Prompt: “Haven't I given enough?”
Song: Two Birds - Regina Spektor
For Tolya x Reader please!!
In Times Of War - Tolya Yul Bataar
Content Warning: Canon Compliant Violence, Suffering And Threat. War. Loss. Not Beta/Proof Read.
You knew the fight was never going to be easy. Going up against The Darkling and his loyal Grisha was never going to be easy. But amplified and relentless Grisha, it is hard to not feel like this is a losing battle.
You can feel the blood rushing in your ears, your bones ache from the fighting, but you just keep moving. You can see Tamar to your left, she has her hands pressed together, in a tight formation, as she pulls her hands closer to her chest, the durast she is up against doubles over, hand clawing at his heart as if any action could dislodge the pain, the man crumples to the floor and does not get up.
You notice the man about to lunge for you quickly enough that you can smash your elbow into the side of his skull, hitting the soft spot on the high temple, you don't hit as hard as you had planned and the man just stumbles back. You don't have much time to plan your next more before he is hauling himself at you again. He freezes, for a moment before he gets to you, you land your right palm fiercely down on his face, shattering the bone in his nose, the man falls to the floor, his breathing laboured.
You have enough time now to look to your right, and you see Tolya, moving in a similar motion to Tamar minutes before, as the man's breathing gets worse and worse you realise the stumble before had been Tolya's doing. Between his own hand to hand combat he was watching your fighting closely, and throwing you assistance where he can.
"Thank you," you mouth in the chaos, and he nods at you, understanding.
The battlefield would never be your first choice of place to be, violence although sometimes necessary did not come so naturally to you as it did to others. But you could handle yourself well enough, it had seen you this far, but knowing Tolya was close, and he had your back, it gave you a sense of safety and assurance you rarely felt.
When Tolya said he would do anything in his power to keep you safe, keep you from harm, you believed him.
Tamar moves both her axes in unison and you turn away from the bloodbath that ensues.
Tolya slides his sword across the ground, and you're surprised, it is rare to see the sword in its sheath, and it's rarer to see Tolya favouring anything but the blade in a fight. He moves quickly, using his leg to swipe out someone else's, knocking them to the floor, and he has moved over them, grabbed his sword with one hand and made his advances onto the next before the man hits the ground.
A bullet tears through a nearby barricade and it sends wood splintering everywhere. Tamar, ever the warrior, takes a few steps back, and lands an axe in the back of someone attempting to land a shot on her, they don't manage it. Their body drops and Tamar who knows better than to her back on a wounded adversary, swings her other axe back around to finish the job.
You turn to run, but something knocks you off your feet, and the air is yanked from your chest as you hit the ground hard. You aren't sure if it's the impact or a Squaller ripping the air out of you.
Tolya's reaction is subconscious, automatic. He runs at the Grisha towering above you, cutting them down with a single swing and a quick response the backup who came after him in turn.
Somewhere in the distance between your head thundering from the pain, and the ache of your bruised skin, the cut in your leg that you didn't even feel before you hit the ground, you can hear another familiar voice. You think it might be Nina, it sounds like it could be Nina.
You try to get up quickly, and you feel like your whole body is on fire but you have to keep moving.
It is Nina, she has knocked five men down, which is impressive, but their are eight and she is feeling backed up, you don't have to be a Heartrender to sense everyone's fear.
Mortal danger brings clarity.
You make it to your feet, and your eyes search Tolya out, desperate to find him in the crowd, desperate to be sure he is okay.
Mortal danger brings clarity.
But you cannot see him, in all the fighting you don't know where he has gone. You can hear Tamar calling out your name. You move, lumbering at first but soon the adrenalin takes over, and you're running. Tamar grabs your arm, and you feel your pain lessening.
You shake your head. "Save it," you advise. "What is it Nina is always saying? It's so much easier to tear people apart when put them back together, isn't that why Heartrenders and Healers are defined as such."
Tamar laughs and it would feel out of place is Tamar's laugh didn't so soften feel like a battle cry. "We don't use such narrow terms," she reminds you.
"I don't like this," you say. Tamar laughs.
"It's war, I would be worried if you did," Tamar looks around, and you know in your heart who she is searching for.
"Have you seen Tolya?" you ask. Tamar shakes her head.
There's a heat, a searing heat to the right, as something is set on fire, and Tamar heads fowards.
You take a moment to catch your breath, eager to find Tolya, eager to be done with the fighting. You were relying on others now, you just had to keep moving.
Everything was coming back into focus, you hadn't even realised how blurred your vision had become from the winding, but now your breathing was becoming rooted in something steadier once again. You felt as if you were returning into yourself.
You move through the fighting, like a ghost, as people seem to fall either side of you. It feels nothing short of a waking nightmare. Your eyes are searching for Tolya, it's all you seem to be able to do.
Your mind is screaming, racing with all the worst thoughts. All the ways things could have gone wrong, all the reasons you might never see him again.
No. You try to shake the thoughts away, like if you knock them hard enough they'll shatter out of the realms of possibility, like if you push them far enough away they couldn't come true.
'Haven't I given enough?' You feel like screaming. So much pain and loss and anger boiling up inside of you. You cannot add Tolya to the losses. You can't.
You wouldn't survive it.
You couldn't survive it.
You feel someone grab you and pull you back against a wall, you turn and the scrawny stranger with long coat and his hand deep in a brown satchel that clinks and rattles as he rustles through it. He pulls out a small fabric wrap and throws it a distance, and flicks up the length of his coat to shield you both from the blast. A piercing white light can be seen from behind the fabric, and then it's gone. Wylan you presume. He is skittish as he talks. "We need to go," he says.
You follow him, and a familiar face joins the side of you. "Didn't think we would see you again gorgeous," Jesper says, his smirk bright, as he flips one of his guns into the air, catches it with the opposite hand and takes a shot, which lands perfectly, as they always seem to. There wasn't a doubt in your mind Jesper could shoot the scent off a skunk at almost any distance. And he knew it.
"Have you seen Tolya?" you manage to ask. Wylan shakes his head.
"Things are getting worse from here up," Jesper explains, "you might want to pick a Saint and start praying."
Only one prayer comes to mind. But it was the only one that matters. Please, let Tolya be okay.
On the other side of a few barricades Tolya is dealing with a Tidemaker, he can feel the pain in his shoulders and ribs, but the pain is a sensation and he tries his best to block it out, set it aside. He keeps reminding himself over and over, as he absorbs the pain, swallowing it.
Water hits Tolya with a force, he has been expecting it, anticipated it, and in the moments after landing he let his body relax. He did not let the Tidemaker land another.
He sees people he recognises around him, but no one he is looking for. He just keeps moving. He finds himself shoulder to shoulder with Nikolai and the relief is overwhelming as he spots Tamar to the other side.
"Good to see you," Nikolai smiles.
"You had us worried for a minute," Tamar says. Tolya looks at Tamar and Tamar can see the question on his face, she shakes her head. "I lost them back at the fire." Tamar hears it as she says it, her poor choice of words. "I'm sure it's fine."
"We need to keep moving," Nikolai says, "things are about to get a lot worse before they get better. But hey, either we win or I get that hero's death I always wanted, silver linings."
"Always the optimist," Tamar says.
The explosion is noticed first by all, Nikolai looks up, trying to figure out where it was coming from. But you don't hear a single thing said as soon as you spot Tolya with them. You could scream the thanks to every Saint you know but you just find yourself staring. He sees you and he breaks out into a smile.
"You scared me," you tell him as you make your way over to him as quickly as you can.
"You think I wouldn't make my way back to you?" he asks, pulling you in for a tight hug. "I'll always make my way back to you. Always."
63 notes
·
View notes
WIPS & 2024 Plans!
Hey ya’ll. So as hinted at I have a lot of ideas and works in progress so wanted to kind of do a little summary and tease some of the stuff I’m currently throwing around and kind of give and make a plan of action for the coming year regarding my content here.
I finally finished the office kinktober prompt after nearly two months of it being half written as said in the authors note, I am giving up on the idea of kinktober/kink til Christmas altogether. But there are still a few ideas that came from that list I do really want to write which will be included in the future ideas portion of this post but yeah… let’s just start with the current WIPs and what’s gonna come first.
Current WIPS (with summaries)
In order of completion with rough estimate of posting!
Spiders and Lace
1920s Mob Spider-Man Au where Peter starts dating a young socialite in order to get to her criminal brother.
(First Part releasing this December)
The Secrets We Keep
A Jeb Pyre (Under The Banner of Heaven) multi chapter story. Jeb is starting a new job in a new town after the Lafferty case where he meets an old school friend. Both of them are running from their hometown and hiding secrets, but will those secrets crush this new budding romance?
(Series starting in January, date to be announced)
WIPS Currently On The Shelf
These have all either been teased and parts not posted or one or two parts posted then currently abandoned. I have stuff written for these and aim to go back to them at some point I just don’t know if or when.
I Will Always Find You
A multiple part Pedro and Oscar character’s fic featuring different linked AUs looking at the idea of past lives and reincarnating with the same souls.
(I keep picking this up and putting it back down but I love the idea and it means so much to me and I want to do it right, so until I can do it justice, it’s on the shelf.)
Metanoia
When Mando takes on a job to retrieve a kidnapped young senator, the two of them end up on a journey that has Mando questioning his whole way of life.
(I have posted the first chapter of this but may take it down as I don’t know when I’ll go back to this idea and I think I want to adjust it anyway. This is basically just a story to really go into what I wanted from Mando’s journey meeting other mandalorians and how it makes him question his creed seeing how other mandalorians live and getting to really explore that inner turmoil.)
Future/2024 Ideas
Some of these may get written some time next year, some of them may come later, some may never get written at all, but I wanted to share my thoughts anyway.
No Body No Crime
Based on the Taylor Swift song, this is a murder mystery that would feature multiple crossover characters from Dave York (the murdered husband), Joel Miller (the accomplice lover), Jeb Pyre (the detective) and possibly a few other characters from across the Pedro, Andrew and Oscar character lists. I love this song and I do have a whole list of ideas just based on Taylor Swift songs which may become their own mini series with a song for each album, but I really want to write a multi chapter fic based on this song.
Untitled Joel Miller Fic
I already made a post with this idea. Inspired by the Mummy, as I feel Rick O’Connell and Joel Miller give me similar energy. However instead of fighting Mummies we’d be fighting Infected to hunt down different artefacts a particular bookish main character wants to protect and preserve. Think road trips, myths, history and unlikely allies with ridiculous sexual tension.
Triple Frontier Boys One Shot
I’ve been fantasising about a very naughty TF boys one shot which is pretty much straight smut and one rocking night for reader. I did start writing some bits for this a few nights back, but didn’t like it the next day but plan to return to it at some point.
Tis The Damn Season
Another of those previously mentioned prompts inspired by Taylor songs, Tis The Damn Season is a Frankie Morales one shot that may come sooner than we think as it’s an idea set at Christmas. Frankie goes back to visit his parents one time a year and always ends up back at your place on Christmas Eve like your very own Santa Claus.
—————————————————
So those are my current WIPS, ideas and plans. Let me know which you’re most interested in.
2 notes
·
View notes
Rowling isn't denying holocaust. She just pointed out that burning of transgender health books is a lie as that form of cosmetic surgery didn't exist. But of course you knew that already, didn't you?
I was thinking I'd probably see one of you! You're wrong :) Let's review the history a bit, shall we?
In this case, what we're talking about is the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, or in English, The Institute of Sexology. This Institute was founded and headed by a gay Jewish sexologist named Magnus Hirschfeld. It was founded in July of 1919 as the first sexology research clinic in the world, and was run as a private, non-profit clinic. Hirschfeld and the researchers who worked there would give out consultations, medical advice, and even treatments for free to their poorer clientele, as well as give thousands of lectures and build a unique library full of books on gender, sexuality, and eroticism. Of course, being a gay man, Hirschfeld focused a lot on the gay community and proving that homosexuality was natural and could not be "cured".
Hirschfeld was unique in his time because he believed that nobody's gender was either one or the other. Rather, he contended that everyone is a mixture of both male and female, with every individual having their own unique mix of traits.
This leads into the Institute's work with transgender patients. Hirschfeld was actually the one to coin the term "transsexual" in 1923, though this word didn't become popular phrasing until 30 years later when Harry Benjamin began expanding his research (I'll just be shortening it to trans for this brief overview.) For the Institute, their revolutionary work with gay men eventually began to attract other members of the LGBTA+, including of course trans people.
Contrary to what Anon says, sex reassignment surgery was first tested in 1912. It'd already being used on humans throughout Europe during the 1920's by the time a doctor at the Institute named Ludwig Levy-Lenz began performing it on patients in 1931. Hirschfeld was at first opposed, but he came around quickly because it lowered the rate of suicide among their trans patients. Not only was reassignment performed at the Institute, but both facial feminization and facial masculization surgery were also done.
The Institute employed some of these patients, gave them therapy to help with other issues, even gave some of the mentioned surgeries for free to this who could not afford it! They spoke out on their behalf to the public, even getting Berlin police to help them create "transvestite passes" to allow people to dress however they wanted without the threat of being arrested. They worked together to fight the law, including trying to strike down Paragraph 175, which made it illegal to be homosexual. The picture below is from their holiday party, Magnus Hirschfeld being the gentleman on the right with the fabulous mustache. Many of the other people in this photo are transgender.
[Image ID: A black and white photo of a group of people. Some are smiling at the camera, others have serious expressions. Either way, they all seem to be happy. On the right side, an older gentleman in glasses- Magnus Hirschfeld- is sitting. He has short hair and a bushy mustache. He is resting one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him. His other hand is being held by a person to his left. Another person to his right is holding his shoulder.]
There was always push back against the Institute, especially from conservatives who saw all of this as a bad thing. But conservatism can't stop progress without destroying it. They weren't willing to go that far for a good while. It all ended in March of 1933, when a new Chancellor was elected. The Nazis did not like homosexuals for several reasons. Chief among them, we break the boundaries of "normal" society. Shortly after the election, on May 6th, the book burnings began. The Jewish, gay, and obviously liberal Magnus Hirschfeld and his library of boundary-breaking literature was one of the very first targets. Thankfully, Hirschfeld was spared by virtue of being in Paris at the time (he would die in 1935, before the Nazis were able to invade France). His library wasn't so lucky.
This famous picture of the book burnings was taken after the Institute of Sexology had been raided. That's their books. Literature on so much about sexuality, eroticism, and gender, yes including their new work on trans people. This is the trans community's Alexandria. We're incredibly lucky that enough of it survived for Harry Benjamin and everyone who came after him was able to build on the Institute's work.
[Image ID: A black and white photo of the May Nazi book burning of the Institute of Sexology's library. A soldier, back facing the camera, is throwing a stack of books into the fire. In the background of the right side, a crowd is watching.]
As the Holocaust went on, the homosexuals of Germany became a targeted group. This did include transgender people, no matter what you say. To deny this reality is Holocaust denial. JK Rowling and everyone else who tries to pretend like this isn't reality is participating in that evil. You're agreeing with the Nazis.
But of course, you knew that already, didn't you?
Edit: Added image IDs. I apologize to those using screen readers for forgetting them. Please reblog this version instead.
16K notes
·
View notes
at some point it's just like. do they even fucking like the thing they're asking AI to make? "oh we'll just use AI for all the scripts" "we'll just use AI for art" "no worries AI can write this book" "oh, AI could easily design this"
like... it's so clear they've never stood in the middle of an art museum and felt like crying, looking at a piece that somehow cuts into your marrow even though the artist and you are separated by space and time. they've never looked at a poem - once, twice, three times - just because the words feel like a fired gun, something too-close, clanging behind your eyes. they've never gotten to the end of the movie and had to arrive, blinking, back into their body, laughing a little because they were holding their breath without realizing.
"oh AI can mimic style" "AI can mimic emotion" "AI can mimic you and your job is almost gone, kid."
... how do i explain to you - you can make AI that does a perfect job of imitating me. you could disseminate it through the entire world and make so much money, using my works and my ideas and my everything.
and i'd still keep writing.
i don't know there's a word for it. in high school, we become aware that the way we feel about our artform is a cliche - it's like breathing. over and over, artists all feel the same thing. "i write because i need to" and "my music is how i speak" and "i make art because it's either that or i stop existing." it is such a common experience, the violence and immediacy we mean behind it is like breathing to me - comes out like a useless understatement. it's a cliche because we all feel it, not because the experience isn't actually persistent. so many of us have this ... fluttering urgency behind our ribs.
i'm not doing it for the money. for a star on the ground in some city i've never visited. i am doing it because when i was seven i started taking notebooks with me on walks. i am doing it because in second grade i wrote a poem and stood up in front of my whole class to read it out while i shook with nerves. i am doing it because i spent high school scribbling all my feelings down. i am doing it for the 16 year old me and the 18 year old me and the today-me, how we can never put the pen down. you can take me down to a subatomic layer, eviscerate me - and never find the source of it; it is of me. when i was 19 i named this blog inkskinned because i was dramatic and lonely and it felt like the only thing that was actually permanently-true about me was that this is what is inside of me, that the words come up over everything, coat everything, bloom their little twilight arias into every nook and corner and alley
"we're gonna replace you". that is okay. you think that i am writing to fill a space. that someone said JOB OPENING: Writer Needed, and i wrote to answer. you think one raindrop replaces another, and i think they're both just falling. you think art has a place, that is simply arrives on walls when it is needed, that is only ever on demand, perfect, easily requested. you see "audience spending" and "marketability" and "multi-line merch opportunity"
and i see a kid drowning. i am writing to make her a boat. i am writing because what used to be a river raft has long become a fully-rigged ship. i am writing because you can fucking rip this out of my cold dead clammy hands and i will still come back as a ghost and i will still be penning poems about it.
it isn't even love. the word we use the most i think is "passion". devotion, obsession, necessity. my favorite little fact about the magic of artists - "abracadabra" means i create as i speak. we make because it sluices out of us. because we look down and our hands are somehow already busy. because it was the first thing we knew and it is our backbone and heartbreak and everything. because we have given up well-paying jobs and a "real life" and the approval of our parents. we create because - the cliche again. it's like breathing. we create because we must.
you create because you're greedy.
18K notes
·
View notes