.” Jon waits until he catches Martin’s eye before he continues. “It isn’t your fault. This is what the Fears do. It’s what they are. They find an opening, they sink their hooks in, and they pull you under. They don’t let go until either you drown or you learn to breathe fear. The only way out is for someone to throw you a lifeline, and even then, the odds aren’t great. And the Lonely in particular – one of the first things it does is make it difficult to even conceive of a lifeline. It’s hard to catch hold of one if you never think to look for it.”

“I thought you hated convoluted metaphors.”

“Yes, well, unfortunately the Powers That Be tend to elude any sort of straightforward, concrete discussion,” Jon grouses. “Just one more reason to begrudge them, really. My point is, the Lonely is an insufferable liar and so is Peter.”

“What do you know, they’re perfect for each other.” The remark succeeds in putting a lopsided smirk on Jon’s face, much to Martin’s delight. “Anyway, Peter said his plan won’t work unless I’m voluntarily Lonely.”

“He’s right, although his plan has nothing to do with the Extinction. He needs you to choose the Lonely because those were the terms of his bet with Jonah. He poaches you out from under the Eye – gets you to pledge yourself to the Forsaken – and he wins, with the Institute as a prize. He fails to convert you, he loses, and he does what Jonah wants, which is for me to be marked by the Lonely.”

Jon says that last part so nonchalantly. As if it’s a foregone conclusion; as if he’s become so accustomed to dehumanization that it doesn’t even give him pause. Martin grits his teeth, biting back a surge of anger on Jon’s behalf.

“Yeah, well,” he says tightly, “Peter bet on the wrong horse.”

A sharp intake of breath leaves Jon sounding strangled when he says, eyes wide and lips parted, “Oh?”

“I mean, he can’t just sic the Lonely on me like he would any other victim, right? That wouldn’t count as a win. He needs me to choose it. And I’m not going to do that.”

“Yeah?” The expression of unguarded, cautious hope dawning on Jon’s face makes him look years younger.

“Yeah,” Martin says, feeling increasingly emboldened. “The funny thing is, I don’t – I don’t think I ever chose loneliness. I never wanted it – that was just a lie I told myself, and the Lonely just – echoed it back to me. S-so Peter’s out of luck, because if there are other options, then the Lonely will always be involuntary. Because it’s not what I want.”

“You – you mean it?” Jon brightens, leaning forward.

Martin’s heart skips a beat and flutters hummingbird-quick against his ribs. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen Jon smile – not like this, that is, beaming and uninhibited and altogether breathtaking. Immediately, Martin decides that he wants more. It seems wrong for something so exhilarating to be so rare.

He doesn’t know which of them moves first, and it doesn’t matter, because Jon is in his lap, and Jon is nuzzling into his shoulder, and Jon is here and solid and so, so alive in Martin’s arms, breathing warm and steady into his neck, smiling against his skin, hands scrabbling at his back to cling to his jumper. Martin’s fingers seek purchase of their own, and then something clicks.

“Jon,” he says, leaning back just far enough to confirm his suspicion, “is this mine?”

“Are you just now noticing?” Jon asks, devastatingly fond. “Martin, I’ve been wearing this jumper off and on for the last several weeks.”

“You have?” Martin all but squeaks, heat creeping up his neck and to the tips of his ears. “No. No, you –” Jon’s grin is widening, leaving Martin increasingly flustered. “I – I mean, yes, you have, obviously, I know that, but I – I – I –” Martin gulps, mortified, as Jon finally fails to contain his suppressed laughter. “Look, I didn’t recognize it until just now, alright?”

“Well,” Jon says, ducking his head to chuckle softly against Martin’s throat, “it’s mine now, and you can’t have it back.”

Which is fine with Martin, really, because he would be lying to himself if he said he wasn’t helplessly charmed by the newfound knowledge that not only is Jon an unrepentant clothes-thief, but apparently also an insatiable cuddler.

End Notes:

To address Martin’s concern: Jon does, in fact, nap in the tunnels sometimes. Listen, with Jurgen Leitner (derogatory) in absentia, there was an opening for the position of Beleaguered Tunnel-Haunting Hermit and Jon has all the necessary qualifications.

So anyways, who else thinks Peter’s bio on a dating app would probably just be that “every living creature on this earth dies alone” quote from Donnie Darko? I bet he thinks 'survival of the fittest' means 'every man for himself'. What an insufferable clown.

No Archive-speak in this chapter to cite.

I wanted to make a joke about a The Archers-themed Monopoly, so I asked duckduckgo if it was a thing. Sadly, it is not. There IS, however, a 1960s The Archers board game, and yes, there ARE eBay listings for it.

The first section of this chapter was written before eps 190-192 dropped. I think it still lines up well enough with what we saw of Melanie & Georgie’s characterization in these most recent episodes, with the qualifier that things have gone very differently in this AU compared with canon. (Also, I took some liberties wrt Georgie’s not-feeling-fear thing, obvi. Some of it matches with the most recent episodes, some of it not so much, but I decided to keep it anyways.)

Oh and I think I might have given myself cavities with the last section of this chapter. (I’m aro-spec; it’s hard to tell when I’m going over the top, but hopefully it’s fluffy without being overly cloying.)

#tma #the magnus archives #tma fic #tma spoilers #long post

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utterlyinevitable · 4 years

Text

Do We Have A Future?: January

Part 1 | Part 2: November

Paring: Dr. Ethan Ramsey x F!MC (Dr. Rebecca Lao) Word Count: 1.9k Warning: Adult themes, mental health triggers, themes of depression, pregnancy complications and termination Summary: Rebecca told Ethan and now they have to live with the aftermath of their decision.

Author’s Note: Sensitive subject matter means I really suggest only reading if you are 18+ years old.

Taglist: @ohchoices @dulceghernandez @aylamwrites @binny1985 @ramseysno1rookie

________________________________________

Becca stood alone in the middle of Ethan’s dimly lit bedroom one morning after a scalding hot shower while flecks of snow flurried outside. She stood in front of the double wide full length mirror taking in her full form - the unchanged curvature of her hips and abdomen.

“I’d be in my second trimester…” she whispered to herself as she ran a hand delicately from her breast and lingering down to the blank space of skin below her navel.

It would have been born in June.

It was 6:30 in the morning and they needed to be at work in thirty minutes. When Ethan didn’t hear the familiar scuttering of his girlfriend hastily getting ready after choosing another twenty minutes of sleep he grew worried that something may have happened.

He gingerly opened the door to see his love transfixed in front of the mirror. He crossed the distance quietly in four long strides. Snaking his arms around her he whispered into her ear, “Are you okay?”

There Ethan stood in his standard work attire holding Becca’s cold naked body close to him, his left hand securely wrapped around her midsection and his right hand placed on top of hers at her stomach. His clean shaven chin rested on her shoulder and his bright blue eyes searched her features for the explanation he knew was never coming.

“Yeah,” she breathed as she snapped back into reality. Ethan could feel the goosebumps beginning to prick her skin and eyes started to glaze over as she pulled away from him. “Give me a minute. I’ll be ready in five.”

Becca still cried at the thought of what's been lost. She still couldn’t walk past the neonatal wing of the hospital, or any babies for that matter. Even infants on social media or television bring tears to her eyes. Some days the extreme emptiness hits harder than others.

Ethan still refused to talk about it. He wanted nothing more than to know how exactly he could help her without having to guess each and every day. But that would be breaking their solemn vow. He couldn’t break his promise after she explicitly asked him not to all those weeks ago at her appointment. Ethan couldn’t let her down; not now, not ever again.

Unbeknownst to him, Rebecca wanted nothing more than to confront the fact head on, she’s done her self deprecating wallowing and was ready to divulge. She wanted to know what’s going on inside his head. But after the last time she tried to bring it up she feared that if she continued it would be to the detriment of their relationship.

They were sitting on Ethan’s couch watching a Blue Planet documentary. Ethan comfortably laid back with his feet perched on an ottoman and Becca’s legs draped over his lap. She had the purple fleece blanket she brought from her apartment snuggled around her torso. Neither were too intrigued by this segment on flying fish, so Becca picked at the chipping paint on her fingernails and Ethan closed his eyes, relishing in the feeling of how this woman beside him could make him feel so at home.

Out of nowhere the demons eating at Becca’s core shakily asked, “What would we have done if we kept it?”

Truth be told Becca had been thinking this since the moment she swallowed the first pill. What would their life be like here and now?

“Stop, Rookie,” he sternly admonished. Ethan knew she was treading down a slippery slope. She had finally started going through a routine like normal and he believed entertaining this notion would have her regress back into the shell of the woman he once knew. “No point in dwelling on the past.”

Becca pursed her lips and gave him an unsatisfied nod. She could push the subject but she wasn’t strong enough for that. She used every little bit of courage she had to let the thoughts slip off her tongue without the twin tears rolling down her cheeks. The topic seemed like taboo.

Why can’t we talk about this? she thought.

***

Becca had been back at Edenbrook for six weeks. She enthusiastically threw herself into her work hoping it would help fill the void and bring her joy. However it did nothing to soothe her like the way it once had. Rebecca was barren; the things she loved didn’t carry enough weight anymore. Her moods had also frequently gone on a roller-coaster ride, more times than she or Ethan would care to admit. She lived in the realm of fury, rage, disinterest and disdain. But at least she was talking and willing to leave the apartment.

Thankfully, Ethan thinks to himself every day she gets up and goes through the motions of her past self.

She still didn’t spend much time at her place. The awkwardness and permanent ball lodged in her throat at keeping this secret from her dearest friends had put distance between them. Becca didn’t actively want to put a strain on her friendships; she just couldn’t bear the thought of them pitying her. It was easier for them to think she’d let her new job title and relationship become her most sacred of priorities.

When Ethan noticed her dejected and hopeless look day after day he thought now was a better time than any to help move her mind on to something else.

“I was thinking…” he trailed off as they sat at his kitchen island having her favorite spaghetti bolognese dish he ordered for them from Don Luigi’s. Looking down and twirling the noodles around his fork he said softly, “Maybe you’d like to move in?”

“What?” Becca’s eyes went wide as she nearly choked on the two bits of pasta in her mouth.

“You’re here all the time anyway,” he rationalized with a shrug of his shoulders. Ethan dropped the fork and swiftly swung around on his stool to face her. There was a gleam in his eyes that involuntarily made the corners of Becca’s mouth twitch. He reached out for her hands, cradling them between his own.

“How about we make it official?” Their eyes met and Becca took a bated breath. The corners of Ethan’s lips pulled into the biggest grin - a smile Becca knew was just for her. It had been months since she’d last seen him glow like that, all the wrinkles and cracks in his features coming to light just for her. “Make me the happiest man alive and turn this place into a home, Rookie.”

Looking at the man before her she thought maybe, just maybe everything will be okay.

“Okay,” she nodded with a small smile, trying her best to give him the genuine declaration of adoration that a moment like this deserved.

***

The move didn’t help. If anything it made her mental state worse. Rebecca was completely dissociated from her current life and there were two versions wandering around in her place.

The first version; the doctor and third year resident who focused solely on her patients needs, continuously going above and beyond for them. No matter the turmoil raging inside of her. For the first time in a while she was back at the top of her game, she didn’t need Ethan to shadow her or reassign any of her potentially-emotionally damaging cases. In the halls of Edenbrook all that mattered to Becca were the lives of her patients and helping as many helpless individuals as she possibly could.

Ethan knew she was deflecting but as her boss he was overly impressed with her performance as she tirelessly solved case after case in no time at all. He came to accept that the concern he had for her well-being was better felt behind closed doors, whether it be at home or with his father figure. Ethan did consistently speak about her with Naveen for both of their sakes. The two men discussed and debated on how they can support her without her knowing, while the older doctor simultaneously consoled and navigated his mentee’s guarded emotions whether Ethan liked it or not.

The second version of Rebecca was simply Becca. A girl who’s new coping mechanism was throwing herself into packing up her life and slowly turning Ethan’s luxury and sterile bachelor pad into a home. As she packed alone in her room she let her mind project a new, better reality. One where she was still carrying. She’d pass the time singing and speaking to her flat belly of the great life awaiting the three of them. The undeniable love still coursing through her veins.

‘What are we doing today?’ she said softly with a smile as she taped together a cardboard box on her bed. ‘We’re packing up my apartment and we’re moving into daddy’s place!’ Saying those words made her heart swell, feel fuller than it’s ever been.

Rebecca wasn’t alone. Although science and any rationale would say otherwise, she still felt that the baby, her baby was still with them.

Moving about her room she categorized the objects of her life out on the floor into piles of winter clothes, summer clothes, general clothes, books, household objects, and miscellaneous. As each pile started to grow and moving around became difficult she exclaimed,

‘I have so much stuff! Where are we gonna put it all?’ She chuckled to herself as she haphazardly threw one of the piles of clothes into an empty suitcase.

Patting her abdomen she happily added, ‘Dad’s gonna have a fit; we’re gonna take over the whole place.’

This quite well may be the only time she’d get to say those words out loud with Ethan. This could have possibly been the only time she’d be pregnant. Ethan was being more than careful now that she was not on any form of contraception. Her doctor noted that the typical thing to do after a termination would have been to start on the pill but Becca refused, wanting time for her body to readjust before adding more hormones in the mix. Not like we’re gonna be intimate any time soon... she thought bitterly in her OB/GYNs office back then.

In her mind Becca was now moving and creating a nest egg at Ethan’s for their little miracle. She allowed herself to indulge in this fantasy keeping her together - keeping her happy. She had made the mistake of getting attached in those first and last two weeks of knowing and now couldn’t shake the thought. As much as she’d wanted it gone, she grew fond of the little ball of cells and all the possibilities it held. Now she felt unfulfilled; something was missing from her life, from her body and she couldn’t understand why. Why something she didn’t want and didn’t have could hurt so much.

As a woman of medicine, Rebecca is a woman of proven science. She never did believe in a higher power.

But there’s so much unknown in this world. Maybe, just maybe...

If there was even the slightest chance the soul - her baby’s soul was wandering aimlessly around in the unknown, she needed to do something about it. After much internal deliberation and listening to her heart she decided it was a girl and gave her a name, Avaline Dolores Ramsey. She thought of her dark brown hair on the top of her tiny head, Ethan’s eyes shining bright with possibility, their skin colors mixed together to give an olive complexion.

A little bundle of joy staring back at her in her mind's eye every second of every day.

__________

A/N: writing this is the most cathartic thing ever. thank you for reading. we’ve got 2 more parts to go!

#open heart #open heart fanfic #choices open heart #choices fanfic #oph #oph ff #ff #ethan ramsey #ethan ramsey x mc #ethan x mc #tw: abortion #tw: mental health

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