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introvert-celeste · 6 years

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Hm.. How about you write about gem characters that you don't often talk about?

“What are we going to do?” Peridot asked Pumpkin, who slumbered peacefully in her lap.

A familiar sort of anxiety gripped her, that general sense of complete hopelessness that she dealt with on a day to day basis, and it took everything in her power to keep from breaking down. She was scared, that was a given, but she was also confused, clinging to recently discarded ideologies. She was a Peridot, she was meant to work in a kindergarten, helping gems grow, aiding in the destruction of life-giving planets. Over her relatively short life, she’d taken pride in such work, and she was as good at her job as any other era two, maybe even above average, though she always exaggerated her importance in her head.

She’d always wanted to be special, to be valued. Now, all she felt was a deep sense of longing for what she used to have, even with all the bad things that came with it.

In the rare moments that she slept, her dreams consisted of daily monotony within a kindergarten that was always changing, on a random colony controlled by Yellow Diamond, more memories than constructs of the mind. She would see to the creation and maintenance of countless Quartz soldiers: Citrines, Lemon Quartzes, Chyrsoprases, Zebra Jaspers, Aventurines, and more, always working. Sometimes, she was waiting for a new soldier to emerge, put in charge of the preparations by her manager, Olivine. Other times, she would have to break up a fight between Quartzes who would then turn on her, and she would have to call for an Agate to discipline them. In a better scenario, the gems would begrudgingly listen, but one of them would come away from the fight scuffed or bearing a hairline fracture, which she would have to laser shut.

These dreams were stressful, but they were also normal. This was what she had done her entire life, but now, looking back on them, it felt oddly detached. It felt as if they weren’t her memories, but ones of a gem from another time, like she was watching the personal logs of another Peridot.

She became a different gem the moment she called Yellow Diamond out, and with it came a sense of loss of identity. All this time, she tried to fill the void with the Cluster, with the “shorty squad,” with music, with art, with Lapis…and through it all she developed an interest in gardening, adding a thread of familiarity to an otherwise uncharted existence for herself. Gardening was the only thing in her life that truly made sense to her anymore, it was the only thing she liked to do at any given moment.

Every time she tried to plan her newest project, however, she found that it didn’t stir the same excitement and wonder it used to. And she couldn’t very well ask the other Crystal Gems for help, when they had their own team shattering revelations to deal with.

Peridot sighed deeply, pulling Pumpkin closer and tapping the blackened screen of her tablet. Thirty tabs full of research came to life before her, detailing different regions, soil types, and proper planting conditions for different varieties of seeds, as well as a few unsaved documents detailing plans she probably wouldn’t follow through with. One by one, she began to close every single tab, too discouraged to think about it any longer.

A knock at the door made her pause, rousing Pumpkin from her slumber.

“Hey, Per, I’m coming in,” Amethyst announced, pushing the door open without further preamble.

Peridot sat up a little straighter, releasing the tension in her face and shoulders before Amethyst could see, but it was too late. The expression on her face said that she knew exactly what was going on, and that it concerned her. Everything she did seemed to concern Amethyst these days, though she couldn’t say why. She never worried about Peridot like this before Lapis left.

Pumpkin, now aware of Amethyst’s presence, scrambled out of the bathtub and bounded toward the small Quartz, yapping happily and racing circling around her feet.

Amethyst knelt down to pet her, grinning fondly. “Hey there, ya noisy little gourd. Been keeping Peri company?”

“More or less,” Peridot chuckled, laying her tablet to theside. “She’s been keeping my lap warm all day.”

Her smile twitched. “Yeah, you guys have definitely been in here all day,” she replied pointedly, her expression growing serious. “You know what we talked about, Per. You can stay in the bathroom and have your alone time, but you gotta come out and socialize every day. At least once.”

“I was going to!” Peridot argued, knowing full well that she wasn’t. “I was just preoccupied with the plans for my next gardening endeavor. It’s a lot more involved than it sounds, you know!”

“Yeah, I know.” Amethyst’s smile turned more genuine again, as she leaned over to wrap an arm around her narrow shoulders. “But you could at least let us help you out sometimes.”

Although she wanted to be difficult, as always, Peridot couldn’t help but lean into the embrace, taking comfort in her warmth, her closeness. She normally wasn’t the touchy feely type, preferring her personal space, but there came a time when she just…she just needed a hug. She was just too proud to request one. And in her minuscule experience with close contact, Peridot could say with certainty that Amethyst’s hugs were the best. Even Steven’s hugs paled in comparison to the way Amethyst’s made her feel, though Garnet’s crushing embrace had a certain charm to it.

But Amethyst…her hugs stirred all the right feelings in her, feelings that were underused and mildly uncomfortable, but not unpleasant. If she weren’t so embarrassed about falling asleep around the other Crystal Gems, she could have dozed off peacefully in her arms, unplagued by dreams of the past and doubts for her future.

It lingered for a long moment, Amethyst squeezing her closer. Even Pumpkin seemed to sense the mood shift, as she hopped back into the tub and curled against Peridot’s leg. It struck her that she never felt this comfortable, this safe, around Lapis, not even close. Even during the good times, there was still that nagging idea that one wrong step would evoke her fury, or at least upset her. She could never let her guard down the way she did with Amethyst.

Was this what healing felt like?

“I think I would like that,” she finally replied, clearing her throat awkwardly. “Y-your help, I mean. I’ve spent enough time in here.”

Amethyst squeezed her again. “That’s the spirit, Dot!”

Peridot grabbed her tablet and accepted Amethyst’s outstretched hand, letting herself be guided into the house. Already, the quiet felt less oppressive and more of a companionable silence, a peaceful afternoon with her favorite gem and her favorite Pumpkin, talking about something she’d become quite passionate about.

Yes, this warm feeling in her chest must be healing at work.

#steven universe #prompt asks #peridot #amethyst #amedot #lol look at me turning it into an amedot fic #wait is this the first (vaguely) amedot thing I've ever written???#shameful!

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yeoldontknow · 6 years

Text

It Was The Night: 3

Author’s Note: i hope you all are enjoying this little story <3 i know its short and slow going but still! happy chanvember! Pairing: Chanyeol x Reader (oc; female) Genre: drama; historical au; suspense; romance Rating (this chapter): PG Word Count: 2,070

III.

For the rest of the month, very little occurred that would cause one to be suspect of anything untoward within the walls of the opera. The days began to blur into one endless stream of music, costumes, and rehearsals, each the same as the last. Having turned seventeen with almost no pomp and circumstance, and priding myself on a rather mature sense of pragmatism, I very nearly forgot the incident altogether.

The fault, in my mind, was in the trick of the light and the general uneasiness one falls victim to when walking alone in dark corridors. In this resolve, I was resolute, moving through the opera house without any sort of fear, wholly unplagued by the memory.

Even still, as the thoughts of shadows moved through my mind, I found it impossible to replicate their motions with the flames of my candles. When each bit of darkness is unique, each sway of light singular and fleeting, how then can one prove they had seen anything at all? I deemed this memory a fallacy of youth, the last bit of my childhood fading as I moved towards womanhood, letting it die as I did memories of my emotional turmoil throughout puberty.

This was, of course, until the day a rather mysterious, five act opera appeared on the seat reserved for our illustrious conductor.

Morning rehearsals had barely just commenced, each choral member still shaking away the full shapes of our yawns, when Monsieur Letrouc shouted in a rage at the mess. We all bristled, I especially, at the thought of a manuscript left unaccounted for, or, at the very least, left about and carelessly forgotten. Sheet music for an opera, we were taught, is akin to the bible, something holy and therefore sacred. Such a thing is a guide, all answers contained within its dictation, and to leave it so recklessly behind is a cardinal sin of theatrical production.

While we waited for its owner to stake claim, Monsieur Letrouc’s brow furrowed from anger and disdain, to confusion, a bewildered sort of expression making haste along his features. Glancing over its cover, and even at its thickness, we soon realized this was not, as we assumed, the music for Les Abencérages but instead something different, and unexpected, altogether.

Penned by man named Aeon Smith and based on the tragedy of Antigone, it was regarded with much skepticism and laughter throughout the corps for being ‘terribly presumptuous,’ and assumed to be ‘absolute drivel by a first time writer.’ No one had ever heard search a name, not even the international members within the orchestra who hailed from London. This was a man born of obscurity, and was audaciously presenting his work to the most renowned corps in the country. We called him ignorant, we called him foolish, but soon we all were forced to wear the blush of embarrassed prejudice in the wake of the music.

On a spot of daring wit, one of the chamber string players took a page from Haemon’s death, tearing it from the script with raucous glee, and stood in the center of the stage with a wicked grin. At once, he made every effort for the performance to toe precariously on the line of the absurd. Though, try as he might, it was simply impossible to render the exquisite brilliance of the piece anything apart from perfection. With just one page, the orchestra had become lost in a wave of emotion and we were rendered into silence. There wasn’t much deliberation after that, it was simply agreed upon that this would be our show and we were swiftly given new lines to learn.

It was assumed the music was delivered by a night messenger from an English writer, with such a name as Smith we could only assume this was the nature of its origins. Whispers from the choir girls alluded to a member of the kitchens having composed such delights, while the boys each boasted to having written it themselves once alone and separated from their friends, scratching the notes into parchment by candlelight. I believed neither of such accounts, and instead took to obsessing over the memory of my shadowed angel.

Looking back, I do not know why I titled him as such. Perhaps, it was his lack of an origin that persuaded me to call him so, though I daresay there was a sort of divine truth in the name. In the end, I think my essence called to him, named him as my own before I had ever set eyes upon his face.

In those early days, logic told me there was no such person, but then where else could an opera, with such an unusual writer as Aeon Smith, come into existence? I had the pieces but was completely without the ability to connect them. Conclusions were drawn from one to the next without any thought to their sheer impossibilities. The script was far too clean and precise to have been written by a child, the pages free from stray porridge stains. In my mind, the biggest clue was that the tale was far too romantic to spawn from the dreary, unfeeling heart of an Englishman. Eventually, I decided that its parentage was of little import to me and what mattered most was that it existed, and, therefore, required the length of our souls in its performance.

In a sense, I was devout to this opera, and, thus, devout to Aeon Smith.

Soon after rehearsals commenced, I began to experiment with the bending of rules and the thrill of teenage rebellion. On one particular evening, I snuck out of the bed chambers with Jacqueline, Charlotte, and a publicly mild mannered girl named Annessa. There was such excitement to be had from slipping beneath the watchful eye of Madame Catherine, the pull of adult whim tugging gently on our fingers. It was fleeting, these sensations, but we chased after the temptation of autonomy with bare feet and flushes at our cheeks. Our favourite private insurrection was, as one would assume, the performance hall.

As members of the chorus, none among our group very talented ballet dancers neither were we full members of the corps, we were regulated to the sides of the stage for the full run of an opera. At night, with only the dim glow of an oil lamp as our spotlight, we would stand in its center. With my eyes closed, I could imagine the adoring eyes of an audience, the weight of an aria burning at the rim of my diaphragm. This was where I was meant to sing my prayers, before red velvet chairs, beneath the glory of a crystal chandelier. The gold of the room always drew me in, wrapped tightly around my breath to keep me fixed in a permanent state of awe.

Annessa, never one to admire the beauty or importance of cherished spaces, took to the very center with an eagerness that bordered on aggression and began to sing, loudly, the aria of Antigona’s death.

It was the only role in the entire opera we could even attempt to sing, the character written for that of a soprano. As not all of us had yet completed the trials of puberty, we were still viewed as half-formed singers, the lower end of the musical scales still perilously out of our reach. Though Ismene had, in my opinion, far more challenging and bewitching arias written for her character, Antigona was the only option for our group to idly learn. Yet, Annessa sang with such boisterous enthusiasm I found myself scowling in the heart of my sanctuary.

‘That is not how it’s meant to be sung,’ I shouted, stopping her in the middle of the aria. At my sides, my fingers were tense, twitching in irritation at her seeming indifference to the character’s lament.

‘Sorry?’ she asked, bewildered. She rounded on me with a hiss through grit teeth. Yet, she did not intimidate me.

‘Antingona is about to die, she knows this fully,’ I explained gently. ‘She has disobeyed her uncle most egregiously, and has now been sentenced to be walled into a cave. At best, she would be reflective. Mostly, she would be sad, yet proud of her choices. She cremated her brother, defied the law, and loved with all her heart. So young and so in love with Haemon, mourning the future she will never have with him. And so, there is no happy ending. She sees Creon for who he really is, and absolutely cannot come to terms with the truth.’

I paused to bite my bottom lip and continued in a more resolved, severe tone, one I had never affixed to my voice.

‘There is no space for triumph here. I’ve never been one for grief, but I do understand mortality.’

It felt like a relief, saying it, letting her know that she had completely missed the point of the opera, the music, Aeon Smith himself. My thoughts and feelings had felt like a secret which was now being poorly kept, and I was grateful for the admission.

‘Well, if you’re so clever why don’t you sing it?’ Annessa challenged, finally, the sneer in her voice not going unnoticed by me, and likely the others.

I shall never know what sort of bravery possessed me the moment I accepted her demand, and only looking back now I can almost point towards the exhaustion of restraining my sudden, teenage competitive nature. In the end, I believe wanted this moment, wanted the pride, wanted the sin of it all - wanted, more than anything, to let the Godless city into my veins for once and for all. I took to the center of the stage with delight pulling at my shoulders, lifting my posture and with memories of a boasting Father Ezekiel lingering like phantoms in the back of the theatre.

And so I sang, with full voice and relaxed palms, jaw loosely set and diaphragm open. The words came easily, memorized through repetition in rehearsals and their natural cadences. As I sang, every act on stage became tangible. Soaked into my hands was the blood of my slain brother; before me, my young groom, with dagger in hand, visible only through a fissure of stones. My heart ached with closeted familial betrayal, and my tongue burned with the words I wanted to shout, at France and at God:

Do not believe that you alone can be right. The man who thinks that, The man who maintains that only he has the power To reason correctly, the gift to speak, to soul–– A man like that, when you know him, turns out empty.

I kept singing, wishing I could cry for all my losses and all my future gains, the vitriol pouring out of me in a deluge, much akin to flood.

You’ll never see me taken in by anything vile.

And then, with wide eyes, I saw the shadow looming in the dark at the top of the third level balcony. I remembered my ghost, my shadow in the mirror, and suddenly felt a surge of elation. Here now was proof and not just for my own eyes!

Immediately I stopped singing turning back to my friends, gesticulating vigorously into the dark, just beyond the glow of the oil lamps.

‘Look, in the balcony! The opera ghost!’

They all ran to me, squinting in the direction of my finger and I smirked, fully prepared to clarify the proof of childish, erroneous tales. But when I looked back, there remained only the night, with no welcome shadow to put conviction to my name. My friends laughed the entire way back to our quarters, laughed at my eagerness, my foolishness, my sudden, unpredicted turn towards belief. I’d never once scorned a shadow but, on that evening, I wanted the dark to wither beneath my feet.

The following morning there was a folded piece of parchment, sealed in blood red wax, placed directly in the center of the recital hall. As our conductor opened it, his brow grew over more into a concerned furrow and his eyes, upon completion of his read, bore into mine with tremendous distaste.

He read aloud:

‘By order of Aeon Smith, Y/F/N Y/L/N is to play the role of Antigona. There shall be no exceptions.’

#chanyeol x reader #chanyeol fanfic #kpoptrashtag #kwriterskollection #noonanet #chanyeol au #chanyeol scenario #chanyeol fanfiction #exo au #exo scenario #exo fanfic #exo fanfiction #kpop fanfic #park chanyeol

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