#character snippet tag

[autumnalwalker]

Character snippet tag

Thank you for the tag, @druidx.

Passing the tag to @writernopal, @imbrisvastatio, @alnaperera, @floweryprosegarden, @ryns-ramblings, and an open tag for anyone else who wants it.

Rules: pick an OC and post a snippet from their viewpoint.

So, this one's perhaps a little bit of a spoiler since it comes from near the very end of @thearchivistsjournal, but it's one of the few times in there that we get to hear the words of anyone other than the titular Archivist. To read the scene being described here from the Archivist's point of view, see Day 12. For Lin's description of meeting the Archivist for the first time, keep reading below the cut:

I actually made a point of avoiding you when you first washed up, especially after I heard you were going to be Archivist.  I still missed the old man and had a lot of tangled up feelings with all my good memories of the archive being tainted by sadness over his loss.  But I couldn’t avoid the place forever and I missed it as much as I did him, so I finally got my courage together and made myself go down there.

I was so nervous about how it was going to go, seeing someone else in his place, watching over our books, intruding in my place to hide from the world.  But then I got down the stairs and you looked ridiculous.  I know I should say I’m sorry for laughing like I did, but I’m still not.  I don’t mean that in a mean way though.  Seeing you there, looking nothing like him but drowning in his clothes like you were his kid that had gotten into his closet and surrounded by an utter mess was just the right kind of silly to get rid of those nerves and make me feel better about, well, a lot of things really.  I know you were embarrassed but please don’t be when you look back on that.  Under the exact context that you couldn’t have known, I don’t think you could have made a better first impression.

And I’ll admit, seeing all the books out of place and hearing they were going to be reorganized felt wrong at first.  The archive means a lot to me, and who were you to change something so important?  But then as you were talking you just got so into it.  Talking so fast you were stumbling over yourself and repeating things but smiling the whole time.  Here was someone else who really cared.  I was afraid you wouldn’t.  

As we got to talking and while I settled back into my old reading spot I started thinking maybe rearranging everything wasn’t so bad.  It was a fresh start.  A way for the archive to keep what it’s always meant to me without reminding me of what I’d lost.

From there, it wasn’t hard to start thinking of you as a fresh start.  Someone who didn’t have any prior history or associations with me to poison the present.  Someone I could do things right with.

You know I’ve drifted away from all my other old friends.  Some of the reasons I’ve told you, some I think you’ve figured out, and some you probably have an idea of now after all that other stuff I wrote.  I’ve had my problems in the past.  Still do.  But I’ve gotten better.  And I’m still getting better.

I know it was never your intention, but thank you for giving me the opportunity to try being a good friend again.  For being any kind of friend again.  I think we both know you can be alone without being lonely, just like you can be with others and still be lonely.  I was definitely the latter for a long time.  Longer than I realized, and you were my first step to getting out of that.  

[druidx]

Character snippet tag

Thanks to @oh-no-another-idea for this one

Tagging back: @aalinaaaaaa @thewriteflame @wildswrites @aquadestinyswriting @artdecosupernova-writing @autumnalwalker @blind-the-winds @eli-writes-sometimes @hannahcbrown @oh-no-another-idea @rhikasa @swordsoulwrites @winglesswriter @andromeda-grace @writingmaidenwarrior @wispstalk @late-to-the-fandom

Rules: pick an OC and post a snippet from their viewpoint.

Another one from Alexis Dalliance vs the Evil of Titan. Most of this WIP is from her POV in a loose sense, but this is one of the few times we're very much confined to her direct POV.

Also to note, as this was a roleplayed section from a 20yo TTRPG, I'm riffing off what my gut and my vague, half a line of notes tell me happened.

CW Out of body experience, magic fuckery, body horror(?) 500 words

The next thing Alexis knew, she was staring at her body. It lay on a marble slab, tan skin washed out like linen greyed with age and use. Her dignity was covered over by long strips of bold purple silk, revealing the corroded hole caused by the poison arrow. Above her body, blue sparks traced arcs through the air, terminating at the points of brass lines inlaid into the marble. What in the Pit? Alexis tried to ask, but instead there was only a soft sound, like the soughing of the wind in a canopy of trees. Why can't I talk? Her alarmed cry came out like the rattle of raindrops on a canvas roof. "Ah, I hear your little friend has woken up." A kindly face hove into her view – wild yellow hair and smiling eyes of mauve. "You're not dead, little eshen. Well- Hmm." The face tilted upwards in thoughtful regard, a pale hand cupping the chin. "You are, and you aren't. Your body had ceased. We were able to trap your soul before it fled completely and preserve it in this jar until we can make your body whole and functional again. I apologise for these accommodations, but I assure you, the jar is temporary." You can hear me? Alexis asked, voice like the curious trill of a dove. "In a way." The wizard – for they had moved now, such as to reveal the rest of themselves, and she could plainly see the green robe covered in arcane symbols – indicated a two-pronged device next to Alexis' body. "Your soul is still connected to your body and through this tuning fork, I can pick up the inferences of your mental speech. In this manner I can reply to you, or convey your wishes to your friends." They're here? Her joy was like the ringing of bluebells in a spring breeze. They're safe? "Paladin Tetherson," the wizard said, looking to the left. "I believe your friend would like visual affirmation of your continued health." Distantly, she could hear Richard say, "What?" "He means go stick your face in front of the jar and say hi," Victor said, as Bastet laughed. There was the jagling of metal and then Richard appeared, his face large in her view. "Hi," he said. There was a high-pitched ringing. Her words came in the snapping of a branch: Ah! Bloody hell! "Please do not tap the glass," the wizard said. "Oh. Sorry," Richard looked back at Alexis. "Sorry. Um. You doing okay in there?" It's weird, Alexis said in the tones of a squirrel scrambling up the bark-face of a tree, but yes – I'm fine. The wizard relayed her words. Richard nodded. "Good." The wizard strode forward, cupping an arm around Richard's shoulder. "Come, Paladin. It will take some time for the restoration to be completed. You and your fellows should eat and rest. You were not brought here without reason, and you must have your strength for the coming task ahead." Richard glanced back at Alexis as he was steered away, raising a hand in a small wave.

[necklesslapras]

i just realized I never actually posted about these whoops

we found these at my beloved discount store; they're a bunch of obviously-ai-generated books, but from a time before ai could even remotely pass as human (I think at least one of em was from 2020? or earlier) so the contents are. interesting.

most of it is complete nonsense but there are certainly some amusing passages

[ghqstwriter]

love the stuff you write!!!

Can you do a deaf hero (cause of an explosion) x villain?

It's totally fine if you can't :]

Tyy

The villain couldn’t remember when this had turned into a regular habit: breaking into the hero’s apartment. At first, it was supposed to be a kidnapping attempt. Hero didn’t work on Wednesdays, so Villain thought it an opportune time to catch them off guard at home. Only, when they had finally managed to get through the window, nobody was there. No sign of Hero, as though they hadn’t been back for a while.

No worries, Villain had thought. Maybe they’re on vacation. They’ll come back a week later. And so they did, but they were still met with a lifeless apartment, bookshelves and tables collecting dust. That was worrying. The criminal had then started to monitor the agency’s mission reports, just to see if there was any mention of Hero being away on some international assignment, yet their name had not been mentioned for multiple weeks.

So, Villain had made a habit of visiting the hero’s vacant apartment, keeping dust away and checking for any signs that they were still here. After the first month, the realisation that Hero could be dead had conjured itself in Villain’s mind, and that made them sick to their stomach. No, they couldn’t be dead, and they couldn’t start thinking like this. Hero wasn’t someone easy to take down, and if they were involved in a fight with someone like Supervillain, that rumour would have made it’s way to the villain and their allies.

It had been three months since Hero had vanished, and this routine had become like a second nature to Villain. Muscle memory was already kicking in, and the criminal made their way into the building, ready to be faced with the exact same image as usual. Except this time, there were some relatively noticable changes to the apartment. For example, Hero was sat across the room, a bowl in their hands, looking rather startled.

“What are you doing here?” Villain asked, a question that really should have come from the other party here, considering this was Hero’s house, not Villain’s favourite dusting simulator. Yet, they continued. “You haven’t been back for months, there’s been no missions in your name. You practically disappeared off of the face of the Earth, what the hell happe—“

“Can you please just give me one moment,” Hero interrupted, their voice slightly raised. Then, they stood up, placing their bowl down on the oak coffee table, and headed for their bedroom. A poor move that could have been, on Villain’s side. Letting them leave. Because, chances were, they were grabbing their phone, ready to call for backup. Or, worse, they were looking for something to keep Villain out of their apartment permanently.

Hero returned moments later, looking rather pissed at Villain’s entrance, but not seeming angry enough to start firing. A good sign, at least. They didn’t have anything in their hands, no gun or phone, however Villain noticed something wrapped around their ear, though they were too far away to identify it, standing in the furthest corner of the room.

“What is that, some headpiece to contact the agency?” Villain asked, noticing how Hero’s face immediately shifted to dumbfoundedness.

“A headpiece?” They repeated, their tone dripping with utter disbelief. “Are you— are you stupid? A headpiece? Villain, these are hearing aids. For hearing. Please tell me you know what that is.”

“Hey! Yes, I know what a hearing aid is. Does it look like I can see your ears well from here? I’m not stupid, nor am I blind,” Villain retorted, slightly offended by the comment, but mostly overwhelmed with relief that Hero was back and bantering with them like before. They missed this, more than they realised. “Why are you wearing those, anyways? Is it to do with why you just vanished completely for three months?”

Hero flumped down in response, beckoning Villain over. The latter obliged, taking a seat on the sofa across from Hero’s armchair. They shouldn’t have been so comfortable in the presence of their archnemesis, but the room was more than familiar by now.

“Do you, uh, remember that explosion in the city centre three months ago? It was all over the news, I think,” Hero took a breath, recalling the story. “I was pretty close to the blast, trying to fish out any remaining civilians. The external injuries were nothing worse than the stuff we’ve both dealt with before, but according to the doctors there was major damage to my eardrums, and the hearing loss is likely permanent. I’m not completely deaf, but it’s pretty severe, so I really can’t hear well, even with these things in my ears. It’s put me out of commission for months, I only got discharged yesterday.”

There was silence for a few moments, as the words set in. As much as Hero and Villain fought all the time, whenever something major happened in one of their personal lives, the other was the closest a confidant could be. It started when Villain’s sister had passed, and they broke down in the middle of a battle. Instead of taking down a weeping, vulnerable enemy, Hero was by their side in an instance, offering consoling words and a shoulder to sob into. After that, their dynamic had shifted, and they both knew they could trust one another with these kinds of things.

“How are you holding up? I mean, it’s a pretty big life change, especially for someone in this line of work.” Villain asked, wanting to show their concern, yet they were worried it might come across as pitying.

“It’s uh, definitely been something,” Hero wrung their hands together as they spoke. “The doctors recommended some councilling stuff, as well as telling me about some support groups. I’m just a bit worried how it’ll impact my career going forward. Heroism isn’t exactly the most accomodating job industry.”

Villain nodded in response, understanding exactly what they meant. If Hero failed any of their bimonthly testing, the agency would likely let them go. Both of them knew how dear this role was to Hero, and both of them knew just how easily the agency could cut people out. The villain had multiple criminal acquaintances who had turned to this sort of lifestyle due to some form of rejection from them.

The two supers looked at each other in silence. It was evident how worried they both were at the situation. Hero’s eyes were glossy, as though the stress had been eating away at them for months, and it was only now coming out. Hero didn’t trust easy, and their relationships with colleagues were nothing beyond professional. Throughout those months of recovery, they probably had nobody to console them.

“Well, I don’t know what’ll happen in the future, but I do know that if you keep distressing yourself over this, recovery will be an even slower, steeper journey. Relax, just for tonight. I can stay if you’d like me to, we can watch one of those idiotic movies or console games you’re always raving about,” Villain offered them a small smile, standing up in search for the remote.

“Sounds nice to me,” was Hero’s response as they drew shapes into the arm of their plush chair. “Definitely better than you fighting and/or kidnapping me. I assume that’s what you were here to do, right?”

Villain froze in response, though mostly out of embarrassment. Of course, Hero didn’t know why they were here. So, they tried to explain. “Oh, I, uh, have been coming here a couple times a week now. Since you’ve been gone and everything, I’ve just been trying to look after the place. No ill intentions here.”

A civillian would have likely recoiled at the idea of that, a criminal breaking into their home on a regular basis to do the dusting. Yet, Hero smiled in response, almost lovingly. They recognised the Villain’s strange affection after knowing them for so many years. After so many days of pain and spiralling in fear, Hero started to feel some of that weight lift off of their scarred chest, as though Villain’s mere presence made everything else in the world inconsequential.

“Besides,” the villain began, sitting back down in their spot, and dragging their finger idly across the remote buttons. “If the agency does foolishly decide to let you go after this, I’ve heard I’m a rather considerate and accommodating boss.” Villain grinned brashly as Hero chuckled and playfully hurled a throw pillow at their head in response. Everything would be ok.

[irisfixation]

putting a major character into a story where everyone has unique superpowers or magic or whatever. establishing, on their introductory scene, that this particular character has mind control powers.

and then having that character.... sit there, among the ensemble cast, through pages and episodes and films and years. with that one fundamental fact of their introduction still known and understood: this character can dominate the minds of others.

and yet - never betraying their friends, never scheming or being shown keeping secrets or manipulating others, not even by the narrative framing. no veiled hints to latch onto. they have this power. it does not matter. the story continues until it does not, until its conclusion has been reached.

and time carries on and lets the unspoken question of the narrative's trustworthiness gnaw through the audience like a parasite.

[suegodvester]

One drink and straight to bed, he vowed to himself.

“A water?” The barman scoffed. “The poor man’s choice, I see.”

Wally chuckled. “The choice of a man who just got here from a trip longer than you can imagine. D’ya got any rooms free up in this place or?”

The barman’s face softened, and he laughed as he went to grab a glass of water. Returning, he leaned in as he handed Wally his drinks. “We do, but tell me, have you ever been here before?”

A blush rose up his cheeks as Wally shook his head. “To be perfectly honest, I’m not even sure where ‘here’ is,” he laughed awkwardly. He suddenly felt very looked at.

“Curious.” The man pulled back, then nodded to himself. “Gotham usually doesn’t show herself to people who haven’t been here before, well, unless she has plans for you. Or so they say.”

“Gotham?” Wally blurted out, eyes widened in shock. “I can’t believe I’m actually here.” He laughed, not because he was happy, but he couldn’t help himself from laughing at his own stupidity. Of course, with all the weirdness going on around here, how didn’t he realize this sooner?

He did it. He found the no-man’s-land that was particularly starting to look like an any-man’s-land to him. The place he had been looking for all along.

“You know, there’s some rumors about-” The bartender started, then stopped dead in his sentence and looked up behind Wally. Right then, Wally felt two, strong hands clasp onto his shoulders.

“You’re in my seat.” A deep, bouldering voice said, the two goons behind him snickering loudly.

Wally looked around him and noticed the two chairs besides him had indeed come up empty. Still, he shrugged and tipped his drink back. “And I was having a really good conversation.” He shot back, not getting off the chair. “Please, do continue.”

He heard a couple “Ooh”’s and “Shit”’s and snickers behind him as the saloon fell silent. All eyes fell on him, or well, them, as Wally shrugged the hands off his shoulders and leaned forward.

“Funny, kid.” The man all but growled. The bottle in his hand -some dirt cheap brand of beer, Wally guessed- came into his view as Wally skillfully -although accidentally- dodged the bottle when he turned the bar chair around. The glass made a painful shattering noise as it came into contact with the edge of the bar, sending shards everywhere.

His attacker staggered back, the intoxication visible in how he tripped rather gracefully against one of his back-up buddies. Immediately, everyone at the bar shot up from their seats and started screaming. Some people saw this as the perfect time to throw some punches around, and Wally winced as he heard the rough sound of a cracking bone right next to him.

It all happened in the blink of an eye, the way this bar fight came to be, but now everyone was in on it. Everyone, except for Wally. Shit, had he really just started this? He frantically looked around, hoping to spot a way out of this mess he had so swiftly created. Hells, he hadn’t even been here for over ten minutes and he already-

A hand slipped around his wrist, and the strong grip pulled him out of his thoughts as fast as he was pulled out of the saloon. When the cold night’s air pushed his hair out of his eyes, his mind cleared. Loud screams and thuds against the walls and floors, although a bit more muted now, made him look at one of the windows.

What just happened?

“You’re really quite something, y’know?” An amused, cocky voice startled him fully away from whatever was happening inside the saloon now, and he traced his eyes to the figure in front of him.

[save-the-villainous-cat]

Hi! I have a request, i hope it's not too specific or silly! How about an ace character that finds a fellow ace? Could be a villain that keeps flirting and when the hero tells them they don't want anything spicy villain is like 'Oh yeah no I'm ace too, just like teasing you :3'

Regardless of whether you answer or not, i hope you have a wonderful day!!

For better or for worse, the date they were on was rather pleasant.

It had been a trap the villain had prepared which was in retrospect a little bit too obvious. Their nemesis had lured the hero out of their messy apartment with a single note - a warning that quite a few hostages were waiting for them at one of the most expensive restaurants in town.

Without hesitation, the hero had rushed to the address but once the hero had opened the door, it was rather clear that no one was in danger. Instead, the hero got some judging looks from fancy folks when they had thrown open the door, panting.

The villain had looked rather amused when their gazes had met. It was the kind of embarrassment that burnt itself into the hero's brain. A memory that would pop up whenever they tried to fall asleep. It was so bad, in fact, that they considered turning on their heel and leave all together but the villain was too quick.

They raised a glass, their smile crooked.

And the hero felt obligated to walk up to them, now that curious looks were jumping from the hero to the villain.

"You could have told me to wear something nice," the hero hissed as they sat down.

"You look great in everything," the villain purred. Their eyes wandered up and down the hero. "Even in sweatpants."

"You flatter me."

"I'm stating a fact."

The hero took in a deep breath. Their heart was still banging against their rib cage violently. They lowered their voice.

"Why am I here?"

"Because you're gullible?" The villain swayed their wineglass in one hand.

"That's not what I mean."

"Because you're the city's sweet saviour who will always help the poor and innocent?" The hero didn't really know why the villain was toying with them like this. Clearly, there was an ulterior motive behind this. There always was.

Mostly, it was scheme after scheme with them. It was true that the hero was rather fond of them but they'd rather cut their arm off than admit that.

"You know I don't have much time on my hands," the hero said. "So whatever you want from me, make it quick."

For a moment, the villain didn't say anything and exactly that gave the hero enough time to truly look at them. Apparently, they had taken their sweet time to get ready for this date. The hero didn't know how to interpret that. Maybe it was the overall atmosphere of the restaurant or maybe the villain really cared about other's perception of them. The hero couldn't tell.

"I guess there is your answer. I thought it would be nice to spoil you a little," the villain said. "My little workaholic."

Oh, shit.

To say the hero started panicking internally was an understatement. They liked the villain, really liked them. Maybe even more than that.

And the villain seemed to have similar feelings for them.

The hero swallowed.

It had taken them quite a lot of bargaining, denial and a great deal of sadness to realise that they weren't interested in anything sexual. It had taken them a lot of time to come to terms with it. Back then, they had felt guilty for feeling the way they did. Often, they had wondered if there was something wrong with them. If it was just them who felt like this.

It was an almost obsessive fear of exclusion that had infiltrated their mind. It was exhauting to explain their own feelings over and over again and sometimes, they had even forced themselves to go beyond their boundaries.

On some nights, they had lain in bed awake, asking themselves if it was fair to be this way. To never be able to fully give back and love a partner that way. They had lost enough people they had been interested in romantically because of this. It was always the same stupid cycle. Always the same brainless questions that didn't help nor comfort them.

The hero was a different person now. They were much more confident but losing the villain that way wasn't only awkward, it was also a little heartbreak all over again.

"Listen..." the hero said. "I appreciate all of this. You're very sweet."

They dug their nails into their palms. Most people didn't understand. Most people said they were totally fine with it and still, they distanced themselves in the end. It used to make the hero angry but above all, it used to make them very sad.

"But, you know, I'm ace, so. Well, yeah, I...you probably know what that means but if you don't, uhm..."

Suddenly, something lit up behind the villain's eyes.

"Yeah?" The villain smiled. It wasn't a grin. It wasn't a smirk. It was a sweet, lovely smile.

"Huh?"

"You're ace?" they asked. Again, the hero swallowed. They looked down at the still empty dinner plate. It seemed like they had been in here for hours now, even though it had been mere minutes.

"...yeah."

"Me too," the villain said softly and the hero couldn't tell if this was some cruel joke or if this was a genuine gift from the universe. This meant no explaining, no stupid questions. No lost relationship, no arguments over this...For the first time in their life, they felt excited after coming out.

"What? Really? But the flirting and the-"

"I love messing with you, you know that," the villain said, winking. They took a sip of their wine. "And I meant what I said. You need to relax. You need someone to take care of you, even if that someone has to use some questionable methods to get you out of your apartment."

The hero stared at them, almost drunk on happiness.

"Thank you," the hero whispered.

"What a silly thing to say, darling," the villain responded.

Both would return to the restaurant several times after.

Hungry for more.

[inafieldofdaisies]

Character Moodboard | Deputy Sabrina Donovan | WIP: In Hope of Tomorrow

“So many eyes saw the worst in me, and yet yours... yours didn't.”

Tagging, @socially-awkward-skeleton @strangefable @lilywatt @imogenkol

@killyourrdarlingss @katsigian @derelictheretic @carlosoliveiraa @voidika

@aceghosts @josephslittledeputy @josephseedismyfather @trench-rot

@theelderhazelnut @raresvtm @cassietrn @g0dspeeed @direwombat

@purplehairsecretlair @la-grosse-patate @elligatorrex @mkdecimation @simplegenius042

@simonxriley @cloudofbutterflies92 @shellibisshe 

@neonshrike @dumbassdep @wrathfulrook @strafethesesinners @finding-comfort-in-rain and anyone that would like to do the tag 🤍

[forwhump]

a/n; hello again I’m sorry I have the posting schedule of the creature from jeepers creepers 😔 back to our regularly scheduled story progression

this is actually 2 parts put together so kindaaaaa long & rambling but I took so long to get here that I figured some actual real progression was in order

(I think this is a Really Fun One but I also have a bit of a thing™️ for silas being sad and severely unwell 😀)

word count: 6.2k

tw/cw; human weapon whumpee, self harm, traumatic brain injuries, amnesia, lobotomies, captivity, rape/noncon, psychological torture, skinning, gun violence, sexual violence, misgendering, gore, military whump, mentions of bodily fluids

Seven is haunted by somebody he doesn’t remember. 

Often in various states of undress. 

It’s hard to explain how deeply uncomfortable it makes him. He thinks they have to be memories, dredges from his past life, at least something close. His conscience, maybe. He thinks he must’ve done something horrible to this person. He thinks he’s figured it all out. 

For a long time, he’s been alone in this grey room, only his nightmares and vivid hallucinations to keep him company. He has a grey mattress, pushed up against a grey wall, wrapped in grey sheets he’d since sweat and bled through and that hadn’t been changed, not ever, not once. He pisses in the corner. 

He hadn’t been able to figure out why he’s here — he doesn’t fuckin’ remember anything useful. He’d had a field test, a practice in slaughter, but he had failed to kill somebody he hadn’t recognized, somebody that remembered him from before. 

Mercilessly, Seven is being punished for that. He’d been stripped and caned afterward for his failure, for failing to clear the enemy, but then he was closed in this grey room, this cell, and left by himself. For a long time, the flurry of doctors and surgeons coming and going to poke and prod and hurt him had been relentless. Seven has now been alone longer than he’d ever had people around him. 

He thinks. Can’t really know for certain. The lights turn on and off, night and day, but the time between seems erratic, irregular, but even that’s hard to say. Time passes differently when he’s alone. 

It had seemed like a stark overreaction to not kill one guy one time. He’d killed everybody else he’d ever been ordered to. In the short time he remembers, he’d killed a lot. He killed obediently. He didn’t kill Hat or whatever his name was, and that’s it? Discarded? 

Then the nightmares had started. The hallucinations next. Now, Seven thinks he’s figured it out. 

For a long time, it was just colours — splashes of blood, the inside of an opened abdominal cavity. He’s only ever been haunted by a single person, and he doesn’t know who he is. Sometimes, he sees him in grey, but it’s always Seven’s grey, Seven’s sweatshirts, too small for him because everything is too small for Seven but too big for whoever he’s imagining. It’s never made sense to him; when was somebody ever with him? Somebody without greys of their own? Somebody that small? 

He didn’t belong here, whoever he was. He looked out of place before the backdrop of Seven’s grey room, even wearing his greys. He’s beautiful in a way that makes Seven squint when he looks at him. He’s beautiful in a way Seven finds strangely, deeply unsettling. 

Except it has nothing to do with his beauty at all, it’s some other kind of instinct, a part of Seven that must’ve remembered what he’d done. Because he doesn’t see him in grey much anymore, he’s usually mostly naked, short skirts and stockings sometimes, and he’s always bleeding and he begs for help. Sometimes, for days at a time, he begs for help. 

Slowly, it started to make more sense. Seven kinda started to put the pieces together. They don’t know he thinks, but he does, and he’s getting better at it the more that he tries. It makes sense. The way the nurses, the doctors, the soldiers always looked at him, watched him, flinched when he moved too quick or got too close. Why he’d been locked away in the first place, trained for slaughter. Why he’s locked up so tightly now. 

He thinks, before, he was one of them. A soldier, probably, because that soldier from the field test had remembered him. Called him by name, but Seven can’t remember anymore what it had been. He thinks, during his time as a soldier, he did something horrible, something he doesn’t want to think about, something that’s coming back to haunt him now that he’s alone and has nothing else to do but think. They’d tried to wipe him clean after, make him some sort of monster, keep him of use to them somehow. Then he’d failed that test. 

At this point, he isn’t sure why they haven’t put him down yet. That’s obviously where this is tilting. He’s a danger to the people around him, and he isn’t of use to anyone else. What else could they do with him? 

He spends a lot of time beating his head into the grey concrete wall, trying to quell the thinking. It doesn’t work. Behind him, whoever he is, waves of white hair and big, sad eyes, cries out to him for help, and Seven doesn’t know how to help him. He doesn’t want to remember what he did. 

The hallucinations don’t always touch him, but sometimes they do. Sometimes, he grabs at Seven’s ankles, his joggers, clinging to him, pleading with him. Once, he’d put a small hand at Seven’s back and said softly, “what are you doing?”, rocking up on his toes to try to reach up and put his hand between Seven’s head and the wall. For some reason, obediently, Seven had leaned into his touch. His gentle hand on Seven’s face had made him throw up all over himself. Later, he’d discarded his shirt in the piss corner. Since, the ghostly touch on the bare skin of Seven’s back has made him sick every time. He should’ve kept his shirt on, filthy or not. 

He’s filthy either way. The room is filthy. He still thinks of it as being grey, but he can’t say there aren’t splashes of colour now, grime and filth and Seven’s different bodily fluids. It’s probably beyond help. Maybe Seven is, too. 

Maybe that’s why they left him here. Maybe they don’t have the heart to kill him — maybe they’re too afraid. Maybe they’ve left him to rot. 

Standing guard outside the armoured door, since Seven had reached through the meds slot with a shaking hand to gouge out the eyes of whoever was closest, is a pair of soldiers that Seven doesn’t recognize, but that knew him from before. He knows they did, they must have. They taunt him with a sort of familiarity, they reference things that Seven doesn’t know. They call him the dog — what the fuck is a dog? 

They loiter outside Seven’s room day in and day out. Sometimes, they pull open that slot between them just to taunt him. They’re braver than a lot of the other soldiers have been — cocky. Being braver, though, doesn’t necessarily make brave, and they still won’t look him in the eye. They lock that slot as soon as Seven gets too close. They’re afraid of him, too, but they have a dislike for him in almost the same quantity, a dislike that extends far beyond the reaches of what Seven can remember. Did they know the blonde, maybe? The one that haunts Seven? Have they never been able to forgive him for what he did? 

Not that they would tell him either way, but he wishes he could ask. For some reason, he can talk to the man that haunts him and nobody else. He suspects it’s because it’s not real, that he’s hallucinating it like he is everything else. Sometimes, in the rare moments he’s by himself, when the room is empty of ghosts, he’ll thump himself on the chest with his fist and try to force words out. It never works. It’s probably, Seven suspects, because the problem isn’t in his chest, it’s in his brain, or whatever fistful of meat he has trying its best between his ears. It doesn’t fire right, whatever it is, it doesn’t work like it’s supposed to. A part of it was left behind in a time Seven doesn’t remember, and he’s getting fucked as it comes back to him now. 

He cracks his head into the wall again. Behind him, the ghost sobs. He has a cry that makes the inside of Seven’s chest feel cold. But then he takes a deep breath, and he says, “I’m sorry,” in the smallest, saddest voice Silas had ever heard. “I’m so sorry.” 

And that’s weird. Who is he talking to? 

Slowly, Seven peels the split, thin skin of his forehead off the wall. 

However reluctantly, he turns. Immediately wishes he hadn’t. 

Across the room, Seven is sitting on the floor, slumped back against the far wall. Except Seven is standing right here, so that doesn’t make any sense. He can’t remember if he’s ever hallucinated himself from the outside before, but it’s heavier, for some reason, it makes him sick in a different, claustrophobic sort of way. His skin crawls. 

He’s sitting, slumped against the far wall, head tilted back and chest hitching as he drowns in his own blood. The ghost has both his hands over Seven’s opened throat, trying to quell the bleeding that’s seeping out from between his thin fingers like ink. A wasted effort, anyway, because Seven can see his intestine spilling out from the hole that had been ripped in his sweatshirt. The ghost is covered in blood — Seven’s? 

Did Seven die? What the hell? 

It doesn’t make any sense. What happened to him? He looks a lot the same as he does right now, in real time, still a freak. Does that mean he was a monster, too, before all of this? They hadn’t changed him because whatever he’d done? 

What had he done? What the hell is he? 

The ghost is trying to stop the bleeding and Seven is watching himself die. His hands are shaking — blood loss? Or had he carried that with him from before, too? 

What happened to him? 

What is he?

He watches, across a whole other lifetime and just a couple of feet, as he lifts a trembling hand, huge as it touches the cheek of his ghost. Then he does something weird with his hand, crosses the tip of his thumb and his index finger, and the ghost makes a sound that raises the hair on the back of Seven’s neck. Turning away, he looks back at the wall and a pain he doesn’t recognize throbs in his chest as the ghost cries for him at his back. The world, as he had been building it up, crumbles around him. 

Seven’s always been a freak and he died once in the arms of a ghost that now haunts him. How could he be the ghost when Seven’s the one that died? Why is he being tormented by somebody that had mourned him with his blood on their hands? 

What happened to him? 

He beats his head back into the wall. The pain of the impact distracts from the pain behind his eyes as he tries so hard to remember. How can he not remember? What did they do to him? 

Except he must remember, at least a little bit. It’s trapped in there somewhere and it’s coming back to haunt him, fighting tooth and nail to get free. It doesn’t want him to forget. 

Why not? What does it fuckin’ matter? Why does Seven need to watch himself bleed to death? What does it mean? 

Why is he here? 

A small hand touches his back and the warmth of it is so real. Too suddenly, he whirls around to face it. Across the room, his gutted corpse and the ghost grieving him are both gone. Instead, the ghost is standing close at Seven’s side. His hand had been warm on Seven’s bare skin. He’s cleaned of Seven’s gore, dressed, instead, in a set of his hospital greys, rolled up at the wrists and the ankles. His hair is loose around his back and his shoulders, a sheet around him so white it sort of makes him glow. 

He’s so beautiful. Whatever he is, whatever Seven had done to him in his past life, he’s stricken in this one by just how beautiful he is. He’s never doubted that his ghost is real, a memory from a part of his brain that’s trying to remember, because there’s so way Seven could ever have imagined, on his own, somebody that looks like this. He’s so beautiful Seven can’t make sense of him. And, sleepy, he smiles up at Seven, keeping one of his bare hands on his skin. 

“Come back to bed,” he says softly. 

He’s so beautiful that Seven can’t understand why looking at him makes his head throb behind his eye. He doesn’t remember him so he can’t understand why his gentle touch makes Seven’s skin crawl and his stomach turn. What else could it be if it isn’t guilt? What could Seven have done to him? 

“Come on,” his ghost says softly. With one of his small hands he takes one of Seven’s and Seven swallows so thickly something clicks in his throat. “Come to bed with me.” 

This can’t be a memory. He can’t have shared his bed with Seven. Why would he have? Something so beautiful and so human. How could he have trusted Seven like that? How could Seven have hurt somebody that trusted him like that? 

Blood trickles, warm, down the side of Seven’s face. “What did I do to you?” He asks, thick around the lump in his throat. He doesn’t think he really wants to know but he asks anyway. 

The ghost squeezes his fingers and his touch feels too real. He smiles up at him and Seven has to look away. “I’m fine,” he promises softly. “Come back to bed, Seven.” 

Seven’s ghost has a strange, syrupy sort of accent. It’s unlike anything Seven had ever heard, just as surreally beautiful as his eyes and the lines of his collarbones and the shape of his fingers. Seven’s been certain he couldn’t have imagined it because he couldn’t have thought it up, had never heard anybody else speak in the same way his ghost speaks. 

Except when he says Seven. It makes Seven lift his head again. He sounds different, wrong, and for a moment, Seven doesn’t know why. 

He looks into the wide, dark eyes of his ghost and cold prickles at the back of his neck as he realizes he’d said it without his accent. Seven. He’d said it without any of the sugar or syrup. 

Seven has his first real memory. The first one he’s really confident about. 

“You never called me Seven.” He couldn’t hear how his name sounded in the ghost’s accent because he’d never heard it before. He never called him Seven. He didn’t know Seven. 

The ghost smiles up at him again. His eyebrows pull together in the middle, pretty and confused. “Why would I call you Seven?” 

Across the room, his ghost whispers, “leave me alone, Seven.” 

Except he says it wrong, because it wasn’t Seven. It was — 

He lifts his head and the warmth of his touch vanishes from Seven���s hand because the ghost is slumped against the far wall, head tipped back against it. He’s wearing a skirt that’s too short, fingers twisted into the hem, knees splayed so Seven can see the trails of blood tracked down the insides of his thighs. He tries to close his knees as Seven looks down at him and it looks like it causes him a lot of pain. 

“I’ll be fine,” he says, but his voice is so small. 

Is this a memory? Is any of this? “What happened to you?” 

The ghost sniffles, wiping his bleeding nose with the back of his hand. “I’m fine,” he repeats. “Leave me alone.” 

Clearly, he’s not fine. In the short time Seven’s spent looking across the room at him, blood has started to pool on the concrete between his legs. “Did I do this to you?” He rasps, even if he doesn’t really want to know. 

“What?” He says. Tears spill over his cheeks as he looks up at Seven, eyelashes clumping together, and he doesn’t look real. This can’t be a memory because this can’t be real. How could Seven have done this? 

Of course, Seven knows how he could’ve done this. With ease Seven could’ve done this. All he does is hurt people. Maybe that hadn’t been any different in his last life. 

Then why did they bring him back? What more could they want from him? Why are there so many parts of him that want so desperately to remember? “Did I hurt you?” He asks, and his voice is so rough he doesn’t recognize it. 

The ghost sniffles, trying to wipe his eyes again with the hem of his buttoned shirt. It almost looks like he’s wearing a uniform. His skirt is short, indecently, but it’s the same black material the soldiers' uniforms are all made from. His shirt is the same black buttoned shirt as their formals, except his is pulled open, tangled around his upper arms like somebody had tried to pull it off of him. Had Seven tried to pull it off of him? 

But the ghost says, “what are you talking about?”, and his pale eyebrows scrunch together in the middle. “You wouldn’t hurt me.” He wipes his bloody nose again with his sleeve. “You know that.” 

Does he? 

Seven feels himself sway on his feet as the room spins quickly around him again. The world is pulled out from under him for a second time. He didn’t hurt him? Then why is he haunting him? 

While Seven’s pulse beats in his ears, the ghost says, from his right, “Seven?” 

Seven can barely hear him. He’s too aware of his own heartbeat and he doesn’t know why finding out he hadn’t hurt him felt the same in his chest as being hunted. He turns his head slowly, feeling so much of something that it’s too much and he’s almost numb. What’s going on? Why won’t it stop?

From the edge of his bed, the ghost looks up at him. His hair is pulled into two, neat braids and his dress is short and ruffled, demeaning. White socks pulled up over his knees, he sits on the edge of Seven’s bed with his ankles crossed and looks up at him with wide, shining eyes. He looks towards the door around Seven’s arm before looking back up into his face, a flush starting to bloom across the bridge of his nose. 

“What are you doing here?” He asks. 

It’s a hard question to answer. He doesn’t even really know. 

Before he can even try to guess, his ghost tells him urgently, “you have to go.” 

“What?” Seven says. 

“He’ll kill you if he finds you here,” he breathes. 

Seven turns quickly towards the door. “Who?” 

The door is closed, of course. Armored and bolted. Seven, really, is alone in his cell, losing his mind in the dark, filthy and probably dying. Instead, he sees his ghost again, curled on the floor like he had collapsed just inside the door. 

He’s naked but his skin is hardly bare, pale flesh gone black and red and purple with bruises and welts and bite marks. His head is down, his hair flowing around him, matted and turned pink with blood. His hands are tied behind his back, his shoulders pulled at an angle that looks painful and hitching irregularly as he sobs. 

Seven staggers back and collides with the wall, closer than he had expected. If he didn’t do this, why does he have to keep seeing this? What is this? 

Who is this? 

Standing over him is a soldier Seven doesn’t recognize. He’s a big guy, tall and broad shouldered, bearded and dark haired, his uniform decorated with a large number of pins and patches and badges. He looks between Seven and his ghost and as he does, his lip curls in a snarl. Quiet and lethal, he realizes, “you’re fucking the dog.” 

He laughs as he looks at Seven again, but it isn’t a humorous laugh. There’s something a little deranged to it. “Bad girl,” he scolds, clicking his tongue, and as Seven watches he tilts his face down and spits onto the ghost’s back. “I thought you were better than this. The fucking dog,” and he spits on him again before he looks at Seven. 

Instantly, it makes Seven’s skin start to prickle. Something in his stare starts to reopen old scars, eating away at raised flesh like acid. What does it mean? 

“And you,” he says to Seven, his voice like ice. “You ugly fucking mutt. Your girlfriend’s a whore.” 

What the fuck is this? 

Seven looks at his ghost, shivering at the soldier’s feet. There’s a bruise at his rib cage that looks like a handprint. 

The soldier says, “now you get to watch how well she takes my cock.” 

Seven hits his head against the wall. Puts his weight into it. 

Pain throbs behind his eye but the hallucinations don’t slow down. A soldier is standing in front of him. 

It’s a different soldier, that one from the training exercise. The one that Seven had hesitated to kill. 

He smiles up at him, wavy brown hair and crinkles by his eyes that imply he isn’t a stranger to smiling. He isn’t wearing the uniform Seven remembers him in but his own set of prison greys. 

What was his name? He said it to Seven. He recognized him. 

He doesn’t look up at Seven with even a hint of fear — if he were even a little afraid, Seven would be able to smell it on him. He isn’t a stranger to people being afraid of him. That’s been his entire life, as far back as he can remember. Even the soldiers, always putting on brave faces, hands steady as they point their guns at Seven, stink of fear when they get too close. 

Not this guy. He smiles up at Seven like he smiles all the time, like it comes naturally to him. He says, enthusiastic, “nicely done, big guy!” 

Seven looks down slowly, at the intricately folded paper cradled delicately in one of his calloused palms. He has no idea what it’s supposed to be. Couldn’t even begin to guess. 

“Aww,” the soldier says. “He’s gonna love it, dude.” 

“What is it?” Seven asks, looking down at the crinkled folds of paper and back up at the soldier. 

His eyes twinkle as he says, “tell him you made him a paper wren.” 

Seven sees white. A flash of light behind his eyelids not unlike being shot in the face, but he doesn’t know why or where it comes from and staggers back, just a step, before that white heat bursts in his gut, too, and he vomits. 

When he lifts his head, the soldier is gone and he’s looking at himself again, another version of himself he doesn’t recognize. His hair is knotted at the nape of his neck and there are lines carved out of his cheeks by his mouth as he smiles, embarrassed, at his ghost. 

“A wren,” he says. 

The little ghost gasps quietly, cradling that folded paper in his hands like it was something precious. “A wren,” he breathes, and Seven’s stomach turns violently. “You made this?” 

“For you,” Seven says. 

The ghost looks up at him, still so carefully cradling the paper bird, and the look he gives him makes Seven, from the outside, feel like he’s watching something that he’s not supposed to. That he’s intruding on something private. 

Quickly, he looks away. Too quickly, he looks away, and the room turns with him, knocking him off balance. His back hits the ground with enough force to knock the wind out of him and when he blinks dazed light out of his eye and looks up he’s looking into the barrel of a gun. 

It’s that same soldier that hurt him and his ghost. His hand is steady and his finger is poised on the trigger. 

“You,” he says, “have been a very bad dog.” He keeps the gun pointed into the eye socket that Seven has always known to be empty. As far back as he can remember, he’s only ever had one eye. Is this how he lost it? Is this a memory? 

Who the fuck is this guy? 

Crouching at Seven’s side, he tells him, “for your disobedience,” soft and private, “I am going to put you down. Then,” and he smiles, an unnatural smile, one that doesn’t reach his eyes, “I’m going to make your whore girlfriend suck your blood off my fingers as I spread her open and fuck her over your ugly corpse. And I will not be gentle with her,” he tells him, just as soft but severe, a promise. “She will be begging me to stop.” 

Not quite a memory, but an instinct, that same one that was making his skin prickle before, an anger he must have carried with him from his last life even if he never quite realized he was still holding it. Seven doesn’t remember this guy but he remembers how much he fuckin’ hates him. He remembers this for certain. 

He reaches for him. 

He gets shot in the face. 

For a second, the pain is unbearable, indescribable, and just as quickly it’s gone. After being shot at point blank range, Seven feels the pressure in his face and tastes the gunpowder in his throat and then his concrete prison comes back into focus and he’s sitting with his back against the wall. 

His hair is sticking to the sides of his throat and he doesn’t know if it’s with blood or with sweat. Both, likely. His chest is heaving and his hands are shaking, but his hands are always shaking and he twists them into the filthy material of his joggers in frustration. Uneasy and unpleasant, his heartbeat thunders in his chest and the side of his throat. To try and slow it, he throws his head back into the concrete wall as hard as he can. 

He wants it to stop. How can he make it stop? 

He doesn’t want to know. Not anymore. Not if it feels like this. 

He hits his head again with a force that makes his teeth rattle. Even in the short span of lifetime he remembers, all he’s known is violence. Violence, and this lonely grey room. He’d maimed and mutilated, dismembered and decapitated, crushed and carved. He’d been shot, stabbed, skinned. He’d bled and been beaten to death. He’d died. 

It’s never felt like this. Every time Seven has died it’s been bloody and brutal and miserable, but it never felt like this. Never. Something he doesn’t recognize expands in his chest, pressing so hard against the inside of his ribcage it feels like it might push it right through his flesh. Restless, it thrums beneath his skin. 

Seven lives and breathes carnage. Whatever happened to him in his past life, whatever he might’ve done, whatever it is that he doesn’t remember, does it matter? In this life, in the one that Seven knows, he sits alone in the dark and pisses in the corner until it’s time for him to hunt. Seven is good at killing, but that’s all he’s good for. Whatever he might’ve been is gone. Whoever that soldier had seen, the one he hadn’t been able to kill, that isn’t who Seven is, not really. He doesn’t even have a fuckin’ name. 

He isn’t smart. There’s a part of his brain that remembers something, that is trying so hard to tell him something, but Seven is too goddamn stupid to figure out what it is. Seven is so goddamn stupid that it hurts the more that he tries, not just the useless meat that passes as his brain but in his chest, in his heart and his lungs. The more he tries to think the deeper the pain settles, an infection that’s spreading, that’s making him weak. The only thing Seven has is slaughter and trying to remember is taking that from him, too. He wasn’t even shot, not really, he’s losing his mind alone, but his throat still sticks as he swallows like he’s scared. Fuckin’ scared. 

He wants it to stop. How can he make it stop? 

He hits head again. He can feel his scalp split against the concrete. 

In his past life, the door to his cell is opened. 

That same soldier enters, the one that had shot him. Seven’s reaction to him is visceral. 

It’s that same instinct, the one that might be a memory, the same one that made Seven reach for his throat. It isn’t fear. That horrible, helpless feeling is quelled as soon as the door grinds open, washed away by the fury that rises in him like a fever. He might not remember this guy, but his hatred for him transcends what Seven remembers. He hates him so completely it isn’t in his brain but carried with him in the marrow of his bones, interwoven into his altered DNA. 

Slowly, Seven tips his head back against the wall, lip pulling away from his teeth. 

From just inside the door, from safely outside reaching distance, the soldier regards him with a cold sort of disgust. Then, too quick, it’s gone, replaced with a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes, that’s stretched too wide for his mouth. The way it pulls at his face makes Seven’s skin crawl with disgust. “I have a surprise for you.” 

Silently, Seven raises his eyebrows. The concrete had scrubbed most of the skin from his forehead and brow bone and a fresh rush of blood leaks down his face, pooling, hot, between ridges of scar tissue. 

The soldier’s smile tilts, a sneer, and it looks a lot more natural on his face. Just as quickly, he pulls it back into a creepy imitation of a grin, and he turns. In Seven’s memory, he watches as the soldier swipes his key card and leaves. It’s a really anticlimactic surprise and a really useless memory. Why would he need to remember this? 

Seven has just a time to think that maybe none of these are memories at all. How would he know any different? He’d been trusting they must be some kind of memory, that they had to be, because they were all things he didn’t know or people he didn’t remember. How could he have come up with those things on his own? But Seven lives in isolation and the dark. Seven is a freak and a monster. Seven lives in a cage in his own filth and is released only for slaughter. That’s all there is to his life and he doesn’t know anything more than that. How does he know he didn’t come up with all these things on his own? Maybe it’s all just nonsense. Why is he choosing to believe somebody he knows doesn’t fuckin’ know anything? 

Except the door opens again. The soldier returns. This time, behind him, he’s dragging the limp body of Seven’s ghost. 

Whatever it is that was expanding in Seven’s chest starts to crack his ribs from underneath. The infection spreads to his blood stream. He can’t take a full breath in. His hands shake a little worse with the cold that’s seeping under his skin, into the tissue and the marrow of his bones. 

Fear. It isn’t dying that scares Seven. It’s not the soldiers. Head tipped back against the wall, Seven watches his ghost get dragged against the concrete, and he’s scared. This scares him. 

Why does this scare him? What is this? 

The soldier has one of his gloves hands twisted into the ghost’s long, bloody hair. He’s breathing, but he’s limp, eyes closed and bruised and swollen, wrists and ankles knotted so slightly the skin around the binds had split open. He’s naked, bruised skin rubbed raw against the concrete. 

“Surprise,” the soldier says. “You get to watch me impregnate your whore.” 

That thing in Seven’s chest had started to leak acid and it tastes like bile at the back of his throat. “Get your fuckin’ hands off him,” he spits, and surprises even himself with the bass of his voice. 

The soldier, however, only grins. “Off her?” He says, eyebrows raised in good humour. “Just wait till you see the parts of me that are going to be inside her.” 

It’s instinct more than anything else that makes Seven try to get up. He doesn’t even think about it. Where the soldier’s hand is twisted into the ghost’s hair, it’s thinned so much Seven can see the scalp beneath, crusted with scabs, and it’s a tug in his chest that tries to pull him away from the wall. 

The curved meat hooks sunk deep into his flesh pull him back into place. 

With a snarl, Seven looks down at himself, and he’s fucked. He’s fucked. What could he ever have done to deserve this? His throat and his hands are both shackled to different spots on the floor. His back, chest, sides, and shoulders are secured to the walls and the ceiling with meat hooks poking out from deep within his tissue and muscle. He tries to push himself off the wall and the sound is wet as a strip of flesh is pulled audibly off his back. He snarls again. This is fucked. This seems more like a memory he would really have. 

The soldier watches him with one of his wide, fucked up smiles, untangling his fingers from the ghost’s bloody hair. Limp, he falls to the concrete face down, and the soldier is quick to kick his legs apart, not taking his eyes off of Seven. 

“No,” he snarls, and tries to pull away from the wall again, tearing a chunk of muscle out of his shoulder. “Get the fuck away from him,” he spits. 

The soldier smiles a little wider. “You won’t like the things you see me do to her,” he tells him. “I promise.” 

With a roar, Seven lunges, but this time, he slides away from the wall so easily he almost stumbles. Standing straight, he rolls out his shoulders and looks down at his ghost, clean and dressed in a set of Seven’s prison greys. He’s alone and unbruised, his hair pulled into a neat braid over one shoulder. He’s standing just close enough that it makes Seven uneasy. 

“You must be the weapon,” he says. 

He’s even more beautiful up close and the feeling it gives Seven is eerily reminiscent of fear. He tries to swallow around the feeling but he can’t speak. He nods. 

“Robin told me about you,” he says, and he smiles up at Seven, who has no idea who Robin might be. But — 

But could Robin be a real person? Is Seven remembering? 

He feels like he’s been hit really hard in the head. 

His ghost smiles, the single most beautiful thing Seven has ever seen. The brightest, too, after a life underground, and he squints as he looks down at him. 

He says, “I’m Wren,” in his strange, syrupy accent. 

Seven sees a flash of white before the ground is pulled out from under him. 

He sat, slumped in the shower, head against the tile, hair sticking to his chest. Water beat against the exposed meat of his flesh, stripped of most of his skin. Chunks of tissue clogged the drain. 

It was hard for him to keep holding his head up. He’d lost so much blood. 

His ghost sat with him, kneeling in the water in a set of Seven’s hospital greys. His tears were washed down the drain with the blood and the water. He was clinging to one of Seven’s hands. It was definitely broken but he didn’t tell the ghost it hurt. He didn’t want him to stop touching him. “I don’t want you to keep dying for me,” he whispered. “I don’t want to watch you die anymore.” 

“My Wren,” Seven said, lifting his other, trembling hand to cradle Wren’s cheek, so soft against his palm. “I’m gonna die for you as many times as I need to.” 

Looking up at Seven from one of the mismatched couches in the common room, Wren had smiled so brightly it had knocked the wind out of him. Sitting at the ground at his feet, his back against the bottom of the couch, he’d been winded again when Wren had reached out to tuck a stray hair behind his ear and say, “your hair looks really handsome like that.” 

“Little Wren,” Seven said honestly, “you’re so beautiful it makes you really weird looking. Kinda creeps me out sometimes.” 

Wren laughed loudly and it was the most beautiful sound Seven had ever heard. How could he have ever forgotten it? “Thank you,” he said. “That’s very sweet.” 

He’d been wedged into a bed not big enough for the bulk of him, Wren tucked safely under his arm. His head pillowed on Seven’s chest, one of his small hands twisted tightly into the material of his sweatshirt as he cried, fiercely stubborn. 

“My Wren,” he said against his hair, rubbing his back slowly. “You should want better for yourself than me.” 

“Stop it, Silas,” Wren said into his crewneck, firm despite the tears Seven could feel starting to soak through the material. “I want you. I don’t want anything but you.” 

Silas?

Standing alone in the centre of his room, Seven vomits all over himself. 

[brokenheartwithheartbreak]

Okay I don’t even go here and I’ve never done this before but I’m 10k deep into a post-finale probably AU platonic Thiam fic based on Theo trying to figure out his shit and function as a human being and DOUBTING my writing very hard rn so. What’s the consensus from anyone whose been in this fandom for longer than two months (see: anyone but me)

Excerpt:

Melissa bustles away before he can unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth, Liam watching her go with an oddly forlorn look, still draped over the desk, before those wide puppy-innocent eyes snap to Theo, still hopelessly open and unguarded even as he sighs, a heavy laborious thing, and shakes his head.

“She’s still mad at you.” He says by way of greeting. Theo frowns, has lost Melissa in the throng of people toing and froing in the hallways already, eyes cutting to Liam instead and attempting to dissect why he seems to think this matters.

“I killed her son.” He says flatly, when it becomes apparent Liam expects an answer, “He’s still pissed. Why wouldn’t she be?"

Liam’s gaze turns thoughtful, studying Theo as he stands there in his threadbare t-shirt and the same jeans he’d been wearing when Gabe’s blood was splattering on the tiles, four floors up, three weeks ago. They've been cleaned since - he managed to scrape together enough change for a trip to the laundromat last week - but being back here he can distinctly remember the specific scent of blood and fear and death, a little different for every dead body left in Monroe's wake, tinged with a slightly different mix of the same three things her teenage soldiers feel in their last moments.

Liam's still looking at him with those deceptively sharp eyes, blue like the sky, like a bottomless ocean. He has a skill for looking at people - at Theo - and giving off the impression that he's looking deeper, peeling back the guarded layers and taking a look at the exposed damage underneath, poking at that damage and seeing how much it takes to make him jump, not in a malicious way, though, in a 'testing boundaries' sort of way, in a 'how far can I push you before you snap back' kind of way that Theo respects more than he resents, because he's the same, in a way. He gets the feeling Liam is still waiting for the other shoe to drop, for Theo to slip and the carefully crafted master plan to crack and splinter and shatter down around him all over again, gets the feeling this pushing and prodding is a reflexive, knee jerk reaction to how easily he'd slipped into their ranks and earned their trust last time around. While the rest of the pack seem to have decided the best policy is just to keep him at arm's length until they need to pull him in for a human shield, Liam seems to have gone for the opposite; tugging Theo closer so he can peer into the cracks and crevices Tara clawed into his armour and decide whether the things he does and the words he says are genuine or just another misdirection.

Theo really doesn't have the energy for misdirection anymore - what's the point? All these people have already seen the worst of him, have seen him rip them apart to take what he wanted, seen him rip apart his own pack to take their power, there is nothing he could say or do now to wipe that slate clean and make them forget, that much has been made quite obviously clear. And, somewhere along the line of those four months that felt like four years, four decades, too much time and not enough and how do you reconcile losing that much of your life when it felt like repeating the same five minutes over and over and over again, somewhere along the line the parts of him that were so well trained, so carefully schooled he could control his heartbeat and his chemosignals and his every minuscule emotion like his own body was his puppet, those parts died, ripped out of him a thousand times over alongside Tara's heart and left to rot on that cold hospital floor.

He thinks, privately, in some dark corner of his mind, that Liam might be the only one of them that's actually maybe worthy of being an Alpha. He's explosive and angry, yes, but when the anger drains out he's quiet and clever, stubborn and selfless and so quick to forgive. He's rushing headfirst into danger to give his friends a fighting chance, he's pounding fists against stone until his knuckles break to stop himself hurting a kid who honestly deserved it, he's a heart skipping traitorously over 'I'm not dying for you either.' He's the only one Theo might delude himself into believing has possibly come close to forgiving him, despite it all, despite Theo manipulating him into attacking his own Alpha, despite Theo taunting him and goading him at every opportunity because once, Before Skinwalker Prison Theo thought it was kind of funny to see how many buttons he could press before Scott's favourite blew a fuse.

All that, and he's still the top contact in Theo's pitifully empty phone, he's still the one who came looking that night after the hospital, after Gabe, limping on his own bullet wound, to find Theo sprawled in the back of his truck, rolling the crumpled slug he pulled from his sluggishly bleeding shoulder across the scratched plastic of the tray and trying to erase the feeling of death creeping through his veins as Gabe's heart gave out, pain free. He doesn't know where he stands with a lot of the pack these days, other than understanding the general air of discontent and distrust whenever he happens to be in the same room, but with Liam, at least, their relationship is relatively clear, cut and dried. They're not friends, probably never will be, but they went through something together, survived something together, and that simple act has tied some sort of invisible string between them that has Theo gravitating towards Liam like he's a sharp metal blade and Liam a magnet.

Maybe he's lonely, left behind by everything he's known, cracked open by Tara's hand in his chest, left exposed in the aftermath in such a way he doesn't know how to put the mask back on and pretend anymore. Maybe Liam doesn't look at him like a monster, just a puzzle, not ugly-messy-killer boy but beaten-tired-trying boy. It's not much but it's enough for him to think maybe one person in this fucked up town doesn't completely hate his guts, and that breadcrumb of hope is enough to stir the dead thing in his chest into some sort of continued existence every morning.

None of that stops him from feeling a little like a bug under a microscope, now, trapped in this moment that seems to last hours and seconds at the same time, caught in the arcing swing of the pendulum on a grandfather clock, caught under Liam's gaze that sees too much and not enough at the same time. He fights the urge to let his hands curl into fists, tries instead to remember what it felt like to break Liam’s nose - four weeks ago, five, it doesn’t matter - last time so he doesn’t give in to the urge to do it again, bloody and broken, right here in front of all these hospital staff, these Normal people who might not be so Normal after all. Half of them were here, were working when Monroe’s hunters took over the hospital, when they threw guns into the hands of children and told them to go to war against their classmates, told them that murdering a teenager for being Something Else would net them a win in some sort of moral war as well as the actual, bloody, violent one.

He wonders if any of them recognise him and Liam, two teenagers lingering in a hospital hallway, two Others making themselves easy targets.

“What?” He snaps, surprises himself a little with the sharp tone, but Liam hasn’t moved, hasn’t stopped pinning him with that piercing look, and that’s supposed to be Theo’s job, reading him like an open book, putting together all the little invisible tells and figuring out exactly which buttons to press to get the reaction he wants, the fallout he wants, writing the script and having Liam-Scott-Stiles, all, follow along without ever even realising it. He’s not so good at that anymore, lost that skill somewhere around the three hundredth time Tara ripped her heart out of his chest.

Liam has the grace to look bashful, peeling himself off the desk in a way that looks vaguely like tearing apart Velcro, wobbling to his feet in a way that speaks of long days and longer nights, exhaustion drifting off him like cologne. “Sorry, you just…seem different.”

The apology rolls of his tongue so easily, so simply, like Theo can’t count on just his fingers how many times someone has offered him any sort of apology, and it’s about nothing, about accidentally staring in a fatigued sort of way, but it’s about so much more than that in his head and Liam’s simple-easy camaraderie makes something in his chest ache even fiercer.

‘You seem different’ Liam says, and Theo thinks about his belt being two holes tighter, shirts hanging a little looser, hard ridges of bone hidden beneath. He thinks about long, uncomfortable nights, broken up into sections of haunted sleep and a constant, thick exhaustion he wears like a second skin. He thinks about the sandwich he wolfed down at the last pack meeting to discuss the Hunters, two days ago, that barely made a dent in the gnawing, empty feeling of his insides. It’s fine, he’s managing, he’s still alive; call it another test, perhaps. How long can The Subject sustain itself with no resources?

He wonders how much of that Liam can see, wonders if ‘different’ means ‘thin’ or ‘tired’ or ‘a facsimile of who you were before’.

Theo chooses to ignore the comment entirely, stuffs his hands a little deeper in his pockets, shakes around the boxes of himself in his mind to find some semblance of his usual cold, calculating snark. His lips curl into an expression that is all fangs without ever baring his teeth, one eyebrow lifted in challenge. “You call me here just to stare, Dunbar?”

[dahlia-tourism-board]

The thing about the car accident is, Sam and Alexis remember that night very differently.

[This was inspired by @secretagentsloveblogs and their very good post about Alexis' actions and potential thought process during the accident, go read it, it's A+ nuance]

From Sam's point of view:

Fooling around with someone he'd never feel anything more than lust for wasn't who he wanted to be. He was a troubled man from a broken home, but he didn't want his past to dictate his future.

So it was time to start growing. And that meant letting Alexis move on and find someone that would like her like she wanted. Sam let the drive stay silent, a sort of final goodbye until he can drop her off at her door and clear his mind of the whole thing.

Then the accident.

Searing pain, lightheaded at all the blood around him. Distantly, he can hear Alexis screaming, at him, at the other driver. A sharpness in his side, a piece of a car cutting through him.

But he's a healer, one of the most powerful. Through his daze, he knows all he has to do is get it out, and he can fix himself. But then Alexis' hand is on his wrist, stopping him, and he can see what she wants to do to him now.

He begs her stop, to get off of him, and he pushes against her. But she's stronger than him in the best of circumstances, and then she trances him so he can't fight back at all. She forces herself on him, crawling over him and pinning him down in the ruins of his car.

The pain of her teeth in his neck, and what it means, hurts worse than any injury every could.

From Alexis' point of view:

The man she was starting to love had asked her out to dinner, said he wanted to talk about something. Her heart had hoped and broken over the course of a meal. And still, he was good enough to drive her home.

He was so, so good. He made her want to better. But he didn't want her at all. She was lost in her thoughts, heartbroken and angry and wondering where she had gone wrong.

Then the accident.

Sharp movement, confusion before her reflexes catch up, but then her heart catches in her throat. She yells for him, but Sam doesn't seem to hear her.

He's splayed out in the car, the blood, too much of it, pooling around him. A door spliced through him at the side, his skin pale, his eyes unfocused. Alexis senses him trying to gather his healing magic, sees him reaching for the piece of car going through him. But he could bleed out in the time between pulling that piece out and reaching over to heal the wound.

She loves him. He's a good man in a world that had very little good in it. A selfish part thinks that if she saves his life, he might finally start to see her the way she wants. He'll be hers.

But above all, she doesn't want to see him die like this.

She sets herself over his mangled body, her mind made up. He pushes at her shoulders, babbling at her to stay away. Distantly, she thinks of drowning men fighting their rescuers in their panic, taking them all down together. Sam's that close to death too, his words slurring and incoherent.

She can save him, can guarantee he'll walk away from all this. She just needs him to hold still, to stop fighting and flailing in his death throes. Alexis trances him, a last ditch effort, and now she can get to work saving a good man. The man she loves.

[deepfriedtrout]

never thought tennant would warrant a mention but she randomly just decided to waltz into my mind while writing this. anyways hc time that caroline would burn water without supervision and it was a miracle she did not burn willow's house down putting the kettle on beforehand

[from-the-coffee-shop-in-edoras]

WIP Whenever

Thank you for the tag @hobbitwrangler ! I am being true to myself here with a snippet of something from my Dúnhere/Lithcynd story — an extremely obscure Rohirrim and his OC wife. But it’s what I’m working on, and so it’s what I’ve got! It follows my pet theory that Dúnhere, although the Lord of Harrowdale, could not have fully organized the muster of the Rohirrim that took place in his lands because he was canonically off with Grimbold and Elfhelm during some of the precious prep time. So his wife did it instead.

**********

Had she been a different sort of person, they might never have come to Dunharrow in the first place. If she had stopped to consider the magnitude of the task when the first messenger arrived from Edoras, bringing word of an assembly of historic proportions to be accomplished in mere days, she might have never begun. She might have simply declared it an impossibility and sent back word that another plan must be devised in its place. But she had never been one to waste time in contemplation when there was work to do. Before the messenger had even finished speaking, she had started a list in her head of what supplies were required, who would need to be called in to help, how she could wring the most out of every scarce minute available to her. She had gulped a breath and jumped in head first, trusting herself not to drown in the enormity of the job. 

That is not to say that everything had gone smoothly or well. Rarer provisions had run out early, with leather being in such high demand that some men had to repair their stirrups with rope or boot laces instead, and several of the equipment tents had been robbed, thieves absconding in the night with tack and weapons that were already in short supply. Lithcynd had even quarreled with the king’s nephew when he arrived and immediately attempted to overrule her order to exclude any rider who showed signs of fever or nausea. We are in no position to turn away willing hands, he had snapped. You’ll have no hands at all if you let a flu or stomach ailment take hold in my camp, she had shot back. He eventually conceded, being wryly counseled by his uncle that he had taken on an opponent beyond his measure, and since she held no grudges, she made it up to him with a blanket and pillow from her own bed for his tent before turning back to her voluminous list of tasks and challenges.

**********

No pressure tags to @lady-of-ithilien @frodothefair @emmathefanficgal

[sixlane]

JILY PROFESSOR PLEASE I NEED IT

EEEEE YES she’s been on hiatus for a minute but im so excited to get back to her soon. here’s a snippet for you <3 (they’re revising lily’s essay together)

[sewellsheart]

WIP WEDNESDAY

A little more Three of Wands as per usual 🥰

Tagging @nat-seal-well @grapecaseschoices @agentnatesewell @itsmistyeyedbi @wayhavenots @thee-morrigan and YOU!!

[bitingdrivers]

Another post about Bones AU!

hello again! This time I want to talk about the supporting cast: interns, fbi agents and some other guys.

I want to preface this with a little note that my knowledge of american education (and any other) system is very surface level. And all of this is made up anyway, so don't sweat it. also acab

Mr. Alex Albon

Minors in veterinary medicine. The honorary intern on the case where they find a bull penis in the evidence. After that it's revealed that he has 7 cats, 2 dogs and even a horse. After graduating he will probably go work as a vet at the National Zoo.

Alex is bright and funny, he is down to earth, but very professional and smart. Rumor has it he is in some kind of relationship with George Russell.

I imagine he is fine working with corpses, but at the end of the day his heart is in the veterinary medicine, so after a few internships in the lab he announces that he managed to get hours at the Zoo, so he won't be in the lab anymore. Despite that, he still has to help on some cases when no one else can.

Mr. George Russell

Besides anthropology, he also studies archeology and will probably end up in the Authentications Department after graduating.

He is usually interns in Authentications, but a few times he has to help at the lab, when other squints are unavailable. He hates working with corpses and one time is found crying in the lounge after he has to help solve a child's murder.

George is reserved and serious about keeping it professional in the lab. But after you know him better, you will learn that he is very passionate and a big gossip (he probably started that rumor himself)

Dr. Fernando Alonso

Works in Palaeonthology department, but has anthropological education so a couple of times he helps in the lab when there are no avaliable squints.

Since they are both Spanish and share a passion of biology and geology, Carlos and Fernando are good friends and often help each other.

One time he has to help in the lab and one of the Institute's sponsors, Lance Stroll pays a visit. Something happens between the two

The Stroll family

The Strolls are the main benefactors of the Institute and sponsor a lot of it's campaigns. Lawrence Stroll is the head of the family and has a son and heir of the company – Lance Stroll.

Lance is very enthusiastic about the Lab and sometimes likes to visits and hover around to see how the cases are solved. After a couple of times people just accept it and even include Lance in conversations and explain things to him. In return Lance tries to help with fundings and internships. His knowledge in business and other affairs helped solve the cases on numerous occasions (he is very proud of that).

Mr. Yuki Tsunoda

Yuki studies anthropology, but is very passionate about chemistry. He is a food enthusiast and is very interested in the field of molecular kitchen. Despite studying to be an anthropologist, he plans on working in a molecular kitchen restaurant, although he still takes studying and working in the lab responsibly.

Daniel is a big wine enthusiast and dreams of making his own wine one day, so when he learns about Yuki's food hobby, the two quickly bond. Yuki even takes Daniel to a few molecular kitchen restaurants.

Mr. Liam Lawson

Liam is a the first intern to fill the space after Oscar. Because of that the crew feels really weird about him being there. But after a few weeks of working together they became good friends.

Daniel and Liam quickly bond over their shared love of American football and sometimes even play the sport together.

Yes, Liam also thinks Max is flirting with him at the start, but Charles quickly explains that this is just Max being Max (this happened in the show, I swear)

Agents Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon

They both work in the Cyber division of the FBI. Their friendship feels weird and strained to the outsiders, but Pierre and Esteban refuse to tell anyone what happened between them. Despite that, they often work together and do it well.

During one of the cases where a hacker is involved, Agent Gasly is put on the case and he and Charles work together to catch the killer. During this time they develop a connection and quickly start dating after (this happenes when Charles and Carlos decide to take a break). But since Carlos is Charles' true love, the relationship with Pierre doesn't work out, but they stay good friends afterwards

Mr. Guanuy Zhou

Guanyu spends a couple of months in America as an exchange student from China. During that time he is given internship hours at the lab and helps to solve a case. He is studying to be a forensic anthropologist in China.

Agents Kevin Magnussen and Niko Hulkenberg

Agents Magnussen and Hulkenberg used to serve with Daniel in military and went through war together. But after Daniel went to Criminal, Cyber, Response, and Services Branch (specifically the violent crime division), Hulk and Magnussen went to National Secutiry. Sometimes they meet to have a few beers together

Valterri Bottas

As one of the best anthropologist in the world, Max is asked to go to Finland to assess and authenticate some very old and important remains. Daniel decides to go with Max (obviously). But in classic Bones fashion a murder happens during their stay and Max and Daniel have to solve it. A local police officer Valterri Bottas helps them with the case.

Prof. Gianpiero Lambiase

Ok so in the show it's established that Brennan has slept and dated her professor and mentor (although I don't remember if it happened after her graduation or during her years in the university)

So I decided why not. Max dated his professor and mentor GP after graduating university. It was brief and they never took it seriously, because it was mainly just lust.

But one day GP decides to visit the lab. Daniel is not thrilled to find about Max's and GP's relationship (but at this point he won't say anything about it to Max).

Agent Sergio Perez

So uh. I kind of forgot about him till this moment and almost hit post lol.

I decided just now that he works in Organized crime division and helps during one of the cases. Sorry Checo, I forgor.

Ok so this is obviously not all the people in f1, but at this point I think it's enough. But feel free to make your own headcanons about how this or that f1 person fits in this au.