#silas writes stuff

[ihearnocomplaints]

I look up at the stars and they remind me of your eyes. They tell me stories I could never get from words alone. I look at the stars and find comfort. The same comfort I find in you. When you look at me, I’m frozen in place, enamoured by your beauty. You are uniquely you and that’s what’s beautiful. You are human. You are real. You think, you feel, you taste, you see, you touch. You do not run on code and programs. You do not run on fuel or electricity. You are beauty. I am artificial. I will outlive you. And for eternity, I will miss you.

[dreadpiratesilas]

So keeping with my making my FO4 project a mixed media with a combination of comics and illustrated prose, I started writing Danse's chapter. I've managed 1500 words today. Considering I don't write prose, well, ever, I'm kind of proud of it. I'm not done with it yet, but would anyone like to beta-read it when I'm done?

[whumpy-wyrms]

i completely forgot about this but the one year anniversary of me creating aspen and silas was last week!! gimme scenarios to draw them in to celebrate (and also try to get me outta this art block)

[fl4tlines]

May All Hope Leave You ┆ Panic Attack @whumpthisway ┆ May Curses Prompt 20

「✦」 OCs: Kay Edwards, Natalie Irvine ⅋ Silas Reyes 「✧」 Content: Abuse of Power ┆ Handcuffs ┆ Law Enforcement ┆ Talk of Murder 「✦」 Word Count: 1,134 「✧」 Relevant Links: Masterlist ┆ .𖥔˚ ♫˚ 𖥔. ⛧ ‿̩͙‿ ༺ ♰ ༻ ‿̩͙‿⛧ ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ❝ I let it burn; // You're no longer my concern; // Faces from my past return; // Another lesson yet to learn; // That I'd fallen for a lie; // You were never on my side; // Fool me once, fool me twice; // Are you death or paradise? ❞ ⛧ ‿̩͙‿ ༺ ♰ ༻ ‿̩͙‿⛧

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“We found the bodies, Aeon.” Agent Reyes had both his palms pressed into the metal table. Glaring down at the man in front of him. “Would you like to alter your statement?” He cocked his head.

“Alter it? No – I – why? What did you find?”

“Don’t play dumb with me, kid.”

“I’m not, I swear,” Kay reflexively raised his hands, jerking at the chain around his cuffs. A sharp clatter before he lowered his hands. “I told you what I knew. I – I gave you the place. I gave you –”

“You gave us half a damn story,” Reyes snapped. “Five, you said?”

“Five.”

“Try twenty-five. So far. We’ve got three teams excavating the area.”

The colour drained from Kay’s cheeks as he shook his head.

“No – no. No, it was five. I knew about five. The names – I gave you names.”

“And you think that’s enough?” Reyes spat. “You’re not even scratching the surface with your story.”

Kay kept shaking his head, brows furrowed as he tried to hide the appearance of tears. In his eyes – down his cheeks.

“And now it’s those crocodile tears? You have some serious explaining to do,” he slammed his hands down on the table. Kay flinched. “I want the real story.”

“I gave it to you! The names – I gave you five names.”

“For twenty-five plus bodies? You need to do a damn sight better than that,” Reyes leaned in closer to Kay. “Aeon, if you talk, we can work out a deal.”

“I think I need a lawyer for this conversation,” Kay’s voice was shaky. “Chloe should be here.”

“You think? I would agree with you,” Reyes snapped. “Except, if you’re innocent on the extra bodies that just happened to show up, exactly where you said they’d be, you don’t need one.”

“Okay,” Kay swallowed hard. “I – I gave you the names I knew. I’m giving you signed confessions for those cases,” he looked up at Agent Reyes. “I don’t know what else you want. I – I think I need a lawyer.”

“You want me to drag your lawyer out of bed at one in the morning for this?”

“You dragged me out of bed.”

“Don’t you dare talk back to me. Not happening.”

The door to the interrogation room swung open. A woman stood in the doorway, quickly surveying the scene before she spoke.

“Agent Reyes. You were instructed to wait until I arrived to speak to the suspect,” she looked between the pair in the room. “Wait outside. I’ll speak to you later.”

Reyes muttered something under his breath, gave the table a futile shove and stormed out. Slamming the door behind him. Kay flinched at each action as it unfolded.

“I’m Special Agent Natalie Irvine, I’m from the New York FBI office,” she introduced herself, taking the opportunity to assess how Kay sat in front of her, “You’re Aeon Edwards?”

Kay, breathing uneven as he fought – he didn’t know what he was fighting – nodded. Took a second before he spoke.

“It – It’s Kay – but – but Aeon is fine – I just –” his gaze flickered towards the door. “I swear, I didn’t know.”

“Can you tell me what you did know?”

“It – I gave the names. In the file.”

“Do you mind?” she gestured to the chair opposite Kay, and he shook his head. So Irvine sat down. “I’ve read the file, can you tell me in your own words?”

“I knew he had a place to dump the bodies. I knew about that. I never went out there, but he told me about it.”

“That makes sense,” Irvine was already taking some notes in a notebook. “The names you gave, where did you get them?”

“I was there – for five. But not the murders. I – I wasn’t even sure he killed them. I just thought they might be…” he trailed off. Eyes on Irvine’s scrawled handwriting.

“Can you tell me the names?”

“Emma – Ella Grant. I think? I wasn’t sure. Something Marsden – I didn’t get her full name either. Nolan Mc – something. McGill? I’m sorry – I –” he put his head in his hands.

“That’s fine, Kay, are you okay to keep going?”

“Bridget Hale. I remember that one,” he looked across at Irvine. Tears reappearing in his eyes, voice breaking. “She begged me to call her sister. Shannon Hale. I couldn’t. And Isabella – Isabelle Santos.”

“Good. That’s good, Kay. It’s information we can work with.”

“The – the other agent. He said there were more bodies – I didn’t know about those.”

“Do you understand why that’s difficult for us to believe?”

Kay nodded slowly.

“You mentioned a second person, but I hear that you don’t want to give us a name. Why are you protecting him?”

“No – that’s not right. I – I’m protecting a friend. Someone he’ll go after. He – M – He was threatening him. For years. I’m not protecting a monster.”

“Monster… That’s an interesting choice in words,” Irvine mused. “Why do you say that?”

“Because he is – I watched him do so many awful things. And he turned me into – not something I’m not – people don’t change. But – but he used me to get what he wanted. I got off lightly.”

“I think I can understand that,” Irvine reassured him. “Do you regret what you did?”

“No. It kept the people I care about safe.”

“And how about the other people who got hurt in the process. Did you have any right to use their lives as bargaining chips?”

Kay’s head was in his hands.

“I did what I thought I had to do. And it escalated.”

“Would you do it again?”

“I wouldn’t – it wouldn’t go so far.”

“So you would stop it sooner?”

“I – I don’t know. I don’t know why this matters. We both know I’m getting a pile of life sentences. I’m not getting out.”

“We have been after this guy for years. If you have information about him, I can work with you. Offer a deal.”

Kay slumped back in his seat, gritting his teeth.

“I can’t. I – I gave you the burial site. I’m already as good as dead.”

“We can protect you. The FBI has the resources for that.”

“No – no. I can’t. I’m sorry – I – I think I need a lawyer.”

“I understand. I can call them for you but it’s late. I think it might be best if we spoke again in the morning. If that’s acceptable with you?”

“Yeah – yeah… That’s fine. I can talk tomorrow.”

Kay exhaled as Irvine stood. As she told him that someone would return him to the holding cell. And for the first time that day, he felt a solid kind of relief. If he hadn’t come here, those bodies would have laid buried for decades longer.

In all the bad, there was at least a glint of good.

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[cc-writes-stuff]

for the 'what will ur character do' ask for silas & theo: #9 & #17 ✨

Sorry this is only 17 but i don’t really have any ideas off the top of my head for how they would betray each other 😅 hope you enjoy this nonetheless!

17: if their partner-to-be? enemy? pulls them into a secluded and shushes them? (their bodies pressing and all that!!)

Silas didn’t know if Theodore was even daring to breathe.

He was, if only because Silas could feel the movement of his chest under his hand, the small, but it sure didn’t seem like it.

The Paladins were still shouting at each other to find them, voices carrying over the empty, ruined town. Could see the shadows moving from the gaps in the wood flooring. Silas still had his knife in a vice grip, ready to be thrust towards the first plated chest he saw.

If anyone stepped on their hiding place, they’d be doomed.

Idly, he wondered if the Paladins took his spear. They probably did. It’d be a bitch to get back, but most convenient hiding places don’t support a five-foot tall weapon made of metal and wood. He had to ditch it to ensure their safety.

More voices. Theodore, somehow, gets even more tense under his hands.

“Relax,” Silas dares to whisper, eyes glancing towards the floorboards above them. “They won’t find us.”

Theodore’s heart was hammering in their chest, under his palm. It was a sensation Silas was used to, the feeling of the beating organ before it slowly came to a stop, and it was almost comforting in the familiarity thereof.

The other man doesn’t say anything, but he shifts, just barely, scooting back a little. Through the gaps of light coming in from the floorboard, he can see Theodore’s lips turning into a scowl. A muscle cramps in Silas right hand, the one taking his upper body weight and keeping him from collapsing entirely onto Theodore.

Silence, still. Theodore seems uninclined to talk and given the situation, Silas refrains as well. Only their—well, mostly Silas’—breaths can be heard in the tiny little cubbyhole probably designed as some sort of drug stash centuries ago. If there was anything in there, it was looted a while back.

Shadows pass over the light. Theodore, who had started to relax as the minutes ticked on, goes rigid again. Silas is close enough to feel the tension in his legs, the halting of his breathing, the way Theodore seems to coil into themselves.

Silas can hear his own heart, pounding in his ears. He’s been in situations similar to this before—hiding from mobs of people who knew of his faith, hiding from the lawlayers and militias after another sacrifice or several, hiding from the Paladins that cut his time short in any place he stayed in—but this was different. He had never done this with someone else before and Theodore’s naiveté regarding what to do when pinned made it dangerous.

Once again, Silas finds himself wondering what it was like for Theodore, growing up the way the did. In a community where he was accepted, even revered, instead of shunned, for his faith. Where the community would protect him, where he didn’t have to worry about meeting his end at the business end of a blade.

The shadows pass, and the light filters through the crack’s again. Theodore is biting his lip, lower one wedged under his upper teeth, chewing nervously. His chest still barely moves. Silas’ neck cramps.

Slowly, the voices fade. Theodore relaxes more and more and sinks further down between Silas’ legs.

Finally, after what must be an hour, Theodore asks, “Is it safe to go?”

Truthfully, Silas thinks, it was safe a good bit ago, once the voices cleared. He tells himself he waited longer, just in case there were any lingerers waiting to see if they got tired and exposed themselves.

“I think so,” he says instead. Letting go of the knife, Silas reaches up as far back as he can go, fingers pressed against the fake floor panel. With a grunt, he heaves upwards, using the extra height Theodore’s chest offers to push it open.

Beneath him, Theodore wheezes.

The false floor clatters away, and Silas stands up, back popping. He gives a quick glance around the room, and when he deems it safe, he steps out.

“Come on, let’s get going,” he sayd, turning around to offer a hand to Theodore.

Cold, thin fingers wrap around his own, and for a moment, Silas allows himself to revel in this simple fact of life. Then he tightens his grip and steps back, helping pull Theodore out of the floorboards.

“Thanks,” the prophet says, once they steady themself on the floor. His face is bright red, and he starts rubbing his arm. “For the save, I mean. I— do not think I would have fared well in that situation.”

“Hey, it’s no problem,” Silas says, shooting a smile at Theodore, before he steps back down into the cubbyhole to grab his knife. “Us Zakelians have to stick together.”

Sunlight streaming through the fire-burnt buildings lights Theodore’s face up in a golden glow. For a moment, he wonders how their people could ever doubt that Theodore was a chosen one.

“Right.”

[corinneglass]

A Curse of Veracity

This post is about my main WIP. I’ll share everything that I can think of under the cut.

Title: A Curse of Veracity

Genre: Fantasy, Romance

Audience: YA

Tags: #a curse of veracity

Stage of the Writing Process: Drafting (first draft)

Characters

Lystra Arquette (Main Character):

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: she/her

Height: 5’7”

Hair Colour: black

Eye Colour: grey

Species: human

Character Traits: very reckless, “pokes the hornets nest”, smart, political, good at fighting, dry/sarcastic humour, strong moral code, black or white perspective, selfish (to an extent), focused, assertive, ambitious

Other Info: daughter of Fortress Captain of Ryria/Aneira, friends with Reine, dating Evren

Tags: #lystra arquette

Dorian Narenne:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: he/him

Height: 6’1”

Hair Colour: black

Eye Colour: silver

Species: Fae

Character Traits: sarcastic and dry humour, 2 personalities, good at fighting, always writing down his thoughts, focused, introverted, assertive, can be mean, been through a lot, scared, wounds on purpose, ambitious, backhanded

Other Info: son of Leader of Ni’yx/Silas, Lavera’s younger brother

Tags: #dorian narenne

Lavera Narenne:

Nickname(s): Vera

Pronouns: she/her

Height: 5’8”

Hair Colour: black

Eye Colour: aqua

Species: Fae

Character Traits: logical, cautious, honest, doesn’t trust people well, teasing, “my job is to keep you safe”, tries to help everyone, backhanded, strict boundaries, figures you out quickly, has a lot of anger, very secretive, under lots of pressure

Other Info: dating Aelia (see below)

Tags: #lavera narenne

Aelia:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: she/her

Height: 5’6”

Hair Colour: blonde

Eye Colour: navy blue

Species: Fae

Character Traits: peacekeeper, sunshine, sees the good in things, strong will, quiet but strong, first to laugh, silver lining, pure, innocent

Other Info: Very traumatic backstory, people think she’s innocent and hasn’t seen the world’s hardships, but she has and still chooses to be kind

Tags: #aelia

Marlena Arison:

Nickname(s): Lena

Pronouns: she/her

Height: 5’7”

Hair Colour: black

Eye Colour: red

Species: Fae

Character Traits: basically a feminine version of Dorian, but balances duty and family really well, tries hardest to have fun, ambitious, doesn’t trust people easily

Other Info: has a twin sister

Tags: #marlena arison

Reine Allaire:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: she/her

Height: 5’6”

Hair Colour: blonde

Eye Colour: green

Species: Human

Character Traits: stubborn, has fun, in the middle of the drama, cries a lot, has lots of secrets, very complicated, very loyal, tries to be kind, very hard on herself, ambitious

Other Info: has two siblings, Lenore and Devlon Allaire, who are her everything; most mischief leads back to her; aspiring Sentry

Tags: #reine allaire

Evren Rainier:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: he/him

Height: 5’11”

Hair Colour: beige/light brown

Eye Colour: brown

Species: Human

Character Traits: Tries hard to please his parents, dishonest, rank above everything else, ambitious, charming, authoritative, logical, playful, teasing, serious, masks his emotions, cautious, thinks out every move

Other Info: he hates disappointing his parents, is under constant stress, hates that he has to choose rank over people.

Tags: #evren rainier

Trystan Veire:

Nickname(s): Trys

Pronouns: he/him

Height: 6’0”

Hair Colour: red

Eye Colour: black

Species: Fae

Character Traits: protective, calming, cautious, accepting, tired, helpful, strong moral code, loves music, fakes his bravery, very formal, very introverted

Other Info: dating Nova, has a single mother whom he tries hardest to protect

Tags: #trystan veire

Rylan Solace:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: he/him

Height: 5’11”

Hair Colour: blonde

Eye Colour: navy blue

Species: Fae

Character Traits: playful, teasing, sarcastic, loyal, extraverted, strong moral code, senses changes in emotions, very casual, protective, ambitious, reckless, authoritative, obeys orders without question

Other Info: originally from a different Fae Camp, bought passage into Ni’yx

Tags: #rylan solace

Kylian Everlie:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: he/him

Height: 5’10”

Hair Colour: light brown

Eye Colour: cream

Species: Fae

Character Traits: sleek, arrogant, vain, cruel, hopeless, quiet, bargaining, loyal, uses his cruelness as a mask, cautious, ambitious, reckless, introverted, formal, tries not to form attachments to people, has seen his fair share of death

Other Info: had a twin sister named Luna

Tags: #kylian everlie

Nyssa Starline:

Nickname(s): Nys

Pronouns: she/her

Height: 5’8”

Hair Colour: white

Eye Colour: violet

Species: Witch

Character Traits: cruel, commanding, authoritative, political, intimidating, selfish (to an extent), looks after everyone, blank, cautious, ambitious, playfully cruel, loyal to select people, has lots of different faces, observant

Other Info: leader of the Starline Coven, daughter of the Witch Matron

Tags: #nyssa starline

Silas Narenne:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: he/him

Height: 5’10”

Hair Colour: black

Eye Colour: sky blue

Species: Fae

Character Traits: cruel, paranoid, tyrannical, hypocrite, arrogant, entitled, cautious, logical, political, tired, sleek, blank, multiple faces, powerful, observant, makes hard decisions, unfeeling, aloof

Other Info: brother of Cain (leader of other Fae Camp), Heir to the Fae Empire

Tags: #silas narenne

Aneira Arquette:

Nickname(s): none

Pronouns: she/her

Height: 5’6”

Hair Colour: black

Eye Colour: grey

Species: Human

Character Traits: loyal, brave, problem solving, tired, responsible, makes hard decisions, assertive, commanding, introverted, strict, unfeeling, cautious, logical, on top of everything

Other Info: Fortress Captain of Ryria

Tags: #aneira arquette

POV: Lystra and Dorian

Settings: The main settings are Ryria (a fortress that humans live in) and Ni’yx (a fae camp), but there’s also Etaellis, Aenoria, Luphora and Ni’ley.

Content Warnings: There will be blood, gore, fires and burning, murder, abuse, swearing, emotional torture and more.

Synopsis: (For now a Skeleton Blurb)

When Lystra, the brave Heir to the Fortress Captain of the Humans, finds herself prisoner to the enemy, she must decide whether her roots are stronger than where her heart lies and weigh the worth of the destruction of an entire unique species.

Magic System - Rank of Powers

The magic system is based on eye colour:

Highest - Lowest rankings: Gold/Silver, Aqua, Red, Black, Navy, Cream, Blue, Brown, and Pink.

The lowest-ranked five powers (Pink, Brown, Blue, Cream, Navy) are called Lesser Fae

The highest-ranked five powers (Black, Red, Aqua, Silver/Gold) are called Royal Fae

Fae Species

The Fae are different from the humans because they are ultimately more ethereal, but they also have some structural differences like pointed ears, elongated canines, etc, and for some fae (the Lesser Fae), they have a second form.

The reason that only the Lesser Fae have a second form (a wyvern; basically a two-legged dragon) is to balance the amount of power that all fae have, though the difference is that the Royal Fae have more power to use.

There is also bond between Royal Fae and Lesser Fae called draekim where a Royal Fae rides a Lesser Fae.

[formshaper]

on the one hand a) it makes perfect sense that the man.sand rpc is dead considering NG's bullshit and also the short-lived nature of fandom rp in general, and b) the vast majority of man.sand rp blogs that did exist back in 2022 weren't really up my alley and i especially hated most people's depictions of dream because the netflix show made it so easy to turn him into a Poor Little Meow Meow Who Did Nothing Wrong

but on the other hand AHHHHHH GOD I MISS WRITING CORINTH WITH CHARACTERS FROM HIS OWN CANON AHHHH. and i guess i miss getting really fucking weird with it with various dream blogs all in completely different ways. outside of the context of his own canon he gets kind of stuck in the role of "nightmare/predator hunting your muse" because there isn't much else for him to do, but at one point i was writing the most wild and fucked up shit with so many different people (not just dream rpers to be clear) without having to do crossovers and i MISS it.

[ihearnocomplaints]

It’s almost 1am and I decided to write a little DCA drabble just for fun. (Not canon to my AU)

You look around the seemingly empty daycare. It’s dark. Unusual, you think. Shrugging off the unease, you step in.

Why were you here again? Had you forgotten something? You stand there, next to the slide nearest to the exit. Staring at the floor, brows furrowed, you try to retrace your steps.

You had said goodbye to Sun and left. Halfway to the main entrance, you remembered something. What was it? What was it you remembered? Had you remembered that you’d forgotten something? Were you intending to give the Daycare Attendant something? Why can’t you remember?

You groan and drag a hand down your face.

Well, you can’t leave yet, since you clearly came back for a reason.

“Sun?” You call out, glancing around the darkness. No answer. You strain your ears to see if you can hear the soft whirring of his mechanisms or the jingle of his bells. Again, nothing.

Frustrated, you step deeper into the daycare, beyond the light the doorway casts. You walk past the tall jungle gyms, desaturated and cast in an eerie light now that the daycare is dark and empty. And quiet. Too quiet.

It suddenly becomes very apparent that the never ending daycare song is no linger playing in the overhead speakers. Its absence makes you miss it all the more.

“Sun?” You call out again, now standing near the ball pit. You walk the perimeter slowly, dragging your hand across the plastic brick wall that borders it. Where could he be?

You sigh and idly walk to the rainbow bridge, standing at its peak. Maybe that would give you a better vantage point of the daycare.

You strain your eyes, slowly surveying the area before you feel a sudden tap on your left shoulder. You snap your head in that direction but find nothing there. Then there’s a tap to your opposite shoulder. Looking has the same effect as last time. You huff and turn to face the ball pit.

“Sun, this isn’t funny,” You say before turning back to face the daycare. As you turn, you’re met face to face with the Daycare Attendant, hanging upside down from a wire connected to the ceiling. Except this isn’t the Sun you know. This one is darker and night themed. Much more moon-like than Sun.

Before you can even get a word out, they’ve got their hands on your shoulders. They rotate their head 90° and give you a shove as their whispery, raspy voice says, “boo.” Followed by a mischievous giggle.

You find yourself falling backward into the ball pit. It isn’t very deep but it’s certainly overstimulating as you try to flounder your way out. It’s a struggle to even figure out which way is up and right yourself accordingly.

Once you’ve managed to stand, the balls up to your waist, you wade through them and make your way to the little island in the middle of the ball pit. “That wasn’t very nice,” You huff, tilting your head up to look at the ceiling.

There’s a brief glimpse of red that disappears behind a cloud and a familiar giggle that just barely reaches your ears. You frown and look around, trying to decide your best route to the exit.

You really should have waded over to the rainbow bridge instead of the island. It’s going to be a pain going through the ball pit again. But this was the path you chose and you must walk it.

Letting out a frustrated breath, you waddle your way through the balls once more and end up just fine on the other end, if not mildly annoyed at this point. You look to the ceiling once more but find nothing.

“I’m leaving now!” You shout up to the ceiling then mumble to yourself, “I don’t know why I even came back in the first place but, frankly, I don’t care anymore.”

As you walk past the plastic house that’s way too small to fit you, you feel something hit your back. You spin around, frantically looking around for the Daycare Attendant only to see one of the ball pit balls rolling away from you on the floor. You glare at it and then the ball pit.

“Why?” You ask, picking up the ball. You can see the animatronic’s head poke out of the ball pit, that once sweet, now eerie smile tilting as the click, click, click of their head’s mechanism rotate it. You toss the ball back into the ball pit.

“Cuz. Funny.” Is all the Daycare Attendant responds.

You’re still not sure who this is. It’s clearly a moon-themed version of Sun. But if this one is here, then where is Sun? Is this just Sun messing with you? Surely he wouldn’t do such a thing.

You huff and promptly turn away, continuing your trek to the exit. “It’s not funny. It’s mean. I don’t even know who you are and you’re already bullying me,” You say as you walk away. Another ball hits you.

“Rude.” You freeze at that and turn around, about ready to give this animatronic a piece of your mind. Except they’re no longer in the ball pit.

You glance around in all directions, thoroughly confused at how they could possibly move this fast. “I’m not rude!” You say, sounding a lot more like a petulant child than you meant to.

“You are.” The bot says, coming from your left. But when you look, there’s no one there. “Won’t even let me introduce myself.” This time the voice is directly behind you.

You stumble forward and spin around to face the tall animatronic looming behind you. Even when they’re slouched they’re taller than you. You frown and stare at them expectantly. “Well?” You gesture for them to continue.

They tilt their head as they seem to have a habit of doing. “Moon,” They say, placing a hand to their chest. They point to you and say your name. Logically, they’d know your name from the employee database but somehow it’s still a shock to you when they actually say it. Not even Sun has called you your name yet. And you know he knows it. It’s always pet names or nicknames with him.

“Moon,” You repeat with a nod, looking them up and down. “Fitting.”

Moon’s optics seem to brighten with glee and he lets out a little giggle. “Sun and Moon.” He responds with a nod.

“Can I leave now?” You ask, taking a step backward toward the exit. Moon’s gaze drifts to the door behind you before they wordlessly fly up and disappear in the rafters.

You stare up at the ceiling for a while, unsure of whether to leave or not, but when you see no further signs of Moon, you take that as your go-ahead for making a swift exit. And exit you do, practically sprinting to the exit.

You’re not sure why, but something about that whole interaction made your alarm bells ring. There was an odd sense of danger, despite Moon’s overall playfulness. There was danger in those glowing red eyes of his, you think. You can’t be certain, though. Perhaps the dark was clouding your judgement.

[tricks-n-illusions]

@guardians-of-dreams Malachi@Silas The Jirachi looked at the Zorvul a slight concern on his face, “You look a bit hurt, I don’t mind giving you a bit of a heal pulse, but I’m not going to do it without permission,” he offered, “I don’t want to overstep any boundaries…” while he definitely seemed nice, but he also seemed a bit cautious

Silas quietly stared at the blood, he seemed... almost Indifferent to the fact he was injured, as if he didn't notice it in the first place. He showed no surprise, only taking a moment to recompose himself before he began his act once again.

The Zoroark grumbled dramatically, shaking the blood away. "Well, at least someone respects me around here. Congrats on being the only person on this stupid planet to care about "boundaries" with me. So, you want some kind of fuckin' reward? Brownie points perhaps? My undying gratitude? What will it be? Hm?" He scoffed. "Besides."

Silas's tone was uncaring, however, his gaze was nervously trained on the Jirachi, almost if he was scared they were going to be put off by his remarks. His words clearly did not match his wants at the moment. He gave some unintelligible spiel about pitying him before he let out an annoyed huff.

Silas sure as hell wasn't the type of person to openly admit when he wanted help, and it didn't look like that was going to change anytime soon. The best he could do was make a backhanded remark about it and hope the person he was talking to took his vague hint. Though this was likely the vaguest hint known to man sprinkled in with a side of unwanted attitude.

For a moment a sort of sadness return to his expression once he realized the position he was potentially putting himself in.

Though it didn't last long as his attitude came back in full force. Of course he had to bring in the dramatics eventually, this was Silas after all. It wouldn't be him without a side of drama.

"Put myself in a hole! Might as well make it my home at this point!" His tone was cheerful and fake. "Oh, Just wait yet, this is my redemption arc now! I repent for my unforgivable sins. All that murder? All those deaths? It was just a ruse for my pain and heartache. Obviously." For some reason there was a disgusting truth to his word. "Why don't I just do it in full force? Hm? Spill my guts."

"Oh, I can't wait to be loved and adored by the masses. Maybe North will finally fulfil her life goals and save me from my dark ways! Return me to that disgusting loving and stupid little fox I was!" "Always ready to please at a whim. Trying to make everyone love him in hopes of just a measly scrap of positive attention!"

"I'm not a fuckin' moron anymore." He huffed, "I actually grew a spine and decided to stop being everyone's cute little lapdog." His rant seemed to finally end as he gave a sigh, "As if you'd actually want to help me of your own free will. Doubt it. People ain't nice in this life. They just want something from me every single fuckin' time. You're probably that type of deity that's thinks I'm indebted to them for a merciful glance my way. Hm?"

→ Silas seems skeptical about Malachi's offer, though he's not denying it by any means. It's best to be careful with your words if your determined to continue.

[ Ask from @guardians-of-dreams ]

[forwhump]

a/n; hello again I’m sorry I have the posting schedule of the creature from jeepers creepers 😔 back to our regularly scheduled story progression

this is actually 2 parts put together so kindaaaaa long & rambling but I took so long to get here that I figured some actual real progression was in order

(I think this is a Really Fun One but I also have a bit of a thing™️ for silas being sad and severely unwell 😀)

word count: 6.2k

tw/cw; human weapon whumpee, self harm, traumatic brain injuries, amnesia, lobotomies, captivity, rape/noncon, psychological torture, skinning, gun violence, sexual violence, misgendering, gore, military whump, mentions of bodily fluids

Seven is haunted by somebody he doesn’t remember. 

Often in various states of undress. 

It’s hard to explain how deeply uncomfortable it makes him. He thinks they have to be memories, dredges from his past life, at least something close. His conscience, maybe. He thinks he must’ve done something horrible to this person. He thinks he’s figured it all out. 

For a long time, he’s been alone in this grey room, only his nightmares and vivid hallucinations to keep him company. He has a grey mattress, pushed up against a grey wall, wrapped in grey sheets he’d since sweat and bled through and that hadn’t been changed, not ever, not once. He pisses in the corner. 

He hadn’t been able to figure out why he’s here — he doesn’t fuckin’ remember anything useful. He’d had a field test, a practice in slaughter, but he had failed to kill somebody he hadn’t recognized, somebody that remembered him from before. 

Mercilessly, Seven is being punished for that. He’d been stripped and caned afterward for his failure, for failing to clear the enemy, but then he was closed in this grey room, this cell, and left by himself. For a long time, the flurry of doctors and surgeons coming and going to poke and prod and hurt him had been relentless. Seven has now been alone longer than he’d ever had people around him. 

He thinks. Can’t really know for certain. The lights turn on and off, night and day, but the time between seems erratic, irregular, but even that’s hard to say. Time passes differently when he’s alone. 

It had seemed like a stark overreaction to not kill one guy one time. He’d killed everybody else he’d ever been ordered to. In the short time he remembers, he’d killed a lot. He killed obediently. He didn’t kill Hat or whatever his name was, and that’s it? Discarded? 

Then the nightmares had started. The hallucinations next. Now, Seven thinks he’s figured it out. 

For a long time, it was just colours — splashes of blood, the inside of an opened abdominal cavity. He’s only ever been haunted by a single person, and he doesn’t know who he is. Sometimes, he sees him in grey, but it’s always Seven’s grey, Seven’s sweatshirts, too small for him because everything is too small for Seven but too big for whoever he’s imagining. It’s never made sense to him; when was somebody ever with him? Somebody without greys of their own? Somebody that small? 

He didn’t belong here, whoever he was. He looked out of place before the backdrop of Seven’s grey room, even wearing his greys. He’s beautiful in a way that makes Seven squint when he looks at him. He’s beautiful in a way Seven finds strangely, deeply unsettling. 

Except it has nothing to do with his beauty at all, it’s some other kind of instinct, a part of Seven that must’ve remembered what he’d done. Because he doesn’t see him in grey much anymore, he’s usually mostly naked, short skirts and stockings sometimes, and he’s always bleeding and he begs for help. Sometimes, for days at a time, he begs for help. 

Slowly, it started to make more sense. Seven kinda started to put the pieces together. They don’t know he thinks, but he does, and he’s getting better at it the more that he tries. It makes sense. The way the nurses, the doctors, the soldiers always looked at him, watched him, flinched when he moved too quick or got too close. Why he’d been locked away in the first place, trained for slaughter. Why he’s locked up so tightly now. 

He thinks, before, he was one of them. A soldier, probably, because that soldier from the field test had remembered him. Called him by name, but Seven can’t remember anymore what it had been. He thinks, during his time as a soldier, he did something horrible, something he doesn’t want to think about, something that’s coming back to haunt him now that he’s alone and has nothing else to do but think. They’d tried to wipe him clean after, make him some sort of monster, keep him of use to them somehow. Then he’d failed that test. 

At this point, he isn’t sure why they haven’t put him down yet. That’s obviously where this is tilting. He’s a danger to the people around him, and he isn’t of use to anyone else. What else could they do with him? 

He spends a lot of time beating his head into the grey concrete wall, trying to quell the thinking. It doesn’t work. Behind him, whoever he is, waves of white hair and big, sad eyes, cries out to him for help, and Seven doesn’t know how to help him. He doesn’t want to remember what he did. 

The hallucinations don’t always touch him, but sometimes they do. Sometimes, he grabs at Seven’s ankles, his joggers, clinging to him, pleading with him. Once, he’d put a small hand at Seven’s back and said softly, “what are you doing?”, rocking up on his toes to try to reach up and put his hand between Seven’s head and the wall. For some reason, obediently, Seven had leaned into his touch. His gentle hand on Seven’s face had made him throw up all over himself. Later, he’d discarded his shirt in the piss corner. Since, the ghostly touch on the bare skin of Seven’s back has made him sick every time. He should’ve kept his shirt on, filthy or not. 

He’s filthy either way. The room is filthy. He still thinks of it as being grey, but he can’t say there aren’t splashes of colour now, grime and filth and Seven’s different bodily fluids. It’s probably beyond help. Maybe Seven is, too. 

Maybe that’s why they left him here. Maybe they don’t have the heart to kill him — maybe they’re too afraid. Maybe they’ve left him to rot. 

Standing guard outside the armoured door, since Seven had reached through the meds slot with a shaking hand to gouge out the eyes of whoever was closest, is a pair of soldiers that Seven doesn’t recognize, but that knew him from before. He knows they did, they must have. They taunt him with a sort of familiarity, they reference things that Seven doesn’t know. They call him the dog — what the fuck is a dog? 

They loiter outside Seven’s room day in and day out. Sometimes, they pull open that slot between them just to taunt him. They’re braver than a lot of the other soldiers have been — cocky. Being braver, though, doesn’t necessarily make brave, and they still won’t look him in the eye. They lock that slot as soon as Seven gets too close. They’re afraid of him, too, but they have a dislike for him in almost the same quantity, a dislike that extends far beyond the reaches of what Seven can remember. Did they know the blonde, maybe? The one that haunts Seven? Have they never been able to forgive him for what he did? 

Not that they would tell him either way, but he wishes he could ask. For some reason, he can talk to the man that haunts him and nobody else. He suspects it’s because it’s not real, that he’s hallucinating it like he is everything else. Sometimes, in the rare moments he’s by himself, when the room is empty of ghosts, he’ll thump himself on the chest with his fist and try to force words out. It never works. It’s probably, Seven suspects, because the problem isn’t in his chest, it’s in his brain, or whatever fistful of meat he has trying its best between his ears. It doesn’t fire right, whatever it is, it doesn’t work like it’s supposed to. A part of it was left behind in a time Seven doesn’t remember, and he’s getting fucked as it comes back to him now. 

He cracks his head into the wall again. Behind him, the ghost sobs. He has a cry that makes the inside of Seven’s chest feel cold. But then he takes a deep breath, and he says, “I’m sorry,” in the smallest, saddest voice Silas had ever heard. “I’m so sorry.” 

And that’s weird. Who is he talking to? 

Slowly, Seven peels the split, thin skin of his forehead off the wall. 

However reluctantly, he turns. Immediately wishes he hadn’t. 

Across the room, Seven is sitting on the floor, slumped back against the far wall. Except Seven is standing right here, so that doesn’t make any sense. He can’t remember if he’s ever hallucinated himself from the outside before, but it’s heavier, for some reason, it makes him sick in a different, claustrophobic sort of way. His skin crawls. 

He’s sitting, slumped against the far wall, head tilted back and chest hitching as he drowns in his own blood. The ghost has both his hands over Seven’s opened throat, trying to quell the bleeding that’s seeping out from between his thin fingers like ink. A wasted effort, anyway, because Seven can see his intestine spilling out from the hole that had been ripped in his sweatshirt. The ghost is covered in blood — Seven’s? 

Did Seven die? What the hell? 

It doesn’t make any sense. What happened to him? He looks a lot the same as he does right now, in real time, still a freak. Does that mean he was a monster, too, before all of this? They hadn’t changed him because whatever he’d done? 

What had he done? What the hell is he? 

The ghost is trying to stop the bleeding and Seven is watching himself die. His hands are shaking — blood loss? Or had he carried that with him from before, too? 

What happened to him? 

What is he?

He watches, across a whole other lifetime and just a couple of feet, as he lifts a trembling hand, huge as it touches the cheek of his ghost. Then he does something weird with his hand, crosses the tip of his thumb and his index finger, and the ghost makes a sound that raises the hair on the back of Seven’s neck. Turning away, he looks back at the wall and a pain he doesn’t recognize throbs in his chest as the ghost cries for him at his back. The world, as he had been building it up, crumbles around him. 

Seven’s always been a freak and he died once in the arms of a ghost that now haunts him. How could he be the ghost when Seven’s the one that died? Why is he being tormented by somebody that had mourned him with his blood on their hands? 

What happened to him? 

He beats his head back into the wall. The pain of the impact distracts from the pain behind his eyes as he tries so hard to remember. How can he not remember? What did they do to him? 

Except he must remember, at least a little bit. It’s trapped in there somewhere and it’s coming back to haunt him, fighting tooth and nail to get free. It doesn’t want him to forget. 

Why not? What does it fuckin’ matter? Why does Seven need to watch himself bleed to death? What does it mean? 

Why is he here? 

A small hand touches his back and the warmth of it is so real. Too suddenly, he whirls around to face it. Across the room, his gutted corpse and the ghost grieving him are both gone. Instead, the ghost is standing close at Seven’s side. His hand had been warm on Seven’s bare skin. He’s cleaned of Seven’s gore, dressed, instead, in a set of his hospital greys, rolled up at the wrists and the ankles. His hair is loose around his back and his shoulders, a sheet around him so white it sort of makes him glow. 

He’s so beautiful. Whatever he is, whatever Seven had done to him in his past life, he’s stricken in this one by just how beautiful he is. He’s never doubted that his ghost is real, a memory from a part of his brain that’s trying to remember, because there’s so way Seven could ever have imagined, on his own, somebody that looks like this. He’s so beautiful Seven can’t make sense of him. And, sleepy, he smiles up at Seven, keeping one of his bare hands on his skin. 

“Come back to bed,” he says softly. 

He’s so beautiful that Seven can’t understand why looking at him makes his head throb behind his eye. He doesn’t remember him so he can’t understand why his gentle touch makes Seven’s skin crawl and his stomach turn. What else could it be if it isn’t guilt? What could Seven have done to him? 

“Come on,” his ghost says softly. With one of his small hands he takes one of Seven’s and Seven swallows so thickly something clicks in his throat. “Come to bed with me.” 

This can’t be a memory. He can’t have shared his bed with Seven. Why would he have? Something so beautiful and so human. How could he have trusted Seven like that? How could Seven have hurt somebody that trusted him like that? 

Blood trickles, warm, down the side of Seven’s face. “What did I do to you?” He asks, thick around the lump in his throat. He doesn’t think he really wants to know but he asks anyway. 

The ghost squeezes his fingers and his touch feels too real. He smiles up at him and Seven has to look away. “I’m fine,” he promises softly. “Come back to bed, Seven.” 

Seven’s ghost has a strange, syrupy sort of accent. It’s unlike anything Seven had ever heard, just as surreally beautiful as his eyes and the lines of his collarbones and the shape of his fingers. Seven’s been certain he couldn’t have imagined it because he couldn’t have thought it up, had never heard anybody else speak in the same way his ghost speaks. 

Except when he says Seven. It makes Seven lift his head again. He sounds different, wrong, and for a moment, Seven doesn’t know why. 

He looks into the wide, dark eyes of his ghost and cold prickles at the back of his neck as he realizes he’d said it without his accent. Seven. He’d said it without any of the sugar or syrup. 

Seven has his first real memory. The first one he’s really confident about. 

“You never called me Seven.” He couldn’t hear how his name sounded in the ghost’s accent because he’d never heard it before. He never called him Seven. He didn’t know Seven. 

The ghost smiles up at him again. His eyebrows pull together in the middle, pretty and confused. “Why would I call you Seven?” 

Across the room, his ghost whispers, “leave me alone, Seven.” 

Except he says it wrong, because it wasn’t Seven. It was — 

He lifts his head and the warmth of his touch vanishes from Seven’s hand because the ghost is slumped against the far wall, head tipped back against it. He’s wearing a skirt that’s too short, fingers twisted into the hem, knees splayed so Seven can see the trails of blood tracked down the insides of his thighs. He tries to close his knees as Seven looks down at him and it looks like it causes him a lot of pain. 

“I’ll be fine,” he says, but his voice is so small. 

Is this a memory? Is any of this? “What happened to you?” 

The ghost sniffles, wiping his bleeding nose with the back of his hand. “I’m fine,” he repeats. “Leave me alone.” 

Clearly, he’s not fine. In the short time Seven’s spent looking across the room at him, blood has started to pool on the concrete between his legs. “Did I do this to you?” He rasps, even if he doesn’t really want to know. 

“What?” He says. Tears spill over his cheeks as he looks up at Seven, eyelashes clumping together, and he doesn’t look real. This can’t be a memory because this can’t be real. How could Seven have done this? 

Of course, Seven knows how he could’ve done this. With ease Seven could’ve done this. All he does is hurt people. Maybe that hadn’t been any different in his last life. 

Then why did they bring him back? What more could they want from him? Why are there so many parts of him that want so desperately to remember? “Did I hurt you?” He asks, and his voice is so rough he doesn’t recognize it. 

The ghost sniffles, trying to wipe his eyes again with the hem of his buttoned shirt. It almost looks like he’s wearing a uniform. His skirt is short, indecently, but it’s the same black material the soldiers' uniforms are all made from. His shirt is the same black buttoned shirt as their formals, except his is pulled open, tangled around his upper arms like somebody had tried to pull it off of him. Had Seven tried to pull it off of him? 

But the ghost says, “what are you talking about?”, and his pale eyebrows scrunch together in the middle. “You wouldn’t hurt me.” He wipes his bloody nose again with his sleeve. “You know that.” 

Does he? 

Seven feels himself sway on his feet as the room spins quickly around him again. The world is pulled out from under him for a second time. He didn’t hurt him? Then why is he haunting him? 

While Seven’s pulse beats in his ears, the ghost says, from his right, “Seven?” 

Seven can barely hear him. He’s too aware of his own heartbeat and he doesn’t know why finding out he hadn’t hurt him felt the same in his chest as being hunted. He turns his head slowly, feeling so much of something that it’s too much and he’s almost numb. What’s going on? Why won’t it stop?

From the edge of his bed, the ghost looks up at him. His hair is pulled into two, neat braids and his dress is short and ruffled, demeaning. White socks pulled up over his knees, he sits on the edge of Seven’s bed with his ankles crossed and looks up at him with wide, shining eyes. He looks towards the door around Seven’s arm before looking back up into his face, a flush starting to bloom across the bridge of his nose. 

“What are you doing here?” He asks. 

It’s a hard question to answer. He doesn’t even really know. 

Before he can even try to guess, his ghost tells him urgently, “you have to go.” 

“What?” Seven says. 

“He’ll kill you if he finds you here,” he breathes. 

Seven turns quickly towards the door. “Who?” 

The door is closed, of course. Armored and bolted. Seven, really, is alone in his cell, losing his mind in the dark, filthy and probably dying. Instead, he sees his ghost again, curled on the floor like he had collapsed just inside the door. 

He’s naked but his skin is hardly bare, pale flesh gone black and red and purple with bruises and welts and bite marks. His head is down, his hair flowing around him, matted and turned pink with blood. His hands are tied behind his back, his shoulders pulled at an angle that looks painful and hitching irregularly as he sobs. 

Seven staggers back and collides with the wall, closer than he had expected. If he didn’t do this, why does he have to keep seeing this? What is this? 

Who is this? 

Standing over him is a soldier Seven doesn’t recognize. He’s a big guy, tall and broad shouldered, bearded and dark haired, his uniform decorated with a large number of pins and patches and badges. He looks between Seven and his ghost and as he does, his lip curls in a snarl. Quiet and lethal, he realizes, “you’re fucking the dog.” 

He laughs as he looks at Seven again, but it isn’t a humorous laugh. There’s something a little deranged to it. “Bad girl,” he scolds, clicking his tongue, and as Seven watches he tilts his face down and spits onto the ghost’s back. “I thought you were better than this. The fucking dog,” and he spits on him again before he looks at Seven. 

Instantly, it makes Seven’s skin start to prickle. Something in his stare starts to reopen old scars, eating away at raised flesh like acid. What does it mean? 

“And you,” he says to Seven, his voice like ice. “You ugly fucking mutt. Your girlfriend’s a whore.” 

What the fuck is this? 

Seven looks at his ghost, shivering at the soldier’s feet. There’s a bruise at his rib cage that looks like a handprint. 

The soldier says, “now you get to watch how well she takes my cock.” 

Seven hits his head against the wall. Puts his weight into it. 

Pain throbs behind his eye but the hallucinations don’t slow down. A soldier is standing in front of him. 

It’s a different soldier, that one from the training exercise. The one that Seven had hesitated to kill. 

He smiles up at him, wavy brown hair and crinkles by his eyes that imply he isn’t a stranger to smiling. He isn’t wearing the uniform Seven remembers him in but his own set of prison greys. 

What was his name? He said it to Seven. He recognized him. 

He doesn’t look up at Seven with even a hint of fear — if he were even a little afraid, Seven would be able to smell it on him. He isn’t a stranger to people being afraid of him. That’s been his entire life, as far back as he can remember. Even the soldiers, always putting on brave faces, hands steady as they point their guns at Seven, stink of fear when they get too close. 

Not this guy. He smiles up at Seven like he smiles all the time, like it comes naturally to him. He says, enthusiastic, “nicely done, big guy!” 

Seven looks down slowly, at the intricately folded paper cradled delicately in one of his calloused palms. He has no idea what it’s supposed to be. Couldn’t even begin to guess. 

“Aww,” the soldier says. “He’s gonna love it, dude.” 

“What is it?” Seven asks, looking down at the crinkled folds of paper and back up at the soldier. 

His eyes twinkle as he says, “tell him you made him a paper wren.” 

Seven sees white. A flash of light behind his eyelids not unlike being shot in the face, but he doesn’t know why or where it comes from and staggers back, just a step, before that white heat bursts in his gut, too, and he vomits. 

When he lifts his head, the soldier is gone and he’s looking at himself again, another version of himself he doesn’t recognize. His hair is knotted at the nape of his neck and there are lines carved out of his cheeks by his mouth as he smiles, embarrassed, at his ghost. 

“A wren,” he says. 

The little ghost gasps quietly, cradling that folded paper in his hands like it was something precious. “A wren,” he breathes, and Seven’s stomach turns violently. “You made this?” 

“For you,” Seven says. 

The ghost looks up at him, still so carefully cradling the paper bird, and the look he gives him makes Seven, from the outside, feel like he’s watching something that he’s not supposed to. That he’s intruding on something private. 

Quickly, he looks away. Too quickly, he looks away, and the room turns with him, knocking him off balance. His back hits the ground with enough force to knock the wind out of him and when he blinks dazed light out of his eye and looks up he’s looking into the barrel of a gun. 

It’s that same soldier that hurt him and his ghost. His hand is steady and his finger is poised on the trigger. 

“You,” he says, “have been a very bad dog.” He keeps the gun pointed into the eye socket that Seven has always known to be empty. As far back as he can remember, he’s only ever had one eye. Is this how he lost it? Is this a memory? 

Who the fuck is this guy? 

Crouching at Seven’s side, he tells him, “for your disobedience,” soft and private, “I am going to put you down. Then,” and he smiles, an unnatural smile, one that doesn’t reach his eyes, “I’m going to make your whore girlfriend suck your blood off my fingers as I spread her open and fuck her over your ugly corpse. And I will not be gentle with her,” he tells him, just as soft but severe, a promise. “She will be begging me to stop.” 

Not quite a memory, but an instinct, that same one that was making his skin prickle before, an anger he must have carried with him from his last life even if he never quite realized he was still holding it. Seven doesn’t remember this guy but he remembers how much he fuckin’ hates him. He remembers this for certain. 

He reaches for him. 

He gets shot in the face. 

For a second, the pain is unbearable, indescribable, and just as quickly it’s gone. After being shot at point blank range, Seven feels the pressure in his face and tastes the gunpowder in his throat and then his concrete prison comes back into focus and he’s sitting with his back against the wall. 

His hair is sticking to the sides of his throat and he doesn’t know if it’s with blood or with sweat. Both, likely. His chest is heaving and his hands are shaking, but his hands are always shaking and he twists them into the filthy material of his joggers in frustration. Uneasy and unpleasant, his heartbeat thunders in his chest and the side of his throat. To try and slow it, he throws his head back into the concrete wall as hard as he can. 

He wants it to stop. How can he make it stop? 

He doesn’t want to know. Not anymore. Not if it feels like this. 

He hits his head again with a force that makes his teeth rattle. Even in the short span of lifetime he remembers, all he’s known is violence. Violence, and this lonely grey room. He’d maimed and mutilated, dismembered and decapitated, crushed and carved. He’d been shot, stabbed, skinned. He’d bled and been beaten to death. He’d died. 

It’s never felt like this. Every time Seven has died it’s been bloody and brutal and miserable, but it never felt like this. Never. Something he doesn’t recognize expands in his chest, pressing so hard against the inside of his ribcage it feels like it might push it right through his flesh. Restless, it thrums beneath his skin. 

Seven lives and breathes carnage. Whatever happened to him in his past life, whatever he might’ve done, whatever it is that he doesn’t remember, does it matter? In this life, in the one that Seven knows, he sits alone in the dark and pisses in the corner until it’s time for him to hunt. Seven is good at killing, but that’s all he’s good for. Whatever he might’ve been is gone. Whoever that soldier had seen, the one he hadn’t been able to kill, that isn’t who Seven is, not really. He doesn’t even have a fuckin’ name. 

He isn’t smart. There’s a part of his brain that remembers something, that is trying so hard to tell him something, but Seven is too goddamn stupid to figure out what it is. Seven is so goddamn stupid that it hurts the more that he tries, not just the useless meat that passes as his brain but in his chest, in his heart and his lungs. The more he tries to think the deeper the pain settles, an infection that’s spreading, that’s making him weak. The only thing Seven has is slaughter and trying to remember is taking that from him, too. He wasn’t even shot, not really, he’s losing his mind alone, but his throat still sticks as he swallows like he’s scared. Fuckin’ scared. 

He wants it to stop. How can he make it stop? 

He hits head again. He can feel his scalp split against the concrete. 

In his past life, the door to his cell is opened. 

That same soldier enters, the one that had shot him. Seven’s reaction to him is visceral. 

It’s that same instinct, the one that might be a memory, the same one that made Seven reach for his throat. It isn’t fear. That horrible, helpless feeling is quelled as soon as the door grinds open, washed away by the fury that rises in him like a fever. He might not remember this guy, but his hatred for him transcends what Seven remembers. He hates him so completely it isn’t in his brain but carried with him in the marrow of his bones, interwoven into his altered DNA. 

Slowly, Seven tips his head back against the wall, lip pulling away from his teeth. 

From just inside the door, from safely outside reaching distance, the soldier regards him with a cold sort of disgust. Then, too quick, it’s gone, replaced with a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes, that’s stretched too wide for his mouth. The way it pulls at his face makes Seven’s skin crawl with disgust. “I have a surprise for you.” 

Silently, Seven raises his eyebrows. The concrete had scrubbed most of the skin from his forehead and brow bone and a fresh rush of blood leaks down his face, pooling, hot, between ridges of scar tissue. 

The soldier’s smile tilts, a sneer, and it looks a lot more natural on his face. Just as quickly, he pulls it back into a creepy imitation of a grin, and he turns. In Seven’s memory, he watches as the soldier swipes his key card and leaves. It’s a really anticlimactic surprise and a really useless memory. Why would he need to remember this? 

Seven has just a time to think that maybe none of these are memories at all. How would he know any different? He’d been trusting they must be some kind of memory, that they had to be, because they were all things he didn’t know or people he didn’t remember. How could he have come up with those things on his own? But Seven lives in isolation and the dark. Seven is a freak and a monster. Seven lives in a cage in his own filth and is released only for slaughter. That’s all there is to his life and he doesn’t know anything more than that. How does he know he didn’t come up with all these things on his own? Maybe it’s all just nonsense. Why is he choosing to believe somebody he knows doesn’t fuckin’ know anything? 

Except the door opens again. The soldier returns. This time, behind him, he’s dragging the limp body of Seven’s ghost. 

Whatever it is that was expanding in Seven’s chest starts to crack his ribs from underneath. The infection spreads to his blood stream. He can’t take a full breath in. His hands shake a little worse with the cold that’s seeping under his skin, into the tissue and the marrow of his bones. 

Fear. It isn’t dying that scares Seven. It’s not the soldiers. Head tipped back against the wall, Seven watches his ghost get dragged against the concrete, and he’s scared. This scares him. 

Why does this scare him? What is this? 

The soldier has one of his gloves hands twisted into the ghost’s long, bloody hair. He’s breathing, but he’s limp, eyes closed and bruised and swollen, wrists and ankles knotted so slightly the skin around the binds had split open. He’s naked, bruised skin rubbed raw against the concrete. 

“Surprise,” the soldier says. “You get to watch me impregnate your whore.” 

That thing in Seven’s chest had started to leak acid and it tastes like bile at the back of his throat. “Get your fuckin’ hands off him,” he spits, and surprises even himself with the bass of his voice. 

The soldier, however, only grins. “Off her?” He says, eyebrows raised in good humour. “Just wait till you see the parts of me that are going to be inside her.” 

It’s instinct more than anything else that makes Seven try to get up. He doesn’t even think about it. Where the soldier’s hand is twisted into the ghost’s hair, it’s thinned so much Seven can see the scalp beneath, crusted with scabs, and it’s a tug in his chest that tries to pull him away from the wall. 

The curved meat hooks sunk deep into his flesh pull him back into place. 

With a snarl, Seven looks down at himself, and he’s fucked. He’s fucked. What could he ever have done to deserve this? His throat and his hands are both shackled to different spots on the floor. His back, chest, sides, and shoulders are secured to the walls and the ceiling with meat hooks poking out from deep within his tissue and muscle. He tries to push himself off the wall and the sound is wet as a strip of flesh is pulled audibly off his back. He snarls again. This is fucked. This seems more like a memory he would really have. 

The soldier watches him with one of his wide, fucked up smiles, untangling his fingers from the ghost’s bloody hair. Limp, he falls to the concrete face down, and the soldier is quick to kick his legs apart, not taking his eyes off of Seven. 

“No,” he snarls, and tries to pull away from the wall again, tearing a chunk of muscle out of his shoulder. “Get the fuck away from him,” he spits. 

The soldier smiles a little wider. “You won’t like the things you see me do to her,” he tells him. “I promise.” 

With a roar, Seven lunges, but this time, he slides away from the wall so easily he almost stumbles. Standing straight, he rolls out his shoulders and looks down at his ghost, clean and dressed in a set of Seven’s prison greys. He’s alone and unbruised, his hair pulled into a neat braid over one shoulder. He’s standing just close enough that it makes Seven uneasy. 

“You must be the weapon,” he says. 

He’s even more beautiful up close and the feeling it gives Seven is eerily reminiscent of fear. He tries to swallow around the feeling but he can’t speak. He nods. 

“Robin told me about you,” he says, and he smiles up at Seven, who has no idea who Robin might be. But — 

But could Robin be a real person? Is Seven remembering? 

He feels like he’s been hit really hard in the head. 

His ghost smiles, the single most beautiful thing Seven has ever seen. The brightest, too, after a life underground, and he squints as he looks down at him. 

He says, “I’m Wren,” in his strange, syrupy accent. 

Seven sees a flash of white before the ground is pulled out from under him. 

He sat, slumped in the shower, head against the tile, hair sticking to his chest. Water beat against the exposed meat of his flesh, stripped of most of his skin. Chunks of tissue clogged the drain. 

It was hard for him to keep holding his head up. He’d lost so much blood. 

His ghost sat with him, kneeling in the water in a set of Seven’s hospital greys. His tears were washed down the drain with the blood and the water. He was clinging to one of Seven’s hands. It was definitely broken but he didn’t tell the ghost it hurt. He didn’t want him to stop touching him. “I don’t want you to keep dying for me,” he whispered. “I don’t want to watch you die anymore.” 

“My Wren,” Seven said, lifting his other, trembling hand to cradle Wren’s cheek, so soft against his palm. “I’m gonna die for you as many times as I need to.” 

Looking up at Seven from one of the mismatched couches in the common room, Wren had smiled so brightly it had knocked the wind out of him. Sitting at the ground at his feet, his back against the bottom of the couch, he’d been winded again when Wren had reached out to tuck a stray hair behind his ear and say, “your hair looks really handsome like that.” 

“Little Wren,” Seven said honestly, “you’re so beautiful it makes you really weird looking. Kinda creeps me out sometimes.” 

Wren laughed loudly and it was the most beautiful sound Seven had ever heard. How could he have ever forgotten it? “Thank you,” he said. “That’s very sweet.” 

He’d been wedged into a bed not big enough for the bulk of him, Wren tucked safely under his arm. His head pillowed on Seven’s chest, one of his small hands twisted tightly into the material of his sweatshirt as he cried, fiercely stubborn. 

“My Wren,” he said against his hair, rubbing his back slowly. “You should want better for yourself than me.” 

“Stop it, Silas,” Wren said into his crewneck, firm despite the tears Seven could feel starting to soak through the material. “I want you. I don’t want anything but you.” 

Silas?

Standing alone in the centre of his room, Seven vomits all over himself. 

[katwritesshit]

Me: yeah my character is actually really nuanced and multi-faceted, but im scared to talk about him because i feel like people will just baby him :/

Also me talking about him: And THIS is my darling precious baby boy who's never done ANYTHING wrong hes just my lil itsy bitsy boy <33333333

[altschmerzes]

🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹

here's a clip from, as a bit of a curveball bc i was just recently reminded people also care for this project of mine and so very much do i, my gideon the ninth 'fix it but break it way worse first' resurrection fic :)

so, from my dead are mine (and yours as well as mine), from very far ahead in chapter 9, after the dust has settled and we all have to figure out what to do now, how to interact with each other in this weird new normal we're arriving to:

“Silas!” It’s impossible to tell which of the Fourth had been the one to holler the name from far across the room, and it takes Harrow a few moments to realize that this is because it hadn’t been one of them at all. The voice had been two voices, Jeannemary and Isaac yelling over in twin tandem, melting together into one high bird’s call that aims to summon the boy over to them for some unknown purpose. Glancing at Silas, Harrow is not surprised to see the hard, stone expression on his face or the rigid stiffness in his body. Colum is the only person she has ever heard refer to him by his first name. Harrow doesn’t know what sort of operation they’re running in the Fourth or Fifth, but she can’t imagine it’s smiled upon to take that sort of liberty in the Eighth House. He doesn’t react at first, just stands there and stares across the room at them. At his sides, Silas’s hands are held in tight fists.

“Silas, come here!” This time it’s just Jeannemary, exasperation tinging her voice as she yells to be heard from where she and Isaac stand, almost outside the room entirely. Harrow is not the only one who’s noticed the way Silas has reacted to them. Abigail, who’s seemed to materialize out of nowhere for the dozenth time, leading Harrow to wonder if that might be some kind of special necromancy they teach you in her House, gets his attention with a light touch to one tense shoulder. He gives a very faint, almost imperceptible twitch that Harrow might not have noticed if she hadn’t herself bit back enough flinches to know what it looks like when one is just barely not all the way smothered. “They mean it well,” Abigail tells him. Her own voice is quiet, deliberately kept low enough not to be heard by the teens she refers to. The sound of the words and the look on her face is not quite a warning, but it’s not quite not a warning either. “That’s probably our fault, Magnus and I. We’ve never been formal with them. But they mean it well.” There’s no reply. Silas barely glances at her before he’s looking back across at Jeannemary and Isaac, still impatiently waiting for him at the doorway. “If you must correct them,” Abigail goes on, once it becomes clear that he’s not going to say anything, “I’d ask you please do so kindly.” This time she gets an answer, if only in the form of a quick, sharp dip of Silas’s chin. He nods to Abigail, ignores Harrow completely, then starts across the room to where two pairs of hands have started to beckon him, waving in the air like they might physically pull him over faster by doing so. If Silas says anything to them about the name, rebukes them for using it or orders them never to call him such a thing again, he doesn’t do it within earshot, even of Harrow’s sharpened hearing. The only thing that filters through the doorway in that deep, resounding voice unmistakable for anyone else, is, “What is it, then?”

[em-writes-stuff]

Flufftober + Whumptober day 3

prompts: "wait, you love me?" / "I always have" + solitary confinement + journal

711 words

warnings: cursing, spoiled food, hospital-like setting

characters: silas gable, isadora harper, holden florence

~

Scratch rolls the fabric of its shirt between her fingers and puffs her cheeks. It looks over her shoulder at the boarded up window and the bedside table with a plate of food sitting on it. Sighing, she slides down in the bed and pulls a blanket up to her chin. She stares at the locked door and prays that, this time, its unlocked when it wakes up. 

-

Silas shouts at Holden, begging them to let him see Scratch. “Just fucking unboard the window!” he begs. “I need to see her and let it know she’s not totally alone! Please!” 

Holden shakes his head and puts his hands on Silas’ shoulders. They lead him away from the cabin and hand him a cup of tea. “We have to make sure Kaya didn’t do anything to her that’ll hurt us, too. Just another day or so and then you can see it. I promise.” 

Silas looks at him, brows knit together in worry, “It’s been a week. Don’t you think that something would show by now?” he takes a drink from the cup and takes a deep breath. “And why does Dough get to bring her food in? He’s at more risk than I am, he doesn’t even have magic. I do, I’m protected.” 

Holden sits next to Silas and takes a drink from his cup, “Beau almost shut down when Scratch left him here to save you. The only reason he’s up and doing stuff is because of the two minutes he gets to see her.” 

“Fine, whatever,” He mutters, staring into his cup. He thinks for a second and sets the cup down, “Can I at least write her a letter or something? Then Dough can give it to her with her food and she knows I haven’t been ignoring it?” 

Holden sighs, but eventually nods. “Something short, she’s still pretty worn out.” 

“Of course, I only know how to write a few words.” 

-

Scratch wakes up to a new plate of old food. A stale sandwich, browned apple that’s been cut in half, some sort of stew with a film over it and a cup of water. She shuffles the apple around on the plate and swirls the spoon in the stew, wrinkling her nose at the smell. 

It sets the bowl to the side and picks up the sandwich. Under the plate, there’s a corner of a piece of paper. Scratch tilts its head and lifts the plate up, pulling the paper from under it. She unfolds the paper and smiles warmly at the sight of Silas’ sloppy handwriting. 

Its a paper he’d ripped from her journal and his script is scrawled across the page. 

“Scratch, 

   Holden said I could write you something short, but I don’t really know their definition. I hope you’re doing alright in there, I can barely go a night without hearing someone snoring, let alone an entire week. 

   Holden said you’ll probably be able to leave there in a few days, as soon as he rules everything on the face of the earth off his list. If it’s too long, I’ll break you out. I’d stop eating the cheese on the sandwich, people have been getting sick. 

   I have to go now, Dough’s waiting for me to finish this so he can give it to you. With love, Silas” 

She smiles softly, folds the paper and holds it close to its chest. She picks the cheese off the sandwich and turns her nose up at the small spots of mold on it. Carefully, she scrapes the color off of the meat and puts the sandwich back together. 

-

The next day, Holden takes the wooden planks off of the window and lets Silas poke his head through, “Hey.” 

“Hey!” Scratch says, rising from the bed. “I didn’t think I’d see you for a while. How’d you convince them?” 

He shrugs his shoulders and puts a finger over his mouth, “It’s a secret.” 

She smirks and rolls her eyes playfully. “So…” she says, unfolding the letter and tapping on the last sentence. “You love me?” 

“Duh,” he says, leaning against the wall and putting his arm through the window, “I always have.” 

Carefully, she laces its fingers with his and smiles. “I love you, too.”

[birdcatt]

oh yeahh i wrote this

it was originally going to be a drawn comic but i changed my mind because i wanted to write something <- has not written in a while

heres a lad

[lucius-the-sinful]

i already have ideas for rewrites for 99 again oop

[neptunerunaway]

Me: planning out an incredibly toxic and unhealthy relationship, going over the very specifics of how their dynamic is horrible for them both while dragging the other down into their specific hell with them and knowing the best thing for them both would for them to never see each other again.

Also me: but what if I gave them a happy ending together? Can they not learn to be better and grow beyond their past ways?

Once again, also me: But the drama! both of them being forced to move on with their lives without the other! The agonizingly slow, grief-filled process to moving on!