#ITS SOUNDS SO MUCH MORE. ATMOSPHERIC THAN HEAT HAZE SHADOW

[scalproie]

I need the song in the trailer to come out right fucking now

[inkykeiji]

beautiful when the damage is done

part one | part two

characters: todoroki touya | dabi, todoroki natsuo

genre: smut laced with angst and a pinch of fluff

notes: part two of getting naughty with natsuo!! please please heed the warnings!! | title cred: sick thoughts by lewis blissett

warnings: 18+ minors dni, dubcon/noncon, sadism, punishment via overstimulation, pseudo-incest (stepcest), vaguely implied incest, emotional manipulation, a hint of degradation, toxic relationships, poly relationship, dom/sub dynamics, a LOT of crying (dacryphilia), slight size kink/size difference, rough sex

words: 4.6k

synopsis:

And you’re both reminded of how privileged you are, being the only two who ever get to witness this side of him, the only two who are fortunate enough to see the person he might’ve been if you stripped away years upon years of trauma and abuse, the person he truly is at the core of his soul, the person he was born as before he was forced to layer himself with thick, protective walls of aggression coated in indifference—and the person who he becomes as he sheds that armor, in the middle of the night when it’s just the three of you, the whole world having fallen away outside the bedroom door.

It’s musty, air thick with the haze of sweat and sex, saturated the smell of tears and cum, so potent you swear you can almost see it in the atmosphere of Touya’s room. Uncontrollable quivers course through your entire body, never-ending chills erupting across bare, damp skin that shines every time it catches in the dim beams coming from Touya’s desk lamp.

Your scalp is still sore from where Touya yanked you off of Natsuo—back in the living room, how many hours ago? It feels as though it’s been forever since then, memory murky and swimming as you try to think—one strong hand wrapped in your hair jerking you up with such force you nearly stumbled. The pain is dull, a throbbing ache that radiates fading waves of hurt along your skull.

It’s constant, though, brewing a headache that is equal parts agony and dehydration, and you wish to rub at the spot, to place your palm over it in a futile attempt to soothe the discomfort at least a little, but you can’t.

Because it feels as if your blood has been replaced with sand, dense and heavy as it clogs your veins, weighing your arms down and keeping them firmly locked around Natsuo’s neck, steadying you in his lap.

But the ache in your scalp is nothing compared to the burn between your legs.

You can feel it, your third orgasm, churning in the depths of your stomach as it builds, a blistering warmth furling into a tight, concentrated ball of fire. It’s almost sickening, now, the heat roiling inside of you as heavy as lead, wracking destruction on your body as tender muscles, already quaking from exhaustion, begin to tense once more, to coil and wind up the way a lithe tiger does right before it strikes.

“Nat-Natsuo, I can’t,” the words wobble as they spill from between clattering teeth, you head shaking sluggishly as fresh tears sting your eyes.

“Yes, you can,” he murmurs softly to you, gentler than he’s ever been before but refusing to slow his movements as he bounces you on his cock, concerned stone eyes searching your face while his fingers flex on your hips, readjusting their grip on the slippery skin.

“You better,” Touya spits from his place on his bed, peering down at the two of you with something akin to disgust, to derision, saturating his features. And it stings, blazing sapphire searing his glare into your skin much like how he had carved his name into you, years ago.

A wet sob hitches in time with Natsuo’s rough thrusts, has you choking on it, concentrated with thick saliva that sticks in your throat and forces your breaths to escape in wheezes, hands clasping tighter behind Natsuo’s neck.

Yet, despite the pain, there are still sparks of pleasure that accompany each catch of your puffy clit on Natsuo’s slick skin, flickers of lust interspersed with those excruciating spikes that shoot through your abdomen.

It hits suddenly, that third orgasm—you’re halfway through your punishment now, Touya reminds you—has your tightly shut eyelids springing open with a gasp, entire body freezing up in Natsuo’s strong grasp, a grunt falling from his chapped lips as he drives his hips to piston into your rigid body.

He follows only a few moments later with a deep groan that rumbles in his chest, body vibrating with the force of it as his thick cock throbs, filling your little cunt with spurt after spurt of cum that feels almost cool in comparison to your scalding insides.

Touya allows half hour breaks between each orgasm—a short refraction period for you and Natsuo to regain infinitesimal amounts of strength—and not a second more, he had spit after the second orgasm, cutting off your plea for just a few more moments of rest, because this is plenty of time, more than you need, really and you should be grateful he’s so generous.

By the time you’re due for your fourth orgasm, you can barely move, and Natsuo doesn’t have the arm strength to hold you up anymore, to force your hips to keep gyrating or to bounce you on his cock, his entire upper half spent.

“Lay her on the floor, then,” Touya instructs coldly, voice firm and void of any compassion, though it’s hard to miss the sadistic glint in his eyes, hard to ignore the way the corners of his lips quirk up in an ill-concealed smile.

The look Natsuo gives him is almost heartbreaking, a puppy looking up at its owner with its tail tucked between its legs, eyebrows knitted together so tightly they crease his forehead, a deep frown—no, pout—etched into his face as he gazes at his big brother, glazed stone eyes pleading.

“Nii-san, can’t we use—”

“No,” Touya cuts him off harshly, sapphire eyes flashing, and Natsuo flinches. “You’re fucking her on the Goddamn floor for all five—it’s part of your punishment,”

Natuso doesn’t argue, but his lips twitch, and his eyes blur, and his nose sniffles, and he gives his brother a curt little nod of understanding, head bowed in submission.

The hardwood is cold against your heated skin, and you exhale a hiss through gritted teeth as Natsuo positions you as gently as he can, one large palm cradling your head, the other positioned on your back, slight tremors running through his exhausted muscles as he reclines you.

A wrecked little whine pries its way past your lips as Natsuo pushes in again, face scrunching up as sharp, needle-like pinpricks shoot through your gut, your raw, sensitive cunt stinging as Natsuo’s cock reopens previous sutures, skin split further, wounds dug deeper.

The sound your skin makes as it scrapes against the hardwood from Natsuo’s clumsy bucks has all three of you cringing, a piercing squeal that only adds to the symphony of your sobs and Natsuo’s grunts, flesh inflamed and chaffed from being repeated rubbed against the surface.

It’s getting harder and harder for you to cum, even with the generous breaks Touya allows, sparks of pleasure faded to mere cinders now, each shallow drag of Natsuo’s cock causing both of your bodies to recoil, and it’s too much, too much.

“Please, nii-chan,” you beg in a tiny whimper, teary eyes flying to Touya’s face, partially shrouded in shadows as glowing sapphire gazes down at you in scrutiny. “S’enough now,”

“We’ve learned our lesson, p-promise,” Natsuo adds, nodding frenetically.

“P-Pinky promise, nii-chan, please, stop,”

Touya scoffs. “You wanted to cum, didn’t you?” he pauses, cobalt eyes darting between your faces, an eyebrow raising in question. “Well, now I’m allowing you to. Now you have my permission; the permission you knew you needed so bad, but refused to request,”

And it’s then that it dawns on each of you that he had heard the both of you, had heard the entire fucking conversation, while he was doing his work in the kitchen.

How could either of you thought that he wouldn’t? How could either of you been so fucking stupid? Nii-san knows everything—nii-san always knows everything.

“Please, please, we’re sorry, nii-san, we’re sorry,”

“We won’t ever do it again!”

The laugh that claws its way up Touya’s throat is soaked with ridicule, and he shakes his head, a gleeful little grin present on his lips, as if he can’t believe what he’s hearing, as if it’s so ludicrous it’s funny.

“Wait, wait, wait—let me get this straight…you two wanted it so bad, and now you have the balls to complain when nii-chan complies?”

His voice is painfully apathetic, almost nonchalant in a way, as if it makes no difference to him even though it so clearly does, or you and Natsuo wouldn’t be shivering messes of tangled limbs on the floor.

Excuses begin tumbling from two pairs of lips, words stuttered and choked on and sandwiched between pleads and apologies, jumbling together in a mess of garbled, wet, desperate sounds.

“Enough,” Touya growls, and both voices cut off in an instant. “I don’t want to fucking hear it anymore! Keep acting like ungrateful little brats and I’ll make this punishment longer, I swear to God,”

But you can’t halt the words bubbling up past your lips, regardless of Touya’s threat, regardless of the fact that you know he’s deadly serious. They’re compulsive, automatic, almost instinctual in nature as you seek out comfort, hunt for solace and fragments of relief in the hulking man blanketing you.

“I-I don’t wanna anymore, Natsuo,” you’re weeping into his chest, hot tears leaking from the corners of tightly shut eyes, streaming down the sides of your head and into your hair. “I don’t wanna,”

“I know, baby, I know,” Natsuo murmurs, though his bottom lip is beginning to tremble.

“Make him stop, Natsuo, make nii-chan stop,”

“I can’t,” his voice breaks on the word, facial features saturated in concern, in fear, wincing as if it physically pains him to deny you. “You know I would if I could,” he nearly whimpers, and his eyes search yours almost frantically, as if he’s begging you to understand. “But I can’t,”

But your head is shaking as you wail louder, fingers weakly curling against his skin, nails pressing into the flesh of his shoulders and clinging to him.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Natsuo’s saying, the words cracking in his throat, voice hoarse. He pauses, clearing it twice, eyes closing briefly as he sighs out a slow, deep, stammering breath, gathering his strength. “One more after this, princess,” he begins as his hips start to speed up their rutting, procuring a yelp from you. “That’s it, jus’ one more after this one. C’mon, we can do it,”

“No, no, no,” you chant as pretty, gleaming tears roll down your face. And you can see it, the potent guilt swirling in his gunmetal eyes, from the way his pupils expand as they focus on the salt water sullying your cheeks, from the way his cock twitches despite it all. “I don’wanna, I don’wanna, stop, Natsuo, stop,”

His motions pause immediately, the moment the word falls from your lips, but he starts up just as quickly as Touya dictates from his spot on the mattress above.

“Stop, and I’ll add another two,” he promises, ruthless and unforgiving. Chills skitter along your glistening skin, erupting across your damp body at his tone. Both of you know he isn’t bluffing, that he’ll add as many orgasms as he wants to, and that he’ll continue to pull them from your fatigued and worn-out bodies one way or another, even if he has to do it completely by himself.

“Focus on me,” Natsuo instructs gently, though there’s a sense of urgency in his voice, a frenzied need to calm you down before Touya loses his patience completely. “I’ll take care of it, okay? Just focus on me, look at me,”

So you do, blinking the bleariness from your gaze as you direct all of your attention to him. And although there’s that ever-present guilt still swimming in his irises, in his unshed tears, there’s also love in his stare, so much love it’s nearly overflowing, overpowering the remorse and instilling a deep sense of comfort in your stammering chest.

Because at least you’re not alone in this; at least you have each other—each other to find comfort in, to cry and whine and beg with, to protect.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he’s whispering over your wails like a broken mantra, those tears that have been glazing his eyes, that have been collecting behind his lashline, finally beginning to fall.

His hips speed up, as fast as he possibly can as he gathers every last ounce of power and manages to wring another one out of you, another one out of himself, sore cunt clenching painfully around him, your fourth orgasm feeling as if it’s been punched out of you, despite the fact that Natsuo’s thrusts have been shallow.

And by the time your fifth orgasm rolls around, you’re nothing more than Jell-o in the shape of a human, though Natsuo’s not much better, barely able to move other than the uneven rutting of his hips, a crushing deadweight on top of you as his weary hips give pitiful little thrusts, pubic bone dragging across your hypersensitive clit, every tug against it ripping another ragged cry from your throat.

But you’re having trouble, both of you struggling to do anything other than feebly hump against each other, unable to secure enough strength to pump—to milk—that final orgasm out of yourselves, sniveling little protests punctuated by wrecked sobs leaking from your mouths.

Touya’s pissed—beyond pissed—sharp jaw clenching while seething insults burn his tongue and slice your skin, berating the both of you for being so fucking weak, so fucking pathetic, because he’s forced more orgasms out of the both of you before, so why is this so fucking difficult?

Touya’s too stubborn, and he refuses to end the punishment early irrespective of the fact that you’re both entirely drained, reminding you in a callous voice that you each must cum five times before it’s over while he aggressively roots through one of his desk drawers, snickering to himself when he finds what he’s looking for, hooking his index finger in it and pulling it out.

And the look on his face when he turns back to face you and Natsuo is positively petrifying, idly swinging the cockring around on his finger as his head tilts slightly, observing the both of you with that sharp smile you’ve come to know so well on his lips, eyes glittering with pure delight, features lit up with his own personal brand of sadistic excitement.

Natsuo starts to say something, voice forming around a word that sounds suspiciously similar to no, but he catches himself before it fully leaves his mouth, pressing quivering lips together tightly as he stares up at his brother with wet eyes.

Touya chuckles, raising an eyebrow with that trademark lopsided smirk, as if he’s challenging Natsuo to dispute him, to resist.

He doesn’t, of course, because he never would, but he does finally allow full shuddery sobs to escape his chest, Touya’s condescending shh’s and hush, now’s doing nothing to calm them as he slides the cockring on.

Natsuo nearly howls when Touya turns the tiny, pretty pink device on, his entire body jerking with that initial vibration.

“The faster you cum, the faster I’ll take it off,” Touya says calmly over the stifled little shrieks Natsuo’s continulously trying to swallow back down, nodding his understanding as he repositions himself between your thighs, holding his vibrating cock in one massive palm as he guides himself back into you.

And you want to tell him no!, don’t!, stop!, you want to shove him off, to kick and scream and beg and cry, but your heavy head sluggishly lolling from side to side seems to be all you can manage, words snagging in your throat, nothing more than incoherent babbling leaving your lips.

Because you can barely speak, barely think, barely breathe, vision fading in and out of focus as Natsuo rocks stuttering hips against yours, warm salt water rolling down the bridge of his nose, dripping onto your cheeks and mixing with yours. You’re both more each other, more one than two separate entities now, spit and cum and tears so interspersed you can’t tell which belongs to who anymore, limbs and fluids, thoughts and sounds, endlessly flowing into one another.

“Tell her to behave, Natsuo,” Touya barks, though there’s twisted amusement dancing in his eyes as he observes. “Tell her to finish the fucking punishment,”

And Natsuo, ever the perfectly trained pet, does as he says immediately.

“We can—We can do it,” Natsuo keens from above you, full body shudders wracking his hulking form, alabaster hair clinging to his forehead in uneven clumps, drenched in sweat as he forces words through his own bawling, hips grinding into yours. “We can do it, let’s be good for nii-san, yeah? L-Let’s make nii-san proud—c’mon, you wanna make him proud, don’t you?”

You do—of course you do. You never want anything else. But…But you’re not entirely sure you can, hiccupped sobs peppering your slurred words. Unconsciousness tugs at the edges of your hazy mind, whispers enticing promises of repose and relaxation as weighted eyelids begin to sag.

“Okay, okay, okay,” Natsuo cuts you off gently, shaky knuckles brushing against your cheek in a poor imitation of a caress. “I’ll do it, baby, I’ll do it,”

You don’t even remember cumming a fifth time, only a feeling of hot coals smoldering in the pit of your stomach, but you must have, because then Touya’s hooking his arms under Natsuo’s and dragging him off of you, propping him up against the side of the bed and kneeling as lithe fingers remove the toy from his cock.

And the sense of relief that seeps into your body and floods your veins is so intense it almost feels like a rush of adrenaline instead. You did it. You both did it. Finally, it is over.

Or so you and Natsuo thought.

—

Spikes of fear piece through his heart as Natsuo blearily watches Touya gather your limp body in his arms, hauling you up with a soft grunt.

And it’s astounding, the way you still curl into him, still seek that familiarity, that solace, in his chest, mumbled out honorific padded by hitched half-sobs as you cling to him. It’s astounding, because even after all he’s done to you, after everything he just put the two of you through, you will crawl back to him each and every time, over shards of glass on your hands and knees with his name on your lips—his name in devotion, in submission, in love—without a single question asked.

And Natsuo realizes that he would, too.

The thought inspires a bittersweet taste to settle on his tongue, like sticky toffee and black coffee, alien feelings swirling in his chest, clashes of consoling blooms of warmth and spiky shards of ice.

But Natsuo doesn’t have time to meditate on his newfound emotions, your faint pleas recapturing his attention.

“I’m sorry, baby,” Touya murmurs, large hands repositioning you.

And he really does sound sorry, even though Natsuo knows he isn’t.

“Wh-What are you…”

“It isn’t over yet,” Touya says simply, though the smile stretched taut across his face is severe, terrifying, azure eyes sparkling in merciless amusement at the horror that shows on Natsuo’s face when he realizes, eyes widening as they fill with thick tears again, bottom lip jutting out into an involuntary pout as panic surges through his veins.

His heart palpitates violently against his ribcage, tongue turned to cotton as worry signs itself in the creases of his forehead.

“Nii-san,” Natsuo begins cautiously, trying in vain to keep his voice steady. “I don’t think—I-I mean, is that really necessary?”

“Of course it is,” his big brother responds without looking at him, preoccupied with folding your lifeless limbs up, knees bent and pressed to your chest.

“Why?” the word slips out without Natsuo’s permission, grey eyes widening in shock as he swallows thickly, shaking his head a little as if to say I didn’t mean to!, though Touya doesn’t seem to mind.

“Because the overstimulation was her punishment,” Touya glances over at him, the amusement dancing in his eyes turned vicious as his smile stretches wider—so wide Natsuo’s surprised it doesn’t split his face clean in two—cruel and brutal. “This is yours,”

Natsuo isn’t quite sure he understands, brain doused in a thick fog and having difficulty grasping the concept, the knowledge of what his nii-san truly means turning to dense, ashy smoke any time he tries to grasp it, metaphorically slipping through his fingers.

But then you’re speaking again, and Natsuo’s head whips towards you, chest tightening at how completely wrecked you sound.

“No, please, no more,” the words gurgle in your throat, escaping as nothing more but jumbled, spit-soaked whines that have Touya chuckling as he shoves his cock into your aching little hole.

“You’re in no position to be making demands, princess,” he speaks through a patronizing pout, a mockery of your own expression, voice syrupy and supercilious. “If you weren’t such a needy little whore always desperate for a hard cock to grind on, this wouldn’t be happening,”

The words are spit in the same demeaning tone Touya had been using earlier, the same demeaning tone he always uses, and Natsuo’s powerless to stop the words flowing from his mouth.

“It’s not your fault, sweetheart,” he reassures you, though his voice cracks under the emotion, words wavering as his chin trembles.

“You’re right,” Touya muses, slight breathlessness the only indication that he’s railing the absolute life out of you. “It’s yours,”

And suddenly, Natsuo understands what nii-san had meant when he said this was his punishment.  

Because he’s right.

It’s got to be the harshest punishment Touya’s ever bestowed on him.

Because it’s hard to watch the way your lax, abused body is forced to just take it, Touya’s thrusts so rough they jostle you up the mattress; even harder to hear as you bawl and beg and scream, and Natsuo’s nose twitches as the threat of new tears climbs up his throat, lodging in the column as he fights against them.

He feels sick, like some sort of depraved pervert, for the weak twitches his cock gives, for the faint embers that flicker in the pit of his stomach, igniting a dull blaze as he watches, almost entranced by the grotesque situation unfolding in front of him. He feels sicker, knowing that both of those would be stronger, much stronger, had Touya not forced him to fuck his entire soul into you.

And Touya—Well, Touya’s been hard from it all—high from it all—the whole time, and Natsuo can almost see the sheer power flowing through his veins, an aura that envelopes him, that radiates off of him in intoxicating waves, that licks at his skin like flames of blue fire. Natsuo bets—no, knows— it’s better than any drug Touya’s ever taken.

Protests marinate on his tongue, bitter and acidic, pleads of stop and enough scraping against the walls of his throat as he forcefully swallows them back down, emitting pathetic little whimpers in their place.

Because he knows if he starts, Touya will only make it worse for you, so he suffers in silence, readily agreeing with Touya every time he reminds Natsuo that this is all his fault and neither of you would be in pain if Natsuo could’ve just kept it in his fucking pants for a few minutes longer.

It hurts, because it’s true, nii-san’s words sending thick, piercing stakes spearing through Natsuo’s heart, through Natsuo’s very soul, straight to the core of his body. Acrid bile climbs up his throat as Touya’s moans mingle with your sobs, so exhausted that they’re barely more than little wheezes at this point. It’s abundantly clear that Touya doesn’t feel a shred of remorse, and that makes Natsuo feel even worse—if only he had said no, if only he had waited and asked, if only he had been stronger, you wouldn’t be suffering.

The tears collecting in the column of his throat sprout talons and claw their way up, past his steadily weaking resolve, prying their way through his lips in the form of jagged sobs.  

It’s magnificent, really, the way Touya can render Natsuo a snotty, shivering mess with only a few choice words. And Natsuo—Natsuo only ever cries in front of his big brother, only ever cries for his big brother, full-on weeping that slashes through his sputtering chest, coughing around and choking on his own sobs of nii-san, I’m sorry!

But it ends eventually, finally, Touya tearing one last orgasm from you, gentle words contradicting his cruel, ruthless actions, murmurs of come on baby, just one more, one more for nii-chan. You can do this for nii-chan, can’t you? You can be a good little girl for me and cum one more time, right? lingering on his lips

And somehow, you find the strength to obey, to be his good baby, because you always do, entire body convulsing with a raspy shriek of the honorific, Touya praising you only moments later as his hips still and his cock pumps you full.

—

It’s cute, really, how fucked out the two of you are. Touya thinks you’re both so beautiful when you’re like this, with glassy eyes and tearstained cheeks, lashes clumped together with residual water and swollen faces stained with streaks of salt, all dazed and fucked and stupid for him, from him.

Natsuo’s doing better than you are, of course—Natsuo wasn’t subjected to being fucked again. But Natsuo still needs to rest, Touya softly tutting his tongue with a disapproving shake of his head as Natsuo attempts to aid him with your aftercare, movements clumsy as he stumbles to his feet, inept and awkward as he blunders towards you.

“No,” Touya’s large hands wrap around his younger brother’s shoulders, halting him, steadying him, forcing Natsuo to look at him. “You rest,” he instructs sternly, guiding Natsuo back to his previous spot and delicately depositing him onto the desk chair. “I’ll get to you in a minute, okay, Natsuo-kun?”

Natsuo hums out an affirmation, eyes closing briefly as Touya’s fingertips affectionately trace the curve of his cheek, palm patting it once.

It’s in moments such as these, nights after hours and hours of extreme punishment, that Touya automatically, perhaps unknowingly, slips into Big Brother mode, and you’re reminded of the age gap between them.

Because even though Natsuo’s bigger than Touya, taller than Touya, beefier than Touya, he looks so tiny under his older brother’s protective gaze.

You both must reek terribly, covered in drool and sweat and cum, must look like hot messes, strands of tangled hair saturated with salt and sticking to your cheeks, but your Touya-nii is still right there regardless, whispering the sweetest affirmations and the tenderest praises to the both of you as he wipes each of you down with a damp cloth infused with lavender, telling the both of you how good you did, how proud you made nii-san, how pretty both of you are.

Nimble fingers spend a decent amount of time rubbing soothing circles of moisturizing cream into each of you, your most sensitive skin rubbed raw, aching and puffy from such intense maltreatment, before Touya-nii dresses each of you in his softest, comfiest clothes, steady stream of pure, unadulterated love never stopping as it pours from his lips.

And you’re both reminded of how privileged you are, being the only two who ever get to witness this side of him, the only two who are fortunate enough to see the person he might’ve been if you stripped away years upon years of trauma and abuse, the person he truly is at the core of his soul, the person he was born as before he was forced to layer himself with thick, protective walls of aggression coated in indifference—and the person who he becomes as he sheds that armor, in the middle of the night when it’s just the three of you, the whole world having fallen away outside the bedroom door.

You’re all each other need, after all; because he loves you both more than he could ever put into words—and you each love him back just the same—and that will always be more than enough.

Touya reaches across your body, arm a pleasant, heavy weight as it rests on you, and runs slender fingers through Natsuo’s sweaty hair as you snuggle into your nii-chan’s chest, and Natsuo nearly mewls, nuzzling into his nii-san’s touch as Touya instructs the both of you to sleep, now, a film playing softly in the background as the three of you drift into unconsciousness together.

[fukurokoma]

I said I was going to start working on the tendo x reader x semi shit I’ve got kicking around in my head.. but I’m a fucking liar lol so have a 2.8k preview of bokuto x reader x akaashi smut that I ended up working on instead. warnings: contains mxm oral sex, references to drinking, use of a blindfold, and I think that’s all for now

It’s sticky and warm, sweet liquor lacing your tongue and two light eyed boys peering at you in mirrored cunning. The haze of warmth that dusts across your cheeks stains moonlight and sun in kind, fingers caressing glass rims and condensation coating fingertips. Outside you are sure you departed glumly oncoming rain and grey skies but you feel the warmth of mid-June saturate your skin with a light sheen of sweat at the nape of your neck despite the late December day.

Beneath your fingertips, slick with water that has too quickly grown warm, your skin feels heated, warm blood burning beneath the surface. You lick your lips absently, throat parched no matter how many sips you seem to take of the whiskey lemonade mix that Bokuto continues to pour.

He appraises you with a jovial smile, a gesture so natural on him though it would seem obscene, amplified on anyone else. To his side Akaashi is considerably more restrained, the expression he wears tempered docile yet deceitfully sweet. Affection burns in his eyes, but unsurprisingly there is something more behind it, a low simmering foreshadowing.

Akaashi wears a great many of his intentions on his face like a warning.

You regard them with caution shadowing your expression, a wry and curious smile twisting your lips.

“What are you two planning?” you ask and though you aim for lofty and offhand you miss the mark by some ways, landing within anticipatory and eager. Shame threatens to burn your cheeks hotter still and teeth bite into the plush measure of your mouth to restrain a broad smile.

Akaashi’s lips twitch into an almost shade of his own and he lifts one deft brow, glancing to Bokuto. Fans and flutters of tousled silver sway with the playful tilt of Bokuto’s head and the deep neckline of his shirt slips along his shoulder, exposing more of his sunshine skin. The loose cotton rests temptingly along the slope of his collar, the shadowed line quietly begging for lips and teeth and tongues to adore it.

Your eyes are not the only ones to appraise the artistic sweep of skin pulled taut all the way up his elegant neck. But Akaashi is closer, the orchestrater in most proceedings. As Bokuto sweetly murmurs, “It’s a surprise,” his skin is touched by Akaashi’s mouth of galaxies, his tease of teeth that leave constellations in their wake. When minutes have passed and Bokuto’s fingers are twisted in silken strands of midnight sky the rosy bloom of Akaashi’s mouth will reveal a milky way in lilac and gold, brilliant and branded.

But before such artistry is applied to Bokuto’s throat Akaashi spares a moment to infer low and roguish, “Don’t look away, don’t touch.”

You swallow the last of your drink thickly, a loud gulp that’s distinct and clear in the tense silence of the room.

The hiss of a sharp breath being drawn through gritted teeth cushions the clatter of your glass meeting the cluttered bedside drawer and Bokuto’s eyelashes flutter, resting in soft feathers upon his cheeks, closed. You can see the pearly white point of Akaashi’s teeth dragging across Bokuto’s skin, the wet pink of his tongue soothing red streaks and points. His talented fingers slip beneath striped cotton and map designs of undiscovered universes in the spaces between Bokuto’s ribs, low between his hips.

Bokuto croons hums of content in quiet, dulcet tones.

He is subdued under Akaashi’s careful ministrations, an orchestration that slowly builds, lost in whatever plays behind the shadows of his eyes. He’s all sensation and music, his pulse thrumming in a steady tempo his body already knows the steps to. But Bokuto is pliant, almost entirely still and unequivocally patient but for the hand he slips into Akaashi’s hair. The thread of midnight locks between his golden fingers is tentative, fingertips pressing tight when stardust fingers slip past his button and zipper to delve inside.

You cannot discern Akaashi’s precise actions through the stretch of denim that conceals his hand but Bokuto’s whimpers and groans do little to leave you wondering. His initial gasp, filtering from previously bitten lips at first touch sounds sharp in the silence, piercing through the thickening haze of mounting tension in the atmosphere only to lend itself as accelerando, the first of many small notes and vocal nuances, not all his own.

The softest whimper slips past your teeth and where you had initially not considered the gravity of Akaashi’s instruction earlier the itch you feel in your fingers now to touch has you slipping your hands beneath your thighs to prevent yourself from unintentionally doing so, hoping, hoping, hoping, that the telling sound managed to slip past unnoticed. From where he was once tucked into the crook of Bokuto’s neck Akaashi’s eyes are dark mischief when he smiles saccharine sweet at your reposition.

He does not say a word on the matter, though the angle of his mouth speaks loudly enough in lieu. It is Bokuto who remarks upon your delicate sensibilities, pleasantly singing in a way almost mocking, “You’re in for a long night, baby.” And he does as much with a lopsided smile dripping across his lips, his eyes already heavy. “We’ve barely even started.”

The soft pant of his breaths is a delightful distraction from the increasing thrum of your pulse and you drown in it, focusing on all the little noises that Bokuto makes and suppressing the groan his warning had thus prompted. Each sound Bokuto makes is familiar and evocative, reminding you of times before, enticing you until you realize you are already perching so far forward that it comes as no surprise when Akaashi’s smug chuckle bleeds into the room.

Though with him the small gesture alone says enough the distinct twist of his wrist that has Bokuto whimpering into Akaashi’s hair is a warning. You do not misunderstand the implications of his timing in the slightest though you do not straighten your spine either. Akaashi meets your defiance with an angled frame to his mouth and catches his teeth against the lobe of Bokuto’s ear.

After his tongue has soothed the initial sting Akaashi plays idle with the hair at the nape of his neck, continues to stroke him languidly as he comments, “You like listening to our ace, don’t you?” He keeps his eyes on Bokuto as he speaks, a low simmering affection searing across his features while he grazes his nose along the side of Bokuto’s neck

But then as if to prove his point Akaashi lures a weak moan from Bokuto’s throat, has his hips twitching in their seat with a sly smile. The lazy arch of his brow when he finally does cast his gaze back to you is damning, charmingly so. The blush you had so narrowly avoided earlier takes cue, illustrating your cheeks with a sting of heat, and the warmth adorns Bokuto, too, crawling up his neck in a pretty, pretty pink.

Words momentarily escape you and Akaashi does not wait long for a response before he deems it too late, chuckling darkly to himself. Bokuto joins him with a vaguely looming smile, inadvertently admitting that he is in on the plan and you are not all that surprised when he gathers the presence of mind to untangle his fingers from Akaashi’s hair and retrieve the silk tie in his pocket.

He hands it over with a small smile, the curve of his lips implicit amusement, mirrored in kind in the lazy half stretch of Akaashi’s own. Satisfaction in double doses is tucked away in the solitary quirked corner of his mouth, Akaashi’s hands abandoning Bokuto who pouts in brief dismay, and you nervously pressing teeth into already bruised flesh, waiting for the silk to be drawn over your eyes.

Presumption proven true, once Akaashi approaches he gathers the blind over your eyes, tying a neat and efficient knot in the back. There is a kiss lain atop the crown of your head and then his presence is gone once again, the room little more than peeks of setting sun streaking beneath the smallest gaps of silk and skin.

But then Bokuto’s broken voice fills the room once more and you can see as clearly as if your eyes were open.

You cannot ascertain whether the illustrious plays that come to mind as you tune specifically into each and every nuance of sound are true, but the potential of them does wonders. Every airy little noise Bokuto makes spurs fanciful possibilities behind your eyes and you imagine just how Akaashi might be touching him in order to lure such sounds from his mouth.

It becomes only somewhat easier to discern their actions by the rustle of clothing and the hushing that Akaashi infers after what feels like much, much later. Bokuto does not fall silent, and you acknowledge somewhere in the back of your mind that silence is not what Akaashi would have wanted anyway, but he restrains any pleas or sugar coated requests where he might otherwise not have.

What breaks him is a noise distinctly wet and you realize it to be Akaashi’s mouth as Bokuto’s voice breaks on the most satisfied moan you’ve likely ever heard. It’s not hard to imagine the relief etched into his features, eyes shut and his face blissful while Akaashi works pink lips down his cock in that slow, fluid, manner that he likes to start off with.

This you know for certain, particularly when you hear the pleased rumble that sounds in Akaashi’s chest. You are sure then that Bokuto’s fingers have taken solace in his night sky once more, the sun adoring the stars and the stars doing the same in kind, the push and pull of gravity at its finest in play.

Although your world is limited to darkness as you listen to the ascension of Bokuto’s breathing, from shallow barely audible breaths to short, fast pants and low whines as you hear Akaashi’s execution grow sloppier, wetter, slick, and surely so well paced his jaw must be absolutely aching; the darkness that enshrouds you burns red.

You feel along with it your skin beginning to burn, so gradually at first it’s barely noticeable but fastly becoming a heat you long to cool that scorches along your cheeks, chest, the back of your neck. Beneath your thighs your fingers twitch, teeth worrying your bottom lip as you feel the restlessness crawl into your limbs and unfurl.

Your teeth bite down unashamedly, hard, blunt enamel that is sure to bruise and leave you a reminder of your devil may care boys, but you don’t care for the pain that’s bound to come; you could listen to Bokuto for days.

There’s a stutter in Bokuto’s breath, a low whistle as he exhales and you hear the distinct pop of Akaashi’s lips, the ragged inhale he greedily takes. Even if you can’t see it all unfolding, the sweet torture of it all is damning enough that you can’t quite stop the curse that befalls you, the way it lends itself to further speech, a sweet lilting inquiry of, “Is he taking good care of you, Bo?” escaping before you think better of it.

Bokuto releases an affirming groan and you can just imagine the way Akaashi’s mouth is sliding back down his length as he does so, as he shakily replies, “the best,” in a voice that’s entirely wrecked and breathless. You picture the haze of arousal that Bokuto must have in his eyes, the liquid honey that would be visible only in glimpses between his thick lashes, his eyelids oh so heavy the more Akaashi set to work, coaxing each luxuriant sound from his swollen, needing lips. Bokuto just loves to be kissed, loves making out like he’s still a horny teenager, with his hands grasping everywhere and his god forsaken hips rolling in sinful, tempting teases.

And Akaashi, Akaashi, your sweet, selfless lover, lavishing affection on your shared boyfriend, his lips just must be the richest shade of red, stark contrast to his pretty, golden moonlight skin. Just the thought of his swollen, pouty mouth makes you want to kiss him, lick into his mouth and taste Bokuto on his tongue. But you are under no false illusions here, aren’t about to push your own luck.

Instead you venture a push for Bokuto’s, softly inferring, “I bet you wish you could kiss him right now, hm?” You swallow thickly, envisioning it for yourself, narrating it for the both of them to picture what you’re picturing. “You’d just love to taste yourself on his lips, in his mouth.”

“I can imagine it so clearly, Bo: the way you’d trace our moody boy’s lips with your tongue, the way your fingers would curl into his hair… the way you’d tug it ever so softly so you could get your mouth on his neck. And he’s so sensitive there, isn’t he? He would just melt underneath you, you and your eager hands, stroking, pulling at clothes, drawing him against you, drawing him against your hips. Those hips of yours Bo...”

The quietest of moans escapes you at the thought, you know what sins his hips are capable of and you can hear them, him, getting restless now. You can hear his breathing scatter, the tempo uneven, staccato. Everything sounds frantic now, low whines and rustling fabric, and the wet, wet, sound of Akaashi’s mouth slipping, the muffled sound of him groaning. You realize Bokuto must have tugged on his hair.

A little gleefully your back arches forward even more, longing to be closer to the both of them as you entreat, “You’re close aren’t you, Bo?” You wonder if he’s watching you when you lick your lips, teeth pulling the lower momentarily into your mouth. It doesn’t matter if he is or not ultimately. Even from your place on the sidelines you don’t mind being an inactive player. You just want, want, want. You want so much that you don’t hesitate to ask for it. “Go on Bo, please, I wanna hear you cum. I want to listen to you fall apart.”

Perhaps they’re feeling merciful, or perhaps Bokuto couldn’t hold off any longer. It takes only a handful of moments more for you to hear Bokuto’s downright offensive vocal assault crescendo, the guttural pitch of his voice teetering your flimsy acquiescence. It would be only too easy to work yourself to orgasm after listening to Bokuto moan and groan, and swear, swear so filthily your only regret is not being able to have seen just how Akaashi got him so good that he expels an emphatic ‘fuck.’

He sounds so good, sounds so absolutely ruined that for just a moment going against your orders crosses your mind. But Akaashi catches you just in time, a shift on the mattress alerting you to the approach of one of them, though it's not apparent which of them until there are coarse fingertips along your jaw, Akaashi’s velvet tone instructing, “Open your mouth, kitten.”

Before a smile can fully shape your lips they part acquiescently, your deference subdued effectively, and rewarded with the feeling of Akaashi’s mouth shaping to yours succinctly. His tongue touches your own, the taste salty, inherently Bokuto, and his fingers glide along your jaw, the nape of your neck, to sweep into your hair.

He kisses you breathless, absolutely stupid, tearing his mouth from your greedy own far too soon. He’s gracious enough to expend, “What a good girl you’re being, still sitting pretty on those naughty little hands of yours.”

Bokuto is quick to point out, “Her mouth is worse.” His voice has a playful edge to it, but lacks no audacity.

You smile saccharine sweet, counter, ‘Mine?’ with all the trappings of innocence, spare the contrary arch of your brow, only just visible above the silk blindfold.

Bokuto scoffs, as if he takes offense to your claims. Yet not a moment later do you feel Akaashi’s fingers depart your hair to traverse down your body.

Though he attempts to take his time there is no preamble in the way he traverses the length of your torso, skipping pointed detours he would normally favor to slip his fingers past your waistband.There is no hesitation in the way that Akaashi spreads you open, running his fingers against your dripping cunt while he infers lowly, “Our wee kitten may have a point Bokuto-san.”

[lune-hime]

Garden of Tulips (Levi/Reader) Tea Time # 2 ~ Shower Mishap

~Click me for more chapters~

“What did it look like?”

“Hmm?” Levi looked up from his place next to your sleeping form. “The titan that tried to snack on my darling granddaughter.” “Ugly as fuck.” “Aren’t they all?”

Levi recounts memories of the reader and their shared life together while she recovers from a serious injury.

!!WARNINGS!! - Violence, gore, smut, wholesome content ;)

So these little Tea Times were written as little filler-memory chapters to place in between the main story line.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Y/N.” Hange drawled. She clumsily attempted to sit cross legged along the dining hall bench, her legs not quite folding correctly. When she almost tipped over the side, Erwin used his quick reflexes to snag her by the arm and place her upright. You sloppily turned your head to give her as much undivided attention that your remaining active brain cells could muster.

“Please enlighten everyone on the shower story.” Her request brought a giddy smile to her lips. Levi immediately cast you a quizzical look, his gaze drowning in beer. Your face heated up like an oiled saucepan but thanks to the excessive drinking it made no difference to your already rosy complexion.

“But it might be too unprofessional for the Commander.” You shot a sassy look at Hange over Levi who was seated between the two of you. Alcohol was quite the bold word choice inducer as you definitely would not have phrased your sentence with so much gusto if you were sober.

“What in the fucking hell  kind of story is this?” Levi asked darkly, his pupils dilated so far they eclipsed their usual silver. There was a preciseness to his phrase despite it being slurred. Indeed, the only soul at the table who knew of your unintentional shower adventure was your former squad leader. Erwin chuckled softly and Mike quirked an eyebrow at you.

“We drink as friends tonight, Y/N. No one will get you in trouble for just telling a story-” Erwin began his explanation calmly but paused when he locked eyes with Levi’s burning glare. It took what was left of his composure to refrain himself from laughing at the tiny fireball across the table.

“But only tell it if you are comfortable doing so.” The commander flashed a dazzling smile before taking a hearty swig of his drink. The man may have been inebriated but he was still so much more put together than the rest of you. Well, with the exception of Mike of course.

“It’s not that bad, don’t worry about it Vivi.” You reassured the steaming man between giggles. You reached up to gingerly pat his cheek a couple times, his glare turning into an intensely childish pout that he would definitely deny later.

“So you’ll tell it?” Hange chittered, practically vibrating with excitement. You nodded lazily, swaying a bit but steadied by Levi’s secure arm around your waist.

“Okay so, it was during my first few months as a cadet-”

↞♞♘↠

You had come to terms with the fact that you were going to be tired on a daily basis. Since you had joined the cadets it was nonstop physical and tactical training that bored into the innermost parts of your brain and body, immersing you in a constant state of exhaustion. Your grandmother’s war stories about her painful life in the military were indeed accurate (well, yours were much less scandalous than hers); it’s no joke how far the organization pushes every limb, muscle, fiber, and atom within your being.

Which was why you couldn’t be happier that you had an hour of free time to shower after your training session before you had to meet your mentor. Plush towel hanging off your shoulder, you rounded the corner of one of the many hallways of the vast compound and practically skipped into the bathing area.

The steam from the showers was thick at first and obscured the space as you passed through the initial chamber to enter the main bathing area. The only element of the atmosphere that told you other cadets were occupying the room was their loud banter and laughter. Only, it wasn’t the feminine voices you were accustomed to hearing and you’re pretty sure you just heard Connie’s na-

“Y/N!?!?!” A voice shrieked, immediately scuttling to the side upon discovering your arrival. When your vision adjusted to the thick steam, your eyes widened in shock when you spotted Eren's very exposed form through the haze.

"Ohmygodohmygod, Eren I'm so sor-" You blabbed, immediately trying to look anywhere but the boy's nether regions. Before the split second it would have taken to cover your eyes, you were startled by an immense figure in your personal space. The shadow gave you zero time to shield yourself from the Michaelangelo’s David that was possibly the cockiest cadet on the premises.  

"Y/N, I didn't know you were so bold. Come to play?" Reiner cooed, smirk widening as he watched your face heat up to the scalding temperature of their showers. He made no effort to hide his manhood, as Eren did, and actually attempted to emphasize it by propping his leg up against one of the benches littered throughout the bath. You were frozen in embarrassment and as much as you wanted to punch him right in the spot he most yearned for you to gaze upon, you couldn't do it.

"Walls, Reiner do you have any shame?" You spat back, your muscles still seized up with your beyond awkward encounter.

"None if it comes to you, sweetheart." He chuckled confidently. Before you could quip back another response, a blur shouting your name dashed towards you and turned your vision black. The hands over your eyes became your sole protector from the copious amounts of naked men.

“I know you are dumb, but you really need to watch where you are going.” Jean scolded from behind you in a hushed tone. You let out the balloon of a breath you had been internalizing. If you hadn’t believed in angels before, Jean sure as hell was your angel now. He abruptly turned around and began waddling the two of you towards the entrance when you heard agile footsteps circling around you. Jean suddenly halted, the unexpected loss of movement sending you flailing.

“Hold up, Jean. Maybe she knew exactly where she was going.” Reiner purred. You felt Jean’s breath quicken against your ear and his grip on your temple tightened momentarily. You didn’t need to physically see Reiner’s face to picture the shit-eating smirk edging its way into his features.

“If you wanted me, Y/N, all you had to do was ask.”

The sound of wet feet against tile grew closer until you felt unwanted puffs of air leaving feather-light touches on your face. Jean suddenly flung you sideways like a cooked noodle, placing himself between you and Reiner and causing you to squeak in surprise.

“Fuck off Reiner. She doesn’t want to see your tiny dick.”  Jean spat back. A chorus of snickers resounded through the bathroom.

“She was trying hard just a moment ago to avoid the temptation.” Reiner huffed. His arrogance was like a tough stain that you couldn’t get out, no matter how hard you scrubbed.

“Sadly, I did see it and Jean’s right.” You groaned. Your best friend let out a snort followed by the laughter you could feel rumbling from his chest.

“You must not have gotten a good look at it then-”

"If you don't get out of our way, no one will get the minute pleasure of seeing your dick again." Jean sarcastically threatened.

"Please, Reiner, give it a rest." A soft voice pleaded to your right. You recognized it as a familiar cadet, one Jean had grown quite close to.

"Everyone else besides you is uncomfortable here." Marco's even tone was music to your reddened ears. There was a palpable silence of which you presumed was the soundtrack to an alpha male staring contest. Then, Reiner huffed and backed off seeing that the odds were against him.

"Fine, fine. You know you can always call on me Y/N." Reiner chided before sauntering back into the shower.

"The only call he'll be getting is from the infirmary." You grumbled under your breath.

“Can’t keep it in his pants for five minutes can he?” Jean scoffed lowly as he began leading you to the doorway.

“I mean he’s not wearing pants…” You mumbled, still trying to recover from the overwhelming shock and embarrassment. Jean stopped you at the entrance to the connecting hallway.

"When I let go, don't you dare look behind you." Jean warned, playfully swaying you back and forth.

"Okay just let me go!" You sputtered and swatted his arms before he released you.

You fixed your gaze on the tile walls and heaved a sigh of relief.

"Thanks Jean, I owe you one." You said, voice regaining its composure.

"Whatever, just buy me some food when we go into town next." He replied. You heard him turn around and begin padding back to the showers when you realized your shoulder was missing a fluffy presence. Your towel must have fallen off during your steamy showdown.

"Jean wait!!" You exclaimed. You turned around and in the waning of your flustered hysteria forgot you were technically still in the boy's bathroom. Both your and Jean's eyes almost popped out of their sockets.

"Shit, Y/N what did I say???" Jean exclaimed, hands immediately flying to cover his crotch. You breathed a heavy exhale, feeling the flames scorching your cheeks once more.

"Dammit, I'm sorry! My towel fell-" You sputtered and cursed at yourself for letting the heat flood your brain cells too.

"Ah! Y/N-" Marco appeared with your towel, only he was sporting his birthday suit as well. Oh, this could not get any worse. You were the embodiment of a beet, cheeks puffing in fear and eyes screwing shut.

"I have your towel, I was going to place it by the doorway but-um-here." Marco gently grabbed your hand and placed the towel in it. He laughed nervously and retreated back into the bath.

You turned back around to face opposite of the doorway and slumped your head into your hands exasperatedly.

"You good now?" Jean checked, slight annoyance evident in his tone.

"No." You whimpered in utter mortification.

“Reiner’s just a dick who thinks that everyone wants to see his own.” Jean said with a roll of his eyes.

"It was an accident, so don't worry. Plus this gives me prime blackmail material." He snickered. You shot him the middle finger over your shoulder.

“How am I going to face anyone in that room anymore?” You groaned sadly, the last three minutes of excitement playing on an endless loop within your mortified mind.

“Easy, if they bring it up just kick them on any part of their body you saw today.” Jean snickered.

“But I saw every-” You started to protest and then gasped in horror. Your humiliated expression deepened Jean’s smirk.

"We'll pretend it never happened. Now please, go to the proper bathroom before you play with the crazy lady. You stink."

↞↠

“Y/N? What’s wrong?” Hange asked, taking a break from poking at the titan’s dirtied toenail. When her apprentice approached the titan holding area she looked absolutely worn out.

“I have the extreme urge to scratch my eyes out.” You groaned, setting your bag of notes down and crouching in the grass next to her.

“Please don’t, today I need you to help me scratch Bean’s eye instead.”

↞♞♘↠

Levi’s grip threatened to shatter the glass pint as he brought it down onto the table with too much force.

“If we had been together when this happened I would have ripped off every one of their micro cadet penises.” He hissed, the alcohol turning into flames within his eyes.

There was a moment’s pause before the entire squad leader table erupted in laughter. The guffaw rattled the wood paneling and caused confused cadets to turn their heads in shock. Erwin accidentally snorted some of his beer and was now struggling with it coming out of his nose. Seeing the commander in such a state caused the same exact thing to happen to you, the burning of the alcohol hurt almost as much as your stomach did from hilarity. Mike kneed the table so hard that it sent his drink flying at Hange who moved out of the way to dodge it, only to smack into Levi’s chest. The action caused the two of them to double over and flip off the bench which only caused the rest of your table to create a larger cacophony.

Nights spent in cherished company like these were ones you held close to your heart.

[immortalonus]

Where You Belong: Chapter 2

A/N: Hey folks, this is a day late from my posting on AO3, mostly due to tiredness/travel, but here it is! I'm not sure how quickly I'll be able to put out the next chapter (In addition to being mostly dialogue, it's also a mess,) but I'll try.

Read it now on AO3

Chapter 2:

“Nope, nope, nope.”

In the realm of the dead, there was no night. No dark reprieve from the inescapable glow. A state that wore on eye and mind alike in its obstinate refusal to diminish or fade.

This did not mean the Zone was without its own sort of cycles, however.

Every seven hours, perhaps eight, the thin, omnipresent mists scattered throughout the air would begin to thicken, coalescing into a deep, impenetrable fog that stuck to every surface with a viscosity not unlike that of cold soup. It's brightness, too would gradually increase until the traveler was left all but blinded for the unending wall of light now spread on all sides before them.

Navigation in such conditions was impossible, and even ghosts seemed to prefer squirreling themselves away during these hours of fugue than to brave the blind depths the mists made of the world around them.

It was really nothing like night, but for conveniences sake, Valerie had taken to calling it as such.

It was now well into what she liked to consider “evening.” The mists had already weltered up, thickening strands not yet impermeable to the naked eye, weaving themselves into fantastic shapes ever larger across the atmosphere of the zone. Soon to merge, but not now, not yet.

While she normally preferred to travel as long as she could safely dare, Valerie had opted to settle down early that evening, using the extra time to sort through the goods held in the bug ghost's many sacks instead.

“Nope, nope, nope, weird, gross, and oh--hell no!”

Valerie yanked her hand free, shaking off the clear slime that coated her fingers as she threw the parcel and all its contents, still squirming, over the ledge of the small outcropping that served as her latest campsite.

If she were ever forced to say one nice thing about the Ghost Zone, Valerie would admit, grudgingly, that it did make a remarkably good garbage bin.

She sighed, allowed herself to stretch out and rest after yet another day of continuous exertion. One would not think riding on her sled for hours on end would tire her so, but it did. And when she added the additional effort of chasing down and interrogating that ghost--She grimaced, still unsure it had been wise to let the creature scamper free, in the end.

There had just been something in the way it had begged, had cried and whimpered as it carried out her every command with that slump of abject surrender that had just made finishing it off seem so, so...Dirty. As though she would be in the wrong, somehow, for doing it. It gave her such a sense of frustration. She couldn't help but wish that ghosts were precisely the emotionless hulls the Fentons believed them to be.

Oh, ghosts were essentially selfish, no doubt about it, narcissistic chunks of ectoplasm that only rarely empathized with their own kind, and never with humans, but they did feel.

Phantom, the bug, even Plasmius, in his own, twisted way, it was no longer something she could reject.

A part of her hated them all the more just for that, as though it made her life better, somehow, to know.

Couldn't she just have this one thing? After all the shit she went through, all the misery she bore, couldn't this one thing be something simple?

Goddamn ghosts, ruining her life, her stuff, and now her morals, too.How was she supposed to be the hero here? how was she supposed to save anyone, much less Elle, if she couldn't crush one goddamn dirty bug?

“Shit.”

Valerie flopped down on her back, staring into the viridian heavens with bitter eyes. The sky could not be bothered to stare back, rolling over in a cloud of mist instead.

“Shit,shit,shit!”

She tried to breath, but it caught in lungs suddenly shriveled against a breast-bone to tight for air.she clenched her fists, fingers squeezed into a shape fit for violence. Her body trembled, her hidden heart beat staccato as something hard and hot and sour twisted through her very soul.

“Stupid ghosts.” She whispered.Her eyes were cold marbles, but deep within her chest, she was still burning.

Valerie grabbed a stone laying loose on the ground beside her, pushed herself back up, and lobbed it with all her strength at the offending universe.

“You won't win!”

She picked up another rock, tossed it even further.

“I won't let you!”

She threw another rock, then another, as fast as her arms could reach them, intent on stoning the high green heavens for all the wrongs it had ever wrought against her. Each projectile went higher and farther into the encroaching mists, which swallowed them whole.

“You hear me! Not now, not ever!”

Even her screams were muffled, now, pressed against her ears by the haze. The stones made even less a mark, vanishing into clouds unrippled by their passing, engulfed the sound of their landing, if, indeed, they landed at all.Her chest heaved, her arm ached, but still her emotions threatened spillage. She felt at once utterly drained and full to bursting, squeezed of all verve even as her heart simmered still in some vague malcontent.

She flopped back to the ground, tired, but too troubled for rest.It wasn't all hopeless, she knew. She had an idea of where to go now, closer than she'd dared to hope, if the directions of the bug she'd captured earlier were to be believed.

And even if it was a lie, she'd still managed to buy herself some time.

She reached over to her right, where she'd piled everything of use from the insect's many stores. It was a pitiful stack, a single bag of food plastic wrapped or canned, adorned in letters and signs utterly foreign. But food it was, enough to keep her going a few days more.

She had set her stolen boot next to the parcel, and, resting just beside it, a crumpled polaroid weighed down by a worn leather fold.

She brought her hand down, shimmied the picture out from under its makeshift paperweight. Her other hand rose to brush across it, one last attempt, gentle, futile, at smoothing out the damage littering every aspect of its face.

It was fruitless, of course, but even broken beyond all repair, even with all the bitterness that lingered from the loss, the photo still soothed her, touching something deeper, more tenderly, than any hard flung stone.

She reached into the depths of her mind, grasping for those parts of the huntress that were always with her, woven in electric tapestry with the living currents of her brain.

Graphical Storage and Processing:Status: Active:

Recall request: Confirmed.

Data: Available, reporting 100% recall.

Overlay Request: Confirmed.

Initiating Command: Overlay:

Processing...

The change took place in the space of a moment. Emerald fragments reformed into broad leaves struck through with sunshine. Golden light struck their rays through the gaps where shadows fluttered down across the youthful oak that cast them, springing proud and slender from a meadow thick with blooms.

Beneath the shade of the tree, nestled between the long grass arches, there was a family.

They were at a picnic, the three of them, quilt littered with the remains of their meal. Cold chicken and half eaten corn cobs peeked out from broad folds of cloth, plastic water bottles refracted the scattered sunlight in their crumpled facets, where it danced across the surface of what liquid yet remained.

The man of the family sat beside a big wicker basket, arm resting over the thickly woven lip of its hatch. His face not yet wearied, his mustache quirked in a second smile as he looked into the long vanished camera with an expression of shy delight.Her father, Damian Grey.

A young Valerie could be seen sitting just in front of him, clutching a rubber ball nearly half her size. Grass stains streaked the young child's face, grin bold as she hoisted her rubber prize high above her head.

Besides the child, shoulders leaned in close press to the man beside her, knelt a woman. Acorn brown and satin soft, head tossed back in jubilation bold as summer. Her heat dewed neck curved swanlike above shoulders hunched up in mirth.

Valerie traced the outlines of the woman's face, slowly, ignoring—refusing—the ragged edges that brushed against her thumb as she outlined the vanished forms of her lips, her cheekbones, her chin, alight with a youth yet lingering even as the glow of motherhood softened the hard angles of ignorant adolescence.

A beautiful woman, vibrantly, vivaciously alive.

You would never know, looking at her, just how fast it would all drain out, her every pore a sieve for the good health she would never more contain.

But Valerie wasn't thinking about that, now, just as she wasn't thinking about the photograph or the damage it sustained.

Just for the moment, she allowed herself to focus only on the memory of a memory before her. If she imagined hard enough, she could almost see that sparkling smile turn, eyes opal dark and glimmering in delight at the chance to see her one and only daughter once again.

“Hey ma.” She said by way of reply. “Long time no see.”

[omg-imagine]

⊱ Drabble #3 ⊰

Pairing: Keanu Reeves x Reader

Prompts:

51- “I missed you so much.”

53- “I’ve been thinking about you all day.”

Words: 1.6k

Warning: fluff, smut

A/N: Not really a drabble lol. I also went full on with the smut here. Hope you like it!

Requested by @eevee-of-rivia​ ♡

The house sat still, cold and empty, the late-night chorus of crickets sounding from an open window, its irritating tune echoing in the hushed atmosphere. For what seemed like hours, you tossed and turned under the warm silken sheets, incredibly restless and deeply yearning for precious sleep to come soon.

Sighing, you flipped over to lay on the left side— Keanu’s side— of the bed. It was dull, uneventful evenings such as this which made you miss your husband a bit more than usual. Undoubtedly, if he were home right now, the night would have been more pleasant. You always slept so soundly with Keanu, feeling loved and secure with him curled up behind you, holding you close.

As expected, your mind continued drifting off to thoughts of him, silently wondering what he was up to at this hour. Though Keanu had sent you a few texts here and there, today had been the first time he couldn’t call you from where he was on the other side of the world, his packed shooting schedule this week taking up most of his energy and focus.

You couldn’t blame Keanu, of course. Even though there had been many, many times when you wished you and him weren’t separated by thousands of miles, the long absences were sadly part of his job. Over the years, you had learned to accept it, but that didn’t stop you from feeling so lonesome throughout the day, wanting nothing more than to see him and hear his voice.

Finally, fatigue took over, and you eventually succumbed to sleep with the slight hope of seeing Keanu in your dreams, just like every night. For tonight, your consciousness conjured up a familiar scenario; a vivid memory, to be exact. It brought you back to the day almost six years ago when you and Keanu exchanged vows on a sandy beach near the bright, blue Pacific waters; in a ceremony that was intimate and perfect, filled with so much joy and love. 

As your dream-self stood there holding Keanu’s hands, anticipating your first kiss as husband and wife, the scene around you began to melt away, your physical body rousing from its deep slumber and emerging into the real world. 

Carefully, your eyes fluttered open, your brain still thick with sleep as you observed your dark surroundings. That’s when you heard it—the sound of the wooden floorboards creaking as if someone were walking out in the hall.

Sitting up on the mattress, you let out a scream when the door suddenly cracked open, and a shadowed man came into the room. Then you heard him say your name, and it took you less than a second to figure out who it truly was.

“Keanu?” You uttered as you reached over to turn on the light, your racing heart soon relaxing.

At first, you couldn’t believe what you were seeing. You wondered if you were still asleep; if this was merely part of your dream. But when Keanu approached the edge of the bed, his kind cocoa-hued orbs gazing down at you, you were then convinced that this was actually happening. 

This was all real.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare—”

You didn’t allow Keanu to finish his sentence. Without warning, you jumped out of the covers and quickly scrambled towards him, pushing yourself up on your knees to kiss him. Capturing his neck in your arms, his lips were soft and sweet as they tenderly, perfectly molded to yours. Running out of air, you pulled away from him but not too far, letting your fingers weave through the ends of his raven locks.

“I missed you,” you spoke, your voice light and airy as the corners of your mouth lifted to form a smile. “I missed you so much.”

“I missed you, too,” Keanu beamed, placing his lips on yours once more. “I hope you don’t mind me coming home unannounced. I just thought it would be a lovely surprise if I didn’t tell you.”

“It’s a lovely surprise, indeed. Even though you gave me a fright back there, I’m happy that you’re here.”

With a bright grin, Keanu wrapped his arms around your body, drawing you in close as you sank into his warm embrace. Closing your eyes, you could feel him nuzzling his head into the crook of your neck, trailing the gentlest of kisses along the side. You hummed in delight while his mouth slowly traveled upwards, his lips grazing your ear as he murmured, “I’ve been thinking about you all day.”

“Hmm, what about exactly?” you questioned Keanu teasingly as he urged you to lie back in bed, positioning himself to hover above you.

“Well, for starters, I thought of doing this…”

A shiver ran down your spine as the large palm of his hand caressed your body, gliding smoothly over your thin, silky nightgown before pushing the garment up and off. Lustful gaze unwavering, Keanu’s fingertips ran alongside the skin of your inner thigh, inching them closer to your heated core. You inhaled sharply when you felt him massaging your sensitive nub through your panties, a smirk flashing across his face knowing that his simple touch could quickly reduce you to a needy mess.

“I imagined this moment during the entire flight, and it made me so hard just thinking about it.”

His words were somewhat of a loss when he swiftly rid you of your underwear and moved down your body, pressing his face towards your warmth. Hot breaths of air softly fanning over your cunt, you couldn’t hold back the moans escaping you as Keanu’s wet tongue delved into your aching pussy, two of his thick digits stroking, teasing your inner walls.

“I missed the way you taste,” Keanu cooed as you writhed helplessly against his strong hold, teetering dangerously on the precipice of climax. “I missed how tight you are around my fingers, my cock. God, I can’t wait to feel you around me.”

“P-Please,” you whimpered, lifting your head to meet his eyes which were filled with urgent desperation to touch, to feel. It had been too long since he’d given you this much pleasure; the late-night, steamy phone calls were incomparable to the real deal. “I want you inside me, baby. I can’t wait anymore, please.”

In an instant, Keanu pushed backwards, removing his fingers from your pussy, and you whined at the loss. You felt like you were half-delirious, your mind utterly stuck in a pleasure-drunk haze. Watching as your husband stripped off his clothes, your heart began to soar seeing his bare body. Your eyes shamelessly roamed over his entirety, sighing softly at the sight of the beautiful man before you. 

Finally, Keanu removed his boxer shorts, the last barrier separating you from all his glory, and you couldn’t help but admire his gorgeous cock, hardened and glistening because of you, just for you.

Wordlessly, he crawled back up to you, his body settling between your legs as your lips met in pure haste, kissing each other fiercely, almost frantically. Releasing a gasp, you felt Keanu’s member pressed against your entrance, its swollen rosy tip slicked with your juices. Breaths mingling together in short pants, you moaned at the delicious burning sensation of him pushing inside in one slow, measured thrust. He paused for a beat, allowing you to get used to his size, only proceeding once you gave him a nod.

“I missed this,” Keanu husked, his hips moving at a tantalizing pace. “I missed you.”

Bodies moving as one, the bed under you creaked with every thrust, the sound of skin slapping against skin mixing with the moans falling from your lips. Keanu’s girthy length stretched you out exquisitely. Each timed stroke became harder, rougher, and deeper, the growing coil of tension within you now starting to fall apart, and you looked up at him, knowing full well that he too was close.

“I love you,” he whispered in between staccato breaths, his movements becoming more erratic, his self-control slipping.

You gazed into Keanu’s dark, heavy-lidded eyes, his mouth slightly agape as a bead of sweat dripped from his quivering brow. Reaching a hand down, you hissed in pleasure when Keanu rubbed at your clit, dragging your nails over his back as he continuously hit that sweet, sweet spot deep inside you.

Within seconds, you began to tremble underneath him, spasming and tightening around his cock as you wailed softly, riding out your high. Grunting out your name, Keanu buried his face in your neck, giving a few final stuttering thrusts before finding his own release, pumping spurt after spurt of his thick creamy cum inside, a sated smile gracing both of your lips.

A minute passed, and so did several more. Soon, your ragged breaths steadied, your heaving chests returning to a calmed state. With a loving kiss, Keanu slowly slipped himself out, his tired body collapsing next to yours as you shifted to lie on your side, facing him. Staring adoringly at his gentle features, you felt your eyes beginning to drift close, though you tried to fight the sleep creeping in.

“It’s okay,” Keanu soothed when he noticed your drowsiness. “Go to sleep. I’ll be here next to you when you wake up.”

“Promise?” You asked in a muted tone, watching as he threw the duvet over to cover your bareness before turning off the lamp, darkness instantly enveloping the room.

Planting one last gentle kiss to your forehead, Keanu then snuggled closer, and you basked in the warmth surrounding you. “I promise.”

Content with his answer, you finally let the exhaustion take over, both your heart and mind now at ease knowing you would be peacefully asleep all night, held by the arms of the one you love the most, Keanu.

Permanent Tags: @penwieldingdreamer​ @keandrews​ @feminine-machinegun​ @fanficsrusz​ @thehumanistsdiary​ @rdjloverxxx​ @flaminasteroid​ @lussdew​

[starr-fall-knight-rise]

Humans are Space Orcs, “A Little Light.”

Guys, I am releasing a new alien species! I am super excited about this, and I will explain at the end because there is an awesome story behind this. I hope you like it, it was a strange style to write in, and I ended up confusing myself on more than one occasion.

The genesis of these guys is actually super cool, or I thought so.

The world around him was white, a white blinding haze that seared his eyes and burrowed into his brain so profoundly it made his ears ring, not a quiet ringing, but a loud almost ear splitting ringing that burrowed into his head and drilled through the small bones in his middle ear. Aside from the ringing there was only silence accept for his own ragged breathing gasping that, made the space around him humid despite his visor’s inability to fog.

He stumbled over his own feet, for it had to be his feet since the ground about his was completely flat, A dessert of salt stretching for miles in all directions, pure white against the roaring power of the blue-white star, a star so bright even the sky had been bleached white. He tried to open his eyes, tried to find where he was going but was immediately blinded. He tried to scramble for the visor on his helmet but found there to be none there, snapped off.

He stumbled again, this time falling to his knees on the vast white nothingness.

He could feel the crunch through his gloves and boots, rattling up through his knees, but it was as if he stared down at his own body white against paper, in a ceaseless void filled with not but light. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried for the comm again.

“Harben- harbinger, this is…. This is Commander Vir… I, my ship…. Was malfunctioned. I Have fallen and…. I can’t eyes… help, send please….. Think I may have been…. Damaged.” More light, blinding him driving into his skull like screws being driven in with a power tool. He lifted his hands to his ears as the light grew stronger bringing the ringing to a crescendo.

He fell backwards barely feeling his body hit the ground, knowing that something had happened only for the slight vibration through his body, like the slamming of a door seen only in the ripples on a glass of water. Light bombarded him from above the ringing grew louder. His hands fell to his sides as he fell, mercifully into blackness. 

***

There was a disturbance, they had sensed it some time ago, a distant disturbance in the distant sky. They did not see it, but felt it. Waves of sight, particles of distortion washing over them. They do not sense the light that beats down from above, only the infrared radiation of their distant star which sustains them. Besides that, the landscape is flat blackess warmed occasionally in spots of unfathomable color by the heat of their star. They can sense it like they sense particles of radio light given off by their brethren. Light is their survival, light is their spawn and their life. They sense everything, and with their light comes a great euphoria. They love light.

They float now, great billowing sails propelling them in silent, slow-motion arcs over the landscape. Below them their great flexible appendages wave and quiver, two long in the front, and a hundred shorter trailing in the back. They float, though it seems as if they swim, cutting through the light the way a sting-ray cuts through the water. They are silent, ethereal, and somewhat strange. They do not move quickly for they see no need simply floating through the white, surrounded by light and the rolling waves of radio chatter from their companions.

With the radio waves gone.

They are silent, though their world is not.

It startles them, when it appears on the horizon, a spot of light under the glorious rays of their star. It does not belong there, for, even though the ground is bright, this thing is brighter. They approach on trailing ribbons of their own limbs gracefully floating, floating, floating. They make it eventually, towards the bright spot.

It sheds light and heat, though it is covered by darkness.

The shape is not something they have seen before, it is alien and unknowable. Behind it, it leaves traces of it’s path, back in the direction of the disturbance. It does not fit on this landscape, it does not belong here. It tracks pieces of itself behind it.

It is living.

That much they know for sure.

They know it is not from here.

With their sense of light they look on. The creature loses light in great swaths, it is bright, not as bright as their star, but very bright, though it’s brightness is fading.

It is a sin to let anything that is bright die.

***

He awoke when he felt himself moving, felt the rattling in his feet as they jostled and crunched over salt scraping and covering the sound of the ringing in his ears. He was seeing double, the world around him was  still so bright. It thunders down on him in great rays of pain. He tried to move, but he found that he couldn’t. His head spun and rotated, or at least it seemed that way. He tried to open his eyes, but the light hurt. It cut into his soul until he could no longer feel but for the pain. His eyes closed, but the searing light still cut through burning him replacing the whiteness with the cherry red of his own blood.

A shadow fell over him. He could sense it with the passing of pain and opened his eyes. He could not comprehend what he was seeing, a towering shadow, a monolith slowly swaying back and forth, back and forth bringing the sun into view, and then cutting it off a moment later. Ribbons, or tedrals wave about him, there are thousands of them. He can’t make them into shapes, can't determine what they are or what they mean.

Has he died?

***

What is it?

They aren’t entirely sure.

What does it want?

Probably to live, but then again it was perishing, so maybe it didn’t.

Maybe they should leave it back out in the void, in the whiteness, on the planes of salt. 

That would be foolhardy though not to learn about something new. They knew everything there was to know here. Then again this thing was a thing they did not know, so it was only right that they should know. If they knew everything else.

Did they actually know everything?

It seemed so. They knew of the salt, and atmosphere. They knew of the chemical structures, and the atomic particles. They knew of the particles that acted as waves, they knew of their beloved light, and it’s tendency to behave similarly. They knew of gravity and quantum law and that they were on a sphere that simply orbited a large sphere of fire. They knew their light would be gone some day, and they knew when that day would be.

They were not worried.

They new a great many things, and this was a thing to know.

It was clear they needed to know more.

***

It Is a trick to learn about something that cannot be known, a trick to determine that which has no base of reference. The do not know this thing, this thing that lays before them warm and flickering with its pulsing light. It is a good light, warm and steeped in life. However, it is symmetrical two limbs for either side and a trunk in the middle, that is a start.

It does not float, that much is clear, behind it it left tracks in the salt, the shapes are oval in nature or somewhere between an oval and another shape, it matches the bottom of two of the appendages at the base. So it moves, somehow, on two appendages without floating. Touching it, for their tendrils are very sensitive to touch, they feel at its shell, or it has to be a shell because the shell does not give off its light. The light is from the inside, from behind a clear layer.

The shell has a structure, it is very uniform, nothing that comes from nature. They can make things like this, though they do not bother to do so, for what does that have to do with light? So this creature wears a fake shell, that seems reasonable. Looking through the clear layer, at it’s true shape, the creature is very….

Squishy? 

Yes that appears to be the correct term, though they cannot be sure. Perhaps it is not squishy and they are just misleading themselves based on appearances. But if it is not a shell for their squishiness, than what is the shell for? They can see it’s temperature, the warmth of the light can tell them that, and it seems as if it would be comfortable. The surrounding are only a little cooler than its body.

So if that is not the case, then what is it.

They look closer, for that is their desire, and the light helps them to see. They must use other types of light, they must use these lights to see inside, and inside they find the shell does other things too. The shell holds gas, a gas that surrounds the creature on the inside, for the creature on the inside is smaller than the shell on the outside.

They can test this gas, and that is where they find it.

It is a very strange mixture of gases, mostly nitrogen, but some oxygen and carbon. That may be a problem, for their planet is very high in oxygen.

Another group returns, the group that continued onwards to find the disturbance. They did not get close as they sensed a great heat from the thing that had fallen from the sky. 

Fire.

Fire was not good when your planet had much oxygen, and you floated with hydrogen on your insides.

It seemed as if the two things were connected.

Perhaps the thing came from the fire, or from the thing previous to the time when it was on fire? 

But that was assuming time was linear.

The thing’s light is fading, that is a bad sign.

It may be required for them to remove the shell. 

They need to figure out how to do it though, the creature has appendages on the top that it does not use for walking, and at the end of those appendages, it has tendrils like theirs only shorter and more rigid. It is small, so they can assume the thing uses those to do its tasks. 

They are right, they find the answer, for if you twist at some parts and pull, the thing comes off.

***

He woke up to the sound of frantic beeping. 

That was not a good sign, that was his atmospheric indicator determining that he had a suit breach. Despite the ringing in his ears, he knew enough to know that. He didn’t know where the light was still too bright and his body was still in pain. But then, he felt it…. Something cold against the skin of his hands.

He knew nothing should be cold since the inside of his gloves were very warm.

He tried to open his eyes, finding that, strange, there was shade, and though it was bright, he could finally see. Thinking was harder though considering the pain his was still in, the throbbing of his head the the diplopia that mirrored every image over itself.

He felt sick.

The suit continued to beep.

He heard the sound next, and knew what was coming. The soft scraping and snick just beside his neck. 

Air rushed over his face, the beeping grew louder. 

And then the world coalesced around him. To his sides it was bright, to bright to look, but above him it was less so, he could stare upwards now, and he wasn’t immediately dead, though his helmet was gone. 

Something had taken off his helmet.

Why had it taken him this long to realize it?

He turned his head trying to find the source of his imminent death, and stops 

This time, it does not take him long to register surprise.

***

They were right, and wrong, the creature was squishy, though no completely, and now it was moving responding to their touch.

It hadn’t died yet, so that was good, though it did not get up and move like it was supposed to.

They reachout touching at it, at it’s strange appendages at the end of it’s upper limbs, at the soft fibers atop it’s head, and the strange rubbery surface about the top which gave off a great amount of light.

It is silent as far as they can tell though it had many strange openings in its body that flexed and moved. It’s light is still fading. They use their light again to look and found something very strange, a symmetrical pattern of scaffolding that held up the squishy parts of the creature. This scaffold is generally open except for the one about the head which is closed. There is lots of heat there, and their light could see inwards, a building pressure.

That did ot seem normal for it is not symmetrical like it should be.

They could fix that.

They know how. Though, the creature has gone limp under their appendages, they still work. It is their duty to save all sources of light. It didn’t take them long to release the pressure, and once that is done the light grows back up pulsing more evenly. Their radio chatter is one of incandescent excitement. Merrily, they float about in circles basking in the light from outside pleased that this little glimmer of light is still here.

***

He woke up without a ringing in his ears this time, and the light from outside wasn’t so horrible on his eyes, though he still attempted to shade his vision. It was a struggle though, trying to remember where his limbs were and what they were doing. He was still having trouble comprehending his place in space and where all his appendages were.

Something caressed the side of his face.

He tilted his head down flinching back and the strange blue-tipped thendral pulled back away from him. At first he thought it was some sort of snake, and nearly panicked, but that didn’t seem right, so he followed the body of the tendral bak and upwards.

Still groggy, that didn’t stop his mouth from falling open in stunned amazement.

Stunned amazement as the alien creature floated over him.

***

The creature notices them now, they cannot tell how since it does not respond to their light, it is completely silent. They reach out with their tendrils feeling the creature, the fibers on its head, the soft outer covering. It pulls away from them at first hunkering bac against the ground, but as they continue, it seems to grow curious responding to their touch with touch of its own.

Its five protrusion appendages reach out trailing gently down their skin. 

They tremble with delight.

It continues to reach towards them with it’s strange appendage, and one of their number reaches out wrapping a tendril around the appendage searching and feeling at the structure underneath. The creature is gentle and does not pull away. THey like this creature, it makes light and though they cannot fathom or understand it, there is something about the way it touches them.

It seems curious, just like them.

Just like the did before, it wraps its own protrusions around their tendrils. It is warm giving off heat with it’s light. This close, it’s heat is like the face of the sun cold spots giving it distinct character as it plays with them, though something is wrong. It’s light isn’t working again…. Had they done something wrong.”

***

He was growing very dizzy, and the muscles in his face would not stop twitching. He gently unwinded a tentacle from his wrist careful not to spook the creature that floated over him. It was curious like you would expect an octopus to be, and it did remind him of one like some weird sort of elephant squid. It was large, maybe six feet in length from the bottom of it’s two long tentacles to the top of it’s ‘head’.

On either side of its body, there were two large flaps, which it slowly used to maneuver flopping back and forth as it floated. IT floated primarily with the help of some sort of sack on the back of its body, not dissimilar to the Vrul. It had four eyes in a diamond pattern towards the top of its head, though as far as he could tell it did not hear seeing as it had not reacted to his voice. 

Did he sense a sudden agitation in their numbers as they move in again beginning to prod at him with their tendrils once more.

One brushes itself down his face again, feeling at his head where, he had received somewhat of a knock during the crash. The dizziness was getting worse, as was the facial twitch.

He knew these signs, and desperately reached for the components of his suit, lying neatly beside him. The creatures pulled away floating about him in a wide circle.

He pulled a glove on and snapped it into place.

He turned to reach for the other finding one of the creatures had wrapped a tentacle around his other glove and was slowly reaching out towards him.

He took the offering gently and snapped the glove on.

He turned for his helmet, but had been beaten to it. With delicate movements slowed as if they moved through water, two of the creatures maneuvered the helmet over his head lowering it down and twisting it until it snapped in place.

Oxygen levels high, toxicity imminent, lowering oxygen output.

He took a deep breath. A tendril patted the outside of his helmet like an old granny pats the cheek of her grandchild.

He couldn't help but smile stroking his hand along the length of the tendril like he was petting a dog. 

***

The light has returned, they are pleased, though they worry as another disturbance breaks the atmosphere. It is bright, bright like a second star, but it is fire, and fire is dangerous, they pull back watching as the fire descends from the sky. They do not move though, the creature does not move, but they cannot be sure it sees the disturbance at all. Things died down, and then a group of small lights appear over the wasteland.

They move without floating leaving trails of light behind them.

They pull back as the things pull closer slowly moving towards them. It is as if they are communicating with each other though there can be no possible way for them to do so seeing as they do not make noise and the light they commit is a steady pulse. They emit light like the first and slowly approach in a group.

The creature is not alone.

There are more of them, and they descend from the sky to walk on the ground.

As they observe, the first creature reaches out to them like it had done before. They are hesitant, but they follow suit wrapping tendrils around the proffered appendage. It returns their touch with touch of it’s own, and the group of its friends follow.

Another holds out an appendage like the first, and though they are cautious, they give it over, and the creature is just as gentle and curious.

They like to think that the creatures are thanking them for helping one of their own, and sadly they have to watch the creature go, wobbling back across the salt to return to the sky from where it came.

They were not likely to understand the silent creature.

But they did appreciate its curiosity.

The little light that had come to visit them, before returning to the sky.

Like a star

-

So I found this in my things the other day, and it is an alien design for the first space orcs book idea I had that I ended up scrapping. They were designed specifically to be as different form humans as possible, unable to stand us in any way.

I completely forgot about them, but then if you look at the bottom of the page you can see what I named them, “The Kril” and then I realized that they are the inspiration for my character Krill, who like them, can float, is plant based, and can see in infrared .

Guys these crazy dudes are the inspiration for Krill!

I thought they deserved to be resurrected.

Now I just need a good name for them, Comment if you have any ideas :)

. 

[certifiedskywalker]

Bounty, Meet Hunter (Part Two) Din Djarin (The Mandalorian)

Originally requested by chritsiandior

In Part One:

“You’ll have to stay around to find out.” That and your name, you thought to yourself with a smile.

With that teasing response, the Mandalorian turned and stomped back up to the cockpit. Once he was out of sight, you looked around the ship. You could make this work. As the thought entered your mind, you looked back up to the cockpit only to catch the shine of the Mandalorian’s helmet. Yeah, you could definitely make this work. 

Now, for Part Two:

You’re not used to working on a team. A life of crime and scraping by made trust a hard thing to find; let alone foster. But something about this Mandalorian kept you around. Call it fate, call it the Force, you were willing to make things work. Even when budding feelings made things more complicated.

“You got what?”

“Four bounties.” As he spoke, the Mandalorian threw a bunch of tracking fobs down in your lap. All four of them were active, red lights blinking steadily.

“So the phrase ‘stop and smell the meiloorun blooms’ means nothing to you?”

“Nope.”

“Chit, Mando,” you grumbled. “We have enough credits to-”

“Set course to Corellia. After we capture the target, we can refuel in their ports.” The Mandalorian took his spot in the pilot’s chair.

Your eyes widened. “Corellia?”

“Yes,” he replied coolly. As he plotted the course, he pushed off your feet from where you were resting them on the console. What had been a bad habit was now your favorite way to annoy him. Although, the idea of visiting Corellia killed any joy pissing off the Mandalorian would have brought to you. That planet was a death wish.

“You do realize that the entire sector was under Imperial control right? And that Corellia was the center of the Empire’s industry?” 

Mando turned his head and you could feel the incredulous look he was giving you, even from under his helmet. He didn’t have to speak for you to hear the implied ‘really?’.

“The place is in ruins since the Empire’s fall! Gangs, syndicates, and the like!”

“Scared you’ll run into someone you know?” Your mouth fell open at his question but you promptly shut it, unwilling to let on about your worries. Instead you forced a mask of confidence over your features and smiled bitterly.

“I would never gamble on Corellia. Laying bets on a Core World is throwing yourself into a Sarlacc pit, no Hutt needed.”

Mando let out a huff and turned back to the steering apparatus. “Then it sounds like we have nothing to fear. Setting course to Corellia.”

You scooted up in your seat to peer out the viewport. The sand of Nevarro swirled up as the engine of the Razor Crest roared to life. Almost like snow, the sand fell back to the ground. You wouldn’t miss this place, even with how much you wanted to sit still for a while. Perhaps the Mandalorians’ work ethic was rubbing off on you. 

Or maybe, you were glad to leave behind the planet where the Mandalorian could easily collect the bounty still placed on your head. Each time you landed on Nevarro, the trust you put in the Mandalorian was tested. Though, you imagined, whenever he was alone with you, Mandos’ trust in you wavered as well. Resigned, you leaned back in your seat a sighed.

“Who are we after?” You asked as the planet’s surface disappeared. The sand dunes became obscured by the haze of grey clouds and smoke that lingered in Nevarros’ atmosphere.

“Far right fob,” the Mandalorian answered, too engrossed in flight to show you. You sighed and grabbed the blinking fob.

 If working with Mando had taught you anything it was that it was better to be informed about a target than to charge blindly after them. The first few bounties you worked with the Mandalorian didn’t end with full payment; some without any payment, for that matter. You had fallen back on your impulsive ways, much to your detriment and your new partner’s pocketbook. Now, more than a few cycles in, you had fallen in line with the ways of bounty hunting; most of them, at least. 

“I need the holo-display,” you muttered as you stood up from your seat. You sidestepped over to the console where the slot for the holo-display was. When you leaned over, your shoulder knocked against the Mandalorians’. The smell of ash and smoke from Nevarro still clung to his armor. Both were scents you felt familiar with now; scents you associated with a feeling of safety. You hadn’t felt safe in...

You shifted to break yourself from your thoughts and inadvertently knocked your shoulder against your partner’s harder than before. “Sorry, Mando, gotta read.”

He let out a scoff as he turned back to the main viewport and rolled his shoulders. You couldn’t stop the smile that spread on your lips. For a man of few words, he was more expressive than any person you had ever met and you had met a lot of people. Granted, they weren’t always good people. Was Mando a good person?

Before you could dwell on the question further, the hologram flickered to life and projected the face of your bounty. “A Devaonrian?”

“You know the species?” Mando asked as he pulled the lever to initiate lightspeed. The force of the movement had you taking a step back to brace yourself. You scowled and studied the hologram closer and nodded.

“Hard to miss ‘em with horns like those. They like to gamble too.” You squinted to read more of the displayed information. “Cikatro Vizago...that name sounds…”  

“Familiar? I thought it would,” the Mandalorian said smoothly. The slightest twinge of pride in his modulated voice did not go by unmissed. “Ex-crime lord and renowned smuggler who founded the Broken Horn Syndicate on Lothal.”

“Vizago, he worked with the Rebellion. I remember hearing about how Broken Horn was dissolved. Didn’t he fight for the New Republic?”

“He did,” your partner replied and you furrowed your brow. “Read.”

“Wanted for violation of Ordinance 20098-B and…flying a spacecraft without a Class-One Wavier.” Your eyes widened and you leaned closer in disbelief. “New Republic laws...the Senate put a bounty on him?”

“The Guild doesn’t ask questions.” You smiled broadly and shook your head. 

“You only say that when I get too close for comfort or too close to being right.”

“Then you should take the hint,” the Mandalorian said sharply. You watched as he checked on the navigation system that tracked the jump through hyperspace. The Corellia system grew closer with each passing second. “You should sit. We’re coming up on Corellia.”

“Yeah, yeah,” you ejected the fob from the holo-display and took your seat. Throwing your arms behind your head you reclined and kicked your feet up on the console. “But a Class-One Wavier? What is that? Enlighten me, Mando.”

“Allows flight and landing privileges to spacecraft that don’t meet standard specifications and regulations.” He reached over and pushed your feet off the console. “Enlightened?”

“And what is Ordinance-”

The Mandalorian scoffed before you could ask your question in full. You shut your mouth and peered at your moody partner as he reached for the nearest lever on the console. 

“The Guild doesn’t ask questions.”

“Good thing I’m not technically Guild then, huh?”

“Leaving hyperspace now.” You smiled to yourself and Mando pushed the lever down. A moment later, a war-torn planet was all you saw.

The Corellia was just as desolate as Nevarro, although in a different sense of the word. Whereas Nevarro lacked a hearty population, Corellia was missing something else. A means to support its people or was it hope? One thing you were certain the industrial world was missing was proper sanitation. As an Ex-Imperial Core planet, you had assumed the more residential sectors would be relatively clean. You were grossly mistaken.  

The streets, riddled with potholes and excrement, served as a horrible mixing pot of odor. Scents of sweat and urine mingled with the acrid smell of fuel. The air of Corellia could only be described as disgustingly sharp. Smoke trailing out of plume on the tops of factories stung your nose and made your eyes water. Sadly, the tears did nothing to mask the ruddy, emaciated faces of the people wandering around storefronts and ramshackle huts. 

“I got a bad feeling about this,” you whispered as you trotted alongside the Mandalorian. With careful eyes, you glanced around and watched all those you passed as they watched you. Although they weren’t watching you; their eyes were glued on the Mandalorian. “Everyone is staring.”

“Keep your eyes to yourself,” he huffed as he kept walking.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Mando?”

“It means,” he veered suddenly to the left, his hand grabbing your elbow and dragging you along with him. It took everything you had to ignore how your stomach flipped at his touch.

Before you could speak up, your back was pressed up against an alley wall. Mandos’ hand, the one that still wasn’t holding your arm, was pressed against the wall near your head. Your entire vision was filled by his armor. Heat gathered between you and you thought back to the first day you met the Mandalorian; when you had taunted and teased him in the hopes of escape. Now, you found it hard to speak and you didn’t want to leave.

“Mando-”

“It means we have to be careful,” he said in a low voice. You looked into the visor of his helmet and you swore, just as a guard droids’ light shone red, you could see some glint in his masked eyes. A pregnant pause consumed you both and, sensing it, Mando let his arm fall to his side. “The shipyard is this way.”

Your eyes never left him as he let go of your arm and strode down the length of the alley. After allowing yourself a moment to catch your breath, you pushed off from the wall. There was no time to dwell on the feelings that swelled up in your chest. 

“Could’ve jus’ told me that,” you hissed as you started after him. 

Flapping in the slight breeze, you caught the sight of the Mandalorians’ cloak as he rounded the corner. You picked up your speed and followed his swift shadow. As you turned out of the alley, your eyes widened. You felt the tension in your muscles relax at the sight that greeted you.

A tower of Imperial design, all sharp edges and gray stone was split in half. The walls that still stood were covered in carbon scoring and blaster holes. Bricks and machinery from within toppled over leaving the interior of the building exposed like an open wound. A wound that not even the Empire could recover from. 

You let a content smile spread along your lips; the confusion from before fading from your mind. “I’ll never get tired of seeing the Empire in ruins.”

“Focus, bounty,” the Mandalorian grumbled. You gritted your teeth at the nickname.

“I have a name, ya know,” you snapped, “and I’m not a bounty anymore.”

“Tell that to the two thousand credits on your head,” he fired back. 

A small gasp slipped out from between your lips. “Only two thousand?”

“It’s the standard payment for someone like y-” He paused and turned his helmet away from you; he was looking at the building now. You, on the other hand, were still staring at him, anger bubbling up inside of you. How could you be so easily quantified?

“Standard? I’m worth a standard-”

“Move!”

Just as the Mandlorians’ order reached your ears, you let your eyes divert back to the ruined, Imperial tower. A large, yellow-white ball of flame suddenly erupted out from the rocky depths. Adrenaline rushed through your limbs but before you could start running, Mando was rushing towards you. With an outstretched arm, he captured in you a hapless embrace and threw you, and himself, to the ground. The impact knocked the air from your lungs. 

“Stay down!” 

The Mandalorian yelled above the rumbling of the explosion. You curled closer to the pavement despite how the metal and rocks below bit into your skin. As you moved, your head knocked against the beskar of the Mandalorian’s chest. If you had the courage, you would have opened your eyes to look at him one last time. Maybe even thanked him for your second chance at life.

Instead, you pressed yourself as close to him as possible. His arm tightened around you and, for a moment, you felt regret. You didn’t even know his name. How could you thank him without knowing him? You were about to try, readying yourself to shout out your gratitude just before a flaming death engulfed you both; only, that death never came. 

Heat licked at your boots but came no further. You waited a moment longer, giving whatever looming darkness a chance to finally take you. Yet, there was still nothing. Timidly, you opened your eyes as you felt the Mandlorian’s arm slip off of your waist. You watched as he got to his feet, crouching down for cover as he glanced around.

He stood up to his full height after a scan of the area and extended his hand to you. You reached out for it and stumbled to your feet at his side. Smoke hit your nose and the back of your throat as you took a breath. Coughing fits gripped you with a vengeance and you had to grab the Mandalorian’s shoulder for support.  

“Are you alright?” You nearly choked at the concern in his voice before you nodded.

“What was that? Was that our guy?” He looked out towards the tower that now reduced to smoldering bouts of rubble. You watched as he took a step forward and bent down. One of his gloved hands reached down and thumbed at some of the fresh ash. “Mando?”

With his ash-free hand, he pulled a tool compartment from his belt. Shining under the dim light of the Coreillan sky was the glass of a microlense. It was a tool you were familiar with from your engineer training. The lense was used to find microscopic fractures, leaks, and blockages in the fine-tuned pipes of droids and small spacecraft. 

“Mando?”

“Ordinance 20098-B,” he said coldly. He lifted the microlense for you to take and stood up by your side. You wrapped your fingers around the handle and raised a brow at him. “Look.”

Warily, you leaned forward and put the microlense up to your eye. When the lense focused on the Mandalorians’ gloved hand, the image was foggy. Scowling, you pulled back and adjusted one of the dials on the handle of the lense. When you looked back, the image sharper, alarmingly clear. The sight was full of insect-like bodies although they were far from natural organisms.

“Nano-droids? Those were…” You pulled your face from the microlense and looked at the Mandalorian. He let the ash fall from his hands and took a step towards the remains of the tower.

“Banned,” he finished for you. “NM-K reconstitutors, specifically.”

“So...Ordinance 2…” 

“Contraband,” Mando took the lense from your hand and shoved it back into his belt. “We need to keep going. The bomb was a distraction. We’re close.”

Just as he was about to take a step forward, you grabbed his arm. “Whoa there! You want to head towards the explosion, right behind the guy with nano-droid bombs?”

“We have a bounty,” he said, turning to face you. There was something cold in the helmet when you looked at him. Something tense in the way he held himself. He was angry.

“Yeah, but not a death wish,” you fired back. He pulled his arm from your grasp and shook his head. “Mando, don’t get laserbrained on me now! We need to go!”

Despite being the Mandalorians’ partner for many complete cycles now, you were still learning things. You had never seen him angry before, at least you had never been unable to read it so plainly in his posture. Including his name and his face, there were other things about the man you didn’t know. So you weren’t entirely surprised when he ignored your pleading and ran off into the smoking ruins of the tower.

 However, you were surprised when you followed him.

You weren’t as coordinated or practiced as the Mandalorian was at moving through the rugged terrain. Although, when you looked up in his direction, he too was stumbling through the broken stones. Somehow, you managed to catch up with him. So much so that you nearly stepped on his cloak as it whipped with his every stride. 

“We better get paid well for this.” 

Your quip was half-hearted for, as you spoke, you lept from the rubble and into the main, somewhat cleared plaza right outside of the tower’s entrance. The putrid smell of Coreilla’s inhabited sector was replaced by the near-chemical odor of melting metal. It was so strong that it left a taste in your mouth that made your face screw up in disgust. There was little, no, there was no time to make a remark about the horrid conditions. Mando was already moving again.

You followed him as he turned sharply to the right. As the scent of stone and metal faded, the dense, overpowering stench of fuel filled your nostrils. There was no escaping it as you and the Mandalorian neared the shipyards. With every step, you grew more and more nervous.

Nano-droids could be placed anywhere. There could be some clinging to the bottom of your boots, dormant and waiting to be activated. If Vizago was smart he would have spread the little explosives out behind him; like the portion bread in that old Twi’lek tale about the lost children. Sadly, there was no ‘estimated intelligence’ section in the bounty file.

“There’s his cruiser,” the Mandalorian pointed over to a strange-looking vessel. It had to be more custom than Mandos’ own Razor Crest. Sharp, horn-like cones of metal stuck out from around the thrusters of the ship.

“Leave it to a Devaonrian to-”

“Well, well, it seems you’ve finally caught up with me!” There was no mistaking the Devaron accent or the shadow that suddenly loomed on the ground before you and Mando. “Perhaps I can offer you a better deal, yes?”

Before the Mandalorian could speak up, you started to laugh. “Don’t try it. He doesn’t take deals from bounties. I would know.”

You could feel the Mandalorians’ gaze on you. The piercing stare had you turning to look at him sheepishly. You shrugged and, wordlessly, the Mandalorian took a step towards Cikatro Vizago. The green-skinned humanoid shifted and his large, right ear twitched; something you just barely saw.

“We can bring you in warm or we can bring you in cold.”

We, he said we. You snuck a glance at the Mandalorian, a curiously content little peek at him, your partner. A warm sense of pride ran through you that nearly made your brush with death worth it. Nearly. You still didn’t know his name.

“You forget third option,” Vizago snarled, “you die.”

So much for your pride and ever knowing Mandos’ name.

“I have placed many nano-droids around my ship. If you dare to come get me, you will...explode.” Vizago’s pointed right ear flicked once more. “You die right here unless you let me go.” Another flick. You smiled.

“He’s lying,” you whispered. The sound of beskar clinking caught your attention and you looked to see the Mandalorian looking at you again. “He’s got a tell.”

He didn’t have to speak for you to know his hesitation. You needed him to believe you.

“Trust me,” you pleaded quietly, “really trust me.”

Silently, he dipped his head and pushed his cloak to the side. He pulled his blaster out of its holster slowly, almost teasingly. You looked back up to Vizago whose eyes were now wide enough for you to see the fear within despite the distance. He pulled his own weapon out of his belt although it was no weapon at all.

“Stop this,” he said, panic evident in his tone. “I will activate the droids. You will die.” A bloom of nerves twisted in your gut. The confidence you felt in reading the Devaonrians bluff was now faltering. You bit your lip and tried your best not to show your worry. You had asked the Mandalorian to trust you; the least you could do was trust yourself. 

You glanced back to Mando who was now stepping towards Vizago, blaster gripped tightly in his hand. It was alarming, how smooth, fluid the Mandalorian’s steps were. You could only imagine how many times prior he had done this. It was probably impossible to count how many times he had to face down his bounty. You had only bore witness to it a handful of times but the sight never failed to impress you.

“You’re one of the last of your kind, Mandalorian,” Vizago snapped. His caustic tone stung even you. You half expected Mando to stop, ask the criminal what he meant. But Mando had a job to do. “You are a dying breed.”

Without stopping, the Mandalorian lifted his blaster and aimed it true. The Devaonrian let out a hearty shout and threw the activator towards the two of you. In the second after, Mando fired. A blue stun bolt shot from the end and struck Vizago in the chest. He fell to his knees and you let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

You rushed towards the activator switch and pluck it from the ground. In your hand, loose wires tickled your palm and you smiled to yourself. 

“It’s not even a switch,” you called out to Mando. 

He was already striding over the Vizago and cuffing his wrists. When you looked up, the Devaonrian was sat up against a near by storage unit and Mando was walking inside the oddly designed ship. You stood at the end of the loading ramp and watched the familiar beskar helmet become shrouded in shadows. Nervously, you shifted an waited for your partner to return.

“Mando?” You took a step up the ramp to get a better glimpse inside. As you moved, the Mandalorian came out and you nearly ran into his chest. Before you could, his hands reached for your arms and caught you. “Sorry.”

“How did you know?”

“What?” His hands were still on you, the touch more distracting than you could have ever imagined.

“How did you know he was lying?”

“Oh, his uh, his ears. Back when I...I played Sabacc with a Devaonrian and every time he had a good hand his ears would twitch.” Mando’s head cocked to the side and you shrugged. “Guess that tells are consistent in species.”

“Seems that way,” he replied, his hands still grasping your arms. It took all you had not to pull away for fear you might lean into his touch. After a moment, the Mandalorian seemed to sense the tension growing between you. He let his hands fall and said, “the client will meet us in the shipyard. They tracked the ship here.”

“Wait. They tracked the ship?” The Mandalorian started to walk past you in the hopes of ignoring you. “Why didn’t they just pick up this guy then?”

You followed him out of the ship as he strode towards Vizago. He turned around sighed. The sound was enough to make you smile. You knew exactly what he was going to say.

“The Guild doesn’t-”

“Ask questions, yeah, I know.” You sat down on a storage box as the Mandalorian check Vizagos’ vitals. “He good?”

“He’s alive,” he says as he straightens. He stands by your side, the visor of the helmet not ever leaving your captured bounty. 

You nodded and turned your eyes to your fiddling hands. Your nerves were still alight and bouncing through your limbs as residual adrenaline ran off. There were so many questions you wanted to ask. What’s your name? What do you look like? Why are you so blasted stubborn?!

But the question that came out was something else entirely. 

“So...nano-droids...what’s the deal?” The Mandalorian turned and glanced at you before going back to Vizago. “I mean...you were so angry.” 

“There were used in the Clone Wars.”

“The Clone Wars? That feels so long ago. Why are you-”

“They were developed by the Separatists, used in their droid armies.” Mando shifted, visibly uneasy about this topic. There was something there, below the armor he wore and something he kept close to his chest. Losses in war were often kept that way.

“You don’t like droids?”

He glanced down at you and all you felt was cold. “No, I don’t.”

“I don’t either, at least not the killing kind,” you said softly. “I didn’t know my parents and during the war I came under...servitude, we’ll call it.”

“Slavery?” You looked up at him and swallowed hard. For years, you hadn’t let yourself think of your early days. 

“Servitude,” you continued, “it was where I learned about ships and the like.” You stopped speaking then, let your tongue still so you could catch up with your thoughts. You felt dirty digging up and talking about your past. It would be better to leave the dead to their silent graves; but you were alive. You were alive, thanks to the man standing at you side and you wanted to tell someone your story. Who knew how long either of you had left. 

“I worked and worked. There wasn’t ever any stopping,” you lifted your eyes to Mando, “that’s why I gave you sucha hard time on Nevarro. But uh, anyway, I worked enough to get myself out of servitude and wanted...I wanted something more.”

“Smuggling and gambling,” Mando said coolly and you nodded with a slightly embarrassed smile. 

“Yeah, smuggling and gambling.” You turned you gaze down to your boots. “But then you came around and...I found that something. Even if that something isn’t what I imagined it would be. So, uh, thanks.”

Shyly, you let your eyes travel back to the Mandalorian and found that he was already looking at you. His body language was no longer nervous. Instead, his arms were loose at his side and his shoulders, almost always tense, were slumped. He was listening, you realized and that alone made your chest tighten.

“How sweet, the little thing likes you, ‘Mando’,” Vizago’s rough accent broke through the moment and pulled you from your thoughts. The helmeted head of the Mandalorian turned and stared down the older Devaonrian. “How charming you must be.”

You swallowed hard and shook your head. The tension was there and if a criminal could feel it, that meant that Mando, despite all his seriousness, could too. A sigh slipped past your lips and you looked up to the overcast skies of Coreilla in hopes of some escape. What you saw was a strangely shaped darkness and you heard a low hum in the air.

“I would stay quiet.”

“Why is that?”

You stood up as a ship, a lightweight freighter, broke through the clouds. “Your ride is here.”

The hexagon-shaped ship slowly descended, trailed down with a strong gust of wind as it landed. Sections of it’s metal shell were painted a bright, yellowish orange that was broken up by carbon scoring. This ship had seen war, battle after battle for years. Your well trained eyes could see every repair to it’s underbelly: from the patches of discolored metal to cover severe damage to the hissing hydraulics of the loading ramp as it lowered.

You watched, eager to see the client that, most likely, worked with the Senate to put the bounty on Vizago’s head. New Republic officials were said to be young but wise and so very eloquent. You had seen holomovies of Mon Mothma and the spunky Princess from Alderaan. Little did you care for politics but you did like their speeches.

So when an older, middle-aged Twi’lek with light green skin, wearing a rather ratty looking flight suit made her way down the ramp, you were shocked. There was something bright in her blue eyes that made you feel small, yet safe all at once.

“No,” Vizago murmured, “no. Is not possible!”

“Oh, but it is, Vizago. I would like to thank both of you for this undertaking,” her voice was gentle, yet stern; almost motherly. She was something of a contradiction. The Mandalorian dipped his head and you gave the Twi’lek a slightly skittish smile.

“No problem,” you swallowed, “as long as you have the credits.” Despite you sudden lack of tact, the Twi’lek woman smiled.

“Yes,” she pulls a pouch from her suit and handed it over. Mando outstretched his hand and took it. “I do hope that he wasn’t too much trouble.”

“He blew up part of a tower,” you quipped, setting your hands on your hips.

“Was anyone injured?” The Twi’lek’s eyes went wide with fear.

“No one lives in the old Imperial sector,” Mando explained. The Twi’lek let out a breath of relief.

“The New Republic will send relief to Coreilla as soon as this criminal is tried. I’ll make sure of it. But, for now.” Reading between the lines of her words, Mando stooped low and pulled Vizago to his feet.

“His contraband is inside,” you jabbed your thumb behind you in a gesture towards Vizago’s ship. The Twi’lek nodded and dipped her head. With the movement, her long lekku fell from over her slim shoulders. She pulled herself back to attention and smiled.

“The rest of my crew will handle it. Thank you, and the Guild, for your service. I wish I could say the Senate would be pleased to work with you again.”

With that, the Twi’lek turned and pulled a worried-looking Vizago aboard the freighter. You glanced at the Mandalorian and found he was already walking out of the shipyard. Quickly, you followed after him and back to the Razor Crest. 

“So, where to next?” You asked as you plunked down in your seat. The Mandalorian turned in the pilot’s chair to glance at you and you raised your brows. “What?”

“Where do you want to go?”

You were taken aback by his question. Without a word, your mouth fell open and you blinked absently a few times. Mando scoffed, an almost chuckled, and you shook your head.

“I-I, I don’t know. I mean,” you leaned over and pulled out the three, active tracking fobs that remained. “We got more of these. One’s on Tatooine. That could be fun.”

“If you wanted to stop working for a cycle, I would understand, Y/N.” Your name; he had used your name and it sounded so natural coming from him. The Mandalorians’ voice was also different as he spoke. There was something soft in it and it made you melt. You fought to keep back the smile that threatened to spread along your lips. He had listened.

“I’m good, Mando.”

“Din.” 

You furrowed your brow. “What?”

“My name is Din.” Your eyes widen as the new knowledge rolled in your mind. So lost in the sound of his name, you didn’t notice as Mando, as Din, removed one of his gloves. He stood and extended his bared hand to you. 

You took a moment to study his palms. His fingers weren’t long but not really shirt; his nails were blunt and, somehow under the gloves he wore, there were calluses on his skin. Before, you had focused on imagining what his face looked like. Never before had you considered what his hands looked like or how much effect seeing them could have on you.

It took all you had to pull yourself out of your own mind. You found what confidence you had left and took his hand. Din’s skin was rough but you liked how it felt against your own. At the feeling, a natural smile spread along your lips.

“Well, then I can thank you properly.” You gave his hand a shake. “Thank you, Din.”

You liked to think that Din was smiling as widely as you were underneath his helmet. You liked to think that there was questioning the trust between you and Din now.

At some point, you stopped shaking his hand but Din did not let go. Not right away at least. Although he let your hand drop after you gave his a small squeeze. He turned back to the control console of the Razor Crest and sat back down in his seat. Din slipped his glove back on and flicked a few switches.

“So, Tatooine?” 

Your smile remained glued to your features as you reclined back in your seat. Proudly, you set your booted feet up on a cleared portion of the console and sighed.

“Yeah, I have a good feeling about it.” You heard your partner sigh before he pulled the lever to bring jump into hyperspace.

[lovemissmini]

I Found you

Synopsis: We all need a friend. Sometimes you have to find one to gain one. Especially in this post-apocalyptic world.

Pairing: Taehyung X Reader

Warnings:  Post-apocalypse, reader might not be 100% sane, hints of death, not much action. PG13

Length: ~2k

A/N: I would go crazy if I was all alone for 6 months, no questions asked.

All works here are purely fiction. Everything I write is my intellectual property and therefore belongs to me. Lovemissmini © . Do not copy, rewrite, repost without my permission. That is illegal and you are stealing no matter if you give credit or not.

“If it weren’t for you, Tae, I would have gone crazy a loooong time ago. Hmm?” You spare a glance towards your companion before you continued your babbling. “It’s just, six year, who wouldn’t go insane in that amount of time. All alone. No one to talk to.”

You nod to yourself, sinking deeper into the worn-out armchair, letting the cheap cushioning quickly engulfing your thin form. Human interaction had become a strange topic for you, just like the concept of keeping track of time. Did it really matter what day of the week it was? It’s not like you had a job or anything. So, what did it matter if you woke up at 1 in the afternoon or ate during the deadly hours of dawn? Hell, why do you even care about the number of times the sun rose before it ultimately set to make the end of the day. One day or six years, tomato tomato.

You should stop. Your mind was wandering off on a tangent even whilst you continued to hold a conversation on a separate matter, yet again. Your thoughts always did that, wander off, that is, into an incoherent multitude of ideas. That’s just how your brain worked. Or maybe that’s your insanity talking.

“But I’m lucky to have found you, yeah?”

You look out of the window of your new living room, into the streets and the cars that haphazardly littered the cracked roads and pavement. Room, that’s quite an interesting word choice. It might be too generous a word for the space where you were seated as of now. A room would imply an enclosed area with a roof above your head and at least three connected walls and some form of a door or partition. Right?

But your choice of temporary lodging was, to be honest, not quite the conventional image you would associate with that word. The best you could truly say about said room was that it was once a room. All that was left was remnants of a living room; the lone standing section of the street facing wall decorated with a broken window frame, piles of brick from the other less fortunate walls scattering the surrounding chaos, broken scraps of furniture thrown around you in a disordered arrangement.

At least it had a mostly intact armchair and couch. Right? Yeah, so who care. Life is good.

“I mean, you’re lucky I found you. Hella lucky at that.”

The lack of a roof let the evening sun beamed down on you from the sky, heating up your skin and leaving a warm tingle as your fingers played with the loose threads of the chair, twirling them around your finger absentmindedly.

“Hey, are you just gonna keep ignoring me? I said I was sorry for nearly leaving you behind last time. I even got you a new shirt to make up for it.” You huff in frustration, glaring at said shirt that fitted around your partner; a black and white abstract collage of spikey leaves artistically decorating the thin material, beautifully trimmed into what was now button up shirt that sported a deliciously deep v neckline. It was slightly revealing but not quite, just enough to give a hint of what was underneath but leave you wanting more.

“That shirt is in so much better condition than anything I’m wearing right now.” A scowl pulled at your lips as you regard the tattered t-shirt that clung to your skin, dirt discolouring the once yellow fabric into a murky brown and the pair of barely held together ripped jeans, denim threatened to fall off your thin waist even after being tied tightly by a belt.

You abruptly get up, palms slamming down on the arms of your chair, sudden movement causing ancient dusk to explode from deep within the fibres and into a thick cloud that surrounded you. You push past the brown haze of floating particles- ignoring the need to cough from the putrid smell- and close the distance between you and your companion.

“Listen here you ungrateful piece of shit! You don’t get to ignore me. I found you so I make the rules. I can leave you when and if I want. Capish?” Your voice breaks through the otherwise silent atmosphere before dissipating into the distance. Your eyes were hard with anger, veins bulging in your neck from the strain, as you glared at the unseeing eyes of your companion.

You blink, veins running cold as you realise your sudden outburst. It was uncalled for. Regret slowly filtered into your system, weighing you down like lead. You take deep slow breaths, trying to calm your racing heart and the roar pulsing in your ears.

“I’m sorry.” You voice is barely a whisper when you come through, a slight quiver at the last syllable and thick with guilt. The crimson in your cheeks fading as you settle down next to your companion on the couch, eyes shifting to gauge their reaction- or lack of one in this case.

“I’ll forgive you if you forgive me.” You joke, a small chuckle trying to defuse the tension that hung heavy in the air. Your hands betray the cheerfulness mask you donned, thumb rubbing the barcode inked into the skin of your left wrist, in a nervous habit that first formed in the lab. “I- uh- well, I forgive you too. Just because I like how handsome you and your stupidly symmetrical face are.”

There was no response. At least none out loud. In fact, there never was a reply out loud from your companion since you found them five years ago, and never would be. The only replies you earned were ones spoken to back of your mind, a deep voice echoing your subliminal thoughts back to you, answering your conscious questions. You companion, the top half of a male mannequin, would never grow a set of vocal cords to voice the replies you longed to actually hear.

If someone were to ever talk to you, question who it was you were talking to, you would have simply stated it was to yourself. Because that would mean you were never alone to begin with, never needing to talk to a humanoid piece of plastic. Right?

But there was no one else.

There no one left, no one ever since that happened six years ago.

“Anyway, let’s go. I want to see what that blinking light was from last night.” You announce as you get up from the two-seater, tossing on your backpack as you stand waiting for your partner to get up with you. You roll your eyes at the lack of movement in your peripheral view, head turning to throw a glare at its plastic form still seated on the couch. “Get up you lazy ass. Get up or I’ll carry you.”

You stand there for a moment longer, waiting for its plastic muscles to twitch under the heavy weight of your gaze. But your effects are yet again fruitless, the only signs of motion par your breathing was the dust dancing weightlessly in the air, illuminated by the setting sun as the specks float carelessly around you.

You sigh, giving up your side of the stalemate and pick up the oversized plastic excuse of a friend. The weak muscles of your arms ache under the burden, straining to produce a strong grip as you walk out onto the streets.

As you venture further into the deserted mass of torn buildings, further into the what could barely be recognised as Seoul, you reach the glass doors of a seemingly intact corporate building. The name of the facility standing tall and proud on the metal door frame, as if in celebration of its survival, almost unscathed par from the broken glass and a missing letter, the skyscraper was rather untouched.

“B-um-Bigit. HA. Sounds a lot like bigot, doesn’t it, Tae?” You muse, as you shift the plastic deadweight in your arms to a more comfortable position.

After exploring the bottom floors of building, going through countless office draws and lab cabinets, you filled up the most of your backpack with expired food items and multiple water bottles. Still, you had yet to find the source of the blinking lights you had seen last night.

“Maybe its further up?” You question out loud.

“Yeah, you’re right Tae, it must be one of the top floors. How else would I have seen it amongst the other buildings?” A grin splits your dry lips, tongue darting out to wet the cracked skin- ignoring the lingering taste of dirt.

“You’re so smart, bud, what would I do without you?”

You continue your journey up, scavenging through every nook and cranny of each floor before arriving at the top landing. A gasp leaves you lips, eyes widening as you look out from the doorway of the staircase and into the concrete floorplan. A glint of excitement sparked in your eyes, much like it did when you found a can of peaches.

The 16th floor was so different to the lower levels, barren like a construction site but shielded under large planes of glass and metal frames in a greenhouse-like roof. Moonlight filtered through the clear glass, illuminating the area in a milky wash of pale white and harsh shadows.

The grey concrete floor was littered with giant solar panels, all scattered methodically around three capsules that laid in the middle of everything. Walking forward, you trotted down the empty path that connected the doorway directly to the capsules, careful not to touch the electronics barricading you on either side.

The capsules were large, large enough to fit a person, you note to yourself as you walk past the first two. Or maybe a giant alligator, you never know.

You don’t bother inspecting two pods, both dark and most likely damaged as a large piece of metal beam speared the centre of one, a thick layer of dried green mould covered the cracked glass panels of the other, obscuring the view of what you assumed was the face of whoever it coffined. Not that you cared.

They were not of interest to you. Especially not when the last capsule vibrating with a low electronic hum. Small lights that were attached to the surface of pod pulsing, bright reds and whites flickers in the darkness as if demanding attention. And attention if caught.

You place Tae on the floor, hands steadying its plastic frame whilst your eyes were still glued to the flashing lights. “Wait here, Tae.” You tiptoed closer to the pod like a moth to fire, neck shifting as you crane you head to see above the capsule before you carefully approached it.

A yellow screen blinked on and off at the centre of the capsule. Bold black lettering fizzing from sparking pixels. You narrow your eyes, brows furrowing in concentration as you focused on trying to decipher the message. After a handful of seconds, you make out the warning.

Emergency- press red button for capsule ejection. Subject -

A hand moves to lift a clear plastic cap, hovering over the large obnoxiously red button, hesitant to push it as instructed.

Instead, you hand reaches to swipe off the sheet of debris covering the glass face panel. Eyes sweeping the sleeping form of the person trapped in the metal pod. The moonlight casting soft lighting against their prominent features. Their eyes were closed, long eyelashes fanning high cheekbones, thick brows tucked under gently tousled hair. Corking your head to the side, you continued to admire the pillowy shape of their plush lips, imagining the way the heart shaped flesh would move as it talked.

“Kim Taehyung.” The name from the screen rolling off your tongue seamlessly. Your lips twitching into a soft smile, your friend of five years long forgotten in the mass of solar panels. “I found you. Will you be my friend?”

[clericbyers]

okay, so, if s4 is set in the upside down, and there's danger at every turn in the UD... what if we get a byler confession, while they think they'll die? like, mike and will are being chased by a monster, they can't outrun it, and mike "sacrifices" himself to save will. while mike's running at it, fully convinced he'll die, he yells out a quick confession. it's really dramatic, and then everyone shows up, and starts killing the monster. it's later revealed that they heard the confession

Will’s chest burns with a conglomerate of pressures from inside his lungs and outside in the air. His arm is twisted funnily but he can barely feel the pain in comparison to the burning fire searing through his veins. One, two, one, two, he repeats in his head, taking a step with each desolate count. The darkness is never ending just as it was all those years ago and while there is some comfort found in not being alone, as he hears a crunch and whirls around with a quickness to spot Mike tripping over a fallen branch, Will is equally scared to have brought his friends along with him into this dangerous land. The Upside Down knows Will is here; the Mind Flayer can taste his flesh as easily as Will can taste the spores on his tongue with every breath from his mouth. No one is safe and Will and Mike are stupidly separated from the others. It was an accident, a moment spent too long trying to reassure each other that they would be okay, and suddenly, the party was split and Mike and Will were left alone to race against time. Time trapped in the morphing body of a shadow, of the monsters, of Death itself.

Time moves awkwardly; it ticks by slowly with the legs of an addled creature yet is equally as unchangeable as the irrefutable concept. The second hand slows its trajectory. It oscillates between moon-driven chilling ocean waves and sun-struck ripples of hot, sticky heat. It’s stuck between seconds yet jumping into minutes, never stable yet stable enough for time to pass. A bell tolls somewhere in the distance. Top of the hour, what hour Will can’t even begin to guess. Time works differently here, looping around his ankles until he trips into the next minute and the next minute and the next minute until he’s toppling over the edge into a free fall. A blanket of misdirection topples over Will’s eyes and he skids to a stop with a heaving breath. He turns to look at Mike, who isn’t far away but is far enough away that he could be lost in the darkness without even realizing it.

Will snaps his fingers, a glimmer of light sparking from the tips of his numb fingers and he repeats the action again and again in hopes that Mike can see the flashing light and find his way back to Will’s side. That’s all Will has ever wanted: Mike right at his side, forever and always, never leaving him as he can never leave Mike. The other boy makes his way where he belongs and hunches over as he catches a shaky breath or two. Mike’s bangs are plastered with sweat against his forehead and Will feels a silly urge within to brush those thin strands away. Perhaps it’s an urge he’s always had, perhaps it’s an urge he has now that they are lost and the possibility of time catching up to them disassembles into realism. Will’s not pessimistic, he leaves that to Lucas, but he’s not fairly optimistic either, he leaves that to Dustin. Realism isn’t where his ideas settle either, not since the Upside Down stole reality from him and shoved nightmares down his throat until he was choking on slugs and burning from the inside out as a demonic monster controlled his body. He doesn’t know where his ideas lie, perhaps nominalism or a more pragmatic strain of realism, but it doesn’t really matter when the world is falling apart around him and philosophical disciplines mean little in the face of near death.

Still, there’s something about Death’s touch hovering over Will’s throat as he watches Mike that makes him question such minimal things as the way one looks at life. And when Mike looks over at Will and shoots him a soft smile despite the blood and dirt smearing his face, Will is struck with a smidgen of optimism, a subtle mist against the crushing sensations taking over his thoughts. Maybe things aren’t that bad when Will’s got his best friend looking at him like he’s the only person that matters in the world. No, not the only person that matters in the world—they know first hand there are at least two worlds in existence, maybe more—Will is the only person that matters in his world, and that’s far more touching than anything else.

Will would kiss Mike if he had permission to do so.

The moment is gone as easily as it appeared, snapped in half with fear and shock as a monster’s cry shrieks through the air. Mike stands full and quickly turns toward the sound, reaching a hand out for Will in an odd gesture of comfort. Will doesn’t know if he’s supposed to take Mike’s hand, but he does anyway, shuddering at the familiar touch that’s been kept from him for so long. Mike’s fingers are warm despite the Upside Down’s chilly atmosphere and for a moment Will wonders if Mike is the one between them with the electric manipulation powers. Mike’s hold tightens and in the blink of an eye, Will finds himself slammed into Mike’s chest, his twisted arm throbbing as it smashes against the taller boy’s body.

Will doesn’t have a moment to ask what’s happening before the clock is ticking and he’s stumbling into the next moment in time. His fingers slip from Mike’s grip, wetness from sweat and moisture making things too slippery to maintain a solid hold. Mike turns back to grab at him but Will is already free falling and nothing but air fills his fist as he reaches out to grab onto whatever he can. The distance between them grows larger but Will still feels the echo of Mike’s warm hand on his. He can hear the monster screaming again, branches crunching and crumbling to dust under the creature’s heated feet. Will knows he’s not physically there anymore, but time has yet to catch up with his physical location so he sees the monster getting closer. He watches scaly claws and sharp teeth slither toward Mike, prepared to strike and taste the revitalizing, viscous blood of the boy who resists the Upside Down the most. Mike is still facing Will, his mouth wide open from calling out Will’s name. Mike can’t see the monster behind him, he can’t see that he’s seconds away from dying, so Will calls out in turn hoping that the other boy can hear him.

Mike turns, notices the monster, and then starts sprinting as fast he can to close the distance between him and Will and lengthen the one between himself and the monster. Will trips into a stand still, time frozen within him yet everything around him continues on, slinking through the shadows as it chases after his friends and family. Mike’s gesticulating wildly and shouting something Will can’t really hear, but when he skirts to a stop by Will, he can hear him much like hearing voices underwater. Will tries to open his mouth to reply but no words come out. Mike desperately looks back and then turns on his heel, face drawn tight with worry and a special type of concern that can’t be put in words. It hurts Will’s heart and he’s barely able to hear Mike’s parting words before the darkness takes his sight and envelopes him in smothered smoke. 

I’ll keep you safe, I promise! I’ll chase it away but you need to stay hidden! Wait for me, okay?

Wait for me, okay?

Wait for me, wait for me, wait for me.

Wait, wait, wait.

Tick, tock, tick tock, tick tock.

Tick.

Tock.

Time comes back in flaky, peeling layers that unwind and unfold into consciousness. It slams into Will’s body with every chilling breeze and he shivers back into reality with lingering shock. His hands are burning, sparkling with lightning and static despite him not even remembering activating an energy surge. It doesn’t matter now; somehow time has sent Will into the thick of things and there’s not a moment to waste. Almost like magnets of the opposite charge, Will and Mike easily find each other on the battlefield. Will feels like he’s missing something—there’s a gap in his memory, not as frightening as his memory loss when the Mind Flayer possessed him, but still an issue to be concerned about. When the monster is defeated though, the memories come back like gentle waves and it overlays the exhaustion burning his chest. Will’s chest is always burning, scarring over with every breath, but it burns with a soothing ache that reminds him that he’s alive and himself. The memories he lost when time played with his soul help mend the holes in his mind left by existing in the Upside Down.

The last memories Will regains are Mike’s parting words. They come through in a fuzzy haze as he’s holding the other boy to his chest, tending to the wounds Mike collected being overprotective of everyone. His hands freeze while wiping a bleeding scratch clean and time speeds up with his beating heart. Mike turns to give Will a look, probably curious as to why he suddenly stopped patching his wounds but the injured boy doesn’t get the chance to ask a question when Will pulls him up by his face and kisses him before time can steal the moment away.

I’ll keep you safe, I promise.

tick. tock.

I’ll chase it away but you need to stay hidden!

tick. tock.

Wait for me, okay?

tick.

You won’t ever lose me. Even if I die, you’re never alone.

tock.

Best thing I’ve ever done…

ticktockticktockticktockti—

…was fall in love with you.

[lady-charinette]

Feral - Marichat Smut

Chapter 40 of my fic “A Smitten Kitten & A Lovestruck Princess” on FFnet (https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12746973/40/A-Smitten-Kitten-A-Lovestruck-Princess )

"Good night Tikki," Marinette smiled softly at her kwami, watching as the little goddess settled in for the night.

"Good night Marinette," she chirped happily before her chosen turned away to head for the bathroom to change.

Marinette didn't remember turning the lights off before she went inside the bathroom, she also didn't remember Tikki leaving the room either.

But she remembered she left the window open.

Rubbing at her bare arms, Marinette quickly strode towards her window and closed it shut, skin raised in goosebumps at sudden rush of cool night air, "T-Tikki, I'm so sorry I forgot to close the window!"

No response.

"Tikki?" Marinette's eyes narrowed, trying to make out the shape of her kwami from somewhere in the void of darkness that was her room. She blinked furiously, trying to make her eyesight adjust to the sudden change of light, "Tikki?" she called out again, worry seeping into her tone.

Marinette wasn't sure what she had expected, but the sudden creak from somewhere behind her made her jump and whirl around.

Nothing.

"Alright, Tikki, I thought we're going to sleep," her kwami was known to be a tad playful and mischievous, like a certain black cat, but she didn't think Tikki was up for a game of hide and seek this late into the night.

Her gaze narrowed when she heard muffled movement from behind her but again when she turned, Marinette saw nothing. Carefully navigating her way through the darkness, Marinette tried to search for the light switch until a sudden, bone-chilling realization hit her.

Tikki could fly.

So why did she hear muffled noises on the floor?

A low growl sounded from behind her, far closer than Marinette expected and she mentally cursed her uncharacteristically bad luck tonight.

How had she not heard him before?

She had felt the change in atmosphere the minute she had stepped into her darkened room.

It was charged, like a tightly coiled rope about to snap and she felt the buzzing of energy in the air.

She felt electrified, knowing she was trapped.

In his game.

A game of hide and seek, of cat and mouse.

Marinette closed her eyes, instead focusing on her other senses to try and detect his location. She knew he was in her room, she felt his eyes on her, all over here and it caused tremors to wreak her body and her mind was in a haze she didn't know how to get out of.

"Cold?" clawed fingertips gently touched her bare arms and her breath hitched sharply in her throat.

"Y-yes," she replied without thinking and he gave a low chuckle.

The sound made her shiver.

"You shouldn't leave the windows opened purrincess," the endearment was a low husky purr, filled with intent, with dark promises and hidden agendas, "Who knows who or what may come into your room,"

He was deliberately teasing her, running just the tips of his claws lightly against her arms, the outbreak of goosebumps on her skin growing even worse and she felt herself suddenly burning up, despite only wearing the thin nightgown she wore.

She snorted softly, trying to will her voice to remain calm, "You're right, I forgot about the nosy cat sometimes visiting me. I should lock the windows next time," she smiled, "But…I think I'm purrfectly safe," a low groan escaped him and she giggled, but her giggle was abruptly cut off as her breath sharply caught in her throat from the warm gust of hot air upon her bare neck.

She shivered, "Hm, here and I thought my princess would be so responsible to dress more warmly,"

Oh, her sudden eruption into goosebumps and trembling flesh had nothing to do with the sudden drop in temperature in her room and the damn cat knew that very well.

Marinette tried to regain some of her control, tried to not let him get the upper hand, but in a dark environment with close to no source of light, the clever cat definitely had that small advantage.

Except, she knew her own room and he didn't.

The minute she felt just the tips of his claws barely touch her arms, she moved.

With Ladybug speed, Marinette expertly evaded her desk chair, which her partner promptly ran into, she heard the short scuffle of the wheels of her chair sliding across the floor, she also heard his lowly muttered curse as he fussed over his toe and she couldn't help but feel smug.

That, however, had only lasted a second before she felt his presence again, right at her back.

He was like a tall, looming shadow, following her every movement, calculating and anticipating her next step- just like a lion ready to pounce on his prey.

Ladybug never allowed herself to not have the upper hand in battle, but the dynamic was slightly different with Marinette, if only slightly.

Especially that stupid cat that just seemed so smug at the entertaining thought of catching her off guard and having the upper hand.

Despite knowing who her partner was, him being in his superhero outfit had a slightly different…aura to it. Not that she didn't equally appreciate and love him as his civilian self, but there was just something positively…exciting about the thought of her tall, smart and handsome boyfriend in his leather, superhero suit starting a interesting twist of cat and mouse.

And she knew he had similar thoughts to this, if the way his speed increased and his movements grew slightly more desperate to finally catch her were any indication at all.

She moved only when he was very short of catching her, slipping away from the tips of his fingers a hair's breath away and she could feel the slowly mounting frustration at failing to catch her with every attempt she managed to dodge.

She enjoyed seeing her usually composed, gentle boyfriend unravel like this, even if she couldn't see him well, she could tell what he must be feeling, because she was feeling the same, but she would be damned if she gave up without a fight.

He had made it harder for her to continue the game, increasing his speed, using his flexibility and agility to preform acrobatic movements in the air which made her briefly lose his location and in those precious seconds he had managed to slip continuously closer in her range and nearly catch her off guard. The wildly beating rhythm of her heart made her feel more alive than ever, the thin sheen of sweat of anticipation on her skin made this so much more real and stimulating.

It was the thrill of the hunt that made them both tether on the edge, him more so than her, he resembled his feline companion in more ways than even she had realized.

She was promptly caught off guard, slightly lost in her thoughts and the suffocating atmosphere, that she failed to dodge his next attack.

Strong arms encased her against an equally strong chest and she inhaled sharply, instinctively struggling to get free, causing his arms to tighten around her midsection and his warm breath to hit her ear, his voice uncharacteristically low, "Caught you," his words made a pleasant shiver cascade down her entire body in small waves and a dark smirk curled his lips as he felt it.

"Breathe kitten, you're panting already," a dark chuckle made her flush and she struggled to shoot a snarky remark back but a sudden movement on his part made her freeze pleasantly.

One hand that had been curled around her stomach, slowly moved from its original place, sliding slowly over her arm and up to her neck, fingers gently but firmly grabbing her jaw and tilting it to the side.

The room was dark, nearly devoid of light except from the moon outside, but she could clearly see the nearly glowing green, silted eyes watching her.

Pupils dilated, there was a hungry, dangerous gleam in them that made a shiver rush from the top of her head all the way to the ends of her toes and it made her feel hot underneath the thin fabric she wore.

She was sure Chat Noir had felt it too, if the insistent way he had her pressed against himself was any pointer.

She smiled, "Heh, t-took you long enough to catch me, kitty," she was glad her voice was relatively normal, except for the mild breathlessness from their little chase earlier.

His however, while usually comforting and sweet, was now making her positively melt into a puddle of goo, "What can I say, I was distracted by the purrfect view,"

Oh. Marinette had forgotten about her scantily dressed state. In her defense, she hadn't prepared for an impromptu chase in her room, "Y-you caught me off guard,"

Another chuckle and her toes curled, just how did he have that effect on her? "Mhmm…" a sensual purr that made her knees wobbly, "You're trembling, m'lady, could it be because of meow?" she could practically hear the smirk in his voice and it made her acutely aware of how her body was trembling in the smallest of shivers.

Damn him.

The hand still gently, carefully curled around her neck moved, a single claw gently tracing the side of her jaw and for the life of her Marinette never knew how hard it was not to move!

Just where was Tikki?!

"As i-if, don't go getting any ideas now k-kitty," mildly peeved at her stuttering, she gasped aloud when she felt her boyfriend's body giving a slightly different reaction than just increased body heat and it made her jolt in surprise and squeak.

Chat inhaled, as if a physical blow made him lose his breath, but he quickly regained his composure to whisper naughtily into her ear, "Heh, too late for that princess," she didn't expect the hot, wet tongue to trace her earlobe, nor did she expect the surprisingly pleasant sensation of his claws barely pricking the shivering skin of her stomach, taut with tense muscles, tense in anticipation.

This cat would be the death of her, "Aren't we getting a little too ahead of ourselves chaton?" two could play at this game as Marinette purposely lowered her voice into a sensual purr, turning her head so the tip of her nose reached his defined jaw and traced it with the barest of contact.

A low, guttural growl vibrated within his chest and she felt it the sensation against her back, as his grip around her tightened and his hot breath came in short, quick pants, "Princess…" his messy hair tickled the side of her face as he leaned forward to rest his forehead on her bare shoulder, "You'll be the death of me," came the low moan against her overheated skin.

Her? The death of him?

Ha.

A sharp hiss escaped him when his minx of a girlfriend shifted, and his grip moved quickly to her hips, "Don't move," came the guttural command and Marinette felt a small smile creep onto her flushed face.

"Getting a little flustered now, chaton?" her voice was full of teasing and he would have to remedy that.

Within seconds, she was in his arms and her small squeak of surprise made his broad shoulders shake with restraint laughter when he gently laid her down on her bed, "And you call me the tease, cherrie,"

From her admittedly pleasant view of him towering over her, the small source of moonlight from outside made her see just enough to recognize his handsome features and she wasn't sure if that was a blessing or a curse.

His roguish grin stretched over his lips when he noticed her heated examination, "Checking meowt?" she swore black cats were little devils incarnate.

She huffed, "In your dreams Chat," she stuck her tongue out at him but promptly closed her mouth when he leaned down, the same heated, hungry look in his eyes.

When he spoke, it was all sharp teeth, "Purrcisely princess," her face flushed uncomfortably hot and he chuckled at her cute reaction, tracing a claw down the side of her burning cheek, "For having the powers of bad luck and destruction, I sure got lucky to have you," the look changed in his eyes and she realized it hadn't changed, but intensified, because her chaton always looked at her like she was the center of his whole world.

Now wasn't different and it made her heart swell with her strong feelings for him, "Oh chaton, you sly cat," he smiled and nuzzled his nose affectionately against hers.

"Only furr you," the sweet words made her giggle.

Marinette smirked, "How about you show me purrcisely what you mean?" she quickly realized how her plan of gaining the upper hand backfired on her when she found her hands suddenly pinned above her head.

The same dark look was in his eyes as his messy blond hair slightly fell into his gaze, trained intently on her as he licked his lips with a grin, "Don't bite off more than you can chew princess," the devil said as he traced his teeth along her neck.

When Marinette opened her misty eyes to look up at Chat, she swore she saw something positively feral.

[laurelsofhighever]

The Falcon and the Rose Ch. 38 - The Wind and the Summer Sea

Chapter 1 on AO3 This chapter on AO3 Masterpost here

--

Twenty-ninth day of Justinian, 9:32 Dragon

Consciousness came back to Alistair slowly. A haze of dim sound faded in and out of his awareness, some kind of scratching, and with it the sensation of his eyes roving beneath the lids. His head felt thick, his body heavy and too hot, and when he tried to move, he discovered through a general inventory of aches and pains that somebody had dressed him in his nightclothes. The noise stopped. He must have caught the attention of whoever had been making it.

A shadow blocked the light. As he turned towards it a cool hand smoothed against his forehead, and he squinted itchy eyes up at Rosslyn, no more than a dry blur through his exhaustion but one he would recognise anywhere.

“You’re awake.”

He made an indistinct noise and found out his throat had been rubbed with sandpaper.

“Hold on.”

She slipped away from him and without her face to ground him his eyes drifted shut again, content instead to follow her movements by listening as she glided about the room. He heard a door open, a muttered conversation, but his mind struggled to comprehend the words and floated instead, wavering between the current state of his body and flashes of the Swallow, the rising water, and the return to shore that he could barely remember. How long had he been lying here? Where was here? Just as he dared open his eyes again to check, blinking in the light, Rosslyn closed the door to whoever was outside and stepped lightly back towards the bed. His bed, he realised.

“How are you feeling?” she asked, brushing fingers along his cheek, apparently unaware that she had sat with her thigh pressing against his hip.

He groaned. “I’m still pretty at least, right?”

“Well there’s no blood this time,” she reasoned, with a ghost of her usual smirk. “And no broken bones. I’d call this a distinct improvement.”

“Hmm.”

In the silence, her gaze slid away from his, dipping instead to where her hand followed the line of his neck over his chest, to where his heart fluttered beneath his ribs. Unlike at West Roth, there was no hesitation in her touch, no recoil when his hand – almost of its own accord – unfolded from beneath the covers and settled at her waist. She barely seemed to notice. Dark circles bruised the hollows of her eyes, lending her skin a pallid sheen, and the hair usually so neatly braided frayed at the temples. But she was warm, and real, and leaning over him with a knotted frown hanging between her brows.

“I had a dream like this once,” he remembered, rubbing small circles onto her hip with his thumb.

“Mm?”

“Oh yes. I was tucked up in bed, and you were all worried about me... I can’t feel my legs.”

To his surprise, she laughed. “I can assure you they’re still there. Look.”

Cuno sprawled across the bottom half of his body, with his head pillowed on Alistair’s thigh and his paws splayed over the entire width of the bed. One bridle eyelid twitched as he snored.  

“His breath stinks.”

Rosslyn smiled fondly as she stroked her dog's ears. “You couldn’t possibly ask me to move him, not when he’s so peaceful.”

“No, I suppose not,” he huffed, still trying to work out how he had missed the presence of such a heavy animal on top of him.

“He was the best way we could think of to keep you warm. You were almost blue by the time we got you back.”

“How long was I asleep?”

“A day and a night.” The words were spoken calmly, but her frown deepened with the recollection. “The deepstalker venom kept your blood flowing against the cold, but then it gave you a fever and we had to bring it down.” She offered him a smile that didn’t quite lift the slump of her shoulders. “You got us our ships.”

He caught the hand still lying over his heart and brought the knuckles to his lips. “You look exhausted.”

Rosslyn opened her mouth to reply, perhaps to deny the observation, but her breath stalled and in the gap between her words the silence eddied like a dammed stream. One slight tug on her fingers and he could draw her down, coax her to rest against him, wrap her up in his arms and use her warmth to soothe away the despair the demons had clawed into his mind.

“What happened in that dream you mentioned?” she asked.

Heat itched on the back of his neck. “You, uh, spilled soup all over me.”

“Really?”

“Oh yes,” he replied. “The finest leek and potato – there was a public outcry and Cailan held a state funeral and everything. It was very moving.”

She shook her head, that lopsided smirk in place. “I don’t think I quite believe you. You’re blushing too much.”

“Curse my delicate complexion.” He smiled as he squeezed her hand. “It doesn’t really matter anyway.”

“Why not?”

“Because this is better.”

She tried to look exasperated, though the roll of her eyes was betrayed by the pull of her bottom lip, drawn between her teeth in a futile effort to remain demure. On an ordinary day, he might have teased her for such a reaction, but here in the quiet of his borrowed room, with his wounds aching under their bandages and the memory of the cold crawling along his spine, all he could do was look on, revel in the image before him, and marvel at the fact that she thought him worth all this effort. Her gaze flickered down to his mouth and his breath faltered. This time, he found the courage to tug on her fingers, beckoning with the same soft touch on her waist for her to tilt forwards, into his arms, into the kiss with which the demon had tried to tempt him in the cave. He remembered their promise to talk, but that could come later, after sleep and food and hopefully hours upon hours of having Rosslyn’s lips pressed against his own.

The door opened just as his hand cupped her jaw. They pulled apart in surprise, with the dog behind them snorting at the sudden rude interruption to his nap, and every muscle in Rosslyn’s body stiffened with defiance. In the doorway stood the Storm Giant, his arms folded over his chest, glowering under his bristling mane of white hair.

“So you’re back in the land o’ the living,” he growled, and turned to Rosslyn. “Away wi’ ye.”

She glared and stood, sliding to block the old man’s view like a wolf in front of the den. “You couldn’t give him an hour at least?”

“Hey,” Alistair tried, reaching for her hand.  

“You only just woke up,” she reminded him.

“And thanks to you, I’m absolutely fine. I’ll be alright.”

The Storm Giant cleared his throat when she opened her mouth to argue further. “There are matters te be discussed. In private.”

Still not quite ready to back down, cheeks hot with defiance, she glanced to Alistair with a final press of his hand and stalked over to the other side of the bed to the scrubbed wooden bench that served as a vanity.  

“A letter for the king,” she explained when she caught his questioning glance. “I finished it just before you woke up, and if I’m to be evicted, I might as well do something useful.”  

Unhurried, she folded the loose leaves of paper into an envelope and scrawled Cailan’s name across the front. The Storm Giant’s scowl only deepened as she turned the package over and closed it with a blob of blue wax from a crucible she had set to melt over a candle, but she remained guileless as she stamped it with Alistair’s own seal in place of the ring she had given to Ser Gideon. When the task was finished, she made a show of wafting the letter to cool the seal, and, though her expression remained bland, the rigid set of her shoulders as she stepped towards the door made even Alistair shiver.  

“Cuno,” she snapped, with her eyes fixed on her grandfather.  

The dog shifted, ears pricked and stubby tail wagging, waiting for the command.  

“Stay here.”

--

Up above the hold, the cliffs basked under the bright summer sky, the last of the previous day’s clouds chased across the horizon by a stiff northerly wind that coaxed white tips to the waves below and made the meadow grass ripple like silk. Out of the close atmosphere of the sickroom, and with Alistair’s recovery now certain, Rosslyn found space to breathe again. Her vantage point offered a view clear across Dunedyn and beyond the narrow strait to the neighbouring island, a sacred place forbidden to all but the augurs. Ships leapt through the stramash, one among them perhaps carrying the letter she had left with Brantis, and the others likely the clan lords’ vessels, going to take news of the moot to the rest of the Clayne.

News of Alistair’s success. She twisted the circle of flowers in her hands. Making crowns from the blooms that grew in the upland meadows had been a tradition she shared with her mother, who had taught her how to weave grass and stalk together without leaving loose ends to stick out and spoil the effect, and who had always giggled when her finished wreath was placed atop her husband’s head. The memory brought a smile to Rosslyn’s lips as she worked. She had started without quite meaning to, the action a reflexive motion to occupy her hands and keep her mind focussed on something other than the moment Alistair dragged himself out of the Swallow. It had played itself out again and again in the hours they had worked to save his life. Nerlina had come to her in the late hours of the evening, once he was out of danger, and apologised for her comments during the feast.

“I was just playing a little,” she had said. “If I had known...”

Rosslyn couldn’t remember her reply.

A bumblebee wobbled past and settled on the clover by her feet. Crickets buzzed in the grass nearby, larks high in the sky, and from the crest of the hill came the distant bleating of rams, carried by the wind that snagged her hair and sent it lashing about her shoulders. The day was wearing on, the pressures of the war looming behind the horizon with Tevinter ships and traitorous arls, but for now just distant enough that the pull of an easy walk along the cliffside held greater sway.

She sighed. “Not enough yellow, I think,” she muttered to the wreath, and brushed off her knees as she stood to scan the horizon for buttercups or frothy spikes of lady’s bedstraw.

A bark broke the silence. Turning, she was just in time to catch sight of Cuno through the grass, ears flopping and tongue lolling as he bounded towards her. Though he had tracked her this far, the strength of the wind scattered her scent so that he paused in confusion, craning his head above a spray of ox-eye daisies until she took pity on him and whistled to get his attention. The wide, doggy grin that broke over his face was enough to make her laugh, and she bent down with her arms spread wide to greet him and hopefully dissuade him from barrelling headlong into her legs.  

“Who’s a good boy?” she crooned when he met her, scratching his shoulder as he sneezed his delight and tried to lick her chin. “Who’s so clever for finding me? But I did tell you to stay with Alistair.”

Cuno chuffed and sat on her foot, then changed his mind and raced back the way he had come. Alistair was already cresting the hill when the dog reached him, his gait stilted and his shoulders hunched under a cloak he wouldn’t normally have needed, but he waved nonetheless and sent Cuno skipping ahead of him back down the path.  

“You should be in bed!” Rosslyn chided. In the daylight, the ashen pallor of his skin stood out more than it should.

“Nonsense.” He grinned at her. “Fresh air and sunshine, that’s what I need.”  

Unable to think of any real reply, she turned instead to fuss Cuno, who was delicately trying to steal the flower wreath from her fingers now that he had ceased to be the centre of attention. “No, this is not for eating. Here –” Dodging the investigations of a cold, wet nose, she knelt and placed the wreath on the dog’s head, tucking the sides under his ears to keep it in place.

“Very handsome,” she decided as she leaned back to survey her work.

Cuno only stared at Alistair, imploring.

“I don’t think he believes you.”

“Well, he can live with it.” Her knee cracked as she stood, her gaze on the ocean. “And so will all the disappointed young women I ran into on my way out of the broch. They were all so eager to offer their services and make sure you were alright.”

“It’s a shame I missed them,” Alistair answered with a shrug. “But then again, I was waiting for one young woman in particular, who was nowhere to be found.”

When she faced him, a flutter in her stomach, she found the gap between them closed to a bare few inches. “I would have come back eventually,” she teased. “For my dog if nothing else.”

His thumb brushed over the back of her hand. “Well, he’s very impatient.” His eyes dropped to her mouth. “I wanted to thank you.”

“Thank me?” She blinked, tilted her head back to see him properly, frowned as he pulled her dagger from his belt and offered it to her.

“You saved my life,” he murmured. “Again.”

On instinct, she reached up, but her hand curled away before she could touch the hardened leather scabbard. “No... I was forbidden to help you.” Her hand dropped to her side. “I didn’t do anything.”

For an instant, it looked like he would argue, but the words stalled on his tongue and he sighed them away as he scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Alright. Hypothetically, then. If you had helped me, and you’d been caught, what would have happened?”

The earnest look in those autumn eyes scalded. The view out over the cliffs was far safer, over the sea to where Howe sat in her father’s seat, and over Dunedyn and the realm of her mother’s people, the only family left to her, who were bound by law to shun any who dared defy the will of the sea.  

“Nothing that wasn’t worth the risk.” She pushed the dagger back towards him. “Keep it. I’m sure I’ll find another one. But that reminds me...”

He frowned as she fished under her collar, close enough now that his hands fell to her waist in a movement as natural as breathing. His surprise when she revealed his mother’s amulet, hanging from its silver chain around her neck – something swooped low in his belly, a kind of possessiveness that thrilled along the length of his limbs knowing she held onto something that was his, that it touched her skin where nobody else could see.

“I kept it safe,” she offered, when the silence stretched.

“Keep it,” he echoed.

“You’re sure?”

“It looks better on you, and it’s a fair trade. For a dagger. Don’t you think?”

“Alright.”  

With a steadying breath, she tucked the tiny silver disk out of sight again and adjusted her shirt to hide it, and batted impatiently at her wind-snaked hair when it caught on her nose and mouth. Alistair watched the quirk of her lips, the nimbleness of her fingers, the way her brows drew in over her grey eyes as she paused and once more let her gaze slip out to the horizon.

“What is it?”

“It’s nothing,” she said, and startled when he brushed a thumb along her cheek. “It’s - it’s silly, really. My mind keeps going back there, to waiting – not being able to do anything – and imagining how much worse it must have been for you, with the water rising, I...” Her eyes closed. She leaned closer, wavering with her hands braced against his shoulders until the confession became too much and she tipped into the solace of a proper embrace. “I couldn’t have done it. I would have been too afraid.”

Alistair's arms closed tighter around her, his words bitten out through clenched teeth. “At the moot. You volunteered to do it anyway.”

“I panicked. I would have lost you.”

“You didn’t.” He pressed a kiss against her hair. “You didn’t. I’m here, and it’s thanks to you.”

This time, she didn’t protest, only buried herself deeper against his shoulder and fisted her hands in his shirt, and he was grateful for it. Right at the end, in complete darkness with his lungs burning and the current pulling at him and the demons screaming in his mind, he had thought he wouldn’t make it. His body had starved for air, but in the moment, his only thought had been to see her again, to hold her and inhale the jasmine of her scent as she kissed him. Nothing happened on Innse Gaillean that did not reach its lord’s ear; the Storm Giant knew what she had done, and before all other things he made sure Alistair knew it too, in its entirety, so he would understand.

“You went against the gods for me.”

Playing with the hem of his collar, she shook her head. “No. If I had, you would be dead. They gave me what I needed to help you, long before I even knew I would need it.”

They fell silent. The dog, having lost his flower crown, snapped after crickets through the grass.

“We’ve come such a long way, haven’t we?” Alistair asked. His fingertips traced idles shapes along the back of her neck. “We sort of… stumbled into each other. And here we are.”

She chuckled. “From what little I recall of the night we met, I fell on you.”

"Mmhm… you were bloody heavy.”

“I was barely conscious!”

“And yet you demanded to see Teagan anyway, with this haughty look on your face like blood loss and exhaustion were for lesser mortals.” He sighed at the memory. “But… you were so brave, so determined… would it be too much to say I thought you were the most beautiful person I’d ever met?”

“It doesn’t say much for your taste,” she pointed out. “Since I was covered in blood at the time.”  

"You remembered my name. I wasn’t expecting that.”

Something in his voice pulled her back from the embrace, a shiver that ran through her core and lodged in her chest like smoke. Had he really fallen for her so soon? Had he realised, or had that come later?

“You called me Andraste,” she recalled, the memory unbidden but no less powerful. “In the infirmary, after West Roth. It was so awful to see you lying there, knowing the last thing I said to you was an argument.”

He nodded. “I touched you on the arm.” And he mirrored the gesture, a cautious slide of fingertips up from the wrist, turned into a question.

“I... wanted to kiss you. It was terrifying – I’d never felt that before.”

The confession robbed Alistair of thought. She watched him go still, saw his eyes fix on her mouth as he leaned forward – hesitated.

“I thought I was fooling myself, hoping you might… come to care for me.”

How had it taken them so long to get here? “You weren’t.”

Hands at her waist, her fingers playing with his hair as a breathless puff of laughter ghosted across her lips, and after so much time, it felt like the easiest thing in the world to tilt her face up, to let her eyes fall closed.

“So I fooled you, did I?” he asked, impossibly close.

She paused, pulled back. “… What?”

“Yeah that – that made more sense in my head,” he admitted, wincing even as he leaned in again. Her giggle hummed against his lips.

“And you were doing so well.”

“Maybe we should just stop talking?”

“If you like.”

And then there was no space between them at all.

[felseekers]

celestial balance--

For the countless years he and the Army of the Light had been fighting their way through the infinite coils of the Twisting Nether, Turalyon had learned to believe in the simple concept of light at the end of a tunnel.

It was more than hope, because while hope on its own was a powerful force, it was something different, he felt, to hope despite the greatest odds. To be surrounded by shadow, and still believe, with absolute certainty, that there was a pinpoint of light somewhere within.

The Xenedar crashed, and Turalyon began looking for the light anew.

Deep in the fel-corrupted fields of Krokuun, Turalyon had found the broken draenei left behind so long ago who had not joined the ranks of the lightforged--forced to adapt and survive to fight for their home--and had thought beyond doubt that he had found that glimpse of light. He took shelter with them, and began to plan to take the Xenedar back, because Xe’ra was still within, a priceless prize for the Legion to claim, and was disturbed from those thoughts and plans only when the obvious tones of an argument brewing outside urged him to action once more.

Outside, the Prophet Velen--the very same one who had departed Argus so many millennia ago--conversed in heated, controlled tones with Hatuun, accompanied by two others: one was kaldorei, but obviously fel-corrupted, with a blindfold over her eyes and demonic horns sprouting from her head, unnaturally dark hair falling down her back in a wave. Nevertheless, her body language was open, relaxed, almost casual, yet still alert enough Turalyon doubted she was ignorant to the threats that surrounded the group.

The last person in Velen’s entourage, though--she was sin’dorei, but the only indicator were her ears, sticking out from a helmet that otherwise covered her head. From head to toe, she was outfitted in plate gear in dark colors, with faint tones of almost painfully bright blue, and that was when Turalyon sensed the cold that all but radiated from her, like a slow, vicious wave, indiscriminate to whatever stood in its path.

A death knight.

It was not the light that Turalyon sought, perhaps, but, well.

It would have to be a start.

Turalyon intervened, and the argument was dispelled, and he found himself walking with the night elf and the blood elf in Velen’s entourage as he told them of the demons that stood in the way of securing their perimeter.

“Splitting up would be most efficient.” said the death knight--even her voice was unyielding, sharp, and crisp, echoing with the haunting reverberation characteristic to death knights. “I will take one Legion lieutenant, and the Illidari commander can take another.”

“Can we at least introduce ourselves first?” drawled the night elf with the fel horns, who still somehow managed to present a more open and affable image than the death knight next to her. “Vex Felseeker. Illidari commander. Well, one of them.”

With a roll of her whole head, the death knight begrudgingly drummed her fingers on the hilt of one of her two blades, sheathed at her hip. “I am Deathlord of the Knights of the Ebon Blade.”

“Not even a name?” Felseeker, the Illidari commander, nudged the Deathlord’s shoulder, and she barely even shifted with the motion--Turalyon noted the familiarity between them, despite the somewhat chilly response. “Come on, Tyra, it wouldn’t kill you to--”

“My name is inconsequential here,” came the brusque interruption, “and just because we worked together in the Broken Isles does not give you leave to use a nickname on me, Vexara.”

“Enough.” Turalyon finally interrupted, when it seemed the pair were about to dissolve into bickering. “I believe taking the Deathlord’s suggestion would bring us the swiftest resolution. Return to Hatuun’s camp when you’ve completed the mission.”

Turalyon watched the pair depart and go in two very different directions--Felseeker took a running leap and sprouted fel wings, gliding down the rocky slope with both warglaives drawn. The Deathlord walked briskly down the path, then slowly picked up her pace until she was sprinting, and a horse almost seemed to materialize from nowhere with an equine scream, ghostly fire trailing from its hooves. In a split second she hauled herself aboard its saddle, and disappeared into the ridges of Krokuun.

Turalyon looked up, and saw Azeroth on the horizon. He turned and strode back to Hatuun’s camp.

For now, that alone would have to be the light at the end of the tunnel, brighter than it had been for countless years.

*

When the time came to clear the last obstacle to their attack on the Xenedar’s crash site, Turalyon elected to lead the charge there.

Hope was all well and good, but it was only made worthwhile with action.

“I will go, as well.” it had been somewhat surprising to hear the Deathlord volunteer first, rather than the commander of a sect of forces dedicated to dismantling the Legion at all costs, but the Illidari herself had little comment on the matter as the Deathlord continued, “Vex is needed on the Vindicaar to give orders to the rest of her people for the assault on the Xenedar’s crash site once we are successful. Too much is at risk here to wait for them, so I will go.”

“Are you implying something, Deathlord?”

“Only that you and the rest of the Illidari are incapable of sticking to a plan unless you come up with it. Months spent in Suramar with you have illustrated that point quite clearly.”

“Then let us be off.” the incessant bickering, Turalyon had a feeling, would be the biggest hurdle of all to overcome in this mission. He thought the Deathlord might’ve been relieved with the intervention before the banter spiraled out of control, but it was difficult to tell.

Their trip up to the demon’s lair was made in near-total silence, broken only when the Deathlord spoke to alert them both of potential reinforcements to avoid. She was not the ideal ally to have at his back here, in the midst of a landscape almost entirely controlled by the Legion, but Turalyon’s situation had ceased being ideal from the moment the Xenedar crashed to Argus’ surface.

“Your hesitance in dealing with either myself or the Illidari commander is understandable,” the Deathlord spoke suddenly as they settled into a brief reconnaissance position--clearly he hadn’t been as subtle in his doubts as he’d thought, or perhaps the assumption had been made based on prior reactions to their offers for help, but either way it stung, “and while I acknowledge both myself and the Illidari commander may have somewhat questionable backgrounds, by the standards of the High Exarch of the Army of the Light, for now, we all want the same thing.”

“No one is victorious if the Legion is.” Turalyon said, half as a reminder to himself and half a confirmation of the Deathlord’s words.

“Just so.” Her helmet didn’t turn to look at him, her gaze steadfastly focused on the slope behind them while they readied themselves to strike, but a single thread of tension lifted. “On that topic, I am ready to attack whenever you are.”

Turalyon turned to take in the pit lord in the clearing ahead of them, still unaware of their presence. Bile rose in his throat and his lip twisted down into something that tried to be a scowl, but he scarcely had the energy for it. “Strike.”

A single word, and the Deathlord drew her twin swords in tandem with his greatsword, charging towards the pit lord as one. An ambient chill, stronger even than the atmosphere in Hatuun’s camp, settled over the clearing, such a steep contrast from the almost harsh burn of the Light’s energy that coursed from the lightforged draenei he had fought alongside before.

He would give the Deathlord this, though: for all the plate armor she wore, her agility was remarkable.

The pit lord’s minions emerged to harass them throughout the battle, and consequently fell to the Deathlord’s swift blades and icy strikes, holding them at bay with effortless ease, immovable and unbreakable as a glacier. Soon the demon’s minions came faster, and the Deathlord’s steps brought her closer and closer to him as she began to slowly lose ground.

When the minions vanished, Turalyon didn’t have time to even shout a warning before fel eruptions emerged from the earth and rooted him in place--out of the corner of his eye, he saw the Deathlord trapped as well, but a frosty haze began to cover the rock almost as soon as it trapped her. Turalyon dug deep within himself, deeper than he’d been forced to dig in many years, for that place where the Light was strongest.

There was a sharp crack, a squeal of something frozen shattering into a thousand pieces, and a somewhat-hoarse roar of defiance and triumph combined. The Deathlord stood from the fragments of her stony, icy prison, a minutely-contained blizzard of her own making swirling around her body--the remorselessness and ferocity of winter incarnate.

With a sharp ripple of light, Turalyon’s own prison broke under the weight of so much power being brought to bear all at once, and as he reached for his weapon again, a series of arrows, fired blindingly fast, announced Alleria’s arrival before he ever saw her.

She wasn’t the only one--the Illidari commander soared into the pit lord’s den on her own fel wings, glaives drawn as she finished off the wounded demon. Alleria appeared shortly after and wrested several of her arrows from its corpse. Her grin was dry.

“I seem to be making a habit of saving you from demons.” she told him, and to anyone else it would have sounded light and faintly joking, but there were cracks forming in that facade that Turalyon had not yet had time to examine, in the wake of constant war with the Legion.

Alleria was familiar, and here, that was enough.

“Ran into her on my way to bring the rest of my Illidari forces to the Xenedar’s crash site.” Felseeker joined the conversation, warglaives dripping vile demon ichor onto the ground, a wide and almost predatory grin on her lips. “Thought you could use some assistance.”

“Your flair for the dramatic and unbelievably convenient timing are your best and worst qualities, Vex.”

“Was that a joke? I must be dreaming.”

Alleria made her way to his side without his knowing, and she said, out of earshot of their two new arrivals, “They don’t have the context of our war across the years. I fear the stakes have yet to fully take hold.”

“I don’t believe they would have come if some idea of the stakes had not been made clear.” Turalyon countered. “The Xenedar awaits--we ought to gather our forces to take it back.”

It was impossible to ignore Alleria’s somewhat skeptical noise from behind him, but he was certain there would be little to worry about once Xe’ra was returned to them--she was the prime naaru, the Light incarnate: there could be no greater symbol to rally around as they destroyed the Legion.

Another light, however obvious the symbolism was, to guide them through the dark once more.

*

With fragments of Xe’ra’s being scattered over the Vindicaar’s floor, his blade held at bay with only Illidan’s hand, dripping with fel blood, Turalyon felt rage, pure and undiluted, for the first time in recent memory.

It was bright and fiery in his veins, ready to burst, and when he was finally forced to give ground and step back, he turned his gaze to what remained of the prime naaru herself, shattered and broken, and felt a light deep in his chest flicker dangerously low.

He stopped short of dropping his sword to the Vindicaar’s pristine floor, covered with the last remnants of their biggest hope to look to for guidance as they stood in the maw of the Legion itself, but instead turned sharply away from the display and went to stand at the Vindicaar’s viewport, overlooking the Antoran Wastes. Azeroth still hung in the backdrop, and Turalyon kept his eyes on it, barely heeding the words Prophet Velen attempted to console him with. It felt selfish, to stand and essentially sulk whilst the Legion’s armies raged below, but it was quiet here, for once, and with Azeroth in sight, it was almost easy to believe in a light at the end once more. Almost.

Another presence at his side broke him free of the reverie, something cold and vastly different than any others here, and Turalyon looked down to see the Deathlord looking out over the same view as him.

“Does my presence trouble you?” she asked finally, and there was no judgment in it, no silent accusation that he could hardly afford to be so critical of the allies he was being given to aid this final push in the seemingly-endless fight.

“No.” he finally answered, honestly, but hesitantly. He did not trust the Deathlord, but her silence was refreshing.

Quiet passed for several beats before she spoke again. “You may not care to hear a death knight’s perspective on this, but I will offer it for consideration.”

“If you intend to tell me it was naive to place such faith in Xe’ra--” Turalyon began brusquely, ill in the mood for a lecture.

“I would not be so cruel.” the Deathlord replied, surprisingly quiet. “Perhaps I cannot believe in the Light the same way you do, but as a death knight, there was another near-supreme authority that I believed in, once. Albeit we death knights were not afforded a choice to believe otherwise, at first, but even after being freed from his thrall, there was a part of me that wanted to go back. It was familiar, for all it had broken me.”

“I was not ‘broken’ by the Light--”

“An unfortunate comparison,” the Deathlord raised a placating hand, and Turalyon fell into a sullen silence, “that nonetheless presents a parallel. We stand at a crossroads. Allow this to be a blow to your faith. Allow your confidence to falter. Find new purpose, and stand firm again.”

Silence fell again, and Turalyon thought. He turned to say something else, and found the Deathlord already gone, speaking with a small group of four other death knights at the other side of the Vindicaar--two humans, one man and one woman, a draenei woman, and a troll woman. They were familliar to the Deathlord, he could see it in the slope of her armored shoulders as she spoke to them, the words inaudible from this distance.

Xe’ra’s fragments had been cleared from the Vindicaar’s floors, a few glittering shards placed in the crucible on the vessel’s second floor. A source of light, incomplete without the shadow that contrasted it.

He might have called it the last shards of hope, but he didn’t truly believe that, not really. He still stood, the Army of the Light still stood, and for the first time in a thousand years, they had new blades to take up the fight.

It was not so potent a symbol as Azeroth on the horizon, but it was a tiny pinpoint of light, a solid anchor in the void, and Turalyon latched himself to it, stubbornly certain.

Surreal that he had been guided to it by a death knight, of all people--the death knights’ commander, no less--but if nothing else, Turalyon had been forced to accept that hope could come from the most unlikely of places, of people.

It was still a gift, and he refused to squander it.

*

Turalyon had set foot on Azeroth for the first time after what felt like a thousand years what was now several months ago, and the landscape still felt more alien than even Argus’ had.

There was a pronounced distance between himself and nearly everyone he had seen and spoken to in that time, even those he considered old friends, and the distance was something Turalyon knew he could only recover with time, but it still left a pang in his chest, knowing how much time he had lost to the Legion.

Now that the Legion was gone, however, it left a curious void in his day-to-day purpose.

For what had felt like a thousand years in the Twisting Nether, Turalyon’s sole purpose had been the destruction of the Legion--demon incursions happened daily, and there was always something more to do, another perimeter to secure, another pit lord to remove from power, another of Sargeras’ servants to destroy. Now it was done, and Turalyon did not miss it, but perhaps he did miss the certainty of it.

He had returned to a world on the brink of war once more, but it was not a war he was familiar with fighting anymore.

Alleria had been in a similar situation, and for a time they had taken solace in that shared struggle as they had with so many other things, but with time came the realization that distance drifted between them, too. On Argus, they were familiar, and it was enough. Back home, after so long fighting their war, the weight of their war had forced them to consider what a future on their old homeworld meant, spending so long apart from it.

They were still bound by their son--their son, who was nearly grown himself now--but by little else, now.

From certain places in Stormwind’s keep, it was possible to see the docks, and Turalyon had stood guard over them, waiting for the vessels dispatched to Lordaeron to return. Since the burning of Teldrassil, the fires of war had begun to burn brighter, with several members of the young King Anduin’s council clambering for war, for retribution. He had offered his voice to those negotiations as best he could, but as with many things since returning from Argus, he was somehow distant from that as well.

In the distance, he saw the vanguard flagship slowly coast into port, and almost immediately he found himself summoned--a cold pit of dread sat in his stomach as he followed the aide down to the docks, where a crowd of onlookers waited to catch a glimpse of the returning warriors.

“What is the meaning of this?” he asked lowly of the aide as they wove between the varying individuals making up Stormwind’s typical complement of citizens. “Has something happened?”

“I was only told that the king requested you to escort a potentially dangerous prisoner from the battle,” the aide told him nervously, armored in Alliance colors, but with a voice that was so young it made something in Turalyon’s chest ache.

Down at the docks, he was brought to the ship at the furthest dock, where the king himself waited, the rest of his immediate council dispersed. The aide vanished, and King Anduin greeted him, “High Exarch--you were told we have a...potentially compromising prisoner to escort?”

“Yes, however I am somewhat light on details.” Turalyon followed the king into the ship’s cargo hold, unsure whether he ought to be reaching for a weapon or not. “I trust that--”

As they entered the final cargo section, Turalyon found his words stolen by shock, as he took in the sight of the Deathlord herself, the very same from Argus, fully-armored and inscrutable as always--with Alliance shackles binding her wrists and ankles. “You were previously...acquainted with the Deathlord during the Argus campaigns.” Anduin began hesitantly, “And given her status, as well as the depths of her power, we felt it prudent to have an escort capable of keeping the masses at bay.”

Curious, Turalyon thought, that Anduin was more concerned about the reaction from Stormwind’s citizens than the fact they now had one of the most powerful death knights on Azeroth in their custody. “Where would you have me take her?”

“If I understand it correctly,” the Deathlord herself spoke up, loudly enough to make the point she didn’t appreciate being discussed as though she wasn’t present, “I am being brought to the Stormwind stockades along with our other prisoner. Your Majesty,” she turned to the young king, who straightened instinctively, “I would still wish to share words with you. Soon.”

“We will see what sort of discussion you wish to have.” Anduin conceded. “High Exarch?”

Wordlessly, Turalyon stepped up to where the Deathlord was shackled to the deck, and released her from it, leaving her ankles and wrists bound in sturdy chains that he had a feeling she could very well have frozen solid and shattered if she truly wanted to--the first mission on Argus, where she had frozen a fel eruption produced by a pit lord solid, came to mind.

They walked in silence for several minutes until Turalyon had a feeling any potential eavesdroppers were well out of range. “Why are you here?”

“I surrendered. I thought that fairly obvious.”

“I didn’t ask how. I believe I asked why.”

“That is something I would discuss with the king.” her voice was as guarded as ever, solid and unshakable. In some way, he found himself envious of her clearly-evident certainty. “If I must languish in a cell to reach that opportunity, so be it.”

At Stormwind’s cells, Turalyon was directed where to bring the Deathlord, and as they arrived, it felt wrong to say nothing, but there was not much Turalyon felt he could say about this situation. He had come to respect the Deathlord’s prowess during the Argus campaigns, and her surprising streak of something that smacked of compassion, but she was still a warrior of the Horde, and had been witness, at the very least, to the atrocities at Ashenvale and Teldrassil.

Turalyon stepped away, and this time the silence was filled with words he didn’t know if he could--should--say, here, now, to the Deathlord, of all people.

He felt the chill in the air as he left, and altered his initial assumption of the Deathlord’s wintry aura--it was not indiscriminate, but deliberate, and still, despite the situation she was quite obviously in, there was something certain and solid about it, the energy laced with an unshakable confidence.

Some part of him wanted to draw strength from it, but he resisted.

*

Stormwind’s court did not have to wait long for the Deathlord’s address.

Less than two days after their return to Stormwind from Lordaeron, King Anduin gathered the inner circle of his advisors to the throne room, and Turalyon attended on the periphery, unsure what exactly was about to happen, but feeling as though he ought to be prepared.

Escorted in by a half-dozen Stormwind guards came the Deathlord, still fully-armored and looking very like she had when Turalyon had last seen her, days ago. Her chin was held high, and her cape--torn and shredded at the bottom--flowed behind her with each step, looking for all intents and purposes as regal as a monarch’s mantle.

“King Anduin.” while the Deathlord’s voice carried well across the room, the impassable mask of her helmet muffled her voice just slightly. “I have a favor to ask, before I begin--would someone remove my helmet, please?”

Turalyon felt a pulse of shock surround the room, but Genn was the first to protest. “She’s a death knight--one of the most powerful death knights known to us. If we--”

“If I intended to trick you,” the Deathlord interrupted, a hard, scathing edge to her tone, “I would not be so foolish as to attempt it with something that obvious. It is a fairly innocuous request. Please.”

There was a beat of silence, then with a single nod of approval, one of the guards that escorted her in slowly began to unfasten the buckles that kept the Deathlord’s helmet connected to the rest of her armor. The helmet was lifted off her head and dropped to the floor, and another pulse of shock, stronger this time, choked the room off into silence.

She was young, almost shockingly so, but there was still a weathered quality to her face that spoke of long battles and longer years spent living a life with a great deal of strife--she was not quite ageless, in this way, but it made it difficult for Turalyon to tell if she truly looked young or not. Her skin was nearly snow-white, marked by several small scars across her face, her hair a stark black in comparison, and her eyes the unnatural blue that all death knights’ were.

When she spoke, it was not what any of them expected--though what anyone expected was beyond him. “Your Majesty, tell me--what would you have given to be on Broken Shore? With your father?”

There was a collective intake of breath from everyone in the room, Turalyon included--he of course had not been there, but heard of how both factions had lost their leaders to the battle there.

“What would you have given,” the Deathlord continued, her tone quiet but firm and resolute, “to have been there, to have seen it for yourself, or--dare I say--to have taken the strike that killed him instead?” a beat of silence passed, but it was a question she didn’t seem to need an answer to--an answer everyone present already knew. “Your Majesty, you and your court can see my face, and know this for truth, but I will emphasize the point--I was young when the Scourge killed me. Barely into adulthood, by sin’dorei years. Being resurrected by the Lich King and becoming one of his many thralls forced me to acquire new perspectives, and when we were freed from his control, it forced another adjustment, though it’s debatable which one was more jarring.

“You see, it left us with choice, for the first time, choice we were ill-equipped to handle.” the Deathlord took a step forward, her chains rattling slightly. “But choice became my watchword, because I saw it as the greatest thing I had been given since my resurrection. When I was killed, I had no choice in being brought back as whatever I am today, but I could choose what to do with the life given me, for better or worse. The first time, I chose to fight for the Horde because it felt like the natural conclusion to that issue. Now I come here to make another choice. I have only ever removed my helmet for negotiations once before, in similar circumstances to these: in respect, and in desperation.”

“What do you intend, Deathlord Nightsinger?” King Anduin finally asked, after a charged pause, and Turalyon realized it was the first time he had heard any mention of her name since meeting her--she had introduced herself with her title and nothing more on Argus.

“Right now, I intend only to make a point.” Deathlord Nightsinger’s gaze turned intense, and Turalyon felt a subtle chill hang in the air. “I asked you what you would have given, to be on Broken Shore, already knowing the answer. I knew the answer because it is what I would have chosen, as well.” One of the Deathlord’s hands moved up to the chestplate of her armor, and the Stormwind guards surrounding her fidgeted as if readying themselves to stop her, but Anduin raised a hand, and they fell still.

Reaching beneath her collar, the Deathlord pulled what looked like a pendant from it--the end of a tusk, bound on a chain. Her voice wavered slightly on the first few words before steadying again, “I, too, would have given anything to take the strike that felled someone I loved. That is a choice I would have made without question, not because I would have been compelled to through some application of dark magic, but because we choose to stand, fight, and potentially die for the causes we believe in--the people we believe in.” Tucking the pendant back under her armored chestplate, Deathlord Nightsinger raised her chin again, proud and confident. “I stand here because I looked in the face of my warchief, who asked what honor should matter to a corpse, and told her that it still matters to this corpse--because I can choose differently. I surrendered to your people to avoid further bloodshed, knowing I would be detained and imprisoned, at the very least. I come to deliver this address to make my motivations clear.” One of her dark brows quirked up. “But be certain of this: I will not sit idle long.”

It was a promise if Turalyon had ever heard one, and the rest of King Anduin’s court was not blind to the obvious implication, either, but when it became clear the Deathlord had said what she came to say, her helmet was returned to her, and Turalyon asked to escort her back down to her cell.

This time, the silence that sat between them demanded to be filled, and Turalyon found himself saying, “I admit I am somewhat at a loss.”

Deathlord Nightsinger made a sharp, amused sound. “Is that so?”

“You orchestrated your capture, came all the way to Stormwind, only to speak and make vaguely threatening promises to King Anduin’s court?” Turalyon searched for the logic that would explain why he felt compelled to ask, and failed to find it, but asked anyway.

Even though her helmet was back on her head again, it was all too easy to imagine the even, steadfast look on her hauntingly ageless face. “I made no threats, High Exarch, and be assured that none of this was orchestrated. I am not particularly known for my spontaneity, but this decision was made in a split second. I refused to--could not--do anything else. Sometimes the most important decisions are made that way.”

“Your certainty on the matter is enviable.” he found himself admitting, and was surprised when he received a laugh, short and humorless, in return.

“My ‘certainty’ comes with years of practice cultivating a suitably convincing image.” the Deathlord countered. “But I meant what I said, and perhaps that is most surprising to me. I don’t often have the chance to speak from my heart anymore.”

He didn’t know what to say to that, if there was anything to say in the position they found themselves in. Ultimately, Turalyon turned to leave again, felt the ambient weight to the air that came from Deathlord Nightsinger’s suitably-convincing certainty, and let its subtle chill settle into his bones this time as he left--a little pinch of the dark, to balance the light.

*

Two days later, Deathlord Nightsinger escaped Stormwind.

Well, they suspected it had been two days later--the sleight of hand her death knight compatriots had played left room for doubt on that matter. There had been no brutal, punishing assault, no quiet assassination of guards in the dead of night, no alarm raised, because for all intents and purposes, the Deathlord’s knights had simply walked in, and escorted her out.

It was slightly more complicated than that--it always was--but so far the reports he was getting out of the guards on duty that night were meager to say the least. Many of them reported a few consistent details, though--three death knights, a human man and woman, and a draenei--had come into the stockades and bluffed their way to the Deathlord’s cell, after a suitably-plausible excuse that the Stormwind guards were ignorant to death knight upkeep, and had been allowed to bring her back to Acherus, which supposedly had more suitable arrangements.

It was only after two days with no word from the Acherus-bound death knights the guard force had to report they had been fooled.

An immediate search had commenced for the missing death knight, but with portal travel being a strong possibility for their escape, the group could very well have been anywhere on Azeroth. As war continued to simmer, rapidly reaching a boiling point, fewer and fewer resources could be spared for the search.

Turalyon thought about the last day he had seen and spoken to the Deathlord far more than he reasonably should’ve, but reasoned it away with the justification that knowing her motives might make it easier to discern where she’d gone. Admittedly, it was proving a weak tactic thus far.

A sudden commotion drew Turalyon’s attention--the clatter of armor and shouting made him rise from his desk, only armored from the waist down, as one of the guards rapped hurriedly on the door. “High Exarch, you’re needed at the main foyer--hurry.”

A dozen lifetimes of swift preparations for Legion assaults left him oddly prepared for such circumstances, for once, and in a few short moments, Turalyon barreled down the hallways of Stormwind’s keep late at night, one hand reaching up to his shoulder, ready to draw his sword if needed.

In the keep’s foyer, just outside the throne room, Turalyon took brisk strides down the long, sloping hallway, and felt a telltale chill in the air, slowly becoming oddly familiar.

Deathlord Nightsinger was surrounded by the very same combination of death knights who had supposedly gotten her out of Stormwind’s prisons, along with the same troll death knight he recognized from the Argus campaigns, months ago now. King Anduin was already present, as were Genn and Tyrande, but it was clear many of them had been brought straight from their beds.

“Deathlord,” King Anduin’s voice, with all its strained patience, was still mild for the situation at hand, “you escaped our custody and have already found your way back to our gates--why?”

“After my friends freed me from your cells,” the Deathlord exchanged a glance with one of the knights in question, the human woman, who flashed a toothy grin, “I began thinking about the future. Originally I intended to save the Horde, but it became clear to me, reading over the notes I exchanged with the Illidari commander prior to the attack on Teldrassil, that it does not particularly want to be saved--not by me, at any rate.” she lifted her shoulders in a shrug. curiously casual for someone who presented herself so stoically. “In short--I want to defect.”

For a moment, conversation--or objections--were stolen by shock, but Tyrande was the first to break the silence. “And we are supposed to trust you, who watched Teldrassil burn and committed countless atrocities as a death knight in the Horde’s service?”

“I admit that I was present at Teldrassil at the time of the attack, but I do not condone the methods used there.” it was almost too easy to imagine the expression on her face, eyes narrowed and dark brows drawn together, even with her helmet covering it. “I also freely admit that, at the time, I served a cause I felt I could believe in, and chose to do so. Now, I am choosing differently. I do not ask for immediate trust. I ask only for a chance.”

Turalyon watched the room split with indecision, and thought back to the last conversation he’d had with the Deathlord, and her statement that some of the most important decisions were made on a blade’s edge, when it could fall either way, a choice made when there was no choice at all.

He thought, but at the same time knew he had already reached his verdict on it.

“I believe her.” he declared, and as he felt the tension rise steeply in the room, he grasped for justification, because the decision was made, he had only to defend it, and it came to him in a flash, how obvious it was-- “On Argus, we were confronted with the reality of losing a potent symbol to our cause. It was the Deathlord herself who told me that we stand at a crossroads, and we may allow doubt to tempt us, but not consume us. We can rely only on ourselves for guidance, for purpose. The Light lives not as a symbol, but in each of us. Even,” here he couldn’t help but watch the Deathlord’s reaction--she’d seemingly gone stock-still with surprise, “in whom we might consider the most unlikely people.”

‘Unlikely’, he said, though it was clear, even from the first time Turalyon had felt that chill in the air that announced her presence, in a clearing on Argus, that there was light that lived in the Deathlord, somewhere. It had not driven her to seek this fate out, to offer him what she felt was a comfort in a moment of doubt, to stand in the face of death on Argus and not even flinch from the possibility of it, with the lives of her people on the table.

She had chosen it, and in those choices, the light shone as if from a deep shadow, hesitant and half-forgotten, but unquestionably there.

“Well,” King Anduin finally said when the room seemed to have recovered from the shock of his defense on the Deathlord’s character, “Deathlord, I would like to discuss further terms in the morning, but I’m willing to work with you.”

Incredulousness all but radiated both from Genn and Tyrande, but the decision had been made, and Turalyon felt the finality of it settle into his bones, as certain and resolute as the wintry aura the Deathlord herself gave off.

“I...thank you, Your Majesty.” Deathlord Nightsinger paused, then bowed her head. “I look forward to working with you.”

“Have the Deathlord and her knights secured in a section of the keep, and have them guarded until morning.” Anduin turned to the nearest guard, somewhat apologetically, who straightened in a brief salute before dashing off. “I trust that arrangement will work, for now.”

“For now.” Deathlord Nightsinger confirmed, and while her helmet still unquestionably faced the king, Turalyon could almost feel the intensity of her gaze on him anyway, piercing and questioning.

“I can escort the Deathlord herself, if that would be of some assistance.” Turalyon offered, and the intensity of her gaze turned nearly impossible to ignore.

King Anduin nodded once, and exhaustion began to steal across his face again. “It would, High Exarch--my thanks.”

Separated as she was from the rest of her knights, the Deathlord looked somehow smaller, but still projected that same unshakable energy. They walked in silence for several long moments before she broke it. “You spoke in my defense.”

“I did.” he confirmed.

“Why?”

Turalyon could have given the Deathlord any answer, in that moment, but none of them seemed to fit right. It was the right thing to do. Having a high-ranking Horde defector would be invaluable for the war effort. You would make a valuable political prisoner at the worst case scenario.

In the end, all he said was, “It was not a planned decision, but I meant what I said. Perhaps it has been some time since I was afforded the opportunity to speak from the heart, as well.”

She said nothing in response until they reached the wing of Stormwind’s keep where the Deathlord would be sequestered until they determined just how much they were willing to trust her, and as the guards already stationed there pushed the door open for them, she wordlessly entered and cast her gaze around the room for a short moment.

With a faint sigh, she reached for the buckles on her helmet, and Turalyon prepared to turn and leave, sensing that the removal of her helmet was more momentous an occasion than one might’ve ordinarily suspected, but before he could, the buckles came loose, and she pulled her helmet from her head, setting it on the desk as she turned around.

“Tyracel.” she told him at last, her face unreadable. “My name is Tyracel.”

In that moment, Turalyon felt he’d just been given a gift with a nameless, indefinable value, and had no suitable response to it.

“I am no Deathlord anymore,” she looked at her helmet, sitting on the nearby desk, “so I will need to be called by something else.”

“Very well.” Turalyon finally managed. “I suppose we will speak again soon...Lady Nightsinger.”

Tyracel--he was going to have something of a difficult time thinking of her as Tyracel--snorted with amusement. “I have not been called a lady since the day I was resurrected, High Exarch, so I must say your standards as to what constitutes a ‘lady’ must have fallen dramatically during your time on Argus.”

A laugh bubbled up in his chest, but Turalyon covered it up with a swift cough instead. “Perhaps, perhaps not.”

As he left, and sought out his own quarters on the other side of the keep, Turalyon thought about hope, about purpose, and about the choices one was often forced to make in order to keep believing in both of those things. He thought of Argus, of the countless days where hope was a conscious choice, because there was little else to believe in, and of the days since returning from the blighted world, where purpose had stubbornly eluded him.

He thought of a single death knight, determined to make her own way in this world with only her principles and those few of her kind who shared them for company, who shone with a sliver of light, somewhere, obscured by a brisk, icy shell. Something like--

Something, he thought, like a light, at the end of a tunnel.

[artemis-entreri]

Just One Word

Part 3: Nightmare | Part 2: Prayer | Part 1: Despair

As he had for so many nights, Entreri wandered the fog-filled plane. He'd come to recognize the gloomy place and knew it to be a dream, so he didn't fight it, as he had the first time he'd arrived here. Back then, he'd collapsed from exhaustion after desperate and vain attempts to resuscitate Jarlaxle, so his first thought upon waking in the gray haze was that he'd arrived in the Fugue. 

The assassin smiled mirthlessly as he recalled his hubris, to believe that he'd somehow managed to follow the drow's soul into the afterlife. Even more laughably, he'd immediately set off to try to find the mercenary's spark without a shadow of his usual circumspection, so convinced was he that if he didn't succeed the Demon Queen of Spiders would snatch Jarlaxle forever away from him. For what felt like tendays, Entreri had futilely wandered the featureless gray plane, meeting nothing but the muffled echoes of his own forlorn shouts of the mercenary's name.

Now, he simply stood amidst the still mists, waiting for the dream to release him. Like so many of his nightmares, it seemed a matter of them being done with him rather than him being done with them. Another reason that he didn't fight the gray dream was that, unlike the nightmares, it would release him into physical warmth, and that warmth would not be tainted by a mental chill that crushed both his body and mind.

It was always difficult to tell the passage of time within a dream, but Entreri waited for what he believed to be much longer than usual, and still, no physical warmth roused his body. He waited longer, but still the heat did not come. After yet more waiting, which was met with no change, the assassin set off in a direction that looked the same as all the rest. Moving seemed as pointless as standing still, for the scenery did not change. But, he kept walking, for he knew not what else to do.

Then, suddenly, the mist thinned, as though the fog was parting. Thinking that perhaps he'd found a way out of the dream after all, Entreri quickened his steps, his pace increasing even more as he made out the vague shapes of buildings and streets. He looked down, and saw familiar uneven cobblestones beneath his feet. He looked up, and saw the irregular rooftops jutting out asymmetrically overhead. Even though fog still obscured much of his surroundings, he knew in his heart that he was in Luskan once more.

But this wasn't the Luskan he knew. Tattered sails hung from the moldy masts of decrepit ships in the harbor, the rotting planks of broken docks jutting up at odd angles. Cobwebs hung in window frames with shattered pieces of glass, shutters dangled on loose nails. Abandoned wagons laid on their sides with the desiccated bones of horses littering the ground nearby. It was like a vision of the Shadowfell, but Entreri had visited the Shadowfell, and even the darkest despair that he felt there was unlike the malaise that filled his heart now.

Realization struck him like a lightning bolt. The assassin ran to where he was supposed to be laying in dreams, repeating the steps he thought he took earlier that very night to what was supposed to have been a sturdy but nondescript two-story building. He paused only a heartbeat to gawk at the sagging frame before bolting inside, not bothering to look at the door that clattered hollowly to the ground behind him. Each stair splintered apart beneath each of his steps, and he had to run his quickest to stay ahead of the whole structure collapsing underneath him.

The stairway fell into a heap of rubble behind Entreri as he stood on the landing, the door before him perforated by mildew and permeated by mold. It collapsed inward at just the brush of his fingertips, shooting forth a blast of stale blight into the space that the assassin had painfully "sanctified". He leapt over the ruined wood, which already began to crumble to dust. He was by the prone figure's side within the same breath, the figure whose skin was as ashen as this gray world.

"Jarlaxle?" 

Entreri's voice sounded distant even to his own ears. As he had done earlier, he gingerly touched his palm to the drow's forehead, but drew it back with a gasp. 

It was ice cold.

"Jarlaxle!" 

Still, his shout sounded so far away. The frantic human scooped up the drow while simultaneously trying to gather the blanket, his haste causing the latter to fall to the dust-covered floor. The wooden boards should've been spotless, for he'd made it part of his daily routine to wipe away every trace of filth from this sacred space. 

Yet Entreri paid the dirt no mind, for the mercenary was so painfully cold. The assassin swiped a foot across the floor until he hooked the blanket, which he desperately wrapped around his companion, even though his doing so meant tainting his most precious charge with dirt. Furiously did Entreri rub Jarlaxle's stiff limbs, his thoughts stubbornly affixing themselves within memories of bygone days in the cold north and how his companion had suggested that he tried rubbing his limbs when he'd complained about the chill making him stiff. 

But Artemis Entreri was pragmatic, too pragmatic to allow himself delusion even when it might've comforted him. Even before his forlorn eyes rose to see all around them crumbling to dust, he knew that, as with all things, Luskan could not survive without its heart.

"Jarlaxle," the assassin whispered as he bowed his head and bent his shoulders forward protectively over the mercenary. The ceiling, walls and furniture faded to ash and blew away on an invisible wind. Entreri vaguely felt bits of the debris catch on his skin and stick to his hair. Those sensations too went away as the world around them disappeared, and though he couldn't feel his arms or what laid within them anymore, he still held fast. Then, he saw his own body start to chip apart, each piece falling off like a torn bit of parchment. His arm crumbled to dust, but he managed to turn his body so that the disintegrating wind could not yet touch Jarlaxle. Bits of his clothing drifted past him, rags crumbling to ashes. His hair was next, thick dark strands turning into insubstantial soot. 

Finally, Entreri felt the field of his vision narrowing. He smiled, and whether he still had lips hardly mattered, as he knew that his desire would be fulfilled. He would go first, he'd protect his companion until he was no more, but more than anything, he wouldn't have to experience losing Jarlaxle again. 

The assassin's dark irises faded to dullness before crumbling away too, and what remained of his indomitable will kept his pupils affixed upon the only remaining solid shape. But even that indomitable will eventually yielded to the ravaging decomposition, as the little black dots were yanked from where they'd defined the disciplined human's steady gaze. The black dots bobbed, resisting being carried away by the flow of particles enough to affix themselves to the drow's cheek. There, they lingered, like a long final kiss, before disintegrating and rolling like tears down the smooth obsidian surface.

But even etherealness brought no relief, for though he could not see, hear nor feel, Entreri still "lived". He'd become one with the endless gray, his sorrow its atmosphere, his desperate plea the breath that dismantled his cherished one.

"Jarlaxle, please don't leave me," whispered the wind that broke the lifeless drow into pieces.

[cartoonfangirl1218]

Broken pieces

Note: Hi y’all. So here is yet another Eleteo angst fic concerning the events of Rise of the Sorceress. I wanted to do a small comfort fic concerning Elena finding a prized possession of her mother being broken by the witch who is currently trying to kill her. So yay!-ish. 

Elena jumped off her horse once she approached the palace and ran up the steps. Her friends had gone to put their horses in the stables but Elena couldn’t stop moving. She had to check the palace, she had to see who was safe. She had to do something!

Her mind screamed at her to go back. Shuriki was just going to cause more terror especially now that she had the scepter. 

She could attack one of the lower villages. Maybe she would circle back to the palace. Maybe if they chased after her... maybe they could find Shuriki’s hideout and ambush her? Maybe...

She should be doing anything but what she was doing now. Retreating to her palace like a scared little princess.

Before she had time to knock Armando flung the doors opened and Isabel ran to her hug her. Elena looked at her little sister for any signs of pain but it was obvious that apart from the look of utter grief and terror written across her face, she was alright.

“She’s really back, Elena, and she broke Mamí’s tiara.” Isabel sniffed into her torso.

“What?” A minute before her mind had been racing with all the possible consequences of Shuriki’s return, but now it she felt the weight of her tiredness. The beginnings of a migraine were pounding in her temples and she repeated, “Mamí’s tiara is broken?”

Somehow that sentence didn’t compute. She knew that the tiara must be broken since she had seen Shuriki with the crown jewel. The crown jewel as part of the glowing green scepter. The flash and the glow as she screeched “Llevequ” at her.

Elena instinctively flinched as the memory of the bright flash through her mind. She had felt its searing heat blaze past her head and for a moment, she knew the terror her parents had felt when Shuriki killed them.

A lump rose in her throat but she managed to push it down when her abuelos approached, their voices high with anxious worry against a threat only she could vanquish.

The rest of the afternoon was a blur to Elena. She understood everything that was going on, but she felt disconnected from it all. Esteban reportng what he had seen of the treasury. Isabel clutching her hand in a death-grip, reminiscent of when she was a 7 year old afraid of the shadow monster. Mateo and Naomi returning to tell the story of Shuriki’s return and Rita’s infiltration. Francisco announcing that they would have a Grand Council meeting the very next morning to plan what to do next about Shuriki. Gabe assigning guards for her protection. Abuela insisting that she should go to bed early. It was all a haze.

She managed to nod and speak at the appropriate times but all she could really feel was the heavy weight pressing against her chest, and the lump in her throat that constricted her breath. The migraine made the rest of her body feel heavy and unsteady when she walked to her room and once she approached the bathroom she threw up. 

It disgusted her. Not so much the contents of her lunch but the fact that she did it. Shuriki returns and this is what she was reduced to? Throwing up in fear of what the witch would do to her. Freezing at first sight of her evil self-satisfied smirk.

She was grateful that her friends had helped to save her. She would have been dead if Naomi hadn’t pushed her out of the way and Mateo hadn’t thrown her, her scepter. But as she glad as she was for them she still felt ashamed for needing them. She was going to be the queen of Avalor. She had to be the light of her people and to be able to help them with their every problem. She was the one who was supposed to face their enemies with an unflinching stare. Not freeze in cold fear.

Elena trembled against the cold tiles of her bathroom and clenched her fists in an effort to still her quaking body. Her breath was coming in short desperate pants and it took all of Elena’s willpower to remember that the best way was to reduce panic was to think of something calming. But when she closed her eyes, all she saw was the green flash.

Like a phantom pain, she felt the heat of the spell graze her face and her breath catch in her throat. With a strangled cry Elena jumped to her feet, nearly knocking over the shower curtain in her distress.

She managed to grip the sides of the bathroom mirror, and focused on her face, watching as her breath became slower and slower.

She blinked rapidly to try to clear her eyes of the tears that were threatening to fall and once again, saw the bright green flashes behind her eyelids. She would never be able to sleep this way. Not without thinking of Shuriki everytime she closed her eyes. How she wished that she had gone after her. Maybe if they had, they would have defeated her by now. She wouldn’t have to live with such anxiety.

She glanced at her mirror again. She didn’t look profoundly changed she knew from how she looked this morning till now but she felt changed. She felt older, a bit wiser almost. She had seen and done so much in this past year. And now Shuriki could change everything again.

Beyond the pale sheen on her face, she noticed her eyes seemed dimmer than this morning. It made sense, she was no longer excited about the Sunflower Festival as she had been before. But she felt a stab of sadness in her stomach. Her parents would be so sad if they were with her now.

When she had been a little girl and had gotten teary-eyed, her parents would immediately try to comfort her. Normal. But she had noticed that her parents would seem personally saddened too, especially as her mother said, “I don’t want to see the brightness go out of your eyes mija.”

Well the brightness was gone now.

“Oh Mamí” Elena lowered head .

“Shuriki broke Mamí’s tiara.” “Mamí’s tiara is broken?”

The words swirled in Elena’s head and a new course of action gripped her mind. She obviously wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight. Maybe if she saw her mother’s tiara it would renew her anger against the witch and give her new ideas on how to stop her.

That sense of purpose made Elena’s feet lose their slowness and she paced quickly towards the treasury. Then she stopped. She had vaguely registered Armando’s words that he placed the tiara in a safe in the basement of the palace since the guards would need to recheck the security system of the treasury-maybe it was there instead.

It was unlikely anyone would see her. Rarely did anyone ever go to the basement or dungeons or lower levels of the castle. Plus it was almost dinnertime which was when everyone started settling down from the busyness of the day. With the events of today, she was the palace would be almost silent with a subdued atmosphere that Shuriki’s return brought.  

She cautiously approached the basement door and her knock easily swung the door wide open. The safe was inconspicuously in the corner among the shadows. The only sign that it had been recently used were the broken cobwebs.

With a hairpin in her ponytail, Elena easily opened the safe up and gazed upon the broken tiara.

It was in two pieces with cracks on the gold where small jewels formerly layed. The silver was scratched and jagged and it had lost its luster.

Tears unexpectedly filled her eyes when she saw it and the lump in her throat returned making her emit hoarse choking sounds.

It was broken. Completely and totally broken. Though it was split perfectly in the middle Elena knew it could never be fixed.

Elena gripped the two pieces in her hands and the sobs that she had been holding in from her brief panic in the bathroom came out fast and furious.

It felt like her mother had died all over again. She knew that maybe it was superficial to put so much sentiment into an object but this was her mother’s tiara!

Memories of her mother and her decorating the float for Carnaval, her mother standing tall and proud as she waved to the people of Avalor, her mother holding her hands as she taught her how to first do the Sunflower dance almost 47 years ago. Her mother hugging her and fencing with her and her singing. It was all gone forever.

Memories flew by in a jumbled rush but one that kept returning in vivid slow motion was her parents screams and the green flash that incinerated them.

“I’m so sorry Mamí” Elena hiccuped  between her tears, “I’m so sorry I failed you. I’m sorry I’m a failure.”

She failed protecting her parents when Shuriki first came, she failed when she hadn’t really killed Shuriki when she had the chance, some oversight allowed her to live. She failed to realize that Rita was a traitor. She failed to understand much less win over the dark prophecy. She failed. Now Shuriki broke her mother’s tiara and was going to kill her.

Her lungs heaved with sobs and air that fought to win over her tired body. Her hot tears streaked down her face and the overwhelming pain, sadness and hopelessness within that threatened to engulf her. Her mother was gone and with the tiara broken, it felt like Shuriki killed whatever spirit that was left in it.

She was a failure, she was going to die. Her parents would be so ashamed. How could she have let Carla get past her like that? How dare she stay here safe in the palace when Shuriki was out there planning her next move of destruc-

“Hello?” A voice called, the floorboards creaking under his feet.

Elena whipped her head around to recognize the royal wizard entering the room. Before she could wipe her tears away he caught a glimpse of her face. His face automatically softened as he sat down next to her and put his arms around her shaking shoulders. 

Elena uncharacteristically squirmed away from this touch, vainly trying to rub away the watery tears.

“Mateo why are you?”

“My workshop kinda has thin walls and I heard crying. Since it was coming from beneath me I came down here and..”

“I’m sorry.” Elena muttered hating how weak she sounded with the small whine at the end, trying to hold back her cries.

Elena wiped her eyes again and without the blurry vision she saw that Mateo was keeping his hands folded in his lap. Her chest twinged with guilt. He was trying to hug her to cheer her up and she pushed him away.

Elena sighed. She didn’t deserve his kindness. Not with how badly she was screwing everything up. If she had killed Shuriki the first time then he wouldn’t have been put in danger today. No one would have been put in danger.

“I’m sorry.” Elena repeated and looked up into his warm hazel eyes. As usual they were creased with worried edges on his brows but still an underlying softness that showed how much he cared. Elena always was amazed at this trait. He cared so much for everyone. The kingdom, the people, his friends, his mother. He was the true protector. He had been scared of Fiero but he pushed past that fear to defeat him. Unlike she with Shuriki.

“You don’t have to apologize.” Mateo patted her shoulder. “I should, I let Rita get in the palace..”

“So did I! How could I have done that? I’m supposed to be queen, I should be on alert. And I-No  I mean, I just.. I was crying. Not about that but I shouldn’t. I’ve-” Elena futility held the two pieces of the crown in her hands but she couldn’t get the words out.

She wanted to explain that she should be out in the kingdom to stop Shuriki. But she was stuck here and she saw her mother’s tiara. She was grateful that he was by her side in battle but that she shouldn’t have needed backup. She shouldn’t have froze. She shouldn’t be here, blubbering with sadness. If she couldn’t do anything useful why was she on the throne? She was going to lead them all to ruin.

But Mateo looked at her and as their eyes connected Elena felt some of the weight that was on her chest lift. That small connection felt more than comfort but like an understanding between them. She didn’t have to explain or justify how she was feeling, he just understood. No questions, just trust and comfort.

On one hand Elena felt that she should leave. She was the queen. This was her duty and her duty alone. She shouldn’t get him involved with her insecurities. She had to appear like a peerless rock or else the kingdom would be in fear. But on the other hand, she desperately wanted someone to confide her fears too. She had already done just that when she told him of Quito Moz’s prophecy, but this was more than a prophecy she hadn’t figured out. She felt as vulnerable as she did when she was stuck in the amulet. Being the only one against that witch.

If her parents were here they would be able to guide her but they were gone, and so was one of her mother’s prized possessions.

A glance at the jagged tiara sealed the decision for her. She flung her arms around him and buried her face in his woolen robe, letting all the tangled emotions come out muffled against his body and feeling the constant steady touch of Mateo’s arms wrapped around her. It was so familiar to when she was a little girl with her parents it almost made her cry harder. Something small that she would never feel again.

Elena didn’t know how long she stayed wrapped in Mateo’s arms but as her tears petered out and a yawn threatened to overtake her, she disentangled herself from Mateo.

Elena sniffed and was about to say “Thank you” when Mateo opened his mouth as if he would like to say something but finished with a tight lipped expression.

Was he scared now? Did he think she was behaving foolishly? She knew she shouldn’t have let anyone see her like this-

“I’m sorry about your mother’s tiara.” Mateo’s voice broke into her thoughts. She almost sighed in relief. How could she have doubted him for a second. He had said that he would be there for her no matter what.

“Me too.” Elena nodded. There wasn’t much to add to that. She reverently put the two pieces back in the safe, closed it and got up to her feet with Mateo.

Mateo gripped her shoulder and with a solemn face, “I know it seems like Shuriki got the upper hand right now. But I promise I will do everything in my power to stop her. I will do everything to help you. Me and the rest of Avalor is behind you, Elena. It’s okay that you haven’t defeated Shuriki yet because tomorrow you will. You are not a failure because there is still time for you to succeed.”

Elena gripped Mateo’s other hand with her own, the last weight in her chest falling away. Something about Mateo’s reminder that he was behind her, along with the rest of Avalor gave her some feeling of safety. They were behind her. They still had work to do, but she could overcome Shuriki and if she fell at least she could count on Mateo to be there for her.

“Thank you for that, Mateo. You’re absolutely right. We still have time. I’m going to search for Shuriki tomorrow, I will do something about her. Mark my words.”

Simultaneously, they gave each other a curt nod and Elena smiled for the first time since the attack. She no longer felt as helpless as before. She was going to do something and she knew Mateo would help her with any of her plans.

They left the basement together and went their separate ways. Elena to her room where she would not sleep but stay up pacing and practicing spells with her scepter. When Mateo entered his workshop, he took one more glance of Elena leaving the corridor. A confident step in her walk.  

When he had saw her crying over the tiara he had meant to apologize fully for his actions that led Rita to the treasury. How stupid and foolish could he be to believe Carla’s silver-tongue fake compliments? He was a wizard, shouldn’t he have recognize a shape shifting spell? How could he let her play him like that and endanger Elena?

He had meant to apologize but when he saw Elena’s palpable fear for Shuriki and her insecurities blinding her to her true strength he hadn’t been able to finish what he had meant to say. It wasn’t his turn to wallow in his flaws when Elena was carrying a burden and guilt far more greater than anyone else.

His heart broke just a little seeing Elena so fearful for her life and feeling that she was a failure. She was brave, compassionate, creative, talented, gorgeous...she was much more than the legends he had heard about her in his childhood. She was flawed to be sure but she was a literal shining light.

He hadn’t been able to apologize but he saw that that didn’t matter. Like she needed to do something to defeat Shuriki once and for all. So did he. He was going to make potions, learn new spells, he was going to take action, do everything in his power to right his wrongs. 

For Elena and for Avalor.

[anemoiarts]

Corrupted Hero, by anemoiarts

1: False Dawn

The stagnant haze of a century clouded the humid air of the Shrine. Painted a soft blue from the reverent glow of the resurrection pedestal at the heart of the room, the haze hung, silently, around the dormant form of a young Hylian laid across the pedestal. Sealed away from the world above, the Shrine hummed to itself in silence, as still as the Hylian it cradled. Forgotten by time and memory and ash, both the Hylian and the Shrine listened, awaiting the voice they had heard, every day, for one hundred years.

She was late today. Her calls had grown later and later, recently. But the Shrine knew she had a reason. Its patience could withstand the delay; time had always been its friend.

Though initially absent, she finally appeared from out of the darkness. She breathed her usual appeal just as intently and urgently as she had when the fields of Hyrule raged with flames.

Wake up, Link… she plead, faithful as always.

Her voice reached across a vast expanse, seeping through the Shrine’s walls and drifting toward the Hylian. Gently, it pushed through the thick, ancient mist enshrouding the pedestal and sunk through the murky, protective lake entombing him, whispering its way into his mind, straining to inspire some form of life within him.

She paused, half-expecting something to happen. Her ears strained to hear anything — any movement, any sound. Anything. Yet in spite of her efforts, he remained stiff as death. Her throat tightened.

Open your eyes, she mourned, a pang of sorrow wilting her voice. Please!

Only silence.

...I need you...

Nothing.

Crestfallen, she withdrew for a moment, choking back helpless tears. They stung at her eyes as if in punishment for her naught hopes.

She believed he would have woken up by now — now, more than ever — perhaps on this, the hundredth anniversary of his slumber. But why did he not wake? What was she doing wrong?

For an agonizing, almost eternal century in isolation, she had prayed and struggled and cried to awaken him, to bring him back to the world, to get his help that she so desperately needed. But as the years bled together without him, her hope had withered in the shadows, craving the light. Craving him. Buried in darkness and malice, she had grown weary, almost wishing to join him in his sleep. She had teased the thought many times, but found herself too afraid of what may happen to drift off unawares. She had fought too hard to let go now.

Each time she had called to him, the Shrine had replied with a crushing, mute, Not yet. Each denial was nothing less than a strike to the heart, thousands of times over.

She wasn’t ready to give up on him, but just how soon was yet? There had been no respite for her. Day in and day out, staunchly holding back a demon voracious for destruction, all while reaching out to a fallen hero. Her fallen hero.

But just as before, she had nothing to show for it.

She wasn’t sure how much more loneliness she could endure, and how much more silence she could bear.

To her fortune, this silence was soon broken.

With her latest prayers on deaf ears, she was about to retreat back into her mind when, without so much as a warning, the Shrine gave a sudden shudder. The movement stirred the mounds of dust clinging to the corners into clouds. A deep, resounding thud rumbled through the stone of the Shrine, sending a ripple through the water submerging the Hylian as dust motes danced through the startled air.

The girl felt the tremor even from her high, polluted pavilion — it thundered through her mind with a mighty quake that brought her attention immediately back to him and his dull brainwaves. She poised herself, acutely alert, but her guard drawn.

Is it time? she wondered, her hope rising from the dust.

Though unable to watch what was happening in the Shrine with her own eyes, she experienced the great row of the structure within herself in sync with it. Beginning modestly, it grew more and more intense by the second, almost as if the Shrine were ripping itself apart with a calamitous bellow from deep within the earth.

From seemingly nowhere, a bud of nausea blossomed inside her, her head swimming with a dizzying heat. Puzzled, she endeavored to comprehend it. The Shrine of Resurrection, it seemed to have become… sick. It was the only explanation she could fathom. But machines, medical facilities, couldn’t suffer infirmity.

What was happening? She hadn’t the faintest idea. None of her research had told of this reaction. Concerned, she continued to monitor the strange occurrence.

This supposed sickness began to spread. Around the slumbering Hylian, the decorative beads of light on the walls flickered from a serene blue to a panicked magenta color, flashing in-between wildly as the Shrine continued to shake. Such intense movements kicked up a blizzard of dust and rocked the surface, trees swaying above ground, boulders shifting and fauna scattering. The terrific reverberations found their way to her; the familiar trembling of the earth brought back scarring memories.

In spite of the chaos, the Hylian remained obliviously unconscious on the pedestal until the crystalline-blue water around him darkened to a vibrant scarlet, bubbling and writhing as if in a storm. The light glaring off of the water and the frantic wall embellishments cast the room in a violent, ethereal glow such that the Shrine had never seen. The flailing of the Shrine only worsened as an alarm began to blare from a device on the solitary plinth at the opposite corner of the Hylian, clamoring for attention, wailing in fear and shock.

Something’s wrong, she gasped.

The girl’s body ached in tune with the Shrine. Amidst her pain, she paused and gazed around her, finding her own surroundings alight with a vicious glare. Her warden shifted restlessly, pulsating with power, its influence dripping from the ceiling and snaking beneath the overgrown lands of Hyrule, where it ingrained its corrupt claws into the Shrine of Resurrection, and in turn, into Link.

She realized with a stab of horror that, in her grief, the creature had wormed through a careless opening she had made, greedily spreading its poison. It was doing something to him. Something twisted. Something awful. And yet he laid, like a corpse, in the grave that was consuming him.

She had to stop it. She had to wake him.

Calamity Ganon?! she gaped. No! You can’t do this! Don’t you touch him! No, NO!

Had she the capacity, she would have darted free from her bonds, rushing for him. But she could not abandon her post. There was nothing another barrier could fix, now — it was already inside the Shrine. All she could do was scream. She whirled her mind back to him.

Link! Link, you must wake up!

But he didn’t stir. The beast seemed to thrill with satisfaction at her skyrocketing panic.

Stop it, stop it, you MONSTER! LINK!

No matter her cries, he didn’t hear. Or perhaps Calamity Ganon had deafened him? Regardless, there was nothing she could do but listen as the Shrine nearly rent itself into rubble. The alarm from the plinth filled her mind to splitting, an evil light blinding her, crippling her efforts to stay the beast’s clutches. Pain lanced through her brain — she cupped her hands over her ears and pinched her eyes shut, but to no avail.

Petrified at the thought of losing her dear knight after all these years, and at her own misstep, she braced for the worst, her breath caught and her eyes welling with tears.

Link, Hyrule… forgive me… I’ve failed you. I knew I would… Father was right.

With its princess weak, the beast didn’t hesitate. It greedily dug its way further into the Shrine. The blood red water surrounding Link ceased seething for half a moment before it abruptly surged into his body, piercing his pores, pouring inside him through his nose and mouth. As the dark water saturated his lungs and bloodstream, his spine arched and his eyes snapped open, his heart giving a heavy thump as it jolted back into autonomy.

Beneath his revitalized body, the resurrection pedestal cracked into pieces with a tremendous boom, scattering shards of aged stone onto the floor.

Then all at once, the Shrine’s roars and rumbling stilled, as well as the beast’s.

The chamber fell ungodly quiet, apart from its sole occupant; he gulped in a centuries-starved gasp of air, only to immediately choke on both it and the water flooding down his throat.

Rolling onto his side, he coughed up the bright red liquid in his lungs — it ran in small rivers onto the floor. His hacking shredded the once-peaceful atmosphere as he clawed for breath, continuing to spit up excess water for several moments before he managed to claim some control over himself.

He finally fell limp, his body relaxing from the shock. Draped like a sacrifice atop the broken pedestal, he savored his breath, shivering in the warm, moist air clinging to his skin. When his lungs had soothed themselves, he opened his heavy eyes and drew his gaze across the room, groggily wondering where he was.

The small, dim chamber was as full of clouds as his head. Unfamiliar, strange. His empty mind spun with dazed confusion. As the fire in his body steadily cooled, he blinked against the throbbing magenta light igniting the dust and haze swirling around him. The light issuing from the walls seemed to follow the gradually-slowing rhythm of his heart.

Curious, he carefully eased himself upright.

He rotated his head, analyzing his somber surroundings. The only other objects nearby were the lonely plinth in the corner, a sealed doorway, the shattered pedestal beneath him, and an odd, chandelier-like structure looming over his head. It, too, radiated an unnatural, crimson light.

As he ran his eyes over the remains of the pedestal, he sucked in a sharp gasp, flinching where he sat.

His legs — they didn’t look right.

Upon waking up, he had no reason to believe they were anything abnormal, what with his nonexistent recollection of things. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. Something was extremely wrong.

Frozen at the sight before him, he found that he could quite literally see his bones — his femur, the tibia, even the knee cap — glowing with that same surreal, magenta light. They glittered up at him beneath black, semi-transparent skin.

Eyes widening, he raised a knee and wiggled his leg back and forth, baffled. His bones floated innocently in his leg, moving at his command. Running a palm over his knee, he stared. It certainly didn’t look right, but it didn’t feel wrong. It felt as normal as anything.

Beginning to stutter for breath, he repeated the action with his equally-transparent, bony hands, clenching and unclenching his fingers before his face. The movements of his claw-like fingertips disturbingly entranced him with such intensity that he almost didn’t hear the voice return to him.

...Link…? she asked, breathless.

Her voice has trickled into his mind softly,  yet he heard it clear as day. As if stricken by lightning, he jumped in his place, tossing his head around the room in search of the voice’s owner. But he found nothing but the wordless haze.

“H-hello?” he croaked, his voice ragged. “Who’s there?”

At last. At long, tiresome last. He was here. He was awake. Movement. Beating heart and running blood and breath in the lungs. A voice. Life.

Link. Wonderful, irreplaceable Link. And he seemed to be in one piece, though she was blissfully ignorant of his bizarre bones, as well as the rest of his appearance. She could only feel his strong, courageous presence, and it was like manna to her.

Her joy at just the sound of his voice was immeasurable — it swelled within her, a sunrise after a bitter winter’s night, thawing her icy hopes and setting her heart alight with a golden dawn. She had no control over the tears of sweet relief that streamed down her face then, but she didn’t even attempt it. All that mattered was that he had risen from the Shrine. He was here. All she had to do now was guide him to her.

But her delight was cruelly short-lived. She didn’t get the chance to welcome him any further, for her warden reared its ugly head once again, howling at her. Bleary from her tears, she turned just in time to throw another barrier up between the two of them, only to buckle at the knees beneath the beast’s power.

Like a ravenous wolf for a fresh kill, the beast pounced upon her barrier, baring its teeth with hate and clawing at its prison. Straining to keep it at bay, she took in its sudden energy spike with awe. It seemed to have taken a new fondness for Link as it mindlessly scratched and roared to bypass her and seize him. Perhaps it wanted to finish what it had attempted those hundred years ago, now that he was awake.

But she wouldn’t let it. No matter how much it yearned to. She had just gotten him back.

Calamity Ganon’s rampaging soon grew relentless — her strength withstood it, but it took every ounce of herself to hold it back. She realized with dismay that even if she had wanted to, it would have been impossible to divide her mind between containing the beast and guiding Link. The monster wouldn’t allow it.

It was one or the other.

Curse you!! she cried, closing a fist against the beast. You vile creature! How could you?!

It didn’t seem to care; it ceaselessly pounded against her barrier, wicked eyes set on Link, eager to devour him.

There was no alternative. The thought destroyed her, but she knew which she had to choose. It was her duty, after all.

A new set of bittersweet tears ran down her cheeks. Though it nearly tore her to pieces to withhold herself from him, she stepped back from the Shrine to ward off Ganon’s might. But she vowed, whenever she managed to calm Calamity Ganon, to catch up with her dear knight, guiding him and ensuring his safe return to her. She couldn’t be at his side at every moment. He was strong enough to journey back to her on his own. She knew that.

Beneath the crushing influence of the beast, all she could offer him was this:

Link, she began. His ears perked up. You may or may not know me, but know this: you must rise from that Shrine. Find the Sheikah Slate. It will guide you after your long slumber.

Link, listening to her with wonder, found his eyes drawn to the plinth in the corner, which had sprung to life. He stared at it, his thoughts radiant with her voice. A barrage of questions hung on his tongue, but her tone was so earnest, so captivating, that he remained silent.

She continued, Do not fear what you will face in Hyrule, though trials you will endure — I know you can triumph over whatever will come with the courage flowing through your veins. Link… you are the light — our light — that must shine upon Hyrule once again. We need you.

Her heart stuttered as she prepared to withdraw.

I need you. And I believe in you.

May the goddess smile upon you.

Just as quickly as she had appeared in his mind, she abruptly vanished, leaving Link stupefied, his bones rattling inside him.

When he regained his senses, he sprung up on the crooked pieces of the pedestal, crying, “Wait! Who are you?!”

But she had already gone.

He quaked in the new silence, the pounding of his head his only companion. She stayed with him, a mute ghost in the room. There was something warm and calming about her sweet, imploring voice — it sent a familiar shudder down his spine. But as much as he strained his mind, he couldn’t place where he knew her from.

The memory of her lingered in the back of his head, tickling his brain to remember — it was an itch he just couldn’t scratch.

Waking up in such a strange place, with no recollection of what had lead him there, only made his hunger for information grow. And her mysterious presence, not to mention her words, nearly drove him mad in the minutes he sat alone. What did it all mean? Her voice, her guidance, his bizarre bones. He didn’t have any answers that he craved...

But she would.

He had to find out who she was. It was time to move.

Hey, peeps! I’m very pleased to post this. I thought, after making my first Corrupted Hero sketch, I’d continue. If you didn’t catch it, here’s a link to it:https://anemoiarts.tumblr.com/post/176782294883/corrupted-hero-by-anemoiarts-what-if-during-the. I also updated the design a bit. Hope you like!

Anyway, I’m going try and highlight some of this AU’s more interesting story bits in Breath of the Wild. I was inspired by my favorite webcomic, Romantically Apocalyptic, do tell this story in this format: a picture, and then a story to go with it. I’ll try to keep the others a bit shorter. I actually had to cut down a bit of this first chapter. I was worried it would be too long!

But I’ll stop rambling. :) Hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think, and I’ll see you in the next entry!