#and not only would their death NOT solve that issue

[girlactionfigure]

1948 as the original sin

MAY 21, 2024

1948 AS THE ORIGINAL SIN

There is only one country in the world whose right to exist is persistently cast into question: the State of Israel. It’s no coincidence that it is the world’s only Jewish state that is subjected to this delegitimization, not only in private conversations, but in university lecture halls, the top newsrooms in the world, and the General Assembly of the United Nations. For centuries, the right of Jewish people to live — the “Jewish Question” — was cast into doubt. Today, the Jewish state is subjected to the very same rhetoric. How is “does Israel have a right to exist?” even considered a legitimate question? Why are we even entertaining it, instead of flagging it for what it is — blatant xenophobia, at best?

The anti-Israel crowd justifies its flagrant bigotry by depicting Israel’s founding as illegitimate, thereby delegitimizing the country in perpetuity. This, of course, is a blatant double standard from the get-go, as hundreds of countries across the globe had bloody establishments. What’s worse, though, is that to delegitimize Israel’s founding, these people push a blatantly false narrative. According to their story, European settler-colonizers with the backing of the European empires, America, and/or the United Nations violently came to Palestine, seized lands, and, in 1948, massacred and displaced Palestinians to establish the Jewish state. Except this is not what happened.

To be sure, Palestinians were massacred and displaced in 1948, with 750,000 fleeing or being expelled from their homes. The displacement of Palestinians completely fractured Palestinian society, and it remains an open wound to this day. 

But the very real suffering of Palestinians should not be used to fuel an ahistorical narrative with the purpose of delegitimizing the Jewish state, and, by extension, the lives of nine million people in it. 

SO WHAT REALLY HAPPENED?

The outbreak of the 1948 war was the culmination of almost three decades of Arab-Jewish violence in Palestine. The first of these violent incidents took place in 1920, during the Nebi Musa festival, when Arab rioters descended upon the ancient Jewish population of Jerusalem, murdering, pillaging, looting, and shouting “Palestine is our land and the Jews are our dogs!” and “death to the Jews!”

It was this event that first prompted the Jewish community in Palestine to organize a paramilitary. Arab antisemitic violence continued to escalate, with massacres in 1929, 1936, and 1938. In 1936, the right-wing Jewish paramilitary, the Irgun, began carrying out retaliatory attacks against Arabs. 

Given the rapid escalation of violence, in 1937, the British first proposed partitioning Palestine into one Jewish and one Arab state. The Jews accepted the plan reluctantly — to quote future first president of Israel, Chaim Weizmann, the Zionist movement was prepared to accept a state “even if it’s the size of a tablecloth” — but the Arabs rejected it, so the plan was scrapped. But it wasn’t only partition that the Arabs were opposed to, seeing that two years later, the British offered the Arabs an entirely Arab state, so long as they could guarantee the rights of a tiny Jewish minority. The Arabs rejected the proposal — they wanted no Jews, period — and would continue to reject such proposals well into 1947. 

In 1947, the British handed the problem over to the United Nations, which voted in favor of partitioning the land. The Jews accepted the plan, while the Arabs infamously rejected it. For months, the Arab states had been threatening genocide of Jews should partition come to pass. After the partition vote, the Arab leadership in Palestine issued a leaflet quite explicitly threatening a second Holocaust in the Middle East, writing, “The Arabs have taken into their own hands the Final Solution of the Jewish problem. The problem will be solved only in blood and fire. The Jews will soon be driven out.” 

It wasn’t just threats. The morning after partition, Arab mobs in Palestine attacked Jewish buses, marking the start of the Palestine Civil War, which later turned into the 1948 war, after five Arab states invaded immediately following Israel’s Declaration of Independence on May 14. 

THE JEWS OF 1948

Contrary to the ahistorical depiction of European settler-colonizers with the backing of European empires, the Jews fighting in 1948 were largely refugees and Holocaust survivors. An international arms embargo had been placed on Palestine, affecting both Jews and Arabs, but the Arabs already had established militaries and even the unofficial support of the British, whereas the Jews had nothing and had to go through incredibly risky lengths to obtain the necessary arms and equipment. 

It’s really important to remember that all this took place less than three years after the end of the Holocaust, which eradicated nearly 70 percent of Europe’s Jewish population. For the Jews of 1948, the Arab threats of extermination felt very much existential. For example, prior to the partition vote, the General Secretary of the Arab League had threatened, “Personally I hope the Jews do not force us into this war because it will be a dangerous massacre which history will record similarly to the Mongol massacre or the wars of the Crusades…We will sweep [the Jews] into the sea.”

Imagine this for a second: before World War II, the Jewish population around the world stood at 16 million (to this day, our population still hasn’t recovered). Just six years later, the global Jewish population had dwindled to 10 million. Three years later, the Arabs, outnumbering Jews about a million to one, were threatening to carry out another genocide against the very same people.

Of the Israeli casualties during the 1948, about one third were Holocaust survivors. Many were also Jewish refugees from elsewhere in the Middle East, as the Arab countries expelled some 850,000 Jews from their homes in retaliation for the 1948 war. No country in history has ever had to absorb as many refugees proportional to its total population as Israel did, in such a short amount of time. Because of this, conditions in Israel were dire, with an economy on the brink of collapse and food shortages. This picture is the opposite of that of a powerful foreign empire coming to conquer.

THE SIN OF MORAL EQUIVALENCE

Both the Jews and Arabs — including, yes, Palestinian Arabs — were responsible for expulsions and massacres during the 1948 war. In many cases, events described as “massacres” were actually battles between the two opposing parties. All of this, of course, happened within the context of a war. Framing it otherwise is a blatant distortion of the facts of history. 

Palestinians were not expelled from their homes because of their identities as Arabs or Palestinians; in the cases in which they were expelled, this occurred within the context of the Jewish paramilitaries and later the Israeli army battling with a hostile village, though, of course, innocents were caught in the crossfire and suffered the consequences. Any attempt to frame it as persecution of Palestinians on the basis of them being Palestinian is to try to draw a moral equivalence to the Holocaust, a crime which was entirely unrelated to the German war effort during World War II; in fact, the Nazi extermination campaign of Jews at times hindered the war objectives. The Nazis persecuted Jews because they were Jews, not because they were members of a hostile nation during wartime. 

“Nakba,” just like “Shoah,” the Hebrew word for Holocaust, means “catastrophe.” Constantin Zureiq, the Syrian intellectual who coined the term “Nakba,” described the Nakba not as the tragedy of the displacement of Palestinians, but rather, as the tragedy that “seven Arab states declare[d] war in an attempt to subdue Zionism, then stop[ped] impotent before it, and return[ed] on their heels.” 

The catastrophe, according to Zureiq himself, was notthat innocent people had been displaced from their homes, but that the Arabs had lost the war that they started. 

ERASURE OF ARAB ATROCITIES IN 1948

The anti-Israel crowd depicts the 1948 war as a case of an oppressor (Israel) versus the oppressed (Palestine). In reality, there was was a victor (Israel) and a loser (Palestine), with both sides committing war crimes. As far as who started the war, there is absolutely no question that the Arabs were the aggressors. As always, the true victims of the war were the innocent civilians.

The anti-Israel narrative consistently ignores the Arab atrocities that very much shaped Zionist morale during the 1948 war. The Arabs besieged 100,000 Jews in Jerusalem, depriving them of food and water, and destroying all relief trucks en route to the city. In fact, it was this siege that, four months into the war, prompted the Zionists to go from the defensive to the offensive, and subsequently led to the expulsions and massacres of Palestinians. 

Though the Arabs ended up conquering few Jewish communities, those communities that they did conquer suffered from expulsions and massacres. For example, on December 30, 1947, Arab mobs lynched 39 Jews in Haifa. On April 13, 1948, the Arabs attacked a Hadassah Hospital medical convoy, killing 79 people, mostly patients, doctors, and nurses, and burning most of them beyond recognition. On May 13, 1948, 157-220 Jews were murdered, many execution-style, by the Jordanian and Palestinian Arab forces in Kfar Etzion, with at least one attempted rape documented. When Jordan expelled the entire Jewish population of East Jerusalem, 600 Jews were murdered. The Arab forces also decapitated and paraded the heads of Jewish soldiers, disemboweled pregnant Jewish women, mutilated and dismembered Jewish women and prisoners of war, and more. 

The Palestinian Arabs were not the pure innocent victims of the war. They were the losers of the war. Those are two different things. 

Notably, while Israel has declassified many of its 1948 archives, the Arab countries have not and probably never will. As such, the historiography of 1948 is inherently biased, and the true extent of the atrocities the Arabs committed against the Jews might never be known.

THE EVOLUTION OF NAKBA MEMORY

About 750,000 Palestinians were displaced in 1948. Of these 750,000 refugees, 100,000 or so of wealthy means left Palestine before any documented expulsions. The majority of Palestinian refugees of the war, as is usual during wartime, fled out of fear, with many fleeing their villages before the Jewish forces even captured them. About 5 percent of Palestinians were actively forcibly expelled by the Jewish forces, while some 10 percent were evacuated or encouraged to leave by the Arab forces and/or the British. 

Without downplaying the pain of displacement, it’s really important to note that, unfortunately, every war produces refugees. What happened to Palestinians was sadly not unique. Yet Israel-detractors frame it as such to characterize Israel’s founding, and therefore, its entire existence, as uniquely evil and unjustifiable. If Israel was born out of sin, then Israel’s entire existence is a sin, and therefore, the moral thing to do would be to destroy it. 

As mentioned, the originator of the term “Nakba,” Constantin Zureiq, was describing the Arab military defeat, not a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian people. 

Since then, however, the story of the Nakba has been distorted to completely de-emphasize the actual circumstances of the displacement, the genocidal war that the Arabs started.

The allusions to the Holocaust are intentional, beginning with the choice to use the word “Nakba,” a direct translation of the Hebrew word for “Holocaust,”  “Shoah.” In reality, the Nakba and the Holocaust have absolutely nothing in common; a more apt comparison would be the Greek-Turkish population exchange of 1923 or the Hindu-Muslim population exchange during the Partition of India in 1947. But nothing could possibly delegitimize the Jewish state more than comparing the Jewish state to the Jews’ worst historic oppressors. In fact, many Palestinian writers, such as Edward Said, even depicted themselves as the ultimate victims of the Nazis (despite the Palestinian leadership’s alliance with Nazi Germany). 

rootsmetals

let me tattoo this onto my forehead because people love putting words in my mouth: not a single word in this post is excusing, justifying, denying, or supporting any atrocities committed in 1948. Read that sentence again, please. groups like Hamas attack Israel because they believe that Israel is an illegitimate entity that must be wiped from the map at all costs. This idea rests on the premise that the State of Israel could only come into being through an act so egregious, so inhumane, that it has rendered Israel’s entire foundation, and thus, its entire existence, unacceptable. THAT’s why it’s important to address this distortion and weaponization of history. I’m not writing this to minimize the suffering of Palestinians.

[desire-mona]

when do you think welton closed, if you think it closed at all? do you think it lasted many decades after neil's passing, or do you think neil's death was the start of a trend of the issues at welton manifesting themselves in obvious ways? do you think the eventual closing had anything to do with neil at all?

to me, i feel like welton closed some time in the mid to late 80s, maybe 90s, but definitely not reaching the 2000s, at least not in the way that welton is in the movie.

in 1972 a law called Title IX was passed that essentially prohibited sex-based discrimination from being allowed in an educational setting, or at least public educational settings (src). now obviously, since welton is a private school, that law being passed has no DIRECT effect on the way welton runs, but i wouldn't be surprised if it caused the demand for single-sex private schools to ultimately go down.

this could mean more than welton closing all together, though. if welton is particularly eager to stay open, i could see mr nolan eventually making it co-ed (yay for charlie), but that's really only a last resort situation in my mind. i suppose it depends on the extent of how hellbent you consider nolan to be with keeping tradition. you could definitely make a case of him preferring to close welton all together as opposed to changing one of the key. components? of the school.

honestly i think both would happen if that makes sense. like nolan seeing the decline in Welton Demand and scrambling to at least slow down the eventual death of the institution by making more and more rules more lenient.

in my eyes, no matter what, welton is not a school that withstands the test of time for as long as the students / staff are led to believe. whether that be a more abrupt end, or a gradual decline in students / funding / whatever. but i unfortunately don't think itll have anything to do with neil, i think welton would effectively sweep his death under the rug, seeing it as an issue that was "solved" by firing keating.

welton's end could go in a bunch of different directions, so im interested to see what the rest of u think

[morgana96]

FFXIV players who want their WoL to kill the Elementals: "My WoL would be applauded for freeing the Shroud of their evil and their death will fix Gridania's shortcomings, prejudices, and xenophobia."

The actual likely consequences of that scenario:

[denkies]

🐈 clan-confessions  Follow

i'll never say this publicly but honestly i think tigerstar had some valid ideas about having one big clan. obviously he was super wrong with all the violence and force, but one big clan could solve a lot of issues. No more border patrol fighting, more food for everyone during leaf-bare season, no drama involving cross-clan mates, etc etc. a lot of deaths could be avoided if we all took care of one another instead of fighting all the time

🌠 fishluvr76  Follow

ok are we all going to ignore that anon is siding with a literal DICTATOR??? :/

🌸 sweet-tooth  Follow

That's not what they meant and you KNOW it. They brought up some valid points about preserving lives, and denounced Tigerstar's actions as much too violent. Starclan above, no cat can have an opinion these days...

🌒 singlequeen7  Follow

Honestly I don't know how I feel about this... each Clan is beautifully unique and has their own traditions, which would fade away if Clans were desolved altogether. But OP makes a valid point about less violence and food scarcity. I hate the idea of sending my kits off to become Warriors, only for them to die during a stupid argument about Sunningrocks. A pile of rocks is NEVER worth a cat's life, whether they are in your Clan or not. And we have lost lives like that before.

🍄 medicinepawz  Follow

I agree! Traditions are important, but every medicine cat knows that working together saves lives. Sharing herbs can stop the spread of greencough, and sharing prey stops kits from crying from hunger. We really need a better system, because I can't cry myself to sleep another night, blaming myself for not having enough cobwebs to stop a kit from bleeding out in front of me.

🐅 lonelywarrior5346-deactivated

leave it to a woman and a medicine cat to emotionally manipulate proud warriors into giving up our PURECLAN bloodlines and Clan patriotism lolol

🍄 medicinepawz   Follow

HELLO?????

🐛 bug-enjoyer  Follow

> complains about "emotional manipulation" (it wasn't?)

> proceeds to be misogynystic AND racist in the same sentence???

> we get it babygirl, you want to fuck Tigerstar. weird ass mf.

🐈‍⬛ moondrops  Follow

"Lonelywarrior5346" is Flintstep from Riverclan btw

🌸 sweet-tooth  Follow

LMFAOOOOWAGWHQAKDHOA

🫐 berrycloud  Follow

GET HIS ASS

🌌 dorkstar  Follow

nah bc which one of you killed this dude yesterday lmfao 😭💀

🌸 sweet-tooth  follow

NO ARE YOU FR

🐛 bug-enjoyer  Follow

@ dorkstar say sike right now 😭😭

🌌 dorkstar  Follow

border patrol found him dead in a ravine 😭 yall play too much

🫐 berrycloud  Follow

when i said get his ass i did not mean like this

[writingwithcolor]

How can non-Jewish writers include Jewish characters in supernatural stories without erasing their religion in the process?

Anonymous asked:

I have a short story planned revolving around the supernatural with a Jewish character named Danielle (who uses they/them pronouns). Danielle will be one of a trio who will be solving the mystery of two brides' deaths on the day of their wedding. My concern with this is the possibility of accidentally invalidating Danielle's religion by focusing on a secular view of the afterlife. At the same time, I don't want to assume that Jewish people can't exist in paranormal stories, nor do I want to use cultural elements that don't belong to me. So, how do I make sure that Danielle is included in the plot without erasing their Jewishness?

Okay so to start with I think we need to ask a question about the premise: what is a secular afterlife? I’m not asking this to nitpick or be petty, but to offer you expanded ways of thinking through this issue and maybe others as well.

A Secular Afterlife

What is a secular afterlife? To begin with, I get what you mean. The idea of an afterlife we see in pop culture entities like ghost media owes more to a mixture of 19th-century spiritualist tropes drawn from titillating gothic novels than to anything preached from the pulpit of an organized house of worship. Yet those tropes--the ominous knocking noises from beyond, the spectral presences on daguerrotype prints, the sudden chill and the eerie glow, all of those rely on the idea of there being something beyond this life, some continuation of the spirit when the body has ceased to breathe. For that, you need to discount the ideas that the consciousness has moved on to another physical body and is currently living elsewhere, and that it was never separate from the body and has now ceased to exist. Can we say that this is secular?

More so: Gothic literature, as the name suggests, draws heavily on Catholic imagery, even when it avoids explicit references to Catholicism. Aside from the architectural imagery, Catholic religious symbols permeate the genre, as well as the larger horror and supernatural media genres that grew from it: Dracula flinches from a crucifix, priests expel demons from human bodies, Marley’s Ghost haunts Ebenezer Scrooge in chains. The concepts of heaven and hell, and nonhuman beings who dwell in those places, are critical to making the narratives work. 

The basis also draws from a biblical story, that of the Witch of Endor. The main tropes of Victorian spiritualism are present: Saul never sees the ghost of Samuel, only the Witch of Endor is able to see “A divine being rising” from wherever he rises from, and her vague description, “I see an old man rising, wearing a robe,” evokes the cold readings of charlatan mediums into the present (Indeed, some rabbinic sources commenting on this assert that this is exactly what was going on).

While neither of these views of its origin define the genre as the sole property of Catholicism--or of Judaism for that matter--it would be hard exactly to categorize them as secular.

A Jewish Perspective on ghosts

However, it’s not the case that ghost media is incompatible with Jewishness, assuming that it doesn’t commit to a view of heaven and hell duality that specifically embraces a Christian spiritual framework. 

Jewish theology is noncommittal on the subject of the afterlife. The idea of a division between body and soul in the first place is found in ancient Egypt, for instance, earlier than the earliest Jewish texts. In Jewish text it’s present in narratives like the creation story, in which God crafts a human body out of earth and then breathes life into it once it’s complete. It also appears in our liturgy: the blessings prescribed to be recited at the beginning of the day juxtapose Elohai Neshama, a blessing for the soul, with Asher Yatzar, expressing gratitude for the body, recited by many after successfully using the bathroom. 

Yet it’s not clear that this life-force is something separate than the body that lives beyond it, until the apparition of the Witch of Endor. The words we use to describe it, whatever it is, evoke the process of breathing rather than that of eternal life: either ruach (spirit, or wind) or neshama (soul, or breath): neither is a commitment to the idea that it does--or that it doesn’t--go somewhere else when the body returns to the earth. 

Jewish folklore, however, leans into the idea of ghosts and other spiritual beings inhabiting the earthly plane (and others). Perhaps most famous is the 1937 movie The Dybbuk, in which a young scholar engaging in kabbalistic practices calls upon dark forces to unite him and his fated love, only to find himself possessing her body as a dybbuk. It appears that he is about to be successfully exorcized, but ultimately when his soul leaves her body, hers does as well. 

More relevantly to your story, a Jewish folktale inspired the movie The Corpse Bride. In the folktale version, a newly-engaged man jokingly recites the legal formula he will soon recite at his wedding, and places his ring on the finger of a nearby corpse--a reference to a time when antisemitic violence is said to have gotten worse not only at Jewish and Christian holidays as it does still to this day, but around Jewish weddings as well. The murdered bride stands up, a corpse reanimated complete with consciousness, and demands that the bridegroom honor his legal obligation. 

In the movie, the bride gives up her demand willingly: her claim on him is emotional rather than legal, and she finally accepts that he has an emotional connection with another person, that he doesn’t love her. In the folk tale, the dead woman takes him to court to decide whether their marriage is legal, since he spoke the legal words to her in front of witnesses as is required, and the court rules that the dead do not have the right to make legal demands on the living. In this version, the moral of the story is that a legal formula is an obligation; that when he jokingly bound himself to the corpse, he not only disrespected the dead but also the legal framework that structures society, and by so doing risked being obligated to keep his side of a contract he never intended to enact. 

This speaks to the ways that a Jewish outlook can differ from a Christian-influenced “secular” one. Christian-influenced cultural ideas can often focus around feeling the right thing, while Jewish stories will often center on doing the right thing. Does the Corpse Bride leave because she realizes she is not the one he loves? Because she--or he--learned a valuable lesson? Or because she loses her court case? It’s not that the boy’s emotions are irrelevant to the story--the tension, the suspense, the horror of the story takes place primarily within the boy’s emotional landscape--but emotions on their own are not a solution. The question “should he marry her” can be answered emotionally, but “has he married her” can only be answered by a legal expert, and once it has been the deceased bride may not have changed her emotional attachment to him, but she no longer has legal standing to pursue her claim. 

Centering legal rectitude over emotional catharsis isn’t a requirement for having Jewish characters in your story, but it’s worth thinking about what is and isn’t universal, what is and isn’t actually all that secular. 

Meanwhile, back at the topic:

Where does any of this place Danielle?

Well, unless you’re positing a universe in which Christian or other deities or cosmologies are confirmed to exist (See Jewish characters in a universe with author-created fictional pantheons for more on that topic), there’s no reason why they shouldn’t be perfectly fine interacting with whatever the setting you’re building throws at them. 

My wishlist for this character and setting runs more to the general things to consider when writing fantasy settings with Jewish characters: 

Don’t confirm or imply that Jesus is a divine being. That means no supernatural items like splinters of the cross, grails, nails, veils, etc. There’s nothing particularly powerful or empowering about this one guy who lived and died like so many others.

Don’t show God’s body and especially not God’s face, or confirm that any other gods or deities exist, whether that’s Jesus, Aphrodite, or Anubis, or someone you made up for the context. 

Don’t put Danielle in a position where they’re going to play into an antisemitic trope like child murder, blood drinking, world domination, or financial greed. If you have to, name it and let Danielle express discomfort with or distaste for those actions both because Jewish values explicitly oppose all of those things but also because Danielle as a Jewish character would be painfully aware of these stereotypes as present and historical excuses for antisemitic violence. 

Do consider what Danielle’s personal practice might look like. What does Danielle do on Shabbat? What do they eat or refrain from eating? What are their memories of Jewish holidays and how is their current holiday observance different than their childhood? I know I say “Jewishness is diverse” on every ask, but it is, and these questions--which also underscore how very much Judaism is rooted in one’s actions during this life--will help you develop how Judaism actually functions to inform Danielle’s character, even if you don’t spell out the answers to each of these questions in text. 

Do let Danielle find joy, comfort, and identity in their Jewishness not just in contrast with Christianity but simply because it’s part of the wholeness of their character. I know the primary representation of Jewishness is a snappy one-liner in a Christmas episode followed by the Jewish character joining in the Christmas spirit, blue edition, but make room for Jewishness to inform how Danielle approaches the events of your story, or why they decide to get or stay involved.  

-Meir

Hi it’s Shira with some Jewish ghost story recs written from inside–

When The Angels Left the Old Country by Sacha Lamb (deliriously good queer YA Jewish paranormal, mainstream enough that it’s got a good chance of being at your local library and won all kinds of awards)

The Dyke and the Dybbuk by Ellen Galford (sorry for the slur, warning for a paragraph of biphobia in the book but it’s an older book. I read this right before my divorce so my memories are super fuzzy but it’s about this modern day lesbian who gets possessed by the ghost of a different lesbian from hundreds of years earlier in Jewish history.) Nine of Swords Reversed by Xan West z’L of blessed memory - another queer Jewish paranormal.

The general plot is that two partners are struggling with how to be honest with each other about the effect disability is having on them. It’s got a very warm and fuzzy cozy vibe but kink culture is central to the worldbuilding so if that isn’t your vibe I didn’t want you to go in unaware.

The Dybbuk in Love by Sonya Taaffe. I don’t remember the details but I remember loving it, it’s m/f and romance between possessor and possessed.

I wrote a really short one called A Man of Taste where a gentile vampire woman and a Jewish ghost/dybbuk get together.

~S

[llamagoddessofficial]

As a scuba diver I can confirm how quickly a peaceful dive can turn scary; on a sea dive I was so caught up in the moment that I completely forgot to watch my oxygen gauge. Thankfully my buddy was there to let me use his air supply and take me to the surface.

What would the siren boys do if MC got into danger while diving, such as very low oxygen? Maybe MC was pulled by the current and drifted away from other divers? Would they help her or take advantage of the situation?

Sans: Her life entirely depends how serious the 'trouble' in question is.

He'll save her if it's a very easy problem for him to solve. Like... if she's near the surface but runs out of air, he can rush her up the last couple of metres. If she drifts away from her friends and is struggling hard against the current, he can loop her arms around his neck and swim her back to them. Things that are emergencies to her, but slight inconveniences to him, he'll help with - especially since saving her life is a very easy way to get a LOT of favour with her. He likes the way she looks at him after he saves her. Beautiful, breathless, exhausted, staring like for a moment she adores him as much as he adores her.

However... a more complex issue? He'd let her drown. Maybe she's too far away from the surface and taking her straight upward wouldn't be safe. Maybe she's entered a state of panic and is making things worse for herself and he can't convince her to hold onto him. Maybe, even, she's in trouble but she simply hasn't seen him. If she never knew he was there she wouldn't be upset he didn't help.

He'll watch. It's just a little bit of discomfort. Then? They can be together forever.

Red: Come on. It's our boy. Our respect women juice chugging world champ - of course he'll rescue her, no matter what.

Her dive buddies definitely recount the story to her. Red was goofing off like he always does, nipping and shoving people he doesn't like, making it clear he's the 'alpha' around here. But suddenly, something about him flips... something in his disposition instantly changes. He becomes completely serious, and beelines into the near distance.

... And it's only once he's with her that everyone else notices she's silently struggling. They wouldn't have known to help if Red hadn't drawn attention to her.

He acts silly and stupid. But he's always paying attention to his mate, even when far away, using his incredible senses to keep tabs. He can sense her heartbeat with his electroreception, hear her breathing in the regulator, smell her blood in her veins. He's much smarter than he acts, and if the situation gets messy, there's not much better help underwater than a massive aggressive shark who'll move mountains to keep her safe.

Skull: Surprisingly, he'll do his absolute best to save her.

You'd expect the big lug to be the one actively pulling her down. But Skull doesn't really have a plan, so to speak, with his beloved little diver, he isn't plotting her death like Sans. He just wants to be around her; he wants to court her, show her what a good mate he'll be, show her pretty rocks and gifts, win her love and pull her back no matter how many times she tries to swim away from him. So it doesn't really matter what's happening - if Skull sees her struggling, he just sees his mate in distress, and he wants to rescue her. He doesn't like seeing her in visible pain or terror.

He might be delayed in helping if she's under the effects of nitrogen narcosis, because that just makes you act silly and drunk, so he wouldn't actually know anything was wrong. But as soon as he notices something off (she takes out her regulator, passes out, etc) he'll do everything he can to save her. He's a good boy underneath all those scars and deadly tentacles.

[uvobreakmylegs]

Dark Light Within

part two of Lamp of the Body

Chrollo x female!reader

Part 1

Warnings: trauma, mentions of death, mentions of murder, manipulation. unhealthy relationships, smut, oral (male receiving), choking

Word Count: 12.1k

In the days that followed the compromise you and Chrollo had come to, you found that you were doing well. Over that period, the nightmares stopped and you actually got a few full nights of sleep for the first time in a long while. Finally you had mornings where you woke up feeling completely refreshed and ready for the day, and you had the energy to do more around the apartment as well, happy to no longer be stuck doing one or two tasks you'd set for yourself before you inevitably needed to take a break and recharge.

Admittedly, it was a bit performative as you were trying your hardest to prove that you were okay. That the days of you feeling exhausted from a restless night were over with and had only ever been a temporary problem, one that had solved itself. That Chrollo didn't need to move away from the city for your sake and that the both of you could continue to live here as you had been.

Soon enough, you'd be able to go out again, you were sure of it.

Chrollo obviously noticed your change in mood as he commented on it one evening while you were rinsing off the plate you had used for dinner.

“You seem a bit better recently,” he said.

“I've been feeling better,” you answered.

“That's a relief,” he replied, smiling as he added “maybe I was a bit hasty in my suggestion to move.”

“Maybe,” you repeated, “it's a good thing we held off on that. We saved ourselves from a lot of hassle.”

“So it seems,” he agreed.

You went to bed that night feeling good about yourself.

The fact that the nightmares started up again that very night was ironic. Or it would've been, were it not for the fact that they now felt worse than ever. The new constant was the figure being on top of you, their hands around your throat, squeezing and letting go only to repeat the process over and over again. You always woke up in the middle of the night now, feeling worn out and terrified.

During the times that Chrollo would wake up after you and asked what was wrong, you came up with excuses, mostly claiming that you were feeling restless and joking about how your internal clock was wired wrong since you could no longer get any sleep at night. The look in his eyes told you that he didn't believe you, but he would accept your explanation regardless, even if it seemed to be reluctant.

You just wanted to be okay again.

You were in a good place now; there was no reason for these attacks from your subconscious to continue as they did. They needed to stop so you'd be better, so you could go back to the way things had been before.

Get over it already

But as much as you tried to will yourself into better health, it just wasn't happening. Not on its own. And it was clear that Chrollo could see that. Even without his ability to be as insanely perceptive as he was, no doubt anyone could see that you were tired.

He'd held off on any major discussion of it, but there were comments made here and there that let you know what he thought: that you should stop being so stubborn and putting yourself through unnecessary stress, though you doubted he would ever use such wording. The next time the two of you sat down to actually talk about the issue, you knew you would lose. He had a million reasons as to why his decision was correct and there wouldn't be anything you could do to prove otherwise.

That was what drove you to an impulsive decision.

It came on a day where Chrollo was away running errands; nothing that would last too long, so he had no need to call in any more favors from his friends. And no one else being around you meant that there was no one that would keep you from going out.

It wouldn't be anything major. You were just stepping outside of the building. In your mind, being able to do that without any negative affects would prove that things were okay.

Nothing bad would happen, you told yourself. It was killing two birds with one stone, actually. You would prove that you were doing okay by leaving the apartment while also getting a much needed breath of fresh air. Of course, Chrollo would have argued on the second point that you could've gotten that by going out onto the deck outside your apartment. But that wasn't the same as walking around freely. That was probably part of your problem; that he'd essentially kept you under house arrest out of concern for your safety. Although his concern was appreciated, it felt like that was probably part of why you weren't doing well. Being locked inside had left you feeling stir-crazy, which didn't do any good for your mental state during a time that you were supposed to be recovering.

Dreams and nightmares have meanings, you remembered hearing. Maybe you being paralyzed and the figure that watched you was a representation of your deteriorating health while being kept trapped.

…. It probably wasn't that deep. Your mind was just running with random thoughts because it didn't have anything better to do. Again, another sign that staying cooped up was bad for you, regardless of what Chrollo told you.

It didn't feel good to sneak around him, but surely if you did this, he might ease up a little.

That thought had you feeling pretty good as you made your way down to the apartment lobby, pushing the button for the ground floor of the elevator and absentmindedly humming to yourself to pass the time as the elevator began made its descent. The last time you'd been out was when you were returning from the Dentora Region in Padokea, and you hadn't seen any of it as Chrollo wanted you to keep a bandage over your eyes until it was safe to remove, which was, of course, after you were back home.

There were two others present when you entered the lobby: a woman you didn't recognize who seemed to be a resident like yourself and a receptionist stationed at the desk. They were chatting with one another and didn't pay much attention to you when you walked past them. Heading towards the main doors of the building, you only glanced at them for a moment longer before bringing your attention to what was in front of you. Through the glass doors, you saw the street outside, the people who were walking along the sidewalk and the traffic in the streets.

Perfectly normal, nothing to be worried about.

But when you grasped the handlebar of the door was when you froze, and you stayed in place as you fully took in the sight before you.

The sad part was that nothing had really happened.

There was no dramatic scene outside that made you pause, no recreation of your accident with you being a bystander this time – it was simply a normal day outside in the city streets that were teeming with traffic.

And yet after that sight had set in, you stopped in your tracks.

Why? Nothing bad had happened. You'd been out before. Very briefly and while you were being transported to and from different hospitals and airports with Chrollo at your side, but still, dread filled you when you looked upon that street. Your hand gripped the handlebar so hard that your knuckles paled and your breathing got heavier.

Maybe it was because you were alone, because Chrollo wasn't here.

From behind, you heard the woman at the counter saying something that seemed to be directed at you. You couldn't hear it clearly. Then she got closer, and she said something else when she stood next to you. By that point, her words were background noise.

You weren't able to focus.

Suddenly you were in the backseat of that taxi, checking the weather forecast on your phone while some advertisement played on the car's radio. The driver was chatting with you about something mundane and unimportant while you half-listened to him, adding in some commentary of your own from time to time. Everything was fine.

Then the driver made a left turn and you heard him shout.

You looked up in time to see an oncoming car hit the taxi head on.

Then nothing.

Just the feeling of waking up with a curtain of darkness over your eyes that refused to lift.

This was a bad idea

Go back upstairs, you told yourself. Go back up and if you need to have a breakdown, do it in the comfort of your own home. Go back up.

Those thoughts ran through your head as you continued to look at the scene outside, unable to move.

Go back up.

“What's wrong with your eyes?”

You didn't really understand the question at first; all you knew was that someone was talking to you and you looked over to find that the woman was standing next to you. Better to apologize if she thought you were behaving strangely and to explain what had happened to you a year ago. Surely she and the receptionist would understand, and they would encourage you to go back up so you could recover in private.

But when you looked to the woman, you found that her expressions wasn't one of worry, but that of being disturbed, or even fearful, and she took a step back when you looked at her. When you glanced over to the receptionist who was still seated at their desk, they seemed confused until you made eye contact, and then their expression mirrored that of the woman.

They both looked at you like there was something wrong with you.

“Seriously,” the woman said, “what the hell is wrong with your eyes?”

You heard the question, but again, it didn't register. All you saw were the disturbed gazes of the two before you, and all you wanted in that moment was to get away from them.

Without saying anything, you made your way back to the elevator, pushing the button to summon it and hoping it would come down quick.

It didn't.

And with the two still staring at you for a few more agonizing moments and you feeling like you could tear and claw at your own skin as you desperately wanted them to stop fucking looking at you, you opted to take the stairs back up to your level. Before the door closed behind you, you heard them talking in hushed whispers almost immediately after you were out of sight.

You felt your heart rate increase on hearing that.

You were lucky enough to not run into anyone else on your way back to your unit, though you didn't feel that way when you slammed the door shut and leaned against it after, supporting yourself while you tried to level out your breathing. What just happened? Why did you freak out? How could you still be so unprepared for life outside these walls?

Why did those two look at you like that?

You had no clue. What was that woman even talking about?

Still no clue. Your throat felt dry, though.

Pushing yourself off the door, you made your way to the kitchen. A glass of water should fix that. And maybe getting some fluids into you would help you feel better after that ordeal.

On your way to the kitchen you caught sight of something strange in the reflection of a decorative mirror that hung on the wall as you passed by. Something that looked red.

You paused after you passed it, then took a step back and looked into the mirror.

Your heart could've stopped in that moment.

Where you should've seen two gray eyes in your skull looking back at you, the color you saw in the irises was red. Two violent, bloody red eyes staring back at you, and you saw clearly when your expression grew distraught as you backed away from the mirror.

Why?

In an effort to tell whether or not you were dreaming, you dug your nails into the skin of your arm, just enough to cause you pain. If this was just a dream, the pain would be enough to snap you out of it and bring you back to reality. But as the minor amount of pain made itself known in the flesh of your arms, the image before you stayed the same: you, looking back at yourself in the mirror, and a pair of red eyes in your skull.

Why?

Not convinced that what you were seeing was real, you ran to the bathroom, wanting to see if those eyes would appear in the mirror in that one, too.

They did.

Why?

Desperate to be wrong, you went to the bedroom and pulled out a hand mirror, wanting to believe that somehow, the other mirrors had been tampered with and that this one would show you the truth.

The same bloody red eyes stared back at you a third time.

Why?

Panic overtook you. Your heartbeat was thundering in your ears and you felt so light-headed that you ended up on the floor, sinking your fingers into your scalp while you breathed hard in and out through your mouth. Why was this happening?

What happened in the moments after that point was hard to remember exactly. You were so wrapped up in your panic that you didn't notice when time passed or when someone entered the room.

Chrollo found you on the floor of your bedroom, still staring at the image in the hand mirror that lay in front of you while you cried. He spoke your name as he placed both hands on your shoulders, and that snapped you out of it, looking up at him as you finally realized that you weren't alone anymore.

He stared at you for a moment before saying “it's alright now,” and pulling you against his chest. Without another thought you grabbed at him, holding onto him while you continued to cry. How long he held you like that was also unclear, but once you felt a bit more calm, you noticed that the sun was lower in the sky now than it had been when you first ventured out. Eventually your sobs quieted and your breathing became more regular.

Sensing that you were doing better, Chrollo gently pulled you away, caressing your cheek as he asked “what happened?”

After taking a few breaths, you spoke.

“I'm sorry,” you began, “I wanted to go out. I thought I'd be okay, but when I got down there…. I don't know, I freaked out.”

That wasn't the issue, you remembered. It was your eyes.

Your eyes. That he clearly saw.

You felt stupid. It would've been the first thing he noticed. You were looking right at him, and currently, his expression was neutral. Had it not hit him yet how strange it was? Would he have a similar reaction to the two downstairs? The thought of Chrollo looking at you like that almost sent you into an entirely new panic. But you shoved that down as you forced yourself to speak.

“You can see them, right?” you asked, “my eyes.”

He nodded slowly, but said nothing.

That only made your panic worse.

“I don't – I don't know why this is happening,” you stammered, “I don't know why this happened, what could've caused it. I swear this hasn't-”

Chrollo brought a hand up, and you stopped talking.

“First things first; we should get off the floor,” he told you.

Taking both of your hands into his, he pulled you to your feet and kept his grip firm on you when you stumbled. Once you were steady, he led you out of the bedroom and took you to the kitchen, where he sat you down at the table before pouring you a glass of water and urging you to drink it. You did as he told you, and as you downed the glass, he pulled up a chair to sit closer to you, keeping a hand on your shoulder as he watched your expressions. The water and his touch had you feeling more at ease.

When you placed the glass back down, he asked “are you feeling better?”

“Sort of.”

You reached up to touch the area beneath your eye, asking “but I don't understand why this is happening.”

Upon hearing that, Chrollo's hand that had been softly rubbing your shoulder stilled, and you looked back to find a resigned look on his face.

“Chrollo?”

“It's alright, love,” he said, “you were going to find out sooner or later.”

Your eyebrows furrowed as you asked “find out what?”

Chrollo considered you for a moment before he spoke again, saying “I'm afraid I have a confession to make.”

“Confession?” you repeated.

“About the origins of your current eyes.”

You weren't sure where this was going, so you stayed quiet and waited for him to explain further. But instead, he asked you a question.

“Have you ever heard of the Kurta clan?”

Your eyebrows furrowed again as you shook your head.

“That isn't too surprising. They were a very small, secluded group of people that lived on the other side of the world,” Chrollo explained, “there isn't much known about them due to the way they isolated themselves, but the main thing that was known was what would happen to their eyes once they became agitated or upset in some way.”

What he was saying clicked for you as you asked “they turned red?”

He nodded.

Part of you wanted to feel relieved. Technically speaking, it wasn't so bad. Sure, it would be inconvenient for your eyes to turn red whenever you become upset, and learning to manage that would be difficult, but it could be worse. At the same time, however, you didn't understand why Chrollo had kept this from you. Since he had labeled this as a 'confession', there was no way for him to claim ignorance about the eyes. Maybe keeping this from you for the first few weeks was somewhat reasonable, but to stay silent for all this time? What reason could there be?

“…. So my eyes came from a donor from that clan?” you asked.

You didn't like the way he frowned after you said that, and the sinking feeling you were having only got worse.

“I'm afraid that the story is far more gruesome, love,” he began.

“How?”

“The scarlet eyes were considered by many to be a wonder of sorts, and the way the Kurta hid away from the outside world only made those people want to see them even more.”

You said nothing, but you couldn't help but note that he had referred to the Kurta in the past tense this entire time.

“It ended with the Kurta being massacred several years ago, and the eyes of those that had stayed red after death were harvested and sold on the black market.”

“Black market – people buy them?” you asked, incredulous and not sure what point you should address first.

“They're considered to be a collector's item,” Chrollo explained, “and their value tends to be high, given that there are only thirty six pairs in existence.”

Then he added “although now the number of eyes that one can buy has dropped to thirty five.”

It all clicked into place in that moment, and no words could escape you. All you could do was stare at Chrollo in shock.

He didn't fault you for that as he continued to speak.

“I'm sorry, love. I knew you wouldn't be happy once you learned the history behind them, but after realizing that you may never be able to see again, I decided to take matters into my own hands.”

You didn't know what to say, and your hand returned to your cheek as you processed what he'd just said. Things made sense now. Why he didn't want you going out. Why he made sure you weren't alone for any long periods of time. Why he wanted you to leave the city with him. All it would take was one really bad moment out in public and you would become a spectacle. Like what had happened downstairs in the lobby.

Just how long was he planning on keeping this from you?

Fuck

None of what he'd just told you could've been legal. He said that the eyes were sold on the black market, right? How many crimes had Chrollo committed to help you?

He must have sensed that your thinking at that moment was something along those lines, as he made a point to assure you that nothing bad would come from any of it, that he'd been thorough in making sure nothing would lead back to either of you. That no one knew he'd gotten the eyes aside from the specialist in Padokea, and that they'd been paid to not talk about it. Everything would be fine as long as the two of you were careful.

Everything would be fine.

He'd said that a lot during the past few months, and him telling you that had done a lot to keep you calm. Your thoughts went back to the many, many times he had his hand in yours as he said that, and how at peace you felt when you heard him say that.

And as for right now…. You still wanted that. Chrollo brought about a certain sense of security with him, and as you weren't sure how to take in this new information, it would've made you feel better to feel his touch and have his arms around you again as you decided what would've been the best way to react to all of this.

It didn't feel like you could do that right now as another question was on your lips.

“You bought the eyes of a murder victim off the black market?” you asked.

He was quick to respond.

“I know it sounds nasty, but it was for the best, love,” he answered, “there's nothing that can be done for that person who died, but their eyes can be put to good use for your sake.”

….. You didn't know how to reply to that. And despite his attempts to continue to talk to you, you weren't able to say anything else.

This was all too overwhelming.

You needed some time alone.

When you began to stand up and pull out of his grip, he spoke your name. But you didn't let him get any further as you interrupted him.

“I'm not leaving or doing anything stupid. I just need some time to process this on my own,” you told him.

He didn't seem happy about it, but he let you go and didn't follow after when you walked back to the bedroom and shut the door behind you, though he watched you the entire time. Once you entered, your gaze immediately went to the hand mirror that you had left behind on the floor earlier, and you approached it tentatively, scared of the sight you might find in it again.

Relief hit you when you looked into the mirror and found that the red color had dulled. It wasn't gone completely, but it wasn't as vibrant as before. Hopefully it'd be gone completely soon.

You let out a breath you hadn't realized you'd been holding, and you settled down onto the edge of the bed.

….. The room felt stuffy.

Being on your own wasn't enough. After spending who knows how long in here freaking out, you needed out of this room completely.

The door that opened up to the balcony slid open and you stepped out. Taking in a deep breath as you got the fresh air you'd failed to get earlier, you sat down on the balcony flooring and wrapped your arms around your legs before resting your chin on your knees as you collected your thoughts.

How the fuck had you ended up in this situation?

In the span of a single conversation, you'd found out that your boyfriend of several years had done dealings on the black market by buying the eyes of someone who had been murdered. You'd learned of a clan who seemed to have been driven into extinction because people decided it was better to cut out and pickle their eyes like collectibles, and then that your boyfriend had essentially used one of those pairs of eyes as spare parts so you could go back to the way you'd been before the accident.

Where do you even begin to unpack all of that?

Legally, all of this was wrong. Buying body parts was illegal, and getting involved with the black market and possibly the mafia would be opening up a whole world of potential trouble. How much had all of that cost? The eyes along with whatever he had paid that specialist in Padokea – how much had you drained him financially? You knew Chrollo did well with his job, but would there be any resentment on his part for how much you had cost him?

You hadn't noticed anything off about him, but then again, Chrollo was good at hiding things. This revelation was proof of that.

And then the eyes themselves. Or rather, where they had come from. You'd assumed that they had come from someone who'd been in an accident and had signed up for organ donation. That had made you a bit more comfortable with the idea, that the eyes had belonged to someone who didn't want them to go to waste. Now that you knew what had really happened, it felt morally wrong that you were using them. Someone had died for something as silly as preserving an eye color, and now their eyes had been used just so you could see again.

Spare parts.

Those words came to mind again and you felt guilt for it.

If only that accident hadn't happened. If only you hadn't gone out that day. If only, if only.

You pressed your head against your knees while wrapping your arms tighter. Fat lot of good that kind of thinking did.

The door to the balcony slid open, and you turned your head to find Chrollo standing outside. He had one of your hoodies in hand which he held out to you.

“It's cold out, love,” he said, “wear this.”

You didn't feel that cold, but you accepted the hoodie anyway and gave him a soft “thank you” in response.

He seemed pensive as he watched you pull the hoodie on.

“Do you still need to be alone?” he asked.

It hadn't been that long since you separated yourself from him – it was a few minutes at best – yet you answered “I don't know.”

He hummed as he shut the door behind him and took a place next to you on the balcony, both of you sitting on the floor while you looked out at the buildings across the way. You glanced over at him a few times, only to find that you couldn't really read him in that moment. Your worry from earlier reared its head again – was he mad at you? Did he feel like he'd spent so much time, effort and money only for you to turn out to be an ingrate? What would happen if that was the case?

“Are you angry with me?” you asked. Your nails were digging into the skin of your leg, scared of what his answer might be.

“Of course not, love.”

Chrollo pulled your hand away from your leg and held it, clearly not wanting to see you hurt yourself.

“I should be the one asking if you're upset with me,” he then said.

He kept his eyes on you while your gaze stayed on the city as you thought over what he'd said.

Were you upset?

Yeah.

But how much of that was directed at him?

“I don't think so,” you answered.

“You don't think so?”

It took you a moment to collect your thoughts before you were able to get the words out.

“I don't want to sound ungrateful, because I'm really happy that I got my eyesight back, and it also makes me really happy that you would do so much just for me, that I matter enough for you to go that far,” you began.

“But it's really scary that you would involve yourself with criminals.”

He stayed quiet as you continued.

“I don't want you to get involved with dangerous people and get hurt for my sake. It would kill me if someone went after you because you bought the eyes just so I could see again. If I had known that was what you were going to do to help me, I would've told you not to go through with it.”

Chrollo seemed thoughtful as he considered your words.

“I suppose I wasn't thinking about that,” he told you, “all I could think about was how I could help you.”

That was sweet, you had to admit. And it made you feel guilty for pulling away from him earlier. He was just trying to help, right?

“What made you go that far?” you asked.

“That's a silly question, don't you think? Why wouldn't I do everything in my power for your sake?”

…. That also made sense. And you knew that if the positions were reversed, you would want to do everything you could to help him if he needed it.

The whole issue of the eyes themselves was still strange, however.

“Why didn't you tell me that the eyes would change color?” you asked.

“I wasn't sure they would change at first,” he said, “when they were preserved, they were permanently stuck in their red form. It was quite surprising when you first opened your eyes and I saw that they were gray.”

Had he seemed surprised when you took off the bandages? You couldn't recall; being able to see again had been too overwhelming for you to remember much of how he'd been acting during that time.

“Did you ever realize before this point that they could still turn red?” you asked.

He nodded.

“Why didn't you tell me?”

For once, your boyfriend didn't seem to know how to respond. An unusual sight to see, for sure.

“I was going to once we left the city,” he eventually said, “I thought it'd be good to do it then once we were in an environment that was better for you.”

“I think I would've preferred you told me before this.”

“That's understandable. And for that, I'm sorry.”

Chrollo squeezed your hand gently as he added “thinking on it now, I was using that as an excuse to put off telling you about it. I couldn't think of any way to ease you into revealing the truth.”

He had a point there. As hard as you tried, you couldn't think of any way to open up a conversation like that.

He still should have told you, though.

But there wasn't much you could do about it, so all you said was “at least I know now.”

Chrollo was oddly quiet once again.

“Can I ask you about something else?” you added.

“Of course.”

“Was the specialist you took me to also involved with criminal stuff?” you asked.

“There were no legal avenues I could take to restore your vision, love.”

That made sense. It explained why the doctors at the hospital you'd gone to told you there was nothing that could be done. It was also scary; Chrollo had entrusted everything to some shady individual who operated outside of the legal limits. What if something had gone horribly wrong? What if they'd done something to you and you were left off worse than you were after the accident?

But Chrollo wouldn't have let that happen.

You needed to believe that.

The two of you remained quiet. Your brain couldn't come up with any other questions at that moment, and Chrollo was waiting for you to speak.

Not long after he took the initiative to ask a question of his own.

“What else is bothering you?” he asked.

“…. I feel guilty,” you said.

“Because of how the scarlet eyes came to be available?”

“Yeah.”

“You shouldn't,” he said, “after all, you didn't have anything to do with what happened to those people.

“I know that,” you began, “but I just feel like the person who had the eyes originally would be mad that I was using them. They died because of their eyes, and then I end up using them like they're spare parts for a car.”

“That's quite a pessimistic view.”

“Doesn't mean it's wrong.”

“True, but think of it this way, love,” he continued, “instead of leaving their eyes floating in jars to be gawked at, you're putting them to good use. I'm sure that, whoever they were, the Kurta Clan member would have preferred that someone actually use their eyes as opposed to allowing them to gather dust while they sat on someone's shelf as a decoration.”

…. It did make it sound a bit better, but it wasn't like the guilt could be pushed aside just like that.

That would likely be something else you'd need to learn to live with.

“Are you sure you're not mad at me?” you asked.

“Not at all,” he told you, “I know that the steps I took to help you are ones most consider to be wrong, and I understand the guilt you feel after finding out where the eyes came from. But I hope that you also understand that I did what I did because I wanted to help you.”

“I do. And I really am grateful.”

You sighed, adding “I just wish that accident had never happened. Then we wouldn't even need to have this discussion.”

“I know.”

With that, Chrollo squeezed your hand softly again, just like he had during those long days from before. That made you feel a bit better.

“Can you just promise me something?”

“Promise you what, love?” Chrollo asked.

“That you won't buy human body parts off the black market again. Or anything similar to that. Even if you're just trying to help me,” you said.

To that, he smiled, and brought your hand up to his mouth so he could kiss it.

“I promise I'll never buy body parts off the black market for any reason,” he said after.

You let out a sigh.

“Never thought I'd need to ask you something like that,” you said.

“Life is full of surprises,” said Chrollo.

“That's one way to put it,” you answered.

Sunset was quickly approaching, given the golden hue in the sky. Nightfall would come soon after, and accompanying that would be a drop in the temperature. It probably wouldn't be the greatest idea to be sitting on the floor for too much longer.

Chrollo certainly realized that as he squeezed your hand again and said “we should go back inside, love.”

You nodded.

“Okay.”

With that, he stood back up and pulled you up after. One of his hands went to cup your cheek, his thumb rubbing softly at your skin.

“I think it's time we got started on dinner, don't you?” he asked.

You nodded again.

“And after if you'd like, we can watch one of those terrible horror movies that you enjoy so much.”

At that, you couldn't help but let out a little of a laugh.

“You must be desperate to make me feel better if you're willing to sit through one of those with me,” you said.

“Whatever it takes to make you happy,” he answered, jokingly adding “even if I feel my brain cells slowly shriveling up while I sit through the trash you make me watch.”

“Rude.”

“It's the truth, love.”

You laughed again as he led you inside. This felt good. The normal, playful banter between you two that signified that things were fine. As questionable as everything he'd revealed had been, you didn't want to think about it much right now. It was easier to push it to the side and focus on other things. Like the intentionally awful movie you'd pick for him to roll his eyes at.

But as you were considering that, another thought came to mind.

“Actually….”

Chrollo turned to you after shutting the balcony door, tilting his head in question.

“After dinner, would you read to me?” you asked.

He smiled.

“Of course, love.”

After dinner, the two of you found yourselves on the couch, with you resting your head against Chrollo's shoulder while he read aloud to you, his free hand in your own and your fingers intertwined with his.

After the accident, when you'd been brought home but your leg was still in a cast, Chrollo would read to you often. With you being largely confined to the bed, he would settle down next to you as he read to you, holding out his hand so you could take it in yours. More often than not you would wrap both of your arms around his, your cheek resting on his shoulder while his hand would hold yours firmly. Those moments on their own made the days while your leg healed more bearable.

The feeling of Chrollo's hand holding yours had become a familiar one during that time. It helped a lot more than you would've anticipated – with sound alone, you weren't always sure of where he was around you, but the feeling of his hand in yours while he talked with you or read aloud to you helped you to know for certain that he was by your side.

That he really wouldn't leave you.

He stopped suddenly in the middle of his reading, and you looked up to find his gaze on you.

“What's wrong?” you asked.

“I have to admit, I was worried,” he said, “after learning everything, I thought you may want to leave me.”

“Me? Leave you?”

That thought hadn't crossed your mind even once. While you'd been shocked and incredibly worried when it came to the black market dealings in particular, you couldn't envision any sort of future where you packed up your things and left him behind. Certain things he'd said still scared you, and maybe for some people, those admissions might be enough to make them leave. But everything that had happened, you couldn't imagine spitting in his face like that.

Even if some of what he said was scary, it wasn't like his actions had directly hurt anyone, you told yourself.

You shook your head as you said “I don't think I could live without you, Chrollo.”

The second you uttered those words he kissed you.

It was far more forceful than you'd experienced in months and the pure passion of it surprised you, leaving you slightly stunned. He held you after he pulled away, and again you were surprised, this time by how firmly he held you.

Chrollo had been that worried that your response would be to leave?

You reciprocated his hug, silently communicating that you wouldn't do that.

You sensed the way he smiled against your hair.

He understood.

The day you learned the truth about the scarlet eyes had been a hectic one, yet it had managed to end calmly. Despite that, however, a majority of the days that followed were more in line with what had happened down in the lobby: out of nowhere, something would come over you and leave you unable to function properly as you struggled to control your emotions. Sometimes it was triggered by a phobia that suddenly made itself known, other times you were once again left confused as to why it happened at all.

Maybe it was all because you knew now what would happen once you became upset and how you'd see similar reactions from others like the two downstairs. It could be really bad for you if you freaked out in public and someone from the group that killed the Kurta found out and think that they'd missed one.

It was safe to say that your desire to go back out had died completely.

Even if the chances of those killers finding out about you were slim, you decided that it was too dangerous to risk it. Especially with how out-of-control your emotions were right now. You didn't want people to know – to look at you like that again.

The only one you could depend on was Chrollo.

Your boyfriend was always quick to rush to your side when he saw you weren't doing well – now easier to tell than ever due to the mood ring quality your eyes possessed. Despite this new bought of helplessness you were now displaying, you still got no sense that he was annoyed with you over it. He was just as understanding and calm as he'd been prior.

He stared at your eyes a lot, though.

It took you a few times of it happening before you realized just how often he would stare, his gaze on the blood red color in your eyes. There was always some reason he had to pull away from you, be it to grab you something to drink or to cup your cheek and caress it softly. With that latter action, there was always the silent encouragement to turn your face up towards him, his hand ever so slightly angling your jaw so you would look at him. And when his gray eyes met your scarlet ones, you felt as though you could see something strange moving within them. Some emotion of his being betrayed despite the expression on his face showing something different.

There was some manner of fascination he had with them, you came to realize, and you wondered how long he had known of the scarlet eyes before your accident even happened.

…. At least he wasn't disgusted with you. The faces of those two in the lobby frequently came to mind, especially during those moments of duress. At least Chrollo wasn't looking at you like they had. And even if the way Chrollo would at times treat you as though you were made of glass, you knew it came from a desire to protect you, perhaps born out of whatever feelings of helplessness he had felt once he finally received word that you had been in that accident, that you had been hurt so badly while he happened to be gone.

Chrollo looking at the scarlet eyes the way he did wasn't a big deal, you told yourself.

The fact that he cared about you so deeply was more important.

The other upside during that period of time was the fact that your nightmares had stopped. Maybe that was because you were simply too exhausted from the stress to have the energy to dream. Regardless, you preferred it that way, even if your days weren't all that better.

When Chrollo broached the topic of moving again, you didn't fight him on it. There were too many stresses that came with living in the city. The last few days had made that clear. If you wanted to live a healthy life, you couldn't continue on like this, and while you were sad to leave the life the two of you had made together here, Chrollo encouraged you to think on it positively. It wouldn't be the same, but it would be better for you.

You agreed.

After that point, the panics that took over you almost daily slowly died down as you began moving preparations.

In your mind, that was because you were being moved to a place that would be better for your mental health, with less things that would stress you out. While a part of you would always be sad that you likely wouldn't be back here, the fact that your panic died down cemented to yourself that this was the right decision.

The days were filled with moving boxes and packaging. Monotonous work that left you tired and sweaty after moving around heavy boxes. Today had largely consisted of packing away a majority of Chrollo's book collection, so you were more tired than usual. After a shower, you were standing in front of the bathroom sink in the middle of your bedtime routine, ready for another dreamless sleep.

When Chrollo entered the bathroom and came up behind you, the way he wrapped his arms around you after wasn't entirely unexpected, looking at you through the mirror as he held you close to him.

You leaned into his touch, placing a hand on top of one of his as you asked “everything okay?”

He nodded.

“I'm just grateful we can still have moments like this,” he told you.

You smiled and lightly squeezed his hand as you said “me too.”

Chrollo smiled back at you.

He turned you around and placed a kiss on your lips. You returned the gesture, placing your hands on his chest as you leaned against him.

Then one of Chrollo's hands reached up to cup the back of your head while his tongue pressed against your lips in a not so subtle way of asking that you open up for him. You obliged, and his tongue was then moving against your own while his free hand wandered down and squeezed your ass. The noise of surprise you made was muffled by the kiss.

Ah.

It'd been a while for both of you, hadn't it?

With all that had been going on since your accident, with your broken leg healing up and your recovery after getting the eyes, sex had been one of the furthest things on your mind. But now that you had Chrollo's body pressed up against you and his lips on yours, you realized just how much you needed him. To have that skin on skin contact and that ache in your legs afterwards.

You wrapped your arms around his neck while your teeth nipped at his tongue that was still in your mouth. Chrollo's hands immediately went down so he could hoist you up onto the counter, opening your legs after so he could slot himself between them.

He must've been pent up as well, but had held off until he was certain that you were better.

Always looking out for you and your well-being.

You pulled away from the kiss to whisper “I love you, Chrollo.”

“I love you too,” was the response he gave before he pressed his mouth against yours once more. He seemed needier than you were used to – no doubt a result of him putting his needs aside for you. You decided then that tonight you would do whatever he wanted.

A strand of saliva kept you connected when he pulled his mouth away from yours before it broke as he stood up straight. His hands went to the hem of your shirt with the intent of pulling over your head as he looked back to you-

And then he froze.

Chrollo blinked at you, as if he was surprised. You, on the other hand, were confused by why things had stopped.

“What is it?” you asked, still a bit breathless.

“Have I upset you?”

His question confused you as you answered “what? No, of course not. Why would you think that?”

“Your eyes.”

“Huh?”

You turned your head so you could look at the mirror and see what he was talking about.

Oh no.

Your irises had turned red.

But why? You weren't angry or upset – you wanted this. Why had they changed color when you were fine?

Then you felt Chrollo begin to take his hands off of you, and you quickly turned your attention back to him, grabbing onto his shirt as you said “Chrollo, I'm not upset. Really. I want this, too. I promise.”

One of his hands came up to caress your cheek as he gazed into your eyes.

Then after a moment, he nodded as he said “I believe you.”

Relief filled you, and you glanced back at the mirror again, taking in the red of the irises.

“I don't know why they turned red, though,” you mumbled.

Chrollo hummed as he moved your head so he could look into your eyes again.

“Perhaps,” he began, “the Kurta eyes don't change color just from anger.”

“Wait, you mean they also turn red from….?”

You trailed off, for some reason finding yourself too embarrassed to finish the sentence. But he decided to finish it for you.

“Arousal, yes,” he confirmed.

“…. Did you know about that?” you asked.

“It's new information to me,” he answered, “I doubt that the Kurta clan would have wanted to advertise such a thing.”

“Ah, yeah. That makes sense.”

He was still staring at your eyes, not saying anything. And the longer things stayed like that, the more awkward you felt. Until he'd approached you, you weren't aware of how much you wanted him, the tiredness you'd felt moments earlier gone completely. Now that he'd stopped you desperately wanted to continue where you left off just a few moments earlier.

Did he not want to now? You'd realized that he had a fascination with them, but was adding sex into the mix too off-putting for him?

“… Does it bother you?” you asked after another beat of silence.

He smiled at you.

“On the contrary,” Chrollo said, pulling you off the counter and turning you around once again, making you squeak as he did so.

“You were upset those times before, so it seemed inappropriate to say anything about it-”His hand gripped your jaw as he made you look back at your reflection.

“-but it is a beautiful color, don't you think?”

With little other choice, you looked to the reflection of your eyes in the mirror.

The vibrant scarlet was still present, but now that you were made to really look at them, you found that the color was darkest around the outer circle of the iris, with bits of lighter shades of red speckled around going up towards your pupils. The blood red color itself was so vivid that it almost looked as though it was glowing. Your pupils dilated the longer you looked, and then you noticed another quality they had: an odd shimmer within the scarlet, like a halo that surrounded your pupil that almost seemed to have an iridescent quality to it. All of those things were odd, to say the least, yet you found that you couldn't disagree with your boyfriend's opinion.

You looked back to Chrollo through the mirror and found that he was waiting for a response from you.

“…. It is,” you agreed softly.

He smiled at you before leaning in to kiss you on the cheek.

“It really-” you were cut off when he buried his face in your neck, sucking at your skin with the intent of leaving marks. Looking at the mirror during that felt strange, so you looked to the side while you gripped at the counter.

“It really doesn't bother you?” you managed to get out when you composed yourself.

“I promise you; it doesn't.”

His free hand snaked down beneath the waistband of your pants as he said that, and you let out another squeak when his fingers began to play with your clit.

“Chrollo-”

“Keep looking, love.”

Those fingers continued playing with your clit while his other hand re-positioned itself on your jaw, making you look back at the mirror. While you did try a few times to move your jaw out of his hand, you were forced to give up as his grip was scarily strong. And when you shut your eyes as you felt Chrollo's fingers slip into your cunt, a nip on your neck forced them back open, and he whispered as he once again told you to keep looking. Remembering what you told yourself of doing what he wanted, you followed that instruction.

You saw how your fingers held tight onto the edge of the counter, unable to find purchase anywhere else. You saw how you bit your lip in frustration when Chrollo began to tease you by pushing his fingers in before immediately pulling them of you in favor of caressing the lips of your pussy. You saw how his arm moved as he delved into you again with the intent of scissoring you open. And you saw the way his eyes flashed over to look at you through the mirror when he heard the noise that escaped your mouth.

Through all of that, you found yourself always looking back to the red reflection of your eyes that only seemed to grow more vibrant.

It felt embarrassing, to be made to watch a reflection of yourself becoming a flustered mess from the way your boyfriend toyed with you while he kept you pressed against the counter. Every time his fingers brushed over a part of you that was sensitive would have you jolt against his firm chest, and every time you felt his teeth biting ever so softly into the skin of your neck had you moaning.

By now you could feel how hard he was as his erection pressed up against your ass.

His fingers were gliding out of you even easier now and your underwear was a wet mess. The heat inside of you was building up as you moved your hips against his hand, trying to get him in deeper.

Chrollo glanced up at you again through the mirror and your eyes met.

And then he stopped.

You managed to keep a frustrated whine contained within you as he pulled his hands away from you, leaning them against the counter as he remained on top of you.

“Would you do something for me?” he asked breathlessly.

“D-do what?” you asked in response that was just as breathless.

“Turn around and get on your knees for me.”

“Ah…”

He pulled away from you as you understood what it was he wanted, and though you were immediately missing the way he touched you, you told yourself not to be selfish.

The fibers of the bathroom mat protected your legs from the cool tiles of the floor as you knelt down before him. Though your hands were shaky, you went to undo his zipper before you pulled the material of his pants and underwear out of the way, allowing his cock to spring free of those confines.

You let out a soft breath as one hand went up to stroke him, fingers gliding over his length with a feather light touch. When you gripped him fully was when you felt him twitch in your hand. You continued like that, hand running along his dick while you leaned in to place a kiss at the head, licking the tip after. You heard his sharp intake of breath and saw from your peripheral vision the way his hand clenched into a fist. Remembering once again of how pent up Chrollo must've been spurred you to not waste time with teasing him and in moments you had his length in your mouth, your tongue moving against the underside of his dick and your cheeks hollowing as you sucked.

The appreciative groan that came from his lips and the gentle hand that settled in your hair after told you that you were doing good, and you closed your eyes as you continued to bob up and down his dick.

“Don't do that.”

Those words surprised you, and you stopped suddenly to look up to him, uncertain of what you'd done wrong. The intensity of his stare caught you off-guard and you pulled off of him. Or you would have had it not been for the hand that kept your head from moving any further. Within a moment, that same hand moved to caress your cheek just beneath your eye.

“Keep looking at me, love,” he said, “just like that.”

You made a noise of affirmation before you continued as you had been, keeping your eyes open this time. It felt a little awkward for you to stare at him the whole time, but if that was what he wanted, you would do it.

You wanted him to be happy with you.

His cheeks became more flushed and his breathing was getting harsher, all the while those gray eyes bore into you. Chrollo always had an odd way of seeming to look right through you, and that was no exception now. Though never had there been such an intense look of fascination and awe until now, as his eyes gazed into yours.

You would be lying if you said it wasn't slightly unsettling.

It won't always be like that, you told yourself.

It's only because it's been so long since you did this for him.

Both of Chrollo's hands ended up tangled in your hair, and he stopped your movements completely as he forced himself down your throat. A soft groan from above and the clenching of his thighs served as the signs that he was about to cum, and soon you felt his release running down your throat, forcing you to gulp as you swallowed it since he still held you in place.

When you felt him begin to soften he finally let go, pulling out of your mouth and leaning against the sink counter as he collected his breath. You watched him from your spot on the bathroom floor, your thighs pressing together while you bit your lip. Your pussy was dripping and you were desperate for him to do something about was the frustrating ache inside of you. Remembering the way Chrollo had his fingers inside of you for that brief period only made it worse, and all you wanted was for him to continue where he left off.

He noticed, smiling at you as he asked “shall I take care of you as well?”

“Yes,” you answered without any hesitation.

He laughed.

“Eager, aren't we?”

“I was a little worried you weren't going to,” you admitted.

“When have I ever been that cruel to you, love?”

He said that while holding a hand out for you, one that you took and allowed him to haul you up to your feet. You ended up leaning against his chest, wide eyes staring up at him.

Out of curiosity, you glanced over to the mirror. Your eyes were still red. What a surprise. At least you were getting used to the sight. Chrollo then turned your jaw once more so you would face him as he leaned in for a kiss.

A weird pain suddenly shot through your chest once you saw his face.

You should hate him

…. Why would you ever hate Chrollo?

You weren't given anymore time to think on that as your lips met his and your arms wrapped around his neck while you pressed yourself against him. That weird feeling was pushed down into the depths of your chest; this was all you cared about right now.

Chrollo was on top of you, his arms caging you in on the bed while he thrust his hips against yours. You were squirming beneath him, one of your hands insistent on holding onto one of his own while you did your best to minimize the amount of pained noises coming from your mouth. He knew he was being too rough; you hadn't had sex in months and he should've been more gentle. But the sight of you laying beneath him and the red Kurta eyes staring up at him so lovingly caused Chrollo to simply not care as much at the moment – as long as he didn't hurt you beyond some bruising, you would be fine. And even that could be soothed in the moment. Whenever those noises of discomfort did become too loud, Chrollo would lean back down to place tender kisses on your lips or suck on your neck, and the feeling of his lips against your skin had you mewling while you squeezed his hand.

The marks on your neck, shoulders and chest tallied up while you forgave him easily, likely in part because of the past few months and how much of a burden you must've felt like during that time, as well as because of the sheer gratitude you had towards him, that he had done so much to give you back your sight.

He could get away with being a little rough.

And as he pushed himself back up so he could stare down at you again, he once more brought his gaze to the sight of the scarlet eyes that he admired so much.

It was a surreal sight, one he had never anticipated.

Nor had he planned on using the scarlet eyes for you. Not at first.

It began after bringing you home. Determined to keep the promise he'd made to you at the hospital, he had tracked down a transmuter who had the skills to replace your old eyes with ones that worked – a pity he couldn't steal their abilities for himself – and once you were well enough to travel again, Chrollo had looked about the area where the two of you lived to find a suitable replacement. At that point his goal had been to find a pair of eyes that looked close to yours, spending a considerably long time trying to find the correct shade of your original color while you recovered under the supervision of other members of the troupe.

He thought he knew what he wanted when he found a woman who had the color you once had, and after learning her schedule and when she would be alone, he'd gathered up what he needed for the job: the blade he would use to slice her throat so he could kill without her crying out, the tools that he would use to extract her eyes from her skull without damaging them, and the jars filled with fluids that would keep the eyes preserved until they could be transferred to you.

Chrollo was moments away from ending that woman's life when he remembered that job from years prior, when he and the troupe had attacked the Kurta Clan. Handling the jars had brought the memories back, as they had brought over a hundred of them for the heist; yet most had ended up unused as they hadn't been able to kill enough of the clan members when their eyes had been in the scarlet state.

While the massacre of the Kurta Clan had been a success in the troupe's book, he had always been personally unsatisfied with the final results of that heist. There was something lacking in the end result for him, as the eyes in the jars didn't look the same as when they did in the heads of those Kurta members who had died by his hand. The vibrance that had been present in living eyes that held emotion – that was gone. After the deed was done, all he saw in the dead eyes that floated in those jars was a waste of effort.

It was disappointing, to say the least.

That was when the thought struck him: what if he gave you one of the pairs of scarlet eyes?

… It was impractical, he thought after. For one, it would require him to track down someone who had a pair of the eyes, and once he found them, he'd need to steal them and more than likely kill the owner in the process. And going through all of that would cause you to wait longer. It was much less trouble to go with what he had planned initially and settle for the eyes he had already picked for you.

There was no need to go that extra mile when you would be grateful either way.

But now that the idea had come to him, it itched in his brain. The thought of not only being able to see the scarlet eyes as they were meant to be seen, but also that you might have them.

That mental image was all he could think in that moment, and it was then that Chrollo knew that he wouldn't be satisfied with anything else. So he walked away from his would-be victim's apartment, the woman within completely unaware that a passing thought of his had saved her life.

It was more for him than it was for you. He was well aware of that. And during the time he spent tracking down one of the thirty six pairs, he was aware of the disappointment you felt at how often he was gone, though you kept those thoughts to yourself. He could tell even without Pakunoda informing him that you were desperately terrified at the thought of him leaving you. The relief you felt when he always returned was evident in your voice, your body language and the way you gripped his hand.

The stress he was putting you through his search and retrieval of the eyes was wholly unnecessary.

But he pursued it regardless, intent on making the vision in his mind a reality.

And within a relatively short amount of time, he did just that. Now not only did he have you, but he also had the sight of the scarlet eyes with the life brought back into them.

Your pussy walls fluttered around his cock and he heard you moan. This time it sounded far more pleasurable and he sensed you were getting close. Without missing a beat Chrollo moved his hand so he could rub your clit with his thumb.

That was enough to make you cum on his cock, and the legs you had wrapped around his hips clenched hard onto him while your grasping fingers intertwined with his and you rode out your high beneath him.

That shade of red truly was mesmerizing, Chrollo thought to himself, his eyes focused on yours. Everything he'd done had all been worth it just to get to this moment right now.

He reached down once your orgasm had subsided, softly petting your cheek while you breathed through your mouth. You leaned into his touch immediately, smiling up at him.

“Love,” he began, “may I finish?”

As expected, you agreed. You didn't say anything when he resumed his harsh pace from earlier; you only readjusted your grip on his hand. With another love-bite left on your neck, Chrollo pushed himself back up with his arm, staring down at you while he continued to thrust his hips and fucked you into the bed.

“You're perfect.”

He breathed those words out and you smiled, somehow managing to seem embarrassed by the compliment despite everything he'd done to you tonight, as you glanced away. Chrollo cupped your cheek, bringing your gaze back on him.

When the scarlet eyes looked up at him again he began moving faster.

This surprise you both learned about the Kurta Clan eyeballs was a welcome one. Now he didn't need to force you into a panic to see them again. No more need to use any stolen ability to get your adrenaline to rush during the day while you were left inconsolable. No more need to interrupt your sleep schedule to gaze at them during the night while you silently cried. Now if he wanted a view of those eyes all he needed to do was force you onto your knees and push his cock in your mouth.

He'd be doing that more often. Definitely.

And you would be eager and willing to do so, jumping at any chance you could to show your appreciation for all that he had done.

As Chrollo looked into your eyes, he felt as his hands moved to your throat, grabbing you and holding you just hard enough to cut off the circulation. He'd done it without thinking, continuing the habit he'd picked up from those nights he spent watching you. There was something about the way you looked up at him while he had you like this. How helpless and at his mercy you were.

Your reaction was let out a soft gasp in surprise and to move to place your own hand on his forearm. There was no attempt to pull him off.

Once more, he was fascinated by the sight. And once more, he had to wonder if those eyes had looked at him like that before when they'd been in the possession of their previous owner. If this particular set was one that he himself had collected and bottled up.

If the eyes that now gazed up at him so lovingly had once done so in hate.

His grip on your throat must have gotten too hard, as the hold you had on his forearm tightened ever so slightly while you whined. Hazy scarlet eyes stared up at him, looking up in a mixture of arousal and fear.

He fully lost control then, stopping as he pressed himself as deep as he was able while he came, his hot release spilling into you and making you whimper as you felt his cum dribbling out of you.

That was long overdue.

With that, he released his grip on your throat and relaxed, falling onto the bed next to you as he pulled himself out of your sore pussy. Your eyes were still that shade of vibrant red, and they would remain that way until your heart rate returned to normal.

As relaxed as he felt, he noticed how tense you had become, your eyebrows furrowed as though you were thinking about something unpleasant.

“Is something wrong, love?"

You blinked as you looked over to him in response to his question, looking blank for a moment before forcing a smile on your face and shaking your head. Chrollo brought his hand back up to cup your cheek, asking “are you sure?”

“Yeah,” you answered.

The way your eyes moved about told him that you weren't being entirely truthful, and he wondered for a moment just how much you were able to remember of those nights he spent gazing at you.

But before he could begin to do any sort of damage control, you spoke again, asking “Chrollo, could you do something for me?”

“Anything,” he answered.

Your smile seemed more genuine as you softly asked “will you hold me?”

Within an instant Chrollo had pulled you against his chest, cupping the back of your head with his hand as he said “you never need to ask for that.”

You hummed happily, nuzzling your face against his chest. The tenseness of your muscles melted away shortly after.

He'd been far too greedy tonight. He was so focused on the eyes and the newfound knowledge of the color also being linked to arousal that he'd wanted to drink in the sight at every moment. So much so that he'd held you down to keep you in place, something he'd never really done before the accident.

He would need to do a better job of controlling himself in the future if he wanted to keep you happy and complacent. While the chances were slim, there was always a possibility that you could learn the truth about everything: about him, about the troupe, and about who really was responsible for the death of the Kurtas.

Even with his efforts to ensure that you were heavily dependent on him, you wouldn't want to stay if you learned all of that. You might not even want those eyes in your skull anymore.

Better to not put you in situations where you could remember something unpleasant involving him and begin to put the pieces together. Keeping you happy while he kept you away from the rest of the world would be better for you, even if the alternative possibly gave him more opportunities to see that red color he admired so much. Losing the way you so eagerly clung to him wasn't worth it.

“I think we sabotaged ourselves,” you mumbled against his chest.

“Hm?”

“It's so late, and we still need to do so much. We're going to be exhausted tomorrow,” you continued.

“We'll manage,” he said, “just like we always do. Right?”

You smiled against his skin as you nodded, and Chrollo took the opportunity to place a kiss on top of your head.

“Getting some sleep is a good idea, though,” he added.

You hummed in agreement as Chrollo turned to flip the light switch, and held you once more as the room was shrouded in darkness. Moments passed before you spoke once more.

“Chrollo?”

“What is it, love?”

“Things will be better now, right?”

Chrollo smiled to himself as he answered “of course they will, love. You can trust me on that.”

[utvarpcity]

sorry for all the stranger things posting btw. will probably post even more once i’ve watched the new episodes that come out tomorrow

[missglaskin]

Do you think Rhaenyra and Daemon would work together to get the Reader? I can see them forming a shaky truce and marrying after their spouses die, but still pushing for their respective sons to marry the Reader. Jace and Daemon's son constantly compete for the Reader’s love. I can also see Luke and Joff/Baela and Rhaena backing up their respective bros and adding to the chaos. Meanwhile, Aegon and Aemond are fuming at King’s Landing.

A big reason why Leanor and Rhaenyra’s marriage happened in the first place is under an agreement to share the reader, it was also a deal made between Viserys and Corlys. Daemon and Rhaenyra while marrying out of desire, also did under a similar agreement. But while they agreed to share her they are also simultaneously maneuvering behind each other’s backs on whose son she marries. 

With the marriage done so soon after their children’s death, Corlys and Rhaenys aren’t all too happy. In fact, they had hoped that they take the reader to themselves and have her reside on Driftmark.

Surprisingly, Rhaenys finds herself taking Daemon’s side, trying to persuade the reader to wed Viserion. Rhaenys even goes as far as to propose letting Jace wed Baela and Luke to Rhaena. However, even if Rhaenyra ever agrees to this proposal, she’ll continue to find ways to bring Jace and the reader close, having him accompany her whenever she goes, and even letting her ride Vermax during travels. 

Daemon, on the other hand, relies on Viserion to do it himself, he is his father’s son after all. Viserion is much more forward, participating in tournaments, and vying for the honor of crowning the reader, challenging any suitors who dare come between him and her.

The siblings also choose sides, with Luke and Joffrey supporting their brother and Baela and Rhaena doing the same to theirs. Baela and Rhaena have a better advantage as they can easily enjoy girl time with the reader, akin to sleepovers where they persuade you into giving in to their brother's advances. However, Luke and Joffrey somehow find a way of tricking you to help them with something only to find yourself conveniently alone with Jace. 

Despite, Viserion appearing to have an apparent advantage, it all changes when Viserys comes in. He of course advocates for Jace, in his eyes the reader deserves nothing more than to be a queen, and what a wonderful queen she’ll make. He’s also had his issues over the reader’s namesake, being Laenor’s daughter she had to have his Velaryon name; marrying Jace would solve all that without causing any problems with the Velaryons. Funny enough, Daemon himself finds weding Viserion to be a solution to that issue as well. 

Otto and Alicent, predictably, oppose both matches, with Alicent seeing all faults in Nyra’s sons and Otto is vehemently against the idea of a marriage between the reader and Daemon’s son. The two are doing all they can do to sabotage any potential matches, Otto is sure that all he needs is some time for when Aegon becomes king, they can just wed them.

Meanwhile, it doesn’t take one to say that the animosity between Aegon and Aemond is growing, but it intensifies with Viserion and Jace. Whenever the family visits, it usually ends with a fight breaking out. To prevent any possible accident mishaps, no more than one can participate in any tourneys.

[hidden-poet]

Commander Snow; chapter 6

Commander Snow

Summary; Under the advice of Dr Gaul Coriolanus returns back to district 12 where without blinding light of lucy-grey he could see you.

Warnings; dead dove to do not eat, stalking, unrequited love, breeding kink, violence, possessive!Snow, unco/dubco, sexual content, she/her pronouns, explicit, violence, death.

Editor: @hotline-to-hell

chapter one

Chapter two

Chapter three

Chapter four

Chapter five

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Being Commander of District 12 meant that Coriolanus couldn’t just whisk you away to the forest to face his fears. He had a whole army dependent on him. It meant that while you were held up in his apartment, he was held up in his office. 

It annoyed him to no end. To have you so close and yet still out of reach. 

Despite you living with him for a week, you’ve only shared one meal together. 

His overtime meant that you were asleep by the time he got home. 

You had left a clean pair of his pajamas on the end of the bed. He had a habit of just stripping down to his underwear to join you. 

You left dinner for him in the fridge and he sat at the dinner table eating it alone. 

On the odd occasion, there was time to spend together, the mood was often tense from Coriolanus stress. 

He tried not to take his frustration out on you but his answers were often short. 

After a long day filled with complaints and issues that could have been easily solved without him, Coriolanus decided that he would not return to his office after supervising drill training and instead remain with you. 

He was beyond tired from his day, but it was too early to suggest bed. You lay with him on the couch, propped up by a throw pillow against the arm of the couch while he lay in front of you. He threw your arm around his shoulder and held it tight under his chin. 

The TV played a music talent show that neither you nor Coriolanus could care about but the tv only picked up two channels; the news or the entertainment channel that the Hunger Games were shown on. Coriolanus couldn’t bear to hear any more politics for the day so you watched people dressed in irregular costumes perform ballads out of their range. 

His eyes droop as he fights the upcoming sleep. It was the first time since the fight with Edmund that he got you to sit down. The little he was here you spent avoiding him. For the first few days, he was angry too and avoidance stopped the fight he wanted to have with you. 

But a week had passed and his temper cooled. 

You were with him now. Playing housewife to the Commander. 

He felt better now that he was coming home to something, rather than just the cold. When he looked in the fridge there was food for him. His clothes were washed and prepared for him. His bed was warm at night. He made him feel less homesick.

The talk from the TV turned from the judges to Lucky the presenter. 

“Now ladies and gentlemen. We have a surprise for you tonight. We have a certain special guest gracing us. And we have given him the power to save one of your favorites from elimination! Mr Augustus Bloom won’t you please come out!” 

Coriolanus shot up from your hold to watch him. 

Augustus Bloom walked on screen wearing an expensive suit. His brown hair was slicked back and a small gold earring dangled from his ear. 

The crowd cheered for him. 

Coriolanus was stuck in District 12 dealing with half-wits and scum, while Augustus was charming the Capitol on live tv. 

He shakes hands with Lucky. 

“Mr. Bloom, a privilege to have you here tonight!” 

“A privilege to be here amongst you and away from my office.”

Lucky turns to the crowd and laughs. 

“Look at you. You good-looking man! You should be out on the town, breaking hearts!” 

Augustus laughs along with the crowd. 

“I am too busy preparing my business for when I am president of Panem. I’ll worry about women after that.” 

Coriolanus clenches his fist. 

“Oh,” Lucky turned serious to the crowd, “I think Coriolanus Snow might have something to say about that!” 

The crowd murmurs amongst themselves giving Coriolanus an air of confidence. 

A picture from his Academy days flashes up on the screen, you look at it with curiosity. He was once a young boy with soft curls, he now sat nearly unrecognizable. 

“He’s looking like a strong contender. Isn’t he handsome ladies!” He points out to the crowd, “And some gentleman.” 

Augustus had the wind knocked out of his sail. He fidgeted on stage and took a step back almost as if he was going to run away. Dr. Gaul's criticism ran through Coriolanus’ head, “a soft-bellied rich boy, not fit for the presidency.” 

Now the whole audience knew it too. 

“Snow isn’t here” he gritted through a smile. He wasn’t going down with a fight. 

“No. He’s in District 12, keeping us here in the Capitol safe. A round of applause for Commander Snow!” 

The crowd cheered causing Coriolanus to smile.

“So am I!” Augustus interrupted like a child. 

“Yes, right. I am sure one day you will!” Lucky claps him on the back and returns to the audience with an excited demeanor. 

“But of course, that’s a while yet! We are wishing our President Ravenstill all the good health in the world. Now let’s get on with the show!” 

Coriolanus switches the TV off and rests his arms on his knees. He couldn’t help but smile at Augustus' national failure. He made Coriolanus look so strong, so mysterious, and focused. He would send Lucky a fruit basket in thanks tomorrow. He would also send one to Augustus. 

“You had curls.” The young boyish figure had shocked you. 

“Yes,” he pats your knee affectionately, “When we are back in the Capitol and I am president of Panem, I’ll grow them back again.” 

==================

Coriolanus has the nightmare that night. He woke up with the tune of ‘Hanging Tree’ stuck in his head. The first thing he does is reach out to where you should have been lying only to find the space cold. Panic rushes through him. His feet thump against the floorboards as he runs from the room into the hall. Your sleeping body can be seen on the couch and he instantly relaxes. 

His body tells him he should be angry; fists clenched, shoulders up and tense, his face hot. But he couldn’t manage it. His mind was too hazy to comprehend anything but his own panic. 

Instead, he sits down on the floor beside you and tries to control his breathing. The tune hums in the back of his mind and he tries to force it out. 

“You had the nightmare again?” Your voice halts the tune. He looks over his shoulder at you with wide eyes. You finally saw the resemblance between the schoolboy with the curls. 

He gets up and pushes himself on the couch next to you. You feel his hands slide up your back, trying to hold you close but you wiggle free from his grasp. 

You would not comfort the man who kidnapped you. 

He tried to bring you back down to his chest as you crawl over him but his tired state left room for error. 

You tumble down to the floor as you escape. 

He sighs disappointed, bringing his hands up to his face. 

“Was there something wrong with the bed?” he asks. 

“I prefer the couch.” You sit on the ground next to him. 

“You prefer the bed built by Edmund.” He spat his name like it was poison. 

You look up at him warily, “I never told you that Edmund built my bed.” 

Coriolanus is silent for a minute, he sucks his teeth and sits up. 

“You didn’t have to. The wood from your door and bed match.’’

He feels settled as you sit by his feet. The panic subsides, but his anger bubbles up from it. 

“Can you make me a cup of tea?” he asks. 

With him on your bed, you couldn’t go back to sleep anyway so you rose and went to the kitchen to put the kettle on. 

He watches you while sitting on the couch. He liked how you moved so comfortably in the space. You were treating it like your home. No hesitation about where things were, you used things liberally.

“What do you dream?” You ask him. 

“When I wake up it’s gone,” he lies. 

You know he carries it around with him.

“Whatever it is, it scares you.” 

The kettle whistles and you pour it over the tea bag. 

He worried that he now looks weak in front of you. The man who was supposed to be protecting you was scared of a dream like a child. He could continue with his lie but you already knew. 

Instead he tries a half-truth. 

“I dream that I am killed like my father was.” 

This peaked your interest causing him to sit up straighter under your attention. 

“How did he die?”. 

He takes the cup from you but you don’t scurry away like you usually do. You stand in front of him eager to listen to him. The attention moved his mouth, 

“Here. In District 12. A trap out in the forest during the war. He was a governor”. 

“Is that why you wanted to come back?” 

“I didn’t want to come back” he admits. He reaches up with his spare hand to lightly touch yours, “But I am glad I did.” 

“What did you do?” you feel his thumb brush over the back of your hand, “I mean, to get you sent here?” 

He takes a sip of his tea before answering, “I had an enemy in the Capitol. He disliked my father and took it out on my family”. 

“He sent you back as Commander?” 

“No. He died. Gaul sent me back for my presidential run. It looks better to be serving my country.”

You tear your hand from him, “And when they find out you brought me back to the Capitol. How will that look?” 

He places the cup on the floor and stands up to your height.

“I’ll keep you safe, okay?” he presses his forehead against yours, “In the district and in the Capitol”. 

“Safe from danger you put me in.”

Coriolanus shakes his head as you pull away from him. “You’re safe. You’ve always been safe.” 

He tried to pull you close again but you stretched out your arms to keep him at distance.  

“I wanna go home, Coriolanus.”

“Home to Edmund, perhaps?” he bites. His calm and soft features harden. 

A shiver shoots up your spine at the mention of Edmund. 

“Home to my family. The same as you.” 

He sighs, “You won’t be alone in the Capitol as you are here. You just have to put up with it just a little bit longer. We’ll be back home soon”

The Capitol was not your home nor would it ever be. 

But you knew anymore talk of home would lead to more talk of Edmund. 

“Come on. Let’s go back to bed.” You rip your elbow from his grasp as he walks past you. 

“I’m fine on the couch.” 

He rubs a hand over his mouth before bending down and picking up his tea cup. He splashes the remains on the couch and hands you the empty cup. 

“Enjoy it then.” 

—————-

The next day he comes home around lunch time. It catches you by surprise. 

“Come on,” he says, nodding his head backwards. 

You follow him without a word to the van below where officials stood around. Upon seeing him they take their place. You see Smiley by the passenger side door and he calls out for his Commander. 

Coriolanus tell Smiley to take the seat and climbs in the tray of the truck. 

He pulls you up into the van amongst the Peacekeepers. He sits on the end of the bench with you between his legs on the floor. Like a seatbelt he keeps you in place by taking a hold on your upper arms and pulling them back up on his knees. 

You can feel the glances of his officers but they look away as soon as you try to meet their eyes. 

Halfway they try to break the tension with idle chatter. 

“Will the recruits be as bad as last year?” 

“That’s couldn’t be possible.” 

The talk soon turns to anecdotes about their youthful days as Peacekeeper grunts. 

None of them try to include Coriolanus in their jests. They all willfully ignored the couple on the end. 

You don’t try to talk to him either. 

As you pass through the district the people look at the Peacekeeper van causing you to turn your head in embarrassment. You could still feel the harsh judgements from your community as you sat between the Commander's legs. How would you ever rebuild your reputation? 

The van stops in front of the tunnel to the train station. The people part in the crowd to let the van through. 

Coriolanus releases you to unhook the bolts from the backn of the truck. None of the other Peacekeepers move until he does. He jumps down from the bed of the truck and turns back around to help you down. They all wait until you are down and out of the way before they follow. 

It’s busy, too busy for a normal docking of fresh recruits. All of the road and tunnel leading to the train station were overrun by bodies. 

 District people flood the space, all chatting loudly in a panic. They part as the line of Peacekeepers march through. 

Normally on orientation day, the newcomers to District 12 were given a wide berth. People had better things to do then get a glimpse of the faces that would soon be terrorizing them. 

You wondered what peaked their excitement today. What had Coriolanus done that both you and the district people had to see?

Coriolanus drags you down the dark tunnel into the light of the train station. The talk quitened but didn’t stop altogether. 

You screamed upon seeing the commotion. 

Edmund. 

He was badly beaten and tied to a sturdy metal pole that kept the roof up. A bulls-eye was spray painted an inch above his head.

Blood soaked his face to the point you almost didn’t recognize him. 

Large black bruises covered his exposed skin.

You turn to Coriolanus who was already looking at you and beg him to release Edmund. 

“Please, Coriolanus. Let him go.”

“He threw the first punch.”

You knew it had less to do with causing Coriolanus physical harm than it did with damaging his ego and need for control. Your neighbors were shown that the Commander bleeds like any other man. 

“He learnt his lesson.” you promise. 

“Have you learnt yours?”

Only ten young boys disembark from the train.  They were all thin with a badly-shaved buzzcut and carrying a Capitol issued duffle bag. 

You wanted to run over to Edmund. Protect him somehow. But you couldn’t, it was your protection that got him here in the first place. 

“Gentlemen, welcome to District 12.” 

Coriolanus stood by your side while another officer went in front of the line of boys. 

“This is Edmund Flare,” he gestures to Edmund at the post, “A known rebel sympathizer, and a troubled citizen of District 12.”

Another Peacekeeper runs over and passes the man a gun. You grab Coriolanus' arm in protest. 

“More likely than not, you will have to shoot Edmund one day in service of your country. We figured today we would give you the opportunity to save yourself the trouble in the future.”   

The first young boy is given the gun. 

“You get one shot before you have to wait for that day to naturally come.’’

Edmund holds his head up high to show he is not afraid. But you were. You were terrified. A strong urge to go over and rip the gun out of the young boys hands presented itself but you knew you would be pulled back before you could even stand close enough to touch him, 

The boy checks the gun for the trigger, earning a laugh from everyone but you and Coriolanus. 

Eventually he finds it, and he takes aim. 

The shot misses by a mile. 

“Coriolanus please.” He remains emotionless, watching the scene before him. He stood as if it was a street performance, hands clasped behind his back and perfect posture to get a good view.

“Wait! Wait!” you call out but the men continue. Another boy steps up and takes the gun. 

He takes less time to examine the gun before firing a shot. Edmund flinches as it wizzes past his shoulder. 

‘‘Coriolanus! Stop this. Just please stop, untie hi-”

The next shot is fired causing you to spin around to ensure that Edmund was still standing. He was tall and stupidly proud. 

“I’ll never forgive you if one of them hurt him!” you threaten but it doesn’t even earn you a glance. 

“Do you love him?”

“No” you answered firmly and fast, “No, Coriolanus. Please stop.” 

Another shot is taken. 

“Because if you loved him now would be the time to tell me, because I would hate to break apart lovers.”

The third shot lands next to Edmunds boot. You felt physically sick watching the scene. Your legs shook and would soon give way. 

The men start to whoop and cheer the young recruits on. It gives the next young boy confidence to take a step closer to take his shot but it misses all the same.  

You can’t tear your eyes off Edmund as the next recruit takes aim. They look each other in the eyes. Never spoken a word and already enemies. 

The shot is taken but wizzes past Edmunds head.

You shake your head no. You knew telling him that you loved Edmund would sign his death certificate. 

“He’s my brother's friend, Coriolanus. We grew up together.”

The next shot hit the pole but not the target, causing you to yelp. 

Loud cheering snapped you out of your daze. Begging would get you nowhere. 

Instead you take his shoulders into your arms and turn him towards you.

“He looked after me before you. I would have been dead long before you got to me if it wasn’t for him”. 

Coriolanus throws his eyes back to Edmund which was not the desired effect. 

You change positions, wrapping your arms around his neck and pulling his attention back down to you.

“I didn’t tell him that you’d taken his role. The other night he was just trying to protect me as you would’ve.” 

He finally looks down at you.

“Please, don’t kill him, Coriolanus. I could never forgive myself.” Your voice begins to shake. You were so nervous for Edmunds safety. Your knees buckled and tears threatened to spill from your eyes. 

He takes the side of your face into his hands. 

“Do you love him?” 

You shake your head feverishly, “No, Coriolanus.” 

“Do you love him?” You feel his fingers tighten on your face. 

“Yes.” you admit. 

“Do you love me?”

Through gritted teeth a ‘yes’ resounds. 

“More than him?” 

A shot whizzed into the crowd as the new recruit lost control of the gun and Coriolanus pulled his body over yours. 

The officers scold the boy. Taking the waving  gun away. The shot landed into the train station wall but it was a close call for those standing in front of it.

He removes your arms from him and you watch him walk over to the officer holding the gun. 

He takes it and aims at Edmund who stood straight and tall. 

You shrink as the gun fires. Unable to look, you cover your face with your hands. 

The cheering made no impact on your confidence. You couldn’t hear Edmund from their excitement. So you reluctantly open your eyes to see him still standing. 

The bullet had made it straight to the middle of the painted target. 

Coriolanus stood taking aim still, as if he was still considering firing another shot. 

Edmund stared back, almost daring him. 

“Commander.” you call. You don’t call him by his name, not in front of people. 

Coriolanus lowers the gun but keeps his eyes on Edmund as he speaks, 

“Load them up and head back to the compound.” he passes the gun to the closest officer and turns back to where you stood. 

“Cut him loose.” he calls back. 

When he tosses his arm around you and pulls you back to the truck, you turn back to see Edmund surrounded by Peacekeepers. 

People mummer as you walk past but your ears buzzed too loudly to hear a word. 

You felt so weak as you walked. You thought you were going to collapse before you could make it to the van. But with Coriolanus’s strong hold on you, you made it back. 

He climbs in first and reaches down to pull you up. He sits you on his knee instead of on the ground and you watch as the peacekeepers, old and new, return to the truck. 

You don’t even have it in you to feel embarrassed as eyes locked into you. 

No one said anything to Coriolanus on the way back. 

As soon as the truck opens back in the compound, you are the first to jump out. You hear Coriolanus footsteps as he followed you back to the apartment.

You immediately take a seat at the kitchen table and Coriolanus gets you a cup of water. You stare at it in front of you. 

“Edmund died today, as far as you are concerned.” 

Closing your eyes to the image of him, you nod your head. 

He could hear Coriolanus moving around the apartment but you couldn’t care what he was doing. 

When he slams something down in front of you, you open your eyes to see a piece of paper and a pen. 

“I want you to write to your brother and tell him about us.” 

You couldn’t. Your brother was hot headed, and powerless. He would cause only problems for himself trying to get back. 

“What would be the point? He is over in District 8.”

“My family are in the Capitol, yet they know about you.”

Shock strikes you knowing that his family knew of Coriolanus’s actions. 

“Write to him,” he pushes, “tell him that we are together. How you feel.” 

You pen a half-hearted letter about how you met a man. Coriolanus, you called him, Not Commander Snow. You tell him how you miss him, and that your mother is okay. That Coriolanus is ensuring that your basic needs are met. Don’t worry, you tell him, you’re perfectly safe.

Coriolanus reads it after you are done before folding it and placing it in his pocket. 

He slides another piece of paper over in front of you. 

“Now write to Tigris and my grandmother. Tigris suggested it would make you feel better, already knowing someone in the Capitol.”

You pick up the pen and write again, but your mind remains on the image of Edmund being used as target practice. You make yourself a promise that you would never meet his cousin or his grandmother. Their letters are as close as they will get before you could escape.

—------

Coriolanus amped up his work schedule even more. Eager to break free from his responsibilities and solve the mystery of Lucy Gray. 

You were left alone at night which was preferable to his company but you felt yourself going crazy with only your own company. 

You tried to keep a routine to fill the day. It was mostly taken up by cleaning tasks. 

After dinner you would wash and dry the dishes, wipe the countertops and table and sweep and mop the floor. Then you would retire to the living room with your sewing or polishing work until it was time for bed. 

There is a quiet tapping on the window disturbing you from securing the buttons on Coriolanus’s shirt. 

No fear ran through you wondering who it could be. They couldn’t get in to harm you anyway. So you peer out from the window. 

“Edmund” you gasp. 

His left eye was blackened, a large bruise formed around the bloodshot vessels. A purple bruise marked his cheek and there was a cut on his right eyebrow. 

“How did you get in?”

He hold a pair of wire cutters up to the window. 

“Are you okay? God I was so worried about you.”

“Ah,” Edmund smiles and replaces the wire cutters with a small knife from his pocket, “Takes more than that.” 

“What are you doing?” you hiss. If Coriolanus found him, there was no way Edmund would escape death a second time. 

“Getting you out of here.” 

“You can’t be here. He’ll be home soon.”

“I know. I’ve been here every night since i’ve been well enough.  I told you, you’re not alone.”

“The Peacekeepers-’’

“There’s a fifteen minute window where this section is blind.” The lock wiggles but resists being opened under pressure, “And he just entered the infantry to wish our poor peacekeepers a speedy recovery. We have time.” 

The door was determined to chew most of it up, however. 

“Edmund, what did he do to you?” his face was swollen from the bruising, and you could see large black and purple spots peeking out from under his shirt. 

“The day after he took you, he sent Peacekeepers to my home. They took me back to the compound and showed me some ‘hospitality’”. 

“Edmund,I am so sorry,” you begin to cry, “I never should have taken the oat bars to the jail.” 

You remembered the day at the market that set off the chain of events. 

You remember seeing the man, he stood out amongst the crowd. Dirty, torn clothes. An arm missing, no doubt from the district's mining work. There wasn’t much work for men outside of it. 

A sense of pity overwhelmed you, so when he swiped a loaf of bread off the table, you looked the other way. Unfortunately a watchful Peacekeeper did not. 

The man's plea echoed through your mind as he was taken away; “Please, I am so hungry.” 

It led you to making the oat bars not only for him, but for all the others punished for their hunger. 

You remembered a rumor that there was a hole at the west end of the jail for the Peacekeepers to sneak out from, and women of the night to sneak in. You were surprised to find out it was actually true. 

“This is not your fault, okay. I am going to get you outta here, and we’ll go to the mountains okay? Where it’s safe. Like planned.”

You nod your head. 

The door jingles as Edmund tries to force it open with his knife. It doesn’t bulge.

“Edmund, my mother, is she okay?”

“She’s okay. She’s already up the mountains.”

“How? She could barely walk?”

“I carried her.” 

The guilt came crashing down on you. Edmund had his own family to look after. They wouldn’t survive without him. 

“Edmund. Stop. I can get the key,” you weren’t sure if you actually could, “You need to go. Just tell me where you cut the hole.” 

He stops trying to wedge the door with the knife so you could hear him clearly. 

“There’s three big bins out by the back,” he points to the direction, “I cut a hole behind the middle one. It’ll take you to the south forest. I’ll wait there.” 

“No,” you interject, “No. Wait for me in the mountains.” 

He rolls his eyes and picks up his work of jamming his knife in the door. 

“You’ll never make it up the mountain by yourself.” 

“At home then! Just stay away from here.” 

The plea was for both you and him. 

“You can get the key and get out?” He asks in a serious tone, looking at you once more. 

“Yes.” you confirm. 

He sighs as he pockets his knife, “When?” 

The Commander kept his keys by the night stand. You think you could remember which one opened the door. 

“Soon.” 

“A week. I’ll give you a week before I come back with something stronger.” 

You nod your head in agreement.

“Thank you, Edmund.” 

“You’re my girl.” he remarks as it was an obvious motivation for his work. 

You shiver at his words. 

————

You don’t sleep well at night so you have taken to having naps while Coriolanus is at work. He is home more often now. He had got ahead of a considerable amount of work which meant nights were spent together. 

Most nights he would take you walking around the compound for fresh air after dinner. You tried to memorize the key he used to unlock the door but there were so many that all looked the same. You wondered how he even knew.

He is anxious now that he found out you were sleeping in the living room and has taken to chaining you together as you slept. He cuffed one of his wrists and one of yours, making sleep impossible as he basically slept on top of you now. 

It was only three days after Edmunds promise, that you woke from your nap with the sight of Coriolanus packing your clothes into a bag. 

“What are you doing?” you ask. 

Was he moving you to your own apartment? 

He drops the bag and comes over to sit next to you on the bed. 

“Hey,” he greets “You need to get up now. We are going to go away for the weekend.”

You sit up away from him, “Where are we going?”

Vacations were not a thing in District 12. 

“The Capitol?” you guessed. 

“No, not the Capitol.” 

You sigh in relief. Still he had not answered your question. 

“Where then?” 

He gets up from the bed and zips the bag up. 

“Do you not trust me?”

You get up from the bed to see he had laid a dress on the end of the bed for you. 

‘‘I just want to know where we are going.” 

“You took me to a special place, and now I want to take you somewhere, okay?”

Throwing the duffle bag filled with spare clothes for you and him, over his shoulder he exits the room. 

You change and his way out to the living room. There would be no point in fighting. You were going to find out where he was taking you at some point. 

The living room was empty, but the door swung wide. 

With the door being left open for you, you took the stairs down to where Coriolanus was loading the back of a patrolling truck. 

You saw a small cooler of food, one of the old pans, bedding and pillows, a small bag of toiletries and the clothes bag. He had packed in a hurry. The bags were thrown in without care. They were far apart from each other and more items than not were upside down.

“We’re not coming back?” you ask. 

“We’ll stay a night or two.” Or however long it takes to find Lucy Gray’s body.

He holds open the door and you follow his silent command to get in. You spot the rifle tucked between the seat and the console. It makes you rethink your decision of complacency. 

“My special place didn’t need a gun.”

He takes your arm and gently pushes you forward into the car, but you tug back against him. 

“It’s nothing. Just a precaution.” 

He gently pushes you again to move. 

“Get in.” he barks. 

“No.”

He takes a harsh grip this time on your arm and leads you back to the cage where Peacekeepers kept people who disturbed the peace.

He pushed you into the small space amongst the bags. 

It was big enough that you could sit with your back against the wall but it would only leave an inch of space between your head and the roof. The back was caged in so the rebels couldn’t reach the officers in front, and the length was long enough to fit three or four rebels at one time. Albeit a tad uncomfortably. 

You bang on the metal divide as he slams the door shut and begins to drive. 

“Coriolanus, you don’t have to do this. I could just go home.” 

He drives through the middle of the district to the out of bounds forest, where Peacekeepers were waiting armed and ready by the electric fence line. They buzz the parting gate open and seal it shut again once the car passes. 

Past the gate, it was just you and him. What would he want to take you to a secluded forest for. A million reasons run through your mind and they all end with you dead. 

“How are you doing back there?” he calls from the front. The car as it powers through the harsh conditions almost drowns him out. 

“Where are you taking me?” you demand to know, “What’s out past the boundary line that you set up?”

Was he hiding something out there? Was that the reason he set up the fence? Not to keep people contained but to hide something. 

“There’s a cabin I know of. There’s a lake too. I think you’ll like it.”

You watch from the front window, looking out for landmarks that could lead you back home. The dark clouds that roll fourth threaten to destroy anything you can remember. 

The path to the cabin is ingrained in his mind since he walked back a different man. He weaved through the gaps in the forest without looking at his father’s compass. 

“Did Lucy Gray like it?” 

He ignores your comment and you don’t speak again. 

—---

When you reach the cabin it is old and run down. Vines cover the walls of the house, patching up the rotten wood. 

Coriolanus seemed nervous to be there. His hand flexes as it reaches for you.

The door had been sealed shut with moisture and it took three hard shoulder charges from Coriolanus to get it open. He invites you in with a hand on your shoulder, shutting the door behind you before retaking your hand in his.

You could smell the dust as you stood in the small living room. The cabin was small and colorless. Mostly everything was made from wood. From the small kitchen table and chairs to the bed you could see in the adjacent room. The only thing that was metal was an old fire stove, and a few decorative pieces.  

Leaves had blown in from holes in the roof scattering the floor. The place looked like it hadn’t been touched in years. You would have thought the place was abandoned since its creation if there weren’t bags upon the floor. Despite its appearance, someone had been here before you and Coriolanus. 

He lets go of you to rush over to the bags. He unzips one and pulls out a colorful dress. The way he lets out a laughy breath sends shivers down your spine. 

“Lucy Gray’s?” you ask but you already know the answer. He had taken her here to kill her, maybe under the guise of running away together, and now he has taken you here to kill you. 

Coriolanus shrugs as if he doesn’t know and shoves the dress back in the bag. 

“Whoever it belongs to is long gone.” 

He continues to look through the bags for anything missing while you glance at the door. 

You think about making a run for it. Surely you would have a better chance in the forest then against him. You feel your feet slowly turning in the direction of the door when his speaking interrupts you. 

“I’ll take this junk outside.” he gathers the bags, slinging one over his shoulder and carrying the other two in his hands. 

You don’t speak as he comes over to you.

“Are you okay?” he asks, noticing your uptight demeanor. 

“Fine. You?” Was he being driven to a quiet rage with thoughts of Lucy Gray?

“Perfect.”

He places a quick kiss to your lips before carrying the bags outside. 

You look at the gun on the floor. If you ran now while he was busy outside it would give you a head start. Surely he would need to come back to get the gun before chasing you. He couldn’t do it with his bare hands. 

You could feel his hands around your throat and knew he could. 

You bolt through the door and down the old steps but run into him as he comes back up. 

He had only taken to throwing the old bags by the side of the house, planning to sink them alongside of the guns in the lake at a later point. 

“Whoa” he stops you with his hands, “Where are you going?”

“The bags. To get the bags out of the car.” 

He looks out to the forest as if he had heard something. 

“Get back inside. I’ll get them.” 

You watch him from the window bring the items in. He was cautious and kept glancing at the forest. 

You did not want to end up a ghost among the forest with Lucy Gray. You wanted to live. To go up to the mountains with Edmund and be shielded in his arms. 

As Coriolanus finished his second trip with the bags, he used an old chair still there and pinned it under the door handle to prevent it from opening. 

You promised yourself that you would make it to the mountains. Coriolanus would not kill you and bury your body next to Lucy Gray. 

You felt as if you were in the Hunger Games.

You were going to be the victor.

Coriolanus looked unbothered by these thoughts as he tried to light a fire in the old stove. 

He gets it going and as he puts his matches back in, he notices you still in a tense form. 

“It’s only for tonight. We’ll go home tomorrow afternoon.”

“Will we?” you spat. “Why are we here anyway?” 

‘To kill me. Say it, you coward’, you thought. 

“It’s quiet,’’ he suggests, “Some place quiet where we can be alone.”

“Is this where you took Lucy Gray?”

He slams a pan down on top of the hot surface. 

“I didn’t know Lucy Gray. I’ve told you.”  He opens a pack of sausages and throws them down without care before tossing the leftover garlic potatoes you cooked the night before in as well. 

“Did you bury her out here?” you push. 

He ignores you. Pushing around a sausage with the knife he used to cut open the packet. 

“Are you going to bury me out here?”

“I have never hurt you.”

“You starved me, hit me, nearly killed my mother. You call that not hurting me?” 

You felt your blood boiling. It was one thing to make your life a living hell, it was another to deny he did it. 

He drops the knife and turns to face you. 

“Have you starved under me? Has your mother?” he hits his chest with his next words, “You eat because of me. You sleep in a bed that I paid for. I provide for you. Me.” 

He stalks towards you causing you to stumble back. You hit a wall but feel a rusted piece of metal under your fingertips. You grab it from the desk but keep it low from his sight. 

“Everything has happened to you because you strayed, and you want me to apologize for it?”

“I want you to admit to what you did.” What you are about to do, so I don’t feel guilty. 

He grabs hold of the bar and pulls it from you. 

“I did not kill Lucy Gray,” he said earnestly. But he wished he had. 

He throws the rusted object across the room and it lands with a heavy clang. 

“And I am not going to kill you. You don’t think you’ve done enough already to get yourself hanged? I protected you from that. Not Edmund.”

Your breath hitches as you hear his name. 

The smell of burning and sounds of angry popping infiltrates the room. Coriolanus leaves you to deal with it. The sausages were charred on one side but raw on the other. After a quick flip, Coriolanus returned his attention to you. 

“Sit on the ground, by my boots.’’

You eye your weapon on the other side of the room but he was stronger, faster, you would never get it and wield it in time. Night time would be the best chance of escape. The cabin had no lock on it, and you were sure you could make it to the mountains from here. But first you had to get Coriolanus off his guard. He still carried his cuffs with him. Escape would be impossible if you were locked in place. 

So you sit on the ground and wrap yourself around his leg as he cooks. 

He liked the feeling of you anchoring him. It made him feel secure. 

He cooks in silence, tossing the items in the pan so they wouldn’t burn. Cutting a sausage in half, he could see it was done, but he had forgotten plates. 

Instead he takes the pan off the stove and carefully sits down across from you on the floor. The pan sizzles as it is placed between you on the floor. It didn’t matter if it burnt the wooden floor. The cabin was so run down, it hardly made a difference. Coriolanus pokes a potato with his knife and brings it up to you. 

He wouldn’t give you the knife after the pipe incident. You bite the hot potato off and Coriolanus had his turn. 

You could tell the rocky temper was still floating around in him. He had calmed but his face still spoke of his annoyance. His necklace overlaid his shirt, your ring called out to you. 

“Give me your dog tag.”

“What?” he responds. 

“If you’re not going to kill me, then let me wear your necklace. I’ll give it back at the compound, but if you do kill me, you’ll be forced to wear your guilt around your neck.”

You wanted your ring back before you left him forever. 

“I am not going to kill you.” he sighs, taking a bite of sausage. 

“Then give me the necklace.”

You hold your hand out for it, which Coriolanus eyes. 

Dropping the knife into the pan, he maneuvers the tag of his neck, bypassing your hand and dropping it over your head. 

You felt the ring scratch you as it landed. 

“Happy now? Will you stop acting crazy?”

You hold the pendants in your hand and nod in agreement

. 

The rest of the night was uneventful. He sets up lamps as it darkens and teaches you a card game. You lost every round, even the ones he tried to let you win. It was a strategy game and you didn’t have the head for it.

The game only lasted an hour before you were helping Coriolanus set up the bed. He had brought along air beds from the Capitol that inflated and deflated by a push of a button. He pushes them together and you made a bed out of the queen sized bedwear from the apartment. 

As he went to sleep with you wrapped safely in his arm, he thought about how he was going to get you to stay inside while he went searching the woods.

He couldn’t tell you what he was looking for or who he was looking for. Nor could he take you with him under the guise of a leisurely walk. If Lucy Gray was out there he didn’t want you anywhere near her. He knew there were four more other cabins in these woods. Just because she hadn’t come back for her mother’s dress, didn’t mean she wasn’t out there. If anything, if she was alive it would be the last place she went back to. She was smart, she would have known that Coriolanus would one day come back to find the mystery of Lucy Gray. She was probably trying to throw him off her scent. 

You wiggle, pulling the blanket higher over you and it brings his attention closer to home.

Maybe he could lock you in the back of the car while he searched. 

He decided he was going to do something nice for you after this. For putting you through it all. Get your measurements and commission Tigris for a new dress, perhaps. Or buy you a necklace of your own. 

 Maybe both. He had the money for it for the first time in his life. And he did owe you an apology and a thank you for being here with him tonight. 

He could see how scared you were thinking that your protector was turning against you. After yesterday, he perhaps should have waited a day or two before taking you away. He at least  should have been more gentle in the approach, so you didn’t think he would harm you for his anger towards Edmund. 

Coriolanus understood him in a way that saved him from being shot. He was just looking out for you, the same way Coriolanus would have. He and Edmund both wanted to take care of you but your heart only had place for one. And that spot rightfully, and wholly belonged to Coriolanus Snow. Edmund did his job of keeping you alive for Coriolanus and he was rewarded when the bullet went behind him and not into his skull. But now it was Coriolanus’s turn and both Edmund and you needed to learn that. 

Coriolanus mind slowed as you stilled beneath him. 

You will yourself to be still. You count your breaths out to mime sleeping. Coriolanus’s hold on your shoulder falls as he sleeps but you don’t make a move just yet. Half-scared that he would wake when you got up. 

It wasn’t until it started to pour rain that you decided to stop stalling and make a move. 

Carefully you rose, and the chains of his arms fell off you. The rain pelting down covered the sound of the air mattress as you moved off it. 

The rain, as it turns out, was a blessing and not a punishment. 

You had left your boots and dress next to you for easy access. Stripping yourself of your nightdress, you quickly change and tie up your boots. 

Coriolanus had taken to sleeping in his underpants, now that you weren’t in a position to indirectly persuade him to dress in his nightwear. He liked the feeling of skin to skin with you but you beg him to keep his t-shirt on. You hated the feeling of his skin pressed against yours. He obliged. 

Your boots squeak against the old floor boards as you walk across it to the door. Causing you to wince at every step, but you do manage to reach the door without waking him.

You try to gently tug the chair from under the door but it was jammed. Turning back to see him still sleeping, you tug a bit harder, but only the door knob jiggles. You cringe as he moves slightly on his back. You would have a harder time escaping the compound than here. There were no armed guards or sniffing dogs. Just you and him, and you had a head start. You had to pluck up the courage now. 

The chair scraps against the floor but you manage to get it free. 

There is a second where nothing moves or makes sound. You almost think you got away scot-free.

“What are you doing?” You hear his voice and turn to see him sitting up dazed. 

Your answer is the throwing open of the door and running out. You hear him jump up as you do. 

He yanks on his Commander’s pants and boots, leaving the laces untied. 

It was too late by the time he got out you were nowhere to be seen. 

He felt his heart jump from his chest. This couldn’t be happening.  It was just a bad dream that he would wake from. But the icy water pouring down on him told him that it was true. You had betrayed him like Lucy Gray. 

Lucy Gray. What if she was out in the woods where you ran? She was the victor of the hunger games, you were a lost lamb. You wouldn’t stand a chance against her. She would tear you to shreds if she thought she could get back at Coriolanus. 

He thinks about returning to the cabin and retrieving his gun but you were already too far out of reach. 

He yells out for you. 

The rain poured down soaking you to the bone, but covered your tracks as you ran. 

“Y/N!” he screams. You battle the rain as you ran through the forest. Pushing yourself to go faster. 

“Hey, it’s dangerous out here. Lets go back to the cabin. Talk about this.” 

His wild eyes scan the area for any sign of movement. The rain hindered his vision but he could hear the faint sound of branches snapping under your foot. 

“Do you honestly think you can run from me? That I won’t find you?” 

You don’t answer and he screams out some more

“Y/N! Come out now! This isn’t funny!” 

You stumble as your dress caught on a tree, it grazes your arm as you pull, leaving a nasty cut. 

He screams loudly out of frustration. The rain seemed to slow down to a trickle as he did, as if it was also scared.  

“You stupid, little girl” you can hear him as he walks, he was catching up. You couldn’t outrun him so you slowed your pace, focusing your efforts on hiding. 

“When I catch you…” he doesn’t finish his sentence. 

You press yourself against the tree. Your arm stung from the cut and your lungs burned from your efforts. 

“Hey, who do you think will reach your mother first?” he taunts. 

 You knew it wouldn’t be him. She was safe in the mountains and soon you would be too. 

“Y/N. That’s enough.” 

You slink to the next tree and focus on quieting your breathing. His footsteps got louder as he gained ground. 

“Y/N, I said that’s enough!”  He picks up a large tree branch and walks forward with it. 

“You’re going to get lost in the forest. There’s worse things than me out there.” 

He imagined you wandering, lost amongst the trees. Lucy Gray, savage and wild, following you. You wouldn’t see her as a threat when she introduced herself. You were too sweet. You would willingly follow her back to wherever she was hiding and by the time you sense the danger of her, it would be too late. 

He needed to find you. To make sure you were alright. That Lucy Gray hadn’t got her hands on the only pure thing in his life. 

“Look it’s not too late. We can just forget this happened. Go back to the compound.” he offers but you knew it wasn’t true. 

You hold your brother's ring in your hand and make an attempt to move forward. 

You made it to the next tree but hear Coriolanus stop walking. 

With the rain slowing, it was harder not to make a noise. 

A loud banging spooked you as he threw the wood against the tree you were hiding behind. You knew you should have stayed still, he was only testing, but your feet took off before your mind could command them not too. 

He felt better seeing you run off. You ran uninjured and with no one following you. 

He takes off after you, determined not to lose sight again.

Both of you run through the forest and rain. You felt as though he might eat you alive if he caught you, but he was faster. All too soon, you feel hands on your waist, pulling you down. You scream as you sink into the mud, trashing under his weight.

He sits on your thighs and keeps your hands pinned against the dirt floor. 

“What were you thinking?” He spat. You had never seen him look so upset. His face scrunched, eyebrows furrowed, his eyes looked down at you in a crazy panic. 

“How could you be so stupid?” 

You toss under him, screaming at him to release you. 

“Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?” 

You kick your feet in an attempt to buck him off, but he was too heavy. 

“Shut up,” he grabs your jaw and stills it in his direction, “You stupid, stubborn, fool of a girl. What was your plan? Huh? Wander around the forest and hope you make it back to District 12?”

You don’t answer and he tightens his hold. 

“It was foolish. What if something got you in the forest?’’

What if Lucy Gray got you in the forest. 

“Do you have any idea what that would have done to me?” 

“I don’t care,” you cry. 

“You don’t care?” he says, astonished.

He sits back off you and pulls you up by your arms. 

“When you were hungry, I cared.” he pulled you along back to the cabin. 

“When you didn’t have money for rent, I cared.” You wriggle your arm, but his hold was too tight. 

“Clothes for the winter, medicine for your mother. I cared. And what do I get for it?”

You latch yourself onto a tree. It grounds you as he tries to tug you off it. 

“All I ever wanted from you was for you to care.” 

He yanks you off the tree and shoves you forward. 

“You would think after everything, I would be entitled to it.” 

“Coriolanus, please let go of me.” you buck against him. 

He tightens his hold, wrapping his arms around you and lifting you off the ground. 

He throws you across the floor as you reenter the cabin, going to get his cuffs from his bag. You scramble away from him as he gets closer but he stands over you, trapping your wrist in the cuff and hooking it around the leg of the oven and then trapping your wrists. 

He stood back over you.

“Look at you,” he spat, “You wouldn’t have lasted the night out there.” 

The cut on your arm bleed down, your hair was tangled with twigs and mud. You looked pitiful. 

“Let me go, Coriolanus. I won’t tell anyone.”

He lowers himself down to the ground, placing his knees either side of you. He places the weight of him on your legs. You hated the feeling, as now you were fully immobilized.

He speaks slowly and dangerously with your face in his hands. 

“If you ever try to leave me again, there will be nothing you could do that would save Edmund”.

Do you understand?” 

You nod, but it seemed to anger him. 

“I asked if you understood,” he yells. 

“Yes. Yes. I understand.” 

“How stupid could you be? So worried about me killing you, you decide to do it yourself.” 

“I wasn’t thinking,” you just wanted him to get off you. His weight was crushing. 

“I doubt you’ve ever thought something useful in your life. Use to everybody else doing it for you.” 

His hands tangle in your hair forcing you to keep still. 

“I’ll do your thinking for you from now on. Your next independent thought, I’ll smash from your skull, understand?” 

“Yes.” you cry. The night proved too much for you. The hope of getting away now crushed under his foot. 

Your chest heaves with sobs. The panic of being a sitting duck waiting to be killed courses through you, it was a choking sensation. 

He takes his wet form off of you and towards the door. 

The night was getting to him too. He felt as if history was repeating itself. Back in the forest with little control.  

He goes to the side of the house where the bags layed and stuffed them with as many heavy rocks as he could find. 

They were heavy as he picked them back up and takes the old boat out to the middle of the lake. The bags sink easily with the rocks, and join the guns at the bottom. His past was officially buried. He now only had the future to look forward to. A future with him as President of Panem, and you by his side. 

He rows the boat back to shore. The rain soaked him again and his shirt clung uncomfortably on his skin. It sticks the cold to his chest and his mind floats back to you inside. You were sure to catch a cold if he didn’t move fast. 

Entering the house, he could see he was correct from the way your body shivered. 

Wiping off the water from his face with his soaked shirt, he goes to his bag and pulls out a fresh shirt for himself. He could still hear you crying as he changed into dry shirt and underpants. 

He takes one of his long sleeve off-duty button ups and a towel he wanted to be used from swimming in the lake and brings them over to you. 

He had brought you a spare change of clothes but after tonight he felt like he needed the extra security and you needed a extra reminder. 

You flinch as he drops down on his knees. 

“I am going to uncuff you so you can change.” 

You sniffle and he takes it as confirmation to move. With your hands unlocked, you battle with Coriolanus over your clothes. He grasps the end of your dress, beginning to hike it up but you push down the fabric. 

“I can-” you manage. 

“I do the thinking for you, remember.” 

You don’t fight as he yanks the wet dress over you, throwing it behind him carelessly. He keeps his eyes as forward as he can as he slides the sleeves up your arms. Only looking down as he does up the buttons. It was oddly gentlemanly and you wonder if he did it for his sake or yours. 

“Stop,” you beg, as you feel his fingers hook over the elastic of your underwear. He doesn’t, going as far as to help you put on a fresh pair. He cuffs you once more to the oven before bringing one of the blankets and pillows back over. 

He lays the blanket over you without a word and props the pillow under your head before returning to makeshift bed. 

He lays on his side away from you, but you gather he doesn’t sleep, as an hour or so later he brings his pillow and blanket and curls up against your side. 

He gets his rest, but you are left in a state of shock that hinders your sleep. 

————-

Early the next morning you woke from the sound of Coriolanus stomping in the kitchen. He was eating beef jerky for breakfast. You wake with the sight of him leaning back against the wood counter, towards you. You try to sit up as much as you can while being tied down. 

Looking at the food, your stomach grumbles. 

“Hungry?” he asks. 

You nod in hope that mercy would be given to you. 

None was.

“Imagine how hungry you would be lost in the woods.”

“I would have made it back.” you contend. 

He strips off another piece as he answers, “You would be dead if I didn’t find you.” 

He throws the packet on the counter. It sits unbalanced on the side. 

“Are we going home?” You saw the bags were neatly packed in a pile and you thought calling the compound ‘home’ might earn you some beef jerky. 

“I have something I have to do. We’ll be back by this afternoon.” 

“What do you have to do?” 

“None of your business.” he snaps. 

The conversation ended as he walks over to the bags and picked up his gun that was resting against them. 

You watch him, dressed down in his white t-shirt and army pants, as he swings his rifle over his shoulder. 

“I’ll be back soon.” he comments, half way out the door. 

He walks through the forest at a slow pace. Careful not to miss the smallest bit of detail. 

Retracing the steps of that day, he makes it to where he was bitten by the snake. 

Time had overtaken the hunting ground. There was now grass where the earth once was.The branches and trees had healed from the damage done. 

He eyes the place where he attempted to shoot Lucy Gray and aims his gun like he did. 

He half-expected to see her in the space waiting for him, but it was just ground again. No clues were left for him to find.

There was no rotten smell overtaking his nose. No scrap of clothing left for him to find, or anything to indicate human life had been moving through the forest. 

He continues to walk through. 

The mockingjays squawk above him. If he was a better shot, he would have taken the time to kill at least some of them. But you would hear the gunfire and panic. 

With no sign of Lucy Gray, he continues his way up to the other cabins. He searches each one but they look untouched and run down. The heat of the sun beats down on him as he makes his way back. It was early afternoon by the time he had satisfied himself that Lucy Gray was nowhere in the woods. She could have made it back to District 12, but it was unlikely. He kept tabs on the Covey for months after he got back. He surely would have known if they were hiding her. She must have gone north like planned. He wondered if she made it, or if her body is now one with the earth. 

Either way, she was gone and Coriolanus could shake her from his memory. 

When he returned back to the cabin, you were busy yanking on your chains. 

He presses the point of the gun into your ankle, pinning it against the floor. You don’t try moving  under threat. He slides the gun slowly up your leg, over your calf, over your knee, inching up to the middle of your thigh under his shirt. You pulled against your chains, but don't verbally acknowledge you were scared. 

“Open your legs wider.” he demands. Instead you squeeze your thighs tighter together. 

He pushes the gun with more force against you. 

“I am in a very good mood. You would hate to ruin that wouldn’t you?” 

Deciding you would, you separate your legs. He nestles himself between you, pulling you closer by your thighs so your legs are past his hips. 

Thankfully the gun settles on the floor.

“I think we should talk about last night.” 

You shake your head no and he gives you a serious look. 

“Every time I give you an inch, you take a mile.” 

“I thought you were going to kill me.” 

“I have been nothing but patient and kind to you.”

You wanted to laugh at him but forced it down. It was not too late for you to end up dead in the forest. 

“I know, Coriolanus. And I am sorry. It’s just no one has ever cared for me like this before”. 

He laughs gently at you, “You’re trying at least.”

“It scared me. But if you give me another chance, I promise I won’t disappoint you.” 

He lays his body down on yours, keeping his weight off you by planking on his elbows. 

“You can have as many chances as it takes.” he promises, softly.

“Just one more.” you return in the same small voice. 

He kisses you as if you had earnestly promised to live up to his expectations. 

But really what you promised is that you would allow yourself one more chance of escape before he made good on his promise to kill your mother and Edmund. If you lead to their death, then you would follow them shortly after. 

---------------------------

NEXT CHAPTER

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[brucewaynehater101]

I come again w/ another Tim Drake au!!

So there's this fanfic "If We Could Only Utter the Words Left Unsaid" by TaintedCure on AO3

And now I wanna share an idea

TW for suicide because of Timothy + death-fueled-time-travel

Basically, whenever somebody kills Tim, they go back in time, and there's no limit to how many times he can die. they go back far enough to prevent his death or not do an attempt on his life

He dies during Titans Tower? Back in time you go Jason!

Cut his line and he broke his neck and died? Damian is now back in time!

Some goon cracked his skull too well? Say hello to the past bucko!

Hell, even accidental murders still register so if you were to accidentally push him off too high a ledge you're getting the Time Travel Treatment

Hey maybe Tim still is aware of his time travel powers, but only when it comes to natural causes (like hypothermia) or suicides, so as a result he thinks he knows it all when he in fact doesn't

So yeah, unless somebody spills, Tim is clueless to the whole truth of his powers

I imagine only old age would do him in at this rate

It'd be like real interesting to see all the POVs, especially if they think they know all the loops

Like there's Tim who's regularly exploited his powers to get perfect results but is trying to convince himself he isn't being too frivolous with his life since he's saving lives or making them better

Then there's the people who did him in and may or may not even be aware that the time travel they experiences was because they killed the Third Robin or got him killed

Then there's the people who've done him in maybe one, twice or multiple times and have clocked into the fact that murdering Tim is an exercise in futility

TW: suicide (powers revolving traveling time by dying), violence/abuse (skip the angst if you don't want the second one), and death.

Now, this is a very interesting concept, and I'm probably gonna get lost in the setup for a bit.

The way that Tim's powers work would have to be defined really well. How far back can he go? In the fic you mentioned, he has a save point, basically. He can die an infinite amount of times, but he'll only return to his save point unless he reaches past the OG time he died. He can play around as much as he wants between the savepoint and his death, but a new savepoint gets set up after he passes his OG death time. It also indicated a decrease in time he went back (or his savepoint was established) so that he'll eventually die for good if he kept using his powers. That solves a lot of continuity issues.

However, the setup for Tim's powers could be like SSS-Class Suicide Hunter. For those who aren't familiar, the MC revives 24 hours in the past. He ends up killing himself thousands of times to end up at least a decade in the past. It's been a while since I've read it, but that's the basics of it.

If we're working off of those rules, anyone who kills Tim is only working with 24 hours in the past. You can add more or less time to fit your AU better.

I have some questions about the setup. You mentioned that the person who kills Tim would get sent back without his knowledge. Therefore, in Tim's mind, has he never been murdered? Or, is it a two for one ride into the past? Does the villain get sent back into the past, but Tim doesn't know the past has been changed? Or does Tim get sent back as well, but he doesn't know the villain is also sent back?

Imma get into the angst in a bit if Tim doesn't get sent back into the past when he gets murdered.

However, the issue with this is fucking with the timestream. If a goon kills Tim, ends up 24 hours in the past, and past Tim kills himself within those 24 hours, what the hell is the timeline? Does the goon still get sent back in time? Does Tim get sent back, and then, when the goon is supposed to, his consciousness gets sent back during that time? Does Tim killing himself wipe out the goon being able to travel back in time?

Continously, I assume if villains found out about the power, they would gun for Red Robin with prejudice because they know they'll get a cheat that way. They get a ticket to the past if they kill the bird. They get a redo.

Alright. Angst time!

~~

Bruce is the first one to find out about Tim's power. He's training with Tim when, as per usual, he takes it a bit too far. The man has a habit of not pulling his punches in a fucked up version of trying to push Tim away from being Robin. This time, when he punches Tim, the kid doesn't get up. It's a wonder he didn't hear the awful crack or notice Tim's neck wasn't quite right. Only not recieving an answer after berating Tim about not getting up causes Bruce to pause. He doesn't hear breathing.

Oh gods. He doesn't hear breathing. Is Tim dead? Did he kill Tim? Did he break his nec-

Bruce snaps to attention mid lecture to Robin. They are both in the cave (not on the training mats not on the mats not on the mats), and it seems the exact same as it was yesterday when he was yelling at Tim about proper batarang maintenance.

Tim, ever the observant Robin, leans forward as if to ask if Batman was okay. Bruce flinches back.

Tim's eyes widen in shock as he takes a step back. In the year or so he's worked with Bruce, he's never gotten that response to initating touch. Tim's eyes flicker down to his hand in recrimination and puzzlement.

Bruce takes a shaky breath in before dismissing Tim for the night. The child is hesitant to flee but follows the request.

Bruce doesn't know what happened and he's not sure he wants to find out.

This cues Bruce being kinder to Tim and less harsh. The detective figures out that Tim has a time traveling power upon death, but it appears as if Tim isn't aware of it (he doesn't know that Tim constantly kills himself for better results in field). Tim never finds out that Bruce's change in behavior to him was born of guilt. He never learns that his dad killed him.

~~

Next angst!

Two concepts with Jason.

One, Jason creates a fucked up timeloop with Titan's Tower where he kills Tim over and over again in fucked up ways until he satiates his desire for bloodlust. If Tim is still aware of the Tower incident, that's because Jason wanted him to be. Whether Jason becomes guilty about this timeloop he created or not could also be explored. There is a fic out there kind of similar to this concept (timeloop Titan's Tower, not the added element of Tim's powers).

Two, Bruce does end up killing Jason in the showdown with the Joker. He batarang slices Jason's neck, the building blows up, and Jason never emerges. There's a few ways to add on top of this angst. If Titan's Tower happened before this (and Tim was left beaten), that means Tim chose to kill himself to save Jason. Jason will never know. That, or Titan's Tower happens afterwards and Jason tortures Tim not knowing the teen saved him from a second death at the hands of his father (ironically Tim also doesn't know that he's been killed by Bruce).

~~

Last Angst!

Damian finds out about Tim's power and abuses it constantly. He's a kid that was raised to be an assassin and found someone he can kill that also gives him the benefit of getting away with anything. As long as the kill goes through, he's golden.

Eventually, Damian starts to slow down on this. He doesn't really want to see Drake choking on blood again.

He one day finds that he hasn't tried to kill Drake in months and he doesn't really want to try to.

Then he finds that list.

Then he cuts Drake's line.

Then he has to relive those 24 hours again knowing he killed someone he was starting to trust.

Bonus angst if Tim finds out, jokingly asks his family members how many times they have killed them, and finds out Dick is the only one who hasn't (Tim killed himself after the 16th birthday incident and he somewhat blames Alfred for that, though he'll never tell him).

[thenightling]

Dead boy Detectives review

I've watched all eight episodes of Dead Boy Detectives and it was a decent show. It's not something I may obsess over like The Sandman, or The Witcher, but it was decent.

Dead Boy Detectives is the story of Edwin Payne and Charles Rowland. Edwin was killed during a Satanic ritual in 1916. Charles died from hypothermia and internal bleeding after some bullies drove him into an ice-cold lake while throwing rocks at him.

(Note: That was not how Charles actually died in the source material. In the comics, Lucifer had quit and shut down Hell (the basis for the TV show Lucifer) so many evil souls returned to Earth, including the boys that sacrificed poor Edwin. They badly burnt Charles' back on a hot stove and Charles died from his injuries.)

The two ghosts decided to dedicate their afterlife solving mysteries to help other ghosts find peace. They are aided by psychic, Crystal Palace, who is haunted by her abusive ex-boyfriend who happens to be a demon.

Both Edwin Payne and Charles Rowland originated in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman: Season of Mists, The Sandman: Volume 4. Issue 25 of The Sandman comics, and within Act 2 of The Sandman audio drama.

The Dead Boy Detectives made their TV first appearance in Doom Patrol for HBO Max (now Max). During a shakeup at Max the show was moved over to Netflix as to better connect it with The Sandman since that is where they originated.

The show features different actors from the ones that played Charles and Edwin on Doom Patrol.

The Dead Boy Detectives is a decent show but ...it feels a bit like a CW teen drama. I had been told that some of the show's writers were originally writers for the CW... and it shows.

There are some deliberately surreal elements of the show that I think are a callback to their appearance in Doom Patrol.

I love the variety of supernatural entities in the show, including the appearance of two of Morpheus's siblings. Death and Despair. The things I don't like about the show can be considered CW tropes or cliches. The angsty romances and unrequited love. The ham-fisted abusive ex metaphor between Crystal and David The Demon.

And of course the most tedious of CW tropes, the end of the episode pining and angst while a sad pop song plays in the background.

If you look past the CW-ness of it, the show is enjoyable.

The only other things I can complain about is the "connecting thread" subplot of The Afterlife: Lost and Found feels like unnecessary filler. And I wish they would openly establish that Edwin, being an innocent, would NOT return to Hell if collected by Death now. I don't think that should be left hanging over his head. Especially since we're supposed to see Death as a kind entity. Also I think Charles says "Aces" a little too much. It's very distracting and makes me feel like the writers didn't know much late 80s English slang. It would be like if he was an American and they had him say "Radical" all the time. I get that it's kind of his catchphrase but it also got a bit annoying.

The parts I don't like are CW tropes and what I'd consider to be late 90s Vertigo edginess.

The thing I liked were plentiful though. The protagonists were and are likable. The ending is satisfying enough so that if there is only one season this was still good. I liked that it appears that one can ascend out of Hell after some self-reflection as is indicated by the boy Edwin confronted in Hell. The blue light was established to mean ascension, a good afterlife.

I also LOVE the opening credits theme music and animated sequence. It reminds me of the intro to Showtime's Creature Feature movies. (See the trailer for 2001's She Creature, not the 50s version. Watch the trailer at thirteen seconds in, on Youtube, and you'll see what I mean).

That's two Gothic themed shows from Netflix in the last two years with great opening credits sequences. The first being Wednesday. That one won Danny Elfman an Emmy.

It's funny, Wednesday and Dead Boy Detectives (which is a spin-off of The Sandman) have great opening credit intro sequences but The Sandman does not. Apparently Neil Gaiman was told people don't watch the opening credits anymore so The Sandman doesn't have them.

I feel we were cheated out of what could have been a great opening sequence for The Sandman.

Episodes 7 and 8 of Dead Boy Detectives were probably the best of the series. I liked it well enough that if Dead Boy Detectives gets renewed I'll happily watch season 2.

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

I believe Aang was right to end the war by sparing Ozai. But the only (imho) valid reason some people say he should have done it is because they wanted Aang to realize that pacifism is flawed.

I'm gonna disagree with you here, because a lot of the flaws fans talk about pacism and how ATLA in particular handles it as a concept are 99%:

1 - People being ignorant/racist and not knowing the difference between pacifist monks and "make love, not war" hippies.

2 - People being ignorant/racist and refusing to understand that there are different kinds of pacifism, even within the same cultures/people groups.

Aang is very clearly not the type of pacifist to go "You can NEVER react with ANY kind of violence towards someone else, even if it's to defend yourself/someone else" (which does exist, both IRL and in the show, just look at the owl spirit in "The Library").

We see him fight, and even be quite aggressive in said fights, in a lot of episodes. We also see he has no issues with invading the Fire Nation. More importantly, for the longest time the Avatar State was a result of him being pissed off enough at some kind of injustice that it makes him lose control, meaning he is very clearly affected by the horrors of war to the point of RAGE.

What makes him a pacifist is the way in which he doesn't WANT to lose control, doens't WANT go from aggressive to full on cruel, and, yes, wants to defeat his enemies, but not kill them.

And as I keep repeating, the show DOES make him question that last boundary he set for himself. He gets told by a past Avatar, who was also an air-nomad before anything, that, when there is such a large threat to everyone's life, including his own, he has to put aside his own spiritual needs and take a life - provided there isn't another option. But there was, so Aang took that, even after he decided that, yes, if there was no other way, he WOULD kill Ozai.

What people don't like is that Avatar, although questioning some types of pacifism, is far more interested in questioning the way people are WAY too eager to use violence to solve their issues, and, more importantly, expect someone else to get their hands bloody.

Fire Lord Sozin starts the war because he, according to himself at least, wants what's best for everyone and would like to share the Fire Nation's glory and great life with the other nations. He tries to do by invading foreign territories, killing his best friend, and commiting genocide. The fucker even has the dragons, an obvious Fire Nation symbol, to be hunted to extintion.

When Jet is angry at the Gaang for ruining his plan to free a village from the Fire Nation's control by blowing up a dam, Sokka asks "Who would be free? Everyone would be dead."

Zuko is banished because he spoke out against a Fire Nation higher-up's plan to use soldiers as fresh meat to bait the enemy into a more vulnerable position, thus assuring the nation's victory in that battle. He openly says "These men love and defend our nation, how can you betray them?"

When Zhao wants to kill the moon spirit, Iroh tries to stop him by pointing out that the Fire Nation needs the moon too (seriously, if it wasn't for Yue's sacrifice and Zhao's death, the Fire Nation would have had to create a word for "Big-ass wave that wrecks everything and kills people" like Japan did).

When Aang is deliberately trying to trigger the Avatar State because he doesn't want anyone else to die in the war, Katara, who had her life ruined by said war, is against it because while she opposes the Fire Nation, she cares about Aang and, in her own words, seeing him in so much pain and rage hurts her too. When Aang can't force himself to go nuclear, an Earth Kingdom ruler attacks Katara and makes both her and Aang, two very traumatized child soldiers, think he is going to kill her.

More importantly, when Ozai wants to burn down Earth Kingdom cities, he says "A new world will rise from the ashes, and I'll be supreme ruler of everything", to which Zuko concludes that, if they don't save the world before his dad takes over, there won't be a world to save.

And what does he say to Aang when he is about to kill him? "You're weak, just like your people. They didn't deserve to live in world, in my world."

Avatar does questions pacifism, and is critical of it on ocasion (again, watch "The Library"). But it's biggest theme is being critical of VIOLENCE, of resorting to it immediately without considering any other option and acting like it doesn't have long-lasting negative consequences, both to the person suffering it to the person inflicting it (see Azula's breakdown, Zuko's angry outburts only making him more miserable, Jeong Jeong growing to resent being a firebender, Zhao accidentally burning his own ships, etc)

The show is constantly highlighting that, yes, sacrifices need to be made for the greater good - but that CAN'T be normalized because it inevitably leads to a never-ending cicle of cruelty, as well as suffering to the one who has to do the dirty job (because lets not forget there's a big difference in how a soldier that is constantly in battle sees the war and how a king that just gives the orders but never goes into the actual combat sees the war).

The show embraces pacifism, despite knowing some versions of it are flawed, because the narratives themes are:

1 - EVERYONE is capable of great good and great evil

2 - No group has the right to impose it's own lifestyle onto others

3 - If everyone is either dead, mentally (and physically) scarred for life, or preparing to kill someone as revenge, then being killed by someone who wants to avenge that person, who will themselves be killed for revenge later, then the "greater good" you're sacrificing everything for doesn't actually exist because NO ONE will have a good life in a world that is stuck in the cicle of violence.

[writingwithcolor]

Avoiding the white savior of the kingdom

@ceo-of-angst asked:

Okay so I'm writing a fantasy series. There's two main kingdoms though there is a third but that one doesn't have to do anything with this ask. Both of them are likely as big as a continent each so there are different climates everywhere, therefore there's a lot of diversity even within one country. The issues mostly is between the two kingdoms nationality wise, as there's a war. The prince of one of the kingdoms kills his older brother to gain the throne. This is where the issue starts. They have a younger (half)sister who ends up leading a revolution bc of her brother's bad rule (famine, war, dictatorship and incantation or sentence to fight to the death in war to anyone who doesn't obbey the government etc), she's white, she's helped by my main cast who are all poc (one of them also from nobility) from the other kingdom and I don't want to accidently make it a white savior She's not my main character though if anything we only see into her pov bc of a difference between kingdoms in book 2. Most of the pov is on my main cast so I don't know how this could pay out.

Add diversity to the kingdom

There is a simple solution: don’t make one kingdom all-white or all-BIPOC. Add in diversity and mixed race. You seem to already be doing that, and it’s not an issue of race but rather tyranny. White saviorism is when only a white character can solve a problem for BIPOC and they’re seen as the hero. If it’s a team effort, where your protagonist is fallible but well-intentioned, you should be fine. -Jaya

Questions to ask yourself

This critique got levied at Tamora Pierce’s Trickster series, and it’s a pretty valid critique of the books—every time you have a white person as a figurehead of an otherwise-diverse movement, you’re going to start getting into why this white person, and why then?

It’s especially salient if you have the person come into an already-established rebellion movement. Is her involvement the thing that gets the privilege necessary to make the movement valid? What about her makes her the ideal top person in the organization?

Why is she white?

My first question is: why is she white? Is it related to colorism and classism? If yes, then why are you automatically making the leading group white if there’s so much diversity and so many other groups can trend extremely pale?

Why are the kingdoms so big?

My second question is: why are the kingdoms so big? It’s actually frighteningly hard to run a continent-sized country. If you’re attempting to make these single groups so big simply for ease of worldbuilding, and for diversity’s sake, know that a country does not have to be large to contain a multitude of groups. You are allowed to have political rivalry in a small area and still maintain diversity within it.

How much privilege is she willing to give up?

My third question is: how much privilege is she willing to give up? Is she trying to take the throne for herself, or is she trying to destroy all of the structures that gave her status in the first place? Because that question will determine how willing the PoC around her are going to be. Why would they support a ruler if they’ve been subjugated by that family, with no real promise she’s going to be any different once she gets in power?

On the flipside, why would she be willing to give up any of her privilege in the name of removing her brother from the throne, and what stops her from going off the deep end once she has the ability to control others?

It’s likely doable to make this situation read as less of a white saviour, but in order to do that you’ll likely need to wask yourself a lot of hard questions about your motives and the character arc you want to have with her.

People may see a white savior, regardless

And you’ll also have to ask yourself if you’ll be comfortable with never really being able to avoid some people calling this a white saviour plot. Even if you do “everything right” and follow every bit of advice you can, there’s always going to be some people who aren’t too thrilled that the person saving everyone is white.

So examine your motives, really nail down what you’re trying to show with this, and come to terms with not making everyone happy no matter what you do.

~Mod Lesya

[emo-gremlin]

SFW Mr. Puzzles x Reader!

PDA IS A MUST. He's always holding your hand, hugging you, tapping his screen against your forehead, arm around your waist (only after you've made it clear that he can do so)

Was never in a real relationship (platonic or romantic) until you. He definitely pulls stuff he saw in romcoms when you first got together. You admired his gestures, but you did eventually sit him down and explain not every romantic relationship is like the stuff on TV.

After you guys have that conversation, he tones it down a little, but he's still quoting the cheesiest lines and he will not be stopped

Tries to spend as much time with you as he can.

Have a dream of stardom? He's doing everything he can to help you get there. Prefer to stay in the shadows? He's fine with that too.

An absolute doting sweetheart.

Very nervous about touching you at the start, he knew enough from TV that consent is key in a relationship, and didn't want you uncomfortable. So once you clarified PDA to him, he never breaches those boundaries unless you say it's OK.

He still has his temper, but has not, and WILL NOT use his power OR raise a hand against you. He told you at the beginning if he ever does that to kill him, he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he did that. He usually holds himself up in his office. You can tell he's upset if his voice glitches and he reeks of cigarette smoke.

It takes a while before he opens up to you about his childhood, and what drove him to the 'Transformation' as he calls it. It's an extreme sign of trust that he tells you about it. He tries to remain a puzzle to his audience, you are the first to get the tools to solve it.

Watching anything with him has stages.

1st time watching something: Remains quiet unless you don't understand a plot point, or need help identifying an actor.

2nd time: Fun facts about production, the tricks they used to get certain shots, gets more in depth with the Lore and explains symbols if there is any.

3rd time: Starts pointing out errors, plot holes, starts talking about how HE would have done it if he had been on the crew.

He usually stays in these guidelines unless the movie is GODAWFUL or is TRYING to be so bad it's good.

Loves having your input on his scripts, costumes (you may end up being a living mannequin for him at times if he's having trouble), set design, etc.

Will list you in the credits, but if you prefer a nickname to be used, he will use that instead.

CUDDLEBUG. My boy didn't get much physical affection as a child, and it shows. He's also a big spoon.

Absolutely adores everything about you, and it shows when he talks about you. Smiling wide, very energetic, so in love with you that you wouldn't be able to keep it a secret.

Loves being able to just slow down and enjoy being with you. Even if he's working on a script at his desk, he loves hearing a soft giggle while you look at memes on your phone on the couch.

Wanna watch something but afraid that there's content in it that might trigger something? No problem! He has no issue listing off what it includes for you. (If you still have interest in the plot, but wouldn't be able to see the media, he'll spoil the plot so it saves you the trouble.)

Always up before you, and definitely a malewife when he isn't working. He tries his best to be there when you wake up before he goes to work. If he can't, he leaves a note and fresh made coffee/tea in the pot.

You have to pull him away from watching the negative reviews, otherwise he WILL obsess over them and work himself to death trying to make them happy.

He's ready to commit various warcrimes if anyone so much as looks at you funny if you asked him to. You're the first person to actually stand by him and he's not letting anyone hurt you.

Definitely will set up private dates on his more romantic sets for the two of you. He turns all the cameras away from the set, as a way to show that this is all for you and you alone.

Will bring you with him if he's filming something in an exotic place. He makes sure you two get enough time together to see the sights.

Has invited at least one of your favorite actors/directors/writers to a birthday party. If you ask him not to, he will be a little disappointed, but respects it. (As long as he can AT LEAST get you their autograph)

Gets invited to an award show? You are going with him, but will try to convince the cameras not to point in your direction if you feel uncomfortable. He wants to share his success with you.

While he can't get props from your favorite movies, if you show interest in a particular prop from his sets, the second filming is done, it's yours. Same with costumes.

I love him your honor

[furiousgoldfish]

Being raised in the abuse means the dynamics in the home changed for your rapidly. One moment everything could be okay, you could be just tending to your own business, playing or doing homework or even hanging out and cracking jokes, and then within that same day, without you doing anything to cause it, there can be screaming, death threats, you running for safety in your room, trying to argue back but being shut down, obscenities being thrown into your face, you blamed for the entire thing. Or, you could be outside with your family enjoying a field trip and everything is fine and everyone's in a good mood, and then later in the car every adult is screaming, throwing blame, exploding with rage and bitterness and you quiet down hyper aware that all of this can be turned against you in a second.

After a while you can predict when things are likely going to go bad, but you can't control it. It's never you who decides to start the drama, you're always doing your best to make it safe and calm again, to get to that place where maybe someone was talking to you in a normal tone of voice or said something funny that made you laugh. You need that reality to be true, you need that normal. You do everything in your power to keep it consistent, but it seems that any minor inconvenience, any kind of event, any little irritation and frustration that comes from the outside, can throw the entire family experience into chaos, hatred, threats and violence.

This inconsistency and instability is what causes constant vigilance and anxiety. You cannot count on anything. You cannot know whether the parent you need something from, will react calmly and give it to you without an issue, or whether they'll turn on you and ask you what about what they need, why you never ask about their needs, and what a filthy selfish disgusting brat you are, leaving you alone with a problem you're not able to solve. You don't know whether you're allowed to speak your mind or say what you think, because sometimes it's allowed, and sometimes it's taken as a provocation and 'talking back' and you could be punished for it. The rules and goalposts change constantly, you don't know what behaviour is allowed or okay, never know what is expected from you, only that whatever you're doing can be proclaimed as wrong and punishable.

Your parents moods and whims dictate the atmosphere, and what kind of parent you get that day. You need a parent who cares about your moods too. Your need for consistency, reliability, safety, predictability, logical consequences and clarity, is completely ignored in favour of two adults throwing tantrums every other day of the week. Your childhood and raising you are so insignificant, they don't even care about your experience of it, or how hard you're trying to keep an illusion of 'normal', so that you would keep being able to survive in a home like that. Having parents that can change moods rapidly, explode, go from rage to good humor in a second and then turn back just as quick, is traumatic for a child who needs a consistent, kind, attentive and patient parent. That child deserves a parent too. Not this. Even adults wouldn't be able to consistently deal with bullshit abused kids go trough every day.