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olivia-anderson-fanfic · 2 years

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Yuu can do it!

Part 13

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Ito liked having problems to solve. If there was something to do, then it gave them something to concentrate on. That way they didn’t have to think about how they were stranded in another world with no known way home, or how they had just technically murdered something, or –.

They forced themself to look around.

Deuce had been sent to try and get cell service – there was no way there was any this far into the woods, let alone underground, but he was concussed and had been insisting on helping so they figured that was the best option.

Kuroki had been near hyperventilating (not good considering they were already working with limited air) so Ito had dropped Grim onto him. He had only recently managed to bring his breathing down to a normal rate, and was now burying his face in the white fur of Grim’s collar while the monster squirmed.

Which left Enma, Ace, and Ito to try and find a way out.

Not that Ace was all that much help. After a few blasts of wind magic he had said that he was too tired to do more and now doing the stone-throwing equivalent of crawling up that fifteenth flight of stairs.

Which meant…

Enma and Ito threw rock after rock over their shoulders. They just needed a tiny hole to let in some oxygen. That was all. They could do this…

Ito was no nihilist, but they were pretty sure they were going to join the other ghosts in the mine.

At least the ghosts had been friendly, they supposed.

A tiny sigh left their lips and they rubbed their hands off on their shirt. Kuroki had long-since managed to snap out of it enough to help, and Ace had joined them after a few minutes’ rest.

(Deuce was still concussed and Grim was… Grim, so they weren’t much help. To his credit, though, Grim tried: he screamed at the top of his lungs – did he have lungs? – but Ito, privately, doubted that any sound escaped.)

The group had been working at one spot for ages… but every time they finally managed to make headway more rocks and boulders came to fill in the place left by their brethren. And they were getting tired, the air was thin, and, one by one, they all gave up in favor of finding a comfortable position to die in.

Enma was the last one to give up. He groaned and leaned back against the wall of rocks that kept them separated from the outside world.

“At least suffocating like this isn’t really painful,” he said after a moment. “We’ll probably just die in our sleep or something.”

“... dude, that’s so dark,” Ace complained, tossing a magestone from hand to hand idly.

Enma gave a weak grin. “No, this cave is dark.”

“Do you really want your last words to be a bad joke?” Kuroki said, absently stroking Grim’s fur.

Ito lifted their head from their knees, careful not to disturb Kuroki because he was leaning back against their side, to glare halfheartedly at them. “Do you really want your last conversation to be a fight?”

“Yes,” Kuroki and Enma said at the exact same time.

“What else are we supposed to do?” Ace said.

“Well, in books this is where we all give heartfelt speeches and then get miraculously saved at the last moment.”

“Ew,” said Grim.

Kuroki’s nose scrunched. “I’d rather die.”

Enma opened his mouth.

Ace threw the magestone in his hand at Enma before he could do it. The boy was quick to dodge, and the magestone clattered against the rocks.

And then the cave began to rumble, boulders and rocks and pebbles alike falling away.

Ace looked at his hands in awe. “I’m so powerful…?”

He was not. The way out cleared and they were met by three people and two ghosts.

The redhead from the ceremony stood at the front of the group, a heart-topped staff still pointed at them. He lowered it slowly and looked upon them all with slight distaste lining his expression.

“Honestly, how did that wall trouble you all so?”

Deuce’s eyes took a moment to focus but, when they did, his back straightened and he smiled from ear to ear. “Dorm head! You’ve come to save us! Thank you!”

“Rescue, you say… I have no reason to support transgressors.” His gaze swept over Deuce’s rapidly paling face and Ace’s scowl critically. “You have violated rule 304: On the day a hedgehog sneezes, all card soldiers must gather and perform a song!”

“If the hedgehog is sick do you think they have to do multiple songs a day?” Grim questioned, clearly just to start shit.

Enma seemed to also want to start shit, because he scratched his head with a small smile. “Their offense is that they were stuck here on an order from the Headmaster and not the ruined statue or chandelier?”

Riddle seemed uninterested in their idle chatter. He pointed the staff at Ace and Deuce.

(Ace looked about five seconds away from ducking behind their concussed companion for cover.)

“OFF WITH YOUR HEADS!”

Collars like those from the ceremony snapped over the pair’s necks and Deuce seemed a little thrown off by the weight.

Riddle turned away from them, to the two people who were standing silently beside him. “Trey, Cater. Take them to the dorm.”

“Yes, Dorm Leader,” they chorused.

The Ramshackle residents watched on without moving an inch as two of their companions were grabbed by the back of their collars like misbehaving housecats and dragged out, complaining and squirming all the way.

“Huh,” said Kuroki. “Wild.”

That was all the thoughts he seemed to have on the matter. He started gathering his scattered things and then struggled to pick up Grim.

Enma and Ito, however, frowned at Riddle.

“Wait, what’re you going to do with them?” Asked Enma. It wasn’t clear whether he was concerned or just curious.

Ito wasn’t afraid to be outwardly concerned, though: “Are they going to be okay?”

Riddle looked between the two of them. “It has nothing to do with you, this is Heartslabyul business.”

Not suspicious at all, thought Ito, a little perturbed.

And then his expression softened just slightly. “If they follow the rules, then they will be fine.”

Ito’s shoulders relaxed.

Enma smiled. “Thanks for saving us… even if it was just to punish them properly, I appreciate it.”

Riddle chanced a small smile back and they shared short goodbyes before he turned to follow his dorm members.

Ito turned to Enma with a mock pout playing at their lips the moment they were sure Riddle was out of earshot. “Why aren’t you that nice to us?”

“‘Cause I like him more than you,” Enma said without hesitation.

“You barely even know him! He punched you when you met!” Grim hissed.

“Exactly. Maybe you should think about that more.”

“Maybe you should –!” (The rating on this fic does not allow for Kuroki’s retort.)

Ito took a seat on a nearby boulder, watching the dormmates bicker. They rolled their eyes and rested their head on their hand, giving a tiny huff in their exasperation.

But they still wore a tiny smile nonetheless.

Enma had insisted that they all stuff their pockets with magestones (Kuroki had agreed because they might be able to sell them and Ito had just not had enough energy to argue), so they were now walking around, gathering as many as they could while he struggled to find a way to comfortably carry the large one the Headmaster had asked for all on his own.

The two were careful to avoid the body as they picked their way around. Ito didn’t want to look at it, and Kuroki seemed to think that it might come back to life and seek revenge based on the way he kept looking over his shoulder at every little sound, so: wide berth.

Grim wasn’t as concerned. He was actively rooting through the dead monster’s pockets.

“Grim, please stop grave robbing,” Ito tried.

“It’s not grave robbing… it’s archaeology,” Grim retorted.

“Both of you are wrong,” said Kuroki. “It’s looting a corpse.”

Grim paid him no mind. “Besides, something smells really good.”

“Please don’t cannibalize the corpse please don’t cannibalize the corpse please don’t…” Ito chanted under their breath.

The tiny monster produced a small, black stone not unlike the ones they were currently collecting. “Aha!”

But, instead of stuffing his pockets like the humans were doing, Grim stuffed his face.

Enma frowned. “Don’t eat rocks.”

Grim didn’t listen. His eyes went wide as he swallowed the last of the rock. “Oh…”

Kuroki yelped and jumped to his feet, the magestones that had been in his hands twinkling across to the floor as he ran over to the monster. “Grim! Grim! Spit it out!”

But Grim’s eyes lit up. “That was… amazing!”

Kuroki skidded to a stop.

“... sorry?” Said Enma.

“It’s full-bodied, but also rich with an aromatic sweetness that just melts in the mouth!”

The three Yuus looked at each other to confirm that, yes, the monster had said that the rock tasted good.

And then Ito remembered Grim had been eating grass earlier and decided that, maybe, they shouldn’t listen to him.

Ito’s nose scrunched. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“Huh. Guess monsters are omnivores,” said Enma after another moment of thought.

“That should not be all you guys have to say about this!” Snapped Kuroki.

The pair of ghosts accompanied them out of the mines. Almost definitely because the four of them couldn’t thank them enough for leading the group of seniors to them. Who doesn’t like praise?

Kuroki breathed a sigh of relief when the outside world finally came into view. And only partially because Grim jumped off of him and zoomed out, leaving him with a literal burden off his shoulders.

“And this is where we leave you,” the ghost with the pickaxe in his head said.

Enma frowned. “Do you have to? You can come with us. Our dorm already has ghosts. What’s two more?”

Ito watched them cast a sad glance back down the mine, and then the two ghosts shared looks.

“We’ve been here so long…” started the other ghost carefully. It tried to scratch its head, only to be stopped by the miner's hat that seemed glued there.

“Then a change of pace might be nice,” Enma said.

Ito yawned into their hand. “Unless there’s another monster in the mine you need to protect people from…”

“In which case we don’t want to know,” Kuroki said hastily.

“But you’ve spent… a long time here warding people away.” Enma smiled. “Don’t you think it’s time you actually enjoy your afterlife?”

The two ghosts mulled it over.

The one with the pickaxe in its head glanced back one more time before nodding. “That… I could do that.”

“No takebacksies, though,” the other said, ruffling Enma’s already messy hair.

They made their way out of the mine – nobody said anything when the ghosts stopped to bow their heads and stand there in silence for a moment, nor when the ghosts knocked down two trees to block the entrance and seal the tomb so the dead could finally rest – and started back the way they came.

“You actually went to the Dwarf’s Mine?” Was the first thing Crowley said to them upon first seeing them.

Enma held up the magestone as a slightly nicer way of saying ‘duh’.

The Headmaster gasped and jumped back a step, then clapped his hands to his cheeks and gave his best approximation of a horrified look. “My word… I never really thought you’d go… and you have come back with a magestone… I feel a little sorry for filling out the expulsion papers in your absence, now…”

“You what?!” Ito said.

Grim floated up so he could properly scold the man that was over 100 centimeters taller than him. “We defeated a huge beast for this and you were already preparing to throw us out?!”

Crowley’s exaggerated fluttering stopped cold. He stared at them in silence, the yellow balls of light that made up his eyes taking in everything about them – from the clothes that were ruined when the cave collapsed to the hands that were scraped and rubbed raw from their attempts at getting out. They must have been quite the sight.

“Could you explain in more detail while we make our way over to the hospital wing?”

And, so, they each gave their specific retelling of the events of the night. Kuroki’s was ridiculously short, Ito overdramatized everything purely for the sake of their own entertainment, Grim took all the credit, and Enma slipped puns into an otherwise perfectly acceptable explanation.

The Headmaster mulled over their stories while they took a healing potion the Headmaster had whipped up in seconds.

Ito grimaced at the affront to cooking that slipped down their throat and they had to pinch their nose to get it down. Enma groaned quietly and had to take his own in little sips. Kuroki didn’t seem all that affected, but the slight cough he gave upon first taste suggested he had just decided complaining wasn’t worth it.

Besides, Grim made up for Kuroki’s lack of complaints by yelling his own for the whole world to hear.

(Ito snuck a couple of extra doses into their pockets to give to Ace and Deuce later while the Headmaster was distracted trying to make the monster quiet. It wasn’t like the strange, pink liquid was all that out of place among the many glowing magestones that they had collected.)

And then they sighed and pushed Kuroki forward. Something they could do with ease now, because the pain and exhaustion lingering in every centimeter of their body had dissolved into a faint buzzing between blinks.

Kuroki sent them a betrayed look.

“Grim is yours, you deal with him.”

Kuroki glared at them for a moment longer, but then he reached forward and covered Grim’s mouth with his hand. “Shh. Do you want to stay here or not?”

Grim scoffed, but fell silent.

Kuroki let his hand drop.

Crowley looked at the group of them all. “So… if I’m getting this right… it seems that all six of you banded together to defeat the monster.”

“Were you not listening to me?” Grim said, baring a sharp fang.

Kuroki slapped his hand over the monster’s mouth once again.

“Yes, sir,” said Enma, pretending that that entire interaction hadn’t happened. “So…please don’t expel us.”

The Headmaster burst into sobs, burying his face in his hands.

Enma took a quick step backwards, horrified. “Gross.”

“Why is this grown adult crying?” Kuroki hissed, looking very much like he was considering leaving.

Ito cuffed them both over the back of the head before carefully walking over to the older man and giving him a few awkward pats on the back. They tried not to cringe when the Headmaster seemed to sob even harder and slowly retracted their hand, only for the man to catch their hand in both of his.

Now that his eyes were uncovered, Ito noted that there were no tears on his face. In fact, he looked less sad and more silently calculating. They wondered, idly, if they had made a mistake in not letting themself get expelled.

The man removed a hand to wipe away imaginary tears. Ito wasn’t stupid enough to try and pull away quite yet.

“In the many years I’ve been Headmaster, not once has this happened.”

“Not once has what happened?”

“I never thought I would see anyone from Night Raven College that was willing to stand, hand in hand, even if it meant defeating a common enemy!”

“I don’t hold hands,” said Kuroki.

“Patently untrue,” Enma snarked.

Ito sent a glare at them over their shoulder.

The distraction gave the Headmaster an opening to drag them over to Kuroki and Enma so he could wrap them all in a ‘hug’... in quotation marks because the large, feathered cape the man wore engulfed them all in a way that felt very much like a trap ensnaring them.

“This confirms it without a doubt! You three are beast tamers!”

“... right, you said that earlier. But you said that doesn’t change anything, remember?” Kuroki said in a tone that bordered on hopeful as both him and Grim tried to squirm away.

“I have changed my mind!”

The silent fuck that ran through all of their minds was palpable.

The man chuckled and squeezed their shoulders tighter.

“It seems that Night Raven College will be gaining some new students.”

~~~

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dimiclaudeblaigan · 8 months

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No but something I love is how fucking loyal Miklan really is (in Hopes specifically since we don't have enough information in Houses).

At the camp, he takes his job seriously. Very seriously. He doesn't act begrudging or like he's just doing anything by force. As the chapters go on he not only goes from relatively aloof to a full fledged commander (which is great development in that span of chapters btw considering how fast the story has to progress) and one who fights for Faerghus because he wants to (why would he reassure the player that he's going to, literally, hold down the fort? Why doesn't he flee when his life is in immediate danger despite that Dimtiri prefers his allies to flee and save their lives over sacrificing themselves? Why does he like helping citizens who had their lands destroyed by the war, despite being a bandit who used to plunge towns just like those?).

At any time when the Empire was attacking, he could've surrendered and even joined their side because of not liking Faerghus and its people... if he didn't like Faerghus and its people. Also, someone brought this up to me once that Miklan likely has family in the Empire still, because his mother was from the Empire. He had a perfectly good out that wouldn't even necessarily be considered treason to Faerghus, i.e. surrendering and going to the Empire to protect that side of his family.

He doesn't. He dies for Faerghus. It was both a matter of honor due to the fact that he was finally living the life he always should've been and wanted to be respected for that, and also his loyalty that followed in the past's wrongs being righted. No matter what you think of Miklan post disinheritance, he was the heir who was removed because he didn't have a Crest. All over just that, despite that Sylvain having a Crest never meant they didn't still have someone capable of fighting off Sreng invasions.

They had someone able to wield the Lance of Ruin, so why did it matter if he was officially the heir? Miklan felt like his life was stolen from him (and I'm not saying what he did to Sylvain was okay either). Dimitri gave him all of that back and he started to become loyal to Faerghus and its king because Dimitri was giving the chance even the man's own father never gave him from the moment Sylvain was determined to have a Crest.

What happened in his life before Dimitri had him brought to him as soon as he became king is, in a way, almost like it never happened as far as Miklan's behavior. It was obviously there at first, but over time it's like it never happened. That is, if someone met him and didn't know about his past, by chapter 9 they'd never even know he'd had that history. He was the person he would've been years ago if he hadn't been disinherited, which led to the mess that led to him being disowned (and he says he just "left", but Matthias doesn't mince facts. At all. If that had been the case he wouldn't just say he disowned him. He would admit Miklan ran away. That means Miklan claims he left as a means of coping and trying to convince other people that it was his choice and not forced on him).

Miklan became a lot more loyal than he's ever given credit for, both in the game and in the fandom. Gwendal did recognize it, but that's about all we're given.

Gwendal corrected himself when Miklan died, referring to him instead as Sir Miklan instead of the insults he was spewing during their fight which were very clearly pissing Miklan off; but Miklan kept fighting and defending the fort, not just because he wanted to prove Gwendal wrong but because he was here because he was pulled out of his life as a bandit. The people he was defending the fort for were the people who effectively gave him his life back.

Basically, he would've been there in that fort defending it anyway if he had lived the life he should have to begin with. If his value was acknowledged all along, he would've been defending the most important fort in Faerghus all along (if this exact scenario occurred and everything was the same except him being disowned in the first place). He would be there being the commander and fighter he was supposed to be.

Mind you, it was the king himself who gave him that chance, meaning the person who reigns over Faerghus and has the most power to change whatever the hell he wants - including how people with Crests and without are treated. Miklan was part of a fight to better their society and be part of the new generation taking over. Nobody could truly change things unless the king - the top power - had the thought to change them (not saying Lambert thought the political climate was good the way it was, but he clearly had other priorities and it didn't seem to be something weighing on his mind. He may not have even truly noticed the problems and power discrepancies because he was so focused on other things).

However, the moment the king thought to change all that old stuff, Miklan was one of the first people who came to mind, and one of the first people he took action regarding, to integrate into his new army (and he even mentioned completely rearranging his army and whatnot, and then we find out he had Miklan located basically right after becoming king. We had a two year timeskip and Miklan had been there for those two years because of how soon after Dimitri was crowned that he had decided to bring Miklan back and give him another chance).

If the king sought to change things and was taking active action to prove it, that was something Miklan could see and realize was actually going to happen. It wasn't a blind trust - he could see Dimitri was actually doing it. He had a reason to be able to trust him with this.

He was also able to trust the people who were watching over him, i.e. the people Dimitri had making sure he didn't revert back to any sort of banditry. Those people could have easily faked it, made up that he did something and that they had killed him on the spot. Dimitri trusted those people not to do that of course, but those people were not told to bring him to Dimitri if he did anything. They were told to apprehend him and kill him immediately (which is reasonable, given what he'd done in the past, and they wouldn't want to try to wait to get Dimitri over to wherever they were. If Miklan escaped in that time, they'd just have a big problem on their hands).

So that is to say, those people could've just faked it at any point and killed him. They didn't. They, like Dimitri, were willing to give him another chance provided he didn't do anything bad.

The same goes for Felix and everyone else who had qualms about him being allowed into their army. Dimitri explicitly stated if anyone had issues with his appointment as a commander to "by all means" kill him themselves. He literally made it an open option for his friends to just up and kill him if they truly couldn't forgive him (which at that point was more reasonable of a time because the war was still new and people didn't know if they could trust him with this specific appointment yet. By later in the story I don't think it would have been as reasonable for someone to try to kill him after he'd already been proving himself).

In other words, nobody did it. Everyone, literally everyone, backed off and respected Dimitri's decision (and technically Sylvain and Matthias' as well). None of those people, even when given open opportunity, turned a weapon on him. Not one. These people all gave him a chance. These are the same people he died fighting for, and for himself to be able to feel like he was fighting and dying for what he would have to begin with if he hadn't been disinherited - Faerghus and its people.

In the end Miklan was in both rank and heart a top ranking commander of Faerghus and he both appreciated it and knew he appreciated it. He was looking forward to the future Dimitri would bring, basically saying that he thinks Dimitri is a fool ("weak-willed") for it but that he now believes in it too. If anyone wants to try arguing those points, I have receipts as the young folk call them, fresh from Miklan himself about his feelings about it as spoken to Catherine and Shamir!

Miklan fought for the future he was hoping to see, and he died protecting that future. Again, not something he by any means whatsoever had to do. He was tasked with guarding the fortress, but was never told to lay down his life defending it. After years and years of being hateful and angry, he finally had some peace of mind and hope for what he could be. He was loyal to Dimitri in the end because Dimitri was loyal to him - that is, he kept his word and Miklan was able to thrive in Dimitri's society without being a bandit or having to worry about his future because of his status.

Like Dimitri said, the only thing holding him down by that point were his past mistakes. It was up to Miklan to do something about that for himself with the opportunity he was given to fix it. Dimitri said here, fix it, and Miklan said okay, and worked to fix it. For me the saddest part is that he didn't even get enough time to properly fix it and be able to be free of his past. He died for Faerghus though, with his dying words being that he was able to buy them time (to arrive and fight back against the attacking Empire). That's not something someone who holds a resentful grudge would say in their last moments. He was grateful he managed to buy the other fighters time, even though it cost him his life.

hopes was a dumpster fire a whole lot of times but its incorporation of miklan into the plot was not one of them. miklan fire emblem my love you will live on in my heart and in my fics. i am also deeply grateful to hopes for uh i guess hopes-canonizing (hopesonizing???) basically every one of my headcanons about him before the game came out.

#Miklan #Miklan Anschutz Gautier #remember the time i mentioned working on a fic and it was an au and like #i had planned to kill him and glenn off together for the plot? and how i scrapped it bc i got too attached to them?#and i couldn't go through with it when i thought abt sylvain and miklan's could be would be relationship?#that was me on the right track for the rest of my life. even back then i see i had a FEELING #i just KNEW something. funny enough in hopes miklan has a line that's like #pretty close to what i had him say in the fic... so uh my assertions and understandings of his character #were scarily accurate before we had anything but him as an enemy in houses to go by #and what dimitri talked abt post that chapter. uhhh maybe i am a miklan whisperer???#anyway miklan is easily by far the most underrated character in the entirety of hopes #and one of the most underrated characters overall #he has one of the most interesting stories from start to finish (esp in hopes)#how he was a noble family's heir to being disinherited to becoming an angry and hateful child #to growing up like that bc evidently nobody tried to steer him on the right path #to getting disowned only to be disowned for a lol measly for few months or so TOPS in hopes lmao #before being told to come back. in houses he was disowned presumably exactly as long but #dimitri wasn't the top power of faerghus. he couldn't have made the decision he got to make in hopes #so ofc the whole yeehaw lance of ruin thing happened. in hopes' case he was gone that long and just #took a vacation basically and came back and was basically told /B E H A V E/#except everyone was finally trying to steer him in the right direction even if it was SUUUPER fucking late #and he was grown up and set in his ways/behaviors/mannerisms that arose due to his childhood and onward #BUT from there and after being a very spiteful bandit he pulled himself together and was genuinely happier for it #enough to the point of considering himself ''weak willed'' to have started to believe in these visions dimitri has for the future #it makes me sad how he died in ag and like... even outside of ag there was never any hope of that family being whole #they weren't whole from the moment sylvain was determined to have a crest #and they couldn't be whole in houses bc dimitri never had the chance to change anything #then in hopes they could never be whole bc a different gautier dies in every hopes route #my poor fam never even had a chance to be whole again even though they genuinely tried so hard to be ;n; ;n; ;n;

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