#because like. even amongst humans living in one area languages differ

[astarionspocketpussy]

Thought too hard about how I name Tieflings and started considering the role of "common" in DND and how different real life languages might fit in that framework. Needless to say now I want to write an essay but alas. Its midnight.

[laineystein]

I know that the media would have you believing that war is constant and ruthless but sometimes it’s a lot of sitting around and waiting for orders. And a lot of talking. Really introspective talking. And the things that people say when there’s a very real chance that they might die, are probably the most poignant and well said. So here’s a conversation my unit had in a million different ways with a million different words:

We love beings Jews. We love being Israeli. We can’t imagine being anything else or belonging to any other group. But this statistic that we are 0.2% of the worlds population has been so much more than a statistic lately. We all feel it. We feel how so much of the world has turned their backs on us — how the same people that posted those stupid blue squares on instagram are now using language that calls for our genocide and the destruction of our homeland. We know that for so many people we are pawns in their political game. We know that so many people think we are sub-human and therefore deserving of less respect than any other person. We don’t need anyone to tell us what they think of us because so many people are showing us by what they’re doing or not doing. And that’s okay. We’re used to it. We’ve always been alone. We’ve always fought (and won) our own battles. We’ll win this one without any of you. It’s fine. But it makes me think about how the same people that alienate us are the ones that critique how we live in insular communities (like the neighborhood I grew up in Crown Heights) and how our religion is closed and how we don’t need a place (read: Israel) where we all live together (assumedly because no other group has such a place — which is just a total lie). And there’s this thought amongst many Jews that communities like the one I grew up in in Brooklyn exist as a result of the persecution we faced. Just like there’s this thought that Israel exists because of the Holocaust. The survivors of the worst thing that can happen to a group decided to live together and close out the outside world. Now I’d argue that we certainly haven’t closed anyone out in Israel - I’m currently serving with Israelis that are Arab and Druze. But is our country very Jew-centric? Absolutely. Just like Crown Heights is very Jew-centric. Goyim can/do live and visit Crown Heights but it is a place that caters to what is otherwise considered a counter-culture in America. Just like Israel caters to Jews in an area of the world where all of us were expelled. We are fine living in these places. We have created these communities and curated them to our Jewish way of life. But people wonder why we close ourselves off and why we need special spaces - and that same ignorance is the answer. Sure, our diets are different and we have laws about how we go to school and work and pray that make it very difficult to live in a non-Jewish world but there’s a very real truth that so many people are scared to say aloud so I will: We don’t trust goyim. Goyim have never stood up for us or protected us. Only we can keep ourselves safe. Only we truly care about our wellbeing. We do not feel safe around goyim. And I think we have every right to be distrustful. We have every right to think that our survival and security rests solely in our fellow Jew. So while this has all proven that the Jewish people are amazing and loving and stronger than even we knew, it’s also only cemented this idea that we absolutely need our own world. And it’s clear that we’ve essentially lived in our own world all this time anyway - our world view is not your world view. Our experiences are so incredibly different than the goy experience. If you’re not Jewish and especially if you’re not an Israeli Jew, you can’t possibly understand any of this. And that’s fine! But don’t get angry when, in the absence of your support, we’ve figured it out. And don’t be upset when your Jewish friends - Israeli or not - have pushed you away because you didn’t show up in the way they’d hoped. You’ve merely proven us right. We do not need you. Our communities are enough. Our country is enough. Together, we will outlive you.

[mha-cuties-pls]

Alleyways and Avenues.

Part 3 of 4 | pairing: Dabi x Reader | rating: T+ (suggestive themes, language) | genre: suspense

Read ‘Part 1’ here.

Read ‘Part 2’ here.

You had been so engrossed in conversation with the man you had just met, you hadn’t even realized that you had already stepped out onto the sidewalk.

A weight you hadn’t known you were carrying lifted off your chest as you stepped into the light; and almost at the same time, it seemed, your mind found a new stressor to take the previous ones place.

Maybe because you were just so shaken up at the time, you hadn’t really noticed until now, but your shirt, or whatever was left of it, was just barely hanging on by a thread; quite literally. And now, faced with the reality of being seen clearly, being perceived; you froze up.

Your face got hot and your stomach nauseous all at once, and you felt paralyzed in fear, uncertainty, and embarrassment all at the same time; like your fight or flight response was short-circuiting.

Managing at least to cover your exposed chest with your arms, a weird, guttural “AHHHGNH” left your mouth as you turned away from him in a panic and closed your eyes instinctively; bracing yourself.

But, once again proving that he was no ordinary guy, Dabi did probably the last thing you’d ever expect from a man in this position with you-

“Here,” you heard his smooth voice say, and you felt a piece of fabric be placed on your back, “take my sweatshirt.”

Opening your eyes, you turned back around slowly while a shaky hand reached around to grab the garment on your back. After you maneuvered it probably not so gracefully over your head, you looked up at him, to see his head quickly turn away.

Was he blushing?

You certainly were. “Thank you.” You breathed out, probably for like the millionth time that night. “God, I’m sorry I keep saying that.” He was probably so tired of hearing it by now. “I’m not usually such a mess.”

Though he just shrugged, “Don’t mention it.”

Taking a moment to just breathe, you tried to steady your heart rate; but found it hard when the smell of his cologne wafted all too pleasantly into your nose from his borrowed clothes. It smelled so…clean. Like expensive sandalwood and fresh air , with just the faintest hint of smoke.

Shooting a quick glance over to where he stood, you noticed that he wasn’t wearing much under his sweatshirt; just a tight white tank top that clung onto his clearly taught body way too well. But, even more peculiar than that, were the scars that seemed to run all along his body.

He had what looked like two different types of skin making up his body, held together simply by titanium staples; and, if you looked close enough, you were pretty sure you could even see a bit through the gaps.

It was like he was some kind of handsome, generous, human-Frankenstein; a gift from above meant to save you from yet another soul crushing identity wiping experience.

But, why? Who was he? What was he getting out of this?

Finally catching your breath enough to stand up straight, you cleared your throat a bit awkwardly, “okay, cool. Thank you,” fuck, “I think we can keep walking now.”

Motioning for you to lead the way, you watched the subtle way his muscles flexed when he moved his arms. “After you, doll.” He said, flashing you that dashingly handsome smile, making you feel a bit less embarrassed again; amongst other things.

However, you decided, you were still only just blushing right now from being so exposed in front of him earlier; that’s all. “We’re almost there.” You tried to assure him, hopefully he wasn’t beginning to get annoyed with you.

When you glanced up at him, though, he seemed to be looking around the area with a disquieted expression. “You live around here?” He asked, eyes scanning over the shanty apartment buildings and hoards of people that were adorning the area currently.

Still on the outskirts of Midori, the neighborhood you were currently residing in was riddled with social outcasts, vagrants, and other societal rejects; it was a hotbed of criminal activity at any time of day, you could always find someone up to no good here if you were looking for it.

Even now, around 2am, as you and Dabi walked along the street you passed huddles of people working on bikes in the corner or passing around a pipe while talking and laughing.

A sheepish smile took over your face as you tried to shrug it off a bit. “Sometimes.”

Sometimes? Dabi quickly realized, amongst all your vague statements and peculiar reasons for roaming such dangerous streets so late, why you might be acting so strange.

But he decided to stay quiet, at least for now.

As he continued to follow you, he watched the way you maneuvered yourself through the crowds of people almost expertly; he might’ve even lost you once or twice, if it wasn’t so easy to spot the obviously lewd stares you seemed to get from every other man that walked past you.

Watching the way they looked at you like meat made him scowl; he even ended up walking straight into one of the guys whose eyes were lingering just a bit too long on your figure. Fucker should’ve been paying attention instead of drooling like an animal.

“Watch it.” Dabi seethed, towering over the short, grubby mole of a man that stood in his way. It almost looked like, for a second, that the man was going to try and say something back; but he quickly realized who was standing in front of him.

The small man’s eyes grew wide as the moon as he side-stepped quickly out of the way. “S-sorry.” He stuttered, bowing his head a bit as Dabi walked past him.

You watched the entire scene unfold behind you as you stood still for a moment to wait for Dabi to catch up realizing that, in his large size, he probably wasn’t able to weave through the crowd as quickly as you could.

But, judging based on the way he was able to clear a path for himself just by looking at people, you started to think maybe he really wasn’t just some random loan shark.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” Dabi said while walking up to you, throwing back one more nasty glare toward that guys direction, “some people have no manners.”

Finally, when he caught up to you, you began to turn back around to guide him, but felt a hand on your shoulder; stopping you.

The contact made you jump a little, and your stomach suddenly felt bubbly.

“Stay a little closer to me this time,” he said, looking down at you with a small smile, “for my sake. Yeah?”

The implication that he was the one who needed you right now made you feel a bit lighter, and you looked into his bright eyes.

You took his hand off of your shoulder, and held it lightly in your own. “Sure.” Your hand was definitely shaking, and maybe a little sweaty, but you tried your best to pretend like you didn’t notice, and continued guiding him through the crowds.

As you trekked forward, you saw the entrance to your building approaching, and felt a pit build in your stomach. Your journey was just about to come to an end.

Slowing your steps ever so slightly, you moved toward the front door, releasing the tight grip you hadn’t realized you had on his hand…but not completely. You couldn’t; not yet.

You didn’t want to.

“____!” An unfortunately familiar voice said, pulling you violently from your thoughts. “You got my fuckin money tonight or what?”

Dabis face immediately twisted up like he ate something sour; but managed to refrain himself. For now.

He watched in silence as you turned to face the wrinkled old hag that stood in the doorway. Her clothes were faded and torn, and her mousy hair looked like it was tied in a messy knot on top her head.

Still though, you obeyed her, and a pang shot through his heart; he knew what this was.

“Here.” You said, voice low as you reached into the pocket you had sewn inside your skirt.

She snatched the wad of cash from your hands with a scowl, “Feels light.”

The embarrassing sting of tears in your eyes didn’t help the worthless, empty feeling she was causing to build inside you. “It was a slow night for me.” You said through gritted teeth. She always had to make sure she humiliated you before she let you inside.

Only, the woman in front of you seemed to get more displeased. “Worthless whore,” she spat, raising her hand to you, “just like your mothe-“

And then, suddenly, she stopped;

“Alright,” Dabi interjected, his tall figure stepping in between you and the woman, catching her wrist in a grip so painful she screamed out in anguish, “I think we’re done here.”

“Hey!” She screamed, trying fruitlessly to twist out of his tight grasp, “that bitch belongs to me, until she pays off her families debt.”

But Dabis expression remained the same, “im familiar with how your little trafficking scheme works,” his eyes darkened ever so slightly, “been to a few of these myself in my spare time.” He smirked down at her, his lip twisting up a bit in disgust as he scanned the disorderly room in the house behind her, “but never one as fucked as this place.”

Finally, Dabi released the woman’s arm.

“What do you want?”

His eyebrow raised in amusement at her attitude, but he wasn’t in the mood to do any cleanup tonight on account of reckless behavior, so he was really trying to reel it in right now; besides, he didn’t want to frighten you any further. Despite the fact he thought you looked incredibly hot with that tear stained expression on your face.

He glanced behind himself to see you still standing right where he left you, looking up at him with those big, gorgeous eyes that he suddenly realized he never wanted to look away from;

“The girl.” Dabi said, looking back at the old hag.

Your ears perked up. What did he say?

Her eyes narrowed upon hearing the request, and from a quick glance back into the open door of the house, she saw some of the other girls had begun to gather around the door. They had acquired an audience.

“¥500,000.” She demanded, though her voice now wavered a bit as she spoke, “that’s the debt still left by her parents.”

But Dabi just laughed sharply, making everyone jump a little in surprise; you could cut the tension in the air with a knife.

Taking another dauntingly close step towards her, he positioned his face so close to hers, she could now clearly see the dangerous gleam in his eyes;

“How about,” he breathed out, patience running thin, “I take the girl,” taking a quick glance back into the house, he saw a full crowd of young girls hanging by the door. Watching, waiting; hoping.

But, Dabi could only do so much good for one night.

“And,” he lowered his voice to just a hush, “you get keep on running your whore house without having to worry about me coming back and burning it down while you all sleep.” Smiling eerily, Dabis stare never faltered; if anything, it only grew watching the womans face as she realized she had lost.

With just a huff, and a sharp turn of her heel, the miserable old woman stomped back into the house; yelling at the other girls to ‘get back to work!’ Before slamming the door shut behind her.

Releasing a small sigh, Dabi looked down for a moment and closed his eyes; his chest felt tight.

“Thank you.” Your soft voice said, hitting Dabis ears pleasantly and pulling him from his somber thoughts after the emotional exchange that had just transpired.

He turned his head around to face you; you were still standing just right behind him, close enough he could feel your body heat, and even smell your perfume. It was so sweet, like strawberries.

“B-but,” you stuttered, causing his ears to perk up, though, you seemed to have lost your words. Twiddling your thumbs, you suddenly found it impossible to look up at him. Your mind started to race. What were you gonna do? “I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

Though, you felt his cold fingers lift your chin up gently to look at him.

He held a soft expression on his face, one very different from the one you saw just moments ago. “You can stay with me, even if it’s just for the night.” Dropping his hand down from your chin to your side, he took your hand in his own lightly, “if you want.”

Staying quiet for a moment, you didn’t know what to say; your face got a bit hot again.

Though you felt his hand give yours a light squeeze, and you saw him smile a bit. “I can take the couch for the night.”

A small part of you, the one that was still scared and felt all alone, told you to run; that you’d never be able to make it out here on your own and trusting a stranger out of the blue like this, no matter what he may have done for you, was a stupid decision that was only going to get into deeper shit;

But, another part, the one that felt a bit more daring, told you that this was your chance; you had to go for it.

Taking in a deep breath, you tried your best to put on a smile. Looks like your adventure was only beginning.

“Okay.”

A/N: ahhhhhh loved writing this ! I never know where it’s going when I start tbh I’m as surprised as yall sometimes. Part 4 coming soon !

[pokemonbiologyirlthetabletop]

Smeargle

Smeargle (#235)

Canisartem domesticus

General Information: Smeargle are bipedal dog Pokémon with long tails that ooze paint-like oil from the tip. Each Smeargle’s tail ooze is a different color. They average in at 3’11 feet tall (1.2 M) and 127.9 pounds (58 kg).

Habitat: Smeargles are overwhelmingly found in human cities, but outside of cities they can be found in oak savannahs and places with cliffs (ie: where they can both seek shelter, find food, and have places to paint/mark their territory). It is rare to find Smeargles outside of human cities, but small populations do exist elsewhere.

Life Cycles: A Smeargle is born to small litters of 1-4 pups once a year in the late Spring. They are good parents who co-parent and live in packs. The only real hierarchy in their packs is that older and more experienced Smeargles are given more respect and reverence than the younger ones.  They have intricate and incredibly complex courtship rituals that involve painting.

Smeargles tend to live in caves and abandoned buildings. They live to be around twenty years old. They are eaten by most generic predators, such as large birds, snakes, and Ariadoses.

Behavior: Smeargle are hypersocial creatures that live in packs from a handful of individuals to upwards of a hundred. They mark their territory and communicate with an intricate series of marks made with their tails, which scientists have collected over 5,000 unique marks created by Smeargles. There are vast regional differences in these marks and packs and individuals often have their own that separate them from others in the area. Scientists have come to understand that this is written language, albeit more rudimentary than human languages, but still capable of conveying key information and individuality. The study of Smeargle linguistics is a developing field of language science!

On the back of each Smeargle, they are marked with a paw print by their parent to show that they are a member of the pack. Some groups have more distinct paw marks, while others go for simpler designs. These paw marks must be remade regularly; the process is a regular part of the grooming rituals, where a pack mate marks another and reclaims them as a member of the pack.

Diet: Smeargles are omnivores that can be seen rifling through human garbage and gardens. Be careful what you put in the garbage!

Conservation: Least Concern

Relationship with Humans: Smeargles are beloved Pokémon most popularly seen amongst artistic sorts. They are incredible companions who thrive in homes of many other Pokémon or people, but become depressed and bored when they are in households of 2-3 members. They make good companions for children of all ages, and are quite safe to be around.

Smeargles are synonymous with the visual arts in the same vein that Meloetta and Chatot represent the performing arts. Any art school has at least one Smeargle amongst its Pokémon Staff, even if it’s purely for the sake of it. Artists are the biggest fanciers of Smeargles the world over, the drivers of fancy breeds, Smeargle shows, and the breeding of rare and exotic tail colors in Smeargles. Because of this, Smeargles can fetch surprisingly high prices depending on the type that you buy, and some fancy breeds are known to have health defects in exchange for their fancy looks—a similar problem with many fancy breeds of dogs and cats in the real world. Of course, you could always catch a generic mutt from the streets of any particular city.

When it comes to Smeargle’s symbol of the artistic world, there is a media rival in this regard: Grafaiai. Those who partake in the more experimental and provocative arts of the world, such as graffiti artists, tend to treat Grafaiai as the symbol of punk and alternative art scenes, while Smeargles have come to represent the finer and more mainstream arts.

Classification: Smeargle are in a genus all to themselves, and remain a distinct lineage from many of the other dog Pokémon.  

Game Mechanic Explanation: Smeargle can use its Sketch attack to copy any attack, which it can then be used to breed down onto any Pokémon within the field egg group (so long as that is a viable egg move for the offspring). While later videogames place a handful of very specific restrictions on the extent of Smeargle’s ability to replicate any attack, I think that’s boring and it’s way funner to just let Smeargle use sketched powered-down versions of any and all attacks known to Pokémon kind. Additionally, in the moveset spreadsheets (viewable here) the amount of times Smeargle can naturally learn Sketch without human aid has been doubled, since I think it's a little silly that in the videogames it can only learn Sketch once every 10 levels. The change has been made because campaigns can potentially drag on for a very long time, so it makes more sense for Smeargle to learn Sketch every 5 levels and again at level 100.

~~~~~~~~

Hey guess what, if you like my stuff, this is my website where you can find other Pokémon I've written on and more information about the game that I’m slowly making! Check it out! I write books sometimes too.

[str33tydr1ft]

| TTTE AU | Ok Ima explian it now- |

okay I have only been here for like- an hour or two and I feel like I need to explain my TTTE au so I don't seem insane. Okay here we go

I'll start it off with a TLDR in case you don't wanna read a whole ass fucking essay lmao

TLDR : Take the dinosaurs from Jurassic World and Park, make them speak english, and make them breathe fire, but instead of them being dinosaurs they're trains with faces and if you piss them off enough they will snap and go feral and insane and kill everyone. Oh yeah they're also carnivores and have a food chain and a whole ass life cycle that lasts for almost 200 - 250 years :D

There's your TLDR, now here's the same shit but with more DETAIL

So the best way to start off is what the engine are bassically.

Alongside lore... yummy

Starting off this AU is set in a world where Dragons were living amongst the Dinosaurs, and went extinct alongside them when they all died from that asteroid. Fossils of them are almost everywhere like the Dinosaur fossils, hell there's even a whole entire Dragon skeleton up in Kanpford Station.

The way Dragons evolved into the current engines today was through the same way dinosaurs evolved into birds. They became smaller and smaller overtime. (And from what I got from Google) The smaller Dragons, Crocodiles, Turtles, and Non-Avian creatures survived the impact. Overtime they evolved and Dragons stuck to eating sulfur in order to breathe fire and lived in more metal-sulfur-rich areas, eventually becoming a sort of a bio-mechanical creature that became the modern-day train. So yeah Trains are just Dragons!

Alongside all of that, that's enough how they came to be, it's about I start explaining the more important stuff. AKA what they're like in the modern-day.

They evolved to have a carnivorous diet, -unless the engine is one like Mike, rex and Bert, they're omnivores due to their size- often hunting smaller trains or whatever creature is unfortunate to come across them when they're hangry, that includes humans. Naturally they became a lot more dangerous than humans could ever be, even though they were tamed by humans. But hey the rare smart guy knows to never fully trust a train, and never turn your back on one. They can be a little bit deceiving because they same the same language.

They have a sort of species only type of food chain alongside being apart of the main one (the main one being them, and every other animal in the world), the engine-only chain though goes from the different classes / breeds of train you can get. The smallest are at the bottom and the biggest are at the top, so an engine like Rebecca or Hiro would be at the very top while Mike, Rex and Bert are at the very bottom. The smaller the train the more they get picked off by the bigger ones.

So yeah mini funny train hierarchy hahaha, oh yeah there's also the fact they can glow and breathe fire too- whoops

That's the AU currently as of yet, it's a huge wip but I'll post about it more when I add more to it, anyway there I hope you guys like it lol

[ragingbookdragon]

To Be Human--To Be Alive

Hal Jordan x Reader One-Shot

Word Count: 3.5 Warnings: Explicit Language, Mentions of Death, Angst

Author's Note: I've been listening to Calum Scott's "Biblical" on repeat since it came out and I thought about this. Enjoy! -Thorne

********************************************************************************

Hal Jordan was no stranger to pain. He’d felt it all: emotional, psychological, physical, mental, the list goes on and on, up and down, left and right, every which way until the end of time. That being said, he still wasn’t used to being thrown into concrete walls by meta-humans who had strength equivalent to Superman’s.

He rolled onto his side, feeling his broken ribs shift beneath his skin, and groaned, trying to find the will in him to get to his feet. All he had the strength to do was look over at Barry who was busy getting his own ass handed to him by another meta-human who seemed overly fond of freezing his feet.

A sinister laugh came from above him and Hal turned his head, eyes widening as he saw the meta-human standing before him a slab of concrete raised in his hands.

“Oh fu—”

He saw it before he heard it. The meta-human’s head intact one second and exploding into a hundred shards of brain matter and bone, some of it splattering across Hal’s suit and face. The concrete slab fell behind the meta-human and then he went to his knees, body pitching forward to land beside Hal’s feet.

The echo of the gunshot was enough to gather the other’s attention and her eyes had barely widened before another shot echoed across the street and her head exploded too, body falling beside Barry.

The two superheroes scrambled to their feet, and Hal was already forgetting about his broken ribs, willing constructs to life in order to provide protection for him and his best friend. Whoever killed the two enemies wasn’t firing anymore, but Hal wasn’t going to take any chances.

Green Lantern. Flash. Come in.

Barry skidded a stop beside Hal who shifted his hand, making the constructs combine into one giant wall; he put his free hand to his ear. “We’re here, Batman.”

What just happened? The life signs of your targets just went offline.

Hal looked to his friend whose blue eyes were wide, equally shocked about the turn of events. “Uh…about that…”

What happened?

“Batman, we’ve got a sniper somewhere in the range of our local. Took down both meta-humans within seconds of each other.”

Deceased?

Hal glanced behind him at the freezing meta-human’s corpse, a giant pool of blood growing from the spurting arteries. “Well, they don’t have heads anymore, so, yeah. They’re deceased.”

Understood. Superman’s coming in for protection.

The line clicked and Barry looked at Hal. “I think we should move. If that sniper’s still in the area, we shouldn’t be hanging around waiting to find out.”

Hal let the speedster pick him up, speeding down an alley away from the street so they’d be out of the line of sight. “What type of gun do you think they used?”

Barry shrugged, setting Hal down. “I don’t know. Normal rifles don’t do that much damage, even from that distance.” He didn’t even want to look out the alley way. “That had to be a high caliber rifle.”

“You think they’re a friendly?”

“Hal, they just blew off two people’s heads. That doesn’t seem friendly to me.”

He shrugged. “Well yeah, but they didn’t blow our heads off so…” he tipped his head side to side. “Seems like they were helping.”

Barry glowered at him. “Blowing people’s heads off isn’t helping superheroes. It’s vigilantism gone dark.”

“Sheesh, you sound like Spooky with that attitude.” Hal griped, turning with a new construct when a flash of red appeared in their visions. He lowered it when he realized it was Superman. “Supes!”

“Are you two okay?” Superman asked.

“We’re fine,” Barry replied. “The bullets came from the right. If I had to take a guess, it would’ve been the parking garage in the distance.”

Clark shook his head. “I checked. There were no signs of scuffing from a gun stand, or GSR around the area.”

“So, where’d they fire from?” Hal questioned and Clark nodded towards the street.

“Somewhere farther than just this street.” He glanced at them. “Whoever it was is gone now. C’mon, Batman’s getting a statement ready for the local PD.” He flew off, leaving Hal and Barry standing beside one another, more confused than anything.

***

Calling in late to work had never been Hal’s thing. Honestly, as lazy as he was sometimes, he loved his job. Loved the thrill of getting up in the air, loved feeling the shock sending him into his seat as he broke the sound barriers in the sky. Scrounging around parking garages and abandoned buildings for a ghost-shooter wasn’t his idea of a good day.

So far, he’d searched at least three abandoned buildings in the area, each coming up empty, and the last one showed the exact same signs. He sighed, letting the construct fade. Even the ring couldn’t make heads or tails with any of the evidence around him. Whoever their shooter was, was practically a specter. Hal had no idea how someone managed to shoot two meta-humans down that fast and then leave just as quickly, escaping both Barry and Clark’s abilities.

Hal had seen people killed before. Had even done the same a few times, even up in the air on combat missions and in his suit when he had no other choice. But seeing someone’s head burst like a watermelon hitting concrete right in front of his very eyes was something completely different. A different level of fear that there was someone out there ready to do the same to him, and all it would’ve taken was a random whim and a finger pulling a trigger. But it was like he told Barry—whoever their shooter was, wasn’t shooting to kill them, they were helping.

He drew his eyes along the wall of the empty room, finally resigning himself to the fact that he wasn’t going to find whoever it was that had helped them; with that, he sighed, letting his shoulders droop—he was going to lose fifty bucks to Barry because of this.

“Giving up so soon?” Hal spun around, coffee eyes wide as he scanned the room around him. “I’m surprised Green Lantern showed up. I was expecting Superman or Batman.”

“Who said that?” he questioned, spinning in a circle.

“Who or what?”

“What?”

“Who.”

Hal growled. “Quit screwing with me.” Apparently, they already knew who he was, and he let the green suit flash to life. “Show yourself.”

“Why should I?” they asked in return. “I saved your life.”

“You blew off two people’s heads.” He retorted.

“Should I have let the metas crush you and freeze off Flash’s legs? And here I thought you wanted to live and let your best friend be safe.”

“Killing people isn’t always the answer.” Hal said, turning around again and then he saw it, the glimmer of what looked like a tactical cloak. He pointed to the corner of the room and let a construct come alive. “Show yourself.”

The glimmer appeared again, and then something booted down and he watched as the tactical cloak faded, leaving a woman in its place, sitting up against the wall, one leg stretched out, the other pulled up near her chest, her elbow resting on her knee—and a big sniper rifle was resting against her chest, barrel pointing up towards the ceiling.

She was decked out in some kind of cyber armor that Hal could only describe as futuristic, solid black with purple electric currents running through the slots where the plates of her gear met, mainly down her shoulders and arms, and down the sides of her chest to her ribs to her feet.

“What’re you doing here, Green Lantern?” she inquired, the mask she wore muffling her voice enough that it wouldn’t give identification; her visor was darkened too. “Shouldn’t you be in the air, flyboy?”

Hal tipped his head curiously. “You know who I am?”

She nodded. “I do. And who Batman and your friends are.”

“How?” Batman’s identity was practically unidentifiable unless he told someone.

“Government databases as well as a hacked encryption into the Justice League computers.” She seemed awfully nonchalant as she shifted and rose to her feet, slinging the rifle to her backs. Even when Hal aimed the construct at her, she didn’t seem phased. “Why are you here?”

He blinked. “I wanted to find you.”

“What for?”

“Well…I’ve got a bet riding on finding you, but I also wanted to see where you’d shot from.”

She eyed him momentarily then gestured him over to the window; he stood beside her, and she pointed down the street. “I shot from here.”

Hal’s eyes almost bulged out of his head—he couldn’t even see the street they’d been on. “That’s gotta be at least eighteen hundred meters. Maybe farther.”

“Fifty caliber rifles are built for long range.” She merely replied. “I heard the commotion when the JL got into the city. Then I heard you and Bartholomew Allen getting beat down and decided to level the playing field.”

“How’d you hear commotion that far away?” he asked, and she tapped the side of her head.

“I’ve got enhanced senses. But the detection cameras around the city help too.”

Hal looked at her, watching as her eyes were darting around the street, like she was trying to work a strategy in her head; it reminded him of Barry. “Are you some kind of super soldier?”

She nodded. “I was. Designation Spectre.” Her head turned and she met his eyes. “I was created for covert military operations.”

“You mean assassinations?” he mused, and she nodded.

“Amongst other things, yes.”

“So, if you’re a military toy, why are you here?”

Something shifted in the air and Hal shivered. “Because when they cut the operation, they started hunting down all the soldiers. I went AWOL before they got to me.”

“You’re on the run?” Hal was sympathetic to her, reaching out to place a hand on her shoulder. “I can help you. Come to the Watchtower with me and we’ll see about setting you up with us.”

Her head turned again, this time staring at the hand gripping her shoulder; he didn’t seem to get the hint because he squeezed her arm. “You mean come to the government regulated superhero operation? That one?”

He winced. “Okay, maybe that wasn’t the smartest thing I could’ve said.” He pulled away. “But we can protect you. Or at least get you to safety away from any enemies.”

She grunted quietly. “There’s a lot of enemies after the bounty on my head.”

“How many?”

“Well, Deathstroke’s been a recurring figure.” She rolled her shoulder and turned around, walking away from the window. “He’s more annoying than dangerous. Like a brown recluse infestation that you just can’t kill.”

“Do you want to come with me though? I can take you directly to the Watchtower and call Batman.”

“I don’t think someone like Batman is going to like someone like me coming into his territory.”

Hal made a face. “Excuse you, the Watchtower is our territory.”

“Yeah, everyone but Wonder Woman is Batman’s bitch.” She bemused. “You just think the place is for everyone.”

“Still waiting on a yes or no.” Hal griped.

“I’m thinking it over.” Then she fell silent for a few moments; she hummed and looked at him. “Alright I’ll go with you.”

Hal cocked a brow. “It took you that long to think about it?”

She scoffed and led him from the room. “Don’t be ridiculous, my mind moves at a speed similar to Bartholomew Allen’s or Bruce Wayne’s.” She glanced at him. “I was looking over the watchtower floor plans in case you decided to collect my bounty and I needed to escape.”

He merely blinked at her and formed a construct outside the building, watching as she climbed in. “Something tells me you’re going to be a handful.”

“Well, I can tell you like having your hands full, Hal Jordan.”

Hal chuckled. “What’s your name?”

“(Y/N) (L/N).”

***Months Later***

Oddly enough to Hal’s surprise, (Y/N) fit right in with the League. She and Barry could talk about forensic science for hours, going into their own little world that only batman knew anything about, and occasionally, the Big Bat himself would involve himself in their discussions. It was the one time Hal thought that Batman was enjoying himself. Of course, Batman also seemed to enjoy training with her.

They’d go for hours on the mat, switching through different forms of martial arts, and Hal and the others kept a betting ring on who would win each match because for all the greatness Bruce Wayne was as Batman, (Y/N) seemed to be the only person who could match him blow for blow and still win sometimes.

Diana loved her, or so she loved the idea that (Y/N) didn’t back down from fights or simply let enemies off the hook. And he understood from listening and learning, that (Y/N) enjoyed Greek literature and culture, prompting the two women to delve into deep conversations over history and stories.

Everyone loved (Y/N). She was like Bruce if he were lethal and was kind. And Hal? Hal wanted nothing more than to take her to dinner, but surprisingly, (Y/N) was either extremely dense or she just didn’t want to date anybody because every time Hal asked her out, she had an excuse. And while Hal backed off when a woman said no, she’d not said no yet, so he was merely wondering if she was waiting it out—something he was going to find out, come hell or high water.

***

He watched as she held the soldering iron in one hand and held up the gauntlet in the other, examining her work before deciding it was decent enough to call it a day. Setting both the armor and the tool down, she stood from her seat and stretched, rolling her muscles, and popping her joints. She didn’t like to be still for long periods of time unless she was doing something, like sitting in a sniper nest or enhancing equipment; he’d learned that the hard way after they were set on global patrol in the Watchtower one night.

“Do you want something?” she asked, not looking at him as she gathered her armor together.

Hal chuckled, walking over to lean against the table. “A few things.”

“Gonna ask me out again?” (Y/N) questioned, putting the gear into a footlocker.

“Finally gonna say no?” he responded, and she stood up, meeting his gaze.

“Do you want a no?”

Hal shrugged. “It’d be easier than having to come up with another excuse for asking you out.”

(Y/N) hummed, walking past him and he followed her as she wandered through the hall of the Watchtower. “So far you’ve asked me out twenty-one times.”

“I’m tempted to make twenty-two, if you’ll say yes.”

She paused and turned on him, giving him an odd look. “Why do you want to go out with me? Aren’t you worried about fraternization?”

“Fraternization is only regulated in the military,” Hal shrugged off. “We’re no longer in the force.”

“That only answered part of the questions.”

Hal reached out, thumbing a smudge of oil off her face. “I’m interested in you.”

“That’s it?” (Y/N) inquired. “You’re interested in me and that’s why you won’t quit asking me out on dates?”

“You’re smokin’ hot?” he offered with a snarky grin, and she rolled her eyes, turning around.

“Every day I’m reminded of why you’re such a skirt-chaser.”

As she walked off, he hurried behind her and grabbed her upper arm. “(Y/N), wait.” She paused and he pulled her around. “Go out with me tonight.”

“Are you asking or telling?” she challenged. “Because the latter isn’t going to fly with me.”

Hal snorted. “It’s a bit of both.” When she cocked a brow, he added, “Go out with me tonight, and if you don’t have a good time, we’ll never talk about it again and I’ll stop asking.”

(Y/N) regarded him a moment. “Promise?”

“Cross my heart.”

She pulled her arm from his grip and spit into her hand holding it out to him. “Shake on it, flyboy.”

Hal pulled a face and grabbed her hand, shaking it firmly, and when (Y/N) pulled back and stalked off, he grimaced and wiped his hand down his pants—but he was happy she finally agreed.

***

“It’s been a long time since I had good Cuban food,” she murmured, glancing towards the stars in the sky. “I’d forgotten how good it was.”

Hal looked over at her, folding his hands in his lap. “Before or after the program?”

(Y/N) hummed. “Before…I grew up in an old neighborhood in the suburbs of Jacksonville…there was a Cuban restaurant down the street from my house and we used to go there all the time for dinner.”

“Who’s ‘we’?”

“My family.”

Something in her tone seemed bitter, but also disheartened and lamenting. “Have you seen them since you came back?”

(Y/N) looked away and muttered darkly, “The government executed them when they couldn’t bring me in.” Her lips pulled down. “I heard that none of my family gave into their demands…they were loyal to me until the end.”

Hal felt his heart sink in his chest. “I’m so sorry, (Y/N). That’s horrible.”

She shrugged. “I killed the squad that attacked them…I got my revenge.” Her eyes found his as she looked back over. “What about you? Is your family still around?”

He found it hard to believe she didn’t know even though she knew everyone before she joined. “You don’t know my history?”

“I only know your name,” she responded. “And what little you’ve shared. Well…little is for Batman, you share an awful amount of yourself with everyone.”

Hal snorted and nudged her in the ribs. “Hey, just tryin’ to be friendly.” She smiled, waiting for him to speak, and when he did, his voice was just as sad as hers was. “I have a big family. Me, my siblings, my mom, everyone else.”

“No dad?” (Y/N) questioned and he looked at his hands.

“My dad died in a plane crash when I was a kid.” He sighed. “I witnessed it.”

“That’s…I’m sorry.”

“I swore I’d never bow down to my fears and when I turned eighteen, I joined the Air Force and followed in dad’s footsteps.” He huffed a breath. “I still get terrified when I fly…always have…but I do it to honor him.” Hal swallowed thickly, feeling warmth in his eyes. “I’ve always wanted to be someone that would’ve made proud.”

A hand touched his and he looked down at it, then to her, eyes widening when he saw tears silently running down her cheeks. “I’m sure your father is looking down on you with pride wherever he is, Hal.”

He couldn’t help but reach over with his free hand. “You’re crying?”

(Y/N) nodded. “Your story is…heart wrenching.” She leaned into his palm. “I feel your pain.”

“I—I can’t believe you’re crying for me though…no one’s ever done that.”

She reached up and wiped a tear that had fallen form his eye; he hadn’t realized it did. “You can cry too, Hal.” (Y/N) smiled sadly. “We might be strong…but we’re still human.” She reached up with her free hand and pulled his hand down from her face, squeezing it in hers. “Cry if you want to, Hal. I won’t judge you if you do.”

Hal didn’t want to cry. Not in front of her at least and he squeezed his eyes shut to keep them at bay. “It’s not manly to cry in front of a woman.”

“Everyone cries, Hal, even men.” (Y/N) leaned forward and took his face in her hands, pressing her forehead to hers. “You are allowed to feel.” He gazed into her eyes, this time not stopping the tears as they gathered in his; she smiled. “Fall to pieces, Hal…I’ll put them all back together.”

“Yeah?” he breathed tearfully, and she nodded, pressing her lips to his.

“Promise.”

Hal pulled from her grip and buried his face in her strong shoulder, and soon his body was shaking with sobs. And (Y/N) merely wrapped her arms around him.

“Let it go, Hal. Fall to pieces, darling.” She whispered, pressing kisses to his skin. “I’ll pick it all up.”

He kept apologizing, “I’m sorry’s” rolling off his tongue with each cry and she merely shook her head.

“Don’t be sorry, darling.” (Y/N) replied, turning her face to his cheek, pressing her lips to his skin. “Be human…be alive, Hal.”

His grip only tightened on her, and he shifted his face so he could see her, and he stared into her eyes, his own big, brown ones saddened, but full of heart and emotion. She threaded her fingers in his hair and smoothed it with gentle stokes and caresses.

He sniffed strongly and croaked, “The next time we go out, can we forgo the emotional moment?”

(Y/N) huffed a laugh and kissed him. “Sure, Hal.”

[dwellordream]

“…First and foremost, one of the strongest and most fundamental influences on medieval scholarship about women throughout the entire Middle Ages was the bible. Christian writers relied on the bible because of the fact that it represented God’s holy word, and as such offered important and (at least theologically) irrefutable ideas about women, the majority of which cast women in a decidedly negative light.

To be sure, there were (and still are) biblical verses that portrayed women in a more favourable – even militant – light, such as Deborah, a prophetess and leader of Israel who helped guide the Israelite army to victory over the Canaanites, and Jael, who it is written killed the Canaanite general Sisera, but the overall image of women is a negative one. Various passages throughout the bible reiterated how women were supposed to be, for instance, silent in public, submissive to their husbands, periodically unclean to touch, and scheming seducers of men.

Yet it was the Genesis story of creation and the Pauline Epistles which were to exert the most influence upon medieval conceptions of women. Indeed, Paul himself used the Genesis creation story, specifically the idea that women were created of man and that they caused the Fall of Man, to justify man’s superiority over women and show how women cannot be trusted and require male guidance. Similar concerns about women were displayed by the early Church Fathers, whose writings bridged the gap between the biblical and the medieval period and helped formulate much medieval Christian doctrine.

Their thought is indicative of why later medieval conceptions of women were primarily negative. There is, for instance, the uncompromisingly misogynistic view of writers like St Ambrose (c.338- 397) and St Jerome (c.347-420), who contended that ultimately women were the root of all evil and defined them primarily as lustful beings who must strive for the ascetic life in order to be reconciled with God. Only through a life of reflection and controlled living could women achieve salvation, for nothing else would suffice.

A slightly more temperate view is that of St Augustine of Hippo (354-430), whose writings, for various reasons, were highly influential in shaping the attitudes of the western Church in the Middle Ages and beyond. He adopted a more subtle approach to the issue and argued that although God only made man in his image and not women, both sexes resemble God at the level of the soul, a level which occurs whenever anyone from either sex contemplates or spiritually seeks out God through prayer and religious devotion. In that activity gender becomes redundant, and they both resemble God’s likeness.

Nevertheless, despite this spiritual unity of the sexes, women still differ from men physically and can only ever hope to be man’s helper, as noted in Genesis, thus it is only when a woman is together with her husband that she forms the image of God. By identifying women’s inferiority in their bodies therefore, Augustine was free to highlight the inherent sinfulness of the body and hence argue that women were more prone to sin and must be under male control.

Patristic and biblical sources, therefore, were highly influential in shaping High and Late medieval conceptions about women. Yet in order to understand one of the key writers in this area during the high medieval period, Thomas Aquinas, it is necessary to understand the work of Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), whose ideas about the nature of women remained virtually unknown in Europe until the mid-thirteenth century, but which then became an important base for later medieval discussions about women. We shall come to the rediscovery of Aristotle shortly, but first it is necessary to explore the essential elements of his thought.

He was, of course, the student of another great classical philosopher – Plato (c.428-c.347 B.C.), but unlike Plato, who suggested that men and women could to a certain extent participate equally in political life and military matters, Aristotle’s work left no doubt as to the subordinate and inferior role women should play in society. The clearest expression of this inferior status is found in Aristotle’s Politics and his ideas about the natural hierarchy of beings. This book described a natural order of ruler to ruled, where he contended that just as tame animals are by nature better than wild ones and should be ruled by humans if they are to be preserved, so ‘the relation of the male to the female is by nature that of better to worse and ruler to ruled’.

Such a statement leaves little doubt as to the subordinate role women naturally assumed in relation to men. Nevertheless, evidently trying to clarify and further distinguish the nature of this male-female relationship, he states that within the household the male rules over the female ‘for by nature the male is more fitted for leading than the female’. The male’s right to rule ‘by nature’ stems from the fact that, although women have the ability to deliberate and make decisions, they are nevertheless ‘not in control’ of this ability. In other words, women are able to reason, but they are unable to control their passions, unlike men, who can both reason and control their passions, and who therefore should rule over women.

Moreover, nature makes things for only one purpose; for women, their natural role was in bearing children and tending the household, which left the men free to practise politics – a role that accorded with, and was dictated by, nature itself. As a consequence, women must also be excluded from military participation, since, as Aristotle notes, ‘the political way of life...[is one]...divided between the needs of war and peace’. In other words, war was a political – and by implication – male-only affair. Women’s natural procreative purpose and inability to be in full control of their reasoning capacity shut them off from any political rule or military participation.

Important as these ideas would become in later medieval thought, however, they found no traction in medieval political thought until the mid-thirteenth century, when firstly the Nichomachean Ethics and then the Politics were translated into Latin in 1246/7 and c.1260/65 respectively. Their translation formed part of the larger rediscovery of Aristotle’s philosophy in the medieval West at that time and coincided with the flowering of Aristotelian studies in the universities at Paris and Oxford during the 1240s and 1250s.

Amongst the first to engage with this rediscovered material was Thomas Aquinas (c.1225-1274), whose Summa Theologica (written 1265-1274) is notable for the way in which it wove together the patristic writings of the early Church with the emerging naturalistic Aristotelian world view into a text which has been described as ‘at once more androcentric and less misogynist than the patristic inheritance’. More specifically, Aquinas helped synthesise the rediscovered works of Aristotle with more traditional Christian notions regarding the body-soul duality, and in so doing offered a new foundation and justification for male superiority in the physical world.

Adopting the Aristotelian idea of a natural hierarchy, in which those with more rationality ruled those with less, Aquinas applied it to the Christian tradition by placing God at the apex of a divine order of beings, over which He had supreme control. In this divine order man was possessed of a better intellectual capacity than woman, and although both sexes had a rational soul, men’s greater ability to reason made them naturally superior to the female sex, and the logical rulers of society. Women, on the other hand, were a sex created solely for purposes of reproduction and no other, since procreation was the only task which unquestionably required male- female cooperation, and in all other tasks man would be better served by another man in fulfilling that task.

Moreover, although women help ensure the survival of the species, Aquinas maintained that ‘man is yet further ordered to a still nobler vital action, and that is intellectual operation’, as man’s ultimate goal must be in striving for rationality through the perfection of the soul. Thus, in his conception, women serve an inferior bodily-related function, unlike men’s role as leaders and the natural rulers of the world in which they live. Furthermore, while both sexes have a rational soul and are formed in the image of God, men nevertheless have this image in a superior form to that of women.

In essence, therefore, Aquinas used Aristotle’s ideas on natural order to assert that the inferiority and subjugation of women was a natural state of affairs, and in so doing he helped reinforce the biblically based arguments earlier Christian theologians (such as the Fathers) employed to justify the subordinate position of women. Additionally, it is clear that his conception of women’s avowedly domestic social function left no place for women to fight in medieval militia or command troops.

In Aquinas’ view, women’s only true hope for equality with men lay in the resurrected state (after death) where, because both men and women are possessed of a rational soul, both sexes are able to come together in worshipping and loving God in a place where there is no need for any form of carnal expression or coitus. Thus, only once free of all bodily processes and temptations is Aquinas willing to afford women equal standing to that of men. For all his efforts to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy with the bible, however, it was not Aquinas but rather one of his students, Giles of Rome (c.1243-1316), who in fact made Aristotle’s ideas accessible to more than just a university audience.

His lengthy mirror-of-princes work De regimine principum (c.1281) – dedicated to the future French king Philip IV (1268-1314) and intended to help guide him in governance as well as princely conduct – was highly popular and widely translated into numerous languages (even today more than three hundred Latin manuscripts still survive). Indeed, it has been described as ‘the most successful product of the mirrors for princes genre’, probably because it was one of the few such works to bridge the gap between lecture theatre and noble household. This success can be attributed to the way in which Giles distilled the ideas contained in Aquinas’ work and presented them in a very readable and systematic format.

While the specifics of Giles’ arguments as far as they relate to female militancy are presented in the third subsection, for now it is enough to note that it was his work that provided the most publicly accessible expression of Aquinas’ political thought and of women’s supposed inferiority to man. Examining the development of political and theological thought up to its fusion in Aquinas’ work, therefore, there was evidently a generally negative, even hostile, attitude toward women, combined with a broad denial of any possibility that they could be useful for any public leadership role. It is fair to ask then what prejudiced these men, and many others not mentioned here, against women, why they were so unwilling to acknowledge that women could reason, and why they were so quick to denounce their sinfulness.

Although it is possible that individual experiences may have influenced what these authors wrote, the clearest explanation for such attitudes is that women’s roles were classified on the basis of their biological differences from men, and they were held to a different standard because of it. As Susan Okin notes, philosophers and theologians were led to define women ‘by their sexual, procreative and child-rearing functions within [the family]’, thus theoretically constraining the roles which women might perform outside of private life. Moreover, by linking women to temporal and less rational bodily processes, Christian theologians could argue that women were more prone to suffering a loss of control or reason (for instance, during sex), just as the first woman, Eve, was the one tempted and who caused the Fall of Man.

Invariably this line of argument led them to conclude that all women were inferior to men in practically every way and that their only conceivable temporal purpose was as an aid in reproduction. Such sweeping generalisations suggest that there was a subtle, if ill-defined, male fear of ‘female sexuality and reproductive functions’, perhaps because the vast majority of medieval authors were members of an educated but celibate clergy who rarely came into contact with women and were, consequently, quick to point out the supposed faults and weaknesses of women.

Furthermore, we cannot rule out the role patriarchy had in shaping negative views of women in the High to Late Middle Ages. Patriarchy emphasised a certain core set of male-centred values and beliefs that included such qualities as strength, logic, rationality, calmness under pressure, control and toughness – all of which were well suited to the political and military arena. In medieval times (and even today) this meant that more traditionally ‘feminine’ values, such as cooperation, equality, compassion, and emotional awareness, were not emphasised and consequently less valued, especially when it came to war.

As a result, medieval authors espoused a general belief in the universally passive or timid nature of women, as opposed to the ‘active’ nature of all men, which they used to help delineate the differences between the turbulent (but logical and rational) male world and the more tranquil female domestic sphere. Thus, female involvement in public affairs would have challenged or compromised the traditional image of men as the ones who engaged in public activity and who defended those believed to be unable to defend themselves, namely women and children.”

- James Michael Illston, ‘An Entirely Masculine Activity’? Women and War in the High and Late Middle Ages Reconsidered

[jazzistolkienfanfics]

Beads and Braids - Kili x reader

Type: Imagine  Pairing: Kili x reader Summary: post BOTFA, everyone lives!AU, in which Y/N, a girl from Rohan seeking shelter in Erebor, befriends the Princes, and the mischievous Kili needs better ways of confessing his feelings. Warnings: ‘fuck’, ‘shit’ Word Count: 2735

All italicised, non-English words are in Khuzdul, one of the main Dwarvish languages.

Y/N was no stranger to being alone, nor was she unused to being unusual. Being on the run from a dangerous league of hunter assassins that were sweeping through her hometown of Rohan, spending months trying to reach Erebor, the Mountain of Gold, then arriving only to be turned away, had taught her not to care too much about loneliness.

Sure, she’d been allowed in eventually, after she’d insisted to the stingy King Thorin Oakenshield that she had ‘absolutely no fucking interest in your goddamn gold’, but the reminder that she wasn’t wanted in Erebor still stung dully day after day, even as she attempted to bury the emotion beneath layers of stone. 

Although, she was no longer completely shunned while in Erebor. The first few weeks had been difficult, especially as she was at least eight inches taller than everyone else, even as a relatively short human - Y/N was surrounded by Dwarves, and it was a transformative experience (she enjoyed being tall for a change). 

But as time went on, the Dwarves became far more accepting - mostly because when Bard visited with his children, Sigrid and Tilda (who was the reason they were there, to say hello to the ‘lucky Dwarves from the toilet’, namely Dwalin, her favourite) and saw her, he spouted a whole speech on the helpfulness of humans in the Battle of the Five Armies, especially how a number of them had charged Azog’s numbers, saving the line of Durin. That made Thorin begrudgingly become kinder to her.  

Y/N spent most of her days outside the cold fortress, reading old books on Dwarven culture and their previous interrelations with other relations on the ramparts or the grasses below the Mountain. It was on one of such days that she ran into someone who would change her life.

Well, Y/N didn’t run into him.

He really ran into her.

Y/N had been sitting on the ramparts, her legs swinging over the side and continually tucking her h/c hair behind her ears as the wind blew it into her face. A large book with a f/c leather cover that had stood out to her in the towering shelves of the Library was sitting in her lap, gold-leaf lettering across the front of it boldly proclaiming ‘A History of the Honourable Line of Durin’. She’d been told by Balin (a frequenter of the Library) that it was updated often with the latest triumphs of the youngest of the Line of Durin: Thorin, Fili and Kili, the Royals Under the Mountain.

Y/N wouldn’t lie, she was mostly reading it to make fun Thorin, but then again, history was interesting. 

She looked up from a particularly hilarious passage about Thorin’s ‘incredible bravery and innumerable acts of service to the Throne of Erebor’ at the harsh cry of a raven. It circled around her, cawing enthusiastically with something less akin to malevolence and more to happiness in its black eyes, before flying off. 

Y/N had been smiling but she frowned when she realised that the raven was not flying towards Erebor, as most did, but away from it.

Then it had to be flying away from something … Y/N connected the dots just as the door to the battlements whipped open and something slammed into her back just as she was turning around, knocking her off the ramparts.

She screamed loudly, looking at the ground beneath her and envisioning the fifty different ways she would splatter all over it.

A hand encased in a brown glove but for the fingers suddenly swung into her view, catching ahold of hers in a startlingly tight grip.

Y/N looked up, seeing a Dwarvish face that was at once familiar and entirely seperate from her small existence in Erebor, and she couldn’t put a name to him.

His brown hair reached just past his shoulders, and was not braided. Paired with his beardless, kinda attractive face (stubble did not count in Y/N’s eyes), Y/N reached the conclusion that he was still young, definitely under 100.

He was holding onto her with one of his hands and his other was held by a blonde Dwarf with much more facial hair than the former and a messy blonde mane like a lion who stood behind the battlements where she had been sitting prior to being knocked off by (presumably) one of the two. 

Y/N was very impressed that the Dwarf was holding her up with one hand, as she was at least more than half a foot taller than him, but she had no energy to be focused on that emotion beyond the hot fear coursing through her veins.

“Oi! Pull!” the brown-haired Dwarf yelled, and the blonde did so, clenching his teeth and heaving, until all three of them were safe on the ramparts.

“I am so sorry for my brother’s clumsiness, Miss Y/N!” the bearded, seemingly older Dwarf apologised. 

“Itkit! (Shut up!)” the younger brother hissed, giving the blonde a scathing glare. “But I do apologise, Lady Y/N.” He emphasised the title he gave her, though it was definitely not one she actually possessed.

“I’m sorry,” Y/N replied to the two enthusiastic Dwarves with confusion etched all over her face. Here they were, having knocked her off the side of a fucking Castle, calling her ‘Lady’ and apparently knowing her name when she could not match a name to either of their faces. “How do you know my name? Do I know you?”

“Oh, that’s right,” the brunette said thoughtfully, turning to his brother. “Uncle Thorin said she was new.”

“He also said she was a-”

“Oh Mahal, shut up! How many languages do I have to say that in?”

Uncle Thorin? Oh shit ....

“Anyway. Prince Fili-”

“-and Prince Kili-”

“At your service!” they both chimed, bowing low in unison and springing back up with wide grins that made them seem a lot younger than they probably were.

“Fuck...” Y/N muttered under her breath, curtseying as low as she could. “My Princes, I apologise-”

Her embarrassed apology was cut short with a squeak flying from her mouth as she was yet again jerked up by Kili, who brushed off her f/c dress that was dirty from falling off the ramparts. 

“Lady Y/N, you needn’t apologise; it is technically my fault for knocking you off the walls of Erebor!”

“Then you needn’t call me Lady Y/N,” the girl retorted, almost instantly regretting the familiarity with a royal figure, but also proud when Kili gave a loud laugh and wide smile. “I’m just Y/N.”

“Alright then, Just Y/N,” Kili teased, wiggling his eyebrows and taking her hand, kissing it gently. “On behalf of the Prince of Erebor-”

“-Princes, you little shit,” Fili interrupted, casually spinning a knife on his fingers.

“... Princes of Erebor,” Kili rolled his eyes. “Welcome, new friend.”

---

“You two are unbelievable,” Y/N complained, though a wide smile was affixed on her face.

“We know,” Fili and Kili replied, both still covered in flour from when they’d begun to throw it like snowballs in the middle of baking with her. 

“Well, at least we salvaged-” Y/N cut herself off as she took the cake out of the oven. “Mahal. What is that?”

The cake was less a cake, and more a complete mess. Half of it looked gooey and porous, and the other half burnt. Y/N just turned to the brothers, raising an eyebrow.

They eyed each other too, shuffling their feet. 

Y/N sighed. “This is why we don’t have food fights in the kitchen, guys.”

Fili and Kili had the decency to look a little sheepish as Y/N turned to dump the mess in the bin. As she did so, she glanced out the window and flinched.

“Shit! I’m meant to meet Bard soon - it’s a meeting of great importance. And I’m not ready, there is flour everywhere, my hair is a mess-”

“Well, we can handle at least one of those things,” Kili told Y/N, lightly pushing her into a chair, his hands clean of flour now. “I know a really good hairstyle for special occasions - our mother used to wear it.”

He began to run his fingers through her hair, gently untangling the knots with a brush Fili gave him (honestly, how much did that Dwarf have in his coat?) and braiding it. Y/N closed her eyes, enjoying the feeling of his hands in her hair and its soothingness. Suddenly, she opened her eyes, flushing red. 

Was she falling for the Prince of Erebor?

No, surely not. After all, he was a dwarf, and she a human: a human the King of Erebor didn’t exactly have a partiality towards. It would never work out.

That doesn’t mean feelings just stop, dumbass. Y/N’s brain reasoned. She rolled her eyes at herself. 

 “Alright, it’s done! And Fili and I will clean up the kitchen,” Kili announced, pulling her up and lightly dusting off her f/c dress, careful to avoid any areas it was improper to touch, a small hint of pink on his cheeks as he did so. Y/N pulled some of her hair around her shoulders - Kili had done several braids amongst her loose hair, most of them tied with black bands but one with a beautiful bead in it that she didn’t get a proper look at.

(A/N - imagine this hairstyle, but only one bead, and that bead has lots of jewels all in different colours)

“We’ll clean up what?” Fili protested. Kili smirked, pushing her out the door.

“We’ll see you later, Y/N!”

---

Y/N ran as fast as she could, considering her annoyingly impractical skirt, and she finally skidded to a stop in the snow outside the great doors, taking in who was there.

Bard bowed his head in greeting, his eldest daughter, Sigrid by his side. (Y/N had thought she had heard faint giggles from inside, meaning Tilda was hanging out with Dwalin again), Thorin stood impatiently, leaning on his sword, and next to him, keeping a petty distance was …

“My lord Thranduil,” Y/N bowed, having also read all about the infamously glamorous Elvenking of Mirkwood. “I apologise for my tardiness.”

“You are on time, Y/N,” Bard said, giving Thorin a side-eye. The damages of the Battle of the Five Armies went far beyond death. 

Thorin chose to sit on a ledge that a) placed him higher than all of those present and b) allowed him to rest. Recovering from being impaled by the Pale Orc was a lengthy process, and one still far from finishing. 

“What is the importance of this meeting?” Y/N asked, eager to go back to her chambers and think on the startling discoveries she’d made on what her heart told her about Kili Durin.

“The purpose, Y/N, is for this …”

---

After the meeting, Y/N went to leave, but Thorin called her name, stopping her.

“Yes, my King?”

He reached for one of the braids Kili had put in her hair, smiling kinder than she had ever seen him do so.

“Kili’s bead. So you have not tamed the Lion, but you have chosen the Fox. Loyal, yet cheeky and sweet.”

Y/N opened her mouth, confused, but Thorin kept speaking.

“I congratulate you on your courtship, Y/N. I wish you much love and happiness.”

“My King, I’m sorry, but I am not courting-”

He swept off in a majestic swirl of furs, leaving Y/N with a finger raised and her eyebrows wrinkled in confusion.

“Courting?” she wondered aloud. “What in Middle-Earth ...” 

Suddenly, she recalled Thorin’s observation of ‘Kili’s bead’, and she pulled her hair in front of her face, scanning it for the singular, beautiful silver bead, with its nine differently-coloured gemstones, and some vague thought buried in the back of her brain called to her.

“That Dwarf ...” Y/N cursed colourfully, tossing her hair over her shoulder, picking up her skirts and running as fast as she could to the most familiar area of Erebor.

The Library. Shelves upon shelves, thousands stretching out further than Y/N could see from the entrance. She raced for the section on Dwarvish customs, pulling a dusty red tome titled ‘Dwarves and Their Secrets - The Rites and Customs of Their Culture’ and flipping through it, coughing as swirls of dust swam into the air.

Finding the page she was after, she slammed the open book onto a nearby table, running her finger down the page as her h/c hair fell in her face.

“That little fuck,” Y/N hissed, closing the book with a slam and sliding down one of the shelves until she sat on the floor, her arms curled around her knees, her face hidden from the world and vice verse by her h/l hair.

“So you found out,” a meek voice said, prompting Y/N to lift her head as Kili sat next to her.

“You bet your non-existent beard I did,” Y/N grumbled. 

“I’m sorry,” Kili mumbled, burying his face in his hands, which were large, the same size as yours. “I didn’t know how to tell you that I liked you. I chose the coward’s way out.”

“I can understand that,” Y/N admitted. “Although telling everyone that why were courting via my hairstyle was not the smartest way of going about it.”

“Well, technically, your hairstyle doesn’t say you are dating. (A/N: this part here is completely made up) These braids in this style, paired with the loose hair actually means unrequited love. And seeing as I did your hair, and I have a matching braid-” he briefly pushed his hair behind his ear, pulling on a small braid, that was, indeed matching, even with a simpler version of the bead, with only two gems. “-it basically tells everyone that I have a crush on you. Uncle Thorin just misunderstood because he only looked at the bead, which he knows I own.”

“What do the gems mean?” Y/N asked, knowing she was avoiding the topic of Kili’s love for her and her possible love for him, but too afraid to cross that bridge.

Kili smiled nervously, already flushing from what he anticipated Y/N’s reaction to be, and he pulled the bead from her hair, pointing to each gem as he explained their meaning.

“The white one with the blue sheen - moonstone. It means patience, like how I am willing to wait for you. This pink one is morganite. It symbolises divine love and prosperity. These two are the ones that I have in my matching bead.” And Y/N saw that this was indeed true.

“The red ruby, which symbolises passion.” Kili’s cheeks looked as red as the jewel as he hurriedly moved on. “An emerald, green, which is fertility. Not only in children, but fertility in the soil that grows the flowers of success. Old wive’s tale. The purple one’s an opal - which is for emotional purity. It’s meant to guard against jealousy and anger. The garnet and the citrine - orange and the yellow - both stand for protection, though the citrine also provides prosperity and success.”

Y/N was completely entranced by his knowledge of the gems, even as he came to the last few.

“This pastel blue one is for fidelity, although I don’t think you need that, you have loads of it.” Y/N and Kili laughed together, and Kili fixed the bead back in her hair.

“Wait! You didn’t explain the last one!” Y/N protested, eager to hear more.

Kili stopped, smiling. “Oh. That’s a sapphire, which means trust, like how I’m trusting you with my heart. But I put it in there because it’s the exact colour of your eyes.”

Y/N was so touched by this last one, that he trusted her with his heart, even after she heard that it had been broken by the death of the Mirkwood elleth, Tauriel, that she threw her arms around him, squeezing him tight. On the floor, they were a similar height, and he hugged her back lightly.

“You know, Kili of the Line of Durin,” Y/N said teasingly as her arms lingered around his neck, though she pulled back so she could look him in the eye. “I think I need to thank you for the bead and the braids, because you made me realise something.”

“What?” Kili breathed.

“I realised I’m kinda in love with you.”

And hidden in the endless shelves of the library, Y/N kissed him, right there and then.

Hi there guys! I’ll be putting up a dialogue prompts request list soon for you to request UP TO THREE numbers.

Thanks for reading! Please feel free to heart this imagine, give me a follow and/or request (it makes my day so much!).

[bootleg-sara]

Accidently created a bunch of hcs and theories for the beggars despite how little of the role they play in the story that drove me to develop them to begin with.

Anyhow wild thought, bums are just legless children of the basement that aren’t quite monsters but aren’t fully “there”, in a sense. You don’t want to be one though because being a beggar is akin to living hell on earth.

(Gonna go on for a bit about hc stuff in the undercut if you want to read it)

The beggars of the basement are a real interesting group for sure. The basement is a world were nearly everything inside is influenced by the kids inhabiting it. From many of the monsters being the dead kids of failed runs, to the items forming from seemingly nothing, every element of the basement is the direct result of the energy taken from the kids preforming “runs”. Beggars are no exception. While the kids don’t know for sure, it’s commonly accepted that beggars are the reanimated corpses of previous runs and/or other children who may or never been in the basement bur where close enough to be affected that haven’t quite lost their humanity yet. (The basement does love to bring corpses back from the dead, and the kids keep on living a death cycle)

They are mostly tricksters, though do help simply because they can get more of what they want that way. All beggars speak their ow language the basement dwellers can’t understand, which sounds a lot like grunts and whines. It’s not a complicated language, just enough to communicate the important stuff. 

Now being a beggar in the basement is one of the worst ways you can live. Due to having to rely on their hands and whatever they can find to use as walking poles, they are terrible at movement. Not at all mobile. Because of their awful movement they are easy targets for anyone who happened to be hungry or simply a little more upset than usual. Beggars have to rely on staying in arcades to avoid monsters, and if they can’t find one or aren’t let in, do the next best option of hiding amongst large piles of rocks. Not as protective but helps in a pinch. Rarely they’ll be seen in shops hiding or purchasing items, though beggars and shopkeepers have a notoriously bad relationship.

As said before they can be tricksters, but all beggars have a natural respect for the kids of the basement. Not because they like them or anything, but because they know that in the grand scheme of things, the kids are the one’s who have more control over their lives than themselves. It’s not uncommon for a kid to murder a beggar for a multitude of different reasons, so bargaining has to be done with care. Even so the kids aren’t known as merciful people and sometimes even the more generous beggar will end up on the chopping block. 

Oh but even if you’re lucky enough to not die by the hands of the kids, your fellow beggar isn’t much nicer. Skull game beggars in particular are known for using the skulls of other beggars in their games. If your a normal beggar and a skull game loses/breaks a skull, you better hope they aren’t desperate for coins in that moment.

Most special variants of the beggar (rotten, bomb, key, and battery bums) are a result of a normal/devil beggar being dragged into the shift of the basement. While the basement isn’t one single place, but a large collection of many, beggars are constantly being shifted along with the rest of the area after the death of a kid ending a run. The constant strain of shifting realities causes the beggars to be mangled more and more along with it. If you can even survive long enough to be affected that is. It comes with plenty of it’s own drawbacks and benefits. The affect makes you more sturdy and/or better at hiding (aka being able to get easier access to secret rooms), but you lose yourself more to the basement. These beggars often lose the knowledge of any kind of verbal communication, but can still offer help to passing kids. Essentially you become more like a living corpse than before, whether it be the lack of will or constant anger.

Other random little fact: The items they will give to you after enough coin donations are made on the spot with said coins. The bags they carry with them work a lot like T. Cain’s bag of crafting, though on a much smaller scale and requires more material. It’s the reason why they can give pickups but can’t be killed and robbed for a free health upgrade or whatever they have.

There is more I could get into, but this is long enough for now and the most of the rest of what I would say is a lot about the functions of the basement rather than the beggars themselves.

[writerthreads]

How to write POC characters, by a POC writer

by Writerthreads on Instagram

This post will be our second attempt at doing this topic. This time will be more of a discussion where I don't tell you what to do but allow you to think about how you can write about a POC character. I will be tackling these four questions: 

What makes someone their race/ethnicity?

How should writers mention their race/ethnicity?

How can you avoid whitewashing POC characters?

Should White authors write POC main characters?

It is important to note that I am a teenager who’s from Hong Kong (and lives there right now), so I don't experience racism towards myself as I'm not an ethnic minority where I live. My experiences as an East Asian will be different from other POC. My opinion is my personal opinion, which doesn't speak for everybody in my community, let alone the entire POC/BIPOC community.

What makes someone their race?

Race: "A grouping of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into categories generally viewed as distinct by society."

Ethnicity: "a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups such as a common set of traditions, ancestry, language, history, society, culture, nation, religion, or social treatment within their residing area." 

Someone of a particular ethnicity might have specific habits, eat or not eat particular kinds of foods, take part in unique customs or speak a certain language, amongst other characteristics that "makes someone a certain ethnicity". 

However, just because they don't do any of these things doesn't immediately make them not a part of that ethnicity. I know many friends who are from Hong Kong but can't speak or understand our native dialect or speak Mandarin fluently. This doesn't make them less of a Hongkonger. 

When you're writing a POC character, you can talk about ethnic-specific things the character does, for example, celebrate holidays like Diwali or Lunar New Year. It is essential to know the customs that come with these festivals and how they differ between regions or countries. 

Universal celebrations, such as birthdays, can also have different traditions. For example, my mum's region-specific culture in China dictates that people eat noodles on their birthdays because noodles are long and represent long lives.

How should writers mention their race/ethnicity?

To me, race is literally just the physical characteristics of a person. However, writers are often criticised for describing too little of a POC character's physical features or not mentioning that they're a particular race, making the character appear "too white". Some authors have also been criticised for failing to describe BIPOC characters adequately, for example calling darker-skinned BIPOC characters "tan". 

Commenters on our Instagram account have pointed out that skin tones shouldn't be described with edible words, such as "caramel", "chocolate" or "coffee". However, it is fine for hair colours. 

I think the author should explicitly point out a character's race or, at a bare minimum, describe them appropriately. The writer can also choose to use specific last names that help readers identify the particular character's ethnicity. There can also be variations of a surname that point out where the character is from. For example, "Li" is Mandarin Chinese, "Lee" is Cantonese, Lê is Vietnamese, and the surname is transliterated to Lai or Lye in Central and South China.

Sometimes, POC characters are portrayed with stereotypes. I guess stereotypes all start with an element of truth, but they don’t represent the entirety of the stereotyped group. For example, my year group’s further pure maths school is entirely asian people (with the exception of three biracial kids and one who dropped out). There is an issue of where a personality trait becomes a stereotype, and it up to the writer and the beta readers to decide. Personally, I would love to see characters who break stereotypes, but I understand if POC characters have a stereotypical trait as long as it is portrayed well.

How can you avoid whitewashing POC characters?

Sometimes when I read a story about a POC main character, they don’t seem to be of that race or ethnicity apart from their physical features. They act like every other person in their community, and that’s totally okay. But as a person of colour, I think it’ll be nice to have different kinds of POC characters, some who might switch between languages or some who don’t know how to speak their mother tongue. 

If there’s a character who is presented as “too white”, why are they “too white”? Justify their “whiteness” with external or internal factors, which could be the fact that they really want to fit in or they have just been brought up in an environment where their culture isn’t really represented. Explain to the readers how these factors have impacted their perception of their culture and their identity, and identify problems with oppression and the necessity of representation.

I really liked the portrayal of Asian-American/Canadian families in Fresh Off the Boat and Kim’s Convenience, if you’re interested, you can watch them on Netflix or another streaming service. I think TV shows are better as there are different stories within the storyline as opposed to one main fictional plot with subplots in books and movies.

Should White authors write POC main characters?

As far as I’m aware, there’re two different points of view: “poor representation is better than no representation”, and “poor representation is more harmful”.

People who think that poor representation is better seem to think that having representation ensures that non-POC readers are exposed to more diverse castings, even though they are inaccurately portrayed. If these books are turned into TV shows or movies, POC actors will be used, which benefits them. However, there are more people who think that poor representation is worse because the characters don’t really represent us POC people. 

In my opinion, as long as the portrayal of POC characters aren’t harmful but just not enough, I think it’s OK as long as nobody is misguided about us or any race/ethnicity in particular. If you’re a white author writing POC characters, also run your draft with POC beta readers to make sure what you’re writing is politically correct. Use multiple POC beta readers, because one might find something un-offensive when another might. 

I encourage White authors to write about POC characters but not stories about being a person of colour. This is because they don’t really understand what is is being a person of colour and have to rely on resources that might be inaccurate. They can only offer a limited perspective, and this argument can also be applied to straight people writing LGBTQ+ characters. (I’m straight, confirmed by bi friend)

Before I end this post, I would like to remind you once again that this is purely my opinion, and you are free to disagree with anything if you know what you’re saying. (and you’re not a White person deciding on what’s racist or not) 

[skylights2000]

Blush (Kazuichi x Fem! Reader) Part 1

This is my first story with a Female Reader, but if you guys don’t like it that way, I can rework it to make the reader Genderneutral. Let me know what you think 💜

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Kazuichi had only agreed to this stupid ritual because Sonia asked him, and Miu said she’d drag him here herself if he didn’t show up.

He’d gone through the motions, trying his best not to panic, but that all went out the window when the lights above their heads burst, showering, Miu, Sonia, Gundham, and him with sparks.

He stood there, frozen in horror, as smoke swirled from the center of the salt circle they’d made. A figure slowly appeared as the mist began to vanish. The lights flickered back on, and standing in the middle of the circle was what appeared to be a woman.

She was wearing a dark purple t-shirt and black jeans. She would look like a regular person if it weren’t for the dark spirals that curled up her arms, and the pair of curled, dark purple horns that protruded from her head.

She looked around the room before her eyes settled on him. She moved silently and at a speed his eyes couldn’t keep up with. In a heartbeat, she was standing at the edge of the salt circle, her dark purple eyes boring into his.

He jumped, stumbling backwards. She held out her hand, frowning when her hand met the barrier created by the salt circle.

“Mm, that’s unfortunate.” Her voice was soft, slightly deeper than most women he’d met.

She hooked her thumbs through her belt loops and turned to face Sonia and Gundham. “You called?”Gundham nodded calmly. “We wish for you to imbue this mechanical being with a living soul.”

She moved back to the center of the circle where Kiibo laid. She crouched down beside him, inspecting it quietly.

“No.”

“What?!” Miu screeched. “You have to! Please!”

She turned to Miu with an exasperated frown. “It’s not that I don’t want to. It’s that I can’t.”

“How is that possible? Your power is quite immense from what I can tell.” Gundham asked curiously.

“Even with my power, giving this robot a living spirit would take too much of my energy. I’d be completely immobilized. If I went back to my world in that condition” She scowled darkly. “I’d be ripped to shreds.”

“Then stay here until you’re strong enough to go back!” Miu countered fiercely.

The demon ran a hand through her hair, frustration written across her face. “It doesn’t work like that.”

“Why not?!”

“I’m a demon. My energy doesn’t replenish on its own. I gain energy from others through physical touch.” She explained.

“Then touch one of us!”

“No!” She snapped, finally losing her cool. “Taking that much energy from a human at one time would kill them!”

Miu finally went silent as she processed the words. “Then can’t you take someone’s energy a little at a time?”

“I can in theory, but it’s hard to find a human that’s willing to agree to something like that.”

“Take Kazuichi!” Miu offered, ignoring Kazuichi’s sputtered protests.

The demon glanced at him, a ghost of a smile dancing at the corners of her lips. “As tempting as that is, I don’t think you should be volunteering your friend without asking him.”

Every head turned to Kazuichi, and he instantly stiffened under their gazes.

“I..” He looked at Kiibo, the metal robot that he and Miu had painstakingly made by hand. They’d spent months building and improving the robot until it nearly looked like a real person. He glanced to Miu, who was watching him with a painfully hopeful expression.

He swallowed thickly, squared his shoulders, and locked eyes with the demon woman. “I’ll do it.”

“Are you sure?”

He nodded stiffly, trying to hide how nervous he actually was. She shot him one last doubtful look before shrugging and turning away from him. He watched in shock as her fingers grew into long, black claws. Just as she was about to dig them into the ground, Sonia spoke up quickly. “Wait!”

The demon paused, head raising to look at Sonia from where she stood. “Yeah?”

“You can’t carve anything on the ground. We don’t own this building.” Sonia explained.

The demon glanced around the room before nodding. “Take me somewhere where I can.”

She leaned forward and picked Kiibo up as if he weighed nothing. It had taken both Kazuichi and Gundham to move Kiibo the few feet to get him in the circle, but she carried him with ease. She stood at the edge of the salt circle, and Sonia kicked some away to make a path for her.

The demon woman nodded gratefully and moved to stand beside Sonia. “Lead the way.”

Gundham led them outside the building and into a grassy area outside. “Put it here.”

She laid Kiibo in the spot Gundham was pointing to and told them to back up. She used her claws to draw a large circle around Kiibo, carving several strange symbols inside as she went.

When she was done, she crouched down next to Kiibo and took one of his smooth, metal hands. The symbols she carved began to glow, softly at first but rising until the light lit up the area around them. He could hear her talking, her voice carried by the wind that swirled around them, whipping his hair into his face. The words were different, spoken confidently in a language he didn’t understand. Her body began to shift, the spirals on her arms began to curl all the way up her neck, framing her face and branching across her cheeks. A pair of large, dark wings protruded from her back, shielding their eyes from the blinding explosion of purple light that followed. The light slowly began to fade until all that was left was a soft glow coming from Kiibo’s chest. Once it faded, Miu rushed forward, cradling Kiibo’s head in her lap.

The demon girl shifted to sit on the ground, using one arm to hold herself up while the other was clenched in the center of her chest. “..He’ll wake up..tomorrow..” She choked out, each word strained and laced with pain.

“Are you okay?” Sonia asked worriedly as she crouched down beside the horned woman.

She nodded stiffly. “Just..took more than..I thought it would..” She glanced back at Miu. “You need..to take him..inside..” At the curious looks she received, she clarified. “A storm..is coming..”

“You can sense the shifting of the weather patterns.” Gundham spoke up, tapping his chin thoughtfully.

“Whatever, just help me with this, man.” Kazuichi said.

He and Gundham worked together to carry Kiibo back into the garage while Miu and Sonia worked together to cover the markings in the dirt before returning to her side.

The demon had clambered to her feet, swaying dangerously when she moved. Sonia and Miu rushed forward to catch her, supporting as much of her weight as they could. She was taller than both of them, so it was a bit difficult, but they managed to help her into the building.

By the time they got inside, her wings had vanished and the spirals on her skin had receded back to their original place. They helped her over to a bench nearby, and she sat down, leaning her head against the wall.

Miu glanced over at Kiibo and smiled softly. “Thank you.”

She laughed breathily. “You better enjoy that damn robot. Nearly killed myself for it.”

Miu grinned at her excitedly. “Hell yeah, I’ll enjoy it!” As if to prove her point, she ran over to the robot man and began excitedly tinkering with several things to get him plugged in. She assumed it was so that he could charge.

“Oh my, how rude of me!” The demon glanced at Sonia when she spoke. “My name is Sonia Nevermind.” Sonia held out her hand happily, and when the demon woman hesitated, Sonia took her hand instead. “What’s your name?”

“...Call me (Y/n). That was my human name.”

“You have another name?”

The demon, (Y/n), nodded but didn’t specify what that name actually was.

Sonia squeezed her hand gently. “You can have a bit of my energy.”

(Y/n) turned to her sharply, eyes narrowing skeptically. “You’re sure about that?”

Sonia nodded seriously, and after a second, she felt a spark at her fingertips. When (Y/n) removed her hand from Sonia’s she still didn’t look great, but she no longer looked like she was in pain. “Thank you.”

Sonia smiled sweetly and headed off towards her friends. (Y/n) watched as she tapped the pink haired man on the shoulder. What had they called him, Kazuichi?

(Y/n) watched Sonia’s mouth move, tempted to use her stronger hearing to hear the conversation, but she decided against it. She shouldn’t be eavesdropping.

She really wished she had though when Kazuichi started walking towards her.

He approached her hesitantly, like she would suddenly rip out his heart. She was honestly a bit offended by his reaction, but she supposed she couldn’t blame him.

The portrayal of demons amongst humans, both in writing and in word of mouth, was quite horrendous. Most of the things said about demons were actually wrong.

Many people claimed demons were monstrous beings that were created by and served Lucifer, but that wasn’t entirely true. Every demon was once human, but only the vilest, most horrible demons served under Lucifer.

She was not one of them. She had been born a human, though her father was, indeed, a demon. Her father was a truly wretched demon. Being his daughter had plagued her from the beginning, filling her head with horrible thoughts and desires for destruction.

In the end, it started to become too much to control. The only way to fix it was to perform a ritual that would denounce him as her father. The only problem was that the ritual would kill her.

She’d done it knowing that, and for that, she was to be locked out of heaven for one thousand years as her punishment. She was currently 999 years old. One more year and this hell she’d suffered would be over. She would be allowed into heaven and have any remnants of her father cleansed from her soul forever.

That thought had been enough to keep her going, to keep her hoping.

She was so lost in thought that she didn’t realize Pinky had reached her until he was standing right in front of her.

He pointed at the spirals on her arm that had begun to shift, almost like they were flickering. “What’s goin’ on with those marks?”

“Since I’m only half-demon, it takes a certain amount of energy to keep up my demon form. Soon, I’m gonna have to switch back to my human form.”

“You’re half-human?”

“Yeah. My mom was a human.”

He shuffled awkwardly. “So what now?”

“Whaddya mean?”

“Aren’t you like” He waved his hand as if that would answer her question. “feeding off me?”

Her eyebrows drew together. “You say that like I forced you to agree to that.”

“You did!”

She glared at him, not even caring when he flinched. “I didn’t tell you to do shit. In case you’re forgetting, I even asked you a second time if you were sure about it. The second you said ‘yes’, it became your problem. I don’t know about here, but in the demon world, a promise is a binding contract.” She scowled at him, irritation written across her face. “You think I wanted to be here? The only reason I showed up is because I owed the on-call demon a favor. If I knew I’d be knocking on death’s doorstep for the second time, I woulda said no.” She snapped angrily.

She pinched the bridge of her nose, telling herself to calm down. Her father’s spirit came through much worse when she was angry, and that was the last thing she wanted. “Listen, I’m not here to start a fight. Figure out what you wanna do. Until then, leave me alone.” With that, she leaned her head back and closed her eyes.

She wished she was still human. If she was, maybe no one would look at her with such disgust. She was tired of the fear in people’s eyes when they saw her.

‘Just one more year, kid’ She told herself.

Just one more year.

[drabbles-of-writing]

Happy Birthday (pt 2)

This is part of my Four Years AU

AO3

Masterpost 

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

It was October thirteenth.

Luz’s first birthday without her mother.

She hadn’t told anyone what today was. She had mentioned it before, during the summer. But Eda and King weren’t known to be the best at remembering something so small from a single conversation.

They were already worried about her, it would only make things worse to remind them.

She saw the worried glances Eda and King gave her. Even Lilith looked concerned. Luz assured them she was fine before she holed up back in the library and, later, her room. Which she had made into makeshift into a study area.

Just because it was her birthday didn’t mean she had to stop trying. Even if it was her quinceañera.

‘Mamá must be worried.’ Her mind murmured.

‘She probably thinks you ran away.’ Added a snicker from the back of her mind. ‘She must think you hate her.’

Luz shook her head and hunched back over her papers. This wasn’t the time to mope and worry. This was the time for research! Even the words ran off the pages and her mind kept wandering.

‘You shouldn’t have gone through that door.’ Her thoughts spoke up again. ‘How bad could a reality check camp be, really? Would you really rather spend an eternity here, where your madre will never know if you're alive or dead?’

“Will you be quiet?” Luz snapped to no one.

‘Look at you,’ Her mind sneered back. ‘Talking to yourself. Maybe you did need that summer camp.’

Luz groaned and thunked her head on her desk, hands collapsing behind her neck. How was she supposed to work under these conditions?

She should’ve asked Gus to research with her. Out of all her friends, he was by far the most willing to spend all-nighters reading and searching for anything human. Any single link to the human realm.

This wasn’t to say Willow and Amity didn’t help her. They did, plenty of times. But it was always Gus she could call at two in the morning and ask to travel with her to some long-forgotten ruin on the slim chance it had even a sentence of human language on its stones. Amity was definitely a close second.

Everyone had tried. Even before the summer was over they had tried. Luz still beat herself up about not searching harder when she didn’t have to worry about her madre thinking she was lost somewhere. Every day that ticked by didn’t seem to bring her any closer to making it home.

The first week when summer vacation was over was horrible. Luz barely got any sleep and practically tore the library apart looking for any book on the human realm. She had crashed on the fifth day and slept all of the sixth. While she slept, her friends had taken up researching for her. Even Eda and King. Well, King tried. He couldn’t read all that well, but Lilith was happy to help.

Luz tried to at least get a few hours of sleep each day now. She still had bags under her eyes and her footsteps still dragged, but at least she wasn’t about to collapse anymore.

‘Mamá would tell you to go to sleep.’

Luz lifted her head and looked towards the window. It had originally been a hole in the wall courtesy of one of her recent adventures, so Eda had turned it into a wonky window instead of bothering to fix it up.

It was dusk. How had time gone by so fast?

Luz dug around in her desk for her glyphs and pulled out her light spell. She tapped the paper and it transformed into a small ball of light. She let it float next to her for a moment, simply watching it.

“She would like this spell.” Luz said to herself. “It doesn’t cost any bills to keep up.”

She almost laughed at her own joke. Almost.

‘Yeah, like she’d be proud of anything you did here.’

Luz sighed and turned back to the pages spread out before her. She stared blankly for a few moments, repeatedly telling herself to focus and failing to do so.

Then her bedroom door slammed open.

“LUZ!” King cried.

Luz yelped and shot backwards, tumbling out of her chair and hitting the wooden floor.

King winced and scurried over to where she lay, giving her a nervous look.

“Eh heh, sorry…”

“King! Don’t scare me like that!” Luz scolded, sitting up and rubbing her head.

“Sorry, but it’s important!” King said, waving his little arms. “Come on, come on!”

“Is something wrong?” Luz worried, standing up as King tugged on her cape.

“Well, no,” King said, still pulling her out of her room. “But it’s still important!”

Luz, more confused than ever, followed King as he finally let go of her cape and scampered down the stairs, practically shaking with excitement.

A part of Luz was expecting some prank he and Hooty had concocted. It wasn’t out of the ordinary for them these days.

Luz wandered down the stairs as King skittered towards the living room. She heard murmuring and frowned, slowing her steps until she was right by the doorway and peeked her head in, one hand resting on the doorframe.

Willow, Gus and Amity were sitting on the floor around the couch. They had pushed a table up in front of it. A cake sat on the table, and Amity was currently trying to stick in a candle shaped like a five next to the one shaped like a one, though was clearly having trouble as the candle was made of something very squirmy and kept shifting into something that looked more like a weird S.

Gus was trying to help contain the candle as Willow looked on with concern, holding a small square lidded box in her lap.

Eda and Lilith were sitting on the couch directing Gus and Amity with little success. As Lilith was also dealing with Hooty continuously bugging her with questions or whatever he ate outside that day.

King had just arrived and was now climbing onto the table, promptly freaking out everyone else who clearly didn’t expect him to be back so soon.

“Guys…?” Luz blinked, taking a step into the room.

Everyone's heads whirled around to her, none of them having expected her to make it downstairs faster than they anticipated.

Hooty, as per usual, was the first to break the silence.

“Hi, Luz!” He greeted. “We made a cake!”

“You didn’t do anything!” Lilith snapped. “All you did was be a lookout. A very lousy one, at that!”

“Hey! I deserve credit for doing something!”

“What...is all this?” Luz asked, deciding it was better to cut in before Lilith and Hooty started arguing again.

“What does it look like, kid?” Eda snorted, snatching the five candle from Amity and sharply sticking it into the cake, making it lopsided and causing clear distress to Amity’s OCD.

“This is what human birthdays look like, right?” Gus worried, sitting upright and putting his hands on the table. “Was there supposed to be streamers? I knew we should’ve gotten streamers,” He grumbled.

“No, no, it’s just…” Luz looked over everyone before her eyes landed on Eda and King, who had hopped onto the couch beside her.

“You...remembered?” She asked quietly.

“Of course we did! The King of Demons never forgets!” King said proudly.

“Yesterday you forgot that you drank your own apple blood and threw a fit because you thought someone else drank it.” Amity deadpanned.

“That was one time!”

“Happy birthday, Luz.” Willow said, gesturing for her to sit down and setting the small box on the table.

Luz slowly walked towards the table, sitting on her knees at the end of the table. Still stunned, she slid the gift closer to her and pulled off the lid.

Inside it was a book. It was dark blue with golden lining along the edges. It’s title in gold cursive read; Glyph Spells & Other Written Magic .

“Thought you could use one of those,” Willow said casually. “Since you’ve got your own students to teach now.”

“We all pitched in for it,” Eda said gleefully.

Amity gave the witch a very pointed glare. One that Eda sighed in response to.

“Alright, we all pitched in to look for it. Little Miss Rich over here paid for it.” She relented, pointing a thumb towards the girl.

“I tasted it!” Hooty added happily. “It tastes like old dust and death.”

Luz carefully lifted the book out of the box. It seemed like well-kept book. Though the frantic scratches among the cover here and there proved that it had likely been quickly cleaned before placed in the box. The pages were yellow and crinkled, and there was the occasional stain or tear. But overall, it wasn’t unreadable.

“Do you…” Amity swallowed. “Like it?”

Luz kept her eyes on the book for a few quiet seconds. She pulled the book close to her chest and lifted her head, trying and failing to fight back the tears welling in her eyes.

“I love it.” She said hoarsely, a wide smile stretched across her face.

Everyone in the room visibly relaxed, shoulders sagging.

“Does this mean we can have cake now?” King asked, impatiently tugging on Eda’s dress. “I’m starving!”

“Nope!” Hooty chirped, his head popped up beside Luz and startled her. “It’s group hug time!”

“Wait, wait, Hooty NO--!”

Hooty was faster than any of them could react and wrapped around them all, pulling them into a tight ball with Luz squished in the middle.

“A little more warning next time?” Gus wheezed from where he was currently being suffocated by the insistent bird tube.

“The cake!” Willow exclaimed.

Everyone craned their necks downwards towards the table.

Sure enough, amongst the struggle to get everyone in a circle, the cake had been knocked off the table and onto the floor, completely smashed against the carpet.

Everyone stared at it for a few moments.

“Floor cake!” King exclaimed. “The best kind of food!”

Nobody knew who laughed first, but it wasn’t long before everyone had smiles on their faces. Now, it didn’t seem to matter how human they made her party.

“Thanks, guys.” Luz said once she’d calmed down. “I...I think I needed this.”

“Any time, Luz.” Eda smiled.

Luz giggled and looked towards the stained windows of the Owl House. She could already hear Lilith and King arguing with Hooty again, probably to put them down, but it was tuned out.

The sky was completely dark now. And though the sky back home looked different than in the Boiling Isles, Luz couldn’t help but wonder if her mom was looking up at the stars, too.

She glanced back to her friends, still not processing any of the arguments or conversations they were having as they tried to free themselves from Hooty.

Yeah, she’d be okay.

Luz smiled and relaxed. Even if her mom didn’t know where she was, Luz could at least rest assured that she’d make it home, eventually. And she’d have real friends helping her out.

‘Keep that light on until I get there, mamá.’ She silently asked.

‘Te veré pronto.’

[allsassnoclass]

my only weakness (you know all my secrets)

I have had the great fortune to participate in @ashesonthefloor‘s Halloween fic event this year!  Honestly it was a blast and I’m super excited to see everyone else’s creations!

Event Masterlist

For this event, we all were assigned a pairing, then got to choose from a list of prompts.  My prompt was as follows: “You’ve told me three separate times now you have a vampire kink and I’m starting to wonder if you know I’m a vampire.” Or, pretty explanatory. One person is a vampire. The other has a vampire “kink”. (Can also be them saying they like the aesthetic, or trying to hint that they know and don’t mind. Literally do what you want with it) I strayed a little bit, but the prompt idea is still there!  Hope you enjoy!

Michael is having a hard time figuring out if the amount of vampire jokes and references is due to Ashton knowing his deepest, darkest secret, or if that's just his sense of humor.

Read on ao3

1.

The first time it happens, they’re heading to their first date.

Michael hasn’t really dated anyone since the 90s, because dating is complicated.  He doesn’t age.  He can’t eat regular food.  Going out in the sun is dicy at best and results in extremely painful sunburn at worst.  He shows up in most mirrors now, because they rarely have silver backing anymore, but pictures are a no-go because his eyes cause a lens flare.

The last person he went on an actual date with was Calum, because they’ve been friends for centuries and figured they might as well give it a go.  Michael wishes they could have worked, but it took some making out before they both agreed that, as much as they love each other, it’s all platonic.  The date itself was fun, but there were no romantic butterflies to be found.  Michael has seen Calum naked many times before, and while he can appreciate a handsome man, when it’s Calum it does nothing for him.

Ashton is very handsome.  He’s also funny, and passionate, and he’s got more than enough snark to speak Michael’s language.  He’s got tenacity and determination, and for some reason part of that determination got directed towards getting Michael on a date with him.

He didn’t have to work very hard.  Michael said yes at the first opportunity.

For the first date, Ashton asked if he could pick him up, so Michael waits nervously in his living room, listening to his grandfather clock ticking.  (He’s had it since 1733.  It was made specifically for him by the clockmaker, a parting gift because if Michael stayed in the area for too much longer, his lack of ageing would get suspicious.)

(This is such a bad idea.  Even if this date goes well, Michael can’t be in a relationship with a human for very long before his secret will slip.)

His phone vibrates with a message, and he nearly jumps out of his skin before he realizes that it’s just Calum, not Ashton about to cancel or spring a sudden change of plans.

Cal: have fun on your date ;) wow him with your Biting sense of humor

Michael: i hate you the puns got old centuries ago

Cal: you love them

Michael’s doorbell rings, startling him enough that he fumbles his phone and effectively cutting off any sort of argument he may have started to get into.  Michael stands from the couch, takes a deep breath, and answers the door.

Ashton looks really fucking good.  Michael has only really seen him in their work clothes, when Ashton is writing up articles about the local music scene and Michael is busy approving things to put on the website, but he dresses up very nicely.  His hair is artfully tousled in a way Michael knows must take a little bit of time, and Michael thinks there might be just a hint of glitter under his eyes that would make his heart palpitate if it still did stuff like that.  His shirt is short sleeved, showing off his arms nicely, and there are roses printed against the white fabric that match the ones in the bouquet in his hands.

Michael doesn’t know the last time someone gave him flowers.

“Hi,” Ashton says.  “You look amazing.”

Michael feels like he’s underdressed now.  He’s got on a black long sleeve, because the sun hasn’t fully set yet and he’s trying to cover as much skin as possible, and a pair of black jeans.  It’s a nicer shirt of his, something name brand that he can afford due to decades of saving here and there, but he’s well aware that his overall style leans more casual than dressy.

“Thanks,” he says.  “You look absolutely fantastic.”

Ashton glances down and smiles, pleased.  Michael likes that he can make him react like that.

“I got you flowers,” Ashton says.  “I hope you aren’t allergic.  It wouldn’t be the end of the world, but I’d feel silly.”

“I’m not,” Michael smiles, taking them from him.  There are a few sprigs of lily of the valley tucked in amongst the roses and ferns, and he takes a deep inhale.  He loves the sweet scent of roses and how lively fresh flowers can appear to be even when they’re dying.  Maybe it’s self-centered, but he likes to think there are some similarities between him and the plants.  They’re not alive anymore, but they’re still going, and they can still bring people a little bit of joy for a few impermanent moments before moving on.

“I’ll put these in some water.  You can step in for a second, if you want.”

He had excessively cleaned the entry and living room earlier in the evening, paranoid in case something like this forced Ashton inside.  At least now he’s certain that there’s nothing incriminating lying about.

“Nice place,” Ashton says.

“Thanks,” Michael replies, already booking it for the kitchen to grab a vase.  Once he gets there he takes a moment to try to stop the slight shake to his hands and compose himself.

You are an ancient, immortal being who has lived through the fall of empires, he scolds himself.  You can handle one date with a cute boy who brought you flowers.

Ashton beams when Michael says he’s ready to go.

“I was thinking we could walk, if that’s okay,” he says while Michael locks the door behind them.  “It’s not far.”

“Are you going to tell me where we’re actually going, yet?” Michael asks.  Ashton mimes zipping his lips.  The only information he gave Michael was that it’s going to be a pretty casual setting (and yet he showed up to Michael’s door looking like that) and that Michael won’t have to eat.  That’s something he specifically requested, making up a bunch of excuses about being gluten free and severely lactose intolerant and giving a list of other allergens a mile long.

“You’ll find out soon enough,” Ashton laughs when he pouts.  “Come on.”

He grabs Michael’s hand to start leading him down the street, and Michael absolutely will not admit to himself how nice it feels, warm and alive against his.

They go through some basic small talk on the way there, touching on current work projects since they’re in different departments and learning a bit more about each other’s families.  Michael makes an excuse about his being in Australia and tells Ashton about Calum instead, and Ashton fills time by describing his mom and siblings.  It’s cute to see the way he lights up, seeming radiant in the light of the setting sun that Michael has to squint harshly against.

“Wow, you really don’t like the sun,” Ashton says eventually.

“What? Oh, not really, I guess.”

“I should’ve known, but I wasn’t sure if all of you are fully nocturnal or not.”

“What?” Michael asks, alarm bells ringing.  “Why would you--what makes you say that?”

Ashton shrugs nonchalantly.

“You know.  You’re just so pale and pasty,” he says, obvious tease in his voice.  “Definitely closer to a creature of the night than an early bird, I’d guess.”

He’s joking.  Ashton has not, somehow, discovered his secret ten minutes into their first date.

“Oh fuck you,” he laughs.  “Not all of us can have perfect natural tans.  I burn really easily.”

“Do you glow in the dark, too?  Turn fluorescent under blacklights?”

“Shut up,” Michael says, but he leans a little into Ashton as he says it to let him know that the banter isn’t unwelcome.

“I suppose we’ll find out soon enough.”

Michael doesn’t have a chance to ask what he means before Ashton is pulling him towards the doors of a large building.  He holds it open for him like a gentleman, and Michael misses the contact of their hands but appreciates having all of his senses free to process the new environment, which is full of a plethora of new sights, sounds, and smells.

“Roller skating?” Michael asks, looking around the large arena.  It’s dim, but his eyes adjust immediately to take in the wondrously tacky carpet outside the rink, highlighted in brief bursts by rotating colorful lights.  Loud music plays over the speakers, and in the arena people in small groups or pairs are making their way around the track.  He can smell fried food and various types of beverages coming from a bar in the corner, mingling with the scent of unfamiliar people.  He takes it all in for a moment, then dials back his senses to make it more bearable.

“It’ll be fun,” Ashton says.  “Willing to give it a go?”

“Definitely.”

They go get their skates, and Ashton pays for the shoe rental and the entrance fee.  Michael hasn’t been roller skating in probably around a decade, and he’s excited Ashton picked this as their date location.  So many date ideas these days have to do with food, the only thing Michael absolutely can’t participate in, but Ashton found something that will hopefully be fun while still allowing them to talk and get to know each other better.

“Ready?” Ashton asks.  Michael nods, and then they step out into the rink.

Ashton, it turns out, is worse at roller skating than Michael is.  That makes sense, because Michael did it a lot in the 70s and 90s and has gone a few times since to keep it fresh, and Ashton isn’t awful, but there are a few instances where he wobbles and his hand immediately reaches out to grab at Michael’s arm before he rebalances and apologizes.  Michael laughs at him good naturedly and does a few circles around him until Ashton huffs and Michael slips an arm through his.

“Come on,” Michael says.  “Once you’re used to this in about fifteen minutes, I’ll race you around the track.”

Michael wins the first race, but Ashton wins the second, although Michael is giggling too much for it to count, in his opinion.  They spend a lot of time making laps and talking, and Michael skates backwards to show off at every opportunity while Ashton dances to the songs that come on over the speakers to make him laugh.  It’s one of the best nights Michael has had in a long time, and by the time they leave they’re both walking slowly, stretching their time together as much as possible.

“I had a really good time tonight,” Ashton says when they finally reach Michael’s door.  His front light makes the glitter under Ashton’s eyes sparkle, and Michael technically doesn’t have to breathe, but his breath still catches.

“Me too,” he says, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“So...do you want to do this again?” Ashton asks.

“Yeah, I’d like that a lot.  I’ll take you out, next time.”

“Okay,” Ashton smiles, ducking his head.  Michael catches a faint blush on his cheeks, blood rushing up to color them, and he loves that he sees Ashton like this.  At work, he’s always cool and level-headed, confident in what he says and strong in his opinions.  Michael has managed to turn him bashful, and that is possibly the best thing to come out of the date.

“I should let you get on with your night,” Ashton says eventually.  Michael tries to find some sort of excuse to get him to stay, but then Ashton leans forward and presses his lips to Michael’s cheek, soft and lingering.  When he takes a step back, Michael wants to pull him in again to memorize the scent of his skin and feel of his warmth.

“Good night,” Ashton says.

“Night,” Michael makes himself reply.  Ashton smiles again, then sets off down the street.  Michael watches him, smiling when he glances back and waves again, and continues to stand on his front stoop until Ashton is fully out of sight, even for him.

His phone buzzes as soon as he steps inside, and Michael pulls it out in case it’s something important or work related (or Ashton).

Cal: how was the date? or are you two still going…?

Michael: really fucking good

2.

On the third date, Michael gets to see the inside of Ashton’s apartment.

Michael took them stargazing for their second date.  There was a meteor shower he wanted to try to watch, anyway, and he found a good spot outside the city where it would be mostly visible.  Ashton likes being outdoors, and Michael doesn’t mind it at night, so he drove them out of the city, made the trek up a hill, and laid out a blanket for them to cuddle up in.  All in all, it was a great night.  Even the car ride to and from the location was amazing, because Michael told Ashton to make a playlist for it and they spent the entire time discussing favorite songs.  Ashton is such a snob about it sometimes, since he’s a music journalist and is always evaluating in his head, but there were a few surprises that he put on there simply because “good music doesn’t always have to be good music, Michael.”

Ashton kissed him on the cheek again when Michael walked him to his door.  Michael thinks that something so simple shouldn’t occupy so much space in his thoughts, but he’s been replaying it in his head over and over.  It’s a little distracting at work, especially when he gets one of Ashton’s articles to upload to the website.

They head to Ashton’s right after they both clock out.  Ashton doesn’t live far and typically walks (he really likes walking places, Michael has noticed), but Michael drives them so he’ll have his car handy at the end of the night.  It’s a relatively nice building, and Ashton holds the lobby door open for him, which counts enough as an invite to allow him to enter.  They take the elevator up to the fifth floor, then Ashton unlocks his door and steps in.

From what Michael can see, it’s a nice apartment.  The entry, kitchen, and living room flow easily together, and there’s a hallway off to the side that Michael assumes leads to the bathroom and bedrooms.

He can’t step over the threshold.  He hasn’t been invited in this time, not explicitly enough for him to freely enter despite knowing that Ashton wants him there.

“My roommate is out for the night.  I swear I cleaned before I left for work today,” Ashton says, puttering around the living room and picking up what looks like a stray sock, righting the pillows on the couch and straightening some books on the coffee table.  Michael leans against the doorframe and watches him.  Fluffing the pillows doesn’t really matter to Michael, but if it makes Ashton feel better it’s no hardship on him.

Ashton finishes, then glances around until he spots Michael still in the hall.

“Oh.  I didn’t really invite you in, did I.”

“It would’ve been the polite thing to do,” Michael teases.  “I’d hate to intrude, you know.”

“We wouldn’t want that,” Ashton says, coming forward and taking both of Michael’s hands in his.  “Michael Clifford, I formally invite you into my home.  You are welcome here whenever you’d like.”

“A simple ‘hey, come in,’ would’ve been sufficient, but thanks,” he laughs, stepping forward.

“Absolutely not,” Ashton says.  “If you’re going to be vampiric about entering my home, I’m going to treat you with the proper respect, Count Clifford.”

Apparently the vampire jokes are going to be a thing.  Michael can work with that, instead of panicking over it.  If he turns it into a bit, maybe Ashton will brush things off longer.

“Thank you, mortal.  Now, I vant to suck your blood,” he says, exaggerating the awful stereotypical (absolutely false and insulting) accent.  It gets a laugh from Ashton, though, which is what he wanted.

“If you manage to beat me at chess, I’ll let you,” Ashton says.

Michael hasn’t let himself think about Ashton’s blood.  He can control himself very easily around humans, and bloodlust isn’t really a thing with him unless he hasn’t eaten in over a week.  He has a specific concoction that he picks up from the magic shop like clockwork, a mixture of animal blood, some herbs, a few drops of human blood (humanely donated), and whatever the fuck is the flavor for that batch, but that doesn’t mean he’s completely forgotten how amazing it tastes to drink pure, living blood.  It’s incredibly intimate, and Michael hasn’t been that close with a human in a very, very long time.

“Okay,” he chokes, once the silence has stretched on too long.  Ashton quirks an eyebrow at him, but moves to get the board games without comment.

Michael loves board games.  He loves all games, really, and he mostly deals with video games now to keep as up to date as possible (and because he doesn't have to invite friends over to play most of them).  What’s nice about games, though, is that they can change every time.  Michael has been playing chess since it was invented, but he’s never played against Ashton, and it’s going to be an entirely new experience.

Unfortunately, Ashton is extremely good at chess.

“What the fuck,” Michael says, king toppling after a five-move checkmate.

“Darn,” Ashton replies, faux innocent.  “I guess there’ll be no bloodsucking tonight.”

“Wait, I want a rematch.  I’m good at chess, I swear.”

Ashton wins twice more before they move on to another game.  They cycle through a few before landing on a card game from Ashton’s family, one that Michael hasn’t heard of or played before.  It has a lot of complicated rules, and Ashton walks him through it slowly.  If Michael feints misunderstanding more than necessary just to have Ashton’s focus on him, leaning close to look at his cards and explain the best moves, then that’s his business.

Michael doesn’t realize how much time has passed until Ashton’s stomach grumbles loud enough for him to hear.

“How is it already nine o’clock?” he asks.  “Shit, you haven’t eaten yet.  You could’ve had something.”

Ashton just shakes his head.

“I’m not going to eat in front of you if I don’t have anything to feed you, too,” he says.  Michael wishes it were possible for him to digest human food, because while Ashton does have a nice amount of blood he could tap into with permission, somehow Michael doesn’t think that’s on the table

“I have a weird meal schedule, anyway,” he says.  “I eat a really big lunch, then only something small late at night.  I really don’t mind.”

“I’ll remember that for future reference,” Ashton says.  “Although someday I hope you let me feed you.”

It is such a good thing that breathing is an option for Michael, rather than a requirement.  Ashton may not have any clue how what he’s saying sounds, but that doesn’t mean Michael isn’t affected.

“We’ll see,” he says, although there’s no chance that’ll ever happen.  “I should probably head home, anyway.”

Ashton checks the time.

“You can stay longer if you want.  My roommate will be back soon, but he wouldn’t mind.”

Michael wants to stay, but he’s not sure he’d ever leave if he did.

“I think I’ll go.  I’m not sure we’re at the “meeting the roommates” stage yet.”

Michael stands, and Ashton follows to walk him out.

“I had a good time.  Again,” Ashton says as they walk down the stairs.

“Me too, even if I think you were somehow cheating at chess.”

“Hey,” Ashton complains, then pauses.  “I was going to say that jealousy isn’t a good look on you, but everything is a good look on you.”

“Shut up,” Michael says.  “That’s not true at all.  I have made some bad fashion choices in the past.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” Ashton says.  Michael wishes he could show him the pictures from the 80s, as embarrassing as they are.  They reach the bottom landing entirely too soon, but Ashton walks him out to the parking deck until they’re standing next to his car.

“So,” Ashton says, squaring his shoulders.  “We’ve been on three dates so far, and I really like you, Michael.  Hanging out with you has been some of the most fun I’ve had in a long time.  I was wondering if you wanted to officially be my boyfriend.”

Fuck.  The smart thing would be to cut this off now, before either of them get too attached, because Michael already thinks it would absolutely shatter his non-existent heart if Ashton found out and thought he was a monster.

“Absolutely,” he says instead, because he’s an idiot who wants what he can’t have.  “These past few dates have been the most fun I’ve had in a long time, too.”

Ashton beams, like the sun breaking through clouds.  He has dimples, and Michael really wants to press his fingers into the divots.  He just wants to touch Ashton everywhere, really, to feel the soft skin and know that there’s blood bringing heat to it from his heart to every corner and crevice.

There’s something so absolutely tantalizing about how alive Ashton is.  Michael knows that he can’t be more like him, not even if he was actually alive still, but he’s content to have him near.  He’d be content to watch from a distance, honestly, but if Ashton wants him close then Michael is going to stay close.

He should not be this whipped after only the third date.

“Well,” he says once they’ve spent too much time grinning at each other silently.

“I should let you go,” Ashton says.  “I’ll text you.”

“I’d like that,” Michael says.  He goes to open his car door, but Ashton’s hand on his wrist stops him.  He leans forward and to kiss Michael on the cheek, just like the past two dates, but this time it lands a bit lower and closer to the middle.  The corner of his mouth hits Michael’s and lingers there for just a second longer than he can bear.

“For fucks sake,” he breathes, then slots their lips together properly.  Ashton smiles into the kiss before he can get it under control and properly kiss back.  Maybe it’s dramatic to say that this kiss feels like it’s filling some hole in Michael that he didn’t know was vacant, but Michael is a dramatic guy, and there’s something special about the way their noses bump and how instinctual it is to shift closer.  Michael doesn’t really want it to end, so he gives Ashton another peck before pulling away fully.  Ashton’s eyes take a moment to flutter open.

It’s definitely far too early to be in love, but Michael is very self-aware after being around for so long, and he knows he’s going to have to actively try not to fall head-over-heels for Ashton.

“Have a good night, Ashton,” Michael says.

“You too.  Drive safe.”

Michael keeps his composure as he pulls out of the parking space, aware of Ashton’s eyes on him.  He manages to keep it together all the way home, actually, but the moment his door shuts behind him he’s leaning against it, giddy with a crush and wondering what he’s just gotten himself into.

3.

Movie nights become a bit of a thing.  It’s a low-maintenance way to spend time together, and sometimes they’re both too tired after grueling work days or hard weeks to be around a lot of people.  Michael’s house has a pretty nice tv, and he has an extensive movie collection, including some horrible b-movies on VHS that Ashton finds endlessly amusing.  A lot of Michael’s favorite moments are spent snuggled up on the couch under Ashton’s arm or with his feet in his lap, watching the way the light from the screen plays off of his face more than the movie itself.

Ashton hasn’t seen the Twilight movies, which is almost a travesty.  Michael watched all of them in theaters with Calum, both of them weirdly captivated with how completely bonkers and inaccurate they are, and they’ve seen them often enough to quote them almost completely to each other at the drop of a hat.  Michael is tired today, and he wants something he doesn’t have to pay much attention to.

He sleeps significantly less than humans do, but that doesn’t mean that staying up for the past week and a half straight was a good idea.  He was also on his feet more than usual at work, and everything is hurting a little.  His body has better-than-average healing, but it’s also over a few centuries old.  Today, he’s feeling it.

Edward has just gotten the first sniff of Bella and looks like he’s about to puke when Ashton turns to him.  Michael is leaning against the corner of the couch, head lolling to the side and feet tucked up next to him.  He’s been looking at Ashton and letting his thoughts drift, and he should probably be more embarrassed than he is that he was caught at it.

“What’s up with you today?” Ashton asks.  “You’re suspiciously quiet.”

“Tired,” Michael says.  “My feet hurt.”

“I can help with one of those things,” he says.  “Give me your feet.”

“What?”

Ashton gestures until Michael uncurls, stretching his legs out until his feet land in Ashton’s lap.  He starts at Michael’s ankles, gently rubbing and then moving to the bottoms of his feet.  Michael jumps when he presses down on a particularly tight tendon, but it’s already feeling leagues better.

“I can’t believe you’re touching my feet,” he groans as Ashton presses a knuckle into the center, making his toes curl.  “That’s so gross.”

Ashton snorts.

“I don’t mind, but I’ll wash my hands after if it makes you feel better.  I just want to make you feel good.”

Michael’s face would be completely inflamed if he had the blood for it.

“Shut up.  This better not be a fetish for you.”

Ashton laughs this time, a full belly laugh that Michael would enjoy hearing more if it didn’t make him stop the massage.

“Would that be a deal breaker?” he giggles when he’s calmed down enough.  Michael takes a moment to evaluate if he’s actually joking or not, because he really likes Ashton and has loved being his boyfriend for the past couple of months, but feet might be where he draws the line.

“No, I don’t have a foot fetish,” Ashton says after a moment of Michael staring at him like a deer in the headlights.  Michael lets out a sigh of relief.  He can be adventurous about stuff like that, and he’s been around long enough to try basically everything, but someone being aroused by his feet will always be just a little too weird.

“Do you have any embarrassing fetishes or kinks?” Ashton asks conversationally.  “Just… for future reference, if that’s something you want.”

They haven’t done anything besides some lazy making out, which Michael is grateful for.  He likes that they’re taking their time with it.  He doesn’t want to rush this, but the thought has crossed his mind before.

He swallows.  Ashton’s alternating between glancing at the tv and paying attention to his massage, and Michael doesn’t know if he should be grateful that he’s not trapped under that gaze or upset that he doesn’t have Ashton’s full undivided attention.

“Nothing embarrassing,” Michael says.  “I’m open to a lot of things, but I really like being taken care of.  I’ve been told I can be demanding and needy.  Sometimes I like… being held down, I guess.  Nothing excessive, but…”

He’s an extra-strong, extra-resilient being.  Every time he feels like someone else has the control, it’s a special kind of rush.

Ashton glances at him from under his eyelashes, the blue-green light from the tv casting strange and otherworldly shadows over his face.  Michael swallows thickly again.

“I like taking care of my partner, so that works out,” Ashton says.  Michael nods.  Ashton turns back to the tv and tilts his head in consideration, putting his neck on full display.

“You know,” he says, “I never really was into biting, but now…” He trails off, then brings a finger up to his neck, tracing along the length of it subconsciously.  At least, Michael hopes that it’s subconscious.  The air is thick with tension, and if Ashton is doing this on purpose than he knows a lot more about Michael than he’s let on.

“It might be nice to be marked up a bit,” Ashton says.  He glances at Michael, the corner of his mouth turning up in a small smile.  “Maybe Bella had the right idea, going after a vampire.”

Michael snorts and the tension dissipates like a balloon popping.

“I hardly think anyone in this movie counts as a real vampire.”

“You don’t think real vampires sparkle in the sun?” Ashton asks.  “Darn.  What’s the point of vampires if you have to dump glitter on them for the sparkle effect?”

“You’re an idiot,” Michael laughs.

“I’m the idiot?  You’re the one who’s all the way over there when you have a perfectly good boyfriend right here who’s ready to cuddle you.”

Michael rolls his eyes and shifts to tuck himself against Ashton’s side.

“Happy?” he asks.

“Very,” Ashton says, taking a blanket from the back of the couch and draping it over them.  It’s cozy.  Michael sighs in contentment.

“Do your feet feel a little better?” Ashton asks, pressing a kiss to the top of his head.

“Yeah, thanks.”

“If you want to take a nap now, you can.”

Michael hums and seeks out Ashton’s other hand, tangling their fingers together sloppily.  He’s tired, but he probably won’t drift off.  He has all night for a power nap, and right now he doesn’t want to miss a second of his time with Ashton.

4.

The door bangs shut behind them, and Michael doesn’t have a moment to reorient himself before Ashton is on him again, lips incessantly seeking his and body caging him against the wall.  Michael’s own hands are already slipping under his shirt, desperate to feel the warm expanse of his back and pull him even closer.  He’s always run cold, even before he was turned, but right now he feels like he’s burning up from the inside out, flames igniting with every point of contact between them.  Ashton gets a hand in his hair and tugs, and Michael makes a noise he wasn’t expecting to come out of him.

Don’t drop your fangs, don’t drop your fangs, don’t drop your fangs, he repeats to himself.  It’s typically effortless to keep his fangs retracted and unnoticable, but he hasn’t done this with someone he truly likes in a very, very long time.  He can’t allow himself to get so mindlessly overwhelmed that they slip down.

Ashton detaches their lips to take a breath, and Michael takes the opportunity to trail kisses over his jawline and down the column of his throat.  Ashton hums into it, the sound reverberating through his vocal chords, and Michael nips at his throat to turn the hum into a groan, sucking at it again to ease the sting.

There’s a particular feeling of satisfaction at leaning back briefly to take in his progress, knowing that the blood is pooling just under the surface of Ashton’s skin.  When he returns to his ministrations with a slightly harsher bite, Ashton jolts, rocking into him.

“Fuck, Michael,” he breathes.

“What do you want to do tonight?” Michael asks between kisses, trailing over his collarbones now because Ashton never buttons his fucking shirts.

“Anything.  Everything.  I--” He’s cut off by another groan that dissolves into a breathless laugh.  “You’re so fucking distracting; get back up here.”

He tugs on Michael’s hair again, guiding their mouths together.  It’s easier than breathing to let Ashton take control, and Michael could stand here all night and let himself be kissed against the wall if there weren’t other things he wanted to be doing in the bedroom.  Still, he whines when Ashton pulls away.

“I know you don’t sleep, and I’ll keep up as much as I can,” Ashton pants.  “I can’t fucking wait to take you apart.”

“So do it,” Michael says, not able to care about how desperate he sounds.  “No one’s stopping you.”

“You’re such a mouthy little shit,” he says, leaning back in for a kiss that Michael feels all the way down to his toes.  They don’t part again until they’re in the bedroom and falling onto the mattress.

-/-

Afterwards, Michael watches, amused, as Ashton fights to keep his eyes open.  They never turned on the lights, but Michael can see just fine with his vampire eyesight and the early rays of sunshine beginning to paint the sky outside in pinks and oranges.

“Just go to sleep,” Michael laughs, tracing another mindless pattern onto Ashton’s ribs.  “We’re done.  I can’t handle anything else.”

“Weird to sleep when you’re not,” he mumbles, eyes already slipping closed again.  “Can feel you watching me.”

“I won’t watch you,” Michael says.  “I’ll probably fall asleep right after.”

Ashton snorts halfheartedly.  Michael rolls his eyes, then nudges Ashton onto his side and fits himself behind him.  Ashton sighs and relaxes again almost immediately, a heavy weight at his front while Michael slides one arm under the pillow and anchors them together with the other.  He gets a great view of Ashton’s sweaty and tangled hair, and that’s about it.

“There,” Michael murmurs.  “Now I can’t watch you.  Happy?”

Ashton hums.  He’ll be out in less than a minute.

Regardless of all of Ashton’s jokes about Michael never sleeping (he resents that he looks tired enough at all times for that to be an assumption), Ashton managed to tire him out.  He doesn’t need to sleep right now, but there’s no harm in it.  He lets the steady push and pull of Ashton’s breathing and the heartbeat he can barely feel under his palm lull him, and he drifts off soon after.

5.

“You want me to meet your family?” Michael asks, eyes wide in the face of this new information.

“If you’re comfortable with it,” Ashton says nonchalantly, but the way he’s avoiding Michael’s eyes tells him this conversation is anything but casual.  He’s focused on throwing things into a blender, raspberries and peaches joining ice cubes and yogurt for a smoothie that Michael has watched him make dozens of times before.  Michael can drink smoothies if they’re blended enough, and honestly he’s got a bit of a blood hunger going on because the last batch of his concoction from the magic store tasted gross and he’s supposed to go in today to get the new one.  Still, a smoothie wouldn’t help with that, and he turned down Ashton’s offer in favor of a cup of coffee, wanting a warm mug in his hands.  He’s glad to have something to keep his arms from flailing at this new curveball, in any case.

Ashton turns on the blender, the angry sound filling the previously-serene morning.

He can’t meet Ashton’s mum and siblings.  He’s a vampire, and he’s already entirely too attached to Ashton as it is.  It’s easy to fantasize about revealing his secret and Ashton being okay with it when it’s just the two of them, but there’s no way he can get to know his family only to break their heart when he has to leave Ashton for his own good.

Michael can’t watch Ashton grow old without him.  He could do it for a few years, maybe a few decades, and he wants to spend as much time with him as possible, but eventually it would get too hard.  Michael’s good at running, and he’s good at being alone.  It’s harder to do both of those things with a family involved.

“That’s a big step,” Michael says once the blender stops.

“I’ve met Calum, and you said he’s closer than your family.”

“Against my will!”

Calum had insisted on meeting “the guy who’s got you wrapped around his finger,” and Michael had been powerless to stop it.  They get on like a house fire and Michael gets teased about five times more than he used to, but he secretly loves it.  Calum and Ashton are by far the two people he loves most in the world, and it’s nice to see them also enjoy each other.

“Michael,” Ashton says, pouring his smoothie into a glass and still refusing to look at him, something unfamiliar in his expression, “I’ve never gone this long without introducing them to someone I’m serious about.  They really want to meet you.”

“I--I want to meet them, too, but…”

Ashton sighs and finally faces him head-on.  Michael has never felt this small.

“Are you serious about us?”

“Of course,” he says, but it comes out more like a question, and he watches something shutter in Ashton’s eyes.  He turns back to the blender, starting to dismantle it so he can rinse it properly, always trying to keep the kitchen neat, and Michael knows that he has to say something to try to fix this, anything to stop the sad slope of Ashton’s shoulders and that hurt look in his eyes.

“Ash, I have to tell you something,” he says before he can think twice.  Ashton hums, and Michael steels himself for whatever reaction is about to occur, whether he has to bolt for the door or not.  “I--um, well, I…”

He hasn’t had to confess to someone in over forty years.  He doesn’t know how to do it anymore.  He swallows and tries again.

“I don’t really know how to say this, but… I mean, I--”

“Shit,” Ashton exclaims, something clattering in the sink.

“What’s wrong?” Michael asks, and a second later the metallic tang of blood reaches his nose.

“Cut my thumb on the blender blades,” Ashton says, turning around and sticking the pad of his thumb in his mouth.  Michael stares at him, unable to move.

The thing is, Ashton’s blood smells really good.  He knew it would, because if he loves everything else about Ashton it makes sense that he would love him down to the blood in his veins and the DNA it carries, but this is the first time Ashton has split skin in his vicinity, and it’s more to handle than Michael thought it would be.  He’s hungry, and he’s upset, and Ashton is right there in front of him, bleeding.

He shakes himself from that train of thought.

“Are you alright?  How bad is it?” he asks.  Ashton takes his thumb out of his mouth to check, and that just makes the smell intensify.  Michael feels a bit of saliva pool in his mouth and swallows it back.

“It’s not too bad,” Ashton says.  “It mostly just hurts, but once the bleeding lessens I’ll put a bandaid on it and it should be fine.”

He goes to put it back in his mouth and glances up at Michael, freezing at whatever he sees there.  Michael doesn’t know what his face is doing, or why his posture feels so stiff, or what the fuck he’s supposed to do with Ashton just standing there with a bleeding thumb, and for a long moment they just stare at each other.  Michael forgets to breathe.

Slowly, like he’s coaxing a startled animal towards him, Ashton reaches out his hand towards Micheal.  A drop of blood drips off his thumb and onto the floor.  Michael couldn’t move even if he wanted to.

“You know,” Ashton says, low and calm, “you could help me stop the bleeding, if you wanted.”

Michael stares at him, not comprehending the words, when he feels two pinpricks on the inside of his bottom lip.

His fangs dropped.

“I have to go,” he says, scrambling out of his seat and hastily putting his coffee on the table.  He probably spills some, but he can’t look back to check, shoving on his shoes and sprinting out the door, Ashton’s questions echoing behind him.

Shit.  Shit shit shit shit shit.

He’s scrambling for his phone as he tries to unlock his car, tears starting to cloud his vision with the panic.  He presses Calum’s speed dial as soon as he gets the door open, tearing out of the parking space without putting on his seatbelt.

“Hello?” Calum finally answers.

“My fangs dropped,” he says, consonants coming out in that strange way they do when his mouth has more teeth than usual.

“What happened?” Calum asks immediately.  He knows how serious something like this can be, especially for someone like Michael, who tries so hard to avoid it.  He sniffles and blinks the tears out of his eyes so he can see the road better.  Calum’s house is close, and he just needs to get a few more blocks before he has backup.

“I was with Ashton and he cut himself on a blender.  I--we had a fight, or--I made him feel bad, in any case, and I haven’t eaten enough, and then he cut himself and I felt the fangs and ran out of there with no explanation.  He’s going to hate me.  I’ve ruined everything!”

“I’m sure that’s not true,” Calum says, but it’s not like Ashton is his boyfriend.  Michael doesn’t know how to recover from something like this.

Calum tries to console him for the rest of the short car ride, stopping once Michael pulls into his driveway to turn an assessing gaze on him instead.  His expression tells Michael that he’s leaving much to be desired right now.

“Alright, Mikey.  Let’s get you out of the sun, yeah?  We’ll figure this out.”

He holds out his arms, and Michael falls right into them, letting Calum lead him into the house.  His fangs still prick at his lips, a sharp reminder of everything he ruined due to one second of lousy control.

+1

The bell to the magic shop digs as they enter, and Michael pulls down his sunglasses.  Calum got him to stop crying and gave him a bit of his own leftover concoction, because he hadn’t drunk all of it due to the taste, either.  It was enough for Michael to be able to get his fangs back under control, but it doesn’t stop how miserable he feels about the way he left, or the conversation they were having beforehand.

He can’t let himself be around Ashton if his fangs are going to drop like that.  He would never hurt him, he knows that, but there’s still the potential that he can’t ignore.  Ashton’s safety and comfort isn’t something he can risk.  Even if Ashton was somehow okay with him being a vampire, they wouldn’t work.

Michael has known this since the beginning.  He let himself fall in love, anyway.

There are three missed calls and over a dozen text messages that he still has to try to answer on his phone.  There’s no way to do that without breaking both of their hearts, but Calum told Ashton that Michael is physically okay and that he’d talk to him tomorrow.  For now, he needs to sort through his own feelings and calm down, and for that they need to pick up the weekly blood supply.

“Hi!” the witch at the counter says.  His name is Luke, and Calum’s been flirting with him ever since he started working there.  It would be cute if it didn’t make these excursions so tedious, and if Michael himself wasn’t currently mourning what is soon to be the end of an absolutely spectacular relationship.

“Our usual, please,” he says curtly.  Luke glances between him and Calum, who gives a beaming smile, then heads to the back storage room.

“Maybe it’ll taste less like shit this time,” he mutters.  Calum nudges him, but doesn’t get the chance to say anything before the bell over the door chimes again.  Michael knows who it is before he turns around, the scent and rhythm of his heartbeat as familiar to him as the back of his own hand.

Ashton freezes in the doorway.  He has changed into a sweatshirt, the one he wears when he’s having a bad day because it feels like a perpetual hug without having to be touched, and Michael is probably going to cry again.  Out of the three of them, Calum pulls himself together first.

“Hello, Ashton.  I didn’t know you frequented this shop.”

“Ashton!” Luke says, returning from the back with their order in a crate.  “Did you bring it?”

Michael finally notices the tupperware in his hands when he hands it to Luke, who opens a corner and sniffs.

“You know each other?” Michael asks.

“Oh, sorry!” Luke says.  “This is Ashton, my roommate.  I’d never eat lunch if he wasn’t there to bring it to me.”

“You’re the roommate?” Michael asks.  In all of their months of dating, he never managed to meet the roommate, even though Ashton has known Calum for weeks.  Weird schedules and Michael’s aversion to meeting and possibly getting attached to more people prevented it.  Luke looks between Michael, Calum, and Ashton, and then a lightbulb hits.

“You’re Ashton’s Michael!”

“How many other vampires named Michael do you know?” Ashton asks, and Michael reels back, Calum’s hand on his spine the only thing keeping him upright.

“You know?”  Ashton frowns.

“Michael, I’ve known since the first day I met you.”

“Wh--you never mentioned it!”

“I made some references, then figured it wasn’t something you were comfortable talking about.”

“Wait,” Luke says.  “You know Ashton is a minor deity, right?”

“What? ”

Michael turns desperately to Calum, because none of this makes sense, but Calum is having some sort of silent conversation with Luke.

“You two need to talk,” he says eventually.

“I need to show Calum something in the back, anyway,” Luke says, grabbing Calum’s sleeve and tugging him around the counter, shutting the door to the storeroom behind them.  It’s not the slickest move that Michael’s ever seen, but he’s having a crisis and can’t be bothered to laugh at Luke for it.

“So,” Ashton says.  “It seems there’s been a bit of miscommunication here.”

“You’re a deity?” Michael asks.  Ashton starts to blush, which is cute.  He clasps his hands together and nods once.

“Yeah, my entire family is.  The religion died down centuries ago, so it’s mostly our belief in each other that’s keeping us alive.  I’m basically just an immortal human now, but I’ve been around long enough to recognize other non-humans when I see them.”

“And you’ve known I was a vampire the entire time?” he asks.  Ashton nods.  “Oh.”

“I thought that you knew that I knew,” he says.

“I didn’t,” Michael says.  “I thought you would hate me when you found out.”

“I could never hate you,” Ashton says, taking a step forward and reaching for him before he aborts the movement.  Michael looks at his feet and wonders if what he says next will change that.

“My fangs dropped earlier, when you cut your thumb.”  His voice is steadier than anticipated, but he can’t help but brace himself for Ashton to back away or run screaming.  He doesn’t do either of those.

“Is that why you left so quickly?”

He nods, shame pooling in his stomach.

“I was offering, you know?  I wouldn’t have minded if you had a taste.”

“But I didn’t know that at the time,” Michael says, focusing on the shame so he doesn’t do something horrible like start thinking about what it would really be like to have some of Ashton’s blood.  “I just… lost control.  I can’t do that.  I won’t let myself.”

“I think you’re being a little hard on yourself,” Ashton says gently, stepping closer until he can put his hands on Michael’s arms, then sliding down to grasp his hands.  “Can you look at me?”  Michael tries, then shakes his head.  “That’s okay, and your fangs dropping earlier is okay, too.  You had a lot on your mind, were probably a little hungry, and I was waving my bloody finger under your nose, even if you didn’t recognize it as an invitation.  What’s important is that you didn’t try anything without asking.  You didn’t hurt me; you removed yourself from the situation.  I would say that that’s keeping things pretty under control, wouldn’t you?”

“But I could’ve hurt you, even if I didn’t.”

“Michael, you’re not a mindless beast,” Ashton says.  “The fact that you’re this upset about your body’s natural physical reaction shows that.  You’re not going to do anything to hurt someone else like that.  You have to trust yourself.”

Michael wrinkles his nose, then finally makes himself meet Ashton’s eyes.  There’s nothing but compassion there, no fear or disgust.

“You’re not going to hurt anyone,” Ashton repeats.

“I’m not going to hurt anyone,” Michael agrees.  “I can trust myself with that.”

A grin breaks out on Ashton’s face.

“Good,” he says.  “I trust you, too.”

“And, about meeting your family,” Michael starts.

“Don’t worry about that,” Ashton says.  “I was a little pushy.  We can talk about it and figure out something that works for both of us.”

“I was going to say that I’ll do it,” Michael says.  “Half of my worry had to do with me being a vampire and you and your family being unsuspecting humans, but that’s not an issue anymore.”

“What about the other half?”

“Just normal meeting-the-family jitters,” he says.  “They’re really important to you, and I don’t want them to hate me because I didn’t meet them earlier.”

“They won’t hate you,” Ashton says.  “You’re a delight.”

“I hope they share that thought.”

“They will.  I love you, so they will, too.”

Michael feels like he’s going to burst.  He also feels menally exhausted from this entire affair and the emotional whiplash it’s giving him.

“Can I kiss you?” he asks.  Ashton answers by leaning forward, and Michael sinks against him, melting into the feeling.

“So,” Calum says loudly, startling them both.  “Are you guys good now?”

“What do you think?” he snips.

“I don’t know, Luke,” Calum says, turning away from Michael and towards him.  “Do you think that they’re good now?”

“They did look rather cosy,” Luke says.  “In fact, I’d say that Ashton looked ready to pledge himself to Michael as his personal blood bank.  His little ketchup packet, if you will.”

Calum bursts out laughing.  Michael tries to be affronted, but Ashton starts laughing incredulously next to him.

“Ketchup packet?  Is that what I’m reduced to?”

“There are worse titles,” Calum says between bouts of laughter.  Luke looks ridiculously pleased at this development.

“Please never refer to him as my ketchup packet again,” Michael says.  “I’m begging you not to.”

“If the fangs fit,” Luke says, which makes Calum dissolve into laughter again.  It’s not even funny.  Honestly, they deserve each other.

“Come on,” Ashton says.  “Let’s go back to my place.  I want to hear all about your vampire antics from the olden days, now that I know you’re okay with talking about it.”

“Only if I get to hear stories about being a minor deity,” Michael says, grabbing his part of the blood order.  “Cal, you’re paying for this one!”

They’re out the door before Calum can protest, and Ashton puts an arm around his waist as they walk.  It’s uncomfortably sunny out, but Michael feels no rush to get back inside.  They’re both immortal, and they’ve got the rest of their lives.

[dreamsofthescreen]

Alluring or Meaningless? - The Ending of Sorrentino’s La Grande Bellezza (The Great Beauty)

Renowned director Paolo Sorrentino's classic 'La Grand Bellezza' mixes the pathos of life with philosophical ideas, but does its ending even have the desired meaning that audiences were expecting?  

Giusi Merli in ‘La Grande Bellezza’

Paolo Sorrentino’s renowned 2013 Italian modern classic, ‘La Grande Bellezza’ (The Great Beauty) was certainly one for the critics to praise highly, yet there is a certain quality to its largely masterful storytelling that can see it lacking in true depth. Where much of the film’s entirety soars, its value seems to get lost amongst its artsy attempt to create meaning, where it really can appear as overdone and quite hollow. If we look at the last 30 minutes of Sorrentino’s work, we as an audience can certainly debate whether there is awe-inspiring significance or just overplayed rhetoric in the ending of La Grand Bellezza. Where whimsical characters and moments are introduced, viewers can be very easily swept up in Sorrentino’s foreign fairytale, where it really can be deemed as just pretentious. Yet, this point is far from black and white, as ‘La Grande Bellezza’s’ meaning is up to the audience to interpret, still making it a favoured and beloved work.

Italian director Paolo Sorrentino’s works have garnered praise for their dramatic and striking visuals, as well as their convoluted plots. He has been compared to Federico Fellini, and certainly does seem to take inspiration from the 1960s film icon. But Sorrentino is certainly no copy of Fellini, as his culturally inspired films do reach audiences well. Yet where The Academy Awards gave it the win for Best Foreign Language Film, and where critics seem to kiss it’s feet, this doesn’t always mean that it is altogether an expert piece of cinema. You can say that the beauty of film is that it can be totally subjective, which, in hand, is what makes such great art. So us as an audience can ask whether we view the film as more so pretentious or philosophical?

‘La Grande Bellezza’ follows former writer & popular socialite Jep Gambardella, a sort of philosophical muse for Sorrentino. As Jep’s life in Rome is consumed by materialism, it isn’t until his 65th birthday that he begins to look inwards. This leads him on a search for ‘the great beauty’, which has him relishing in nostalgia and existential simplicity, audiences closely following behind on that journey with him. The greater part of Sorrentino’s film does successfully have us questioning our place in the world, and where our values lie. Through comparing and contrasting the superficial high life with what’s most important to humanity, we are reminded of our own perspectives on what does and should hold the most substance or meaning.

Toni Servillo in 'La Grande Bellezza'

Yet as Jep has wandered around searching in different areas for beauty in truth and philosophy, his defining moment seems to be towards the end of the film, when he is introduced to Saint, Sister Maria. As Jep is told that she had ‘read his novel & loved it’ years before, we are left open to interpretation to who this Saint may be. Yet the answer in itself is somewhat disappointing. Again, it is not to say that the ending of Sorrentino’s film is wrong or terrible, but is surely very thought provoking.

This moment starts in the last thirty minutes of the film, and we are never given a backstory to Sister Maria when or before she is introduced. And she is introduced, literally, on a pedestal. As she sits there in silence, she wears a dusty, grey-blue nun’s habit, her olive skin lined with deep wrinkles, and expression truly dried out. Members of high society kneel to her, kissing her hands. In the chapel that she sits, there are priests, monks, African tribesmen and all in all, only established figures flocking to her, their eyes wide in honour of her presence. It is as though these figures are all awaiting an answer that they cannot find, and seek out from Maria. Though she is established as a wise old prophet with supposed life-changing aid, what makes her so respectable? She appears as though she has lived three lifetimes and has ‘only granted three interviews in all her life’, yet this alleged messiah altogether utters very little meaning. Sister Maria’s introduction has her appearing as a monumental figure, mostly due to the filmmaking aspects of the scene. In the chapel, lit with a chiaroscuro inspired light, along with medieval Roman Catholic music echoing throughout, with the purpose of warming our hearts. Contemplative looks from across the room, including a black priest, may be there to show the diversity that Maria is surrounded by, as those across the globe seem to adore her. The only interpretation gathered is that Sister Maria is an attempt to create a grandiose moment to close out the film in a profound sense. Yet what I’d gathered of this Saint, is that she lives so austerely that Sorrentino’s ending becomes muddled and pretentious.

As previously mentioned, we are never given a backstory to Sister Maria, but maybe that is the beauty of it that Sorrentino was trying to portray. This icon in the film is looked up to for her granted simplicity. But by portraying something so obscure, Sorrentino’s work doesn’t always appear as interesting, but as an attempt to do so. Is it her goodness or her stripped back way of living that those aspire to? And why does it need to be members of high society that only seek her advice? Wouldn’t Sorrentino’s inclusion of ordinary citizens make it all the more realistic, or relatable and grounded, rather than once again getting caught up in something so grand?

Her grandeur is never explained, to which we can be inspired or simply baffled by the mystery, seeing it as something that creates interest, or just remains pretentious. Yet even if her significance was explained, and made this supposed icon as meaningful as someone like the Pope or Mother Teresa, aren’t we supposed to be inspired by the ordinary and the beauty in simplicity. Isn't the point of 'La Grande Bellezza' to celebrate the simple things in life, rather than an established, worshipped figure? The portrayal of this kooky character tries to make a point towards being so well grounded, that it is absurd. As she speaks to Jep, she asks 'Do you know why I only eat roots?', to which Jep asks why, her response following as, 'Because roots are important'. Now Sister Maria's actions line up with her values and grounded nature, as she genuinely decides to eat roots. This can be seen by some as profoundly inspiring, but is altogether quite a weak attempt to deliver an overly-artistic message. And sure, it isn't all pompous, as there is a great reference to the Catholic influences in Italy and the holy hierarchy of Rome & it’s art. But it is the aureate expression  doesn’t sell it as being moving, but is instead simply too showy.

When sat down at dinner with Jep and his fellow members of Roman high society, Maria is slouching at the head of the table with a vapid expression. The attempt at meaning that Sorrentino has so clearly tried to create is open to interpretation, yet it can be said that this is not one of the his finest writing moments. Sister Maria does not speak a word, and whenever she does, it is a brooding comment that is supposed to hold substance, but instead can be regarded as pretentious. The moment she lifts her head to comment on Jep's novel, all eyes are so enthusiastically on her. Sister Maria does not sleep in a bed, as she finds Rome’s 5 star Hassler hotel, ‘uncomfortable’. Her perspective on life can be seen as purely existential and somewhat nihilistic, or greatly generous. As she works alongside the sick and supports the Third World, her abandonment of any enjoyment and subscription to poverty has us question our place. Is someone really so empathetic that they’ll refuse any comfort, because others are worse off? Again, Sorrentino does succeed in communicating a message that has us asking questions like this, yet the point is too greatly emphasised through the worshipping and dramatically overdone expression of this holy character.

As Jep focuses on switching his hedonism for eudaemonism, his perspective on the finer things in life is the things he used to have, leading him to relish in nostalgia. Sister Maria seems to be an exaggerated symbol of his changing philosophy, as well as a turning point for him to once again write, after abandoning any such creativity for decades.

Something in meeting Sister Maria has Jep retuning to Giglio Island to report on a shipwreck, again, quite symbolic of Jep’s career position, having not written a novel in 40 years. Here, he remembers his first meeting with his first love, to which inspires him to write again. Apparently Sister Maria is the bridge between Jep’s despair & newfound hope.

Paolo Sorrentino's expertly expressive film is a no doubt a masterful passion project that communicates the pathos and joy of the human condition, impacting audiences greatly. Yet Sorrentino's attempt to create something meaningful to close out an already wonderful film filled it with more vanity than it needed. It is an entirely subjective work that involves the audiences thought and we can all interpret it how we see it, which is assuredly a good thing. However, Sorrentino’s quite bombastic ending was just a questionable cliffhanger and didn't line up with the greatness that the first two hours of 'La Grande Bellezza' provided. Though a fantastic feature, Paolo Sorrentino seemed to get too lost in portraying a message so obscurely overdone, that it had somewhat lost it's original meaning.

visit at: dreamsofthescreen.com

[jackdawyt]

Today we’re carrying on with my new mini-series paving the road for the anticipated release of the next Dragon Age game. As, I’ve said before, and I’ll say it in every video. I’ll be delving into very particular honed-in lore and plot threads that are rather telling for the future narrative of Dragon Age.  

Last episode I discussed Thedas’ most prideful nation, as an empire of power-hungry mages rule over their own magical utopia known as the Tevinter Imperium. Continuing from that, today I’m exploring Thedas’ most-misunderstood race, the Qunari. The grey-horned giants, who follow a strange set of rigid ideals, sought to convert all of Thedas to their way of life.

The Qun:

While humans, dwarves and elves rabble amongst themselves, there is another race, relatively new to Thedas, that most people call Qunari.  

“This race is large and powerful; on average, they tower over humans by a foot or more. Most have horns growing from their heads.” (WoT V.1)

To many humans, the Qunari are an evil and tyrannical people who do not believe in individual rights. ln the lands occupied by Qunari, all other belief systems are expelled, families are split apart, marriages are forbidden, and any dissenter is sent for "reeducation" by a secret police that watches for any violation of the strict Qunari ethos.

While the majority of that fear is warranted, the Qunari believe their ancient texts known as the Qun are laws that everyone in Thedas should adhere to. These laws are based on two core philosophies: Mastery & Balance.  

Mastery (issqun): 'To know something is to understand it, to understand why it is, what it is, as well as what it is not. To know something is to possess the power to master it, and only in the lack of knowing lies weakness."

Balance (aqun): "To exist without balance is to fall, to break, to yield. Only with balance can true stillness be achieved. When one is still, one is free to listen and know. In knowing, become strong. With strength, become steel. And as steel, endure."

Briefly put, the Qun texts are a code of honour that encompasses philosophy, laws and a social architecture to prepare and govern the Qunari people with discipline.  

For those who believe in the Qun, the lack of individual freedoms does not matter. They find comfort and stability in the order of it all.  

A few freedoms the Qun does not tolerate are: any worship of a god or gods, such as the Maker, this is forbidden and is stopped with violence if necessary. And, magic is feared and hated, The Qunari take its treatment of mages to extremes even the Chantry might consider cruel.

While some in Thedas may consider the Qun as a radical religion, it’s actually a social archetype that governs everything from society, culture, religion, economy, government, etc. The Qun dictates all aspects of Qunari life.

“Any discussion of the Qun as a philosophy must extend to Qunari society as a whole, for the two are intrinsically linked.” (WoT. V1)

Because of this, the Qunari view other nations of Thedas as inferior and as “Kabethari”, which means "those who need to be taught." As of which, the Qunari plan many incursions guided by the Qun’s text for the rest of Thedas, ensuring their way of life will thrive on, even if they have to re-educate every single person in the populace. The Qun is an implacable force that will not be denied.

Existence is a choice.

There is no chaos in the world, only complexity.

Knowledge of the complex is wisdom.

From wisdom of the world comes wisdom of the self.

Mastery of the self is mastery of the world.  

Loss of the self is the source of suffering.

Suffering is a choice, and we can refuse it.

It is in our own power to create the world, or destroy it.

And the Ashkaari went forth to his people.

—An excerpt from The Qun, Canto 1

The label “Qunari" more accurately refers to a follower of the religious text known as the Qun, regardless of his or her race hence the capitalization of the name in many texts. The actual horned race's ancient name is “kossith.” This term is not widely used or even widely known outside scholarly circles.  

Simply put, anyone of any race who embodies the Qun’s text are Qunari, while the horned races’ biological term stems to “kossith”, however, this term is not spoken by the people themselves. As of which, I’m just going to keep calling them Qunari.  

Par Vollen was the first land the Qunari conquered and converted to the Qun. It’s a very peaceful land that the Qunari consider their new homeland. This island has many wonders like the great pyramids and abundant jungles. Even the native humans of Par Vollen willingly converted to the Qun.  

“Par Vollen is peaceful, its native humans largely willing the Qun converts to the Qun. The Qunari consider Par Vollen their new homeland.” (WoT. V1)

As the Qunari come from uncharted territories, they have their own language called Qunlat which, in short, is a very blunt language with little use for communication beyond its necessities. Many Qunari can speak the common tongue, when doing so, they are very to the point, with no reason for wasting time.  

“Qunari speak a harsh language called Qunlat. As a rule, Qunari have little use for communication beyond its necessities. When speaking to those who do not follow the Qun, their statements are often laconic, with a kind of underlying condescension.” (WoT. V1)

The Qunari arrived on the shores of Thedas several ages ago. The origin of the race itself is still a mystery today. Even among the Qunari, not much is known about where they came from or why they landed in Thedas.

They’ve been described to share physical similarities with dragons, while having ears that resemble elves. Many Qunari believe that their priests, known as Tamassrans mixed dragon blood into their biology some time ago. However, the truth still remains...

While living under the Qun, the Qunari do not have a concept of personal identity. While they possess names, they do not use them, primarily using titles rather than names to identify and present themselves.

Given that Qunari names are just their job title, the Qun has many roles fulfilling different purposes. Such roles are separated between males and females, as the Qun believe each gender perform better functions than the other in certain areas, like raising children.  

“The Qunari believe that both men and women are capable of leadership. However, Qunari deem one gender or the other better at certain roles in their society. No matter how much aptitude a male shows for management, he will never be as good at it as a female. Therefore, they would consider it inefficient to put him in such a role when a woman would be better.” (WoT. V1)

The Body of the Qun

The Qun itself consists of single body, with each of its aspect responsible for governing certain movements and operations.  

"The Qunari view their whole society as a single creature: a living entity whose health and well-being is the responsibility of all," she wrote. "Each individual is only a tiny part of the whole, a drop of blood in its veins. Important not for itself, but for what it is to the whole creature. Because of this, the Qunari most outsiders meet belong to the army, which the Qun regards as if it were the physical body: arms, legs, eyes and ears, the things a creature needs in order to interact with the world. One cannot get to know a person solely by studying his hand or his foot, and so one cannot truly 'meet' the Qunari until one has visited their cities. That is where their mind and soul dwell.” (WoT.V1)

The primary symbol used to represent the Qunari as a people is the House of Tides, symbolising the triumvirate of body, mind, and soul. The body is represented by the Arishok. The mind is represented by the Arigena. The soul is represented by the Ariqun.  

Arishok, Arigena and Ariqun together are known as the Salasari:

The Arigena is the head of the Qunari matriarchy responsible for looking after the good of the community.

The Ariqun is the head of the Qunari priesthood, responsible for the maintenance of public spirituality and the progress of science through the Tamassrans & the Ben-Hassrath.

The Arishok is the head of the Qunari military, responsible for the protection and safety of Qunari society, as well as its expansion through the Antaam.  

The operative groups within the Qun’s body are separated for their unique purposes and tasks ran by one of the Salasari.

The Tamassrans; which means "Those Who Speak" in Qunlat, are the priesthood branch of the Qun led by the Ariqun.  

Tamassrans are strictly a female role within the Qun, they control the selective breeding process, deciding who mates with whom. They name and raise new-born babies; they educate and evaluate children when they reach 12 for more official tasks.  

And most importantly, they use a substance called qamek to "free those beyond redemption," i.e. to turn dissenters who have persistently resisted re-education into all-but mindless creatures ("viddath-bas"), who can only perform hard labour and require looking after in the same manner as the disabled.  

“Because they raise the society's children, the Tamassrans wield great influence.” (WoT.V1)

The Ben-Hassrath; which means "the Heart of the Many" in Qunlat, are the secret police branch of the Qun led also by the Ariqun.  

The Ben-Hassrath enforce the law of the Qun. Their purpose is protecting the faith and the innocents. They are leaders who maintain unity, which Qunari believe to be a strength.  

The Qunari divide all Ben-Hassrath activities into three distinct categories: "Dangerous Purpose," "Dangerous Action," and "Dangerous Questions.” Each category has a different Ben-Hassrath role, as you can imagine, following a very in-particular pursuit, they are:  

Ariqun: supreme priest of the Ben-Hassrath

Hissrad: "one who creates illusions; liar" (a spy)

Tallis: "to solve" (an assassin)

Saarbrak: unknown function

Salit: unknown function

Viddasala: "one who converts purpose”

Ben-Hassrath will venture outside Qunari society to perform covert missions in foreign lands, hunting Tal-Vashoth and other enemies of the Qun, sometimes acting as spies. They’re responsible for “reeducation” and the assimilation of conquered people.  

“While the Qunari accept the Ben-Hassrath as a fact of life, other races vilify the Qun's secret police. These notorious hammers of Qun justice do not usually kill their prisoners. To do so is seen as a waste, as all people have value. Instead of death, prisoners are put to work in labor camps and taught the way of the Qun.” (WoT. V1)  

The Antaam; which means "body" in Qunlat, are the military branch of the Qun led by the Arishok.

Antaam are generally a male role within the Qun, however, females who’re capable of both the talent and dedication to fighting can join the Antaam as part of a military classification known as the Aqun-Athlok, which means “one who is born as one gender but lives like another.”

Aqun-Athlok: “One who is born as one gender but lives like another."

Other notable ranks among the Antaam military body are:  

Arishok: supreme commander of the Antaam

Arvaarad: "One who holds back evil" (Watcher)

Katari: "One who brings death."

Ketojan: An infantry platoon

Sten: Infantry platoon commander

Antaam control every military aspect, they gather specific intelligence for the Qunari, seek and destroy anything that threatens Qunari society, and protect or recover revered artifacts, and technology.

While the Antaam are normally led by the Arishok. Currently, an invasion on Tevinter has already begun as an unsanctioned operation. The force took over two Tevinter cities, Ventus and Carastes without the Qun’s authorisation. The Arishok’s order has been ignored, instead, Rasaan, a prominent Qunari Tamassran revealed that quote “her” Antaam are in Tevinter unofficially.

Rasaan, taking actions into her own hands, is searching for Fen’Harel’s true name, so the Qunari can oppose him once they figure out his greatest weakness.  

“Fen Harel,” she lectured, “is a name given by enemies. Its translation, ‘Dread Wolf,’ isn’t true.” She turned, considering one of the tomes now piled on the slab. “The name given when he lied to us—and to your Inquisition—was chosen by a self-styled martyr. ‘Solas’ is also not true.” (Tevinter Nights)

While the Ben-Hassrath watch over the Antaam’s movements, they’ve decided not to join in their conquest. Other Qunari outside of the Antaam feel the same, and have spoken out against the Antaam’s actions, some even killing their fellow brethren for disobeying orders.  

“Antaam, to me!” Bas-taar choked out.

“I am not Antaam.” The Huntmaster smiled as the Qunari beside him looked at him in confusion. In one fluid motion, he swung the spear down from his back and hurled it across the clearing. Bas-taar shuddered as the spear struck, then went silent and still. (Tevinter Nights)

The Saarebas; which means “dangerous thing” in Qunlat, are the mages of the Qunari forces.  

The Qunari fear and loathe magic. But it is of course still possible for a follower of the Qun to be born with the power to use it. The Qunari treat their Saarebas with brutality and caution. The seer of Kont-aar once wrote:

"Saarebas must be carefully controlled by someone else, an arvaarad, 'one who holds back evil,' because they cannot truly control themselves." (WoT. V1)

The Qun teaches that those who can control magic cannot control themselves. Because of this, it is common practice for saarebas to be chained, masked, and kept on a short leash. Their lips may, in extreme cases, be stitched together. An arvaarad may also use a rod, similar to one used to control a golem, to restrain a saarebas.

Finally, Tal-Vashoth; which means "the true gray ones” in Qunlat, a name they gave themselves.

Tal-Vashoth refers to Qunari who have lived under the Qun and rejected it. This rebellion against its principles makes Tal-Vashoth traitors in the eyes of the Qun. Tal-Vashoth frequently clash with Qunari, but they are not large enough in number to be a formidable threat to the Qun.  

Tal-Vashoth usually stick together. Most are kossith. Since many in Thedas see kossith and think "Qunari,~ the Tal-Vashoth are often forced into a life of banditry and mercenary work, unaccepted and unable to find safer work.

And that makes up the majority of the Qun and its people. The Qunari are Thedas’ most immediate threat, as their invasion on Thedas has already started, while the Qun is greatly splintered, many nations in Thedas will face onslaught from these terrifying giants who will fulfil their Qun’s demand. Many plot points and future story beats lie for the Qunari.  

Ben-Hassrath's Current Movements

The Ben-Hassrath's plan titled “Dragon’s Breath’ failed, the scheme would’ve wrought the destruction of the Winter Palace and an immediate conversion on the entirety of Southern Thedas’s people, with the Divine and many other key figures dead. As the Inquisition and Fen’Harel stopped this from happening, the Ben-Hassrath focus many of their efforts on hunting Fen’Harel, the Dread Wolf. He has made himself an enemy to the Qun.  

Other aspects of the Ben-Hassrath attacked the estate of Magister Nenealeus, looking for a mysterious lyrium sarcophagus that can imbue any elf with lyrium tattoos.  

The Ben-Hassrath moved their “Darvaarad” (their magical quarantine site) to a mobile dreadnought.  However, the ship was destroyed by an agent of Fen'Harel who placed an Altus Tevinter thief on their land. Their intention was to force the Ben-Hassrath to join the war between Tevinter and the Antaam. Fortunately, Gatt, one of the Ben-Hassrath saw through this scheme, and the plan was thwarted.  

“The Antaam will still agitate for us to move against you more openly. But we can blunt their strike. The Ben- Hassrath will remain officially neutral. More important, free to act against the true threat.” (Tevinter Nights).

While they predominantly hunt Fen’Harel, what are they going to do about their inner struggles within the Qun’s body? Will they step up and stand against it? Or continue to ignore it?  

Antaam’s Invasion  

A delicate peace existed between the Qunari and the rest of Thedas, however, the Qun is a text that must be adhered to by all. The Military body of the Qun, the Antaam, led by Tamassran Rasaan have decided for themselves, without the blessing of the other Qunari, to attack Northern Thedas.  

“Rasaan stopped him with a raised index finger. “I know your work,” she said. She knelt again, her eyes dead-straight with his. “My Antaam are in Tevinter as officially as you are. Does that change your tone?” (Tevinter Nights)  

While this is a prohibited invasion, the Qunari have declared war on the rest of Thedas, and will continue their efforts to re-educate the world, by any means possible. It’s estimated that the Antaam will crush Tevinter’s opposition in the east, and everything east of Vyrantium will be under their control within a year, and northern Antiva as well. Unless the newly appointed Airshok, who used to be Sten, personally stops this conquest. The Antaam may very well besiege the majority of Tevinter’s rural land.  

"You all know that the Antaam invaded without permission of the other branches of Qunari government? We had assumed this would hobble them, but it appears the priests and workers were a moderating influence. Without them, the Antaam have crushed the Tevinter opposition in the east, and I fear everything east of Vyrantium will be under their control within a year, and northern Antiva as well." (Tevinter Nights)

While the majority of the Antaam’s army will find fulfilment in overthrowing cities and bestowing the Qun’s law. Rasaan has taken interest in Fen’Harel and his scheme, she seeks his demise, just like the Ben-Hassrath. It seems each force within the Qunari government can agree that Fen’Harel is a formidable threat, as many of their efforts are focussed on stopping his plans.  

As a side note, Rasaan is a very attractive female Qunari Tamassran, we have not yet had the opportunity to romance such a striking, yet intimidating figure like herself in the Dragon Age games as of yet. I’d very much like her to “re-educate” my next protagonist, if you catch my drift.  

Seheron’s Occupancy  

Seheron is the largest island in Thedas, it was a paradise claimed by Tevinter long before the Qunari first landed on its shores. And even today, both groups fight for the island, while the Qunari dominate the majority of Seheron, Tevinter kinsman are constantly aiming to retake the land.  

Seheron is still "kabethari" to the Qunari—a land to be conquered and converted, literally "those who need to be taught." The tide could change any moment for either party.  

Rivain’s Qun Influence

Rivain is home to the only peaceful Qunari settlement on the main continent, in Kont-aar. The influence of the Qun, if not absolute adherence to its teachings, is present throughout Rivain, getting stronger as one heads north toward Kont-aar. During the conquest of the Tevinter city – Ventus, a captured elf and human discovered that the Qunari are moving some of their forces back to Rivain. A perfect location to continue their conversion of Thedas.  

“The Qunari are moving into Rivain. You need to get word to the clans before they land.” Irelin looked at Myrion with her maybe-glare, then back to Strife.

“I can be there and back by midnight. Can you stay ahead of the Qunari until then?” (Tevinter Nights)  

Antiva Invasion

The nation of Antiva do not have a personal guard or army, instead the Antivan Crows step-into the battlefield for the sake of their countrymen.

“Without an army, Antiva’s only line of defense was the Crows. Should the Qunari decide to attack, the assassins must present a united front.” (Tevinter Nights)

The eight leaders of the Crows are called Talons. Each talon from each house within the Crows had a political meeting to discuss the ongoing Qunari threat, in which, one of the eight talons decided to oppose the Crows and sign a contract with the Qunari for a peaceful invasion of Antiva’s land, all they needed to do was eliminate the remaining other talons.  

“The Qunari are coming. I was approached and presented a contract—an opportunity—for a peaceful invasion. In exchange for seven deaths, we could keep our way of life. They wouldn’t make us submit to the Qun.”

“And you believed them,” Teia scoffed.

Emil squared his shoulders. “The Qunari are many things—brutal, rigid, merciless warriors—but they are also honorable.” (Tevinter Nights)

Fortunately, the Talons were able to uncover this conspiracy before they met their deaths, however, the Qunari are on their way to Antiva, and with this deal no longer in effect, there will be blood to pay on the streets of this costal nation. The Crows will not give up their home so easily.  

Plenty of war lingers for the Qunari, as they declare this transfiguration for the people of Thedas. Since Trespasser’s events, the Qunari have all but continued their slaughter, while they’ve decided to take on the hunt for Fen’Harel. The lines are going to be so blurred when we experience this war for ourselves, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, right? Perhaps the Qunari could willingly help us, but at the cost of Thedas’s entire transmutation. So many seeds are in the planning for the Qunari and their conquest, we can safely say the future will be nothing but tragic. Let me know your thoughts down below.  

[nextbrain]

What Drives Artificial Intelligence Applications?

Artificial Intelligence or AI stands for artificial intelligence applications. These applications make use of the computers with the ability to think, reason and interact with humans. Such applications can either be used alone or they can be used as part of a network. Software developers use artificial intelligence software in order to analyze large sets of data. They also make use of the computers in order to make better decisions and provide better services.

The main aim of the artificial intelligence software is to help humans by collecting, organizing, processing and presenting the data gathered. It helps to reduce the cost of providing services, it also helps to cut down on human error and it helps to make better decisions. The technology has changed over time. Initially the artificial intelligence was restricted to a few programs. Today you can find a wide range of artificial intelligence applications available. It can include weather prediction, stock trading, transportation and decision making amongst others.

The main challenge when it comes to artificial intelligence is to ensure that it remains unbiased and objective. For this it must always remain within the same domain. In fact this is one of the biggest challenges that face the software developers in the current period.

There are a number of technologies that make use of artificial intelligence. One such application is the language translation software. This uses a database of translated texts in order to provide accurate and reliable translation of the given text. Another application is the automated warehousing systems. It works by collecting all the data and information about a specific warehouse and then storing it in an efficient manner in order to make better decisions.

In today's world there are a number of IT solutions using ai applications as a key feature of their overall software architecture. One of the most important applications is the artificial intelligence Forex trading system. It works by gathering, processing, organizing and presenting market related data and information in a reliable fashion. This is done in a process which is called supervised learning. The software helps to make better decisions and also makes them in a manner which is completely automated.

Another important piece of software is the content management system which is used for managing large number of documents. These can be used for creating a work flow and for ensuring compliance with legal requirements. They make use of different technologies like XML (Extensible Markup Language), SOAP (Server-Based Application Protocol), and RDF (relational database management) to support the document management.

Some of the most well known software is the medical software which is used in the areas of speech recognition, image recognition and speech transcription. In addition, the software also includes artificial intelligence web cams. Such software has been instrumental in generating high accuracy and high quality images. Such software also includes software for weather prediction and weather forecast.

What drives artificial intelligence is the desire to drive the development of machines with human capabilities to the point where artificial intelligence becomes equal to or better than human capabilities. It is not far fetched to imagine that artificial intelligence will drive the future of computer technology, because in the end it will almost inevitably occur. Whether we like it or not artificial intelligence will rule our lives and no one can count the ways it will help us.

In the future artificial intelligence driven software will likely be used in many aspects of our lives. Will we have artificially intelligent robotic doctors and nurses or will patients be able to talk to their doctors and be less subject to a robo-surgeon? Will there be software that can beat the S.C.U.T. test?

Will artificially intelligent computers and software to be used to: o Design human beings and make them better through artificial intelligence; o Design buildings, infrastructure and planets o Create a better way of life by creating artificial intelligence o Create new knowledge and new concepts and solutions to our current problems o Create new ways of earning revenue, driving business and achieving goals on a global scale o Create new business opportunities and markets on a global scale o Create a new economic order and increase wealth in the world's poorest countries The list of what drives artificial intelligence is still long and a research program into such ideas may well reveal many answers to the question 'what drives artificial intelligence'. It is an interesting area of research and it is sure to continue.

Today's artificial intelligence is no doubt more than a small part of our lives but what it does do is give us a perception of what might be possible in the future. Robotic software developing tools which can help diagnose diseases, aid healing and even perform a surgery or something as complicated as a heart transplant is all being developed with the help of artificial intelligence software. What drives artificial intelligence will continue to change the way we live our lives and hopefully in the future the type of software we develop will be limitless and will not be limited to a certain purpose.