#'Death is inevitable! Live like you know it!' <- A line to break me through short and long-term funks of varying degrees | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

spidey-strange · 4 months

Text

Romeo, Romeo...

I am now living in a post Romeo & Juliet world. It might well be the only time I get to see it, but honestly what I saw on Saturday is going to stay with me forever. I wanted to put it down into words - my review of this play.

The first part of the experience is the music. We were in the bar and this repetitive rumble sound played over the tannoy, signalling that we were being called to Verona. We took our seats and we waited, all while more and more haze appeared across the sparsely-set stage and the music bore deep into my soul, gnarling and industrial, giving a sense of dystopian doom and foreboding. By the time the lights went out and the video screen showed 1597 in bright red lettering, I was already feeling a nervous nausea and an elevated heart rate.

This play is asking you to pretend, as much as they are. There is no set. There are no props. The actors stand like statues, dotted around, sometimes deep into the back of the stage as if ghostly apparitions. Sometimes the actors talk freely, other times they take their place behind mic stands as if part of a debating society. What happens on stage is coupled with video footage of other actors scattered around the bowels of the theatre, in the narrow backstage corridors, or even the theatre bar (and, of course, the roof). The fourth-wall breaks that often punctuate the end of these short video pieces eally pierce into your soul, looming over you, much like the mood of this whole production.

An example - as Mercutio lay dying, the camera is right in his face so you get the full pain and rage of him as he screams "a plague upon both your houses" and takes his final breaths. All the while, Romeo stands metres away, covered in blood, seething with unbridled rage, tears mixing with the blood of his friend.

The interval moment that follows literally made everyone gasp, a jumpscare that absolutely warrants the gravity of the moment. I won't say more because if there's even a 0.1% chance of you seeing it I don't want it ruined.

The second act of this play is decidedly quieter than the first. Clandestine conversations, whispers between characters, the comedy, gone. The deaths of Thibault and Mercutio loom large as the reality of the consequences kick in. Juliet remains defiant to the last - this is a Juliet who really knows what she wants (supported by Nurse, who is more like an older sister character full of kindness and friendly age-appropriate advice). As the end draws near, and the inevitability of what's about to happen (let's face it, we've all studied it at school, we know what happens!) becomes apparent, the silence in the theatre speaks volumes.

This production challenges you to see the traditional story through a far darker lens, and the blank spaces leave room for the oppressive mood and music to thrive and grow. It asks you to find answers in the quiet as much as the loud. It might be the best known love story of all time but the added weight of the staging proves everything hangs on the final line: "For never was a story of more woe, than this of Juliet and her Romeo."

Now. Acting. And oh boy was there acting. I'm going to start with Mercutio (Joshua-Alexander Williams) and Paris (Daniel Quinn-Toye) - two actors who are in their first professional production. What pressure, and how they dealt with it. Particularly Joshua-Alexander! I thought Tomiwa Edun, who played Capulet, Juliet's father, was immense - so sinister in his delivery, he had me convinced he was head of a family and of a gang empire. And Freema Agyeman as Nurse was wonderful, as I said earlier, giving this big sister energy and providing delighful lighter moments against the shade. HUGE mention to Nima Taleghani who not only was an excellent Benvolio but also edited the original text to make it a 1hr 45 version that was powerful and punchy.

Now, our main stars. Francesca Amewudah-Rivers as Juliet was incredible. She was headstrong, she was poised, she was dynamic and still at the same time. She portrayed a Juliet desperate to be free from the confines of her family, but clear that she knew what she wanted from the love (and escape) she sought. The second act belonged to her, her stillness lingering.

And the reason I fought for a ticket, Tom Holland. I've seen him at film premieres and press events, and twice playing golf, but the opportunity to see him do what (as fans) we all know to be his true calling, was irresistible. And oh my God. Honestly I was blown away by his portrayal. Brooding, emotional, at times so quiet you had to strain to hear his lament. And then rage, euphoria, shyness, a fumbling lovesick idiot. Throughout the production he provides so much range, but also so much depth, it's impossible not to feel everything he does.

To see him, clearly in his element, providing a soul to Romeo that I've never felt before - I couldn't be prouder as a fan. For too long he has been tarred with the brush that he is not a "serious actor". As fans we know that The Devil all the Time, Cherry, and The Crowded Room are proof otherwise. This should be the moment the world realises he is INCREDIBLE, to be taken seriously, to be given the respect he is long overdue.

I wish beyond words that I get to see this play again. I hope at the very least it gets an NT live screening so that fans around the world get to witness this amazing, unique, innovative production.

Violent delights indeed have violent ends.

#tom holland #spoilers #romeo and juliet #romeo montague #jamie lloyd #theatre #west end #shakespeare #francesca amewudah rivers #freema agyeman

122 notes · View notes

iamfuckingsorry · 6 months

Text

Sorry guys, another DE rant incoming. This one's not even on any specific topic, just some feelings about the game that I need to get out.

So, the game absolutely fucking killed me. I intentionally didn't play the entire thing at once to give myself time to process and it still fucking killed me. And by killed I mean I had to take crying breaks at work hiding in the bathroom. Like literally unable to go through a day at work without coming this close to a breakdown. And there's other compounding factors for that, sure, but still.

And it's like... It's a chilling social commentary with too many layers for its own good. The main character is a walking bundle of current and past issues mixed with the consequences of extremely messed-up past actions. The main support character has the best of intentions but is heavily flawed himself. Everyone else in the story is fucked up, really every single fucking thing is fucked up, yet the game itself keeps giving you these little snippets of hope. All the side quests where you can make a difference to someone. Deep conversations. Kim smiling. Realizing the people you originally thought were massive assholes were just hurting. The goddamn stick insect.

You are a violent and irrepressible miracle.

Something beautiful is going to happen.

In the dark times, should the stars also go out?

Streets and sodium lights, the sky, the world. You're still alive.

You still have some years. You still have some hope.

The only way to load the dice is to keep on fighting.

Kim being so hopelessly in love with Revachol even though he's been treated like shit by the city's inhabitants.

Harry being so hopelessly in love with Revachol, too, even though he can't even remember her.

The world is shit, but there's still all these little things that make it worth living.

And I'd... really love for that to be my take away. I would really, really fucking love that. But somehow, I can't.

Because no matter how much good you do preventing an absolute bloodbath in Martinaise, changes are coming, and they aren't good changes. The wheels are already in motion and they cannot be stopped, no matter how vigilant Harry is, no matter how much Revachol loves him.

22 years after Harry wakes up, Revachol's getting nuked to pieces.

Some 5 years after that, the entire world as we know it is getting swallowed by the pale.

Kim Kitsuragi will not live to see 70.

(Honestly, this is the line that kills me the most. He deserves to grow old, to look at his life and be happy with what he's done with it, at peace and fully accepted by everyone including himself for the first time in his life. And instead he's getting killed in a pointless conflict that will usher in the end of the world, or if he won't get killed then, he's getting nuked to death. Kim Kitsuragi will not live to see 70.)

Anyway. I know that that's part of the point. Horrible things are inevitable but that doesn't mean life isn't worth living and good things aren't worth fighting for. You can still fight the inevitable darkness while you're here, you should still fight the inevitable darkness while you're here, you need to fight the inevitable darkness while you're still here because if you don't, then what are you living for? And if not you, then who? If you lose your last sliver of hope, then you lose everything. Yes, life is terrible and terrifying, but life is also so, so, so beautiful.

And even when life is shit, it's all just part of a cycle. Sometimes bad things need to happen in order for the good ones to be able to come back again. One day I'll return to your side. After death, life again. After the pale, the world again. The good connected to the bad, intertwined so tightly they cannot be separated in any meaningful way.

And I think I'm starting to get there, I really do. After the pale, the world again. Even in the darkest of times there is always hope of a brighter future. After the pale, the world again. After death, life again. Un jour je serai de retour près de toi. The only way to load the dice is to keep on fighting. The stars will never go out, not even in the darkest of times.

But instead I just... I close my eyes and I think of Revachol herself begging Harry to save her, and I think of her burning, and I think of Kim not living to see 70.

And I want to cry.

#DE #disco elysium #herr's personal tag #god this rant got so so heavily edited down and it's still so fucking long #god #i /need/ to talk about DE to someone alright #i /need/ to or i swear i'm gonna go crazy #if you're wondering about the kim line #he says he is 43 and planning to live to see 70 #when harry wants to climb up that rusty fire ladder to the building ruby's hiding in #and i dont know why #but that line just hits me so fucking hard

20 notes · View notes

idealisticrealism · 6 months

Text

TCL 3x06 thoughts (and many feelings)

Well, as expected, this ep basically broke my heart into a million tiny pieces- but still, they really did give Arman the best send-off that they could given the circumstances, and I’m so, so grateful for it.

Breaking the recap up a bit differently this week because I have a lot to say about everyone lol

But of course, I have to start with my beloved boy Arman, and Armony. I always knew that this ep was going to break me, and man, they didn’t waste any time doing it… less than 4 mins in and the tears were already flowing from hearing him saying the Reloj line, because seriously, knowing that this was his one chance to pass on a message to the people in his life, and that he chose that??? God it was powerful seeing Nadia and the others incorrectly assuming the message simply meant that he was running out of time, vs seeing Thony's jaw clench on hearing it because she knew the truth, knew that it was meant for her alone. In some ways, it was a “I think my time is up and I'm the one leaving forever in the morning, and that's okay” kind of message, but it was also a “this is me telling you I love you, because I never got the chance before”, and a “no matter what they do to me, in my mind I'm there, dancing with you by the fire.” No wonder she reaches for a beer the moment she gets home, knowing that there’s the chance she will be able to hold him in her arms again in only a matter of hours, but not being able to do anything to make it happen except just sit and wait for news. Well, at least until the moment she sees the report and understands Dante’s involvement, and then there’s no holding back anymore, no more trusting others to save him. Her blind determination to go find him and bring him home is exactly like how she acted when Luca was dying or when Fi was deported; it’s the way she always responds when someone she loves desperately needs her, and I love that Arman is so clearly in that category. (Okay gotta break this up bc of Tumblr's character limit lol)

Anyway ugh the entire time she was at the apartments I could feel my heart in my throat, because god, she got so close. (Oh and the way she instantly recognised the jacket and then knew with a single sniff that it was his?? Help???). But anyway ugh when the kid pointed them to the apartment, and she saw him right there through the window, only for him to be stolen away again in the mere couple of minutes it took her to get back around to the apartment’s front door.... Ughhh these two have been star-crossed from the start, but it was so hard to watch the final acts of their tragedy unfolding. I'll never be over the fact that for days, he was kept in a haze of drugs and pain, and yet we (and Thony!) know from his message that he spent that time thinking of her, escaping his reality by living in the moments they’d shared. And her own drug-induced hallucination of him was equally heartbreaking… god, to see her be so honest and unreserved in the way she looked at him and held him and spoke to him ("I’m gonna take you home, I'm never gonna let you go again”)... like damn, in that moment we really got to see the unfiltered, uninhibited truth of her feelings for him, the truth she never got to tell him and that he never got to hear.

But still, I’d like to think that he knew it anyway, especially when he saw her there in that car– saw that she had come for him, that she was trying so hard to save him, even at risk to herself. (Naturally I wish that we could have had his real face for that heart-wrenching moment of goodbye, but it was close enough, and when it comes down to it, that moment was still truly Arman and Thony no matter what). And while I’m sure Arman would have wished that he could live, that he could have stayed and built a life with her, we also saw multiple indications in the past 2 seasons that Arman knew and accepted that an early death was likely for him, if not practically inevitable, just like it had been for Mateo and Carlos and Bosco. And so for him to get to go out on his own terms, and in the act of saving Thony? It was exactly the death that he would have wanted. (On first watch I was sobbing too hard to notice that he didn't just knock the gun away and cause chaos in the car, he actually also grabbed the wheel and deliberately drove them off the cliff, meaning he truly chose for himself how he met his death). Honestly, it was literally the exact kind of ending I'd been predicting for him ever since s1– both the culmination of his hero arc, and also the ultimate fulfillment of his vow to protect her. I'm so, so thankful that he got to have that, got to go out fast and painlessly and like the hero he was, rather than dying in the hangar or alone in that grungy apartment, and I’m even more thankful that he got to see her one last time, got to have that final goodbye with her. He died knowing she loved him and never gave up on him, and knowing that his death would ensure she got to live on; and for him, that would have been everything. And as devastating as it was to see Thony on her knees on the cliff, staring up into the sky as everything faded into white and El Reloj began to play... it was also heartbreakingly beautiful- seeing them dancing together again truly felt like getting a glimpse into his heaven, like it was telling us 'This is where he is now. This is where he'll always be"- and though it'll still always hurt to have lost him, I can be at peace with that.

(Though ngl, this ep was full of 'if onlys' that are going to haunt both us and Thony forever... If only Chris hadn't blocked the toilet today of all days. If only Thony had called a different plumber. If only JD's friend hadn't gotten him the arrest report. If only Ramona hadn't put a tail on Thony that caused her and Fi to have to rely on Jeremy for a ride rather than going on their own. If only Thony had been able to trust that Jorge wasn't involved and had called him instead. If only Nadia hadn't sent her the address for the meet location. If only if only if only. The show has always centred around this theme (all the way back to 1x01 and ‘if only Thony hadn’t encouraged the underground fighter to make her own choices, then the fighter may have done what Theo ordered her to and deliberately lost the fight, and then Tarik wouldn’t have killed Theo and Thony wouldn't have witnessed it, and none of this would have happened’), and it's a vital aspect of both the storytelling (because if none of that had happened, then there's no story at all) and also of Thony's character development. But obviously in this instance we all know that the writers had no other choice, and that there was no way this ep could have gone differently anyway, not after the loss of Adan. We know that, but Thony doesn't, and so it's going to be devastating to see Thony blame herself for yet another death, especially the death of someone she loved so deeply.)

But alright let’s talk about who is actually responsible for Arman’s death, because while Thony inadvertently contributed to it, she absolutely wasn’t the one who directly led to them being in that situation! Let’s start with Dante: firstly, I knew it was very suss that he ‘accidentally’ killed that guy in the last ep! And then when I saw the BTS pics for 3x06 last week and saw that Thony and Fi were going to go to the same apartment buildings that Dante got arrested at, it was clear that he was definitely involved in Arman’s abduction somehow. So either it’s option 1, and that giant bastard knew just how deeply Ramona wanted Arman back in their lives and figured he could not only give her what she wanted, but could also use the opportunity to score a fuck-ton of money without Ramona ever knowing of his involvement; or it’s option 2, and he abducted Arman on Ramona’s orders so that she could a) get her hands on a bunch of Nadia's money, and b) receive Arman's gratitude for saving him, which would then lead to his return into the family. Personally I think that option 1/Dante working alone is much more likely, and I'd also prefer it to option 2, because if Ramona was involved it would completely ruin the enjoyment I’ve been getting out of her character and her sibling relationship with Jorge. So I'm really hoping that it was all just Dante’s plan, and that Ramona and Jorge believe Thony when she tells them about Dante’s role in Arman's kidnapping (and therefore his death) and then they fucking murder him for it.

Speaking of murdering, that brings me to Jeremy Fucking Dolan. (Yes, I literally looked up his last name on IMDB purely bc I felt the need to put a curse word in it). It’s funny, but from the very first moment his character was announced and it was mentioned in his bio that he would befriend Thony while hiding a dark secret, I had an almost irrational level of hatred for him, even more than I had for Jorge’s character, which was definitely odd and inexplicable given that Jorge’s bio made him sound like he was purely meant to be an unwanted ‘Arman 2.0’/potential love interest, which I obviously did not want in the slightest. But if I’d been given the option to get rid of one of them before S3 even started, it would have been Jeremy with no hesitation. The moment he made his appearance, I called it that he was actually an undercover FBI agent who was using Thony to get to Arman, which was maddening enough because she just didn’t deserve to be manipulated in that way, or to be betrayed by someone whom she had been isolated and vulnerable enough to risk trusting. And then that undercover bastard not only uses her, but ends up being the very reason that the FBI shows up right at the worst moment– not only preventing the exchange, but also causing the chase that kills Arman??? I don't care if he was only doing his job and trying to catch criminals, goddammit, I still hate him so much, and it's going to destroy Thony (even more than she already has been destroyed after losing Arman) when she eventually puts it together and realises that her trusting Jeremy directly contributed to Arman’s death. Which is why I’m over here violently daydreaming of a moment sometime late in the season where Jorge and Ramona finally manage to capture Jeremy, and then they bring Thony in and let her pull the fucking trigger and end him. (I mean, is it at all likely that she would go that dark, even to avenge Arman? Well, no. But thinking about it certainly gives me great satisfaction so I’m sticking with it lol)

Anyway, moving onto something more positive– if you wanna find the MVP of this ep, you only have to look at Fi!!! I loved her for the kind and understanding way she addressed Thony's connection to Arman, and the way she almost got Thony to acknowledge her feelings for him. Though I guess in that moment she could see that Thony still wasn’t ready to talk about it, and so she tried to ease Thony's mental discomfort by shifting focus to jokes about Jeremy (gross). Still, throughout the ep she was just so completely ride or die for Thony, like she has always been, and honestly Thony needs that, needs her. And not just for her badass lock-picking skills haha (taught to her by Paolo maybe??). Basically, Thony is like the Frodo of this series, carrying a huge burden and going through unimaginable things, but Fi is like her Sam, and it’s only with Fi’s support that Thony is able to keep pushing forward through everything. Obviously the loss of Arman, the other vital person in her life (does that make him Gandalf??) is going to be absolutely crushing for her, and I think Fi is going to be even more incredible in the coming episodes as she supports Thony through her grief and devastation. Ngl, I already had a fic idea about Fi going and getting Arman's jacket back for Thony, and it makes me cry just thinking about it ugh

In addition to Fi and Thony, I did love the whole De La Rosa fam vibe early in the episode, with Chris and Jaz bickering, and Thony and Fi making a fuss of Luca, and then Chris gently telling them to ease off when Luca got overwhelmed– it felt so nice to have them all reunited again and just getting to be a ‘normal’ family getting ready for school in the morning, and for Fi and Thony to be dealing with problems like blocked toilets and wet clothes rather than threats of deportation or dangerous cartels or the FBI. Chris worrying over missing Camila’s call was super cute too; I’m glad we got to have another mention of her and I hope we get to see her again soon. As for Luca, I’m really happy he’s started school, mostly bc it frees up Thony’s schedule haha, but also because it’s an important step for both him and Thony in moving forward with their lives. Thony has lived in an endless loop of ~My Child Is Dying~ for 6 years, and finally (thanks to her and Fi and Arman, like she said in the ep) that cycle has finally been broken. Luca will always need careful monitoring of his health, of course, but Thony isn’t trapped by his illness anymore, and I’m excited to see what potential paths that will open up for her. I will always wish that one of those paths could have been a relationship with Arman, and I'm sure she does too, but as long as she finds happiness and purpose, I'll be satisfied.

Okay, so Jorge showing up at the school was pretty great honestly; like he says, it kind of is their thing to just show up uninvited into each other's spaces, and plus I think he actually truly did want to help make the moment a little easier on her by being there and distracting her/reassuring her as a fellow parent. I also loved the sweatshirt mention lol, it was a good throwback and I enjoy that he’s comfortable enough with her to tease her. Just shows how much their relationship has changed in the week or so since he first tossed that sweatshirt at her in a different school parking lot!! And he definitely won points with me here by going out of his way to get the info for her about the legal/CPS stuff without being asked, and though he explained it away as basically just him buying her influence over Arman in regards to the Sin Cara business, again I think he just genuinely wanted to help. Like Arman, he doesn’t get the opportunity to do many things that are purely good and noble, and so the feeling of getting to help her and Luca clearly has somewhat of an intoxicating effect on both men haha. Even with the loss of Arman (and so the loss of his supposed reason for helping Thony with the CPS stuff) I don’t doubt that Jorge will still help her with it once he’s satisfied that she had nothing to do with Arman’s death. But ugh speaking of Arman, the way Jorge questioned her about her connection to Arman… he already knows that Thony’s husband only died a few months ago, and as far as he knows from Nadia's behaviour, her and Arman’s marriage was solid, so it’s understandable that the intensity of Thony’s loyalty to/concern about Arman is a bit confusing to him. And because he doesn’t understand it, he’s always going to view her with at least a trace of suspicion until he learns the truth. Which may even be as soon as next ep– it looks like Jorge and Ramona are going to be demanding answers from Thony about how Arman died/ whether she betrayed him to the Feds/ how she was even there in the first place etc etc, and honestly I'm desperately hoping we'll get some kind of "I would never betray Arman! I LOVED him!" outburst from her that makes both Jorge and Ramona stop in their tracks because of how clearly heartfelt and honest it is. And ngl, while we’ve seen Thony indirectly state or demonstrate her love for Arman multiple times now, it would really mean a lot to me to hear her just say it openly without holding back. Not to mention that I think it would also really help pave the way for her to be accepted into the Sin Cara/Sanchez family, which would make for interesting viewing for the rest of the season.

Speaking of the Sanchez family, I enjoyed the flashback and getting the backstory about the caddy, and seeing more of the Eduardo/Ramona/Jorge dynamic. (I’m trying so hard not to be nitpicky about the fact that young Arman's hair was straight and young Jorge's was curly, when it should have been the opposite, lol). But I’ve been thinking a lot about what Eduardo says to young Arman in that moment about how the only way to be a good man is to work hard and make an honest living, and I think that before we meet him in S1 Arman had really internalised that, and didn’t see himself as being a good man even though he wanted to be, which is why it hurt him so much to have Thony reinforce that belief during their argument at the wedding in 1x03. But then through helping her and forming a connection with her, he sees that even though she’s witnessed him at his worst, she genuinely does believe he is a good man, and it allows him to start believing it of himself for the first time. The flashback also definitely gave us more of a sense of Arman’s relationship with Ramona and Jorge, and really added another layer to him not selling off his caddy despite the direness of his debt to RK. What Nadia said to Ramona about the caddy being Arman’s dream car seemed to prove to Ramona that Arman still loved her and Jorge, and never truly turned his back on them… and so hopefully her sense of family and honour will mean that she will now consider Nadia and Thony– Arman’s family– to be her family as well. I also really enjoyed the scene of Jorge and Ramona sitting together in the caddy, discussing their business choices/differences in their life plans, and also talking about Arman and his good heart… they’ve definitely both grown on me, partly because they’re well written, but mostly because they've helped Thony and they genuinely care about my boy Arman. I’m sad we'll never get to see an Arman and Jorge brotherly reunion, because that could have been truly great. But tbh what I’m really wondering is what will happen to my beloved caddy now that Arman's gone... will Nadia want to get rid of it because seeing it is too painful?? Will Jorge offer to take it? Will I get my dream of Thony being the one to keep it lol? Doubtful, but one can always hope.... (and I guess there’s always that fic I’ve been planning to write about it for like 3 weeks lol)

Sigh, poor Nadia gave me a lot of feels in this ep. She is working so hard to get Arman back, and handling herself amazingly well under incredibly stressful circumstances. She dealt calmly with the kidnappers (which Ramona was clearly very impressed by... a potential protege there, perhaps?). Nadia also politely yet firmly declined Ramona’s plan for Arman to be basically kept in their home, despite knowing how powerful Ramona is and how risky it would be to piss her off. She also insisted on being at the exchange to get him back despite the risk to herself (and possibly partly because she still doesn’t trust Ramona’s intentions). She trusted Thony with the meet location, despite their complex history, despite knowing that it meant that she would have to share her reunion with her husband with the other woman he loves. Even if she only gave Thony the address because it meant getting to have a highly-trained doctor there who could be trusted completely with Arman’s life, it still means she put Arman’s wellbeing above her own wants. Honestly I respect the hell out of Nadia, and literally the only consolation I have about losing Arman is that at least I'll never have to watch her go through the heartbreak of Arman still choosing Thony over her despite all their history and everything she’d done for him. Of course, we still have to watch her going through an absolutely horrific heartbreak of a different kind, but at least instead of being alone in it, she has Thony to share that pain with. (Or at least, she will, when she gets past her initial anger and blame towards Thony). It's almost a certainty that Thony and Nadia's connection will continue and even strengthen throughout the rest of the season, and I strongly believe that Thony is going to do everything she can to support and protect Nadia now, not only because she genuinely does care about her, but also because it’s the only thing she can do now to honour Arman and give thanks for all he did for her.

Okay, last couple of things: I loved that even despite her desperate search for Arman and the ticking clock that was hanging over their heads, Thony still stopped and helped the kid’s grandfather. It was very true to who she is, and how she can’t not help the people in front of her that need her. And tbh in terms of TV medicine, this instance actually wasn’t too bad haha, even if her Epley manoeuvre was a bit off. The fact that the man turning to look at the clock helped her diagnose the vertigo was also a cool reference to the ep’s title/theme as well. But anyway the reference that I can’t quite figure out yet is the word Thony saw written in the dust on that mirrored platter thing; I’m assuming Arman wrote it as a clue in case someone found the apartment? It seems to say something like ‘Marin’ which means nothing to me rn, but they very intentionally included a shot of Thony seeing it, so I guess its meaning will become clear in the next ep or two?

Anyway, this has been many many words and feelings, so I’m just gonna end it with this, the prayer that Thony spoke as Arman walked out of prison in 2x02, because it feels even more tragically fitting now:

Now he is freed Through your blood on the cross Through the blows to your face And through the crown of your thorns that pierced your head Deliver him from all evil From the rigor of injustice From the torment of conscience And from all darkness Welcome him into Paradise Where there will be no more sorrow No more weeping or pain Give him the blessings of the life to come As he enters into the kingdom of peace and light.

#The Cleaning Lady #TCL recaps #Armony #Arman Morales #Adan Canto #God this ep is definitely in my Top 3 Most Traumatic Episodes of any show ever #I don't think I've cried that hard over a character's death since I was 18 and just lost the Blorbo I'd been obsessed with for like 4 years #but at least in that instance we didn't lose the actor too #ugh #anyway #if you manage to read this whole thing I salute you #and you're welcome to come talk to me about it!#let's suffer together lol #TCL spoilers #The Cleaning Lady Spoilers

16 notes · View notes

tired-old-men · 4 months

Note

not really a question FOR the guardians cause doubtful they'd actually answer this in fear of their enemies knowing this but

do your guardians have any particular like

fears?

could be as silly or specific or serious as you'd like lol

Sojourner

Well…This one was scared of thunder -points at Thunderhawk with a cheeky smile-

Thunderhawk

-smacks his lips and rolls his eyes dramatically- Ugh, come on give me a break I was a baby..

Sojourner

You were afraid of part of your name sake, you would cry and run for your mother like a little scaredy cat, all over some loud noises from the sky -chuckles-

Thunderhawk

I WAS LIKE 2!! What was I supposed to do put on a brave face and fight the sky?!!

Sojourner

That would have been pretty cool actually.. -smirks-

Thunderhawk

-brings a palm to his temple with a sigh, while Sojourner chuckles like an idiot behind him-

✦ ~ :･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧ ✦ ✧ *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ~ ✦

As the legion sleeps the mun comes out to play and spill all the best guarded lore~

There’s this bit in the comics [KtE # 24] where Franklin D Roosevelt Spectre in a speech states

“It is my conviction that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert defeat into victory.”

Which gets me thinking of my favorite piece of literature coming from the Dune series which is the Bene Gesserit Litany against fear:

"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."

The concept of fear to a Guardian would be a complicated feeling as they would be trained on how to overcome fear; to be a Guardian they must be sharp physically, mentally, and emotionally. When your enemies are a whole optimized army, and the pressure builds up, being too afraid to act can be a deadly mistake, and after the loss of Aaron, the Guardian training plays an essential part in a Guardians development and survival skills.

Yet… even with their extended lives and chaos abilities they are still mortal to a degree which makes fear inevitable. If not fear of the enemy, fear of what the enemy might do to innocent civilians, or even their own loved ones. The growing pains of fearing what Guardianhood would be like, fear of underperforming or not living up to the standards of their ancestors. Even just the fear of living replacing the fear of dying, the fear of culminating meaningful relationships, of making friends, falling in love, knowing they will live to see all their funerals. All inevitable facts of being born with the crescent chest, challenges that they face just by their own existence and role in their society.

There’s also the lingering effects of unreasonable fears that stem from traumatic past events. There’s no shortage of trauma when it comes to the Brotherhood, I’d even say it’s been a trickle down effect since its inception with Steppenwolf’s own history. I imagine that the Brotherhood has a real love for their own family and are naturally protective of each other, so when Thunderhawk lost his daughter due to ‘illness’ It affected him deeply. So much so he tends to become overprotective and overbearing if someone in the family gets sick, even going as far as keep a night watch, his already anxious nature amplified by the fear of loosing someone like her again.

I cannot talk on the subject of fear without talking about my boy Spectre. The speech that he gave, to me is just telling about his own relationship with fear as a whole. When I think of the last line in the litany of fear “Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.” I can’t help but think of him. Having to grow up with a ‘father’ that was cruel and harsh to him, to being kidnapped and tortured by The Dark Legion, to the perception of how his body looks from what the Legion did to him. Fear is something he is well acquainted with and has far surpassed due to years of mental discipline, as he is now he is a fearless force to be reckoned with. Yet… he is a father, a grandfather, and at one point a husband, so while fear does not control him he’s not void of all emotion.

While he has a limited range of displaying his emotions; keeping expressions of his fear suppressed as to not give a the enemy the satisfaction of seeing him weak and afraid, there’s a reason he fights so hard and has such a high degree of discipline. To ensure that what happened to him, never happens to him or his family ever again.

I hope this answered your question some, didn’t get too crazy in specifics since I feel they can all relate on these fears, some more than others; also can’t give away too many secrets now The Legion’s always watching and there’s still fun to be had~ ;3c

#charleecat-bat #Sojourner.txt #Thunderhawk.txt #Mun talk #thank you for coming to my TedTalk #living for that sweet sweet echidna lore

4 notes · View notes

fanficfunwrite · 1 month

Text

Ripped Apart 🧟‍♀️💚 (Part 2)

10K × Fem!Reader (TW: Death)

Y/N and 10K hadn’t spoken much since that moment in the clearing. The group continued their journey, but an awkward silence had settled between them, one that neither seemed to know how to break. It was as if that kiss had drawn a line in the sand, and now they were both too afraid to cross it.

Y/N tried to push it out of her mind. She had a job to do—keeping the group alive was all that mattered. But every time she caught 10K glancing her way, her resolve wavered just a little. She had seen so much, endured so much, and she couldn’t afford to let anything distract her. Not even him.

As night fell, the group found shelter in an abandoned farmhouse. It was a rare bit of luck in their otherwise grim journey—a roof over their heads and walls to keep out the dangers of the night. The others quickly settled in, setting up makeshift beds and securing the perimeter, but Y/N couldn’t shake the tension that had been building all day.

She found 10K alone in the small living room, sitting on an old, tattered couch, his gun resting across his lap. He looked up as she entered, his eyes full of the same uncertainty she felt. They hadn’t talked about what had happened, and it was clear that the silence was weighing on both of them.

Y/N took a deep breath, gathering her courage. “We need to talk,” she said, her voice steady, though her heart was pounding.

10K nodded, his gaze dropping to the floor. He had never been good with words, especially around her. But he knew this conversation was coming—it was inevitable.

Y/N sat down beside him, but she didn’t look at him. Instead, she stared straight ahead, focusing on the cracked wallpaper peeling from the walls. “About what happened,” she began, “it can’t happen again.”

He flinched slightly, his hands tightening around his gun. “Why?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Because it’s too dangerous,” Y/N replied, forcing herself to remain calm. “Not just for us, but for everyone. We can’t afford to be distracted. We can’t let anything get in the way of surviving.”

“But…” 10K’s voice faltered, and he finally looked up at her, his eyes full of emotions he didn’t know how to express. “It wasn’t just… It wasn’t just a kiss for me.”

Y/N felt a pang in her chest, but she pushed it down. “I know,” she said softly. “But it’s not fair to you. I’m older, I’ve seen too much, and I’ve already lost so many people. I can’t let myself care like that again.”

Before 10K could respond, there was a loud crash from the back of the house. Both of them jumped to their feet, instincts kicking in. The sounds of shuffling footsteps and low, guttural moans filled the air—it was zombies.

“Get the others!” Y/N ordered, grabbing her weapon and moving toward the noise.

10K hesitated for just a second before he rushed off to alert the rest of the group. They quickly scrambled, grabbing their gear and heading for the front door. But the zombies were already pouring in from all sides, cutting off their escape routes.

“Out the back!” Y/N shouted, leading the charge. They fought their way through the house, but as they reached the kitchen, a zombie lunged at Y/N from behind a door she hadn’t checked.

She felt the sharp, tearing pain as it bit into her arm. With a cry of anger, she shoved the creature away and took it down with a well-placed shot, but the damage was done. She knew what a bite meant.

The group finally made it out of the house and into the night, but Y/N stayed behind, holding her bleeding arm. 10K turned back, panic in his eyes as he realized what had happened.

“No!” he shouted, rushing to her side. “We can save you! There’s got to be something we can do!”

Y/N shook her head, her face pale but determined. “It’s too late, 10K. You know it is.”

Tears welled up in his eyes, and for a moment, the shy, quiet boy who had grown into a man over the past year was just that—a scared, heartbroken kid who didn’t want to lose the person he cared about the most.

“I—” he began, but his voice broke. “I love you, Y/N. I’ve loved you for a while now.”

She smiled weakly, her strength fading fast. “I know,” she whispered. “But you have to let me go. You have to survive.”

He shook his head, refusing to accept it. But even as he did, he could see the change starting in her eyes—the dullness, the emptiness that signaled the infection was taking over.

“Please, Y/N,” he begged, tears streaming down his face. “Don’t leave me.”

She reached up, her hand trembling, and touched his cheek. “Be strong, 10K. Like you always have been. Remember that you’re not alone. You have the group. And you have the strength to keep going.”

With those last words, Y/N slips a folded piece of paper with something inside of it in his hand and then her body went limp, her eyes glazing over as the infection claimed her.

10K clenched his jaw, tears blurring his vision. He had one last job to do, one final act to honor the woman who had meant everything to him. With shaking hands, he raised his pike and, with a sob, ended her suffering.

The night was eerily silent after that. The zombies had been dealt with, and the group had made it to safety, but 10K felt like he was standing in the middle of a void. He stared down at Y/N’s lifeless body, his heart shattered.

But he knew she was right. He had to survive. For her.

With a heavy heart, he opened the piece of paper that held the words 'Don't forget me' on it, and her Army tags now resting in his clenched hand, he then turned away and rejoined the group, leaving behind the only person who had ever made him feel whole in a world that was falling apart.

If you enjoyed please react in anyway to let me know 🧟‍♀️💚

Thanks for reading 😊

(Creds to my friend @swimming-in-the-lethe for proof reading and giving ideas as this happened)

#10k #10k × reader #ZNation #Fem!Reader #Zombies #Zombie Apocalypse #Citizen Z #Army Female #Death

2 notes · View notes

tsarisfanfiction · 1 year

Text

Eclipse: Chapter 2

Fandom: Trials of Apollo Rating: Teen Genre: Family/Adventure Characters: Apollo, Hades, Nico di Angelo, Will Solace Glad to see so much excitement for this fic so far! We continue now with another Hades pov chapter - next chapter will be the pov of the other character we'll be hearing from directly during this fic! <<Chapter 1

HADES II Apollo’s Ridiculous Plan Is Revealed

Hades snatched back his hand, releasing Apollo’s throat, and the younger god took a step backwards, one hand coming up to massage at the abused flesh of his physical form. A shimmer of gold passed across the skin, sealing up small divots seeping golden ichor where his nails had broken through, but Apollo seemed unperturbed at the minor wounds.

“If this was inevitable, why did you decide to tell me?” It would have been kinder to live in ignorance of what his son was up to until it was too late; now, he was cursed with the knowledge that Nico would enter Tartarus again, no matter how he tried to prevent it.

Prophecies were infuriating like that.

“My son is going to die.” The matter-of-fact tone Apollo had used to recite the prophecy was gone, leaving one with the slightest of tremors. Whether they were tremors of fury, grief, or something else entirely, Hades did not care to assume.

The prophecy had saved its more dire lines for the light-aligned references, a fact Hades took small relief from although he knew better than anyone that Thanatos could take at any time, and that the absence of death in a prophecy did not equate a lack of death on the quest. Not all quest-related deaths were fair, or even necessary, but then, death itself was not fair.

“You of all beings know that prophecies are rarely so straight forward,” he remarked, striding past where Apollo stood on his throne room floor and returning to sit in his throne. “You cannot be certain of William’s fate.”

Apollo heard prophecies, saw them, caught snatches and glimpses of things no-one else could see or hear, but for all his foresight, he did not have foreknowledge. Hades was well aware that Apollo had barely any more idea what the lines meant than he did; it was not something he kept secret, and indeed was frequently brought up whenever anyone else tried to decipher prophecies.

Having his son – one he had recently connected with on a level Apollo had avoided for centuries – the blatant subject of one had apparently stripped the younger god of his at times frustratingly level head on the topic.

“Will is too kind for the Pit,” Apollo argued, turning around to face him. “I don’t need my foresight to know it will tear him apart.”

Hades waved a hand dismissively. “And? The fate of your son does not concern me.”

“But it concerns Nico,” Apollo retorted immediately. “It concerns your son-” he took a step forwards “-who you want to be happy.” He crossed the rest of the distance to the foot of Hades’ throne, glowering up at him with those eyes that were still far too identical to the Phlegethon. “Do you think Nico will stay happy if Will dies?”

That was a question with an answer so obvious it didn’t need to be spoken. Hades had seen Nico’s descent after Bianca’s death, an event he had never recovered from. He had seen his reaction to Jason Grace’s death, a boy he had not even known for long but had wormed his way into his son’s heart as someone special. A third death of that magnitude would break whatever inside Nico had not yet shattered, likely beyond all repair.

Still, that did not make it Hades’ problem to try and prevent. William was Apollo’s son, and therefore Apollo’s responsibility. There was, of course, the small issue of the Ancient Laws preventing them from interfering directly, but none of them were a stranger to finding ways to indirectly interfere. Apollo himself had bent those rules so far they’d folded over backwards when Artemis had been captured by Atlas.

Why was he hesitating now? Had his punishment as a mortal truly scared him so much that he couldn’t bring himself to even try and bend the rules again? That didn’t fit with the Apollo Hades had known for four millennia, and no god changed that drastically within the span of half a year.

Alternatively, Apollo had already found his loophole, but for some reason was unable to action it himself, which was why he was in Hades’ palace, taking up his valuable time with complaints about his son’s upcoming fate and making strong suggestions that it would be in Hades’ interest to… what? Help? He had to be truly desperate if that was the case; Hades did not help anyone. Not his brethren, not his children, and certainly not heroes.

“What do you want from me, Apollo?” he asked, tired of trying to read the younger god. “Some of us have duties to be doing and do not have the time for idle conversation.” Admittedly, it was unlikely that Apollo was genuinely ignoring all of his duties; Zeus would notice if the sun chariot was left on autopilot, and not even Apollo would risk drawing his father’s wrath so soon after the last punishment. One perk to having his domain entirely out of the eyes of his brother meant that Hades could do things like collect himself all in one place to deal with an errant nephew gate-crashing his palace, but it was one very few other gods enjoyed.

That being said, the level of power Hades had had to deploy in order to throw his nephew out implied that only the bare minimum that Apollo could get away with was elsewhere; the vast majority of his essence was standing before him, coalesced into Apollo’s usual form of the blond-haired young mortal barely out of teenagerhood who could easily be the brother of the demigod whose fate they were discussing.

It was the same appearance Hades recalled from times gone past, not the most recent years where he’d instead taken the form of a teenager, but a century ago, when the Great Prophecy had spoken and the elder gods had been forced to swear an oath to never sire children again. Zeus had been displeased at Apollo then, the god of prophecy trying to fade back, out of sight against his father’s frustration. Apollo wasn’t skulking in the background with hunched shoulders this time, though. No, he was still standing with his shoulders thrown back, spine straight up and expression a careful mask.

A far more careful, blank mask than it had been moments earlier. Guarded, as though he thought Hades’ question was a trap.

Admittedly, that was a fair assumption to make.

“Did I say I wanted anything?” his nephew asked. “I don’t remember saying that.” He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans, putting a curve to his spine that made his pose look suddenly nonchalant. “Well, I’ve told you what you needed to know. Catch you later.”

He disappeared in a burst of sunbeams and solar flares, lighting up the black walls in a flash not too unlike the split-second burst of his father’s lightning, leaving Hades staring at the space where he’d been stood not a moment before.

Now, he was certain of it; whatever interference Apollo had planned for his son’s – their sons’ – quest, the younger god had been trying to secure his assistance. It was risky on his nephew’s behalf; Zeus would not take kindly to it should word reach his ear, and in their family, assistance never came for free.

Down here, in Hades’ domain, Zeus was not a concern. His younger brother could not enter uninvited, and Hades was no bootlicker to the king of the gods. If Apollo wanted to bend some rules, Hades did not care enough to tattle.

No, the question was what Hades’ assistance was worth, and if he wanted to give it at all. Prophecies, as Apollo himself had told them all time and time again, were both notoriously unreliable, and also inevitable in their conclusions. Attempting to subvert them was unwise and dangerous. Nothing good could possibly come of it.

Apollo’s abrupt departure allowed him to put off considering the quandary further; there was no guarantee that his nephew would even continue trying to secure his assistance, or if he would look for a new loophole in the Laws to exploit, and Hades was a busy god. Mortals didn’t just stop dying whenever he took a break from the paperwork, after all.

He sent off a sliver of his consciousness to lurk in the shadows of the Overworld – if Nico was planning on going to Tartarus, he was going to know how, when, and every detail of his plan even if it meant resorting to spying on his son every moment – before dividing himself across his duties once again, as though he’d never been interrupted.

Several days passed in that fashion, and Hades could almost forget Apollo’s behaviour if not for the fact that the sliver watching his son was learning far too much about the upcoming quest, including the fact that he had made acquaintances with the troglodytes, of all creatures, to tunnel him down and thereby avoid Hades’ own restrictions.

Hades was incredibly grateful – not that he would ever admit it – that Apollo had told him about the upcoming quest, because his son was not wrong in thinking the underground dwellers would be able to get him and William to Tartarus without alerting Hades, had he not already known something was going on. As it was, he was now aware, pleased that William was as unhappy about Nico’s interactions with the vicious carnivores as he was – a point in the son of Apollo’s favour – and dismissing Apollo’s unknown plan while debating with himself how best to approach his son and ban him from going anywhere with his new… tentative allies.

He would escort the demigods to the edge of Tartarus himself if it came to it, now it was an Official Quest with an irritating Unavoidable Prophecy. Nico might not like the interference – Zeus certainly would not – but Tartarus would be hazardous enough without the loose cannons that were the troglodytes. Besides, there was an entrance in the Underworld, which was Hades’ domain and Nico often frequented, so it wasn’t like his brother could prove that Hades was giving genuine assistance for the quest.

By the time the two demigods decided to embark on their quest – or rather, when they decided to stop procrastinating, because they had every detail organised beyond any practicality – Hades had all but forgotten Apollo’s visits.

He was abruptly, and rudely, reminded when his nephew materialised in his throne room in his usual shower of sunbeams and solar flares, scorching a few nearby skeletons that didn’t get out of the way fast enough.

“I’m busy,” he dismissed the younger god without even looking at him. “Leave.”

“They’re leaving today,” Apollo told him, striding forwards with more than a little desperation in his voice. Hades glanced at him out of the corner of his eye and was a little concerned – not that he’d admit it – to see that his nephew was fully kitted out with his bow, quiver, and even a medicinal pouch. What was Apollo planning?

The other god came to a halt at the edge of the throne’s dais, impossible to miss even in his periphery.

“Turn the light down,” he ordered, turning his head so that even the glow was barely visible. “This is the Underworld, not your chariot. What are you doing here?”

“Will and Nico are leaving to meet with the troglodytes now,” Apollo told him, unnecessarily. “I-”

“I am well aware of that,” Hades interrupted him. “Why my son thinks that is a good idea, I would love to know. They are not taking that route.”

He met Apollo’s eyes in a challenge, daring him to claim that he couldn’t interfere because of the prophecy, and tried not to flinch at the bright light still pouring off his nephew’s form in waves.

“Good.” The sun god fiddled with the string on his bow. “I- That helps a lot. If they don’t take that route, I mean.”

The god of poetry was supposed to be eloquent, and while Hades had sadly not escaped his haiku phase – or the limerick one, or any of the modern rubbish he had begun to spout instead of the masterful epics he had once composed – he had still never heard him stumble over his words quite like that.

“Apollo,” he said firmly, making the split-second decision to rise from his throne and step down to stand in front of his nephew, “what are you planning?” He braved the vibrant light that Apollo had not toned down at all to take another look at the younger god. Apollo looked, frankly, like he was dressed for war. Gone were the lazy, modern clothes he often lounged around in; instead, the sun god had donned his armour over simple, traditional clothing that dated back millennia.

His nephew fidgeted with his bow again, taking a moment before lifting his head to meet Hades’ eyes firmly, and with sudden clarity the Lord of the Underworld realised that Apollo – shameless, dramatic Apollo – was nervous.

“My son is not entering the Pit,” he declared, with the idiotic conviction of someone who had thought long and hard about a problem and come up with the worst solution imaginable. “I’m taking his place.”

Defiant eyes, still the colour of the Phlegethon as they smouldered away inside the rim of blond lashes, dared Hades to try and stop him. He should; quests were for demigods, not for gods, and interference on this scale trampled the Ancient Laws until they were mere specks of dust beneath Apollo’s sandaled feet. It would be easy for him to banish Apollo from his realm, then summon the two demigods away from where they were making the trek towards the troglodytes directly to the Underworld and point them in the direction the quest demanded they go. Hades could do all of that, and should.

“How were you planning on stopping your son from following you like a lemming?” he found himself asking, and justified his immediate response as a natural defence against Apollo’s sheer stupidity. “Or, if he does show some self-preservation and keeps his feet above ground where they belong, how were you planning on keeping him safe from my brother when he decides the mortal makes an easier target for the sins of the father?”

Apollo swallowed, an unnecessary and entirely human action he must have picked up during his time as a mortal, and adjusted his grip on his bow. Despite the display of nervousness, he didn’t look away from Hades’ own eyes, and realisation finally dawned.

“You want me to keep him here,” he said bluntly. “You want me, the Lord of the Underworld, to keep a living demigod who cannot eat any food I might have to offer him here until you crawl back out of the Pit with my son, so that your father does not kill him for your actions.”

“I looked for other places!” Apollo protested, “but-”

But there was nowhere else that Zeus couldn’t simply send a thunderbolt and call it a day, Hades knew. Apollo’s own sacred places would be firstly too obvious, and secondly an easy target. The Underworld was the safest place if you were looking to hide from the king of the gods, that was true.

He held up a hand to stop Apollo’s far longer-winded explanation of the same thing, and his nephew fell silent. Hades held all of the power right then, and he could see the fear Apollo was trying to conceal behind a mask of indifference.

Normally, Apollo was a master actor, but there were times when his masks failed him. The fall of Troy had been one such occasion. Now, it appeared, was another.

Hades regarded his nephew – his stupid, idiotic nephew who was too bright and sunny and light for the Underworld, let alone the Pit he was about to throw himself into – and found himself making a decision that would never have occurred to him before.

He could not stop Apollo from entering Tartarus; regardless what happened with his son, it was clear that the younger god had set his mind on going and providing godly backup to the quest. It was also clear to Hades, who lived with an entrance to the Pit too close to his front door for comfort and was therefore more familiar with the blackness that oozed out of it than any other Olympic god, that none of Apollo’s major domains had any foothold inside the Pit, which would leave the younger god weakened and less capable of protecting Nico than Hades would like.

And really, what sort of father would he be if he subjected his son to suffering the unnecessarily dramatic existence of Apollo on top of the horrors that awaited him on the quest?

If Apollo thought he could replace his son in the prophecy and claim the role of sunshine for himself, which was no doubt exactly what he was intending, then what was stopping Hades from claiming darkness as his? It was, after all, one of his many titles.

“Hades?” the other god asked after a moment of silence had passed. “What-”

“Finding a way to keep him alive for the duration of his stay is your responsibility.”

Relief broke over Apollo’s face like clouds disappearing from where they’d dared conceal the sun. It was uncomfortably blinding. “You’ll let him stay?”

“Turn the light down, Apollo. I will not say it again.”

The lightshow dimmed immediately, his nephew clearly realising that the wellbeing of his son depended entirely on Hades’ mood.

His son was almost at the troglodytes’ warren now; Apollo’s interruption had cost more time than he was comfortable with, but at least they had not yet made contact. Hades reached across the shadows, linking with the sliver of him observing from the deepest of the shadows and waiting a moment to ensure he had a full connection with his powers before giving a little tug.

Passing demigods through shadows was far less intensive than banishing stubborn sun gods; Hades barely felt a dent in his vast reserves of power as two human-sized figures materialised in the middle of his throne room. Compared to himself and Apollo, both currently in their godly stature, they looked painfully fragile. Mortal.

One of the figures – glowing like a full-body lamp, much like the other god currently in Hades’ palace – hunched over awkwardly, groaning. Apollo had been like that once, when he was much younger and not yet accustomed to shadows invading his light as they yanked him around – usually dispensing him somewhere that was not near Hades. He’d grown out of the discomfort over the years, so his son likely would, too, should he survive to grow old enough.

The other was slender, although more like a skeleton than a healthy body, and familiar. Hades watched as his son stepped automatically in front of William, sword leaping to his hand as he assessed the threat.

He almost dropped his sword when his eyes fell on Hades, who gave his son a stern look. Nico was usually immune to most of Hades’ displeased faces – much to his frustration and Persephone’s amusement, when she was present – but it seemed that, for once, he still held the smallest sliver of fear.

“Nico di Angelo,” he announced, walking past Apollo to stand in front of where the demigods crouched. “I seem to recall I forbade you from ever entering the Pit again.”

Chapter 3>>

#trials of apollo #trials of apollo fanfiction #riordanverse #riordanverse fanfic #pjo hades #pjo apollo #nico di angelo #will solace #solangelo #tsari writes fanfiction #eclipse

47 notes · View notes

spritehouse · 11 months

Text

Doors a Kid Shouldn’t Walk Through (WIP) Title from Guiltless by dodie

Notes: I started writing this for Whumptober and never finished it, but I like the concept so I'm making it into its own fic (if I ever get around to it)

Prompts: Pinned Down (no. 5) + Recording (no. 6) Moreid/Ralvez (eventually) | 509 words | The BAU gets a case where an unsub digs up Spencer, Derek, and Luke's pasts, forcing them to reveal some guarded secrets & make some difficult decisions

⚠️TW: CSA (Spencer's father & Derek's canon trauma) & SA

Spencer doesn’t remember the first time it happened. He was too young.

And coming to terms with that feeling like mourning, crying for a childhood someone ruined before he was old enough to know that someone who tells a kid they love them shouldn’t mean it like that.

The memories come in flashes, snippets of scenes unattached to time, assaulting his senses until he can’t breathe, begging his brain to stop.

The first time he remembers it, all of it, every move, every emotion, how hot breath felt against smooth skin, is in Los Vegas following his hypnotherapy session, sensations sparking under his skin, burning down the walls his brain built, causing everything to come crashing in.

“Get it off! Morgan! Get them off!”

Derek does remember the first time it happened. He was too young.

He was too young to lose his father, too young to become the man of the household, too young for his life to be so tainted.

But Carl Buford didn’t care–

“I pulled myself out of the gutter! All the way to the FBI!”

–or maybe he cared too much, drawn to the dying innocence in his eyes, snuffing out the last sparks; the damage at such a young age was part of the appeal.

He’s the first to put it together, or at least to acknowledge it, anger building and boiling in Derek’s gut as he watches Spencer’s hands shake as he denies the signs, breaking down in the older agent's hotel room, sobbing when he stops running from it.

“I was just a kid.”

He stays by Spencer’s side, sleeping on his sofa for when the genius inevitably wakes up screaming, talking him through breathing exercises he learned for the same reason, keeping his friend's head tucked under his chin, hiding the silent tears staining his cheeks.

“I know, Spence. I’m sorry it happened to you; you didn’t deserve it.”

Derek drove him to therapy for weeks, talking him down from flashbacks until he felt okay leaving Spencer alone, never batting an eye when the young brunette showed up on his doorstep or outside his hotel room at midnight, simply inviting him in, holding him until they fell asleep.

“I love you, Pretty Boy.”

They never defined their relationship, never put a label on it, blurring the lines between platonic and romantic with every gentle touch, holding each other through the horrors of their lives and jobs, Spencer screaming Derek’s name through their comms whenever he pulled some “stupid, self-sacrificing stunt,” refusing to move or speak until the older agent responded.

“You’re going to be the death of me, Derek.”

They never discussed the terms, never called each other “boyfriend,” never came out, but they still managed to drift, life ripping them apart like a breakup—even if they were never together—never lost each other, they stopped gravitating towards each other, remaining in orbit, but never coming closer.

“Whoever they are, they’ve gotta be one hell of a person to keep up with you.”

“I just can’t imagine this room without you.”

“You’ve lost protectors before, haven’t you? That’s what makes this so hard, history repeating itself.”

#criminal minds #spencer reid #criminal minds fic #criminal minds fanfiction #spencer reid fanfiction #shortmc #derek morgan #derek morgan fic #derek morgan fanfiction #spencer reid fic #moreid #moreid fic #moreid fanfiction

17 notes · View notes

idsb · 5 months

Text

I don’t know, and I suppose I will never know, if the world only ever smiles upon me like this, or if the whole point of this all is that, if you let it be, it’s filled with as much closure and as many epilogues as one can possibly fill it with.

The world is a book collection of stories in the same cinematic universe, which inevitably ALL end an intertwine and get wrapped in a perfect bow at some point down the line, in a way that Marvel could never dare dream of writing. You can always go back to that country. You can always keep that friend in your life. You can always meet back up with him. Maybe not all in the same place. Maybe there is some cataclysmic cruelty of the world that never gets resolved. But maybe it will, and maybe it takes far longer than you could ever envision in the moment. But maybe it all happens together in ways you least expect.

All I know is one of the most vivid memories of my life is the tears I shed on the drive home from Florida in February 2020. I called it rock bottom. I remember screaming the words to Liability by Lorde. I remember calling everyone who would listen to talk me off the ledge that whole ride home, pleading, “you don’t understand” through a whole mess of tears. Anyone who would listen, until they got sick of listening, and then on to the next name on the list. I don’t remember what I talked about. Probably about how no one would ever want me. As I sat there a sad, sorry mess of a human, so fresh off the memory of what it might be like to feel wanted again. Of what it might be like to be in a long distance relationship with a guy from Florida. A certain awful friend in my ear telling me those were cheap flights. Me rationalizing how the $700 in my bank account could obviously make that work. Laughing in the shower. Laughing on the phone with room service. Laughing when he pretended to leave. Knowing, in hindsight in that moment, that it was too real of a joke to mask what might be about to happen. Two sets of absolutely ridiculous hair perpetually entangled in sloppy kisses, for hours and hours and hours. The feeling that I thought I finally might have gotten it right. Asking how I liked to sleep with someone. As if that would ever matter after that night. The sudden, sobering knowledge as that next day went on, that I sat with that whole drive, that it never would.

I wish I could say that it being rock bottom meant it was a turning point as I drove a little too fast down that road, home to what? A dwindling bank account? A friend group I hated, who didn’t like me very fuck-all much, either? A career I was sick to death of, sucking up to people I didn’t like to beat people I couldn’t compare to? An absolute rat of a man at home who would never stop making me feel inferior? It wasn’t the events themselves, but every realization on that drive of how hollow I truly was, that felt like signing my life’s sentence with every mile I drove. Waving goodbye to the last taste of freedom I’d ever get, what felt like it might be my last attempt to break the chains that the world and that friend group was putting me in; a plot soiled for the last time. Me, a joke, a laughing stock, a beast with no teeth. Sent back to the captors who deranged me, happily awaiting with pitchforks and punishments and laughter for how they couldn’t believe I did all that, as if they hadn’t been the one to convince me getting out of the cage was a fun and intelligent thing to do. Again.

There was no Australia. There was no Florida. There was nothing better. There was nothing. The world locked the door and threw away the keys. And that. That was rock bottom.

I sat in my room for many nights prior to that Florida drive with them all in my ear. And I think the combination of things which occurred this evening sounded like they came out of my wildest fantasy from that time. I couldn’t have even dared write it: I live in Melbourne, Australia. He's playing a show there, on his tour. I am at the show, there to support him. There’s some kind of overlap happening there with the multiverse in which he and I got together; in the moment he said goodbye and grabbed my hand and smiled; desperately clinging onto another second. For what? A glitch in it all that teleported us into the wrong world for just a second; it felt real. A future I wanted back in the past, right before my eyes. Yet, how do people separate themselves at their most intimate, sharing secrets in a shower in a Red Roof Inn in Tallahassee, to casually being a stranger they sit next to over Bahn mi after not having seen one another in 4.5 years? In a way it is so devastating. In a way it is so beautiful. Standing there with the knowledge that, really, at the end of it all, every last moment comes with healing and a taste of all you could’ve ever dreamed, right there in the palm of your hand. A held breath, a barely-there touch with something, and then, suddenly, the realization that you are not in that universe, and time has moved in such a way that this so casual it does not even matter. Which in and of itself makes everything feel right in the world. A roar a cry a death a tragedy a life a rebirth sex and fantasies and escape and burning it all down and sitting on the floor of the ocean watching ships sink around me; fire and rain and oceans and fighting and healing and tearing it down and building it back up, and then: nothing at all, in a single glimpse on a stage and a squeeze of a hand. There’s a certain level of poeticism of it all that I could never even dare put words to. It was a scene out of my dreams. And yet it felt, in the most positive way this can be said, like absolutely nothing.

It could be a song, it could be a movie, it could be a novel. And yet it, simultaneously, is nothing. And I think that is the beauty of it all. It resolves. It always resolves.

#I do b having some words in my notes app #and I haven't overshared the inner workings of my brain like this in a while #but best believe I'm gonna do it #I’m over shutting up!

6 notes · View notes

unfortunately-obsessed · 1 year

Text

Reencounters

( Next ) | Part 1 of We Can Make This Place Our Home

Warning: Mentions of violence, Wounds, Canon character death, Weapons, Blood

Characters: Bruce Wayne, Selina Kyle (mentioned)

Word count: +2.8 | AO3 Link

N/A: Let me know if there's any other warning I should add. There's plot aspects of Batman (2022) but I did not write this based solemnly on the movie (⁠づ⁠｡⁠◕⁠‿⁠‿⁠◕⁠｡⁠)⁠づ

Gotham is a strange city, after all. The place knows no weather other than the torrential rain and grayness, always coating the night sky, pouring from the heavens. It drowns and burns, it kills.

For those that lost all the hope: who will listen the begging that dies on your throat? When there's blood, must there be bloodshed?

Unexpectedly, Bruce sees a silver lining standing in his living room.

\\~~~//

Bruce always had nightmare. Like a cursed child, the kid never had a night spent in peace.

Most of the dreams are about that night.

The necklace breaking, a cacophony takes place. Pearls hitting the ground, a child crying out as the father is down on his knees. Thomas Wayne fought with all he had. Martha Wayne bite the man's fingers off.

Blood starts to flood, it stains. Bruce's suit was all red with staining blood.

Gotham is a strange city, after all. The place knows no weather other than the torrential rain and grayness, always coating the night sky, pouring from the heavens. It drowns and burns, it kills.

Gotham is built for suffering. It's full of people desperately trying to leave, difficult to swallow, to survive.

Bruce is Gotham's child. Almost suffocating.

Everyone knows this story, how Martha and Thomas didn't die until three hours later because they didn't want to leave young Bruce alone. Bruce didn't want to be left behind either. He crawls and beg into his parents bodies.

Blood and pearls spilled all over the place.

He has been born that night. No child walked out off that alley.

Because Bruce Wayne is no one's son but Gotham's. The place has burned his name and hope, all that his parents fought for. The city holds his faces and asks is this pile of destruction finally enough? will you finally give up?

Gotham is doomed since day one.

"This place is never gonna change," Selina says.

Selina thinks she sees the city for exactly what it is.

"The city can change."

Maybe Bruce is delusional on this crusade, so she can't expect him to grow common sense now.

Her face darkens. "It won't."

But Bruce is not blind to the real Gotham, even when everything indicates otherwise. She looks at him with hope but they both know the answer to that unsaid question.

"I have to try."

Somewhere between having a gun pointed to his head and answering the call, Bruce learned that living people also can leave. He's never the one to turn away first.

She slips through his fingers, driving away. On this city, calamity lay for all, destruction is inevitable, but that means that when there's blood must there be bloodshed? Will nothing ever change?

Gotham burns. Sometimes, Bruce looks like he fell in love with the city, blindly passionate. Even if the city is cold, he is trapped by it's chains with a promise of hope. Bruce Wayne is too stubborn to leave.

So Gotham drowns, it floods. Proud, strangely and rightfully so.

He could watch from above, from up the tower. The exhaustion and the tired people. Bruce could live life simply, unworringly, because he's royalty.

He does seem untouchable, sometimes, but they're all part of this bigger battle.

Up in the sky, even Bruce Wayne can burn.

So Gotham rages, let the smoke of Wayne Tower burning touch the sky. The same way Wayne Manor burned to the ground, water downpours and the fire spreads faster than anyone could contain it.

Vengeance. With a fire worse than what burns the city, feasting into his chest with no mercy whatsoever.

He has been doomed since day one and so, maybe, that's why he is worse than the city itself.

A pariah. A paragon of life and death. He is not mercy or hope. Vengeance run on his blood, he's Gotham's son. His parents too far gone.

A civilian holds up to him, terrified of letting him go. Bruce is not used to someone having him as a symbol of hope, because everything went wrong and he couldn't do anything about it.

(But he can try to be.)

He still wakes up the same. Everyday, up in the sky, tired.

He still has nightmares.

Bruce Wayne gave up half his fortune to reconstructing the city. Batman has been working with rescue teams restlessly. People still find ways to make the crime rate worse.

Even if he has 6 pounds of kevlar in the way, he still managed to break too many ribs with sheer blunt trauma. Alfred, in the hospital for far more lethal damage, would still kill him if suspected Bruce was not resting. Staying still is worse.

He can't rest when it's night because this is when monster lie awake, then he turns into something that makes rogues in Gotham sleep with the lights on. Marked as vengeance, as fear, because he belongs to the city.

So he turns into a monster that lie awake in the night.

So, staying still is worse. His hands need something to do.

Dorothy, at least, listened to him when he said that one of them needed to go see Alfred, and if Bruce couldn't because of the broken ribs, then it should be her.

The penthouse is lonely and quiet. Dorothy only goes after making a sandwich and hearing Bruce starting a shower.

Bruce is eager for the moment she leaves. He finishes the cleaning process to quickly dress anything and go down the stairs.

Aimed to the Terminus to finish the repairs of the car. His brain don't even register what could be a threat.

Bruce sees a silver lining standing in his living room.

He always had nightmares. All of them are about being left behind.

For those that lost all the hope: who will listen the begging that dies on your throat? When there's blood, must there be bloodshed?

Helen Blackwood stands in his living room.

She watches the city below, her hands tucked behind her back.

Powerful, distant. Her eyes are sharp, darker than the power outage that lies into the city. Using a silk dress and diamond earrings.

Gotham is pretty when it's night. Even when the city is flooded. Even when people are desperately trying to build breakages so the city can return to being what it is: a city.

It's much darker when people are fighting to survive.

Does her stomach still drops at the height?

Does she still likes blue?

And does she remember running around those halls?

Playing tag with no worries?

Lost on her own thoughts, her chin tilted up, her eyes are slightly puffy, red.

She's been crying, Bruce connects the dots. His heart sinks down to his stomach.

Almost desperately, he moves. Instinct propels him nowhere but closer to her. Two steps before his brain knocks sense into his legs. But not faster than his mouth.

"Helen."

The voice echoes through the house. He doesn't meant it to, but his voice thunder-strong.

She turns around. Her gaze hit him like the first punch he took. She taught him how to take a punch well.

It sounded too much like a question. So he proceeds:

"What are you doing in here?"

Now it sounds angry. Because he is.

An anger that has teeth, and eats.

Because he was abandoned by water thicker than blood.

Here's calamity given form and purpose, here's chaos given a meaning and a body.

Fierceness lingers on Helen's face, her jaw set.

Concern bleeds into Bruce's mouth, makes him ache. The same way he throws up hot disgusting blood that is not his–

And Helen's eyes turn gentle. A type of gentleness that sink into Bruce's bones, with a beauty of an open wound.

"Dorothy let me in," she answers.

The Tower smells like burning wood, taste of ashes in the air. A fine layer of dust cover over the wood furniture, the main table has abandoned teacups and documents pilling that nobody had the time to keep care of.

The place is a grave up in the sky.

Much like the penthouse, Bruce is exactly the same, yet utterly haunted. Shoulders broader, taller.

Helen finds the knot on her back dissipating, tension releasing from her muscles.

Bruce has exhaustion exhaling down to the marrow and she can't find the blue in his eyes.

Older, more tired, but it's the same face. And he is well, alive and well.

Helen's heart pang.

Or rather, what makes her heart pang is that she imagined this moment several times and none of her scenarios started with his tone being so dry.

His eyebrows, somehow, got closer together.

"The city has been evacuated," he says. And it sounds like why are you here?

All flights have been canceled. She had to land in Metropolis and then take a helicopter down to Gotham.

How much she feared. Utter fear crushing her bones.

Thinking he's dead. He died. His house-

Fear she felt in her ribs and lungs, crushing every bone all the way down to Gotham, because the news didn't talk about anything other than the Riddler and then the burning, and then she was in an airplane trying to get in there, and then the city was flooded-

Bruce proceeds, "Martial law has-"

Helen licks her lips. "So what are you doing in here?" she cuts.

The tone sounds a little more annoyed than she intended. Helen is seven again and he just fell down the well, so her throat starts to hurt.

Bruce doesn't answer. He finally glares somewhere else, eyes falling on the table.

"Weren't you in Beijing?"

Yes, attending a business conference over some technology advancements that never will get out of the paper. Helen doesn't question how he knows that, he always was paranoid.

Instead, her eyebrows also furrow together. "Your house was burning on national TV."

And isn't this enough reason? Her throat is full of reasonings and sorrow but isn't this enough?

Bruce ran a hand through his hair. He would rather ignore how the media broadcasted such a sensitive moment, again.

Dorothy said she was going to go see Alfred in the hospital. The old lady held Helen's face between her hands, a gentle touch Helen didn't know.

Oh, dear. I'm so happy you're here.

And Helen almost cried after the woman left, crumbling in the absence of a warm touch. She didn't know Alfred was in the hospital, but she doesn't think it was because of that.

So she moves closer. One of them has to. It's just then in the tower, untouchable for those below.

Bruce's jaw tightens and all his attention is back on her. Helen has to stop a convinced laughter. He looks like an apprehensive drenched animal.

Pale, even more than when she knew him, dead-eyed staring at her as she moves, Bruce stays still.

One step after the other. She stands too close and, only then, Helen can understand how tall Bruce is now, in such a way that even if she is the one being assertive he towers over her.

He looms, taller, paler, sweating even if he is straight out of the shower.

"Flower boy," Helen appealed, she didn't notice the nickname slipping, "why you're looking miserable?"

(Helen suddenly remembers the short period when she was bigger than him, twelve years old. Bruce would get all the Forget-me-nots for her.)

His face tenses up. "Came to my house to call me miserable?"

A little miserable, yes, but mostly pitiful.

Helen doesn't laugh, usually dead serious when she feels lead on her stomach. "Why are you in pain?"

Bruce scolds his expression into stoicism. Effort is worth nothing when Helen knows him that much.

A fireplace, ornaments, the shelves still have a dent where Bruce promptly ran into as a kid.

He grumbles. "Why are you here?"

The question changed but not the reason behind it.

Helen's eyes narrow. "I asked first."

The smell of smoke mix with pear-scented shampoo. If he wanted her out, she would be in the streets long ago.

"You didn't actually answer any of my questions," he growled stepping away.

Bruce's gait is normal but he can't hide the subtle change of expression. She never saw him flinch before.

Her head pounds heavy. It's utterly dark outside and the Wayne Tower was never a place to find light.

After 17 hours trapped inside a plane, she had a lot of time to think.

And thinking she did.

"I wanted to see you," spills from her mouth before she can make sense of it.

Neither of them expected her voice to crack. Bruce finally let his poke-face melt.

Even when she's using pumps, he is too tall, too imposing, even if she sees a glimpse of a much younger, rawer than this Bruce in front of her.

Her feet hurt. She forgot about it. It's the heels.

It's not the same type of pain Bruce's feeling. His pain seems much more hectic.

Helen's used to it; looking for injuries. Bruce got into fights every other week as a teenager.

Cold stiffness finally missing from his face, yet he doesn't look like he will start speaking anytime soon. He makes her small and isn't even on purpose.

"This answer half your questions," she prompts him.

No more tight expressions or furrowed eyebrows. The man still looks miserable as if he lost blood and sleep over something.

(There was a grand ballroom in the Wayne Manor. Bruce and Helen would run around in a tag game, blue curtains they would hide and seek.)

"Why are you here?" he murmur and it felt very much like not him.

The underlying hurt in his voice tugs Helen's heartstrings. The storms angered outside with the occasional sound of helicopters bringing supplies, Helen concluded she didn't understood what he meant.

Thunder strikes, shakes the whole tower. The storm is roaring outside.

She made so many calls just to get to the tower-

"What do you mean?" Not one to back away, she asks with the conviction of getting an answer.

-And, oh, if they could talk like normal childhood friends...

Angry? She would know if he was angry. There's an emotion in his face that she can't name.

Bruce's mouth open several times, no sound coming off whatsoever. His shoulders tense up, looking to a clock like a late businessman.

He asses the situation carefully. Helen gives him all the time to figure out what he wants to say, stringing the words together.

The man was never one to admit too much, to say too much.

When he does, though, it makes her heart ache so much she could rip the meat out of her chest.

"You left without saying a word."

Ah.

The resonance of his voice sends shockwaves against her body. It felt ridiculous, shameful. Dumb soft heart.

Four years ago, Helen thought that leaving like this was less painful. Now feels like that, if she had a time machine, she would use it.

Helen forces a smile into her face. Makes she look arrogant and self-righteous, but it's better than actually showing any wound.

"I missed you too," she says.

Because the words I'm sorry are too hard to get out of her throat. So she is admitting something but not what she needs to.

What she wants to say is, I didn't want to leave, I'm sorry.

They had an ending that didn't make too much sense, that didn't had a warning.

They knew each other since being toddlers.

A long time ago Martha would peel fresh oranges for them. What a terrible, terrible ending.

Fresh oranges, blue curtains. In silence, down the foyer. Helen still remembers it, but she's a year older than him, so does he? He was too young.

It doesn't matter anymore.

She is seventeen again, soon they'll be strangers again. Helen simply can't bear standing there and having her heart shattered.

"I'm leaving," she says then, she can't manage an apology out.

I'm leaving again. I also don't know why I'm here.

Her mouth feels bitter like the million times she would underage drink, throw up on the carpet of someone's house, pass out in the bathroom because it was better than coming back home.

The smells of pear-scented shampoo and smokes creeps into her nose, a citric tone she might go insane for.

Her stomach turns.

Bruce also seems surprised, holding her arm when she tries to move. His eyelids drooping, staring down at her. (His heart is also shattered over this.)

His hand is cold. Only then Helen is made aware she is still using a silk summer dress she used for the conference – she had no respect for that technology whatsoever.

"Don't." He finally steps closer.

(For the millionth time, Bruce steps into the bathroom to rescue a lost princess. He scoops her out of the dirty floor.)

A heartfelt confession is enough, even if it is one word long. Helen stops every movement and stares back at the man.

She can see the blue. A fling of it.

It's a simple, reasonable request. His hand leaves her arm.

(She couldn't risk him having the opportunity the first time for this exactly.)

Helen stays.

Bruce blinks multiple times, he didn't think this far. "I can make tea."

He looks agonized over it. It doesn't look much like the man on the magazine covers with scandalous titles.

Helen doesn't think he knows how to make tea, because she herself has no idea of the process. She has to inhale deeply to understand the implications.

They would be dead if Alfred caught them burning the kitchen over tea- "Sounds like a plan."

The storm isn't settling anyway.

Maybe it is this easy to be normal.

9 notes · View notes

elwenyere · 2 years

Note

Late, but: On Stolen Time for the director's commentary meme

Thank you so much for this ask, my dear. <3<3<3

Asks are from this director's cut meme.

The first spark for "On Stolen Time" came to me while I was reflecting on the importance of autonomy to my understanding of Cassian and Melshi's relationship. On the most basic level, I think of them as two people who helped each other get free, and it makes sense to me that that would be the foundation for all their subsequent interactions. And then I had the thought: how awful would it be if the first time they fucked, it happened under circumstances where complete and unfettered consent was impossible?

And thus, my first sex-pollen fic was spawned. Spored. Manufactured in a nefarious Imperial lab.

Some things that I discovered and enjoyed:

The first idea I had for the fic was that Cassian and Melshi would have a wee fight over whether they were going to fuck the pollen out, because Cassian would obviously be focused on saving Melshi's life, and it would take a while for Melshi to admit/explain that he was more afraid of breaking something about what Cassian meant to him than he was of dying. I imagine that Melshi, like many other Rebels, would come to see his own death as a near-inevitability at a certain point, and that one of the things that makes that deal feel worth it is that he gets to keep fighting beside Cassian. So it might be more painful for him to imagine having to live with knowing that he'd fucked up the freest thing in his life than it would be to imagine dying.

Of course Cassian is not having that at all, and I imagine that both he and Melshi know that he's using his powers of manipulation (carefully, but definitely using them) as he chooses which arguments to make in order to convince Melshi he wants him (which is both true and also a point he needs to win to keep Melshi alive). Thus Melshi's, “You can be a real bastard, you know that?”: I think Melshi is still not totally convinced this isn't going to end the way he fears, but he has to let Cassian make the choice to try to save him for the same reasons he originally resisted that solution.

"Cassian runs cold" has been a hc of mine for explaining his preference for unseasonably large and numerous jackets (the way he's never quite adjusted to cooler climates), and I liked incorporating that here into a scenario where Melshi would be running even hotter than usual - in a way that's both a sign of the danger and an edge on the pleasure. (Also, as you have pointed out to me, I have a Thing for Melshi putting his hand on the small of Cassian's back. <3)

This was my first time focalizing narration through Cassian, and that was probably the hardest part of writing the story for me. Writing Cassian from the outside, there's a lot to play with in terms of how another character reads (or fails to read) the shifts and slips in his expressions, movements, voice, words. From the inside, one of the challenges for me is deciding how many layers of that performance Cassian is aware of himself: what would register consciously enough for it to show up in interior narration, and what is he looking away from so determinedly that it's only going to emerge indirectly - through displacement or silence or projection - even when we have access to his interiority? One of the ways I tried to play with that in this story is in the tension he experiences during sex among: (1) staying focused on his mission objective (to get Melshi off so that he doesn't die), (2) becoming affected by the intimacy of fucking someone he cares about (which ends up being a more overpowering factor than Cassian expected), and (3) experiencing a deep, low-level guilt about what happened to Melshi (which he's tried so hard to set aside in order to focus on 1 that it doesn't emerge consciously until he thinks Melshi's about to die).

Playing with those tensions led to my favorite line from this fic: "so few people had ever said Cassian’s name like that - like it was a place to rest instead of the key to some other door."

Thank you for giving me a chance to talk about this, fic, my dear!!! It means so much to know you enjoyed it. <3<3<3

#writer asks #director's cut #melshian #andor

10 notes · View notes

thatgayunoriginalbastard · 1 year

Text

Whumptober 2023 Day 4-Cattle Prod

My Life In Your Chokehold:

AO3 Link

Words: 2855

Summary: Number Two sat in her cell, a scowl on her face as she braced for the inevitable torture. She could take it, so it wouldn’t bother her. But that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. Or that it didn’t affect her in other ways.

CLINK CLINK CLINK

Number Two could hear the sound of that awful machine tapping against the floor.

CLINK CLINK CLINK

The scout that held it was a high ranking one. It's how they were allowed to know about the basilisks.

CLINK CLINK CLICK

It’s how they were allowed to see the basilisks.

CLINK CLINK CLICK

It’s how they were allowed to take part in their torture.

CLINK CLINK CLICK

BANG

The scout violently grabbed onto the bars of the cell. Number Two looked up at them and sat up from where they were laying on the ground. They couldn’t see the scout’s face, but they knew they were wearing a sadistic expression.

“Morning Ty. How are you doing?” Number Two asked, their voice dripping with sweetness and sarcasm.

Number Two had no idea what the scout’s name was, so they made one up. Ty. Because every time they came along, it would end with the basilisk they visited screaming to the Titan for mercy. Or death. And Ty didn’t seem to mind the nickname, so she just kept with it. She wondered if they even liked it.

“Aw, and how do you know it’s morning?” Ty asked, talking to Number Two like they were a pet.

“I suppose I don’t, but time is relative and words have the meanings we choose. So to me, it is morning because it’s when I’m waking up.”

“Who would think that someone who has never gotten an education would know philosophy?”

“Well you're not the only one who visits us. And they sometimes tell us about their lives and kids. While they torture and experiment on us, that is.”

CLANK

CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK

Ty pulled open the cell door and Two got closer to them. She crossed her arms and looked at him semi-patiently. Ty tossed the wriggling bag he held on the ground and it opened up, releasing a weird, tentacled creature. Two picked it up curiously and examined it. Even if she didn’t know what it was, food was food.

And she was so hungry.

“Not a rat? Ooo, fancy. What even is this?”

“Baby puppeteer. Nearly extinct. They’re able to create illusions with a strange smoke once they mature. We only caught a few, so only you basilisks early in the number line are getting them. These things have more magic than the rats, so they might give us a better idea of how you freaks do what you do.”

Two examined the wriggling creature in her hands, squeezing it a few times. It was almost stress relieving. Then she carefully leaned to it and bit it right between the eyes. She could feel the muscle protecting its brain break. The small demon went limp in her hands. Satisfied, Two drained any magic left in it, causing the creature to shrivel up and shrink in her hands as she grew slightly.

Her change in size was thanks to the genetic defect in her creation that made it so whenever she drained magic she grew.

Once Two removed all the magic from the creature, she tossed it into the air and caught it in her mouth, swallowing it whole.

“Man if these things weren’t endangered I’d ask if we could only get these instead of rats.” Two chuckled, “These things are chock full of magic which is great for you guys to observe and they’re also really tasty which beats the scraps we get now. When you remember to feed us, that is.”

CRACK

A violent jolt coursed through Two’s head as she was whacked with the shock baton Ty wielded. She fell to the ground and could almost feel the black eye forming. Or maybe that was just the electricity in her brain.

“You know damn well that you aren’t supposed to kill the creatures before you drain them. That makes the magic less potent. Makes the data worthless. Like you.” Ty jeered, standing over Two.

CRACK

The baton hit her shoulder, sending pain shooting through the joints of that arm and the side of her neck, even making her twitch slightly.

“What can I say? This is worth it for a good meal.” Two groaned.

CRACK

Two curled inward slightly from the shock in her abdomen making her torso muscles tense up. She coughed out the magic she had gotten from the young puppeteer and shrank back to her normal size.

CRACK

Her back arched and she turned back out as the muscles tensing up were now in her back. She felt like one of these days her spinal joints would break under the pressure. Maybe she could be lucky like One and have a vessel pop, putting her out of her misery in an instant.

Ty dropped to his knees stradling Two’s chest. She could hear their heavy breathing through their bird mask. They were enjoying this, clearly.

“You know, some basilisks crack under the pressure and drop dead. I wonder if I can make you crack another way.”

Two let out an agonizing scream as the tip of the shock baton was placed on the center of her neck. It became more and more strangled sounding as Ty pressed down. Her head was repeatedly seizing and banging itself against the floor as the rest of her body spasmed. Even her tail was thrashing against the chain connected to her tail fin as the electricity coursed through her body.

“You know exactly what I want to hear you say. And I’ll stop.”

Two’s saliva began to foam in her mouth and come out from the corners. Ty only laughed.

“Come on, it’s just one little word. How hard can it be?”

The baton was pressed down harder, making Two start to go into a coughing fit. She swore she could hear something break or snap.

“Say it. Or maybe I’ll move from your neck to your head. I didn’t want to break you like the others, but if that’s the way it has to be, then so be it. There are eight more of you creatures in case you drop dead.”

The electricity was suddenly so much higher than it had been before.

And Two’s screams were so much louder than they had ever been before. A broken, pained, desperate scream.

“TITAN PLEASE MAKE IT STOP, I BEG OF YOU PLEASE JUST STOP!”

Ty laughed and, after pressing down even harder for a few more moments, he released her and got off of her. Two immediately grabbed at her throat and could feel a dent in the front from where he had pressed down. Her breaths were raspy and her eyes still watered as she tried to breathe normally again, but the damage was so bad that she could feel not just her windpipe but her vocal cords themselves had been damaged.

“Now was that really so hard? But you see, this is what happens when you don’t do as you’re told. I hope you liked that snack, because for your non-compliance you won’t be eating for a while.”

Ty turned around and began to leave Two’s cell, the shock baton tapping against the stone floor like it had been when he arrived again.

CLINK CLINK CLINK

Two moved her tail from side to side as she pushed herself up, feeling the weight of the heavy chain is her tail fin being dragged around.

CLINK CLINK CLINK

Curiously, she flicked her tail up a few times, feeling the chain pull against the thin cartilage that made up her tail fin.

CLINK CLINK CLINK

Her eyes narrowed as she stared at Ty, the world almost moving in slow motion as they reached out towards the door in front of them. Filled with pure rage blocking out all other thoughts or senses, Two lunged at Ty.

They didn’t even notice her until it was too late.

SLAM

Two knocked Ty into the ground, their head crashing against the floor. Two was so focused on that, she didn’t even notice that she had ripped out her tail ring, a tear now in her tail fin as part of her tail stayed connected to the chain on the floor behind her. She grabbed Ty’s head through their cape and began to repeatedly slam it into the ground.

She was seeing red. Nothing else mattered but making her most sadistic torturer pay for what they did to her, to all the other basilisks.

SNAP

Two could hear the sound of something breaking. What it was, she didn’t care. It didn’t matter.

What did matter was the approaching sounds of footsteps.

Two knew that she wouldn’t get this chance for revenge for long so she had to make it count.

SLASH

Two used her claws to tear through the fabric of the cape Ty wore and the material that made up their now caved-in mask. She flipped them over and finally got to see their face. But she didn’t care about any of the identifying details or whatever look they had in their eyes. The only thing that mattered at that moment was seeing them bleeding.

Two chuckled at the sight and began to drain them of their magic.

It tasted delicious.

She had been missing out, only tasting magic from small demons. Witches had the most amazing magic she had ever drained. And it made her grow more than any magic she had ever tasted before had.

She wanted more.

She needed more.

But she wouldn’t get more.

SLAM

Before she could even fully drain Ty, other scouts who were in the hidden prison arrived and one of them blasted her off of Ty and slammed her against the back wall of her cell with magic. Her head hurt from the impact and, after curiously touching the back of her head, she saw that it was hard enough of an impact that the bricks of the cell broke her scales and the back of her head was bleeding.

When she looked up from her hand, she saw three scouts, one of which being the captain, standing outside the cell. With a simple tilt of the head, the captain was able to command the two scouts to pick up Ty and drag him away.

“Hello there, captain.” Two chuckled, not even caring how awful her voice sounded, “My oh my do you smell delicious. I’ve gotten a taste for your people’s magic now. And let me just say, I’ve been missing-”

Two couldn’t even finish her sentence as she was punched across the face. The captain then grabbed her by the throat with one hand and slammed her against the wall, holding her there by her throat. With their free hand, they pulled out their shock baton.

CRACK

Two just giggled as the electricity shot through her skull.

CRACK

She wasn’t feeling pain anymore.

CRACK

She was just laughing.

CRACK

And starving.

CRACK

The shock baton was jabbed into the side of her head and just held there. But Two didn’t scream. Frankly she thought she had lost the ability to feel pain. She just smiled, trying to stare through the eye holes of the mask into the empty abyss where the captain used to house their soul before giving it away to be in the coven.

At some point she began to cough, not from the electricity but just because of the way she was being held, and coughed out the magic she had drained. But that didn’t stop the captain from pressing the baton harder into her skull.

FLOP

Two collapsed onto the ground as the hand around her neck finally let go. The captain put away their shock baton, but they weren’t done with her.

Over and over, Two was kicked in the stomach, unable to do anything to stop it.

But she didn’t cry. She didn’t beg. She didn’t plead.

That’s what they wanted, after all. They wanted to think that she feared them.

But she was over that.

Eventually, the captain stopped and just walked away backwards, clearly having learned from Ty that turning your back on a basilisk was just asking for trouble. As they stood in the open door of the cell, Two sat back up and felt her torso. When she poked a broken rib, she just scoffed with a smirk.

“Got one hell of a kick. Or do scouts have metal tipped boots? Either way, let me just say, ten out of ten on the brutality. Highly recommend to an inmate near me. Well, not near me actually. I’d rather this happen to witches than to my kin, thank you very much.”

“Did all that electrocution give you brain damage or something?” the captain grumbled.

“Probably!” Two said chipperly, beaming.

The captain just scoffed. A few moments later, two scouts, Two didn’t know if they were the same from before, brought in heavy looking gold chains with large manacles. The scouts entered the cell, Two could tell from their body language that they were terrified, and bolted each of the two chains to the wall. They then cuffed the manacles on Two’s arms.

She didn’t try to stop them, frankly she was curious.

She got even more curious when, once both manacles were secured, the chains gained a slight blue glow. Not only that, but they shortened so that Two’s arms were raised up. Two moved around some to test them and found that the chains never allowed her arms to hang below shoulder height. They also prevented her from getting too close to the cell door.

The scouts were quick to leave the cell, but after the first one left the second one was blocked by the captain standing in the way.

“Captain? Are you giving me a lil’ treat for being so good while you put me in these new duds?”

“That depends on you. Go ahead, I bet you’re absolutely ravenous now that you’ve had a taste for witch magic.”

“C-captain, are you sure about this?” the scout in the cell stammered.

Neither the captain nor Two answered the question.

Two could feel their stomach grumble and she licked her lips. However, when she attempted to drain the scout, nothing happened. Again and again they tried, but nothing. Two just got more angry and desperate.

More hungry.

The captain just chuckled and finally got out of the way, allowing the scout to swiftly leave the cell.

CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK

CLANK

The cell door slammed shut and locked as Two just glared at the captain and scouts, absolutely seething.

“Let the emperor know that the experiment worked. We now have control over the draining capabilities of the specimens.”

Two wasn’t angry about being called a specimen, no, it was the knowledge that she had just lost one more thing that she used to have control over. First she was locked in a cell that prevented her from shapeshifting, and now she was in chains that regulated her ability to drain.

“You…can’t…DO THIS TO ME!!!” Two screamed.

“But we did. The chains were still a work in progress, but thanks to you we had a reason to test them. And since they’re a success, they will be given to all your little test buddies ahead of schedule. So know that you’re the reason all of them will be going through what you are. Except they’ll be chained to the floor, not walls like you.”

“None of them are going through what I am! They haven’t tasted magic like I have. They don’t know what they’re losing.”

“I bet you think you’re so superior don’t you.”

“You can’t do this to me! I know so much. One of these days I’m going to escape here. I know you have kids, captain.” Two laughed, rage palpable in her broken voice, “I know half the scouts here have kids! Kids, siblings, family. And you know what I’m going to do when I get out? I’m going to shapeshift to look just like you and your buddies. And I’m going to go one by one to every school and feed on all of the people there.”

“And then what? What will you do when you drain that much? Go into a food coma?” the first scout, the one who hadn’t been stuck momentarily with her, asked.

“I’ll never be full.” Two growled, “I’m going to use all the magic I got and go after your precious emperor. And I’ll be so big even he won’t be able to stop me. Only then will my hunger be satiated! I can only be full when Belos lays in front of me as a limp, pale husk.”

“Well then I guess you’re going to be starving for a while.” The captain shrugged before turning around and looking at the scouts, “You are not to give her anything until I say so. We have plenty of other basilisks. We’ll be taking notes from them until further notice.”

The scouts nodded and they and the captain walked away. All Two could do was scream. Not out of pain, but out of anger.

She needed magic.

She needed to feed.

She was so hungry.

So hungry.

#whumptober2023 #no.4 #cattle prod #the owl house #fic #graphic depictions of violence tw #torture tw #pre canon #revenge #insanity #electrocution

2 notes · View notes

pinkiepiebones · 2 years

Note

Culpa, Spirit, Mummy, and Secular for the Ghost asks 👻

Culpa - When did you first discover Ghost?

January 2017. I mean, I had a vague awareness of them earlier (I remember regonising their logo in the movie LIGHTS OUT) but January 2017 was when they got their hooks in me. I was driving home from housesitting for grandma- she was staying at the hospital with grandpa, who was dying- and I was just feeling sad and bad and all that comes with inevitable death, and the local rock station played this song where the singer said he could feel the thunder breaking in my heart and see through the scars inside me... It was just super comforting in that moment. I had to pull over and scribble down the chorus on a notepad so I could look it/ the band up later. The rest is history.

Spirit - What’s your favorite Ghost song?

Well my name's ZOMBIE so... "He Is." No, actually! "ZOMBIE QUEEN." And fwiw I was called Zombie ages before I'd ever heard "ZOMBIE QUEEN." I also have the same birthday as George A Romero, father of the modren zombie film. It's all fate, it's all connected, Tobias will cast me as the Zombie Queen in the Ghost movie.

I also really really like "Kaisarion." It's an anime OP.

Mummy - Have you ever attempted to cosplay someone from Ghost (or are planning to)?

In Halloween 2018 I painted my face in the style of Papa 3. I had been planning on painting for work but made the mistake of asking instead of just rolling in (I never worked with patients, no one would have minded!). But I still painted after work. I remember the year because I had bought a sickass cane from the Halloween store to use in real life because my endometriosis/adenomyosis pain was getting so fucking bad I needed a mobility aid but felt guilty buying a "real" cane LOL... Anyway. Never tried any other cosplay. :(

Secular - What’s your favorite Ghost MV?

I'm actually not a fan of MVs! Horrible, I know, I'm sorry. I just get such vivid images in my head when I hear their songs, and the videos never line up with what I "see," it's like, well yeah they can't live up to my imagination, so why bother being disappointed? 🙃

#ghost bc #the band ghost #ghost the band #my answers are bad and I should feel bad

2 notes · View notes

missusplum · 2 years

Note

What are your thoughts and analysis on the latest episode and the potential direction of this informant storyline direction with Garette ? Are you still unhappy with the show?

hello anon! sorry for the late reply. as always, i have a lot to say so i’m gonna answer more in depth under the cut lol.

to preface, while i totally get how this might be interpreted given my ranting lmao, i wouldn’t necessarily say i’m unhappy with the show. i have some gripes with the writing choices but ultimately i’m still in it and i want to see what happens!

to me S1 felt a lot tighter because it was easy to focus on the sole arc of the season (keeping luca alive). every character’s arc more or less revolved around this singular goal. S2 has felt more uneven to me but maybe that’s just an inevitable outcome of expanding the TCL world. ep 4 was promising because we saw arman being introduced into more aspects of thony’s life and we got a taste of the storylines intersecting. but ep 5 we went back to the siloed storylines which i didn’t love as much. there’s just a lot going on and it’s been hard to keep focus or care about all the storylines. i’ve kind of said this before, and i know it’s selfish, but the show is spending a lot of scenes on characters i do not really care about at the expense of the ones that i do lol

my thoughts on the latest episode are mixed. i actually appreciated seeing thony and arman butting heads because, given their backgrounds, where either character draws the line in the morality sand will naturally be miles apart. while it was sweet to see thony support arman by the end of the episode, i really feel like it was ultimately a missed opportunity of a scene. imo it was a chance to pick into arman’s psyche this season by having him actually confide in thony about everything he’s been going through. his loss of self worth, his humiliation, how killing hayak affected him, maybe even the guilt he feels for going behind her back because that’s how desperate he’s become — having him and thony actually talk that out and come to a better understanding of each other would have been sooo meaty and necessary. they literally teed it up perfectly but all we ended up getting was like five lines of dialogue (and the rest i guess the audience just has to interpret on our own?? idk). it felt kind of rushed to me to see thony just giving in like she did. now, the little motorcycle scene was cute and i loved to see it, but personally i would have much rather they spent that time on thony and arman talking through his situation and resolving their difference of opinions (or at least try to??). these two will inevitably clash when it comes to their moral codes, that should be expected imo, but seeing how exactly they work towards meeting each other in the middle is what i’m most interested in seeing. how he continues to change her and how she continues to change him. because despite everything they want to keep each other in their lives

i’ve seen some discussion around how both thony and arman have too much going on to sit down and have an actual conversation. but TCL strikes me as the type of show where the characters won’t ever be given a break or a breather, lol. and we often see fiona and thony talking things out so it’s not like the show doesn’t write for it. for some reason, seemingly important conversations between them are often just skipped over. like wouldn’t it have been great to actually see thony telling arman the truth about marco’s death?? what his reaction would have been learning that she’s had to carry this burden? but it was just glossed over for reasons that i can’t comprehend lmao

in a recent interview with daily beast obsessed, it was said that the writers were trying to find a balance of keeping armony apart while still giving fans what they want. which like… idk lol at least for me, i don’t think they’ve been super successful so far. i don’t care that they aren’t together or in love, but what doesn’t work for me is when it feels contrived, and when it’s obvious that a show is keeping a pairing apart just for the sake of keeping them apart. when it’s organic and makes sense, the story feels natural and usually the angst is great. i’ve already gone into this but the crescendo in their relationship built from S1 straight up hit a wall this season, for no real reason other than just that — not wanting to get them together so soon?? narratively, i get wanting tease out the anticipation and the yearning. but you still need to make it make sense!

re: the informant story, i’m not sure how i feel about it yet tbh. i’ve made it clear how much of an incompetent nuisance i find miller to be so i’m not completely enthused that my favs will be forced to work for him ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ i do like that these different stories are finally colliding but it’s felt like a bit of a drag getting here i’m ngl. like, we all could see kamdar being the brit a mile away right? did we really did 5 episodes to set that up lol. this is what i mean by uneven pacing. little to no time spent on deepening character studies but multiple scenes and episodes setting up the obvious

one last thing i will say is that sometimes it feels like the show is more interested in creating juicy moments than giving us necessary character beats. for example, nadia catching armony riding off was very dramatic i guess? but like why was she even in the alley. what were they even arguing about earlier. she just popped up in the alley to look sad. narrative choices like these have left me wanting more

on the whole i still feel like the season has been unsatisfying and a little muddled so far. we’re almost halfway into the season and it’s still pretty unclear to me where the season is headed towards or what the payoff is anymore. the S1 finale was so satisfying because we got to see our faves triumph and get the one-up on the people after them. what does that even look like for this season? i’m in the middle of genuinely curious and also pretty confused. i’m still tuning in because i love the actors, love the leads, and am still more than invested in potential of the characters and the premise. and i rly wanna see armony bond, make out, just like be near each other etc. i want to see where it all goes and what happens to these characters. to be perfectly clear, i’m more than happy to watch a confusing, unevenly paced TCL than not watch TCL at all! at the end of the day, i just think some of the writing choices could be better, and this is only because the potential is so high. like i would love to look back after S2 has finished and say i was dead wrong and have everything fit and make sense in hindsight. but yeah that’s where i’m at atm!

#the cleaning lady #asks #tcl rants #took a while to make my thoughts seem coherent i’m sorry for the essay lmao

6 notes · View notes