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goodlucktai · 3 years

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out past the shallow breakers

the untamed pairing: jiang cheng & wei ying, jiang cheng & lan sizhui word count: 3148 read on ao3

“He died!”

The words ring loud, sharp—in the pavilion where they’re taking their evening meal, surrounded on all sides by untroubled water, the words seem to carry for miles.

It’s unlike Lan Sizhui to raise his voice at all, much less to raise it toward a senior. His hands, resting politely on his knees under the table, have curled into fists.

“Everyone goes on and on as though baba has so much to atone for,” Lan Sizhui says, each word lurching from his throat like a line of fierce corpses shambling through brush. “What more is there for him to give? What more do you want? He died.”

Jin Ling is staring at his friend as though he’s never seen him fully before. On Lan Sizhui’s other side, Wei Wuxian’s expression is shifting rapidly from alarm to comprehension. His gray eyes are full of a painful understanding.

“Sizhui ah,” Wei Wuxian says, touching the boy’s shoulder. “Come take a walk with me.”

Jerking his head in a nod, Lan Sizhui pushes to his feet and then pauses there. His Gusu Lan whites, those extra lines and layers that denote him a member of the main family, ghost elegantly around him when he lowers himself in a bow that is every inch deep that it needs to be and not one inch deeper.

“Sect Leader Jiang, this disciple apologizes,” he says. The cheerful ‘shushu’ of earlier that morning might as well be a memory of another life. “My behavior was unworthy.”

He doesn’t grit it out, the way Jin Ling would probably have had to. It doesn’t even seem to cost him any pride.

For one, single, impossible moment, it’s as though Jiang Yanli is standing there, making her apologies to their mother for her brothers’ sake, to spare them any pain she could. It didn’t matter that the blame wasn’t hers. It didn’t cost her any pride, either.

But Jiang Yanli didn’t have a chance to be a part of her nephew’s life, as much as she would have wanted to be. This likeness isn’t hers, not truly. Wei Wuxian was always more like his sister than he or Jiang Cheng were ready to admit.

“Forget it,” Jiang Cheng says. His voice is hoarse, but in the stillness of the water and the silence of the pavilion, it carries, too. “Go on.”

Wei Wuxian shepherds his son from the table. He glances back at Jiang Cheng once, a grimace of apology on his face, but then Lan Sizhui’s hand finds the trailing black hem of Wei Wuxian’s sleeve and clutches to it, and that steals all of Wei Wuxian’s attention as easily as a slap or a shout might have.

The moment they’re gone, Jin Ling lets out a breath he must have been holding, and rounds on his other uncle with wide eyes.

“What did you say?” Jin Ling blurts. “I wasn’t really paying attention, but it didn’t sound like—I mean, it sounded normal.”

Jiang Cheng is still staring at the place Lan Sizhui had stood.

The last living remnant of a persecuted clan, so much an amalgamation of his two fathers that it didn’t make sense that one of them had been dead for most of his young life—holding a grudge and bowing his head at the same time. Lan Wangji, in Jiang Cheng’s experience, has never once let something go that he could nurse icy resentment for instead. Wei Wuxian has always choked down hurt like it was second nature, no matter that it must feel like swallowing nails every time.

It was a normal conversation, but perhaps that’s exactly why Lan Sizhui couldn’t bear another second of it.

“He died,” Lan Sizhui had said, as raw as a fresh wound, or one that kept getting torn open again before it could heal. “What more do you want?”

“Ah, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian says the next morning, meeting him in the courtyard. “Did you sleep well?”

He’s smiling with a certain nervous energy that Jiang Cheng can only pick out because he spent the formative years of his life raising and being raised by his siblings. To an outsider, there probably wouldn’t be a single visible chink in that cheerful armor.

Jiang Cheng, for all his failings, isn’t an outsider. Not quite. The door between them is closed—has been closed for years, almost decades��but Wei Wuxian isn’t the one who closed it. There almost certainly isn’t a lock or talisman keeping Jiang Cheng from forcing it open again.

It won’t come open again easily. There is so much stacked in the way. Hurt and betrayal and grief throw their weight into keeping it shut, weighing it down on either side.

But—

“What more do you want?” Lan Sizhui had asked.

“Fine,” Jiang Cheng forces out. Wei Wuxian blinks, as if he didn’t expect a forthright answer, or any answer at all. Something about his open surprise at the barest scrap of civility makes Jiang Cheng add, “If you’re awake this early, you didn’t sleep at all.”

His brother takes the opening for what it is, and bends into character. “Oh! You know me so well!”

Mo Xuanyu’s body is smaller, slighter, than the body that Wei Wuxian was born into, and his face is not quite the same, but Wei Wuxian’s mannerisms shine through so clearly that it’s easy to look past everything else. Even the way he stands still is entirely his own, his whole body vibrating with the necessary focus it takes to keep from bursting into movement again.

He is so familiar. The most familiar thing in Jiang Cheng’s entire, almost-empty life.

“I’m sorry about last night,” Wei Wuxian says. The words spill from his mouth like river pebbles, scattering around their feet. There’s that echo of their jiejie again, smiling around I’m sorry. “Don’t hold it against him, please. He’s so young, and he’s struggling to make sense of some things. He was happy that you invited him to Lotus Pier.”

The past-tense makes Jiang Cheng want to flinch, but he doesn’t. He just stands there in the peach pink morning and absorbs the beginning of a goodbye.

“So you’re leaving, then?” he mutters.

“I think we’ve definitely worn out our welcome this time,” Wei Wuxian says, easily shouldering the blame for everyone else’s bad behavior. They might as well be twelve years old again, kneeling here in the courtyard under Madam Yu’s furious eyes. “But it’s alright! Wen Ning sent word that he’s waiting for us outside of Yunmeng and Sizhui is eager to see him. We’ll go find some trouble to get into before we head back home.”

He won’t say a word about this change of plans to his husband, but Lan Wangji will still find out—whether Lan Sizhui tells him, or Wen Ning, or he just picks up something from Wei Wuxian through osmosis—and the next cultivator conference will be excruciating. And if the Jiang clan gets anything out of it, it won’t be anything good. And Jiang Cheng will feel slighted and angry for months, until the next time Wei Wuxian swings by for a visit. And having his brother nearby will soothe an ache in the pit of Jiang Cheng’s chest that he’s able to ignore all the rest of the time. And then, inevitably, Wei Wuxian will look wistfully at the water, or linger for too long by the flowers their sister liked best, or bring some other manner of ghost to the dinner table, and Jiang Cheng will lash out because it’s the only way he knows how to handle hurt. And then Wei Wuxian will extract himself and go home to Cloud Recesses early, and Lan Wangji will rightly guess why. And it just never fucking ends, does it?

The grief he carries around with him—he’s not wrong to carry it. It’s his. He was hurt, time and again, by a person he used to count on not to hurt him. He’s two times an orphan; once when his parents died, and again when his siblings did. He had to rebuild his home from the ground up, by himself, with his own two hands. Everything he has is what he was able to dig out of the dirt and ashes.

It isn’t Wei Wuxian’s fault that Lotus Pier fell. It isn’t his fault that the Wens were persecuted, that they had nowhere else to turn for protection. And it isn’t—

This one hurts; this one comes away bleeding. Jiang Cheng forces himself through it anyway.

It isn’t Wei Wuxian’s fault that Yanli died.

She died for him, but he didn’t ask her to.

Jiang Cheng feels his brother’s golden core thrumming inside his chest, hyper-aware of it now in a way he rarely was before—how it feels the way the sun looks in the morning, warm and brilliant and spilling color across the dull gray of dawn.

He didn’t ask Wei Wuxian to cut himself open for Jiang Cheng’s sake. He can’t be blamed for his brother’s choices. And if that’s true (and it has to be true or Jiang Cheng will go insane) then Wei Wuxian can’t be blamed for their sister’s choice, either. Yanli died for Wei Wuxian because she loved him, and Wei Wuxian gave Jiang Cheng his golden core because he loved him, and Jiang Cheng never moved on and never let go because he loved them, too.

They weren’t raised to love softly or quietly. Love between the three of them was always fierce, like a wild animal baring its teeth. Clinging to each other in a world that wanted to rip them apart. Even Yanli, who smiled and spoke with such sweetness, went to war because her brothers were there.

“What more do you want?” Lan Sizhui had asked.

Jiang Cheng lifts his head. Wei Wuxian is already looking at him, poised, as ever, to leave the moment Jiang Cheng gives him any indication that he should, like a bird ready to fling itself into flight. His brother, dead for thirteen years and back again, and only sometimes-welcome in the place he used to call home. Only sometimes-wanted by the person who used to be his family.

In a world full of people missing people they’ll never see again, Wei Wuxian is a miracle that Jiang Cheng is entirely unworthy of.

He’s right to carry his grief, because it’s his. But he wouldn’t be wrong—it wouldn’t be a betrayal—if he chose to set it down.

“You find trouble as easy as breathing,” he says, speaking through his heart, where it’s lodged in his throat, “so that shouldn’t be too hard.”

“Maligned!” Wei Wuxian cries with an air of great sorrow. “Blatantly maligned, by my own flesh and blood!”

Jiang Cheng can’t say what he wants to say. He can’t find the words. There’s only so much of himself he can dig up and expose like raw nerves before the pain of it becomes overwhelming, and he reacts to the hurt the way he always does, and shoves Wei Wuxian away.

“Don’t forget to say goodbye to Jin Ling, or he’ll never forgive you,” Jiang Cheng settles for. “And I’ll be the one stuck hearing about it.”

“I would never forget my favorite nephew,” Wei Wuxian says easily.

“And if you fuck up, and get yourself into a stupid mess,” Jiang Cheng adds, before he loses his nerve, “don’t let me hear about it from someone else.”

For a moment, Wei Wuxian doesn’t seem to know what to say.

“What if it’s very stupid?” he finally asks, his voice at once both faint and painfully fond.

“What else is new?” Jiang Cheng snaps. “Just send for me, and I’ll come.”

Above them, the pink and orange of fresh dawn make way for vivid blue. As Jiang Cheng stands in his childhood home with his only brother, while the market comes to life outside the walls and the breeze sweeps the smell of lotus flowers and scallion pancakes through the courtyard, the years seem to fall away. For a brief, uninterrupted moment, they’re both back where they belong.

“Aiyah, shidi,” Wei Wuxian says. “Of course you will.”

The next time Jiang Cheng sees Lan Sizhui is at the cultivation conference in Gusu, two months later.

The boy smiles politely but greets him as ‘Sect Leader Jiang’ again, and next to him, Jiang Cheng can feel Jin Ling wince. Lan Sizhui’s counterpart, the wildly opinionated and deeply un-Lan-like Lan Jingyi is giving him a frank, up-and-down appraisal.

“I mean, I’ll give it to you,” he says baldly. “You’re brave. Like, if Hanguang-jun hated me as much as he hated you, I just wouldn’t show up. You couldn’t pay me to show up.”

“Jingyi,” Lan Sizhui says at length.

“No, I know. I’m just saying. Young Mistress,” he adds, sweeping into a deep, performative bow in front of Jin Ling, “if you’ll come with me, your presence is earnestly awaited by Young Master Ouyang in the library pavilion.”

“Shut up, Jingyi, I swear,” Jin Ling snaps, but he lets himself be herded away with only a single worried glance back at his uncle.

Lan Sizhui is gazing up at Jiang Cheng with a complicated expression. Even though the explosive anger of that disastrous dinner doesn’t seem likely to make a reappearance, there is still something troubled in his eyes.

“I wanted to apologize, shushu,” the boy says slowly. “Properly, that is. For the way I spoke to you last time.”

Ah. So the stiffness isn’t born of lingering irritation, but worry. These Lans, Jiang Cheng thinks, with significantly less venom than he’s used to thinking of the Lan sect with.

He has a well of patience for his nephews that has never run dry. Jin Ling has stretched it nearly to the limit, more than once, but it will take Lan Sizhui more than one emotional outburst to come even close. Given that they’ve only been family (for given value of the word) for a short while, it makes sense that Lan Sizhui wouldn’t know that.

“It wasn’t you that I was angry with, not really,” Lan Sizhui says, explaining when Jiang Cheng has already largely guessed. “I know that you care about baba in your own way, even if a-die doesn’t think so. But—there are—”

His young face folds in frustration, less remarkably than Jin Ling’s does when he’s having a snit, but just a creased forehead speaks volumes in this repressed sect.

“There are other people. Who say similar things. And they don’t mean it the way you mean it.”

Jiang Cheng knows that. He attended those meetings, too.

“And let me guess,” he says, “my idiot brother doesn’t want you speaking up for him.”

Lan Sizhui’s mouth twists. “He says that he did horrible things, and those people are well within their rights to feel about him however they want to feel about him. But—he did good, too. He protected my clan, even though he had to do it alone. I don’t remember very much,” he goes on, slightly quieter, “but I know that he made the Burial Mounds a warm and safe place for me. I know that I never felt scared or cold or hungry when I was there with him. And I don’t think most people could have done that.”

Jiang Cheng boxes up the involuntary pain that swells into place at the poking of this half-healed wound, and gives himself a moment to organize a reply. Talking to the mind-healer his chief physician recommended to him has helped a lot, not that he’ll give that smug witch the satisfaction of admitting it.

“Wei Wuxian hurt a lot of people, but so did everyone else,” he says when he’s certain he can say it without losing his composure. “We were at war. None of us are blameless. He was just the most convenient scapegoat. He still is.”

Lan Sizhui’s eyes are bright with vindication. He was born a Wen and raised a Lan, but there’s a streak of Jiang in there, too, Jiang Cheng thinks with pride. It’s that love that Jiang Cheng recognizes, the same kind of love that he and jiejie and Wei Wuxian had cultivated between them since they were children—the vicious, untamed kind of love that marches to war and claws its way up from hell and clings too hard to things it rightly should let go of.

“It isn’t fair,” Lan Sizhui says.

“No,” Jiang Cheng allows. “It isn’t.”

Wei Wuxian waves animatedly at Jiang Cheng from across the room, even though it makes Lan Qiren scowl at him. It’s reminiscent of every single stuffy banquet they had to sit through as kids, making faces at one another when Madam Yu’s eyes were turned away.

Jiang Cheng rolls his eyes in return, and Wei Wuxian lights up like he’s been handed a pile of gold. Lan Wangji gazes at him with a tenderness that would be absolutely absurd if Wei Wuxian didn’t actually deserve every scant inch of it that got sent his way, and even though the entire cultivation world is waiting, he spares a moment to tuck a stray piece of hair behind Wei Wuxian’s ear.

Sect Leader Yao scoffs, a bit too loudly. “Shameless upstart.”

Lan Wangji’s eyes turn so sharp so fast that it promises violence.

Before he can say anything that starts another war, Jiang Cheng turns fully around in his seat.

“Problem?” he asks shortly.

Baffled, Sect Leader Yao’s gaze skates around the room for a moment before landing back on Jiang Cheng.

“If you have something to say about my brother,” Jiang Cheng says, his voice a snarl, zidian sparking on his arm, “say it so that I can hear you.”

“Ah, this meeting is off to such a lively start,” Wei Wuxian says into the ominous stillness of the room. “Shidi, you’re so energetic, why don’t you kick things off?”

It would be the first time in his career that he’s the first to speak at a conference. Openly disbelieving, Jiang Cheng looks from his brother to Lan Wangji. Lan Wangji’s eyes are narrowed, but not as though he’s sizing Jiang Cheng up for a coffin, which is how he usually sizes him up. All he does is tip his head incrementally, conceding the floor to him.

Gods. It’s that simple.

“You are really not a difficult person, are you?” Jiang Cheng says aloud.

“No,” Lan Wangji agrees, this force of nature who turned the world upside down and challenged every single person in it, who would do so again and again and again, just to be able to sit there and hold Wei Wuxian’s hand.

And then, in the closest the two of them have ever come to an understanding, Lan Wangji adds, “Neither are you.”

#mo dao zu shi #the untamed #yunmeng shuangjie #jiang cheng #wei ying #lan sizhui #mdzs #wangxian #my writing #mdzs fic

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allsassnoclass · 4 years

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All I Really Want is You

Clearly showing on the screen is the beginning of an email from a jewelry store, the kind that specializes in engagement rings, with the subject line Order Confirmation. He can’t see the body of the email, but it’s enough.

Ashton bought an engagement ring. It might even be in the house right now. Michael is going to get proposed to at some point, possibly very soon.

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“I can’t find it,” Ashton says, his huff of frustration breaking the easy silence of the evening as he continues to scroll through his email. Michael glances at the phone from where he’s plastered to his side on the couch, watching letters blur together, none of which seem to spell “escape room.”

It was Luke’s idea to book one for all of them. Apparently being best friends and living in each other’s back pockets for nearly a decade is not enough “band bonding,” and the last time they all got together Luke complained that they always neglect each other when on breaks between touring and writing.

“You should third wheel the Mashton dates, like I do,” Calum had said. Luke had pulled a spectacularly sour face, then pouted when he saw that Michael had the same expression.

Michael thinks some space is healthy. He also thinks that getting all of them in the same room to fail at solving puzzles is going to be the most fun he’s had since they played their last show. As such, Ashton booked the room a few days ago and now apparently can’t find the order confirmation that they need for tomorrow.

“Let me try,” Michael says, taking the phone and navigating to the email search bar. He types in “confirm” and waits for the results to load. Once they do, he freezes. Next to him, Ashton stops breathing.

Clearly showing on the screen is the beginning of an email from a jewelry store, the kind that specializes in engagement rings, with the subject line Order Confirmation . He can’t see the body of the email, but it’s enough.

They’ve talked about marriage before, so this isn’t a new concept. They’ve been dancing around each other since they were teenagers, and it had always been part of the plan once they finally, officially got together, both of them too nervous about risking the band to take a chance on a relationship together they weren’t already 100% sure of. It’s been years since the subject was first mentioned, and Michael distantly knew this day would come. They’ve been working with management to come out separately, to mostly supportive reactions. They always said that marriage would happen when they felt like they could be open about it.

It’s very different to talk about in hypotheticals than to know that one of them has a ring somewhere.

Michael blinks himself out of his daze, steels himself, and keeps scrolling. He obviously wasn't meant to see the email, and they need to find the escape room confirmation before Michael loses himself thinking about this. Ashton breathes out next to him, arm tightening just barely around his shoulders.

“Found it,” Michael says, clicking on the proper email and flagging it so Ashton can find it again if he clicks away. He hands back the phone and picks his own up with the intent to get rid of some of his own notifications, but he can’t move beyond the homescreen before he’s staring at it blankly.

Ashton bought an engagement ring. It might even be in the house right now. Michael is going to get proposed to at some point, possibly very soon.

Ashton snorts next to him. Michael glances at him out of the corner of his eye, and then he’s giggling, growing into full-out laughter by increments. Ashton’s laugh has always been infectious, and Michael can’t help but join him. The entire situation is ridiculous enough that it’s verging on hysterical, and Michael’s laughter doesn’t die until Ashton has melted into the cushions. He can’t believe he’s in love with this man.

“Why are we laughing?” he asks.

“You know why,” Ashton says, and that almost sets them off again, because he does know. They both do.

“Is it… is it here?” Michael asks. Ashton smiles at him. If it was in his pocket and he whipped it out right now, Michael would say yes, but he knows that won’t happen. Ashton likes planning his romance.

“Yeah, it’s in the house,” he says. A shiver of anticipation zips up Michael’s spine.

“Is it hidden?” he asks.

“Obviously,” Ashton says. “Don’t go looking for it or I won’t give it to you.”

Michael pinches his thigh in retaliation, but Ashton just laughs and pulls him closer. Michael twists so he’s in his lap and tucks his nose against Ashton’s neck, even though he knows it tickles.

“Can we play hot or cold?” he asks. Ashton flinches a little at the puff of air, predictable in a way that makes Michael smile.

“Absolutely not. You’ll just have to be patient.”

Michael whines. Ashton laughs at him, because patience has never been his strong suit.

“This better be worth it,” he says.

“I hope so,” Ashton says. Michael cuddles closer, as if trying to get Ashton to absorb him through osmosis will show just how much he loves him.

“It will be. It could be made of tin foil and it’d be worth it.”

Ashton hums, carding his fingers through Michael’s hair while he checks the rest of his email and any other notifications left unopened on his phone. Michael dozes off, but when they move to the bedroom he spends too much time awake, imagining what the ring is going to feel like on his finger.

-/-

“So,” Calum says the next day, once they’ve escaped the room (surprisingly) and sent the others to order their food. “What’s got you so distracted today?”

Michael hums, squinting against the sun and watching a few cars go by. The cafe is a bit out of the way, but they have good sandwiches and good quiche and the patio is really nice. Ashton managed to find it within the first week of officially moving to LA, and they’ve been coming here ever since.

“Ashton told you, didn’t he,” Michael says, because Calum is barely containing a grin and looks far too smug for Michael’s taste.

“Have you found it yet?” he asks.

“He asked me not to look.”

“Usually that would just spur you on.”

Michael shakes his head.

“Not with this. It means too much to him.”

Michael glances through the window to the inside of the cafe, where Ashton is standing in line with Luke, locked in his own conversation and waiting for their orders to finish. As if he senses Michael’s eyes on him, he glances at him and smiles. It’s instinctual to smile back.

“I’m really happy for you,” Calum says.

“It hasn’t even happened yet,” Michael replies, going back to tracing the lines of their patio table with his finger.

“But it’s going to, and we all know you’re going to say yes. You two are made for each other. I’m glad that my best friends are happy. Besides, it’s a really nice ring.”

“You’ve seen it?” Michael asks, gaze snapping back to Calum. A lazy grin spreads across his face, and this is definitely intentional. He knows that now Michael is going to be thinking about this for the entire rest of the day. Michael is going to trip Luke on his way over here so Calum’s food goes flying.

“Luke and I went with him to pick it out.”

“What?” he squawks. “I’m the only one who hasn’t seen it? Cal, that’s not fair .”

“What’s not fair?” Ashton asks, setting down a plate in front of Michael. Calum snorts, but doesn’t say anything, so Michael sighs.

“All of you have seen the ring except me.”

“Oh, that. You’re still not allowed to have a sneak peak,” he says, then turns to Calum and Luke. “And neither of you are allowed to drop hints or encourage him to look for it.”

“I wasn’t going to,” Luke says. Calum just grins, so Michael kicks him under the table.

“Ow! Fine, I won’t, either.”

“Good,” Ashton says.

“So have you guys thought about a wedding date, or…” Luke asks.

“No wedding talk until we’re actually engaged,” Michael says. “Band rule, established right now.”

“Of course,” Luke says very seriously. “You still need to have the option to say no. I understand.”

“Hey,” Ashton says defensively. Michael puts a hand on his thigh under the table, in case he’s about to get insecure and actually think Luke isn’t joking.

“If Michael says no, I’ll marry you, Ash,” Calum says. “I’d be the better option, anyway.”

Michael really hopes Calum gets a huge bruise from the amount of times he’s kicked him under the table today.

“No one is marrying Ashton except me,” he says. “Now we’re switching conversation topics, and you guys are going to stop bringing up our impending engagement until it actually happens. Let’s talk about when Luke thought we had to pry the door open despite everyone telling us no brute force would be used.”

Luke huffs and sets off in a defense of every idiotic moment he had in the escape room, and Michael stabs his quiche and starts to eat. Ashton’s hand lands on the one still resting on his thigh, squeezing briefly before he goes back to his own meal. Michael smiles to himself and rolls around the word fiance and then the word husband in his mind a few times.

-/-

Michael manages to push thoughts of the ring to the back of his mind for about two weeks, but when Ashton steps in water because Moose knocked over her water dish and Michael goes to get him another pair of socks because he is a nice boyfriend, it comes rushing back into his mind.

Sock drawers are a very stereotypical place to hide an engagement ring. Surely, Ashton wouldn’t hide his there. Ashton is better than that. He wouldn’t put it somewhere Michael would think to look if he was actually snooping, right?

“Hey Ash?” he calls.

“Yeah?”

“The ring’s not in your sock drawer, right?”

“What?”

“I said--” he starts to shout, but then Ashton appears in the doorway. “I said, the ring’s not in your sock drawer, right?”

“No, it’s not,” Ashton says, smiling. “You’re not going to find it unless you’re deliberately looking and get lucky.”

“Good,” Michael says, and he’s surprised by how relieved he feels. He wants to get engaged, wants it even more now that he knows it’s so close to happening, but he doesn’t want to ruin whatever plan Ashton may or may not have. If that includes not seeing the ring yet, he’s going to do whatever he needs to in order to not see the ring yet.

“It’s cute that you’re worried about that,” Ashton says, stepping closer and sliding his hands around Michael’s waist. Michael’s own hands follow the lines of his arms up to the shoulders, tracing familiar muscles until he can properly play with the hairs at the back of Ashton’s neck.

“It’s cute that it’s something to worry about, in general. Cute that you bought a ring and have it somewhere,” he says.

“Not as cute as you,” Ashton says.

“Obviously. I’m the cutest,” Michael replies. Ashton smiles, then ducks forward and kisses him quickly.

“Can I have my socks now, please?”

“No,” Michael says, pressing closer. “I’m going to keep you here a little while longer.”

“Okay,” Ashton says, and meets him for another kiss easily.

-/-

Michael and Ashton try to have Date Nights every two weeks. They do a lot of things that could be considered dates all the time, but Date Nights are for special things that they plan in advance. Sometimes it’s as simple as a dinner out or going to a movie, and sometimes it’s an elaborate anniversary idea that involves a scavenger hunt around LA to places that hold significance to them, because Ashton knows Michael likes driving and they both like getting sentimental sometimes.

Ashton takes them to an arcade for this one, a reliable date that Michael always enjoys as if it’s his first time there. They go late, so the place is full of young adults hanging out, bowling, or renting karaoke rooms. Michael leads Ashton from game to game, offering advice on games they don’t know how to play and trash talk on the ones they do. They make fools of themselves on a dance game, and do spectacularly bad on a knockoff version of Guitar Hero, which Ashton wins. Michael loves every second of it, and he loves it more because Ashton is right there next to him, laughing and getting snacks and staring at Michael in that fond way that makes him feel like he’s melting from the inside out.

“This was a good one,” Michael says when they’re back in the car.

“That implies that I’ve ever taken you on a bad date,” Ashton says.

“The ridiculously long hike,” Michael reminds him.

“That wasn’t a bad date! You admitted that the view was worth it!”

“Maybe I just meant that getting to see your smile was worth it.”

“That’s too cheesy and I’m not allowing it.”

“Fine. The restaurant where we both got food poisoning.”

Ashton makes a face.

“I’ll give you that one.”

Michael tries to come up with another bad date example, but it doesn’t work. There have to have been some, because you don’t go on dates consistently with the same person for a few years and not have a few misses, but all the amazing ones and the fact that each of them is intentional time spent with Ashton tend to cloud his memory.

“Seriously, though,” Michael says after a few moments. “I had a really good time tonight.”

“The night’s not over yet,” Ashton says. Michael glances at him as much as he can while driving. He’s got a small smile on his face, looking out the window at the houses and other cars passing by.

“I thought we were going home?”

“We are,” Ashton says. “That doesn’t mean I don’t have something else planned for us.”

“Like what?”

Ashton mimes zipping his lips.

“Ashton,” he whines. Ashton laughs, but shakes his head.

“I’m not telling. You’ll find out in five minutes.”

“Is this just your way of saying you want to have sex tonight?”

“I wouldn’t be opposed, but I really do have something else planned for us first. Unless you need something to take the edge off?” Ashton asks, hand landing dangerously high on his thigh, big and warm through the fabric of Michael’s pants.

“No teasing while I’m driving,” he says, a rule they agreed upon because Michael is far too easily distracted when it comes to Ashton.

“I wasn’t going to do anything,” Ashton says, faux-innocent, but he shifts his hand to a more respectable place on Michael’s leg.

“Is it food?”

“I’m not telling.”

“Come on!”

“It’s five minutes, Mike. You can wait for five more minutes.”

Michael pouts, but Ashton is more stubborn about stuff like this and just lets his thumb rub a gentle pattern on Michael’s leg right up until they get to the driveway and exit the car.

“Hey, go in without me, okay? I need to check on something quick,” he says.

“You sure?”

“Yeah,” Ashton says. He leans forward and pecks him on the cheek, and Michael thinks his hand might be shaking slightly where it lands on his waist. “I shouldn’t be too long.”

Michael wants to press, but something in Ashton’s voice stops him. He looks at him, Ashton smiles back, jittery with something , and Michael says “okay” and enters the house alone.

The dogs greet him at the door, like they always do, and once they’re satisfied with a few ear rubs and cooed compliments he straightens up and freezes.

There’s string everywhere. A piece of red yarn stretches through the entrance, taped to one spot on the wall, hooked on the coat rack, and disappearing into the living room. Attached with a tiny clothespin is a piece of printer paper that reads MICHAEL! Start Here in Ashton’s handwriting. Michael flips it over, but there’s nothing else on it, only a few more papers and photographs clothespinned to the string beyond. Michael looks at the first one, a simple notecard.

October 2011, we met at a house party. I never told you, but I had to psych myself up to go over to you. Something about you felt important, and now I know why.

Michael swallows. He looks at the door behind him, as if Ashton might finish checking on whatever he was lying about and come join him, but it stays firmly shut. This is a journey Michael is supposed to go on alone, evidently.

The next notecard talks about their first Facebook conversation. Then there’s a picture, a printout of the one that was posted on the band social media on December 3 to announce Ashton as their new drummer. It’s got writing all over the back of it, spilling over to another notecard because Ashton never sees the need to be concise when he has something specific to say.

Ashton talks about the Annandale, the electricity on stage despite how much they sucked back then, and he talks about taking this first step together as a band and how Michael looks under stage lights, high on adrenaline and music.

Michael follows the string to a screenshot from their “Teenage Dirtbag” cover, then to other notecards and pictures and moments that are somehow significant to the story of them .

Ashton talks about the day he picked Michael up from school without the other two and they got ice cream, then stayed out late enough that they had to get dinner at a McDonalds, too. It wasn’t a date, but that night Michael couldn’t sleep, replaying every moment over and over in his mind and wondering what an actual date with Ashton would be like.

Ashton talks about recording their first EP, and he talks about their almost-kiss the first time they went to London. He talks about Michael dying his hair and about their late-night writing sessions that always turned into just the two of them talking about things they couldn’t say to anyone else. He talks about going on tour and how every fan vying for his attention could never keep it for long if Michael was there, too. He talks about meeting Alex Gaskarth together, and he talks about his jealousy at seeing Michael come back from dates with an easy smile on his face while Ashton stewed and tried to figure out how to tell him how he felt.

Michael reads every notecard and back of a photograph carefully, tracing over the inked-on words with his finger and whispering them to himself, just to get a feel of what they taste like in his mouth. The string stretches around the living room, winding through the kitchen and around to their makeshift studio in the basement, where Michael reads about their actual first date and first kiss in multiple notecards hung above the drum kit, one right after another. He smiles to himself, sitting down on the drum stool to remember all of the things Ashton doesn’t have first-hand experience in, like how Michael spent two hours freaking out to Calum and then Luke about it, and how his heart was beating so wildly he thought he would have a heart attack right until he saw Ashton waiting for him with a smile, when everything seemed to slow down and settle. In the end, the date itself felt as easy as breathing, jitters turning into excited thrills and anxiety melting into happiness.

He can recall that first goodnight kiss as if it were yesterday, despite how many they’ve shared since then. He remembers the warmth of Ashton’s breath on his cheek in the second before he closed the gap, how tenderly his hands cupped Michael’s jaw, how the moment seemed to simultaneously stretch on forever and end before it started.

More than anything, Michael remembers how the kiss felt more like a promise than any verbal agreement ever could.

Michael traces their relationship through the basement, back up the stairs and around the game room and their bedroom. Some of the notes make him giggle, a few make him blush, and one by their bedside table makes his mind turn to static for a few seconds. There has to be well over one hundred notes throughout the house, but Michael can’t even wonder when Ashton possibly had time to do this while he’s reading such an enthralling account of their journey.

He finally finds the other end of the string taped to the wall by their patio door.

The third to last note reads: A few weeks ago you were helping me find an email and found the order confirmation for your engagement ring first. I can’t begin to tell you what sorts of panicked thoughts raced through my mind, but all you did was continue your task, laugh with me, and promise not to look when I asked. It made me want to marry you even more than I already did, which I thought was impossible.

The second to last note reads: I took you to the arcade tonight because I love watching you light up when you play games and how intently you focus on me when you’re helping. I want to make you happy like that all the time.

The last note reads: In a few moments, once you come outside, I’m going to propose.

On autopilot, Michael opens the patio door and steps onto the deck.

Ashton is in the yard below, surrounded by strings of fairy lights. He scrambles to standing once he spots Michael making his way slowly down the stairs to him.

There’s a ring box clutched tightly in his hand. The ring box. Michael almost stops short at the sight of it, but his feet are on autopilot, always headed towards Ashton.

“You’re crying,” Ashton says. “I haven’t even said anything.”

Michael brings a hand to his face, and Ashton’s right. His cheeks are damp, and he hadn’t even noticed. He swipes at them, but it’s useless. He’s so overwhelmed by nostalgia and love and Ashton, and now there’s a ring box and he’s resigned himself to becoming a blubbering mess by the end of this.

“You said quite a lot already,” Michael says thickly. “Our home is covered in string and notecards.”

“And memories,” Ashton says. “And I want to make more with you. I want to keep making more until the day we die, and then maybe beyond that if there’s an afterlife. Michael you’re--”

He pauses. Swallows. Michael wonders how long it took him to look at all of the notes while Ashton was out here alone, working himself up over this.

“I can’t properly put into words how much you mean to me. I want to wake up next to you every morning and fall asleep next to you every night. I want to be with you during the good days and hold you through the bad nights. I want to hear every bad song you write and every good one and the mediocre ones in between. I want to cook for you and argue about who’s turn it is to do the laundry. I want to take care of you, and I want to let you take care of me. Michael, I can’t love anyone else the way that I love you, and I don’t think anyone else can love me like you can, either.”

He sinks down to one knee, so sincere in what he’s saying, and Michael is already nodding before the ring box is even open.

“I haven’t asked the question yet,” Ashton says fondly. “You have to let me ask the question.”

“Okay,” he laughs, the sound foggy with tears. “Ask me, then.”

“Michael Gordon Clifford, will you marry me?”

“Yes! Yes, of--”

He can’t say anything more because he’s bending down to kiss Ashton. It’s a little gross, because he’s crying and Ashton’s tearing up too and the angle is so bad, but it’s their first kiss as fiances , and that means everything. He pulls Ashton up and wraps his arms around his waist, tucking his face into his neck because he’s crying too hard to do anything else right now and needs a moment. Ashton’s arms circle him, supporting him and keeping him safe and secure, and Michael thinks he could live in this moment for eternity if he didn’t want to have a million more moments with Ashton in the future.

When Michael has caught his breath, he pulls back enough to look at Ashton and chuckles at the tear tracks he sees.

“We’re a mess,” he says, reaching up to swipe at them with his thumbs. “I can’t believe we’re engaged.”

“You haven’t even put on the ring yet,” he says, and Michael gasps.

“The ring! I get to finally see it! Can I--will you--”

“It’s right here,” Ashton says, holding up the box between them. Michael looks at the band inside, silver metal with a golden outline.

“It’s platinum and rose gold,” Ashton says. “It’s not quite a shiny diamond ring with your name on it, but if that’s a deal breaker I can get you another one.”

“It’s okay. You showed up with the plane ticket a long time ago, so I think I can forgive the different ring. Referencing the song fully would probably be too cheesy, even for us.”

“Yeah, probably,” Ashton says, taking Michael’s left hand gently and slipping the ring on. It fits perfectly, and Michael stares at it for a moment, testing the new weight that he’s going to wear forever.

“It’s so beautiful,” he whispers.

“Worth the patience?” Ashton asks. Michael gives him an exasperated look.

“You could have tossed me a ring pop while eating microwaved leftovers and it would have been worth the patience. You didn’t have to go all out, although I loved it, obviously. How did you even get that all set up?”

“We have some pretty good friends.”

“Of course we do,” Michael smiles. He’ll have to thank them later. “Still, all those notes you wrote... You really outdid yourself this time.”

“I wanted you to experience how you make me feel all the time,” Ashton shrugs.

“Overwhelmed?”

“Loved.”

Michael looks down at the ring again, a promise that he’d known was coming for weeks but that still somehow feels poignant displayed on his finger. Nothing’s really changed with their relationship, just their titles for each other, but Michael loves it, knew he would since the moment he saw that email that let him know this was coming. They keep so much of their relationship to themselves, confined to tender moments or small glances that no one else gets to see, but this is a sign for the world. There’s a ring on Michael’s finger, and it means that he’s loved by and loves someone enough to know he’s going to spend the rest of his life with him.

“Maybe I’ll get you the shiny diamond ring,” he says, looking back to Ashton’s face. “Just so you have something as a reminder, too.”

“I’d like that,” Ashton says. He takes Michael’s hand, and Michael squeezes.

“Come on,” he says. “I’m exhausted now. This is one of the best nights of my life and I need to lay down to process it.”

“I can start taking down the string,” Ashton says, stepping around the fairy lights and flipping the off switch on the power cord they’re plugged in to, plunging the yard further into darkness.

“Don’t you dare,” Michael says. “You’re coming to bed with me, and tomorrow we’re going to go through everything again together, with my commentary. I can’t believe you thought you could send me on that emotional journey alone.”

“I should have known better.” Ashton shakes his head, but Michael can still make out his grin in the dark.

“Yeah, you should have. That’s the type of thing you know about the person you’re going to marry.”

“My fiance ,” Ashton says, and the sound of it coming from his mouth sends electricity up and down Michael’s spine. “My husband-to-be.”

Michael makes a happy noise, pulling Ashton closer as they head inside to go through their nightly routine. When teeth have been brushed and all the lights turned off, Michael curls around Ashton in the dark, legs tangled and his left arm securely around his chest. Ashton covers his hand with his own, running a finger across the ring that Michael hasn’t taken off.

“My future husband,” he says sleepily, and Michael thinks the words have a nice ring to them.

#5sos fanfic #mashton #my writing #y'all ever love mashton? I love mashton so much #you know what else I love? thinking about people getting married #maybe I should be a wedding planner I think I'd be good at it #also my streak of writing fics from Michael's pov continues.......#someday I'll write a full fic for a Michael pairing and have the other person narrate

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madscientistjournal · 5 years

Text

Fiction: The Titan Through the Dust

An essay by Claire Gainsborough, as provided by Joachim Heijndermans Art by Leigh Legler

You’ve seen it. Everyone’s seen it. Kids know of it from their school books. It’s been on TV, in movies, and in every history book published in the years after the incident of Singapore City. Hell, even if you’ve never seen the actual shot, you’ll know it from the ripoffs and the parodies and the references by college kids trying to be artsy in their projects. Cultural osmosis, I think they call it. It’s a hell of a thing, to have your work be absorbed by the current zeitgeist and spat back out, like a cheesy meme passed around on Twitter, to the point that everyone around the world will instantly recognize your photo on sight, even if they have never heard your name.

And I gotta say, with the passage of time, I don’t know how I even feel about the shot anymore. For one thing, it’s been nearly twenty years since I aimed that camera, pressed my index finger down, and made a piece of history in a split second of time. So yeah, that part’s cool. But you’ll be hard pressed to find anyone familiar with any of my other work. Last year I had a book collection of my travel photography published in conjunction with Nat Geo. Sales were so-so. Biggest complaint? That shot wasn’t in it. That’s all that people want anymore. Kagemura, on the most devastating day of my life.

Is this what Eisenstaed felt like when he shot that photo of the VJ day in New York? I doubt it, because even if that kiss was forced and all that, it still had some sense of beauty to it. A joy was captured in that scene. My shot? It’s beautiful in its own terrifying way. But I just see the carnage. Carnage in blood, rubble, and dust. Absolute carnage.

This morning I got an offer to do the photography at a wedding. It’s a famous couple. You know them, I guarantee it, but I signed an NDA before I even met with them, so I can’t say much about it other than that the money is blasphemously great. Had I accumulated any, I could have paid back my college loan debts three times over. It’s insane. And do you know what they called me when they rang me up? Claire? Of course not. I was “that Kagemura lady.” They wanted that style for their reception. As in, that exact style. Happiest day of their life, but shot in a sepia tone and with the sun partially blocked. I said yes, obviously, as the KSF needs the cash more than I do. My best guess is they just didn’t realize people actually died when I took it.

I’m tired of talking about the shot in public, to be honest. Because that’s all that people discuss when the topic of my work comes up. The technique. The type of lens I used. The other dumb crap. And it’s so … what’s the word I’m looking for? Dull. Yeah, that’s it. It’s dull. It’s technical jargon and people standing around printouts of it with glasses of champagne in hand, each of them trying to find something new and profound to say about the photo. In the end, it’s just words. Words about a picture I took in the spur of the moment as I was half-suffocated by ash and grime.

Nobody ever asks what it was like, being there when it all came down. I think that’s why they’re all drawn to the photo. It’s a way to get close, but not too close to the actual awfulness of it all. The Disneyland version of it, where they can see the horrible monster without having to think about what it can do and what it did.

I want to talk about that day. What it was like. This is what happened on that day when I shot The Titan Through the Dust. My opus, I suppose.

Do people take gap years anymore? Or is that just a rich people thing these days? I swear, every time I talk to a student who either has never heard of a gap year, or worse, mentions they couldn’t afford it because they have student loans to pay back, it just reminds me again and again how I was born with a silver spoon up my ass. I love my mom and my dads, who really did their best to pool everything two orthodontists and a lawyer could scrape together to get their ditzy daughter through college pain-free, but boy howdy did they shield me from the realities of the world. Might be why it hit me as hard as it did when the earth literally opened up that day.

Anyway, I’m off topic. Back to the event.

I’d just graduated with my BA in programming and game design. Yeah, that’s right. Claire Gainsborough, the one whose book your mom has on the coffee table and who shot that photo you owned the poster of, wanted to make a career for herself in video game production. The art critics either tactfully neglect to mention that whenever they praise my photo work, or somehow bring up the supposed influence that “Banjo-Kazooie” on the N64 had on my choice of angle and lighting. I don’t know if any of that is true, as I only played it for about a week and a half during a retro-game bender in college, but whatever. To wrap it up, I graduated the course and had my fill of screens and code and engines after four years, so I chose to take a year to travel. I wanted to see the world and snap some pictures along the way to fill up a scrapbook or a blog or something. I never expected to go down in the history books as the next Joe Rosenthal, which only happened after my photo began circulating around the net and Nadaria, my agent, hooked me in and began to tour my shot, helping me realize I had a knack for a good photo. Lucky me, falling into a career like that.

I’ve often thought about going back into video games, make a simple platformer or an RPG with cute cartoon animals who save the world. But I just can’t seem to muster the drive to sit down and do it. I mean, making video games? After what I witnessed and lived through? It seems so quaint … no, childish even. How do I imagine the fantastical anymore? How can I create the illusion of power, when I’ve seen what real, actual raw ball-busting power looks like in the flesh? Now that I know what it feels like as it walks past you, too large to notice something as insignificant as me? What the air around it tastes like as it marches onward? How can anything compare? Well, I guess only Team Ico got close, and maybe those “God of War” guys, but still–

Wait, wasn’t I talking about gap years? Sorry. I got way off topic.

So, my gap year. The idea was that I’d backpack through Asia. Had a whole route planned out. I’d start in Jakarta and see all the Indonesian islands one by one (which I did in three weeks’ time). Then it would be on to Singapore, then Malacca, Kuala Lumpur, Krabi in Thailand, and so on up the peninsula and into the continent. My final stop would be in Wakkanai, the most northern spot on Hokkaido, Japan. It was going to be the experience of a lifetime. Just traveling, seeing the sights, taking selfies, and going out at night with whomever I met along the way. Food. Sun. Shots out of someone’s belly button. And maybe there’d be things that would go horribly wrong, and I would have had to wash dishes for a week to get my ticket out of there. Something I would vlog about and then do a book and the whole shebang. Then, twenty years down the line, they’d make a movie about it with someone who doesn’t look a thing like me, but is willing to look less pretty on screen for when the awards season rolls around. That’s where I was with my mind at the time. Just laughs, experiences and the idea of fame coming from my Asian trek.

I didn’t get that far, barely a quarter way of the journey. As you might guess, my third day in Singapore was the March the 23rd. The first Kagemura Ascendance. Day Zero.

What I did those first two days in Singapore is a haze for me now. I doubt anyone really remembers what they did on half their vacations down the line. But I’ll tell you this: everyone who was there can recall that day with near 100% accuracy. I guarantee it. What they had for lunch. Who they talked to. What clothes they put on that morning. All of it. Trust me on this one.

As for me? I was in the midst of an iced coffee and a croissant with an omelet and chives, which I’d told myself would be the only familiar food I’d eat that day (part of the whole “experience the local cuisine” thing I was going for). It was 10:32 AM on the dot, and breakfast was coming to a close in the dining area. I had my nose in my tablet … like, nose in the book, but I guess it doesn’t go in a tablet. Is there a phrase for that? Dang. I’m rambling. Sorry. I always ramble when that day comes up. It’s … it’s difficult to talk about this. But anyway, I was planning out my day, when my glass trembled. And when I say trembled, I mean it was flung right off my table.

That’s when it started.

It’s funny, but the camera I used that day? A hand me down. The most famous modern photographer, and I didn’t even go out and get my own equipment. It was one of my dad’s, my biological one, who had bought it for a summer trip he and my step-mom were going to take down to Tijuana. Then he won an even better one at a sweepstakes thing with the Shoprite around the block, so he gave me the Canon for my trip.

It’s never taken more than thirty photos, and twenty-eight of them are pics from the plane, the hotel, and the pool that was on the roof. The other two are from after the attack. The camera itself now sits on my mantle, still dirty and containing its original memory card. A conversation piece, really. I use better stuff for work.

I don’t know why I keep it. I’ve had to fish it out of the trash over six times, thrown out during my darker mood episodes that are common to people with survivor’s guilt (according to my therapist). Two other times, Carla, the lady who comes in every Tuesday to clean, pulled it out. She just put it back and never said a word about it. She looks out for me. Bless her heart. I should really be nicer to her. Like, to her face, instead of anonymously paying her daughter’s college tuition as I have been.

But yeah, the camera. It sometimes drives me batty. It sits there, reminding me of what I’d done. What I could have done. There are still days I desperately want to get rid of it. But then I would blind the last eye that saw them.

It was so sudden. There wasn’t any build up to it at all. A calm, serene morning the one moment, and then the earth broke open like a fresh baguette ripped in two. A horrible noise blasted past us, a sound wave of broken steel and ten billion nails against ten billion chalkboards, that threw us from our feet. Before anyone could react, the glass in all the windows shattered, broken by the pitch of the sound. That was the first roar, but I didn’t find that out until later.

I wasn’t hurt, but I could hear the people in the streets scream as the shards came down on them. While everyone else in the dining area ran for the nearest exit and the stairs, I leaped under my table, which might have been what saved me from what came after. Not a conscious choice. Just a habit I picked up from my time dealing with the L.A. quakes.

Now, for a while, I didn’t have a clue what was going on outside. There weren’t any tremors after the initial quake, but from the sounds, I knew it had to be bad. I just stayed where I was, in case someone came to get me. No one did. In fact, the first sign that things were weird was the sudden collective silence. There were some loud astonished gasps and some incoherent yelling, but it didn’t sound like anyone was in a panic.

Then came the second roar. And with that, hell was unleashed on the city.

There are reports of what happened in the initial strike as it emerged. I’ve read them all, but they don’t mean anything to me. Just a list of factoids and hypotheses about its tunneling ability and how long it laid dormant underneath Singapore, a sleeping giant upon which we just built a city. What I could gather from them was that, just by coming up from its resting place, it took out three of the adjacent buildings in an instant. After that, it stumbled about for a bit. While it wasn’t like it was immediately attacked, something must have set it off in a real bad way, because what it did next is what hit the building I was in.

But back to the massive tremor that knocked everything over. At the time, I thought it was an earthquake, which is why I leaped under the table. That theory went out the window the second a purple beam of pure heat ripped across the city skyline and shredded through buildings. The Summer Palms hotel I was in lost its top eight floors in one swoop. If anyone screamed, I didn’t hear it on account of my eardrums shattering (still have the tinnitus as a souvenir).

I think I may have hidden under that table for a good ten to fifteen minutes before I crawled out. Dust was already coming down like snow in December, but I could feel the rays of the sun hitting me. The roof was gone. Not broken. Not damaged. Gone. Rendered to dust.

As I look back now, I’m surprised as all hell that I didn’t panic. Somehow I kept myself level, waited for a couple of minutes after the heat blast took out the top floors, then just grabbed my backpack and ran for the exit, nearly tripping over people that just lay there in the path. Were they dead or unconscious? I haven’t the foggiest, as I was too busy trying not to get trampled by the others who made their way down. But I remember cursing myself for going out to breakfast in flip-flops that day, since they made my escape three times harder. I tripped and fell down a flight of stairs, bruising my knee and scraping my arms. It hurt, but I forgot about the pain when another beam blasted overhead. I saw its purple light ripping through a cloud of dust, but the sound from within was that of steel melting, foundation crumbling, and screams silenced in an instant. I didn’t think about it, or at least I tried not to. I just ran down the stairs with one thought on my mind: escape. Run like hell and try to make it out on the street. Maybe there would be somewhere I could hide. Find an ambulance or a cop I could hitch a ride with. Be anywhere but a demolished building that could topple down any moment.

Then the stairs collapsed right out from under me.

Hours had passed when I finally woke back up, though I didn’t find out about that until later. When I came to, there was nothing but darkness around me. Engulfed in panic, I shrieked and flailed my arms wildly in an attempt to break free, thinking I’d been trapped. Technically, I was, but it wasn’t rubble I was stuck under. Three men, two women, and a potted plant had tumbled on top of me and shielded me from the debris. There were other people, who all laid there as limp ragdolls, with not a single sign of life among them. I remember I started sobbing, even though no tears were coming out of my eyes. For a bit, I stumbled in the semi-darkness to try and find a way out by touch, which I did eventually. Bad news? It was blocked with rubble. No way out but either wait for help or dig. I seriously considered just waiting it out. Help would come soon, and I wasn’t in a bad place. Then the earth shook again. So I dug.

Like a frightened mole, I burrowed my way through the dirt with ferocious speed till my fingers bled. I credit my adrenaline for giving my 125 pound frame the strength I needed to get out of there, even as I hacked up my lungs in the process. It wasn’t until that first beam of light hit my face that my heart finally stopped trying to leap out from my chest.

Wasting no time for comfort, I dug out a hole large enough for me to fit through. I pushed my bag out and followed suit, writhing like a worm after a rainstorm. I stumbled and fell twice, scraping my knees again, but I’d done it. I’d made it outside on the street, although I still couldn’t breathe for shit, with the massive dust cloud seeping right into my nostrils and lungs. My eyes narrowed in an attempt to keep the dust out of them. None of it mattered. I was deaf, dumb, and blind, stumbling through a cloud of dirt. Every exhale was a cough. I could feel the blood in my lungs and tear ducts. I knew with absolute certainty I was going to die. But I still kept going.

It was then that I remembered the bottle of water in my backpack. I scrambled for it blindly, overjoyed to find it unbroken. With some sloppy haste, I pooled some of it into my hand and splashed it in my face. A reprieve. Water had never felt that good on my skin. And with that, I got my sight back.

Then I wished I hadn’t.

There’re these two paintings by Goya. They get brought up and compared a lot in the art books that have my photo in them. Pose and lighting and all that. I do see it. And yet (and I’m going to be completely honest here), I’d never seen them before I took that picture. But I see their point when the comparison is brought up again and again between The Colossus and my photo. Goya couldn’t have known what it would be like, to see a massive behemoth waltz across through mist and smoke. But he nearly got it. Out of all the paintings, he came the closest. Because he got the dust right.

The dust. That’s all I could see that day. The dust. After the first few buildings collapsed, the dust shot out over every inch of the city. It became a cloud. No, not a cloud. More of a ghost. A specter. A second monster, a mollusk of granite and ash and human remains that fell down on the city like a sheet of pain and tears. The bride of the beast, a herald to its approach and a silent mourner, standing vigil in the wake of its terrible walk. I remember the dust more than Kagemura itself. The creature was just a flash that passed by, shone its giant eyes down at the little people screaming for their lives below, then stomped off.

There’s a second Goya painting. Saturn devouring his Son. This giant titan, the most ghastly dude you can ever imagine, is ramming this little kid into his gaping maw, all on account of a prophecy that proclaimed his children would bring his downfall. He eats a child to preserve his own future.

Goddammit, Goya. Get the hell out of my head.

Dust. Nothing but a giant cloud of dust as far as the eye could see. I felt like I’d walked into a grey-brown fog, and the city that had been there a few hours earlier was now a “Silent Hill” level, but a lot hotter. With the towel from my backpack, I made a mask to cover my nose and face, while I blocked my eyes with my hands, peering through my fingers. For some reason, I also took out my camera, the Canon, and just held onto it. I’m not sure why. Maybe as my last testament? Was I that certain of my death?

Now, I had no idea what to do next. Where was I walking to? To safety. Where was that? I didn’t have a clue. There were faint sirens that came from every direction. Muffled screams beyond the dust clouds. And me in the middle of it all.

I picked a direction on pure instinct and just booked toward it. Me, missing one flip-flop and with half a bottle of water, a towel, and a camera, shuffled in the direction to what I’d assumed was away from the danger. My foot got cut up on the rocks and debris, but I managed by some miracle to avoid any glass shards. Here and there I’d see what I thought were bodies, but to keep myself from completely losing it, I tried to block them out.

Then I heard it again, even with my fuzzy hearing and blood-soaked ears. The sound that had announced its attack and shattered all the glass. The sound of hell. The roar. I turned around, trying to see where it was coming from, which seemed like from all directions at once. Destruction in surround sound. Each breath was a hurricane. The beat of its heart was an earthquake. While I couldn’t see it through all the dust and debris, I knew it was close. Hell, I didn’t even know what “it” was at the time. The sounds were just unexplained noises. I still thought it was some kind of a bomb at the time. That’s what I assumed the source of the heat was. I tried to rationalize it all. Terrorists. A war. Or an accident. Gas pipes. All these rational explanations for all that horror. Something to just make a little sense of it all.

And then I saw it. For real this time, as it stepped right over me. I couldn’t comprehend what I was looking at. But in that moment, like a reflex, I aimed the camera and pressed the button.

A few weeks ago, in an interview with Time for the tenth anniversary of the Singapore attack, I told them that I’d only seen Kagemura the one time, back when I snapped the picture. That’s actually not true, and I should apologize for my lie. I’d actually seen it twice. The second time was about seven years after Singapore, during the three-year hiatus when they couldn’t locate the creature anywhere, during my trip to Switzerland. Yeah, you’ve seen the story. You know where this is going.

I was in the midst of climbing to the top of a mountain whose name I can’t remember, because who cares what mountains are called anymore when actual titans now walked the earth? I climbed it because I hated skiing and I wanted to get away from the world and the aura of sorrow and fear it had wrapped itself in since the monster began to walk across the landscape. Stupid me.

I saw it in the early morning, lit up by the early sun’s rays as it breached the dew that descended from the Alps with its massive frame. It was actually more bizarre to see it there. A giant crab/dinosaur/eel that keeps going in and out of the Chinese sea wasn’t that out of place in that area, if you know what I mean. But in Switzerland, among the green hills glistening with dewdrops and the sturdy pine trees that formed a carpet of bark and needles, it was as if Heidi suddenly got a weird last chapter. It was more alien than ever out there. Especially since it didn’t do anything.

There was no fire that day. There were no screams. It wasn’t even loud. A complete one-eighty from that day in Singapore. It just lurched forward and slowly made its way past the hills and mountains, cloaked in the haze that was the mists of Switzerland. Wrapped in a cloak of morning dew and fog, rather than fire and dust, it looked beautiful this time around, as it rested itself against the mountainside. Had I brought my camera, I would have gotten my second Pulitzer. Yeah, I sound like a cocky bitch, but I’ve got the royalty checks and the big gold coin on my shelf next to my Pikachu change jug, so I’d like to think I have the cred to back that statement up.

Now, how do you react to something like that? I was on vacation in Switzerland for God’s sakes, with uncomfortable hiking boots and two walking sticks in hand. I expected it all to just be pine trees and purple cows from those chocolate wrappers. Nothing weird, and certainly not it. But there it was, among the Alps without a care in the world.

For years, I’d imagined how I would react if I ever ran into Kagemura again. I thought I’d scream insults. That’d I’d raise hell as jet fighters bombed the shit out of it. Or that I’d at least flip it off, should it happen to look my way. But no. I did nothing. I just watched it for a while as it stumbled slowly around, pushing clouds aside by merely exhaling. After about ten minutes or so, it moved out of sight into the fog. I could hear its steps, as the tremors became gentler and gentler. Just like that, it went away. Then I went back to the hotel, listened to the other guests freak out about the giant prints across the landscape, had my tea, got a book from the book-swap shelf, and called it a day. Stayed there until they evacuated us all.

I’ve never told anyone else that story. Lucky you.

It stopped for a moment, as a thunderous rumble emitted from its throat (think a lion growl, but a billion of them at once), then tilted its head back to let out a deafening roar. And me? I took aim, clicked, and took the photo that defined that day and the rest of my life.

Seeing it that first time, my mind went blank. The words “what” and “the fuck” and “is that?”. A giant lizard-like thing waltzed right over me. One wrong step, and I’d have been jelly on the pavement. But as soon as it passed me, I could barely make it out anymore through the dust. The only part I got a good look at was its long, almost chameleon-like tail, which ripped through the buildings like a whip as it twisted. All I could make out was its silhouette, partially illuminated by the purple glow from its eyes. I’m not going to lie: it was beautiful. For a moment, I completely forgot how terrible everything was. There was just me and it, a skinny girl in shorts with a camera, and a creature unlike any the world had ever seen. It stopped for a moment, as a thunderous rumble emitted from its throat (think a lion growl, but a billion of them at once), then tilted its head back to let out a deafening roar. And me? I took aim, clicked, and took the photo that defined that day and the rest of my life. Like I said before: a split-second that neither I nor anyone else will ever forget.

You know what question I get asked the most? Whether I took any other shots of Kagemura later. Do they seriously think I went and ran after it? Do I look like Jimmy Olsen? It was thirty stories high, and that was back before it was full grown! No way did I risk my life like that.

But there was a second picture I took on that “fateful” day (as they call it in the history books). It was right after Kagemura made its way through the main street, right through those four buildings. And it was the only one I took with the intent for people to see it. No one did. Or if they did, no one cared. Everyone was in such awe of the best picture taken in the history of humanity, they neglected the picture I took of humanity.

It was a girl. She must have been around fifteen or sixteen, though she looked decades older. Her skin had been turned a smeared dark grey, with soot and ash clinging to her body. Her mouth was agape, gasping for air as strands of spittle clung to her chin. Then, without warning, a deep, bone-chilling wail escaped her. I stood there, frozen and coated in the same grey goop that rained from the sky, unsure if I should approach her gently or just grab her and try to find shelter. It was then I noticed she held something in her arms. At first, I thought it was a doll. But what teenager carries around a doll, especially in a disaster zone.

When it clicked for me, I nearly puked on my feet. I stood there, dry heaving bile and what little I had in my stomach out on the street, while this young girl wept for the charred body in her arms. When I regained my composure, I … I just stood there. I watched the woman cry with wild abandon. I could have approached her. I could have helped her. Shared my water or taken her by the hand and tried to find help with her in tow. But what did I do?

I raised the camera and snapped a photo. The second I took that day. And no, I have no idea why I took it, instead of anything else I could have done. But it was something real. Something human in a sea of unknown horror. And I approached it like the tourist I was.

A part of me likes to think I was going to help her and the child in her arms. Or do anything. Anything! And maybe I would have, if Kagemura hadn’t turned around.

A squadron of jets dived toward it. Missiles flew. More fire. The creature roared, snarling at the little men in the little metal birds. Like flies, they nimbly dodged its claws as they unloaded volley after volley right into it, so for a moment, I thought they might actually hurt it. But another purple light dashed through the dust, ripping those jets to shreds. It was then I saw that those beams came from its mouth. Its mouth! Do you have any idea how insane that looked at the time?

I turned to the woman, holding the body. She must have been about my age. The girl in her arms couldn’t have been more than ten. She screamed as Kagemura turned around and made its return down the street. As in right toward us. I looked at her, my legs frozen in place. She reached out at me. Then the second step hit the earth, which nearly knocked me off my feet. That’s when I snapped to. That’s when I did what I did.

I wish I knew their names.

I don’t have any copies of Dust in my home out for display. I don’t want that to be the centerpiece around which I’ve build my life. All the stuff I have for that one, the books and posters and trophies and accolades, are packed into storage boxes up in the attic. The only thing of that day I have out are these two photos on my nightstand. A photo of a young woman, cradling her little sister’s body, while the shadow of a woman falls on them. The second is a selfie of me, with ash caked into my hair and a stream of tears leaking down my cheeks. I took it after I made it to a rescue center to let my mom know I was okay. I’m alone in it.

I survived on my own. I’d ran for what felt like hours, alone. I dodged boulders of cinderblock and concrete and rebar, alone. I was even showered with empty bullet shell casings from a helicopter strike, all alone.

I could’ve taken her by the hand. I could have stayed with her. But I didn’t. No, I ran. And I became famous and rich for a photo that the smallest drone can take way better nowadays (which they have, as you can see on the Kagemura Tracker Stream). Yeah, good call Claire. Awesome choice.

My shrink tells me not to blame myself. But did she ever see Kagemura in the flesh? No. All of my exes, who just couldn’t deal with the moods and the night terrors, told me I couldn’t have done anything to help her, which is clearly bullshit meant to make me feel better. My agent always sends me clips of Robin Williams in Good Will Hunting (“It’s not your fault”) whenever I send him drunken e-mails at three in the morning about how awful I am for surviving, which in all honesty make me feel so much worse.

No matter what I do. No matter how much money I give away or pump into the Kagemura Survivor Fund or places it’s stomped through I visit to drum up aid, her face never goes away. Who was that in her arms? Did she love that child? Was it hers? A sibling? Or just a kid she tried to save, because that’s the kind of person I imagine her to be.

And if you’ll excuse me, I can’t breathe right now.

There are nights, the ones where I can’t sleep, that I just stare at my phone at the KTS. I see its face in full hi-def. Cracked, green-purple skin. Mad, almost insane eyes that look like those of a crazed crocodile, with rows of teeth like an angler fish. I still can’t believe this is the same thing I saw in that dust cloud. There’s no beauty to it. Just rage and pain, lashing out at the world as it marches wherever the winds take it. I’d say I know what that’s like, minus the lashing out and the laser breath. Sometimes I envy that part.

I hate Kagemura. I absolutely hate it. It has become everything that my life revolves around, whether I let it or not. But it’s also the only one who was there in that street. Would it remember me? No, that’s insane. I dunno; I’m rambling. Sorry.

I want to like myself. I did at one point. But now it’s gone. And I tell myself the Titan on the other side of the dust is to blame. But no. It was the cowardly twenty-two-year old who ran. No one forced her. She did that.

Now, when Kagemura shows up on screen, all I see anymore is a reflection, staring right back at me.

Claire Gainsborough, B.A., is a graduate of the School of Greater Design in Pasadena, CA. During her gap year, she survived the Day Zero event of the first Kagemura Ascendance in Singapore. After her trials, she became the most renowned photographer of our modern age, among the highlights being her works “The Titan Through the Dust,” “The Royal Wedding of the Prince and his Husband,” and the “Tezuka in Blue” series.

She currently lives in Colorado and can be contacted through her agent in New York.

Joachim Heijndermans writes, draws, and paints nearly every waking hour. Originally from the Netherlands, he’s been all over the world, boring people by spouting random trivia. His work has been featured in a number of publications, such as Ahoy Comics, Asymmetry Fiction, Gathering Storm Magazine, Hinnom Magazine, and The Gallery of Curiosities, and he’s currently in the midst of completing his first children’s book. You can check out his other work at www.joachimheijndermans.com, or follow him on Twitter: @jheijndermans.

Leigh’s professional title is “illustrator,” but that’s just a nice word for “monster-maker,” in this case. More information about them can be found at http://leighlegler.carbonmade.com/.

Fiction: The Titan Through the Dust was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

#Claire Gainsborough #Cryptozoology #Joachim Heijndermans #Kaiju #Leigh Legler

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elodieunderglass · 7 years

Note

For the dashboard osmosis meme, this might be too obscure, but could you do BBC Merlin?

(This is an ask meme where I try to describe a franchise I’ve never seen based on “dashboard osmosis,” i.e. what I’ve learned of it from fandom.)

It’s not too obscure, my dash used to be really into BBC Merlin!

I’m a big Arthuriana fan nerd so I know who the characters are, or who they’re meant to be.

BBC Merlin is a television show about “what would happen if Merlin and Arthur were the same age, and Merlin kind of pined for Arthur in a one-sided and Extra Gay way, in a land where magic exists but is outlawed. Also all the weird incesty dark stuff is sanded over.”

The result is Merlin, as a skinny Welsh kid with enormous ears and a red bandana. A large dragon and his cranky professor are insistent that he be friends with Arthur, because they love jock/nerd friendships.

Arthur’s father, played by Anthony Stewart Head, is outraged about everything. He is also alive. This is okay because all of Arthuriana is fan fiction anyway. I assume his name is Uther, because that’s what Arthur’s father is named in canon, but he might be called Gaius.

I feel like there is definitely a “gaius,” but that might be because Gaius Baltar is a character, or because ASH also played a guy called Giles. I have seen 6 episodes of Buffy and 1 of Battlestar. So I would know. Maybe the Dragon is called Gaius. Anyway, Merlin shakes his fist at the sky a lot, shouting “GAIUS!” , and I don’t think he’s yelling at another franchise.

Magic is illegal. The penalty is probably death. But Merlin is magic. He gets around this by doing lots of magic, and - this is the strange part - nobody ever notices.

Guinevere, or Gwen, is played by the Most Beautiful Girl In the World, but I don’t know if she actually does anything related to the Great Tragic Romance Plot; I think she may just hang out in a smithy, vaguely banging pans together and being sensible. It’s smart of her to stay out of it.

Morgan appears to be a cousin, rather than a sister, and apart from looking fabulous in the distance, she does not appear to menace Arthur. She does magic too but is marginally capable of actually keeping it a secret. I don’t think a Mordred ever happens but I’m okay with that. If there is a Mordred he’s probably a kitten that Arthur found.

The other knights might be around, but I don’t think they do much except go “oooh!” And “aaaah!” In unison when something happens. This is definitely not a Round Table show, the subject of the show is the eponymous Merlin and his pining, so there don’t appear to be any questing beasts or mysterious maidens imprisoned in bowers, or random digressions into the state of the ruling family in Nubia, or strange backwater incest plots, or even Mads Mikkelsen in a fur coat for no reason. So that’s kind of refreshing, although I do think the ensemble nature of Arthuriana is part of its charm, much like how the world of Harry Potter is larger than the central character. I also think the “king who invents chivalry and unites England” plot doesn’t happen.This is Arthuriana Lite, a college-AU.

“Now elodie,” you may say, “there’s like 15 seasons of this show. where is the drama and conflict, if there are no weird quests or politics and no incest?”

Ahh, you see, this is a romantic comedy show. The drama and conflict comes from Merlin, who is Gay AF, trying to win his prospective boyfriend’s father over. Arthur is oblivious and does not know he’s being courted. Uther is outraged and constantly being attacked by falling chandeliers or strange demands from the peasantry, all of which put him in a worse mood. Merlin does magic to rescue or impress Uther, then remembers that magic is illegal, so he panics and pretends it was a sudden gust of wind or an invisible badger or ergot-induced hysteria. Uther eyes him suspiciously and still doesn’t like him. Merlin tries even more desperately for Uther’s approval, and then goes to Puzzlewood and cries on a dragon about it.

“Have you told Arthur that you value his friendship yet,” the dragon says.

“Why would I do that?” Merlin says.

Then he looks sad, in the rain, with his enormous ears.

Arthur is beautiful, but utterly oblivious.

#king arthur #arthuriana #dashboard osmosis

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scribbling-scribbles · 5 years

Text

Main Story Outline

Black and White (working title)

Part I- Will joins the Black court (White Court)

Who's Red

meeting

remember? Backstory (kinda)

what is the white court? What do you do?

This is abuse. I'm getting you out

I get you have a skewed perspective, but, really!

you don't need to be anyone's soldier

you sold your SOUL?!

Okay, how can we do this? It's time for research!

Introduce Glass Mask sub-plot

A powerful artifact and semi-sentient, produced as the universe’s counter to magic.

Will is intrigued, but ultimately decides the mask would be too dangerous to use.

At some point, Will dips into more magical sources, either on purpose or by accident, and one of the Black Lady’s servants comes to confront him.

A method! Let us execute it!

The Board and the Rites

Preparing

Finding. The damn. Contracts.

Start the Rites

Crap!

Attack! (Battle of the Board)(that's as far as they get before they are caught. The Board has some very powerful magical significance, though, and is usually where part of the contract-making process occurs)

Will sells his soul, and regains some memories.

Part II- Will and Red re-align and plan (Black Court)

Introduction to the court

Infinite apartment building, from a modification on the standard infinite forest. As far as human members are concerned, exits only lead to the Board, the Market, and various points in the human world. These exits are arrayed around the building, almost seeming at random, but there is a pattern somewhere. There is a time dilation, but not a large or consistent one. Like +/- 1 day.

The Black Lady, her rules and ruling

The court and the developers

It appears I need a new name.

Who are you guys? What are we doing

Time passes

Will/Tim befriends the developers and other members of the court

Angst and sweetness with Joe/ Volto

Any’s mech, a subplot

Movie night!

Damn, the Game’s sound kind of even more horrible than I thought.

The Basement, i.e. the torture chamber for Bad Courtiers (maybe run by Steve? Maybe Steve is constantly tortured? Steve is involved)

Tim does R&D

Let’s all go to the Market!

Continuation of the Glass Mask sub-plot

I have modified some cool magic based off of physics because gODDAMNIT, science works!

Tim is slightly obsessed with incorporating iron into anything possible. Iron salts are his new best friend.

Tim and Red (Rose) meet (again)

So I was hoping you would still remember me? No? Well s hit.

Timur should have expected it sooner.

I’m not a Black mage. I just wanted us to be clear on that. I am a developer, there is a difference, I'm not on the board.

I didn't give my whole name. This should give me a bit more leeway in my obedience. I still can't outright harm, but neglect and sedition is much easier than it would have been.

We're friends. I mean, I forgot, now you've forgotten... It's complicated.

We had a plan. Not a good one, but it existed.

No, really, they're evil, I swear

Tim becomes a piece.

Fuck.

After first game

Will and Taylor team up

We are looking for leads a bit deeper in Faerieland and oH SHOOT WE'VE BEEN ATTACKED, but Tim saves the day.

Emma shows up

The hell are you doing here?!/ Nerd?! // What the hell, you remember me?/ What the hell, you're real?

New recruits came all the time

Some more dialogue

"I sold it," Tim said

Some more dialogue

"What did you trade?"

Tim explains what he can/ is willing to.

Emma’s side of it

“I was pretty sure I remembered you, but there was no official documents proving you existed, so that messed me up for a while.”

“Then I decided ‘screw that’ and went to find you anyway.”

There was a sound like discordant wind chimes.

“What you thought I found you all by myself? Heck no, I got help.”

Team includes Stacy (phone friend), a couple other of

Emma’s friends, and Peter, Will’s friend who no longer remembers him.

No one has official connections to either Court except Emma.

(Huh) says Tim (A team sounds like a good idea. Maybe I should look into that)

“And they… believe you?” “Kinda? Some of them do at least. Peter thinks its a government cover up.”

"Well. Hmm. Can I bring my baby sister into this crazy plan?”

Debate

Some internal debate.

Some debate with Red.

Verdict: Hell No.

A nightmare

Part III- A better and more viable plan, i.e. let's do a revolution. (Gray Gang)

Guess who wants to get involved? That’s right, it’s Emma.

“No.” says Tim.

Spectrum

Who are they?

(Was Ash)- royal self-aligned (ineligible for throne) pansexual non binary (genderfluid) (Prince, but non binary, thanks.)

Oh, you didn’t know this is just about succession? Wait, you thought this was about Unseelie and Seelie? Dudes, no.

Someone contaminated me. See the wings? Blue, means I'm impure, unfit to rule.

Also, I'm like, way younger.

What will they do for us?

Legitimate heir to the throne, could challenge their sisters and demand the freedom of all the Bonded.

“I mean, I don't really feel like doing anything, but if you've got something to offer…”

“What do you want?” “I'm loooonely, be my friend.” “Oh, sure.”

Also, say Spectrum, to themself, That is a very cute boy right there and I want to seduce him.

This will not work. At all.

The Gray gang

Emma has weedled her way into this mission.

Does not bring her group, but is in contact with them.

They try to see if they can do anything more mundane for them.

What are you?

Support group for ex-courtiers.

Made of both Black and White.

The Ones That Got Out Too Late

Courtiers who were only able to escape after they had lost a significant portion of humanity. They cannot rejoin human society.

Headed (loosely) by two who joined back in the middle ages or earlier, one from each court, they got immortality, and have honestly lived long enough at this point and soaked up enough ambient magic that they are two thirds of the way to fae already. This would worry them, if they weren’t already beyond the point of caring about pretty much anything.

Umber

Black

Original deal was for immortality, but boy do they regret that now.

Lux

White

They are one of the very few Old Whites, since humans in the White Court tend to lose their humanity through weird, magical osmosis, and the iron in their own blood starts to poison them. The ones who survived made some kind of deal to counteract that.

The Ones That Got Out With Nothing

What it says on the tin

Identity erased, no family, no money, nothing.

Maybe a boon, but it’s a pretty useless one now.

The Ones That Got Out With Trauma

May or may not have returned to family.

But how do you explain that for a while you were a soldier in a war of immortal, amoral beings?

Maybe you killed for them, and if you did, what does that make you?

Maybe you made weapons, and does that make you as bad as a killer?

Who knows! These are not fun questions!

Magic addiction is totally a thing, and very hard to satisfy unless you were born naturally gifted.

Operate under the radar

Apparently, they've been around a while.

Boy, we could have used you in part one.

Yeah, well, we've been trying to keep a low profile. You are not at all low profile.

“Touché, but what is your plan?” “Help the people who actually get out.”

New idea: what if you teamed up with us and help stage a revolution?

Hell no.

We do have this semi-legitimate heir to the throne to utilize?

No, that's worse, we're not working for THEM anymore.

Well, you wouldn't be working for Spec either, they just make the thing binding.

(Also) says Tim to himself, (Glass Mask backup plan)

Fine, I guess.

Hey, Spec, guess what!

Oh sweet, says Spec, also, did some looking, turns out there is a not unsmall faction of fae who also do not like this system.

Hell yes

Turns out they have a similarish set up on my side.

It’s Maren and Mark.

Hell yes

Part IV- Now that we’ve decided to do this thing, let’s do some awesome prep work (my favorite part) and then FIGHT! (Red Army)

Strategy/ inspiring speech montage (best part),

Tim, Red, Emma, and some of her crew hang with the Gray Gang with more frequency.

Tim is a good big picture/big plan guy, but Red is where we really get strategy.

The breakdown goes like this: Tim: Here is a goal/ step that needs to be accomplished Spec: Here are some ways to do that and their cost/benefits. Red: Here is which one is most tactically sound, given out resources and position. GG/Em Folks: Here is what you need to do that, let's go!

Tim is able to recruit some folks from the Black Court, those who do not have very constricting contracts, or those that can leave, or those that find loopholes.

Somehow, the Ladies find out about the planned rebellion and the Gang base is attacked.

The base is attacked by fae soldiers and/or loyal bonded humans

Short scuffle where some folks including Tim fight as a diversion while others make an escape route and flee to an inbetween.

Tim gets stabbed.

Shoot! (Hey look, other allies, namely, Jo)

But hey, we have someone who can help!

Really? Say Red and Emma and Spec and any defectors and probably a bunch of GG folks as well.

Yeah, say a small group, now looking slightly sheepish, uh, their name is Jo.

JO!

Bit of their back story, probably starting with “Jo never realized the dangers of lending milk money to strange teenagers…”

Recoup

Hey, Spec, can we stage the final battle yet? We’re asking you ‘cause Tim’s unconscious.

I mean, we wanted to wait until May (or November?) Day? Because of magical significance? That’s not too far off at this point.

Okay, so we need to hold out just a bit longer.

Tim wakes up and he is maaaaad…

He actually seems just a wee bit crazy right now

Like, instead of being ruthless but clean, now he’s plans almost seem, sloppy.

“Okay, so we do this and this...” “Tim, we can’t do both of those things at once for some reason you should really know and may have actually pointed out to us at some point.” “Ah, so we can’t, well-”

He is TERRIFIED and FURIOUS, and that is not the mood you want your teenager general to be in.

This whole time, there have been continuous small strikes at any GG/ defector/ fae ally groups that are out in the open.

Like, any time they need to get food, or when trying to communicate between mortal and fae side groups

One of these missions is headed by some of the fae side operatives, and results in the destruction of a few select contracts, including Red's.

This is not helping anyone, but it is especially not helping Tim.

He feels trapped, like everything is closing in on him.

Hey, Tim, you good?

The other folks are genuinely a bit worried about him now, because this does not seem like him at all

Oops, we lose Tim.

Tim is part of a group attacked by adversaries.

He was probably not supposed to be part of this group because he is recOVERING FROM A STAB WOUND and cannot fight or defend against any members of the Black Court.

Honestly, though, this almost feels like relief, ‘cause some of these folks are definitely Whites and this is SOMETHING as opposed to however long he’s been cooped up doing nothing but planning.

Tim is not typically a man of action, but anticipation gets to even him.

Either just Tim gets taken while providing cover for the rest (look, it’s easy to sacrifice theoretical soldiers, but it’s much harder to abandon the friends in front of you), or the whole group gets taken ‘cause Tim tried to abandon them, or just Tim gets taken for the same reason. (Option one sounds more like Tim, but options two/three fit better with the devolution arc.)

Crap.

Okay, so this is pretty bad; who knows what the Black Lady's doing to him?

We (the readers) do. She's torturing him for information about this upcoming attack and how he has been resisting her commands.

We gotta do something!

It'd be too risky to spring him, says someone, we'd probably just get captured as well.

Hey, Spectrum, when were we planning on staging this whole thing again? In just a few days, Spec says, uncharacteristically grim, He'll have to hold out until then.

This visibly pains Spec, they really like Tim, possibly a crush.

PRE-BATTLE MONTAGE BABEEY!

A reiteration of the basic plan.

People are running around, suiting up however they suit up, saying their "I love you"s however they do.

Big speech, collaborative from Rose Red, Spectrum, Lux and Umber, Maren and Mark, and Emma.

What are we fighting for today?

What we have lost, what has been taken from us.

The many who have not escaped as we did.

A better society in the future.

This is not a rescue mission. They are not going in to save Tim, there are going in to break the system. Saving Tim is just one of the good results of this. As such, this is not a rescue speech, this is a revolutionary's speech.

Battle!

Includes the fantastic line of “talk s hit, get hit!” by someone attacking a chant based spellcaster.

Culmination of the “Any’s Mech” sub-plot (may be a two pilot mech with Em as the other pilot)

Also includes Albus' redemption, where he does something sacrificial to help/protect Rose Red and by extension The People's Court. (The Rainbow Court? What court is Spec?) Possibilities include Albus refusing to fight when played, kneeling in submission before his opponent. That's all I got right now.

So what does this involve, actually?

This is Spec making a formal claim to the throne and showing they have the manpower to back it up.

They have to fight their way there.

They escalate from “Right to be The Chosen Heir to the Monochrome Court” to “Make Me King Right Now I’ll Fight You”

So they set up a three-way board, each side playing for itself, but also trying to play the other two off each other.

The Black and White Ladies have pieces of various shapes and talents, but they all wear the color of their court. Spectrum's side lives up to their name, it is a riot of color from all of those who have pledged themselves to them.

This might be a no-mercy match, or at least the Ladies might try and play it that way, knowing that whoever wins this game gets all the contracts.

Resolution of the Glass Mask sub-plot

Tim escapes wherever he is because he never gave his whole true name.

Before this though, I want him to have a confrontation with the Black Lady.

"Magic likes a story right? So which one is this, huh? They say there are only seven basic plots, so which one is this?"

He says it's "Slaying the Monster"

Tim sees this as his only chance to fight on the side of what he sees as justice, since by submitting to the mask, he gives up any identity he has, including the identity he “gave” to the Black Lady.

True, he becomes a kind of raging monster, but hey, it means he isn’t fighting for the “wrong” side.

This Ends TERRIBLY.

He takes a deep breath before putting on the mask

Red, Spec, and Emma are understandably freaked the heck out, that’s their friend in that thing, and he doesn’t do this kind of thing! What is happening, and can our dude be saved?

Maybe? Currently, we know of two options: option one, and the better backed option, we try to break the mask, which will collapse this current iteration. This will probably kill our dude. Option two, which is mostly just wishful thinking, is an act of true love, and they don’t really have much there either.

They end up having to go with option one, saving the Faerie dimension from certain doom.

“it’s over we won” *monster slowly staggers up in the background* *comrades point and try to speak* “No, it’s over. We won. We’re done now, everybody go home” *a meteorite drops from the sky, killing the monster* “Will…” “That was not me” “But Will-” “That was nOT ME”

Will may or may not have residual cosmic powers

Freedom for the bonded.

Probably collaborative shenanigans with Will’s maybe cosmic powers and Spec’s new legal ones.

Part V- So, how does one live after all this? (Epilogue)

Going home?

Welp, looks like my mom remembers me now. That’s nice I guess. She’s gonna kill me.

Welp, looks like my dad remembers me now. That sucks, I hate that guy.

I grew up in the nineteen thirties. Does my immortality still apply? If I leave the Faerie dimension do I die? I have no clue how life out there works anymore, and I have no living relatives I can contact for help.

I liked living here, do I have to leave?

Gray Gang to the rescue!

Umber and Lux are fae enough and served long enough to earn themselves actual small estates. They work with Mark and Maren and combine the property and modify it with Spec’s help so that people who need to can stay there.

Some of the people they had helped in the past actually grew up to be pretty successful, like doctor/ lawyer kind of successful. The Gray Gang gets into contact with them, and people who need it get human help (therapy, temporary living, working papers, etc.)

Effect on Faerie society

Specifically, what are our main characters doing?

Probably accomplished through a scene featuring some or all of them, talking about life.

Rose probably stays in Faerie as one of Spec’s most trusted knights, so she doesn’t have to worry about going back to her dad. She is of course welcome to stay with the Gerbers, but that could get dicey legally. She is still free to come and go from Faerie as she pleases, within reason.

A news report, or a scene from Rose’s dad’s perspective. She’s out getting groceries with Will and she sees him and just. Decks him. It’s great.

"Wiiiillllll," Rose whined, tugging on Will's sleeve like a needy two-year-old, "Willll, I neeeed iiiit."

#Writing #Fiction #Fae #Fairies #Outline #Main story #spoilers #long

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thetygre · 8 years

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Dark Souls Lore Ramblings #1

So before I go on, I guess I should make it clear that I haven’t played DS3 or DS2. So, if there’s any information that contradicts or explains something, I probably don’t know about it. I’ve just got what I absorbed through pop cultural osmosis.

I don’t really have any particular order or priority in mind for what I’ve got to say, so this could be kind of all over the place. If you want to know my opinions on something in particular, you should probably drop me a message or a leave a comment or something. With that said, let’s start at the very beginning. I understand that it’s a very good place to start.

Dragons in Dark Souls

So, the Everlasting Dragons. I guess they’re the start of Dark Souls. In the beginning, it was all stone and mist and arch-trees and dragons. Everybody and their mother knows from the interviews with Miyazaki that the dragons are more like elementals than flesh and blood creatures. Their scales are made of stone, the same way the arch-trees are made of stone. So the dragons, the trees, and the earth are essentially all one in the same, to some degree. At the very least, the dragons are part of the landscape and the trees might be their own separate things, what with being the pillars of worlds and all.

Anyway, this is all to get around that whole disparity of existence thing. Rocks don’t die; they’re not alive, but they don’t die, or become undead, or whatever. They still succumb to entropy, but that’s real-world science being applied to a very broadly painted mythic portrait. The way I figure it, the dragons just sat around for millennia, fusing with the ground, coming out of the ground, going back to the ground, all in an endless cycle with no actual beginning or end. Seems appropriate.

Now here’s where things get tricky; did the Everlasting Dragons know about the First Flame and the Lord Souls? Were they trying to keep them down? If they didn’t, then the war against the dragons was perpetuated solely by the Lords; they began a fight with creatures completely beyond their comprehension and perspective. But then, why have a fight? The Lords didn’t even want the place that the dragons had; that would become Ash Lake. The Lords wanted the luxury suite in the arch-tree’s branches. (Whether that refers to exclusively Anor Londo or reality as a whole, I don’t know. We’ll get there when we get there.)

The way I see it, the Dragons did have some agency in this conflict. They didn’t just happen to be there. They were guarding the arch-trees, trying to stop the Lords from establishing reality. They actively opposed the First Flame and the cycle it brought. But why exactly? Well, the obvious, existential answer is that they wanted to avoid the pain and chaos of being. Why go through life and death and all that humdrum when you can be an Everlasting Dragon? Then I thought that it might be to avoid The Dark, or Death, or whatever else; something so horrible that the high point isn’t worth it, that an eternal purgatory is better than having to live with the worst. But then I started noticing details about the dragons;

Stone Dragon. Last of the OG Everlasting Dragons. Hatched in secret or hid away somewhere. Possibly also a Bonfire Maiden, but that doesn’t make any sense (or does it?). Offers Nirvana by offering an escape from the cycle of Light and Dark by becoming somebody’s scale-sona. Anyway, count the limbs on this guy and the dragons from the opening cut scene; four legs, four wings. That’s eight limbs in total.

The Gaping Dragon. Coolest dragon in dark fantasy. Succumbs to the pleasures of the flesh and grows a giant ass mouth to feed its gluttony, because Soulsborne runs on that kind of fairy tale logic. Locked up in Blighttown for a long while until its jailers were too weak to contain it or feed it; probably both. Got hungry, escapes, rampage. I like to think it was worshiped as some kind of sewer god for a while, but that’s pure fancy. On topic; four wings, and... well, eight legs. Twelve limbs in total, but I think we can make an exception given the whole freakish mutation thing.

Now Seath? Seath’s another horrible, freakish mutant. He’s got two arms, six wings, and a whole bunch of tentacles/tails. So that’s eight limbs plus whatever’s going on down south. I’ll be honest, I was going to cover Seath as his own separate business later. But Seath is important; Seath is described as being born. Not fissioning out of the stone, but being born. Birth is tied to death, implying that Seat, unlike the Everlasting Dragons, is tied to the cycle of existence. The whole point that I’m making over these last three is that the original Everlasting Dragons come with eight limbs.

Cut to Kalameet. So called by Gough as the ‘last of the great dragons’. Big boy. (That gemstone in his head might be a nifty callback to draconic lore; in both the East and the West, dragons were described as having magical glowing gems that they stored in their head. In the East, these were the pearls that lung used for flight and to control the sea, while in the West, these gems were the dragon’s actual brain, and had fantastic divinatory and alchemical properties.) I imagine he started rampaging around Oolacile after the Dark hit and the Four Knights fell to shit. But count his limbs; two wings, four legs. Six limbs. If Kalameet is the ‘last’ of the great dragons, then that means he is well after the Lords won against the Everlasting Dragons. He may even have been born in the last days of the war proper. But in any case, Kalameet is literally lesser than the Everlasting Dragons.

Similarly, we don’t know a lot about the undead dragons, but they follow the same basic rules. Four legs, two wings; less than the Everlasting Dragons. What’s more, they’re actually well and proper dead. I mean as much as anything that’s undead (and not an Undead) is dead. They’re corpses animated by some kind of magic or willpower, that’s all. But the cycle of life and death has absolutely affected them.

Also, their asses are in Izalith. I have no idea what that’s about. It honestly kind of infuriates me. I feel like I could just put the word “IZALITH” in great big, bold letters over these things and anybody who actually played this game would understand. Maybe something cool happened. Maybe the Lords fought their last epic battle against the dragons at Izalith, and dragon butts are all that remain. Maybe the Witches tried to enslave or tame the dragons, and when the Flame of Chaos destroyed Izalith, it killed the dragons, and the demons and dragons fought in some Heavy Metal war of fire and claws! Yeah! But probably not. Because it’s Izalith. So the answer is ‘rushed development’.

And at the very bottom are the dragons of today. Interchangeably called ‘drakes’ or ‘wyverns’, they have two wings and two legs; a paltry four limbs compared to the Everlasting. The Hellkite is a dangerous enemy, but the Blues are easy pickings for the patient knight. Ornstein hunts them for sport. (Have to guess that he must have started slacking off if something as big as the Hellkite could grow up there.) Even their habitat doesn’t acknowledge them as dragons; it’s ‘Valley of the Drakes’, not ‘Valley of the Dragons’. In essence, the Everlasting Dragons devolved; over the generations, they became less and less until their current descendants are no better than animals. Could it get any lower than this?

The answer is yes. The hydra is barely even acknowledged as a pseudo-dragon. The only thing that even ties them to dragons is that they drop dragon scales and are in the vicinity of dragons or something that a dragon made. It has no limbs, unless you count its ray-like flippers, and a bunch of seemingly useless tendrils hanging off it. I’ll be honest, the hydras kind of piss me off; the one in Darkroot I can understand, but how the Hell did one get into Ash Lake? It’s one thing for basilisks and mushroom folk to be there; they came in through the arch-tree. But how did a sixty foot long aquatic reptile get there?

I don’t know; frankly, I don’t think there is an answer. The best I can come up with riffs from Norse mythology. If we assume that the arch-tree is Yggdrasil, then the Stone Dragon is Nidhoggr, the dragon at the bottom of the world. In some versions of the myth, Nidhoggr is surrounded by a nest of lesser serpents. So the hydra is the Stone Dragon’s guardian? Offspring?

I guess I’m not really talking about all the dragons of Dark Souls if I don’t talk about the Path of the Dragon covenant as well. It really is kind of analagous to Buddhism in a weird way; through the Stone Dragon, you can escape the cycle of life and death, becoming, like the Everlasting Dragons themselves, something beyond any of the Lord Souls. In a way, it’s perfect for Undead; as a being already outside the cycle of life and death, an Undead is closer to escaping it than almost any other creature in Lordran. All they would need would be that final push to make the transformation a permanent part of themselves.

Of course, there may be a more petty side to the covenant; given that the covenant operates on dragon scales, it might be that the Stone Dragon intends for its servants to hunt down lesser dragons like the drakes and hydras. There’s no evidence to that, however, and it frankly seems beneath the Stone Dragon. Remember, its motivations and mindset are unknowable to anything derived from the Lord Souls. Petty vengeance doesn’t seem like it’s M.O.

So what’s all this add up to? Nothing much, really. It’s just what motivated the Everlasting Dragons, the setup to the establishing conflict of the Dark Souls mythos. The Dragons weren’t afraid of dying or the Dark; they were afraid of watching their own devolution. Somehow, I think, they knew that the cycle would wear on them, generation after generation, until dragons were little more than animals. Time ruins all things; it’s one of the big recurring themes of the Souls series. Even Dark Souls 2 (which, as I understand it, is stuffed to the gills with dragons) understood that.

The Dragons’ fight was the fight against definition itself; not as simple as stagnation versus chaos, but against the very act of being in and of itself. And I guess that adds up to what’s valued as important in the Souls universe; ‘existence’ is synonymous with ‘definition’. The very act of perception and processing that perception is the heart of reality, a notion that goes all the way back to Demon’s Souls.

Ultimately, like I said, it doesn’t really matter. The dragons are dead, stupid, or in hiding. But they tell us about the tone of the universe, and I had to start somewhere. Thanks for reading this far! Anything to add or ask for the next rambling?

#Dark Souls #Dark Souls lore #everlasting dragon #stone dragon #seath the scaleless #dark souls lore ramblings

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