#still... really scraping the bottom of the barrel here huh

[camelpimp]

I guess I never realized how bad the mobage/gacha situation was until I saw that they made a fucking Arc the Lad gacha

[akiisp]

"The new snake"

Slytherin x reader|| One-shot

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Summary: She came to Hogwarts with a reputation; expelled from her last school, a temper like fire, and fists that spoke louder than her wand. Nobody knew the full story — and she didn’t owe them one. But Hogwarts wasn’t any better. The Gryffindors made sure of that. Mockery, hexes, sabotage — it didn’t stop. Until one day, she stopped holding back. With blood on her knuckles and rumors in her wake, she didn’t just earn detention — she earned the famous Slytherin’s attention. They weren’t just impressed — they were all in.

Chaos didn’t follow her. She was the chaos.

Warnings: Contains bullying, physical violence, emotional manipulation, mentions of blood

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The Hogwarts rumor mill was working overtime. Whispers followed her through every hallway like shadows:

“Did you hear about the new Slytherin?”

“She got kicked out of her last school… for fighting.”

“I heard she knocked out three students with one curse.”

Truth be told, no one knew the full story. And she preferred it that way.

But Hogwarts wasn't much of a fresh start when the bullies came knocking — especially the Gryffindors.

It started small. A few snide comments. Looks. A trip jinx here and there. But then came the Weasley twins. Everyone laughed at their pranks — unless you were the target. Their “jokes” always seemed to hit harder when they were aimed at her. Paint bombs in her bag. Stinging hexes. A cursed quill that inked “SNAKE” across her face.

Ron wasn’t much better — constant emotional digs. “No wonder they kicked you out.” “Even Slytherin had to scrape the bottom of the barrel, huh?”

And Cormac McLaggen? He took it too far. Every single time. Too close, too loud, too smug.

She tried to keep her mother’s tear-stained face in mind — the only reason she was still keeping her fists down. Her mum had cried when she got expelled. “Please, no more fighting.”

But peace is hard when war is walking beside you.

The castle was quiet. A few students lingered near the arches, chatting lazily. A trio of Hufflepuff girls leaned against the wall, flipping through magazines. Two Ravenclaw boys sat on the steps nearby, mid-conversation.

She was walking alone when it started.

“Oi! Slytherin psycho!” Cormac McLaggen’s voice rang out like a curse.

She stopped, jaw tightening.

He strode toward her with that obnoxious strut, hands in his pockets and a smirk too wide to be harmless.

“You know, I’ve been wondering,” he said, circling her like a vulture, “what did you do to get kicked out of that last school? Curse a professor? Or did you finally lose it and break someone’s spine?”

A couple students were turning to watch now. The Hufflepuff girls stopped giggling. The Ravenclaws went quiet.

Cormac leaned in, dropping his voice just enough to make it more vicious.

“Or maybe you just couldn’t keep that freak temper of yours under control. Bet even your own house was scared of you. You’re not a Slytherin — you’re a liability with a wand.”

She stared at him. Stone still. Breathing steady.

He smirked wider, thinking he won.

“You gonna snap again? Come on then, show us all what a real threat looks like—”

She moved.

A blur of fists and fury, she shoved him back into the wall with a crack. One hit. Two. Blood.

The Hufflepuff girls screamed. A Ravenclaw ran for help. But no one moved fast enough.

She was on top of him, hands curled tight, every punch louder than the last.

“They expelled me for less than this. Want to see what I really got kicked out for?”

By the time a professor dragged her off him, Cormac’s face was a wreck, her hands were full of blood but not hers. Students stood frozen, eyes wide.

No one said a word.

Snape’s eyes were cold, but something about the tilt of his head… it wasn’t just discipline.

“Would you care to explain,” he drawled, “why you saw fit to launch yourself onto Mr. McLaggen in the middle of the hallway?”

Her voice was steady. “Gryffindors have been harassing me for weeks. I held back for as long as I could.”

A beat of silence. Snape looked at her, and for just a second, his mask slipped. He saw himself — years ago, tormented in shadows by laughing lions.

“…Three weeks detention,” he said quietly. “And twenty points from Gryffindor for instigating.”

By Monday morning, Hogwarts was ablaze with new gossip.

“Did you hear the new girl beat the shit out of McLaggen?” Blaise Zabini said, sliding into the Slytherin common room with a smirk.

“Oh, I heard,” Mattheo Riddle said, eyebrows raised. “She snapped his nose clean in two.”

Theodore Nott whistled. “Not bad.”

Blaise grinned. “That was genius.”

Pansy twirled her wand and smiled dreamily. “She’s very pretty… pretty dangerous. I like her.”

Draco, lounging in his chair, let out a low chuckle. "Finally, someone in this school with an actual spine."

The classroom was electric with whispers the moment she walked in.

Even without looking, she could feel eyes on her — some curious, others wary. Her knuckles were still bruised. Her reputation?

Officially carved into Hogwarts stone.

The legend of McLaggen’s broken face was still fresh, still hot.

Professor Snape stood at the front, robes shifting as he surveyed the class. “Wands out,” he said sharply. “We’re dueling today.”

Snape’s eyes flicked over the class. “Nott. Macmillan. Zabini. Finch-Fletchley.” Names were rattled off, pairs forming. Then his gaze lingered on her.

“…And L/N,” he drawled.

She stepped forward, eyes locked ahead.

“Versus…” He looked to the Gryffindor side with something close to disgust. “Morgan.”

A lanky Gryffindor boy stepped forward — smug, wand already twirling between his fingers.

“Shouldn’t she be in detention?” he muttered to his mates. “Not in a duel.”

Snape heard. “Do try not to embarrass your house, Morgan.”

She took her stance silently. Controlled. Focused. Not angry — not yet.

“Begin.”

The duel was fast.

He fired first, a showy jinx meant more to impress the room than win. She sidestepped it easily, her counter-spell tight, efficient — no flashy nonsense, just power and precision.

He tried again. She blocked it. Dodged another.

And then, one clean flick of her wand — Expelliarmus — and his wand flew from his hand and clattered against the wall.

He stumbled back, red-faced and furious.

The class gasped. Someone whistled.

Snape didn’t smile, but he looked… satisfied.

His eyes met hers with something bordering on approval. “Ten points to Slytherin.”

The Gryffindors glared. Then applause — but only from Slytherin.

Mattheo let out a low whistle. “That was a textbook.”

Blaise leaned back in his chair, arms crossed. “She fights like she’s been in real duels.”

Pansy twirled her wand, eyes sparkling. “She’s chaos. I adore her.”

Theodore looked genuinely impressed. “She doesn’t miss.”

Draco let out an impressed chuckle.

No one said it outright, but the shift was obvious.

She wasn’t just the new girl anymore.

The dungeons were quieter than usual, but the buzz hadn’t died down — if anything, it had grown.

She stepped into the common room, hands still bandaged from McLaggen, shoulders loose from that clean win against Morgan. Heads turned. Conversations paused. But no one said anything. Not until—

“There she is.” Blaise, lounging like royalty across the emerald velvet couch, gave her a lazy grin. “Cormac’s still eating soup, I hear. No solid food. Impressive.”

She arched a brow, but said nothing.

Mattheo sat cross-legged on the carpet, flipping a silver sickle between his fingers. “Snapped his nose, dodged every detention hex, then took down Morgan like it was a warm-up round. You’ve had… quite the week.”

Theodore Nott looked up from his book with a ghost of a smirk. “Bet she’s the one who turned the Gryffindor locker room into a goblin’s lavatory.”

She blinked — once — and didn’t deny it.

Mattheo barked a laugh. “Knew it.”

Pansy practically slid onto the seat beside her, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “You’re not just pretty. You’re strategic. That’s a dangerous combination.”

The room chuckled.

She let the silence stretch a second longer, then finally spoke.

“They started it.”

The group nodded like that was the only explanation needed.

Blaise leaned forward, interest sharpening. “What did you really get expelled for, though?”

She just smiled — slow, unreadable.

Mattheo nudged Theo. “We’ll get it out of her eventually.”

Pansy rolled her eyes. “Or she’ll murder you in your sleep.”

Blaise grinned. “Worth the risk.”

Draco, who’d been sitting on the other side of the couch, legs crossed, looked up from where he’d been tossing a quill between his fingers.

“Honestly,” he said casually, “if I knew she’d deck McLaggen like that, I would've saved her a seat weeks ago.”

Theo snorted. “You’re only saying that because she did what you almost did last year.”

Draco shrugged. “Difference is, she actually followed through.”

Laughter rolled through the group again — easy, natural. No judgment, no hesitation. And just like that… the new girl wasn’t just a rumor anymore.

She was a storm — and Slytherin? They had just found their new queen.

[kikyoupdates]

Love Bite ⭑˚🩸⭑ 𝑓𝑖𝑟𝑠𝑡 𝑏𝑖𝑡𝑒

yandere!vampires x f!reader

yandere, reverse harem, original characters, vampire!ocs x fem!reader

Desperate for money to pay off your debts, you sign up for a program that allows you to sell your blood to vampires. At first, everything is fine, and you’re finally able to make ends meet. But they soon begin craving more than just your blood.

story masterlist | next

Certain people are dealt a shittier hand in life than others, and unfortunately, you are one of those people.

Life has never been easy for you. As far back as you can remember, it's been one shitstorm after the other. Your parents are as good as dead to you, because all they ever did was make reckless choices and run away, leaving you to clean up their mess. That's how, at the young age of twenty, you've already got more debt than the average person could ever fathom.

Still, you make do. You hustle as best you can to get through one day and move on to the next. It's exhausting, and sometimes it feels like you're ready to give up, but against all odds, you persevere.

"That'll be 50 credits," the cashier says.

You let out a sigh and give her your card. Everything is so goddamn expensive these days. Even a simple grocery trip feels like a big slap in the face.

"Oh. Sorry," she blinks. "It's been declined. Do you have any other form of payment on hand?"

Shit. This one too?

You mumble an apology and dig through your wallet again. Thankfully, you happen to have enough cash to cover the cost. Just barely.

"Thank you for shopping with us," the cashier recites monotonously. She packs your groceries in a bag and hands it to you, then gestures for the next customer to step forward.

You leave the store the same as always, feeling worn-down and discouraged. You'll have to apply for a new card, but who knows when they'll send it to you. Goddammit. You're already scraping the bottom of the barrel as is. You hardly have enough emergency savings to last until then.

It's a shitty day, and unfortunately for you, it's about to get even worse.

"[Name]," a distinct, familiar voice mutters. You flinch at the sound, nearly dropping your grocery bag in the process. There's a man standing outside your apartment complex. A man that always makes your stomach crease in discomfort.

You instinctively step back. "I don't want any trouble, Johnny. Please, can I just get through?"

He ignores you and walks over, and while you stand there, stiff from fright, he peeks into your grocery bag and hums, visibly amused.

"Not exactly a lavish dinner," he chuckles. "But I guess you've got no choice but to be frugal, huh?"

"I just want to go home," you plead. "Please. Don't do this."

Alas, Johnny has never been one to give a shit about your circumstances, and today is no exception.

"I haven't been getting the money you promised me," he glares. "You've been late on your payments, and I'm really starting to lose my patience here."

You try to protest, but he wraps his hand around your throat and forcibly pins you against a wall. He isn't applying too much pressure, not yet, but the threat is there all the same.

"You owe me money, [Name]." His pupils constrict, a telltale sign that he's furious. "I'm done with your shitty excuses. If you can't make good on your promises, then you pay the price. This is the way the world works."

He holds you there, just so he can watch you whimper and cower in fear, then he eventually releases his hold on you and steps away.

"I'm giving you one more week," he says. "If you don't come up with the amount we agreed on in one week, I might seriously have to kill you. And don't even think of running away like your parents did. I'm sure as hell not gonna make the same mistake twice."

Johnny walks off with a steady, relaxed gait and his hands buried in his pockets. It's that easy for him. He can threaten an innocent woman and not think anything of it, the sick bastard.

You sniffle and resist the urge to cry. Fuck your parents. All they ever did was ruin your life. You have no idea where they're hiding right now, but for their own sake, they had better not show their faces around you ever again.

Still. There's no point in lamenting what can't be changed. Your parents are gone. It's up to you to remedy this situation and pay that disgusting loan shark back.

The question is, how?

How in the world will you pull that off? You barely make enough to eat two meals a day and cover your rent, let alone the steep cost of your debts.

It just seems like a lost cause. You've been working yourself to the bone, but you still can't even make a dent in what your parents owe. It's all too much to bear. It makes you want to forfeit your life entirely. At least then, you might finally be able to rest in peace.

Weighed down by the hopelessness of your situation, you trudge into your crappy studio apartment, chuck the groceries in the fridge, and plop down on the couch, defeated.

I guess it's time to look for another job. Something I can squeeze into my schedule. I can probably survive without sleeping a few days in a row, right?

You chuckle brokenly and scroll through your phone, looking for anything you might have a shot at. Finding a good job in this city is yet another hopeless dream for someone like you, who didn't go to college and doesn't have any other notable qualifications. All of your current jobs may as well be paying you dirt, which is why you can never meet Johnny's ridiculous demands.

You're just about to give up and go make yourself a rather pathetic dinner, when suddenly, something catches your eye.

[𝗡𝗘𝗪 𝗣𝗥𝗢𝗚𝗥𝗔𝗠 𝗟𝗔𝗨𝗡𝗖𝗛]: 𝗕𝗹𝗼𝗼𝗱 𝗱𝗼𝗻𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝘄𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗱. 𝗦𝘂𝗰𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗳𝘂𝗹 𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗹𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗰𝗼𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝘃𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗶𝗿𝗲 𝗰𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘇𝗲𝗻𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗮𝗻 𝗮𝘀-𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗲𝗱 𝗯𝗮𝘀𝗶𝘀.

Vampires. Not long ago, a law was passed, granting vampires access to the city. More and more of them seem to be moving here, the central hub of the country. Of course, most people felt uncomfortable with this change, but it seems to be a necessary step in fighting back against years of discrimination. Humans naturally fear vampires, and the government is doing everything it can to integrate them into society.

Since drinking blood by force is considered a crime, this program is most likely a way for vampires to obtain their blood safely and without any consequence, just so long as people are willing to sign up for it.

You take a moment to assess your situation. You have almost no money to your name, and there's a greedy loan shark that's just itching to torture you if you fail to pay him back in time. If you don't get some money, and fast, you're probably headed for the afterlife.

That being said, you've never encountered a vampire before. You've heard all sorts of horror stories about them. That they're physically stronger than humans, have more acute senses, and could easily bludgeon you to death if they wanted to.

But even if that's actually true, how is it any different than what Johnny will do to you if you don't pay him back?

You press your lips together. Perhaps there's no harm in trying at least once and seeing how it'll go. It's not like you're guaranteed to get accepted for the program anyways. And besides, this is being implemented by the government, so surely, they won't allow any humans to come to harm in the process.

Above all else, you are incredibly desperate, with very little to lose.

So, you decide to take a gamble.

𝗔𝗣𝗣𝗟𝗬 [𝗫]?

...

Your luck might finally be changing for the better, or maybe they're just desperate for applicants, but either way, you got the job.

It was a bit tedious. The screening process was rather lengthy, and they made you do quite a few medical tests to ensure you didn't have any infectious diseases or anything like that. You suppose having a clean bill of health is the one thing required for this position, considering you'll be giving your blood to someone else. Thankfully, even though your life is shit, you've always been rather sturdy, which is the only reason you've lasted this long.

You're currently walking through a glossy white corridor. The building you're in is polished and sleek, some kind of medical company that's been researching vampires for quite a long time. They call themselves Plasma Inc., which is a bit tacky, but you're certainly in no position to judge.

The doctor escorting you holds a clipboard against his chest, and glances over at you every so often.

"We're almost there," he says. After a brief pause, he adds, "There's no need to be nervous."

Honestly, you're a little nervous, but only because you've never done this before. Giving your blood to a vampire... it all sounds so farfetched. You really didn't think this was something you'd ever be doing.

But beggars can't afford to be choosers.

"For the client's privacy and peace of mind, there aren't any cameras inside the room. We will not be able to see or hear anything that happens in there. You signed the confidentiality clause, so please keep in mind that you will be liable for any private information that you happen to disclose."

You knew as much going into this. There's no point in psyching yourself out. Everything's going to be fine. This is all perfectly safe.

...it should be, at least.

"Whenever you're ready," the doctor says. He's stopped in front of a door, and you instinctively gulp as you imagine what—or rather, who—is on the other side.

Okay, then. No reason to back out now. You chose this. It's a desperate measure, and sure, you'll lose a bit of blood in the process, but if it helps you pay off your debt and get back on your feet, then it's easily worth it.

"I'm ready," you say.

The doctor nods briefly, offers you an encouraging smile, then opens the door.

It closes behind you right away, and your eyes instinctively search the room until they land on a motionless, seated figure.

It's a man. Well, a vampire, but still a man. Deep down, you'd been hoping that it might be a woman. A man seems somewhat more intimidating, although you suppose all vampires are stronger than humans, so it wouldn't have made a difference either way.

He's beautiful, though. Vampires are scarce in numbers, and they don't usually go out during the day, so it's unlikely that you would have ever passed by one. But you've only ever heard people speak of them in frightening terms. Never in a million years did you imagine they'd be so utterly gorgeous. Or perhaps this particular vampire is simply an exception.

You don't quite realize how much time you've spent fawning over his appearance until he suddenly stands up.

Instinctively, you flinch, and it's clear that it doesn't go unnoticed.

He narrows his eyes. "If you're not comfortable doing this, you're welcome to leave. I was told that the humans who signed up for this program were all completely willing. I have no intention of taking your blood without your full cooperation."

"Oh. S-Sorry," you stammer. "I'm not uncomfortable. I guess I'm just a little bit starstruck. It's my first time meeting a vampire."

"There's no need to gawk at me. I'm not some animal trapped inside a cage."

He has a rather harsh tongue, but again, you're in no position to judge. Perhaps your reaction offended him, unintentional as it may have been.

"Sorry," you say again, then you offer him a weak smile. "Um... I'm [Name]. I'm not really sure what the etiquette for this sort of thing is, but it's nice to meet you."

It takes him a while to respond. He studies you quietly with those mesmerizing eyes of his, and the silence is awkward, to say the least.

"I'm Xavier," he finally replies. He frowns a bit. "But I didn't come here to chat. If you're ready, I'll like to move on with this as soon as possible."

Right. He's here for the same reason you are. It's not an opportunity for the two of you to exchange pleasantries.

You're here to sell your blood, and he's here to drink it.

"Okay," you swallow. Now that it's come down to it, you can feel your heart beating faster by the second. But this is fine. This is nothing. Compared to all the shit you've already been through, this may as well be a walk in the park.

You walk over to him, taking slow, careful steps, then you sit down in one of the chairs. He does the same, staring at you without blinking the whole time. You watch as he shuffles a bit closer, and he uses his fingers to pull down the collar of your shirt slightly. You shiver at the sensation of his skin brushing against yours. God, his hands are cold.

Xavier stares right into your eyes. "This is your last chance to back out. If you tell me to stop now, I will, but otherwise, I'll take it that you've agreed to move on."

"I'm fine," you reassure. Despite the fact that your stomach is a bundle of nerves right now, you're determined to press on. You need this. There's simply no other option.

You'll do whatever it takes to live on, even if it means selling the very essence that grants you life in the first place.

"Okay," Xavier says, and he wraps an arm around your waist, pulling you closer. His jaw unhinges, and the last thing you see before you squeeze your eyes shut is the pearly-white color of his bright, glistening fangs.

He bites into your neck.  

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[arcanechariot]

🎬 chariot watch - x-men apocalypse

we really are scraping the bottom of the barrel, huh?

fuck it, let's look at the blue man group

ngl i never watched this bc i hate jean grey as a character in the x-men movies but w/e

omg welcome back, moon knight!!

welcome back, classic who omega circa 1982??

it's not peter davison under the mask.... unsubscribe

bald honeybunny i'm gonna hate what they do to you on god

okay but like look at his lashes and his profile oml he's so pretty wtf

he do got those bazoingas tho

also does this pretty hunk of man-meat have a name (in canon or fanon?)

instant downgrade....

nooooo khonshuuuuu

cirk? with a c??

also scott summers 97, my beloved

also i'm already sick of jean making googoo eyes at everything with a cock so im gonna skip here and there

after like 2000 years he finally cummed i think?

bc magneto needed another tragic backstory ig?

look what they did to my baby

he's a 3 but he still has kissable soft lips

he does keep calling people 'my goddess' and 'my angel' which is hot ngl

people with no context; explain this screenshot

shocker; erik is evil again

the beginning of fallout is happening lmao

STAN LEE!! WE MISS YOU, KING

asjvasovjsufvhsui fuck you; steals your charles

YASSSS GIRLY POP!! 🥳✨

also is this age of apocalypse!logan bc oml oooomphh

his lashes still be poppin tho

vore time

also i'm sorry but jean is such a self-insert like; 'you're the only one that can help', 'you have the strongest powers of all time', 'you have like 18 different powers that makes a load of the other mutants pretty much defunct', 'everybody has a crush on you'. dude she has like zero character and everybody worships her and she's just like an edgelord manic pixie dream girl mary-sue. fuck off

RANT OVER. TIDDY ENTERED THE CHAT

and then he died terminator 2 style

overall? didn't like the movie and skipped all the highschool drama segments. hated his look. he died at the end

but i can work with this

[inventors-fair]

Secondary Effects: Trigger Runners-Up

Our runners-up this week are @izzet-always-r-versus-u, @misterstingyjack and @tanknspank!

@izzet-always-r-versus-u — Principal of Reaction

Sometimes it's important just to be reactive, honestly. This name is pretty awesome when you consider the scientific in-joke there, and that humorous aside leads into quite well-written flavor text that emphasizes this character's personage. The amount of targeting in the STX set as a whole (especially the Archive) is one reason why it's a phenomenal card to pick up in these colors, but even then, the fact remains in a draft environment: your stuff is gonna be targeted. At the very least, you can force some kind of answer, and that answer is going to make things more difficult for your opponents to work through. And yet, there's the force equivalence: you might lose some big piece of your board. What do you gain? A huge symmetrical creature. The world is right again.

I'll be honest, I never liked the wording about how 0/0s with counters work, but that's not technically wrong. There's some minor kerfuffle about how someone could interpret the "it" to be the targeted permanent in corner cases, but I'm also scraping the bottom of the barrel for what sorts of things I'd have to explain to someone who didn't know how cards' wordings worked. The nature of the card means that your opponents will have to slow down regardless to consider their game states. I really like the focus on spells here, because you can't really do the mana value of ability sources without adding a zillion lines of text, and it focuses on the spellslinging nature of Arcavios in a way that both boosts the feeling of the world as emphasized in its inception and encourages players to interact with their opponents on that spellslinging level. Your and your opponent are each opposing and intertwined sources yourselves, no? I really dig the zen of this card. I also really dig annihilating my opponents in the dome with crystal snakes.

@misterstingyjack — Irradiated Drinking Water

Yeah, I buy it—the whole setup, I mean. I'm an old fart and don't know the newfangled planes and inhabitants as much, but a checkup on the Gastal world and the Mad Max-ness of it all makes sense here. Even the barrels part. It's weird, those feel really modern, but... I'm getting ahead of myself. The only reason that this card would be a bend is the association between blue and life loss, and even then the Mothman deck already put a few of those in mono-blue so I don't have a leg to stand on here. Would this be more of a Commander card or would this be fine for limited, then? It's a good question; as far as limited cards go, we've had Psychic Corrosion, Sphinx's Tutelage, Jace's Erasure... Granted, those are all YOUR draws. But this one's almost more balanced, I think.

It's a really interesting take. As much as these wordy hard-to-remember-everything mechanics grind my gears, there's a charm to this one where you're putting a massive clock on them but also taking an important limited turn off to play an enchantment that doesn't affect the board. So is the clock enough? If you're a good enough blue player, I suppose. Extra draws are gonna be rough, but they always are, and punishing those is a real funny thing that I support 100%. I think I'm warmed up to give this card a seal of approval. Name makes sense, effect is fair enough as a bend, flavor and art and vibes check out. Huh. Maybe that's one of the other reasons why this whole Judge thing matters—I don't think I ever would've made a card like this, and I would've dismissed it if I wasn't weighing it against standards that I had already set out. So thank you. I might just be in a good mood at time of writing but that counts.

@tanknspank — Paragon of Intellect

Man, that flavor text is such a 'sphinx' flavor text. Like, it's got some more questions that follow up, but if you take it at face value then you're still fuming a little bit with how insufferable the characters must be to deal with. Let's back up: this card's pretty great. There are obviously ways to make it combo off in frustrating ways, but they're pretty roundabout deals, and your opponent still draws a card off of it. In limited, you're gonna have an almost-on-curve flier than generates advantage off of cantrips, so that's already pretty awesome. Everyone likes drawing cards in limited. Would this one possibly limit the way that other colors could draw cards? I think so, but perhaps in a space outside of limited, you're in an awesome Commander spot. Everyone gets their draws, you get to, well, sit there and hope that your opponent doesn't have a Paragon as well, because you both choose to draw to combo and nobody else has a good time.

See, the problem with this card is that it absolutely needs a once-each-turn stop on it. This kind of effect is great at ensuring that your opponents have something to focus on and that you get some annoying little draws in yourself, but there really needs to be a limit. I love Notion Thief. I love Narset. I love all of those horrendous little blue gremlins that live in my head and tell me to hoard resources and bounce spells and counterspells. Like, let's be real here: this kind of effect should exist and is good to have. Limits ensure that nobody is stuck dealing with infinite loops, and that's the one thing you really need to get here. Maybe this should be a rare just because, y'know? Cantrips and cycling and bonuses and artifacts... Lots of ways to draw that need to be taken into account here. If I didn't appreciate the fact that you boiled this card into a flavorful smoothing of an oft-sought effect, I don't know if I'd go for it as much. Alas: you tapped into a necessary evil. Still evil. But necessary all the same.

I'm on the tail end of some long days, but we'll get commentary as it comes. Thank you all for your super-cool entries! @abelzumi

[aeternxm-aa]

starter from x | @cryptidsncurios

radiant garden had seen better days, for sure. where there had once been elaborate and ever expanding gardens - rose bushes, flowerbeds and peach trees that lea vividly remembers climbing ( usually only because isa had dared him ) to pluck fruit for later, only to be chased off by ansem's apprentices, now stood ruins and scaffolding.

radiant garden was slowly being rebuilt, sure, but it would never be restored to it's former glory. there was some sort of bittersweet nostalgia there, lea could feel it.

but, home was home. and regardless of how radiant garden looked now, lea was still happy to be back. once xehanort had been dealt with and the dust had settled, lea was finally given time to breathe, to really get used to life after the organization and make something of himself.

only thing, lea had noticed, was that a lot of the people he had once associated with weren't here anymore - whether they'd moved on or passed on, lea wasn't sure - but they sure as hell weren't here and that had given him something else to deal with -- getting comfortable in his own company.

walking through the streets that had once been so empty, now showing the beginnings of the bustling town that it once was, lea notices a familiar uniform - ansem's apprentices. huh, didn't think there was much use for 'em now.

was ansem even still around?

lea walks a bit closer, trying to see just who it is, and it's only a few steps in that he realizes who he's looking at. there's a brief thought 'turn around, walk the other way - you don't have to talk to him' but it's like his legs are working against him as he finds himself in front of someone he didn't think he'd ever have the displeasure pleasure of seeing again.

" geez, apprentices were really scraping the bottom of the barrel when they let you back in, huh? "

[dmbakura]

what's annoying is when people try to paint nintendo as some innocent publisher in comparison to the rest of them. not being 'as bad as x other triple A company' really isn't like... a criteria that suddenly absolves them of all the bullshit they've done

[sakebytheriver]

Leverage Redemption James Sterling Episode:

The team is on a con when someone hears that Interpol is on the scene cue everyone but Harry (on coms) going "no it couldn't be" "who?" "but what if it is" "he wouldn't be" "who?!" "but wouldn't he" "he might be" "WHO?!"

And then they do the classic reveal with the musical cue and everyone in sync "Sterling."

Harry: "like the washing machine?" Sterling walking into the room: "The rifle, actually"

Sophie is there standing next to Harry so Sterling looks at her and then gets close to Harry and sizes him up before stepping back and saying "him? really?" Sophie: "hes a stray found him his first time trying to steal a Rembrandt" Sterling pikachu shock face: "no, this guy?" Sophie: "with a youtube tutorial" Sterling: "really scraping the bottom of the barrel these days, huh?" Harry: "you know im still standing right here"

{[Plot ensues with whacky hijinks a la The Frame Up Job]}

Sterling and Sophie have a moment alone when everything is said and done Sterling admits that maybe he let the team get away as a last favor to Nate and Sophie tells him that she knew Sterling was going easy on them

Sophie: "do you miss him?" Sterling: "of course i do, but you already knew that" "just wanted to hear you say it" "ill see you around, Sophie. next time i won't go so easy on you" "looking forward to it, Sterling"

They share one last sad smile and a look charged with a challenge for next time before Sterling walks away and Sophie takes a sip from her drink with a look that speaks of past memories of her adventures with Nate

The End

[five-rivers]

I wonder how Danny phantom would've been like if Danny's friends were ghosts like Sydney and he befriended Sam and Tucker later on.

“I’m just saying,” said Danny, “that they should have something better to do with their time than harass me.”

“Ain’t that a bite,” said Sydney, morosely.  “It’s the same here.”

Danny groaned and tilted his head back to clang against the side of his locker.  Somehow, knowing that the bullying situation was the same in the afterlife as it was in his current life wasn’t terribly encouraging.  

Sydney was even still trapped in a high school. It was like there was no way out, no matter what.

Wait. Maybe that was it.

"Maybe," said Danny, testing the waters, "we should try to get out more."

"What do you mean?" asked Sydney.

"Well, I mean, I'm not going to have any luck making friends while I'm victim number one here, and I think that if the guys on your end were going to have a change of heart, they would have done it already. I mean, it's been fifty years, dude."

"Don't remind me."

"Okay, but that's why we should get out. Look in other places for friends!"

"That's not going to stop the bullies," said Sydney, dubiously.

"No, but it might make us feel better. And, if we go together, worst thing that could happen is that we just hang out with each other, then go home. Or back to school."

Sydney made a face. "I can't exactly go places with you, Danny. Your town isn't exactly welcoming to my kind."

"That's why we're going to do this in the Ghost Zone! I'm way too much of a freak to make human friends."

"I'm not sure that's a good idea..."

"I'll go as Phantom. What's the worst that could happen?"

.

"I changed my mind. This is a terrible idea."

"Hey, I had to trade three packs of soda just to get the location!"

"Yeah, and I bought you those sodas," said Danny.

He took a deep, steadying breath. This was just a techno-blasting ghost nightclub. Nothing really scary, like, for example, a school cafeteria.

"You're right. We can do this."

.

It soon became apparent that they had either vastly overestimated what two introverted nerds could take, or vastly underestimated the ghost nightclub. Either way, Sydney had been breathing into a paper bag behind the building for the last ten minutes, and Danny wasn't much better. Both of them were studiously avoiding looking at the biker couple making out a few yards down the wall.

Then the back door slammed open, and an almost human-looking girl with blue hair and stage makeup strode out. "Which of you losers can play an instrument?"

"I can play the piano," said Sydney.

"Theremin," said Danny.

"Wow, you really are a loser. What about you two?" she asked, turning to the couple.

"Drums," said the boy, scratching his ear.

"Guitar," said the girl. She crossed her arms. "What for?"

"My band was tagged by Walker, and I'm up in thirty minutes." Her face went hard. "The show will go on, even if I have to scrape the bottom of the barrel. A theremin. Unbelievable. Come on." She swept back into the nightclub.

Danny made to follow, but Sydney caught his wrist. "Should we really do this?" he asked, whispering.

"It isn't as if we have anything better to do. Let's go!"

.

Danny and Sydney sat on the side of the island that housed the nightclub, their feet swinging above the abyss below. They were, to put it lightly, rather stunned.

"What was that?" asked Sydney.

"It was..." Danny considered his words, "an experience."

"What am I wearing?"

"I... don't know, actually. I think that might have been a tie? Maybe? It's very punk."

"I have only the very vaguest of conceptions of what that means."

"It's cool? I don't know. But! We accomplished our goal for tonight, so we can count this in the win column."

"We did?"

"Yeah! We made friends!"

"We did?" asked Sydney, looking at Danny like he'd grown a second head (which he'd only done once, thank you very much).

"We played in a band with them," said Danny, solemnly. "That makes us friends."

"Huh. I guess you're right."

[clonecumber]

ZangZip again. Dug your post about Munin's version of Mandalorian parenting and it got me thinking. Do you think Jango and Walon specifically looked for Mandos like Skirata for the Cuy'val Dar because they'd be training such young clones so brutally? Maybe that's why they had a tough time finding more than 75 of them - they were selecting from the weird child soldier raising clans. I mean Jaster might have fallen into that category too as he kept Jango in combat after his adoption.

Huh, honestly, yeah? That makes a lot of sense. I also sort of had a thought that the Cuy'val Dar would specifically need to be people who could die in a ditch and not have anyone come looking too closely.

Even though most of the trainers are from an extremely clan-centric culture made up of people who are professionally trained to look closely.

Right.

So his targets boil down to 1) the literal scum of society, 2) the lonely and isolated without a clan or associates to care about them, and/or 3) the real hard liner professionals. Then - as you said - they have to be the sort that can handle...everything about what's happening with the clones without flying off the handle and endangering the operation. Which sort of fits with the idea Jango was out here scraping the bottom of the fringe radical barrel. (I actually wonder if Jango had more trainers at the beginning, but had to put some of them down when they wouldn't settle in quietly?)

Jaster is sort of interesting to me, because I'd have to re-read Open Seasons, but I do remember him letting Jango come along to get his revenge, but I also sort of wonder if that might have been a one-off thing? I also don't know how old Jango was, which sort of opens me up to this other random question I've been wondering about, which is what happens to the kids adopted after thirteen? Or who are thirteen? What about adult adoptees? What did Mij's training look like? What about Besany? She's not joining the culture just to cook for Ordo, presumably. She'll have to be taught how to handle herself at some point and brought along to learn the ropes. How do they distinguish between "trained adult Mandalorian, can be expected to handle self if sudden shoot-out happens" and "adult Mandalorian but still learning how to shoot so lay off". I feel like there has to be some way.

At that point, I'm not sure Mandalorians would be dragging things out for the sake of letting a kid grow up a bit. If Jango was already about thirteen (or close enough), and if letting Jango come along for "closure" wasn't just a one-off, it might be Jaster just sort of let him heal up, gave him some training, and brought him right back out. He's "old enough" after all, by Mandalorian understanding. Not a baby. If Jaster was following the general idea that thirteen-ish is old enough for a kid to start learning the ropes of adulthood, and if he felt confident Jango wouldn't have immediately gotten himself killed, that was probably all he needed to feel comfortable bringing Jango along.

I don't know. For a culture that's really big on adoption there seems to be a lot of fixation on kids who are born to the culture or brought in super young, but less on how to fold in teenagers and adults who might not have been raised in a militant culture previously and would need basic training, physical and mental, before they could tag along. It's sort of a weird murky area.

[abarbaricyalp]

@sambuckylibrary

SamBucky Halloween Prompt 5: Mausoleum

Sam meets Bucky in a mausoleum in Brooklyn  (This fic is set in Brooklyn because I could not make up a reason for Bucky to be in Louisiana despite the fact that I really very badly wanted it set in Louisiana. Bucky is also slightly younger because of fic reasons.)

Rated G: Discussions of death and loss (It’s set in a mausoleum, use discretion) (AO3 link in the notes)

Title from “Little Ghost” by The White Stripes, highly encourage you to listen to the song

One I’m Most Scared Of

Sam hated funerals. He hated that his father wanted him around for them. No other seventeen year old was surrounded by so much death and mourning.

“Sam, you have a gift,” his father said. “You put others at ease just by your presence.”

Sam thought everyone else should invest in a therapist and not a high schooler.

Petulantly, he kicked his heels back against a stone bench as he stared at the walls of crypts and cremains spots. Behind him, the funeral party milled and offered condolences to the bereaved, which actually seemed like everyone in the party. Sometimes, a funeral party seemed less bereaved than relieved at these things. Sam remembered the first time he heard a man’s daughter immediately plan lunch with a group of friends without a waver to her voice or a tear on her cheek. He vowed he’d never be the kind of person that had a funeral like that.

If he even had a funeral. Putting himself in the ground in whatever clothes he died in and then becoming a tree without telling anyone was becoming a nicer and nicer option.

So, he listened to the sniffling without turning around and thought about what kind of tree he’d become. He’d already done his duties of rubbing a wife’s arm, hugging kids, tickling grandkids, listening to the same three stories a dozen times. His father couldn’t expect anything else from him. So he wasn’t thrilled when someone his age sat down beside him.

The guy was handsome in a traditional, classical sort of way. Not as boring as the rich white guys who went to Sam’s school. His hair was side parted and only long enough to make an impressive arch on his head instead of laying in his face. He had a square jaw that was a little comical and his nose was a little fucked up in a kind of endearing way. The way Sam’s best friend looked after getting beaned in the face by a wayward baseball. Like most people who came through the mausoleum, he was sad.

There was no other word for it. Sam had tried to be poetic about his time in the crypts, but there was only so much the clinical-ness of bereaved and the dramatic-ness of tortured or sobbing or anguished could do. And they were rarely entirely true. Sad was just the word for people staring at remains of someone they once loved. Sometimes the simple explanation was the most appropriate. The rest of death and grief was already so complicated. It was easier to just feel sad.

The guy was too old to be a grandkid but too young to be a kid, unless the deceased and his wife had gotten freaky in their elder age. Sam hadn’t noticed him in his previous passes of the party or from the service, where he always sat in the back and made it a game to memorize as many shades of black or ridiculous hair styles as possible.

In fact, the boy wasn’t even wearing black. He was wearing a dark brown jacket, adorned with gold accents and pins. In fact… Sam was pretty certain it was an old military dress uniform.

“Uh...are you just visiting?” Sam ventured when the guy didn’t even bother to glance over.

The guy’s mouth quirked to one side faintly. “Yeah, you could say that. That one,” he said, gesturing to an entombment with a gravemarker that read James Buchanan Barnes March 10, 1922 - February 5, 1942. Son, Brother, Friend, Hero.

“Oh,” Sam breathed and understood the weird military uniform. “Are you related to him? You do kinda look like him.”

The guy turned finally to look at Sam and raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, you could say that. I’m Bucky.”

“Oh, jeez, you were named after him too.”

The guy--Bucky 2, apparently--cocked his head in a half nod. “I’m actually waiting on someone. Do you think they’ll be here much longer?” he asked, jerking his chin over to the party.

“Well, these things don’t really have a limit to how long people can be here,” Sam pointed out. “But most people get the point when they start sealing the tomb and all. Uh, this thing you’re waiting for, is it about him? Like, some kind of memorial service?”

It was neither February nor March, so Sam couldn’t imagine why there would be a memorial service for Barnes now. It had been a while since Sam’s father had done a service in Brooklyn and he’d kind of forgotten the cult status Barnes and,  to a much greater extent, Rogers had in this town.

“Nah, I’m just waiting on a friend,” Bucky said.

“Well…” Sam settled back against the stone bench. “I’ll stand in for a while.”

“You wanna be my friend? Should I be worried. I think horror movies start off like this.”

“Name one horror movie that starts off in a mausoleum.” 

“Murder by the Clock. Mummy’s Tomb. All the vampire movies.”

“Dracula doesn’t live in a mausoleum,” Sam argued lightly. “And I’ve never even heard of those other movies.”

“That’s ‘cause you don’t watch classics.”

“Uh-huh. Or you were just scraping the bottom of the barrel.”

Bucky rolled his eyes and knocked his shoulder against Sam’s. “Did you know…” He gestured back to the waning funeral party.

Sam shook his head. “No. My dad’s the pastor. He did the service. He likes me to be here for moral support.”

“Hell, I don’t think my parents trusted my morals as far as they could throw me,” Bucky snorted.

Sam noted the past tense but knew better than to push for information, especially in a mausoleum during a funeral of all places. “Are you a student around here?” he asked instead.

“Can’t you tell?” Bucky answered as he popped the lapels of his jacket. “I’m a soldier.”

“Right. A soldier who’s home, spending his time in mausoleums in front of his great-great uncle or something.”

“I could be a great-great grandkid. I heard he got around.”

“I heard that was all manufactured propaganda to sell a story.”

“I read it in a book.”

“And I read about time travel and aliens in a book.”

Bucky shrugged. “There are weirder things out there.”

“Right, in a world of super soldiers and Nazis with no faces,” Sam agreed drily.

“You’ll see,” Bucky assured. “Aliens and time travel are both gonna be all anyone talks about soon.”

“Y’know, I didn’t think a guy dressing up as his great-great grandpa-uncle to meet someone at his burial site would be so into sci-fi too.”

“Multitudes and all that. You know, there were half a dozen sci-fi books in his bag when his belongings were recovered.”

“I’ve heard that,” Sam said. Only because it’d been a point in the Oscar-Bait movie a few years ago. “He’d read to Rogers when he was sick.”

Bucky looked a little wistful and then nodded.”I’ve heard that too.”

“Do you ever feel pressure to be like him? Or be somethin’ you’re not, just ‘cause someone looked at your little baby face and named you after a legend?”

That wry, sad grin came back and Bucky shook his head. “Nah. Not really. Do you, though? I mean, obviously not him. But someone.”

Sam traced out the letters of the name of someone who died in 1985. A L E X A N D E R. He nodded. “Feels like everyone needs me to be someone and I let myself play that part until people stopped noticing it was a part.”

“What’s the part?” Bucky asked as he leaned back on his hands.

“I dunno. Someone who-- Well, I mean… Maybe it’s not a full part. Maybe I’m just upset that people only want me to have one kind of personality trait. I mean, everyone knows I’m kind and I’m good with words and I care about people. And I really do want to be that guy. But when I want to be that guy, y’know? Not all the time. Sometimes I want to cry and scream and rage too. Sometimes I want to be quiet for a little while and not help someone else. Just for a few hours.”

Bucky nodded and stared at the rows of internments  before them. “Y’know. I’m sure people would understand that if you told them. If you said, ‘I can’t do this right now. Please let me be quiet.’”

“I know that,” Sam said softly. He tangled his fingers together in his lap. “Maybe I’m mostly angry at myself for not being able to say something like that. I’m the guy who helps. If I don’t do that, if I beg a day off, then who am I? What am I bringing to the table?”

Bucky scooted closer and put a hand on Sam’s knees. It sent a jolt through Sam’s body and he worked very hard on not jerking his gaze up to Bucky’s face. “Sam, you just said you have other personality traits, other feelings, other hobbies that aren’t hanging out in a mausoleum. That’s what you bring to the table on the days you can’t be there for everyone else.”

Sam nodded and reached up to rub two fingers under his eye. He wasn’t at full tears yet, but he also didn’t want to get any closer. “Wait, did I tell you my name?” he asked suddenly.

Bucky lifted an eyebrow again. “You must’ve. Or someone else said it earlier. The point is, you’re still you. And you bring smarts and humor and a good head around, even when you aren’t offering free therapy or a crying shoulder. And, Sam, listen, even when you don’t want to be any of that, you’re still kind. I’ve only been sitting here for a few minutes and you’ve been kind the whole time, even when you weren’t trying. It’s not a part you’re playing. Just be who you are and ask for your time when you need it. If people reflect even a quarter of the love you put out there back at you, no one will ever begrudge you some quiet.”

Sam swallowed thickly and leaned against Bucky’s shoulder heavily. Bucky moved his hand from Sam’s knee to wrap his arm around his ribs instead. “You really think I’m funny and smart?” Sam asked eventually.

“You started spouting off propaganda theories and joking about where vampires technically live. Yeah, you’re something else, man,” Bucky laughed. “And I think you’re beautiful, which people always appreciate in people they hang around with.”

Sam rolled his eyes and ignored the last comment, thankful that his skin was dark enough to hide his blush and Bucky couldn’t see the swooping of his stomach. “Well, if you think that’s impressive, I’ve got a whole list of things I think are propaganda.”

“I’d love to hear all about it some other time.”

“Is your friend here?” Sam asked, sitting back a little and glancing around.

Bucky’s eyes cast around the mausoleum briefly too. “No. I just don’t feel like listening to any propaganda tonight,” he joked.

Sam jostled his elbow into Bucky’s rib and leaned back against his side. “I can’t remember the last time I actually talked to someone in one of these things. Everything’s always so surface level here. ‘Sorry for your loss’ ‘He was a good man’ ‘Of course we’ll come by the benefit.’ None of it means anything.”

“Well, I wasn’t part of the funeral, so maybe that was a plus. I’m just some guy. Hanging out in a mausoleum.”

“Ah, you’re the vampire,” Sam said with a grin. “Maybe I should get a stake in that casket.”

“There’s no body in it,” Bucky reminded him. “They never found Rogers’ or Barnes’ body.”

“Right, right. The train and plane.”

“It’s just for show,” Bucky said. He reached out to trace his fingers along Barnes’ last name and then held his palm against the stone for a second longer.

Sam put his hand on Bucky’s knee and said quickly, like ripping a bandaid off, “Do you want to get lunch or something? With me? Now, or later. I’m not picky. And then maybe again?”

Bucky turned blue eyes back to Sam and he really did look just like all those old pictures. That same sad smile came to his mouth. “Yeah, I really, really do. Maybe later,” he said and leaned over to kiss Sam’s cheek softly.

Sam’s eyes fluttered shut and his heart kicked up so rapidly in his chest it punched the air out of his ribs.

When he managed to open his eyes again, Bucky was gone.

[kmlaney]

WIP word ask: smooth, silk, dust!

It should come as no surprise that "dust" is the clear winner here in terms of occurrences, at 34. "Smooth" has 12 hits and "silk" only three.

As they appear in WIP, under a cut because long:

Smooth. 12 occurrences: 

Don’t know why he needs to know, especially out of the blue. The hackles I barely smoothed down from yesterday go back up. 

I drink the last of my coffee and set the cup on the table. I’m still mentally smoothing prickles.

Nice. Smooth. I wouldn't know good stuff from really good stuff but it’s definitely not the rock bottom cheap stuff.

The makeup smoothed her face and corsetry slimmed her waist and spangles distracted from the rest.

Their hands are smooth and warm.

Soft, like a black barn cat nuzzling my hand but under the smooth fur are porcupine spines.

I’ve seen some drivers don’t care much about their team; this one’s confident and smooth. They pull up to a stop and wait for hostelers to get hold of the horses before handing off the reins to one of the grooms and climbing down from the seat.

Marshal Doughan shakes himself and smooths down his vest. “I do, Phil,” he says, emphasizing my name.

“It’s true. You used to say it all the time.” I resist the urge to run a finger over the smooth wood shelving.

Shopmaster Ephriam stands and brushes his coat smooth. “I am so glad you asked, Bedeviled.”

He recovers a bit of composure and smooths his hair with one hand. “I will not have this creature sow dissension among my most trusted companions.”

Originally a tack-room or grain store, maybe. Nicer now—the floor is smooth, there’s a desk with a blotter, and a cut-glass inkwell and lamp.

Silk. Three occurrences. Only three? Huh. Interesting:

And Crumley would answer, “That would be a hundred dollars, sir, for a fine walnut coffin and silk lining, and to properly prepare the body for an interment.”

Stained and varnished wood or raw? Silk, satin, canvas or cotton lining?

“Oh, I see how it is. You need someone to lever this beast out of the mire. Someone who’s not wearing a silk coat and complaining they didn’t pay fare to push.”

Dust. 34 hits on dust, including variations such as dusty (adjective) and dusts (verb) but excluding duster as an article of clothing or as part of knuckle duster:

Dust motes drift in the light until the closing door renders them invisible again.

Gray, all gray. Gray hair, gray skin, gray eyes, gray lips. Gray clothes. Gray like the dust of the world settling into corners and imagining it’s alive.

Dry as dust and hot as hell and it’s barely out of spring. Too early for berries and quine-apples, too late for maypop. 

A tiny breeze kicks up, sending billowing dust across the road. The birdwarden’s ribbons flutter.

The air is dry and oily. Hot. Dusty. I taste salt on my lips. Salt and pitch.

She swaps it for a fresh one. “Ought to be good if the dust hasn’t gotten to it.”

I ream the bore harder than I should and it screams as the brush scrapes against the metal. Black dust and other gunk drifts downward out of the end of the coach gun’s left barrel.

The surface odors are the same as in any of ours: old makeup and greasepaint, mouldering costume components, sweat, powder, and perfume, and of course the ever-present dust. Underneath, though, is something more rank.

“Gotcha, Bren,” replies the girl holding the middle pair, a chestnut mare and a dusty black gelding.

Clean-shaven, wild wavy hair squashed beneath a floppy hat, ruddy freckled complexion clear under the line where they’d been wearing a bandana to cut the dust. 

Frown lines furrow the dust in their forehead for a second before they speak. “I’m grabbing chow. You got ‘till I’m done to convince me.” 

Given I don’t breathe unless I want to, I don’t choke on the damn dust kicked up by a six-horse team. 

Unfortunately, it also makes it hard to see past the immediate vicinity and our dust cloud is a dead giveaway of our approach.

I point out a bit of dust kicked up on our left to Bren. They acknowledge with a nod.

The riderless horse is still running in our dust but falling behind.

Dusty as fuck. Hot as fuck too. Fortunately the flies have plenty of targets to choose from so no one notices I’m attracting more than my fair share

Before I know it all I see is the sky and dust. The shops and stalls stream by, framing the view until they vanish. 

Just like in the song, he’s all in black, from head to toe, graveyard dust powdered his hair the color of bone.

Cree himself, hand on the coal-dusted shoulder of the poor slob he coerced into his drinking contest, pushes his hat up with one thumb. “Oh ho! New player?” he asks

Mr Buchwald dusts off his gloved hands. “Mercury does not employ known killers,” he says, partly to me and partly to the Deputy.

I drop my hands back down to the cot, sending up a puff of dust and insect parts. 

Bare feet shuffle in the dust. Their hair is scraggly and unkempt and some vague shade of filth and desperation.

The constant wind whips the dust away and into town, which is something of a blessing.

Off in the distance is a dark, dusty, pile.

It’s a cloud of gray dust or billowing smoke.

Spinning scribble circles filled with smoke and dust push close to my face. 

I stick a leg out to block its path and it spins to a halt, its forward motion going sideways like a child’s top made of dust and smoke.

I hold a hand out to the cloud of smoke and dust that’s Bad Phil’s shape in this place, wherever it is.

I blink a few times to wipe the dust from my eyes and take stock of what remains of me. 

 An older woman—Eva, her name is Eva—in a dusty dress performs close tricks with cards and coins. 

A vivid taste memory crosses my tongue, of picking one from the tree and taking a big bite, the soft sweet-tangy fruit almost bursting in my mouth. Then it’s gone, like so many other pleasant memories. Reduced to ash and dust. 

Maker Lewis opened the windows and the constant breeze from the pass brings in fresh air and the dust.

 Maker Lewis is most of the way down. His horse leaves a trail of dust. 

Not like I’d enjoy the taste, all dry and dusty. I eat the whole package, crumbs and all, despite it being a poor substitute for meat fresh and warm.

[relenafanel]

Dicks (in every definition): a fake-relationship AU

Geralt/Jaskier

Find it on Ao3:  Dicks (in every definition) by relenafanel

FOR THE MODERN AU CHALLENGE. WEEK 1: Fake-Relationships

Tag: witcherauseptember

________

“I can’t believe anyone could be such an unmitigated puss-filled dick,” Essi said, staring at her phone in disbelief. Jaskier groaned and let his head thunk on the bar.

“I can.” His sticky forehead was the least disgusting part of the evening.  He'd just come out to forget his ex, and maybe celebrate being free a little (as fucked up as that was) and quite frankly felt attacked by his social media.

“If I believed it from anyone it would be that narcissist,” she conceded, biting on her lip.

“I know,” Jaskier agreed. “That’s the worst part. I feel like it’s my fault being blindsided by this, as though I should have known something was going to happen today.”

Essi snorted. “It’s not your fault your ex is the worst.”

“No, but I was with him for almost 3 years. I don’t know. That’s my fault.”

“Don’t be stupid,” she said. “Look at this desperate fucker. Do you actually think he’s winning? He might be in a new relationship but the look of this guy makes my vagina want to shrivel up and die.”

Jaskier took her phone from her and looked again. Yeah. Yikes. Valdo was definitely scraping the bottom of the barrel with that one. Jaskier hadn’t even tried to join any dating sites post-breakup, but he was pretty sure there were better options. It wasn’t even the guy’s looks so much as he just screamed skeevy douchebag. It was making Jaskier’s metaphorical vagina also want to die.

“You need to get drunk. Maybe laid.”

“No,” Jaskier said, an idea starting to form as he looked at the relationship status change. “No. I need to match pettiness with pettiness. I need to find someone so hot that I’d have trouble getting him - let alone Valdo with his sad, small dick - and make sure to post a picture on Facebook.”

“Would that make you feel better?”

Jaskier smiled with teeth. “I think it would.”

***

It was their third bar of the evening and Essi was definitely sick of the manhunt. She probably hadn’t realized that when Jaskier was judging men fully objectively and not looking for matching personalities (relationship goals) or a willing body (one night stand goals) he had incredibly discerning tastes.

Probably too discerning.

“How about him?” Essi asked, barely looking up from her phone. She gestured to a guy sitting at the bar trying to make eye contact with a woman across the room.

“Ehh,” Jaskier said. “Sweater vest.”

Essi rolled her eyes. “But cute.”

“I’m not looking for cute. I’m looking for eye-searing hot.”

“I’m having trouble remembering how you’ve ever been in any relationships with these unrealistic expectations.”

“Valdo thought I was hot.” Jaskier thought about that for a moment. “Did I stay with someone for three years out of flattery?”

“Probably. Fuck. Get therapy.”

“I am.”

“You’re going to be working on tonight for a while.”

Fucking true. “Oh god, we just saw Valdo’s taste in men. Tell me true… am I ugly.”

“You’re spiraling.”

“That’s not an answer!”

“You’re spiraling!”

“Yes,” Jaskier agreed, pulling at his hair. “I’m so aware.”

“Based on the guy in his status update I’m going to guess you’re the hottest guy he could get.”

“You’re a good friend.” Jaskier pressed his head against her shoulder.

Then, a table opened up across the room, revealing the man sitting on the other side of it. “Holy shit.”

Essi looked up. Then she looked up. “Wow.”

“I hope he’s into men,” Jaskier said. “Or at least willing to play along with pretending to be for long enough for you to get a picture.”

“You’re going to walk up to that?” Essi asked. “You have more balls than brains.”

That was probably true.

***

“Hi, I’m Jaskier,” he opened with, dropping into the seat across from the gorgeous man. Up close he was even more startlingly pretty, with a chin dimple that highlighted his strong jaw and drew attention to his mouth. “And my boyfriend broke up with me two months ago, only to post his new relationship on Facebook today. Our three year anniversary. It’s the dickest of moves, right?”

The man hummed in agreement, but otherwise didn’t stop frowning in Jaskier’s general direction. Like someone waiting for him to get to the point. Jaskier saw that frown often.

“The reason for the oversharing is that I just forced my best friend to follow me to three different bars to find someone so phenomenally hot for me to spend time with and get picture proof, and here you are. I’d do jazz hands but you don’t seem like someone who responds well to jazz hands.”

“What are jazz hands?”

Whoa.

What a voice. What a sexy, sexy voice. Jaskier knew what he was talking about. He was a connoisseur of voices.

Jaskier wiggled his fingers at him. Tada! “Jazz hands.”

“Huh.” The man took a drink of his beer. “You want to use me as a revenge plot?”

“Exactly. Can I buy you a drink?”

The man gestured to his mostly full beer. “I’m not drinking to get drunk tonight.”

That was only a no to the beer. “Nachos or some other foodstuff?”

The guy seemed possibly interested in food.  

“Fine,” he agreed.  

****

Facebook: Julian Alfred Pankratz is in a relationship with Geralt of Rivia.

“Who’s Julian Pankratz?” Geralt muttered, staring at his phone.

“What?” Jaskier groaned, coming out a shitty sleep to a few realizations:

He’d gone home with the hottest guy on earth, which he should be pleased about, AND WAS PLEASED ABOUT

He might throw up

He’d done something last night. Something he’d said “that’s up for tomorrow Jaskier to sort out” because his drunk self was apparently a fucking masochist, and now Jaskier wasn’t really sure what that was.

Only Geralt was still scowling at his phone and seemed to know his real name.

So.

“Fuck,” Jaskier groaned. His mouth tasted like nachos and the regret of doing shots too late in life. He was 28 years old, not dead, but his hangover didn’t seem to know that.  “We didn’t get married , did we?”

“...”

Jaskier risked the light filtering in through the edges of the blinds to look at Geralt. His hair was beyond mussed - Jaskier didn’t know hair could get that tangled overnight. He was still frowning at his phone.

“I’ve been calling you Jaskier.”

“I go by Jaskier,” he promised. He was too busy having his own crises to deal with Geralt’s! For fucksakes. “Now, back to the marriage thing??”

“No.”

Phew. That was probably on him. He wasn’t sure people could actually get fake married overnight. Legally. He’d seen a lot of movies, though.

Ok. Next problem.  “I might throw up.”

Geralt turned his head slowly to look at him. Yikes. Too much beautiful-man-face in his face for this early in the morning.

“It’s eleven,” Geralt told him in the dry tone that told Jaskier he’d said that all outloud.

“Eleven after getting to bed at what? Five? Eugh, boo. Do you have any food?”

***

Geralt did have food.

Well, Geralt had protein bars and electrolytes, which was basically the same thing. Jaskier could always fall on top of a burger on his way home if he had to.  He’d finally looked at his phone by the time he was halfway through his breakfast.

107 new notifications.

What the fuck?

Julian Alfred Pankratz is in a relationship with Geralt of Rivia

Geralt and I were going to wait until announcing this wasn’t an asshole move, but now that it doesn’t really matter, I just wanted everyone to know that I’m doing GREAT.

Attached to it was the picture of the two of them together that Essi had taken with the caption of “I wouldn’t feel too sorry for Jaskier tonight”

His drunk self had a lot to answer for. No wonder Geralt had been scowling at his phone.

“I can’t believe I went Facebook Official with someone I haven’t even had sex with yet,” Jaskier mourned. “What is it, 2007?”

***

It took Jaskier almost the full day to recover enough to actually look through his comments on Facebook. By the time he had, they’d almost doubled and he’d made the mistake of clicking into Instagram to find one of those quintessential happy-relationship-our-feet-are-cute-together bullshit pictures. He had a different following on Instagram, mostly using it for pictures of himself singing.

Yikes. Yikes. Yikes. This wasn’t a contained problem, if you could call their mutual friends and families on Facebook that had been gathering in the wings for 15 years a contained problem . Fucking Facebook. Jaskier friended people he’d met once. He had a database of acquaintances. It was great for - you know - being a musician looking for gigs. He’d done 15 weddings in the last year.

It was pretty shitty when he’d faked having a boyfriend so people wouldn’t feel bad for him.

But, as he read through the comments and realized that some of them weren’t for him, he realized that maybe he wasn’t the one with the biggest problem.

Jaskier: Did you just come out?

Jaskier: Are you EVEN INTO MEN?

Jaskier: I REMEMBER YOU THINKING THIS WAS FUNNY AND AGREEING TO IT

Jaskier: BUT

Jaskier: I REGRET COMMITTING TO CAPS SO SOON BECAUSE I MEAN THIS IN CAPS AND BOLDED

Jaskier: WHOEVER LAMBERT IS JUST CONGRATULATED YOU ON FINALLY GETTING DICKED DOWN BECAUSE IT MIGHT MAKE YOU LESS GRUMPY

Geralt: I see you’ve read the comments

Geralt: my brother

Jaskier: YOUR BROTHER?!

Geralt: bold and caps?

Jaskier: and italics what the fuck. Why’d you let me do this?

Jaskier: wait.

Jaskier: WAIT

Geralt: there it is

Jaskier: this was your idea

Jaskier: did you use me to tell everyone you know that you’re gay or bi or whatever you identify as?

Jaskier: what a brilliant opportunity last night was for both of us

Geralt: you went back to sleep and didn’t process any of this yet, didn’t you?

Jaskier had been seen with that, fuck. He made a face at his phone even though Geralt couldn't see it.

A few moments later a response to Lambert popped up from Geralt himself.

@Lambert who says I haven’t been getting dicked down this entire time you heteronormative asshole

Followed by someone named Yennefer posting a picture of a strap on.

Who were these people? Could you love someone based on how their friends reacted to their ill-advised fake-relationship status change? Asking for a friend.

Geralt: for context, that’s my ex-wife

Geralt: we’re ok

Geralt: especially when she’s helping me fuck with my brother

***

Jaskier was debating the merits of asking Geralt if he wanted to come up with a break-up plan or just date when another comment showed up.

Vesemir left a comment:

You’ll bring him to brunch tomorrow?

Geralt left a comment:

We’ll be there

Vesemir left a comment:

Leave the frightening device at home

Geralt left a comment:

He doesn’t need it

This was followed by a string of variations of LOL and OH SHITs from about 7 different people. Jaskier watched it all unfold feeling like he’d stepped into the middle of something he didn’t understand - yet. He was definitely in trouble, if the way his heart rate increased at Geralt’s he doesn’t need it was any indication. It wasn’t even the dick reference, though that was amazing. It was the snappy, quick response. The underlying sarcasm.

Jaskier had a type. He could end a fake relationship that was based on seeing a searing hot guy across a room, but it was a bit harder when the guy had a personality he liked. If Geralt turned out to have a heart of gold, Jaskier was screwed and would probably be proposing marriage by year’s end.

Yeah, we’ll be there , he commented.

Geralt: my dad

Geralt: thanks

Jaskier: no problem

Jaskier : gonna call

“So I’m thinking,” Jaskier said the moment Geralt’s face showed up on the video call. He was squinting at his phone like no one had ever tried to video call him before.

“Hi,” Geralt replied, looking amused.

“I’ve been debating the merits of planning a breakup for our fake relationship or just… dating? I’m thinking maybe we should date? Do you have input?”

“Dating’s fine.”

“But do you… are you even attracted to me? Would you pick me?”

Oh fuck, what was that?! Something new to bring up in therapy.

Geralt tilted his head.  “You don’t know this about me yet, but I’m capable of saying no. Overly capable, some of my family might tell you.”

“So you’re not saying no?”

“I’m pretty confident I said yes instead.”

***

“As Jaskier’s best friend and the only witness,” Essi said into the microphone, holding up a glass of champagne to salute the two of them. “Our happy couple gave me full permission to tell the story of what happened the night Geralt and Jaskier met. Like Jaskier himself, the story is partially an embarrassing tale of bad decisions, half-cocked plans, and a lot of heart.”

Jaskier grinned, and nudged his shoulder into Geralt’s.

“And,” Essi continued with glee, “dicks in every definition.”

[bubonickitten]

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

Previous chapter: AO3 // tumblr

Full chapter text & content warnings below the cut.

Content warnings for Chapter 29: discussion of Jon’s & Daisy’s restrictive diets & associated physical/mental deterioration (and potential parallels with disordered eating etc.); arguing & relationship disputes (that are not immediately resolved in-chapter); self-harm (burning oneself with a lit cigarette); cigarette smoking; discussion of suicidal ideation; panic & anxiety symptoms; discussions of grief & loss; cyclical mental health issues (post-traumatic anniversary reactions; related self-loathing, internalized victim blaming, & survivor’s guilt; generally speaking, Jon’s relapsing into self-isolating, worse-than-usual headspace, esp towards the end of the chapter); depiction of parental neglect/rejection (Martin's mother). SPOILERS through S5.

There’s also a Hunt-themed statement that contains descriptions of indiscriminate violence & unprovoked warfare against a civilian population. Oh, and a cliffhanger.

Let me know if I missed anything!

_________________

“Statements ends,” Jon says, somewhat breathless as he fumbles to stop the recording.

“You alright?” Daisy asks.

“Fine.” The word is punctuated by a click and a whirr as the recorder resumes spooling.

“Are you, though?”

“Yes.” Scowling, Jon jabs his finger at the stop button – only for it to keep recording.

“It’s the Hunt, isn’t it.” Daisy sighs, rubbing the back of her neck. “Sorry it’s been so prominent for the last few. I’m… not quite scraping the bottom of the barrel yet, but–”

“It’s fine, Daisy.”

“Still, I–”

“I said it’s fine–!” Jon winces at his sharp tone. “I’m sorry, that was… I’m just – on edge, I suppose.”

Which is an understatement, really.

Because it’s September. It’s September, and after September is October, and October is–

Well. These days, he can’t even look at a calendar – can’t even look at the time and date on his phone – without icy dread coursing through his veins.

Sporadic flashbacks have become an everyday occurrence, set off by the smallest of stimuli: a dropped glass shattering on the breakroom floor becomes a window bursting inward into shards; a thunderstorm heralds a fissuring sky, marred by hundreds upon thousands of greedy, unblinking voyeurs; his own voice is a doomsday harbinger, a key crammed into a lock he can’t keep from unbolting. The memories are too immediate, too vivid to feel past-tense.

It’s to be expected. Studies, common knowledge, and anecdotal evidence all point to the impact of anniversaries on mental health. He knows what a textbook post-traumatic stress response looks like. Monster or not, in this particular sense he remains overwhelmingly human. No matter how much he rationalizes it, though, intellectually understanding a psychological phenomenon does little to soften the lived experience of it.

And it does nothing to temper the chilling knowledge – bordering on conviction – that it may happen again.

“Would be worrisome if you weren’t stressed out, considering… you know. Everything.” Daisy leans back in her chair, stretches her legs out in front of her, and rolls her shoulders. “Speaking of the Hunt. Any new developments?”

“I mean… nothing since yesterday? Everything I know, Basira knows.”

“Basira… isn’t keeping me updated,” Daisy says, shifting uncomfortably in her seat.

“Ah,” Jon says, with tact to spare. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize.”

“It’s fine.”

“Is it?”

Daisy sighs. “She thinks that I think she’s wasting her time.”

“And do you?”

Daisy gives a jerky shrug. “Don’t you?”

“Not… necessarily,” Jon hedges. Truthfully, his answer to that question is as mercurial as his moods these days, shifting from hour to hour, sometimes minute to minute. Daisy gives him an unimpressed look. “I won’t lie and say I’m optimistic, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth trying.”

“You sound like Martin.”

“Well, he spent ample time drilling it into me,” Jon says with a wry smile. “I don’t have the same capacity for hope as he does, but improbable doesn’t mean impossible. If I’d had it my way, I’d have lain down and died ages ago. I’m only here now because of him.”

“Mental health check,” Daisy says automatically.

“Not thinking of hurting myself,” Jon replies, just as rote. “You don’t have to do that, you know. I’ve told you, I’m physically incapable of killing myself even if I wanted to.”

“That doesn’t stop you brooding.”

“Anyway, I wasn’t referring to anything recent.”

“Weren’t you, though?” At his blank look, Daisy gives an impatient sigh. “It hasn’t even been a year since you woke up, Sims. Up until six months ago, you were wandering an apocalyptic wasteland–”

“…I found myself utterly alone. Facing down a room full of nothing eyes, willing myself to take action. I never did, though–”

“–I wanted to act, to help, to do something, but – my mind had all but seized up, and I felt helpless to do anything but watch as events progressed–”

“–there was nothing I could do to save him – he died – so did any hope I had of – doing good in the world–”

“–there’s a sort of numbness that you adopt after months or years of bombing–”

“–I did spend a lot of time just… slumped in despair – had no reason to think it would help, but I could see no choice but waiting for death–”

“–hoping against hope that – it wouldn’t be forever–”

“Hey!” Daisy’s voice finally breaks through the rush of static. Or perhaps it was the pressure: Jon looks down to see her bony fingers caging his own in a bruising grip.

“Sorry,” he says, catching himself as he starts to list woozily.

“Not to say ‘I told you so,’ but…” Daisy gives his hands another light squeeze. “You sort of just proved my point there.”

“I’m well aware that I’m – traumatized, or whatever–”

“Not ‘or whatever’–”

“–but I’m not a danger to myself, so could we please just move on?” Jon mumbles, averting his eyes. “You wanted a Hunt update.”

Daisy scrutinizes him for a long moment before she allows the conversational pivot to stand.

“Basira said you’ve heard back from that Head Librarian,” she says, “but she blew me off when I started prying.”

“Zhang Xiaoling,” Jon says, his shoulders relaxing. “She was able to confirm some of Jonah’s intel. They do have a statement about a book matching that description in their records, and she agreed to forward a copy once it’s been digitized. They’re further along in their digitization process than we are–”

Daisy snorts. “Probably because they’re actually working on it.”

“That, and they have the benefit of a Head Librarian who actually has a background in archival studies,” Jon says drily. “In any case, they have a large archive, so it’s a work in progress. She’s processed our inquiry, though, and she says she has someone on it. We should hear back by tomorrow at the latest.”

“Huh,” Daisy says. “Sounds…”

“Like a functioning archive?”

“I was going to say ‘streamlined,’ but sure.”

“The wonders of a hiring process that prioritizes job qualifications as opposed to a candidate’s apocalyptic potential.”

“What are the chances their institution is also led by a centuries-old corpse with a god complex?”

“Non-zero, I imagine.”

Daisy wrinkles her nose. “Ugh, don’t say that.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I don’t have evidence one way or the other.”

“It doesn’t. Does she know about…” Daisy waves her hand vaguely. “All of this? The Fears, Rituals… Jonah?”

The question gives Jon pause. He thinks back to his meeting with Xiaoling all those years ago – well, last June, from her perspective.

“Some of it, I think,” he says slowly. “She seemed familiar with some of the Archivist’s abilities. There were parts of my visit that struck me as odd at the time. I didn’t realize until later that she had been speaking both Chinese and English at different points in our conversation.”

Daisy frowns. “She didn’t clue you in?”

“She didn’t, no. But…”

Elias made a good choice, the Librarian’s voice echoes in Jon’s mind. I did offer him someone, but he thought the language might be too much for him.

It does tickle me, Jonah’s voice chimes in, that in this world of would-be occult dynasties and ageless monsters, the Chosen One is simply that – someone I chose.

“I don’t know if she’s aware of Elias’ true identity.” Jon swallows with some difficulty, his mouth suddenly dry. “Or his intentions.”

“So is it really smart to trust her?”

“If she’s in communication with him, there’s nothing she can tell him that he doesn’t already know. We’re just following up on information he gave us. And he’s likely spying on our correspondence whether she’s in contact with him or not. Not much we can do about that.”

“She could have her own ulterior motives,” Daisy says.

“True enough, but… I got the sense that her primary interest is curation. Studying phenomena, building a knowledge base–”

“In service to cosmic evil,” Daisy says pointedly.

“W-well, yes, but – I don’t think she has delusions of godhood herself, and I don’t think Jonah has tempted her with the idea.” Jon huffs to himself. “He wouldn’t want to share his throne.”

“Hm.”

“I’m not saying we trust her or the Research Centre as a whole. I had reservations about their motives then and I still do. It’s not unthinkable that they’re a front for something more sinister in the same way that the Institute is. But… I don’t think there’s any especial danger in utilizing their library.”

“Sims,” Daisy sighs, “your danger meter is broken beyond repair.”

“In my defense,” Jon says, bracing one arm on the desk to leverage himself to his feet, “at this point, everything is just differing degrees of dangerous.”

As the two of them leave the tunnels, Jon’s phone buzzes in his pocket. When he glances at the screen, he sees a text notification from Naomi – in addition to two missed calls. He frowns to himself. The two of them text regularly, but she rarely calls.

“What’s up?” Daisy asks, her brow furrowing in concern.

“Naomi,” Jon says distractedly, already returning the call. Naomi picks up on the first ring.

“Jon?” Naomi’s voice sounds thick and tear-clogged.

A cold weight settles in Jon’s stomach. “What’s wrong?”

“I j-just” – Naomi pauses to clear her throat – “just needed to hear a familiar voice.”

“What happened?” Jon asks – and realizes too late that in his urgency to discover the source of her distress, he’s poured too much of himself into the question.

“Nothing.” What starts out as a self-deprecating little laugh quickly deteriorates into a half-sob. “Nothing new, anyway. It’s always like this, this time of year. Evan and I didn’t have an exact date planned, but we’d talked about an autumn wedding. Thought it would be fitting, since we met in September, you know? Tomorrow is our anniversary, actually. Or – or it would’ve been. A-and then by the time I’ve picked myself back up, the holidays will have crept up on me, and that’s always hard, and – and then before I know it, it’s March, a-and that’s its own kind of anniversary, and it’s just… it’s a lot.”

“Oh, I – Naomi, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to–”

“It’s fine,” she says with a sniff. “Don’t think I would’ve been able to get it all out, otherwise.”

“S-still, I–”

“It’ll be three years this March. And it still feels like it was yesterday. I spend six months out of the year feeling like I’m still stumbling through that cemetery, and I just…”

This time last year, Jon thinks with a lurch, I was still the monster in her nightmares.

And even now, he still pulls her there whenever they’re both asleep.

“When does that stop?” Naomi laughs again, a desperate, pleading thing. “When does the healing come in?”

“I… I don’t know,” Jon says truthfully. “Anniversaries are… they’re hard enough on their own. It doesn’t help that… well, it’s difficult to heal from something when you’re still living it.”

“What do you mean? Evan’s dead,” Naomi says, her voice breaking on the word. “He’s not coming back. It’s… it’s over.”

“There are still the dreams. The narrative might have changed, but the stage dressing is still the same.” Jon draws his shoulders in, one arm pressed tight to his stomach. “Keeping the memory fresh.”

“It’s not so bad.” Naomi sniffles again. “Better than being alone.”

“‘Alone’ or ‘nightmares’ shouldn’t be your only options.”

“I have my own nightmares, you know,” Naomi counters, sounding slightly annoyed. “When I’m asleep and you’re not. And they’re worse, because in them, I actually am alone. Nothing supernatural about it. It’s just… me.” She sighs. “This time last year – and the year before – I didn’t have anyone. And I just… I didn’t – I don’t want to be alone.”

“You’re not,” Jon says. “Not anymore.”

“I – I know, but I…” Naomi takes a breath. “I was… I was thinking – maybe tomorrow I could come by.”

“I’m sorry,” Jon says gently, “truly I am – but it’s not safe. Especially for you, especially right now. Not with Peter here.”

Naomi is already the equivalent of an unfinished meal to the Lonely. That, together with her association with Jon, is more than enough to mark her as a potential target should Peter take notice of her.

“Feels safer than being alone,” Naomi says. “The Duchess helps – a lot – but I…” She lets out a fond but tearful chuckle. “I can’t expect her to grasp the nuances of… grief, or loneliness, or what have you.”

“How about this,” Jon says. “We tell Georgie what’s going on – as much or as little as you’d like, even if it’s as simple as ‘I don’t want to be alone right now.’ I doubt she’d be opposed to having you over.”

“I wouldn’t want to impose. I mean, I – I’ve not spent much time with her outside of just… spamming the group chat with cat photos. I like her, but she’s your friend. I’m just… a friend of a friend.”

Nestled between the words is a familiar sentiment, unarticulated and nonetheless resounding, echoing all of the earnest conviction it had when first she made such a confession: All my friends had been his friends, and once he was gone it didn’t feel right to see them. I know, I’m sure they wouldn’t have minded, they would have said they were my friends too, but I could never bring myself to try. It felt more comfortable, more familiar, to be alone…

“People can have more than one friend,” Jon says. “I can’t speak for Georgie, but she wouldn’t go out of her way to talk to you if she didn’t like you.”

Indeed, that might be the reason Jon was able to open up to Georgie in the first place. He observed early on that she had no qualms disengaging from people whom she had no interest in getting to know. Whatever Jon might have felt about himself on any given day, the simple fact of the matter was that Georgie would never have let him get so close if she hadn’t seen something redeeming in him.

And she likely wouldn’t be letting him stay close now if she didn’t still see something worth salvaging.

“It’s up to you, of course,” he says. “I won’t pressure you. But I think Georgie would be more receptive to friendship than you expect. And I think – I think you’d get along with Melanie, too.” Naomi is silent on the other end of the line. “At the risk of overstepping, I… I know being alone feels like the natural state of things, but it doesn’t have to be. If you want, I can talk to Georgie. Lay the groundwork. I won’t give her any of the details – it’s not my story to tell – I’ll just let her know that you’re feeling alone and could use some companionship.”

“Okay,” Naomi whispers. “Just… let her know she’s not obligated.”

“I will. On the extremely off chance she says no, or if she’s busy tomorrow, I can keep you company remotely. We can spend the whole day holding up the office landline if you want.”

“It’s a Friday.”

“And?”

“It’s a work day?”

“Naomi, my job is wholly comprised of monologuing to any tape recorder that manifests within a six-foot radius and doing my utmost to render my department as counterproductive to both the Institute’s professed and clandestine organizational objectives as humanly or inhumanly possible.” Naomi barks out a startled laugh. “I won’t be fired no matter what I do – which is a shame, seeing as it became my foremost professional development goal somewhere between finding out my boss murdered my predecessor and virtually dying in an explosion at a haunted wax museum. Barring a sudden and unexpected apocalyptic threat – which, admittedly, is unlikely but not unthinkable– I’ve already cleared my non-existent schedule for you.”

“Okay.” Naomi makes a sound somewhere between a sniffle and a chuckle. “Thanks. Really.”

“Any time.”

_________________

The statement is an unnerving, circuitous thing: a firsthand account from an unnamed member of the Drake-Norris expedition in 1589. In many ways, it’s eerily similar to the last statement Jon accessed from Pu Songling’s archives: Second Lieutenant Charles Fleming’s shellshocked, guilt-fueled confession of atrocities committed under orders.

The historical record is rife with accounts of Francis Drake’s cruelty, Jon knows: his role in the transatlantic slave trade, the unprovoked massacres committed in his name, the preemptive strikes that incited further bloodshed. The statement giver speaks in awestruck horror of the bloodlust lurking in the man’s eyes, the vitriolic fervor with which he undertook his campaign to seek out and destroy the remnants of the Spanish fleet – and the depths of his rage when his efforts ended in defeat. Humiliated, he turned his vengeful eye to the Galician estuaries.

The writer tells plainly of his own complicity in the sacking of Vigo, razing the town to the ground and slaughtering its inhabitants with indiscriminate zeal. For four days Drake’s men carried out their rampage, retreating only when reinforcements arrived to stem the tide.

“You may ask yourself,” the Archivist reads on, “how it is that a man born into the reign of Good Queen Bess sits before you today, some four centuries past his due?

“You see, as we left the shores of Galicia that day, I heard from behind us a vicious braying, as if someone had set loose a great host of hounds. They were close – close enough for me to sense their stinking breath hot on the back of my neck. Such a thing was impossible, for we were by that time far from shore, having already rowed half the distance between the beach and the waiting armada. That did not stop me dreading the dogs lunging and tearing into me at any moment.

“I am not ashamed to admit that I let out a whimper.

“As the seconds ticked by and the pack failed to descend upon us, my curiosity grew to outweigh my terror. I turned to look – and was thus ensnared. It was, I realize now, the instant at which I became beholden to the blood. My greatest folly.

“Perhaps I oughtn’t have been so surprised to see no hounds surging toward us atop the waves, but you must understand that the proximity of their snarling was far more convincing than their visual absence. In looking behind us, though, I was able to appreciate the havoc we left in our wake: the great plumes of ash rising from the smoldering rubble, backlit by a flickering orange glow, and wails of despair so profound as to combat the noise of the wind, the waves – even the discordant shrieking of the hounds.

“It was a scene of such devastation as I had never seen before or since. Looking back, I think upon the acrid stench of charred flesh on the breeze with horror and… indescribable remorse. It shames me now to admit that at that time, I had never felt such… rapture.

“That was when a motion caught my eye. Between the distance and the billowing smoke, it should have been impossible to discern such detail, yet there he was: quarry I had left for dead, emerging from the debris and staggering away from the ruins of his… wretched life. As he looked out to behold our retreat, I could see the grief playing on his face, the fury, the fear – but what most set my blood to boiling was the spark of relief I saw in his eyes.

“It awakened something in me – a famished and merciless thing, composed of tooth and claw and a mind beginning and ending and utterly encompassed by the call of the pack. With a roaring in my ears and a single-minded violence supplanting my sensibilities, I deserted the rowboat and swam to shore. A chorus of howls carried me forward, and I let them be my wings, steering me down the swiftest, straightest path to my target.

“I slowed for nothing, and I made certain my prey did not live through the night.

“As you can likely guess, the chase did not end there. Those baying devils who had so called me forth continued to hound my steps, nipping at my heels, spurring me ever onward to the next quarry. Those who once knew me would scarcely have recognized what I became. Whenever I dared look into a mirror, I would see in myself a dogged, seething violence so akin to that which had lived in the eyes of my former commander. A cruelty that once had frightened and repulsed me had become the blood and breath of me.

“For a time I sought to refrain from the chase. The longer I refused the call, the weaker I became. The hounds’ breath on my neck grew hotter; their braying swelled louder. I found myself wasting away: always hungry, never sated. Eventually my faculties began to slip. I would lose myself to such… bestialimpulses, and only the stain of blood on my teeth would return to me my reason. It pains me to confess to you now that it did not take long before I ceased my resistance entirely.

“It was at the turn of the sixteenth century that I happened upon the artefacts now in your possession. Their previous owner was a formidable adversary. I spent nearly a fortnight tracking him before I managed to run him down, and he fought like a tempest before he fell.

“Ordinarily I did not linger after a kill, instinct hastening me ever onward to the next great game. As I turned to leave, though, I was overcome by the sense that the hunt was… unfinished. Troubled, I reached down to check the man’s pulse. I was reassured to find him quite dead, but as I drew back, I noticed the brooch.

“It was a simple thing made of tarnished copper, fashioned into an incomplete ring, the ends of which resembled the heads of dogs. The moment my fingers brushed that ornament, I knew it was meant for me. It went into my pocket with nary a conscious thought.

“The itch of the hunt was still crawling down my spine, though; the frantic snuffling of phantom hounds yet filling the air all around me. I continued to search his person until I found what was calling out to me: a thin volume bound in leather. Curiosity ever my folly, I opened it.

“Up until that point, I had never learned to read nor write Latin with any degree of mastery. Yet I could understand the text within with perfect clarity. The script did not transform to English before my eyes, nor did the book render me proficient in the language. No, I simply… beheld the pages, and the meaning flowed into me.

“The story tells of Herla, legendary king of the Britons, who visits the dwarf king’s realm. Upon leaving, he is gifted a hound and warned not to dismount his horse until the dog leaps down. When Herla and his men return to the human world, they discover that not days but centuries have passed: all those they had known have long since perished, and the Saxons have taken possession of the land. In their distress, some of the men dismount, whereupon they turn to dust. Herla warns the survivors to stay in their saddles, to wait until the dog leaps down.

“‘The dog has not yet alighted,’ the author tells us, ‘and the story says that this King Herla still holds on his mad course with his band in eternal wanderings, without stop or stay.’

“The next several pages are unreadable. The language resembles none I have ever encountered, and I have yet to find a soul who can decipher it. I can however attest its hypnotic qualities. I have spent many hours mired in those words, but I could not for the life of me tell you what I saw there. Others to whom I presented the text found themselves either enthralled or agitated, though none could recall such episodes once lucidity returned to them. I expect you mean to unravel its secrets, but you may do well to let its mystery stand.

“The final passage – a single page, this written in English – tells of Herla’s escape: how, weary and driven to despair, he casts the dog from the saddle and into the River Wye. The instant the hound hits the water, Herla and his band crumble into dust, at last meeting the same fate they spent so many hundreds of years trying to outpace.

“I have had hundreds of years of my own since first reading the tale to digest its message, and that is why I come to you today. Although I have killed several times since these items came into my possession – it should come as no surprise that there are those who covet them – I have not sought out a single hunt since I vanquished the man who yielded me these trinkets. The hounds at my heel have not ceased their clamoring, but so long as the brooch is on my person, they cannot sink their teeth in me. I am always hungry, yes – but I am no longer starving.

“But I am also weary. I have come to understand that even as the hounds can never catch me, they will never leave me. In my four hundred years, I have played the role of both the hunter and the hunted, and have learned that they share the same ultimate plight. Whether I be predator or prey, I am trapped in the throes of an endless pursuit. So long as I should live, my blood shall never quiet.

“And that is the key: so long as I should live. Even now, the fervor in my blood insists that the hunt is eternal, but I know now that one cannot outrun one’s end forever. Much like my constant, howling companions, Death will always be nipping at my heels. In that sense, he is perhaps the ultimate hunter. Just as I have delivered to him so many souls, neither can I escape his judgment. If ever I am to rest, I must bow to his supremacy.

“And so, like Herla, I shall cast the dog away from the saddle. I leave it in your care now, and the book. I should be so lucky to exit this life with the dignity I denied so many others, though I fear I shall be found undeserving of such a swift end. I can only hope that, whatever my comeuppance should be, I shall have the grace to accept it without complaint.”

With a heavy exhale, Jon depresses the stop button on the recorder, then puts his head in his hands, putting pressure on his closed eyes.

“You alright?” Basira asks.

“More than I’d like,” Jon mutters.

“If I thought there was any chance this guy was still alive, I wouldn’t have given you the statement to read.”

“I know. Just…” Jon waves his hand vaguely.

“Unpleasant, yeah.”

And rejuvenating, Jon thinks bitterly. It’s only been a few days since his last statement from Daisy, and already he had begun to feel famished.

“They sent along some supplemental records,” Basira says, rifling through printouts. “The statement is cross-referenced with two objects in their Collections Storage – here.”

The document she slides across the desk contains two catalog listings:

Item No. 9820702-1

Description: Pennanular brooch, copper alloy. Geometric and interlace motifs. Confronted zoomorphic terminals (canine profile). Moderate surface oxidization and patination. Dimensions: 5.5cm x 4.5cm body; 12.5cm pin. Artefact dated ca. 500–700 CE.

Properties: Primary subject (Case No. 9820702) reports mediating effect on the Hunter’s affliction (unverified). Item implicated in subject’s alleged abnormal longevity (unverified). Further study suggests dormancy and/or lack of reactivity to unafflicted subjects (see associated Investigation Log).

Storage: Special Collections – Inorganic Storage, Container Unit No. 982-05. Acid-free board housing, etherfoam packing. Environmental parameters in brief: maintain stable temperature (16-20°C); relative humidity, 32-35%; light levels, <300 lux. Handling protocols as per Acquisitions & Collections Policies and Procedures §3.5.3: Artefact Preservation – Metals – Copper and Copper Alloys.

Access: Upon request. Curator approval required prior to initial visit. Applicants may submit statement of intent to Acquisitions & Collections Department Head Curator for clearance. Terms, procedures, and degree of supervision subject to Curator’s discretion.

Provenance: Surrendered 2nd July, 1982 upon receipt of accompanying statement (Case No. 9820702), subject name unknown. See also Item No. 9820702-2.

Appendices:

· Investigation Log No. 9820702-1;

· Supplemental Documents Nos. 9820702-1.01 through -1.03.

Cross-reference:

· Case No. 9820702;

· Item No. 9820702-2;

· Acquisitions & Collections Catalog §3.6.4: Antiquities – Adornments and Jewelry (Inert).

Item No. 9820702-2

Description: Bound manuscript. Front and back covers unembellished leather (source undetermined) stretched over wood board (source undetermined). Leather cord binding (calf, bovine). Paper and parchment leaves. Ink corrosion and paper degradation present but minimal (fair condition inconsistent with age and media). Dimensions: 8.8cm x 14.0cm x 2.5cm. Artefact dated ca. 1190–1450 CE.

Contents: Eighteen (18) pages total, one-sided.

· Title page (1) iron gall ink on parchment (sheepskin): Gualterius Mappus – De nugis curialium – xi. De Herla rege

· Pages two (2) through four (4) iron gall ink on paper (hemp pulp, linen fiber): Medieval Latin (ca. 12th century) script.

· Pages five (5) through sixteen (16) ink (chemical composition undetermined) on paper (cotton fiber): alphabetic script (unknown roots); refer to Supplemental Document No. 9820702-2.03 for comparative linguistic analysis (inconclusive).

· Page seventeen (17) ink (chemical composition undetermined) on paper (cotton fiber): Middle English (ca. 15th century) script.

· Page eighteen (18) parchment (sheepskin): blank.

Transcripts and translations (where possible) provided in Supplemental Document No. 9820702-2.01*.

Properties: Primary subject (Case No. 9820702) reports total comprehension of Latin portions of the text despite lack of proficiency. Text alleged to diverge from source material (De nugis curialium – Map, Walter, fl. 1200). Both claims verified upon further examination (see associated Investigation Log). Probable association with the Hunter’s affliction.

Storage: Special Collections – Secure Storage. Environmental parameters in brief: maintain temperature at 20-22°C; relative humidity, 32-36%; light levels, ≤50 lux. Housing and handling protocols as per Acquisitions & Collections Policies and Procedures §2.5.5: Document Preservation – Premodern Inks – Iron Gall and §9.2: Special Precautions – Occult and Esoteric Texts.

Access: Restricted.

Provenance: Surrendered 2nd July, 1982 upon receipt of accompanying statement (Case No. 9820702), subject name unknown. See also Item No. 9820702-1.

Appendices:

· Investigation Log No. 9820702-2;

· Supplemental Documents Nos. 9820702-2.01* through -2.07;

· Incident Report No. 9930214.

Cross-reference:

· Case No. 9820702;

· Item No. 9820702-1;

· Acquisitions & Collections Catalog §2.1.1: Archival Media – Occult Books (Active);

· Interdepartmental Bulletin No. 9941002, “The Library of Jurgen Leitner: Lessons Learned.”

*Addendum, 16th February, 1993:Supplemental Document No. 9820702-2.01 reclassified as Restricted Access. Direct all inquiries to Pu Songling Research Library Head Librarian or Acquisitions & Collections Department Head Curator.

“So?” Basira prods. “What do you make of it?”

“Well, assuming the statement is a reliable account, it seems…”

“Promising, right?” Basira says, her eagerness tinted with relief. “If we can–”

She stops abruptly as the tape recorder on the table clicks back on.

“I think that’s our cue to move this conversation elsewhere,” Jon says.

Not that it will stop the tape recorders from listening in, but he has no desire to make Jonah’s surveillance any easier for him.

_________________

It takes some hemming and hawing, but Jon manages to convince Basira that this really ought to be a group discussion. As she recaps the statement and shares her own remarks, Jon keeps a close eye on the other two people in the room. Martin is listening attentively, leaning forward slightly but otherwise at ease. Daisy, though… she’s all corded muscles and jittery legs, taut and precarious on the edge of her seat.

All the while, Basira appears impervious to the storm brewing in Daisy’s eyes, even as Martin catches on and begins chewing on the inside of his cheek, darting nervous glances between the two of them. By the time Basira finishes her overview, the tension in the air is palpable, nearly electric.

For several seconds, no one speaks.

“So,” Martin says, his voice a bit pitchy. He clears his throat before continuing. “Magical, Fear-resistant brooch, huh?”

“It wouldn’t be unheard of,” Jon says. “Remember what I told you about Mikaele Salesa?”

“The apocalypse-proof bubble? Yeah.”

“That camera of his didn’t just protect him from the Eye, it hid him from the Powers in general.”

“What was the catch?” Daisy asks pointedly. “Got to be a catch.”

“Does there?” Martin asks. His hesitant smile falls at Daisy’s blank stare, and he tilts his head back with a sigh. “Yeah, alright.”

“It’s… not entirely benign, no,” Jon says. “In Salesa’s statement, he called it a ‘battery’–”

“–charging itself on all the quiet worries that come from living in hiding, and then when the sanctuary collapses, all that fear flows out at once. No doubt, if my oasis breaks before I die, the Eye will get quite the feast from me, but in this new world–”

“That’s enough of that, I think,” Martin says, resting a hand on Jon’s arm.

Jon bites his tongue, shuts his eyes, and takes a deep breath in, only daring to speak once the tingling on his lips subsides. “Sorry.”

“Nothing to apologize for.” Martin offers him a reassuring smile. “Just didn’t want you getting bogged down.”

“That’s one term for it,” Jon says, not quite under his breath. It’s true enough, though. Sometimes it feels like the Archive is pressed up against the door, watching for the tiniest crack, waiting for any opportunity to surge through and drag him under. Lately, Martin has grown uncannily adept at sensing when to interrupt these lapses before they spiral out of control – likely because they’ve been growing more frequent.

“That’s what I thought,” Daisy says. Puzzled at the apparent non-sequitur, Jon glances at her, but she isn’t looking at him. All of her attention is focused on Basira. “This thing is probably the same. It’s not some… some harmless miracle solution. If we mess around with it, it’s bound to blow up in our faces sooner or later.”

“I’m… not sure about that, actually,” Jon says. “The brooch didn’t free the Hunter, it just made it so he couldn’t be caught. I think that’s what it was feeding on – the Hunter’s gradual awareness that he was no different from the hunted, that sensation of being perpetually stalked from the shadows by a greater predator. It spent centuries charging itself on that fear, and it culminated in the realization that he would never escape it. He would always be waiting for the axe to fall, and Hunt was happy to keep him as perpetual prey. If he wanted the chase to end, he had to give up the artefact – and once it was no longer keeping him in stasis, he had a choice to make.”

“Go back to hunting, or let it catch him.” Daisy breathes a humorless laugh. “The Hunt, or the End.”

“But it would keep you alive,” Basira says. “It would buy us time to find a way to free you for real.”

“What about the Leitner?” Martin asks. “That’s what Jonah sent us after in the first place.”

“Turns out it’s not actually from Leitner’s library,” Jon says. “No bookplate, and it seems the statement giver had it in his possession since the 1500s. It’s… difficult to tell from the statement whether it had any significant effect on him. He called it ‘hypnotic,’ but he was already a Hunter by the time he found it. I imagine it might have different effects on someone not already under the Hunt’s influence.”

“He sort of alluded to that.” Basira takes a moment to peruse the statement, running her finger along the page until she finds the relevant line. “Here – they ‘found themselves either enthralled or agitated.’ A bit obscure, but… he says it like it’s an afterthought. If it outright turned anyone into a Hunter, he probably would’ve said so.”

“That doesn’t mean it isn’t dangerous,” Daisy says.

“I never said it wasn’t,” Basira replies coolly. “The record references a transcript, so I assume they had someone read it at some point. And it also mentions an incident report.”

“What was the incident?” Martin asks.

“Don’t know,” Basira says. “They didn’t provide any of the supplemental documentation, just the catalogue listing and the statement itself. But they acquired the book in ‘82 and didn’t make the transcript restricted until ‘93, so… either it was dormant when they first studied it and became active later, or they didn’t study it closely enough to activate its effects, or it doesn’t affect everyone the same way, or – or maybe their workplace safety guidelines just changed and they decided not to risk studying it anymore.”

“Jonah did say something about its effects varying depending on how much of it a person reads, right?” Martin asks. “Though who knows where he got that from.”

“There might be some truth to that,” Basira says. “The catalogue entry does describe what’s on the title page, so I’m assuming that part at least is safe. I’m most curious about the untranslated chunk in the middle.”

And I’m a universal translator, Jon thinks, fidgeting with the drawstring of his hoodie. Basira’s eyes flick to him, as if reading his mind.

“I… suppose I could–”

“No,” Martin and Daisy say simultaneously.

Jon scowls. “You didn’t even let me finish the–”

“You threw yourself into the Buried – twice – to save me,” Daisy says severely. “You can’t keep sacrificing yourself at every opportunity.”

“I wouldn’t be–”

“What, re-traumatizing yourself by reading a Leitner?” Jon shuts his mouth, pressing his lips tightly together. “It’s not worth it, Sims.”

“Daisy,” Basira begins, but Daisy cuts her off.

“No. I’m not having him throw himself to the wolves just because you’re curious.”

Basira flinches, hurt momentarily crossing her face before her expression goes stony.

“You really think that’s what this is about?” she says, her voice shaking. “Knowledge for knowledge’s sake? Me being curious?”

“You can’t tell me you’re not,” Daisy says, and then her expression softens. “And I love that about you, I do – you’re brilliant, Basira – and driven, and passionate, and…” She sighs. “But sometimes… sometimes you need to let things go.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Jon notices Martin cross and uncross his legs, his lower lip captured between his teeth. When Jon catches his eye, Martin jerks his chin minutely at Basira and Daisy, a grimace on his face. All Jon can offer is a helpless, equally awkward shrug. Near as he can tell, Basira and Daisy seem to have momentarily forgotten that they have an audience, and judging from their locked eyes and thunderous expressions, he doubts either of them would appreciate a reminder right this second.

“Let you go, you mean,” Basira says tersely. “When you say ‘it’s not worth it,’ what you really mean is that you’re not worth it.”

“Well, I’m not.”

The cavalier tone is the last straw, it seems.

“Why won’t you just let me help you?” Basira slams her hand down on the rickety table, straining its wobbly legs. “You’re just so ready to–” She lets out a frustrated groan. “You never used to give up this easily.”

“Maybe should’ve done,” Daisy says flatly. “Might’ve lowered my body count.”

“Giving up Hunting doesn’t have to mean giving up on living,” Basira says. “I might have finally found an alternative, and you won’t even consider–”

“I’m not doing anything that’s going to hurt someone, and that includes exposing Jon to a fucking Leitner.”

“I’m right here, you know,” Jon mutters testily, the friction finally getting the better of his nerves. “Don’t I get a say?”

“No, you don’t,” Daisy says, rounding on him. Now that all of her brimming agitation is funneled in his direction, he regrets saying anything at all. “Because lately, whenever I ask you if you want to hurt yourself, the best you can give me is ‘it doesn’t matter because I can’t die anyway.’”

“Jon?” Martin says urgently, his eyebrows drawing together.

“Th-that’s not what I–”

“You’re not thinking rationally,” Daisy speaks over Jon’s stammering. “You’re thinking like a condemned man with a rope around his neck and something to prove, and I’m not going to be the noose you use to hang yourself with.”

“Will you listen to yourself?” Basira says heatedly. “You get on my case about double standards–”

“That’s enough!” Martin bursts out. “This isn’t helping. Daisy’s right, Jon. You’re not going anywhere near that book – I don’t want to hear it,” he adds before Jon can retort. “Not now, anyway. We’ll talk later. But Basira’s right, too,” Martin says, turning his attention to Daisy. “You can’t make amends by dying, and you can’t do better going forward if you’re not alive to try.”

“Who says I deserve a chance?” Daisy says.

“Whatever you think you ‘deserve’” – Martin gives Jon a meaningful glance as he says it – “you’ve got a chance, and people who want to help you through it, and you ought to consider that before you assume you’d do more good dead than alive.” He exhales a sharp breath. “Anyway, forget the Leitner, and forget what Jonah said about it. The brooch seems like the more promising option here.”

“I agree,” Jon says, cowed. “Between the book and the brooch, the statement giver credited the latter with keeping the Hunt at bay. And perhaps my bias is showing, but truthfully I – I’m not inclined to see those books as anything but tragedies waiting to happen.”

“What’s the difference?” Daisy says flatly. “It took a decade for something bad enough to happen for them to make the Leitner’s transcript restricted. The brooch could be just as much of a time bomb. Just because it doesn’t have any ‘incidents’ connected with it now doesn’t mean it never will.”

She isn’t wrong. Looking back, Jon had found it infuriating that Leitner would continue meddling with the books even after he witnessed the horror they wrought, all while claiming to have learned from his hubris. Just because this particular artefact isn’t a book doesn’t make it any less ominous.

And yet…

“I think it’s already shown its more sinister side,” Jon says slowly.

“You think,” Daisy scoffs.

“It doesn’t give a Hunter strength, it makes them perpetual prey. It… won’t be pleasant for you, I’m sure,” Jon admits, “but Basira’s right – it could keep you alive while we search for a better solution.”

“There might not be a better solution,” Daisy says stubbornly.

“Which is what I said before you browbeat me into taking statements from you,” Jon counters.

“I didn’t browbeat–” Jon raises his eyebrows. Daisy gives a flustered groan. “It’s just – it’s different, okay?”

Much as Jon wants to disagree, he knows better than to argue. They’d only end up talking in circles.

“I think it’s an avenue worth pursuing,” he says. “Given the alternatives.”

“Please, Daisy,” Basira says. “Just… consider it, at least.”

The for me remains unspoken, but Jon can hear it loud and clear. As can Daisy, it seems – the defiant set to her jaw falters for a moment before she tenses again.

“Fine,” she says grudgingly. “But if it starts to go south–”

“If it manifests any new properties, we’ll prioritize containing it over interacting with it,” Jon says.

“You promise?” Daisy asks, but she looks at Basira when she says it. It takes a moment, but Basira does nod.

“Do you think Pu Songling will let us have it?” Martin asks. “Seems like their protocols are…”

“Rigorous?” Jon supplies.

“You’d almost think they were running an academic institution or something,” Basira says drily.

“Yeah, but treating the artefacts like museum pieces, it’s… it’s weird, isn’t it?” Martin says. “It’s not as if they’re fragile, right? They’re held together by… nightmare alchemy, or whatever.”

“I suppose it’s to be expected,” Jon says. “I know the Librarian has a degree in information science. And I recall her telling me that the Curator is an historian with a background in museology. But you’re right – it would be nice if Leitners were as delicate as the average old manuscript.”

“At least they’re flammable,” Daisy mutters.

“We spoke with the Head Curator,” Basira says. “She’s willing to work out a trade.”

“A trade?” Martin asks.

“Knowledge for knowledge,” Jon says. “An artefact for an artefact. I get the impression that the Librarian and the Curator are both very… collections-oriented. True to their titles, I suppose.”

“Hold up,” Daisy says. “‘The Librarian,’ ‘the Curator’ – are those just job titles, or are they, like… Beholding Avatar titles?” Jon blinks at her, perplexed. “I mean – the way you keep saying them, it’s sort of like…”

“What, ‘Archivist’?” Jon gnaws on his thumbnail as he pauses to consider. “I… don’t know, actually. I wasn’t really doing it consciously? It just…” He shrugs helplessly. “It felt right.”

“Is it coming from the Eye, then?”

“I have no idea, Basira.” Jon leans forward, props his elbows on his knees, and digs the heels of his palms into his eyes. “I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“Hm.”

“In any case…” Jon exhales slowly, forcing himself to sit up straight again. “They seem to take the research and curation aspects of their roles to heart. They aren’t reckless with their pursuits, they take ample precautions, but the scholars at Pu Songling do study the items that come into their possession. And from what I understand, the Curator takes avid interest in adding to their collection. Same as the Archivist’s role is to record stories. To what extent her efforts are driven by her connection to the Eye versus her own innate curiosity, I couldn’t tell you, no more than I can make that distinction in myself.”

“Sort of a chicken-or-egg situation, then,” Daisy says.

“From an evolutionary perspective, the egg came first,” Jon says automatically. “Amniotic eggs have been around for over three hundred million years. Birds originated in the Jurassic, true galliforms didn’t evolve until at least the Late Cretaceous, phasianids don’t appear in the fossil record until about thirty million years ago, and chickens as we know them were only domesticated about eight thousand years ago–”

“Oh my god,” Daisy groans, putting her head in her hands.

“What?” Jon says, heat rising in his cheeks as Martin muffles a snicker beneath his hand. “I’m not wrong.”

“Pu Songling’s Collections Department is larger than our Artefact Storage,” Basira interjects, “but the, uh… Curator has a shortlist of artefacts she’s been on the lookout for. I checked our records and found a match. A ring – probably belongs to the Vast, based on the reports surrounding it. Looks like the Institute purchased it from Salesa in 2014, shortly before his disappearance. The Curator considers it an ‘equitable exchange,’ but she still wants to assess the ring in person before making the trade.”

“And we still have to talk to Sonja,” Jon adds. “On the one hand, she likely wouldn’t object to being rid of an artefact, but on the other hand… I imagine she won’t be keen on letting it out into the world.”

“I think it would be a harder sell if you were just going to swap it out for another artefact – something unfamiliar that they’d have to develop all new protocols for,” Martin says. “But yeah, even if you won’t be making the brooch her problem, she’ll probably still want to know what we want with it. And I can see her pressing the Curator on why she wants the ring when she gets here.”

“The Curator won’t be coming here,” Basira says evenly, casting a surreptitious glance at Daisy to gauge her reaction. “Says she’s too busy to travel.”

“So you have to haul the ring up to her,” Daisy says.

“I mean” – Basira breathes an uneasy laugh – “it’s a ring. Not much hauling involved–”

“Oh, don’t start–”

“–and there are precautions I can take. Looks like Artefact Storage has relatively thorough documentation for this one.”

“‘Relatively’?” Daisy repeats, unimpressed. “You were just complaining about how sparse their records are. ‘Relatively’ isn’t saying much.”

“Well, it’s better than nothing.” Basira rubs at her face. “I have to do this. Just… trust me.”

“You know I do–”

“Then let me have your back,” Basira says, practically pleading. “Let me help you.”

“Fine,” Daisy mutters, her posture going slack. “Do what you want.”

It’s not exactly a resounding endorsement, but it’s as good as they’re likely to get.

_________________

Despite Daisy’s lack of enthusiasm, Basira immediately throws herself into making arrangements. The Curator at Pu Songling is more than accommodating, seemingly as eager as Basira to make the trade. The real challenge is the Head of Artefact Storage.

It takes over a week of cajoling, lengthy justifications, and a concerted, collaborative effort from Basira, Jon, and Martin before Sonja finally, albeit reluctantly, agrees to discuss the matter with the Curator. Over the following days, Basira and Jon facilitate negotiations between the two: mediating a fair amount of (professional, but nevertheless pointed) verbal sparring early on, and later arbitrating the terms and conditions of the trade.

“You’d think that in the course of dealing with literal supernatural evil on a daily basis,” Basira gripes at one point, “bureaucracy wouldn’t be the biggest priority.”

“I’ve found that the bureaucratic process gives me ample time to make assessments,” Sonja says, unruffled. “Red tape has a way of bringing out the worst in people. Sometimes that’s a procrastinating student who woke up this morning, realized their deadline is next week, and ‘needs access to our materials, like, yesterday,’” she says, complete with finger quotes and a mocking tone. “And sometimes it’s some shady rich snob who’s been consistently cagey about his motives, and eventually he starts to go from impatient and entitled to desperate and frustrated, and that’s when the red flags start popping up crimson. After a while, you learn to distinguish the mundane sort of desperation from the more sinister sort.”

“Huh,” Jon says, smiling to himself. He knew Sonja was clever, but he never knew she was so calculating. It seems Jonah made the same mistake with Sonja as he did with Gertrude – overestimating a person’s curiosity and malleability, underestimating their prudence and pragmatism, and then promoting them to a position where they were free to act in a decidedly un-Beholding-like manner.

Once Sonja is sufficiently assured that the Curator has no intentions of utilizing the artefact or allowing it to venture beyond the secure confines of Pu Songling’s Collections Storage, the process starts to go a bit more smoothly. As expected, Sonja is amenable to the prospect of having one less piece of malignant costume jewelry, as she puts it, provided the Archival staff take full responsibility – both for the ring once Basira signs it out and for the artefact they receive in exchange.

“The ring has a compulsion effect,” Sonja tells them. “Makes people want to put it on – and once it’s on your finger, it’s not coming off until you hit the ground. Luckily it’s not a particularly active artefact, at least not compared to some of the other things we have here. I wouldn’t call it safe, obviously, but” – she raps her knuckles on the wooden beads of the bracelet on her opposite wrist – “it’s never breached containment.”

The how and why become abundantly clear upon seeing the closed ring box, so caked in earth and grime that it’s impossible to make out the color or material underneath.

“Buried, I take it,” Basira murmurs, giving Jon a sidelong glance.

“Yeah.” Jon grimaces at the phantom taste of soil on his tongue. “An artefact to contain an artefact.”

“Looks like the Curator is getting a twofer,” Basira says.

“Fine by me,” Sonja says with a nonchalant shrug. “That’s the box it came in, actually. Don’t know why it works, but it does, and that’s all I care about. So long as you keep it closed, the worst you’ll get is vertigo. As far as we’ve observed, anyway. There’s always a chance that an artefact has more secrets than it lets on at first glance. Assuming you know everything there is to know is a good way to end up in a casket.”

“We’re well aware,” Jon says. “Believe me.”

“Seriously, though – if this goes tits up, I don’t want to hear it,” Sonja says sternly, all but wagging a finger. “And if you call up here a few months from now to tell me that you’ve got a rogue artefact wreaking havoc in the Archives, and I’ve got to put my people at risk to contain it, I will unleash unholy hell.”

The funny thing is, Jon believes her.

_________________

Despite the progress they’re making on obtaining the Hunter’s brooch, dissent continues to simmer within the group – particularly where Daisy is concerned. As the escalating tension in the Archives becomes ever more tangible, Martin begins to feel claustrophobic under the weight of all the things left unspoken.

Daisy is consistently ill-tempered: bellicose in one moment and taciturn in the next, frequently seeking out solitude whenever her agitation gets the best of her. Martin suspects that her volatile mood has as much to do with her deteriorating condition as it does to do with her lingering aversion to the rest of the group’s efforts. Although she and Basira haven’t had another row – so far as Martin is aware, anyway – there’s been an undeniable friction between them. On the worst days, Basira keeps to herself, burying her head in her research while Daisy slinks off to some dark corner of the Archives to brood until Jon comes to drag her away from her thoughts.

Not that Jon is much better. He’s been sullen lately, growing more withdrawn, sleeping less and jumping at shadows even more than usual. Martin often catches him in a trance, staring vacantly into space and droning horrors under his breath. More and more he lapses into statement clips mid-sentence, regardless of how recently he’s had a statement. Sometimes, all it takes is a momentary slip for Jon to lose his footing and devolve into a frenzied litany of back-to-back, fragmentary horror stories. On a few recent occasions he’s lost his voice entirely, though luckily it’s only been for an hour or two at a time.

(So far, Jon says morosely after each episode.)

Most unsettling, though, is the chronic faraway look in his eye, like he’s seeing something else. Like he’s somewhere else, lost across an unbridgeable divide.

Martin is well-acquainted with the sensation of feeling alone in the presence of others. That doesn’t make it any less distressing. It’s not that Jon intends to be distant. He might not even be aware of it; would likely be mortified if he knew just how much that detachment stirred Martin’s longstanding fears of isolation and abandonment. Jon’s still affectionate, after all. Although he seems reluctant to actively seek out comfort these days, he’s still prompt to take an outstretched hand, to lean into a kind touch, to accept a proffered embrace. Still makes a concerted effort to muster, however feebly, a soft smile whenever Martin enters a room. Still attempts to be present and attentive and open.

But sometimes it feels like Jon is out of reach, separated from the rest of the world, watching it pass him by through layers of frosted glass. Martin knows the feeling. What he doesn’t know is how to fix it.

Before long, Basira is set to leave for Beijing, an artefact of the Vast nestled away in her luggage amidst assurances to Sonja that, yes, under no circumstances will Basira attempt to take it on a plane or into the open ocean because, no, Basira does not have a death wish, thank you very much.

Martin half-expects another quarrel to break out on the eve of Basira’s departure, but Daisy is oddly subdued. Perhaps she just doesn’t want to part ways with angry words and unresolved arguments, or perhaps she’s simply come to accept the rest of the group’s decision to move forward with the plan. Considering the dark circles under her eyes, though, it’s just as likely that she’s simply too fatigued to start a fight.

A few days later, Martin descends the ladder into the tunnels to find Jon standing at his makeshift desk, staring down at the map unfurled across its surface – the product of the group’s ongoing efforts to survey the sprawling tunnel system of the former Millbank Prison. The blueprint-in-progress is an equally sprawling thing: sheets of mismatched paper layered one atop the next and taped together, its irregular borders comprised of haphazard angles and dog-eared edges.

The hand-drawn map on its surface is chaotic, reflecting the penmanship of four different authors. Jon’s contributions might be the messiest – the burn scar contracture on his dominant hand renders his lines shaky at best, and his handwriting has always been a tad chickenscratch. Daisy’s isn’t much better. Conversely, Basira’s additions are the neatest, her strokes as steady as the persona she tries to project to the world. Martin’s are passable, if only because, unlike Jon or Daisy, he actually has the patience to use rulers and book edges to trace straight paths.

To be fair, it would probably look a mess no matter how painstaking they were in constructing it. The tunnels are as labyrinthine as expected: a vast network of arterial corridors with offshoots along their lengths, branching into three- or four-way forks, most of which lead to dead ends. Occasionally, they find a path that loops back around and connects other parts of the maze, creating a series of meandering, convoluted closed circuits. It’s difficult to tell just by looking, but they are (Martin hopes) making progress. At the rate they’re going, they have to be on track to find the Panopticon before the winter solstice.

In any case, as Martin approaches the desk, he sees that familiar vacant look on Jon’s face, as if he isn’t actually seeing what’s in front of him. The effect is underscored by the cigarette burning away in his hand, hanging limp and forgotten at his side. Martin clears his throat lightly, in deference to Jon’s hair-trigger startle reflex. He doesn’t count the fact that Jon doesn’t jump at all as a success. If anything, it’s cause for concern.

“Jon?” Martin tries. There’s a slight delay before Jon glances over, giving Martin no acknowledgment aside from a sluggish blink before lowering his head again.

“I, uh…” Martin offers a weak smile, attempting to keep his tone light. He gestures at the cigarette. “I thought you quit?”

Jon shrugs, refusing to meet Martin’s eyes. “Not like it’ll kill me.”

“Might catch up with you later, though,” Martin says, scratching at his neck. “You know, once we find a way out of here.”

“There is no ‘out’ for me,” Jon says mulishly.

“You don’t know that. Or Know it.” Jon’s only reaction is to press his lips tightly together, like he’s biting back a retort. “Look, I’m not trying to nag you, I just wor– Jon!” Martin yelps as he watches Jon put his cigarette out on the back of his hand.

Martin lunges forward, grabbing Jon’s hand and yanking it close to inspect the damage. It’s the same hand that Jude shook, already textured and pitted with webs of hypertrophic scarring. Somehow, Jon managed to plant this newest burn on a patch of previously-undamaged skin, sandwiched between two bands of knotted tissue.

The contours of her fingers, Martin recognizes with a queasy lurch – followed by another when he thinks to wonder whether Jon sought out that scrap of healthy skin on purpose just now.

Jon barely reacts, staring into space with wide eyes and dilated pupils. Martin looks down again to see the circular singe mark already knitting itself back together, leaving only a small, shiny patch of discoloration ringed with a dusting of ash. In all likelihood, even that will be gone by morning.

If only all wounds would heal so easily.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Martin hisses, fighting to keep his voice even. He brushes a soothing thumb over the spot, as if to apologize to the abused skin on Jon’s behalf.

Jogged out of his reverie by Martin’s sharp tone, Jon stares daggers at him, his mouth open as if to unleash a scathing reprimand, the set of his jaw so reminiscent of those early days in the Archives. An instant later, though, he withers, cringing away and fixing his eyes on the floor.

“I wasn’t,” he mumbles, at least having the decency to sound contrite. “Wasn’t really paying attention.”

It’s not the first time Martin’s witnessed a self-inflicted injury. When pressed, Jon always claims that it’s not a deliberate, planned form of self-punishment, but rather a reflex reaction that kicks in when he starts feeling adrift in time. Somewhere along the line, it seems, he convinced himself that physical pain is as good a shortcut as any – a sort of panic button to bring him back to the present when he needs grounding.

Whatever his intentions, though, and no matter what rationalizations Jon wants to dole out, it’s not a healthy coping mechanism. And it’s difficult for Martin to believe that self-punishment doesn’t factor at all, considering Jon’s obsessive guilt spirals and his blasé attitude towards being hurt.

“‘S already healed,” Jon says with a spiritless shrug. He drops the snuffed-out remainder of his cigarette on the floor and unnecessarily grinds it under his heel.

“That’s not the point.” Martin doesn’t realize how tightly he’s grasping Jon’s hand until Jon winces. Although Martin relaxes his grip somewhat, he doesn’t let go. “It doesn’t matter how quickly your body heals, or that you’ve had worse, or whatever other justifications you want to make. You’re still getting hurt. That’s not okay, and – and if it were me in your shoes, you’d be telling me the same thing.”

“I’m sorry.” Jon’s hair falls to cover his face as he ducks his head.

It’s fine, Martin almost says – except it’s not, is it?

“Come on,” he says instead, guiding Jon to sit in the nearest chair before taking a seat next to him. Where before Jon was all stiff limbs and rigid spine, now he looks like he’s given up the ghost, drooping like a wilting flower.

Though he allows Martin to keep hold of his hand, Jon doesn’t return the pressure. And Jon’s skin is freezing – no doubt partly due to the damp chill of the tunnels, and partly because he has, by his own admission, always had shit circulation. Combined with his limp fingers and loose grip, though, the overall effect is far too reminiscent of those months spent keeping vigil over Jon’s hospital bed, his hand nothing but cold, dead weight in Martin’s.

It took too long for Martin to admit that he had been foolish to hope that Jon was still in there somewhere, aware of Martin’s presence, fighting to regain consciousness. The whole time, Martin was just keeping his own company. Jon wasn’t just unreachable – he wasn’t there at all.

(Martin had been wrong about that in the end. He doesn’t know that he’ll ever forgive himself for not being there when Jon woke up.)

Martin bites his lip as he formulates a response. He’s learned over the years that when Jon is like this, it’s best to strike a careful balance between docility and defiance. Push too hard too fast, and Jon will dig his heels in; approach him too tentatively, and he’s liable to interpret concern as pity; force him to talk about his feelings, and he’ll bolt; smother him with tenderness, and he’ll balk.

Granted, Jon has become much more receptive to tenderness over the years. Most of the time, anyway. When his skewed self-worth and convictions about what he does and doesn’t deserve don’t get in the way.

“At the risk of being a nag–”

“You’re not a nag,” Jon says softly.

“When’s the last time you had a statement?”

“A few days ago.” The response is too quick, too automatic.

“A few days ago,” Martin repeats, allowing a bit of disbelief to seep into his voice.

Jon nods stiffly. “Monday, I think.”

“Today is Tuesday.”

“I–” Jon cuts off his own retort, turning to blink owlishly at Martin. “Is it?”

“Yeah,” Martin says, his heart sinking. Jon must be losing time again. “So you had a statement yesterday?”

“No, I – I don’t…” Jon squints up at the ceiling, wracking his brain. “I don’t think so? It’s – I think I would recall if it had been shorter than one day.”

“So, last Monday?”

“I don’t – I don’t know,” Jon says, growing testy. “I suppose. Must’ve been.”

“Are you hungry?”

“I’m always hungry.” The admission is devoid of all the simmering agitation that had been there only moments before. Now, he just sounds tired.

“Well… I think you might be due for one.” Although Martin had been striving for gentle suggestion, there’s a harsh edge to the words. Rather than get Jon’s hackles up again, though, he seems to crumple under what he doubtless reads as an accusation.

“You’re right,” he says hoarsely. “And I’m sorry. I know lately I’ve been…”

“Tetchy,” Martin offers, just as Jon says, “a bit of a prick.”

“Your words, not mine,” Martin says with a tentative grin. Jon returns his own feeble half-smile, but it quickly falters.

“I’ve almost exhausted Daisy’s catalogue,” he confesses. “Only a handful left now. I’ve got to make them last until the solstice.”

An apprehensive chill runs down Martin’s spine at that. “And then what?”

“I haven’t thought that far ahead.”

There’s virtually no chance that Jon, prone to rumination as he is, hasn’t been dwelling on it.

“Basira said she has a few statements, right?” Martin asks. “Which… if you already have a statement about an encounter, can you still get nourishment from other statements about it, so long as it’s coming from someone else’s point of view?”

“Probably.” Jon shrugs one shoulder. “The factual details of the encounter are less important than the subject’s emotional response. Different perspective, different story, different lived experience of fear.”

“Then… you have my statement about the Flesh attack, but there’s still Basira’s. And – and maybe Melanie–”

“I’m not taking another statement from Melanie,” Jon says tersely. “She’s been tethered to me for too long without say, and I’m not dragging her back in.”

“But if it’s consensual–”

“It won’t be, because I don’t consent.”

“If the alternative is literally starving–”

“I’ll find another alternative. Or I won’t. But I’m not asking Melanie for a statement.” Jon keeps his head bowed, but he looks up at Martin through his lashes. “The first time she quit, I was worried that she might show up in my nightmares again, but she didn’t. I don’t know if her severance from the Eye will keepher out of my nightmares if she gives me a new statement, and… I can’t risk it. I can’t do that to her. Even if the nightmares weren’t an issue… I’m not going to ask her to relive yet another traumatic experience for my benefit–”

“–I shall choose to die rather than take part in such an unholy meal–”

Jon claps a hand over his mouth, a panicked look in his eye.

“…nor shall I take my own life, whatever extremity my suffering may reach,” he tacks on, too much of an afterthought for comfort.

“Which means we need to plan for the future,” Martin says, forcing calm into his voice despite the way his heart picks up its pace.

“But it can’t involve Melanie,” Jon says – gentler than before, but still firm.

“No, you’re – you’re right,” Martin relents. “It wouldn’t be fair to her. But we could still ask Basira.”

Jon makes a noncommittal noise, his expression rapidly going pinched and closed off again.

“Lately,” Martin says, licking his lips nervously, “lately it feels like you’ve been shutting everyone out again. It isn’t healthy–”

“Healthy?” Jon’s glare could burn a hole in the floor. “I don’t need to be healthy, I just need to be whatever it wants.”

Once, Martin might have been daunted by Jon’s scathing tone. By now, he knows that Jon is all bluster – and that the brunt of it is turned inward, against his own self.

“Please, Jon. Tell me what’s going on. You’re worrying me.”

Those, apparently, are the magic words, because Jon finally capitulates.

“It’s October,” he tells the floor.

“It… is October, yeah.” Bewildered, Martin waits for elaboration. When a minute passes with no response forthcoming, he prompts, “Is that… bad…?”

“Historically, yes, it has been,” Jon says with a tired, frayed-sounding chuckle.

“I… Jon, I need you to help me out here,” Martin says helplessly. “I can’t read your mind.”

“October is when it happens, Martin.” Jon glances at Martin once, quickly, before returning his gaze to the ground. He’s twisting one hand around the opposite wrist now, fingers curled tightly enough to blanch his knuckles. “The eighteenth. When everything goes wrong.”

“You mean…”

Jon’s sharp inhale becomes a choked exhale, which in turn abruptly cuts off as the Archive takes its cue.

“…what settled over me wasn’t dread; there wasn’t enough uncertainty for that. It was doom. I was certain that some sort of disaster was on the horizon–”

“–something bad. Something unspeakable. And I would have helped make it happen–”

“–the fear never really went away. I’ve heard that being exposed to the source of your terror over and over again can help break its power over you, numb you to it, but in my experience it just teaches you to hide from it. Sometimes that might mean hiding in a quiet corner of your mind, but–”

“–soon enough, I could no longer fool myself–”

“–the calm I had been getting accustomed to had been torn away completely, and where it had been was just this horrible, ice-cold terror–”

“–that – we can’t escape the ruins of our own future–”

“–a future where – humanity was violently and utterly supplanted, and wiped out by a new category of being–”

“–there are terrible things coming – things that, if we knew them, would leave us weak and trembling, with shuddering terror at the knowledge that they are coming for all of us–”

“–I think in my heart, I have been waiting for this moment. For the final axe to fall–”

“–we create the world in a lot of ways. I suppose it shouldn’t be surprising that, when we’re not being careful, we can change it–”

There’s a breathless pause before Jon continues, in a nearly inaudible whisper: “What could I have chosen to change? Would a different path have been possible?”

“It is,” Martin says firmly, “and we’re on it. What happened last time won’t happen again. We won’t let it.”

Jon doesn’t acknowledge the reassurance.

“I should’ve known,” he says with a quiet ferocity, in his own voice this time. “It was too peaceful. I should’ve known it wasn’t going to last. And – and on some level I did know – I knew it wasn’t over – but I just… I didn’t want to be the one to shatter the illusion, I suppose.” His expression goes taut. “Didn’t much matter what I wanted, in the end. But I still should’ve seen it coming. Can’t let my guard down again.”

“How could you have known?” Martin doesn’t intend for it to come out as exasperated. He tries to reel it back, to gentle his tone. “You’ve said yourself that you can’t predict the future–”

“No, but I knew Jonah had plans for me. And I knew nothing good could come of feeding the Eye, but I kept on anyway.”

“It’s not like you were doing it for fun, Jon! You needed it to survive, and Jonah took advantage of that. Or…” No – that makes it sound purely opportunistic, doesn’t it? In reality, it was all part of Jonah’s long game from the start. “He made you dependent on statements specifically becausehe wanted to take advantage of that.”

“I made choices,” Jon says tonelessly. “I can’t absolve myself of responsibility just because Jonah was nudging me in a particular direction.”

“You were manipulated,” Martin insists, “and I’m not having you apologize for surviving it. For not starving to death.”

“You don’t understand,” Jon says, growing more distressed, reaching up with both hands and tangling his fingers in his hair. “When that box of statements finally arrived, I… I couldn’t shoo you away fast enough. I was hungry, yes, but I wasn’t starving yet. I could’ve waited longer, but I just… I wanted one–”

“–should have fought harder against the temptation – but my curiosity was too strong–”

“You shouldn’t have to wait until you’re literally on death’s doorstep before you fulfill a basic need,” Martin interrupts.

“I should when that ‘basic need’ entails serving the Beholding,” Jon says heatedly. “And I – I should’ve known better – should’ve known not to jump headlong into the first statement that caught my eye. I’d known for a while that the Beholding leads me away from statements it doesn’t want me to know. It logically follows that it would lead me towards statements that would strengthen it. If I’d had any sense, I would’ve been suspicious of anything in that box that called out to me. It didn’t… it didn’t feel any different, but I – I suppose that somewhere along the line I just got used to… to wandering down whatever path I was led. I didn’t think, I never stop to think–”

“If anything, Jon, you overthink. You’re overthinking right now.”

Martin has known for a long time now that Jon will latch onto the smallest details, allow his thoughts to branch into an impossible number of routes and tangents, tie together loose threads in countless permutations in the interest of considering all possible conclusions, no matter how outlandish. He will apply Occam's razor in one moment before tossing it into the bin, only to fish it out again: lather, rinse, repeat. His mind is a noisy, cluttered conspiracy corkboard, and he’ll hang himself with red string if given half a chance, just to feel like he’s in control of something.

“It’s easy to look back and criticize your past self,” Martin says, “but he didn’t know what you do. If we knew the outcome to every action, maybe we wouldn’t make mistakes, but we’re only human–”

“Not all of us.”

“–so we just have to do the best with what we have in the moment,” Martin continues, paying no heed to Jon’s grumbled comment. No good will come of guiding him down that rabbit trail right now. Anyway, Martin has a more pressing concern–

“Why didn’t you tell me about any of this sooner?” he blurts out, immediately wincing at his lack of tact. “That came out wrong–”

“Why didn’t I tell you how quick I was to chase you out of the house and sink my teeth into a statement the moment temptation presented itself?” Jon scoffs. “Because I’m ashamed. Why else?”

“No, not–” Martin scrubs a hand over his face. It’s a struggle, sometimes, not to grab Jon by the shoulders and shake him until all of that stubborn self-loathing falls away. “About the fact that you’ve got a – a post-traumatic anniversary event coming up, I mean. You haven’t been well, and I thought I understood why – thought it was just… all of it, in general. But here I come to find you’ve been agonizing over the upcoming date of the single worse day of your life–”

“One of the worst,” Jon says quietly.

“What?”

“I didn’t lose you until much later.”

Martin’s breath catches in his throat at that, a sharp pang shooting through his chest.

“Well… you’ve got me now,” he says meekly. “So – so you don’t have to suffer in silence, is what I’m saying. What happened to you – no, what was done to you – it was horrible, and it wasn’t your fault. I know you don’t believe that, but it’s the truth.”

“Either I’ve always been caught up in someone else’s web, passively having things happen to me with no control over my life–”

“–the Mother got exactly the result she no doubt wanted, one that would lead to a fear – so acute that I could later have that horror focused and refined into a silk-spun apotheosis–”

Jon bites down on one knuckle, eyes shut tight as he waits for the compulsion to subside.

“Or,” he says after a minute, “or I do have control, and I can change the outcome, which makes me culpable. I don’t know which prospect I hate more. Which probably says some unflattering things about me.”

“It’s not that simple–”

“It is,” Jon says viciously. “If there is another path, then I should’ve found it last time!” He closes his eyes, pinches the bridge of his nose, and takes a steadying breath. When he speaks again, he’s no longer bordering on shouting, but there’s a quaver in his voice, a fragility that Martin finds more disconcerting than any flash of anger. “The way I see it, there are two options. One, what happened in my future was inevitable and nothing I could’ve done would’ve changed it – which certainly doesn’t bode well for this timeline. Or, the outcome can be changed, in which case my choices matter, and had I just made better choices, maybe I could have prevented all of this from ever happening in the first place.”

“You’re not being fair,” Martin says, his hands clenching into fists – but Jon isn’t listening.

“Doesn’t make much difference, I suppose. The consequences are the same either way–”

“–billions of – people making their way through life who had no idea what was right above their heads–”

“–would-be occult dynasties and ageless monsters–”

“–minds so strange and colossal that we would never know they were minds at all–”

“–idiots who destroyed themselves chasing a secret that wasn’t worth knowing–”

“–there, caught up in a series of events that I didn’t understand but that terrified me – I did the stupidest thing I’ve ever done–”

“–running was pointless. To try to escape from my task would only serve to fulfill another. I finally understood what I needed to do–”

“–I don’t know if you have ever drowned, but it’s the most painful thing I have ever experienced–”

“–I do not suppose I need to dwell on the pain, but please know that I would sooner die than endure it again–”

“Would you?” Martin says abruptly. Jon won’t look at him. “Jon, I need to know if you’re feeling like hurting yourself.”

“What would it matter if I was?” Jon still won’t look at him. “I’m categorically incapable of hurting myself in any way that matters.”

Martin blinks in disbelief. “Okay, that’s blatantly untrue.”

Jon has been a glaring portrait of self-neglect for as long as Martin has known him. That simple lack of consideration for himself, together with compounding survivor’s guilt, was the perfect stepping stone to active self-endangerment. Now that Jon’s convinced himself he’s invulnerable to a normal human death, he’s all the more careless with himself.

“I don’t want to die,” Jon whispers. “That’s the problem.”

“What—?”

“Before, I was unknowingly putting the entire world at risk by – by waking up after the Unknowing, by crawling out of the Buried, by escaping the Hunters, by continuing to read statements like it was – like it was something routine, as unremarkable as – as taking tea. Now, though – now I know better. I know what Jonah is planning, I saw what I’m capable of, and still I… I don’t want to die.”

“Well… good,” Martin says. “You should want to live–”

“It doesn’t much matter what I want–”

“–I never wanted to weigh up the value of a life, to set it on the scales against my own, but that’s a choice that I am forced into–”

“–doesn’t get to die for that – gets to live, trapped and helpless, and entombed forever – powerless–”

“–a lynchpin for this new ritual – a record of fear–”

Shit, Martin thinks the instant he recognizes the statement. It’s the worst of them all, virtually guaranteed to send Jon spiraling.

“–both in mind as you walk the shuddering record of each statement, and in body as the Powers each leave their mark upon you – a living chronicle of terror – a conduit for the coming of this – nightmare kingdom–”

“Okay, okay, stay with me–”

“–the Chosen one is simply that: someone I chose. It’s not in your blood, or your soul, or your destiny. It’s just in your own, rotten luck–”

“Jon, can you hear me? Jon–”

“–I’ll admit, my options were somewhat limited, but my god, when you came to me already marked by the Web, I knew it had to be you. I even held out some small hope you had been sent by the Spider as some sort of implicit blessing on the whole project, and, do you know what, I think it was–”

Martin reaches over, taking both of Jon’s hands in his own and squeezing tightly. The pressure seems to do the trick: lucidity sparks in Jon’s eyes and he takes a deep, ragged breath, as if coming up for air.

“There you are. Are you okay?” Martin rubs both thumbs over the backs of Jon’s hands in rhythmic, soothing motions. “Hey, it’s–”

“I don’t want your kindness!” Jon snaps, jerking backwards and snatching his hands out from Martin’s grip.

Both of them lapse into a stunned silence. As mortification dawns on Jon’s face, Martin can feel the color rising in his cheeks. It only takes a few seconds for the blood rushing in his ears to be drowned out by another voice.

Martin can remember with cutting clarity the days prior to his mother’s departure to the nursing home. She had been in (somewhat) rare form, her already-short fuse dwindled down to nothing, sniping at him around the clock, full of caustic observations and spiteful accusations.

I don’t want your help, she had sneered as she entered the cab, swatting his hand away.

It was one of the last things she ever said to him.

“Well, tough,” Martin bites out, “because you deserve it, and you never should’ve had to go without it, and you’re not going to change my mind about that, so you may as well stop trying!”

“Martin, I – I – I’m sorry, I didn’t mean–”

He saw, Martin realizes all at once, his skin crawling with humiliation.

“I’m going to go make some tea,” Martin says, rising to his feet.

Jon reaches out a hand. “Martin–”

“I just need a breather, okay?” Martin says, a pleading note to his voice. His lungs are constricting, his chest is tightening, there’s a lump in his throat, and he really doesn’t want to have a panic attack in the tunnels – or in front of Jon. “I’m not – I’m not angry, okay, I just need some air.”

Jon opens his mouth, then immediately closes it, clutches his hands to his chest, and gives a tiny nod that Martin just barely glimpses before turning to flee.

_________________

“Stop crying,” Jon hisses at himself, furiously scrubbing at his face as the tears slide down his cheeks. “Stop it.”

He plasters the heels of his hands over his closed eyelids. It does nothing to stem the flow, only brings to mind images of pressing himself bodily against a door to hold it closed, only for the crack to continue widening, millimeter after millimeter, the flood on the other side trickling through the gap, rivulets swelling into rivers, frigid eddies biting at his ankles, a whitewater undertow threatening to drag him below the waves–

“Enjoying our own company, are we?”

Once, Jon might have been humiliated to be caught mid-breakdown, raw-voiced and puffy-eyed, especially by Peter Lukas of all people. Several lifetimes spent in thrall to cosmic horrors have a way of putting things in perspective.

“What do you want?” Jon says with as much ire as he can muster.

Peter hums to himself, starting a slow, back-and-forth pace in front of Jon. “It occurred to me that I’ve been derelict in my duties as far as the Archives are concerned–”

“That’s just now occurring to you?”

“–and, as such, I thought it was high time that I met the infamous Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute.”

“Well,” Jon scoffs, gesturing at himself, “you’ve met him.”

“I must admit, I was expecting something a bit more… hm.” Peter taps a finger against his lips. “Formidable.”

“Sorry to disappoint.” The scathing sarcasm is rendered pitiful by an ill-timed, involuntary sniffle. Jon can’t bring himself to care.

“The state you’re in, you hardly seem fit to work.” A pause. “Have you ever considered taking some time off?”

“A six-months hospital stay has a way of eating up your PTO, oddly enough. I’m told that payroll already has already had to make special exceptions for my ‘unprecedented’ circumstances.” Jon chuckles to himself. “On multiple occasions. Did you know the Institute considers a kidnapping in the line of duty to be an ‘unexcused absence?’”

“I think you’ll find that Elias and I have different management styles,” Peter says mildly. “I’m open to making allowances – particularly since your department can function so smoothly in your absence. Your assistants have proven themselves to be quite capable of working independently – and seeing as your approach to supervision borders on fraternization, I imagine they would be more productive without excess drama to distract them.”

“I’ll take that into consideration,” Jon says acerbically.

“No need.” Jon squints at him, and Peter stare him down. “It’s not a request, Archivist. It’s an order.”

There was a time, not long ago, that sneaking up on the Archivist would have been difficult. Only Helen had consistently managed to ambush him, and that was because she didn’t waste time sneaking – she manifested and launched the jump scare in the same instant, giving him no chance to See her approach. Readjusting to a binocular point of view had been a process, but rarely does he find himself yearning for the panoramic field of vision that had been foisted upon him during the apocalypse.

Occasionally, though, there are moments when 360° sight would come in handy. Too late, Jon realizes this is one of those moments.

By the time he notices the tendrils of encroaching fog, they’re already curling around from behind him, pooling at his feet, ghosting across the back of his neck, affixing themselves around his wrists.

“It’s alright,” Peter says placidly, almost soothingly. “You can let go now.”

Jon shivers as his heart pumps ice through his veins, fingers and toes going numb as he struggles for breath.

No. No, no, no, no, no–

“I am not Lonely anymore,” Jon gasps out through chattering teeth.

“No,” Peter says with an air of nonchalance. Then he smiles, sharp and cold and cruel and the only detail Jon can still discern through the fog. “But you will be.”

___

End Notes:

Daisy: hey siri, google what to do if i suspect my bff has been possessed by the ghost of a fussy paleornithologist Jon: why are you booing me????? i’m right

Pretty sure this is the longest chapter yet? Probably bc of the statement. I could’ve split it into two, but, uh. I like that cliffhanger where it is. >:3c (Sorry for that, btw.)

Quite a bit of Archive-speak this chapter. Citations as follows: Section 1: 122/124/011/007/047/155. The Xiaoling quote is from MAG 105; the Jonah quote is ofc from 160; the Naomi quote is from 013. Section 3: 181. Section 5: 058 x2; 144/130/086/143/121/149/134/144/143/069; 147; 017; 147; 057/160/106/111/067/121/129/098; 155/128/160; 160 x3. Section 6: 170, of course.

I’m taking wild liberties with Pu Songling Research Centre’s whole deal. I’m conceptualizing their spookier departments as being like… actually academia-oriented, instead of “local Victorian corpse with illusions of godhood throws a bunch of traumatized nerds with no relevant archival experience into a basement, what happens next will shock you”. Xiaoling is out here like “our digitization is still a work in progress, I’m sure you know how it is” and Jon Sims is like “digitization who? i don’t know her”. (Listen, he tried once. Tape recorder was haunted, he got kidnapped a bunch, there were worms and things, he died (he got better), his boss used him as a battering ram to open a door to Fearpocalypse Hell – it was a lot.)

Likewise, we didn’t get much info about Sonja in canon, so I’m having fun envisioning her as a certified Force To Be Reckoned With (and a bit of a Mama Bear wrt her assistants). Most of the Institute is leery of the Archives (& especially Jon) but Sonja’s seen a lot of shit and Jon Sims doesn’t even rank on her list of Top Spooky Scary Things.

re: the statement – it’s not clear in-text, but I want to clarify that I’m not conceptualizing Francis Drake as being influenced by the Hunt. Fictionalizing aspects of history is tricky, and I’d feel personally uncomfortable chalking up Drake’s real life atrocities to supernatural influence, even in fiction. In the case of this particular fictional member of his crew, he was (like Drake’s real-life crew) complicit in following Drake’s orders for entirely mundane reasons and was only marked by the Hunt at the point in his statement where he first recounts hearing the Hunt chasing after him.

At some point in writing this chapter, I had 137 tabs open in my browser for Research Purposes and like 20 of those were bc my dumb ass seriously considered writing that statement in Elizabethan English before going “what are you DOING, actually.” If I’d tried, it would have come off as inauthentic at best, if not ridiculous, bc I’m unfamiliar with English linguistic trends of the 1500s, and I’d basically be badly mimicking Shakespearean English, which isn’t necessarily indicative of how everyone spoke at the time, and I don’t know what colloquial speech would look like for this particular unnamed character I trotted out as exposition fodder, and it was probably unnecessary to formulate a whole-ass personal history for him for the sake of Historical Realism for a single section of a single chapter of a fanfic, and… In the end, I decided that this pseudo-immortal rando can tell his life story in modernized English, as a treat (to me) (and also to those of you who don’t think of slogging through bastardized Elizabethan prose as a fun endeavor).

Speaking of research – shoutout to this dissertation that had an English translation of the Herla story in Walter Map’s De nugis curialium, and if you want to read the whole story, you can find it on pages 16-18 of that paper. I feel it’s important for you all to know that IMMEDIATELY after Map dramatically proclaims, “the dog has not yet alighted, and the story says that this King Herla still holds on his mad course with his band in eternal wanderings, without stop or stay,” he goes on to say in the next breath “buuuut some people say they all jumped into the River Wye and died, so ymmv. ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯ anyways, can I interest you in more Fucked Up If True tales?” (Herla throwing the dog into the river wasn’t in the original story though. I made that part up.)

Thank you so much for reading! <3

[chaseatinydream]

pirate king (80) || atz

The deck is sheer chaos.

All you hear are the frantic footsteps pounding across the deck as the crew race to sail as fast as possible, the sounds of the cannons being loaded, Mingi’s sharp commands and Yunho screaming orders to trim the sails from above. Still crushed to Wooyoung’s chest, you tap him on the shoulder and he looks down at you, eyes brimming with concern.

“Just let me down somewhere, I’ll-”

“Wooyoung! Some of the halyards of the fore topsail has gotten caught, I need you to come with me and free it.” Yunho lands lightly next to the two of you, face unnaturally drawn with worry and flushed from exertion. “Chin Hae, are you alright?”

You manage a smile for him, though your legs both feel like they’re on fire and you’re missing a hand. “As alright as we’re going to get in this situation. Wooyoung, go with him, I’ll be fine on my own.”

He looks doubtful, but relinquishes his grip on you slightly. “You sure?”

“Yeah.”

With a sigh, he sets you down and you nearly stagger, biting your lip at the pain that shoots through your legs. Even Yunho looks concerned, reaching out to steady you by the shoulder. “This is definitely not okay. We should take you to the-”

“You have more important things to worry about than a sprained ankle, now shoo!” You push the two of them lightly towards the forecastle deck. “I’m not an invalid, I can get myself to the infirmary on my own. Now go!”

With a final look back, Wooyoung and Yunho take off running for the masts, while you turn around and make your way towards the infirmary, gritting your teeth with each step. However, before you can so much as pass the main mast, the entire ship heels - and you’re thrown across the deck.

Your feet practically fly out from under you, and you go rolling like a log across the main deck, arms wrapped instinctively around your head to protect it. Fortunately, you’re lucky enough to crash into a pile of netting used for storage, and for a second, you simply sit there, tangled in the rope and your head ringing.

Shouts of panic and cries of pain fill the air, Mingi’s bellows interspersed somewhere in between. You can’t think straight.

What on earth just-

Yanking the netting out of the way as you stumble to your feet, you glance over at the port side of the ship - and your mouth falls open when you discover the cause of all this mess.

Another pirate ship, one that had been docked beside you, is pulling up right next to the Treasure. An awful scraping sound fills your ears as the hulls of both ships grate against each other, and the entire of the Treasure shudders at the contact. You very nearly fall over again as the deck quivers beneath your feet, but clutch onto the side of the ship for balance.

“Chin Hae!” You hear Jongho shout and whip around to see the young battlemaster dashing towards you. You step forward to meet him, one hand on the main mast to hold steady as the ship groans. “What the hell is that other ship doing-”

Right before you can answer, a dark shape flies between the two of you, so fast that you could mistake it for a trick of light. But no trick of light could cause the awful cracking sound right next to your head, nor the scent of gunpowder so sharp in your nose.

“Attach the hooks!” You hear shouting from the crew of the other ship, and your eyes widen when you see them swarming over towards the bulwarks, throwing long grappling hooks over to the Treasure and pulling taut.

“Chin Hae, get your head down!” The younger man is next to you in an instant and in before you can so much as blink, another musket shot whizzes across your head. You stare at him, wide eyed. “What is happening?”

“That other ship just started attacking us out of the blue, I don’t know.” Jongho says hurriedly, thrusting a cutlass into your hands. “They’re trying to board us for some reason, but we need to get out of here!”

You can almost hear the rudder creak as Mingi shouts orders to adjust the sails so that the Treasure can pull away, but the other ship clings on like a leech. “We’re all going to die at this rate if the Royal Navy catches up with us!”

A sinking sensation worms its way into your belly. “Don’t tell me that they’re still trying to capture me?”

Jongho curses under his breath. “You need to get to the infirmary before they find to you. I need to clear the boarding hooks before they get on deck. Can you handle yourself?”

This reminds you of the first battle you had witnessed at sea, when still had no name. It’s the same, yet different - you’re different now. All you could back then was run and hide in fear.

You’re not that person any longer. You’re part of the crew, and you won’t allow yourself to be a burden to them.

Your legs still feel like someone has replaced your bones with molten iron, but you give a determined nod. “Yeah.” Gripping the cutlass in your hands, you turn to Jongho and give him the best smile you can manage. “Just like the good old times, huh?”

“I don’t see how the situation we’re in seems remotely good in the least, but you’re free to stay positive if that’s what helps you stay alive.” Jongho’s expression is flat, but you catch the small quirk at the side of his mouth before he leaps over a rolling barrel that you narrowly manage to dodge. “It’s good you don’t have a musket on you this time, though.”

With that, he leaps over a stray rolling barrel and you pause for a moment, confused.

Musket...?

Then you remember, cheeks heating up and the shout of ‘Jongho!’ that leaves your mouth is only met with a chuckle carried by the wind. Shaking your head, you turn to make your way to the infirmary when the deck heaves once more under your feet.

“Ahh!”

You drop onto the deck immediately like a suntanning starfish, and by sheer luck you manage to not get thrown into the bulwarks again. The enemy ship must have rammed you again, you realise, but before you can think too far, you hear an awful sound - of metal snapping. Clambering unsteadily to your feet, you glance around for the source of the noise.

There’s a scream of pain, the sound of something breaking, and to your horror, you realise it’s the sound the a bone snapping.

You’re up and running even before you know it towards the sound. It had come from the port side of the ship, where the gunners and the cannon carriages are mounted. And when you catch sight of the situation, you almost throw up there and then.

A member of the gun crew is lying on the deck, shrieking his head off in agony and for good reason - his leg is crushed under the weight of a 24 pounder cannon.

You rush over to him immediately, knees hitting the ground painfully hard as you lower yourself to check over his injuries. The sight almost makes your stomach turn, bile rising up in the back of your throat at the stench of blood and gunpowder, but you force it down in order to look at where most of the damage has been done - his leg.

“One of the chain links holding the gun carriage in place snapped when they hit us.” Another of the gun crew babbles senselessly over the cries of his crewmate and the desperate reassurances the rest try to give him, and you glance at the long iron weapon to see that he is right. “He must have fallen over and gotten crushed then, but we didn’t know what to do-”

“It’s alright,” you try to say, as calmly as possible when your head is in blank panic, trying to take bearing of your surroundings. Wound first, you think, looking down at what you have on your hands.

The wood of the deck is soaked red with blood. The gun carriage has torn the flesh of his thigh into ragged shreds, so deep you can see glimpses of stark white bone from beneath. Even as you watch, blood oozes out of the wound and the sharp smell of iron makes nausea well up in your stomach.

Where’s San? You think almost desperately, hand shaking at the sheer amount of blood. You’ve never dealt with a wound so serious, and you desperately need guidance. But your master is nowhere to be seen, likely treating other wounded on the deck, and from the way the terrified gun crew are staring at you, you’re the only guidance around here.

“O-one of you,” your voice trembles slightly and you swallow, forcing your nerves under control. “Get my supplies from the infirmary, the rest of you, start ripping up your shirts into strips.” You shrug your own overshirt from your shoulders and press it against the wound, trying your best to stem the blood flow.

Just as you’re about to switch out the bandage and instruct one of the gun crew to feed the patient a painkiller, you hear a scream from the starboard side and pale immediately, recognising the sound of clashing steel. They’ve boarded, and another voice rings out in the chaos. “Find the woman! We’ll be pardoned if we hand her up to the Royal Navy!”

Realisation slaps you in the face as you remember just what exactly you are supposed to be doing - hiding in the infirmary. Horror rises up in you, and you shift, almost in an attempt to run, before the blood on your hand reminds you why exactly you can’t.

The man here is dying, and you’re the only one here who knows anything remotely close to how save him.

“Shouldn’t you hide? They’re looking for you.” A crewmate tugs at your sleeve urgently, concern spilling into his voice. “We’ll figure something out here, but who knows what they’ll do to you once they get their hands on you? Go!”

You bite your bottom lip, mind thinking frantically as you press down on the wound. There’s no way they’ll figure this out, the man right now is probably about to start knocking on death’s door. On the other hand, do you really want the Royal Navy to catch you? Cold sweat forms at your temples at the very thought of it.

And yet, you can’t tear yourself away from the person dying in front of you.

“If they’re coming after me, the lot of you better protect me then.” Is all you say before you instruct another of the gun crew to hold a stick in place so you can tie in place an emergency tourniquet. The men look a little terrified. “We might not be able to protect you! We’re gunners, we’re not much trained in swordsmanship!”

“Then I guess we’re all dying here.” You say, concentrating on yanking down hard on the bandage to secure the knot as tightly as possible. You can’t tie it too tight or the man might lose his leg forever, but at this point, between losing his leg and his life, you think he’d prefer to save the latter.

The gun crew exchange glances, before they draw their swords, one of them rubbing his forehead in exasperation. “How are we supposed to be cowards when you talk like that?”

You manage a small chuckle, before returning your attention to the wound. The man’s eyes are half lidded now, drifting in and out of reality from the blood loss. At this rate, he’s going to end up dead, and you swallow nervously. Should you use the healing techniques San taught you or not? What if the same thing happens like the last time with Yeosang, except this time, you actually die?

The sound of steel clashing and people screaming rings throughout the air, punctuated by sound of musket shot and

The face of a certain man forms in your mind. No, you can’t allow yourself to die.

But you can’t let the man before you die either.

Sucking in a deep breath, you stretch out your one hand over the wound, trying not to tremble as you shut your eyes. Find your center, you remember San telling you.  This time, you wouldn’t let it control you.

Before you can do anything, however, there’s a dangerous creaking sound, and your eyes fly open to see the other chain holding the cannon in place starting to groan under the weight of it.

“The chain isn’t going to hold out for much longer!” Someone shouts in alarm, but all you can see is the man lying pinned underneath the cannon, and you know you have to make a choice.

“One of you, get Seonghwa and tell him to bring his carpenter’s saw along.” You try to say as firmly as you can. The man looks up frantically at you, and you take a moment to smile as reassuringly at him as you can. “I’m afraid that I need to take your leg.”

He’s so out of it he just slumps back onto the deck, looking resigned to his fate though his lower lip is trembling. “Do you think Yeosang-ssi will make me a personal peg leg?”

“Of course he will. Although I just lost my hand first, so you’ll have to wait in line.” You try to joke, pushing back the sweat soaked hair from his forehead. It’s a miracle how he’s stayed conscious so long, although it won’t be for much longer judging from how clammy his skin is.

In a few moments, Seonghwa is hurrying back with his saw. When he sees the state the man is in, his steps slow as he makes a face of realisation, eyes meeting yours. “Is there no other way?”

“No,” you say, pulling a drug out of your satchel. “And we don’t have much time left before the entire cannon rolls across the deck and crushes him.” You turn to Seonghwa, holding the herbal tincture up to him. “Here, make him drink this.”

Seonghwa obeys, trusting in your medical knowledge. The second the man has swallowed half the bottle, you strike the side of the man’s neck as hard as you can with the edge of your hand. The man crumples.

Seonghwa stares at you in shock, down at the passed out man, and back at you again. “...What?”

“We needed to knock him out.” You explain, already moving to tighten the tourniquet around the man’s leg. Seonghwa looks down at the bottle in his hand. “Then what was this for?”

“To distract him so he wouldn’t squirm and I wouldn’t miss. Don’t worry, it is actually a sedative, although it wouldn’t have been strong enough to knock him out completely.”

“That doesn’t make it any better!”

“We didn’t have any time!” You protest, dragging him over to the man. “We need his leg off as fast as possible, then I’ll use healing techniques on it to stop the blood flow.”

“The things that San is teaching you...” Seonghwa mumbles as he sets the saw in place, gauging how much of his leg he’ll be able to save. “I’m going to have a talk with him.”

You blink at him. “I didn’t learn that from him. Master only said to ‘do no harm’.”

“How’s that doing no harm?”

“It’s all a matter of perspective.” You insist, reaching over to look at the leg. “You should cut it off right below the knee.”

Seonghwa inhales deeply as he sets the saw to the flesh. “You owe me so much for this.”

“You can claim it when we get out of here alive.” You reply, but your smile is grim. “Now get sawing.”

>>>

When you and Seonghwa finally pull the man free from under the gun carriage, you don’t have any time to think about how the blood is getting all over your pants and shirt.

“He’s bleeding out!” Seonghwa says in alarm, moving over to help you apply pressure on the wound. You glare at him, wiping your red stained hand on your pants. You’re not sure which turns more red. “I can see that, yes.”

There’s no time for hesitation. “Smack me away if I start to go under.”

Seonghwa’s eyes go wide with concern, but he nods, gripping your shoulder tightly. “Come back to us, alright?”

A smile brushes the side of your mouth. “Aye aye, sir.” You return your attention to the man, setting your hand to the side of his injury. Find your center, you remind yourself as you shut your eyes. Concentrate on yourself and the patient, no one else exists but the two of you.

The warmth comes to you more easily this time, like a flickering, slowly waning flame. You swallow, coax the warmth out of your chest and down your arm, directing it into the injury.

There are no memories this time, you realise, except for the pulsing warmth that throbs in your chest, the gentle feeling of the summer sun on your face. You sit there for a while, almost in a daze, holding the tiny flame close as it flickers and sputters.

Suddenly, something yanks you out of that peaceful warmth and you startle, thrashing about in an iron grip as someone lifts you clean off the ground. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you hear something that sounds like Seonghwa’s scream of horror, before you feel cold metal digging into your temple.

“Let us off the ship, or she dies.”

[everybodyscupoftea]

no longer the plug

college jj x reader

you’ve had a tough go, jj makes you feel better, you return the favor 

part 3 of the plug series got requested. part one and part two here

i’m running out of titles relating to this, seriously scraping the bottom of the barrel at this point

anyway, didn’t think i’d be writing this but here we are (also i know i used a gif that’s different from the other two, pls don’t be mad at me)

warnings: cursing, drinking, nsfw, vaguely edited 

You and JJ were busy a lot. Spending time together outside of work usually started with food and TV and ended with the two of you falling asleep on the couch. Cuddling with JJ was great normally, you loved waking up with him. He was warm and his voice was raspy and he was softer, squeezing you closer and pushing his face into your neck.

“Baby,” he mumbled and shifted around with a little sigh, clenching and unclenching his fist in the material of your t-shirt. You brushed a piece of hair off his forehead and smiled down at him, wrapping your arms around your knees. He yawned, halfheartedly tugging the blankets higher up his torso.

The hand holding your t-shirt slid around and started tugging on the waistband of your shorts. With a laugh, you tugged it away and squeezed it gently, linking your fingers. He pouted up at you and you told him, “I have work soon, we don’t have time right now, J.”

“When?” he asked, slight whine.

“Soon, okay? I have a big test Thursday, but after that, I’m free until Monday.”

JJ grinned widely, “Can’t wait.”

-

Thursday evening found you laying on the floor, beer in hand, listening to your ‘so you failed a test huh’ playlist. You’d managed to find someone to cover your shift and had been drinking since you got home at 2. JJ called at some point and you’d answered, slurring something about not going anywhere in life into the phone before hanging up.

Like a good boyfriend, he brought home your favorite comfort food and a six pack, a new perk since he’d turned 21. He took one look at you laying on the floor, wearing the rattiest clothes you owned and said, “Thriving, I see.”

“I’m drinking because I’m sad, and I’m wearing my shame clothes. I don’t deserve to look cute; I’m going to be drunk and suffer in my failure.”

“You never do as bad as you think you do, but we’ll eat Chinese food and you can sleep it off, yeah?”

You nodded, a little pathetically, and held your arms out for him to help lift you up off the floor. JJ grabbed you under your armpits and hoisted you up. Knees weak, you stumbled to the couch and sank down into it.

Sitting down next to you, JJ unwrapped the food and handed you a box of chow mein. Resting your head on his shoulder, you teared up a little, “You’re so nice to me.”

JJ laughed, “I guess I am; you deserve it.”

“I don’t deserve it, I’m the worst.”

He pressed a kiss to your forehead before asking, “Why do you think you’re the worst?”

“Accounting will be the absolute death of me, if I can’t get through school, how am I supposed to succeed in life?”

“That seems like a stretch. You don’t want to be an accountant, so your total understanding of accounting isn’t really necessary. Focus on getting through the class now, and then figure out what you want to do.”

You blinked a few times and a tear fell down your cheek while My Heart Will Go On blared in the background, “That was the best hype speech I’ve ever heard.”

JJ nudged your hand gently, “Finish your food and we’ll go to bed.”

“Gonna finish my food so we can sleep,” you repeated, nodding.

-

JJ had class on Friday morning, so you were a little surprised to see him still asleep when you woke up at 10. Instantly panicking, you shook him awake, whispering, “JJ, babe, you’re missing class.”

He groaned, rolling to face away from you, dodging your shoves as best as possible. After a few seconds of unsuccessful attempts to fall back asleep, he finally flopped onto his back, hand thrown over his eyes, and said, “Got cancelled, let me sleep.”

Cancelled. You could work with that. The night before was pretty blurry, but you could definitely remember being sad and sappy about JJ having to put up with your shit sometimes, and you wanted to somehow pay him back.

Before he could sink back into sleep, you ran a hand down his chest, stopping at the top of his boxers. JJ opened one eye to look at you, confused, “What are you doing?”

“What do you think?”

Instead of dipping your hands into his underwear, you let the waistband go and rubbed over where he was starting to chub up, trying to wake him up faster. JJ blinked rapidly, hands twitching a little by his sides as you kept rubbing, watching his face carefully.

“Kiss?” he asked, pouting at you, so you straddled him, not quite sitting all the way down, and bent down to kiss him, hands pressed into the mattress on either side of his head. He surged up to meet you, hands immediately going to your jaw to tilt your head at the perfect angle.

You didn’t let the kiss go on too long, focused on what you wanted to do. Pulling away, you moved from where you were hovering over him to push his legs up so his feet were planted on the bed, knees bent, and peeled your shirt off. He was staring at you, head slightly lifted from the pillows, glint in his eyes as he watched you slowly pull his boxers down.

Before touching him again, you made sure to ask, “Good with all this?”

He nodded eagerly, almost tripping over his words when he spoke, “Yes, god yes, please.”

Ducking your head, you licked up and down his shaft a few times, rolling your tongue around the head, before slowly taking his dick into your mouth. JJ’s head dropped back down onto the pillow, eyes fluttering shut as you hummed softly. His hips twitched and you quickly reached up to push them back down onto the bed.

Hollowing your cheeks, you took him deeper and deeper, listening as his groans got louder and more frequent. JJ’s hands scrabbled in the bed sheets next to him, looking for something to grip on to, and you reached up with yours to hang on.

Pulling off slightly, you told him, “You can fuck my face,” before sinking back down.

JJ’s face was red and a bead of sweat dripped from his hairline down the side of his face. You could feel his legs shaking near your shoulders, knees knocking into you every so often as he gently thrusted up.

It took a few thrusts, but you felt him finally hit your throat, and hollowed your cheeks, sucking hard. The noise he let out could only really be described as a whine, and you hummed again. He made a strangled noise, hands gripping yours hard, and mumbled out a slight warning before he was coming.

The warning wasn’t quite as far in advance as you would’ve liked and it surprised you, causing you to choke a little. You pulled off, the rest of his cum hitting you in the chest. Pumping him a few times just to make sure he was fully spent, you grinned at him, “Felt good?”

“You could say that,” he said, voice hoarse, face still red.

“Good,” you told him, flopping back to lay down next to him, “now hurry up and recover so we can move on to round two.”

JJ laughed, heaving himself on top of you to kiss you. After a few seconds, he pulled away, “Gonna make you feel good, sweetheart.”

“Oh I bet you will.”