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13tinysocks · 1 month ago

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My Dead Girlfriend

Surrounded by Marks, but you still yearn for him. You take soul-sucking measures to dull the pain, and get someone on your side to hunt down Phantom.

NSFW. Shlorp shlorp!

[Invincible Variants X Reader]

[Part one] [Ao3] [15] [17]

16 * Hindbrain [8.8k]

"Outside your house,

Down on my knees,

Swollen with doubt and animosity."

Mercy - Sir Chloe

Gray didn't turn around when he entered. Back to you, sat ridged, trying to rest and conserve what energy he had left. "What do you want?"

Tracksuit set you down on the corrugated metal sheet flooring as Maskless touched down beside him. "Wow dude, I come bearing gifts and this is the thanks I get?"

Gray turned, "What-"

Surprise wasn't an expression he was used to wearing. Foreign. Alien as his blooming feelings for you that he thought had been snuffed out with your apparent death. But there you were. Standing, leaning on a crutch. Dirty and miserable, but alive.

He looked nearly identical to the last time you saw him. Suit knicked, scratched in a few places. Hair undone, slightly longer. Strangely, no stubble grew from his cheeks. Somehow not a degree tanner or paler.

He swallowed back the urge to rush forward. He approached slow, measured. "My compatriot will be pleased at your return." He made himself say as he scanned clinically over your body. You weren't rapt with starvation and your skin was unburned by the sun. Curious. Then there was the mystery of the crutch and your wrapped and splinted leg. He didn't like the look of misery on you. Didn't like it one bit. "He will be returning from scouting soon." His eyes flicked to the others, hovering nearby. "You can go."

Tracksuit blinked. "Go?"

Gray nodded a tight solider's nod. "You've done well brining her back. Am I wrong assuming you would rather be rid of her?"

"What the fuck?" Tracksuit had to do a doubletake at the pure audacity. "I know I said gifts but that was a joke, man. She's like- a person."

"I am aware." Gray said, hovering around you in a loose circle, getting a better idea of your condition. The bruises made him rather unhappy, he had to suppress the urge to reach out. "She is a person safer in our care than anyone else's."

"Uh, yeah, that's not happening." Maskless said though it wasn't aggressive. This move wasn't a trade, it was an olive branch. An acknowledgement they trusted one another even after the shitshow.

Gray didn't understand the concept of life not being tit or tat. He'd rather barter now than feel he owed the duo something later on. He was also not too keen on expanding the camp by three people. It would draw untoward attention from the others, make you less safe.

"I doubt we'll have anything worth your time." He said, implying the idea of trading. He knew a human wouldn't like that word in regard to their autonomy.

"We're not trading." Maskless said with an annoying lack of tact. "Think of this as a favor." He moved to the center of the room where a fire pit better than anything he could build waited.

Gray eyed you. Were they really going to give you up? Just like that? When he and/or Omni could double-cross them at any moment? What was the angle?

You hobbled to the fire, sat by it when you were close enough. Bad leg stretched in front of you with a grunt. Maskless had a growing fire and the rudimentary cookware set up by the time you were settled. Arms lifting out of the cloak, little bugs crawling up and down your forearms. You picked one off, killed it with a flick to the chest, and popped it out of its exoskeleton.

Gray watched on. Tried putting together the few puzzle pieces he had. The bruises. The bugs. The misery on your face. The story he put together in his head wasn't too far off from the truth, though it was missing some key points. Leaving him to calculate risk versus reward. Give up his healing accelerant and get... Nothing. You could aid in his survival with a healed leg, yet you were a crutch yourself, especially when you could not give him children. But despite this, when he saw you it had his immediate thought, to heal your wounds and any burden that would come. But there was no need, you were already giving him food and according to Maskless it was for no trade. He didn't need to barter when provided with everything he needed for survival- bet he still wanted you better. Seeing you hurt, the way your eyes were hollowed out- it shifted something solid within him. Perhaps this was what father described feeling for mother. Caring? Affection?

Maybe he didn't need to get something out of helping you- when helping you was fulfilling enough. Was this...

Gray's stomach growled. Thankfully, you didn't look at him in his embarrassment. You went on, picking bugs off your skin, killing them, and shucking them as the water Maskless brought in the basin started to boil.

Maskless had explained the plan on the way over, though you weren't listening. Feed those two and they'd have two more allies who weren't about to die. By no means did he want to have more buddies or to share his newfound food, but the tortured screams during the night had shook him. He was terrified Lensless and Scars would come for him next. Make him scream while everybody listened and nobody helped. It was better to have people to throw at them first. People who were strong enough to not immediately die so he could get away. Live on for William, for the world lost to his father.

Gray would parse his intentions out later, but in the moment he was focused on you, his mind made up. His heart fluttered as he knelt down, pulling a vial out of his pocket that meant more to him than you could know.

Especially when his voice came out as flat as usual, "Here."

You vaguely remembered him showing them off on one of the first nights. You didn't take it, not quite remembering what it was. Cologne? Plasma from a spine? No, that didn't sound right.

"For your leg." His flat words make you remember. Wound something or other.

You snatched it out of his waiting fingers. He relished the moment of contact but his face gave nothing away. You snapped the top off and threw your head back. His hand is back on the vial, over yours.

"No." He says sharp. Maskless and Tracksuit tense. Not quite willing to fight for you but not quite willing to give up a bargaining chip either. "You have to directly apply it to the skin."

Your hand fell, your companion's shoulders relaxed. Imagination running wild with what would've happen if you drank the stuff. "You're only telling me this now?"

"An oversight."

Tracksuit laughed to himself, "Oversight. Who the fuck says oversight?" He went ignored.

You started to bend forward to undo the tight cloth wrapping only to cringe. A pulse of pain shooting up your leg. "Shit."

Gray didn't think, just moved. Propped up your leg with a rock he zipped away to find before you even noticed. Unwrapped it and laid the bandages and splint to the side. It was... Not good. Your skin was discolored up and down your shin with a noticeable lump in the middle where your bone had snapped. The only good thing was that the skin didn't break.

He held out his hand for the vile, "May I?"

You eyed him suspiciously. His intentions were always hard to read, he was short and acted without explaining. But you had no idea what you were doing in regards to self care beyond stitched up gut wounds. No choice in the matter, you returned the vial.

"I need to make an assessment first." He said, "This will hurt." Before you could protest, his hands were cupping your leg, pressing down gently but sending rockets of pain shooting through your body. You gasped, flinched back, jostled your leg and flinched again. Gray steadied you, voice neutral, "Don't hurt yourself."

You straighten your leg best you could and let him continue pressing, lifting, assessing the damage. The only sounds were the water hissing and fire crackling. It reminded you of the cave. Of Mark. Suddenly you are on the verge of tears, blinking them back.

"How do you know how to do this?" You make yourself say, voice calm but wavering. You needed to think of something else but every time you tried you saw Mark's face in the pale firelight. Then blackness, hearing echoes of his voice. His dying gasps.

Gray notices but doesn't pause. "Viltrumite and human biology are almost identical." He says, "The key differences are in our muscle tissue, much denser than a human's. Our brain tissue as well is denser, allowing for better senses, especially in battle."

"Doesn't make sense why so many of us are so stupid then." Tracksuit said, sitting feet away, idly watching. Ears perked for Omni's arrival. Wondering if he'd kick Gray's ass for weirdly massaging your leg.

Again he is ignored. "As part of the World Betterment Committee, we must be prepared for all sorts of resistance. Many worlds fought against our occupation. Many had no chance but some were clever. We are trained to assess physical damage and minimize the time needed for healing." He flipped the vial, spilled a few drops onto his hands and lathered them together. His hands came down, encompassed your leg best they could. You hissed, pained, but the liquid made his hands a cool relief in the sweltering heat.

"You really are one of them." Maskless said to himself- literally.

Gray didn't reply. Focused on rubbing the slick into your leg. "This is agent fourteen. It enters through the skin into the bloodstream. It targets damaged tissue throughout the body but is faster acting when applied to the-"

"How can you live with yourself?" Maskless said, a little louder this time.

You winced while trying to relax into his cool, gentle touch. His hands were calloused, movement rigid and precise. He was distracted by everything happening around him, the smell of soup wafting on the hot wind, making his stomach lurch and his mouth go dry, unable to salivate with the lack of water in his system. The feel of your skin under his own, the way your heart was beating erratically from the pain. But he didn't stop. "I'm almost finished."

Tracksuit snorted. Maskless snapped, "How could you turn your back on your own people like that?"

"Earthlings are not my people." Gray said coolly because clearly this man-child would not stop pestering him until he answered, "The Viltrumites are."

"Your mother is an 'Earthling.'" Spat like a slur.

"Yes, she's proud of her heritage, but recognizes that Earth was primitive compared to the empire. She has long since accepted what became of it."

Maskless's lip twitched. "And what became of it?"

He had to wait for a reply. Gray only truly cared for your comfort. "You should be able to put some weight on it in a few days. Though it may be a week or so until it's fully healed. It's the best I can do."

"I'm talking to you."

But Gray doesn't hear his poisoned words, focused on the way you mutter, "Thanks," under your breath and look away.

"You are welcome." Said more robotic than usual.

"Hey."

Ah yes, the other one was still speaking to him despite his disinterest. "Most of Earth's population had to be culled to quell any resistance." Despite this resistance was rampant on the colony. The human spirt was a strong, burning flame that'd never go out. Much like the Viltrumites, but they didn't have the strength to back it up. That's why he took you. You burned bright despite your circumstances and it helped he found you rather pleasing to the eye. "Last Father reported, the population had been growing." Gray didn't bother meeting Maskless's hard stare. Attention set upon your leg, now lightly glistening. "Earth's occupation was a success."

Your skin tingles as his touch leaves.

"A success?" Maskless fists ball and unball. Body undecided as his mind was ready for blood. Attack and quell some shred of vengeance. Don't and let that abomination with his face continue to exist. "You call killing thousands a success?"

"We killed millions." Gray corrected. "I don't see your point. You did the same thing working with Angstrom Levy." Gray rose, padding to a stockpile of potentially useful garbage. Looking for something clean enough to wrap your leg in.

Maskless's hand went to his chest, "So I could fix things."

"Millions had to die for the betterment of Earth. It's the same thing."

Maskless's body twitched. The idea of attack clear in his movement. Yet he made no move to hop over the fire and give Tracksuit the drama he craved. Gray waited for him to make a move, back to him, sifting through the materials, body relaxed purposefully. Almost a taunt. He wasn't worried. Which made Maskless want to kick his ass even more.

"I can't believe we're the same person." Maskless rose to his feet. Purposeful. Gray pulled out the longest stretch of dry canvas he could find in the pile- a faded white and green ad for some long dead company. He passed by Maskless, paying him no mind as he began to rewrap your leg. Purposeful.

"Neither can I." Gray's eyes left your leg to flick up and down Maskless' blood-crusted suit. Hoping he'd get the message, that he was a hypocrite- All that death, not for the greater good or the Empire, but for personal reasons. Pathetic. He fought for nothing. Unlike Gray, who finished wrapping your leg. Setting the splint firmly as you'd allow- fighting for something he didn't yet understand, and the Empire, of course.

Maskless stepped around the fire, stood before Gray. Fists twitching. Gray stood, body a shield in front of you. Maskless's gaze flicked to you- his apparent Achilles' heel. "If you don't care about us Earthlings, why do you care about her so much?"

"Keep me out of this." You grumbled.

Maskless went on, chest puffed, feeling emboldened with rage and memory. "Is she different because she was some sort of slave to you? Did you tie her down and force her to have your kids?"

The thought had occurred to him but mother insisted he try things the human way- after he kidnapped you. Despite his attempts, Viltrumite ideology rang true, "Viltrumites choose their mates. If the selected can not fight off their prospective mate, procreation occurs."

A collective cringe crossed your faces. You were thankful for Gray, for the balm, already feeling like the pain had ebbed. But the idea of you as some baby-birthing machine to an alien empire made you look at him differently.

He sensed the shift. "I did not do things the Viltrum way. I courted her." He said carefully. "Mother said humans like to have a choice." She hadn't had one, but you didn't need to know that. "My comrades looked down on me for it but I enjoyed our time together." Much as he'd allowed himself to with the perpetual stick up his ass. "It was a shame when she passed." He snapped her neck like one kills a sick pet rabbit. You were sick, too poisoned by the rebellion's ideologies. Ungrateful for the second chance. Yet he could never bring himself to return to Earth for another mate. Strangely burned on the inside, like something had been lost. He had enjoyed when you were more docile with fear. When you talked with him of inconsequential Earthly things. It was nice, but you were not. So that you had to die. This time he'd do things different. Even if you hated him for it, you would not die so long as he drew breath.

This you didn't need to be so scared. You should be afraid of him, yes, fear would keep you in line, but too much and you'd reject his advances again. Because he wanted to try again, to soothe the burn that ate away at his insides.

Gray thinks he's done well curbing your idea of him. He had, all save for that last part, said with too little care. Like you were a childhood pet, remembered fondly but inconsequential. Maskless opened his mouth to jab at him.

The barely secured floor shook as Omni landed. Suit torn at the knees and fingers. Cape shreds of what it used to be. He stepped into the tent, pulling his mask off his face, blinded by the switch to shade after hours in the bright desert. He was so tired. So frazzled. So grief stricken he didn't notice anything but your loss. "There's no sign of-"

His mask was freed from his sweaty face. Black lenses glinting sunlight. Tanlines softer on his face than you'd expect. Stubble a solid shadow on his jaw, though not as dark as the circles under his eyes. Light and honey-toned but flat with despair.

Until they land on the sliver of you visibly behind Maskless and Gray. They would've been toppled over if they hadn't moved. Quarrel put aside, for now as Omni barreled past them.

He stopped at your feet. Standing close but not touching. Scared you and the food were a mirage. "Is it really you?"

You looked awful. Tortured. Not as bad as he'd let himself hope late in the night- wishing he could see you one last time. Assuming that last time would be holding you dying again. If he ever got to see you, bones lost to the dunes.

"Yeah." You were not enthused by his presence. By any of their presence. You missed Mark, missed being held and kissed. Missed the cool cave but couldn't imagine going back.

"You.." He knelt, hovering over you a moment before lunging. Hugging you flush to his chest. Feeling your skin, your raggedy clothes, your breath and heartbeat against him. "You're really real." He at least avoided your leg, seeming to notice the splint. To be asked about later, but forgotten for now.

You could have shoved at him and he'd have let go. But you didn't. Even as Gray eyed Omni's back, as Maskless stared in mild disgust, as Tracksuit watched the others for their reactions. The contact felt like a missing puzzle piece. You had missed being held, arms like a vice keeping you together in this fucking wasteland.

"I thought you were..." He can't say it. Can't say it because then you'd dissolve in his arms.

You felt that. Deeply. Too deeply.

Your arms came up and held him back, hard as you could. Pressing your body to his like you were trying to become a single whole being. You needed to be held. Needed to be comforted. Hated it at the same time. Hated yourself for throwing yourself into it like a sad puppy. You wanted to scream and cry and puke just as much as you wanted to hold him until everything was better.

Omni pulled back, hands sliding up your sides and to your face, holding your cheeks. He sees it then. The bruises, dark and puffy where Mark had held your mouth shut, where he'd tied rags around your face for days. Your hands come up to push his off, wincing from the pain. Which only lets him see your wrists. The rubbed raw indents, just starting to scab over where the rebar had been for days.

He was absolutely murderous. "Who did this to you?"

Mark.

Mark was right in front of you. Mark was beside you. Mark was watching over the fire. Mark was happy without you in another dimension. Mark was dead. Everything was Mark's fault.

You hated that you couldn't stop the tears. The way his dark brows knit together and his lips fell when the tears came and didn't stop. He reached to wipe them away but it reminded you too much of Mark. You flinched back, covered your face with your hands.

"Eat." You managed. "We brought food."

Omni doesn't want to be away from you. Still partly terrified you'll vanish. He sat beside you, thigh grazing your own as Maskless reluctantly served them both bowls. You were aware they were eating. Talking. You were too busy trying not to lose your shit more than you already had. When the tears and sniveling were done for good, you removed your hands the best you could. Face stinging with shame as wet friction. Palms slobbery with snot. The fire only made your misery more apparent.

Omni had long since finished his bowl. Watched you quietly convulse. Wondering what happened to break you down like this. What stroke of luck brought you back to him. He held out his cape to you. You took it, wiping off your hands. Nodding a tight lipped thanks. He tried catching your eye but you looked away. To the desert and the gray sky.

Maskless told Gray and Omni some of what he knew. The cave, the bugs, how he found you. He left out the rebar around your wrists, the dead body. He hated talking to these assholes enough as it was, that part was yours to tell. But you didn't start talking, just looked into the sandy nothing while they stood around, dicks in hand.

"If there's anything else down there we don't know about, now's the time to tell us." Maskless tossed the ball in your court.

Only for it to bounce, once, twice, then roll to your feet. You hadn't been listening to him anyways. "The bugs. These are the last of them." You said. "Unless you can dig out the nest and save the queen larvae, but they're probably all dead. There's a mold farm too. I think you said it was also collapsed but maybe you can recover some spores from it." You knew what they wanted to hear but couldn't bring yourself to say.

Gray thinks those resources could be recovered but he cared more about, "The prisoner- that's his blood on you, correct?"

You don't say anything for a moment.

"The bugs will last us awhile. Don't make me eat him." An acknowledgment, but the most you were willing to do.

Omni's leg pressed more into yours. "He's gone then."

"I don't want to talk about this."

Tracksuit scoffed, drawing annoyed glances. "Oh, boohoo, your crazy desert boyfriend died. News flash, sweetheart, you've got like a bazillion boyfriends who aren't as crazy right here. So why don't you fess up n' tell Daddy what's wrong?" At Omni's expression, he quickly added, "Not countin' myself or my good man 'ere." He wasn't scared of Omni but he'd rather watch the drama unfold than be part of it. He wasn't good with other people's feelings, let alone his own.

"Did you see the body?" You asked, remembering in flashes. The dark, the blood stench, the sound.

He seemed oblivious to the shift in your tone, the way the others had stilled.

"Nah, but my boy here said it was nasty."

The response made you want to scream, to tear him apart. You turned on him then, hollow eyed, "I could do that to you. I'm stronger now."

You meant it. Wanted to do it. But you were scared of feeling another Mark's body heat dissipate beside you. You knew you wouldn't, but the threat felt good.

"Meeee-ouch! I thought we were friends but apparently not. Okay, cool, I get it. I'd hate me for being chill and normal too since you like 'em crazy." Clearly, Tracksuit wasn't taking you seriously.

You clicked your tongue a few times and tiny bugs began crawling up his legs. He batted a few off but some make it under his collar, crawled under his clothes while he shot up and danced around, trying to swat them all. "Call them off! Call them off!" Bugs were no big deal, they weren't even biting but he hated the little fuckers.

"We ate their queen and lived in her exoskeleton." You say, "They listen to me now. Do you know how many of them there are left?"

"I don't fucking care! Get these things off me!"

"I tried counting before. Lost my place after a thousand." Though there were way more than that and counting had been an exercise in boredom. You couldn't tell one bug apart from another. "I could make you tear yourself open and let them eat you. Think about that before you say rude shit about him again." A few clicks later and the remaining bugs crawled out through his sleeves and dropped to the sand where they burrowed before he could stomp the life out of them.

You regretted calling him crazy, regretted so much you had done. But you didn't regret your freedom, being in the sun, horribly hot as it was. You missed Mark so much your chest ached.

"Wasn't bein' rude." He shivered, still feeling the little legs on his skin.

"If she said you were being rude, you were being rude." Omni said but still, he needed to know, "We need to know what happened to you down there, we want to understand. What happened?"

Nothing. Everything. A lifetime in two weeks. You didn't want to talk about it, but you knew they were like dogs with a bone.

"He took me down there and I let him. Told me how he was going to fake the disappearance and everything."

"You assholes cut us out?" Tracksuit huffed.

"Would you have taken everybody?" You asked.

That stung. Tracksuit thought you were cool before but... you were sort of traumatized now more than you already were. He could almost give you a pass for being a massive bitch, and you were right. He probably wouldn't have taken you. "Should've never let you smoke my shit."

Omni eyed him quizzically but looked back to you when the story kept going. "Phantom found it first. Showed Mark and Mark showed me." Omni and Gray should've felt insulted you called that prisoner their shared name, but oddly they didn't. Omni knew you knew his name- Markus, though you hadn't said it again. Gray was content with your nickname specially picked for him. The dead man could have the title Mark.

"He was supposed to stay long enough to convince you all I was gone, then he was going to come back. Help us make a tunnel out that you wouldn't find so we wouldn't get cabin fever down there but-" You thought about the screaming in the night but remembered he's fucking Invincible. He should've been able to get away to tell someone else where you were. He'd had all the power in the world to help you and had done nothing. "-Man, wha'dya do when you got two ex-cons and want 'em to hate each other?" Looks of concern were shared but nobody said a word, "That's right! Leave 'em in a dark cave for two weeks until one of them..." The word stuck in your throat, you couldn't say that he killed himself. You'd made him do it.

Omni leaned in soft-browed, fingers hovering over your wrists, "He did that to you?" He was partly horrified Mark Grayson of any variation could torment you so. He had killed you sure, but it had been quick.

"No shit." He doesn't move back despite your venom, "I answered your questions. Answer mine. Where is that screaming asshole?"

Omni hesitated. Gray doesn't. "They're close enough to be a threat."

You leaned in, blood in the water. "Where?"

"If you're trying to get me to take you to him- it won't happen. He is constantly surveilled by those pests." Scars and Lensless in their yellow suits.

You felt the need for revenge pulsing in your scabs, under your bruises, in your heart. "Take me to them."

You cast the net too wide. Connect weakly with Maskless and Tracksuit, but Gray's mind is like a steel trap and Omni had always been difficult to control. Maskless and Tracksuit come for you, held off by the others a few moments until you control snapped back in your face like a bungee cord. Their expressions hard, daring you to try again.

Blood trailed down to your lip. "Fine. I can wait." Until you were stronger, strong enough to get a ride and kill all three of those assholes. A few days was all you needed.

You don't say it but they feel your intent. An uneasy undercurrent passed between them. You were weak, but controlled two of them at once. Being strong enough to survive this long wasn't a small thing. You were a real threat to yourself and to them.

"Don't do that again." Omni warned, though it was soft as he reached to wipe the blood dripping down your nose. "You don't know what you'd be getting into. Those two are a problem but don't push yourself for revenge. It's not healthy." Said the psychosexual, emotionally-incestious-daddy-issue-having freak.

You let him touch you. Smear the hot blood away. Fractionally leaning into his touch. Missing Mark. But knowing, "I can wait."

"Whatever." Tracksuit's feet left the floor. Head shaking off the cloud you'd laid over his brain. "We did what we came to do. We're gonna head out if you're all powered down."

You had some dregs left. You don't tell him that. Thinking it'd be good to always keep a little power in your back pocket. It was safer that way. "I am."

He turned to Maskless, "Cool. You carry her this time."

Light early-life wrinkles the rest didn't have deepened on Omni's brow. He opened his mouth.

"You haven't shown us the cave with water." Gray said first.

"Fine. We'll show you, then we leave." Tracksuit jutted his head toward you, Maskless approached but Omni was in front of him.

"I can carry her." He said.

Maskless narrowed his eyes. "How do we know you won't just take her?" He didn't care about you, not at all, but he recognized you were the glue keeping things together before. Best case scenario, the others would flock to you, kill each other to get in your pants and he'd have more meat. Worst case scenario, you could be traded for his own life.

"How do I know you won't take her away and never let me see her again?" Omni retorted.

You weren't waiting for them to hash this out, "I'm not going down there." You said.

Tracksuit crossed his arms, little more than tiffed with you and your emotional outbursts. He'd been baking in a desert, starving and thirsty while you were cool and fed, and probably getting dicked down.

"Oh yeah? Whadd'ya gon do to stop us?" He was above ground, where the bugs couldn't get to him.

You should save the power but the rage boils out, unexpected and deeply hateful, "Hit yourself."

Tracksuit's fist came up against his will. Reeled back to the shoulder blade before springing forward, cracking against his jaw. Not as hard as Mohawk, but hard enough to send his flight off balance. You caught a look at his face before his mask fluttered down, lip smearing blood cross his teeth.

He doesn't attack as he stabilizes himself. Omni was in front of you like a Viltrumite-human shield. So he spat out a wad on blood onto the corrugated floor, "Touchy, but I'll admit you got me there."

"I'll do worse if any of you think about taking me back down there." You said, weak and weary, "You all go. I'll wait here."

"No." Gray and Tracksuit.

"'S just asking for those other guys to snatch you up then boom! There goes the food-lady." Tracksuit alone this time. "One'a you assholes stay with 'er."

"I will," Gray said before Omni could. Omni wanted to protest, but he needed the building trust between him and Gray to stay. Gray had been the only one Omni semi-tolerated in the caves. The only reliable ally he had. So he'd allow it, remembering he'd get his turn alone with you in time.

"Not alone," Maskless added. "You stay too."

Tracksuit spluttered. "What- No way, man!"

"You got lost on the way here." Maskless deadpanned.

"Only a little!"

"Fifteen miles give or take."

Tracksuit didn't argue that.

And so it was.

Maskless led Omni into the dusking desert, leaving you, Gray, and a pissed off Tracksuit alone. Leg tingling with numbness.

"Hey," Tracksuit was first to talk in the minutes of long quiet. You sat by the fire, the same way you had in the cave before things got bad. Gray stood by the edge of camp, hovering an inch over the sand, straight postured with hands behind back like always. "You're not gonna kidnap her if I take a s-"

Gray held up his hand. "There's nowhere for us to go. This alliance is worth too much to put at risk anyway."

"Cool, cool. Uhm, others shouldn't be back for a bit if they-" He doubled over clutching his stomach, "come back before me tell them to suck it." Tracksuit was gone in a flash. Too much food after a period of starvation making his stomach a roiling mess.

You were alone.

Two days after your... after Mark died. Aching stupidly on the inside, the dark of the desert whispered memories you tried to drown out. Trying to turn your thoughts to Phantom. Where he and the others were, if he was truly suffering or not. If Phantom was already dead, if you'd get revenge or not.

"Where are the others?" You ask.

"In the cave that you-"

"The other others."

"Ah." He's quiet a moment. Deciding weather or not to tell. You didn't exactly need to know. But it wasn't like you could fly or walk.

"Gray." You turned on him, find his expressionless mask cracked by a single word. "Where are they exactly? I need to know."

He knew that look. Saw it on his mother all the time. When father was following Viltrum's customs a little too closely. You'd given him the same look, the other you, when you told him how you hated him even though he brought you to a utopia. Emotional determination that perplexed him so. Father would give into mother, but he never gave in then. He should now to win you over- but you had powers. You cried in front of him and clearly hated it- you were unstable, unreliable. You had plans in mind, ones that'd get you killed.

"You can not make me tell you where they just like you couldn't make me take you. You are powerless."

Stubborn insistence, you knew better. He tried to stay impartial, but he cared about you like the others. He just needed a push and you needed to forget.

"I controlled that asshole." You scooted toward him on your ass, using your good leg as leverage. "You don't know how much shit I got stored up."

He watched you, confused as to why you were trying to pick a fight with him on the floor. "If I were to attack, you're making it much easier for me."

"You won't." You grunted with effort, pulling the last few inches you needed to be by his feet. Sat splayed by his legs like a good dog, looking up at him from under your lashes. "You're right, though, I probably couldn't control you, not for long anyway."

His gaze hardened, understanding you had ulterior motives, "Don't make me restrain you."

"I'm not doing anything." You said as your hand moved to his leg. Feeling up his calf that tensed at your touch.

You knew Gray wanted you. Knew he was some repressed alien freak. People who say 'courting' have never came in their entire fucking life. These over-protective assholes wouldn't give you what you needed, not like this. But if you leaned into their underlying carnal desires- they'd be putty in your hands. Revenge would be yours for the taking.

And Mark. You could hold Mark again. Not your Mark but a Mark and for now, that was enough.

"What are you doing?" Gray watched you feel up and down his calf.

Your hands traveled further up. Over the knee to his strong thighs that unwillingly flexed at your approach. He didn't move away. "Just admiring the view."

Viltrumites didn't do such things. He'd walked in on his mother and father, sure, but not in the light touches of pre-sex, pre-foreplay. He didn't see the bait you were holding.

"You need to touch me to do so?" Your fingers were feather-light. Tracing then cupping much of him as you could in your palm. It sent tingles down his back, electrical shocks to his abdomen. Made something within him that had been in a lifelong slumber, open its eyes.

"Gotta get the full picture." You lifted onto your good knee. Leg numb but scared you'd hurt it. Hands splaying the expanse of his legs, up the to creases his hips not hidden by his stupid skirt. You press your thumbs in and he shuddered. You saw it, how the usual lump in his skirt was a little larger than you remembered. Easy, just like Mark had been. A distraction from your situation, just like Mark had been.

Your touch moved up, to his lower belly. Up the muscles, tightly packed in white clothes. "Very nice."

You weren't just buttering him up. The man was drool worthy. Part of your plans, yes, but a distraction you desperately needed.

He watched you, expressionless, gaze intense. You think he's going to crack. So you snatch his forearms and use them to pull yourself up. He gets the memo, ends up pulling you up himself, feet coming to the ground. "You shouldn't be on your feet for long." He said as you leaned in. Pressed your chest to his, arms going around his shapely waist, hands skimming across his broad back, head crooked in his shoulder despite the height difference because he was so much (taller/shorter) than you. His arms refolded behind his back. Heart hammering oddly in his chest as blood rushed low in his body. He knew what was happening but feeling it was another story. Territory he had never crossed into with the old you, too afraid to touch him in any capacity.

"I won't be." You grabbed the hammer and swung it down- pulling his stupid collar to the side and kissing his neck.

He tensed. Crack. You kissed lower. Crack. He white-knuckled gripped his elbows. Crack. You trailed kiss, kiss, kiss, until you reached the nape of his neck where you sucked. He let out a nearly inaudible sigh. Crack.

Gray knew he should make you stop this nonsense. But when you lathed your tongue up the side of his throat, groaning into his never-before-worshiped skin, his resolve disappeared. He wouldn't stop you, but he wasn't stupid. "He will return soon." Your husband. Technically not, but still he claimed the title. Humans took that title very seriously. Except you.

You kissed his jaw, felt him swallow. Pulled back and looked at his embarrassingly flushed face and apparent hard-on. "I won't need much time."

"Time for what?" He knew what you meant but... why? Why him? Why now? Usually he could think, figure you out but his mind was a haze tunneled on you. The questions quieted when you pressed your lips to his. Chapped and rough. The pressure was pleasant.

You pulled back, ending the feeling too quickly. "You gonna just stand there the whole time?"

He tilted his head. Wracking his brain. He'd never been kissed like this before, his mother had pressed them to his forehead and cheeks when he was young. He had seen mother and father kiss quick morning pecks, but that was no tutorial or training with his mentor.

You breathily laughed at his expression. "What? Big bad alien boy doesn't know how?"

"There is no use for mashing lips together on Viltrum." He wanted his voice to be even but it warbled. Palms sweaty behind his back.

Your hand came to his neck, pressing gently, "Tilt your head like this." He did and went too far, you had to adjust him again. "Good, and I'll come in like this. Just follow my lead, okay?"

He mirrored your parting lips. Was robo-stiff in the kiss while you moved, lips, jaw, and all. Teeth came down on his lip and made his hands slip behind his back and his cock throb in his uniform. When you slipped your tongue past his defenses, he had to reinforce his knees as not to fall. You did all the work while he let it happen. Trying to take mental notes, trying to commit the moment to moment while living in it. So unreal, so good.

When you pulled back, his lips followed yours. Pressing tentative kisses to your buzzing mouth. You chuckled, grinding your tongue against his just to hear his soft whimper. Then you left him, red faced and wanting, looking absolutely fucked-out from a little light kissing. "You've got a lot to learn."

"Activities like this were not part of my training regimen." Gray was unsubtly looking at your lips. Hands hovering, wanting to take your sides and press you to him but he didn't know if that was the right thing to do. He wanted you, but wanted it to be good, worthwhile the way you'd made it for him.

You laugh. "That's fine, you're a fast learner."

Which was true. Heat pulsed hard between your legs. You'd like to take him to the floor. Like to teach him a lot more, but you didn't have time to teach him to get your rocks off. You knew however, you had more than enough time to take care of his straining hard-on which had been delightfully pressing to your thighs. He had twitched, but hadn't dare truly hump your leg.

Your hands go from his sides, down the hard planes of his chest, over the needy bulge. He gasped, shuddered into your hand. "What are you-"

"I think it's pretty obvious." You ran your hand slowly up and down. Watching his face tic and contort. "Do you want me to stop?"

Gray's throat twinged as he tried to find breath, find words as you squeezed him ever so gently. "Don't." He just barely managed to sound composed.

You grinned, touch leaving him a moment to move his skirt to the side. Without the gray fabric, you got a better idea of how pleased he was with his current predicament. Dick straining against the alien white cloth. "I've barely done anything to you, and you're this hard." Your teasing touch returns and his eyes go misty. "Are you sure you're the same guy who conquers planets?"

"Yes." He replied stiffly.

"I'm having a hard time believing that."

"I was a part of three large scale invasions and countless solo scouting excursions-" You palmed at him harder now. Every tense of your fragile human fingers had the composed solider gasping and twitching.

"Wow, great dirty talk." You smiled as you sank to your knees. You paused, pulling hard at his pants that didn't seem to have an obvious fly. "How do you open this thing?"

He slid his thumb into an invisible seam beside his crotch but paused, "The others..."

"Trust me, you'll be done before I even get started."

Still, Gray scanned the horizon. Nobody. Plus, you were... humiliatingly right. He'd never cum before but knew of the function. Knew his heart was hammering, his lower belly coiled tight, cock aching were all signs of what was to come. It'd be better to take care of his problem before anyone saw anyway. He pulled the fabric apart, held together by an invisible magnetic strip.

His cock sprang free in front of your waiting face. Thick and defined as the rest of him. Precum wept out the tip. Slippery and shiny on your hand as you brought it down, from tip to base. Gray had to actively prevent himself from thrusting into your palm as not to hurt you. He watched you, lips parted, gaze burning as you admired him. Jerking him off slow.

"We," his chest heaved, fingers twitching, feeling pleasure he never had, "we don't have much time."

You hummed, pressing a kiss to the side of his cockhead. Eyes looking up at him as your lips slowly captured him. Tongue lathing unhurried over the sensitive skin. Your jerked him off lazily from the thick base. Pushing and pulling his skin back but never enough to fully expose the flash of pink you saw. Not yet. You had to build him up. Make the chance for another blowjob like this worth risking his life.

So you jerked him off, pushing more of your head down his cock. Bobbing lazily, eyes always locked on his. Moaning at the stretch of your lips around him. So big it was hard to swirl your tongue around anything but the bottom of him. Veins pulsing on your tongue. Tasting of salt and sweat.

Gray doesn't know what to say. Can't speak at all. All he can do is try to repress the moans that escape him, foreign as they sounded on his lips. Your mouth was wet, and warm, and so inviting. Lips good on his but so much better on his dick. Looking up at him like you needed this, not the other way around.

His cockhead started to stretch the back of your mouth, soon to hit your throat. You moaned. Feeling a phantom of him in your cunt. Not really there but the thought of him inside you drove your head up, down, up, down until the only thing separating you from his pubic bone was your own hand. Which migrated to his thighs, trying to pull him closer, deeper, to fuck your throat. Fuck the pain away.

"Too-" He gasped, feeling your throat open up around him, feeling your lips press to his hips. Throat tight and vibrating with your moans, "Too much-"

You should finish him off. The others could be back soon. You pulled your head back, feeling the regrettable loss of his girth from your mouth. His cock glistened with spit and a wishing well's worth of precum. It was too easy to grab his dick and pull the skin back, expose the lickable pink of his unsheethed head.

Your open mouth came down, tongue teasing along the bottom when Gray gutterly groaned. Shooting cum onto your waiting tongue. You paused. You were expecting him to not last long but wow. You hadn't even really gotten going.

His chest rocked. Never before had someone, even an enemy or his mentor, left him so red and breathless. Then there was the feeling of cumming, so foreign, but like a straight shot of adrenaline after a hard battle. But there had been no battle. Only you and your flushed face and cum coated tongue that slipped back into your mouth. Throat bobbing before your lips reopened. His fluids gone down your tight throat.

If he hadn't gone soft, he'd cum again.

He could stare at you like this all night long. Wanted to return the favor, though he had no idea how.

Except you rocked back, patting his thigh, "Clean yourself up, think I see company."

He was back in his pants. You were back sat by the fire with him yards away. You looked back at him, lips buzzing, tongue tasing of him, a smile that left him dizzy as you said, "Hey, I'm not doing that again unless those assholes are dead."

You little...

"I'll-" He swallowed, watching the figures grow closer but still out of earshot. "I'll confer with your husband."

You didn't have the energy to be annoyed by the title.

***

He never thought those assholes would leave. Always lurking in the fucked up castle they built. Always indulging in the freshest meat the desert could offer. They had to go out a search for you sometime. Through the madness, it was apparent that they'd lost hope. Looking was just a part of their schedule now. They expected nothing.

Mohawk slipped inside the ruins. Knew what turns to take, he'd done this before. He'd been watching them for days. Stealing food from under their noses.

He's where they left him just... missing another piece. The first time Mohawk saw him, it was his broken forearm. Then it was his calf. Now, they'd taken the rest of the leg nearly up to the hip. Yet he still breathed, shallow in his unconscious stupor. Wounds wrapped tight in bloody cloth.

He recalls your voice, missing it so much it hurt. You called him, the pathetic, plotting motherfucker- Phantom.

So he said it now, hoping the name would goad him into the world of the living. "Phantom."

His head stayed dropped, chin to chest. Unmasked and sunburned. Scalp scabbed and stubbly from where they'd sheered off his hair with that knife that used to be yours. At first, they kept him masked, seeing their own face tortured was too weird, but the hair got in the way of remasking and the longer you stayed missing, the more they wanted him to hurt. They let his skin blister and peel. Broke his bones unhurried before tearing off the limbs and eating them raw. Mohawk had too grown used to the feel of wet, raw meat slipping down his throat. Had almost come to savor the taste, but never as much as those two.

"Phantom." A little louder this time. Mohawk wasn't afraid of Lensless and Scars per se, but they could be back anytime. Give up leaving any day, eat Phantom whole and let their fragile brains collapse even further into ruin. "Hey."

Phantom's head bobbed. "Whhaaa?" Mohawk was in front of him, holding him hard by the chin, forcing him to look up with those disgustingly blue eyes. Cloudy with hardly held on lucidity.

"Where is she, shithead?"

Phantom hadn't told Scars or Lensless where you were despite the torture, so there was no way in hell he'd tell Mohawk. Would rather go to the grave then let them find you. But he wasn't planning on it. He told himself he'd escape sooner or later. He'd get back to you. Take care of Baldie. Be with you the way he had planned. Delusionally sure since they made the first cut.

Phantom smiled before his body slumped. Unconscious again. Dying.

"Hey." Mohawk shook him. "Hey!"

The building shuddered as one of them touched down, then the other. "Did you hear that?" Lensless. Home earlier than usual.

"No."

"I swore I heard something. Do'ya think he got loose?"

Boots crunched glass and gravel as they made their way through the winding halls. Mohawk looked to Phantom, still unconscious, useless. Mentally promising to be back, to get answers, and if he didn't? He'd kill the fucker himself.

Mohawk slipped out the busted window, flying low and thanking Art for his suit that melted into the night.

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gay-dorito-dust · 11 months ago

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Saw your most recent thought about writing Gambit, PLEASE DO ITTT!! He has been my favourite ever since i was young... After watching Deadpool & Wolverine, the one who played by Channing Tatum... OH GOD I need him more now 🤚😔💥 ((But please take your time to write tho!! Don't wanna rush or pressure you about it ✨️

Part two here

‘What if this is it. What if this is the ending we get because we were the unlucky ones and that this is where we were meant to be regardless of how hard we try.’ You say one day and Remy stopped shuffling his cards.

‘And what made you come to that bleak conclusion, mon cher.’ He asks softly, having a feeling that you had been withholding this thought inside for a while, and it wasn’t only until now did it feel like coming to light in the presence of someone you felt safest with, or at least he assumed you did with how often you tended to stick to his side. You had lost your friend Jubilee a while back to Alioth and ever since then you’ve been stuck to Remy and admitting things to him in confidence that he beloved you would’ve told Jubilee…had she stayed a little while longer.

You shrug. ‘Merely an educated guess. That and the copious amounts of times where we’ve tried and failed to escape but I’m pretty sure that’s evident, considering that we’re.still.fucking.here.’

Remy sighs, gets up from the table and walks across the room and takes his place next to you, shoulder to shoulder and as your thighs briefly touch. ‘You may think me stupid for thinking this mom cher, but it is the truth of my heart, and that truth is that I’m glad we’re here.’ He admits but starts laughing soon after upon looking at your confused face, finding it adorable.

‘Care to elaborate on that?’ You then said as you started at as though he had grown a second head. What did he mean by that? That he was happy he was trapped here? Had Remy finally gone mad, you weren’t quite sure but decided that you would hear him out in hopes that there was a logical explanation after a confession like that after all.

‘With pleasure,’ Remy began, ‘the reason I say this because if I weren’t here then I would’ve never met you, built a friendship with you and so on, so while I share your want to leave this place.’ He then leans in real close to you, so close to the point you could feel his breath fanning your face and his lips ghost over your own as your heart went nuts in your throat. ‘I can’t help but thank it for brining us together, for I wouldn’t have thought to experience a love quite like ours mon cher.’ Remy concludes and you couldn’t help but smile.

Remy has once told you that you did exist in his timeline, just with a minor detail in the fact that you weren’t a mutant like him. You were friends, close friends, but one day you died protecting him, he’s never forgiven himself since and still hasn’t. ‘Brave soul, courageous heart you had.’ He had said while fighting back tears as you held him just as he began to weep over a you that wasn’t you; Regarding whether or not you were together was a question that was never answered nor asked, for you didn’t want to reopen old wounds Remy chose to close for a reason.

You had a Remy back home but he was with Rouge and you weren’t even remotely as close as Remy and his variant of you were. You were barely even on speaking terms because of how little you interacted with one another. So needless to say your absence wasn’t felt nor missed in the slightest, but you didn’t have the energy nor the ability to care about that anymore.

You gently shove him in the chest. ‘Cheesy bastard.’ You muttered as Remy chuckled, pulling you into his arms as he pressed a kiss to your forehead, breathing you in as you melted into his warmth, feeling safe from all harm and most importantly; loved.

‘Don’t you know. All Remy’s to ever exist are romantics at heart mon cher?’ He playfully said as he tightened his grip on you, planting one more kiss on your forehead, humming in content.

‘No. I only know one Remy who’s a romantic at heart,’ you told him as you lifted a hand to gently boop him on the nose, ‘you and that’s the only Remy I need to know, for you are the best Remy out of all of them. At least in my opinion.’ You finished as you then kissed him on the cheek.

Remy smiles softly at you as he felt himself becoming more content with his fate if it meant sharing these moments with you for the rest of his life, you made life here bearable and he couldn’t imagine going back to a life where all he had to remember was your name scrawled into a cold, unforgiving headstone. ‘And your opinion is the only opinion I ever want to have for the rest of my life.’ He says as he held you tighter before smothering you in kisses, smiling widely as he heard you giggle and squeal for mercy, while back home you may not be anything to him, but here? You were everything to him and more.

#mcu x you #mcu x reader #mcu imagines #mcu imagine #marvel x you #marvel x reader #marvel imagine #marvel imagines #marvel x y/n #mcu x y/n #gambit x reader #gambit imagine #gambit imagines #remy lebeau imagines #remy lebeau imagine #remy lebeau x reader #Remy lebeau x you #deadpool and wolverine

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mowtowench · 5 months ago

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according to wil,, regards has replayed it like 20 times already

that creature has some type of intrigue with the growl he makes

obsession much,,?

so uh,,,

you like the growl?

please explain.

I'M NOT EXPLAINING SHIT.

DON'T WORRY ABOUT WHAT I DO IN MY FREE TIME.

#BOTH OF THEM GROWL #i wonder if BRINE replays REGARDS's growl too...#REGARDS wherearethepuddles #REGARDS puddlesinthelake #BRINE wherearethepuddles #wherearethepuddles #BRINE puddlesinthelake #alternate reality game #puddlesinthelake #slenderverse #emh #arg #mla0 #everymanhybrid #mlandersen0 #tribetwelve #unfiction #marble hornets

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basedonconjecture · 3 months ago

Text

Sharing (Sample?) Sunday

Idk anymore I’m just here for the vibes and accepting the challenge to share something I’m proud of given by @ofcrowsanddragons & @biowaredisasterbisexual

And even though ik some of you have done this or been tagged already I’m tagging you anyway bc I want tags back so I can share your stuff 😤 (and also hi): @thedissonantverses, @hyperions-light, @bygonesigh , @mythals-whore, @introvertedfangrl, @muqington, @operative-arrow, @mercars-musings, @corvus-frugilegus, @propenseverbosity, @pavuslavellan

And taking this opportunity to share something I have not really shared here yet beyond the first line! Mostlyyyy because I’ve barely done any editing on it yet (I’m working on it I swear, for those of you who’ve already read it) but I’m still really proud of how this section turned out 😅

For those of you also reading Per Esseri Veri, it is the one mentioned in chapter 6 :)

Anyhoo, have a bit of a lighthearted piece about a silly (informal) contract Lucanis accepted from Viago (vaguely set around the same time as the infamous dagger gift who knows exactly, not me) feat. a young gambling Rook de Riva and a very ugly hat

Viago de Riva had squandered the last of the goodwill he’d accrued with House Dellamorte. If not with that house entire then, most certainly, with one of its three primary members. However, two facts presented themselves as challenges to how Lucanis might make this change in status known to the Talon of House de Riva.

For the first, he was forced to acknowledge that he did not have nearly enough sway with the Talon of his own house as being the more favored of her grandsons might suggest. As for the second… his present irritation with the man in question did not run deep enough to inspire any genuine vindictive feeling.

Instead, he entertained himself imagining a series of minor slights that would, perhaps, get the point across. Unfortunately, the Talon was already so devastatingly unimpressed with him that none of them were likely to cause more than brief irritation.

Entertaining to think about, nonetheless.

Rather, it kept him occupied while he waited for his mark to make an appearance.

Viago had given him little in that regard. Look for the ugliest hat in the place, the Talon had instructed him in his missive, alongside little else but the name of the tavern and an address.

Lucanis had to give it to him: the hat was, indeed, very ugly.

An old, wide-brimmed felt thing not unlike something he’d seen in the country. Whatever color it had been before had faded to a muddled gray, pinned up on one side, and a scraggly black feather stuck through it to make it all the worse. Illario would have deemed it an insult to hats had he been there to see it, Lucanis was certain, he could almost hear the droll remark in his cousin’s voice. The youth wore it tilted high on their forehead in a jaunty fashion that matched the confidence with which they sauntered into the tavern, a silk cape that had seen better days tossed back over their shoulders.

He tracked them from his corner table as they crossed the smoke-filled taproom to a group of rough-looking men already deep in their cups.

Sailors, by the look of them. Or, more likely, fishermen. In their flat caps, and threadbare linen shirts stained with old sweat, fully brined from a day’s labor hauling in nets—he could smell them from where he sat. They’d been telling ribald stories over their card game for the last hour, growing more brazen with the barmaid who kept their tankards filled.

Now, they laughed loudly and elbowed one another as the youth approached. There was a telling flash of coin. A pause. Then the scrape of stools as the group made room for one more in their game.

He caught an expression that passed between a few of them, but the youth took no notice as they settled in, hat firmly in place. The first round, unsurprisingly, went to the youth. Then the second and the third. Their pile of coins quite high, they now wagered the entirety on a fourth round. Confident in their winning streak, and aided by ale, with no little encouragement from the woman serving the table, they had no idea they were about to lose it all.

Internally, he sighed from his corner, ready to finish this contract and be done with it—and Viago de Riva—for good. Once the youth lost their winnings, there would be his opening.

As expected, the youth was sorely fleeced and Lucanis prepared to move as they begged for another hand to be dealt. The men rebuffed them at first, demanding to know what they would wager now their money had been claimed. Silence fell among the group as the youth produced a gold andris—the single coin worth more than what they’d won.

Lucanis sat up a little straighter, his eyes narrowing as he watched the group regather. There was some argument as to who would meet the bet until they put forth their agreed upon representative, pooling their earnings together in an attempt to win the andris off the youth. Eventually, they all settled once more at the table, while the cards were shuffled and dealt between them.

The energy in the tavern seemed to shift, becoming quieter, breaths bated, as all eyes turned to the game.

#it’s the hat tbh #that hat’s still my favorite part of this #i need to figure out how to ressurrect the hat bc it deserves a better moment than this #sharing sunday #sample sunday #uhhhh #wip

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strangelittlestories · 3 months ago

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The hunger is getting bad now. Whatever I made a deal with, it changed me. Made me ravenous. A hunger that even blood, ambrosia and Five Guys cannot sate.

And it gave me teeth. I can’t see them, but I can feel them. Like my spirit has sprouted vicious inch-long incisors. I’m scared to use magic; I tried placing a blessing on a guy in a bar (he was having a hard time) and I’m sure I nearly killed him. My anima was too sharp. Whatever this thing is, it made razors of my spirit.

I ended up emergency-dumping the energy into the place’s sound system. Half the clientele ended up bleeding from their ears.

I need to work out what this is. But it’s beyond my expertise and out of my weight class. And even if it wasn’t, if I tried a divination right now, I may end up trying to snack on the Worldsoul…

So I go to see an expert in all things big, bad and dangerous to owe. I go to see Senara.

Senara is an old-school sea witch. In fact, when it comes to sea witch education, the school is not just old. It’s ancient. And she founded it.

Elemental power. Primordial mystery. The secrets of the deep. Drowning sailors. The whole five fathoms.

She’d sing you to your doom and you’d applaud as the waves claimed you.

She's also a tricky person to pay a social call. Oh, there's all sorts of tricks to contact people remotely. But Senara won't deal with you that way. She's got some real nasty wards to hammer home the point; and pretty much any magical comms leaves you open to backlash. You're reaching out with a tendril of your anima, after all, so don't be surprised if she turns it into a collect call (what she's collecting is *you*).

And most arcane chicanery is out because of my *situation*. So my usual trick of “lying to the ocean about how you're actually a very unusual octopus” is out.

But I do still have a few tricks squirrelled away and a few favours owed.

Magic is, fundamentally, about truth. About understanding what is true. About using it. About negotiating paradoxical truths with the Worldsoul.

And some stories are so old and reach so far down, they have veins of truth running through them. Like, for example, stories about people being swallowed by giant fish…

—

The ocean here is beyond night-dark: it's void-dark and mine-deep. Thankfully, the beast that owed me one is modelled on (or perhaps a progenitor of) the angler fish. Its ‘esca’ - the little luminous bobble on its dorsal ray, which attracts prey - cast a globe of light that illuminated way down to Senara’s cave.

She meets us at the entrance and swims languidly up and into the angler’s waiting mouth. There, in the beast’s maw, we regard each other.

I smile from behind my breathing apparatus and raise a wetsuit-clad hand to wave.

“My, my.” Her voice cuts clearly through the brine; the sea has long since learned to give in to her whims. “I never thought you’d dare visit me once more.”

“Let me start by apologising for my behaviour.” By contrast, the little microphone and speaker in my mask makes my voice tinny and the water makes it muffled. “When we last-”

“Spare me your sorry little instagram apology. We are magicians, after all, and are in the business of truth.”

She reaches out with one webbed hand and pulls the scuba mask from my face. Before I can truly start to panic, she leans in close. She breathes out a little bubble of air, which begins to float around my face.

I breathe in deep. It smells like her.

“I wasn’t sure if you were going to kill me or kiss me there.”

Her smile is wider than the beast’s that carried me here.

“I reserve the right to do either or both, if it pleases me. But first, tell me what brings you here.”

“I need your help.”

She looks at me. Really *looks*, deep and clear, with eyes that have seen behemoths rise and cities fall into the ocean.

“Yes you do. The only question is, will it amuse me more to refuse you or to assist you? Which will cause you more pain, I wonder?”

“Let me put it this way … if you don’t help me with whatever curse has leeched onto me, I don’t think I’ll make it. And, hey, you know how much living hurts, since I left The Embrace…”

“Ah, there it is. The wizard’s wanton way with reality. The truth both mutable and inviolate. Every word you say is correct, but still a snare to catch me in the *version* of the world most favourable to you.” The smile fades from her face. “But as you’re not wrong, here is a little bit of help and a little bit of truth in exchange.”

“I’m all ears.”

“No, darling. You’re all *fangs*. It is not a curse that is laid upon you, but a blessing. You have been given the gift of the pneumaphage. You are a Souleater.”

---

With thanks to Zan for the character of "Senara - Sea-witch: Vengeful; Capricious; Alluring"

If you want to submit characers of your own, you can join the Character of the Month Club on Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/strangelittlestories

#writing #microfiction #flash fiction #short story #wtwcommunity #writeblr #contains at least one pun #character of the month club #souleater

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asharkapologist · 16 days ago

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hiii!!! saw u doing request for s5 characters - may i request hcs for louis leroux (and possibly the rest of ad astra if possible)? thanks!!

Of course! I will dedicate this post to Louis' headcanons, and headcanons for the rest of the Ad Astrans are linked below:

Christian Bateman

Rozetta Pierre

Julia Brine

Joe Warren

And now for the star of the show! (Or at least, this post):

He's allergic to cats. One of his sisters had a beloved pet cat, and by the time Louis was about five, it was quite clear he was allergic to it. When the cat eventually passed, Louis' sister begged for another cat and cried when their parents told her no for Louis' sake.

He has three older sisters, and their parents are very rich. He got a full ride scholarship to college because his family donated a building to the university. He kept a high GPA, although he struggled in physical science and applied mathematics, both of which were required GE classes. He used some....less than academically honest methods to keep his grades from dipping below an A- in any of his classes.

However, he was genuinely an excellent debater (and on the debate team with Joe, see his headcanons), and wrote for his high school and college's newspapers. Like Joe, he was a very good student (on the surface, at least, considering he was never caught regarding his academic dishonesty).

Bro is quite vain (I mean, I feel like this is somewhat implied in-game). His morning routine takes about two hours. Gotta perfect that perfect hair curl. (Especially because his hair wasn't ruined at all when he exploded?? Bro what products were you using???)

Speaking of exploding, ohh boy was his death painful! (duh, that's not a headcanon, but stay with me). I hc that the following happened when he blew up, and TW for graphic description of injuries. And thank you once more, @astra-galaxie for helping me make these injuries as medically accurate as possible! So basically: His eardrums ruptured in the explosion as he slammed into the cell wall, cracking his skull, fracturing (but not quite shattering or badly breaking) his neck, and giving him a severe concussion. That all obviously caused sudden, excruciating pain that even adrenaline couldn't completely dull. He sustained spinal injuries, and couldn't control his limb stumps/body as they slightly spasmed and twitched. Shrapnel punctured and pierced through his torso and into his lungs. He could only make slight choking, gurgling noises as he drowned in his own blood. Because of the light from the explosion, as well as shards/shrapnel and dust, his vision was heavily damaged, very blurred, and filled with dark spots. It took him about 2-3 minutes to die as his mind was going haywire as his pain levels increased, especially from his first and second degree burns. He could sort of hear the warden and other staff running to him and talking to each other, but between his ruptured eardrums and tinnitus from the explosion, it all sounded muffled and ringing, like he was underwater. The prison staff knew he was dead the moment they saw him. He was technically still alive when they found him, but he couldn't control his tiny movements, couldn't breathe properly. Couldn't even scream.

He has quite a low pain tolerance, so another reason why his death sucked. (But like, he’d probably loudly scream if he stubbed his toe lmao)

Speaking of murder, the manner/situation in which he tried to kill Zoe in Misty Grove went as follows: He'd been visiting/lingering around/stalking Zoe, knowing everyone in Ad Astra, including himself, needed Zoe dead before she regained her memories regarding Rozetta/DreamLife's secrets. Considering Louis was obviously the closest to Zoe, he said he'd get rid of her. He put off the task for a couple months (or whatever the time gap between the end of Financial Center and mid Misty Grove is lol), trying to figure out what to do. He finally got the "guts" to kill her by luring her to the woods, although he still wasn't sure how exactly he would kill her. When she began losing consciousnesses, he saw his chance and set her on the ground, decided against strangling her because he didn't want her waking up and fighting him, so he opted to grab a rock, lift it over her head, and was going to bring it down on her skull after counting down from three....but then heard Jones and the player approaching and quickly pulled Zoe up and played it all off like he was helping her. After Rozetta was arrested, he visited Zoe to keep an eye on her just in case (although he figured there wasn't a point to killing her now, since DreamLife's secrets had already been exposed to the public and Rozetta was in prison), but then, of course, some time later, he demanded to perform tests on Zoe for the sake of figuring out the serum, and, well, we all know what happened from there.

After Denise caused the blackout to stop Louis from sending the text message to the rest of AA about Plan Supernova and Denise's dishonesty with AA, after Louis snooped around the dome/her lab and stole the serum, Denise enjoyed tormenting Louis by sending him death threats and the like to his apartment suite, letting him know she knew he knew, so to speak, and that his days were numbered. She even planted a camera in his apartment like he did with Zoe and sent him photos of himself in his home to let him know she was watching him. She enjoyed playing with her food, so to speak.

Note: not a headcanon, but Louis sneaking around the dome, discovering the neohumans and stealing the serum would make a FIRE videogame....as long as you could get over the fact that you're playing as Louis Leroux lmao I know how much some of you (understandably) hate him.

During his trial, Jones broke into the courtroom, punched Louis in the face, and straight-up tried to strangle him, all while Louis' journalism coworkers excitedly chattered at and filmed the drama unfolding before them. (See this short one-shot I wrote for this headcanon!)

Note: It's gotta be embarrassing af to be arrested at work, dragged out in handcuffs while your colleagues watch, but ESPECIALLY when your coworkers are reporters and there are high-tech, high quality cameras everywhere, with people whose job it is to write about drama.

He has a certified sweet tooth. He loves Mr. and Mrs. Brines' food. Nearly choked once he was eating some of their treats, he was eating so quickly. (See Julia's headcanons for more details on her parents). Louis kept a jar of candy at his work desk. To his credit, he took great care of his teeth, and has never gotten a cavity.

It's canon that he plays crosswords (he would love Wordle), but those aren't the only brain teasers he likes. He also plays soduku, nonograms, and has several logic puzzle and riddles booklets. He also has a collection of jigsaw puzzles, a couple with as many as 10,000 plus pieces.

He does not like horror movies. (For the record, Bateman likes slashers and gorefests; Rozetta likes supernatural horror flicks (ex: The Conjuring, The Ring); Julia prefers rom coms but will watch some horror/thriller films with a strong focus on relationships (ex: A Quiet Place, Dark Water), and Joe likes dramas but will watch the occasional horror movie), but Louis pretty much hates all horror movies. He probably never admit that to the rest of Ad Astra, with the exception of maybe Joe.

The absolutely amazing Astra has come to save me once again! She helped HUGELY with this one, too! I had the idea that Louis was picked on as a young kid, but I couldn't figure out how to transition between that and him becoming a powerful and vile person. Astra then suggested that Louis was indeed picked on until he discovered the incredible power of....blackmail and ruining reputations! Some time in elementary school, he got his bullies in a huge amount of trouble. He realized how effective that was, and his reputation eventually began to shift from a wealthy but wimpy kid to a blackmailing, gossip-spreading, won't-hesitate-to-embarass-you-in-front-of-everyone bully. He continued his blackmailing and gossip-mongering into university, and who knows, could've been blackmailing a colleague or two. By the time Denise was hunting him, it was quite nasty whiplash, throwing him back into a place where he had no power over anyone or anything.

He is actually a bit musically talented. He can play the piano and sing decently well.

Bateman canonically turned everything into a compeition with at least his fellow male AAs, and, in order to compete with Bateman (since Louis knew he'd never be as physically strong as him), Louis bought more and more expensive watches to try to outclass Bateman.

And that's all that I've got for Louis and the rest of Ad Astra! Thank you for requesting these, they were fun to write! And once more, thank you, Astra, you are such a blessing :)

A little teaser: Some of these were foreshadowing for the next long-term CC fic I have planned after my Meera fic...

#criminal case game #criminal case the conspiracy #criminal case #criminal case facebook #louis leroux #ad astra #criminal case games

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happyheidi · 2 years ago

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posting your generic looking dog under cottagecore just for attention. 0 people surprised about it lmao get that attention you desperately crave.

in regards to this generic Queen 💕

lol such anger such stranger. thanks!. I think she’s kinda cottagecore 🤔 It was more for my mum tbh cus she thinks it’s so cozy hearing ppl love her (like I do with moffe. And lots of pet owners do with their pets) but hey I’ll take it.

Some more generic dog pics #cottagecore

@brine-in-my-eyes ur tags 🥹🥹 UR THE CUTEST!!! “she’s so scruffy and silly and the most wonderfullest thing in the whole wide world” might be the sweetest most purely wholesome thing I’ve ever read. Thanks love 💕

@softshinee lol ikr? 🙈🙈😂😂👏👏

#lol this is what happens when u allow the anon function #cottagecore #😂😂😂#ask #generic

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preservationofnormalcy · 2 years ago

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[It is November of 2021. I am being led down a hallway that looks more like it should be on a ship than a government building. Metal walls with painted horizontal lines down its length, marked with “water depth” markers every 30 feet or so. My guide is a bored-looking man in a suit, balding, checking his clipboard. I seem to remember his name is Clarke, but he’s not who I’m here to see.]

M] Does this tunnel flood?

C] Hm?

M] The water markers.

C] Oh, those. Not unless something bad happens. She’s pretty good about it.

M] Is her name really –

C] Yth’Wa, Herald of Change. Yes. Changed it legally. Not that she gets out much.

M] …kind of an indoorsy person?

C] I mean she’s never in the outside world.

M] Not even to get food?

C] She has people for that.

[Suddenly, from doorways that lead off the hallway, we are joined by six figures wearing yellow robes that conceal their identities entirely. I smell brine and dead fish. Clarke looks back and seems to count the figures, but otherwise doesn’t react.]

M] Is this a joke?

C] Wish it was, ma’am. Hey, fellas.

[Two of the figures wave. We approach a bulkhead at the end of the hall, and Clarke spins the wheel lock. The taste of salt hits my mouth - like the seaside, like brine. Clarke enters the chamber beyond, and three of the figures follow him. Three of them wait behind me, as if waiting to escort me. After a moment’s hesitation, I enter the chamber.

It is dark, hewn from rough stone, sloping downward into dark water. I look up, and the ceiling cannot be seen in the darkness. Utility lights illuminate the path downward, a few of them trailing into the still water. Clarke takes up a post next to the door, and the yellow figures form a pattern facing the water. Two of them kneel, two of them prostrate themselves, and two raise their hands and begin a chant.

I can’t help myself. I back up, and whisper to Clarke.]

M] You cannot be serious.

C] You’re the one that wanted to meet her.

M] Who the hell am I meeting?

[Wordlessly, Clarke points to the water. A figure is emerging.

A humanoid figure, also clad in yellow robes. Her hood is pulled low over her face, only the bottom half of her face visible. She has both hands placed together, palms pressed together in a gesture of prayer. She walks calmly from the water, up the incline, and it becomes clear she must be…seven feet tall, or more. Pallid grey-green skin is visible under her hood, and her hair….not hair. Tentacles. Tendrils roll down her shoulders and chest, spill from her sleeves. Her face is thin, her cheeks are marked with slits - gills.

As she emerges, she joins the chant with her own voice. As water spills from her form, fully on dry land now, her words change to English. An unearthly, inhuman voice…but not unpleasant.]

Yth’Wa] Fathoms deep, fathoms old. Fathoms dark, fathoms cold. We leave the cradle, leave the fold. To serve the one, the Lord in Gold.

[There is a pause. Yth’Wa smiles and stands beyond the yellow figures, who are silent but have not moved from their spots. She is close to me, and seems to regard me with a small smile. Her face is…unnatural, but not ugly. Something beyond. When she speaks, it is with a strange resonance, and no small amount of amusement.]

Y] Ms Hendricks. I was told of your coming.

M] …wh…Yth’Wa?

Y] Do not be afraid.

[She moved her arms, spreading them out. Water dripped off her robes, and tentacles slipped back into her sleeves.]

Y] I am an ally of the Office. I do not harm the unbeliever, as they have their part to play in the grand Circle. The King Of All And Nothing has spoken, and we listen.

M] I don’t…I don’t know what to say.

Y] Then speak your truth.

M] ….I’m here to ask you questions.

[Yth’Wa’s smile widens. Her teeth are sharp, triangular, serrated. I look back at Clarke, who seems nonplussed. He looks at his phone and swears softly, seemingly realizing he doesn’t get reception here. Yth’Wa’s tone is not unfriendly, but somehow…as if she’s humoring me. Slight but not aggressive sarcasm rolls off her lips.]

Y] Inquisitiveness is what drew us all to the Circle, Ms Hendricks. It is a virtue worthy of the Yellow Empty. This is a holy quest.

M] I feel like I’m being condescended to.

Y] No force in the ocean could compel me to do so.

M] But on land?

[She puts her hands back together with a playful smile.]

Y] What are your questions, my dear?

M] …I was going to ask you about the poster, but first…who are you?

Y] I am Yth’Wa, Herald of Change, leader of the Yellow Circle.

M] And what is the…Yellow Circle?

[Yth’Wa gestures to the other figures in yellow behind her.]

Y] We are the children of the One Who Dwells Between. We reach out in humility and hope to the space beyond our candlelight, and we embrace what we find. Our god, the Golden Father, shepherds us into the dark void, and bestows upon us gifts that we take upon ourselves gladly.

M] And you’re….allied with the Office? They’re okay with this.

[Yth’Wa’s smile is slightly more amused, almost smug. Her tone is like kindly addressing a child.]

Y] It’s our world too, Meghan. We live here. We have a vested interest in keeping the things that slither around the lighthouse of the human mind at bay…or under our control. The Office often finds these skills useful. Such as your poster.

M] The….sock a Shoggoth one.

Y] Indeed. It’s an old one. You saw a ripple of waters past, Ms Hendricks.

M] Sorry?

Y] Do you know of Operation Deep Whisper?

M] I…I don’t, no.

Y] Mmmh.

[She steps forward. I’m unsure of what to do, and in my hesitation, she walks around me. Studying me, her eyes never visible but nonetheless biting into me.]

Y] You’ve met Josiah. Josiah Carter.

M] Of Psychotronics?

Y] Of those who wade in pools they will drown in. Tell me. Did he talk about the things they invited?

M] He mentioned things that…came from their experiments.

Y] Poor Josiah. He knew only half of what he unleashed.

M] I don’t think I understand.

[Yth’Wa took in a deep breath.]

Y] When men take hammers to glass, they should not be surprised when it leaks. Those at the Office, in their uniforms and titles. They frayed the real in order to see through it, and they didn’t like what they saw. What they let through. By the 1960s, the camera obscura they had made in their blind stabbing through reality had become a tear. A broken fence post, and of course things came through. Things…not under our control.

M] The things he described sounded horrific. What are they?

Y] Me and mine are…inured to them, somewhat. The Office now calls them Outsiders. Entities from other spaces, other realms, dimensions beyond ours. Beyond the veils. As you can imagine, they are often dangerous to humanity. Physically violent, or ontologically inimical to human life. Often...alien thought patterns, incompatible with the mortal mind. Ontologically incompatible - too many of them, and their reality leaks into ours...impossible geometry, mosses and fungi that degrade the integrity of realspace. Or reality, as humans see it.

M] And you can control them?

Y] More or less. Keep them at bay, influence their behavior. Sometimes they can appreciate something that thinks like them. But all that and more were slowly being unleashed through the world, a secret plague that threatened to collapse the Office’s so called normality. Beasts, anomalies, and forces threatened even our way of life.

M] So they asked the Yellow Circle for help.

Y] Indeed. I was not the leader at the time, but the Circle allied with the Office to eradicate this plague. Using resources and funding from the more mundane conflict in Vietnam, we battled the Outsider across the globe throughout the 1960s, and into the 70s. Our people call it Gul’tho Z’Thuth G-Uz, the Conflict of Brother Blood. But the Office calls it Operation Deep Whisper. It is there your posters come into play - propaganda, encouragement for a war against an enemy so alien that they cannot be understood.

[That smile again.]

Y] By the Office, anyway.

M] And it worked?

Y] You had not heard of Outsiders before you came to the Office, had you? We saved the world, Ms Hendricks. Our world.

M] I guess we can chalk that one up as a success.

Y] Indeed.

M] I don’t feel the need for most of my questions….Yth’Wa. But I guess I had another.

Y] Speak freely.

M] You were…human, right? All of you, but especially you. Who were you before you were Yth’Wa?

[There is a moment of silence. Yth’Wa looked…momentarily annoyed, her thin lips turning down at the ends in a way that made my stomach churn. But after a moment, she seemed to reset, relax her posture.]

Y] Who I was is dead. The One Whose Sign Dances saw me for who I was, and made me into something…more. More real, more truthful. Who I was is…dead. Do you understand?

M] I….I think I do.

Y] Magnificent. If you had no further questions….

[She steps forward, and I flinch. She pauses, as if attempting not to spook an animal, reaching into her robes and slowly pulling free a single scallop shell. It shined like an oil spill in the dim light, runes and markings along the outside of the shell. They hurt to look at.]

Y] If you wish to see me again, throw this shell into the largest body of water you can reach in a day’s walk under the light of the moon. I will see you, I will reach you. And we can talk.

M] …thank you, Yth’Wa.

Y] May the Shattered Lord keep you and guide you.

M] Let the…the Keeper of Yellow—- oh, god, what…what was that? I can taste it.

[Yth’Wa laughs, leaning in further, teeth gleaming in the odd light.]

Y] Truth. Oh, Ms Hendricks. You’ve tasted truth.

(Buy the poster here!)

#Yellow Circle #interview #microfiction #sci fi #sci fi horror #lovecraft #cosmic horror

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rowanwithaz · 1 year ago

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Shared Admiration

So,MHA's end is approaching,and this last chapter has the bkdks brainstorming at the moment,so I wanted to share some of my thoughts on a bkdk (and tgch) ending.

(Chapter 423 spoilers,season 7 spoilers)

Childhood Hero:

I think a lot of people are forgetting about an important factor of Izuku and Katsuki's relationship when analyzing this chapter (and just recent chapters/events in general).

All Might and OFA.

All Might has played one of-if not the biggest-roles in Katsuki and Izuku's characters and relationship.

This is no secret,since the manga and Horikoshi like to spell this out for us as much as possible. Though somehow I feel this gets overlooked pretty often unless it's flat out said. Let me explain what I mean by this.

Most of the time when I see people analyzing Katsuki and Izuku's relationship,they leave out All Might,unless he's specifically in the scene or mentioned,for instance,when Izuku says this:

people see this and they're like, "Izuku admires Katsuki even more than All Might," then kinda just leave it at that. But it's a lot deeper than that,and All Might plays a much larger role in this altogether.

This scene is MUCH more impactful once we consider Katsuki and his feelings for All Might and Izuku. Which at the time were conflicting.

(Which can have a lot of different interpretations,I guess. I kinda see a little bit of a bittersweet double meaning behind this. Katsuki is Izuku's symbol of victory,and All Might is Katsuki's symbol of victory,and All Might is Izuku's symbol of saving,and Izuku is Katsuki's symbol of saving . But the reason Izuku kinda admitting this is a little bittersweet is because Katsuki "caused" their smybol's downfall. So,that's probably why Katsuki saw this as Izuku saying he surpassed him-cuz Izuku has All Might's power,Izuku has the potential over him,and Katsuki took that away from the real deal,which is why I feel the comparison is negative/positive. Yes,Izuku admires All Might and Katsuki,but this is also the downfall of All Might,and in a way Katsuki,since he does have some significant growth after this).

But,All Might has been playing a large role in their relationship for a long while,and considering this doesn't lessen their bond,it only makes it STRONGER. Like,when Katsuki died and Izuku spotted the All Might card right next to his limp body.

it just hits different knowing Izuku held that card in great regard, (or recard-heheheh)

and to figure that Katsuki felt the same way,that Katsuki treasured their moment just as much as Izuku? that's even more fucking tragic. But the point is; they both have a shared love for All Might that keeps them together. I know many people don't like to see it that way,since it might take away from the soul mate factor a tad,but it's true. It kinda makes me think of Togachako,in a sense.

Just because Izuku is the reason Ochako and Toga bond doesn't take away from their relationship,it only adds more layers (especially considering the interesting take on bisexuality) and that explains the All Might key chain Ochako has. It kinda symbolizes how Izuku is Togachako's All Might. For example,when Toga confesses her love to Izuku,he brings up All Might and his admiration for him.

Therefore brining Toga/Ochako's feelings for Izuku on a shared admiration that brings them together in this case.

Why is this even important considering the new chapter? Well,because the ending of it parallels the ending of heroes rising. Like,Izuku falling out of the sky while embers of OFA fade from him,

and not to mention the heroes rising cameos we've gotten thus far,

and what All Might said in chapter 422,

We have to consider the ending to Heroes Rising and how All Might plays a part in their relationship to determine if there's going to be a bkdk (and or tgck) ending.

Katsuki and Izuku still haven't had their real hand hold yet,and Izuku being quirkless while All Might,the leading force of their relationship watches and approves of them as the heroes who win and save once and for all? That's the bkdk ending I think we're getting. I have hope Horikoshi will be very vocal about it being romantic,well mainly because of this bullshit. (I do still believe we're gonna get a talk,mainly because for a lot of their deep conversations earlier in the series had All Might there).

It's cannon dudes

what do you mean these gay bitches got a cherry blossom cover with heart advertisement from the official accounts?? (Also Hori said they were smiling because of All Might complementing them,foreshadowing maybe??)

(This is barely any of it and we're three fucking episodes in)

What do you mean the director starting editing scenes to be more gay after Hori shared the ending with him??? I'm no longer even SLIGHTLY skeptical of the bkdk ending.

#Bkdk #Dkbk #GreeNade #Tgck #bloodbubbles #mha season 7 spoilers #mha 423 spoilers #Bnha #Mha #yagi toshinori #Midoriya Izuku #Bakugou Kacchan

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mowtowench · 4 months ago

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save me white man toxic yaoi save me

#brine and regards much?#or house and wilson?#i'll never tell

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somesthingsomething · 7 months ago

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I think people are forgetting the main point: max was given a bullshit penalty for something people do week in week out, and he was given it because (probably and according to him) of George theatrics off and on track.

George was warned about max and could see him and acted like max did this super dangerous thing, and he did all that because he knew he couldn’t take pole away from max on track.

And when he could clap back about what max said, he moved the whole thing to be about max’s personality and history because he had nothing to say for his favorite regarding the actual problem and that he was more likely to get support for brining all those things that are actually really irrelevant.

He still said nothing about what actually happened, and we are all letting him get away with that.

For me, I’m a max fan, so my opinions are kinda obvious, but to me it seems that the way other people talk about max (even Lewis!) make everything George said kinda unbelievably

#f1 #max verstappen #george russell

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sleepynxri · 1 year ago

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“In hindsight, I should have looked at the instructions"

A/N: THE DEMO IS FINALLY OUT OMG!! Congrats to the devs and the whole team for releasing the demo!! I love it so much to the point I think I'm the first one to make an x reader of it lol. But I chose my favorite (for now)Vince!! And a certain person might like it as much as I do hehe. I might not get his full personality right since it is still the demo and the characters might change their personalities depending the route you pick on the official release, but do enjoy everyone! And requests will be open until further notice. And of course spoilers for the demo!!

P. S. The reader is demisexual! If you don't know what it is it means a person who feels sexually attracted to someone after creating a close bond with them! It made sense to me since in the demo the mc was a bit rude and judgemental in their thoughts regarding their interactions with the different love interests. But hey! If you don't like it then just ignore this part! Enjoy it however you like hatchlings!

Pairing: Vince Matador x gn! reader

Warnings: curses, no use of Y/N only You/I

What did I get myself into?

A sigh of exhaustion released itself from your mouth as you headed out from the diner where you now currently work at.

Who knew that you had to use the first few weeks of your summer in an unknown town after your car suddenly broke down in the middle of nowhere?

Fuck Fate and itself.

You started on walking around the streets of the said town, it was interesting to say the least. Almost everyone in this vicinity at least knew each other if they were a neighbour or a regular. You felt out of place whenever someone pointed out or asked if you were new around.

The only thing that wavered your mind was the interaction inside Cup o Jo Mama. The new part-time job you’ll be doing until you’re able to pay for both the hostel you were staying in and the repairs of your broken down car. (Srsly how did I should have checked it out before going on a long ass fucking road trip??)

Chris was quite a timid character to have as a co-worker, but I am quite the observing person to see how he changes personalities so directly. It concerns me sometimes but it wasn't my business to get into anyone’s personal lives.

And that Wyatt fellow…. Can’t say that the headlines were wrong about his looks. He was attractive, but his personality is that of a stereotypical rich people lifestyle. It's best to not not meddle myself into his work and business, if he was staying in Brine Bay in the meantime.

Placing your headphones over your ears, you started to tune out the noises, you needed some alone time after all the shit that just happened. Familiarising your steps to avoid on getting lost - (Fuck you btw Dante) again.

Clicking your tongue slightly in annoyance after remembering a certain front desk employee who didn't tell you the actual direction towards the diner you were supposed to go in.

Without you knowing, a familiar sheriff and an unknown male suddenly were seen in the corner of your eyes. Jean looked optimistic as ever, but to your surprise- he was with someone else who looked like the opposite of him.

Why not see what they’re up to?

So… . The guy’s name is Vince. Jean momentarily left you both together to help with the white haired males socialising skills. You didn't mind, but you did feel guilty for forcing him to be with you. So you thanked him for staying with you.

You didn't expect the male to give you a half- smile. It almost caught you off guard. It was so pretty…

You shook your thoughts away and gave your own warm smile. Vince was a nice fellow, since he didn't know what to show you, you suggested that he showed the areas where he likes to stay at. You bonded with him with his different favorite places in Brine Bay. You were touched on how he could trust you to these places. You knew it held something for him to show you these areas.

Then you met Kevin….

You almost laughed loudly after hearing the nickname Vince gave him.

A fucking highlighter? You didn't think the male held so much humor. (Or your humor is just broken)

Kevin was a nice fellow. A bit flirty (then again who isn't? Almost everyone - not Dante- has started flirting with you before you could even muster a response to any of their introductions) but a passionate theatre kid.

‘pre’?? Is that a word or a different language? You’ll probably ask the next time you interact with him.

After saying goodbye to the green haired male. You and Vince were left alone together again. You pointed out how it was getting late so you and him started your way back to your hostel.

“Are you enjoying yourself? “ You paused after hearing Vince’s words. You… didn't expect someone would ask this question towards you. I mean it is technically your first day here after all.

You can feel the stare of Vince from the corner of your face as you racked up an answer for him.

“I… . Can't say much. My car broke down, Jean found me, he drove me here, I met a lot of people, found a part time job… . It's overwhelming to say the least” a flash of worry crossed the eyes of Vince as he tried to find the right words to reply.

But you beat him to it.

" But… I am enjoying it. I never expected to have an adventure while on summer break. It's new…. But not unwelcoming" a chuckle escaped your lips as you watched the sky growing darker.

“That's… . Good to hear” Vince relaxed his shoulders with another pretty smile he has. Your heart flutters after seeing it again. This was the second time you’ve seen it but you already knew you’ll always remember that smile he has.

Exchanging numbers with him was… eventful. It was cute to see him flustered while nervously asking if you wanted his contact number (who wouldn't accept his advances?)

You knew you had to take your chances and placed “Vimpire" as the contact name for Vince. (He’ll probably be disappointed but who’s to say he’ll just chuckle after you have him a silly nickname)

You told him your farewells and headed back to your temporary room. Doing your nightly routine and wearing your night wear.

You decided to call someone before heading off to sleep. The first person that popped up from the idea was Vince.

“Ah.. who is it?"

“You forgot about me already?" You teased slightly with a small chuckle as you looked outside the windows while watching the luminescent sky radiating from them.

“It's you… . I-i didn't expect that you would be calling me already” you wanted to tease him more but you asked him first if he arrived home already. He was still walking from home and you both decided to stay in the call for a while.

“Can I ask… why the sudden call? “

Fuck it.

" Is it bad that I wanted to hear your voice before I head to sleep? “

A pause could be heard from the other line. You grew worried when the call suddenly hung up and you panicked. You tried texting him but he suddenly beat you to it with a call.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry! I panicked!" A rush of apologies came after you answered the call. It was a relief to hear that you weren't stepping over boundaries and you asked him if everything was alright.

He reassured you, telling you that he just took time to process on what you said before. You couldn't see it but he was smiling on the other side of the phone (if Jean saw this he would be supportive yet teasing the poor boy).

“Hey uhm… if you have time after your shift ends… I could show you more around town? “

You were shocked again after hearing his words. This is the second time you got shocked by this man alone. You wonder what he got plans for you next.

" I would like that” you smiled warmly from the invitation. As you both continued chatting until you both shared your farewells.

You yawned and stretched your body and headed off to sleep.

You hope you can see Vince’s smiling face again.

Threads of You: Beyond the Bay

Lavendeer Studio Discord Server

Disclaimer: I am not part of the Lavendeer Studio team, I'm just placing the links here to whoever wants to play the game or wants to join the server for more updates and upcoming events!!

#Threads of You: Beyond the Bay #Vince Matador x reader #Vince Matador x fem reader #Vince Matador #Vince Matador x male reader #Vince Matador x gn reader #male reader #female reader #gn reader #first post #im nervous

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i-may-be-an-emu · 5 months ago

Note

Hi! So so sorry to bother you Emu but I was wondering if you could help me out with something regarding the sfth discord server.

This may seem stupid but there's been an uptick in very "triggering" topics, like eds, sh, abuse, ect in places like the headcanon channel lately, and I feel like this is starting to alienate me (and a few other people that I talked to in private about this) from the server when it's supposed to be a safe space.

And I wanted to ask if there's a way to request another hc section to be added for topics such as those. Because I honestly adore that particular channel but given all of this I'm afraid to even look in there anymore.

Again very sorry to bother you with all of this because this is pretty random and I feel silly for even brining this up but I have literally no idea who else to tell this and am way too scared to speak up about it on the sfth server myself.

Hope you have a good day and take care!

Hi anon!! Not a bother at all :)

I’m really genuinely sorry to hear that, and as someone who sometimes puts stuff in the hc channel I’ll try to be more conscious of this, myself. When we talk about things like this we should be censoring it, by marking it as a spoiler by putting “||” on either side of the text to hide it, but I know that it’s easy to forget.

I’m not a mod but you can find a list of them in the #roles channel if you ever want to dm any of them, which I promise isn’t as scary as it might seem! They’re really lovely. But if you’re wanting to suggest another hc channel or a thread because of this you can do that in #suggestions and the mods will consider it and get back to you with a solution or an answer.

I know you said your scared to talk about this on the server so if you’d like I can pass on the message, just let me know wether you’d like to do it yourself or if you’d like me to :) I’m happy to say it for you (ex. “An anon on tumblr said _____”) but now that you know who to contact/which channel to use to bring it up I want to give you the option.

the server isn’t meant to have much talk about topics like this, but when it relates to a character I think it’s more alright? (Just in regards to the rules.) But again, I am not a mod or admin.

You’re right that the server should stay a safe space for everyone, so it’s important to bring stuff like this up :) just send me another ask saying whether you’d like me to say it on your behalf or not and I’m sure we can sort this out.

It might even just be instead of adding a new channel reminding people of the importance of censoring things via an announcement, but again I do not know.

I hope that this helped clear some things up somewhat, let me know what you’d like to do (no rush!!) about this :)

#shoot from the hip #and also it’s so fine to send me asks asks are great there’s nothing to apologise for :)#Sfth asks #sfth discord #Thank you for the ask!#I probably won’t be online for like the next 8-9h ish but after that I can sort it out o7

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doledition · 3 months ago

Text

OUROBOROS

A necklace, a girl, and the feeling of vengeance beneath your rotted flesh- this is all you are, now.

( a IWx PC fic i did way back when for @dolmimi for the dolgl halloween event! be warned this version of Ivory Wraith is not meant to be canon compliant-I take artistic liberties in regards to the canon of the game, so do no expect this fic to be extremely in line with canon. TW for descriptions of decaying flesh, depictions of assault, unreality, etc)

kɨnthaβ̃

There was a woman smoking by the beach. She’d been there for fifteen minutes so far, pacing up and down the strip of corpse gray sand, heeled boots squishing with each step. Every few minutes, she’d stop, face the water, and take a long, slow drag of her cigarette. Deep breath in, and she’d hold the smoke for a bit, as though tasting it. Deep breath out a moment later, and the gray vapor would swirl in the cold fog, twirl and twist into the mush colored sky before fading into condensation.

She’d gone through five cigarettes so far like this, simply by pacing the length of the beach. It was a cold day, deep in the heart of winter. The sun’s rays had disappeared, replaced by clouds that rumbled and roiled far above. Heading into December, it usually snowed, a downpour of white covering the town proper. It usually turned into a wet slurry by the end of the day, trampled over by hundreds of boots covered in slick and grime, sludge and piss. No fret though; by the next day, a new fleet of fresh snow had replaced the old, pristine and untouched, glimmering in the dawn.

The beach was one of the only parts of town spared the constant barrage of snow. This was around the time when the fog would roll in from the ocean, thick and heavy, bringing with it the scent of brine and salt. It covered the beach like a thick coat-it felt sluggish to move through in human skin, sticking to flesh with greedy fingers. The air prick, prick, pricked at one’s skin with clumsy, cruel fingers, eager to undo the weak bindings of flesh. You couldn’t see past your own two feet in the fog, so thick was it. It was a perfect cover for all things unseemly, ghastly, with bodies hard and cruel.

No one in town thought of the beach during the winter as a pleasant experience. Of course, there were still parties held there, deep into the freezing night. The occasional dog walker would pass through, dogpeople lapping at their nervous heels, one second away from breaking free of their leashes. The beach wasn’t deserted during the winter (no area in the town was ever truly deserted) but it certainly wasn’t frequented.

The woman, though, had been coming to this one spot on the beach for a week at this point. It was fairly easy to trace her path: first, she’d emerge from the thicket behind the orphanage, the ruined one with dead trees and burned grass from bonfires. Sometimes, her pockets would be laced with arrowheads, foraged berries, roots- she’d look positively medieval, an ardent of a nomadic lifestyle long since lost to Britons. Other times, her fingers would be laced red with blood, and her maw would be wild, white splattered about and a bit of something dried and ugly laced around her neck, glimmering in the sun.

From there, it was one of two options: on the weekdays, she’d walk down a particular formation of alleyways and crosswalks until she came across Connudatus Street. The day market would be forming starting from eight that morning, and she’d always choose the stall at the very back of the formation, facing the intersection between High Street and the Temple. It would always be stocked with fresh produce by the time she got there, farmed from her own hands. Daisies, roses, cabbages and onions, all separated into neat little rows and set out underneath the peppermint striped canopy. Sometimes, she’d bring bottles of baby milk with her, and the bottles would clatter together in the roiling winter wind.

On the weekends, she’d instead walk to the bus station down the road from the orphanage. It had a rust colored awning and glass that held imprints from watery angels, cold to the couch. She’d lean on them, face pressed and turned into the pane, hand shoved tight into her pocket. The bus would rumble in five minutes later and she’d be the first to hop on.

Twenty minutes later, it would stop at Oxford Street, and the woman would get off. Her body would be tiny, curled in as she walked past the ornate iron fence walling off the school and into the adjacent museum. As she walked, her left foot would meet the pavement first, then the right, and then the left, until she’d climbed inside and had slammed the doors behind her shut.

The innards of the museum were scarce, and had been scarce for years now. You didn’t go to the museum to see the three arrowheads locked behind glass cases, or the cabinets that sat undisturbed and filled with dust. You went there for the exhibitions: for the waterboarding, the Spanish Horse, to see a woman writhe and scream, to see a sinner punished for her misdeeds, to see a thief get her due diligence.

Each day at 1pm, she’d take a lunch break. The town was a small town: it didn’t take more than 30 minutes to get from one end to the other. The walk from Connudatus to the beach was 10 minutes, and the walk from Oxford was similarly short. She’d go along a side alleyway, stopping at Sam’s Cafe first to get some sort of lunch before continuing her walk to the beach. It was almost always a fruit salad, except for when she had cash to spare. Then, she’d get a stack of pancakes, laden with pats of butter and syrup. She had a particular spot she liked to sit in: the dark corner near the employee loo, covered in shadows and as far from the shop window as possible. Her eating was quick, sparse. She ate not to enjoy it, but to feed her animal body as fast as she could, before she could poison her lungs with smoke.

Then, it was to the beach. She always smoked the same brand of cigarettes: Lucky Strike Red, and once she’d finished a pack, she’d fiddle with the packaging before launching it into the ocean. The white box would hit the water with a wet smack and would float upon the waves before sinking, and the woman would watch. Her eyes would be dazed and uncaring, fingers fiddling with the dying cigarette clutched in her hand, before sighing and walking away. That box would turn into mush and melt into the water, to be later swallowed by some poor creature and then regurgitated up.

Be it to thieves to not care about such small, superfluous details.

From there, she’d make her way back to work. She didn’t take the bus back in either scenario- instead, she simply walked back, eyes trained on the ground. She’d stay at the market, or the museum, until six. Then, it was to the orphanage, room 4B on the ground floor near the back door which rattled in the wind despite being bolted shut, and with windows that lay cracked in their frames.

The woman would rob others on the way back. It was an indisputable fact of her miserable existence- her fingers would pass over opened pockets, filching at bare wallets and stealing pennies from paupers. When night struck, she’d slip out of the poorhouse and into the houses of Domus, fingers scrabbling against loose change and the last of some struggling mother’s paychecks, all to save her own skin.

Thief, filcher, burglar, grave-robber, cut from a cruel cloth sewn by greed. She had lungs that sucked the air from the sky and left birds to plummet to the ground; eyes that fixated on glimmering, shimmering things, with a burning desire to rip it away; and hands made for deception, for ripping off a strand of silver once placed there lovingly, never to be seen again.

Her wrists were fragile. Thin and weak, like a baby bird's neck. They danced upon the air, twisted against restraints and brusquely knocked back against rushing arms. Her wrists were small enough to fit into the smallest of alcoves, such as the ones buried beneath the Lake surface. The home of the Wraith, defiled and destroyed by wrists and hands such as those, her jewelry box raided and memories snatched away with each stroke up to the surface.

She would pay. Her wrists would shatter, and her body would rip, and she would pay.

Soon.

Ėl

The Ivory Wraith’s body had laid upon the Lake’s ground for millenia.

At first, it had simply laid there in a perfect fullness that spoke neither of rot or decay. To the untrained observer- if they were able to get down to where her body lay- she looked almost as though in a deep sleep, eyelids fluttering and hair floating against the water's currents. The sea creatures were not at all taken by her beauty, however: the fish dared not swim near her, and the seaweed would grow around her body. The water would churn her body around, as though contemplating her taste. In the darkness of the lake ground, she illuminated like a torch, with the wany paleness of the moon.

Now though, the skin had sloughed off into the ground, leaving behind a canvass of frail, brittle bones. The creatures played amongst its burrows, hiding behind the bones made rock. Algae clung among the spires, the green bright against the dirty calcium. The skeleton had been half eaten by the rocks in subsequent years, until only a skull jutted out. Deep inside the tunnels of the lake, the Ivory Wraith’s skeleton had become simply just another rock of the ecosystem, another footnote to grab onto for swimmers to haul themselves up.

The Ivory Wraith couldn’t quite remember what she looked like in life- she remembered long, moon pale hair, that twirled and twisted along the breeze. The Initiate would run her fingers along the strands, twirl them around her fingers into pretty braids, plaits, whatever her heart desired. The Wraith remembered pale skin and freckles emblazoned upon her cheeks, ones the Initiate would count when the two lay in the fields outside the town proper. They’d sit there for so long the Wraith’s skin would burn crimson, and the Initiate would dip her long fingers into pots of salve to smear across her skin. It had stung cold and harsh against the rashes, and after that was done and the Wraith had her fill of complaining, the Initiate would laugh and press her lips against each portion of sun–burnt skin. Her lips would be cracked and each kiss left behind a faint tinge of vermillion on her flesh, stark even against the irritated skin.

The Wraith didn’t remember the smaller details though. She didn’t remember her nose, the shape of the bridge or the way her nostrils would flare out. The Initiate would say that when she was mad her nostrils turned red and fanned like a rooster, and that it was perhaps the cutest part of her. The Wraith had a birthmark on her knee back when she lived- it was gone now in her ghostly form. Any imperfection was gone, burned by Virgo’s feathers off of her skin. It had been shaped like a star, and the Initiate would wish upon it.

The Initiate. She’d had a name. It started with an H- or maybe an A? D? W? Aine, or Fiona? Bronagh? Maeve? None of them invaded her mind, bought her face to face with the Initiate. After all these years, she still remembered her: the way her nose scrunched up in disgust whenever almond milk would be had during the midday meal- she’d hated it, said it tasted like dirt water- or the way her eyes would shine in the dawn, as though absorbing the light around her.

The hill the two used to herd goats on was gone now. With the schism, it had sunk down deep into the lake. The Ivory Wraith couldn’t remember what formation it was now, whether it had become one of the alcove’s many caves or fused with the lake floor. Any identifiable landmark that could be used to discern where it had gone had faded into the coldness of the pond, into the winter sky with each flap of Virgo’s wings.

The Ivory Wraith used to head into town. In the days after their death, when the town was more of a village, they’d stand on what would become the Temple proper for hours. In those days, the Temple was a formation of trees- Sycamore Trees, the ones the acolytes would tend to. It was only later, during the arrival of St. Augustine, were the trees cleared to make way for the Temple. The Ivory Wraith had watched the landscapers tear at the trees and replace them with Apple trees. Soon, they became heavy with pink fruit, and the Ivory Wraith spent days cursing each tree so when the monks would awake the next day to collect the fallen fruit, they found only charred bark and maggot ridden cores.

The Jeweler had been long dead by the time the Wraith had managed to find him. The old man had sought refuge in one of the nearby villages after the Schism, and was moaning weakly in his bed when the Ivory Wraith arrived at his hovel. He had corroded over the years, weak and trembling in his yellow cot. Maggots and flies had overtaken the village, leaking out of each and every house along the way. Above Head, the cloud of volcanic ash that had plagued the world for years, which the Ivory Wraith would later learn hailed from Indonesia, covered the sun like a brutal fist. The crops had all been dead by then, and it was only a matter of time before the people would die too.

The Wraith had used to keep post over the Mausoleum. It had been evacuated sometime in the 19th century, and the creatures inside laid to waste. The Wraith had not found out until the 1930’s, when the streets were filled with wastes and men turned into nomads, booze in one hand and a clenched suitcase in the other.

In their youthful optimism, the Ivory Wraith had appeared at the Mausoleum everyday, praying- to whom she knew not- for another spirit. Another soul, another vagabond such as she. She didn’t know where any of her friends had gone: whether they had survived the Schism, or if they had turned into food for Auriga. Half of the village had fled for greener lands, but the Wraith had stayed.

All they could do was stay, and sit outside the Mausoleum.

One hot Tuesday, a woman had crawled out of the Mausoleum. Flies were eating the crops, and the Wraith’s children were disappearing, one by one, stolen by wandering hands and pushed into the rumbling black beetles that clogged the roads. Her fingers had turned into bloodied messes, and her clothes were half gone, webs entrapping her thighs. Black streaks- mascara, perhaps- cascaded down her cheeks, and her nose was scrunched up, in the same dizzying way the Wraith had remembered of the Initiate. The sun hit her eyes and the rays were consumed by her irises, and the Wraith felt whatever remained of her heart drop into her stomach.

The same woman who had stolen her necklace was crawling out of the Mausoleum, pockets weighed down with riches stolen from the dead corpses of all the Wraith had known and loved long ago, with the face of the Initiate.

The Wraith had dug her bioluminescent nails into the ghoulish wind of her palm and screamed. The wind crashed into the trees and the pond had foamed over, crashing over the shore bed and bursting out of alcoves that had once held mementos of days long gone.

The Wraith didn’t know how long she’d stood there for, just that when they fully came to, the woman was gone and rain was beating the land. The thief, the murderer, the defiler- she was gone.

She had the Initiate's face. And she was gone.

The Blood Moon was at the end of the month. It would bathe the town in its crimson embrace and the Wraith would feel air fill sunken lungs, and her eyes would gain an almost supernatural clarity back to them. And that day, the Ivory Wraith would have her revenge.

It was only a matter of time.

Trɨdɨð

The woman hadn’t slept in two days.

It was the Blood Moon tonight. A wave of crimson had descended upon the town, the stain of blood upon the air. The town at night looked almost like the vip section of Briar’s brothel, with the red filtering through black smoke clouds in rivets. The town looked as suspect from the outside as it was on the inside, finally.

Some out of towners had arrived. For once, they weren’t interested in the town’s ‘trade’, but in the natural phenomena surrounding it. Telescopes, binoculars, sonar technology, the whole nine yards had been installed in the park for them. The revelers that met in the park hadn’t been there the whole past week, and the streets had been swept of their filth just for the occasion.

The woman didn’t give a shit. She’d only seen the outsiders twice- once when their van had pulled into town, clanking up the rubble road, and once in the town proper buying supplies for their stay, towed by a retinue of Remy’s farmherds. Their equipment was worth a pretty penny, more than enough for Bailey’s rent that week. She’d entertained the notion of stealing it- all she’d needed to do was slip off her shirt, show them a bit of skin- but she’d looked into the eyes of one of the women, and her face had been turned into something grotesque, pale with blood red eyes and hydra tentacles and an empty chest where once lay a gem-

Suffice to say, the woman dared not steal from them. In fact, the woman had dared not leave her room. It was locked shut, and a chair had been propped up against the knob. Robin had asked her to open the door, but it had stayed shut, and at some point, Robin had sighed and stopped asking.

There was a tree right outside the woman’s window. The wind had been strong lately, and whistled through the trees' barren branches. Each gust of wind caused a branch to scratch against her window, like nails on chalkboard. They came in three second intervals, long enough for her to pull in a breath and hold it. The air tasted like iron, as though the sky had begun to bleed, and the air was the sticky remains within.

The world always seemed to shift during the Blood Moon. It wasn’t anything perceptible to the naked eye; more of a gut feeling than anything else. The shadows seemed to drag along the walls, turning into slathering beasts with claws that scraped the ground. Food was meatier, juicier, the fats and juices trailing down your chin and to the earth below. The harvest was always better during the blood moon- turnips were ripped out of the ground with gusto, about as heavy as a pumpkin and with shuddering flesh. Berries were succulent, fat, ripe- they popped in your mouth, with a freshness that spoke of spring.

It only lasted a day though, sometimes three. The Blood Moon rushed into town and just as quickly rushed out, gone with a flick of The Head Priests robes. The world would return to normal, and almost shrink, shrivel up like a prune. The woman would sit by her bedside and watch with melancholy as the pale moonlight returned, and pop a berry between her teeth.

Sometimes, she’d go on a walk in the forest during the Blood Moon. Usually, the woman would be inside her room during the late hours of the night, windows locked and buried in between her sheets. The forest during Blood Moon, though, was silent. The creatures of the forest lay in their abodes, hidden from the red reys. The writhing trees and vines lay asleep, their figs ripe and heavy. The babbling brook, the laughing lake, the shivering shore, all lay in a quiet domesticity, a peacefulness that spoke of peaceful mornings and brewed coffee.

The woman liked to sit on the shore and dip her legs into the water below. It was cold, ice cold, and raised goosebumps against her flesh. There was a certain stillness that prevailed in the area, a calm that made the woman flutter her eyes close and untense her shoulders. A faint buzzing could be heard in the air, and when the woman would open her eyes, lightning bugs would be dancing on the blades of grass, and she’d wonder if this was what peace felt like.

She hadn’t left her room in two days. Not for anything: not to use the bathroom, not to get food, nothing. Her nose had gone numb a while ago, but she was sure the stink was overwhelming, overpowering. The water bottles and snacks she’d stashed in her room had all gone to waste, wrappers and cans rolling around the room floor. She hadn’t moved from her bed in hours, and her body felt almost grafted to the sheets.

There was something stalking her. Kylar always stalked her, would always gaze upon her flesh with the look of a hungered dog. The townspeople would follow her sometimes, heckle her and grab at her skin with mirth. Everything in this town seemed to follow her, as though stuck to her like miasma. At some point, she’d become numb to it.

This following was different. It stalked in dark corners, rotated with each phase of the moon. It whispered in the wind, and had arms that sprung from walls. It had faces, thousands of them, and voices to match. Whatever was following her now was far from mortal…far, far from mortal.

She didn’t know when she’d started looking in the mirror. Was she looking in the mirror the whole time? Her reflection had turned dark in the reflective glass, backlit by the stream of red coming from the window. The mirror was dirty, always had been, always will be- she saw no use in wiping it everyday. Maybe twice a week she’d wipe it down, but that was the extent of it. The mirror was clear now, shining and cool, almost wet looking.

There was a woman staring back at her from inside the glass. Her eyes glowed red, and her skin glimmered pale. A long braid of white flickered behind her- no seven braids. Seven braids of white danced behind her head, flicking against the confines of the mirror and slithering against the frame. The scent of salt and brine followed each twitch of the braids, and the woman could swear she saw a barnacle underneath one.

There was a knock at the door. The woman startled, and the reflection in the mirror was gone. Of course it would be gone; it wasn’t real. Just a trick of the light. A sleep addled hallucination, caused by stress and paranoia. She needed sleep. She needed to rest.

But first, the door. It was Robin, or Bailey there to collect money. Maybe another one of the orphans yelling at her about missing her chores. Something normal, expected. Despite how odd the town was, nothing unexpected ever actually happened.

She opened the door. No one. She looked down the hallway, left and right. No one. The hallway lay dim and empty, dismal, the only sound the scratching of the trees upon the window. Some red light seeped into the hallway from beyond her door, casting long, writhing shadows, tentacles sprouting from her back and licking at the door frame. The scent of sulfur filled her room, and distantly, the woman could hear the faint scream of Thief flying upon the wind.

When the woman woke up, she was floating inside a cage. Something pale had grabbed her, slimy and thick upon the water like an oil slick. The reflection from her mirror stared at her like she was a betrayal, a destroyed secret. Her braids were tentacles, whipping against the woman’s skin. Seaweed clung to her arms, and the currents beat down against her chest. Sea Otters, mollusks, fish, krill, barnacles, surrounded her, as though the whole lake ecosystem had come to see her drown. They glowed with a red glow, the glow of the blood moon. Amongst their chattering voices, a whisper of Burglar bit against the salty gloom.

The woman screamed.

Her face felt wet. It might have been tears, or it might have been the water suffocating her- there was no way to tell. The pale figure’s hands burned against her skin, and her tentacles swirled against the woman’s fear stricken flesh. Hard, gripping, as though trying to break into the sinew beneath, to stain the water red with shark feed. The woman felt her chest constrict and she choked back a sob. Her arms beat against the figures frame, but to no avail. She would drown tonight.

The pale figure hissed. Her prodding grew more brusque, sharp, invasive. The figure’s thick arms pried open the woman’s mouth, and saliva streamed past her lips. The pale figure’s fingers were like ice, pale as the moon and slightly freckled. They looked like they’d been crafted years before, from stardust and moonlight.

She was on a hill. It was lush and green, and there was a bushel of Sycamore Trees growing in the distance. A small group of people congregated on the base of the hill, donned in dark brown robes and golden clover necklaces. The sun was bright, and the air smelled of roast duck. Someone was cooking, far below.

Goats pranced below. Gray goats, one, two, three, hightailing over knolls and rocks. Each jump in the air was a sudden spike, and their hoofs made a clack sound against the gray rock. A woman ran down below, chasing after them with the speed of a wild cart. Her robes were the same drab brown as the group below, tied at the waist with a brown cord of felt. Her hair was blinding in the sun; her body was the color of stardust, freckles staining her body like brown paint; her feet, when emerging from behind the hem of her frock, became a blur as she ran across the green expanse. A necklace of solid blue and silver bashed against her chest, and the woman felt a phantom shiver go through her arm.

The pale figure down below glanced up at her. There was a grin on her face, teeth glimmering white in the spring day, and her forehead was slick with pale sweat. Her eyes met the figure’s, and an awareness gleamed inside, a sharp pinprick of knowledge that appeared in a flash and made her red eyes shine all the brighter. The woman’s hand flew up to touch her face as the red ate up the world around them, as smoke hissed into the air and orange flames licked at the braying goats. The ashes floated upon the air, thick and cloying, and the clouds ate her up.

She woke up.

Her bed was wet. The woman lay there, entrapped in her blankets, smelling of slime and rot and wet. The detail she was most cognizant of, besides her numb face and aching torso, was the wetness of her bed. Something inside her felt empty, drained, as though it had been torn open from her chest and consumed. A growing abyss, shaped like an alcove worn into rock, ached inside her. A name resonated from within, a voice from eons before. A spire grew from her spine, and saltwater rioted in her lungs.

The woman didn’t remember if she had a name or not. It felt as though it had washed upon the ocean, buried with one of her cigarette cases into the thrashing waves. The name inside her swelled up, as though eager to answer the query, before sinking back down.

Up- the hallway door began to shake, cave in, transform. Barnacles bloomed upon the coral wall, pink and purple, as a redness began to seep into the room. The wallpaper began to stink, and bruise-like stains appeared on the white cracks. Dirty water began to leak up from the floor, and the woman's face in the dark water had turned into sludge.

Down- the moon outside began to wane. As the water rose, inch by inch, the moon’s reys began to flicker. The red turned into a light pink instead, the color of salmon and pink eye. There was a churning outside, as though the earth was changing course. A humming floated on the breeze, the sound of machinery and weaponry, as pink bled onto trees and roofs.

Up- The water below her rioted. It sprang up high, high as a building, blasting against the roof and splattering on the walls. The dark brown liquid sprayed the woman in the face, and seeped into her mouth. It tasted foul, like sewage, and as she doubled over trying to choke it out, she could swear she heard a laugh, sharp and cruel, ring out into the night.

The walls shook. They began to shrink in on themselves, collapse. She was a doll in a dollhouse, too large for this space. The photo of Robin on her bed stand cracked as the wall rammed into the bed, and her closet fell down onto its side, clothes spilling out onto the filth water below.

The sun peeked outside. Golden reys spiked the town. It rolled over the snow banks outside, awoke the animals from their slumber, and singed the lake shore with its brightness. All the things that thrived in the night had been banished, and the water hissed and dried as the sun touched it. Her eyes glowed, dizzyingly, and she blinked furiously. When her vision cleared up, the water was gone, the laughter had ended, and red eyes flickered in the mirror before receding into the glass, as though it was never there at all.

The next week, the necklace would disappear from the Museum. Winter mourned it, of course- the woman would see Winter’s glaze turn longing, sometimes, and she’d run a finger across the dust ridden case slowly. The woman didn’t know why Quinn had wanted it, and truthfully, she didn’t care. Whenever she looked at the case, a measure of guilt would bury itself in her chest and she’d hurry away, trying not to think of a pale girl with long, white hair.

The red eyes were everywhere now. Sometimes, the woman would squeeze her eyes shut, and the red eyes would be there. Watching, always just watching. They’d appear behind the reception desk of the Museum, staring down at her from the high ceiling and melting into her soul. Other times, it would be in the eyes of all she crossed on the street, large, encroaching, unnatural. She’d walk away in a hurry, now, and head into her room, making sure the door was triple locked.

She wondered about the name. Maybe once or twice she’d think about the group clothed in brown at the bottom of the hill. Her mind would often drift to the white tentacles foaming in the waves, and a gnawing chasm would bite at her. But mostly, she thought about the name. She thought about its echo, its imprint in her mind, and would rub at her chest as though her heart were on fire.

She heard it on the wind, on occasion. When she’d smoke by the sea, she’d hear it whispered to her on a salty breeze as she wound her arm back to discard her cigarette case. She would focus on it, ears straining to hear. It was too faint though, always, always too faint, always just out of reach. And so, she’d throw the case out into the water (aiming further than the day prior, for extra measure) and walk back to town, red eyes staring at her all the way.

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